Carl making his way towards the cloth-swathed stand in the centre of the room. Immediately, the butterflies in her tummy were dancing once more. ‘Any minute now.’
‘Allow me.’ With a smile, Piers offered the woman his arm, excusing himself from Lucie with a smile. No doubt he’d sensed her nerves and was giving her space to compose herself. Such a good man. As he strolled away, his words drifted back to Lucie. ‘There were some questions over the provenance, but Lucie beavered away until she scraped together enough data to satisfy the committee.’
Lucie winced. It was true she’d faced an uphill battle to trace an unbroken line of ownership of the Meileau. Piers was no doubt just trying to make polite conversation, but she wished he would be a little more discreet. Someone might overhear him and assume there was some question mark over her research, which could be ruinous. Provenance was everything in the art community, and any doubt in its veracity might put off potential bidders. Trying not to let her nerves ratchet up to panic, she gave the pair a wide berth as she made her way towards the circular dais along with the rest of the converging crowd.
‘Lucinda, where are…oh, there you are. Come on up.’ Carl gestured to a spot beside him facing the gathered staff and guests.
Feeling heat prickle in her cheeks, Lucie edged towards the front to slip through a gap and join him. Never comfortable in the spotlight, she would’ve preferred to remain within the group. In the grand scheme of things, it didn’t matter who had discovered the painting, only that someone had brought it back into the light for the world to enjoy once more. Credit where credit is due. The old adage drifted up from her memory, the words spoken by her grandfather when she demurred over him giving her a special present after she’d received an award at her school’s speech night. When she’d pointed out her award had been for participating in a group project, he’d chucked her cheek with his finger. ‘You’re allowed to shine a little bit, sometimes. People will be quick enough to steal your glory, don’t give it away so easily.’
With the spirit of her grandfather boosting her courage, Lucie forced her shoulders to relax and lifted her head to meet Carl’s encouraging smile. He’d been instrumental in ensuring she received her due. He’d monitored her progress as she’d worked to pin together the bits and pieces of lost provenance caused in the main by the desperate flight from Paris a few steps ahead of the unrelenting press of the Third Reich sweeping over France’s borders by the grandparents of Mrs Richardson, the now-owner, in the spring of 1940. Along with many other French Jews, their assets had been seized, the belongings they’d left behind ransacked by neighbours and former friends caught up in the anti-Semitic frenzy of those darkest of days.
It had taken many hours of delicate negotiation and correspondence with the great-granddaughter of a neighbour, before she’d allowed Lucie to search through the contents of their attic. In amongst boxes and suitcases stuffed with personal items and correspondence belonging not only to Mrs Richardson’s grandparents but a host of other families who’d fled—or worse—Lucie had eventually found the original bill of sale for the Meileau. What other secrets might still be hidden in amongst the other boxes she’d left for others to uncover.
Lost in the memory of that dark, dusty attic filled with ghosts, Lucie didn’t realise that Carl had launched into his speech until he mentioned her name again. With a little jump, she resolved to pay more attention, though it was hard to concentrate with so many eyes trained upon her. Mrs Richardson should’ve been there to celebrate the moment, but she and her husband had decided to avoid the limelight and inevitable press intrusion that would follow if the painting came close to achieving the sort of sales figure the valuation team were expecting, and had gone away on holiday. The auction house’s legendary spring fine arts sale had been a calendar fixture for many years, and the Meileau was the star of the show. Lucie couldn’t blame the Richardsons for wanting to stay anonymous.
Carl’s tone increased in volume and enthusiasm as he built up to the finale of his speech. ‘…And without further ado…’ Lucie took the agreed upon cue and moved to the other side of the painting to grip the velvet covering as Carl did the same on his side. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, Witherby’s is proud to share with you the first official unveiling of François Meileau’s Summer’s Eve.’
To a round of applause they lifted the cover, Lucie already turning eagerly to drink in the beauty of the painting. Secured safely in the vaults beneath the auction house, it had been several weeks since she’d last set eyes on it, and the myriad photographs she’d taken couldn’t do it justice. Like a woman relearning the face of a long-lost lover, she let her greedy gaze rove over the entire surface of the work, waiting for the flutter of excitement she got every time she was up close to a masterpiece. And waited.
Whether it was too much excitement, or just plain nerves she wasn’t sure, but the gut-punch of pure emotion she’d come to expect didn’t come. The brushstrokes that had once seemed to dance across the canvas lay dull and flat, the delicacy of the colours she’d so admired missing somehow. Feeling strangely hollow, she edged back from the stand allowing the guests to crowd closer. Heat swept through her, churning her stomach and dampening the base of her spine until the silk of her blouse clung unpleasantly to her skin beneath her jacket. As she backed away from the stand, she watched Carl accept congratulations from one of the guests with a clink of their champagne flutes before they turned to face the painting. Arms waving like a windmill, he rabbited a mile a minute, oblivious to the dread creeping through Lucie. She waited for him to react, to notice what she had within seconds, but he continued to chatter to one person after another.
When a reporter clutching a notepad moved up beside him, Lucie found herself swallowing back a mouthful of bitter bile. Unable to watch anymore, she turned away and locked gazes with Piers. A deep furrow arrowing down between his brows, he worked his way across the room before her. Feeling hunted, Lucie backed up until her shoulders bumped against the dark wood panelling of the far wall.
Stopping barely inches from her, Piers cast a horrified glance towards the painting before fixing his confused stare back on Lucie. ‘What,’ he muttered low enough no one else could hear, ‘the fuck is that?’
His unusual use of the expletive as much as the churning inside told her the worst of all possible truths. She hadn’t been wrong, it hadn’t been a case of first night nerves or over-anticipation. ‘I don’t know.’
Piers’ eyebrows all but disappeared beneath the floppy strands of his fringe. ‘You don’t know?’ There was a disbelieving edge to his tone, as though he was shouting at her even though his voice barely carried across the few inches separating them.
Feeling tears prickling behind her eyes, Lucie blinked hard. ‘It’s not the painting I found. It looks like it, but that’s not the Meileau. I don’t know how this has happened.’ Her last words came out as a low wail and Lucie clamped her hand over her lips to stifle it.
Piers opened his mouth, and she flinched back against the wall expecting a tirade of abuse. Not that he was one to rage and shout, but the enormity of the disaster they were facing surely deserved it. It would be ruinous, not just for her career, but for the auction house as a whole. They’d made a huge song and dance about her discovery, had set the Meileau up as the star of the season and instead unveiled what to Lucie’s eyes looked like a poor man’s facsimile of the original. As though his knees were as weak as hers, Piers slumped against the wall beside her, stunned eyes fixed on hers.
‘What are we going to do?’ she whispered.
‘I don’t know,’ he whispered back.
‘We should tell someone.’
He shook his head. ‘Not now. We can’t. Not in front of this lot. It’s not the way.’
The
