Perfect on Paper (27 page)

There was only one problem. My creativity was paying Vivian’s bills as well, and I was becoming increasingly rankled by our fifty-fifty split.

Then again, what if Elinor Ann’s assertion was true? What if I
was
committing fraud by posing as Hannah—punishable-by-jail fraud? Maybe having Vivian serve as an intermediary between me and my patron provided me with a useful measure of protection.

Even so, the twelve thousand five hundred dollars she’d just pocketed struck me as an insanely high price to pay for it.

I slid the check into the edge of my bedroom mirror, topped off Puny’s bowl, then turned on the computer.

Billy Moody was back on dry land:

Of course I was honored. Of course I’d solve it. But dinner?

I raised my eyes from the computer screen and beheld the satin gown hanging on the outside of my closet door, then hit Reply.

There. I’d done it: I had finally sent a clear message that my relationship with Billy should be based on words, not deeds—especially not The
Dirty Deed. And proven, perhaps, that I was worthy of that wedding dress.

But was Hank worthy of me?

Until the mystery of the boutonnière was solved, there was no way to answer the question.

Despite my ongoing suspicions, the events of the previous evening had brought us closer, in a way I hadn’t anticipated.

I’d arrived at the brownstone to discover him applying primer to a new set of balusters on the foyer staircase, although “set” was hardly the right term for them, nor was the adjective “new.” Each of the twenty or so antique posts was shaped differently, one with ornate curves and a ball top, another with a square base and fluted column, and so on.

“That looks
so cool
.”

Hank smiled. “I reckon it does. Wasn’t sure what I was going to come up with when I yanked out those old broken-down ones, but the client told me he wanted color and whimsy. In fact, he just about went ape last week when I sent pictures of the bathroom floor. So I figured I’d keep it up.”

“These are whimsical, all right,” I said, secretly rejoicing that he’d defined the word correctly. “What about the color part?”

“Ain’t thought that far ahead yet.”

“Mind if I give it a shot?”

His face brightened. “Would you?”

I examined a few of the balusters. Giving them the full Hannah treatment might be a little too raucous, especially if the client intended to hang art on the foyer walls. But if I toned the palette down to pastels…

“How about I try one and you decide after that?”

He came down the stairs and put his arms around my waist. “I don’t need to wait—I seen your paintings. That’s good enough for me.”

I tried to remember what had been on my easel during his most recent
visit to Ninth Street. Handbags, probably. It had been right after Vivian scored a slew of Judith Leiber evening clutches at a New Jersey estate sale. “Are you sure?”

“You’re hired. It’ll be real nice having you around during the day.”

Hmm. It would be nice. And illuminating as well, since I’d finally discover exactly how much of the brownstone renovation was actually being carried out by Hank. “What do you think a reasonable budget would be for something like this?”

He laughed. “Name your price. Some people are only happy when they’re blowing too much money, and this guy’s the biggest spender I ever had.”

I counted the balusters from the bottom step up, arriving at a total of twenty-two. “Do you think a hundred apiece is too much?”

“What the heck—make it two.”

I did a quick mental calculation. “Forty-four hundred dollars? For a paint job? Are you serious?”

“Shoot, that’s nothing to this guy. He paid at least three times as much for the bathroom floor.”

“Forty-four hundred dollars? For a paint job? Are you serious?” Elinor Ann said when I called to tell her about my new commission. “Dana, are you absolutely sure you’re going to receive this money?”

“I don’t see why I wouldn’t.” After all, the Timothy of “Tilework by Timothy” had completed his work in the bathroom. He wouldn’t have done the job for free, would he? “The brownstone’s really come a long way over the past few months. I wish you could see it.”

“Right. As if
that’s
ever going to happen.”

She had a point. Elinor Ann had been to visit me a grand total of once, shortly after I’d moved into my apartment. She’d decided New York City was too dirty and expensive and crowded to ever return.

Now I had to wonder: Was her reaction a harbinger of her panic disorder? I’d invited her back repeatedly, but she’d always had an excuse to remain at home.

“How’s the driving coming?” I asked her. “Are you still Acting As If?”

She sighed. “I’m trying. But now that Angus’s cast is off, I’m back in the passenger seat more often than not.”

“Just make sure you take a trip on your own every day,” I said. “Even if it’s only a mile or two down the road. Inure yourself.”

“Oh, don’t worry. I’m inuring.”

I heard a
ping
coming from my computer and went into the bedroom to check my in-box. Billy’s Sunday puzzle had at last arrived. I opened the attached document, sent it to the printer, and rushed back to the kitchen so Elinor Ann wouldn’t hear the whir of the machine.

I was too late. “What’s that sound?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“Oh no. Why do I get the feeling this has something to do with your youthful friend?”

As soon as I glanced at the printout, I groaned. Many of the boxes in the grid had been shaded so that gray, somewhat lopsided plus-sign shapes were scattered across the page. When it came to crosswords, I was a purist. The only thing I hated more than shaded boxes was the addition of circles to individual squares.

I skimmed the clues and groaned louder. There was, come to think of it, one thing I found even more heinous than circles: cross-referenced clues. This puzzle was loaded with them.

16-Across: With 7-Down, clue for 13-Across.

53-Across: With 44-Down, clue for 39-Across.

Swell.

Cross-referencing clashed with my solving style. I liked to start at the first clue and sweep my way diagonally across the page. But in this puzzle,
the only way to figure out the words that made up the themed clues would be to solve the surrounding fill.

To my relief, Billy had made those clues extremely easy. In no time I discovered that 16-Across was GAME SHOW, and 7-Down was PHRASE, which made the themed clue in 13-Across CIRCLE GETS THE SQUARE. And the combined clues for 39-Across, STIEGLITZ and PALETTE, meant that answer was BLACK AND WHITE.

Aha. Crossword terminology. And each of the paired clues for the themed entries comprised… crossed words; hence the gray shading.

Clever.

I figured it couldn’t hurt to remind him—or myself—about the brunch, and the new ground rules for our relationship. But even if Billy were to suggest an impromptu liaison, I’d be much too busy to consider it. Between Hank’s balusters and my three-Hannah debt to Vivian, I’d be painting late into the evening.

She’d asked me to work with several colorful pairs of Acme cowboy
boots dating from the 1950s for the next series, which ruled out Dinner as my model. The boots, however, would make wonderful vases. I decided to run over to the Korean market on First Avenue and pick up a few bouquets for inspiration.

By the time I returned home, the message light on the answering machine was blinking.

“Hi, sweetie. It’s your big brother. I’m looking into flights for Dad’s birthday and had a quick question about your schedule that week. Oh well. No need to call back—we can discuss it next Thursday night. See you then!”

Next Thursday?

I looked at the calendar hanging over the stove. Of course—the Outsider Art Fair. Tom-Tom had given Hank that pair of tickets to its opening night party as a Christmas gift.

“We ain’t never going to find your brother in this crowd,” Hank said once we’d made our way past the scrum at the entrance to the art show. I could hardly disagree. It seemed every New Yorker with a penchant for theatrical makeup and complicated hairstyles had squeezed into the catacombs-like space. One hapless dealer, set up near the endless line for the coat check, stood with his arms spread in front of his tabletop display of eerie, head-shaped urns in a valiant attempt to prevent them from becoming a pile of worthless shards. When a chubby downtown doyenne in Madame Butterfly whiteface bumped into the table, he let out a terrified shriek.

“Maybe there’ll be more room around the corner,” I said, craning my neck for a glimpse of Tom-Tom’s shock of white hair.

The crowd was sparser in the second aisle, but only marginally—the difference between, say, a five thirty northbound 6 train and a five forty-five. Full-body contact with strangers was the rule, not the exception. Despite the overwhelming heat, I was relieved to have the protection of the shearling coat I’d just treated myself to, courtesy of Graciela’s largesse.

Miraculously, Hank managed to commandeer an empty stretch of wall. Exhausted and damp, I leaned against him and pulled out my cell phone.

“I hope you’re not at the show yet,” my half brother said when he picked up. “Oh dear. You are, aren’t you? I can hear the clamor of the arrivistes.”

“Why didn’t you warn me it would be so packed?”

“I thought I had. But don’t worry. It invariably thins out after a couple of hours.”

“A couple of
hours
?” Hank and I exchanged glances. “Tom-Tom? I don’t think we’ll be able to hold out that long.”

“Don’t worry—I’m on my way. My driver just turned left onto Fifth in front of the Pierre—try to enjoy yourselves until I can meet up with you.”

“Tell your driver to run the yellow lights.”

“I already have, sweetie.”

Hank eyed me warily while I returned my phone to my purse. “It won’t be a couple of hours,” I told him. “More like twenty minutes, I’d say.”

“That’s a relief. Guess we might as well try to see us some art while we wait.”

As usual, there was some wheat amidst the chaff. A spectral portrait of a woman in an empty, moonlit room made me long for more discretionary income. And one of my favorite crazed geniuses, A. G. Rizzoli, had a booth dedicated to his meticulous drawings of imaginary palaces. As we made our way from booth to booth, I kept my hand on the back of Hank’s jacket and let him lead the way through the crush.

When he rounded the third corner, he stopped dead. “Would you look at those,” he said, pulling me around to his side and pointing to the end of the aisle. “They look just like Dinner!”

The woman in front of him—a PETA activist, judging from her
rubber messenger bag—turned to give him a withering glance. “You’re
sick
,” she hissed.

But I was the one who felt sick all of a sudden. There was a reason the paintings looked like Dinner, of course. They were Dinner.

The press of people seemed to be thickest in front of the display, which was topped with three-foot-high red letters spelling out “HANNAH.” Below them, all fifteen portraits from the hat series were lined up in rows of five, and dozens of my other canvases hung on the adjacent walls.

Suddenly, the din of the crowd was replaced with a buzzing noise inside my head.

But Graciela’s voice penetrated the drone.

“… And she’s positively
mad
for Cool Ranch Doritos!” I heard her say, just before I burst into uncontrollable peals of laughter.

Hank seemed to sense something was wrong, as opposed to hilarious. He put his arm around my waist and began to steer a path against the incoming tide—which parted readily when confronted with a cackling madwoman, mascara-blackened tears streaming down her face.

When we finally made it past the show’s entrance and out to the elevator, its doors opened to reveal my half brother.

“What in the world happened to you?” he said, whipping out one of his Irish linen handkerchiefs and dabbing at my eyes. By now my laughing jag was subsiding, but I couldn’t seem to form a sentence.

Hank laid a hand on Tom-Tom’s arm. “Give us a few minutes,” he said. “We’ll be in there.” He tilted his head in the direction of a door marked
STAIRS,
and we proceeded toward it, while my baffled brother pressed his handkerchief into my hand before joining the line of people waiting to enter the exhibit.

We had the landing to ourselves. We sat down on the top step, and Hank waited while I cleaned myself up as best I could. By the time I finished, Tom-Tom’s handkerchief was soggy and gray.