Bill said, “Isn’t he great? Intern of the year.”
Yale watched his hand stir his coffee. “It’s not a bad idea,” he said. “And we can visit the lawyer in the meantime.”
They found a gift store that sold greeting cards, and inside a “Thinking of you!” note with butterflies, they wrote Nora a letter saying they apologized for dropping in, but they’d been unable to reach her, and right now was the best time to meet the gallery director. They addressed the letter and even dug up a stamp, rubbed some ink on it so it looked mailed. They drove slowly down County Road ZZ, and when they neared Nora’s mailbox Yale rolled down the passenger window and stuck the letter in with the magazines and bills that were, in fact, still there. They sped away laughing like teenagers who’d just egged a house.
Bill and Yale dropped Roman at the B&B, where he was to wait by the house phone in case Nora called, and found their way to the offices of Toynbee, Ball, and O’Dell in a converted Victorian outside downtown Sturgeon Bay, the kind of place that might as easily have been turned into an orthopedist’s. It was open, and Stanley looked happy to see them. He was working in a blue sweater and khakis, and seemed to have no pressing engagements.
“You probably did the right thing,” he said, “coming up. I worry for her, with that family. They’re not locking her in, nothing like that, but half the time I call, they won’t put her on. And she’s sharp. She knows what’s going on.”
“But she lives alone, right?” Yale said. “I thought the others just visited.”
There was a huge clock on the wall behind Stanley, one that must have reminded most visitors of his hourly fee but that to Yale served only to count down the hours till Frank Lerner’s phone tree reached Cecily.
“I don’t think Debra’s left in months. Let me tell you about her father, Nora’s son. Frank.” He leaned back in a desk chair he was too tall for. “She had him when she was thirty-two, which—you know, back then that was late for a first child. Only child, actually. She thinks it’s all her fault that he’s a bully. Has a decent amount of money, and he thinks he’s a wine connoisseur. An oenophile. You know that word? I just learned that word. My daughter gave me this word-a-day calendar for Christmas.” He tapped the little block of paper attached to a plastic easel on his desk, turned it toward them. Today’s word was avuncular. “Yeah, he’s a big oenophile.” He chuckled. “Sounds dirty, right? My point is, he’s not about to starve if she gives away that art. He didn’t even know about it till five or six years ago.”
Yale said, “That was his wife, at the house today? With kids?”
“One day she’ll wake up and realize she’s married to an old man. She’s what, half his age? Beautiful lady, though. Phoebe. An aerobics instructor.” He waggled his eyebrows.
Bill said, “What are the odds of his contesting the will?”
“Decent. But winning is another matter. And I’m on your side in this. I want whatever Nora wants, and Nora wants to work with you.”
Yale said, “If she could donate while she’s alive, we wouldn’t be worrying about a will.”
Bill said, “You can’t contest a donation from a living person, can you?”
“Well,” Stanley said. “It’s been done. You know, let’s say an old woman with dementia suddenly announces she’s giving her entire fortune to her nurse. But you’re right, in this case it would make things a hell of a lot easier. My advice, regardless, is to have your own counsel present. I’m there, your counsel’s there, it’s pretty airtight.”
“Is Nora amenable to donating right now?”
Stanley half smiled, bobbed his head from side to side.
Yale had a ridiculous vision of the three of them walking back through the doors of the Brigg tomorrow with armloads of art, of Cecily seeing these Modiglianis—and Chuck Donovan’s two-million-dollar check, his little piano donations, falling away like gnats.
The secretary, the one who’d shown them in, rapped on Stanley’s half-open door with one knuckle. She said, “We have a call for your visitors.”
Roman’s voice was ecstatic, breathless: “She called. She wants to see us. She said bring the lawyer.”
* * *
—
And so an hour later there were seven of them seated around Nora’s dining table, an awkward board meeting. Nora sat at the head of the table in a wheelchair—“Not my first time in the chair, but it never lasts long,” she said—the sun setting behind her head. Yale took a seat between Frank and his daughter Debra, so that Bill, Roman, and Frank’s wife were mixed together on the table’s other side. Less adversarial this way. Stanley sat at the other end, opposite Nora. Frank’s children—a boy and girl who probably should have been in school, but maybe it was still Christmas break after all—had been sent to the basement to watch TV. Yale had called Northwestern’s general counsel, who’d promised to drive up as soon as he could get out of the office. It was unlikely he’d arrive before eight p.m., but even if that was after Nora needed them out of the house, they could get everything done in the morning.
Yale felt he should start things off, break the tension that was causing Debra to fold her arms over her flat chest and Roman to twitch his foot so hard that it shook the floor—but Nora piped up, clearing her throat pleasantly and saying, “I’m thrilled you’re here. Frank, not a word from you. It’s good for you to know my plans, but I’m not looking for advice.”
Frank snorted and leaned his chair back. He was close to sixty, and what remained of his hair was silver, but there was something about his wet, dark eyes that made him look like an overgrown child.
“The Polaroids are remarkable,” Bill Lindsey said. “And depending what artifacts you have, what photographs of Paris, letters, and so on, those might be put on display as well.”
Nora looked taken aback, but then she said, “I don’t suppose there’s anything so private in there. I’ll have to look through.”
Debra said, “Wait, Nana, you’re giving away the papers too? Did we know this?”
“Well the papers go with the artwork, dear.”
Frank rolled his eyes, made a sound to go with it.
“So you liked all of it?” Nora said. “The Novak pieces too? Because I do want those appreciated.”
Before Bill could say something that sounded less than enthusiastic, Yale said, “I’m really drawn to the man in the argyle vest.”
Nora laughed, closed her eyes as if the painting were inside her eyelids.
Debra whispered, but for everyone to hear: “Ranko was her boyfriend.”
“Ahhhh,” Bill said. “That makes sense.” And he shot Yale a look.
The only thing Bill’s intern Sarah had been able to find out about Novak was that he’d been one of three students to share the prestigious Prix de Rome in 1914—a detail footnoted with the fact that the outbreak of the war prevented their traveling to Rome that year, and so the award was postponed. But that seemed to be the end of his historical trail.
Bill talked about his vision for an exhibit. “We could always accept the pieces on loan and mount something temporary,” he said, “but in that case we couldn’t raise the endowment for authentication and restoration.” He was speaking out of turn—Yale had never intended to bring up the possibility of a loan—and Yale tried in vain to catch his eye.
Yale said, “We’d like to be able to promise that we’ll care for these works in perpetuity.”
Nora turned to her son and said, “You do understand, don’t you, Frank? That it’s costly. Nothing’s framed, and everything will need preserving.” She coughed wetly into her hand.
Frank said, “Am I allowed to talk? Listen, I know a guy who used to work in the art world, a gallery up in Toronto. He’d do that authentication part for free. A personal favor.”
Yale shook his head. “You might be thinking of appraisal rather than authentication, but even so—”
F
rank was insulted now, Yale could see. “Look,” he said, “I hate to bring this up, but I have a close friend who, let’s just say he’s very big at Northwestern, and—”
“Mr. Donovan has been in contact with the development office,” Yale said. “It doesn’t concern us right now.”
Frank opened his mouth as if to yell at Yale, but then he turned to Nora instead. “Mother, I’m paying for this house. Have you considered that? You’re cutting me and my children out of this money, and you’re sitting here in a house I own.”
Nora said, calmly, “Are you planning to evict me?”
Before Frank could answer, his wife put her hand on his arm. “Frank,” she said, “why don’t you go out back for some air?”
Frank stood, presumably to do that, but then there was a shriek and crying from the basement and Frank and Phoebe ran down to see what had happened, and then Roman asked where the bathroom was, and soon people had dispersed all over the house. Which was fine by Yale. He followed as Nora wheeled herself into the living room, and she invited him to sit on the same couch where he’d sat with Cecily. He picked the middle this time, less awkward but also less comfortable. The seams where the two flattened cushions met dug into his tailbone. Bill—when Yale nodded at him that this was good, that a one-on-one with Nora would help—went out on the front porch for a smoke, and when Roman finished in the bathroom, he scurried out to join. Stanley stayed in the dining room, listening from a distance.
Nora said, “I need you to know that I’m dying. I have this congestive heart failure. My heart is simply weak, and I’m not a good candidate for surgery, as you can imagine. They don’t suppose I’ve got longer than a year. You’d think the doctors would know more. The funny thing is, I’m hardly struggling, but apparently my heart believes otherwise. What’s likely to happen is I’ll die in my sleep. That’s not so bad, is it? I always imagined I’d get lung cancer, and this is what I get instead. You don’t smoke, do you? Nico was always smoking, and I hated it, though I don’t suppose it mattered in the end. I stopped when I was forty, and look where it got me. Now, Frank and Debra know about my condition, but they hate me talking about it.”
Yale couldn’t figure out what to say. He’d had recent practice with this very thing—someone looking at you and telling you they were sick—but in every other case he’d been able to wrap his friend in a bear hug, to sob, to say, “I’m so fucking sorry.” None of these would be appropriate. He managed to nod, to say, “I’m sorry to hear that. You look fantastic.”
She laughed. “I don’t know about fantastic. You should’ve seen me at twenty-five. Hell, you have seen me at twenty-five. Didn’t I look fantastic?”
“You did.”
“Now you and I have work to do, because I don’t just want you to have the art, I know you need provenance, and my memory is still perfect. I can tell you when and where every one of those pieces was done.”
“That would be invaluable.” He could hear Frank and Phoebe yelling at their children in the basement. Debra was angrily washing dishes. Yale told Nora about the Sharps, about their willingness to help. “If we got the ball rolling,” he said, “these works could be hanging in the gallery while you’re still around to see it.”
“Well, I like that. I do. What needs to happen?”
Heavy footsteps ascended the basement stairs. He told her, quickly, about needing professional shots of the work for authentication, how there were separate experts for each artist. “And eventually they’ll want to see it in person. If you’re willing to put the pieces in our hands,” he said, “then they’d come to us. We’d handle it all.”
Frank was in the doorway. Nora said, “That seems smart, doesn’t it?” Yale wished Bill and Roman would come back inside, but then he didn’t want anything to break the spell. The whole room felt like a soufflé that had just risen, like the slightest shake would destroy it.
Frank pressed both hands into the doorframe. He said, “You’re giving away millions of dollars.” His voice a cyclone in a bottle. “Your grandkids won’t be able to go to Northwestern if you do this.”
Nora said, “Stanley, won’t you come in here?”
“I would consider this undue influence,” Frank said. “Is that the legal term, Stanley? Undue influence?”
Stanley had entered the room, and he gave Yale a wary look. “This is where you want your own counsel present. Just—so you don’t have to deal with any of this a year from now, two years from now.” Yale checked his watch. Only 4 p.m.
Frank said, “Then I want my own counsel present.”
“You’re welcome to that,” Yale said.
Roman was back, reporting that it had started to snow.
Nora said, “You certainly do bring the weather, Mr. Tishman!”
Yale squinted at the window. Had this been predicted? They’d had the radio off the whole drive up. It was falling steadily, thickly. A mixed blessing, at best: Frank might not be able to send for his own lawyer from Green Bay, but this would slow the Northwestern counsel down significantly. The Northwestern counsel, whose name, for Pete’s sake, was Herbert Snow. A cosmic joke.
“May I use your restroom?” asked Yale, and Roman, who’d already found it, pointed through the dining room. Yale passed the polished table, the curio cabinets, and entered the kitchen—the kind of kitchen every grandmother ought to have. Herbs on the windowsill, shelves of cookbooks. An oilcloth on the small table, patterned with little picnic baskets.
A hand clamped down on Yale’s shoulder, meaty and cold. Frank said, “Stop right there.”
Yale said, “I understand you’re upset. Family is always—”
“My kids use that bathroom.”
Yale tried to catch up.
“I know who you are,” Frank said. “I know where you’re from. You are not unzipping your trousers in my house.”
The hand was still on his shoulder, and Yale bent his knees to duck out from under it. He was a good six inches shorter than this man, but he had better posture. He had a sharper chin, and he leveled it at Frank’s neck. He said, “Where I’m from is Midland, Michigan.”
“Feel free to head back there.”
Yale could have said terrible things then. He imagined that Terrence, in the same situation, would have assured Frank he’d use the guest towels when he jerked off. He imagined Asher or Charlie lighting into him, calling him a coward and a bigot and worse. But he was himself, and he couldn’t afford to anger this guy any further, and so he said, “I’m healthy. If that’s what—I’m not sick.” But his voice cracked on the last word, which didn’t help.
Frank looked revolted, as if the words themselves were contaminated. He said, “There are children in this house.”
And you’re one of them, Yale didn’t say. He said, “Maybe it would be best if we met Nora at the bank in the morning, to finish this up. At the safe deposit box.”
Debra appeared behind Frank. “Everything okay, Dad?”
“Gallery boy’s leaving now,” Frank said.
Yale and Roman and Bill put their coats on in the living room, and Yale took a pencil from his pocket to copy the number off the tag on Nora’s phone.
Debra would drive her to the bank at 10 a.m. Stanley promised he’d be there too.
“Me three,” Frank said, and his wife scratched his neck soothingly with her pink nails.
* * *
—
At 6:30 that evening, Herbert Snow called them at the B&B: He’d gotten as far as Waukegan and turned around. He’d start again in the morning. “Can you be here by ten?” Yale said. Why the hell had he turned around? Why hadn’t he just stayed there and saved an hour tomorrow? “You’ll need to leave around five thirty, is the thing.”
He said, “I’ll do my best.”
* * *
—
They went to dinner—“To celebrate!” Bill said, though Yale felt it was
a terrible jinx to say so—and wound up ordering three bottles of wine. They were the only people in the restaurant until a wedding party came in—not for the reception but simply to eat after the reception, which had just been cake, as Roman learned and reported back after he’d stumbled over to congratulate the bride and groom—and the two parties both stayed so late that the waiters, by the end, were scrubbing the same nearby tables over and over, clearing their throats. Bill told Yale and Roman a story about Dolly’s father, a concert pianist who had once courted one of Rachmaninoff’s daughters. He kept refilling Roman’s glass the second it was halfway empty. Bill got drunk enough that soon he was doing all the talking, and all of it was directed at Roman anyway, so Yale was free to lean back and stew. He was relatively sober; he’d be the one driving.
The art, he reminded himself, might still be forged. Even if everything worked out, there was still the possibility, however remote, that their trouble getting into the house today, and all this protestation, were part of some long, crazy con behind which Frank was the mastermind. But what in the world could these people gain from it? Not money.
Yale had never been able to take good fortune on its own terms. His fear of being tricked went back to at least sixth grade, to the day the basketball roster was posted and a classmate added Yale’s name to the list in careful mimicry of the coach’s handwriting. Yale showed up for practice unaware he’d been cut, and the coach looked at him and, with no trace of meanness, said, “Mr. Tishman, what are you doing here?” Behind him, the team had laughed and coughed and pounded each other’s backs. While they ran laps for punishment, the coach asked Yale if he’d like to be the equipment manager. He didn’t look surprised when Yale said no.
This had been followed by a thousand small cruelties over the next seven years of school, a thousand baits and traps. And all the while, Yale had tried, hopelessly, to trick everyone around him about the biggest thing of all, hoping against hope that they’d fall for his professed crush on Helen Appelbaum, his ogling of the girls’ volleyball team. But they never did, and Yale understood that he would always be the tricked, never the tricker. It was why part of him had assumed, the night of Nico’s memorial, that he was the victim of some coordinated meanness. And perhaps it was for similar reasons that Charlie had assumed even worse things that night. Charlie had it worse growing up, English schools being what they were.
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