Sammy Keyes and the Art of Deception (16 page)

What
was
it about that painting?

I knew that if anyone could explain it to me, it'd be Hudson Graham. So I turned to Marissa and said, “Do you mind if I stick around and talk to Hudson for a bit?”

“No … unless you're gonna make me stay, too.”

“No, that's okay. Sorry for dragging you all the way out here.”

“Hey, it's fine. Those Indians were cool.”

So she took off, and I slipped back into the Vault.

It wasn't
Whispers
Hudson was standing in front of. It was
Resurrection
—the one with autumn leaves swirling through the air. And I stood beside him for the longest time, but he didn't seem to know I was there. Finally I said, “So why do you like this one so much?”

His body jolted a little. Like he'd just stepped off a curb in a dream. Then he looked at me and asked, “Sammy?” like
his
brain was having trouble clicking pieces together.

“In the flesh,” I said, then laughed. “I did the same thing when I saw you walk in.” He was still sort of staring, so I asked, “Are you okay?”

“Yes, yes. I'm fine.” He looked around a little. “Is your grandmother with you?”

“No. I came here straight from school.”

“Oh. Oh, I see.”

He was back to looking at the painting, so I said, “Hudson, I hope I'm not, you know, disturbing you because … well, I'm really glad you're here.”

“You are?” He smiled at me, and this time he was all there.

“Yeah. Because everyone else I talk to confuses me.”

“Everyone else you talk to about what?”

“Art!”

“Oh.” He chuckles a little, then says, “Subjective topics usually render subjective comments.”

“But you like these,” I said, pointing to Diane's paintings. “You like them the way I do, I can tell.”

He eyes me, but doesn't say a thing.

“Okay. Well tell me this—do they make you feel all jumbled up? You know—happy and peaceful one minute, then sort of tortured the next? Like any minute you're going to cry?”

Hudson just stands there studying me like
I'm
some odd painting. First his head cocks to one side, then to the other. But slowly a smile grows on his face. Not a ha-haha smile or a patronizing smile. It's a gentle smile.

A grateful smile.

So I say, “And it's not just
Whispers
that does that to me. They're all a little that way. And I don't get how they can
do
that. I mean, they're just paintings.”

Hudson nods, then turns back to the wall. “After reading the scathing review in yesterday's paper, I just had to come here and see again for myself.”

“Wait a minute. What scathing review?”

“In our illustrious local rag. That's why the phone was ringing off the hook at Ms. Reijden's house. It's … it's libelous.”

“But—”

“And it made me start doubting myself. So I came here to see whether what I was remembering was something I had simply projected onto the canvas. But here I am, completely mesmerized by these paintings again. Even more so than before.” He starts walking along the Reijden wall, saying, “The reviewer called them ‘conspicuously out of touch,' but I find them to be very much
in
touch. Compelling. They're serious, but uplifting. They each have a sense of hope—deep, steady hope. They touch upon fragility without apologizing for strength.”

As stupid as this sounds, at that moment I wanted to crush Hudson in a hug, wanted to tell him how glad I was that he could put things into words in a way I couldn't and how relieved I was that someone else felt the way I did. Instead, what came out of my mouth was, “I can't believe she'd
sell
them.”

He nods. “But she's an artist, and this is how she makes a living.”

“Well if
I'd
made them, I wouldn't sell them.” I point to the one with the gusting leaves. “Okay, maybe I'd sell that one to you, but only to you, and only because you like it so much. No way I'd sell
Whispers.
”

“But if you'd painted them, you could make others.” He looks at
Whispers
and says, “I hadn't noticed the bookcase before. Or the rocking horse.”

“Neither had I. And the more I look at it, the more there seems to be to it.”

He nods and murmurs, “The deeper it goes.”

“I think that's the same rocking horse we saw in Diane's house, don't you?”

“I didn't notice it,” he says absently.

“It was by the fireplace. See the star on the forehead? It had one, too.” We both look at it a minute, and finally I ask, “So who do you think that girl is? At first I thought it might be Diane, remembering her own childhood, but the girl in the picture has brown eyes. Do you know if Diane has children? Grandchildren?”

He shakes his head. “I have no idea. But I do think she's right that not knowing the specifics is better. Project your own story into the painting. It'll have its own meaning for you that way. It'll become more personal to
you.
”

We looked at the paintings a little while longer and finally I whispered, “Thanks, Hudson.”

He grinned down at me. “Thank you, Sammy.”

So I was feeling pretty good, but then as we were heading out of the Vault Hudson sighed and said, “I'm afraid I'm in rather a bad spot with your grandmother.”

Now the way he said it was sort of heavy. Like just the thought of Grams was making his feet slow down, even stop. And that's when it hit me—he needed to talk. For the first time since I'd met him, Hudson was asking
me
to help
him.

So I jingled around in my pocket, asking, “Can I get you an iced tea? Some cocoa?”

He laughed. “Only if you let me buy.”

Good thing, too, with the seventy-four cents I managed to scare up.

So while he got us iced teas, I settled in at a table behind a big, plastic palmy plant and checked out the Disciple table. Miss Kuzkowski was there, all right, and even though she looked my way once, she didn't seem to recognize me. She just turned and smiled at a guy with a short curly ponytail who brought her coffee and a muffin.

There were twelve Disciples total, plus Tess. And when Hudson came back with the teas, he scowled in Tess's direction and said, “Looks like she's holding court, doesn't it?”

“She is.” I leaned over the table and whispered, “Those are Tess's ‘disciples.' ”

His face scrunched up. “Surely you jest.”

“Not I, sire,” I said in my best English accent.

He laughed. “Say, that was good.” Then we overheard Tess say, “Who's volunteering first today?”

At first none of the Disciples said a thing. Then they all seemed to talk at once. Finally Tess laughed and said, “Frank, you're elected.”

So Frank lifts a covered canvas onto the easel, and when he whips the sheet off, the whole Disciple table gasps at the painting. It's a big red face, with black holes for eyes and a screaming mouth. And glued all around the face and sticking out of the mouth are blue and red tubes of some kind.

“What
are
those things?” I whisper to Hudson.

“Shotgun shells,” he whispers back.

“Comments?” we hear Tess ask the group.

There's a moment of silence and then one Disciple says, “It's powerful.”

“Arresting,” Miss Kuzkowski chimes in, then adds, “No pun intended.”

There's a little laughter, then someone calls out, “It's electrifying!”

“Stunning!”

“Nice depth to the acrylic, Frank.”

Then after a few moments of silence, Tess says, “Very powerful, Frank. Leaps ahead of your last presentation.”

Frank was nodding away, beaming like a little kid.

I whisper to Hudson, “Comments?”

He shakes his head. “It strives to evoke a sense of hatred. I find it emotionally contrived and aesthetically distasteful.”

“Hey, I think you ought to join the Disciples.”

He scowls. “I'm afraid I'd be more of a Dissonant.”

The next Disciple's painting was already on the easel. It was waves of color overlapping from top to bottom with some long drips running through like stretchy faucet drips. Tess stands there, nodding. “I feel the rhythm.”

“Yes, yes!” the artist cries. He's actually bouncing up and down on his toes, his thick glasses bobbing on his nose. “It represents rhythms of civilization. Paths crossing, lives intersecting…. I've tried to be submissive to the materials, allowing them to take me, rather than trying to dominate them!”

Tess nods. “Just as we discussed, Koto. Good progress.” She looks around the Disciple table. “Comments?”

“It's mesmerizing!” some Disciple gushes.

“Very Zen, Koto.”

“It projects heat as it moves from cool to warm and then back to cool again.”

“And I feel a … a flu
id
ity of cooperation.”

“Nicely stated,” Tess says. Then after Koto sits down she smiles around the table. “Those were the only presentations this week, am I right?”

Personally, I'd had enough of Tess and her dopey Disciples. But when I try and get Hudson to tell me about what's bothering him, he holds up a finger and says, “She's brought something, I'd bet my boots.”

And sure enough, the Supreme Splotter lifts a large sheet-covered painting onto the easel, then waits. And when she's sure she's got the attention of everyone at the table, plus all the people in the Bean Goddess who've
been listening in, she says, “I present to you …,” then throws back the sheet,
“Looking Glass.”

The Disciples all
oooh
and
aaaah.
Everyone in the Bean Goddess stares. And what we're all gaping at is the world's biggest …

Oval.

That's right. All it is, is a big white oval on a jet-black background. Well, jet-black except for her signature slashing across the bottom right corner in turquoise.

“Fabulous!” one of the Disciples cries.

“It's so … so deep!” another one gasps.

“Why, just
look
at it!” someone else chimes in.

Tess stands beside it like she's wearing a crown. “Gaze into my
Looking Glass.
See inside your soul!”

Then that Koto guy with the bouncy glasses stands up and moves around the table, shifting from side to side as he looks at her painting. And seriously, he's acting like he's about to bust at the seams, he's that excited.

“What is it, Koto?” Tess asks him.

“This is so brilliant!
So
brilliant.” And Tess is looking oh-so-pleased with herself but then,
then
Koto says, “Did you consider using silver paint? Or some reflective medium? So you could actually have
seen
yourself. Or some contorted version of yourself?”

Tess's face changes like clay on a potter's wheel. From top to bottom it comes squeezing down into a frightful frown. All the Disciples hold their breath. Koto freezes with a big OOPS on his face, then dives back into his seat. And Tess just stands there, nostrils flaring, lightning bolts shooting from her eyes.

“It was just a suggestion,” Koto squeaks, but Tess doesn't let him off the hook. She takes a deep breath and says through her teeth, “It reflects your
soul
, not your face!” Then she sits down with a pout while all the Disciples swoon around her, telling her how brilliant
Looking Glass
is.

Hudson shakes his head and mutters, “The Empress is wearing no clothes.”

I bust up. “Exactly!”

So after we sip and laugh for a minute, he holds his tea high. “Here's to not exposing ourselves in public.”

I clink my glass to his, then kick my high-tops up on the empty chair next to me and ask, “So, Hudson. Tell me about Grams.”

He frowns, then shakes his head.

I sit back up. “Hudson, look. I always feel better when I talk to you … give it a try, will you?”

He just shakes his head some more. “Okay. Well tell me this: Are you
mad
at Grams?”

“No. I'm more mad at myself.”

“Because … ?”

“Because I'm afraid your grandmother's right.”

My hands were suddenly clammy. My heart seemed to forget how to beat. And I tried to make it sound funny, but it came out real quiet when I asked, “About you being all blather-brained about Ms. Reijden?”

He gave me half a grin, then did something that about ripped my heart in two.

He shrugged. Like, yeah, okay. So I'm blather-brained.

I sat up. “But Hudson—”

“I know! And I swore it was just her paintings, but the more I look at them, the more depth I see in them, the more they stir my soul …” His voice trailed off and he gave a helpless shrug. Like it was too late for him to stop it. Too strong for him to fight it.

“But Hudson,” I whispered. “I love her paintings, but I'm not in love with
her.
”

His eyes looked pained. “Don't you see? They are who she is. Her hopes and her fears, her joys and despairs. You know who she is by knowing her paintings.”

“But Hudson, come on. That doesn't mean—”

He shook his head, cutting me off. “She's committed to attending an Art Society dinner in Santa Luisa Wednesday evening, but after that horrific review, she just can't face going alone. She's asked me to escort her, and I've agreed.” He looked at me, his eyes pleading. “Sammy, she was just devastated by that review.”

“But … couldn't she have asked somebody else?”

“I'm sure she could have asked any number of people.”

“So why you? I mean, you just met, and you're so much … you know,
older
than she is.”

His eyes flashed. “No one likes to be called old, Sammy.”

“I didn't say … I mean, I didn't
mean
…” But he was already standing up. “Hudson, wait!”

He shook his head and said, “I'm not some old fool. I'm sorry that's how you see me.”

And with that, the one person I can always turn to— the one person I can always talk to, the one person who knows me better than I know myself—turned his back on me and walked away.

“Hudson!” I cried, but he kept on walking, straight out the Bean Goddess door. And I did chase after him, but it didn't do any good. I'd hurt his feelings, and besides, ol' Purple Eyes had him under a spell.

Now if it hadn't been for Grams, I would have been happy for him. But I knew that Grams really liked Hudson, even though she wouldn't admit it. So I wasn't happy. Not for anybody.