Crimes of Paris: A True Story of Murder, Theft, and Detection by Dorothy Hoobler, Thomas Hoobler Page B
Authors: Dorothy Hoobler, Thomas Hoobler
Tags: History
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create. Outside the Louvre, vendors sold postcards on this theme, with cartoon images of the woman in the painting “escaping”
from the museum, often with a taunt at her “captors,” the guards.
Someone who signed himself or herself as “Mona Lisa” expanded on this idea, writing a letter to
L’Autorité
that explained she had “divorced” the museum because she didn’t like the way she was talked about: “They’ve bored me stiff
with this ‘famous smile!’… You do not know women or you do not know them well. If I smiled with an ‘enigmatic’ air it was
certainly not for the ridiculous reasons attributed to me by the gentlemen of the literature.… This smile marked my lassitude,
my scorn for all the skunks who paraded endlessly before me, and my infinite desire to carry out my abduction.
“I said to myself: what a face those officials will make when tomorrow the news will spread through all of Paris:
La Joconde
5
has spent the night elsewhere!
” 6
i
Since there were few real developments in the case, reporters were free to print rumors and sheer speculation about who had
perpetrated the crime. All that restrained them were the limits of their imaginations. Among the more creative guesses was
that of the
Paris-Journal,
which reported that a professional clairvoyant, Mme. Albane de Siva, after “ascertaining at the Central Astronomical Office
the position of the planets at the time of the theft,” deduced that the picture was still hidden somewhere in the Louvre,
and that the thief was “a young man with thick hair, a long neck and a hoarse voice, who had a passion for rejuvenating old
things.” 7
Meanwhile, right-wing and monarchist publications alleged that the theft was only the latest manifestation of a crime wave
that revealed “the extraordinary state of anarchy” 8 that characterized the government of the Third Republic, which, not by coincidence, was at that time led by Premier Joseph
Caillaux, a member of the Radical-Socialist Party. The fact that Caillaux was currently negotiating with Germany over the
two countries’ rival claims in Morocco led to a darker accusation: that the Germans had taken the painting and were holding
it hostage to secure favorable terms in the final settlement. On the other hand, there were also some who saw the theft as
“a political plot to injure the prestige of the Republic and murmur that the [supporters of the monarchy] could say if they
would, where the Joconde is.” 9
In the days immediately following the theft, anyone carrying a package received attention. Two German artists, suspicious
apparently because they were German and possessed paints and brushes, were reported to the police and questioned. A man running
for a train — the 7:47 express for Bordeaux — while carrying a package covered by a horse blanket caused police to telephone
the stationmaster at Bordeaux, asking him to search the train. When a shabbily dressed man approached an antiques dealer offering
to sell a portrait of a “noblewoman,” the dealer informed the police.
The investigation soon spread its net over a wider area. Checkpoints on roads leading out of the capital examined the contents
of every wagon, automobile, and truck. Fearing that the thief must be trying to leave the country, customs inspectors opened
and examined the baggage of everyone departing on ships or trains. Then, ships that had left during the day that had passed
between the theft and its discovery were identified and searched when they reached overseas ports. In New York City, detectives
swarmed aboard the German liner
Kaiser Wilhelm II
after it docked, and combed every stateroom and piece of luggage for the masterpiece.
Some thought the whole thing was a hoax, recalling that the satirical journal
Le Cri de Paris
had thrown the city into a panic the previous year by reporting that the
Mona Lisa
on view in the Louvre was a copy, hung there to hide the fact
from the museum, often with a taunt at her “captors,” the guards.
Someone who signed himself or herself as “Mona Lisa” expanded on this idea, writing a letter to
L’Autorité
that explained she had “divorced” the museum because she didn’t like the way she was talked about: “They’ve bored me stiff
with this ‘famous smile!’… You do not know women or you do not know them well. If I smiled with an ‘enigmatic’ air it was
certainly not for the ridiculous reasons attributed to me by the gentlemen of the literature.… This smile marked my lassitude,
my scorn for all the skunks who paraded endlessly before me, and my infinite desire to carry out my abduction.
“I said to myself: what a face those officials will make when tomorrow the news will spread through all of Paris:
La Joconde
5
has spent the night elsewhere!
” 6
i
Since there were few real developments in the case, reporters were free to print rumors and sheer speculation about who had
perpetrated the crime. All that restrained them were the limits of their imaginations. Among the more creative guesses was
that of the
Paris-Journal,
which reported that a professional clairvoyant, Mme. Albane de Siva, after “ascertaining at the Central Astronomical Office
the position of the planets at the time of the theft,” deduced that the picture was still hidden somewhere in the Louvre,
and that the thief was “a young man with thick hair, a long neck and a hoarse voice, who had a passion for rejuvenating old
things.” 7
Meanwhile, right-wing and monarchist publications alleged that the theft was only the latest manifestation of a crime wave
that revealed “the extraordinary state of anarchy” 8 that characterized the government of the Third Republic, which, not by coincidence, was at that time led by Premier Joseph
Caillaux, a member of the Radical-Socialist Party. The fact that Caillaux was currently negotiating with Germany over the
two countries’ rival claims in Morocco led to a darker accusation: that the Germans had taken the painting and were holding
it hostage to secure favorable terms in the final settlement. On the other hand, there were also some who saw the theft as
“a political plot to injure the prestige of the Republic and murmur that the [supporters of the monarchy] could say if they
would, where the Joconde is.” 9
In the days immediately following the theft, anyone carrying a package received attention. Two German artists, suspicious
apparently because they were German and possessed paints and brushes, were reported to the police and questioned. A man running
for a train — the 7:47 express for Bordeaux — while carrying a package covered by a horse blanket caused police to telephone
the stationmaster at Bordeaux, asking him to search the train. When a shabbily dressed man approached an antiques dealer offering
to sell a portrait of a “noblewoman,” the dealer informed the police.
The investigation soon spread its net over a wider area. Checkpoints on roads leading out of the capital examined the contents
of every wagon, automobile, and truck. Fearing that the thief must be trying to leave the country, customs inspectors opened
and examined the baggage of everyone departing on ships or trains. Then, ships that had left during the day that had passed
between the theft and its discovery were identified and searched when they reached overseas ports. In New York City, detectives
swarmed aboard the German liner
Kaiser Wilhelm II
after it docked, and combed every stateroom and piece of luggage for the masterpiece.
Some thought the whole thing was a hoax, recalling that the satirical journal
Le Cri de Paris
had thrown the city into a panic the previous year by reporting that the
Mona Lisa
on view in the Louvre was a copy, hung there to hide the fact
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