Stealing Picasso (24 page)

‘Come on,' she takes Harry's hand and pulls him with her.

When they reach the top of the stairs Laszlo calls to her, ‘Greenface? Dora Maar?'

She stops and turns and looks at him, and a smile starts wonkily on her face before she contains it and simply nods. Bam, in a magnanimous attempt not to intrude on this apparently private moment, looks down at a table beside him.

As they emerge into the alley they hear Bam's voice from the open windows of Hell's Kitchen above, echoing out into
the alleyway. ‘Why paint a chick with a green face? No one has a green face. Looks like a crocodile or a snake.'

Laszlo's voice answers tiredly. ‘Well, there you are. It tells us something of ourselves. Crocodiles … snakes.'

‘Yeah? Well, I'm not an art connoisseur, so I missed the message. But you are an art connoisseur who understood the message, and you're more crocodile and snake than the rest of us. So I say her lesson is wasted on you, and probably wasted on everybody. I doubt I'll even go to the gallery to see her. No point.'

Laszlo is uninterested. ‘The gallery director will be crestfallen to have missed the subhuman detritus demographic.'

Harry and Mireille hear three rapid, muffled shots. Then a fourth, loud and sharp. Harry has a vision of Bam standing over Laszlo's prone body shooting down at him, delivering the coup de grâce. Mireille blinks up at the window of Hell's Kitchen, shocked. This isn't how it was supposed to go. Harry links his arm through hers and pulls her walking, then running, out of the alley.

‘I did not want his death and I do not need the money. But to let him see, here I am. And who I am. And what he did. The suffering he caused. Revenge. I admit to wanting revenge. It is not a worthy thing to wish for, I know. But at least I wished it for someone else. I wished it for my mother. If you had seen the dead life she lived …'

In the big room overlooking Port Phillip Bay, Mireille sits down hard on the sofa and runs her hands up the back of her head through her hair and looks at the ceiling. Her face screws up with a reluctance to tell Harry what he wants to know. Then she nods, accepting it is his right. ‘Since I have made this your business, I will tell you of it.'

‘Laszlo was once a bohemian. This was a long time ago, before I was born. I have seen photos. He had black hair slicked back with lavender pomade, and mutton-chop sideboards, and
he smoked a long-stemmed pipe. He wore loose flannel trousers up around his belly and a tight vest of mohair, topped always with a black leather coat to his knees. He hung around, leaning on walls with a foot up behind him on the brickwork, watching the passing Parisians, wanting to be watched in return. Hoping to be reviled, I suppose, and feared, by the working people whirling past headlong in their endeavour.

‘He had been known to paint, but not by nineteen thirty-seven. He had been known to sculpt, but no longer. He wrote some poems, the best refrains stolen, and then stolen again from him so wantonly by poets of his acquaintance that he no longer wrote or stole poems. It was clear there was no money in poems.

‘In truth, by the mid thirties he was a courtier of successful artists. He found more artful ways to praise their art than anyone else could, and for this sycophancy he was called a connoisseur and taken under the wing of the beau monde and fed scraps off their table. He ran errands and procured opium and delivered smarm of such naked virginity that famous artists felt discovered afresh; they felt young again, on the verge of success.

‘This is how he found his way to Picasso's studio. It was almost impossible, by 1937, to throw Picasso a compliment he had not heard. But Laszlo said to him, “I would rather spill my seed before
Woman in an Armchair
than make love to Claudette Colbert.”
Woman in an Armchair
is a painting. Mlle Colbert was a famous beauty of the day, and everyone, but everyone, wanted to make love to her. Picasso was tickled to have created a woman more desirable than Claudette Colbert. It was as though God and Pablo had each entered their girl in a beauty pageant and Pablo's girl had won.

‘Laszlo became his cheerleader of choice at once. And soon
enough Picasso came to depend upon him, for compliments, for opium, for hashish, to buy his groceries, to walk his poodle; he became Picasso's – how would you say … squire … yes, his Sancho Panza. Picasso admired Quixote.

‘Laszlo had become addicted to opium. Picasso was an occasional user himself and he carved Laszlo an opium pipe from jade and amber. Its constant refilling made Laszlo deeply in debt to his supplier, a nightclub and opium-den owner named Django Meinheer, who was a Jew and a homosexual, which must have frustrated the Nazis when they could kill him only once in Buchenwald some years later.

‘As an addict, Laszlo's compliments lost their edge and, before long, Picasso consigned him to outer darkness, telling him never to enter his milieu or give opinion about his work again. Django Meinheer, now Laszlo was no longer backed by Picasso, began making threats. He knew bad people. He had to be paid. And the only thing of value Laszlo still owned was a key to Picasso's studio.

‘So, a month after being exiled, Laszlo snuck into Picasso's studio and stole the painting that we know as
Weeping Woman
. The painting of Dora Maar feigning the grief of war, the horror of Guernica. Laszlo must have felt he had a claim to the
Weeping Woman
because he stole only that painting. Picasso's studio was vast and littered with work. He had canvases leaning against walls, up against one another like pages in books. Benches laden with unfired pots covered with centaurs and fish. Huge unfinished canvases aloft on easels and bull skulls grimacing at the ceiling. But Laszlo stole the
Weeping Woman
. Only the
Weeping Woman
.'

‘Laszlo stole it from Picasso? Who told you all this?' Harry asks Mireille.

‘My mother. She was there – you will see.

‘Stopping at many cafés along the way, talking to the woman rolled up under his arm, Laszlo made his way to the Palais de Noctambules. By the time he got there he was triumphant with wine and he unfurled her before the massive mustachioed doorman and nodded towards her tortured visage and confided, “I did this … with my penis.”

‘The big man leant down and adopted a similarly confidential tone, “Have you washed? With turpentine? Or is it still green? I won't allow you in with a green penis.”

‘The Palais de Noctambules was a nightclub where European royalty rubbed shoulders with bohemians; a place princes went to fondle courtesans. Everyone was there that night, including Braque. Laszlo, having satisfied the doorman his penis wasn't green, entered. He unrolled the canvas before Braque, who was by now handsomely white-haired, with kindly lines around his eyes formed by the satisfaction of many years in the pantheon of genius.

‘“My cock did this,” Laszlo told him. “Picasso will tell you it was the Luftwaffe. He will tell you it is Guernica. But it was my cock.”

‘“Your cock?” Braque asked.

‘“This is a painting of Dora Maar as I made love to her.” They stared at the canvas Laszlo unrolled. The tortured green head of the
Weeping Woman
.

‘“Everyone will blame Herman Goering. But it wasn't fat Herman. Dora isn't weeping, she is climaxing. Picasso will tell you it is an indictment of fascism … but it is his lady, in her throes.”

‘“Dora Maar? In her throes?” Braque asked.

‘“Moaning the name of our Lord Jesus Christ in mindless ecstasy.”

‘“It doesn't look like ecstasy,” Braque said.

‘Laszlo laughed amid the gurgle of opium pipes. “You haven't much experience of ecstasy, perhaps?”

‘Braque ignored this insult. He tilted his head to see her from another angle, her lime-green flesh, her eyes pressed together, her nose on the left of her head where an ear should be. Could all this deformity be caused by pleasure? An orgasm? Was this his great rival's depiction of ecstasy?

‘Braque looked at Laszlo. “Why would Picasso let you, his squire, make love to his woman?”

‘“He is obsessed with her. He paints her endlessly. He wanted to paint her in orgasm.
Le petit mort
. But he couldn't sketch her and make love to her at the same time, so he had me make love to her while he sketched. It was an honour. She is a fabulous beauty, a renowned woman.” Laszlo's eyes softened and his smile amplified with reminiscence as he stared at Picasso's painting of her. He had hoped they would have to make love many times before Picasso caught her essence – the power of her climax. But he was Picasso. He caught it all that first time – her little death.'

‘What is this story?' Harry asks this quietly so as not to insult Mireille with his doubt.

‘It is a story told to me many times by my mother. I suppose she invented some details so she can see it all more clearly. Then these inventions become memory. But they are not important. The detail is there because she lived the story as she told it, she was inside it, seeing it all around her. The way she told it is how I will tell it, because I know it that way and I do not know it any other.' Mireille gets them both a whisky.

‘So I was up to where Laszlo was boasting to Braque of making love to Dora Maar while Picasso sketched them. Braque wasn't sure whether to believe this. “No. It is surely part of
his Guernica series,” his lip curled in scepticism. “Picasso's indictment of fascism.”

‘Laszlo tells Braque that Picasso is scared of what they might say about his painting. Would they call him sick? A pornographer? A pimp? Even the great Picasso runs in fear of the beau monde.
Ecstatic Woman
has sat in his studio for months. Now that the Luftwaffe has bombed Guernica, he sees his chance: he adds a handkerchief, he renames her
Weeping Woman
, and he says she is a native of Guernica weeping at the tragedy that has befallen her city. “You want to buy her?” he asked Braque. “
Ecstatic Woman
?”

‘Braque asked Laszlo, what made him think he would buy a stolen painting, and Laszlo shrugged. “If I had an enemy I would covet evidence of his cuckolding.”

‘Braque and Picasso had fallen out by this time, a well-known enmity, each claiming to be the inventor of cubism. So Braque certainly would have enjoyed this proof, painted by the man himself. Perhaps he would have held private showings, laughed at the great Spaniard, spread word of his beloved Dora's ecstasy at the hands of another.

‘Braque was poised with a handful of notes when Picasso entered the Palais de Noctambules searching for Laszlo, searching for the
Weeping Woman
. Laszlo snatched the francs from Braque's fist and pushed the canvas at him.

‘“Ah, Don Pablo,” Laszlo called to him across the room. “Welcome. You know Monsieur Braque.” He indicated Braque with his hand. “You will be pleased, then, to hear he admires your recent work. Especially, he is fond of this painting in which the artist bravely immortalises his own cuckolding and captures the moment of conception of his lover's child at the hands of his squire. Monsieur Braque admires it so much he has bought it and intends to amuse his friends with it.”

‘“Bastardo,” Picasso called.

‘Now comes the great fisticuffs between Picasso and Braque, of which those of us in the art world have all heard. The reasons given for it vary: it was a battle in the war over the origins of cubism; it was a fight over an unpaid debt; it was a battle for Dora Maar herself.

‘But, no. Picasso, who now regretted painting Dora's ecstasy, was desperate to stop Braque having and showing this painting, and spreading the tale of its origin. He had thought it would be a monument to woman's ecstasy, not to his own cuckolding. Nor could a man with limitless vanity bear to live with the rumour that the baby growing in his lover's womb was not his. His ego would not allow such a role for him.

‘He wanted the painting back so he could announce her to the world as
Weeping Woman
, not
Ecstatic Woman
. To paint her in orgasm had been an idea he had given in to under the influence of opium and it was not worthy of his great artistic soul. He regretted it terribly.

‘He attacked Braque, who dropped the painting, which was snatched up by Laszlo. The giants of cubism got down on the tiled floor like two
anciens putains
in a turf war and bit and pulled hair and cursed, Braque calling Picasso a cuckold, Picasso calling Braque a thief, while their sycophants glared at each other.

‘The two artists wrestled and swore, and by the time they had worn themselves to exhaustion, Laszlo had made off with the
Weeping Woman
once more. So now she was stolen from both Picasso and Braque and both owned her and wanted her back and both wanted Laszlo buried in the Paris sewers.

‘After this famous fight, word of Picasso's cuckolding was out and the only way for him to save face was to pretend he did not love Dora, that she was just another floozy he kept for
sex and canapés – a model he kept on hand. He dismissed her to make the rumour of his cuckolding null and void. He sent her away to save his own reputation. So what if he had shared one of his strumpets with his squire? That was not news.

‘Dora Maar was my mother. She forgave Picasso. She understood – he had his duty to the world. He was a slave to Picasso as much as she was – he had to protect Picasso the myth. He had to throw my mother away as if she were a four-franc-a-day model. But it was not true. She was the burning light of his soul, and he was hers. They were in love.

‘His plan worked. The story of his cuckolding, now that it was with a woman he had dismissed, was worthless and it died. The rumour of a painting called
Ecstatic Woman
died.'

‘Laszlo sold the
Weeping Woman
to an English smuggler who owned a ferry line and made himself a heroic figure in the war by evacuating his countrymen at Dunkirk. He paid Laszlo for the painting with an old wooden ferry and an unknown amount of money and Laszlo went down the coast to Marseilles, where he bribed his way into the position of customs officer, and I have told you about his happy war and his people smuggling.

‘His life as a smuggler of people was set up and paid for with the stolen painting. And it was ended by another stolen painting, when he was found with a Modigliani in his possession. It had been stolen from the Louvre by a fleeing Nazi whom Laszlo was shipping out of France. The Nazi paid for his passage to South America with this bauble. But by the time Laszlo sold it, some years later, it was on a list of French treasures stolen by the Nazis and he was arrested. The last man he smuggled out of France was himself.

‘My mother, after Picasso exiled her, went mad. This is well known. They found her naked in a doorway and she spent some years in a psychiatric hospital, receiving shock treatment.
This is where I was born. My earliest memories are of living in the crèche in that hospital – a dormitory and garden for the offspring of mad mothers. It was a beautiful garden. I was taken to see her once a day, as a princess might be taken to visit the queen. I remember wondering why I was dressed and washed and had my hair brushed to see this lady. And wondering why the nurses thought us so special to one another, when she never seemed very delighted to see me and I had scarcely any feeling for her at all. The nurses sat me on her lap, and I remember it was difficult to balance there, with her not touching me, almost in a position of recoil.