The Pot Thief Who Studied Georgia O'Keeffe (17 page)

44

W
hat does
morena
mean? I heard it several times.”

We were headed back on NM 47 and had just passed the intersection with NM 500, Rio Bravo Road. The Sunport was off to the right.

“It means dark.”

“Is it derogatory?”

“Lupita Fuentes's mother called her daughter
mi morenita con ojos claros—
my little dark one with light eyes. Many people of Mexican descent are mestizos, so there's a lot of variation in skin tone. Describing someone often includes saying whether their skin is light or dark, but it's not derogatory. Today
morenos
sometimes means black people. Usually it's just a description. But if it's said in a certain tone, it could be racist.”

“Well, I don't understand Spanish, but I can judge tone, and none of the voices sounded derogatory.”

“On the contrary,” I said. “I heard Manny's teenage son say to one of the Gomez twins, ‘
Mira a esa morena linda.
'”

“Which means?”

“Look at that beautiful black girl.”

“So was Lupita one of your girlfriends?” she asked teasingly.

“Yes. She had beautiful dark skin and green eyes.” I looked over at her. “I guess I went for that type even then.”

“I don't remember you mentioning her when we told each other about our sexual histories.”

“I was eleven.”

After I left Sharice at her condo, I went to the shop to relieve Glad of his duties. I settled behind the counter with
How Georgia Became O'Keeffe
by Karen Karbo, who was listed on the cover as the author of another book called
The Gospel According to Coco Chanel
. I decided to buy a copy for Sharice.

I considered the contrast between O'Keeffe and Sharice. O'Keeffe wore no makeup and went about in flat shoes and plain shifts she sewed herself. Sharice uses lipstick and eye shadow and wears high heels and designer dresses. But those are externalities. They both have an inner strength and drive. Sharice is as dedicated to her patients as O'Keeffe was to her art.

Stieglitz's philandering sent O'Keeffe into a severe depression in 1933, but she soldiered on. Sharice's depression was caused by cancer, but she also forged ahead. In the long run, neither a bad man nor a bad disease could overcome a strong woman.

Karbo said about Stieglitz, “It's doubtful he ever had a conversation; Stieglitz was a relentless, spittle lipped monologist, commanding every room he ever entered … Every thought that entered his head needed to be verbalized. Here was a man who wrote at least fifty thousand letters, and
hand copied
each one before mailing it, for his records.”

And I thought I was anal.

He showed O'Keeffe's early works without her permission. He took down her paintings of skyscrapers because he said men wouldn't want a woman to paint buildings. Better she stick to flowers. Oink and double oink.

I've come around to Susannah's view. Stieglitz didn't make O'Keeffe famous—he just rode her coattails.

I was so engrossed in Karbo's book and ranting about Stieglitz that I didn't look up when I first heard the bong of the door opening. When I finally did, Dotty and Donald were standing at the counter.

“Oh, Mr. Cloose, I could just hug you.” She squealed and turned to her husband, “Couldn't I, Donald?”

“You could, dear.”

“We just knew after our little tête-à-tête with you that everything would work out despite the tragic death of our mutual good friend Carl.”

“It's good to see you again,” I said, because it was my turn to say something and I had no clue what they were talking about.

“We didn't know it would happen so quickly. But we should have known, shouldn't we have, Donald?”

“Indeed we should have, dear.”

“You did say ‘when the time and circumstances were appropriate,' and sooner is always appropriate, isn't it?”

The question seemed directed at me, so I said, “Sooner is good.”

“It is. And I can't begin to describe how happy we are with the pot. It gives our entire collection a sense of completeness.”

What pot? I wondered. “I'd like to see how it fits in,” I ventured.

She clasped her hands together. “We would love that, wouldn't we, Donald?”

He nodded.

“Could you come for a cocktail at five?” he said. “We can show you everything then.”

“I'm already feeling thirsty. How about we make it at four?”

I was anxious to find out what pot they were referring to and why they thought it was connected with me. But not so anxious that I wanted to cancel margaritas with Susannah.

45

I
never use the F word. And I don't like popular jargon and the abbreviations texting has introduced into the language.

But I admit my first response on seeing the pot at Dotty and Donald's sprawling home in Rio Rancho was
WTF?!

I didn't say the words, just the letters. And I didn't say them out loud. But I would have forgiven myself had I done so, because the pot they had nattered on about in my shop that afternoon turned out to be my fake Tompiro, which had somehow migrated from the Faye Po residence in Albuquerque to the Edwards residence in Rio Rancho.

I spilled most of my Pimm's cup. I seemed to have developed a tendency in that direction. As Dotty was wiping the Saltillo tile floor with a kitchen towel and telling me not to worry about the spill, thoughts were swirling through my mind like tumbleweeds in a tornado.

Had Faye Po—with her ability to see through me—decided that dropping my teacup and beating a hasty retreat after she asked me to examine the pot were sure signs that the pot was a fake? Had she deacquisitioned it, as the museum crowd calls it? Sold it to the Edwardses?

But the Edwardses thought I had something to do with their getting it. Maybe Ms. Po mentioned me and they mistakenly thought I had urged her to sell it to them.

I declined a refill, concocted some lame story about an appointment I just remembered and headed to the Bronco. They followed me outside, thanking me profusely and asking me to return when I had time enough to see the entire collection.

When I arrived at Dos Hermanas, Susannah said, “You're right on time. I thought cocktails with the Edwardses might make you late.”

“I didn't stay long.” I took a deep breath. “The Edwardses have my fake Tompiro in their collection.”

“I
knew
it,” said Susannah. “Ms. Po's pot is the one you sold her. You just didn't see it clearly. I told you that.”

“No. The pot at Ms. Po's house was the fake. I'm sure of that.”

“Hmm. Okay, this must be what happened. She wanted you to tell her what it's worth because she was thinking of selling it. Since you didn't give her an evaluation, she just went ahead and sold it to the Edwardses.”

“Then why did the Edwardses thank me as if I had arranged to have them get it?”

“Maybe she mentioned that she bought one from you, and they figured you had convinced her to sell it to them.”

I couldn't argue with that because I'd had the same idea.

Angie arrived unbidden with our drinks, chips and salsa. I took a salty sip. Susannah just sat there thinking.

Glad showed up and said, “I closed up a bit late because another of those bargain hunters came in just before five. He didn't buy, but I think he might.”

“I've got it,” Susannah announced. “It's like Rudyard Whelkin, who had multiple copies of
The Deliverance of Fort Bucklow
and was trying to sell each one of them as a one-of-a-kind.”

Glad asked if she meant Rudyard Kipling.

“No. Rudyard Whelkin. He told Bernie he was named after Lake Rudyard.”

“Bernie?”

“Bernie Rhodenbarr, the burglar.”

“He's fictional,” I added.

“I seem to have come in at the middle of this conversation.”

“If you'd stayed in the shop just a bit longer, you'd have been spared all of it.”

The pink gin Angie brought for Glad reminded me of my drink at the Edwardses. “Have you ever heard of a Pimm's cup?”

“Of course. It's a tradition at Wimbledon. Over forty thousand are sold during the annual championship matches. They're usually served with cucumber slices.”

“What is it with British drinks and cucumbers?” asked Susannah.

“Lends a healthy touch,” Glad replied, “though I don't much care for them in any form.”

46

I
'll drive,” said Thelma.

She was outside my door again, unbidden and again denied entrance because of the lit cigarette. She wanted to take me to meet Regina.

“I don't want you going back there alone after the three of us talk,” she said, “so you'll need to be blindfolded.”

“No way. I did that once and it turned out to be a disaster.”

“Yeah. When you did that appraisal for Segundo Cantú.”

“You know about that?”

“Sure. Carl was the one set it up for you. He told me all about it.”

“Did he also tell you I was charged with two murders as a result? And that I could have cleared the whole thing up except I didn't know where I had been or who I'd talked to?”

“I don't think he mentioned that.”

“Probably not. So I'll drive and you give me directions. Otherwise, forget it.”

Not only did I not want to be blindfolded again, I didn't want to be in a car that smelled like an ashtray.

She squinted at me through the smoke. “You promise you won't go back and try to make a deal with her to cut me out?”

“I promise.”

“I guess I'll just have to trust you.”

“Learning to trust is important. This will be good for you.”

“Hmff.”

“One more thing. You can't smoke in my vehicle.”

“I got a better idea. Let's walk. That way I can smoke. It's not very far.”

“Then why did you want to drive?”

“I planned to go around in a few circles so you wouldn't know where we were.”

“Oh, good grief. Lead the way.”

We cut over to Rio Grande and walked south across Central. When we turned onto Chacoma and walked along the edge of the country club, a thought popped into my head. We were in the vicinity of the residences of both Faye Po and the Kents—Layton and Mariella.

Faye Po is a collector. Mariella Kent is a collector.

Was one of them Regina?

Thelma said she saw a Tompiro at the collector's house. I'm Mariella Kent's pot dealer. Uh, make that
pottery
dealer. I know her collection as well as she does. She doesn't have a Tompiro. So Mariella was not Regina.

And Thelma had said the collector was not named Faye Po.

Thelma must have lied. How many female collectors of ancient Native American pottery can live in one neighborhood? It had to be one of those two.

And it was. But not the one I'd reasoned it out to be.

We approached a sprawling home originally designed by El Paso architect Henry Trost, a student of Frank Lloyd Wright who did major works in New Mexico, including the Sunshine Theater, Albuquerque's first film house.

“Mariella Kent?” I said.

“You dog. I'm about to be kicked to the curb. You got to her and cut a deal.”

“Remember what I told you about trust? I've known Mariella Kent for twenty years. Most of the pots in her collection came from me. But I didn't know she was the collector you mentioned until we rounded that corner. And she doesn't have a Tompiro, so you couldn't have seen one here.”

“We'll see about that,” she said as she hit the buzzer.

As I listened to footsteps approaching the door, another possibility came to mind. Mariella has an old pot from Acoma with black hatching on a white background. Maybe Thelma mistook it for a Tompiro.

Mariella de Baca Enríquez Kent is said to be descended from Don Francisco Fernández de la Cueva Enríquez, Duque de Alburquerque. My hometown is 91.66 percent named after him. We didn't get the first
r
.

In fact, El Duque never set foot outside of Spain. Perhaps one of his descendants did so and Mariella is a tenth-generation granddaughter.

Even if she is not descended from Spanish royalty, she has a regal bearing and more class than the average European royal. Of course, in light of the events of recent years, that is faint praise.

Mariella led us into the room where she displays her pottery. The old Acoma pot was where it's always been. The Tompiro was about eight feet to the left and on a higher shelf. So Thelma did know a Tompiro when she saw one. Well, I thought, she was married for some years to a pot hunter.

“I told you she had Carl's Tompiro,” Thelma said, rather loudly. She was certain Mariella and I were in cahoots.

Mariella said, “Let me again express my condolences for your loss. As I mentioned the first time you came here, I did not enlist your husband to procure a Tompiro pot for me. I did meet him the one time I mentioned to you. He came to ask if I would sell him my Tompiro. I told him it was not for sale.”

“If you didn't get it from Carl, where did you get it?”

Mariella looked at me. “I know this must be a bit of a shock for you, Hubie.”

“Yes. I told Thelma you didn't have a Tompiro, but now you do. And of course I recognize it. I dug that pot up twenty years ago not far from Willard. It sat in my shop until last year when I finally sold it. How did it end up here?”

“The person you sold it to sold it to me.”

“That's a drummed-up story if I ever heard one. Carl didn't come here to buy a pot, he came here to sell one.”

“Why would we drum up a story?” I asked. “If Mariella bought it from Carl, she has nothing to gain by denying it.”

“Sure she does. You two figured out where the fifty thousand went … wait, now I get it.” She stared at Mariella. “You never paid him. That's why I can't find any trace of the money. He delivered the pot and you told him you'd pay him later. Then when you found out he was dead, you figured you just saved yourself fifty thousand dollars. So you two cooked up a cover story about Hubie digging up the pot and selling it to someone who sold it to you.”

“I have a copy of the sales contract in my shop,” I said.

“Which you probably drew up after I came to see you.”

“Get a grip, Thelma. Remember that trust thing? The contract was signed and dated by both me and the buyer, and it was drawn up by my lawyer.”

“Sure it was. Does this lawyer have a name?”

He did, of course. The same one as Mariella. Rather than make the situation worse by telling Thelma the lawyer was married to the woman she had just accused of swindling her, I said nothing.

My silence just increased her distrust and frustration.

“There's another possibility.” She looked at Mariella again. “Maybe you killed Carl to get out of paying him.”