“OK, Moira,” he said. He set off on his errand.
T
hey followed the farm lane under a colonnade of great stiff-backed tulip trees. To their right they passed the old coach house that Moira had made into her studio. To their left, an open pasture dropping away. You could see all the way down to the river.
Said Romulus, “Who was he?”
“Elon?—he’s David’s inheritance. His father used to run the farm for David. And when the old man died, David kept taking care of Elon.”
“Your brother—he’s what you’d call a selfless man, right?”
“Huh? Oh, now and then, sure. Not that Elon’s family shows any gratitude. Elon’s got swarms of cousins around here, and they bad-mouth us all the time. The city scum, they call us. They say David takes advantage of Elon because he’s retarded. They’re bitter as hell. Which maybe I can understand. Elon’s grandfather, you know, he used to
own
this farm.”
“So why don’t all those cousins take care of Elon?”
“Bad-mouthing’s easier.”
“Seems a lot of people like to bad-mouth David Leppenraub.”
“Uh-oh. What have
you
heard?”
“Oh. Well. Heh heh.”
But she pressed. “What?”
Take the opening, Romulus thought. Take it easy, but take it.
“Well, I guess I’ve heard only what I’d expect to hear about a—about a rich gay artist who shares his home with his models.”
She bristled. “No.
No.
That’s lie number one. David’s never
lived
with any of his models. I mean, all right, it’s no secret he’s had a few wild weekends here. . . .”
And since she’s offered, grab this one, too.
“How wild?”
“How should
I
know? Think I get invited? I live in the coach house, David rents it to me. Until he got so sick, I never spent much time down in the big house, and certainly not when he was having one of his bashes. Nobody wants his little sister around when he’s whooping it up. But the thing is, my brother’s a damn disciplined artist. Monday morning, all lingering amusements are cleared out the door, and he’s back at work. No one has ever
lived
here with him except Vlad and Elon.”
“And that blond kid, right? The kid who froze to death.”
“Scotty? Uh-uh. Scotty lived with me.”
“With
you
?”
“Wait a minute. How do
you
know about Scotty?”
“Oh, I met him. Out in California.”
She gave him a surprised look. He embroidered his lie as quickly as he could. “Yeah, yeah, he showed up at our museum. Don’t ask me what he was doing out there, he never said. But he didn’t like it that we had David Leppenraub’s work around. He had a lot of nasty things to say about your brother.”
She narrowed her eyes and thought this over. Finally she said, “All right. I
know
Scotty changed, I know he said those things. It’s just—it’s still hard to believe.”
Then she looked up into the branches of the tree above them, and she said, “He posed up there once. The crucifixion, you know that picture? But no, no of course you don’t—it hasn’t been published. But anyway, this was the tree, this old cottonwood. That branch.”
She pointed. Her breasts rose under her shirt, and Romulus nearly forgot to look up. When he did, he peered into the branches a moment and then said, “It’s not a cottonwood.”
“What?”
“Slippery elm. Come look at the leaf scar.”
He grabbed hold of a branch and dragged it down and she came and stood close to him.
He said, “Look at the marks on the twig. From last year’s leaves—when they fall off, they leave these little scars. And see here, on each scar, how there’s two dots and under them this smiley line? Sort of a happy face? Only elms have happy faces.”
Whiff of her fragrance.
Earth, straw, musk, stone.
She said, “This is a slippery elm? Really? Rom, you know what witches use slippery elm bark for?”
“I don’t.”
“Ward off ugly rumors. I’ve got some at home. Essence of slippery elm bark. Costs a bundle. Doesn’t work, I guess.”
L
ao-tse came running when she heard Moira’s whistle. She bounded up out of the field and saw her mistress sitting on the low wall under the tree, sitting with the stranger. Suspicious-Shoes. She approached and nuzzled Moira’s knees. Suspicious-Shoes reached out to pet her and made this friendly smacking sound.
She shied away from him.
Strangers were not Lao-tse’s cup of tea.
But a moment later when she was distracted by some scent coming in on the breeze, the stranger reached out stealthily and started scratching her before she could pull away. He scratched her in precisely
the
spot, that place a little ways up from her tail that Moira always neglected. He scratched her deep with his big dark hand in that perfect place, and she arched her back up so he could get to it better, and pretty soon she was pushing up against his legs and he kept at it and she was melting under his touch,
melting . . .
T
hen Romulus turned to Moira and said in as even a tone as he could muster, “Scotty Gates told us that David tortured him.”
Moira did not look at him. She gazed out at the field. She said, “All right. If you say so. It’s hard to believe.”
“Why?”
“Because if Scotty was being tortured why didn’t he say something to me? Or call the police, or just leave, or . . .
something.”
“He said David had him in his clutches. He said he and David were lovers.”
“Also hard to believe.”
“Why?”
“Well, first of all because Scotty was straight.”
“How do you know that, Moira?”
“Fuck off, mister.”
“Wait, I didn’t mean—”
“What, you think I was screwing him? Christ, I was like a mother to him.”
“By no means did I intend—”
“Oh skip it. Think I give a shit what people think of me? I let it out that I’m sort of a pagan, I read the tarot for a few lost locals—next thing they’re saying I’m the bride of Satan. They say I’m ee-vil.”
Then there was a silence. Which she broke abruptly: “Rom, listen to me. I met Scotty in an art class I was teaching. Six years ago. He was one of my favorite students. Not particularly talented or anything, just . . . I don’t know, I liked him. I guess I thought there was some kind of . . .
purity
about him, something like that. Anyway, when he was almost sixteen his parents were killed in a car accident. And he didn’t have anybody,
anybody.
The state was going to send him to some foster home or something. So I took him in. Because I felt sorry for him.
Not
to get into a fifteen-year-old’s pants. I’ve had some unsuitable suitors, but not that unsuitable. I just gave him a place to live. And of course he got to know David, and David made him his model. But he never moved in with him. He lived with me, in the coach house.”
T
he lane left the shade of the trees and cut across a golden field. They came to a plank ridge over a little brook. Farther down the slope, the brook paused to make a pond, in which a pair of mergansers were floating. Lao-tse tore off through the winter stubble, ran to the water’s edge, and barked bloody murder at them.
The mergansers paid him no mind.
The sun was falling, and all colors were preternatural. The green of the mergansers’ cheeks was not of this world. The brown of Moira’s eyes caused an ache.
She said, “See, you just had to have known him. Now when I hear what happened to him—about how he went nuts and said the things he said, it
simply does not make any sense.
”
“Doesn’t sound
real?”
“No.”
“Still.”
“Yeah. Still.
Something
sure screwed him up, or he wouldn’t have been lying in that morgue last week when I went down to identify him. Maybe I was all wrong about him. Maybe he
was
David’s lover. Maybe David did screw him over.”
“But he never complained to you?”
“Uh-uh . . . seemed a little unhappy when I left with David for the hospital. I know he was having problems with his girlfriend. But I didn’t think he was going to flip out. I don’t know, maybe he was lonely. He was living up here by himself—I mean except for Elon. I was staying in a hotel down by the hospital, and Vlad had gone back home for a visit—back to Transylvania. And Scotty stayed here. Till one day he up and vanished. And David got a letter from him saying he’d gone to New York, and fuck you David, and not a word to me.”
A kingfisher’s high horse rattle. Down where the stream ran back into the woods, a wisp of undulating flight. Romulus thought awhile.
He said, “OK.”
Moira smiled. “OK? You’re satisfied? Then will you answer me one?”
“Sure.”
She touched his arm lightly with her hand. “How do you know about leaf scars and slippery elms and all that?”
“Oh. Oh. Well, I used to have a friend who lived in a cave. He taught me. I guess he got it from books. You know? He must have dug the books out of somebody’s garbage.”
She said, “I’m always dreaming about going to live in a cave. But it must take some courage. Tearing away from everything.”
“I suppose. Equal parts courage and cowardice.”
“No, I think you had balls.”
“Ah. Right. Arnold told you about my cave thing, right? Yeah, it
was
me living there, wasn’t it? But a long time ago. Another life.”
“What, were you some kind of holy man, Rom?”
And then they heard a car on the lane behind them. They turned, and there was the sporty scarlet sedan, coming toward them, trailing a simmer of dust.
V
lad driving. David Leppenraub in the passenger seat, his lips set sourly. The car settled beside Romulus and Moira, and David’s window came down with a whirr.
“Thought you might like a ride back to the house. You and your new friend.”
“Friend” came out with a high polish of irony.
“No, that’s OK, David,” said Moira. “We’re walking, we’re having—”
“Thought you might like to come back
now,
before eighty-five guests get here. For Christ’s sake.”
“Everything’s under control—”
“Control? The caterers are already here, Moira. Running around like chickens while everyone waits for my sister to come back from her little stroll and tell them what to do. Jesus—where the hell have you been, anyway?”
Moira glanced at her brother. “I do not want to argue, David. Not now.”
Vlad got out and came around and opened the door for them with an ugly little flourish. He had dressed for the party in a tuxedo. His hair was slicked back, vampire style.
For a moment no one moved.
Then David Leppenraub said to Romulus, “I suppose she was showing you her
work?”
“No, actually—”
“These little caves she builds, and she likes to take her callers
inside.
Very domestic, don’t you think? Very feminine.”
Romulus said, “I didn’t see them.”
“Shut up, David,” said Moira.
Leppenraub said, “You know, I really don’t need this stress just now, Moira. I thought we agreed these arrangements were your responsibility. I mean I think everybody should be pulling their own weight around here—”
Moira sighed, flipped up her hand in a defeated gesture. “OK. OK, for Christ’s sake. Let’s go then.”
She nodded to Romulus, and he climbed into the car. She followed, and he heard her mutter, “My brother’s keeper.”
David heard it, too. He didn’t turn around to face her, but he said sharply, “Except brother’s the one who pays the bills.”
And he added, as Vlad turned the car around, “You want to see some
artwork,
Romulus, I’ll show you work.”
Silence.
They drove back toward the farmhouse.
Vlad glanced back over his shoulder at Romulus. Then he gave Moira a look. His eye twitched, or he winked.
“Hey my friend.”
“Call me Rom.”
“You like John Coltrane? Now that is a man with the gas, you know what?”
Romulus turned to Moira and asked, “What kind of car is this?”
“Diamante. Pretty tacky, huh?”
Vlad was adamant. “Blood
everywhere
when John Coltrane plays, you know what?”
“What?”
“No, I’m saying, John
Coltrane.
”
“Right. Heh heh.”
I
t might have
looked
like a barn.
But inside it was two and a half floors of gallery and sales office and printshop and an $80,000 security system and mist-colored carpets that
gave
like mist when you walked on them. And piped-in Bach.
Bach in chains, Bach and his baroque slave-chanties for two violins.
Leppenraub would glide on ahead of Romulus and touch a panel in the wall, and another room of masterworks would come to light. Then Leppenraub would point out a favorite, and Romulus would stand before it awhile.
Said Leppenraub, “This one’s not bad. My little
Ginkgo.
”
An old city-blasted ginkgo-tree. In its shade, an angelic youth, com
pletely nude. The ginkgo is full of gypsy moth caterpillars. So are the cages
in the pet shop behind it. And caterpillars crawl up the leg of the angel,
gnaw at it. His calf is an open wound, strings of bloody muscle dangle freely,
but he doesn’t seem aware of that at all; he contemplates the dying ginkgo
above him.
The angel, of course, was Scotty. The same boy Romulus had seen dead in the snow.
All the angels in all these pictures were Scotty.
Romulus said, “Could I ask you something, David?”
“Of course.”
“Could I ask, I mean, would it seem crude to ask—”
“How much a thing like this would sell for?”
“Heh heh.”
Leppenraub said, “Well, you know, it depends. Of course, this one, hand-painted—”
“Painted? I thought it was a photograph.”
“It
was
—before I painted it over. It’s subtle—very thin paint. Mostly just blacks and whites and grays. The only color here is in the pet shop sign and the blood. You really didn’t know I glaze my photographs?”