He stood and pulled his T-shirt over his head. “Let’s go, fraidy-cat. You can do it. Face your fear.” He reached down and grabbed my hand. “I’ll be right by your side the whole time. We’ll make a run for it. A quick dunk and we’re out. But we can say we did it.”
“Suddenly I was game. “Okay, then. What are you waiting for?”
“We’ll never make it if we go slow,” he said, unzipping his jeans. “We’ve got to run and go all the way.”
“I thought you’d never done this before,” I said as I slipped off my sweater.
“Never naked,” he said. “Never with a beautiful woman.”
“You promised you wouldn’t look,” I reminded him, although I couldn’t help sneaking a glance at the very flat muscles of his stomach. His wasn’t the sort of body that comes from hours at the gym or from endless miles logged on a bicycle while wearing spandex, but it was lean and sexy.
He covered his eyes with one hand, pulling at his jeans with the other. “It’s kind of hard to get undressed like this.”
I pulled my jeans off my hips and tossed them on the sand, shivering slightly, but not from the cold. I didn’t even feel the chill in the air anymore.
He took my hand, carefully averting his eyes. “One. Two. Three.” We ran toward the ocean together, hand in hand. The icy water was a shock, but we dived in. It took my breath away at first, but once we were in, it felt wonderful. We swam a bit in the moonlight, allowing the waves to pull us along.
I wanted to feel his arms around me, to entwine our legs together. I’d never felt that way about Jean-Paul, I recalled, not even when we first met. There was always something businesslike about our arrangement and—I didn’t realize this until much later—I’d had to continually talk myself into believing it was right, even when I knew, of course I knew, it was wrong. I didn’t blame him when it all came apart, though it stung to learn he’d been unfaithful. We were simply not at all suited to each other, and I was just as much at fault for ignoring the signs. But with Finn, despite how much I’d been trying to talk myself out of him, there was something so right about him. And all I wanted him to do was throw me on the sand and kiss me.
He must have read my mind, because that was exactly what he did once we ran back up the beach to the fire and the blanket. He pressed his long body against mine and when our lips met it felt like coming home.
“I’m terrified,” he said with a smile, holding himself over me when we came up for air.
I don’t know what I’d been expecting his next words to be, but those were not them. “What do you mean?”
“I can’t be your friend, kid. I mean I can’t be just your friend.” His voice was gruff. “I’m in love with you, you know.”
Warmth suffused my body, despite the chilly breeze. “You are?”
“I think I’ve been in love with you since I met you,” he said.
“And that’s terrifying?”
His eyes met mine and my heart seemed to skip a beat. “It is. Because you’re going to leave in two weeks.”
I pulled him down to me to whisper into his ear. “Is that why you were so weird that night you took me for dinner at the Four Seasons?” He nodded, and I said, “You have to face your fear, fraidy-cat.”
He kissed me again and then we couldn’t stop. Time seemed to stand still and we stayed on the beach for a long time afterward. Eventually even the embers of the fire were completely cold and we got dressed and headed back to Fool’s House.
Before we even got to the stairs, he was kissing me again and his hands were all over me. We kissed all the way up the stairs to my room where, I was glad to see, I’d remembered to make the bed with its popcorn bedspread. The bed became quickly unmade as we fell on it and pulled at our clothes in another rush of passion. Afterward, our bodies fitted together like spoons under the old, soft sheet. We talked and laughed, and I thought I would never feel tired ever again, not in Finn’s company, but we did fall asleep eventually as the pink-gray light of dawn began seeping in around the curtains.
Later, Peck would tell me, and anyone else who would listen, about her weekend with Miles. “Did you know,” she would start by asking, “there’s an F. Scott Fitzgerald suite at the Ritz?” Often the person hearing her tale did not know this and she would continue. On the occasion when someone would know, she would ask the follow-up question: “Well, have you ever stayed there?”
She has yet to encounter anyone who had actually been in the suite, allowing her to describe it in lengthy detail, going on about the extravagant upholstery and the wood paneling and the fireplace. “It’s impossibly glamorous,” she would say, fixing her listener with a steady gaze. “And there’s a whiff of history in the air.”
She would pause and light a cigarette, and the listener—me—would feel as though there wasn’t any place in the world she’d rather be at that moment than there at the Ritz.
“History isn’t the only scent,” she’d continue. “The whole place smells spicy and mysteriously rich, like a perfume ad. I swear, they pump this fragrance into the air vents. And then it’s also in the body lotion and this cologne in your bathroom, acres and acres of marble.”
She’d go on about the special cocktails at the Hemingway bar until you were dying for one, and the thick peach terry-cloth robes and the pool with its spa and the club sandwiches. She would tell anyone who would listen about how if you’re a writer you can get your mail at the Ritz. “The Fitzgerald suite is where you must stay. It’s all red and gold, with brocade fabrics and overstuffed furniture and the most incredible high, fluffy bed you could sink into for days with hundreds of pillows on it. A mushy down-filled acre of silk and satin.”
Miles didn’t exactly ask her that weekend. To marry him, I mean. What he said was, “We could get married.” In the same tone, Peck told me, he might have used to say, “We could have tuna sandwiches for lunch.” Or “We should all get vaccinated.” Or “We could go to Morocco.” Some day.
“But I said, ‘Yes. Some day,’ ” she would say, neatly wrapping up her story.
17
Peck came back from Paris with an enormous feathered hat she’d found at the flea market. “I’m afraid it may have fleas,” she said of the thing, which she insisted on wearing over to Hamilton’s house for our showdown with Biggsy three days later. “Or the avian flu. But isn’t it fabulous?”
Hamilton and Scotty certainly thought so. “It’s so risky,” Scotty decreed. “And thus, frisky,” Hamilton added.
We gathered Wednesday evening, the six of us—Peck, Miles, Scotty, Hamilton, Finn, and me—on the patio behind Hamilton’s house. This was the first time Finn and I had been in the presence of another human being since our night at the beach. I felt as though I’d been drugged for those three days, so distracted was I by the intensity of my feelings for him. He said he felt the same way and called in sick to the office. Afterward he said, “I didn’t lie, I am sick. I’m dizzy, weak, I can’t think straight. What have you done to me?”
I didn’t know that one could feel this way about another person. Romantic love had always seemed like an abstract concept to me, I realized, until these raw waves of emotion overtook me so strongly I felt like laughing and crying at the same time. I was taken by total surprise, not only by the feelings, but that Finn—Lydia’s Finn was how I thought of him—was the source of them.
We sat together in one of the enormous wicker chairs with navy cushions pulled up to a low table on Hamilton’s patio. The others all took their own seats but Finn pulled me down next to him with an arm around my shoulders, prompting Peck to comment that we should get a room. Hamilton had instructed Scotty on the proper preparation of the traditional Pimm’s Cup, and they passed around tall frosted glasses garnished with fruit.
“Are we certain it’s not still alive?” Finn asked, wrinkling his nose as he inspected Peck’s hat. “I think it’s moving.”
“It’s probably in horribly bad taste,” she explained in the self-deprecating manner that she ado
pted when she knew she was wearing something truly fabulous. “But I’d rather have bad taste than no taste any day of the week.”
“Oh, me too,” Scotty cooed. He was enamored of Peck’s outrageous fashion sense. “What does your beau think of it?”
“My beau?” she scoffed from under the mass of drooping feathers. “He bought it for me. And then he had to carry the thing on the plane. He almost had to buy it its own seat, didn’t you, Miles?”
Miles nodded distractedly, scrolling on his BlackBerry as he shoveled potato chips into his mouth. He spoke through a spray of crumbs. “When is that punk going to show up?”
On cue, Biggsy appeared on the patio, shocked to see the six of us gathered there. He was dressed in a tight-fitting seersucker suit and he too wore a hat. His was a small porkpie with jaunty red trim, and he looked too young and good-looking for this role, like a heartthrob leading man trying unsuccessfully to play the part of the bad guy. We’re used to crooks looking like rats, with beady eyes and bad shirts, and crazy people looking ugly and unkempt. But Biggsy was so beautiful, with those razor-sharp cheekbones and full lips, that in the movies he could only be cast as the love interest. Or possibly the villain who would then turn out to have been on the good side the whole time. It had been so easy for him to fool us. We’d been so willing to be fooled.
“Uh . . . hello,” he stammered, stopped short by the sight of all of us. He’d only expected Hamilton and someone—Scotty—who looked like an art dealer, and he was shocked to see me, Peck, Finn, and Miles on the patio.
“Hello, young man,” Hamilton boomed. “Won’t you have a Pimm’s?”
“Um . . . sure.” Biggsy didn’t move his feet. He was empty-handed, despite the plan set in motion by Hamilton for him to bring the painting to this meeting. “What’s going on?”
“It’s an intervention,” Peck cried out, the feathers on her hat bobbing madly. “We’ve had a few of those this summer.”
Biggsy looked flummoxed. “It was only a couple of joints. I have ADD. I take it to relax.”
“Not drugs, you idiot. Art.” Peck said, glancing over at me.
“We want the painting back,” I explained, speaking as calmly as I could, even though I wanted to strangle the good-looking young guy who stood there trying to look wide-eyed and innocent. “And then we want you to take your stuff and leave.”
His eyes darted nervously between Peck and me. “I live here. This is my home.”
“Jonathan,” I said firmly. “We know you stole from us. And we know you faked that letter from Lydia.”
He paused for a second, calculating a next move. “I just wanted you to like me,” he said with a pout, like he was trying to be cute about it. “Lydia loved me so much. I was just putting onto paper the words she herself used about me. And she encouraged me to do those pranks. She called it art.”
At this, Miles let out a snort. “Art?”
“That was a mean thing to do.” I sounded like a stern school-teacher. “You’ve been nothing but trouble since we got here.”
“And then you let me believe Miles took it,” Peck added, pointing a finger at him. “You almost fucked the whole thing up for me. I should’ve kicked you the hell out right then.”
“I think of you as my family,” he tried to explain. “We have no more living family, any of us. And I thought . . . you, me, Peck—”
“Peck’s mother is alive and well and living in a condo in Palm Springs,” I interjected, losing what little patience I might have had for this charade.
“Where she belongs,” Peck said with a nod in my direction.
“And we, Peck and I, are sisters, related by blood,” I continued as Peck beamed her approval at me. “You, on the other hand, are a freeloader we’ve tolerated for too long. So don’t try to put yourself in any category with us.”
He looked down at his feet. “I can’t let you do it. You can’t let Fool’s House go.” He looked up then with a vicious gleam in his eyes as he directed his words to me. “You think you’re so fucking worldly, just because you live somewhere else. But you’re myopic. You and your sister.”
Finn had been watching calmly from the big wicker chair, but now he stood. “Hey. Just give them the painting.”
“And the book,” I interjected.
“And anything else you took,” Finn continued. “And then move on. Show’s over.”
“What the hell do you know?” There was a rehearsed quality to the venom in his voice, like he’d been watching soap operas for techniques on how to play the villain, and it made me want to laugh. “You’re a fucking architect.”
Finn gave him a bemused look. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Architects are all failed artists.” Biggsy was still standing at the edge of the patio, staring in at the six of us, who formed a circle in the wicker chairs around the low table with its bowls of chips and other “nibbles,” as Hamilton insisted on calling them.
I stood and folded my arms over my chest, glaring at Biggsy. “Where’s the painting?”
He didn’t answer me but took a step toward Scotty. The elfin Scotsman was perched on the edge of his huge cushioned chair like a child at a tennis match, head swiveling from side to side as he observed the action with delight. “Are you the art dealer?”
“The dealer?” I repeated as I realized that Biggsy still didn’t seem to understand what was going on here.
“I’m not an art dealer,” Scotty announced, pulling himself upright in his seat.
“But he plays one on TV,” Peck added. “This time the prank’s on you, Biggs. There’s no dealer. There’s only us. And we want our painting back.”
“And the book,” I repeated.
He swiveled to look at me. “What book?”
“Just give us back Lydia’s painting,” Peck said. “And then get the hell out of here.”
Biggsy answered with a sneer. “You can have the damn painting,” he said. “It’s not worth shit.”
We all seemed to speak at once. “How do you know?”
He put both hands on his hips before he spoke. “It’s no Jackson Pollock, that’s for fucking sure.” He appeared to be almost enjoying himself, in full performance mode now that he felt he had command of his audience.
“So who painted it?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “Someone short on talent. There’s a lot of them.”
“We don’t care,” Peck cried out. “It has sentimental value and we want it back. And then you’ve got to get out.”
“I’ll get you the painting,” he said. “But you can’t make me leave Fool’s House.”
There was a brief pause when nobody spoke. All this time I’d had Lydia’s revolver in my back pocket and I pulled it out now and pointed it at the young fool. “Yes, we can,” I said, trying to hold the gun as steady as possible as I focused it right between his lovely blue eyes. I’d never pointed a gun at anyone. I’d never even held one in my hand until that morning, when I pulled it out of the cocktail shaker in preparation for this afternoon. It felt surprisingly natural, though, to bring out this extra little bit of force, even though the unloaded revolver wasn’t anything more than a prop.
He looked startled. And then quickly his bravado returned. “You could never shoot that thing.”
“Watch me,” I said, willing my hand not to shake.
Finn was grinning at me as he said to Biggsy, “Just get them their stuff, dude. Nobody has to get hurt.”
Biggsy lifted his hands in protest. “All right,” he said. “Don’t get your panties in a wad. The painting was at Fool’s House all along.” He turned and gestured that we should follow him.
We fell into a line behind him down the path that led around the house to the driveway. I went first with the gun and the others fell in after me in close succession, like we were in a conga line at a party. “Wait until you see where that painting is,” Biggsy called out from his spot as the leader in front of us. “You’ll be blown away.”
I’m sure we m
ust have looked ridiculous, like costumed inmates from an asylum being let out for a parade, to anyone on the street as we filed out of Hamilton’s driveway. There was Biggsy in the lead in his shrunken suit and hat, and then me with a gun. Behind me was tall Finn and then shorter Miles, who somehow managed to be texting on his BlackBerry while he walked. Tiny Scotty, in a purple paisley shirt tucked into orange Bermuda shorts with a red ribbon belt, traipsed along behind him, stepping daintily on the gravel in his flimsy espadrilles. At the rear, looking like they were actually supposed to be in an Easter parade, were Peck and Hamilton, arm in arm, he in a blazer and tie and she in a shiny long dress with that enormous drooping hat.
When Biggsy got to the porch, he stopped and turned to face the rest of us, looking both sly and stupid at the same time. “I told you, it’s in the house. Can you guess where?”
“I know, I know,” Peck exclaimed as she drew close. “The bar cart.”
Biggsy looked confused. “The bar cart? Where would I hide a framed oil painting in a bar cart?”
Peck shrugged. “I hid the gun in it. In Grandma Nonah’s silver cocktail shaker.”
Biggsy turned and opened the screen door and we followed him into the house one by one. Peck had to hold the sides of her hat down so she could fit through the doorway.
In the hall Biggsy pointed at the Pink Lady, the doll that had kept vigil from the top of the stairs since Lydia moved into the place. “She knows all,” he intoned, and then he opened the door to the overstuffed closet under the stairs that Peck and I had not had a chance to clear out.
“We looked in there,” I said.
“Not all the way in the back,” he replied with a grin. “And I dropped so many hints.”
We watched as he burrowed into the closet, tossing aside blankets, sweatshirts, and an old-fashioned wicker picnic basket before emerging, his porkpie hat askew as he held up the painting that had been missing for more than two weeks. He handed it to me without making eye contact.
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