Neil Olson - The Icon

“Tell me, Ms. Kessler,” del Carros said finally, “why your continued interest in the work? You did receive a tidy sum.”

“I’m not interested in it,” she answered.

“I find that hard to believe. Could it be that you have found parting with it more difficult than you expected?”

“You find it hard to believe because you’re obsessed, so you think everyone else must be. It’s a bit egocentric, if you’ll forgive my saying so.” Her words carried more edge than she intended. Must be careful. “I truly don’t care about the icon. I’m only here because I hoped to learn some things about my grandfather. I guess I should have been clearer about that.”

“Then we have both been disappointed,” the old man said, empathetically. “And sadly, I now lack any incentive to speak to you on that subject. Though I could not have told you much in any case. So I must apologize once more for taking you out of your way.”

She was being dismissed. Just like that. As she had been her whole life, whenever she pressed too hard, whenever the questions got sticky. These men. Her father, her grandfather, Wallace, her miserable ex, Paul. Even Matthew. Push them at all and they clammed up, shut down, sent her packing, their precious mysteries preserved.

“I think you’re being a little unfair,” she said, trying to control her anger.

“Oh?” He seemed amused.

“I’ve tried to be straight with you. And you’ve really told me nothing useful. I don’t have the information you want, but I feel that if we shared ideas, we could help each other.”

“So, I am egocentric and unfair.” He was ignoring her overture. “Is there anything else?”

“OK. You’re dishonest.”

“And a liar also.”

“Don’t put words in my mouth.”

“And how do you believe that I have been dishonest with you?”

“You tease me with these hints about my grandfather, then tell me that you know nothing. And you left an awful lot out of that story you told.”

“Is that being dishonest? In my business we call that being careful. And you have been careful today also, though you are being rather careless now.”

“When were you in Greece to see the icon?”

“What does it matter?”

“Maybe it was during the war? And maybe you were there without an invitation? And maybe you had more in mind than looking?”

He no longer appeared to be amused, and she knew she had gone too far, knew it even as she was saying it. She was terrible at games. Quick to catch on, but impatient.

“Someone has been telling you stories,” the old man said slowly, studying Ana.

“No. Just some thinking on my own.” Too much thinking was a bad thing, she had heard. Too much talking about what you thought was worse. “Why don’t you set me straight?”

“Tell me what you’ve been told, and I will fill in the details.”

“I haven’t been told anything. That’s the problem, do you see? I’ll just keep getting things wrong until someone tells me the truth. Meantime, God knows what I’ll come up with.”

She had struck a nerve. He felt threatened by her. This was risky, and she must be careful not to overplay her hand. In the end, she was holding no cards.

“You think I was some wartime profiteer, yes? Because I did business with your grandfather.” He lowered his voice as the bearded man wandered closer, but his whisper was harsh, unpleasant. “Doing business with a thief does not make you one. We were very different men, I assure you.”

“Are you calling my grandfather a thief?”

“I have told you that my sins are heavy, but at least I know what they are. I was forthright in my actions, and I believed certain things, right or wrong. Your grandfather believed in nothing, had no scruples, played every angle. All from his fat, easy perch of neutrality.”

“Hang on now.” It was one thing to have your own suspicions, another to have a stranger attack what was yours. “I didn’t come here to listen to you insult my family.”

“Did you not?” He was clearly warming to his subject. His round, wrinkled face was flushed pink. “You came to learn about your grandpa, no? It’s what you have been begging me to speak of. What did you expect to hear? Does my opinion of him surprise you?”

Jan had appeared in the far door, shadowing the bearded man about thirty feet behind.

“I know he was involved in some shady deals,” Ana responded. “And he felt bad about those. But he truly believed he was saving works that would have vanished otherwise.”

“Child, you have no idea. The museums would not take work from him, and they will not take it from you, because they know it is tainted. Your legacy is dirty money. You sleep among pilfered treasures. I am sorry if I am the first to tell you this, but somehow I doubt that.”

Ana was too shaken to think clearly. She had broken his shell but had not found what she wanted inside. The bearded man wandered out the near door, and Jan doubled back to the far one. When she glanced at del Carros again, his face was placid once more.

“You know,” he said, in a very different tone, warm, surprised, “I now begin to think that I am the foolish one, and that you are a clever girl.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“I think you do. You are too wise a woman not to know about your grandfather. You have deliberately provoked me, and I have reacted. And now, perhaps, you think that you have learned something. The question remains, why?”

“I haven’t learned anything, except that you hate my grandfather.”

“Is it for yourself or someone else? Come now, speak to me, do not be afraid. We are exchanging information, that is all, and it is clear that we have both been holding back.”

Two middle-aged women entered the chapel at the far end, gabbling happily, but their presence only slightly alleviated Ana’s rising panic. Do not be afraid. There were no more frightening words he could have spoken to her.

“I think I have to leave.”

He reached over and touched her arm.

“We should both leave. We require more privacy, I think. I intend to reward your cleverness with answers, but I will require some in return.”

“I really have to be someplace soon.”

He took gentle hold of her forearm.

“Ms. Kessler. I may have to insist.”

She bolted. His grip was just tightening as she slipped it, stood quickly, rattling the old chairs, and raced out through the near stone arch. Instinctively, she turned left, toward the front of the church. There was no danger that del Carros would catch her, but she remembered Jan’s coiled energy and watchfulness. Nothing could happen here, surely, with all these other people around, yet it was hard to be certain and she walked as quickly as she could without running. Down the steps into the open space of the crossing, past the roped-off section before the choir, and toward the central aisle of the nave. Halfway there, the bearded man appeared before her suddenly.

“Ms. Kessler,” he said, “wait.”

She reversed and immediately noted the side exit, simultaneously seeing Jan bouncing down the steps from the direction of the chapel. They nearly had her boxed. Ana ran now, pure adrenaline guiding her toward the daylight beyond the exit.

A steel staircase led down into the front end of a dirty, empty cul-de-sac between the cathedral and the sacristy. She turned right at the bottom and scampered toward the narrow parking strip that led out to the avenue. There was no one in the security guard’s box, damn it, just a square young man in a suit jacket standing in the middle of the lane, smoking a cigarette and looking hard at her. How many of them were there? This was ridiculous, what was going on, why the hell had she come here at all? And alone.