He flew out of JFK amid eerie predawn, chill slivers of sunlight creeping across the tarmac. On the plane, in first class, he and Ellis spoke little, Ellis grading papers, Max trying to read a biography of Monet. Neither mentioned the paintings.

Max eventually tried to sleep, but ended up in an odd twilight state, experiencing those shallow, fitful dreams of bicycles. Only now he’d taken his father’s place, and a twelve-year-old Owen was pedaling. “Don’t wear a helmet,” Max shouted after his son. “It slows you down! You’ll be fine, don’t worry. Just ride like the wind!” He jolted full awake after that one, remembering only the nightmare’s end: blood and broken bones. He gave up on sleep.

On the descent he chewed spearmint Dentyne, but his ears clogged anyway, a wind tunnel in his head. “Can’t hear you,” he repeated through Ellis’s attempts to communicate. His hearing finally returned in the customs queue, revealing the song of Argentina’s Castilian Spanish: castellano rioplatense. When the customs agent asked the reason for his visit, he restrained a wild urge to spin the tale of paintings of uncertain origins, and replied, “Business.”

They retrieved their luggage. To Max, half a day on a plane suddenly felt like minutes, compressed, as if time in retrospect moved with light speed. They stepped outside the airport into a pleasantly cool evening—autumn in the southern hemisphere. As Ellis hailed a cab, Max inwardly painted, picking out the dark-haired, the tan and golden-skinned, hashing out the underpainting, blue for the hair, green for flesh tones, building up the glazes. A black-and-yellow taxi pulled up, and Ellis prodded Max into the back seat as the cabbie attended their bags.

The driver was a heavyset man with bushy eyebrows like caterpillars, who reminded Max of his father’s old friend Tommy who’d been a wheelman with a taxi company, rotund like their driver now, another in the brotherhood of drivers, clocking mileage as their spreading backsides moved nowhere. The man laid a fleshy arm across the top of the seat, twisting around to speak. “Welcome to beautiful Buenos Aires!” he said. “Mucho good things to see, my friends.”

“The only thing I want to see is the inside of our hotel room,” Max replied.

Ellis gave the man the address, and off they went.

                                                 *           *          *          *          *  

The next morning, Max was roused by Ellis banging on his hotel room door. He opened up, and his friend—already dressed in a slate-colored suit—handed him coffee in a paper cup and then sat in an armchair in the corner.

“Shit,” Max mumbled, sipping coffee, “I forgot to call my wife.”

“She’ll forgive you,” Ellis said. “Probably.”

“Did you call Nicole?” he asked.

“Of course,” Ellis said. “What kind of a husband do you think I am?”

Max quickly groomed himself and dressed, and then they headed down to the lobby as he called Hailey. “No answer,” he muttered. He texted her instead, that he’d gotten in fine.

Outside, the clouds were gray and thick, but no rain. The lawyer’s office wasn’t far, according to directions from the concierge. No one around walked with any hurry, so the two fell into a similar pace, rolling down Posadas towards a bustling shopping mall, where they grabbed rolls and coffee. Then they headed a block over, past the mansions on Alvear, onto Avenida 9 de Julio, the world’s widest avenue—sixteen lanes flanked by greenery. They passed through Plaza San Martin, with its majestic, gnarled Ombú tree, and frolicking children on swings and bars. They went south, amid droves of shoppers and street artists on Avenida Florida, and then west toward Rivadavia, and the address Max had been given.

They entered an office building, all gray stone and marble. Max searched out the lawyer’s name—Vasco—in the directory, and then they took the elevator to the seventh floor. Her door stood directly opposite as they walked out, her name on a placard beside it. They walked into the small reception area, with a few chairs and a leather couch. A woman stood behind the desk, looking over some papers—blonde, shapely, in her thirties. “Buenos días,” Ellis said.

“Hello,” the woman said, looking up.

“We’re here to see Ms. Vasco,” Max said.

“You’re seeing her,” she said. “Mr. Reynolds and Mr. Warren?” Now Max recognized her voice from the phone. They shook hands. “Call me Graciella. This way.”

She led them through another door, into a cozy wood-paneled office with a large, carved oak desk. She took her place behind it; Max and Ellis sat in black leather chairs across from her. The leather smelled new. Max caught a whiff of fresh paint. “Did you just move in?” he asked.

“No, but I redecorated. Very observant, Mr. Reynolds,” she said. “Now, as to business, I wish to preface by saying that, when my client first approached me, I found this story somewhat fantastic, as I am sure you do. Four paintings by masters, coming from nowhere? I inquired in art circles, law enforcement . . . Of course the first thing one thinks of is the war. Nazis stole from museums, from individuals, but there are no records, no claims on these particular paintings. By all accounts they do not exist.”

“So how far back can your client document possession?” Max asked.

She leaned in, as if sharing a secret, giving ample view of her plunging neckline. “I have many potential buyers who care little about things like provenance.”

“I’d go public,” Max said. “That’s the whole point.”

“My client wishes to remain anonymous,” she demurred. “There is no way around it. He guarantees they are authentic and he is the legitimate owner.”

“That’s not worth much, Ms. Vasco,” Ellis said, “when we don’t even know who he is.”

“Maybe we are ahead of ourselves, as you say,” she replied. “You have not seen the paintings. But rest assured that if we go further, the guarantees will be in writing. We have laws in Argentina too, gentlemen. Regardless of my client’s name, the agreement will be binding.”

“Let’s see them, then,” Max said.

The paintings were stored in a vault, down the block. The three of them walked over, and through the regal columned entrance of the Banco de Metropole. There they found the manager: a short bearded man, immaculately dressed, heavily perfumed. He spoke to Graciella in Spanish, then led them across the marble floors, footsteps echoing, to the back of the bank, past an armed guard. He opened the vault, and took them into a room filled with safety deposit boxes. Graciella went to one of the few large compartments, and she and the manager inserted two identical keys, opening the lock. The manager removed his key, pulled open the compartment, took a quick peek, then left, locking the doorway gate behind him.

Graciella returned her key to her bag. Beneath harsh florescents, she reverently slid out the first painting: Renoir—warm, vivid simplicity upon the canvas, manifested as a striking young woman with golden hair, holding a violin, her expression wry, teasing. Max froze, transfixed. Graciella placed the painting on a long wooden table.

Then came the Sisley, the Bazille, and finally the Monet. She motioned Max and Ellis over, then moved to the door, affording privacy. The two conducted their examination, noses almost touching canvas, going one to the next. Max spent particular time admiring the Monet, the short dappled strokes, the sense of improvisation, how he handled the light against the violin’s bow.

“They’re real,” Ellis whispered, awestruck. “But where’d they come from?”

“As long as they’re not stolen, it’s good enough,” Max said.

“Don’t say that, Max. This ain’t Kansas. You don’t have any goddamn slippers.”

“I’ll borrow some from the hotel,” Max said. He grinned. “I swear, El, it’s like some kind of a sign. Looks just like her, don’t you think? Hailey, I mean.”

“Who? The lawyer?” Ellis asked.

“No,” Max said, “the girl in the paintings.”

“Similar complexion, but not much else,” Ellis replied. “You see what you want to see.”

“Then how do you figure the paintings are real?” Max asked.

“Because I wanted all four to be utter bullshit,” Ellis said.

“Just wait,” Max said. “This’ll be a brand new start.”

“Sometimes, Max,” Ellis said, “I really wish you’d keep your damn mouth shut.”

Next Chapter: Chapter 6: Erich - 1933