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THE RIGHT THING from page 95
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know what I mean, not down deep,
not grasped that they got grease spots
on their lapels, and had eye infections,
and ate fish for lunch. I found myself
watching his mouth as he spoke, the
way I'd watch a talking snake, fasci-
nated and repelled at the same rime."
The novel begins in the spring of
1945 as the German army, reeling and
near defeat, works ro hide a vast store
of plundered art in the Altaussee salt
mine. In the confusion, a single truck,
its driver and its priceless masterpieces
vanish into a mountain snowstorm.
The mystery of the lost truck surfaces
when a Velazquez turns up in a Boston
pawnshop. Revere turns into a Boston
Police Department art detective. He
authenticates the painting, but things
turn strange when everyone Revere
makes contact with in the case ends up
dead.
He travels to Europe, where he
meets the old Nazi and goes face-to-
face with eccentric European collec-
tors, shifty art dealers, reluctant
bureaucrats and the Russian under-
world, where he eventually becomes a
target for murder himself.
Elkins' current neighbors are Austrian
Jews who survived the Shoah. He says
he's often struck by the dissonance
between their history and their present
life in their lovely Carmel house.
"How can these things exist in the
same universe?" he asks.
That sense of cognitive dissonance
is expressed in Loot, too. Jakob
Nussbaum, a Shoah survivor who
wants to recover his family's stolen art,
lives across the street from Eichmann's
old headquarters.
"Every day I look out that window, I
see beautiful gardens. I look out this
window, I see there's nothing there any-
more at No. 22. Eichmann's dead and
gone, the bastard, with his boots, and
his armband, and his Heil Hiders. But
me, I'm still right here, here I am."
cents the sufferings of the Holocaust
and the sufferings of families, one can
only be sensitive to it," Gates said.
"What was frustrating was that
while 'we sympathized, being an insti-
tution we had to.continue the
process. It made it difficult and
painful because you had to stay your
course and continue Your
investiaa-
,
tion," she said.
Former museum board chair
Herman Sarkowsky, a prominent
member of the Seattle Jewish commu-
nity and an immigrant from
Germany, felt more strongly. about
the criticism of the museum.
"My main complaint was really
with individuals who called me and
others at the museum and, without
really knowing the facts, simply said
we didn't care about the facts. That
\vas not appreciated by me or others
involved," he said.
Sarkowsky's immediate family left
Germany before World War II, but he
did lose family in the Holocaust. And
although he says being a Jew who was
personally touched by the Holocaust
made him more sensitive to the issues
in the case, "I didn't consider it a
Jewish problem to begin with. But I
must say that a lot of the concern
about the process did come from the
Jewish community, because I think
basically they felt it was a Jewish issue."
Some people told Sarkowsky they
felt the museum should not have
questioned the Rosenbergs and
returned thepainting as soon as the
claim was made. He disagrees. "We
had to do our due diligence on behalf
of the community," which owns the
public museum, he explained.
"I suspect that other museums will
look at the route that we took and
perhaps follow it, because it's certainly
the most prudent and fairest. In that
sense, I think we set a very good
precedent," he said.
Gates said many people did not
understand how complicated the
research process is, and because the
Knoedler Gallery was not cooperative,
the difficulty was multiplied. The
museum has said it will continue its
lawsuit against the Knoedler Gallery
for misrepresenting the painting's his-
tory and for breach of warranty.
The case is slated for trial in Seattle
Jan. 3, 2000, but SAM attorneys plan
to file a motion for summary judg-
ment against Knoedler in he fall.
Knoedler's attorneys don't believe the
museum has a viable claim.
In-the meantime, Gates adds, "We
are happy the painting is going back
to the Rosenberg Family. - H
u14.1FAVR,
,,s‘
•
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