“Have you always lived here?” I asked when the void between us began to seem oppressive.
“I was born in Sante Fe,” she said grudgingly. “My parents still live there.”
Conversation died again, and there seemed no way to break through her crusty exterior. Another fifteen minutes went by in silence as we hung several of the paintings.
I liked Rainsong’s work more and more as I watched it go up. There was one painting that spoke to me especially. It was of Pueblo children in a classroom, with an Indian woman teacher at a desk. The small, bright faces were individualized, and I suspected that the artist really knew her subjects. This, obviously, was not an “Anglo” school.
Clara spoke abruptly, harshly. “I expect your father got what was coming to him.”
Her words shocked me out of my reverie. She must have been brooding, stirring them around in her mind for the last fifteen minutes, getting ready to spit them out. I resented such intentional cruelty.
“No one should die the way he did,” I told her sharply.
She changed the subject with equal abruptness. “I heard about what happened last night. That rock throwing, I mean. Orva was full of it, though of course Rick never told me. Orva says Brian claims you couldn’t recognize who it was you saw out there just before the rock was thrown.”
“That’s right. It was dusky beyond the light from the terrace, and I couldn’t glimpse more than a face and a hand. No details.”
We didn’t speak again until the last painting was hung. Then we both stood back to regard our work with approval. The display gave a varied picture of pueblo life. Not a flat depiction of what some outsider saw, but a loving, sympathetic, and sometimes bitter record.
“Let’s clear up this stuff,” Clara said, moving the stepladder. “I hear someone in the shop and my assistant hasn’t come in yet. Thanks for your help.”
Now and then, when a customer had wandered in, she’d left me, but mostly we’d been uninterrupted at this early hour of the morning. After I’d picked up hammer and picture hooks and put them away in a cupboard, I followed her into the main room. Through the front window I could see visitors crossing the plaza, sitting on benches, looking into the shops. Tlaquepaque was coming to life.
When the shop was empty again, Clara said, “I’ll fix coffee. We can have it in my office and keep an eye on things. There are some books Rick’s been collecting for you.”
“Collecting for me? Why?”
“I suppose he’ll tell you when he gets around to it. Come along.”
In a small room next to the gallery were a desk heaped with papers, two comfortable chairs, and a low table, on which books had been piled. She waved me toward one of the chairs and went to the coffeemaker in a corner. The books drew me and I picked one up and leafed through pictures of Zuñi carvings and fetishes. At once my imagination leaped ahead. That blue wildcat might be formalized and adapted in a broad band around a dirndl skirt, or the little mole could furnish an animal motif for a jacket. Lately I’d become interested in decorated jackets. I suspected that just as that roll of cloth had been placed upstairs to tempt me, so had these books been collected. And why not? Why shouldn’t I try something for Rick? Ideas might even develop that I could take back to New York.
“I’d like to do a few croquis,” I mused aloud.
Clara set my coffee cup on the table. “Croquis?”
“Those are the idea sketches we often start off with. It’s odd—when Rick met my plane in Phoenix yesterday, he seemed … I don’t know … preoccupied, distant. As though he wished I hadn’t come. And then, just now, when he took me upstairs and showed me that beautiful woven blue cloth, he came to life again.”
“You’ve arrived at a bad time.” Clara drank coffee gloomily. “Maybe someone ought to warn you—since Sybil’s your sister. It’s not any secret. He’s asked her for a divorce. But I don’t think she’ll ever agree. She can be pretty ruthless when she pleases, and blind to anything except what she wants.”
The wave of feeling that swept through me was dismaying. It was a mixture of pity for Rick, caught in Sybil’s web, sadness for Marilla, and a strange, wild relief for me. Suddenly Vermilion was chattering in my ear: There’s a chance for you now. You always wanted him. Now you can have him. You can get even with Sybil!
I wouldn’t listen. I wouldn’t take pleasure in the pain of others. Vermilion was too often the worst side of me, yet I still had the strength to control her, so that she ceased her chattering.
Now, however, a great deal could be explained. Rick’s preoccupation, Sybil’s hostility, the constant underlying tension I’d felt in their home—all these things must have their base in what Clara had just told me. I hadn’t dreamed that events had moved so far toward separating Sybil and Rick, and now I wished myself well away, lest I become a source of more trouble between them. I knew my sister. I knew the weapons she could use when she wanted to be cruel.
I could say none of this to Clara, and my silence didn’t stop her. Having started to talk, she went right on, and there was new venom in her voice.
“Of course Rick could always walk out. Only there’s the child to consider. He wouldn’t want to leave Marilla in Sybil’s tender hands. Besides, she holds a few trump cards. She can be damned difficult in plenty of ways if Rick goes against her wishes.”
I didn’t want to hear any more. “I shouldn’t have come at all. Perhaps I shouldn’t stay with them now.”
“Sybil won’t turn you out. She has that grand façade of hers to preserve. Defeat’s not something she ever accepts. She’s got that much of your father in her. While we’re talking—why did you come here after all these years?”
We could hear customers moving about in the shop, but Clara merely glanced toward the door, then turned her attention to me. She clearly intended to stand there waiting until I answered.
I set my cup and saucer down carefully, wondering if the question was a smoke screen. “My father was murdered and I want to know why and who did it.”
She moved toward the shop. “What do you think you can learn that the police haven’t been able to pick up? Or Rick either.”
“Perhaps someone around here knows the answer,” I said.
She gave me another scornful look and went out to the shop, not bothering to reply.
My thoughts continued their inner course, and strangely enough, it was Jed’s face that came into my mind, and with it a greater feeling of loss than I’d experienced since his death. A new emptiness, a longing, a need to be with someone I could never see again, flowed in to fill the void. I wished desperately that I could talk to my father about this break between Rick and Sybil, and talk about my own half-formed feelings that theatened to destroy me.
And yet—? When had Jed ever been there to help me in an emotional need? Except, of course, when he’d given me Vermilion. But she was something I didn’t want to have emerge right now.
Deliberately, I opened my handbag and took out the small sketch pad and soft pencil I always carried with me. To do something, to busy myself in some way, was the only possible answer. On one page I drew a formalized eagle with out-stretched wings, and considered it. Thank God, the familiar absorption could be summoned to occupy me. I needn’t think about anything else. Not yet. I realized that I needed to know a lot more about the thunderbird as a symbol before I could use it successfully. Next I drew a long-necked figure in a blouse and skirt, and around the skirt I sketched a design using the blue wildcat from the Zuñi book as a basic motif.
By the time Rick returned to take me to lunch, I had dipped into several books, studied pictures, and filled pages of sketches torn from my pad. Nothing was perfected. I was merely capturing ideas that flashed through my mind. The effort eased me, drew me away from an emotional trap I might tumble into all too easily.
When Rick came into Clara’s office, he stood for a moment looking at the littered table, where books were held open by other books, my rough drawings strewn about. He picked up a few
sketches and leafed through them.
“These are good. You have a real flair for the imaginative and original. No wonder women like your clothes.”
I stood up to stretch cramped shoulders, wriggling fingers that had held a pencil too long, reluctant to let go of my life-line of work.
“I’ve made a reservation for us at Poco Diablo,” he said. “I think you’ll like it there.”
He spoke to Clara on the way out, and as we left I knew she followed us with big velvety eyes that were anything but gentle and warm. I knew that something was troubling Clara, and that I played a part in it. Perhaps more than Rick had told me.
In the truck again, we returned to the highway and once more I found myself responding to red earth and the starkness of rock, softened by the cottonwoods and oaks that followed the creek. Everything I saw was fresh and new and stirred my imagination. Yet if I were honest, it was the man beside me whose presence made all the colors seem brighter, whose existence gave my life an intensity I hardly dared to accept. What I could accept—might reasonably accept—was only the opportunity to work for him and with him, for whatever length of time I might stay.
When Rick had parked, we walked through the right-angled building of the hotel to a terrace where our table overlooked a rolling green golf course above the floor of Oak Creek. Willow trees grew nearby, and there were flower plantings and a small fountain. Beyond rose steep hills, dotted with luxurious homes, as always wedged in by the pinnacles of rock.
“I like this little valley,” Rick said, as we picked up our menus. “There are some fine homes down there, though these low places can sometimes be flooded, even in this dry country.”
I wanted to hear what he had to propose and I ordered quickly. When the waitress had gone, he began to explain what he had in mind, speaking almost hesitantly at first.
“I’ve been working with Indian craftsmen here and there—mostly Hopi and Navajo—opening a few markets into a specialized line of women’s clothes.”
He’d been gazing out toward the green valley below us as he spoke, and now he turned his head to look directly at me. “Maybe I’ve wanted to get you out to Arizona for a long time, so when you played into my hands I jumped at the chance to invite you here. Destiny, of course! But I’m always willing to help it along.” His tone was light, as though he mocked himself, yet there was an underlying seriousness.
“I’d like to help,” I said. “If I really can. But I’m still not sure of a lot of things.”
As I had done so impulsively that time in New York, he reached his hand to me across the table in what was almost a gesture of entreaty. I gave him mine without hesitation, and as he took it a current as ancient as time seemed to spring between us. I felt it, and I knew he felt it too, and that its intensity startled us both, so that we drew apart self-consciously.
When he spoke again, I could hardly listen because I was so sharply aware of Rick himself. The wind had ruffled his thick dark hair, and his face was eager and alight. Wisely, his words returned to the safety of his own work and interests. Like me, he too had an opiate.
“Indian families in Oklahoma have been making dresses for the Anglo market, using their own distinctive designs,” he went on. “We may be able to do something similar here. I have a Flagstaff family in mind that does fine weaving for wall hangings, rugs, and so on. I asked them some time ago to give me something in a cloth that could be used for dresses—and you’ve seen the result.”
He paused, as though considering how he must present this to me.
“You can have any design you like carried out. Your terra-cotta thunderbird, or anything else. My Hopi friends can give you what you want—and more. They’re artists in their own right. Our true, conservative Hopi like to follow the old ways, but these women have been educated in federal schools, and while they still respect the old ways, they can be more innovative. They know the native dyes, and if you want special colors and shades, they can find them for you.”
He was opening exciting possibilities. How freeing it would be to go my own way, to work for once without the restrictions of the textile manufacturers! I listened eagerly as he continued.
“I’ll approach them as I always do through Alice Spencer—Rainsong. This could be a new turn in the road for Lindsay Phillips clothes.”
“What do you know about Lindsay Phillips clothes?”
“I know a lot. I’ve made it my business to know.” He was smiling now, teasing me—as he’d done when I was seventeen, so that I melted a little. “If you furnish the designs, my friends will make whatever you like. We can help each other.”
I gave up trying to keep the man and his work separate. Even as his ideas stirred my imagination, I could no longer suppress my feeling for him. Even more than I wanted to do this work, I wanted to please Rick, and I couldn’t quite shut out the sound of Vermilion’s glee.
Nevertheless, I made a last effort to be sensible. “Why shouldn’t your Indian family do their own designing? They appear to be creative enough. What do I know, after all? About their myths or legends, or symbols? I might unintentionally do something offensive out of sheer ignorance.”
“Once they’ve been persuaded, they’ll want to show you. You’d work together. You wouldn’t be producing silly imitations of Indian costume. They’d be helping you adapt their own great designs. Of course it may not be easy to convince them that you will make a good partner. The Hopi have a great deal of pride, and they’ve been used too often by the Anglos.”
“I’d love to try. I really would. But I’m woefully ignorant about the West.”
“You needn’t stay that way. There are books and museums. I can send you to Santa Fe, and even to the Desert Museum in Palm Springs. And there’s the land itself. All the colors you need are out there, and so are the people. There’s so much to feed your imagination, once you get started. And Lindsay, this is work that can grow and benefit a good many people. That’s what interests me especially. Not to exploit—to encourage and develop.”
“How do you mean?”
“Even today, only a small percentage of Indians go to college. Too many of the women still work as domestics, though these days a few become secretaries or technicians, or teachers. Like everyone else, they have their fine craftsmen and artists who continue to create. When trading posts came in, of course, a great many turned to buying ready-made fabrics. After all, how many white women do you know who weave the cloth for their dresses—though this used to be the custom. These days junk of all kinds is made by opportunists who pretend to produce Indian work. I’d like to see more of the old skills come back. Weaving used to be done in every pueblo, and the men were the weavers in the old days. Alice Rainsong weaves and has a loom, and she’s been teaching others. You’d be helping to open a much wider market because of your special skills and knowledge. You’re not coming to this empty-handed.”
My sense of excitement quickened. This was a far broader canvas than I’d dreamed. Because of Rick Adams, an entire world could open for me. I had only to put out my hand. The very fact that I warmed to the idea so strongly still made me hesitate, however. The electric moment when our hands touched had warned me. It would be all too easy to go on from there. If Rick should want me, need me—how could I not respond ardently? Yet he was still my sister’s husband, and Clara’s words about a broken marriage gave me no license. This was a time to wait; not to plunge without care, as Jed had always done. There were too many ramifications—Marilla among them. The child must come first with me.
“Generalizations are always dangerous, of course,” Rick went on, “but sometimes I think women don’t set their goals high enough. They aren’t willing to dream the big dreams.”
“Men haven’t always been willing to let us follow our dreams,” I told him sharply.
His grin made me relax a little. “You don’t have to attack with me. I had the best of teachers—my mother.”
“I don’t know anything about your parents,” I said.
“
My father edited a small newspaper. He died when I was small, and Mother had to take over. She wrote articles and did very well at it, too. She even had her own radio program in Phoenix for a while. She died much too young. Just the same, she saw to it that I grew up with respect for both sexes. So I’m on your side already.”
And he really was, I thought. Though he might not be secure in his marriage, he was secure in himself. He believed in his own abilities, and he was willing to take the risks that big dreaming might entail. Since women were no threat to his ego, he could allow them to dream too—in fact, encourage it. I not only loved him—I liked him very much indeed.
“I have followed a few dreams myself,” I said more quietly.
“Of course you have, Lindsay. Out here you’ll come to life and do work that will satisfy you even more, because of all the wider implications. You may even want to give up New York in time.”
Again he smiled, as though he joked, but there was a challenge in his words, and I sensed the force of the man behind them. For all his generous words, Rick would use his own will, his own strong determination, to accomplish what he wanted. He might not always realize a tendency to bend others in a direction he wanted them to follow.
“Besides,” he went on, “if Jed were here, he’d urge you to try this. He wouldn’t hesitate for a moment to tell you to take the chance.”
He had chosen the worst possible words to convince me. If I took this step, it must be because it was right for me, and not because I jumped recklessly into a new adventure, as my father would have done.
I answered Rick a little stiffly. “I’m not free right now.”
He misunderstood. “Oh, I wasn’t suggesting that you cut your ties to New York. You can go back and forth until you’re sure what choice you want to make.”
“That’s not what I mean. I can’t be free to move in any direction until the matter of Jed’s death is resolved and we know who murdered him. That’s my first commitment. That’s why I’m here.”
Vermilion Page 8