The Woman Who Heard Color (37 page)

“Oh, Hanna my darling, I’m so very sorry.” He took her in his arms, and she could no longer resist the reassurance of his embrace. “How have you survived such great losses?” he said softly, stroking her hair. Hanna’s entire body throbbed as Johann rocked her back and forth.

Finally he said, “We must carry on with our plans. You must not return to Germany. You must go to America. And someday—”

“We might find one another again?” she whispered.

“Oh, Hanna,” he started, hesitating. “I—”

“I know, I know,” she broke in. “I understand,” she said, gulping back her tears. “I don’t expect you to leave your family.” Hanna couldn’t say
your wife
. She just couldn’t say that. “I would never hurt my own children.”

“Your children?”

“Yes,” she said, the word itself coming forth as a confession.

Slowly he released her and stared into her eyes. Hanna could see that he had been crying, too.

She looked down, ashamed. “Oh, Johann. I have . . . I have a daughter.” Her eyes rose to his as she said, “We have a daughter.”

What she saw in his face now was a mixture of disbelief, anger, sadness. She had never seen this intensity in his eyes, around his tight lips, and she realized her certainty that they knew each other well was perhaps the greatest lie. Had she known only that which one reveals to a lover in the first throes of love, the heat of passion and intimacies of the body suppressing reality and truth? She didn’t know the real Johann Keller. He did not know the real Hanna.

He rose from the bed and walked over to the window, gazing down upon the lake and the first morning light.

“Why, Hanna? Why did I not know? Why did you not come to me with this news?”

“We agreed.”

“But a daughter,” he said, his voice rising. “A child.
My
child.”

He sat on a chair next to a small table in front of the window. Morning light slanting into the room brought out the planes and angles of his face, and she thought of the night they met, how she felt he was the most beautiful man she have ever seen. He lowered his head, covering his face with his hands, saying no more for a very long time.

“Tell me,” he said quietly, not looking at her. “Tell me about her.”

“Her name is Isabella.”

“A name I would have chosen,” he said with a faint smile. “A lovely name.”

“She is a beautiful little girl with long blond hair and soft blue eyes.” Hanna was imagining the child of eight she had left in America. She had just turned twelve, and Hanna realized that she couldn’t describe how she might look now. “She’s very smart,” she continued. “Very clever, and so very kind and watchful with her brother.” Even now Hanna could not picture Isabella without Willy. “She has a stubborn streak, an inability at times to admit when she is wrong.”

“Like her father.”

“Yes,” she said, but Hanna was thinking of Moses, not Johann. Again she sobbed. She felt so alone. “Please, Johann,” she begged, reaching out for him.

He said nothing for many moments, until he stood, walked over, and sat on the bed, his back to her. “You should return to your room, Hanna.”

 

 

B
ack in her room, she bathed, thinking this might calm her nerves, which it did not. With anxious fingers, and trembling hands, she dressed for breakfast, but ate little when it arrived. When her escort called for her, she was confident that he was unaware she had spent the night away. She was less confident that she would make her way to America, fearful now that Johann would not continue with their plan. A picture formed in her mind—his back turned to her, staring out the window, and she shivered at the thought that he might desert her here in Switzerland, to be returned to Germany. A greater fear worked its way into her head—now that he knew he had a daughter, he might go to America himself and claim her as his own. What would this do to Isabella if Johann revealed what Hanna had just told him?

She did not hear from Johann or see him that morning, or early that afternoon, but she knew he would be at the auction.

With her assistant, Hanna arrived early at the Grand Salon to help with final preparations. It was Friday, June 30, 1939. The auction was scheduled to commence at 3:00 P.M.

When Herr Hofmann’s representative, Dr. Hopf, entered the hall, Hanna greeted him and he asked that she join him. She explained she must be available if Herr Fischer needed her, and he was escorted by a Fischer representative to a seat in the front row.

Hanna stood with Helmut toward the back, surveying the assortment of prospective buyers as they entered—Swiss, French, British, and American collectors, dealers from Paris and New York, museum representatives from Antwerp, Brussels, and Liège. Most of them she recognized, and even knew which particular pieces they had earlier expressed an interest in purchasing. But there were others whom Hanna had never seen, and she assumed they were bidding for clients who wished to remain anonymous.

She waited anxiously for the group from Basel, for Johann Keller.

The hall with crystal chandeliers and arched windows overlooking the peaceful setting of Lake Lucerne was ringed with sculptures to be offered at the auction. The paintings would be presented one by one in the order in which they appeared in the catalogue once the auction began. Pages flipped quietly as buyers studied the offerings and conversed in whispers.

Finally, the Basel contingent arrived, passed by her, moving toward the rows of chairs, settling near the back. From her standing position, Hanna could easily make eye contact with Herr Keller during the auction, and he could signal with a nod, a blink of the eye. But Johann did not look back at Hanna. He did not even attempt to locate her in the hall as he talked with another member of his group.

There were still several empty chairs toward the front, and just minutes before 3:00 P.M., one of Herr Fischer’s assistants escorted the Basel representatives to seats in the first row. As Johann sat, Hanna strained to catch his expression, something confirming they would continue with their plan.

Nothing.

Counting rows and chairs, subtracting for empty seats—and there were many more than she had imagined—Hanna guessed there were about three hundred prospective buyers gathered in the Salon of the Grand Hotel National that day. Had such a sale taken place at a different time, under different circumstances, Hanna knew the room would be unable to hold the crowd. Buyers would be standing in the aisles, against the walls and windows, overflowing out into the hallway. Clearly, many collectors and museum representatives had refused to come to the auction in protest. Yet others, she knew, had arrived with intentions of rescue. Some had come with less noble purpose, fully aware of this opportunity to pick up a true bargain without the competition of those who had chosen to boycott the sale.

Herr Fischer entered the room and stood surveying the crowd. He adjusted his glasses and mounted the podium.

The bidding began with a small painting of flowers called
Chrysanthemen
by Cuno Amiet, estimated to sell for 2,500 Swiss francs, going for a mere 850. This was followed by an Alexander Archipenko sculpture that drew less than half of what had been anticipated.

Hanna wondered if this was how it was to be, and it appeared so as the bidding continued, paintings and sculptures selling for much less than estimated, some not even making the reserves. A Gauguin went to the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Liège, for 50,000 Swiss francs, 13,000 less than estimated. Van Gogh’s selfportrait, one of the most eagerly anticipated paintings, was picked up at a bargain price by an American collector. At 175,000 Swiss francs, it sold for the equivalent of just over $40,000.

Saved,
she thought each time a painting was successfully purchased.
But what of me?

Johann made no eye contact, nothing to acknowledge her presence in the hall, as she watched his every move. Was he attempting to hide any sign of their plan? Was he merely trying to protect her? Or had he decided that she was not worthy of rescue?

The Kunstmuseum Basel acquired two Chagalls for half the price they were expected to bring. Each time a bid came from one of Johann’s associates, she strained to catch a glimpse of him. He did not look back.

As the bidding continued, Hanna felt both excitement and apprehension twisting and turning deep inside her. She sensed a similar tension within the group—a damp brow being wiped with a handkerchief in the back row, nervous fingers twisting a program near the middle of the room, the anxious flutter of a paddle in the front row. Without the competitive bidding such a sale would normally bring, some of the art was being practically given away.

As lot number 85,
Liegender Hund im Schnee
, Dog Lying in the Snow, the first of eight Franz Marcs to be offered, came on the block, Hanna felt as if she were counting the last moments of her life. Her mind went numb and she did not realize it had sold until the next painting came on the block.

Lot 86.
Eber und Sau
, Boar and Sow.

Herr Fischer started with 1,000 Swiss francs, trying to hold on to the enthusiasm he’d elicited on the last painting, which Hanna now realized had actually gone over the estimated bid. But Herr Fischer could not entice them on this one, and it went unsold.

Lot 87.
Die drei roten Pferde
, Three Red Horses. Hanna was growing warm, as was Fischer, she guessed, from the hint of irritation in his voice, the moisture forming on his brow.

“Five thousand, ten thousand?” he inquired. “Fifteen, twenty? Surely for this fine Franz Marc, I hear twenty . . .” He glanced around the room, and Hanna felt he was staring at her, as if he knew when the next painting appeared, she herself would disappear. “All done at fifteen,” Fischer spat out, as though he himself were ready to be done with it all.

When lot 88,
Zwei Katzen Blau und Gelb
, Two Cats Blue and Yellow, appeared, Hanna was sweating profusely, her hands trembling as she attempted to catch a glimpse of Johann in the front of the room. In profile, Hanna could see him as he whispered to his assistant. And then, for a moment as quick as a blink, he glanced back at her, their eyes met, and he nodded. The young man approached her assistant and asked that he fetch an additional catalogue for the group from Basel. Hanna had carefully made sure that there were none readily available.

As soon as Helmut left her side, she hurried through the back corridor, down the hall, into her room, and grabbed her bags. She glanced into the hall, realizing she could not return the way she had entered. She opened the door to the balcony, stepped out, and carefully dropped one bag, and then the other to the ground. Hiking her skirt, she climbed over the rail and awkwardly tumbled to the ground. She felt her ankle twist as she hit.

Feeling dizzy and wobbly, Hanna stood. She reached for the smaller bag, then the larger as she glanced around. She ducked behind a bush as a couple passed. They did not see her and continued around the building to the hotel entry. She started toward the lake. Her ankle ached. With each step, the bags became heavier and heavier, as if they were filled with stones. Should she leave one? Drop it right here? The larger contained the art she had saved; the smaller, her own drawing and the bill of sale for Kandinsky’s
Composition II
, which Frederick would keep for her until she returned. But Hanna wondered if she would ever return, and then she wondered if she would even make it to the car. Surely by now Helmut was aware she was missing, and perhaps even reporting her disappearance to Dr. Hopf.

As fast as she could move, she hurried down along the lake, her heart pounding, her cheeks burning with anxiety, her ankle throbbing, feeling as if it were now not sturdy enough to support the weight of her body.

Just as she had hoped, the automobile that Johann had described was parked along the lake at the exact location indicated. The driver stood outside, pacing, glancing at his watch with agitation. He looked up, puzzled, as Hanna was now dragging both bags and leg. He ran to meet her, grabbed one bag, then the other, threw them into the backseat, and then took hold of her arm and shoved her inside. It all seemed surreal, everything moving so rapidly, and yet at the same time her life was standing still.

When they were well outside the city, the driver handed her papers. A Swiss passport identified her as Hanna Schmid—her family name—as if she were moving backward in time. Everything was in order, papers for passage to America, leaving from the French port of Bordeaux. Her skin felt prickly and warm. Her ankle throbbed and sweat dripped from her forehead. She stared down at her passport picture and realized it had been taken by the man who’d come to photograph the art, that she was correct in her observation that he had also photographed her. She wondered if these phony papers could get her to America. Was she a fool to attempt this?

They sped through the countryside, arriving at the French border. The inspector studied the papers, looked up at Hanna, down at the photo, up at her again. She swallowed hard, her heart now throbbing in her ears. He motioned them through.

As they drove, Hanna did something she hadn’t planned. She took the largest bag, opened it, ripped out the lining, and removed the four small paintings and drawings, the confiscated art. She had backed them with cardboard to protect them and, surprisingly, they were none the worse for wear. Quickly, she ripped the lining completely from the bag and folded it over the drawings. She pulled a ribbon from a nightgown packed in the bag, found pen and paper, and then stuffed everything else back inside. Carefully, she tied the ribbon around the cloth from the lining as if she were wrapping a present. Then she wrote the following note.