Catharine Bramkamp - Real Estate Diva 03 - In Good Faith

by Catharine Bramkamp

  He grinned. “There wasn’t much O’Reilly could do. He got her possession of the house, but she couldn’t afford to buy me out, and in fact, didn’t really want to. She got $6,000 a month in alimony, not enough of course, but she managed to squeak by.”

  I thought of her shoes, squeak by was right. There was no way she was paying for those clothes and shoes and jewelry on a mere $6,000 a month. Which was probably where the missing art came in.

  I did not express that idea out loud. “Was she the friend?”

  “What friend?”

  “When we first met and you and O’Reilly were so rude to each other, and you explained it was because he screwed with a friend of yours - was Beverley the friend?”

  “No, but that’s a great guess. Beverley wasn’t a friend.”

  “The woman you married was not your friend?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “I should say so.”

  But I didn’t pursue it.

  ***

  “Why didn’t you pursue it?” Carrie demanded when I called her from my car to update her on the Ben situation.

  “It’s complicated.” I repeated.

  “It’s always complicated when they don’t want to explain something.” She said sarcastically.

  “I honestly don’t have an answer, and here is my client. I’ll call you back.” It was the first break Mr. Owen Spenser had ever given me.

  Misty rain is not ideal for viewing condos (nor is it a good name for a stripper). Condos tend to look bare and small in the overcast dim light. I was 100 percent certain we had seen this condo before, but since Owen Spenser was determined to buy at the very bottom of the market, and because he re-discovered this one on Craig’s List, it had the patina of a bargain. The rain was not a deterrent.

  “It’s pretty cheap.” Owen is a comfortably average looking single man who teaches math at the local Junior School. I think both my nephews had him as a teacher. I never felt threatened by Owen, which in the light of the warnings currently posted over my email from the Realtor Association about the inadvisability of women agents showing homes alone, was a comforting thing. Sometimes an empty condo can feel as isolated as a country house in the middle of a five-acre parcel.

  All the admonishments from the office maybe had finally penetrated my sometimes thick skull. I even remembered to look around as I opened the door. The only human I saw was one man strolling in the opposite direction, he didn’t look interested in me. Good.

  “Many of the condos in town are pretty cheap.” I pushed open the door so Owen could precede me.

  “And,” I continued, out of habit, “it has windows and a view out to the field and a full kitchen, including a new stove.” I had to glance down at my MLS print out. New Stove was a feature. When there isn’t much to say about a property, agents resort to listing the relative age of appliances.

  Owen wandered to the upstairs leaving me alone in the kitchen. I peered out the window, but saw nothing and no one.

  Owen’s footsteps were heavy on the stairs. “The closet poles aren’t perfectly balanced. That’s too bad.”

  Last time he viewed this property he was concerned with the slope of the patio and whether it drained properly. I did not bring this up again since he seemed to not notice this time.

  I looked out at the gloom outside. The sky had gradually faded into dark and hung heavily over the bare field that was considered a “view out the kitchen window.”

  “What are your plans for the holidays?” At least a conversation would keep the noise level up and dissipate some of the stony silence.

  “My daughter will have us all over.” He said. “You?”

  “We’re having dinner at my sister- in-law’s.” I said it as if it was a yearly occurrence. But it was not.

  I took a deep breath. Owen seemed neither disappointed nor enthusiastic. Actually that was progress. Owen Spenser was a man perpetually in balance; each side of the equation equaled the other, nice for math, terrible for decisions. The first time I offered to buy coffee, he spent fifteen minutes weighing the pros and cons of latte versus cappuccino. Over the last six months, I have learned not to hold out for a sudden decision from him. Even when he claims he’s interested in buying; I do not rush to the office to fill out the purchase agreement.

  “Maybe it could work.” He carefully placed his feet on the stair treads either because he may fall, or to not disturb the carpet nap. He put his hands on his hips and scanned the empty living room again.

  “I’ll let you go so you can think about it.” I announced as cheerfully as I could. “Go home, call a couple of your friends, and give me a call, you have my number, and I’ll always pick up your call.”

  He nodded. “That’s a good idea, I’ll talk to my friends, it’s difficult to leave my old place, but my rent’s increasing in January, so I don’t have much time.”

  “So you say.”

  “I’ll get back to you.” he promised vaguely. He always promises to get back to me, but never on the same listing.

  “You have the flyer and the link.” I pointed out.

  At this point, after working with someone for months, showing the property, always meeting them on time, bringing options to the table, the client usually disappears, never returning calls and never acknowledging email. Usually, it makes me mad, in Owens’s case, I was hoping for that very phenomena. But no, he keeps calling; and stupid me, I keep showing up.

  I drove by the walking man, probably a homeowner out for a afternoon stroll, and gave him a jaunty wave just to reassure him that I was just your friendly Realtor, trying to keep your condo development from lapsing into one too many rental units. He should be grateful. He eyed me as if he wasn’t.

  Chapter 10

  In deference to the holidays and to the event in question, Ben borrowed Emily’s car Saturday night. It was a more luxurious ride than his truck.

  “You look nice.” He greeted me at my door and escorted me to the car.

  “Thanks.” I wore my own pair of Laboutrox pumps and a diaphanous green and purple dress in a swirling, vaguely floral design that was quite vogue this season. It also had the advantage of hiding my flaws and emphasizing my excellent ankles.

  Ben was dressed in a much better suit than what he wore to the Homeless Prevention League dinner.

  “So,” I settled into the leather car seat and checked my lipstick so I wouldn’t have to look directly at Ben. “Your mother will be there?”

  “Don’t worry about my mother.”

  “No, sorry, that’s not possible. You already met my mother; she thinks you’re a God with a drill. She loves you. Now, I have to live up to your stellar reputation.”

  “You don’t have to live up to anything.” He assured me.

  But I wasn’t even on steady footing with his grandmother yet, so I didn’t have that back up, just in case his mother hated me. And since I’m a working girl from Novato, rather than the fabulous, skinny – skinny is important – socialite, that Beverley was, I didn’t think I stood much of a chance of impressing his mother.

  What bothered me the most was that this bothered me at all. I loved Ben. I was possibly in love with Ben, so why care about what his family members thought? We were grown ups, family shouldn’t matter.

  But it mattered hugely to me. When my own grandmother fell in love with Ben, it was like receiving a papal blessing – and we aren’t even Catholic.

  “Do you think Catholics have a better Christmas than the rest of us?” I said out loud.

  “I think Muslims have a better Christmas than the rest of us.” He flexed his fingers and re-gripped the steering wheel. “ Really, you don’t have to prove anything. Mother is usually more concerned about herself and the impression she’s making on everyone else in the room than she is about connecting with another human being.”

  Startled, I glanced at him, but his face was impassive. Was he aware of what he just said? Was he talking about his mother or his ex- wife? God, no wonder he was all tied u
p into knots about all this.

  “I’ll be good.” I promised.

  He relaxed a bit, but his hands still gripped the steering wheel as if he was wrestling with a loaded truck with no shocks on the back roads of Claim Jump, not a luxury sedan on the freeway headed through Marin.

  “You’re always good.” He assured me.

  The Lost Art Museum collection was housed in a brand new building. The new museum hovered on the edge of the Tenderloin making a brave stand against poverty and the brutal outside world.

  The building had a faintly Frank Lloyd Wright air about it. It was built of natural dry stacked stone and oriented around a central sweeping staircase. It was described in the Chronicle as the twin to the Guggenheim in New York.

  Ben dropped me off at the entrance, but I didn’t go right in. I hovered by the front door waiting for him to come back from parking the car. I didn’t want to walk very far in my heels, but I also didn’t want to walk into the party by myself. I twisted my own bracelets as I waited. I wanted to wear one of the large pieces I acquired from Beverley, but I didn’t want one of the guests, or God forbid, Ben’s mother, to recognize it. That would be too embarrassing.

  Ben dashed across the street. “You could have gone inside.”

  “Where did you park?”

  “Over at the club, it’s easier than parking on the street, and Pablo takes care of the car.”

  “The club.” I repeated.

  “Bohemian Club.” Ben said easily and guided me into the museum.

  I had no time for a response, because we were inside and I had to focus on the party prospects. The guests were directed to the second floor. We trailed up the curved stairs and admired what I could only assume were the less controversial pieces of the collection as a whole.

  “It looked like that.” Ben pointed to a black and blue painting that reminded me of a riot in the making.

  “What does what look like?”

  “The painting I bought when I was young, it was one of my first “real art pieces”. I really loved it. Beverley sold that as well.” He looked around for a plaque to check the name of the artist, but none of the paintings decorating the curved stairs were labeled.

  A tree made of dowels and paper snowflakes marked the entrance of the main hall. Large white paper snowflakes hung from the ceiling and twisted slowly in the warm air.

  “There they are,” Ben pointed to an older couple. “My parents, Mrs. and Mr. Ben Weiss Senior.”

  “You’re a junior?”

  Ben nodded. “See the problem? I was not sorry to give up the junior crap by taking the Stone name.”

  “Oh my, yes.” I agreed. I stopped and observed the power couple in awe. Gloria and Ben Senior flowed through the crowd with much the same panache as I had observed with Carrie and Patrick. But these two were, of course, far more practiced and skilled. Not only were they born to do this kind of gig: they enjoyed it. I knew the type, they would circulate through the party and greet every important guest without appearing to know the guest was important. They would be practiced at expressing astonishment when they discovered the nice young man they had spoken with for an hour was really the featured artist, how fortunate!

  My friend Joan, who has a number of degrees in literature, would say Ben’s parents were characters straight out of The Age of Innocence. I remembered because Joan gave me a colorful lecture about Edith Wharton and her society. She also gave me a copy of the book. I really will read it one of these days.

  Anyway, this party was all about the old guard mingling with the up and coming artists and collectors. “Why are we here again?” I whispered to Ben.

  He liberated two flutes of sparkling wine and handed one to me. “I want to discover to whom my ex sold our art.”

  “What makes you think people here will have that information?”

  He raised his glass in the direction of an enormous painting of a suffering Jesus. I recognized it. My first encounter with this particular Jesus was in a listing in Marin. The painting was originally part of a collection of “dangerous” art that was indeed dangerous in that possessing it got the owner killed. The angry Jesus painting didn’t get the poor man killed; another painting did. The museum had that painting as well. I looked around, but didn’t see it.

  “I can’t believe he displayed that.” I referred to angry Jesus. “Shouldn’t that one have stayed lost?”

  An elderly couple paused at the painting in question and gestured excitedly between each other.

  “Answer your question?” Ben asked.

  “I am constantly amazed.” I admitted.

  “That’s why we’re here.” He grabbed my arm and propelled me into the center of the crowd.

  “Ben.” A small gentleman, about 80 years old, dressed in a blazer and khaki slacks hailed Ben.

  “I wanted to thank you for finally releasing that Kahlo. It looks great in my collection.”

  “One of her self portraits, I assume.” Ben commented.

  “Well,” the man was a bit startled. “You signed the sales receipt, it’s the one with her pet monkey.”

  “Of course it was. Did I say anything about why I wanted to sell such an interesting piece?” Ben asked carefully.

  “No, Beverley said you needed to clean house. I’m thrilled of course.”

  “Did I get a good price?” Ben’s tone was mild. I was impressed. He was far more stirred up when we were discussing “feelings” than he was now, over real money.

  “Hell, yes, $200,000 is more than generous.” The man said.

  I sucked in my breath, but Ben seemed unperturbed.

  “Did you want it back?” The man asked.

  Ben shook his head. “No, no. You enjoy it, take your turn.”

  The elderly man looked relieved and moved forward to grab more stuffed mushrooms.

  “That much?” I took a swig of sparking wine to steady my nerves. $200,000 would buy a lot of shoes. If a girl was planning to get away to a country that say, didn’t set much store by shoes, a girl could make that $200,000 alone go for a couple years, at least. Maybe Beverley did have a good plan.

  “I was lucky, I had found some interesting work when I was young. That’s how I met Fischer, we were scouring the same flea markets, looking to pick up what had been rejected in the past.”

  “And is desirable now.” I put in.

  “That’s how it’s played. My parents are collectors, so I learned early.”

  “My Dad taught me how to golf.”

  He smiled. “I do love that about you. The whole thing with my family gets a bit unreal at times.”

  “Did you collect everything in that kind of category?”

  “You mean the expensive category? No, there were some works I collected for fun. The one I was really fond of was similar to the painting we saw on the stairs. Mine was a weird swirling piece that looked quite similar. I bought it because the color spoke to me, it cost about $2,500 at the time. So it’s probably not worth much more than that now. I could ask around,” he mused.

  “It doesn’t matter how much it’s worth if you like it.” I pointed out.

  “True,” he agreed. “It was back when we were first married.” He gave me a wan smile, “Our marriage was so short, I suppose the whole marriage could be categorized as when we were first married”

  “Why didn’t you take your favorite painting with you?”

  He lifted his shoulders. “I wanted to get out, completely escape. At the time I wasn’t really thinking about the paintings. They were attached to the wall, the walls were part of that house. She was in the house.” He shuddered, a macabre rendition of the nursery rhyme, the House that Jack Built.

  I never got as far as moving in with a lover, so I didn’t really understand. But I’d see him through this: he was important.

  “Ben, darling.” The smooth voice startled me out of my fond reverie.

  Ex-wives hacked up in the bedroom, Rosemary on a diet; I could handle a great deal. I’m even a bit bullet-proof. Bu
t that voice cut through the crowd like a silver letter opener. It cut so quickly and invisibly you couldn’t even see the slice at the top of the envelope, or through your ego. The crowd fell away as if they were so much shredded paper. I had no defense against silver letter openers.

  “Darling, how lovely to see you.” Ben’s mother was so thin she reminded me of a preying mantis, the kind that eat their mates after sex. I looked around for Ben’s father, but he was not in evidence – has she eaten him?

  “Mother.” Ben said weakly.

  Mom was dressed in a sleeveless crimson cocktail dress that displayed not exactly muscled arms, but arms that held their own against any sleeveless dress clad woman in the room. She wasn’t necessarily perfect, her face has clearly expressed disapproval one too many times. Yet to her credit, she was too classy for a face-lift.

  “Gloria.” Ben turned and took my hand, holding it, not gently, as if I was a precious flower, but more with the force of a vise made by Acme. He was the coyote about to plummet off the cliff and apparently I was the only thing keeping him from falling.

  It was kind of sweet.

  “This is my girlfriend, Allison Little.”

  The words girlfriend warmed my heart, but not enough to weather Gloria’s sudden cold expression.

  I know, I know, but you don’t have to make those faces when you meet me. I am aware my name is somewhat of a misnomer. In all my advertising, I only post my head shot, nothing more.

  “Allison.” Gloria extended her hand and gripped mine almost as hard as Ben, I was a bridge suspended between the two, mother and son. It was not a metaphor that bore further consideration.

  “How nice to meet you, Gloria,”

  “How nice to meet you, Allison.” She responded tonelessly. In a flash I saw how she and Beverley must have behaved. And Ben must have learned to stay completely clear of the fray.

  We released hands and then stood in silence. I took a breath ready to plunge into some kind of inane conversation about the weather, the museum, lost art in general, but she beat me to it by ignoring me completely.

  “Ben, honey, there’s a leak in the upstairs powder room, can you take a look at it?”