The Lady with the Ermine, the scholars called it. “One of the most mysterious of all Leonardo’s works.” It was believed to have been painted circa 1483-6, and “believed to show Cecilia Gallerani, the young mistress of Lodovico Sforza, ruler of Milan”. There were two published references to it: one in a poem by Bernardino Bellincioni (died 1492); the other, an ambiguous remark about an “immature” portrait, written by Cecilia Gallerani herself in a letter dated 1498. “But sadly for the student of Leonardo, the real mystery today is the painting’s whereabouts. It is known to have entered the collection of the Polish Prince Adam Czartoryski in the late eighteenth century, and was photographed in Krakau in 1932. Since then it has disappeared into what Karl von Clausewitz so eloquently called "the fog of war". All efforts by the Reich authorities to locate it have so far failed, and it must now be feared that this priceless flowering of the Italian Renaissance is lost to mankind forever.”
He closed the book. “I think, another story for you.”
“And a good one. There are only nine undisputed Leonardos in the world.” She smiled. “If I ever get out of here to write it.”
“Don’t worry. We’ll get you out.” He lay back and closed his eyes. After a few moments he heard her put down the book, then she joined him on the bed, wriggling close to him.
“And you?” she breathed in his ear. “Will you come out with me?”
“We can’t talk now. Not here.”
“Sorry. I forgot.” Her tongue tip touched his ear.
A jolt, like electricity.
Her hand rested lightly on his leg. With her fingers, she traced the inside of his thigh. He started to murmur something, but again, as in Zurich, she placed a finger to his lips.
“The object of the game is: not to make a sound.”
LATER, unable to sleep himself, he listened to her: the sigh of her breath, the occasional mutter — far away and indistinct. In her dreams, she turned towards him, groaning. Her arm was flung across the pillow, shielding her face. She seemed to be fighting some private battle. He stroked the tangle of her hair, waiting until whatever demon it was had released her, then he slipped out from beneath the sheets.
The kitchen floor was cold to his naked feet. He opened a couple of cupboards. Dusty crockery and a few half-empty packets of food. The refrigerator was ancient, might have been borrowed from some institute of biology, its contents blue-furred and mottled with exotic moulds. Self-catering, it was clear, was not a priority around here. He boiled a kettle, rinsed a mug and heaped in three spoonfuls of instant coffee.
He wandered through the apartment sipping the bitter drink. In the sitting room he stood beside the window and pulled back the curtain a fraction. Billow Strasse was deserted. He could see the telephone box, dimly illuminated, and the shadows of the station entrance behind it. He let the curtain fall back.
America. The prospect had never occurred to him before. When he thought of it, his brain reached automatically for the images Doctor Goebbels had thoughtfully planted there. Jews and Negroes. Top-hatted capitalists and smokestack factories. Beggars on the streets. Striptease bars. Gangsters shooting at one another from vast automobiles. Smouldering tenements and modern jazz bands, wailing across the ghettos like police sirens. Kennedy’s toothy smile. Charlie’s dark eyes and white limbs. America.
He went into the bathroom. The walls were stained by steam clouds and splashes of soap. Bottles everywhere, and tubes, and small pots. Mysterious feminine objects of glass and plastic. It was a long time since he had seen a woman’s bathroom. It made him feel clumsy and foreign — the heavy-footed ambassador of some other species. He picked up a few things and sniffed at them, squeezed a drop of white cream on to his finger and rubbed at it with his thumb. This smell of her mingled with the others already on his hands.
He wrapped himself in a large towel and sat down on the floor to think. Three or four times before dawn he heard her shout out in her sleep — cries of real fear. Memory or prophecy? He wished he knew.
Just before seven he went down into Bulow Strasse. His Volkswagen was parked a hundred metres up the street, on the left, outside a butcher’s shop. The owner was hanging plump carcasses in the window. A heaped tray of blood-red sausages at his feet reminded March of something.
Globus’s fingers, that’s what it was — those immense raw fists.
He bent over the back seat of the Volkswagen, tugging his suitcase towards him. As he straightened, he glanced quickly in either direction. There was nothing special to see — just the usual signs of an early Saturday morning. Most shops would open as normal but then close at lunchtime in honour of the holiday.
