Catch 26

by Carol Prisant

  What would he say to that? Laugh? Call for the men in the white coats? Even – and at this moment it strikes her as horribly, stupidly funny – take his painting somewhere else to sell?

  “Clary,” she says, “you can’t know how perfectly I understand what you’ve been telling me. And, for my part, I can’t tell you how truly sorry I am at having made this so awkward for both of us. Especially after you’ve provided such a wonderful – such a memorable – evening.”

  Too drained even to speak, he waves her apology away.

  “You know what?” she goes on. “It really looks to me like you don’t need that long drive home. Could you stay at your club this evening? Do they let you do that?”

  He lights up.

  “See, I knew you were smart, Fernanda. I’ll do just that. Can I borrow your phone?”

  She hands it over, wondering that he doesn’t have his own.

  Well, he’s right, of course. They are living in different worlds. She doesn’t even wear a wristwatch anymore.

  Fernanda waits by the window while he makes his call. Pulling aside the curtains, she sees her “amazing” reflection staring back from the glass. But out there – beyond this spectacular girl, this aging man – there’s a breath of promise in the clear black sky. The contract will expire. She’ll be damned.

  She’ll find him again when – and if – she turns old.

  CHAPTER 20

  It’s December now. Two months and a little more left.

  In the vast and drafty drill hall at the Seventh Regiment Armory, one hundred and ten carefully selected and vetted dealers have assembled for the opening night gala of New York’s most elegant antique show. Several of that elite have brought choice, salable, and expensive Old Master paintings and hung them on damask-wrapped walls or set them on pedestals, which is no less than many of them – certainly not all – deserve. The ticket is a pricey one, and most of Berger’s staff would be here tonight except that auction- house salaries don’t allow for treats like this.

  Fernanda, however, isn’t paying for her ticket because she’s arrived on the somewhat unsteady arm of her latest snowball, the retired pet-food magnate, George Sterling.

  George is immensely and publicly rich, although a little less so now after divorcing his wife of thirty-five years for an embarrassingly young, libidinous and calculatedly self-effacing Asian woman, who was once an assistant vice president of the “organic” division of his empire. After three glorious years, and also, just after he’d had his second hip replaced, she left him for her personal trainer. George contends to this day that there was nothing devious about Dai-Tai (translation: “Leading a Boy in Hopes”). She simply didn’t want to spend the next several years nursing a cripple, and she told him exactly that in the four minutes they spent in the car between her picking him up at Special Surgery, dropping him off with their doorman, and driving away. George admires her for that. She was honest, he says. And yet, their split has a good deal to do with why now, mildly devastated and understandably wary, the eighty-six-year-old George Sterling dates only (very young) women who don’t know who he is – a rather small sorority – or who have their own money, a significantly smaller subset. Sterling lawyers are paid to check the financials of all prospective companions, and Fernanda Turner, naturally, is one of the few who have passed that test. Which is how, this evening – a-foam in irisee green chiffon with emerald studs to match – she’s on the arm of the lordly, ancient George. Although, in fact, she’s propping him up.

  His hairpiece and dental implants don’t entirely offset his tortoise-like beak or the familial Sterling chinlessness. He dresses handsomely, however, and carries a gold-topped Malacca cane primarily for effect (as he’s reassured Fernanda several times) trusting that she’ll overlook some tricky moments earlier this evening, when, as they exited his big, black Lincoln, his bodyguard caught him just in time. Which is what he’s paid to do, of course. That, and drive Fernanda, these past several evenings, to his employer’s immense Upper East Side apartment, where, for the better part of an hour, she was obliged to compliment her host – almost sincerely – on his collection of unusually dark, exceptionally costly, Old Master paintings. Unsurprisingly, she thought, it was all voluptuous Late Renaissance nudes, counterbalanced –if Renaissance nudes can be counterweights – by a score of the grimmer St. Sebastians. Paradoxically, however – and unhappily for George – it was that very curious combination that reconfirmed Fernanda’s recent decision to dispense, in that case, with senior sex.

  In the weeks leading up to these visits to his flat, however, George has been phoning her daily and besieging her with masses of lilies and pastel-ly macaroons. Despite this, and his paintings and his mid-century misogyny, Fernanda almost likes him. He shares her love of Old Masters, for one thing. He doesn’t talk about his golf game or his reps at the gym. And, best of all, he spends chunks of his wealth on worthwhile art. He isn’t remotely close to being Mr. Nice – because he isn’t nice. Even less so, Mr. Right. But George is good company, and kind of fun, now and then. A pleasant diversion as she waits for the end.

  But to “thank her” for viewing his collection, George sent a messenger, just this afternoon, with a diamond-and-emerald bracelet, and Fernanda is wearing it now. When she chided him for the overindulgence, he nicely suggested she could return it. Until she does (and she will), she appreciates the thought, along with all that’s old school-ish about George. She’s well aware that if she’d only say yes – and if he were able – he’d ravish her on the spot.

  Instead, after effusive compliments on her appearance, he slides his soft old hand around her waist and shepherds her around the show, all the while complaining about all “these lacquered battle-axes” and their black-tie escorts, most of whom are besieging the food stations scattered through the aisles as George tries his damnedest to squeeze by. Long tables are piled with salmon, sushi, fruit, little buns with barbecued pork or sliced ham, all the cocktail antipasti, in fact, that $2000-a-couple can buy. The antiques pale by comparison. But no one pays any attention to George, except for one or two of the antiques and picture dealers, most of whom are perennial exhibitors and entirely resigned to the indifferent crush of the opening nights. In fact, small knots of well-dressed dealers, used to being ignored in favor of finger foods and gossip, pass the time and prevent their mouths from stiffening into permanent grins by sipping champagne and sniping at the money flowing by. Now and again, to their pleased surprise, a live one will break from that hot, bejeweled magma to, actually … shop, a discreet red dot will appear, and the buyers wake to indicate a sale.

  The exhibitors don’t know it, of course, but Fernanda Turner is very much more than just a trophy date, appearances to the contrary. She’s a potential buyer, for example. Although she’d never buy anything here. Fairs such as this one are the tail end, she’s learned, of a very long arts-and-objects chain. Aunt Teeks, her old St. Louis haunt, was as close to its source as a buyer might ever hope to get. Which is why it was fun, of course.

  Indeed, despite her Poussin money, Fernanda still frequents thrift shops. She’s addicted to the chase. Who isn’t, she wonders? Well, George, possibly. The George Sterlings of the world prefer – require, really – the safety of a big-name dealer or a highly paid consultant or, as a last resort, the heavily qualified written guarantee of a major auction house. And Fernanda doesn’t really blame them. It isn’t everyone who’s been born with (or given) her dubious gift of aesthetic second sight.

  And yet, as she and George maneuver through the crowded aisles, with George stopping every few yards to catch his breath or exchange a few words with an acquaintance, Fernanda can no more keep herself from looking at the objects than she can unlearn how to read. She’s already seen one or two interesting things and, in fact, a third of the way down the second aisle, she spots something that brings her to a halt. Apologizing to George, and leaving him muttering darkly to himself and gazing around forlornly for a bench, Fernanda cuts quickly into the booth t
o have a better look at an oil sketch that’s caught her eye: to ask about its date, surface, and condition.

  It’s a really interesting picture, oddly, that is being offered by a London gallery best known for its stock of pretty, accessible, art – horses, dogs, babies, overdressed Victorian ladies twirling parasols, paintings by second- and third-tier artists. Knowledgeable collectors wouldn’t waste a minute in this booth, and yet, even from a distance, this image – a hunched quartet of gamblers at a table, onlookers crowding in behind – reached out into the aisle and grabbed her. Fernanda tries to hide her excitement. Because … this painting? In this booth? Luckily, she’s still unknown to the trade, and so, apart from a dismissive once-over by a solemn British salesman, she’s being left completely on her own. And so absorbed is she in the picture (surely Caracciolo?), that, at first, she doesn’t sense the presence at her side.

  “I’m kind of partial to gambling paintings myself,” a pleasant male voice remarks. “Are you?”

  Turning reluctantly from the picture, Fernanda sees, standing beside her, the striking, white-haired casino prince.

  Or his double. Although this man is taller, she decides. And older? But still …

  She offers him her hand.

  “Hello!” she says. “What are you doing in New York?”

  He’s puzzled and stares.

  “I’m sorry. Do we know each other?”

  Fernanda is unnerved. She was Frannie when they met.

  Her cheeks are on fire. It’s very close in here.

  “Oh! Oh, I thought you were someone else for a minute. Forgive me. And well … to answer your question, yes,” she awkwardly replies, taking back her hand. “I think I’m probably a little bit of a gambler myself” – a dark flash of Randi – “maybe very much a gambler, actually. Must have been what caught my eye.”

  “Are you interested in this painting, then? If you are, I’ll walk away and it’s yours.”

  That voice. That fresh, green scent.

  “Probably not.” (Oh, please don’t walk away.) “Well, actually, I’m not sure yet. Do you know how much it is?”

  “Let’s go look.”

  As if they’ve been playmates or lovers, for years, he takes her by the hand, and homing in on the heavy, leather-bound price list lying open on a neoclassic desk, he leafs through the pages.

  “Oops,” he grimaces.

  “What is it? Is it huge?”

  “You don’t want to know,” he replies, closing the book.

  No, she doesn’t. She only wants to know who he is and when they can be alone. It doesn’t surprise her at all to find that he’s lived in her heart all these months.

  “I guess I’ll take your word for that,” she says.

  “You’ll just take the word of a man you don’t even know?” he asks, softly. “How do you know it isn’t by some famous artist? And, hey, what makes you think I’m not going to come back after you’ve left, maybe, and buy it because it’s a steal?”

  Good question. Could he be serious?

  “Well, I feel I do know you.” (In her mind’s eye, she smacks her forehead: incredible, stupid cliché.) “Um, I just don’t know your name.”

  “André. I’m André Celestin. And you?” He takes in her dress, her face, her hair. “You are, obviously … the Armory goddess.” He delivers the phrase straight-faced. Not “gorgeous” or “beautiful,” or the verbal bouquets she’s grown used to. “The Armory goddess.” Oh, God.

  “No,” she says gravely. “I’m Fernanda Turner,” and she extends her hand again. He envelops it in his own.

  “Are you with someone?”

  “I am with someone,” she answers, more regretfully than she’d intended.

  “Maybe you’d give me your number? I have to say that, like you, I have the strangest feeling we know each other.” He touches her bare wrist. “I know how feeble that sounds …”

  Fernanda grows cold with a terrifying thought.

  “Is the woman you think you might know taller than I am, even? Is she incredibly, unbelievably beautiful? With red hair like mine?”

  He’s amused.

  “God, no. Believe me, I’ve never known anyone who looks remotely like you. And anyway, there can’t possibly be anyone else as … as out of this world as you are.” A sudden smile. “It’s only that I had this feeling.”

  So relieved she can scarcely inhale, Fernanda pulls her Berger’s card from her sparkly minaudière. He examines it, turning it over, turning it back.

  “A beautiful name – Fernanda. And you work at Berger’s. You are from New York, though, aren’t you? It would be disastrous if you were here from California or Paris or something.” He tucks the card into a well-used black wallet, as black as his tux and his eyes. “Not that I’d be put off by that.”

  “I am from New York.” It still thrills her to say that. But she remembers him smiling more.

  “Oh, one other question. Are you a twin, André?”

  “Now that’s a peculiar question. Are you a twin?”

  “No.” Fernanda has to laugh.

  “I’ll call,” he tells her solemnly. He steps to the edge of the booth and, blowing a kiss, is swept away. She follows him to the edge of the teeming aisle, watching that snow cap of hair until it melts into the splendid throng.

  Abruptly, she remembers George, and hurries to find him, only an aisle away, still on his feet, leaning on his cane, and looking cross.

  “I’m back,” she says apologetically.

  “Did you buy it?” he asks, now not testy at all, she’s happy to find, merely interested.

  “No. I’ll come back to look at it during the week,” she replies. “It might have been – I’m almost sure it was – something like an exceptionally good reproduction.”

  CHAPTER 21

  The Old Master’s department is in full pre-sale mode. The sale of Clary’s paintings (privately, Fernanda thinks of it as “her” sale) is a mere six weeks away now, and she’s been on the phone every day: calling collectors and dealers in Paris, in Amsterdam, in Milan, in Arkansas. And when she’s not on the phone, she’s been sending out hi-res images, or contacting curators at smaller museums, or answering emailed queries. Despite her having invited scores of clients to arrange dates for private viewings, there are several who weren’t available when she called or couldn’t come to New York, and for these, she’s had to make separate – always highly detailed – arrangements. All of which means she’s had to play catch-up with department meetings and client visits. And she’s been thinking about André Celestin. She’s never forgotten his warmth. Or that kiss. But he hasn’t called.

  To further complicate her life, one of the major paintings in “her” sale has suffered a sickening damage: the Van Ruisdael landscape slipped while being hung, and now it has a messy tear, the kind that leaves paint flaking off the canvas. Its gilt frame was damaged in the fall as well, and while Berger’s insurance covers the canvas repair, it doesn’t include the frame. As usual, Peregrine has saddled Fernanda with telling the owner the news.

  She’s postponed that call for days already, but at the end of a frantic Monday, she’s just been jotting her main points on a handy legal pad – and there will be arguments – when she hears her cell phone buzz. And caller ID pops up: it’s André Celestin.

  He doesn’t say hello or say his name.

  “Are you busy tonight?”

  By now, Fernanda knows that today’s young women don’t mind being called last-minute. She does mind, however. She always did. For half a heartbeat, she considers being busy.

  Then her present-day half kicks in.

  “No, I’m not.”

  “Can we have dinner? There’s this noisy, badly lit coffee shop over on 10th Avenue. The food is terrible and we probably won’t be able to hear each other at all. What do you say?”

  To tell the truth, Frannie was always okay with noisy coffee shops, but Fernanda has become used to a little bit better than that. Though she’s sort of nettled, too, since where
has he been, this man who even Frannie knew was Mr. Right? And does he deserve to be called that? Since where has he been these past few weeks?

  The silence grows as she makes up her mind.

  “Sure,” she says.

  “Wait, Fernanda. Wait.” He sounds flustered. “That was a joke. Who’d consider taking you anyplace like that? As a matter of fact, on the off-chance you were free, I made reservations at Le Pavillon.” He pauses, waiting for a reaction, but she offers none and this time, her silence stems from shock. Pavillon! Five stars in the Times. Three hundred dollars a person, for starters.

  “Say you can come tonight. Please. Will it help to tell you I’m in love with you? That I absolutely need to see you sitting across the table from me. Being pampered. Looking amazing. Say you’ll come, my Fernanda. Say yes. Do I hear a yes?”

  My Fernanda.

  For a fantasy moment, he’s the cool quarterback who never asked her out. The prom king. Who never asked her out. The senior crush who asked her out, but stood her up. In her mind’s bright fairytale eye, he’s every silvery Hollywood star she’s ever loved.

  And he’s a little crazy, evidently.

  “I’ll need to change. Can I meet you there?

  “Really? You’ll meet me?”

  Omigod, Fernanda takes the phone from her ear. This completely smacks of The Hair House. Who “loves” anyone overnight after all? And he hasn’t called. And they’ve exchanged, what? Fifteen words? It’s got to be a trap.

  But he’s so … And there’s almost no time left. Besides, why wouldn’t he “love” her? Other men have. Other men do.

  “I have a few things to finish up here. What time is your reservation?”

  “I made it for 8:30. Is that too late? I’ll change it.”

  “It’s perfect, actually. I’ll see you there.”

  Fernanda clicks off and tries to return to her notes. She needs to rehearse what she’s written before she makes this call.

  But she really needs to process this.