Water from Stone - a Novel (26 page)

After wandering around the gallery, he finally makes it to the woman’s desk. She smiles at him and asks him if he’d like to sit down, if she can get him a cup of coffee, or maybe a soft drink?

He finds himself sitting and accepting a Diet Pepsi, watches her as she sits in a chair near him, crosses her legs. Sees there isn’t a ring on her finger. Listens to himself telling her he is looking for something special for his sister whose birthday is coming up.

“So, you’ve never heard of Mar? Do you know much about art, Mr…?”

“Colomanos. Sy Colomanos. Sy,” he fumbles, reaching out his hand.

“Well, Sy, nice to meet you. I’m Diane Carmichael. Diane.” And she puts her small hand into his big one and for some strange reason, he doesn’t want to let go.

He looks at her and sees a faint blush creep up her neck. What is going on? When she pulls her hand from his, he feels the urge to reach for it, to hold it again.

Diane fumbles with her own glass of soda and clears her throat. “Um, yes, well, so, um, you want something for your sister?”

“My sister?” Sy asks, still caught in her eyes. They are alive, shining. He notices the crinkles around them and likes that they make him think of laughter. Warm bread and laughter.

“Yes. You said you were looking for something for your sister.”

“Oh, yeah, my sister,” Sy says. “It’s her birthday soon and she likes art, so I thought…” Sy knows he sounds like a fool, a babbling parrot, but he is having trouble forming a distinct, coherent thought. What the hell is happening to him?

“Well, that’s so nice of you!” Diane grins. “Do you know what she likes? There are so many different kinds and styles and, with a lot of people, you either love it or hate it.”

“This kind. She likes this kind,” Sy says, waving toward the walls.

Diane looks at him curiously. “This kind. I see,” she says, though clearly she doesn’t. “OK, then, Sy. How about if we walk around together and I’ll tell you a little about the paintings, about Mar and the other artists whose work we show, about what the paintings mean to them. Then you can tell me which, if any, appeal to you for your sister. What’s her name?”

“My sister? Dora. Her name’s Dora.” And Sy mentally kicks himself. Hard. Dora’d be pissed if she ever finds out he is calling her his sister.

“OK, then. You can tell me if you think Dora would like any of them.”

As she takes him around the gallery, Sy feels himself falling more and more under her spell. She is tiny, only about chest-high and he bets that, even with his bum arm, he could lift her up, easy. Her voice is warm and friendly and he likes watching the changes come over her features as she explains the meaning of the different paintings. It is everything Sy can do to remain somewhat focused on what she is saying and not reach out to touch her.

“And this one is one of Mar’s favorites, one of mine, too. It’s called
Mother & Child
. As you can see, it’s a lot different from her normal subject matter. Maybe that’s why a lot of collectors have asked to buy it, sort of like Picasso’s blue period which is all so different than his later work. Anyway, she always comes up with some excuse or other why she can’t. I guess it’s because it’s the first painting she did of herself and her daughter.”

That snaps Sy back to attention. “Her daughter?” he asks, his voice cracking.

Diane smiles warmly. “She has a daughter, the cutest little thing you ever saw. Her name’s Lizzie. Just the light of Mar’s life.”

“Lizzie.”

Diane looks at him quizzically. “Is something wrong? You’ve gone pale.”

“Low blood sugar. I didn’t realize how late it is. Um, do you think, I mean, would you like to have lunch with me? Can you leave?” Sy cannot believe the shit that is coming out of his own mouth. What the hell is he doing?

A grin spreads across Diane’s face. “I’d love to. Let me just leave a note for Mar. She’s taken Lizzie to the museum. I can put the sign on the front door. Why don’t you have a seat while I take care of it?”

Sy can’t sit. He stands in front of
Mother & Child
. Purples, pinks, white and gold. An interplay of light and color. A woman’s face in the upper left corner, a baby’s face in the lower right, both looking out from the canvas. The mother’s eyes filled with what? Fear? Uncertainty? The child looking directly at you. A glimpse of the mother’s hand cradling the baby. He can’t tell what is going on. The mother is either passing the kid off or snatching it back. Something is going on.

“Mar painted that one when her daughter first came to her. Lizzie’s adopted, you see. In any case, she was so afraid of losing her to another couple, or of maybe some family member coming forward to claim her. It was a pretty upsetting time for her. You can see it in the eyes. As much as I love this particular piece, I’d think Mar would want to sell it, it has some difficult memories for her. Well, shall we go?”

Sixty-Two

Mar.

Diane sits on the floor with Lizzie. They are playing some sort of card game that Diane had given up trying to understand twenty minutes ago. Lizzie keeps changing the rules, or making up new ones, or just following her whims. Mar is painting, taking advantage of the last usable rays of the sun. “So, what you’re telling me,” Mar muses as she bends her head critically and then applies a wisp of a Pthalo-Blue line to the Crimson Red-Medium Hue one already there, “is that you like this guy. A lot.”

“I didn’t say ‘a lot’,” Diane dissents.

“OK, so you didn’t say it, but that’s what you mean,” she looks up and grins at Diane.

“Well, yes.”

“I winned!” Lizzie shrieks, throwing the cards up in the air.

“You won, honey, won! I swear, though, I’ve never met a little girl who can win so much as you, Lizzie.”

“Wanna play again?” the little girl asks.

“Sure, sweetheart, I’ll play again.” Diane looks up at Mar and rolls her eyes.

“OK, but let’s play another way,” Lizzie says, and she begins to randomly put out cards. “You do this, Dee-Dee, when I give you a card.” She shows Diane how to put her cards in a pile. Diane shrugs and follows directions.

“So when are you going to see him again?”

Diane blushes. “We’re having dinner tonight,” she admits.

“Tonight! Wow, lady, you sure do work fast!”

“For an old fart,” Diane puts in.

“Hell, no. For anyone! So what are you doing here?  Shouldn’t you be home getting all dolled up?”

“I’m not getting all dolled up. He’ll either like me the way I am, or he can go screw himself.”

Mar smiles. Grabs a clean brush and dabs some more Yellow-Orange-Azo from the back of her hand.

“Besides,” Diane continues, “he wants to meet you.”

“Me? What for?”

“Well, first of all, because he likes your paintings, but mostly because you and Lizzie were about all we talked about at lunch.”

Mar looks up.

“Don’t give me that look! You’re about all I ever talk about. You’re as close to family as I’ve got. Now wait a minute, Lizzie, why’d you do that? You said I was supposed to put it in that pile.”

“That was before. Now you put it in this pile!” The child’s eyes threaten Diane to disagree.

“Oh. Well, then. I guess it goes in this pile. No, really, Mar, he was fascinated by your story.”

“I don’t have a story. I have a life. Besides, I don’t know how comfortable I am with you talking about me to a stranger.” She adds more Ultramarine-Blue, liking the way it complements a swath of Transparent-Red-Iron-Oxide nearby.

“First of all, Mar, he’s a potential buyer, so of course he wants to know about you. And, second, I know you like your privacy. I didn’t tell him anything that’s not in your bio, or that hasn’t been written up somewhere.”

Mar puts down her brush and begins to rub dried paint off her hands. “OK, look, what time’s Prince Charming coming to get you?” she asks, giving in.

“At seven,” Diane smiles.

“Then let’s go downstairs. I could use a glass of wine before I’m put on display.”

Sixty-Three

Sy.

At seven o’clock sharp, Sy rings the doorbell to Mar’s home and gallery. He is nervous as hell and is wondering what the fuck he is doing here in his too-tight boots, holding a bouquet of grocery store flowers, his heart jumping around in his chest. He is having a hard time convincing himself Diane is as special as she’d seemed at lunch when the door swings open.

“Hi. You must be Sy.”

“And you’re Mar.” Jesus, it is kind of surreal. Here is that face in the painting, even down to the pointy, little chin, slanted eyes. Yeah, she’d got herself good, only now she is relaxed and grinning.

“The one, the only. Come on in. Diane’ll be out in a minute but, if you’re up to it, you can follow me to the kitchen and join me in a glass of wine.” She looks at his Marlboro Man outfit. “Or beer, if you’re more of a beer guy.”

Sy grimaces. He is still wearing his new clothes. His feet have swelled up so much in his new boots that he hadn’t been able to pull the damn things off. Probably’d have to amputate them off. “Uh, actually, wine would be great. Thanks.”

As he limps after her through the dimly-lit gallery, he feels, rather than sees, the faces in the
Mother & Child
painting staring at him, weighing him, finding him lacking. He’d spent a good hour that afternoon telling himself he is an asshole, getting involved with someone on an investigation. Especially this one because, when it comes down to it, how the hell do you tell someone you’re the guy who’s gonna take away their kid – or their grandkid, which is how Diane acts about Lizzie – fuck up their life?

“I have a bottle of Merlot open,” Mar calls over her shoulder, “but there’s just about every color, kind, flavor, whatever, in the wine cooler. What’s your choice?”

“Merlot’d be great,” he says and follows her into one of the largest kitchens he’s ever been in. He lets out a low whistle of appreciation as he takes it all in, knowing he doesn’t know a damn thing about what most of the gadgets are about, but appreciating that they look so purposeful. He glances over at the bay windows and almost has a heart attack on the spot. Sitting in the corner, her hands and face covered with ketchup, is Lindsey. A small Lindsey, of course, but Lindsey. He wants to weep.

“OK, sugar,” Mar says, heading back to her daughter, “thanks for waiting. You can have your hot dog back now.” She takes a plate from the counter and lays it back in front of her little girl. “Lizzie, say hi to Sy. He’s a friend of Dee-Dee’s. Sy, meet my daughter, Lizzie.”

“Hi, Sy! Mama, that’s a rhythm.”

“A rhyme, little smarty. You’re right. It rhymes.” She turns to Sy, “Have a seat while I get the wine. She’s mostly over the stage of throwing food, so you should be safe.” At this, Lizzie giggles and makes to toss a few slices of hot dog in Sy’s direction. A stern “Lizzie” puts an end to that, but the giggles continue.

“Hi, there, Lizzie. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“I’m four. Do you want some hot dog?” she asks, offering him a ketchup-covered fistful.

“Uh, no, thank you. But you go ahead. It looks good.”

“I like hot dog,” she says and grins, her little white teeth shining through the ketchup mess. She pops another slice into her mouth and chews noisily.

“Diane should be down in a few minutes,” Mar says as she takes a glass down from a cabinet and clinks it on the counter. “She’s just gone upstairs to tidy up.”

Sy is still staring at the Mini Me Lindsey. He is having a difficult time breathing as the enormity of the moment dawns on him.

“Here you go,” Mar tells him, placing a glass of Merlot in front of him. “Cheers.”

“Cheers,” Sy agrees.

Sixty-Four

Jack.

When the call comes, Jack is totally unprepared for it. He can think of no way to deal with the possibility – and Sy had pointed out that it is still only a possibility – that his daughter is alive and well, is a happy little girl living in Colorado. He has imagined so many horrible deaths for her, has wondered which day he’d wake up to the news that her remains have been found in some shallow grave. He has imagined so many horrible lives for her, starving out a living in a grungy trailer park with abusive captors, forced into prostitution at an early age by drug-crazed pedophiles, sold into slavery in the Middle East. Never had he thought that she could be happy and healthy. And now, as he sits at his desk in Manhattan, looking out over the skyscrapers, he wonders about that.

Jack moves to his favorite spot by the windows and looks out over New York. It is snowing again, mean wet flakes falling heavily from a steel gray sky. Mia would be four and a half now. He tries to picture John’s kids at four-and-a-half, picture how tall they’d been, and can’t. Would she be in school? Taking dance classes? Would she be like Lindsey, a tomboy? Preferring to climb trees than play with dolls? Would she run outside at the first sign of snow, stay there until her lips are blue and she is dragged, arguing, inside? He’s lost so much, missed so much, time he will never get back. Time he can never get back.

Jack is lost in a river of doubt, the skin around his eyes burning and throbbing, when Elena sticks her head in the office. “Jack? Your flight leaves in four hours and your friend, John, is on the phone.”

Sixty-Five

Jack.

By the time the plane lands in Denver and he retrieves his bag, Jack is a little rocky. Three scotches and too much adrenaline haven’t made for a good mix. He falls asleep as soon as he buckles himself into the rental car Sy drives.

“You, my friend, need some food. Hell, I could use some carbs, myself. Let’s go,” Sy pulls into the parking of a fast food restaurant.

As they get out of the car, Jack stops and looks at Sy. “What the hell? You’re wearing cowboy boots.”

Sy grins sheepishly. “I don’t know,” he says. “It’s something about the place.”

“But, boots?”

“I know.”

When they are seated, Jack stares glumly down at his burgers. “I feel like crap,” he says.

“Yeah, well, eat then. It’s not gourmet, but there’s no hangover cholesterol can’t kill.”

“Yeah, thanks, Sy.”

They eat in silence, Sy waiting for Jack’s attention, Jack waiting for his stomach to settle. “You know, after all this time, I’m kind of at a loss about this,” Jack finally admits.

“No wonder there. This is a helluva thing. I’m still in shock myself.”

“OK, so tell me again about how you found her.”

As they eat their burgers and fries, Sy retells the story, adding more details than those he’d given Jack on the phone.

“So what do we do now?” Jack finally asks.

“Like I told you, this might not be her. From everything I’ve got, I’d say it is, but the big question is, how’re we gonna prove it? I mean, what if it’s not her? I’ve been here more than a week. I’ve been around these people. They’re nice people, some of the nicest people I’ve ever met. I don’t think we can just announce this is your kid and you’re taking her. I mean, it’s gonna kill this woman, Mar. I think, before you say anything, we gotta be sure.”