And Edith couldn’t help but pray also for the safety of da Vinci’s Lady with an Ermine. She wondered what had happened to the picture. Had the American soldier she had encountered at the lake—Bonelli?—found the house? What had the soldiers done with the painting? Would they confiscate it, take it back to America with them after all, just as she had been warned that they would do? Would it make another, final voyage, this time across the sea? Edith supposed that she would accept that outcome, as long as the picture was put into a museum collection where it would be properly preserved. Cecilia—her portrait—deserved to be treasured.
But in the back of her mind, Edith wondered if she had missed her chance to make a difference, for the Lady with an Ermine and for so many other important works of art that her hands had touched in recent years. She had made a decision not to share her inventories with that Bonelli, in that strange encounter on a Bavarian hilltop. Was it the right choice? At least, she thought now, she had a better idea of how to put the inventories to best use.
75
Edith
Munich, Germany
May 1945
EDITH WATCHED MANFRED’S HANDS TREMBLE AS HE SHUFFLED the worn, creased pages of her inventories. Then, she saw slow understanding dawn on his lined face. Edith placed a hand over her mouth, stifling a smile.
“Edith.” It was all he could say. His wide eyes ran over the tiny script, the pages and pages of works of art stolen from Polish collections.
Behind them, standing on an easel in her conservation laboratory was the old, overpainted picture by Hans Werl, the same picture that Edith had been working on the day she got the assignment to begin researching the treasures of Poland nearly six years before. How much had changed, how much she had changed, she realized.
Edith touched the dusty surface tentatively with one finger. The picture waited for her; it was just as if she had walked out of the office yesterday, and had arrived to start again, right where she left off. Was that possible? To pick up right where you left off, when so many would never have that luxury?
In the galleries and storage rooms of the Alte Pinakothek, many other treasures awaited, hundreds of paintings and objects stacked methodically in her office and the adjacent storage rooms, waiting in the dim light to be returned to their owners. Edith felt her body quake when she saw the state of the museum. During the Allied strike, a bomb had landed on the roof, collapsing one side of the long façade to the ground. Relief washed over her when she realized that her conservation lab was still standing.
Meanwhile, her colleagues were beginning to return from their far-flung assignments. Around the building, curators and administrators filed back into their offices, wandered the hallways, stopped to embrace the coworkers they had not seen in months, if not years. Manfred had returned from a long stint in Berlin. The atmosphere in the museum was a strange state of euphoric confusion, hushed excitement, and tears of joy, grief, and disillusionment. Edith realized that there would be much to do. With the devastation around them, no one seemed to know where to begin. Would her native country ever be able to recover, to atone for the many acts of evil that were now coming to light?
76
Cecilia
Milan, Italy
June 1491
IN THE NIGHT, HE CAME TO HER.
In the depth of slumber, her heart led her. She smelled him, his intoxicating scent of the forest and horses and old velvet. His thick beard raked across the delicate skin of her neck, sending a shiver down the length of her back. Instinctively, she turned toward him and hooked her ankle around his leg, pulling him to her. Her hands went to his bare shoulders, damp in the clammy air. For a moment, it felt like the seconds before a summer storm, when lightning crackles in the clouds. She inhaled sharply, hungry for breath in the stifling air.
“My flower.”
Softly, he ran his fingers along Cecilia’s jaw. The feeling tingled down through her body and she remembered all the nights he had held her, kissed her, taken her, right in this very bed.
But as he moved his face to her breast and began to twist his fingers clumsily around the tiny buttons of her chemise, Cecilia began to wake. She was raw and sore from the birth. And as much as she wanted him to hold her, to see her, to acknowledge her, to love her, she could not bear to feel his weight on top of her. Not now.
And where was Beatrice? Asleep in their chambers? If she woke, would she come looking for him? Cecilia’s eyes went to the door, where she saw that the duke had fastened the metal latch behind him when he had entered.
At that moment, Cecilia heard Cesare begin to fuss in the next room. She knew that the sound would only get louder. He was hungry. She sat up in bed, and Ludovico rolled onto his arm. She threw back the linens and walked into the small room where Cesare slept. The wet nurse was already on her feet, but Cecilia shook her head. She took her son into her arms and loosened his tight swaddle.
When she returned to the bed, Ludovico was sitting on the edge, tangled in the linens and running his palms over his black hair. In the moonlight, she saw the profile of his bare arm and chest. She settled herself beside him, Cesare cradled in her arms. She unfastened her nightshirt and let it fall from her shoulders, only the edges of her body visible in the moonlight. She felt the baby’s delicate skin stick to her bare breast in the stale air. While Ludovico watched, she guided Cesare’s mouth to her breast. For a few quiet moments, the three of them sat there in silence on the edge of the bed. She felt Ludovico’s eyes on her.
For a fleeting moment, Cecilia closed her eyes and allowed herself the fantasy that everything was perfect, just the three of them together. But she knew in her heart that it was just that. A fantasy.
Would His Lordship claim this bastard child as his own?
Ludovico leaned over and rested his chin on Cecilia’s shoulder, looking down at the baby. He watched the curve of Cesare’s angelic face in the gray glow of the moonlight. Cecilia searched for Ludovico’s black eyes in the darkness, and finally, he returned her gaze, a flicker in the nightglow.
“Ludovico,” she whispered. “Your son.”
77
Edith
Munich, Germany
May 1945
EDITH’S DESK WAS A DISASTER OF STACKED PAPERS, SMALL objects, and dust. But on her chair, Manfred had left a copy of a British newspaper. She took a deep breath and allowed herself to open its folds. There were two different articles on Hans Frank. One concentrated on calculating the number of deaths the man was responsible for—now counting into the thousands. In her mind, Edith included Heinrich in that category. The second article spoke of the horrific death camps he’d opened all across Poland. His own people were put in those camps to be tortured and starved. How could a man do such a thing?
“Edith!”
Edith turned to see the museum director stride through the door. Without thinking, Edith pressed the newspaper into the messy stack on her desk, her heart pounding.
“What a sight you are! It has been so long.” Generaldirektor Buchner grasped her hand in both of his. She felt the calluses there, but his eyes were soft and sincere. “I am gratified to see you in good health.”
“As much as can be discerned from the outside,” she said, returning the grasp of his hand.
“Yes,” he said, his brow furrowing. “I suppose each of us is carrying our own burden on the inside.”