Painted Truth

by Lise McClendon

  “Hi, guys. You’re back.” She made a beeline for the fridge and took out a bottle of Evian, gulping it. When she turned again, her ruffled edges were smoothed over. “I hope you don’t mind about the bed, Alix.” She smiled, her lips curling as if savoring the memory. “To tell you the truth I don’t even remember how we got in there.”

  “Kind of a rush?” Carl said.

  Eden laughed. “Good things come to those who don’t wait.”

  “Operative word come,” I said. The sharpness of my tone surprised me.

  “Alix.” Eden turned to me and crossed her arms. “You sound jealous, honey.” She glanced at Carl. “Don’t tell me you had your eye on my Pete too? First Paolo, now Pete. What about ol’ Carl? You going to share him with me too?”

  Carl was staring at me, a question on his face he wanted me to answer. I clenched my teeth. How did I let her get me into this? I took a slug of wine.

  “Eden. Darling. We were up in your apartment tonight.” I walked around to see the pile of clothes, the worn-out sandals lying on top. Eden looked at them too, her expression unreadable. “Picked up a few things for you. Not much left up there.”

  “You went up there?” she said.

  “I tried to talk her out of it,” Carl said. I gave him a look.

  Pete emerged from the bathroom, a towel around his waist. “Hi, y’all.” His tan began at his collar and went up. The whiteness of his hairless chest was stunning. “Ready for a party?”

  What a pair. I tried to focus on Eden, now circling Pete’s waist with her arm. He nuzzled her hair with his chin.

  “Eden, we have to talk.”

  Her eyes were slow but wary. “About what?”

  “Your apartment. Its magnificent emptiness.”

  “Wait a minute, Alix,” Carl said, stepping up to the counter. I felt him scrutinizing the set of my chin. “It wasn’t empty. You found her clothes. Her dishes and stuff were in the kitchen.”

  “A few things were left to make an impression. If the whole building had burned no one would have been the wiser.” I watched Eden, her eyes darting to the clothes and to Carl.

  “What are you say—” Carl began.

  “Let her explain,” I interrupted.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Eden said, dropping her hand from Pete’s waist. “Are you accusing me of something? I thought we were friends.”

  “This is serious, Eden. We’re talking about an arson conviction. Jail. Did you know your building was going to burn? Did you move your valuables somewhere? Your television, your kitchen appliances, your jewelry, your clothes?”

  Eden looked shocked. “Where would I have moved anything? And why?”

  “Why would she burn down her own gallery?” Carl asked.

  “Come on, Carl, you can’t be serious. Tell us, Eden,” I said. “Tell us why you would want to burn down your gallery.”

  Eden tensed, wringing her hands. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. My insurance covered all that. You have no right to interrogate me like this.” Her eyes filled.

  “We’re not accusing you of anything,” Carl said. “We’re just saying it looks suspicious. If it looks suspicious to us, then it looks that way to the police.”

  “They know it’s arson. The first person they suspect is the owner. Chief Frye already told me he suspects you,” I said. “You took out all that extra insurance on the new show. I didn’t believe him. Not Eden, I said. She loved that gallery, I told him. She put her heart and soul into it. But now—”

  Eden put her face in her hands, tears flowing. Pete put his arms around her and pulled her into his chest. He looked helplessly at Carl. We let her sob noisily, not ready to give up on the discussion. If you could call it that.

  Finally she took a gulp of air and sobbed, “I did love it, Alix. You know that. But everything was getting so terrible, just awful.” She cried some more and Pete patted her back.

  “Shhh, now. Shhh. You don’t have to say any more.” He shepherded her into the bedroom and closed the door.

  I finished my wine. My stomach hurt. I was upset. I turned to Carl. “What should we do?”

  “You’re the one who beat the confession out of her.” He walked back to the couch and sat down. Outside the moon had set and the Milky Way shone bright and creamy.

  “What’s that supposed to mean? You saw the apartment. It was stripped of everything of value. She may not have lit the match herself, but she arranged that arson job. You know it, Carl.”

  “I know no such thing.”

  “You just said she made a confession.”

  “Not a legal one. She only admitted the gallery wasn’t doing so hot. That’s not a crime.”

  “Carl!”

  He looked out the window for a few minutes, silent. The laughter of passing pedestrians walking down the alley floated up. In the bedroom we could hear the low voices of Pete and Eden, her crying, him cooing. The candle flickered and I reached over and blew it out, sending hot wax flying across the table onto a stack of plastic-sheathed Mighty Thor comics. I cleaned the splattered wax with my shirttail.

  Finally Carl said, “All right. We should go talk to the police. Whoever is handling the arson case.”

  “That’d be Scanlon, the fire inspector,” I said. Was Frye in charge too? I looked at my watch; it was 11:30. “We’ll go first thing in the morning.”

  12

  I PULLED THE wool blanket over my head as the birds sang outside the window. What was Valkyrie, my horse, doing this fine summer morning? Munching grass, contented? Smelling the mountain air for stallion blood? Pawing the fresh earth in search of adventure? I didn’t picture Valkyrie as ever contented; she was always looking for trouble. I felt a yearning for her suddenly. I needed to stroke her soft brown neck, feed her an apple.

  It was too early to get up even though my neck had a permanent crick in it. I was curled into my not-so-overstuffed armchair. Carl stretched out luxuriously on the couch, his feet still in cotton socks sticking out the end of the quilt. Under the blanket I could smell the smoke from Eden’s apartment on my clothes.

  The phone on the counter behind my head rang, loud and obnoxious, as if trying to compete with the birds. My watch said 6:15. Normally I would ignore such an early call. Even my mother would wait until eight for an emergency. But since sleep was elusive, my butt numb and my back twisted into a question mark, I got up.

  “Alix.” Danny Bartholomew whispered into the phone, his voice hushed and anxious. “I got a weird call.”

  I blinked, trying to concentrate on the phone call and not on the note on the counter from Eden. “Danny?”

  “Guy said he was Ray Tantro.”

  I was awake. “When?”

  “Minute ago. He said to meet him at his house in Moose.”

  “Okay,” I agreed for some reason.

  “At eight o’clock. Said he had some information about the fire at Timberwolf Arts. About the guy who died in the fire.”

  My mind processed all this, the pieces falling into place. A small measure of satisfaction glinted in my fingertips. “Are you going?”

  “It’s probably a prank. I have to call Frye.”

  “Sure,” I muttered, thinking hard. “It’s Saturday. He won’t be in his office.”

  “I’ll go when I get ahold of him. I really don’t like getting summoned at dawn anyway. It reminds me of the army. Besides, why does this joker call me?”

  “You did the story on the fire, Danny. You gave it a more objective slant than the cops did.” I looked at my watch again. “Thanks for the call.”

  “Wait, Alix. What are you going to do? Do you want to come out with us? Frye may balk, but if I’m going . . ,”

  “No. But let me know what happens at your meeting.” I hung up the phone and watched Carl’s chest rise and fall. He lay on his back, his mouth slightly open. He wouldn’t like the idea I had. He would try to talk me out of it.

  Before I stepped into the bathroom to brush my teeth and find
my shoes, I read Eden’s note. She and Pete had gone to his place. Thanks but no thanks. Some friend you turned out to be, it read between the lines. A copy of this month’s Mighty Thor comic book lay under it, corners bent viciously. How could someone who loved Thor as much as I did do this to me? She had used me, claiming innocence as I helped her bilk the insurance company of thousands of dollars. I shook my head, trying to rid it of thoughts of Eden’s treachery, and grabbed my clogs.

  ON THE DRIVE to Moose the guilt for the botched relationship with Eden seeped through me, something I rarely allow. Guilt is better left to the Catholics, who understand these things from the get-go. For a Norwegian, guilt is a luxury. Life goes on, sin or no sin, mistake or no mistake. No sense wallowing, there’s cleaning to be done. But this morning I wallowed, trying to figure out how I could have misread Eden, how I could have trusted her, how I could have been a better friend. Conflicting regrets, these. How I could have kept her from being who she was. How I could have, through a higher form of kindness, stopped her.

  The fire still baffled me. I had no doubt now that Eden was in some way responsible. She didn’t seem like the type to plan an arson fire, despite her upped insurance and the emptiness of the apartment. She was too emotional, too disorganized. Imagining her planning the blast in the roof, lighting candles by gas-filled balloons—no, it didn’t figure. She must have contracted it. But that meant finding an arsonist. A trustworthy arsonist isn’t anybody a middle-class Lackawanna girl would know. But Eden had surprised me before with her choices of friends and acquaintances. Last night with Pete was only a recent example of her excellent judgment. Three months ago she had the hots for a rodeo cowboy; last winter she let a truck-driving couple stay with her for four days when they got snowed in. I guess I should have wondered about our own friendship. But my vanity, that I was teaching her the trade, educating her, grooming her, didn’t allow me to see her true nature.

  That’s not completely true, she had good qualities. In many ways Eden reminded me of Paolo in his early gallery days. Bringing home strays, feeding hitchhikers, opening his heart and home to everyone. I had been one of Paolo’s strays in New York, friendless and lonely, nearly broke. He had made me bean soup and flat bread and stroked my neck until I almost cried. Those days seemed so far away now. Soon Paolo would be gone for good.

  Eden had that same gregarious nature. All good salesmen did. They liked people, and wanted people to like them. What’s that lounge anthem about people who need other people being lucky? I didn’t believe that. People who need people are lonely. People who can rely on themselves are lucky.

  Did I count myself among the lucky? As I turned off the highway into Moose, the Grand Teton and Teewinot twinkling in the red glow of the rising sun, I wasn’t sure. Maybe I thought I was, maybe I just wanted to be.

  Ray Tantro’s pickup truck still sat in the shade of the aspens in his dirt drive. I turned in, killing the engine on the Saab Sister as I rolled it to a stop behind the truck. My heart began to pound in my ears again. Was this The Moment I am right? When I meet the dead Ray Tantro and shake his hand? I shivered as I walked up the drive.

  The air in the bottomland along the creek held the night’s damp chill. The grass outside the shade of the trees was dry and brittle, with drooping seed heads; it crunched under my feet as I approached the cabin.

  The morning sun hit the tops of the trees, big blue spruces thirty feet tall shadowing the tiny cabin in its dark hole. As I got closer I stopped, listening for the dog.

  “Saffron,” I sang out quietly, my voice shaking a little. All around me forest sounds were muffled, scampering, chattering, birdsong. “Ronnie?”

  There was no answer. I glanced at the cabin, then veered around to the back corner to look for the dog. I could see the food dish and water bowl at the edge of the lawn. “Ronnie,” I called halfheartedly again. “Here, girl.”

  I stepped closer. The weeds were matted down under the tree where she had been tied. The end of the chain was empty. I went to the back door and knocked loudly, wondering if Tantro would be presentable. My watch said 7:10.

  A mountain bluebird landed on a stump in the lawn and began to peck at something in the wood. A goldfinch flashed its gay colors at wild sunflowers growing on a pile of dirt.

  No answer. I went to the front, knocked again, waited. I walked around to the back again and put my nose up to the door. Did I smell coffee? The slight pressure of my hand pushed the door ajar. Another, different odor hung in the air, acrid and bitter.

  I pushed the door wide, my ears pounding again. The kitchen was dirty, and empty. Not even coffee.

  “Ray! Ray Tantro?!” I called from the stoop, softly at first, then louder. “Mr. Tantro! Are you there?”

  When there was no answer, I stepped through the kitchen into the living room. It was empty, the ugly carpeting and ancient sofa still covered with dog hairs. His bedroom was dark, shades drawn. I squinted into the gloom, looked behind the bed. Nothing. The bathroom was empty.

  The door to the studio was half open. I pushed against it, a feeling of dread upon me. This was not the fear of the river, this was an evil dread, a certainty as clear as morning. The door hit something and stopped. I could see the north window bare of curtains. Where was the easel? I looked harder and began to turn to sidle through the door when I saw the easel lying on the floor, on top of the canvas and drape.

  And a body. The feet stuck out, holding the door. Cowboy booted feet, Levi’s, then a pile of art debris. I stared at all of it for a minute, paralyzed, then pulled off the heavy easel, a professional model that was built for years of use. I stood it up automatically, taking my time to get the angle of the legs correct, then made myself stop, hands shaking.

  I grabbed the stretched canvas and set it on the easel. It was still blank, a rectangle of nothing. The man lay there, half covered with the dark green drape like an army surplus blanket made of stiff cotton.

  The blood stopped rushing into my ears. I could feel it drop back into my neck, my chest, the calm of death settling in. For a moment the room’s air was still and I held my breath. This stillness was death, this moment irretrievable. I wanted to talk to Ray, to find out what happened in the fire, what happened to his fire. To find out where his talent had gone. To feel the glow, however tarnished, of his genius.

  But now he was only a body, his creative life drained away like so much fish guts. To everyone else he was already dead. I felt a brief bittersweet rush that I had been right, that he was alive, then caught myself staring at the drape, wondering about his face, his eyes. Although his second death would create problems for the law, one thing would not change: Ray Tantro was legally dead.

  13

  MY HAND TREMBLED. My breath stuck in my throat. The room was warm and rancid with the smell of oil paints and human sweat and something else, a sharp odor. The green cloth drape lay heavily on the body. Several folds covered the face as he lay on his back on the dark tarp so thoughtfully laid down in his art studio. The tarp that now kept his blood from staining the dirty brown carpet. As I stepped close to the body, indenting the olive green tarp with a crunching sound, a trickle of blood ran to the toe of my clog.

  I pulled tentatively at the drape. Did I really want to see his eyes, the eyes of a dead magician who transformed lumps of gooey pigment into pictures that tore at your heart? Tantro clutched the cloth in his left hand, fingers curled around. He was missing his ring and pinkie fingers. I pushed the cloth aside. He wore a blue flannel shirt with his jeans and boots and had somehow kept his stained gray cowboy hat on his head while taking three shots to the chest. The holes were dark, clotted— and very final. His face, rough with several days’ growth of beard and now an icy blue, showed surprise.

  The eyes of artists have always fascinated me. They have special powers to see things that the average person cannot. X-ray eyes, supernatural eyes, the eyes of God. An artist is someone who conjures the invisible for the blind.

  Ray’s eyes were a dark, ocean blue
. Now they stared, dead. I closed them like I had seen hundreds of TV cowboys do to their fallen loved ones. The skin was stiff and clammy and I wished I hadn’t done it.

  How long did I kneel there? I remember the color of the blood on his chest, maroon, dark and lifeless. Inside that chest was a heart that no longer beat, no longer loved. It never would break again. But there was little comfort in that.

  I held his right hand for a moment and thought I should say something to comfort his soul, wandering the cabin or maybe just hovering, wondering what to do next. What would Thor say to soothe the way to the spirit world? Ray had large, muscular hands, callused. I looked at the brushes on the card table. Some had fallen to the floor like Tinker toys, their dried paint dusty with age. I frowned. This wasn’t your studio, Ray. Why did you come back?

  The sirens began. I could hear them far off, echoing off the mountains like the howl of coyotes. Before they got close I heard the footsteps, then voices behind me.

  “Alix, we saw your car, you didn’t come by yourself, did—?” Danny B. stopped in the doorway, looking down on Tantro. Frye pushed him out of the way.

  I stood up. There was nothing to say.

  “Jesus Mary Mother of God,” Frye grunted, grabbing my arm. “You didn’t touch anything, did you?” He looked at my hands. I spread my fingers and saw the blood there. “Christ. Just stand there, will ya? Don’t move.” Frye turned to Danny, whose face was stuck in shock as his eyes shifted from me to Tantro and back.

  “Don’t let her move. Can you fucking do that?” Frye let go of my arm. Pushing Danny aside again, Frye gave him a shake on the way by. “Can you, boy? Don’t move, neither of yous.”

  I felt numb. I stared at the body and the red seams on my palms. I heard Charlie Frye running back to the cruiser. Danny held his notebook limp at his side, immobile. Finally, as we heard Frye coming back, Danny spoke.

  “Wh-why’d you come out, Alix? You could’ve come with me and Frye and you wouldn’t have seen all this by yourself. Why’d you come out by yourself?” He paused, looking at Tantro. “Is that him?”