Michelangelo_s Notebook

3

Crawley was a handsome man in his early sixties, his hair thick and gray, his face square, the eyes intelligent. He was no more than five eight or nine, and Finn was fairly sure he wore lifts in his expensive shoes. As always, he was dressed in a three-piece suit, but this afternoon he seemed even more dapper than usual, probably because of the fund-raiser tonight-the one she hadn’t been invited to. She also noticed there were no white gloves on his hands even though he was handling a piece of the museum’s inventory. Maybe when you got to be director your hands no longer had oils or potential pollutants on them. She commented on it to Crawley. His complexion went from red to purple.

“Whether I’m wearing gloves or not is none of your concern,” he said. “What I am concerned with is your removing this drawing when you had no business to.”

“It was in the drawer I was working on, Dr. Crawley. At first I thought it was just part of the regular inventory.”

“At first?”

“I think it’s been mislabeled.”

“How is that?”

“According to the inventory number it’s a drawing by Santiago Urbino, one of the minor Venetian painters.”

Crawley looked professionally pained. “I know who Santiago Urbino was.”

“I think it’s a mistake. I think it’s by Michelangelo.”

“Michelangelo Buonarroti?” said Crawley, astounded. “You’re insane.”

“I don’t think so, sir,” said Finn. “I’ve examined it closely. It has all the earmarks of a Michelangelo piece.”

“So we’ve been hoarding a page from Michelangelo’s lost notebook for the past sixty-five years without knowing about it, and suddenly a young intern who is still cramming for her master’s degree pops up with it out of the blue.” He let out a little hollow laugh. “I don’t think so, Miss Ryan.”

“I looked on the inventory listings,” said Finn, refusing to give up. “The museum doesn’t have any other pieces by Urbino. Why this one?”

“Presumably, my dear, because Mr. Parker or Mr. Hale decided that he liked it.”

“You’re not even willing to consider that it could be Michelangelo’s work?”

“And let you write a paper on it that would eventually lead to a great deal of embarrassment to the museum, and to myself as well? I prize neither your work here as an intern nor your ego that much, my dear.”

“ ‘My dear’? It’s Finn, or Miss Ryan,” she said angrily, “and my ego has nothing to do with it. The drawing is not by Urbino, it is by Michelangelo. Whoever inventoried it was mistaken.”

“Whom is the inventory of the piece credited to, and when?” asked Crawley. Finn tapped a few keys on the keyboard and tapped the space bar to move across to the end of the inventory line.

“AC, June 11, 2003.” Whoops. A little political incorrectness could take you a long way.

“Alexander Crawley. Me. Not too long ago.”

“Then perhaps it’s your ego that’s in question,” said Finn.

“No, Miss Ryan, not my ego, but your competence-and, I might add, your arrogance.”

“I studied Michelangelo’s work in Florence for an entire year.”

“And I have studied the masters all my working life. You’re wrong and your refusal to admit that you’re wrong and defer to a more educated judgment on the matter shows me that you’re not the kind of person we need here. When your own ego gets in the way of the work, any professional sense goes out the window. I’m afraid I’ll have to terminate your internship at Parker-Hale.”

“You can’t do that!”

“Of course I can.” Crawley smiled blandly. “I just did.” He smiled again. “I suggest that you gather up whatever personal belongings you have and leave now to avoid any further embarrassment.” He shook his head. “A shame, too. You were a very pretty addition to our little department.”

Finn stared at him for a long moment, not quite believing what the man had said, then walked out of the niche, grabbed her knapsack and ran off. She knew she was going to start crying and the last thing she wanted to do was show any weakness in front of that arrogant little son of a bitch. Five minutes later she was on her bike again and headed south to Alphabet City.