Death of an Old Master Read Online Free Page B

Renaissance cities on the edge of a lake, two small figures trudging towards it along a dusty road. In the bottom left-hand corner was the lamb with the infant Christ sitting astride it. Holding on
to the child was a Madonna in deep blue with a red blouse. Above her stood an old man, leaning on a staff, peering with adoration at the sacrificial victims below. The painting was suffused with a
pastoral devotion. The Madonna, de Courcy decided, was not one of those Florentine beauties to be found in the Uffizi or the Pitti Palace. This one looked as though she might have tilled the fields
or milked the cows herself. But Raphael. Was it a Raphael? De Courcy stepped back to inspect the picture from a distance. He took a small eyeglass and looked closely at the brushwork. He
contemplated the composition of The Holy Family with Lamb. He looked out of the window at the river rushing past the terrace, the deer grazing peacefully in their pasture.
    Two thoughts were uppermost in Edmund de Courcy’s mind as he completed his entry in the black book. The first was that Raphael commanded very high prices. For some reason he always had.
Murillos might drift in and out of fashion, Lawrences could come and go, but Raphael, along with Leonardo and Michelangelo, always sold for fabulous sums. Less than twenty years ago the Government
had purchased Raphael’s Ansidei Madonna for the National Gallery for seventy-thousand pounds from the Duke of Marlborough. The second thought was that this house merited three stars in
his private annotation of relative penury. The Hammond-Burkes were virtually bankrupt, if not worse.
    He strolled back through the house to greet his host. Hammond-Burke was seated at a small table in a sitting room just off the Great Hall. Outside de Courcy could see the weeds bursting through
the gravel, the untrimmed lawns, the broken windows still unrepaired. He remembered the many damp patches on the walls of the dining room. Hammond-Burke was looking disconsolately at a pile of
papers in front of him. Reading one or two of them upside down de Courcy noticed that they were bills, probably unpaid, possibly final demands.
    ‘What a splendid collection of pictures you have here,’ he began with a flattering smile. ‘Easily one of the best I’ve seen.’
    His host was not encouraged by the news. He continued staring at his bills.
    ‘Is there any chance,’ de Courcy went on brightly, ‘that you might want to add to your collection? Two Gainsboroughs are always an asset, four Gainsboroughs would be more than
twice as good!’
    James Hammond-Burke laughed. He went on laughing. The laugh turned hysterical. He picked up a couple of his bills and threw them defiantly in the air. ‘Add to the collection, did you
say?’ His face had turned very red. ‘Add to it? That’s good. That’s very good.’ He paused and put his hand to his face. ‘That’s the best thing I’ve
heard this year, oh yes, easily the best.’
    He stopped as if he had said too much. The normal look of melancholy pain returned to his features. De Courcy waited. This was the crucial moment. In the early days he and William Alaric Piper
had rehearsed the various ways these interviews about the compendium might develop. Piper had the ability to become an irascible if impoverished duke or a proud and haughty squire who would both be
quick to anger if the wrong proposition was put to them. Englishmen after all are always loath to part with their possessions, however trying the circumstances. De Courcy thought that the
Marlborough sale must have made it easier for them. If one of the foremost members of the aristocracy could sell the most valuable objects in his collection to pay his debts, then the smaller fish
in the pond might feel easier about doing likewise. On more than one occasion in these rehearsals the Piper figure had thrown de Courcy out of the imaginary house for impudence and discourtesy.
    Sometimes de Courcy waited before he