The Last Weynfeldt (9 page)

Frau Schär had been watching Weynfeldt triumphantly as he examined the paintings. Now she explained, “I don't know much about them, but whenever my husband got fed up with work he'd say, “Let's just sell our Lugardons and live off the interest.”

“Our Lugardon,” Weynfeldt corrected her. x“That one is the only Lugardon; the others are …” He restrained himself, and said simply, “The others are not Lugardons.”

Frau Schär was speechless for a few seconds. Then she said. “You are mistaken. They have always been Lugardons.”

“There were lots of people who painted in his style at the time.”

“But it says A. L. Albert Lugardon. A. L.”

“Lugardon always signed his works using his full name.”

“You know every single one of his paintings, do you?” The rouge on her cheeks deepened as her face reddened.

“Of course not. But every one I've seen was signed Albert Lugardon. Like this one.” He pointed to the genuine Lugardon.

“And what is it worth?” she asked, businesslike again.

If she hadn't forced Weynfeldt to pass up his first chance in years for an afternoon with a woman he fancied, he might have pitched higher. Instead he said, “Eight thousand francs.”

Frau Schär wouldn't even let him use her phone to order a taxi. He was lucky she didn't set Susi on him. He had to walk for ages till he found a phone booth. It was times like this when he considered actually getting a cell phone.

Now he was standing in front of a phone booth, waiting for a taxi, thinking about Lorena. Did she do things like this often? Steal three-thousand-franc dresses? And why? Simply when she liked a certain dress but couldn't afford it? Out of sheer boredom? Professionally—did she steal expensive clothes and sell them?

A taxi approached. Weynfeldt took a couple of steps toward the curb. The taxi didn't slow down. Weynfeldt raised his arm to hail it. The driver pointed over his shoulder to the passenger seat, filled by a plump figure, Frau Schär. She smiled vindictively at him. Weynfeldt didn't react.

Perhaps Lorena was a kleptomaniac. Adrian wondered which explanation he preferred. He came to the astonishing conclusion that he wasn't interested. He didn't care why she stole clothes. Not only that. He didn't care
that
she did it. In fact he was pleased she had done it. Who knew when or if he would otherwise have seen her again?

During the time since their first encounter her face had fused with Daphne's in his mind. Thinking of Lorena, he had seen Daphne. And when his thoughts had turned to Daphne—which they still did after all these years—he saw Lorena before him.

But after today he was able to distinguish the two. Lorena's features were starker, as if drawn with a harder, sharper pencil. Her face was already marked by a life more excessive than Daphne would have led. A longer one too. The skin around Lorena's eyes was a shade darker and even when she wasn't smiling, at the corner of her eyes were the fine wrinkles his mother had called “crow's feet.”

Weynfeldt was so lost in thought he only noticed the taxi as it pulled up alongside him. He asked to be taken to the office, and was grateful the driver said nothing. He was too polite to fend off chatty people.

“Was it worth the effort?” Véronique asked immediately.

“No.”

“Six Lugardons but it wasn't worth it?”

“One Lugardon and five imitations.”

“Oh, I'm sorry; the woman sounded very convincing. Next time I'll insist on photos.” She gave him a searching look. When it looked like he would return to his office with no further comment she asked, “Was it okay for me to give Agustoni's number to that Lorena? She said it was very urgent and personal.”

“Yes, it was fine, thanks.”

He could see she was dying to know more. There weren't many women in Weynfeldt's life. When she realized no more details were forthcoming, Véronique said, “I'm just popping out; I'll be right back.”

“Would you bring me something please; I haven't eaten.”

“What?”

“Whatever you're having.” He went into his office to continue working on the catalogue.

A short time later Véronique returned, bringing stuffed bamboo shoots with sweet plum sauce and pork dumplings. “The same as I'm having,” she said, adding, with a rare touch of ironic self-reflection, “but not as much.”

Rolf Strasser wanted to “discuss something in private” with him, and suggested they meet in Weynfeldt's apartment. Don't go to a big effort, he had said.

Weynfeldt never went to an effort. He left that to Frau Hauser. She would prepare what she called “a morsel”—tiny canapés with salmon, foie gras, roast beef,
viande des Grison
, lobster garnished with homegrown oat and lentil sprouts and radishes. For dessert there would be more morsels, this time sweet—
éclairs
, mille feuilles and the whole pâtisserie repertoire, all in dollhouse proportions.

Weynfeldt had asked Frau Hauser to lay the table in the Von der Mühll room, a small space with a window onto the rear courtyard devoted to the noted Lausanne architect. He had furnished it simply with a walnut ensemble consisting of two uncushioned chairs, a table, and a file cabinet for drawings. Von der Mühll had designed the minimal, right-angled ensemble back in 1924, as furnishings for an office waiting room—at a time, in other words, when Lausanne was still dominated by Parisian Art Deco. Only a handful of experts knew it still existed; even fewer that it belonged to Adrian Weynfeldt.

On the walls hung works by Paul Zoelli, geometric oils from the same period. Although he had no evidence, Weynfeldt was convinced Von der Mühll and Zoelli must have known each other.

The room was ideal for a private conversation. And alongside its aesthetic rigor, there was another advantage to the furniture: it was so uncomfortable that any conversation held sitting on it would not be drawn out. Although in this situation that wasn't an issue. This was undoubtedly about money, and when it was about money Weynfeldt generally gave in sooner rather than later.

He went to sit in his study till Strasser came. The high plate-glass window let in light from the brightly lit offices which framed four floors of the rear courtyard. In some of them teams of cleaners could be seen, vacuuming, emptying wastepaper bins, dusting telephones and wiping screens. In one office sat a lonely figure working to get ahead; in another a meeting was being held.

The dim light fell on the walls filled with bookshelves, and on easels holding pictures—Weynfeldt's own and those he had to write expert reports on.

He flicked a switch on; a spot threw a beam of light onto an easel in the center of the room.
La Salamandre
shone out, with its yellows, reds, lilacs, browns and flesh tones, as if the light emanated from the painting itself.

The picture had been here since he picked it up from Baier. He had told no one that it would be put up for auction. Not even Véronique. He wasn't sure what was holding him back; the work would give the next auction a whole new impetus. But he had strange misgivings.

La Salamandre
had been reproduced millions of times to be sold as a poster, but the original had remained in private hands since it was painted. And it was a very private image. Not all art was meant to be public. Somehow Weynfeldt couldn't bring himself to disrupt the intimacy of the scene by releasing it into the public domain.

He knew this was ridiculous. But why shouldn't he have the picture to himself for a few days?

The bell rang. Weynfeldt went to the door and spoke into the intercom. It was Rolf Strasser. He asked him to wait while he came down in the elevator.

Strasser was drunk. That didn't surprise Weynfeldt; Rolf was normally drunk by this time. The question was simply which stage of drunkenness he had reached. He had undoubtedly passed through the lucid stage at Agustoni's, staying for a bottle or two of Brunello with those members of the group who had stamina, making them laugh. He had hopefully seen off the sludgy stage with a late siesta on his studio sofa. He had probably got over the headache stage with an aperitif in his local bar. The question now was whether he was still in the peaceful stage, already in the sentimental stage, or slipping into the aggressive.

Weynfeldt led him into the Von der Mühll room. Strasser sat on the hard, angular chair with a reproachful look.

“Would you like a glass of white?” Weynfeldt inquired. He had put a bottle of Twanner to cool and showed Strasser the label.

“You got beer too?” Strasser asked.

Strasser drank beer the way other people drink mineral water when they want a brief pause from alcohol. That meant that he wasn't yet in the aggressive phase. Weynfeldt went to the kitchen for beer. He could have waited till Frau Hauser brought the morsels and asked her to bring beer. But this would have represented another defeat in his long-running, losing battle to prove she wasn't indispensable.

He had only just returned with a beer and a glass for Strasser when she arrived with the first tray, and handed him the bottle opener which he had forgotten.

Strasser took a drink, wiped the froth from his mouth and asked, “How long have we known each other, Adrian?”

The sentimental stage had begun.

“When did you return from Vienna?”

Strasser emptied his glass as he reflected. “About twelve years ago.”

“Well, that's how long we've known each other.”

“How long or how short, depending how you look at it.”

“How do you look at it? Long or short?”

Strasser poured out more beer. “I feel like we've known each other for ages. Longer than just twelve years.”

“Strange how the same period of time can seem short or long depending which vantage point you see it from.”

“You know what I hate? When time moves on but you stay stuck in a rut. Like me.”

“You aren't stuck in a rut,” Adrian protested.

“You and your fucking politeness. Of course I'm in a rut. I'm just where I was twelve years ago. What the fuck? Twelve years ago I was further ahead. Then I still had a fucking future!”

Weynfeldt could see that Strasser's mood was tipping. There was no point arguing with him. But he couldn't agree with him either. “I know what you're talking about. You begin the day and immediately realize you've begun hundreds of days like that. That it'll be like all the days before and to come. Pretty depressing, I know.”

“With me it's not just a feeling. With me it's a certainty.”

“With me too perhaps, but I try to treat it like a feeling.”

“If I had your life, I might actually be happy that nothing changed.”

Once people took this tone Weynfeldt was helpless. He didn't seek to defend his affluence, and for them to broach the subject he found tactless; there was nothing he could say to ease the awkwardness.

The fact that Rolf had brought it up was a sign to Weynfeldt that he would soon reveal the real reason for his visit. He helped him out: “Do you have any idea what you could do about it? About the stagnation, I mean, whether genuine or perceived?”

“New impulses. A clean break. New start. Brainwash. Back to square one.”

Frau Hauser knocked and came straight in with further morsels. She placed the silver tray on the table and wished them
bon appétit
.

Strasser had finished the beer and now switched to white wine. “Where was I?”

“A new start.”

“Yes. I have to get out of here.”

This wouldn't be the first time Strasser had sworn by this remedy. There had been trips to Italy, the USA, North Africa. With Weynfeldt's support each time. Adrian didn't mention this, just nodded sympathetically.

Strasser did mention it: “Not like Italy that time, or North Africa. Then I just wanted to get away from here, anywhere. That was a mistake. I don't need to get away from here.” He stuffed two salmon canapés into his mouth and swilled them down with wine. “I need to go somewhere!”

Adrian concurred. “Do you have a specific idea where?”

“Hiva Oa.” He sounded irritated at having to explain, as if Weynfeldt had asked a stupid question.

Adrian risked inquiring nonetheless. “Where is that?”

“Marquesas. The largest of the Marquesas Islands. Gauguin is buried there.”

“Oh yes. French Polynesia. Pretty far off the beaten track.”

“Gauguin managed to make a new start there.”

Weynfeldt said nothing—Gauguin was already very established by this point—except, “True.”

“Gauguin said, ‘To create something new, we have to go back to our origins, to humanity's childhood.'”

Weynfeldt's favorite Gauguin saying was, “Art is either plagiarism or revolution.” But he held back from quoting it now. He ate Frau Hauser's morsels in silence—first the savory morsels, then the sweet morsels—and listened to Strasser's argument for a sojourn on the Marquesas. With every sentence and every glassful he became more enthusiastic, but the threatening undertone crept into Rolf's voice, which silenced any form of objection or doubt.

Weynfeldt fixed his eyes on the bridge of Strasser's nose, a trick he had learned from his father. It gave the person you were talking to the impression you were gazing profoundly into their eyes. At the same time he nodded occasionally in agreement or encouragement, depending on the tone of Strasser's voice. His thoughts returned to Lorena. He pictured himself with her in Polynesia, both of them wearing big sarongs with hibiscus-flower prints, and fragrant garlands of flowers.

At some point Strasser leaned back in expectant silence. Weynfeldt knew the moment had come to say, “Well, that certainly makes sense to me. If there's anything I can do to help realize the plan …”

According to Strasser's research the most convenient option was a business class ticket to Papeete, because that way the return flight date could be left open, an important condition for a new start. He could book the connecting flight from Papeete to Hiva Oa when he got there. Or perhaps he would opt to take the ferry. You should arrive by boat on an island where you plan to stay awhile.