Die in Plain Sight (6 page)

Dana Hills

Tuesday evening

T
he high school gymnasium smelled vaguely of old socks and sharply of fresh floor cleaner. Instead of the usual crowd of teenagers working painfully hard to be cool, there was a swirling, ever changing flood of people holding paintings from their attic or basement for Susa Donovan to anoint as worthy of cultural as well as familial interest.

“Sweet God,” Ian muttered. “I haven’t seen this much crap since I raised geese for a 4-H project.”

“Geese?” Susa asked.

“No room for a pig or a pony. Besides, the geese mowed the lawn for me.”

Susa laughed and felt like hugging him. For the past hour she’d been smiling and trying not to hurt someone’s feelings about the cultural worth of Great-Aunt Sissy’s fabulous study of a rose from bud to petal drop…in mauve, of course.

“Uh-oh,” he said, spotting a woman with a look of hope and determination on her face.

“Remember,” Susa said quietly, “these are treasures to the people who brought them.”

“Lost Treasures Found.”

“What?”

“The name of a shop I was in earlier. Bought a nifty old movie poster. No bargain, but in great condition.”

As Ian spoke, he stepped in front of Susa to protect her from a woman who was carrying more paintings than the average county museum. One of the event organizers and a leading figure in the American Figurative Artists Association, Mr. P. E. Goodman fluttered around her like a balding, scalded moth.

“I’m so sorry,” Goodman said to Susa, rolling his eyes toward the matron. Then, in a hissing undertone, “She’s a big supporter of local artists. Wouldn’t hear of only three to a customer.”

Susa smiled through her teeth. There were some in every crowd who just
knew
that the rules didn’t apply to them. The fact that Susa was built more like a pixie with laugh lines than an Amazon with fangs probably had something to do with the fact that everyone assumed they could just walk all over her.

“Ms. Donovan will be happy to look at all your offerings,” Ian said, smiling gently at the matron even as he blocked her access to the table.

“I knew she would. My grandmother’s paintings are of a much higher quality than—”

“We’ll start with these,” Ian said over her. As he spoke he took three paintings from the woman’s armload and put them on the table in front of Susa. “There, that was easy, wasn’t it?”

Before the woman could get past Ian’s smile, she found herself being escorted by him back to the auditorium doors, where the end of the line awaited her.

“We’ll see more of these paintings in no time at all.” Ian patted the matron’s armload of family pride. “I know Susa is particularly eager to look at everything you brought.”

“But I’m…the line is so…”

Ian was already gone, blending into the crowd even as he speared through it back to Susa’s side.

The red-faced Goodman stared when Ian reappeared alone as swiftly as he’d left. “How did you do that?”

“He smiled,” Susa said.

Goodman glanced at her.

“Killer smile,” Susa assured him.

“Want a job?” Goodman asked Ian.

“I have one, thanks.”

“If you ever—” Goodman began.

“If he ever wants another job,” Susa cut in, rapidly assessing and rejecting the first of the three paintings in front of her, “he’ll apply to Donovan International.”

Goodman wasn’t stupid. He went back to lining up people and making certain that a name or address or contact number of each owner was somehow attached to every painting.

Ian’s dark eyebrows lifted. “Donovan International, huh? Sounds like an order.”

Susa half smiled. “My son Lawe said you were bright. What’s more important, so did Dana.”

“I’m flattered.”

The sideways glance she gave him was amused. “I don’t believe you.”

“Lawe said you were quick.”

She laughed out loud. “I like you, Ian Lapstrake.”

“Now I’m flattered.”

She stood, gave him the kind of quick, smacking kiss she bestowed upon her family males, and sat back down to study the paintings left by the matron, who was still wondering how she ended up at the back of the line again.

“This one isn’t by the same hand as the other,” Susa said.

Ian looked from one painting to the next. Flowers. Lots and lots of flowers. “How can you tell?”

“A century of experience.”

“Bull. You haven’t been around longer than forty years.”

“Flatter me some more, I’m amenable. I’m also old enough to be Lawe’s mother, remember?”

“I’m working on it. So tell me, is the Donovan as tough a bastard as his sons say?”

“Absolutely.” She set the second picture on the table behind her, with the few she had decided merited more study. “Better looking, too.”

“Well, dang. How am I going to win you away?”

Snickering, shaking her head, Susa moved on to the third painting. “I wish I had another daughter for you.”

“Something wrong with the ones you have?”

“Husbands.” She tilted her head to one side and slanted the painting in her hands so that it caught the light from all angles. “Remarkable.”

“Is that good?”

“In this case, no.” She put the third painting on the reject table, looked at the long line of eager humanity in front of her, and questioned her own sanity for agreeing to thumb through Moreno County’s attics in quest of fine unknown artists. As a publicity boost for the Friends of Moreno County, it was a great idea. Now that she had to actually do the looking…well, she’d get through it somehow.

“Time for a break,” Ian said. It wasn’t a question, or even a suggestion.

Susa’s head snapped up. “Have you been taking lessons from my husband?”

“Your oldest son, actually.”

“Archer?”

“Yep,” Ian said cheerfully. “He called and told me to be sure you didn’t get tired.”

“Told you? He didn’t ask?”

“Told.”

“That’s Archer,” she said, but she was smiling a mother’s affectionate smile. “I’ll do fifteen more people.”

It wasn’t a suggestion; it was a fact.

In that moment Ian understood how Susa managed her hardheaded sons and equally hardheaded husband. She smiled. She coddled. And she didn’t budge worth a damn.

“Yes, ma’am. Fifteen it is.”

Ian stepped away from the table and began counting bodies. He had gotten to thirteen when he spotted Lacey Quinn.

Dana Hills

Tuesday evening

L
acey shifted from one foot to another while balancing the three bubble-wrapped paintings and fending off random surges of the crowd. She glanced at her watch. Four people waited ahead of her, holding one or two paintings each. Maybe ten more minutes at most. Susa Donovan sized up paintings the way she painted—with energy, intelligence, and economy. Rarely did she take more than a minute with any of the canvases that people had brought to her for judging.

But what really rocked Lacey back on her heels was the man standing between Susa and the crowd. Except for the suit, he looked just like the guy who’d bought an old Western poster at Lost Treasures Found a few hours ago.

Nope. Can’t be,
she reassured herself.
I’m hallucinating because I’m nervous.

Then the man smiled at something Susa said and Lacey’s nerves ratcheted up several notches. Different clothes, same heart-stopping smile,
same man: Ian Lapstrake. Under other circumstances she’d be happy to run into him again, but not now, not with her arms full of paintings she’d promised couldn’t be traced back to her. The fake name she’d invented to go with the e-mail wouldn’t do any good if Ian remembered her.

Maybe he won’t recognize me. Or if he does, maybe he’ll forget my name. He sure wouldn’t be the first man to do that.

Watching him from the corner of her eye, Lacey tried to decide if Ian was one of the Donovan family Susa’s biography had mentioned. Maybe a son-in-law. Then Lacey remembered the outline of a shoulder holster beneath his jacket and wondered if he was Susa’s bodyguard.

The crowd heaved, pushing Lacey a foot closer to the table where her grandfather’s work would be judged. Susa looked very elegant with her short, silver-streaked dark hair and sleek black pantsuit. An unusual twisted rope of semiprecious gems hung around her neck to her breasts. Deep green gems winked in her earlobes.

Lacey wished she’d taken time to do more than gather up her hair and clamp it in place with a holder the size of her hand and the colors of the rainbow. At least it was a match for her paint-stained jeans, ankle boots, and the vivid, loosely swirling blouse she’d fallen in love with at a garage sale two weeks ago. A bulky, colorful jacket hung over her arm beneath the paintings. The jacket was a wild patchwork of velvet scraps. It didn’t actually “go” with anything in the fashion sense, but seeing it always made her smile.

I’m not here for a wardrobe critique,
Lacey told herself.
The paintings are on display, not me.

And thank God her mother wasn’t in the auditorium. She would have been mortified by her daughter’s outfit. Appearance and the lack of a country-club husband were the two major reasons mother and daughter fought. Every time Lacey thought her mother had finally gotten used to the idea that the oldest of her three daughters wasn’t the cashmere-and-pearls type, she’d get another lecture on her pitiful fashion sense.

Must you look like you just crawled out of a paint tube?

Do you really style your hair with a hand mixer?

If you can’t afford anything but garage-sale shoes, I’d be happy to take you shopping.

“Lacey? Ms. Quinn? Hello? Anyone home?” Ian fanned his fingers in front of her face.

“Oh. Sorry. Is it my turn?” Then she blinked and focused on the man
who was talking to her, calling her by name.
Hell. There goes Ms. January Marsh
. “Ian, right? Neighbor Lapstrake?”

“At your service. Susa will be finished with the two folks in front of you real quick. Why don’t you step up to the table and let me help you unwrap your paintings. Things will go faster that way.”

When he reached for the paintings, her arms tightened protectively around the canvases.

“I’ll be gentle,” he said gravely. “I promise.”

The humor underlying his reassurance flustered Lacey. Or maybe it was the smile. She stuck out her lower lip and blew a stray curl away from her eyes.

“Family treasures?” he asked, waiting for her to release the bundles.

“No! I found them at a garage sale.”

Again Ian smiled even as he wondered why the pretty lady with the summer-garden shirt and clear brown eyes was lying. All the “tells” were there—looking away, defensive posture, restlessness.

“Whatever,” he said. “Take them over to the table and unwrap them. Unless you trust me to help?”

Lacey felt like a fool. “Sorry. It’s just—” She blew fiercely at the curl that kept tickling the corner of her eye.

With a motion too swift and impersonal for her to take offense, he tucked the stray curl back in place.

“It’ll just come unsprung again,” she said. “I’m a walking fashion disaster.”

“Good. I hate models.”

Her quick smile changed her features, adding an electric element to her face that was both intelligence and intensity. “Here. Take the top one. I’ll handle the other two. And don’t mention my name to anyone, okay? If it turns out badly, I don’t want, um, the wrong publicity for my…um, shop. Just call me…” Hurriedly she tried to remember her e-mail pseudonym. “January,” she said, “January Marsh.”

Ian barely managed not to laugh out loud. He didn’t know what game the lady was playing, but he was certain it had to be as innocent as she was. She couldn’t have lied successfully to save her life.

“Okay, Ms. Marsh,” he said, pointing with his chin. “This way.”

From behind Ian, where Susa was judging paintings, came a man’s rueful laughter. “A student exercise, huh?”

“Straight from a
You Can Too Paint
book. The frame, however, is quite old.” It was quite awful, too, but Susa felt no need to point that out.

“Oh, well, back under the bed with it.”

“Actually, if you wouldn’t mind leaving me your name and address, I know a professor who is doing a study of painting books and their influence on the popular culture of their time. I’m sure he’d be fascinated by this painting and its history.”

“Sure.” He ripped the business card off the back of the painting and handed it to her. “Here.”

Susa tucked the card into a small file that sat next to her left hand and smiled expectantly at the next person, a middle-aged man who was sweating heavily in the overcrowded auditorium.

“I think the lady was next,” he said, gesturing toward Lacey.

“Go ahead,” Ian said as he wrestled with the generous tape job. “We’ll be a minute.”

“Thank you!” The man hurried forward, clutching some paintings.

Considering the man’s nervousness, Susa decided the offerings were probably his own work rather than that of an ancestor.

“They’re very unusual,” Susa said, hoping that you didn’t go to hell for white lies, because she sure had told a lot of them tonight. “Clearly in the genre of modern studio art, which is unfortunate. The purpose of this”—she waved a hand at the crowded auditorium—“is to discover old plein air artists, not new studio artists.”

“I’d be glad to donate the paintings for the auction,” the man said quickly, “like it said in the pamphlet.”

Ian had already figured out where this interview would end. He signaled to one of Mr. Goodman’s assistants, all of them local artists. This one was a cat-slim male dressed entirely in shades of black except for an unusual gold earring clinging to his left ear. He trotted over eagerly.

“That’s very generous of you,” Susa said to the hopeful studio artist. “One of the assistants will give you the forms.”

“Would you help this man carry his paintings to the auction table?” Ian said. “We’re trying to move things along so Susa can have a break.”

“For La Susa, I’d move mountains,” he said with a bow that would have done credit to an eighteenth-century French courtier.

Ian covered his laugh with a cough.

It took Susa less than four minutes to reject the next three paintings.
Each one was a still life of the type beloved by middle-class Victorian women who believed that painting roses on china and playing the piano were the hallmarks of good breeding.

“You want to take your break now?” Ian said, tugging at more of the stubborn tape. “Ms., uh…” He hesitated.

“Marsh,” she supplied quickly.

Ian smiled slightly. “Ms. Marsh has these things wrapped up like the lead in
Revenge of the Mummies
.”

“You just have to know where the zipper is,” Lacey retorted, pulling a painting free with a flourish.

Susa took one look at the canvas and felt years fly away.
She was breathless, young, standing frozen in a violent storm of discovery as she looked at a Lewis Marten painting for the first time.
Hand against her throat, she made a small sound of wonder and surprise.

“Susa?” Ian said instantly. “What is it? Are you—”

She held up her hand, cutting him off. “Where did you get this?” she demanded without looking away from the canvas.

Lacey moved uneasily. “A garage sale.”

Deftly Susa turned the unframed canvas over without touching the face of it. All she saw was an e-mail address and the words
Sandy Cove
. There was no artist’s title on the back. No date. But then, many artists didn’t date their work.

“A garage sale,” Susa said. “Where? When?”

“I, um, I don’t remember.”

Susa pinned the younger woman with a clear hazel glance that seemed to look right through to her soul. “How can that be?”

Lacey cleared her throat. “I go to twenty or thirty sales a month, so it’s hard to keep track.”

“Do you have any more Martens?”

“Martens?”

“Paintings by Lewis Marten,” Susa said.

“I don’t even have one. These are—” Lacey stopped just before she blurted out something about her grandfather. “There’s no name on the paintings, so I’m sure they don’t belong to anyone called Marten.” Especially as she’d watched her grandfather paint
Sandy Cove,
a fact that she wasn’t going to reveal.

Susa flipped the painting back over and for the first time looked for an
artist’s signature. Her arched eyebrows lifted when she found none. She tilted and turned the canvas to catch the light, looked at its back, and turned it faceup again, fascinated and bemused by seeing the past live again in her hands, a past brought to life by someone who had lived at the time when Painter’s Beach was called Sandy Cove.

“Well, a rose is a rose is a rose and all that,” Susa said. “No matter that it isn’t signed, this was painted by an extremely talented plein air artist who worked in Lewis Marten’s time.”
More likely, in his body.

Lacey grinned. “I knew it!”

“A garage sale. My God.” Susa laughed triumphantly. “My ancestors strike again.”

“What?” Ian asked.

“Long story,” she said, shaking her head. “Put it this way—I just
knew
I’d find something wonderful if I did the triage for the charity auction. But this—this is like pulling weeds and finding diamonds in the roots. Extraordinary.” She looked at Lacey and started laughing. “A garage sale! Lord, but life is sweet.” She held out her hand. “I’m Susa Donovan and I’m delighted you came here tonight, Ms.—”

“January Marsh,” Ian said before Lacey could get over the shock of shaking hands with a painter whose name was often mentioned in the same breath as Georgia O’Keeffe.

“Are the others like this?” Susa asked, releasing Lacey’s hand.

At first Lacey was afraid that Susa had somehow read her mind and knew that there was a storage unit filled with hundreds of unframed canvases by her grandfather. Then Lacey realized that Susa was looking eagerly at the two other wrapped packages.

“They’re all unsigned,” Lacey said carefully.

“Well, open them up!”

Ian smiled at Susa’s enthusiasm. “I’ve just about got this one out of its cocoon.”

“Here,” Lacey said, leaning in over his right arm and pointing to a piece of red tape. “Yank on that and it will all come off. Mostly.”

He yanked. Bubble wrap slithered down the canvas. Stately, elegant eucalyptus trees rose against a radiant slice of dawn.

“Oh, my,” Susa murmured. She took the canvas and turned it slowly in a circle, letting light flood over the painting from all angles. “Superb. Just superb. Muscular, graceful, energetic, serene. Emotionally vivid,
technically fluid. Everything you could ask of a plein air painter. And so very like Marten.”

Ian looked from the canvas and Susa’s rapt face. “Should I know that name?”

“Lewis Marten?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“No reason to, unless you have a doctorate in obscure California Impressionists. All anyone ever knew was that Marten was a teenage runaway who showed up in Laguna Beach before World War Two,” Susa said. “The local artist community took him in and then watched in amazement as a skinny child painted them right into the ground.”

“Ouch,” Ian said.

“Oh, they didn’t admit it aloud. There were some excellent painters around at the time and their egos weren’t tiny. But still, when you confront huge unself-conscious talent like this, it just takes the world away.”

“That’s how I felt the first time I saw a painting by you,” Lacey said. “It…burned.”

Susa glanced at Lacey, saw sincerity rather than flattery, and smiled. “Thank you. I love knowing that one of my paintings reached out and grabbed someone.”

Lacey started to say that her grandfather had been a great fan of Susa’s paintings. Instead, she said, “Anyone who isn’t ‘grabbed’ by your work must be dead between the ears and the ribs.”

“It would be lovely to think so,” Susa said dryly, “but I know better. After you cut away all the intricate intellectual rationalizations, art is a matter of taste. No single flavor works for everyone. Nor should it, despite what the critics and academics would have us believe.”

“Don’t tell me you had problems with the critics and academics?” Lacey asked before she thought. Then she winced. “Oops. Sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude.”

Susa was laughing too hard to hide it. “I came of painting age during the last hurrah of postmodern abstract minimalism. I painted ‘scenery.’ Believe me, I had a long procession of teachers, fellow artists, and critics telling me I was painting the wrong thing.”