Chapter 3
“Huh,” Peter turned back to me, his eyebrows arched.
I remained frozen in place, unable to tear my eyes from the wall.
“Huh,” he repeated, “Why uh, why didn’t you tell me you had some stuff in the show, Pens?”
His tone was puzzled and penitent. Before reading the name, I could tell he’d just missed making some scathing remark at my expense.
“I didn’t know,” I muttered, shaking my head.
Gradually, I put the pieces together.
Marie… So this was her surprise. My face, chest, and arms all flushed. When I see her, I thought acidly, I’m going to choke her.
Peter scratched his ear, “You know, they’re actually not half-bad.”
It was hardly glowing praise, but at least he was trying.
“I mean, the technique’s spot on,” he tilted his head, “And the palette. I guess it’s kinda…unique.”
I ignored him, rubbing my eyes, and hoping to wake myself up. How? How the hell did she pull this off? And why? God knows I didn’t ask her to.
“They were just supposed to be studies,” I stammered, “Doodles, really. Marie—she must’ve given them to Claude, and…” my voice, already brittle, broke off.
“Yeah,” he took off his glasses and wiped them at the base of his vest. “Studies. That makes sense.”
Replacing the frames on the bridge of his nose, he squinted again at my paintings. Every inch of my skin felt molten hot. Damn it. Damn it, damn it, damn it. What the he’ll was she thinking? I felt on the verge of a panic attack. Could she really not see how awful these are?
“Damn her,” I snarled. “I swear, she wouldn’t know art if she sat on the David’s face.”
“Hey,” Peter put his hand on my shoulder, but I jerked away. “Jesus, chill out, Pens.”
I felt a cold, sinking sensation in my stomach. I needed to calm down. I needed to breathe. But it was shocking how violated I felt. To find something of mine—something personal—exposed and on display without my consent, for all eyes to see and judge. I don’t think I could’ve been more mortified if they were photos of me at age fourteen, braces, acne, and all.
“Listen,” Peter pushed his hands into his pockets, “maybe this isn’t your best work. But do you realize how many people would literally kill to have their stuff in this gallery?” He looked down at me earnestly, “If you’re really serious about making it, Pens, I think you need to thank her. For real. I don’t really wanna know how she got Claude to throw these in tonight, but this could be huge for you. I mean,” he shifted, “stranger stuff’s happened right? Like I said before, you just take it and run.”
My toes curled. I still didn’t like being lectured by Peter. But in the end, I knew he was right. I still felt helpless. Helpless, and a little bit cheated. I wanted to prove I could do better; that I wasn’t a total hack, or a fuckup. I’d been staring at the floor for a while, and when I looked up, he was smiling.
“In fact,” he soothed, “we should probably be celebrating. I mean, it’s basically your big debut, right?”
I dug deep, trying to muster up something resembling a smile.
“Wait here,” he reached over and squeezed my palm, “I’ll grab us some champagne.”
He turned and wove his way back toward the front. His confidence, if nothing else, was a kind of comfort, and as the initial shock began to wear off, I found myself seeing a lot of sense in what he said. Who was I, after all, to get all upset about being featured at a chic, Mile End art gallery? And on opening night, I thought. It could’ve taken me years to get here… And it probably should have, my conscience scolded me. I shut my eyes, suppressing it. It’s no use. No use in staying angry, I breathed in deep. They’re up. There’s nothing to be done about it now.
I turned back to look at the series. My series. They hung together on a single cord. Like the garden at Giverny, each one was subtly arranged in a sequence of shrinking, shifting, and elongating shadows, marking out the passing hours of the day. The succession, at least, looked okay—perhaps even artful.
She probably put some real thought into this, didn’t she? I bit my lip, wondering where on earth she’d found the time. Suppose I really do owe her a ‘thank you.’ Marie was, after all, only trying to help me—albeit in her own signature and psychotically impulsive way. I was even about to forgive myself for having painted the vile things in the first place, and maybe, just maybe, imagine seeing in them some deeply hidden redeeming beauty.
But at that moment a small, tweedy figure staggered in from outside, the red embers of a half dozen cigarettes glowing hellishly the cold dark air behind him. He stamped out his butt in the doorway, and rubbed his nose. For the third time that night, it was the eminent art critic, Benoît Boucher. I held my breath, standing stone still as he sidled up to my paintings, snorted, swallowed noisily, and intoned a word that withered me.
“Quétaine,” he said, and moved away.
I think I would have preferred that he call them ‘garbage.’ In English, we’ve adopted a lot of names for unsatisfactory art from their French brethren—banal, prosaïque, cliché—but from Québécois, the most apt and literal translation for quétaine is “cheesy.”
I felt my cheeks ignite, and tears welling up in the corners of my eyes. Soon they’d be bloodshot. My mascara would run. And then it was only a matter of time before I turned into Gérôme’s ‘Truth Coming Out of Her Well.’ With garden-snake irises, it’s impossible to be a pretty crier.
Cheesy. That was the reality, wasn’t it? To convince myself I could do this, that I wasn’t just a joke, an impostor, I’d spun a little silk cocoon of self-delusion. That’s why I’d been stalling these several months. That’s why I hated sharing my work with anyone. Why I wouldn’t let Marie put my name up at the café. All this time, I’d been insulating myself from the truth—that I was a talentless, uninspired, and garden-variety amateur. And here they were: the undeniable proofs of my mediocrity, posted like Luther’s ‘100 Theses’ on the wall.
I was angry—really angry—not at Marie, not at Peter, not even at Monsieur Boucher, but entirely and apopleptically at myself. I opened my clutch for a tissue, and as I dug around inside, spotted my nail file, its tortoiseshell handle glinting in the bright, halogen light of the gallery.
A ludicrous idea seized me. I gazed up at the thin steel wire that tethered the paintings in place. They bobbed in front of me, mocking me. They were the albatross around my neck, my scarlet A. I glanced over my shoulder. Peter was nowhere in sight, and mercifully, no one seemed to have noticed the little girl beside the backdoor, wrestling her little girl-sized existential meltdown.
I needed those oils gone. Destroyed. Immolated. I wanted a private bonfire of vanities; to purge myself of the twin sins of incompetence and idiocy. I took the nail file in my fist and, perching up on my tiptoes, started sawing.
A full two or three minutes went by, and finally the wire began to fray. Oh my God, I sniffed. It’s working. Grinning like a madwoman, I quickened the strokes, and almost immediately, stabbed one of the stiff, broken steel threads deep into the tip of my finger.
“Ah! Damn it,” I gasped.
The file fell to the floor. I reached down for it, crouching as modestly as I could, but the hem of Madame’s dress was too short. I couldn’t grab it without pulling a full ‘Venus Callipyge,’ and giving the room a glimpse of something more intimate than my oils.
“Esti d’crisse de tabarnak…”
I dropped down to my knees, whispering obscenities as I snatched up the file. My finger was throbbing. A ruby dot of blood the size of a sequin bloomed at its tip. Slipping it instinctively between my lips, I licked it clean.
“Give me your hand.”
A man’s voice growled behind me.
My face went white, and I twisted at the waist to see the tips of two polished, black leather boots. He was standing over me, very close.
I couldn’t bring myself to look any higher. I don’t think I’d felt so mortified since I was about twelve years old, after my Father walked in on me learning to French kiss with my Prince Charming pillow. Whoever he was, he’d caught me at my absolute and literal lowest. I was on my knees, in public, still sucking my finger, with tears still brimming at the edges of my eyes.
Get up. I begged myself. Please. Just get up, and walk away. You can jump off a bridge or something on your way home.
But before I could move, he reached down with one hand, and hoisted me to my feet. I gasped, teetering perilously on my heels. He stayed me, and once I was upright and stable, snatched hold of my wrist, plucking the injured finger from my lips. My words abandoned me. He held my hand up firmly for his inspection, frowning at the little ruby as it blossomed again on my finger. Then from an amber-colored cocktail in his other hand, he plucked an ice cube, and a slice of lemon.
“This is going to sting,” he said coolly, “But it will stop the bleeding, and clean out the wound.”
A feeble nod was all I could manage. I was dazed, and still couldn’t bring myself to actually look at him. But his scent was strong—all cedar, and civetone, and smoke—and he had an accent I couldn’t quite place.
I looked on, frozen, as he held the rind over my finger, and squeezed. I drew a sharp gasp through my teeth. It did sting, but only for a moment. He placed the ice in my palm, folding my fingers overtop.
“For the swelling,” he let go.
The cold sent a lancinating chill through my arm, with undulant echoes up and down my spine. Little by little though, the throbbing subsided.
“R-right, well um,” I stammered, “thank you, Monsieur.”
I shook my head, humiliated. That’s what? Three men swooping in to save you tonight? Christ, get your life together, Penny.
Even staring down at the floor, I could still feel his eyes upon me. I wrinkled my nose at his flashing black boots, praying they might just turn and stride away, leaving me alone to wallow in ignominy. But they did no such thing. Their menacing tips pointed at my painted toes, all curled up and clenched beneath their black straps. His boots were going nowhere. Neither was he.
“It’s my pleasure…” his tone was dulcet, and dark, “Now, why don’t you tell me precisely what you thought you were doing just now.”
Tabarnak. I held my breath. There was no satisfactory way to explain myself; no fabrication I could weave that wouldn’t make me sound completely bat-shit insane. I was still holding the nail file in my fist. I watched him shift his weight, waiting.
What do I say? That I was stealing my own paintings? That a critic made me cry? I shut my eyes. Nope. Won’t do it. Can’t do it. Rather than try to tell him the truth, rather than lie, I resolved to do what I always did when someone cornered me. Run. With a quick glance to the exit, I offered up the only plausible excuse within reach.
“I um, I’m not sure what you mean,” I shrugged, “But if you’ll excuse me, sir, I was just on my way out for a smoke.”
I took a half-step back, ready to make my escape, and half-hoping, really, with how fiery my face already felt, that the cold night air might be merciful, and just extinguish me where I stood. There’d be nothing left of me but a puff of Penny-colored smoke; a pile of Mondrian ash in the snow.
But then his eyes, at last, met mine, and I felt the blood in my veins freeze solid. God. My breath hitched. His eyes… They were glacier-blue, and feathered sharply with white frost—like rime, almost—the coldest, deepest eyes I’d ever seen. The longer I looked, the more I could feel them cutting into me, boring right into my body. He raised his glass. Even as he sipped, he stared at me.
“I don’t care to repeat myself,” he swallowed, “What were you were you doing?”
My feet were leaden. My lips were locked. I was a green blade of grass beneath his gaze, rooted in place—brittle, and pale, a little bit bent. I blinked slowly, trying to break the spell. Still, he was waiting. I took a deep breath in. Just tell the stupid truth, Penny. And make it sound as sane as possible.
“I was taking these down,” I pointed sheepishly over my shoulder, “They’re mine. And I don’t want them here.”
He cocked his head, and the hair on the back of my neck stood on end. Some primeval part of my brain was still whispering, urging me to just turn-tail and run.
“You’re mistaken,” he said softly, “These are mine. And I think they’ll stay where they are for now.”
Come again? My forehead furrowed. I couldn’t quite tell whether he was just screwing with me, or if at some point in the evening I really had lost my mind. Maybe at that very moment, I wasn’t at a gallery at all. Maybe I was locked up and straitjacketed in a padded cell somewhere. Maybe this man was my cold and ruthlessly handsome doctor, come to shock my diseased and delusional brain out of its pipe dream.
“No…” I spoke cautiously, testing my faith in reality, like ice at the edge of a pond, “They’re not.”
He gave a wry smirk, and the crease in my brow cut deeper. Seriously. My teeth clenched. What is his problem? Why the hell is he torturing me?
“They were yours,” he nodded, coaxing me to the conclusion, “Now, they belong to me.”
With a renewed rush of horror, it finally dawned on me.
“Y-you,” I choked, “you don’t mean—you didn’t actually buy them?”
He nodded again, “I did.”
“All of them?” My chest throbbed.
“Every last one,” he took another sip, and stepped closer, “This is precisely what I’ve been looking for. Something to mount in my study.”
He stared down at me, eyes flashing. Still the notion itself was unfathomable to me. I mean, come on. No one, nowhere, would ever in his right mind pay for this trash. Not unless he’s in the habit of putting his money through a paper shredder. And then dumping the shreds in a landfill. And then setting the landfill on fire.
“You’re Penelope Foster,” he leered, leveling his gaze. There was no trace of inquiry in his voice, “I’m Dmitri Caine. Your admirer.”
Dmitri? Not that I was any sort of a sleuth in sociolinguistics, but he didn’t sound especially Russian to me—or even Eastern European for that matter. But then again, he didn’t really sound Canadien, Acadian, French, American, English, or Irish to me either. His voice was strict, but strangely warm, like the long, low draw of a cello. I felt an annoying twinge in hearing him call me ‘Penelope’, but it dissipated quickly. My quirks and pet peeves couldn’t contend with the vaster, more vexing problems at hand.
“It’s a pleasure, Miss Foster.”
He put out his hand. He was standing so close that it almost rested on my waist. Backing full up against the wall, I placed my tremulous palm in his. His grip was firm. His skin warm. I thought at first we were going to shake, and be done with it. But then I watched in silent alarm as he bowed his head, and raising my hand to lips, softly kissed the place where I’d pricked my finger.
Those manners, I flushed scarlet, are definitely not local.
“I hope this hasn’t put your brush hand out of commission,” he smirked again, and released me.
“N-no, I don’t think so,” I stammered, reclaiming my hand. “I’ve had a lot worse, Mr. Caine.”
“Is that right?” His eyes flashed, “I won’t say I’m glad to hear it,” he nodded, raising a brow, “But I wouldn’t mind adding another Foster to my collection very soon.”
But why? My palms felt sweaty, and my fingertips tingled where it his lips had grazed them. Why, why, why, why, why, why? Something here didn’t add up. I mean, did he mistake me for some other painter named Penny Foster? Some long-dead, more talented and worthwhile Penny Foster? Some obscure friend of Bracquemond and Morisot, maybe, who died at Arles of a broken heart, and Spanish influenza. Maybe he bought these thinking they were the newly-discovered scribbles of her adolescence. Honestly, it seemed more likely to me than the alternative. And yet he didn’t seem the least bit surprised to find Penny the painter alive and well, and barely twenty-three years old.
“You, um…” I folded my hands in front of me, “you know I’m not like, famous or anything, right?”
He chuckled darkly.
“Yes, Miss Foster. I know you’re new,” he leaned in, “And I know that these are rough. But that’s fine. I’m accustomed to finding diamonds in the rough.”
Rough. Ha. Understatement of the century. What’s your game here, Mr. Caine? I shook my head, studying him anew in equal parts fascination, and fear. He really was violently, almost comically good-looking—a walking, talking oeuvre of idealized proportions. Like a Riace Bronze, or Bernini’s David brought to life. And mon crisse, those eyes. I bit my lip. Like the ocean right before it rains. I remembered. Like some lonely glacier up north, all tinted blue by rock flour. Just thinking, my teeth started chattering, and my nose began to run.
“Mr. Caine,” I sniffed, “I’m really sorry, but these—they weren’t even supposed to here,” I dropped my eyes, “They’re just studies. I was going to use them for something bigger,” I curled my toes, “Something better.”
Repeating the same half-lie I’d told Peter made me feel doubly ridiculous. The ice was melting in my hand, pooling in a little puddle at my feet. He handed me his cocktail napkin. I took it, blowing my nose and balling it up in my fist. My breath hitched as he leaned even closer, all but pinning me to the wall.
“But they were here, Miss Foster,” he jutted his jaw, “And I wanted them.”
“But why?” I pleaded.
“I like them.”
“You can’t.”
“I do,” he cocked his head, “Very much so.”
Oh, pull the other one. I had no clue why, but I could tell he was trying deliberately to provoke me. Worse still, it was working. I breathed an exasperated sigh. He downed the last sip of his cocktail, the muscles moving tensely along the length of his throat.
“Mr. Caine, really—you don’t want these,” I winced, bracing myself for the malediction, “Benoît Boucher called them quétaine.”
He set his glass aside, “Then Boucher is a fool.”
Fool? That shut me up—although I knew I didn’t agree. The man was, as Peter made clear, the authority, and I wanted nothing more than to win his praise and his approval—the same sort I’d heard him lavish over Evelyn X. But still, it was a queerly encouraging to hear that at least one person in the room didn’t put much stock in his knee-jerk judgement and damnations.
“I’m no connoisseur, Miss Foster. I’m not a critic. I’m not an artist. I’m really only here tonight to see an old friend,” for the first time since we’d started talking, he broke his gaze, glancing icily over his shoulder. “But please,” he glared back at me, “don’t mistake me for a man who doesn’t know what he wants.”
I blinked. Bit of a narcissist, isn’t he? Even so, it wasn’t hard for me to believe him. Sure, he was dressed sharp as knives, but beyond that there wasn’t a sliver about him that screamed wishy-washy or artsy-fartsy. His look was almost unkempt, and vaguely lupine. A dark stubble bristled his chin and jaw—a real one, not the meticulously cultivated kind—and his wavy hair was tousled to just the right side of civilized. He must be outdoors a lot, I squinted. After September, a suntan in Quebec was about as rare as hen’s teeth.
Then all at once, it dawned on me how I could sway him. Seriously, he doesn’t want my oils. Just look at him. He doesn’t give a damn about art. And why should he? I shook my head. He had to be an investment banker, or an estate lawyer, or some other more lucrative and less ludicrous thing than a painter. He’s just got an ugly bare wall somewhere that needs covering. It could be a bunch of old newspaper clippings for all he cares. Or worse, a ‘Waltzing Parlormaid’ print. I wrinkled my nose, remembering her insipid umbrella.
“Look,” I widened my eyes at him, pleading, “I am really, really flattered, Mr. Caine. I am. But shouldn’t you pick out something a little more interesting for your study? Maybe something sort of…sexier?”
He raised a brow. For a split second, I thought I had him.
“Just what,” he growled, “did you have in mind, Miss Foster?”
The way he spoke—his voice so laden with something subtler, more sinister than innuendo—it made me blush, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. I gave a quick, frantic glance around the gallery, trying to summon up something from my tour with Peter.
“Well, there’re some beetle blood portraits over there. And lighthouses. Like phalluses. Light-phalluses.”
Oh my God. What are you doing? I flushed deeper, and he arched his brow higher.
“No,” he shook his head, “I don’t think so.”
I tried again, stammering, “Well, what about that nude?” I bit my lip, “The one over there by Evelyn X. Have you seen it?” I started to point, “It’s, um… it’s sort of incredible.”
“I’ve seen it,” his eyes flashed, “It’s fine. But it’s not for me.”
“And these are?” I breathed tensely.
He nodded, “I’m single-minded, Miss Foster. I’ll have my bond.”
Iago? No, Shylock. My hands trembled. My mind was swimming. It was impossible to think straight with him standing there, searing me alive beneath his burning, blue gaze. A pound of flesh? Mon crisse, he’s stubborn. I shut my eyes. And rude, and arrogant, and smug. And just stupidly, obnoxiously handsome… He was at least a head taller than me. I was literally standing in his shadow.
I sighed. There seemed to be no dissuading him. However desperate I may have been, it didn’t make a difference. He wouldn’t budge an inch, or a millimeter, or whatever. When I was little, I might’ve shrieked and cried and stamped my feet until I got my way. Running low on ideas, I might’ve even tried it right then and there. But I hadn’t the strength left in me for a tantrum. His presence somehow seemed to weaken me—his proximity, siphoning off the air from my lungs.
And honestly, I think all I really wanted at that point was to give in to him, to surrender. And what does it matter, really? He could take my oils away, and hang the damned things up in his study. His clients or partners or patients or whoever would pass by day-in and day-out, hardly even noticing them. Even if someone did, they’d probably just think he had some angsty twelve-year-old daughter at home; some insufferable little girl with paint all over her overalls. Though he looks a bit young for that, doesn’t he? I narrowed my eyes, wondering, and shook my head. Whatever. It’s fine. At least my shame would be off display, and out of the leering public eye. I’d be out of the pillory, and into the Tower.
Go on. Seriously. I don’t even care anymore.
But I did care. In that moment, much as I wanted to throw up my hands and be done with it, I still couldn’t quite bring myself to suffer the thought of going through life knowing that the start for all my artistic trials and tribulations sat the dubious display and sale of these seven crummy paintings.
And God knows what wicked things Marie did to get them here. Of course, she wouldn’t have thought twice about the moral ambiguity of it. Marie had the self-esteem of a Grecian Goddess. Letting men be with her, and lay their offerings at her feet was just her natural modus operandi. I, on the other hand, had none of her celestial self-possession. If I let it happen this way, at least let it happen without a fight, I knew some awful, aching part of me would forever feel cheapened, and degraded by it. Like a prostitute by proxy. I breathed in deep, and shut my eyes. I, too, knew how to be stubborn.
“No,” my fists closed.
“No?”
“No,” I said it again, “I-I just—I don’t want to give them to you.”
“To me?” his tone was cool, and searching.
“To anyone,” I breathed out. “It’s a… a self-respect thing.”
Slowly, I reopened my eyes. He wasn’t glaring at me dead-on anymore. His gaze had drifted lower, and my face caught fire. For a second, I thought he’d stolen the chance to check out my chest.
“That’s quite a scar,” he scowled at my shoulder, “Open reduction. Double-plate fixation,” He glanced up, “You could’ve lost your arm.”
By reflex, my hand snapped to my shoulder, trying to hide it. He cocked his head, looking wolfish.
“How did it break?”
Are you fucking kidding me?
“Does it matter?” I breathed.
His eyes flashed, “Humor me.”
I sank my teeth into my tongue. Normally, people had enough tact to just gawk at me. They almost never asked.
“…An accident,” I hissed.
He nodded, drawing his jaw to one side.
“I should hope so,” for just a second, his icy veneer seemed to crack, “The alternative, Miss Foster. It’s unthinkable.”
I felt goose-pimples prickling along my forearms, and my hands, again, began to shake. What the hell does he want from you, Penny? My skin was scalding. I couldn’t even wonder anymore. I was defeated, beaten. He’d raised me up off the ground at my absolute and literal lowest, and in just a handful of minutes, broke me down so much further that I half-wished he’d just left me on the floor where he found me. At least then I’d still have a dog’s dignity. I could still just crawl away into a corner, and lick my wounds. Go on. Just take it. I dropped my eyes. I’m not going to fight anymore.
He shifted, running a stiff hand through his hair, and traced his eyes along the length of me.
“Very well,” he spoke, scratching the stubble on his chin, “Here’s my offer.”
My ears pricked, but my eyes were glued to the floor.
“You say these seven are just studies. That they’re not for sale,” he shrugged, and leaned closer, “So be it. I’ll let you take them home tonight. And in return,” he stood so near, I could feel the cool sting of his words on my skin, “I want you to paint the finished piece for me—precisely as I tell you.”
I stared back at him, lips parting. Is he… is he serious? I was dumbstruck. I probably should have been livid with him for toying with me that whole time. But just then, I was entirely too grateful to hold a grudge; too thrilled at the thought of getting what I really wanted: the chance to redeem myself; to prove that wasn’t a worthless fuck-up.
He went on, turning his head to my paintings, “Two by three and a half meters. Six centimeters deep. Linen canvas. Red underpainting, the same as these. Sign your name in the bottom left,” he glanced back to me, grinning wryly. “Can you remember all that, Miss Foster?”
I nodded slowly, still stunned, and began slogging through the arithmetic in my head.
“For your pains, I’ll pay you twenty-five hundred dollars,” he cocked his head, “You’ll have one week.”
One week?! My stomach churned. No. Come on. There’s no way! I was still in the midst of working out the square-footage, but already I was pretty sure that the canvas would wind up bigger than most of the lofts I’d circled in the classifieds.
But oh… I froze. I’d almost forgotten. Oh think, Penny—what you could do with his money. I felt a rosy throb spread through my chest. Your own little spot in the city. Your own place the paint. You could do it. For once—you could actually do this.
I lost track of where I was for a moment, fantasizing about a little third-story studio in Old Montreal. I saw its high plaster walls; its scuffed-up floors and rattling radiator, with one clear east-facing window, and tendrils of ivy creeping up the stone outside. I saw my violets and lavender in a slant of sunlight. My easel up, and a little brass bed along the far wall, made up messily with crisp white linen. Just think. An unfamiliar shiver slipped down my spine, tingling its way to my fingers and toes. I think it was hope.
“Now,” his voice ripped through my trance, and I tumbled back down like kite falling out of the sky, “Do we have a deal, Miss Foster?”
I sank my teeth into my lip, and nodded.
“Good girl,” his eyes flashed, “Now, about these…”
My brow furrowed. ‘Good girl?’ I wondered again at his accent. I could see orange brimstone blazing in the eyes of every Gender Studies professor I’d ever had. I suppose I might’ve said something, or at least made myself look offended. But he brushed past it, reaching into his back pocket, and removed a clasp-knife with a burnished brass handle. I watched, eyes wide as he slid the blade open, and with a firm jerk of his wrist, severed the wire from the ceiling. He caught the frames before they fell, arranging them in a tidy stack on his arm. A flurry of whispers swept through the room. A few people pointed.
“You’ll need them for reference, I imagine,” he nodded, replacing the knife.
I stared at him, bowled over by what he’d just done. No longer possessed by my earlier frenzy, I was pretty much certain we were about to be arrested, or at the very least cast out in the cold. Mr. Caine, though, was unfazed. The sliced wire dangled in the air behind him, impotent; gelded of its power to menace me. His calm was contagious, and as the chatter resumed and the incredulous stares melted away, I started breathing easier again. Everything went on as if nothing had happened. But something did happen, Penny. I shook my head. Why isn’t anyone stopping him? With his free hand, he pulled out a neatly creased stack of paper bills, and pressed it into my palm.
“Here,” he nodded, “This ought to cover your supplies.”
And then some. I scowled, feeling scandalized by the exchange of money, and my stomach turned over as he laid a black business card atop the stack, with embossed white letters.
“Call me should you need anything else,” he squeezed, “Or if you have a change of heart, Miss Foster.”
Seriously. Who the hell is he? I lowered my eyes to the card, but found it obscured by the bubbling gold of a champagne flute. Peter was back, and he’d shoved a glass beneath my nose.
“Sorry. Got sidetracked. The line at the bar was bananas.”
Mr. Caine was still looking at me. He didn’t seem to acknowledge Peter’s arrival. I took the stem awkwardly in my fist, and stuffed away his card and his money in my coat.
“Um, thanks Peter.”
He followed my gaze back to Mr. Caine, pausing when he caught sight of my paintings.
“Who, uh—who’s your friend, Pens?” Peter muttered at me out of the side of his mouth.
“Dmitri Caine,” he moved in brusquely, his arm bent at the elbow.
Clasp-knife. I swallowed, and Peter did a doubletake. He took a half-step back as they stiffly shook hands.
What? No kiss? I smothered an unsteady smirk.
“Peter,” his eyebrows were arched over the rim of his glasses, “Peter Mulgrave, sir.”
Mr. Caine narrowed his eyes.
“You’re an artist,” he nodded.
“Y-yeah,” Peter squirmed, “I uh, I did the piece up front. The obelisk.”
“Of course,” his words were dry, “Do you know Miss Foster well?” He shifted, “I’ve just commissioned some work from her.”
Peter’s eyes grew even wider. He gave a tense shrug.
“Well enough. We met a while back.”
“And you’re escorting her tonight,” at last, he released Peter’s hand.
“You uh, could say that,” Peter’s cheeks pinkened, “I guess her friend kinda bailed. I’m just showing her around.”
“How kind of you,” he tilted his head, glancing down at me darkly, “She’s quite talented, don’t you think?”
I flushed blood red.
“Well, yeah. Sure,” Peter fumbled, turning to me for help, “I mean, I think so. Definitely…”
Peter looked almost as flustered as I was, but I had no sympathy for him. Having people talk behind your back is one thing. Having two men talk right overtop of you is pretty much intolerable.
“Yes. Such potential,” another frosty smirk played across Mr. Caine’s face, and I shrank myself a little lower, “I look forward to seeing what she’s capable of.”
There was a long and pregnant pause, with which only one of the three of us seemed at all comfortable. Mercifully, it was Mr. Caine who broke it.
“But that will wait,” he shook his head, “I think I’ve stolen enough of your time tonight,” he cocked his head, “It was a pleasure, Miss Foster,” he growled softly, “Try not to get into any more trouble tonight.”
I swallowed. His eyes were burning me up, inside and out.
“Mr. Mulgrave, if you would,” he handed my paintings off to Peter, making him juggle his champagne, then wrapped his hand around the upper half of my arm, and squeezed, “One week,” he waited for me to scrape my eyes off the floor, “Please. Don’t disappoint me.”
I nodded tensely. My whole body seemed to stand at attention, electrified by his touch, and I shivered violently when he released me.
And that was that. He walked away. I watched him through the shifting cracks and crevices in the crowd. Just barely, I caught a glimpse of his path intersecting with that of the pixie-haired painter, Evelyn X. A cold stone sank in the pit of my stomach as she looped her graceful white arm under his. And then together, they were gone.
My heart quivered. His ‘old friend’?
Peter was still holding my canvases, his jaw hanging ajar.
“What the hell was that?”
I rubbed my eyes, trying to clear the fog without smudging my mascara.
“Seriously. Do you know who that was, Pens?” He pulled a shaking hand through his hair.
I fumbled in my coat pocket for his card.
‘Dmitri R. Caine. Estoty Resources Ltd.’
I read, and my frown sank deeper. How enlightening.
“That was Dmitri Caine,” he whispered.
I shrugged, and he rolled his eyes at me.
“Serious collector. I mean, that’s what everyone says,” Peter scratched his head, “The guy’s like a phantom. I’ve never seen him in-person before.” He shook his head, “Way younger than I would’ve guessed.”
“What does he do?” I asked, still squinting at the card.
I reread it three, maybe four times, hoping the letters might magically resort themselves, and reveal some cleverly hidden anagram.
“No clue. But I know he’s loaded,” Peter gulped his champagne, “like hangs-a-Matisse-in-his-spare-bathroom loaded.”
Matisse? I shivered, and his parting injunction echoed coldly in my head. ‘Don’t disappoint me, Miss Foster.’ I shut my eyes. Come on. He collects Les Fauves, and he still expects me to believe he bought my schlock? I was too confused, too exhausted and beaten-down to make any sense of it.
Peter moved my canvases to his other arm, “So he really commissioned a piece from you?”
I scrunched my nose, nodding “…I guess so.”
“Wow,” he shook his head. “Just wow. I mean, that’s awesome, Pens. Really,” he paused, glancing again to my paintings. A bitter sigh hissed through his teeth. “But you know, just watch your step around him. A guy like that,” he glared at the empty air where Mr. Caine has stood, “You don’t want to let him in too close.”
There was a tremor in his voice.
“Why?” I squinted, “What do you mean?”
“I don’t know. I don’t like spreading rumors,” he glanced over his shoulder, “But you know how people say stuff.”
“No,” my throat tightened, “What stuff?”
By how gleefully he’d been gossiping with me earlier, I had an ugly suspicion there was something he truly didn’t want to tell me. What I couldn’t say was why.
“Just stuff,” Peter scowled, “weird stuff.”
“Weird how?”
“Like, Marquis de Sade weird. Maybe. I really don’t know,” he pulled a hand through his hair, “Look, just forget I said anything. Seriously. We should be celebrating, remember?”
Right. I bit my lip. Easier said than done. I wanted to know what he was hiding from me. I wanted to know everything. But I could see Peter was done with it. I’d get no more from him tonight.
He conjured up his best schoolboy-grin again, and grabbed my coat, tucking it around the paintings to make a sling.
“Now, of all the lies we tell, Miss Foster,” he raised his flute, mimicking Mr. Caine’s dark and inscrutable tone, “Art, I think, is the least untrue.”
I smirked, amused, but unsatisfied, and tapped his glass.
“Chesterton?” I sipped.
“Flaubert.”
Arsenic. I swallowed. Her complexion pale. Passing train. Happy dagger. ‘I’d give you some violets, but they withered all…’ I shivered. Did Icarus die when he hit the water?
The champagne was lukewarm, and almost flat, but it still fizzled giddily in my throat, and set my head abuzz as we meandered back toward the front of the gallery. He offered his arm. I leaned my head on shoulder. In his other hand, he carried the canvases, covertly cloaked beneath my coat. Each time he swung his arm though, I could see the corner of Cardinal Sin No. 3 bleeding out through the little hole his obelisk had torn open.
I know I had a nice time with him. I know he was just as sweet and charming as before. But for the life of me I can’t recall a single word more that we said to each other. My mind was elsewhere. I was enthralled, entirely, by the ghostly prospect of my painting, by my imaginary little studio in the city, and by the prickling skin below my shoulder, marking the spot where Dmitri Caine had laid his hand.
