“My dear Mr. Brauninger, you have not merely impressed me; I might almost say you have dismayed me,” she confessed with a disarming smile. “The workshop I represent in my market survey has some artistic items to offer, it’s true, but . . .” She paused for effect. “If you will allow me an indiscreet question: Who do you buy from? Or to ask a little less directly, do you have any glassblowers from Lauscha among your suppliers?”
“You will understand of course that I cannot name names,” Brauninger said in a rush, as though regretting having given away so much already. “But, yes there are one or two Lauscha glassblowers who work for me. Our working relationship, however, is . . . how shall I put this . . . difficult.”
Wanda frowned. “Are they not able to meet your high standards?”
“Quite the opposite. They really know their glass up there!” He nodded vaguely in the direction of Lauscha. “But they’re such a tight-lipped crowd! Whenever I ask them what they were thinking of as they made this or that piece, it’s like pulling teeth! Just recently one of them brought me a set of four bowls in blue glass. Excellent work, that goes without saying! I realized immediately that if I nest the four bowls one inside the other, the whole assembly looks like a forget-me-not flower. The viewer is drawn into the blossom the way a bee is drawn to nectar. The effect is all the more powerful because the bottoms of the bowls are a pale yellow.”
Wanda nodded, delighted. “I can just see it! An allegory, a description in glass of how we were tempted in Eden!” Monique Desmoines and all those well-heeled customers at Dittmer’s would be blown away by the idea, she thought mischievously. She would never have imagined that she would have cause to be grateful to New York’s high society.
Brauninger nodded, impressed. “A splendid comparison, dear lady! What do you imagine the artist told me when I asked what had been his inspiration as he worked? He told me that it was very practical to be able to stack the bowls one inside the other so that they took up less room in the cupboard!”
Wanda had to laugh. Her father could quite easily have said that very thing!
Brauninger joined in her laughter. Then he said, “How much more sensuous the French artists are! They understand the emotions so well! Perhaps you know the name Émile Gallé?”
Wanda nodded. “My mother admires the French glassworkers enormously. Being a New Yorker, she likes Tiffany as well, of course,” she added, to show him again that she knew a thing or two about art. “And what opinion do you have of Venetian glasswork?” she asked as innocently as she could manage.
Brauninger smirked. “I know that the whole world raves about Murano, but to be perfectly honest the work they do there is a little . . . insincere for my tastes.” He flapped his hand dismissively.
Wanda nodded wisely. “The backward-looking style, I know.” She waved her hand as well, as though to suggest that she had considered the question of Murano glass closely and come to precisely the same conclusion.
Brauninger cleared his throat. “I do not wish to be impolite, my dear lady . . . But sadly I have an appointment in a few minutes.” He blinked in embarrassment. “And though I have found our conversation most pleasant, I am not really sure how I can help you.”
Wanda gathered her skirts. “You have already helped me far more than you will ever know, my dear Mr. Brauninger,” she said as she rose to her feet. Then she opened her eyes a fraction wider and said, “Now that I know there are still connoisseur dealers such as yourself, I am all the more determined to make Lauscha glass a byword for the most refined achievements of the glassblower’s art. You might easily say that you have restored my faith in mankind!”
Brauninger frowned, and she realized that she had gone a bit too far. She did her best to look businesslike. She put out her hand and took a deep breath.
“If it should happen that in the next few weeks or months I am shown a piece of glass that I feel might satisfy your high standards—may I bring it to show you?”
Karl-Heinz Brauninger beamed. “Anytime, dear lady, anytime! I am already looking forward to our first transaction.”
Dusk was falling by the time Wanda went back out onto the street. The snow was glittering in the twilight—a sure sign that it would be another ice-cold night.
“There you are at last! I was beginning to think you’d decided to spend the night in there!” Eva’s shadow detached itself from a doorway across the street. “If we don’t hurry, we’ll miss the last train back to Lauscha!”
“I’m sorry. I never even noticed the time passing,” Wanda answered guiltily as they hurried off to the railway station.