Silvia was also shocked to hear this. She widened her eyes and looked at Haejin to let him know that even she hadn’t seen this coming.
Haejin thought Silvia was even more capable than the Medici at getting information. However, she had never heard about this.
“But I think Albert Harrington can be useful…”
Cavani took a sip of wine and said, “This happened a long time ago, and I cannot find many details about it. It is so vague as if it was shrouded by a thick mist, so I cannot tell who is on my side and who isn’t. I most certainly cannot trust Europeans, especially aristocrats who have money and men. I trust you for the reason I invited you earlier. You are from far away.”
Haejin could understand that, but he still had a few questions.
“Hmm… then I am supposed to appraise a few artifacts here and I’m done?”
Haejin had thought it would take at least two weeks, but judging from what Cavani just said, it looked like it would only take a few days.
“No. You should go to a few places with me and join me in my detective game,” Cavani replied.
“Detective game?” Haejin asked.
Cavani then explained, “With this matter, I cannot afford the luxury of waiting until my men get me the answers. I must check with my own eyes. I want you to help me with that.”
Haejin had no reason to refuse. Apart from everything, going after the artifacts the Nazi had stolen was exciting enough.
“Then, shall we go?”
Cavani took his unfinished glass of wine in his hand and started to walk.
Haejin followed him, but then he sensed Silvia’s hand grabbing his.
He looked at her, and Silvia mouthed a question, ‘What kind of artifact are we about to see?’
‘I don’t know…’
Cavani took them to the mansion’s basement storage.
Usually, a storage is humid and smells bad, and it would also have various bugs. However, this storage looked like a neatly cleaned room.
The room’s temperature and humidity were being perfectly controlled. In the middle of it, there were two paintings covered with brown cloth.
“We didn’t meet anyone on our way down here,” Haejin commented.
Cavani sat down on a chair and replied, “I have sent everyone outside this mansion except for the necessary personnel.”
“Oh…”
“Actually, I wondered if I should call you or not for some time. Oh, it wasn’t because I doubted your skills. After our last meeting, I got to admire your ability.”
Haejin didn’t say anything, but Silvia asked, “But then, why did you hesitate to call him?”
Cavani looked into her eyes and said, “You are quite unusual. You are an Arabian with an American accent, and yet you are not bound by your ancestor’s rules… and your blue eyes seem to have strange powers. Was your name Silvia?”
This surprised Silvia. She nodded, however, she couldn’t help but flinch while saying, “Yes, it is.”
“Mr. Park is very lucky to be with you.” Cavani smiled at Haejin and continued, “I hesitated because I thought what was about to happen could become our weakness. Maybe…”
Haejin realized instinctively what he was trying to say and asked, “Are you thinking your own family might be involved in this?”
“Yes. World War Two devastated Europe, including Italy. However, I still cannot dismiss this doubt. There cannot be many who can plan such a bold artifact heist… merely stealing doesn’t make sense. Hundreds of forgeries were made in the process, and it would require more than 5, 6 people to do such a thing.”
Haejin’s jaw dropped to hear that hundreds of fakes had been made.
“That many?”
Cavani explained, “Huge amount of fakes have been quickly released all around the world. I am thinking the forgeries that were made back then can still be seen now. Maybe most of the paintings, in museums and galleries, are fakes.”
In fact, most of the paintings in museums and galleries were indeed controversial.
However, they had to be left where they were because there was no clear proof of them being fake, and there were more than one or two such artifacts.
“Haha…”
It was so ridiculous that Haejin laughed.
But then, Silvia asked, “Does this matter have something to do with the amber room that William I presented to Feodor I?”
Cavani was surprised for the first time at this.
“Why do you think so?”
“I thought about the most valuable ones among the artifacts lost during the WW2, and I recalled the room and its treasures first,” Silvia replied.
The amber room was first made for the king, but then it was moved to Catherine Palace in 1716 as a gift to Russia.
But during the WW2, after Germany took Saint Petersburg, they dismantled the room that weighed 6 tons and took it to Germany. However, although there is a record that says the ambers were put in 27 boxes and carried away, that huge amount of treasure vanished after that.
It would be worth 500 thousand dollars now, but it has never shown itself after that.
However, the amber room has then been recreated with other ambers to celebrate the 300th year after the birth of Saint Petersburg city.
“Hmm… actually, I have my doubts. I haven’t found any lead yet… but I think these criminals might know where the treasure is. Of course, I have no proof. It’s just my guess,” Silvia replied.
She said she was making a guess, but was it Haejin’s imagination, or did she really sound like she was sure of it?
Cavani amusedly smiled and said, “You are smart and quick-witted. You would be a great help to Mr. Park.”
“Thank you.”
Silvia shyly smiled, but strictly speaking, she was way more capable than Haejin. Even though she had been a princess, she had never given up studying. She spoke five different languages and had gotten a master’s degree in economics at the United Arab Emirates University.
Haejin was rather embarrassed at this. He cleared his throat and changed the subject.
“Khmm… so anyway, these paintings are what you recovered from them?”
“Yes. This mansion is my family’s, so I come here from time to time to rest, but a strange rumor started to spread among antique shops here in Vienna, that the paintings the Nazi had stolen had resurfaced. At the time, I spent huge money to buy the two paintings. I’ve also never shown it to anyone till now.”
However, it was strange.
“But you must have thought the paintings might be fake. What made you think these two paintings were those paintings lost during the war?” Haejin asked.
Cavani explained, “When I became the head of the Medici family, I gained access to the family record. It is like a journal that the former heads wrote. It allowed me to know about not just this family but also the history of Europe with Italy as its center.”
“Then shouldn’t you be able to know if your family was involved in this matter?”
Cavani shook his head and said, “Strangely, there isn’t much record about the time of World War 2 and afterward as if that part has been emitted. The charity auction of Mauerbach must have been an opportunity that cannot be missed by the family, but there is no record of any Medici participating in that auction. It is not right.”
It was really strange.
The Medici always tried to collect valuable artifacts, so they would never let go of such an opportunity.
Haejin could now see why Cavani was doubting his own family.
“Hmm… I see. Then I should start appraising now.”
Haejin stood up. Then, Cavani finished his glass of wine and asked, “Should I wish for them to be real? Or should I wish for them to be fake?”
“If they are real, we should be happy as we would get some traces of that criminal organization, and if they are fake… I guess it would depend on whose fakes they are,” Haejin replied.
“Then I should hope for them to be real,” Cavani said.
“It would make things easier.”
Haejin slowly approached one of the paintings and uncovered it.
The painting was so weird that it wasn’t easy to tell what it depicted.
It was an oil painting, but it had something else, pulp mixed with glue and lime.
“It’s papier-mache,” Haejin said.
“Do you know who the artist is?”
Haejin didn’t answer and examined the painting for some time.
There was no signature, and there was no record nor scribbles at the back of the canvas.
Haejin examined it for about half an hour and said, “It is a painting, but it’s a painting of a sculpture. It reminds me of someone.”
“Who is it?” Cavani asked.
“Alexander Archipenko.”
Archipenko was born in Russia, but he fled to America in 1923 and became an American.
Cavani nodded, “I have been thinking so, too… it turns out I was right.”
Haejin explained, “Only a few paintings of Archipenko are left, although many of his sculptures have survived. And as his paintings are in a unique style, they are not easy to imitate. Judging from its condition, it is definitely at least a few decades old. It would require scientific analysis to be sure, but I think it is Archipenko’s congratulations.”
Haejin thought he must congratulate first since if it were Archipenko’s, it was worth at least 5 billion won.
“Thank you. I had my guesses, but it was really Archipenko’s…”
As one of the missing paintings had been found, they now had one piece of the puzzle.
“Are you going to retrace this painting’s history?” Haejin asked.
“I should, but first, I must speak to the man who sold this to me.”
Cavani immediately sent his servant to bring the merchant to him then said, “You should now look at the other one.”
At this, Haejin carefully uncovered the other painting.
It showed sunflowers burning under the hot sun.
The background was damp grey-green, and the sunflowers were in gloomy colors. The moment Haejin saw it, he exclaimed in surprise, “This is…”
“I was shocked as well when I saw this for the first time. I never imagined I would meet Egon Schiele’s Sunflowers here.”
This Sunflowers was one of the masterpieces that disappeared during the war. It was quite famous.
“However, the merchant who sold this must have known it,” Haejin commented.
Of course, he knew. If he hadn’t known about this painting, he would have been an antique merchant with crude knowledge about the history of art.
“He thought it was fake. That is why he sold it to me at five thousand euros.”
Earlier, Cavani had said he had paid a lot because he had assumed that the paintings were fake.
“5000 euros… you have paid a lot for a fake,” Haejin said.
“But isn’t a fake this good worth at least that much money?”
Cavani was right, the painting was great to the point that it would make you think it was a genuine artifact.
Along with Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele was one of the master artists of Austria.
But there were people who don’t like his paintings as most of them are about eroticism.
He painted nude, sexual organs, and even scenes of sex and homosexuality.
However, this Sunflowers painting wasn’t about that kind of eroticism, anyone could enjoy it.
“Even if this is fake, with this quality, it is definitely worth 5000 euros. Congratulations,” Haejin said.
Cavani burst into laughter, “Haha! It almost feels like I forced you to say that. It is such a pleasant experience to get celebrated for buying it at 5000 euros.”
But then, Silvia, who had been watching quietly, asked, “Have you done research on Karl Grunwald?”
Karl Grunwald became friends with Egon Schiele during World War 1. He was very close to Schiele and even did a portrait model for him.
Cavani was impressed.
“Ah! You are truly wise. I haven’t thought of it. If this painting is real, I must look for Grunwald’s descendants. Maybe they know something.”
As Grunwald was a merchant who collected antiques, he owned a number of valuable works of art. However, after Austria merged with Germany, he decided to flee.
He ran away from the Nazi with a few of Egon Schiele’s paintings that he had in Vienna, but unfortunately, he couldn’t take Sunflowers as it was in Strasbourg.
Eventually, after the Nazi took Strasbourg, they stole the painting. Then, it resurfaced on an auction between the stolen artifacts in 1942.
After that, Grunwald and his son tried many times to get it back.
Although Cavani was impressed, Haejin wasn’t that surprised.
It was because of that feeling that he would get from a fake painting.
However, he wasn’t disappointed. He thought that since it was of great quality, the forger must have had the real painting next to him when he had made it.
“Then, I should start appraising.”
He slowly examined it, and he couldn’t help but be impressed.
Egon Schiele was deeply influenced by Gustav Klimt who was like his artistic father. But afterward, he got away from Klimt’s style and created his own unique and powerful outline.
This painting had his own style and even his unique gloomy mood. It was hard to think of it as fake.
If Haejin hadn’t learned magic, he would have never thought it was fake. However, it was strange as the merchant who had sold it had been so sure that it was fake.
“I must congratulate you once again for buying this at 5000 euros. It is remarkable, but… why did that merchant think this was fake?” Haejin asked.
Cavani collected his thoughts and then explained, “He said he had bought it at an extremely old antique shop in Berlin. The seller even told him that it was a great fake that would fool most appraisers, and the forger was a master like Tom Keating, Eric Hepburn, and Mark Landis. So, I asked if he wasn’t tempted at all. I would have given 5 million euros without thinking twice if he had said it was real, but then he smiled.”
“Why did he smile?” Haejin asked.
“I wondered that as well and asked. He said credibility was everything to him, and he would be left with nothing without it. He then added he would be in jail in no time if he had made the wrong decision, and I couldn’t argue anymore,” Cavani answered.
Haejin thought it was odd. That merchant had sold a real painting and a fake painting of great quality as fakes…
If he had said they were both real, he would have gotten millions of euros in cash.
“That merchant is really impressive,” Haejin commented.
“That is why I have so many questions for him. At the time, I couldn’t ask as I didn’t know about the paintings’ authenticity, but I can ask now.”
Cavani remained calm.
He never showed the changes in his emotion like a true leader of a prestigious family.
“Hmm… I see.”
Haejin sighed and shook his head. He couldn’t find any evidence of the painting being fake.
It had Egon Schiele’s unique gloomy colors, his powerful outlines, and the feeling of life and death.
Haejin had planned to use magic to find out about the forger and the seller, but he was a little disappointed to not find anything.
Seeing a fake that he couldn’t discern with his own skills felt as if he was being defeated by the forger.
At first, he tried to find some proof without using magic because he was worried about not being able to tell others even if he knew that it was fake. In fact, there might not be any evidence just like before.
So, he then used magic to look into the past, but he was startled and took a step back.
Silvia saw this and came to take his hand. She asked, “Are you okay? Is there something wrong?”
She meant about using magic.
When they were alone, she always warned him that the chosen’s power enabled one to do anything, but it sometimes destroyed its master.
“No, it’s not it… I was just a little surprised. May I turn off the lights?”
At this, Silvia went back to her sit. Cavani gulped hard and nodded, “Yes.”
He turned off the lights, and immediately the room became dark. They could not even see their own hands.
Haejin took out a small lamp and looked at the painting with it.
10 minutes went by in the darkness. Then, Haejin stood up while saying, “We can turn on the lights now.”
The room became bright again. Cavani couldn’t wait anymore, he stood up and asked, “Why were you surprised? And why did you turn out the lights? I am very eager to know.”
“Oh, first of all, this painting is fake. However, the forger is a great artist. I almost gave up on it.”
Haejin was telling the truth.
If he hadn’t looked into the past to find out that the forger hadn’t made a rough sketch before painting it, he would have had to give up and go home.
“I also acknowledge the forger’s skills. I would like to see him work myself. But why is this painting fake?” Cavani asked.
Haejin explained, “Egon Schiele used strong and lively outlines. So, he must have drawn rough sketches many times before painting on it. However, this painting has no sketches. It means…”
“It is an imitation. Remarkable. How did you find out that there was no rough sketch?”
Actually, Haejin had prepared some scientific tools before he got there.
He had set an appraisal room in his museum, and he also wanted to use science to make his work easier as much as he could.
He had brought a few things when he came to Austria because he didn’t want to be forced to not tell the truth just because there was no evidence, and one of them was this special UV lamp.
Silvia had gotten it for him, and it enabled Haejin to find out if there were rough sketches or not.
It was very fortunate that he got to appraise a fake without a rough sketch right after he got it.
“This is a special UV lamp. I can check if there is a rough sketch or not with this,” Haejin replied.
“Oh, I see.”
Haejin explained, “This was certainly not made recently. Most museums do this kind of scientific analysis these days, and even auctions agencies like Christie’s and Sotheby’s do it, so there is no reason for such a skilled forger to leave out the rough sketch.”
“Then…”
Haejin concluded, “It was made in the 1960s or before that. There must have been no reason to bother to draw a sketch before scientific means of appraisal became popular. Of course, now he would draw the sketch and paint on it to fool science.”
Cavani looked excited as he nodded.
It was probably because he was sure he had found a lead to the organization that had stolen the Nazi’s paintings.
“Then what are you going to do now?” Haejin asked.
Cavani answered, “Now I feel relieved to know it is fake. I have called the merchant, so why don’t we have dinner while we wait?”
“It would be my honor,” Haejin replied.
“Oh, and you will get your fee in time after three days.”
“Thank you.”
They had agreed on Haejin’s fee before he arrived in Vienna.
The Medici family accepted his terms of 1% of the appraised price and even offered an additional bonus.
After that, they had a pleasant dinner and went out to the wide garden to have dessert while looking at the starry night sky.
“My father liked Egon Schiele’s paintings a lot. However, by the time he became interested in them, they had already gotten quite expensive, and my mother didn’t like them as they were indecent. But it feels so strange to get one of his painting now.”
“It is a little hard to believe a Medici didn’t like a painting because it was indecent,” Haejin commented.
Cavani smiled bitterly at this and said, “Actually, it is a little embarrassing to say this to an outsider, but my father had affairs with many women, like Egon Schiele’s father.”
“Oh… that explains why your mother didn’t like Egon Schiele’s paintings.”
Egon Schiele’s father had syphilis and even transferred it to his pregnant wife, making her miscarry the child.
As Egon Schiele’s sister also died of congenital syphilis, his interest and fear for sexuality eventually showed itself in his paintings.
“We made such great progress on your day of arrival, so I feel we will get good results afterward. If we get lucky, we might be able to find a lot of the lost Nazi artifacts,” Cavani commented.
“I hope so, too…”
But then, a servant came to them and said, “Mr. Matias is here.”
The conversation stopped there, and the silhouette of an old man came very slowly.
He was small and couldn’t walk with ease, so he was clearly very old.
“Welcome. I apologize for calling you so suddenly,” Cavani said.
“Haha… how can I say no to your request when I make my living with paintings?”
Cavani and the man appeared to be very close, but Haejin couldn’t say anything as he was too shocked.
Although the man was old, he could recognize his face.
He was the forger he had seen through magic.
In his youth, he had chosen one of the paintings, piled up at one side, to imitate it.
He was wearing a one-eye magnifying glass to see the painting better, and his cotton shirt was covered in so many colors that it was hard to know what color it had been at first.
The handsome and lively man, who had been painting with passion, now showed up here as an old man.
“This is your favorite 2011 Bordeaux grand cru.”
Cavani had his servant bring some wine, and the old man brightened up while saying, “Oh, my mouth is going to have a good time since forever. Well, why have you called this old man? And who is this lady with blue eyes and that Asian?”
Cavani smiled brightly and introduced Haejin and Silvia in English.
“This man here is Mr. Park, he is a special appraiser my family has invited. He has extraordinary talents and inspiration. If he had known how to paint, my family would have gotten an artist to sponsor.”
The old forger looked at Haejin, clearly interested.
“A special appraiser of the Medici… and an Asian, I am surprised.”
His English was good, probably because he was an art dealer.
Although he said so, his eyes showed contempt.
Actually, discrimination on Asians happens frequently in Europe.
In a way, it was unusual for Cavani di Piero Medici to be fond of Haejin regardless of his race.
“You won’t think so once you see what he can do.” Cavani sensed the hidden meaning in the old forger’s remark and smiled bitterly. Then he continued, “And this beautiful lady here is Silvia, Mr. Park’s partner.”
“Ohh, nice to meet you. Are you from America? Or Spain? Or Morocco? Spanish women are passionate and splendid. Although I’ve never met you before, I can feel that passion in your eyes.”
It could be natural for him to be curious as Silvia’s skin was a healthy brown unlike white people, but Haejin didn’t like that attitude.
He looked like he would collapse and die at any moment, and he was trying to flirt…
“Thank you, but I am here for work. That kind of compliment is not appropriate, so please stop,” Silvia firmly replied.
The old man then burst into laughter, “Hahaha! I knew it! I knew you would be so charming. I’m Matias Leno. Getting to talk with you alone is worth coming all this way. Have you heard about me?”
Haejin frowned, and Cavani hastily stopped Matias, “That would be enough with the introductions. Matias, you were not so talkative when you were with me, but now you are chattering like a little girl. It feels like I am seeing someone else.”
“Haha, I shouldn’t have humiliated myself in front of the head of the Medici family. I apologize.”
Cavani continued, “I called you here because I have a few questions. Of course, there will be matters you cannot easily talk about, but I hope you would answer wisely, considering the relation between us.”
In a way, it sounded like a threat. Matias realized how serious the situation was and said, “That is scary enough. Okay.”
“One of the two paintings you sold me before is real,” Cavani then said.
“What? It is real?”
Haejin carefully studied his reaction.
Judging from his skills capable of making a fake Egon Schiele’s Sunflowers, he thought he must have known Alexander Archipenko’s painting had been real.
However, Matia seemed to know nothing about that painting.
Cavani grimly nodded, “I am delighted to be so fortunate, but as you well know, this is a very sensitive matter. If that painting has resurfaced, a lot of the other paintings can be slumbering somewhere.”
“So, you want me to tell you from where I got it?” Matias asked.
“Yes.”
Matias stroked his few streaks of beard and soon shook his head, “As I told you before, credibility is everything to me. I cannot tell, even if it is you who are asking.”
His refusal made Cavani frown.
“Hmm… I must have expressed myself in the wrong way if it sounded like I was asking. I am sorry, but I am not asking. You must tell me the truth here.”
“Even you cannot push me like this. This is about my credibility.” Matias resisted harder than expected, so Cavani’s expression turned cold.
Then, Haejin asked him, “Are you connected to the people who made the fake painting?”
Cavani looked at him with surprise. It was as if he was asking Haejin what nonsense he was making up.
However, Haejin didn’t simply look at him, instead, he kept staring at Matias.
“What are you talking about?” Matias asked back.
Haejin wasn’t just asking. As he had casted a confession spell, Matias couldn’t lie.
However, he couldn’t ask directly if he was the forger. Even if he would answer truthfully…
In fact, both Cavani and Matias would suspect Haejin had added some kind of drug to the wine.
Haejin, therefore, had to be careful not to be doubted, so he couldn’t push the man further.
“Do you know how to paint?”
Matias stammered at another unexpected question, but soon he started speaking.
“Yes, but why are you asking?”
“I’m just curious. Did you learn it from school? I guess you wanted to be an artist,” Haejin commented.
“I attended the University of Applied Arts in Vienna… but why are do you keep asking me these things?” Matias asked again.
Although he was answering, he couldn’t understand why he was replying to Haejin’s questions.
“I am just curious because you said you were an art dealer.”
Haejin really wished he could ask, ‘it was you who imitated Egon Schiele’s painting, wasn’t it?’, but Cavani seemed to think Haejin had to have a reason to keep asking those sort of questions so he took it from there and said, “If I’m not wrong, I’ve never heard that you attended the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. As far as I knew, you studied economics in America… were you lying to me before?”
It turned out Matias had lied to him before about majoring in economics.
“I, I…” Matias couldn’t say anything. He was capable of not answering as it was Cavani’s question, not Haejin’s.
The spell itself wasn’t enough to make him confess the truth. The question had to be asked with magic, so Cavani’s question had no great power.
However, because of that, both Cavani and Matias didn’t get suspicious.
“You must know I can find out about your works and grades if I want to. You’d better tell me yourself.”
Matias had to talk as Cavani kept pressing him and said, “Actually, I did study art at the university, but I wasn’t trying to fool you. I was just ashamed as I never made a good painting.”
Haejin interrupted him again, “It is strange. The University of Applied Arts in Vienna is a prestigious university of art. If you had said you had graduated from there, your words would have had much more trustworthiness. I really can’t understand why you said you learned economics that has nothing to do with art.”
This made Matias frown even harder.
Haejin was trying hard to reveal his weak points. Matias then raised his voice, “Don’t you know that most art dealers haven’t majored in art?”
“Of course. However, although there aren’t many art dealers who have graduated from the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, there can be no reason to bother to hide that fact. Well, you must have had your own reasons, but I really cannot understand it,” Haejin replied.
“Who do you think you are to keep lecturing me like that!” Matias now yelled in German.
However, seeing this, Cavani grimly said, “It is really strange. You have never lost your temper like this in front of me, but you are now yelling at Mr. Park. Is there really something? Have you really made a forgery of Egon Schiele’s painting?”
The second he finished speaking, Haejin immediately added, “Did you do it?”
He hadn’t planned to ask directly like that, but thanks to Cavani, who suddenly asked a sharp question, he was able to add his own question.
“I… I… didn’t.”
“Huh?”
Haejin was rather surprised to hear the answer.
There was no way Matias was capable of countering his magic. Then, Matias wasn’t the one who Haejin had seen the past.
He didn’t mean to ask further, but he couldn’t help asking, “Then, who is that forger?”
Haejin immediately regretted making a stupid mistake, but Matias’ answer was something he really didn’t expect.
“It’s… it’s my brother!”
Matias wasn’t shocked by his own answer and continued to explain, “I lost my life because of him! I had to give up painting because of him. That idiot, he abandoned the pride of an artist and his family for money…” he then knelt to Cavani while looking down and muttered, “I cannot lose my credibility because of him. I swear, I have nothing to do with him. I even gave up my dream because of him.”
Matias gave up and tried to find a way to survive.
“Okay. If you are telling the truth, who is your brother?”
Matias explained, “He is Benedict Leno, and he attended the University of Applied Arts with me. He had great talent in art, so everyone around him had huge expectations about him. However, he then left home because he thought our family wasn’t supporting him enough and became a forger. At first, I even worked with him as it was to help our poor family, but I stopped after we got enough to live by. After that, me and my mother tried to stop Benedict, but he wouldn’t listen. His talents bloomed in his forgeries, and it became impossible to tell them apart from reals. But…”
“But?”
Matias continued, “Because one of his fakes, a Jewish family with considerable power went bankrupt, and he became a runaway. That was more than three decades ago. I’ve never seen him after that and only heard rumors about him sometimes.”
Haejin interrupted to be sure, “Is that really true?”
Matias looked down, heartbroken and said, “Yes.”
Haejin was asking with magic, so it had to be true.
“Then, do you know where he is?”
Matias quickly shook his head at this, “I haven’t heard about him for more than a decade. Maybe he is dead. I started to think he was dead at some point and didn’t even try to find him.”
Haejin had been thinking he was about to catch the guy, but it was another dead end. He felt sorry for the man as he knew he was telling the truth, but then Matias said something unexpected.
“I cannot tell you from where I got the fake Egon Schiele’s painting, but I can tell you how I got Archipenko’s painting.”
Cavani frowned and leaned forward while asking, “How did you get it?”
“From the Vatican.”
The person who reacted most passionately to the word Vatican wasn’t Cavani or Haejin. It was Silvia.
She grabbed Haejin’s arm and whispered, “I’ve been keeping an eye on the Vatican, too. A number of artifacts with great mana have come out from there. However, I couldn’t get closer.”
Haejin thought it was serious. Maybe the Trinitatis was the organization that had stolen the artifacts the Nazi had stolen.
Then the Trinitatis was hiding in the Vatican…
“Your story really surprises me. Hmm…” Cavani didn’t say anything more.
Messing up with the Vatican was something hard to imagine, even to the Medici family that had a huge influence on the art world.
Additionally, the power it had in Italy wasn’t something the Medici could dare to compare with its own.
However, it was different for Haejin. Now that he had a chance to go after them, he couldn’t miss it.
“So, Archipenko’s painting really came out from the Vatican?” Haejin asked.
“Yes!”
Matias looked irritated, but Haejin didn’t even frown. He asked again, “Then what about this?”
“What?”
Haejin continued, “You said your brother painted Egon Schiele’s Sunflowers. Why don’t you make a fake yourself and offer it to the Vatican?”
Silence fell. Then Cavani looked at Haejn, clearly shocked, and asked, “Mr. Matias here is an art dealer. Are you saying he should make a fake? One of great quality like the Sunflowers?”
Haejin looked at Matias, who was still in a daze, and answered as if it was nothing.
“Once you start painting, that technique never goes away. It’s like riding a bike, you never forget it. And… if you were once a forger, I think you have been painting from time to time to keep your skills. Am I wrong?”
“Hmm… I’ve never stopped painting entirely, but I am not as good as my brother,” Matias confirmed.
Cavani smiled at this, “Ha… well, I am getting surprised many times today. I thought you had never touched paint till a few minutes ago, and you are thinking of making a fake.”
“Let me tell you again. Benedict was a genius. I will never be as good as him,” Matias replied.
Cavani turned to Haejin and asked, “Are you planning to send his fake to the Vatican?”
Haejin answered, “Yes. If we make a fake of one of the paintings that went missing at the time and spread rumors about it in the Vatican, they will surely react. They must be the ones who stole the paintings the Nazi had stolen.”
“Hmm… do you think Mr. Matias can make such a fake of great quality?” Cavani asked.
Haejin thought he could and said, “We can give up if it’s not good enough. We should see what he can do first.”
Cavani nodded and spoke to Matias.
“I don’t want you to lose your business and become homeless on the streets. Just help me with this, and my family will become the closest friend of yours.”
“I will try if you promise not to scold me afterward for not being good enough,” Matias replied.
“Good. Please rest here today and start tomorrow. If you need anything, tell my servants.”
Matias was about to say something about being asked to stay there for the night, but then he gave up and left, following a servant.
As Silvia looked him leaving, she asked, “But you must have the real painting to make a fake of it. Which painting are you going to use? You are not thinking of Archipenko’s painting, right?”
Instead of answering that question, Haejin said to Cavani, “I thought the Medici family would have at least one painting the Nazi had stolen. If there isn’t, then we won’t be able to make that fake for a long time.”
Cavani smiled, called a servant, and gave him some orders. Then, he spoke with that aristocratic confidence, “I have a painting of Titian.”
“Ohh…” Haejin was genuinely impressed. Titian was the greatest artist in the history of Venetia who led the Italian Renaissance. His painting would be enough to draw their attention.
However, he had a question.
“Has Titian’s painting been stolen by the Nazi?”
Cavani confirmed, “Yes. At the time, they took a lot of gold from the Jews and took it to Portugal. The documents of America’s department of state also says that the amount of gold in Portugal soared up during World War 2.”
“Oh…”
It was another interesting story which Haejin had never heard before.
Cavani explained, “The gold they took to Portugal would be worth a billion dollars now, but what is interesting is that the artifacts Hermann Göring collected were also moved to Portugal.”
“Oh… then they…”
Cavani continued, “Yes, they could not openly sell it and said they had bought it from a Nazi spy. What is even more interesting is that Titian’s painting was among the paintings that were put on Mauerbach charity auction but then vanished afterward. Shouldn’t it be enough to make them interested?”
Haejin brightened up. It couldn’t be better than this, and he replied, “Of course, of course. Even though the painting that was sold during the war and the paintings they smuggled away are different, it clearly had belonged to the Nazi. So, if we spread rumors about how it is one of the missing paintings, they will have to lunge in for it.”
The next day, Haejin, Silvia, Cavani and Matias had lunch in a pleasant mood as if nothing had happened yesterday. Then they went up to a small room on the first floor of the mansion.
There were paper, colors, and painting tools already waiting for Matias.
He rather calmly got ready and sat down.
“Although I did ask for it, I didn’t know you would get me everything in less than a day. The power of the Medici family is truly remarkable.”
The paper in front of him looked very old, even to the ignorant eyes.
Cavani smiled.
“My family has a number of old books. Of course, most of them have meaningful records and considerable value, but some are just old without any significant meaning. I just prepared the kind you wanted. Of course, my employees had to work all night to put the paper together.”
The first step of making a forgery is getting the paper that was used at the time.
As Titian worked from the late 15th century to the early 16th century, they had to get the paper of the time to at least start.
Although Cavani said the paper wasn’t that important, surviving for such a long time alone made it precious enough.
“Is that your faith in me?” Matias looked like he couldn’t understand.
If a less good forger worked with such precious paper, it would just be turned into some trash less valuable than toilet paper.
It wouldn’t have been easy to give it to Matias, without believing in his skills.
“Yes, and it is also faith on Mr. Park who trusts you.”
Cavani’s servant explained, “I have prepared all the colors you asked for: flake white, pure ultramarine, madder lake, burnt sienna, malachite, yellow ochre, red ochre, orpiment, and ivory black.”
Matias nodded with satisfaction, “Good. More than everything, getting to see Titian’s painting with my own eyes makes me think helping you isn’t all that bad, Mr. Cavani.”
As he said, what drew attention the most in that room was Titian’s painting in the middle.
Haejin also couldn’t help exclaiming, “So, that is the painting from Titian that you have.”
In the painting, there was a man wearing a strange coat with a tall dog.
As the man was wearing a luxurious coat that even most aristocrats couldn’t afford, he had to be Carl V.
“The records say my family paid quite a lot for it. Of course, as it is Titian’s, I would have paid at least that much myself,” Cavani replied.
Haejin nervously asked Matias, who was sitting in front of the paper, “Do you think you can do this?”
“You made me do this because you thought I could, didn’t you? Then wait patiently.”
His reply was cold, but it satisfied Haejin. He could feel that Matias was confident enough.
Maybe he had felt jealous of his brother Benedict.
If he had, this was the opportunity to show his skills.
His gaze alone said he wasn’t about to hold a brush again simply because he couldn’t refuse.
“I’m sorry. Then please start.”
Matias started to imitate the painting.
To draw the Vatican’s attention, he didn’t make any rough sketch.
The painting had to turn out to be fake easily so that they would believe it was one of their own fakes which had been leaked.
Like his brother, he wore a one-eye magnifying glass and put a support bar in front of the paper to stop his hand from shaking and paint in details.
As such a painting couldn’t be done in a day or two, Cavani went back to Florence to take care of his family’s business. Haejin and Silvia, instead, stayed with Matias and watched him work.
They were not standing to guard him. Instead, watching his painting being created was a pleasant experience on its own.
Cavani came back to Austria four days after.
“Remarkable, truly remarkable. I didn’t know you were capable of this…”
When he returned, he kept exclaiming when seeing the painting.
“Although I used to paint from time to time, it’s been more than five years since I held a brush for the last time. I am surprised as well.”
Even Matias couldn’t believe it and dreamily stared at his own painting.
It was perfect, even to Haejin. Of course, the last procedure still remained, but it was as good as Benedict’s Sunflowers.
Actually, Haejin hadn’t expected Matias to be this good. He had thought a little lack of skills would not be a problem in dragging them to the Vatican, but to his surprise, he got a forgery of remarkable quality.
“Was it luck?” Silvia asked.
However, Haejin shook his head, “No, mere luck cannot do this. In art, technique has its limits. The difference between a master and a skilled painter is as thin as paper. That slight difference is made by philosophy and mind, and Mr. Matias got it as he got older. Sometimes, you improve by not doing anything.”
“I see.”
Silvia was really impressed. Matias was proud of himself and was about to say something with a smile, but Cavani spoke first.
“When I was in Florence, I tried to find some records about the Vatican, and I found something very strange going on.”
“What is it?
Cavani hesitated before speaking, “Um… when I followed the artifacts coming out of the Vatican, I traced them to Marco Veriano’s shipping company.”
“What? Who is Marco Veriano?”
Cavani didn’t answer that question. Instead, the shocked Matias did.
“Mafia… he is the most powerful mafia boss in Italy.”
