Inside the gallery, people were already crowded shoulder to shoulder, holding the requisite wineglasses filled with local chardonnays and zinfandels and munching on shrimp-dotted crackers and seaweed-wrapped California rolls. Though I saw some familiar faces in the throng of colorfully dressed people, many of them were strangers to me, probably out-of-town collectors here to check Greer’s and Shelby’s work. I looked over at Greer’s smiling face as Roland introduced her to a group of matrons dressed in pseudo-Santa Fe clothes featuring an abundance of turquoise, howling coyotes, and sequins. She glanced up, saw me, and gave me the subtlest eye roll. I gave her a discreet thumbs up and turned back to my husband.
“Want anything from the bar?” he asked.
“Since I doubt that Roland has allowed a lowly Coke at this shindig, I’ll just take club soda. No food. I think I’d rather go out to eat afterwards.”
“Sounds good to me.” I watched him move through the crowd, getting caught twice before he could make it even halfway to the bar in the back. It would probably be a while before he returned with my club soda, so I turned to study Shelby’s photographs on the wall next to me, since trying to actually maneuver in this crowd constituted a serious risk of smashed toes.
I gazed up at the photographs, remembering the day Shelby had taken them. Daddy and I were moving cattle from one pasture to another. She caught me in myriad ways—chasing through high grass after an itinerant cow, my legs spread wide in the stirrups; me checking one of Badger’s shoes for a stone, backlit by the morning sun, my still somewhat stubby braid poking out from under my battered Stetson; me sitting against a tree trunk, teasing Bodie, my dad’s Australian shepherd, with a piece of ham, Daddy grinning in the background. Her photographs were stark and strong and real, capturing the life of a ranch woman like none I’d ever seen.
My favorite was an 11 x 14 of me and Dove sitting on the porch. Shelby had titled it “Gentling the Calf.” I had taken off my hat and was sitting cross-legged on the ground in front of Dove’s chair. I don’t remember what we were talking about, but we were both smiling. Dove had reached over to brush something out of my hair. The tender look on her face caused my throat to clench up.
“She was a very talented young woman,” a deep voice said behind me. “That picture brought tears to my eyes.”
I turned and looked up at the huge, snowy-haired man who, because of the crowd, stood inches from me, close enough for me to feel his body heat. He had to be at least six foot four and was as square and solid as a granite building. He wore his hair pulled back in a ponytail and was dressed in worn Levi’s and a gray flannel Pendleton shirt. His eyes were small, busy, and the color of dark brown raisins. An intricate turquoise cross earring swung from one ear. His tanned face was criss-crossed with deep lines like cracks in old adobe. I would have guessed his age at seventy or so. There was something familiar about him, as if we’d met before, but I couldn’t put my finger on where or when.
“Yes,” I agreed. “Shelby was very talented.”
He gestured at the photograph with his half-empty glass of wine. “Is she a relative of yours?”
I hesitated, not sure if he meant Shelby or Dove.
“The extremely lovely older lady,” he said, his rumbling voice sounding just short of laughing at me. Was he being sarcastic about Dove’s looks?
I hesitated again, feeling a strange urge to walk away from this man’s intense gaze. I mentally shook myself. What was wrong with me? This nice older man was just trying to make casual conversation. Why was I putting all sorts of innuendo to it? “She’s my paternal grandmother,” I said, keeping my voice neutral.
“Is she married?”
“Widowed.”
“Does she live around here?”
“Yes.”
“Are you close?”
“Very.”
He gave me a long, speculative look. “Does she have a name?”
I looked directly into his ferret eyes, tired of his bold questions. “Yes.”
He sipped his wine, amusement softening his wrinkles. “If I give you a dollar, will you tell it to me?”
“No.” I glanced around the room, looking for someone I knew so I could politely escape this irritating man’s cross examination.
His laughing voice returned. “Is she wanted by the police or perhaps the IRS?”
“Of course not,” I said in a tart voice.
He waited long enough to make me feel foolish.
“Dove,” I finally said.
“Dove,” he repeated. “Dove.” He rolled her name over his tongue in a way that made me distinctly uncomfortable. “What an extraordinary name. Does it fit her?”
I shrugged. “Some people might not think so.”
He sipped from his glass again, undeterred by my coolness. He continued studying me in a manner that was definitely agitating. “And what does granddaughter think?”
I forced a polite, close-lipped smile. “I think granddaughter needs to use the ladies’ room. Please excuse me.”
“Certainly,” he said, his smile never wavering. “We’ll talk again, I’m sure.”
Melting into the crowd, I thought, not if I can help it, buddy, though I still wasn’t sure why he made me so uncomfortable. I remembered reading somewhere that people’s chemicals actually did react to each other, that some scientists believe that was the secret behind “love at first sight” as well as people disliking someone on the first meeting. In the same article, psychiatrists discounted that theory, stating that all our reactions have roots in our background somewhere. Whatever was true, this man set my teeth on edge and I wanted to stay as far away from him as possible. I wandered over to the portable bar, where Emory was sipping a caramel-colored drink and staring across the room at Elvia. As usual, she was surrounded by admiring men. Emory’s face looked thoughtful.
“That devious look brings back memories,” I said. “What are you plotting and what’s in there?” I pointed at his old-fashioned glass.
“Ginger ale. My ulcer can’t take any of the mediocre bourbon our host has provided for this shivaree. And I’ll have you know I’m not plotting. She’s desperately in love with me. She just doesn’t know it yet.”
I grabbed his glass and took a huge gulp. “You always were a kid prone to fantasy. Far be it from me to try and impose any reality into that beautiful little world you’ve concocted in your feather-headed southern brain.”
He gestured at the bartender for another ginger ale. “Your eyes are wild, sweetcakes. What’s wrong?”
I twirled the ice around in my drink. “You know I hate gatherings like this. Everyone trying to outsnob everyone else. Then there’s the whole thing with Shelby. Just looking at her pictures made me want to cry. And there was this guy who was kinda weird, asking all sorts of personal questions.”
His face grew serious and protective. “Where is he?”
“You can’t miss him,” I said. “He’s about ten feet tall and has a white ponytail.”
Emory gazed out over the crowd, his eyes sharp behind his professor eyeglasses. “Is the man you’re referring to wearing a gray flannel shirt?”
“Yes, and a stupid-looking turquoise earring,” I said. “I know I’m overreacting, but he ...”
Emory gave a small chuckle.
“What’s so funny?” I asked, turning my gaze to the man. At that moment, he looked up from the gaggle of sparkling society matrons surrounding him and spotted us staring at him. He held up his wineglass in a salute. Emory nodded in reply.
“Do you know him?” I demanded. “Who is he?”
“Remember that personally signed photograph I sent you for your birthday three years ago?”
It hung in my bedroom next to my vanity, where I saw it every day when I fixed my hair. It was a black-and-white photograph of a woman leading three horses, her head turned slightly so you couldn’t see her face. Through the leaves of the oak tree shading the woman, a hint of a child’s face peered, like a Cheshire cat, through the foliage. It wa
s a brilliantly whimsical picture that never failed to touch my heart. But it was no wonder because the photographer was the famous Pulitzer Prize-winning Isaac Lyons, a man whom many believed to be more talented than Ansel Adams.
“He took it,” Emory said.
I looked back over at the man who had since turned his attention back to the fawning ladies. “That’s Isaac Lyons?” Now I realize why he seemed so familiar. After Emory had sent me the print, I’d seen a book of Isaac Lyons’s photographs in Blind Harry’s. Though I’d never have spent seventy-five dollars for a book of nothing but pictures, I spent an hour looking at them in the store. It was a book on county fairs. He captured the heart of his subjects in a way that was gripping, touching, and at times almost frightening. It made me think of Indian tribes who feared getting their pictures taken, afraid it would capture their soul. That’s exactly what his pictures felt like, so intimate that it seemed he’d stolen pieces of their souls. At the back of the book was a small self-portrait, his shadowed face almost unrecognizable. But he’d turned his ability to capture a person’s essence on himself and revealed just enough to make him seem familiar to me.
“What happened between you two?” Emory asked. “I’ve only met him casually at a few soirees such as this, but he seemed a nice enough fellow.”
“I don’t know. It was the way he watched my every move. He was just so ... searching.”
“He’s a photographer, Benni. That’s his profession.”
“Something else,” I said. “I don’t know what. He was way too interested in Shelby’s picture of Dove. I wonder what he’s doing here in our town. It’s not like we’re on the A list for art shows here in San Celina.”
“That’s his MO,” Emory said. “He travels around to small towns and stays awhile, looking for subjects. His specialty is common people, if you’re familiar with any of his work.”
“Well, he can be the King of England, for all I care. He still gives me the creeps.”
Emory looked back over in Isaac Lyons’s direction. “You might have to get used to him, sweetcakes, ‘cause it appears he’s moving into your territory. And rumor has it he’s quite the ladies man.”
I turned back to stare at the man and felt my blood pressure start to rise. During the few minutes I’d been talking to Emory, Dove had arrived, and Mr. Lyons had extricated himself from his admiring throng of art lovers, holding out his bearlike hand and smiling down at her. And darned if Dove wasn’t smiling back. Simpering might be a better word.
“Oh, geez,” I said.
“Don’t overreact,” Emory whispered in my ear. “Believe me, I’ve had experience with my own long-widowed and much sought-after daddy. If they even sense you disapprove, they rebel like teenagers and do exactly the opposite of what you want them to do.”
“Dove’s no fool,” I said, though my words seemed hollow when I saw her touch the photographer’s arm in a way that can only be described as flirtatious. “She’ll never fall for his line.” One of my aunts had obviously done her hair up in a complicated braided bun with a few silvery tendrils trailing down her neck. In her good silk navy dress, wearing silver hoop earrings, she did present an arresting picture. It never occurred to me until that moment that my grandmother had once been, and still was, an attractive woman. One capable of being desired by a man. For some reason, that troubled me—the idea that she could have the same vulnerability that sometimes left me slightly fearful of the sensual power that my own often mystifying husband had over me.
“Um-hm,” Emory said. “While you stew, I think I see a slackening in the action around my own fair lady. We’ll compare notes later.” He patted my back and maneuvered through the crowd toward an unsuspecting Elvia with the same determination I’d seen in bulls heading toward unsuspecting heifers.
Tired of the noise and warring smells of women’s perfumes, I slipped through a back doorway to the small room behind the gallery where Roland kept his true working office as well as paintings and sculptures waiting to be unwrapped, logged in, and priced. I wandered around, looking at the labels on the boxes, trying to kill time before going back into the crowd. I flipped through some matted but unframed pictures lying against the wall. Some were duplicates of Shelby’s show prints except for her missing signature. The alarmed back door was open, and I stuck my head through it into the alley to inhale a breath of fresh air. Greer was leaning against the back wall of the brick building, a lighted cigarette in her fingers. At the end of the alley, through the open door of Sweet Dreams Coffee House, a sweet, mournful blues melody floated down to us.
“I didn’t know you smoked,” I said, stepping out into the brightly lit alley. She dropped the cigarette on the ground and mashed it with her coffee-colored boot. The smoke she blew out mingled with the cloud caused by the cold night air.
“I quit ten years ago, so I had to bum this off the bartender. Boy, it sure doesn’t relax me like it used to.”
I leaned next to her against the wall. “Feeling a bit overwhelmed?”
“Absolutely. I mean, I’m thrilled as can be, you know that. There’s actually art reporters here from both the San Francisco Chroraicle and the L.A. Times. And at least three-fourths of my works have acquired that blessed little red ‘sold’ sticker. Roland’s a genius, no doubt about it. It’s just that after all these years, it’s almost a letdown, you know? And there’s the thing with Shelby.” Greer shook her head, her beaded earrings catching in her hair.
“I know.”
“Have you heard anything?”
“No, and I’m not likely to. Like I told you this afternoon, it’s not really Gabe’s investigation.”
“Don’t he and the sheriff communicate?”
I shrugged. “Some, but Gabe has enough city crime to worry about. I’m sure he’ll keep up on it, but it’s not a priority in the sense that it’s not his department’s responsibility to clear it.”
She gave a small chuckle. “My, my, you are learning the rhetoric of the political wife, aren’t you?”
I grimaced. “That did sound kinda pompous, didn’t it? But I’m here to tell you, this thing has me as spooked as a colt on a windy night. Especially since it happened at our ranch.”
“I can imagine. I guess that gives you quite the incentive to get involved ... again, Miss Marple.”
I leaned over and pushed her gently. “Nancy Drew, thank you very much. Or Trixie Belden. Or even Kinsey Millhone. But Miss Marple? Please, I’m not that old. And I’m not going to answer that on the grounds it might get me in trouble with a certain law enforcement official. Besides, I’m too busy this week to play detective. You should know that.”
“You and me both,” she said, sighing. “This week, I’ve agreed to teach four workshops, judge an art show, give three talks on women in the arts, and be interviewed by some writer from the L.A. Times. Not to mention that Roland wants me to get started on my next series since this one is sold out. This clutching for fame business sure keeps you from doing what it is you really want to do.” She gave a mocking smile. “Then again, it’s part of the creative arts game these days, right?”
“Just glad it’s your game, not mine. By the way,” I said as we both started back inside, “you’re familiar with the western art world. What do you know about the photographer Isaac Lyons?”
“Honey, he goes beyond western art into just plain art. I know he did a book recently on western landscapes and that the West has become his latest interest. I also hear he’s a man who really loves the ladies. Did a book on female nudes a few years back that made the bestseller list. Got named in a paternity suit once, but it proved to be a false claim. Not bad for a seventy-nine-year-old man.”
“He’s seventy-nine?”
“There about. Why the interest in old randy Isaac?”
“I just met him.”
“Here? Tonight? Isaac Lyons is at my gallery opening!” Her face flushed pink. “I have to get back in there and meet him. I can’t believe it! Isaac Lyons at my gallery opening.” She dashed
through the doorway and went into the small bathroom next to Roland’s office to check her hair.
“I can’t believe you didn’t see him,” I said, following her. “He’s pretty hard to miss.”
“I took my contacts out because they were causing my eyes to turn a very unattractive shade of vermillion. Everyone except the people right in front of me are a big blur.”
“Just look for the gargantuan white-headed blur and you’ll have found him.” It didn’t seem the appropriate time to tell her that I thought he was a jerk who was scoping out my grandmother in a most inappropriate way. Photographing nudes? He’d better not even think it.
If possible, the crowd had become even more tightly packed in the last half hour. The hum of human voices sounded like a convoy of tractors. The two bartenders looked frazzled though their crystal tip jar overflowed with bills, the generosity of the guests being enhanced by the neverending flow of medium-grade wine and champagne. I was searching the crowd for Gabe with the intention of convincing him to sneak away with me when I saw Dove and her new friend head my way.
“Honeybun, I want you to meet someone.” Her voice cut through the noisy crowd like a hot knife through butter. With her arm intertwined in his, she pulled him toward me. He towered over her five-foot frame, smiling like a huge, cream-fed cat.
“Isaac, this is my granddaughter, Benni Harper. She runs the folk art museum I was telling you about. Her name should be Ortiz ‘cause she’s married to our chief of police, and he’s the nicest young man you could ever want to meet, but she’s balky as an old milk cow and wants to be Miss Liberated-Woman-of-the-World. Makes addressing Christmas cards a big pain in the butt, in my opinion. Benni, say hello to Mr. Isaac Lyons. He takes pictures for a living and he’s wanting to take some out at the ranch. I’ve invited him to stay awhile, though for the life of me I still can’t imagine what anyone would want with pictures of our old ranch. I told him about Shelby, poor little child, that she was taking pictures of our place, too, and what happened to her. I said there might be some sorta bad luck swirling about our land, but he says that don’t bother him at all, so I said you’re welcome to stay as long as you clean up after yourself.”
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