The Dream of the Broken Horses (6 page)

He gazes at me. "Well, I doubt you dropped by to see
my
work."

I turn to the sculpture. "Interesting piece."

"It's for a Holocaust Memorial. Commissioned by a synagogue in Van Buren Heights."

"The one on Dover?"

Chip nods.

I introduce myself. "I'm interested in your father's work, Chip, but I didn't come looking to buy more of it. Just want to ask a couple questions about a photograph I've got." I hold up my eight-by-ten envelope.

"Woman with a whip?"

"How'd you know?"

Chip peels off his gloves, wipes his face again and then his chest, pulls on a black T-shirt, and extends his hand. We shake.

"Don't know which one you have there, but they're all pretty much alike. Different models, different poses, sometimes with some poor naked slob down on his knees groveling or licking the lady's boots. But the idea's always the same. Women rule.
Dominatrixes
. I know a lot about that, see, 'cause my mom was one of 'em. Which was why Pop adored her." He gestures toward my envelope. "Let's see which you got."

We adjourn to the reception room to inspect my photo. Chip nods the moment I bring it out.

"Sure, I recognize her. Mint condition print, too." He turns it over, points to some numbers scrawled in pencil on the back. "Pop's darkroom notes, enlarger lens opening, print timing and such." He turns the picture again, appraises it like a connoisseur. "Mint condition vintage print. I've had collectors offer me two, three thousand bucks for one like this. Seems vintage prints of Pop's '
Fessé
' line are highly desirable these days. Too bad they didn't discover him before he died. He could've used the cash."

"Do you have more like this?"

Chip raises his eyebrows. "So you
are
a collector?"

"No, but I'm curious about this woman. Do you know anything about her?"

Chip scratches his neck. "Hot day. What say we go down to the pub across the street? Buy me a couple of
brewskies
, I'll tell you what I know."

T
he Rathskeller's one of those Teutonic places you find throughout the Midwest: imbedded exterior timbers, dark paneling within, wooden booths,
gemutlichkeit
stuff on the walls—oversize meerschaum pipes, fancy old beer stems, photos of stout guys in lederhosen, the occasional cuckoo clock, and friendly buxom waitresses wearing dirndls. In short, the opposite of Waldo's.

Chip Rakoubian is greeted warmly as we saunter in: "Hey,
Chipo
!" "Hot '
nuf
for ya, Chipper?"

We take a booth, he orders two mugs of the local brew, and, when they come, he takes a long, slow sip, then settles back.

"Pop was a fine all-around photographer," he tells me. "Weddings, portraits, catalogue work. Also corporate annual reports—beaming workers on plant floors and finely lit pictures of whatever they made: gleaming metal widgets, glossy machine tools, shiny objects radiating abstract beauty. The old man was a master of the lustrous inanimate object." Chip takes another long sip. "But there was another side, what he called his 'personal work.' Artistic nudes for one. For these he'd light the women the same careful way he lit the widgets, sparkle here, highlight there, making them look more like sculptures than living people."

Chip shrugs. "That was how he saw them, I guess. But then, later, with his
Fessé
series he followed a different route—fetish photographs of gorgeous dominant women holding whips. '
Fessé
' means something like 'spanked' in French. I think the French word for spanking is
fess
é
e.
Anyway,
Studio
Fessé
was the
marque
he put on them. People into that kind of stuff saw that and knew what to expect."

I find Chip remarkably forthcoming about his father. He seems to enjoy discussing his old man's "personal work." Max, as Chip describes him, was not an especially impressive-looking man—stooped, of medium height, with the bushy eyebrows and beak characteristic of his Armenian heritage, excessively hairy ears, chest hair showing at his throat, with two wild patches of gray head hair flanking a shiny pate. But there was a quality about him, a gentle intensity that drew people in. It was this, Chip tells me, that made it possible for him to convince women to pose for him in postures that, had the suggestions been made by anybody else, they would have been taken as the gravest of insults.

"He'd approach a woman, tell her he found her extremely beautiful, then hand her his card saying he hoped she'd consider calling him to arrange for a portrait sitting. Approximately half would accept, an extraordinarily good batting average when you think about it. With these women, in the course of the session, he'd create a bond. He adored women, you see—put them on a pedestal, and some women found they liked that very much.

"Say a week or so after the session, he'd invite the subject back to the studio to look at prints. The portraits would be good, often the best photos the woman ever had taken. Then, if he felt there were possibilities, he'd show her some of his personal work, first the nudes, and then, after considerable coaxing, perhaps several of the whip photographs as well. Then, depending on the woman's reaction, he'd let it be known he'd be thrilled to take a few shots of her in a similar vein. Or, more often than you might expect, she might broach the notion herself."

They'd have great fun then picking out an appropriate wardrobe from his studio closet filled with fetish gear—riding apparel, glossy black boots, black leather
bustiers
, a huge selection of gloves and crops, plus all sorts of provocative
underthings
, lacy black bras, black silk stockings, stiletto-heel shoes in sizes ranging down to petite.

Provocative as the
Fessé
photographs were, there was no nudity in them. Cleavage—yes! Sexuality—the pictures radiated it. They were choked with implication, innuendo. But there was never anything vulgar or brazen, nothing that smacked of a pornographic magazine. Their brilliance lay in their restraint. That was the art of them. In his
Fessé
pictures, Max showed himself to be an artist. Which was why his
Fessé
series has become so collectible.

"The print you've got, the one of Mrs. Fulraine—the fact that she's bare breasted makes it a real rarity. Pop didn't distribute shots like that, never sold them to clients. But sometimes near the end of a session he'd ask a model whether she'd let him take a few of her stripped down just for fun. And if she did, they'd put in an extra hour, and, if he liked the negatives, he'd make just two prints, one for her, the other for himself"

Chip meets my eyes. "I have Pop's album. There's a print in it identical to yours. So the print you have must have once belonged to Mrs. Fulraine." He pauses. "How'd you get it?"

"It came to me by a circuitous route."

Before he can pursue the issue, I ask how his father met Barbara Fulraine.

Chip shrugs. Perhaps Max saw her, he says, when he was working on an annual report for Fulraine Steel. Chip knows the lady was murdered the following year. It was a famous Calista scandal—she and her lover gunned down in a sleazy motel room near Tremont Park. But he doesn't think his father would have made more prints of the bare-breast shot simply because his sitter was no longer alive. That wasn't Max's style, he was an honorable guy, and the Studio
Fessé
pictures weren't made for profit.

I ask Chip if he has other shots of Mrs. Fulraine.

He nods. "Yeah, a few, but the one you've got is the best. Pop really caught something there, something perhaps the lady didn't recognize herself till Pop brought it out. You get the feeling from that picture she was truly relishing her role. I don't know much about her beyond that she was a society woman and that she was killed. I doubt she ever thought of herself as a dominatrix, not until Max posed her that way. Then, in that split second, she became one. Not a society lady pretending to be one, but a dominatrix pure and true. Again, there's the art . . . which is why I won't sell any of Pop's
Fessé
prints or allow new prints to be struck from his negatives. The nude studies are another matter. I've sold off most of those. But not the
Fessé
shots." He looks into my eyes. "You're lucky to possess one so fine."

T
onight the mood in Waldo's is not exuberant. It's been a long, dull day at the Foster trial, filled with boring technical testimony and tedious arguments. I sensed that early, knew there would be nothing worth drawing, said as much to Harriet, then left the courthouse to pursue my own interests.

Judging from the tenor of the room, those who stayed in court wish they hadn't.

Pam Wells is not in a pretty mood.

"I would've left too," she says, "if there was anything else for me to do." She studies me. "Where do you go off to anyway?"

"Oh . . . Memory Lane," I tell her casually.

"Uh huh." She gives me her cynical reporter's look. "My ass! You're on a story, David. I can smell it. So clue me in, Lover Boy. Unless you're afraid I'll crowd your turf."

She shows me a tight little smile, her way of warning me I'd be a fool to think she wouldn't.

"It's an old story, Pam. You like new stories."

"Sometimes old is new."

"True enough. . . ."

I'm rescued by the strutting entrance of Spencer Deval, who joins a group two tables away. Pam squints as she studies him.

"I don't get it about that guy," she whispers. "He's such a self-important little shit. And that accent! It's so phony. Who
is
he anyway?"

I gesture at the portrait of Waldo on the wall.

"He used to report stories for Waldo Channing. When Waldo died, he took over the column. The two of them were lovers, at least started out that way. Spencer, it's alleged, was quite lovely in his youth."

"You'd never know"

"Waldo left him his house and furniture. There're also rumors about something shady in Spencer's past. They say Waldo, who was to the manner born, cleaned him up, taught him manners, even sent him to England for a year to learn how to speak."

Pam grins. "That explains the accent. I get it now. Pygmalion," she says.

I
 
take her to dinner at
Enrico's
on Torrance Hill, a quiet, family-owned Sicilian place. It's a weekday night, and there aren't many customers, certainly no out-of-town reporters. Pam is charmed.

"Candles stuck in old Chianti bottles, red and white checked tablecloths—I love it, David. Right out of the fifties."

The owner doesn't stand beside our table like a waiter; rather he pulls up a chair, turns it around, then sits leaning over the back in spectator-sporting-event position to take our order.

When he moves away, Pam gives me a serious look.

"Please tell me what you're working on, David. And, please, no bullshit about how it wouldn't interest me. Everything interests me. Especially if it interests you."

"I'm not ready to talk about it yet."

"Must have to do with those weird drawings taped to your walls."

I'm stunned. "You've been in my room?" She shrugs. "Aren't you the little sneak?"

"Curious little bitch is what you mean. You're just too polite to say it."

"How'd you get in?"

"Told the chambermaid I might have left a bra in there. Please don't get mad at her, David. She watched my every move."

"What were you looking for?"

"David Weiss. Like who
are
you, David?" She widens her eyes. "What're you up to? What's your game?"

"What's yours, Pam?"

"Investigative reporter." She smiles. "And you know what? I think that's your game, too."

I stare at her more annoyed than angry, but I know I can't let her get away with what she did. "Talking your way into my room," I eye her sternly, "you've got a fucking nerve."

She shrinks back as if taking a blow across the face. "I did it because you intrigue me so much. I know that's no excuse. Please forgive me," she pleads. "I'm sorry. I really am."

Nothing hypocritical about her apology; I read sincerity in her eyes. "I like you, Pam. I really do. But don't ever do anything like that to me again."

I'
m standing by the once grand entrance to the grounds of The Elms, a morose sight this sultry summer afternoon. The skeletal gate frames hang loose from rusted hinges. With most of the ornamental ironwork missing, they resemble an assembly of bare bones. The stone pillars on either side are also in decay—mortar crumbling, moss attacking the rock. Only one of the two statues of griffins that once perched upon them remains and that one's now headless. This deteriorated entrance would make a fine drawing, I think.

In the old days, of course, these gates were well attended. Members arriving at night would find the griffins illuminated by lights concealed in the surrounding foliage. A guard would stop cars, then relay names by intercom to the reception desk up at the club. People in the cars, the men in tuxedos, the women swathed in furs, would wait with mock joviality for admittance.