The secret mission that resulted in front-page news worldwide

Washington, DC

IN the winter of 1967, a customer walked into a luggage store in Pittsburgh in search of a bag of a certain size and composition. The suitcase was destined for a transatlantic flight, but before that flight, it had to be altered to accommodate a specially built device designed to serve a special passenger.

Ginevra de' Benci was born in 1457 in Florence and was known for her beauty and her poetry. Her admirers included the Venetian ambassador. Some said Ginevra broke his heart and it was he who commissioned the striking portrait of her, her smooth face inscrutable, her body turned just so. Or perhaps the oil painting was commissioned by Luigi de Bernardo Niccolini, a wedding present from the man she married at the age of 16.