Murder in Pastel (19 page)

Some twinge of conscience made him look in the bathroom before he left, and apparently the sight of me sprawled on the floor breathing in stentorian tones was gruesome enough to send him hollering for Joel. Joel had hot-footed it over, taken one look and sent for Adam. Together they had brought me round. If you could call my current torpid state “brought round.”

“I think it will make things worse if you call the sheriff,” Joel said to me.

I was back on the sofa, wrapped in a blanket Indian-style. I couldn’t seem to get warm. “Make things worse for who?”

“For all of us. Besides, Vince is satisfied you don’t have the painting.”

“Hey, so long as Vince is satisfied.”

“Get this down.” Adam set a cup of tea on the table next to me. I looked at the tea, shuddered, glanced up at Adam. I couldn’t seem to look away.

Okay. One of us needed to break eye contact.

Joel’s voice was a welcome interruption. “I know you’re angry, Kyle, but the last thing we need to do is to give the cops another excuse for poking around here.” He seemed adamant about that.

“Joel’s right,” Adam said.

What were they both afraid of?

“When was the last time you remember seeing that painting?” Adam asked Joel. He sat down on the sofa next to me. So close and yet so far, as they used to say in the old romance novels. If he put his arm around me, I wouldn’t have the strength to resist; I could have used a hug about then.

Joel looked irritated. “How should I know? Are you accusing
me
?”

“Somebody took the damn thing.”

“You think
I
—?”

“How do I know?” Adam was uncharacteristically curt. “I didn’t. Kyle didn’t. You were behind the bar all night. You had access to it.”

“Whose idea was it to tack it up on the wall?” Joel’s voice grew shrill. “It hadn’t even been appraised yet. For all we know it’s a forgery.”

I said, “I don’t think it’s a forgery.”

“You don’t know anything about it, Kyle. The last time you saw that painting you were a child. A very sick child.”

“Are you saying you think it was a forgery?” Adam demanded.

“Who knows? It could have been. Vince was a fool to bring it that night. It wasn’t insured.”

“Brett wanted him to bring it,” Adam said.

We were all three thinking the same thing, but Joel put it into words. “Could Brett have taken it? Rolled it up and stashed it somewhere?”

“He wouldn’t have had opportunity before the power went, and there wasn’t time between the power going off and his getting sick. I’ve thought about it,” Adam said. “If the painting wasn’t taken by one of us three after the party, then it had to be taken down by someone when the power went.”

“Nobody could count on the power going off,” I interjected.

“Right. But when the power went Brett was still on the verandah with us.”

“I was also on the verandah, I’d like to remind you,” Joel snapped.

“That doesn’t let you out,” I told him. “You, me or Adam—anyone of us could have taken the painting after the party broke up.”

“If it was still there!”

“Exactly.”

Joel stared at me as though I were a thankless child complete with serpent’s tooth.

“I don’t think you took it,” I added.

“Thanks very much!”

“Joel, when the power went, you, me, Kyle and Vince were all on the verandah,” Adam said patiently. “Brett went inside almost immediately but everybody else was still there. I heard Irene speak to Brett.”

“Right after that Brett was sick,” I said. “So he couldn’t have had time.”

“You could have taken it yourself, Adam,” Joel pointed out.

“Yes. Or Kyle. But you had the best opportunity of getting it out of the house on the excuse of fetching the doctor.”

“Did I have a canvas tucked up my sleeve when I left?” Joel demanded of me.

“Not that I could tell.” I turned to Adam. “The sheriff must have questioned Dr. Hicks. Did he remember seeing the painting?”

“He didn’t notice one way or another. His mind was—er—preoccupied.”

Preoccupied by the sight of Adam MacKinnon locked in the arms of the boy next door.

“Swell,” I muttered. I stood up, feeling a spry and active ninety-nine, and tottered into the bath. After I splashed a gallon or so of cold water over my face, I examined my dripping reflection. Red eyes, pasty complexion, chapped lips and wet hair standing on end. What’s not to love? I asked myself reaching for the toothbrush.

I wondered if Joel would stay much longer and what Adam and I would say to each other once he had gone. The thought of being alone with Adam was exciting and alarming at the same time.

There’s a lot about Adam you don’t know, Kyle,
Brett had said. No kidding. Does anyone ever really know anybody else?

I spat out the toothpaste and rinsed away the bad taste.

When I opened the bathroom door Joel was alone in the living room.

“Where’s Adam?”

Joel said acidly, “Seeing a man about a dog, I believe.”

“Oh.”

He studied me. “Is the honeymoon over already?”

“We’re just friends, Joel.”

“Aren’t we all, dear boy?” His smile was devoid of humor. “Well, you’re a master at the art of emotional detachment. You won’t suffer long.”

I must have looked startled; he added, “You’d have to develop some distance to stay sane, wouldn’t you?”

“I never thought about it.”

“My point exactly.”

I sat down and rubbed my damp hair. Joel inquired grudgingly, “Are you sure you don’t need me to run you in to the doctor’s?”

“I’m okay. I don’t think the stuff was in my system long.”

He wrinkled his nose. “It didn’t appear to be.”

I managed a tired grin. “Did you really think I’d tried to kill myself?”

“I suppose not. I suppose it was the heat of the moment. There was always the possibility. Brett did stand between you and Adam.”

It was unexpectedly hard to meet his gaze. “Not much point killing Brett if I was going to turn around and commit suicide. Why was I committing suicide, by the way? Guilt?”

He said softly, “People don’t always think things through. Sometimes they do things that they realize later they can’t live with.”

The humor was gone out of the situation. I didn’t know if Joel was still talking about me or himself, but I said, “Thanks for racing to my rescue.”

Joel grimaced. “Anytime.”

I spent the rest of the afternoon searching through my father’s papers. As I had told Brett, Cosmo did not keep journals, diaries or letters. Even if he had, I had to accept the fact that anyone who wanted to go through Cosmo’s things had had ample opportunity during the years I was away at college, and later living in Oakland. The paper trail I was following was old and cold.

I did think it would have been nice for me personally if my father had hung on to a few mementos—and if he had not systematically eradicated my mother’s existence as well. It was like not having a history.

I found a letter from the San Francisco MOMA anticipating the arrival of
Virgin in Pastel
along with several other paintings scheduled for exhibition in August of that year.

For several minutes I sat there with the yellowed paper in my hand, trying to decide if this proved anything or not. I already knew Cosmo had decided to exhibit the
Virgin
, reversing his decade-long refusal. This letter didn’t prove that he hadn’t changed his mind again at the last moment and taken the painting with him.

But if Cosmo had taken the painting, how had it turned up nailed to the back of an old dresser? Furthermore, why
had
he decided to exhibit
Virgin in Pastel
, after so many years of declining? Was that significant or coincidence?

Another question:
why
had Cosmo refused to show what had been considered his greatest painting? I couldn’t recall another work of which he had been so protective. He had exhibited paintings of his own father, of my mother.

Granted, that had been before her death, and the subsequent destruction of these same paintings. He had painted me at age six sitting on a crate eating an apple, and sold that one to the Whitney. So I didn’t think it could have been sentiment that held him back. He wasn’t an emotional scrapbook kind of guy.

* * * * *

When the lights came on in Adam’s cottage I found myself prowling restlessly. I went outside and checked my mail box, reading the mail on the porch in the twilight: the usual bills, circulars, a letter from a college friend and a note from my grandfather asking me to dinner Thursday evening.

Since our infrequent family get-togethers were spontaneous—either I dropped by or we ran into each other in town—I wondered why Gramps was suddenly so formal. Maybe he was getting lonely in his old age? I wasn’t sure how I felt about that; I wasn’t sure that it mattered how I felt. When duty calls and all that.

I phoned and left a message on his machine. Then I went back to pacing the floor.

Granted, I was no expert at relationships, but I knew the longer I waited to talk to Adam, the worse it would be. For me.

Honesty forced me to admit that while I did believe it was in Adam’s best interests to keep a distance between us, I wanted that distance for my own protection—and not because I feared arrest for Brett’s murder.

I strolled around the garden while the twilight deepened. The roses and peonies glimmered like phantoms swaying gently in the evening breeze. I could still see the lights of Adam’s cottage winking invitingly through the tree leaves. They worked on me like a tractor beam. So much for emotional distance.

What the hell, I decided all at once, and out I headed across the field.

Adam answered the door as promptly as though he had nothing to do but wait for me to carry the white flag over.

“Howdy.”

“Hey there.” Adam moved aside. “Like a beer?” he asked over his shoulder as I followed him inside.

“Sure. Thanks.”

He brought me a beer. There was a snap of static electricity as our fingers touched. I laughed nervously. Adam’s eyes narrowed as though he didn’t get the joke. He sat down across from me where he had sat the first night I had come to dinner. Fastening his pirate-blue eyes on me, he waited. No pretense that this was a casual visit or that I just happened to be in his area.

It was quiet. The other time music had been playing. I stared at the collection of Verve records gathering dust in the corner. I looked at Adam. He hadn’t shaved and his hair was getting longer. Maybe that heightened the buccaneer look; I wasn’t sure whether I should surrender my sword or fall on it. It appeared he was taking no prisoners. He lifted the bottle to his mouth, swallowed, eyes still holding mine.

I looked away. I felt out of my element. Unsophisticated. But I had come this far, so I said it.

“We spent one night together,” I told him. “A few hours. It shouldn’t have meant that much to me, but it did.”

Nothing from Adam. He had always been good at listening, but right now I wished he would say something, help me out.

“I’ve been in love with you half my life.”

“I know.”

I said irritably, “Then you know what I’m trying to say.”

“I don’t think you know what you’re trying to say.” His dryness was unexpected. “We had sex. Great sex, as a matter of fact—although I guess it wasn’t anything like you imagined.”

I flushed, remembering breaking down in his arms. “Or like you imagined,” I retorted.

“I didn’t have any expectations, Kyle. No fantasy to compare it to.” I started to speak, but he went on. “The next morning you couldn’t get away from me fast enough. You’ve kept a safe distance ever since.”

Epiphany. He didn’t have all the answers. He was capable of misreading and misinterpreting and misunderstanding. I had the power to hurt him too, no longer a child striking harmlessly at the palms of a patient adult.

“I don’t want to be a surrogate for Brett,” I blurted out.

“What the hell does that mean?”

At the sharpness in his voice, I stumbled. “I—I mean that you loved Brett. I know that. I don’t want to try to—I know I couldn’t. It takes time to get over someone. I understand. I’ve waited a long time, Adam. I don’t want to screw it up by moving too soon now. Timing is everything.”

He followed this jumbled explanation, frowning. “Timing is everything?” He snorted. “Where do you get this crap,
Glamour
magazine?”

He set down his beer bottle and came over to sit beside me on the faded chintz couch.

“I’m lousy at relationships,” I muttered, giving him a sideways look.

“You do fine, baby. I just forget…”

What? How inexperienced I was? How it felt to be the one who loved, instead of the one who was loved?

He put his arm around my shoulders like you would your little brother, and said patiently, “My feelings for Brett have nothing to do with you, Kyle. They are separate. They always have been.”

I expelled a long breath. Before I had finished exhaling, Adam’s mouth found mine. He kissed me long and firmly, not patiently, and not at all like you would kiss your little brother. His lips were cold and masculine, tasting of beer and Adam.

“Does that answer your question?” he asked finally, running his knuckles against the bristle on my cheek, teasing.

“Yeah.”

But it didn’t really.

I lay there that night, wrapped in Adam’s arms, Adam’s breath warm on the nape of my neck, Adam’s genitals soft against my ass, spied on by the bold-face moon peering in the window. I told myself that with Adam I would be loved and cherished. I would have companionship, and I would have his strength to lean on; and there was a little kid inside me craving all these things—craving what my father had withheld. But with Adam I would also get a middle-aged mother hen nagging me to take my pills and not lift anything too heavy. What kind of healthy relationship was that? Was this the choice of an autonomous adult? Did I want a parent or a lover?

And right about then my inner child gave me the raspberry royale. Who the hell was I kidding? I was still trying to intellectualize away my gut fear that Adam didn’t want
me
, he needed someone to replace Brett. Anyone. For now.