Page 78 of The Girl You Left Behind
“Even if—”
“No.”
She feels his eyes on her as she gathers up her things and leaves the room.
•••
Paul dials the number for the fourth time, rests his finger above the Dial button, then changes his mind and sticks his telephone in his back pocket.
“Are you coming for lunch?” Janey appears at the door. “The table is booked for one-thirty.”
She must have just applied perfume. It punctures the air, even on his side of his desk. “You really need me there?” He is not in the mood for small talk. He doesn’t want to be charming, to detail the company’s astonishing track record in recovery. He doesn’t want to find himself seated beside Janey, to feel her leaning against him as she laughs, her knee gravitating toward his. More pertinently, he does not like André Lefèvre, with his suspicious eyes and his downturned mouth. He has rarely taken such an instant dislike to a client.
“Can I ask when you first realized the painting was missing?”he had asked.
“We discover it through an audit.”
“So you didn’t miss it personally?”
“Personally?” He had shrugged at the use of the word. “Why should someone else benefit financially from a work that should be in our possession?”
“You don’t want to come? Why?” says Janey. “What else have you got on?”
“I thought I’d catch up with some paperwork.”
Janey lets her gaze rest on him. She is wearing lipstick. And heels.She does have good legs, he thinks absently.
“We need this case, Paul. And we need to give André the confidence that we’re going to win.”
“In that case I think my time would be better spent doing background than having lunch with him.” He doesn’t look at her. His jaw seems to have set at a mulish angle. He’s been sour with everyone all week. “Take Miriam,” he says. “She deserves a nice lunch.”
“I don’t think our budget stretches to treating secretaries as and when we feel like it. Is everything all right, Paul?”
“Everything’s fine.”
“Well.” She cannot keep the edge from her voice. “I see I can’t persuade you. I’ll look forward to hearing what you’ve turned up on the case. I’m sure it’ll be conclusive.”
She stands there a moment longer, and then she leaves. He can hear her talking in French with Lefèvre as they head out of the office.
•••
Liv takes the painting off the wall. She runs her fingers lightly over the oil surface, feeling the graduated whorls and strokes, wondering at the fact that they were placed there by the artist’s own hand, and gazes at the woman on the canvas. The gilded frame is chipped in places, but she has always found it charming, has enjoyed the contrast between what was old and shabbily ornate and the crisp, clean lines around her. She has liked the fact thatThe Girl You Left Behindis the only colorful thing in the room, antique and precious, glowing like a little jewel at the end of her bed.
Except now she is not justThe Girl, a shared piece of history, an intimate gift between honeymooners. She is now the wife of a famous artist, missing, possibly murdered. She is the last link to a husband in a concentration camp. She is a missing painting, the subject of a lawsuit, the future focus of investigations. She does not know how to feel about this new version: She only knows that she has lost some part of her already.
A painting... was taken and passed into German possession.
André Lefèvre, his face blankly belligerent, barely even bothering to glance at Sophie’s image. And McCafferty. Every time she remembers Paul McCafferty in that meeting room her brain hums with anger. Sometimes she feels as if she is burning with it, as if she is permanently overheating. How can she just hand over Sophie?
20
February 1917
Dearest sister
It is three weeks and four days since you left. I don’t know if this letter will find you or, indeed, if the others did; the mayor has set up a new line of communication and promises he will send this on once he gets word that it is secure. So I wait, and I pray.
It has rained for fourteen days, turning what remained of the roads to mud that sucks at our legs and pulls the horses’ shoes from their hoofs. We have rarely ventured out beyond the square: It is too cold and too difficult, and in truth I no longer wish to leave the children, even if just for a few minutes. Édith sat by the window for three days after you left, refusing to move, until I feared she would be ill and physically forced her to come to the table and, later, to bed. She no longer speaks. I’m afraid I have barely had time to comfort her. There are fewer Germans coming in the evenings now, but enough that I have to work every night until midnight just to feed and clear up after them.
