The Prize (32 page)

And yes, he could admit, he was ever so slightly jealous.

A
FTER HIS LUNCH-HOUR
swim he holed up in his office and privately tended to the other artists he represented. He wondered if, once word leaked out that he was no longer working with Agnes, his other artists would leave him, or think less of him, and in his worst moments he imagined a sudden and prolonged exodus that led to him being finished. Remarkably, it seemed as if Agnes wanted to keep it quiet too, and the press hadn't yet picked up on it. He asked May about it. She said that Agnes didn't want negative publicity before her show opened. Defeated, his confidence shaken, he wondered if he'd lost his competitive edge, perhaps even his judgment about what qualified as art, or as art that would sell. He wondered once again how Agnes's new work would be perceived and whether he'd been too critical.

W
EEKS LATER, HE
turned away from a contract he was drafting and faced the window in his office. The sun traveled behind the building across from him and covered his desk in a swath of shadow. He thought of Julia again and though he shouldn't be expecting her to contact him, he checked e-mails throughout the day at the gallery and later at home to see if she'd written. Days passed. A week. At every event or function he went to he looked for her. Another few days passed. He was alone in his office when the receptionist buzzed to say he had a package. He opened the brown wrapping paper. It was his father's copy of Keats he had given Julia. There was a note inside.
I thought you should have this back
, it said.

10 CONNECTICUT

A
FTER A LONG
day at the gallery and a tedious dinner with a collector, he arrived home near midnight and labored up the stairs to their bedroom. His feet ached in his heavy shoes. He sank onto the bottom of the bed and loosened his tie and bent down to untie his shoelaces. Holly was absorbed in an obscure journal on animal habitats, reading glasses at the end of her nose, her hair pulled back. Desire threaded through his core. She looked at him with a half smile and continued reading.

He took it as a sign that maybe he could resume sleeping in their bed. He changed into his pajama bottoms and T-shirt and crawled into his side. He smelled her familiar odor and longed to put his face in her neck. She closed the journal, turned off the bedside lamp, and curled into her side of the bed. “Night, Holly,” he said, and reached over and kissed the top of her head, waiting for her to say something, but she didn't and he turned into his own corner and though he was uncomfortable, he forced himself to sleep in the bed beside her.

In the morning the blasting sound of the vacuum cleaner greeted him downstairs. He leashed the dogs for a walk. Tracing his familiar trail through their neighborhood, he stopped by the pond. The swans hungrily ducked their heads into the cold water and a chill went through him. Trudy reached up and yelped and he
calmed her down and gave her a treat from his pocket. Simon did the same, both desiring and commanding his attention. He found a soft, dry spot on a bench near the pond to sit and watched the water slipping over the rocks at the very edge. The air was cold down his back.

He entered the house and unleashed the dogs. Holly was in the dim breakfast nook, her knees drawn up against her. It took him a few moments to recognize the anguished sounds. She was crying. A piece of hair fell into her eyes.

“It's Daddy. He's gone.” She examined him carefully as he entered the room.

“When?”

“This morning.” Her eyes filled again.

“Holly, I'm sorry,” he said, and wrapped his arms around her.

“I'm just so mad at you,” she said. She pulled away for a moment and then leaned her shoulders back into him. He held her tight and kissed the top of her hair. Over her head he watched the bright light press into the blinds, illuminating the hues on the floor and brightening the walls until it hurt to see. Her tears seeped into his shirt. She clung to him tightly. The funeral was Friday. Her mother had made all the arrangements months ago.

She slowly lifted her face from his chest and stood up. “Annabel will be home soon.” She wiped her wet face with her sleeve. “I knew it was coming,” she said.

“I know. You don't have to explain.”

He watched her open the refrigerator and take out vegetables to start a salad, and though he wanted to say more he sat on the breakfast nook bench. He sat there for a long time as if he were keeping vigil as she chopped the carrots and then the radishes, not
wanting to leave her, and she seemed neither to mind his presence nor to want his help.

The dogs followed Holly, sensing her grief. They rubbed against her legs and looked up at her with their noses in the air and let out little sounds, not quite cries or whines but something in between. Holly reached down to shush them and they licked her face. “Good dog, good boy,” she whispered, breaking up again and putting her head in Simon's fur.

“I'll finish here,” Edward said. “Go upstairs. Get some rest.” She moved slowly and without apparent consciousness, as if in a dream.

T
HE STEREO WAS
turned on loudly. Mahler. He followed its sound to the bedroom. All the windows were open. He found Holly cross-legged in the middle of the bed wearing only a long T-shirt and panties. Her lips were blue. She did this occasionally. She'd turn on the music loudly and get into some kind of zone. He closed the windows and wrapped a blanket around her.

“All these years I blamed Daddy for Lizzie's death. It just hit me. And now it's too late to tell him.”

“I'm sorry, Holly.” He scooted next to her on the bed and cupped his hand around her shoulder. “Your father knew how much you loved him.”

“I don't know. I don't know about anything anymore.” She gazed up, teary. “Why, Edward?” Tears flooded her eyes. She rubbed her nose with the back of her hand.

“I don't know. I didn't mean to hurt you.”

“Something's happened to us.” Her face hardened. She looked into the air rather than at him as she spoke.

The room darkened in shadow. They both rose and descended the stairs. He followed Holly into the cool and drafty garage. She kneeled on the cement floor in the half dark, near the litter of kittens, with the little runt cupped in her palm.

“Did you know that the mother cat won't care for the runt? She knows instinctively if something is wrong and won't waste her time when she has healthy kittens to attend to.” She pressed her lips into the kitten's matted head. “Poor, precious thing. Can you imagine?” Holly sighed as they saw through the garage window the lights go on, one after another, in the house next door.

A
T THE FUNERAL
, the pews of Saint Patrick's Cathedral were filled with mourners, others standing in the outer aisles. After the service Edward embraced Holly and his own eyes filled. She broke away, dried her eyes with her handkerchief, and put her arm in her mother's to greet their guests. At her mother's apartment afterward he observed her warmly receive her parents' friends and relatives, all dressed respectfully in black dresses and dark suits. He awkwardly took the coats and carried them into the master bedroom.

He wandered into the dining room and found the painting of Holly and her twin, Lizzie, on the wall in the dining room above the credenza. Though it had faded, the image of the two girls in their white knee socks, Mary Janes, and matching collared dresses still asserted its poignant authority. Tom Drury arrived with flowers. Holly led him through the back hall into her old bedroom. From the hallway he observed the two of them huddled together in conversation on Holly's canopy bed. Holly leaned over and Tom held her. His gut clenched watching another man hold his wife.

11 NEW YORK

T
HE OPENING OF
Agnes Murray's show arrived the first Thursday in May. Fortunately someone had persuaded her to change the name to
Grand Illusions
. Edward's revenues were still down—lower than ever—and he still hadn't signed anyone new. He'd curated a show of anatomical drawings by Miles McDermott, an artist he'd signed in his early days at the gallery, and though he liked the work and liked Miles, his heart wasn't in it. He found less in the art world that he cared about. He feared he'd not only lost his edge, but perhaps worse, the ability to be truly moved. He remembered the first show he curated and the sense of his connection to the motion and beauty of a particular moment in time as expressed through objects and felt by the way in which he helped to conceptualize the show as if he were a conduit for preserving history. He hadn't felt that way in a while.

The morning of Agnes's opening, May peered her head into his office and explained that she thought it would be best for the gallery if he did not attend. He hadn't been planning on it, but it insulted him that May asked.

Later that evening, he retreated upstairs to the eerie darkness of his study and turned on a small desk light. Outside the windows were shadows of trees and the faraway roofs of other houses. He nursed a scotch and reluctantly turned on his computer to see the
press. Page six of the
Observer
reported that the gallery was packed. Every critic, important art figure, and gallery owner attended. When asked in a profile in
Vogue
about why she became a painter, Agnes said, “I've been chosen by painting to work in its service.”

He found himself avoiding the papers. Avoiding everyone. He entered the gallery every morning and swiftly walked past her paintings mounted on the walls—seeing them up for view, and still not quite buying into their vision, disturbed him. He didn't like the way the paintings were hung. Agnes and Savan had chosen large frames and lots of wall space, as if to emphasize the sense of drama in the work, but instead they made the work look flat. No one had thought to ask his opinion. Agnes hardly came to the gallery. Once he thought he heard her voice and ducked into the showroom to see, and he saw her quickly turn her head. So as not to make her uncomfortable, he retreated to his office and then regretted it. Why should he be the one hiding? What had he done? Hearing her name, seeing it in print, catching anyone speaking of her brought all the humiliation back.

The reviews began to trickle in. The
New York Tim
es said there was a lack of continuity to the paintings. The
New Yorker
wondered if Agnes was cashing in on 9/11 and found the work overly determined and grim. There was a long retrospective piece in the
New York Review
. The reviewer suggested that the work, though powerful, hadn't quite jelled and was a disappointment. Edward thought he'd feel vindicated, but instead the coverage angered him. Agnes had settled for putting a filter between her hand and the work, when what the canvas needed was conflict and intensity and challenging eye movement. The gallery was going to have a rough go of it.

No longer exuding his usual bravado, Savan looked tense, and for a few luxurious moments Edward was glad not to have to deal with Agnes. She was probably fit to be tied. And then he wished, somehow, that he was still her dealer. He'd stand by her during the rough times. That is what dealers did if they believed in the artist and the long haul involved in nurturing talent.

Initial sales were low and it took effort on Savan's part to get collectors to pay attention. After six weeks, the show had brought in not even a third of the profits of her first show. May was surprisingly quiet about the situation, but he could hear that when Agnes's name came up she no longer gushed the way she had in the past.

“There's still Europe,” Savan soft-pedaled in one of their weekly meetings. “We may be able to recoup our investment over time.” He reported that Agnes had complained that the gallery hadn't advertised enough or marketed the show to the right clientele. May refused to pour any more of the gallery's money into advertising and marketing. To distance himself from disappointment, Savan rolled his eyes when Agnes complained, as if he'd forgotten that he'd brought this on himself.

12 NEW YORK

E
DWARD ATTENDED THE
opening of a retrospective at Dia of the conceptual artist Jenny Holzer, known for her displays of words and ideas, like billboard advertisements, in public spaces. The last time she'd shown at Dia was in 1989. If he was honest with himself, he would admit that part of the reason he'd gone to the opening was that he hoped to find Julia. It had been two months since the weekend of the Armory Show. Once Agnes's show was mounted, Julia was the person he'd itched to discuss it with. To his amazement, he found her standing in a corner of the cavernous space chatting with two other women. A quick rush of adrenaline swept over him. Her attractiveness struck him anew, as it always did when he first saw her. She raised her chin to acknowledge him, and motioned with her head for him to come. He quickly strolled over.

She introduced him to her companions, two artists with studios in Bushwick: Simone Klein and Nancy someone, he didn't catch the last name. After a round of small talk, he pointed to a piece he wanted to show her against the opposite wall of the open space and they excused themselves, stopping only to say hello or nodding to colleagues he knew, champagne in hand, as they negotiated their way through the crowd.

“It's good to see you,” he said, once they were alone. Up close he noticed beneath her glasses dark circles under her eyes, making her blue irises appear more luminescent. It gave her a penetrating and unassuming presence.