The Immaculate Deception

‘Prime ministers? Oh, they can ruin your life.’

His little bon mot, for some reason, didn’t seem quite so urbane at the moment. She considered leaning forward to see if the driver could go any faster, but abandoned the idea. Another one of Bottando’s rules. Never let anyone see you are nervous; especially not drivers, who are notoriously the biggest gossips on the planet. So, like a condemned man who finally realizes his fate is inevitable, she gave a big sigh, leant back and gave up fretting. Immediately, the lights changed, the cars began moving and the palazzo came into sight. She was waved through the vast wooden gates into the courtyard with virtually no delay, and within minutes was being ushered into an ante-room to an ante-room to the office where Antonio Sabauda, prime minister now for a whole nine months, held his audiences. Fourteen minutes late.

Her guardian angel was on duty, working hard on her behalf. Sabauda was later still, and over the next forty minutes she allowed herself to work up a fine head of steam about the lack of consideration shown by unpunctual people. In fact, by the time the door was finally opened and she was shown in, the nervousness was gone, the deference dissipated, the stomach quiescent, and her character quite restored to its normal state.

So she marched into the surprisingly dingy office thinking only how stupid she had been to put on quite so much lipstick and wishing she hadn’t bothered, shook hands with the prime minister in an uninterested fashion, and sat down on a chair before she was asked. What did she care? She hadn’t voted for him.

He scored early points by referring neither to her age, nor to the fact that she was a woman, and then pushed his rating even higher by not indulging in any small-talk. Then he spoiled it all by expressing surprise that Bottando himself had not come. Flavia reminded him that she, not General Bottando, was now running the department on a day-to-day basis.

‘But he is still the head of it, is he not?’

‘Nominally. But he takes no active role in our operations any more. He is running this European venture, and that uses up all his time.’

‘And more of his patience,’ the prime minister added for her with a faint smile. ‘I see. And I am sure we are in safe hands with you, signora. I do hope so, anyway. I’m afraid there is something of a crisis on hand. I would tell you about it myself, but I know few of the details. Dottore Macchioli knows those, and he has just arrived. This, I’m afraid, is why you have been kept waiting for so long.’

Of course, Flavia thought. All was now clear. Guglio Macchioli was one of those endearingly lovable characters who sow disaster everywhere they go. Never on time for anything, however much he tried, always colliding with all manner of inanimate objects which leapt out at him as he passed, he was the very model of the unworldly scholar. And as a scholar he was very fine indeed, so Jonathan told her, as he knew more about this sort of thing than she did. But as the director of the National Museum he was, in Bottando’s opinion, one of the wonders of the world. His elevation had come on the rebound; his predecessor had been go-getting, dynamic, determined to drag the musty museum into modernity and was shortly to be let out of gaol. The embarrassment had been considerable, and Macchioli – who could not only resist temptation but probably wouldn’t even notice he was being tempted – had seemed the obvious successor, in the circumstances. A safe pair of hands; back to the traditional values of connoisseurship, erudition and old-time curating. A universally beloved figure, in fact, but quite incapable of defending his patch against the incursions of bureaucrats who wished to cut his funds, to ooze up to potential benefactors, or to manage his disorganized museum.

And deeply unhappy, Flavia judged from the nervous way he came in, thrusting his bicycle clips into the bulging pocket of his shabby suit. It was all most intriguing.

Macchioli sat down, fiddled with his hands and looked uncomfortable as the introductions were made.

‘Perhaps we might begin?’ The prime minister prompted.

‘Ah, yes,’ Macchioli said absently.

‘You have a problem you wish to tell the signora about?’

Persuading himself to divulge it was evidently a titanic struggle, almost as though he knew that, once he had spoken, all sorts of unpleasant consequences might begin to swirl around him. He rocked to and fro, hunched his shoulders, rubbed his nose, and then, in a sudden burst of decision, spoke: ‘I’ve lost a picture. The museum has. It was stolen.’

Flavia was puzzled. She could see why he was upset. Awkward business, losing pictures. That was not the problem, however. They went missing all the time; so often, in fact, that the routine for what to do was well established. You phoned the police. They went round, did their stuff and then you forgot all about it, on the reasonable grounds that it was unlikely ever to be seen again. All perfectly normal. It was hearing about it in the prime minister’s office that was not entirely orthodox.

‘I see,’ she said helpfully, but poor old Macchioli did not take it as a prompt to continue; instead he lapsed into another agonized silence.

‘For the last five years, you see, we have been planning an exhibition.’ He restarted, evidently deciding that a sidelong approach might be best. ‘To celebrate Italy’s presidency of the European Community, which begins in fifteen days’ time. Drawing on all aspects of European art, but I am afraid that some people’ – and here he gave a surreptitious glance in the direction of the desk at which the prime minister was sitting – ‘some people have sought to turn it into a nationalistic demonstration.’

‘Just a small reminder of our contribution in matters of culture,’ the prime minister purred.

‘This has made borrowing the works a little more difficult than it might have been,’ Macchioli continued. ‘Not that it is relevant to the disaster that has befallen us …’

The prime minister, showing more patience than his reputation would have suggested possible, sighed in the background. It was enough to bring Macchioli’s errant mind back to the immediate issue.

‘We did, however, finally arrange to borrow nearly all the paintings we wanted. Most from Italian institutions, naturally, but a good proportion from foreign museums and owners, many of which have never been seen in this country before.’

‘But I know about all this,’ said Flavia with more impatience than the prime minister was showing. ‘We’ve been involved in the planning for years. Members of my department escorted the first few paintings from the airport to the museum last week.’

‘Yes. And a very fine job you did, too. No mistake about that. Very fine. Unfortunately …’

‘The one you’ve had stolen. It was one of those?’

He nodded.

‘When?’

‘Yesterday. At lunchtime.’

‘Lunchtime? Then why are you only telling me about it now?’

‘It was very awkward, you see. I wasn’t at all sure what to do about it …’

‘Perhaps I might fill the signora in?’ The prime minister interrupted, glancing at his watch and realizing that unless something was done soon, this meeting might last for the rest of the day and Macchioli still wouldn’t have explained anything. ‘Please correct me if I get the details wrong. I understand the picture was stolen at around half past one yesterday. A hooded man reversed a truck into the store area, held up the people working there, forced them to load the painting, complete with its frame, into the back of the truck and drove off. Is that correct?’

Macchioli nodded.

Flavia, fidgeting around in her seat, opened her mouth to make the obvious protests about wasted time, trails going cold and so on.

‘Your department, signora, was not called because he left behind a message saying that the police should not be contacted.’

‘A ransom demand, is that it?’

A shrug. ‘Not exactly. Just that we’d be hearing more in due course. I suppose that means money.’

‘Maybe so. What, exactly, is the picture?’

‘It’s a Claude Lorraine. Landscape with Cephalis and Procris,’ Macchioli said reluctantly.

Flavia paused. ‘Oh, not that one, surely? Not the one where the government intervened officially to guarantee it?’

He nodded. You could see why he was upset, she thought. Not that it was such a great picture, although she always found Claude quite toothsome. Not a Raphael, or anything like that. But it had such a dodgy past. Its reputation as one of the most stolen pictures in the world ensured it a status beyond its simple quality. Argyll, no doubt, would remember the details better than she could, but she could recall the highlights. Painted in the 1630s for an Italian cardinal. Pinched by the Duke of Modena when he found it in a wagon after a battle. Pinched again by a French general a few years later. Looted and sold during the French Revolution, pinched again by Napoleon when he came across it in Holland. Stolen by thieves in the 1930s, by the Germans in the 1940s and by two more thieves in the 1950s and 1960s. Whereupon the exasperated owner sold it to the Louvre, in the hope that they would manage to hang on to it. Which they had. Until, it seemed, it had arrived in Italy.

‘Oh, dear,’ she said.

‘You see our problem,’ the prime minister continued. ‘It is exceptionally unpleasant for me, as I gave a personal guarantee of its safety. Quite apart from that, this exhibition is to be one of the cultural highpoints of our presidency. It would be very bad indeed if it was wrecked, and it would be wrecked if this news gets out. It is quite possible that other lenders would pull out, and even if they didn’t our reputation would be damaged badly. You can imagine what would be said. We would look quite ridiculous.’

Flavia nodded. ‘So? When you get the ransom demand you pay up.’

‘The only problem is that it is illegal. If we arrest people for paying ransoms to rescue their wives and children, we can hardly pay up for a mere painting.’

A silence fell on the room, and it seemed as though Flavia was expected to say something useful.

‘You mean you want me to find the painting.’

‘I would ordinarily be deeply grateful, but in this case, no. How many people would you use for such an inquiry?’

Flavia thought for a moment. ‘Everyone we had, if you wanted a quick result. Not that I can guarantee one.’

‘And could you at least guarantee to keep it out of the press?’

‘For about six hours, yes.’