In Gallup, Greed

by Tower Lowe

  The four of them piled into the Audi, ready to hit the gallery and then on to the real business, an afternoon at Sammy’s Bar and Grille.

  Jerry laughed on the outside, worried about the money on the inside. These guys promised to spend a least 250k to loosen up his financial worries. Jerry needed to feel safe, out of the woods, in the money. He needed to feel like a better person than he knew he was. Money did that for him way more than sex or booze. He drove the crew to Redemption, listening to boring stories about LA.

  When they arrived at the gallery, Mirage opened the door with a big smile. “Welcome to The Redemption.”

  Jerry let Mirage take the buyers through the gallery, showing off Lolo’s exquisite inlaid Zuni silver series on cultural icons, asking four times as much as she got just two years ago – 70% of that, thank God, going to Jerry and his partners.

  “A big cut for the gallery!” Lonnie protested at first. “Most art galleries take 40% and give 60% to the artist.”

  “I know, Lonnie, but I need to get back my investment on the remodel. Once that’s paid off, we’ll go back to 60-40 deal most galleries do.” Lonnie bought the argument at the time. The prices were so high that 30% of the purchase price brought more than the three artists ever dreamed of making.

  Nez’s oils—like the one of the wise chief that graced the entrance—were going for at least 150k. Jerry listened as Mirage talked it all up and folded in native mystique – real enough from Mirage’s perspective since she knew the artists and the culture, but Drew and Blue Dog would buy the art either way. The guys wanted an impressive piece, even at the fake price. Mirage made the couples feel like real art collectors. It was a show for the wives, as far as Jerry was concerned. But Blue Dog and Drew ate it up, too.

  By happy hour, Blue Dog and Drew and the ladies spent a half a million happy Jerry dollars.

  “Worth every penny,” Drew winked.

  “I think it’s a big squeeze,” Blue Dog guffawed.

  “Yeah.” Jerry winced. The two men were brash in a way that made him uncomfortable.

  Blue Dog came over and put his arm around Jerry. “Take it easy, Jer. We’re just having some good, clean fun.” He raised a wave at Mirage.

  “Thanks. Mirage. Great visit.” Mirage returned a weak lift of her right hand.

  As they hit the parking lot, Blue Dog charged into one of his off color stories. Drew joined them, leaving the women behind, chatting about where to have dinner.

  “You gotta hear about this girl I met – way back.” Blue Dog smelled of expensive whiskey and tobacco. “It was 1990 – I was a younger guy, looking for amour, you know? I traveled down to Atlanta, Georgia for a legal conference. I’m out shopping—killing time looking for a new briefcase, and the sales woman starts flirting with me. She’s 250 pounds, big set of airbags, sexy face. That’s what they say, right? Got a pretty face. But she had this voice, gritty, low. I bought a nice leather case, and invited her for a drink when she got off. Pretty soon she’s in my hotel room. We knocked down some trees that night let me tell you – bouncing on top, pulling the plug, all the great stuff. My introduction to big girl fun. I never forgot that date, I tell ya. Still got the briefcase.”

  Jerry spilled out a tinny laugh. The stories soured his stomach like bad milk. But Big Dog liked tall tales about sex. He thought it made him seem virile and edgy.

  The wives caught up and slid into the Audi. They all headed for Sammy’s to celebrate. What the hell, Jerry thought, the hard parts over. Sammy’s was a few minutes down the road with Chevy Silverados starting to fill the lot. He felt relief as soon as they entered the dim wood lined room. For one thing, Blue Dog wandered off, and Jerry, with relief, walked over to his favorite corner booth and to visit with his partner and long time friend, Johnnie.

  “Hey, Jerry, great party the other night,” Johnnie schmoozed his boss. “Shame about Lonnie, though. Didn’t see that comin’.”

  The two drank Johnnie Walker Blue straight up, as usual. Nez sat at the same booth, drinking soda water. That automatically made Jerry suspicious. He never felt safe when people were sober. Why would anybody stay sober in a bar?

  “Were you there when it happened, man?” Nez—of course—launched into the negative thing about Lonnie’s murder right away, not even asking how much cash Jerry put in his bank account an hour ago at the gallery.

  “Home,” Jerry dodged.

  “The cops questioned me, but I didn’t see a thing,” Nez went on. “Lonnie holed up in his room about 10 o’clock... seemed to be upset about gallery politics.”

  “Don’t bug the Jer with talk like that,” Johnnie interrupted. He protected Jerry from the artists when he could.

  “No problem,” Jerry lied, waving his drink in a whiskey rainbow. “The cops talked to me, too. I told them I gave Mirage a ride home from the bar, let her off at the door, and drove off. I never even saw Lonnie.”

  “You told the cops that?” Nez quizzed.

  “Hey, man. It’s what happened. I’m not gonna lie to the cops. No way.”

  “Mirage told the cops that Lolo and I argued about money,” Nez confessed. “It was the same fight we always get in when we talk about Redemption. I think we ought to tone it down with the prices, but Lolo likes her Lexus and fine furniture. I think money is a means to an end, you know the drill. Lolo screams at me that I’m a romantic, that don’t get it. It’s our favorite drunken argument. I don’t remember half of it. I know for sure nobody waved knives around.”

  “Right,” Jerry said, hating Nez in an instant. The man claimed to hate the money, but he never turned it down. Nez made more money now than he ever dreamed of making, and he still watched the sales and drove his dusty 1998 Honda Accord all over town. Nez had a religious complex about being poor. A true nut case, Jerry thought. He didn’t want Nez anywhere near Blue Dog and Drew. They wouldn’t understand the class struggle deal Nez lived under every day.

  “Hey, you planning on closing the gallery for a few days, Jer?”

  “I don’t want to, man, but nobody wants to work. Plus Mirage is on this guilt trip about Lonnie – even hired a couple of private investigators to look into the stabbing.”

  “Who are they?”

  “Called Cinnamon and Burro. Out of Santa Fe. So now we need to close the gallery so she can talk to those two and cry her eyes out over Lonnie.”

  “Have some respect, Jer, for Christ’s sake. Natually Mirage wants to cry over her brother and find out what happened. Lonnie was our friend, too, one of the founders of Redemption. We need to show respect.”

  “Of course, yeah, of course,” Jerry acknowledged. “Respect, no question about it.”

  Nez looked unhappy but wandered off to talk to a couple of young Navajo men who entered the bar right then. Jerry welcomed his absence and was glad to get Johnnie alone in the booth.

  “Trust Lonnie to get stabbed a his own party, huh?”

  “You worried about these two PIs?”

  “Maybe, maybe not. I’ll look into it and let you know later.”

  “I’m with you, Jer. Lonnie made his own trouble, you ask me,” Johnnie insisted.

  “You got that right. Lonnie seized on this idea that art represents the spirit or some damn thing. The three of them – Mirage too—took the art and the gallery so seriously. I told Lonnie from the start it was a way to get money. What’s so bad about that?”

  “I get it. But, Jer, you did tell those artists from the beginning that it was about native art and getting national and international respect —redemption was your word Jerry and your choice for a name for the place. Don’t deny you laid the bullshit on thick from the start.”

  Jer squirmed in the booth. “The thing is Johnnie, I thought Lonnie and Nez would be flattered by all the cash, not act like it was a spiritual death to be able to pay the bills. Art and money, that’s all it is....a little sex thrown into the mix. I call that life, you know what I mean?”

  “I do know what you mean, Jer. But artists take everything seriously..
.that’s the way they are. Can’t change it.”

  “Did you tell the cops about firing Lonnie that night?”

  “Nah.” Johnnie hedged.

  Jerry noticed that his old friend Johnnie didn’t meet his eyes – looked down at the scuffed wooden floor of Sammy’s instead. He worried what that meant, but didn’t really want to know. Johnnie could be sneaky – tended to play both sides of the fence. He probably knew details about that night, but Jerry figured if he needed to know, Johnnie would tell him. And if the details needed to be kept quiet, Johnnie could be counted on for that, too.

  Jerry drifted out of the bar and walked slowly back to Country Club Drive and the house he shared with Holly and the kid. He didn’t look forward to seeing Holly, hoped she’d be asleep or watching TV. Guilt hung like a wreath on his front door.

  He slipped his key in the lock and confronted the Navajo maiden sculpture Holly had placed in the high-ceilinged entrance. The Indian woman looked askance at Jerry, like she saw one of his sins – adultery, greed, or another one, maybe, sticking out of his head like an arrow. Jerry turned away from her skeptical eyes.

  “Jerry?” Oh god, it was Holly. “Were you drinking again? Even after what happened with Lonnie?” Holly walked straight at him, a bullet from the center of his family.

  “I need a drink to cope with all this, Holly. Lonnie’s dead, and the artists are making a drama out of the party and stabbing. Mirage only agreed to work for the afternoon to take care of Blue Dog, Drew and their wives. The artists think we need to close up and cry crocodile tears for Lonnie. Meanwhile I’m collecting the money and taking all the risks. My old buddies don’t appreciate me, Holly. I got feelings, you know. So don’t start on the drinking. I’m trying to cope.”

  Holly stood at the door watching him. He expected her to start a lecture, but she didn’t speak at all. She seemed to be thinking. The clock ticked. Jerry thought about getting a hotel for the night. He couldn’t stand the silence.

  “What the hell is wrong with you, Holly? I gave you everything you wanted!” He was tense, spoiling for a fight to shut her up. By some miracle, Holly changed. He saw the anger seep out of her expression, the rounded shoulders relax. Probably those damned al-anon meetings. Whatever, so long as she shut up.

  “You have a point,” Holly was unnaturally calm. “We have this beautiful home, and we have all the things we need for our son. Thank you, Jerry. I’m streaming a movie. Want to join me?”

  Jerry wanted her to stop lecturing, but now he was thrown off. Why did she give up? Arguments like this had peppered their marriage for years. Jerry was an expert at skewing blame for every sin back onto Holly. But how could he do that when she was friendly – thanking him, for Christ’s sake. He wanted whiskey and privacy. “I’m not sitting around with you while you carp at me,” he spit it out with his best venom. “I’m gonna head up to bed with a bottle whether you like it or not.”

  Holly remained eerily quiet. “Okay,” she said and left the room.

  It bothered Jerry more than the yelling, but he wanted to be alone, so he let it go.

  Jerry passed through his home, to the well-equipped kitchen swimming in quartz countertops and stainless steel. Holly was right, and he congratulated himself. I’m a good provider. This house was a real find in Gallup. He looked out toward the entryway.

  The first floor entry was two stories high, the stairwell right at the entrance. The high walls left room for large artworks. The Navajo maiden graced the bottom of the stairwell. In spite of her occasional judgment when he came home drunk, Jerry liked the sculpted figure, wrapped in turquoise and gold. Holly insisted on buying her when they first moved into the house. The sculpture was 8 feet tall, with a bronze face, turquoise skirt and a geometric cloak. Her presence brought the breath of serenity to their home. Now that he’d gotten rid of Holly, the figure struck Jerry as peaceful, enclosed in the kind of spirit Lonnie and Nez talked about all the damn time.

  He backed away into the kitchen, snitched a bag of blue corn chips from the cupboard, and headed up the stairway, looking back at the large windows that lined the entryway and, unseen to him now, the den where Holly watched an Internet movie. As he rose through the openness of his home, he faced the bedroom door of his only child. Jerry hesitated there, not wanting to wake the 12 year old, and yet wanting to see him because in sleep his face was as peaceful as that of the maiden in the hallway. Jerry pressed down on the brass bedroom door handle, releasing the lock and moving the door a quiet six inches inward. There the boy was, his face turned to Jerry, cheeks soft and puffy, released from the cares of the world. Jerry envied his son for that.

  In his bedroom, behind the jackets in the walk-in closet were shoeboxes full of Johnnie Walker pints. Praise God. He skipped the ice and the glass, settled onto the bed, turned on Pawn Stars and remembered the first day he thought of the idea for Redemption Gallery.

  Jerry and Holly were sailing in San Carlos, Mexico. The air was crisp and sweet and Jerry felt generous and completely alive. He and Holly knew they had to make a plan for all the money. They started throwing around ideas.

  “Why don’t we create an art gallery for Lonnie and his friends in Gallup?” Jerry threw out. “Those guys are talented artists, but they get stuck in this rigid category—‘native artist.’ We’ll take all this money we’re dragging in and do something good with it.”

  Holly basked in his generous spirit. He knew she liked him better when he pretended to be the happy kid she met years ago. She didn’t understand what opening this gallery would entail. She imagined dainty parties with clinking glasses and classy collectors. Instead, Jerry and Holly moved permanently to Gallup where the parties turned into late nights at Sammy’s with local color and shouts, not tinkling glasses or classy visitors.

  No matter. They both decided together on the gallery called Redemption.

  “We’re redeeming their reputation as artists.” Holly loved the idea—then.

  Jerry told Lonnie about it in the little wooden house in Gallup. They drank Corona seated across from each other at the spare kitchen table, looking out at the heat baked juniper trees. Lonnie loved the idea – then.

  “Jerry – we can do it. We can get the recognition we deserve as native artists. Nez and Lolo deserve it, you know? They work so hard. Once we get established, we can invite other native artists to join us. We’ll change the art landscape in Gallup. ”

  Lonnie talked his sister, Mirage, into managing the place since she was out of work at the time, living with some white woman married to an archeologist. Jerry went along with that and, besides, Lonnie’s sister was a dark beauty and sexy. He didn’t think of an affair right then, but he started to push her to party with him not long after the move. The only worry started when Lonnie came up with the spirit idea – which Jerry wished he’d knocked down from the start.

  “I’ve got our gimmick, Jerry. It’s more than a gimmick, really, but it’s our hook. The spirit. If we want Nez with us, man, this has to be something the spirit brought – that the work drew international buyers to us through you, our friend. Don’t go talking mansions and Mercedes. Nez is dead set against that stuff. Me, too. Lolo will go for the money, but the spirit is what will make the sale to our friends. I want Redemption, and I can use the cash, but, whatever happens, I’m staying right here in my house. Nez will do the same. He’ll stay with his parents. If we do this thing, Jerry—we let the spirit lead us.”

  “Okay, bud, okay stay here, but get the damn kitchen remodeled, or paint the place...whatever. You and Nez and Lolo are gifted and creative. Your work will draw the right buyers...we don’t need the spirit.”

  Jerry didn’t mention that the buyers he had weren’t exactly international art collectors. He didn’t think Lonnie needed to know that. Jerry told Lonnie the money came from Jerry’s success as a digital artist for the movies. Lonnie went along because he knew about the troubles in Jerry’s family business and, because he took Jerry at his word on the CGI nonsense. I’m a salesman, Je
rry told himself. I had to close the deal.

  Jerry’s dad taught him how to paint creative back screens. Jerry was good at that. But today painted screens are rarely used in films. Computer generated imagery surpasses the work of even the most gifted screen painters. So Jerry studied CGI, but Jerry and computer graphics didn’t mix. So the story he told Lonnie was a little dishonest. But Lonnie believed what he needed to believe about Jerry.

  “Okay, man, okay, we’ll let the spirit be our guide,” Jerry promised. “ But we don’t need it. I look at the feathers and colored streamers in that mountain landscape, and it opens up a whole new vision of New Mexico.” Jerry pointed to a painting that leaned against Lonnie’s adobe wall. The landscape showed a small strip of abstract shapes to represent cacti, grasses, and small desert animals topped by a 3 dimensional sky of feathers and bright colored streamers falling like dry rain on the desert below.

  “You like it, Jer?”

  “It belongs in the Louvre, buddy boy, that’s what I’m sayin’.”

  Lonnie shook his head, of course, driving Jerry to distraction. “The Louvre is a white guy’s dream, Jerry. It isn’t right for me and Nez and Lolo. We want Redemption and we want respect, but the Louvre, man? What are you thinking, Jer? We are native to this earth, this nation, not to Europe and the Catholic Church. My feathered skies belong in a Tibetan Dzong before they belong in a European museum.”

  “Right, bud, right.” Jerry was already tired of Lonnie’s cultural nuance. He wanted to say, “Just take the money and shut up about the details.” He was regretting the San Carlos sun and the brief friendliness with Holly.

  “I bought that big building on Munoz Street, Lonnie. You can help me with the remodel, set up the artists, and display the work. It’ll be an artist-run business. The best.”

  Jerry stood up then, gave Lonnie a hug, and got out of that place. The pockmarked walls depressed him. Memories of Lonnie’s mother, long dead, looking out of the back of her eyes at him, not approving, haunted him in that house. Jerry jumped inside the Lexus and took off for Sam’s and an ice-cold forgetter beer.