“SO, ARE YOU GOING TO make me a extraordinary offer?”
“Well, I don’t know that I’d call it extraordinary.”
“Come on, Marqués. Merryl-Addams told me that if you made an offer it would be a surprising one,” says Colonel Gladstone Burton, and Valfierno is surprised to see that, in spite of Burton’s apparently stolid character, the idea of a surprise brings a little shine to his eyes. Colonel Burton is about seventy and looks like someone for whom surprises have never been necessary in getting what he wanted in his life. He has hands like spades and that square jaw that Americans seem to consider a requirement for certain achievements, and sports a blazer of crimson velvet, which only someone who needed nothing would wear. Too solid to be certain—the type of man who has to show that he’s in control; the best type of person for this game.
“I trust I won’t disappoint you, Colonel.”
“Please, Marqués—no need to be modest.”
“I have worse faults,” Valfierno replies, giving him his best between-you-and-me smile. He learned many years ago that nothing works so well at overcoming suspicion as telling a truth about oneself while pretending it’s a joke. But Colonel Burton does not look like a man who bothers with subtleties. His study is one of forty or fifty rooms in his new Fifth Avenue mansion, which overflows with every kind of art object of every conceivable origin: half a dozen classical busts—probably Roman copies of Greek originals; a winged lion that could well be Assyrian; two enormous wooded landscapes that appear to be Flemish; a half-dozen Spanish still lifes; and a street scene by Renoir, or one of his more gifted pupils.
“Let’s play a game. If you could choose to have any of the paintings in the world, which would you choose?”
“Well, I suppose it would be something Italian. I did once almost get my hands on a Raphael…”
“That’s all? Colonel, you’ll forgive me, but I expected a little more ambition from the man who covered the entire United States with telephone cables!”
“Well, if I really could choose any painting at all…”
“Yes, of course, any painting! Imagine that you have power—true power!”
Burton shoots him a dirty look. Valfierno is having fun; he is surprised to discover that, on top of everything, he is having fun. His script is working better each time he tries it; this is the fifth time using this formula—the same introduction, the same feints, the same measured tones—and he thinks he now has it close to perfection. Though there is always the possibility of a stumble, or even disaster. He cannot relax his attention for a second.
“The truth, Marqués? If I was really that powerful I wouldn’t have to buy any paintings.”
“Touché,” replies Valfierno and decides to try another approach. The stone in his tiepin sparkles as if it were real.
“That Syrian piece belongs in a museum, one of the great museums.”
“I agree. That’s where it’ll end up, once I’m gone. My kids have no interest in this stuff.”
His gambit is a dead end, and once again Valfierno decides to switch tactics. He is beginning to worry, but he takes care that it doesn’t show. He has spent years of his life taking care that things not show, and much of the time he succeeds. For now, he chats with his host about a concert in Carnegie Hall, the winter’s snowfall, the possibility of war with Europe. After a few minutes, the Colonel edges a toe into the trap.
“But, my friend, surely you didn’t come to see me to talk about these things.”
“No, but I’m not convinced it’s the right thing…”
“Please.”
“No, truly. I think you may not be the person I’m looking for.”
It’s a risk. But while he might be risking too much, he feels he might otherwise forfeit the pleasure of having someone this powerful beg him.
“Look, I’m not in the habit of having to ask for things, but I demand that you tell me what you came to tell me!”
“Very well. I came to ask you what you would be prepared to do to possess something that all the world wants.”
“Something all the world wants?”
“Hypothetically: if you were to learn that La Joconde could be yours, what would you be prepared to give in exchange?”
“I think you might be making a mistake here, Marqués.”
It’s the critical moment, and Valfierno is on the point of admitting defeat. He starts to raise his hands as if to say not to bother, but the American stops him and finishes his sentence:
“Everyone knows that La Joconde is in the Louvre.”
“Yes, of course. But it could be somewhere else.”
“It could?”
“It could indeed. I could find a way for it to be here, for example, in this very room. Are you interested?”
It’s a calculated risk. In preparation for his meetings with each of his clients, Valfierno has researched them carefully and found that, in almost every case, they have at least once bought a stolen work of art. So he pays little attention now to Colonel Burton’s protests.
“Do you know what you’re proposing?”
“Exactly what you heard, Colonel. Are you interested?”
He knows, too, that this is the moment when the client realizes that he is supposed to have ethical misgivings, and that he will transfer these to Valfierno and disparage him to keep himself clean. It’s a small price, thinks Valfierno, and waits for it.
“I’d have to see it,” says the Colonel. His gesture of disdain is his small alibi.
“You’re not going to see it. This is hypothetical,” replies Valfierno. “But if I were to show up here with the painting, would you be prepared to pay half a million dollars for it?”
“Half of that would be too much!”
Valfierno makes an effort to hide his smile: his client is caught, like three of the last four.
“No, a quarter of a million is insulting.”
“Then three hundred thousand, let’s say. Though I see no reason to keep discussing hypotheses!”
“It doesn’t have to be one, Colonel. It doesn’t have to be,” replies Valfierno, and thinks that he might have rushed unnecessarily. Colonel Burton, too, knows how to mount a distraction. Realizing that he’s exposed himself, he attempts one now.
“If you don’t mind my asking, where is it you’re from?”
“Not at all. I’m from Argentina.”
“Now I understand.”
“What is it that you understand, if I might?”
Valfierno tries to show some wounded honor at the question—it’s what would be expected. The Colonel is not paying attention.
“Now I know who I’m talking to. You guys are like us—you don’t let details hold you back! That’s why our two countries are going to be countries of the future! But I didn’t know, Marqués, that there was an aristocracy in Argentina.”
“Well, Colonel, you know how our countries are: it’s important to us to be seen as republics, but without our aristocracies—without men like you and me—we’d keep on being just a band of savages, unable to appreciate true art, for example, as you and I do.”
“La Joconde, eh? You did say La Joconde?”
“That’s what I said.”
“And what is the chance that your hypothetical will become real?”
“That depends, Colonel, among other things, on your three hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
The Colonel is quiet now for several minutes, which begin to feel uncomfortably long. Valfierno lights himself a cigar. The Colonel remains quiet. When he finally starts to speak, his voice is almost a whisper.
“A personal question, Valfierno: We both know that painting is pure gold, that you could offer it to anyone you wanted. Why did you choose me?”
The Colonel strokes his mustache slowly and his eyes shine. Now is the time to stroke him. Valfierno knows only too well that what he is selling his clients is an image of themselves: “I have something that no one else has. I knew how to get it. I deserve it.”
“Well, first, because I was told that your discretion is faultless. Obviously, whoever had this painting would never be able to let anyone know.”
“Obviously. That would also be necessary to avoid…”
“And above all, because it’s important to me that whoever has it should know how to appreciate it,” says Valfierno, and for a moment he fears he has played this last part too crudely.
“Marqués, I don’t know how to thank you,” says the Colonel, from within the trap.