The Dream of The Broken Horses

by William Bayer

  Andy and Barb live separately now. Their friends, though hopeful, do not believe their marriage can be saved. I have recently spoken to them both. There is only one thing, they assure me, in their hearts: a prayerful wish that their stolen daughter will one day be returned home safe. Experts in these matters do not hold out much hope, but hope is all the Fulraines have. So they cling to it. And we must too. For at this point, a year later, hope is all there is.

  I didn't set out today to write a sappy column about how brave my friends have been. But they are brave, braver than I can conceive. One purpose of this column is to let them know that we stand with them and always shall.

  Another purpose is to appeal to anyone, anywhere, with any knowledge that may illuminate this matter, to come forward now and tell the authorities what you know…

  Yeah, Waldo could really lay it on when he had a mind to. Reading his piece, I sense he genuinely cared about the handsome young Fulraines, truly did grieve with them, was appalled by the crime committed against them… not only because it was so terribly cruel, but also because it contradicted his world view.

  Waldo Channing, you see, saw the world in terms of social events – beautifully assembled parties, exquisitely hosted dinners, lavish weddings, luxurious homes, chic resorts. He savored urbane gatherings, suave displays of wit, most of all that odd symbiosis between people of wealth and people of achievement, society and celebrity, money and fame, summed up in his favorite phrase (purloined, perhaps unknowingly, from Stendhal): ‘The Happy Few.’

  It's a phrase that turns up again and again in his columns through the years in numerous and varying contexts:

  "‘The Happy Few’ were out in full-dress force last night, at the opening of Symphony…"

  "After the party, the Charles Dunphys, Brownie Dillers, Babe Keniston, her veddy good friend, Timmy Knowlton-Smith, and others of ‘The Happy Few’ assembled in the back room at Rob's for nightcaps, laughter and lotsa giggles…"

  "The fun masquerade party over at Andy and Barb Fulraine's was well attended by members in good standing of our ‘Happy Few.’ Dot Bartlett took first prize for ‘best headdress’ with her amusing…"

  Ad nauseam.

  But still I must concede this to Waldo – when he really cared (a rare event), he was capable of setting aside such drivel and writing from the heart.

  *****

  The other photo of Barbara: I am studying it again as I sit in my rental car parked across from the Doubleton Building at the corner of Harp and Spencer Avenues – the very building where I believe it was taken more than twenty-six years ago in a back-room photographer's studio on the seventh floor.

  Despite the numerous times I've looked at it, this photo always amazes me. Time, I think, to confess that it is this picture that has brought me back to Calista, that is the driving force behind my quest.

  Please imagine: a black and white posed studio photograph of a beautiful woman, glamorously lit as if by Horst or some other skilled Hollywood photographer of the 1940s.

  Imagine her dressed in lustrous black leather riding boots, dark fitted jodhpurs, and, except for a pair of long, laced pigskin gloves, otherwise totally bare above the waist.

  Imagine her leaning forward in this amazing state of dishabille, one raised foot resting on a bench, engaging the camera with beguiling eyes.

  Imagine precisely rouged lips (the lipstick showing black in the photo), loose, dark hair cascading in waves across pale shoulders, perfectly proportioned breasts surmounted by taut upraised nipples, while long, multistory black pearl earrings dangle seductively from her finely modeled ears.

  And if all this is insufficient to hold your attention, imagine The Lady holding a long, narrow riding crop, bowing it slightly as if to test for stiffness and strength, while she gazes at you-the-viewer – the voyeur! – with an expression combining amusement, desire, hauteur, and, perhaps too, the barest modicum of scorn.

  The picture is compelling not only on account of the beauty of its subject and the fetishistic manner in which she's been attired and posed, but also because of the exquisite photographic technique with which the image has been rendered. The lighting has been designed to highlight each engaging detail – sparkling eyes, glossy lips, delicate areolas, the very texture of the lady's skin. And the illumination of the background wall has been contrived so that vectors of light and shadow converge to make delicious contrast with her luminous naked upper body as well as the dark riding attire she wears below.

  I'm certain this picture was taken with a large-view camera under studio conditions, perhaps with the photographer hiding his head beneath a cloth. A signature stamp graces the bottom of the print, raised in fine silver script: Studio Fesse. A pseudonym, of course, one he used on this particular brand of work. His actual name, I happen to know, was Max Rakoubian, still listed on the register in the Doubleton Building lobby.

  *****

  A black attendant with jaundiced eyes takes me up to seven in a very old, silent cage elevator. After I step out, the elevator descends like a waterlogged raft sinking slowly in a lake.

  I make my way down a hushed corridor lined with pebbled glass doors bearing the names of firms: FESTIVE FOLLIES; HYDE INSURANCE; MARITZ INVESTIGATIONS… PHOTOS BY MAX.

  I knock on MAX. No response so I turn the knob and walk in. There's an odd aroma in the reception area, not the photochemical smell I expect. I hear the hissing on the other side of an inner door. I move toward it, call out:

  "Anyone here?"

  "Yeah," a male voice responds.

  "Okay if I come in?"

  "Suit yourself."

  I push the door open, and the smell hits me at once, a foundry smell, hot metal and gas.

  A sweaty, muscular man in his thirties, stripped to the waist, face covered with a visor, is applying a welding torch to a sculpture in which a number of skeletal figures, men, women, and children, are entwined with one another in an agonized group embrace.

  "Sorry, can't shake hands," he tells me. "Hope you don't mind pigeons. They fly in on hot days. One comes at you, my advice is duck. 'Less you like pigeon shit on your face."

  The windows are wide open, the sound of the city – street noise, car horns, distant sirens – makes a din against the hissing of the torch. Two pigeons flap about near the ceiling, while another stands attentive on the windowsill as if deciding whether to depart or stick around.

  "I'm looking for Max Rakoubian."

  The sculptor grins. "Max's been in the ground eight years. I'm Chip, his son… one of them anyway. I took over his lease, never bothered to change the name on the door."

  "Or downstairs."

  He grins again. "Kind of a tip of the hat to the old man, you might say. Me being the only one of his bastards ever gave a shit."

  He finishes his weld, closes the valve of his gas tank, puts down his torch, and pulls up his visor.

  "Bet I know why you've come," he says, wiping his face with a rag. A good-looking guy despite a couple days beard growth, he reminds me of one of those underwear models, the brawny kind with surly mouth and soulful eyes.

  "Wanna know whether I got some of Pop's old ‘art studies’ sitting around. Willing to pay top dollar for them, too."

  "Not exactly."

  He gazes at me. "Well, I doubt you dropped by to see my work."

  I turn to the sculpture. "Interesting piece."

  "It's for a Holocaust Memorial. Commissioned by a synagogue in Van Buren Heights."

  "The one on Dover?"

  Chip nods.

  I introduce myself. "I'm more interested in your father's work, Chip, but I didn't come looking to buy more of it. Just want to ask a couple questions about a photograph I've got." I hold up my eight-by-ten envelope.

  "Woman with a whip?"

  "How'd you know?"

  Chip peels off his gloves, wipes his face again and then his chest, pulls on a black T-shirt, and extends his hand. We shake.

  "Don't know which one you have there, but they're all pre
tty much alike. Different models, different poses, sometimes with some poor naked slob down on his knees groveling or licking the lady's boots. But the idea's always the same. Women rule. Dominatrixes. I know a lot about that, see, ‘cause my mom was one of ‘em. Which was why Pop adored her." He gestures toward my envelope. "Let's see which you got."

  We adjourn to the reception room to inspect my photo. Chip nods the moment I bring it out.

  "Sure, I recognize her. Mint condition print, too." He turns it over, points to some numbers scrawled in pencil on the back. "Pop's darkroom notes, enlarger lens opening, print timing and such." He turns the picture again, appraises it like a connoisseur. "Mint condition vintage print. I've had collectors offer me two, three thousand bucks for one like this. Seems vintage prints of Pop's ‘Fesse’ line are highly desirable these days. Too bad they didn't discover him before he died. He could've used the cash."

  "Do you have any more like this?"

  Chip raises his eyebrows. "So you are a collector?"

  "No, but I'm curious about this woman. Do you know anything about her?"

  Chip scratches his neck. "Hot day. What say we go down to the pub across the street? Buy me a couple of brewskies, I'll tell you what I know."

  *****

  The Rathskeller's one of those Teutonic places you find throughout the Midwest: imbedded exterior timbers, dark paneling within, wooden booths, gemutlichkeit stuff on the walls – oversize meerschaum pipes, fancy old beer steins, photos of stout guys in lederhosen, the occasional cuckoo clock, and friendly buxom waitresses wearing dirndls. In short, the opposite of Waldo's.

  Chip Rakoubian is greeted warmly as we saunter in: "Hey, Chipo!" "Hot ‘nuf for ya, Chipper?"

  We take a booth, he orders two mugs of the local brew, and, when they come, he takes a long, slow sip, then settles back.

  "Pop was a fine all-around photographer," he tells me. "Weddings, portraits, catalogue work. Also corporate annual reports – beaming workers on plant floors and finely lit pictures of whatever they made: gleaming metal widgets, glossy machine tools, shiny objects radiating abstract beauty. The old man was a master of the lustrous inanimate object." Chip takes another long sip. "But there was another side, what he called his ‘personal work.’ Artistic nudes for one. For these he'd light the women the same careful way he lit the widgets, sparkle here, highlight there, making them look more like sculptures than living people."

  Chip shrugs. "That was how he saw them, I guess. But then, later, with his Fesse series he followed a different route – fetish photographs of gorgeous dominant women holding whips. ‘Fesse’ means something like ‘spanked’ in French. I think the French word for spanking is fessee. Anyway, Studio Fesse was the marquee he put on them. People into that kind of stuff saw that and knew what to expect."

  I find Chip remarkably forthcoming about his father. He seems to enjoy discussing the old man's ‘personal work.’ Max, as Chip describes him, was not an especially impressive-looking man – stooped, of medium height, with the bushy eyebrows and beak characteristic of his Armenian heritage, excessively hairy ears, chest hair showing at his throat, with two wild patches of gray head hair flanking a shiny pate. But there was a quality about him, a gentle intensity that drew people in. It was this, Chip tells me, that made it possible for him to convince women to pose for him in postures that, had the suggestions been made by anybody else, they would have taken as the gravest of insults.

  "He'd approach a woman, tell her he found her extremely beautiful, then hand her his card saying he hoped she'd consider calling him to arrange for a portrait sitting. Approximately half would accept, an extraordinarily good batting average when you think about it. With these women, in the course of the session, he'd create a bond. He adored women, you see – put them on a pedestal, and some women found they liked that very much.

  "Say a week or so after the session, he'd invite the subject back to the studio to look at the prints. The portraits would be good, often the best photos the woman ever had taken. Then, if he felt there were possibilities, he'd show her some of his personal work, first the nudes, and then, after considerable coaxing, perhaps several of the whip photographs as well. Then, depending on the woman's reaction, he'd let it be known he'd be thrilled to take a few shots of her in a similar vein. Or, more often than you might expect, she might broach the notion herself."

  "They'd have great fun then picking out an appropriate wardrobe from his studio closet filled with fetish gear – riding apparel, glossy black boots, black leather bustiers, a huge selection of gloves and crops, plus all sorts of provocative underthings, lacy black bras, black silk stockings, stiletto-heel shoes in sizes ranging down to petite.

  Provocative as the Fesse photographs were, there was no nudity in them. Cleavage – yes! Sexuality – the pictures radiated it. They were choked with implication, innuendo. But there was never anything vulgar or brazen, nothing that smacked of a pornographic magazine. Their brilliance lay in their restraint. That was the art of them. In his Fesse pictures, Max showed himself to be an artist. Which was why his Fesse series has become so collectible.

  "The print you've got, the one of Mrs. Fulraine – the fact that she's bare breasted makes it a real rarity. Pop didn't distribute shots like that, never sold them to clients. But sometimes near the end of a session he'd ask a model whether she'd let him take a few of her stripped down just for fun. And if she did, they'd put in an extra hour, and, if he liked the negatives, he'd make just two prints, one for her, the other for himself."

  Chip met his eyes. "I have Pop's album. There's a print in it identical to yours. So the print you have must have once belonged to Mrs. Fulraine." He pauses. "How'd you get it?"

  "It came to me by a circuitous route."

  Before he can pursue the issue, I ask how his father met Barbara Fulraine.

  Chip shrugs. Perhaps Max saw her, he says, when he was working on an annual report for Fulraine Steel. Chip knows the lady was murdered the following year. It was a famous Calista scandal – she and her lover gunned down in a sleazy motel room near Tremont Park. But he doesn't think his father would have made more prints of the bare-breast shot simply because his sitter was no longer alive. That wasn't Max's style, he was an honorable guy, and the Studio Fesse pictures weren't made for profit.

  I ask Chip if he has other shots of Mrs. Fulraine.

  He nods. "Yeah, a few, but the one you've got is the best. Pop really caught something there, something perhaps the lady didn't recognize herself till Pop brought it out. You get the feeling from that picture she was truly relishing her role. I don't know much about her beyond that she was a society woman and that she was killed. I doubt she ever thought of herself as a dominatrix, not until Max posed her that way. Then, in that split second, she became one. Not a society lady pretending to be one, but a dominatrix pure and true. Again, there's the art… which is why I won't sell any of Pop's Fesse prints or allow new prints to be struck from his negatives. The nude studies are another matter. I've sold off most of those. But not the Fesse shots." He looks into my eyes. "You're lucky to possess one so fine."

  *****

  Tonight the mood in Waldo's is not exuberant. It's been a long, dull day at the Foster trial, filled with boring technical testimony and tedious arguments. I sensed that early, knew there would be nothing worth drawing, said as much to Harriet, then left the courthouse to pursue my own interests.

  Judging from the tenor of the room, those who stayed in court wish they hadn't.

  Pam Wells is not in a pretty mood.

  "I would've left too," she says, "If there was anything else for me to do." She studies me. "Where do you go off to anyway?"

  "Oh… Memory Lane," I tell her casually.

  "Uh-huh." She gives me her cynical reporter's look. "My ass! You're on a story, David. I can smell it. So clue me in, Lover Boy. Unless you're afraid I'll crowd your turf."

  She shows me a tight little smile, her way of warning me I'd be a fool to think she wouldn't.

&nbs
p; "It's an old story, Pam. You like new stories."

  "Sometimes old is new."

  "True enough…"

  I'm rescued by the strutting entrance of Spencer Deval, who joins a group two tables away. Pam squints as she studies him.

  "I don’t get it about that guy," she whispers. "He's such a self-important little shit. And that accent! It's so phony. Who is he anyway?"

  I gesture at the portrait of Waldo Channing. When Waldo died, he took over the column. The two of them were lovers, at least started out that way. Spencer, it's alleged, was quite lovely in his youth."

  "You'd never know."

  "Waldo left him his house and furniture. There're also rumors about something shady in Spencer's past. They say Waldo, who was to the manner born, cleaned him up, taught him manners, even sent him to England for a year to learn how to speak."

  Pam grins. "That explains the accent. I get it now. Pygmalion," she says.

  *****

  I take her to dinner at Enrico's on Torrance Hill, a quiet, family-owned Sicilian place. It's a weekday night, and there aren't many customers, certainly no out-of-town reporters. Pam is charmed.

  "Candles stuck in old Chianti bottles, red and white checked tablecloths – I love it, David. Right out of the fifties."

  The owner doesn't stand beside our table like a waiter; rather he pulls up a chair, turns it around, then sits leaning over the back in spectator-sporting-event position to take our order.

  When he moves away, Pam gives me a serious look.

  "Please tell me what you're working on, David. And, please, no bullshit about how it wouldn't interest me. Everything interests me. Especially if it interests you."

  "I'm not ready to talk about it yet."

  "Must have to do with those weird drawings taped to your walls."