“Berg,” he said aloud, shaking his head at his own jumpiness, “You really are a silly old codger.”
Chapter Eight
The tinkling alarm on Jessie’s phone sounded much too early the next morning. She groaned and looked across the bed into yellow reptilian eyes. “Jack,” she muttered aloud, “Six is such an ungodly hour it should have to repent. And I’ll bet you plan to sleep all day.” She swept a finger across the phone screen to set it for “snooze” and put the cell phone carefully on the night stand by the bed.
Maybe ten more minutes would be okay. She’d thought she’d have to hustle through her morning shower and makeup, then drive to Channel 8, but instead, the reporter wanted to conduct the interview in the Yellowstone room where Jessie’s paintings were hung. The interview shouldn’t take long and she could go right to the conference room to teach her one-day workshop on color and composition.
Jack grumbled, then suddenly jumped onto the night stand, peered down at the phone and shoved it with a paw, knocking it onto the carpeted floor.
“Jack!” Jessie leaped from the bed and grabbed the phone, swiping her finger across the screen and then dismissing the alarm. She shook her finger at the tom. “You little bugger. That’s an expensive phone, Fat Boy.”
He squinted his eyes, giving the feline face a smug expression. Then he jumped from the night stand and sauntered over to his bowl, glancing back at her. You’re out of bed. Feed me.
“So. I’m nothing more than cat staff, and don’t think I don’t know it. I also know where the treat bag is, and you, Mister, do not have opposable thumbs,” Jessie told him, tossing him a dirty look. She shuffled over to get the bag of kibble, poured a cup in his dish and then hit the shower. While she shampooed and soaped, she thought about the first talk she planned to present on color. Some students had trouble understanding that red and orange weren’t always hot colors. Blue and green weren’t cold. It was all relative. Color must be judged by the hues throughout the painting, especially those in proximity.
She remembered telling one student in her first class that adding white “cooled” a color as well as lightened it. She’d been chattering on for ten minutes about her thoughts on color, intensity and color complements, until the poor guy just looked at her blankly and said. “Huh?” He hadn’t absorbed any of it. He was still at the beginner stage in learning color, but he drew extremely well. “I just don’t get it,” he’d said. “Maybe I can’t do this.”
Jessie smiled ruefully in the shower, while the blissfully hot water drenched her hair and ran down her back. She’d learned more in that workshop than her students. Patience for starters. She learned to take it slow. Everyone has individual strengths and weaknesses, and each student is at a different level of understanding. You can’t toss them painting tips it took you years to learn like they were clay pigeons at a skeet range.
Jessie hurriedly dried her hair, dressed, dabbed on minimal make-up and picked up Jack. She hugged him close and gave him a squeeze, expecting a loud protest. Instead, he rubbed his cheek against hers and gave a rumbling purr.
“See you later, Butter Tub. And don’t terrorize the maid.” She set him on the bed, scratched behind his rag tag ear, grabbed her room key and stepped through the door. She had just enough time to grab a bite of breakfast.
*.*.*
“What the heck?” Jessie said aloud, her toe colliding with a small hard object in the doorway.
She pulled the hotel door shut behind her and looked down at a tiny, toy tractor about four inches long. She reached down and scooped it up. It was cute as a button. A replica John Deere. She tapped it with her fingernail. Metal. You don’t see metal toys much anymore. Some poor kid is probably bawling about losing his favorite plaything.
She slipped it into the bag with her workshop handouts and headed to the stairwell, anxious to find some breakfast. At the lobby check-in desk, a slim young man held a phone tight between his hunched shoulder and cheek, clicking away on his computer keyboard with nimble fingers, accepting a reservation. He glanced at Jessie and mouthed, “be with you as soon as I can”. She nodded and looked around the lobby with interest while she waited. One wall boasted an enormous oil painting of running pronghorn antelope. Their bodies were rendered with sure brush strokes that gave the two-dimensional animals a feeling of fluid movement. Blue-gray sage and prairie grass lent texture and color. The painting flooded Jessie’s mind with memories of summer trips with her granddad, trips during which he lugged his heavy old-fashioned camera, 400 mm lens and tripod, and she carried his bag of film. She’d peppered him with questions, but he’d never lost patience with his little granddaughter. She leaned in to peer at the corner of the work, trying to read the signature, but without success. And with her closer scrutiny came a slight feeling of disappointment. It was a print. A good reproduction on canvas, but a print, not an original.
Under the artwork was a glass display case containing finds from a dinosaur dig in rural Montana. An impressive triceratops femur lay surrounded by smaller finds, teeth, claws and other fossilized remains. The signage read ‘replicas of fossils found near Jordan, Montana.” Prints of fine art, copies of old bones. Not much is real anymore.
“Can I help you?” The desk clerk asked. “Sorry for the wait. The phone hasn’t stopped all morning.”
Jessie walked over and set the small tractor on the counter.
“I found this in the hall outside my door. I’m on the fifth floor.”
“Hey, thanks.” He picked it up and examined it. “It’s cute. Think they sell these at the Farm and Ranch store. Hopefully, someone will realize it’s missing before they check out.” He set it on the counter. “Our lost and found cupboard is well stocked with all kinds of weird things people leave. By the time they get fifty miles out of town, they don’t feel like backtracking to get them. I think I’ll just leave it here on the counter. Then it can’t be missed.” The phone rang again, and he reached for it with an exasperated expression, but he spoke cheerily into the receiver. “Crooked Creek Resort,” he sing-songed. “How can I help you?” He mouthed a “thank-you” at her as she began to walk away.
She tossed him a short wave before rounding the corner. Turning, she bumped solidly into a body that seemed to fill the hall.
“Hey, Jess, take it easy.”
The big man standing at the end of the short line into the Creek’s Edge Restaurant turned and took her arm, steadying her. It was Glen. He wore a black vest, but today, it wasn’t a Harley Davidson, it was Ranch Wear suede. Gone was the look of the motorcycle boots and bald head of the day before. Today, Glen looked like the ultimate western cowboy, except for the pony tail hanging down his back. He’d paired the vest with a stonewashed denim shirt with western detailing, a cerulean blue paisley silk kerchief, cowboy boots, and a black cowboy hat with a braided horse-hair band. The hat and cowboy boots added a good six inches to his already towering height.
Jessie stepped back. “I’m so sorry…Hope I didn’t hurt you,” she teased. She winked at him, her eye-level somewhere in the middle of his chest. “I know how delicate you are.”
He snorted, looking down at her.
“Yeah. I’m feelin’ a bit weepy after the pain of the impact. Probably got a broken rib or three.” He thumped his chest. “Big pain right here.”
Now Jessie snorted. Same old Glen.
“Have you been waiting in line long? The restaurant looks packed,” Jessie said, giving him a smile. “Hope I can at least get in to grab some coffee. I have to go do the Channel 8 interview before my workshop starts.”
“Coffee? That’s not going to do it for you, if you’re teaching. Teaching is ex-haust-ing.” He drew the word out into three long syllables. “Join us for breakfast, why don’t you?”
“Who’s ‘us’?” Jessie asked.
“Oh,” he stepped slightly to the side. “Camille and I are sharing a table, so we can get in and out before Armageddon. We’ve been waiting about twenty minutes, but everyone’s dawdling
over their coffee. The hostess just told us they were opening the back room to add more seating, though.”
Camille peered around him, saw Jessie and gave her a brilliant smile.
Jessie had looked up at Glen. Now she looked up—and up—at Camille. She smiled hesitantly at them, feeling very small. Diminutive. Weensy. Except for her appetite. She was famished.
“Yes, do,” Camille said warmly. “It’s great to see you.” She cocked her head toward the beckoning hostess. “Super, they’ve got us a booth. Come sit with us and fill us in on art sales in your neck of the woods.”
“I would love to.” Her stomach gave a loud rumble. Jessie winced in embarrassment. “In fact, it’s unanimous.”
Glen took Jessie’s arm and steered her ahead of him into the cafe.
The hostess led them through the bustling restaurant to the back room, and to a table already set with silverware and a pitcher of ice water. She leaned over to raise the window blinds as Jessie slid onto an elegant tapestry seat. Practically tossing the menus at them, she recited the breakfast specials as fast as an experienced auctioneer at a cattle auction, turned and rushed in the other direction. Glen yelled after her. “Three coffees, please!”
“Sure thing, hon!” The waitress didn’t turn around but gave him a little finger wave.
Jessie glanced out the window. The promised advertising banner had arrived. How odd, Jessie thought. The sign was supposed to hang on a portable billboard. Instead, a behemoth of a John Deere tractor was parked outside, draped with the Crooked Creek Expo banner proclaiming, “Art Show Today!” Well, heck. Not really the classiest way to advertise, but maybe it gets the job done. After all, this is farm country.
Then, Jessie looked again. The front window of the tractor was a spiderweb of cracks. Raised on a farm in rural Montana, she was familiar with farm machinery. The green monster outside was the same model as the toy she’d just turned in at the desk. What a weird coincidence.
The waitress returned to plunk coffee mugs on the table, along with a tall thermal carafe. Ginger, as her name tag proclaimed, poured each of them a steaming cup, looked at Glen pointedly and said, “More where that came from, darlin,” before hurrying off again.
Jessie was raising her mug to sip, when from the booth behind them she heard a woman’s strident voice ask, “Isn’t that Berg Nielson’s tractor? The one Adele was driving when some idiot shot her? You know, honey… last fall?”
The cup stopped halfway to Jessie’s lips. Along with every diner within earshot, she turned her head to stare out the window at the John Deere.
*.*.*
Later, with the interview over, Jessie stood in front of the conference room looking at twenty-one eager faces. Organized on the front table were several stacks of printed information, colored folders with pockets, small notebooks, white index cards, pencils and blank name tags. Artists stood beside tripod easels or sat in chairs with table easels placed in front of them.
“Please sign and wear your name tags, so I know your name. I’m handing out blank paper. Please take good notes,” she said calmly. “Next year—and the next—read through the notes from this class. I throw a lot of information at you—too much to absorb in one workshop if you’re a beginner—but a year from now, you’ll have painted more and with that experience, will understand more. If some things we talk about in this class don’t quite gel, by then, those concepts might jump out, clear as day.
“Painting well takes lots of practice. Take other classes. Most painters absorb just a bit from every workshop.” She pinched the tips of her thumb and index finger together. “Sometimes what they learn isn’t from the teacher. It’s from a student painting next to them.”
She picked up the stack of colored folders and began handing one to each person. “To become a good painter, you have to paint as much as you can. Every day if possible. A thousand paintings.” She thought of Russell, her old flame, and his lack of enthusiasm for her art. He had deemed it a waste of time. “Even if some don’t turn out, it’s never a waste of time. One sheet I’m passing out covers the steps of self-critique. Be your own harshest critic and your own loudest cheerleader. You must be both. Don’t let friends or relatives bring you down with a critical comment. Don’t let them pat you on the back so much that you think you’ve gotten as good as you need to be.”
She picked up a stack of color-wheels. “Stretch yourself. Try new things. Rejoice in each new painting skill, no matter how small.” She walked around the room, passing a color wheel and name tag to each student as she spoke. “Remember,” she said, as she handed the sheet to an older man whose face beamed with enthusiasm, “half the fun is doing something you enjoy.” The next student, a heavyset woman in a blue apron, smiled at her and mouthed her thanks.
“Let’s get started. We’ll begin by evaluating each person’s reference photos. Did everyone bring a couple?” Hands reached into bags and painting boxes and people began pulling out their chosen photographs, mostly scenery. “Your painting is only going to be as good as your references and your planning. We’ll start with deciding why you want to paint it. If you don’t know, it’s a good bet your viewer won’t have a clue. The key is to have one idea for one painting. If you get only one thing out of today’s class, that’s the one to remember.”
She reached for her artist’s apron, a cream-colored adjustable cover-up that sported a vintage Arbuckle Coffee advertisement and three large front pockets, and slipped it on, pulling the ties behind her back and securing them. “After we look at the reference photos, I’m going to explain how I use this blasted color wheel.” She picked it up from a nearby table and held it up. “It isn’t exactly as they’re meant to be used, but it works great. I wish someone had explained it to me the first year I picked up a brush. It would have saved me tons of time.”
*.*.*
Three hours later, Jessie stood at the easel applying two wide brush strokes of oil paint side by side. One was a pale yellow-green and the other a washed-out pink. She’d had a question from one of the advanced students about how to make a “lost edge”, a transition where the outline of an object blurred into its neighbor’s.
“See the difference?” She looked around the room at nodding heads. “Do you notice that although they are different colors, the edge of the main object,” she pointed to the area, “and the edge of the object right next to it,” again she pointed to the area, making a slight circular motion encompassing both areas with her hand, “are the same value, the same relative lightness or darkness? Now, squint your eyes.” Twenty-one students immediately looked nearsighted.
“When you squint, the line between them blurs and disappears. That’s called a ‘lost edge’. To make our work more realistic, we need some looser areas. Our eyes don’t see the world in a ‘cut and paste’ look with immaculate, crisp edges. The only place our eyes focus crisp and sharp is on one area at a time. The peripheral vision is always blurrier. Softer.”
She made another stroke. “Beginners, don’t stew over this, but please write it down. When you visit galleries or art shows, try to identify such soft edges in other people’s paintings.”
As she lifted the paintbrush and stepped back so that the students could gather around the easel and look more closely, the door opened and a teen-aged girl in a well-worn hooded sweatshirt strolled in. She gave Jessie a smile full of braces.
Waving a fistful of papers, she said, “Excuse me. Max and Mrs. Jackson said I should drop these off now, before you broke for lunch, you know? The Curl Up and Dye has signed forms from most of the workshop participants. Mona down at the salon said her five gals would cut these guys’ hair over the lunch hour. Work ‘em in, like, so you workshop folks can get the haircuts, like, done slam-bam, you know?” She gave the stack of papers to the woman at the first desk. “Pass ‘em back, will ya?” She handed Jessie one with a little flourish. Inwardly, Jessie groaned.
“Thanks.”
Jessie remembered now that Maureen Jackson was the blue-haired woma
n, the woman that coerced her into getting her hair cut. Unless they made bluish wigs, the aggressive Mrs. Jackson probably had the only safe head of hair in town. Jessie frowned and automatically reached back to slide her hand down her long ponytail. How short had she promised? It had taken her years to grow it this long.
“Oh, and I have a message from Evan Hansen. “He told me to ask you if you’d ever seen Benny?” The girl smacked gum between her words. “The last time anyone saw him was when he was heading out to your trailer house. His dogs went over to the neighbor’s house, because he never went home last night. And, like, the neighbor says Benny loves those dogs. He’d never, you know, leave them to fend for themselves. I love animals, don’t you? My dad doesn’t want me to have a dog. He says they’re smelly, but I don’t care. I love’ em all. I’m earning money to pay for vet bills. He says if I can do that . . .maybe, just maybe, I can have one.”
“Yes, I do love animals and no, I have not seen Benny. But remind Evan that I don’t know what Benny looks like, so I could have passed him in the lobby and not realized it.” And my Hawk is not a trailer house. It is a motorhome, she grumbled inwardly. Frowning, Jessie realized she was feeling downright cranky over the idea of getting her hair cut. Well, heck, it was just hair. She smiled at the girl, who dazzled her with a wide silver one in return. “Thanks for delivering the haircut forms. I’m sure Benny will turn up.”
“I hope so. Benny’s a nice guy. He’s going to give me a puppy next spring if his spaniel has a new litter. Spaniels are kind of stupid compared to like, border collies, but they’re lovable. Oh, and Mrs. Jackson said she needed your hair cut awesome short. They need red hair. I can’t remember why. But it’s got to be red, and your hair is flaming.”
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