Jeffrey Archer - False Impression

Anna woke with a start. “What day is it?” she asked the passing steward.

“Thursday, madam.”

Anna rubred her eyes and set her watch to the correct time.

She had kept her agreement with Anton to be back within four days. Now her biggest problem would be to transport the painting to London, while at the same time... “Ladies and gentlemen, the captain has turned on the FASTEN SEAT BELT sign. We will be landing in Bucharest in approximately twenty minutes.”

She smiled at the thought that by now Fenston’s man would have landed in Hong Kong and would be puzzled why this time he couldn’t spot her in duty-free. Would he carry on to London, or risk switching flights for the Romanian capital? Perhaps he would arrive back in Bucharest just as she set off for London.

When Anna stepped out onto the pavement, she was delighted to see a smiling Sergei standing by the door of his yellow Mercedes. He opened the back door for her. Her only problem was she barely had enough cash to cover his fare.

“Where to?” he asked.

“First, I need to go to the academy,” she told him.

Anna would have liked to share with Sergei all she had been through, but still didn’t feel she knew him well enough to risk it. Not trusting people was another experience she didn’t enjoy.

Sergei dropped her at the bottom of the steps, where she’d left Anton before going to the airport. She no longer needed to ask him to wait. The student working at the reception desk told Anna that Professor Teodorescu’s lecture on “Attribution” was just about to begin.

Anna made her way to the lecture theater on the first floor. She followed a couple of students in just as the lights were dimmed and slipped into a seat at the end of the second row, looking forward to a few minutes’ escape from the real world.

“Attribution and provenance,” began Anton, running a hand through his hair in that familiar way the students mimicked behind his back, “are the cause of more discussion and disagreement among art scholars than any other subject. Why? Because it’s sexy, open to debate, and rarely conclusive. There is no doubt that several of the world’s most popular galleries currently display works that were not painted by the artists whose names are suggested on the frame. It is, of course, possible that the master painted the main figure, the Virgin or Christ for example, while leaving an assistant to fill in the background. We must consider, therefore, whether several paintings, all depicting the same subject, can have been executed by one master, or if it is more likely that one of them, possibly even more, are the works of his star pupils, which several hundred years later are mistaken for the master’s,” Anna smiled at the words star pupil and remembered the letter she had to pass on to Danuta Sekalska.

“Now let us consider some examples,” continued Anton, “and see if you can detect the hand of a lesser mortal. The first is of a painting currently on display at the Frick Museum in New York.” A slide was beamed up on the screen behind Anton. “Rembrandt, I hear you cry, but the Rembrandt Research Project, set up in 1974, would not agree with you. They believe that The Polish Rider is the work of at least two hands, one of which may — I repeat, may — have been that of Rembrandt. The Metropolitan Museum, just a few blocks away from the Frick on the other side of Fifth Avenue, was unable to hide its angst when the same distinguished scholars dismissed the two portraits of the Beresteyn Family , acquired by them in 1929, as not executed by the Dutch master.

“Don’t lose too much sleep over the problems faced by these two great institutions, because, of the twelve paintings attributed to Rembrandt in London’s Wallace Collection, only one, Titus, the Artist’s Son , has been pronounced genuine.” Anna became so engrossed that she began taking notes. “The second artist I would ask you to consider is the great Spanish maestro, Goya. Much to the embarrassment of the Prado in Madrid, Juan Jose Junquera, the world’s leading authority on Goya, has suggested that the “black paintings,” which include such haunting visions as Satan Devouring His Children , cannot have been the hand of Goya, as he points out that the room for which they were painted as murals was not completed until after his death. The distinguished Australian critic Robert Hughes, in his book on Goya, suggests they are the work of the artist’s son.

“And now I turn to the Impressionists. Several examples of Manet, Monet, Matisse, and Van Gogh currently on display in leading galleries around the world have not been authenticated by the relevant scholars. Sunflowers , for example, which came under the hammer at Christie’s in 1987, selling for just under forty million dollars, has yet to be authenticated by Louis van Tilborgh of the Van Gogh Museum.”

As Anton turned to display the next slide, his eyes rested on Anna. She smiled, and he put up a Raphael instead of the Van Gogh, which caused a ripple of laughter among the students. “As you can see, I am also capable of attributing the wrong painting to the wrong artist.” The laughter turned to applause. But then, to Anna’s surprise, he looked back and stared at her. “This great city,” he said, no longer referring to his notes, “has produced its own scholar in the field of attribution, who currently works out of New York. Some years ago when we were both students, we used to have long discussions into the night about this particular painting.” The Raphael returned to the screen. “After attending a lecture, we would meet up at our favorite rendezvous,” — once again he fixed his gaze on Anna — “ Koskies , where I’m reliably informed many of you still congregate. We always used to meet at nine o’clock , following the evening lecture.” He turned his attention back to the picture on the screen. “This is a portrait known as The Madonna of the Pinks , recently acquired by the National Gallery in London. Raphael experts are divided, but many are concerned by how many examples there are of the same subject, attributed to the same artist. Some argue that this painting is more likely to be ‘school of Raphael,’ or ‘after Raphael.’ ”

Anton looked back into the audience to see that the seat on the end of the second row was no longer occupied.

Anna arrived at Koskies a few minutes before the suggested hour. Only an attentive student would have noticed that the lecturer had departed from his prepared script for a few moments to let her know where they should meet. She could not mistake that look of fear in Anton’s eyes, a look that is obvious only to those who’ve had to survive in a police state.

Anna glanced around the room. Her old student haunt hadn’t changed that much. The same plastic tables, the same plastic chairs, and probably the same plastic wine that couldn’t find an exporter. Not a natural rendezvous for a Professor of Perspective and a New York art dealer. She ordered two glasses of the house red.

Anna could still remember when she had considered a night at Koskies so cool, where she would discuss with her friends the virtues of Constantin Brancusi and U2, Tom Cruise and John Lennon, and have to suck a peppermint on the way home so that her mother wouldn’t find out that she’d been smoking and sipping alcohol. Her father always knew — he’d wink and point to whichever room her mother was in.

Anna recalled when she and Anton first made love. It was so cold they both had to keep their coats on, and when it was over, Anna even wondered if she would bother to do it again. No one seemed to have explained to Anton that it might take a woman a little longer to have an orgasm.