False Impression (2006) Read online

  Jeffrey Archer

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Although Van Gogh cut off part of his left ear with a razor following a row with Gauguin, it still remains a mystery why his right ear is covered with a bandage in both self-portraits.

  Art historians, including Louis van Tilborgh, Curator of Paintings at the Van Gogh Museum, are convinced that the artist painted the picture while looking in a mirror.

  Tilborgh points out that Van Gogh wrote to his brother, Theo, on 17 September 1888, after buying a mirror ‘to help him with his work’ (letter number 685 in the 1990 edition of Van Gogh’s letters, and number 537 in the 1953 (English) edition of his correspondence).

  The mirror was left at Arles when the artist moved on to Saint-Re my. However, Van Gogh wrote another letter to J. Ginoux (11 May 1890, 634a in the English edition, 872 in the Dutch edition), asking Ginoux to ‘take good care of the mirror’.

  Van Gogh is known to have painted two self-portraits with bandaged ear. One can be viewed at the Courtauld Institute at Somerset House in London. The second remains in a private collection.

  From Van Gogh’s letter to his brother, Theo, 17 September 1888

  Copyright (c) Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent Van Gogh Foundation)

  * * *

  A TIMELINE OF BESTSELLERS IN THE AUCTION WORLD, 1980-2005

  * * *

  Year Artist/Title

  Price / US$

  1980 TURNER Juliet and Her Nurse 7,000,000

  1981

  PICASSO Yo Picasso 5,800,000

  1982

  BOTTICELLI Giovanni de Pierfrancesco de Medici 1,400,000

  1983

  CEZANNE Sucrier, poires et tapies 4,000,000

  1984

  RAPHAEL Chalk Study of a Man’s Head and Hand 4,400,000

  1985

  MANTEGNA Adoration of the Magi 10,500,000

  1986

  MANET La rue Mosnier aux paveurs 11,100,000

  1987

  VAN GOGH IRISES 53,900,000

  1988

  PICASSO Acrobate et jeune arlequin 38,500,000

  1989

  PICASSO Yo Picasso 47,900,000

  1990

  VAN GOGH PORTRAIT DU DR GACHET 82,500,000

  1991

  TITIAN Venus and Adonis 13,500,000

  1992

  CANALETTO The Old Horse Guards 17,800,000

  1993

  CEZANNE Nature morte: les grosses pommes 28,600,000

  1994

  DA VINCI Codex Hammer 30,800,000

  1995

  PICASSO Angel Fernandez de Soto 29,100,000

  1996

  John F. Kennedy’s rocking chair 453,500

  1997

  PICASSO Le Reve 48,400,000

  1998

  VAN GOGH PORTRAIT DE L’ARTISTE SANS BARBE 71,500,000

  1999

  CEZANNE Rideau, cruchon et compotier 60,500,000

  2000

  MICHELANGELO The Risen Christ 12,300,000

  2000

  REMBRANDT Portrait of a Lady, Age 62 28,700,000

  2001

  KOONS Michael Jackson and Bubbles 5,600,000

  2002

  RUBENS The Massacre of the Innocents 76,700,000

  2003

  ROTHKO No. 9 (White and Black on Wine) 16,400,000

  2004

  RAPHAEL Madonna of the Pinks 62,700,000

  2004

  PICASSO Garcon a la pipe 104,000,000

  2004

  VERMEER A Young Woman Seated at the Virginals 30,000,000

  2004

  WARHOL Mustard Race Riot 15,100,000

  2005

  GAINSBOROUGH PORTRAIT OF SIR CHARLES GOULD 1,100,000

  2005

  YUAN DYNASTY VASE 27,600,000

  Source: Art & Auction, September 2005

  Here follows an extract from Jeffrey Archer’s new book - “Only Time Will Tell”

  1

  I was told my father was killed in the war.

  Whenever I questioned my mother about his death, she didn’t say any more than that he’d served with the Royal Gloucestershire Regiment and had been killed fighting on the Western Front only days before the Armistice was signed. Grandma said my dad had been a brave man, and once when we were alone in the house she showed me his medals. My grandpa rarely offered an opinion on anything, but then he was deaf as a post so he might not have heard the question in the first place.

  The only other man I can remember was my uncle Stan, who used to sit at the top of the table at breakfast time. When he left of a morning I would often follow him to the city docks, where he worked. Every day I spent at the dockyard was an adventure. Cargo ships coming from distant lands and unloading their wares: rice, sugar, bananas, jute and many other things I’d never heard of. Once the holds had been emptied, the dockers would load them with salt, apples, tin, even coal (my least favourite, because it was an obvious clue to what I’d been doing all day and annoyed my mother), before they set off again to I knew not where. I always wanted to help my uncle Stan unload whatever ship had docked that morning, but he just laughed, saying, ‘All in good time, my lad.’ It couldn’t be soon enough for me, but, without any warning, school got in the way.

  I was sent to Merrywood Elementary when I was six and I thought it was a complete waste of time. What was the point of school when I could learn all I needed to at the docks? I wouldn’t have bothered to go back the following day if my mother hadn’t dragged me to the front gates, deposited me and returned at four o’clock that afternoon to take me home.

  I didn’t realize Mum had other plans for my future, which didn’t include joining Uncle Stan in the shipyard.

  Once Mum had dropped me off each morning, I would hang around in the yard until she was out of sight, then slope off to the docks. I made sure I was always back at the school gates when she returned to pick me up in the afternoon. On the way home, I would tell her everything I’d done at school that day. I was good at making up stories, but it wasn’t long before she discovered that was all they were: stories.

  One or two other boys from my school also used to hang around the docks, but I kept my distance from them. They were older and bigger, and used to thump me if I got in their way. I also had to keep an eye out for Mr Haskins, the chief ganger, because if he ever found me loitering, to use his favourite word, he would send me off with a kick up the backside and the threat: ‘If I see you loiterin’ round here again, my lad, I’ll report you to the headmaster.’

  Occasionally Haskins decided he’d seen me once too often and I’d be reported to the headmaster, who would leather me before sending me back to my classroom. My form master, Mr Holcombe, never let on if I didn’t show up for his class, but then he was a bit soft. Whenever my mum found out I’d been playing truant, she couldn’t hide her anger and would stop my halfpenny-a-week pocket money. But despite the occasional punch from an older boy, regular leatherings from the headmaster and the loss of my pocket money, I still couldn’t resist the draw of the docks.

  I made only one real friend while I ‘loitered’ around the dockyard. His name was Old Jack Tar. Mr Tar lived in an abandoned railway carriage at the end of the sheds. Uncle Stan told me to keep away from Old Jack because he was a stupid, dirty old tramp. He didn’t look that dirty to me, certainly not as dirty as Stan, and it wasn’t long before I discovered he wasn’t stupid either.

  After lunch with my uncle Stan, one bite of his Marmite sandwich, his discarded apple core and a swig of beer, I would be back at school in time for a game of football; the only activity I considered it worth turning up for. After all, when I left school I was going to captain Bristol City, or build a ship that would sail around the world. If Mr Holcombe kept his mouth shut and the ganger didn’t report me to the headmaster, I could go for days without being found out, and as long as I avoided the coal barges and was standing by the school gate at four o’clock every afternoon, my mother would never be any the wiser.

  Every other Saturday, Uncle Stan would t