Gabriel Allon 10 - The Rembrandt Affair

  Keys and luggage in hand, Gabriel and Chiara stepped into the tinder-dry air. It had been the depths of winter in Europe, but here in the Southern Hemisphere it was high summer. Gabriel located the car in the rental lot; then, after searching it for explosives, they climbed inside and headed into town. Their hotel was located in the Plaza Italia, named for the many Italian immigrants who had settled in the region in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Entering the room, Gabriel was tempted to climb into the freshly turned-down bed. Instead, he showered and changed into clean clothing, then headed back down to the lobby. Chiara was waiting at the front desk, searching for a map of the local wineries. The concierge produced one. Bodega de la Mariposa, the winery owned by Peter Voss, was not on it.

  "I'm afraid the owner is very private," the concierge explained. "No tastings. No tours."

  "We have an appointment with Senor Voss," Gabriel said.

  "Ah! In that case..."

  The concierge circled a spot on the map approximately five miles to the south and traced the quickest route. Outside, a trio of bellmen were trading barbed comments on the deplorable condition of the rental car. Seeing Chiara, they all rushed simultaneously to open her door, leaving Gabriel to climb behind the wheel unassisted. He turned into the street and for the next thirty minutes meandered the tranquil boulevards of central Mendoza, searching for evidence of surveillance. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, he sped southward along an archipelago of vineyards and wineries until they came to an elegant stone-and-steel gate marked PRIVATE. On the opposite side, leaning against the door of a white Suburban, was a square-shouldered security man wearing a large cowboy hat and reflective sunglasses.

  "Senor Allon?"

  Gabriel nodded.

  "Welcome." He smiled warmly. "Follow me, please."

  Gabriel waited for the gate to open, then set off after the Suburban. It did not take long to see how Bodega de la Mariposa, which roughly translated means Wine Cellar of the Butterflies, had acquired its name. A great undulating cloud of swallowtails floated above the vineyards and in the wide gravel forecourt of Peter Voss's sprawling Italianate villa. Gabriel and Chiara parked in the shade of a cypress tree and followed the security man across a cavernous entry hall, then down a wide corridor to a terrace facing the snowcapped peaks of the Andes. A table had been laid with cheese, sausage, and figs, along with Andean mineral water and a bottle of 2005 Bodega de la Mariposa Reserva. Leaning against the balustrade, resplendent in his newly polished leather riding boots, was SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer Kurt Voss. "Welcome to Argentina, Mr. Allon," he said. "I'm so glad you were able to come."

  31

  MENDOZA, ARGENTINA

  It was not Kurt Voss, of course, but the resemblance between father and son was astonishing. Indeed, with only a few minor alterations, the figure coming toward them across the terrace might well have been the same man Lena Herzfeld had watched striding across the stage of the Hollandsche Schouwburg theater, a portrait by Rembrandt in one hand, a sack of diamonds in the other.

  Peter Voss was somewhat trimmer than his father had been late in life, a bit more rugged in appearance, and had retained more of his hair, which was now completely white with age. On closer inspection, his boots were not as resplendent as Gabriel had first imagined. Deep brown in color, they were coated by a thin layer of powdery dust from his afternoon ride. He shook their hands warmly, bowing slightly at the waist, then guided them proprietarily to the sunlit table. As they settled into their places, it was clear Peter Voss was aware of the effect his appearance was having on his two guests. "There's no need to avert your eyes," he said, his tone conciliatory. "As you might expect, I'm used to people staring at me by now."

  "I didn't mean to, Herr Voss. It's just--"

  "Please don't apologize, Mr. Allon. He was my father, not yours. I don't talk about him often. But when I do, I've always found it's best to be direct and honest. It's the least I can do. You've come a very long way, surely not without good reason. What is it you would like to know?"

  The straightforward nature of Voss's question took Gabriel by surprise. He had interrogated a Nazi war criminal once, but never had he spoken to the child of one. His instincts were to proceed with caution, as he had with Lena Herzfeld. And so he nibbled at the edge of a fig and, in an informal tone, asked Voss when he first became aware of his father's wartime activities.

  "Activities?" Voss repeated, his voice incredulous. "Please, Mr. Allon, if we are going to have a candid discussion about my father, let's not mince words. My father didn't engage in activities. He committed atrocities. As for when I learned about them, it came to me in bits and pieces. In that respect, I suppose, I'm much like any other son who discovers his father is not the man he claimed to be."

  Voss poured them each a glass of the garnet-colored wine and recounted a pair of incidents that had occurred just weeks apart when he was a teenager.

  "I was walking home from school in Buenos Aires and stopped at a cafe to meet my father. He was seated at a corner table conversing quietly with another man. I'll never forget the look on that man's face when he saw me--shock, horror, pride, amazement, all at the same time. He was trembling slightly as he shook my hand. He said I looked just like my father when they had worked together in the old days. He introduced himself as Ricardo Klement. I'm sure you know his real name."

  "Adolf Eichmann."

  "In the flesh," Voss said. "Not long after, I went to a bakery frequented by Jewish refugees. There was an old woman standing in line. When she saw me, the blood drained from her face and she became hysterical. She thought I was my father. She accused me of killing her family."

  Voss reached for his wineglass but stopped. "Eventually, I learned that my father was indeed a murderer. And not an ordinary murderer. A man with the blood of millions on his hands. What did it say about me that I could love someone guilty of such horror? What did it say about my mother? But the worst part, Mr. Allon, is that my father never atoned for his sins. He never felt ashamed. In fact, he was quite proud of his accomplishments until the very end. I am the one who shoulders his burden. And I feel his guilt to this day. I am entirely alone in the world now. My wife died several years ago. We never had children. Why? Because I was afraid of my father's evil. I wanted his bloodline to end with me."

  Voss seemed temporarily exhausted by the admission. He retreated into a meditative silence, his gaze fixed on the distant mountains. Finally, he turned back to Gabriel and Chiara and said, "But surely you didn't come all the way to Mendoza to listen to me condemn my father."

  "Actually, I came because of this."

  Gabriel placed a photograph of Portrait of a Young Woman in front of Voss. It lay there for a moment untouched, like a fourth guest who had yet to find cause to join the conversation. Then Voss lifted it carefully and examined it in the razor-sharp sun.

  "I've always wondered what it looked like," he said distantly. "Where is it now?"

  "It was stolen a few nights ago in England. A man I knew a long time ago died trying to protect it."

  "I'm truly sorry to hear that," Voss said. "But I'm afraid your friend wasn't the first to die because of this painting. And unfortunately he won't be the last."

  32

  MENDOZA, ARGENTINA

  In Amsterdam, Gabriel listened to the testimony of Lena Herzfeld. Now, seated on a grand terrace in the shadow of the Andes, he did the same for the only child of Kurt Voss. For his starting point, Peter Voss chose the night in October 1982 when his mother had telephoned to say that his father was dead. She asked her son to come to the family home in Palermo. There were things she needed to tell him, she said. Things he needed to know about his father and the war.

  "We sat at the foot of my father's deathbed and spoke for hours. Actually, my mother did most of the talking," Voss added. "I mostly listened. It was the first time that I fully understood the extent of my father's crimes. She told me how he had used his power to enrich himself. How he had robbed his victims blind before sen
ding them to their deaths at Auschwitz, Treblinka, and Sobibor. And how, on a snowy night in Amsterdam, he had accepted a portrait by Rembrandt in exchange for the life of a single child. And to make matters worse, there was proof of my father's guilt."

  "Proof he had acquired the Rembrandt through coercion?"

  "Not just that, Mr. Allon. Proof he had profited wildly from history's greatest act of mass murder."

  "What sort of proof?"

  "The worst kind," said Voss. "Written proof."

  Like most SS men, Peter Voss continued, his father had been a meticulous keeper of records. Just as the managers of the extermination centers had maintained voluminous files documenting their crimes, SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer Kurt Voss had kept a kind of balance sheet where each of his illicit transactions was carefully recorded. The proceeds of those transactions were concealed in dozens of numbered accounts in Switzerland. "Dozens, Mr. Allon, because my father's fortune was so vast he thought it unwise to keep it in a single, conspicuously large account." During the final days of the war, as the Allies were closing in on Berlin from both east and west, Kurt Voss condensed his ledger into one document detailing the sources of his money and the corresponding accounts.

  "Where was the money hidden?"

  "In a small private bank in Zurich."

  "And the list of account numbers?" asked Gabriel. "Where did he keep that?"

  "The list was far too dangerous to keep. It was both a key to a fortune and a written indictment. And so my father hid it in a place where he thought no one would ever find it."

  And then, in a flash of clarity, Gabriel understood. He had seen the proof in the photos on Christopher Liddell's computer in Glastonbury--the pair of thin surface lines, one perfectly vertical, the other perfectly horizontal, that converged a few centimeters from Hendrickje's left shoulder. Kurt Voss had used Portrait of a Young Woman as an envelope, quite possibly the most expensive envelope in history.

  "He hid it inside the Rembrandt?"

  "That's correct, Mr. Allon. It was concealed between Rembrandt's original canvas and a second canvas adhered to the back."

  "How long was the list?"

  "Three sheets of onionskin, written in my father's own hand."

  "And how was it protected?"

  "It was sealed inside a sheath of wax paper."

  "Who did the work for him?"

  "During my father's time in Paris and Amsterdam, he came in contact with a number of people involved in Special Operation Linz, Hitler's art looters. One of them was a restorer. He was the one who devised the method of concealment. And when he'd finished the job, my father repaid the favor by killing him."

  "And the painting?"

  "During his escape from Europe, my father made a brief stop in Zurich to meet with his banker. He left it in a safe-deposit box. Only one other person knew the account number and password."

  "Your mother?"

  Peter Voss nodded.

  "Why didn't your father simply transfer the money to Argentina at that time?"

  "Because it wasn't possible. The Allies were keeping a close watch on financial transactions carried out by Swiss banks. A large transfer of cash and other assets from Zurich to Buenos Aires would have raised a red flag. As for the list, my father didn't dare attempt to carry it with him during his escape. If he'd been arrested on his way to Italy, the list would have guaranteed him a death sentence. He had no choice but to leave the money and the list behind and wait until the dust had settled."

  "How long did he wait?"

  "Six years."

  "The year you and your mother left Europe?"

  "That's correct," Voss said. "When my father was finally able to send for us, he instructed my mother to make a stop in Zurich. The plan was for her to collect the painting, the list, and the money. I didn't understand what was happening at the time, but I remember waiting in the street while my mother went into the bank. Ten minutes later, when she came out, I could see she'd been crying. When I asked what was wrong, she snapped at me to be quiet. After that, we climbed onto a streetcar and rode aimlessly in circles through the city center. My mother was staring out the window. She was saying the same words over and over again. 'What am I going to tell your father? What am I going to tell your father?'"

  "The painting was gone?"

  Voss nodded. "The painting was gone. The list was gone. The money was gone. The banker told my mother that the accounts never existed. 'You must be mistaken, Frau Voss,' he told her. 'Perhaps a different bank.'"

  "How did your father react?"

  "He was furious, of course." Voss paused. "Ironic, isn't it? My father was angry because the money he had stolen had been stolen from him. You could say the painting became his punishment. He avoided justice, but he became obsessed with the Rembrandt and with finding the key to a fortune hidden inside it."

  "Did he try again?"

  "One more time," Voss said. "In 1967, an Argentine diplomat agreed to go to Switzerland on my father's behalf. Under their arrangement, half of any money recovered would be turned over to the Argentine treasury, with the diplomat taking a cut for himself."

  "What happened?"

  "Shortly after the diplomat arrived in Switzerland, he sent word that he had met with my father's banker and was confident of a successful outcome. Two days later, his body was found floating in Lake Zurich. The Swiss inquest found he had slipped from the end of a jetty while sightseeing. My father didn't believe it. He was convinced the man had been murdered."

  "Who was the diplomat?"

  "His name was Carlos Weber."

  "And you, Herr Voss?" Gabriel asked after a long pause. "Did you ever look for the money?"

  "To be honest, I considered it. I thought it might be a way to return some money to my father's victims. To atone. But in the end, I knew it was a fool's errand. The gnomes of Zurich guard their secret treasures very carefully, Mr. Allon. Their banks might look clean and tidy, but the truth is, they're dirty. After the war, the bankers of Switzerland turned away deserving people who had the temerity to come looking for their deposits, not because the banks didn't have the money but because they didn't want to give it up. What chance did the son of a murderer have?"

  "Do you know the name of your father's banker?"

  "Yes," Voss said without hesitation. "It was Walter Landesmann."

  "Landesmann? Why is that name familiar?"

  Peter Voss smiled. "Because his son is one of the most powerful financiers in Europe. In fact, he was just in the news the other day. Something about a new program to combat hunger in Africa. His name is--"

  "Martin Landesmann?"

  Peter Voss nodded. "How's that for a coincidence?"

  "I don't believe in coincidences, Herr Voss."

  Voss lifted his wine toward the sun. "Neither do I, Mr. Allon. Neither do I."

  33

  MENDOZA, ARGENTINA

  Gabriel and Chiara drove out of the vineyard, trailed by a cumulus cloud of butterflies, and returned to Mendoza. That evening they had dinner at a small outdoor restaurant opposite their hotel in the Plaza Italia.

  "You liked him, didn't you?" asked Chiara.

  "Voss?" Gabriel nodded slowly. "More than I wanted to."

  "The question is, do you believe him?"

  "It's a remarkable story," said Gabriel. "And I believe every word of it. Kurt Voss was an easy mark. He was a notorious war criminal, a wanted man. For more than twenty years, the fortune was sitting in Landesmann's bank growing by the day. At some point, Landesmann decided Voss was never coming back, and he convinced himself the money was his for the taking. So he closed out the accounts and destroyed the records."

  "And a fortune of looted Holocaust assets vanished into thin air," Chiara said bitterly.

  "Just like the people it once belonged to."

  "And the painting?"

  "If Landesmann had had any sense, he would have burned it. But he didn't. He was a greedy bastard. And even in 1964, before art prices skyrocketed, the painting was worth
a great deal. I suspect he entrusted it to the Hoffmann Gallery of Lucerne and arranged for a quiet sale."

  "Did he know about the list?"

  "In order to find it, he would have had to pull apart the two canvases and look inside. But he had no reason to do that."

  "So it was still inside the painting at the time of the 1964 sale?"

  "Without question."

  "There's one thing I don't understand," Chiara said after a silence. "Why kill Carlos Weber? After all, Landesmann had quietly turned away Voss's wife when she came looking for the money. Why didn't he do the same when Weber appeared in Zurich?"

  "Perhaps it was because Weber's visit was quasi-official. Remember, he was representing not just Voss but the government of Argentina. That made him dangerous." Gabriel paused. "But I suspect there was something else that made Weber even more dangerous. He knew about the Rembrandt and the list of account numbers hidden inside it. And he made that clear to Landesmann during their meeting."

  "And Landesmann realized that he had a serious problem," Chiara said. "Because whoever was in possession of the Rembrandt also had proof that Kurt Voss's fortune had been hidden in Landesmann's bank."

  Gabriel nodded. "Obviously, Landesmann said something encouraging to Weber to keep him in Zurich long enough to arrange his death. Then, after Weber's unfortunate fall into Lake Zurich, he no doubt undertook a frantic search for the painting."

  "Why didn't he just go back to the Hoffmann Gallery and ask for the name of the person who bought it in 1964?"

  "Because in Switzerland, a private sale means a private sale, even for the likes of Walter Landesmann. Besides, given Landesmann's precarious situation, he would have been very reluctant to call attention to himself like that."