The Fraud (36 page)

‘You will never come here again,’ said James Burke with no preamble, ‘but this is what you required to see: this is where the boards and canvases are prepared. A great deal of work must go into obtaining the Materials you are to use for of course they must be authenticated as from the time of the Painter, and these men are infinitely skilled in the knowledge of different Schools of Painting, from different times.’ She saw that the other men looked at her curiously, presumably their - she thought of a word -
accomplices
were not usually women. She looked again at her own painting in amazement. If she had seen it in an art auction would she have stopped and stared?

She turned to James Burke in confusion. ‘What are you doing with this?’ she said in a low voice. The girl still held the letter as if her heart broke, yet it was a different painting.

‘We will try to sell it at an auction next week as a painting over a hundred years old, by a minor painter of the French school.’ He ignored her small gasp. ‘We cannot hope for more - you used one of your brother’s modern boards to paint on, and that could be ascertained easily enough if we were selling at a high price. And there was still something of you in the face: you see we have shaded it very, very slightly. But we will try to sell it - as a minor work, but an old one nevertheless. If we are successful, and I believe we will be, for these gentlemen have made a good job of what we had, we will go ahead with the plan I have outlined to you.’

She looked at him, back at her painting.

‘You must not Varnish the next Picture, lady,’ said one of the Jew-men, suddenly, harshly. ‘The Varnishing is the skill. We will do the Varnishing when you have finished. We shall send you board, for we understand that is what you are most used to, we have old boards that are very suitable, Rembrandt often used board for Portraits. The Painting you are to do now will be an early Rembrandt, we cannot hope for more than that even’, the Jew-man bowed perhaps ironically, perhaps not, ‘- with your skill, and particularly your skill with light and shadow, we feel an early Rembrandt is our best chance of success. And’ - he added - ‘we ourselves will lay the ground before we deliver the board to you. Rembrandt’s grounds were carefully prepared, and even his ground was warm and -’ he searched a moment for a word, ‘humane.’

The three men were surprised when the Italian woman suddenly smiled. ‘I am glad of our partnership,
Signores
,’ she said boldly in her odd Italian accent, ‘I will await the materials - and I must have the best brushes.’ And then, as she turned to the door, she saw the face of one of the men in the corner who had suddenly heard her voice. It was her brother’s old assistant who had found her painting in her brother’s studio, all those years ago. He was older and dirtier, but it was him.

‘Well, well
Signorina
,’ was all he said. Shocked, she did not acknowledge him, moved swiftly to the door, made her way down the narrow staircase.

James Burke came quickly after her. At the bottom doorway they passed a group of sulky young girls being herded into the basement, their high voices complained and a man’s voice told them to be silent as the two visitors emerged into the grey alley.

‘I will walk back with you, you should not walk alone here,’ said James Burke.

—‘You should not walk alone here,’ he said to me in the dark alleys of Covent Garden, as if he had forgot my story. And as if he had not let me walk to, and from, Meard Street that day, walking alone here.

Outside, in the privacy of the alley, she turned to him at once.

‘But one of those men was once Philip’s assistant! He knew me - I have told you of him!’

‘It does not matter,’ he answered brusquely. ‘He could never betray you without betraying himself, we have very much information on him if he were to cause trouble. He and his companion do impressions of Old Masters that would never pass here, but do well enough in the Provinces. He is a Frauder now.’ They turned down towards the Strand. ‘But Monsieur Laberge and the Jew-men are Experts. They find old wood in old buildings, and that is the best of all: the inside of a cupboard of an old, old house and such like. They will paint several grounds on to the board before you use it, so that it will be seen that the board has been used again and again, as was Rembrandt’s habit. The paint cannot look modern, or be a modern colour that was not available a hundred and fifty years ago, so you must not begin painting until we bring you the correct paints - they have many secrets and Recipes for the preparation of the colours in the old way, things I do not know, just as your brother has his secret Recipes, and Sir Joshua Reynolds, and Thomas Gainsborough. You know enough of Painters’ secrets, I hope, not to ask too many questions. And when your Painting is finished, Monsieur Laberge and his men will darken the actual paint with smoke, as you saw today, and use resin and their special method of varnishing to age it. To dirty it, frankly, as you see they have done with the girl with the letter.’

‘You did not tell me that this is what you wanted it for.’

‘You had not agreed, then, to go along with our plan - your Painting was worked on very carefully while you were away as you can see, as an Experiment. For your next Painting, they have acquired some very simple old frames which they have removed from some genuine old Paintings of little worth. One of the Jew-men has also perfected an early Signature, which will be, just, discernible. Then, finally, your next Picture must be Authenticated by Experts and Dealers.’

‘By you?’

‘Of course, but not only me.’

‘I would rather paint on canvas. I like the feel of the canvas.’

‘You have not painted enough on canvas because of your - circumstances, ’ and they both thought of wood and the stretchers that were needed to prepare canvas, things she had so little of in the small sewing-room. ‘Many of his Portraits and Self-Portraits were on board. And as I say we can get the real old panels and so it is safer that way.’

‘You have said that you would pay me one hundred guineas. Do you hope to sell it for much more than that?’

‘The interest in Rembrandt in England at the moment is extraordinary. If your brother had had the courage to go on bidding in Amsterdam he could probably have doubled his money in a few years.’ He regarded her carefully for a moment. ‘However if the auction of the small Painting goes well I have decided to pay you up to two hundred and fifty for the Fake Rembrandt.’ He spoke casually, as they walked, but his companion stopped in the street, a glove dropped.

‘
Two hundred and fifty
?’ He bent politely for the glove. ‘You will pay me
two hundred and fifty guineas
?’ She stared at him, tried to take in his words. Her life would be changed
completely
, with one painting; she found that she could hardly breathe. He tried to make her keep walking but she could not move: stood stock-still on the Strand as people hurried past, buying and selling and thinking of money. She could not help herself: she repeated it a third time, ‘
Two hundred and fifty guineas
? Are you telling me that you are really hoping to sell a Painting
by me
for double that amount?’ For had she not heard, all her life at her brother’s dining-table, about the greed of dealers, how they always had so much of the sale price in the commission, how rich they were.

He forced her to walk on, by taking her arm briefly, but she almost shook him off as she tried to comprehend.

‘We hope, Grace. We do not know. This will be an intimate Painting of course, not a big epic like
The Adoration of the Kings
. But I am a supreme Optimist in my field: this is London, not Amsterdam, and Rembrandt is the rage here - Royalty themselves look for Rembrandts now - King George owns several of the Paintings and a number of Etchings and Mezzotints.’ He looked at her carefully. ‘But your Fee is fixed at no higher than that, whatever happens. Half of what we sell it for - up to two hundred and fifty guineas if it sells for five hundred or more. I am an Art Dealer. And you understand there will be other people to pay.’

She tried to pull herself together and then she looked at him very openly for a moment, her curiosity got the better of her; she may have known the answer now but she wanted to hear what he would say. ‘James, I have never made money. You know very well two hundred and fifty guineas would change my Life for ever. But you have always made plenty of money and now you are involved in a Scheme that is fraudulent, however you look on it. My Reputation cannot be sullied, after all, because I do not have one. But yours could be ruined for ever if we fail. Why do you need to do this, what is your reason?’

His hooded eyes. For a moment she thought he would not answer and then for a split second the mask slipped: she saw his face, his real face, the face she had once known so well. ‘I suddenly find I need more Finance than I at present can obtain,’ he said bitterly, and she understood it was so: his wife Lydia was still gambling. And then just as suddenly he pulled himself together, his face was bland. ‘I would be a Fool not to try this,’ he said, ‘knowing your Talent. Rembrandt van Rijn is at last the rage of the Art Market, and there is simply not enough of his work available. You once persuaded your brother to buy a small Rembrandt - he was alarmed because it cost thirty-five guineas. Now it could, possibly, sell for ten times that amount in London. He told me how he lost the painting in Amsterdam to a Frenchman who added fifty guineas more to the price without even bargaining! Mind my words well, Grace, half the Nobility of Britain yearn for a Rembrandt now: the Duke of Bedford has one, the Earl of Porteus, the Duke of Argyll, the Duke of Bridgewater - and as I said his Majesty has several in Buckingham House. At this moment Rembrandt’s prices are now higher than anybody else’s. We could make a Fortune with half a dozen paintings, if we wished.’

Her voice was loud in the street as she stopped again.

‘One!’ she said. ‘You said one! I will only do one! I want to do my own work!’ Somebody stared at the loud-voiced lady and James Burke touched her arm very slightly; she caught herself, they walked on. They came to the Charing Cross and turned towards Pall Mall. And then he asked a last little question, like a knife.

‘Will you really change your Life at last, Grace? Will you really leave your Brother? You have not left before.’

‘
I could not leave before
!’ and he flinched at the intensity of her answer. ‘
I could not leave Angelica then. I could not leave the children then
,’ and if a shadow passed over the man’s face she did not see it. Again she stopped in the street and again she was oblivious of the people. ‘You of all people know what I have always wanted and how much it has cost me!’ And they both stopped, appalled. They had crossed a forbidden boundary. She recovered first, took a deep, deep breath. ‘I want to work as an Artist in my own Studio, with my own Life, before I die.’ And she did not look at him now: she looked past him, into the future.

Still she had her basket over her arm as if it was an ordinary day. Into that basket he placed a small pouch of money from his cloak.

‘Buy the brushes you would like best,’ he said. ‘Nothing else. The rest will be delivered to you, even the oil.’

‘When will I be paid the full Sum, the - ’ still she could hardly say it, and her voice was very low, ‘ - the two hundred and fifty guineas for my work?’

‘When we have sold it.’

‘You will
pay me
, if you sell it well,’ she still found it hard to visualise this, which is why she repeated it over and over, ‘two hundred and fifty guineas.’ She put it as a statement, yet it was still a question.

‘Yes.’

‘Very well.’ They began walking again along Pall Mall. ‘I am going to paint Hendrickje Stoffels,’ she said, ‘his Mistress.’ And this time it was James Burke who stopped in the street in alarm.

‘No! No, you must not do that. That is too dangerous.’ A cart rattled past at that moment and spattered mud over them both: so intense was their conversation neither of them moved.

‘Why?’

‘That is too difficult. You must not paint her, nor his wife Saskia, the other woman he painted often, nor yourself. You must paint a new person, and we will find a name and an explanation for her later.’

‘Why?’

And she saw James Burke almost shake himself in the summer morning, so anxious was he to explain. ‘You have seen his paintings of Hendrickje. They are infused with light and love as well as shadow. And it is - you know I have studied many paintings for many years - it is his wonderful - his - his luminous Talent but also his
love
that informs the paintings of Hendrickje in particular: we feel it, we feel the - the universality of her face, even though she is one particular person.’ He was standing stock-still trying to find his words. ‘You always paint truthfully, Grace, and vanity means nothing to you, I know that. You have somehow, over all your years of work, found and grasped the meaning of
chiaroscuro
, the use of light and shade, as he did - we have talked of all this, you and I. You know how to use paint in a way that is grand and gorgeous and affecting and full of shadow and brightness, as he did. You have by some miracle the most wonderful Talent of painting
like
him but, forgive me, you are
not
him. I do not believe you should attempt to paint his Mistress.’ And she felt herself blushing at the rebuke. ‘His own love shows in the paintings of Hendrickje: that would be too difficult to copy - surely, Amazing Grace, you understand that?’

Amazing Grace
: words of their intimacy. He had forgot himself. But it was as if he did not notice, he went on quickly, ‘And most importantly after all, we have decided you shall paint an early Rembrandt when he did not yet know Hendrickje; when his particular skill was growing but perhaps not at its full Maturity. But it will work,’ he said and she could see an underlying excitement in his face. ‘You must paint with
your
love.’ He suddenly understood the dangerous ground he was again traversing, quickly ended the conversation. ‘You can do it, I know you can do it. I will not come to your house, I must leave you here.’