He locks his eyes on mine. “Something not quite on the up-and-up.”
I don’t break the stare. “I thought you said it was an opportunity to do good?”
“The end is good. It’s just the means that are a bit iffy.”
“Illegal?”
“There’s illegal and there’s illegal.”
“And which one is this?”
Markel looks across the room at the Degas and Pissarro.
And now it all makes sense. “Oh” is all I can say.
He takes a sip of wine, relaxes into the lumpy couch. The most uncomfortable part of this conversation is clearly over for him.
I cross my arms over my chest. “I can’t believe that after everything that’s happened, you, of all people, would even consider asking me to forge a painting.”
“How much does Reproductions.com pay you?”
“They pay me to copy, not to forge.”
“So you said a fraction. A few thousand a picture? A little more?”
Often it’s less, but I nod.
“I’ll pay you $50,000. Plus expenses, of course. A third up front, a third on completion to my satisfaction, and the final third on authentication.”
“Is this because of what happened with Isaac?”
“It’s despite what happened with Isaac.”
I’m stupefied by this answer, and it must have showed on my face, because he says, “You’re the best for the project.”
“Out of all the thousands of artists you know?”
Again, he looks across the room at the Degas reproduction. “You’re the only one I’d trust with it.”
“How do you know I won’t talk?”
“It’s not your style,” he says, which is true. People who have been on the wrong side of rumor know when to keep their mouths shut.
“What about turning you in? I could always go to the police.”
“Not when you understand what’s at stake,” he says.
“So tell me.”
“I meant what I said about your paintings, Claire. You have a unique talent. You always did. Just because you’ve been blackballed doesn’t mean you can’t paint.” He pauses. “I’d also like to give you a one-woman show at the gallery.”
I barely conceal a gasp.
“In six, nine months,” he says. “After you’ve finished this project. Do you think you could have twenty paintings ready by then? Of the realistic highly glazed?”
I turn away to hide my longing. My own show at Markel G. An impossible dream.
“I’m pretty sure I can get the same Times reporter who covered Jocelyn Gamp to cover you,” he says.
The New York Times. Sales. Commissions. Studio visits from the Met. My heart actually hurts.
“Claire, please look at me.” When I do, he says, “I’ll protect you. Like I said, I’m levels away from anyone with any knowledge, and you’ll be a level away from me.”
“What’s the part where we get to do something good?”
“I’ll tell you all the details when you’re on board.”
“There’s no way I can agree to something this mysterious.”
Markel stands. “Just give it some thought.” He touches my shoulder. “I’ll check in with you next week.”
“You really are the devil, aren’t you?”
“If you believe in the devil.”
Which, of course, I don’t.
Two
When Markel leaves, I flop down on the couch and stare at the pipes and vents chasing each other across the ceiling, trying to process the strangest studio visit ever. Markel G. My own show. The sweet possibility of reclaiming all that’s been lost, everything I’ve ever wanted. But a forger? A pretender? The absolute last thing I want to be.
You’re damn good at this.
I climb out of the couch, walk over to the front windows, and stare down on Harrison Avenue. I look over the chain-linked parking lot to the elevated highway in the distance, then to my window paintings lined up along the walls.
You have a unique talent. You always did.
Damn him. Damn him and his compliments and his offers and his strings.
I grab my backpack and head to Jake’s, the bar where everyone knows my name. Unfortunately, not only does everyone know my name, they also know about Markel’s visit.
There’s illegal and there’s illegal.
When I reach the bar, I square my shoulders and push open the door. Jake’s is clearly and proudly old neighborhood, nothing like the ritzy places drifting south from Back Bay. Here, there are no blue martinis, and the tables are scarred from years of use, not purposely distressed to look chic. There’s no valet because the clientele walk from their tiny apartments or studios. A neon BUDWEISER sign hangs in the narrow window to scare the hip away.
Most of my buds are already here; it’s six, after all, the drinking hour. To be followed by the eating hour—hot dogs, burgers, and BLTs comprise the menu—followed by another drinking hour. Or hours. Right arms shoot straight into the air as each person catches sight of me. Our gang sign.
Mike points to the open bar stool next to him. “Here” is all he says as he turns back to his conversation with Small. Small’s name is Small because she’s very small, maybe five feet, and that’s generous. She says she named herself Small to confront the issue head-on and because her real name is so ethnic it labeled her. Mike’s only half a foot taller than she is, but far too unsure of himself—not to mention he’s a man—for that kind of piercing self-deprecation.
I slip onto the stool. Maureen, owner and bartender, opens a bottle of Sam Adams and puts it down in front of me. She knows I don’t want a glass.
Rik, buff, handsome, and with kangaroo eyelashes every woman I know covets, leans from behind to give me a kiss. “Do tell,” he demands. Rik’s the one graduate-school friend who stuck by me after the “Cullion Affair” slithered its way into the MFA Museum School as well as the art scenes in Boston and New York. I love him for it.
I return the kiss. “And hello to you, too.”
“I want to hear every last delicious detail.” Rik always wants to hear every last delicious detail.
“Well, he seemed to like some of my stuff, especially the paintings where I applied …” I lower my voice in imitation of Markel’s tenor, “‘… classical realism to contemporary subject matter.’ He said he’d give me a call, but I’m thinking he was blowing me off.”
“Did the great man tell you why he suddenly decided to grace you with his oh-so-fabulous presence?”
“Just what he said before. That he wanted to see what I was up to.”
“Nothing about Sir Isaac Cullion?” When I don’t answer, Rik adds, “Not even one teeny-tiny single solitary word?”
I’ve known Rik long enough to know that if I don’t give him something, he won’t let go until he’s got the truth. I heave a dramatic sigh. “He did tell me he sold Isaac’s Orange Nude. That it made him think of me.”
Small turns toward us, and Mike puts a hand on my shoulder. Maureen leans her elbows on the bar. Danielle and Alice, who are on the other side of Rik, stop talking. Everyone looks at me expectantly. There are few secrets among us, especially not career ones—and these are probably the only people who actually believe Isaac lied.
“Didn’t go well?” Mike asks. We sometimes call Mike “the church lady” in joking salute to his keen sense of right and wrong. He’d be horrified at Markel’s offer. And even more horrified that I didn’t refuse outright.
“I’m guessing not, although I wasn’t expecting much.” A lie everyone recognizes. They’ve all said roughly the same thing after a career disappointment. It’s how we survive.
“A shot of tequila for my friend here,” Mike says to Maureen. Aside from Rik, who isn’t really an artist anymore, Mike’s the only one of us who can afford actual drinks. He’s a lawyer by day, painter by night.
I knock back the shot as soon as it’s in front of me. The warmth spreads down my throat and into my empty stomach. A
dangerous thing if Maureen decides to comp me a second shot, which, under the circumstances, she probably will.
“Any idea how much Markel got for it?” Small asks.
I know she’s talking about Orange Nude. “I told him not to tell me.”
“More to the point: Does anyone know if Cullion actually painted it?” Danielle’s voice is thick with sarcasm.
There’s dead silence in the bar; I stare into my empty shot glass. Although she doesn’t mean to, and would never purposely hurt anyone, Danielle often steps over the line she doesn’t see. It’s like her tact sensor is missing.
“Claire knows,” Rik jumps in. “She was there. And she wasn’t wearing any clothes.”
I throw him a grateful glance and hold up my hands. “Present and nude as charged. I can attest to its authenticity.”
“Never should’ve given it back to the old fraud,” Rik says to me. “You didn’t even—” He stops, frowns, and we all follow his gaze. “Well, well, well,” he says sourly, “if it isn’t the fabulous Crystal Mack, our own local artist at work. Slumming it tonight?”
“Oh, darlin’,” Crystal says as she slides onto the stool next to Rik. “Don’t be silly.” She kisses him on both cheeks. “Talking about the Orange Nude sale?” She looks at me and winks. “I heard mid–six figures.” She’s overdressed, as usual. Something clingy and expensive in that trendy green that makes me look seasick. Unfortunately, it looks just fine on her. Blondes can wear any color they want.
“Probably out of testimony to the beauty of the model.” Rik throws his arm around my shoulders. “Rather than the skill of the artist.”
“That,” Crystal smiles at me sweetly, “or the power of scandal.” Crystal, too, often steps over the line—but her eyes are wide open.
Maureen puts a second shot in front of me.
We turn away from Crystal and break into smaller conversations. Crystal orders a double scotch straight up and begins an animated discussion with Maureen, pretending that the bartender isn’t the only one willing to talk to her. Not that Crystal cares. Her purpose in coming here is to make herself feel better by making us feel worse. It works every time. The good news is that no one will ask any more questions about Markel with her around. The last thing anyone wants to do is give Crystal more ammunition.
By nine, Rik and I are the only ones left standing. Everyone else has gone home, and although we know we should, too, we linger at the far end of the bar. The two tequila shots have worked their magic on me: I’m all loose and stretchy, comfortably buzzed.
“I’ve still got options,” I say.
Even though we haven’t mentioned Markel in over an hour, Rik knows exactly what I’m talking about. “You’ve got lots of options, Claire Bear. Lots more than you even know.”
“Markel told me that just because I’d been blackballed, that didn’t mean I couldn’t paint.”
Rik’s eyes widen. “Oh, honey, he actually said that to you? What an asshole.”
“No, no,” I say quickly. “He didn’t mean it like that.”
“Well, then how the hell did he mean it?”
“I think it was a compliment.”
“Some compliment,” Rik mutters.
“So,” I say, “I made it to the final round of the ArtWorld Trans contest. And I haven’t been rejected from the Cambridgeport Show yet.”
“What’s the Trans thing?” Rik isn’t a studio artist anymore, so he isn’t up on the latest contests and juried shows. He landed a job in the curatorial department at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum right out of graduate school—which was an amazing coup—and has happily worked his way up to assistant curator in four years. He claims he doesn’t miss the “drudgery, backstabbing, and poverty of being an artiste.” Sometimes I believe him, sometimes I don’t.
“The submission’s got to reflect whatever you think Trans means,” I explain. “Transpire, transplant, transcendent, transfusion, transmutation, transgendered.”
“Sweet,” Rik says, and I can tell he’s running through the paintings stacked in his closet to see if any would work. He blinks his eyes to stop the parade. “What’d you submit?”
I shrug as if I don’t really care. “A few from my window series. Transparent, transition, transpose, translucent. I figured if every painting had a bunch of Trans, it might give me an edge.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“I heard next year it’s going to be Counter, so I thought I’d submit some of my repros as counterfeit.”
“Funny,” Rik says, in a way that clearly indicates he doesn’t think so. “So how’s that going anyway?”
“Markel liked them.”
Rik homes right in. “What interest could Aiden Markel possibly have in repros?”
“I don’t know, Rik. I can’t read the man’s mind. They were there, I guess.”
Rik holds his hands up. “Sor-ry. Didn’t mean to step on any toes.”
“No, no,” I say. “It’s me who’s sorry. Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Rik grins. “We all know you can’t handle your liquor.”
He insists on walking me home. It’s only a few blocks out of his way, so I acquiesce. Men got to do what they got to do. Even though I’m no fool about living in the city. I know the rules. Walk in the middle of the street or at least at the far edge of the sidewalk, be aware and tuned into surroundings, no white ear buds (steal my iPod), no texting (I’m distracted), no playing with apps (steal my iPhone). But above all, never, never, never look like you’re lost.
We step out of Jake’s into the thick summer air and head down the sidewalk, past the back alley of ChiRom, the Asian-Dominican fusion restaurant that’s presently all the rage. A couple of men in grungy clothes are sitting, actually listing, against the Dumpster, passing a bottle of whiskey, and laughing uproariously. A well-dressed couple approaches us, glances into the alley, and crosses the street.
“Do you think Markel’s visit could’ve had something to do with Isaac?” Rik asks.
“Isaac’s dead.” I’m surprised by the sharpness of my tone.
Rik stops and turns to me. “Hey,” he says softly. “You okay?”
“Why does everyone think it has to be about Isaac?” I snap. “Is it beyond belief that he might just be interested in my work?”
Three
THREE YEARS EARLIER
“Give it up, Claire,” Isaac said. “I’m done.”
“You’re not done. You’re just indulging yourself.”
“Perhaps.”
Isaac and I were lying on the bed in his studio. But we weren’t naked, and there had been no sex, which wasn’t my idea. When I came in and found him sprawled out in the middle of the afternoon, I’d used all my womanly wiles to get him out of his slump—literally and figuratively. I’d succeeded at neither. He insisted on wallowing. This, unfortunately, was nothing new.
I guessed he was bipolar, but who could be sure when he refused to see a doctor? I wasn’t about to intervene. Health nagging was a wife’s responsibility, not a girlfriend’s. But when it came to totally screwing up his career, I had to take a stand.
I pushed myself to a sitting position, and Isaac put his head in my lap. I twisted a curl of his dark hair. He looked up at me with those amazing blue eyes and touched his finger to the end of my nose, then to my mouth. I kissed it and placed his hand over my heart. “Isaac,” I said, “you’re a royal pain in the ass.”
“But I have many other fine qualities?” he asked, in his deep chocolaty voice. A teasing smile lit up his face, and, as much as I wished it didn’t, it lit me, too.
There was everything wrong with this relationship: I’d been his student, he was forty-four to my twenty-eight, he was prone to bouts of depression interspersed with brilliant bursts of artistic production and irresistible magnetism. Even the separated-for-three-years marriage with a pending, but not yet executed, divorce was an old cliché. But it was new to me.
“Don’t try and charm me when I’m pissed at you,” I said. “
I’m not going to let you do this. It’s the Museum of Modern Art, you idiot.”
“And that’s all it is, Claire. An art museum. We’re not curing cancer here.” He took his hand from my breast and wrapped his arm around my waist.
“You’re so full of shit.”
“That, too.”
“You can still do it, you know,” I said. “You’ve got two weeks.”
“Twelve days, but who’s counting?”
“It’s not like you’ve got to wait for glazes to dry. You could do three wet-over-wets in that time if you put your mind to it.”
“You could do three wet-over-wets,” Isaac said. “It’s a matter of drive.”
“So where’d your drive go?”
“High gas prices?”
I punched his arm. “That doesn’t even make any sense.”
“See? I’m not up to it.”
“Karen Sinsheimer thinks you’re up to it.” Sinsheimer was the senior curator of painting and sculpture at MoMA. She was the one who’d noticed Isaac’s work at Markel G and commissioned a painting for her show Survey of Recent Painting and Sculpture. Such a stick-up-the-ass name for a show highlighting the best emerging talent.
“Karen Sinsheimer saw paintings I did a year ago.”
“And your point?”
“No point.” He leaned over, grabbed a detective novel from the end table, and opened it. He smiled up at me guilelessly. “There’s a bunch more over there.” He gestured to a shelf filled with shiny new books. “I wish you’d give one a try. Then we could read together and talk about it.”
I didn’t bother to respond—he was well aware I wasn’t partial to mysteries—so I sat there fuming while he turned the pages. I knew I should leave, but I wasn’t willing to give up so easily. Not only was I madly in love with the guy, but I recognized, as did many others, that he was a great talent. As in a major artist of our time. And if he didn’t take himself in hand, he was going to lose the biggest opportunity of his career.
This MoMA gig was no little thing. Sinsheimer had gone around the world and commissioned work from artists who had broken out in the past decade. Although the museum hadn’t released an official list, word on the street had it that roughly fifty painters and sculptors were included. Which meant that Isaac had been chosen as one of the top twenty-five rising painters in the world.
The Art Forger Page 2
