Original owner: Nowak family, Lower Silesia, exact town uncertain
“Good morning, my dear.” Jakub, the lean Polish translator, entered the room, smelling of soap and the oily cream he used to slick his hair and wiry mustache.
Edith quickly stuffed her duplicate inventory page between the creased pages of her ledger. In a way, Jakub had reminded Edith of her own father, and she felt comfortable in his presence. But now, she felt the sting, the panic of her secret perhaps having been discovered. Had he seen her copying the ledgers?
But Jakub hardly seemed to notice what Edith was doing. He sat at a large table and began poring over his own stack of pages. The German officers relied on Jakub to translate a variety of things that came through the doors. Edith watched him carefully noting the contents of a letter. He was meticulous, dutiful. Just doing what he was asked because, well, what choice did he have? Just like her, Edith thought, and she wondered where Jakub’s true sympathies lay. Edith walked over to Jakub and perched on the edge of the table.
“Jakub,” she began, her voice barely above a whisper. She struggled for what to say or how to broach the subject. But she had his attention now, his sharp blue eyes on her.
“I wondered if you had any . . . contact . . . with groups outside . . .” she began, hesitating. She knew that Jakub left the palace at the end of each day and returned the next morning. Edith did not know where he went, or who or what he knew beyond these walls. His face remained blank, unreadable.
She tried again. “I have heard that there are people in the countryside who can get information to those who might, who might . . .” Her eyes scanned the vast horde of stolen goods stacked high in the shadows of the storerooms. “Help protect all of this. Or maybe get it back where it belongs. Do you know anything about that?”
Edith watched Jakub press his back against the chair and purse his lips. For a moment, he considered her words, turning his pen over and over between his fingers. Finally, he said, “I am only doing what I am asked, my dear.” A tight grin. “What else could I do?”
Edith nodded and began to turn away, but then Jakub leaned forward and whispered, “But please . . . tell me. What were you thinking?”
Edith walked over to the ledger book and removed the duplicate she had stashed in between its pages. She returned to the table and handed the page to Jakub.
Edith watched Jakub peer down at her tiny, neat handwriting through his glasses. Silence stretched long and heavy between them. Would he turn her in? Would he tell the officers upstairs that she had been compiling a duplicate inventory until she could find a way to get it into the hands of the right resistance group? What would happen to her? “You are copying the inventories,” Jakub whispered finally, meeting her gaze.
“I . . . yes,” Edith said, struggling to explain herself, but Jakub seemed to understand already.
Jakub paused, pressing his fingers under his chin. “Your Governor Frank,” he said. At the mention of Hans Frank’s name, Edith bristled. “Perhaps you know that he has already ordered the murder of hundreds of thousands of my people? Maybe more. My brothers are missing. And their wives and children.” A shadow passed over Jakub’s face. “His men do not hesitate to shoot on sight. Without cause.”
A sharp pain stabbed at Edith’s gut and she stared at her hands. How could she explain that she herself had helped Frank get what he wanted? That Jakub might have every right to blame Edith along with all the other Germans who had invaded his home country so brutally? “I only know what is reported in the papers,” she lied.
“And the German press will not report his crimes against us,” Jakub said. Just as Edith conceded that Jakub would not help her, he said, “But it is my belief that not all Germans are bad. You, for example. It is clear to me that you are a lady with great respect for art. And for human life. You want to see these things returned to their owners.” He gestured into the dark recesses of the storeroom, then to her inventory page on the table. “I might help you,” he said finally, lowering his voice.
“Really?” Edith felt her shoulders fall in relief. “What can we do, Jakub? I feel so helpless!”
Jakub paused and examined the doorway warily. Finally he whispered, “The ladies in the kitchen. They may appear to know nothing, but they are connected with groups beyond this palace.”
Edith’s jaw dropped. The quiet, unassuming women who baked bread, washed dishes, and laundered their bed linens? Those who didn’t appear to understand German at all? Edith had all but given up on communicating with them. Now, she could hardly believe what Jakub was saying.
“Your secret is also mine,” said Jakub. Then he tapped Edith’s copied inventory page with his fingers. “If we work together, I think we can find a way to put these into the right hands.”
Part IV
Object of Desire
48
Leonardo
Milan, Italy
April 1491
THE PORTRAIT IS FINISHED.
His Lordship’s secretary has asked me to arrange an evening to unveil Cecilia’s likeness to the court, to Ludovico’s closest friends and guests. For now, the picture rests on an easel in my bedchamber in the Corte Vecchia, the paint finally dry under my thumb. I return to my drawings, the face of Cecilia Gallerani seeming to watch over my shoulder with her curious expression.
I thumb through the stacks of drawings I have made during the years I have spent in Milan. A man based on the perfect proportions described by Vitruvius. Ink-washed renditions of Our Lady turned out for various devotional pictures. A design for a public square and my failed attempt to win the commission for a cupola for Milan’s cathedral. Countless studies of horses in preparation for the great equestrian monument to His Lordship’s late father. Nearly all of these things, Ludovico il Moro has tasked me to design.
But the truth is that His Lordship needs none of them. On a fresh piece of parchment, I have begun to plot a series of architectural designs for improvements to the Castello Sforzesco that will bolster its defense in the face of invaders. I have spent many hours taking measurements of the old battlements and the long outdated underground system of hydraulics. I have redesigned the bridge over the moat, which is currently useless against an attack.
In recent weeks, I have watched mercenary commanders under His Lordship’s employ race in and out of the castle gates on powerful horses. Two of Ludovico’s closest advisers have disappeared; I do not dare to ask where they have gone. In his chambers, Ludovico il Moro surrounds himself with an ever-tighter circle of men. He seems to imagine threats from all sides—inside the castle and without.
A battle is coming, I think. It is only a matter of time.
49
Dominic
Siegen, Germany
April 1945
A BATTLE IS COMING, DOMINIC THOUGHT. IT IS ONLY A matter of time.
The rutted road curved through the woods, the Jimmy’s headlights pushing golden fingers across dusky tree trunks. They moved at a crawl; Hancock hung half out of the truck, squinting into the woods, searching. Dominic couldn’t help wondering if they were lost. He hoisted his rifle a little more snugly into his arms, a nasty suspicion twisting his gut. Lost. Or being led into some kind of a trap.