As the doors of the library opened, Edith positioned herself beside Mühlmann, who had finally stopped his pacing. They waited.
Soon, a line of officers in long coats filed into the reading room, pistols strapped prominently around their waists. Edith watched Kai brush lint from his uniform. The men saluted in Kai’s direction. If they took note of Edith at all, they showed no sign.
In the midst of another swirl of men in uniform, a great buzzard of an officer, his field coat heavy with decoration, strode into the room. His hair dark and slicked, his nose a ridged beak, the man raked his dark eyes like a bird of prey across the reading room. Edith took a step back into the shadows, pressing her body between two easels.
The new governor of Poland, she thought. Hans Frank. It could only be.
“Sieg Heil!” The man extended his arm, saluting Kai.
Kai returned the gesture. “Governor Frank.” For a few moments, the men stood face-to-face, both broad-chested, preening birds, their jaws set and their eyes locked. As they raised their right hands in the gesture of Nazi unity, Edith had trouble recognizing Kai, the opaque yet gentle-mannered art historian she had begun to know.
After the formal greeting, Hans Frank’s manner softened. He offered his right hand to Kai, pumping it vigorously. “My friend,” he said. “How gratifying to find you here.” Frank was close enough to Edith that she could smell the strong aroma of soap and pine. His black hair was raked back against his head as if he had used shoe polish to manicure it.
Kai gestured for Governor Frank to follow him toward the first painting they had placed on an easel, a small eighteenth-century French painting that showed a view of an idealized landscape, a classical temple in a lush setting. A small group of soldiers followed, and Edith was left to stand alone.
Was she invisible? She hesitated, unsure whether or not to draw attention to herself.
She watched the governor run his dark eyes over Raphael’s Portrait of a Young Man. He was rapt, she could see. Kai held his full attention, giving Governor Frank details about where and how the pictures were located, and what made them worthy of preservation under the Reich.
A few of the soldiers idled at the doorway to the reading room, looking bored. Another few straggled behind Kai and Hans Frank, listening to Kai’s description of the paintings. One of the soldiers reached out to a small portrait as if he were going to run his fingers down its surface. Edith stepped forward, ready to stop him, but he hesitated, put his hands behind his back, and then continued on.
“We do not know the identity of the sitter,” Kai was explaining to Governor Frank, “but some believe that Raphael may have painted it as a self-portrait.”
Edith felt a flash of envy, that feeling she always experienced when she heard someone who held the confidence and talent to share their knowledge. It was one of her father’s gifts, the ability to make the viewer really “see” the work in a way they hadn’t before. Her heart ached that his brilliant mind had been degraded in such a cruel way. Her heart leapt a little as she clutched onto the hope that she would soon see her father.
Governor Frank gazed intently at each painting, nodding his admiration. Finally, he stopped in front of the Lady with an Ermine. Kai paused, giving him a moment to absorb the picture. The way the governor was looking at it made Edith squirm. It was a hungry, consumptive look, the look of an obsessive collector. She had seen it many times among collectors and would-be collectors as they browsed the galleries at the Alte Pinakothek.
“It is considered the first modern portrait,” Mühlmann began. “Da Vinci has not painted her in profile as portraits had been painted before, or as an idealized woman of mythical status.”
Edith’s heart began racing in her chest as she heard her own words come out of Mühlmann’s mouth. Was he taking credit for her knowledge of the picture? She felt a streak of heat across her face and neck. How dare he take ownership of her own research, knowledge he may not have known if she had not fed him these very words?
Mühlmann continued. “Instead, da Vinci has gone beyond tradition. He has captured the duke’s mistress as she probably looked in life . . .”
“Where did you find this?” Frank interrupted, a demanding tone in his voice.
Kai stammered to a stop, seemingly annoyed to have been stalled in the middle of sharing his newfound knowledge. “Our own Fräulein Becker found it in a stash the Party obtained from the Czartoryski Palace.”
“Fräulein Becker,” the governor said.
Kai raised a hand to motion for Edith to join them. She stepped into the light.
The governor turned his dark eyes to Edith now. Greed. Yes, that was it, that look on his face. She cringed inside, wishing that she could fade back into the shadows.
Edith gathered her nerves. “We found it hidden in a secret room of the family palace at Pełkinie, walled up behind brick and mortar.”
“Forgive me,” Kai said, gently reaching for Edith’s elbow. “May I introduce Edith Becker? She came to us from the Alte Pinakothek in Munich,” he said, “highly recommended by Generaldirecktor Buchner for her experience in Italian Renaissance painting, and especially in conservation. Graduated in the top of her class from the Academy of Fine Arts.”
Hans Frank took her in with his dark eyes, and Edith wished that Kai would stop heaping praise on her. Now, a few of the soldiers were also watching her. Just as she had back in that museum meeting room in Munich, somehow she had made herself the center of attention.
Governor Frank nodded. “I am impressed, fräulein.” He took her hand in greeting, gripping a little more firmly than she would like. “You may know that it was our Führer’s greatest dream to attend the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, and I myself considered a career in art before my father pressed me on to law school. I look forward to having many conversations with you.”
“Thank you.” She met his gaze, hoping that he would not feel the clamminess of her palm. Her instinct told her to pull her hand away, but she did not want to give this boorish man the satisfaction of having rattled her composure. She held on until he finally let go and spun around on his heel. He addressed Kai again.
“Sehr gut! I am pleased,” he said, and she saw Kai’s mouth spread into a thin line that looked more like a grimace than a smile.
For a few long, silent moments, Governor Frank strode around the room again, running his careful gaze over the little exhibition. Then, he stopped and pointed a long finger at three paintings. He addressed the soldiers following him. “This one, this one, and this one.” Edith felt all the hairs rise on the back of her neck. Raphael’s Portrait of a Young Man. Rembrandt’s Landscape. And da Vinci’s Lady with an Ermine.
The Great Three.
“These will stay with me in Kraków,” he said to Kai. “You may take the rest to Berlin.” He dismissed the other pictures with a quick flick of his hand. The soldiers moved into action. Edith watched as one young soldier grasped the frame of the Raphael and pulled it from the easel.
“Wait!” Edith cried. Without thinking, she rushed forward and grasped the forearm of the soldier with the painting in his hands. Under her grip, the soldier froze. For Edith, time seemed to stand still. Would they listen to her now that she had been the center of their focus? Would she have any say in the matter at all? But the soldier turned away from her and all the men in the room turned their attention to Hans Frank instead.