Art's Blood (28 page)

She looked away from the
Last Supper
to see a terrified mouse peeking out of the cereal box there on the table. Black bead eyes seemed to consider the options. Suddenly the tiny creature made a break for it, darting toward the side of the table.

Franklin Ferman took the spoon from his mouth, smacked the mouse hard on the head, and, without missing a beat, resumed shoveling the beans into his toothless maw. “That’ll learn him,” he commented moistly.

The little gray form quivered and was still. Elizabeth sat, listening to the prolonged slurping sounds of the old man and studying the small corpse. Finally she stood and gingerly picked up the mouse by its tail. The kitchen door was open to the back steps and she walked over to it and tossed the dead mouse toward some scraggly boxwoods.

The body was instantly pounced on by a lean speckled hen that snapped it up in her yellow beak and darted under the back steps, eagerly pursued by two red chickens intent on stealing the treat.

With a satisfied belch, Franklin Ferman pushed the saucepan aside. He picked up his dentures, put them into his mouth, then said, “You keep chickens?”

Elizabeth turned from the door. “Yes, I have a few—”

“Loretty was plumb foolish over them things.” The old man pulled out a ragged blue bandana and blew his nose loudly. “I wish you could’ve seen this place when she was alive. I ain’t much of a hand to keep house, but back when Loretty was able, ever thing was just so.”

He stood and started toward the other room. A heavy man, stooped with age, he was wearing overalls that had been worn and washed almost to handkerchief thinness. He walked slowly, as if his feet were painful. “Come on this away.” He passed through the front room to a little hallway that appeared to run down the side of the house. “Back here is where her quilts is.”

She followed him down the narrow hall, picking her way around the cardboard boxes stacked to one side. The old man stopped before a closed door. “This here room was mine and Loretty’s. But when she took so sick and got to where the least little sound’d waken her, I fixed me a place in the front room.” He blew his nose again. “After she went, I thought I’d keep the room just how it’d been when she was livin’. Thataway, when I get to feelin’ low, I come in here and set with her.” Franklin Ferman’s redrimmed eyes peered at Elizabeth. “I’d just as soon you not mention my foolishness to Birdie or Dor’thy.” He pushed open the door.

“No, sir,” said Elizabeth and followed him into the room. She looked around apprehensively. Long-forgotten memories of Alfred Hitchcock’s
Psycho
flooded her consciousness.
You’re being ridiculous, Elizabeth. Do you really think this old man has a mummy in the back bedroom?

No. No mummy. Just a simple room, an oasis of tidiness within the squalor that was the rest of the house. An old chest of drawers, topped by an embroidered cloth, supported an age-streaked mirror. Beside it was a rustic wooden bed, piled high with bright quilts, one atop another. Family photographs hung on the walls, ranging from oval-framed sepia-toned likenesses that, to judge by the clothing and hairstyles, dated from the early 1900s, to full-color family groups from the fifties and sixties. Dust was thick on everything except for the straight-backed wooden chair pulled up to the bed and the worn black Bible that lay on the little bedside table.

The old man shuffled to the chair and lowered himself onto it. “Loretty liked for me to read to her from the Book. I kindly got in the habit and I still come in and read her a chapter ever mornin’.

“These quilts is all ones what she made. She put her whole heart into ’em— I reckon that’s why she seems near when I’m in this room. But I believe that she’d be proud was folks to see ’em.”

A gnarled hand caressed the pinks and greens of the topmost quilt. “She was so cold-natured there towards the end, she kept askin’ for more covers. And I’d bring her another one of her quilts and she’d just smile up at me like an angel when I laid it over her.”

He turned the top quilt back to reveal a faded brown and blue Nine-Patch. “Just look till you find what you want, Miz Goodweather.”

There were eight quilts there on the bed. Many were in tatters, worn out from use, but there were two that had evidently been kept “for best.” After making sure that Franklin Ferman was willing to part with them for the month that they would be on display, Elizabeth took them from the bed. One was a Double Wedding Ring, pieced in soft Depression-era pastel prints with a background of creamy unbleached muslin. The other was an eye-dazzling array of six-pointed stars, pieced from dress and lightweight upholstery fabrics.

“Will you put her name on ’em?” The old man’s voice was anxious. “I want folks to know it was Loretty what made them quilts.”

“Don’t worry, Mr. Ferman. I’ll make sure her name will be there. These are creations to be proud of.” A lump in her throat made it difficult to speak.

They left the bedroom, Ferman closing the door gently behind him. Back at the front door, Elizabeth took her leave. “Once the quilts are up, would you like for me to come get you and take you up to the library to see them?”

The old man considered briefly. “I reckon I would. And iffen you don’t care, tell Dor’thy I’m sorry I run her off that last time she was here. That woman like to talk my ears off.” He looked around him thoughtfully. “She’s a right good hand to clean though.”

Z
INC WHITE, CADMIUM RED, QUINACRIDONE RED,
cadmium yellow, Hansa yellow, cerulean blue, cobalt blue: the names were as beautiful as the colors. Elizabeth squeezed a blob of each in a careful line along the top of the glossy freezer paper that was her makeshift palette.

“It doesn’t matter how you arrange your palette,” Daphne was saying. “I usually put a larger amount of white over to one side because it’s used so much for mixing. And it’s probably a good idea to keep your colors next to each other: the cool yellow next to the warm yellow, the two reds together, and so on. Just find what works for you and stick to it.”

The Thursday afternoon beginning painting class was under way. Elizabeth had once again made the deliveries to the farm’s clients and had managed to get to class early enough to take the same seat that she had occupied for the previous lesson. As she was unpacking her painting necessities, spreading them out to take up the space next to her as well, she had heard two women at an adjoining table holding a spirited discussion. The words “Carter Dixon” and “tax fraud” caught her attention, but then Kimmie Peterson had walked through the door, laden down with art supplies.

Elizabeth had called out, “Hi, Kimmie!” and had cleared the tabletop to her right. “There’s plenty of room over here,” she added, and Marvin Peterson’s second wife had taken the seat next to her. They had chatted briefly, comparing the paints they had brought with them, as the rest of the class took their places. Elizabeth had thought that the younger woman seemed quietly excited, as though she were concealing some delicious secret that she was longing to reveal. In fact, she had just turned to Elizabeth and said, “The most wonderful thing has—” when Daphne entered the room and class began.

Daphne handed out sheets of heavy poster board and had encouraged them to experiment with different combinations of the colors she had directed them to lay out. “I want you to put only the primary colors and white on your palette. I’ll show you how to mix all the colors you need—”

“I just went on and bought
all
the colors,” one woman said. “I love purples and greens and I didn’t see how I could paint a picture without them. And you forgot to tell us to get black.”

Unperturbed, Daphne continued. “I’d like you to start by just using the three primaries: red, yellow, and blue with the white. Now take a little of one of your yellows and a little of one of your blues…”

They daubed and dabbled, thrilled to discover the endless variety of greens that they could produce. Further directed experimentation yielded purples, violets, mauves, lavenders. Coral, pinks, oranges, turquoises, aquamarines were created, as well as some less lovely grays and browns. By the time Daphne had led them around the color wheel, they had acquired a new respect for the possibilities that lay within the trio of primary colors.

“My stepdaughter’s a
real
artist,” Kimmie whispered to Elizabeth as they worked at producing ever-lighter tints of pink and orange. “We aren’t close but I’m hoping that someday soon things’ll get better and this will give us something in common, something to talk about.”

“Be careful with the cadmiums,” Daphne was cautioning the class. “They can be toxic, so if you get some on you, be sure to wash it off. It’s a good idea just to be aware—”

Elizabeth heard a sudden gasp at her side. Kimmie was staring at her hand where a large streak of yellow crossed her palm. Quickly she jumped up and hurried to the washbasin at the back of the classroom, where she began frantically scrubbing at her hands.

“I didn’t mean to alarm anyone.” Daphne raised her voice slightly. All of the class were now examining their hands and whispering to one another. “It’s not going to kill you just to get a little paint on your skin; what I was trying to say is, you don’t want to ingest any paints, especially the cads, so washing your hands when you finish a painting session is just good sense.”

Kimmie returned to her seat and whispered to Elizabeth. “I guess I overreacted but I want to be so careful now.” She blushed slightly. Her plain face glowed with happiness and her lovely gray eyes sparkled. “I just found out I’m pregnant. My little test had two purple stripes! And the doctor said it was true this time!”

When class was over, Elizabeth walked with Kimmie out to the parking lot. The younger woman was bubbling over with happiness and eager to discuss her joyful news. “I never expected this— my doctor had told me I might not be able to get pregnant— my husband was really nice about it— he said it didn’t make any difference. Of course, he already has a child from his first marriage— I told you I have a stepdaughter. She’s all grown up and she…” Kimmie’s voice faltered and her face lost its blissful quality. “Well, I told you we aren’t close. You see, Kyra— that’s my stepdaughter—”

I have to tell her. It’s going to come out sooner or later and if I don’t say something now, it’ll seem odd.
This passed through Elizabeth’s mind in a flash, and before she could reconsider, she heard herself speaking. “Kyra? I know a Kyra….”

Kimmie seemed delighted to have found someone with whom she could discuss her difficult stepchild. “And you’re the one Kyra was staying with after the fire? My goodness, if that isn’t a coincidence! I guess it really is a small world. Marvin told me she was staying with a neighbor, the mother of a friend…and it was you! I swear, if that isn’t amazing.”

Kimmie paused, then, like a shy child asking for a treat, said, “Would you come have a cup of coffee with me? I’d like your opinion on something…it’s about Kyra and, at this point, you probably know her better than I do.”

Unable to resist those seductive words—“I’d like your opinion,” Elizabeth followed Kimmie’s car (a Mercedes today) to a nearby coffee shop. After getting their coffees— a latte for Elizabeth, a decaf vanilla Frappuccino for Kimmie— they took their mugs to a table in a far corner. Kimmie thanked Elizabeth effusively for agreeing to help with her problem.

“You see, I said my stepdaughter and I weren’t close.” The gray eyes grew clouded. “It’s worse than that, a lot worse. Kyra hates me because her father and I were…together before her mother died. And then he married me so soon after…” Kimmie’s elaborate drink was untouched and she was tearing her napkin to shreds. “I didn’t want us to get married then: I thought we should wait— out of respect for the dead. And I thought…” Tears were brimming up but she plowed ahead. “I really thought that if we waited, then eventually I could get to know Kyra and we could be friends. She wouldn’t have had to know that her father and I…”

The tears overflowed. “But you see, just before that terrible thing happened to Marvin’s wife, I found out that I was pregnant. I didn’t mind that we couldn’t be married and I knew that Marvin would always take care of me and our baby. But then his wife died and it was like he went crazy.”

Kimmie stared unseeingly at the table. “He had always told me that he would never marry me while she was alive, and I accepted that. I even knew that he loved her more than he loved me. I think something had gone wrong somewhere in their marriage— Marvin wouldn’t talk about that; he just said that he needed me and loved me but that she would always come first with him.”

Elizabeth started to speak but Kimmie went on. “Of course it hurt— knowing that— but I had no right…I hated myself for being a homewrecker. Except, I wasn’t really that, was I? She was still his wife. But then, suddenly she was gone. I didn’t see Marvin for almost a week. And then he came to me and said we were getting married right away so that our baby would be legitimate.”

Her right forefinger traced slow circles on the tabletop. “Sometimes I think it’s God’s punishment on us for our adultery. Kyra won’t come back home. She refuses to be around me and she only sees Marvin when it’s about money.”

“Kimmie,” Elizabeth asked, “what about the baby? You said you’d just found out you were pregnant when Kyra’s mother…died. Did—”

“There wasn’t a baby.” The younger woman’s voice was as expressionless as her face. “It was a mistake. The little test from the drugstore was positive and then we got married in such a hurry. But when I went to the doctor, she did an exam. She said that I wasn’t pregnant; I had something in my uterus called a…” She paused and pronounced the words with care. “…a hydatidiform mole.”

She looked at Elizabeth with a crooked smile. “I almost died when she said that. I thought she meant there was some kind of mole creature in there…like in that awful movie, you know? And it would dig its way out of me?”