Warpaint Read online

  “God, you are conceited,” she said, snatching the little star and putting it back where she’d first hung it.

  He stared at her.

  She put her hands on her hips.

  “I learned a lot at Amherst,” he said.

  “Bet you did.”

  He shook his head, took the little star off the branch again and hung it as high as he could reach. The tree was a seven and half-footer; Ted was six foot one and C.C., a foot smaller than he.

  “You bastard,” she muttered.

  “What kind of language is that for a young lady?” said Nancy, standing at the threshold of the room, with a tray of four cocoa mugs.

  “Oh, Mother,” said C.C. “Ted’s being impossible.”

  Nancy put her tray down carefully on the coffee table. “Ted?”

  “I’m trying,” he said, “to make the tree look nice. Balanced.”

  Nancy eyed the half-dressed fir. “Balanced?”

  “See? Mom doesn’t care!”

  “Of course the tree needs balance,” said Ted. “Something around here does.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” asked C.C.

  “Nothing.”

  “Well, I think the tree looks fine,” said Nancy. “Where’s your father?”

  “He went to fetch the Gaineses from the station.”

  “Bother,” said Nancy, frowning.

  “No kidding,” said Ted.

  “His cocoa will get cold,” said Nancy, still frowning. “Here, you take your cups. I’ll put ours back in the pot, keep it warm.” She picked up the tray. “I guess I’ll split mine with Liz, if she wants some.”

  “She won’t. Too sweet, said Ted.”

  “Is it?” asked Nancy, looking at the remaining mugs on the tray. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s fine,” said C.C. “Just right.”

  “Hmm,” said Nancy as she headed back to the kitchen.

  “Why’d you tell her that? This is the way she always makes it.”

  He shook his head. “Never mind.”

  “Like I said – what is it with you?”

  “Nothing! Nothing.”

  “You sure are being –”

  “Look,” he said, putting his mug down. A drop of hot chocolate jumped to the tabletop. “I just want a little normality around here, okay? Just a normal family, a nice normal Christmas – like ‘Father Knows Best.’”

  “Mom makes hot chocolate, Dad picks up aunt and uncle from the train, sissy and brother hang ornaments on the tree. How much more normal could you get?”

  He glared at her. “She’s not my aunt. Not yours, either.”

  C.C. rolled her eyes. “She might as well be, by now.”

  “Well, she’s not. And I’m tired of her. Why can’t she and Paul stay in Beatnikville and leave the rest of us alone? Crazy old woman.”

  “Ted!”

  “What?” He picked an ornament out of the storage basket and pulled away tissue paper. “Ever since I can remember, Liz Moore has been nothing short of a lunatic.”

  “She’s Mom’s best friend.”

  Ted shrugged and hung the green and red bulb on a branch.

  “Without Liz, I don’t think Mom would have –”

  “Don’t, Charlie. Just don’t.”

  “Don’t? But –”

  “But nothing. Mom and Dad – all of us – would have been better off if Liz Moore never set foot over the threshold. She’s a menace.”

  C.C. sat down slowly on a flowered ottoman. “How so?”

  “She as jealous as one of her damn cats. For a start.”

  “Jealous? Of who?”

  “Dad. Tucker. You. Me. Anyone who Mom might love.”

  “Oh, that’s ridiculous.”

  He shrugged again. “Tuck was her favorite.”

  “Lizzie’s?”

  “No, dumbhead, Mom’s. And don’t tell me you couldn’t feel it. After Tucker – Mom was destroyed. I swear she couldn’t even see me, like I was a ghost.”

  “That’s why I’m saying, Liz helped –”

  “Oh you would take her side, wouldn’t you? Creep. But you always liked that witch and I guess people like you have to stick together, huh?”

  “People like –?”

  “You know. Perverts.” He flushed.

  C.C.’s face whitened. “That’s what you think.”

  “That’s what I know. I told you, I learned a lot at Amherst, especially about you ‘girls’ at Smith. As a doctor, I know it’s a mental disease and all, so I feel sorry for you – but not for your so-called auntie. I figure maybe she’s the reason you’re the way you are, always being here, and you taking lessons from her. Maybe she converted you.”

  “That’s crazy.”

  “Is it? How come you’ve never had a boyfriend?”

  “Liz is married to Paul. Or did you forget about him?”

  “He’s an old drunk. Mom won’t be offering him any cocoa, that’s for damn sure. Bet she’s got the whisky poured.”

  “Ted.”

  “What?”

  “These people are our friends –”

  “Not my friends,” he said and snatched another ornament out of the basket, but the tissue tore and the ornament, bare, rolled from his grasp to break with a clean glassy pop on the hardwood floor.

  ♦

  Alone one cold dawn, at the same hour C.C. had left the house for the last time, Quiola took a large, woolen blanket she’d found in the cedar chest of the “shed” out into the yard, poured coffee from a cafetiere and finally opened C.C.’s posthumous letter. In the envelope she found a miniature acrylic, just a sketch, suggestive; on the back, the words “Vixen – essence of Quiola” and the sketch of her own dark features had the quickness of a carnivore, a slight cunning, playful smile.

  “Oh, C.C. –” she said aloud.

  Dearest:

  By now you will know where I’ve gone, what I’ve done. Please try not to grieve hard, or blame me. I am not, perhaps, as strong as other people. It depends on how you look at it. You were raised Catholic, and for you, what I have chosen is wrong. But this is my choice. I choose. To me it is right. Perhaps we choose to be born, as well; our parents’ earthly choices merely a manifestation of our own soul’s will, which would certainly throw a spanner into most life and death debates. I choose death, not because I’ve refused life, but because death comes. I see him hanging about with his scythe, a farmer on the way to harvest. I am ripe. It is time. Know I love you. Always.

  With all my heart,

  C.C.

  Quiola folded the letter up and slipped it back into the envelope with the sketch. She sat for awhile doing nothing, until her coffee went cold. Then she collected her things, and walked back up to the Carriage House, only to see Mark’s Toyota Corolla parked off to one side of the garage. He and Peter stood like refugees on the front stoop.

  “Hey!” she called, hurrying up the slate walkway.

  “Quiola,” said Mark, hugging her, and handing her over to Peter.

  “You two,” she said, stepping back. “What in the hell are you doing here?”

  Peter smiled. “We’re on a little road trip. Had a hankering for the City, got in the car, and I-95 just took us to your place.”

  “Come in, then,” she said, unlocking the front door and stepping into an empty, echoing space.

  “My God, Quiola, what’s happened? Where’s did all the furniture go?”

  “Oh, I can’t live here anymore. She loved this place, but it’s too big for just me, and without her –” Quiola shrugged. “I gave some of the older things to Ted and Belinda, when they stopped contesting the will, then sold what I didn’t need. I’m going to move back into the ‘shed’ as soon as I can rent this place. Want some coffee?”

  “Love some,” said Mark. “I can see why you prefer the ‘shed’.”

  “Me too,” said Peter. “It’s cozy. I’d work better in that space than this one.”

  “So how’s the new one going?” asked Quiola, grinding beans.<
br />
  “Oh, my. Touchy subject,” said Mark, throwing a quick glance at his partner.

  “I’m tapped out,” Peter explained. “That’s how it feels. I write a line, cross it out, write another three and need to scream. It’s not happening right now.”

  “Me too,” said Quiola. “But with this –” she lifted her cast, “– at least I have an honest to god excuse until it comes off.”

  Peter put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “You need a break of a different sort.”

  Quiola kept her gaze firmly on the coffee pot. “I need to keep busy.”

  “That, too.”

  “You never told us,” said Mark, “what happened with your crazy ex – the one who spooked the horse and broke that wrist?”

  Quiola smiled grimly. “I took out a restraining order, and I gather she just left. Went back to the West Coast, and put a continent between us again. I think seeing me fly off Splash ended something for her. At least I hope it’s over, now, and for good. It’s exhausting to have your mistakes follow you around.”

  Just then, the doorbell rang.

  “Um, expecting someone?” asked Peter.

  “No – and don’t worry, it won’t be Evelyn, trust me. Just let me go see –” she left the coffee pot on and went back through the empty, echoing house to peer through the spy-hole, then open the door.

  “Good morning – Miss Kerr, is it?” said a short, rumpled man with an ingratiating smile. “My name is Ben Griffin.” He stuck out a rather pudgy hand.

  “Yes? What can I do for you?”

  “I’m a reporter for the Clinton Gazette. I was wondering if you could tell me a little bit about your unfortunate friend – she was a friend, is that right?” He glanced at his notebook. “Charlotte Calliope Davis? That’s a mouthful, isn’t it?”

  “Please,” said Quiola roughly, “go away.” She shut the door before the man could say another word.

  He rang the bell.

  She locked the door.

  He rang the bell again, which brought Peter out from the kitchen, worried. “What’s going on?”

  “There’s a reporter out there. Sniffing about for dirt on C.C.”

  “Oh brother!” He took Quiola’s good elbow and tugged her back to the kitchen, even as the doorbell rang again.

  “Ghoul,” muttered Quiola. “They’re all ghouls. Lizzie warned me: suicide sells. But somehow I wasn’t prepared for things like this.”

  “Let’s have some coffee,” said Peter, soothingly.

  “What’s up?” asked Mark.

  “A reporter. He wants to know more about C.C. Nothing nice, let’s just say.”

  “Oh, yuck.”

  “Please, talk about something else,” said Quiola. “He’ll go away eventually.”

  “Well as a matter of fact, Mark and I have a proposal for you. We’d like to take this place off your hands, in a sense – we’d like to rent it from you, and open a gallery here. A green gallery, too, something both earth and artist friendly, and a warm, inviting place for art we like, not for profit, for you and me and people like us.”

  “We’d call it the Charlie Davis Gallery – what do you think? You could finally mount a full show of your own, mixed media, everything. And we have some connections, we know people in the business –”

  “– like you –”

  “Guys!” said Quiola. “I paint. I throw pots. I’ve no head for business, and no real contacts.”

  “Oh, yes you do,” Peter said, eyeing her. “Quit with the pride, girlfriend. You can call Liz Moore for us. With her in the mix, the Charlie Davis Gallery will have legs!”

  Peter’s idea blossomed as if organic, a thing of the earth. Liz, to Quiola’s shock, was only too happy to promise the ice-blue Wirkorgan she had in her bedroom as the center piece for the gallery’s first night opening, a gift that was a instant sensation, plastered in full color in that Sunday’s New York Times Arts & Leisure section. The mere existence of what critics dubbed simply “The Blue” proved electrifying. But what was truly astonishing to everyone, including Quiola, was the way in which “The Blue” and the other work showing that night – C.C.’s Planets, and her last sequence, so painful on it’s own, somehow made serene in converse the sheering cold of “The Blue” while Quiola’s watercolors danced – all seemed to pulsate, throbbing with a visual music that was an orchestration of light and dark, of color that seemed almost to chime, a vibrato of three visions, fusing, at last and as if by design, into one.

  ♦

  November 12, Lutsen, 1917. The night and the snow fell together, hard and brutal, without mercy or mind. Each of the Moore boys was forced to carry a lantern for safety’s sake, and the string of light moved slowly once the storm had abated, and dawn crept in over the blanketed land. Hunting hounds, three of them, snuffed but did not bay. Parker pressed his old roan on through drifts, following his long-tethered dogs as thick air stabbed the lungs. The horse staggered, and he pulled up just as the sky grayed to light.

  “Father!” said Park. “We’ve got to stop. It’s no use.” He kicked his own mount up beside his father, and lifted the lantern. “We’re all beat and Lizzie’s half-froze to death. We should go back.”

  “No.”

  “We’ve been at it for hours. Don’t you think we would have found –”

  “Don’t. We’re going up to the old Novitsky place. Now – or I’ll beat the life out of you.” He twisted around in his saddle. “All of you – on up to Novitsky’s.”

  Johannes – Jo – the oldest after Parker, had Lizzie belted to him, in the saddle. He gathered the reins in one hand and hunched forward, trying to shield her from the wind as he nudged the horse after his father. The younger boys, Sven and Ralph, followed and the family made a ragged line of light. What might have been a short ride dragged on into a dreary morning as they fought through the snow, searching. None of them spoke as they came to the abandoned Novitsky land that Ojibwe family had given up farming for fishing a generation back. As they rode on, the dogs began to howl a trail. Parker tugged them to a halt and dismounted to check the ground – sure enough, fresh prints, half filled in but still visible. Remounting, he let the anxious dogs have their heads again, and baying out clouds of breath, they led the family to what had once been a barn, standing now doors open to the weather, the roof worn to ribs. The five lanterns converged bright as the Moores rode in and the dogs bayed at their success. Parker threw himself off the roan and ran into the shadows at the dogs, and at the man and the boy, huddled together in a half-sheltering corner of the dead barn.

  Jo struggled to unhook the belt that held Liz to him, as the other boys moved in to help. One of the dogs began suddenly to howl. A horse blew and stamped.

  “Is it Gus?” said Jo, letting Lizzie down and dismounting himself, the last of them.

  Parker stepped out of the shadows into the lighted circle of his living sons, with the dead baby boy, stiff and blue about the lips, in his arms. Liz walked up and just took the body from him and he let her do this, let her take the baby and cradle him close, as if her warm child’s breast might give Gus comfort, somehow. But then she lifted her head and howled, inhuman, pure grief, so pure the dogs took it up until Liz had exhausted her throat with pain.

  Dearest Lizzie:

  By now, you will have heard that I am dead. I can’t recall a time when I didn’t ask of you, didn’t consult, didn’t wonder what you would think about – whatever. For once, then, I’ve made up my own mind. After that fiasco at Kempton & Shelf, I didn’t see the point of living. The only thing I’d been slogging on for died that night. I know how Mother must have felt, after losing Tucker. You knew, didn’t you, that you held my mother’s heart? She loved you – up until the total erasure of her disease, she loved you so fiercely! I doubt she could have gotten through losing Tuck without you – she always said, you were the only one who felt as she felt, the only one besides my father who knew what it meant, to lose a child so awfully in a sudden way.

  But you must know t
his. Ted sure did, and he hated it. I knew, and didn’t mind and that was something he couldn’t forget, or forgive. I write this knowing you know, but having to write it out, all the same, like we used to do with secret-secrets.

  Please bury this in Lutsen next spring, near some favorite tree.

  Love always,

  Charlie.

  12. Lutsen

  Years after the night of his death-bed confession, Liz could not help but picture him as a young man, big and bearish on the thick-legged, round-bellied roan cantering down the dirt road to his farmhouse, the mud and snow frozen stiff from another night’s dip below zero, one arm awkward and full of a shrieking bundle even more bundled than he against the weather. In her picture, the sky was blue and flat and cloudless and he kept his face as clear and as flat as that sky when he walked up the stairs into his wife’s kitchen. He sent his oldest boy out to stable the roan, then turned to her, his wife, Sara Svetson Moore, there beside the kitchen hearth, seated on her sturdy pine hearthside chair. She met his gaze as he stood beside her, the warmth of the kitchen melting the needles of ice prickling his overcoat and boots. He had not stopped as he always did to take off boots or coat, because of the child.

  Sara’s mild eyes took him in, all of him down and through to the squalling mistake he carried in his arms. She put aside her knitting, and stood up.

  “Give it to me, Father,” she said, reaching her arms as she did

  into his, and under the squirming bundle. “You never could hold a child safe.”

  “She’s to be named Elizabeth, mind. I promised.”

  “Promised?” and on her tongue, the word hissed while that baby girl shrieked, each inhale a wheeze, each exhale a wail.

  You were named after her half-sister. You were hungry and cold and had just lost your mother, a fact that sent me, on my sturdiest horse, up the road and past the Cut, to the homestead on which I’d found her, my Paulette, a breed so bewitching and young and poor, stuck there with her grandfather and his no-good, drunken bastard of a son. Those two she lived with, one drunk, the other old and shamed, they gave you to me when she died, because I was your father and because I was Parker Moore, a man of means in these parts, a man who lived by the work of his own two hands. We may not have has much, but what we had, I made.