Selling a Painting

A rough timber door creaked open and they were led to the rear of a smashed up altar screen where a large painting was leaning against the stonework.

The Prince was beside himself in anticipation but trying desperately to look cool and unconcerned.

"I don't have enough light to examine a painting," protested Max immediately to the black suited man whom he assumed to be in charge.

This had to be translated by the Prince but resulted in three men carrying the large picture out into the open air followed closely by the bemused art expert.

"Can we take it out of the frame?"

Max knew immediately that the carved mouldings were eighteenth century and thus a mismarriage with the artwork itself but he needed to see the panel on which it was painted.

"Careful for god's sake."

His urgency conveyed itself to the goatherd without need of translation but finally it was out and Max sat on a rock examining both the paint and the composite wooden panel which had been used as the ground.

He ignored the impatience being exhibited by the Prince as he drank in the quality of the brushstrokes before eventually turning to the prospective buyer.

"I cannot find anything which leads me to dismiss it out of hand but it needs proper tests to ascertain for sure if it's genuine."

He continued to inspect reverently what he was beginning gradually to believe was the true Francetti while the two Italians appeared to be arguing but in the end they shook hands and the panel was removed from Max, none to politely it should be said, restored to its frame and re-wrapped in dirty sacking.

The Prince was jubilant.

"He will not allow the painting to be seen by anyone else but I am so sure of the provenance that I have agreed a price. As soon as I take possession then I will ask you to arrange for the necessary tests."

Max broke the silence during the return drive to question the Prince.

"Where was it found?"

The man beside him seemed far away but eventually replied.

"In that old chapel. It seems that the German officer had to flee for his life before transport could be arranged and was forced to leave it there concealed in a crate."

Later that night and in Martine's arms Max expressed his misgivings.

"How much has it cost him? What if it proves to be a fake?"

"You can be sure that he has only paid a fraction of its true value even if it should prove to be genuine."

"And how will he get an export licence?"

"Where there's a will there's always a way."

...

Max flew back to New York in a First Class seat, courtesy of the Comptesse, being required back home to wrap up the current exhibition and to interview a number of new artist's whose development he had been watching for some time.

They had kept on the haughty receptionist who had greeted them during their first exploratory visit and Max had rapidly grown to respect the woman's ability.

Martha was a product of Vassar and came from old Boston stock but her initial poor opinion of Max had changed rapidly to a full blown admiration which she had fought against not least because her new employer had begun to people all her lurid sexual fantasies.

This came to a head one evening in a storeroom when they were thrown together bodily by a toppling stack of framed pictures.

Martha grabbed at Max as she lost her balance and involuntarily gripped his arm which was then imprisoned between her firm breasts.

"So sorry," was all she managed before somehow their lips met and all her frosty demeanour vanished in a show of lust which surprised and amazed them both.

"This is not a good idea," he said as she shuddered to a climax on his hand with her skirt hiked up to her waist and her thong pushed out of the way.

"No you are right," she replied as she feverishly opened his flies and then fell to her knees with her mouth already open.

Later he took her round the corner for a drink and ensconced in a bar they sat with heads close together.

"I am a married woman," she began, "and you are the Comptesses man."

"Am I?" He was at first surprised by this interpretation of the relationship between him and the co-owner but then accepted that to others it must appear exactly that. "I suppose I am," then, "so what do you want to do?"

He thought erroneously that Martha might be about to give her notice to quit but she surprised him.

"I don't want to stop."

"We must."

"I suppose so."

"How soon do you have to be home?"

"There's plenty of time."

"Then my bed is empty and available."

But after a month of frequently interrupted work in favour of dalliance with Martha he had to travel back to Italy and leave the receptionist to continue without him.

...

He arrived to be greeted by a cool reception from what turned out to be a very jealous Martine. She waded in immediately

"You've been fucking Martha."

Max recoiled but stung by the attack immediately gave as good as he got.

"So you've still got your spies on my tail. Martha said that I was your 'man' as if I was merely your paid gigolo."

He faced Maxine angrily.

"I am not and never was your property contrary to appearances. You are free to go with anyone you please and by the same token so am I."

For the moment she seemed to swallow her anger at least enough to fill him in on her brother's progress.

"He has the painting ready for inspection and the men that you suggested have been contacted."

"When are they coming?"

"At the weekend."

This time he was put in the guest suite and detected a frisson of sympathy from the staff at this cavalier treatment. Martine was conspicuously absent but he met the two 'experts' both of whom also came to the opinion that the painting was indeed the long lost Francetti which had been looted by the nazi's in the second world war and then abandoned during their headlong flight.

The brushwork was absolutely right, the base panel and the paint pigment had tested positive for age and the subject matched exactly the image shown on the only two black and white reproductions which had survived from before WW2.

He then gave advice on the replacement framing and the level of cleaning to be carried out and had already rung the airline to confirm his flight back to New York when he heard a tap on his door. At his call of 'avanti' the Comptesse entered still wearing an evening dress having obviously just returned from a function.

"May I sit down?"

"Of course."

He waited curious as to her reason for seeking him out.

"Max I am truly sorry for my outburst and for having had you followed. I have already called them off and it will never happen again."

"Thank you."

But he was damned if he would go further and remained silent as her eyes filled with tears.

"I do not know how to say this," she began and then petered out before visibly pulling herself together to continue, "I am hopelessly in love with you Max but I'm afraid of being hurt, afraid that like many men in the past you only have eyes for my wealth."

She had stood and was now pacing up and down the room clearly deeply agitated. But he still said nothing even though his heart was turning cartwheels.

"I want nothing more than for us marry and although I might smother you with affection I would do my best not to emasculate you, what do you American's call it so vividly...I would try not to break your balls."

She was looking at him with hope in her eyes but despite his love for the Comptesse he could see no way in which marriage to this woman could possibly work and seeing her defeat in his face she visibly crumpled.

"It wouldn't work for you, would it?"

She was close to despair but with an even greater effort pulled herself together.

"It is the most unfortunate thing possible for you are the only man that I know who accepts me for what I am, who sees through my disfigurement to the woman beneath and now that I cannot have you I am strongly tempted to simply sign everything over to my brother. Then we might marry as equals."

"But what about the thousands of people who depend upon you for a living wage."

She held up her hands in acceptance of this truth and with the tears now streaming down her face fled in his arms and made the only suggestion she could think of.

"Perhaps you could sign a pre-nuptial agreement?"

He took a moment to think this through but knew immediately that it would never work.

"Even if it was made public everyone would still believe that you had bought me much like you did the clothes on my back. And besides all that I'm a City boy and New York is where I belong, not hanging about with the rich idlers of this world."

She sighed and extricated herself to stand before him but with her head dropped in misery as she accepted her fate.

"Then it's all over."

...

He returned to the US and took Martha into his confidence. She very sensibly accepted that their short but intense sexual relationship was now at an end but so prized her job that she stayed on and was promoted to manager with the full approval of the other partner.

However, and possibly as you might expect given the regular daily contact, his affair with Martha slowly began again but this time with less intensity. It was only interrupted when the Comptesse flew over regularly to join Max in his bed.

In fact, and unknown to Max, those two so very different women had tacitly decided to share the spoils.

THE END