The Vampire Files - Art In The Blood Part 8

"I should think the magazines would still want his art."

"They do, but since the... since his wife died he's refused their commissions. He'd shut himself away for so long we were afraid he'd never come out. I hope this will help him to do it."

"So do we. How's Evan doing?"

"He's got some awful bruises, but seems to feel all right. He's in the studio helping Alex. The place has been shut tight since January so there was some cleaning to do."

"If we've come too soon-"

"Not at all. Alex said this was the business meeting and he'll want to set up a schedule for the sittings with Miss Smythe. I'll take you through now."

The studio was just off the kitchen, a very large room seamlessly added onto the original lines of the house. A bank of high windows ran along its north wall to catch the light. They were open even now but covered with long white curtains that moved with the night breeze like lazy ghosts.

Except for an overstuffed couch and chair in the center, all the furnishings were geared toward Adrian's work. On one end were two slanted drawing tables, one with a light arranged beneath it to shine up through its translucent top. Other, more obscure equipment lined the walls and a huge network of shelving held his supplies and finished work. In the center of the room was his easel, heavier and more complicated than the ones the Robleys owned. I felt like an intruder in a sorcerer's cave.

"Jack!" Evan looked up from his beer and hobbled over. His eye was still swollen shut and the area around it was gorgeously colored. "Recovered from last night, eh?

Boy, was that a party or what?"

"Bobbi, this is Mr. Robley..."

He took her hand and tenderly kissed the back of it. "Evan to you, my sweet, and I'm your slave for life."

"Which is hardly an a.s.set," said Adrian, stepping forward. "I'm Alex Adrian, Miss Smythe. I enjoyed your singing at the party very much." He neatly slipped her hand away from Evan and shook it, then mine. "Please come in." He gestured at the sofa and pulled up an old chair for himself. He looked different from last night; less formal and guarded. His manner with Bobbi hinted at the possibility of some considerable personal charm.

Sandra disappeared and Evan puttered in the background of the studio while we worked out the less artistic details of creation. There was some discussion on the size of canvas to be used and how to pose Bobbi.

"I'm not sure," she confessed. "You're the expert. Have you a recommendation?"

"Yes," Evan said promptly.

"Be decent for once," Adrian warned.

"What I recommend is a neocla.s.sic version of Goya's Maja Desnuda with less surrounding background."

"I told you to be decent."

"Well, she can leave her clothes on, of course! It's the pose I'm talking about-that air of sensual relaxation. If you don't pick up on that, Alex, I swear I'll come in and paint it myself."

"You may try."

"What kind of pose?" asked Bobbi, carefully separating the words.

Adrian smiled. "Evan is suggesting I do a full-length portrait of you reclining on pillows. The choice of what to wear or not wear is entirely up to you, though."

"Oh, good," she said in mock relief.

The next point to work out were the sittings, something I'd have to miss since they'd be during the day for the sunlight. Evan's input had its effect and Bobbi asked if it would be all right if she could bring a friend along to watch. Adrian had no illusions about her wish for a chaperon, but then he had no objections, either."Three sittings, then," he announced. "An hour or so each should take care of it."

"But shouldn't it take much longer? I thought these things went on for weeks."

Evan broke in again. "Not with an expert like Alex and his style of work. What you're paying for is all the training he soaked up in the fancy French art inst.i.tute he went to."

"And you should go there, Evan."

"There's a difference between an inst.i.tute and an inst.i.tution, no, thank you.

Besides, I don't speak French."

I gave Adrian his half payment in an envelope. He seemed to approve of the straight cash and made out a receipt, which concluded the business meeting.

"If you've the time," he said, "I can make a preliminary sketch right now, just to block in the general form."

Bobbi glanced at me. I shrugged and nodded. Adrian had me move off the couch, produced a pillow, and told Bobbi to get comfortable. She suppressed a grin and relaxed back on the pillow. Adrian stood off a few feet, returned, and adjusted the position of her arm and backed off again.

"There's some strain on the line of the neck," Evan observed.

Adrian took the suggestion and tilted Bobbi's head a little. When he was satisfied he pulled one of the drawing tables from the wall and went to the storage shelves for a huge sheet of clean paper and a stick of charcoal. He made a half dozen sweeping lines and added a few precise strokes for details.

His face was totally different now that he was focused on the work. I saw serenity as well as concentration. Evan and I no longer existed for him; all that was important was his eye, his hand, and the model.

He reached a stopping point and had Bobbi come over for a look. Evan and I crowded in as well. The sofa had turned into a chaise lounge covered in plump pillows, but not so much that they overwhelmed Bobbi's reclining figure. She was languid but with an alertness in her eyes that seemed to dare the viewer to come closer. Her clothes were more suggestive of sweeping robes than the smart suit she wore, but anything else would have been inappropriate for the mood he was setting up.

"Is that what you see?" she asked.

"On a good day, yes. Will it do?"

"Absolutely. If this is the sketch, I can't wait to see the finished painting. This is like magic."

"Evan, I've some prepared canvas somewhere..." "Yeah, I put them... I'll get them." He rooted around and produced several sterile white canvases, already stretched and nailed over wood frames. Adrian chose the largest and put it on the ma.s.sive easel.

I thought he'd repeat the sketch on the canvas, but instead he look a pin to the paper and punched tiny holes through it along all the major lines.

"What's he doing?" I whispered to Evan.

"It's how he transfers the sketch," he whispered back.

When he's got enough holes in it, he'll position the drawing where he wants on the canvas, then hit at it with a small bag of charcoal dust. The holes allow the dust to leave a guide mark for him to follow."

"Why not just draw on the canvas?"

"Too hard to clean off if you should change your mind about something."

The sketch drifted to the floor as he shifted his attention to the canvas, and I could see now how he was able to keep up with the demands the magazines had put on him. Only a few more minutes pa.s.sed and he added in all the necessary details.

Bobbi's face appeared out of the blankness. taking on expression and life.

He stood back again, studying it with a critical eye, but was apparently satisfied.

"That will do for tonight, tomorrow I'll see to the underpainting, and you can come by the day after for the first sitting."

"I still can't get over the speed," she said.

Adrian found a rag and scrubbed at the charcoal dust clinging to his fingers.

"Most of the time involved has to do with allowing the paint to dry-at least that's how it is for the way I work. All I ask is that after the final varnish dries you take it to a decent framer."

"We wouldn't do anything less."

Bobbi was looking with interest at some of the painted canvases stacked in slots and asked to see them, and Adrian obliged. Evan said he wanted another beer and invited me for one as well. I again turned down the offered drink, but tagged along to the kitchen.

"I've got some good news for you," I said as he searched the icebox. "I talked to a friend of mine and he's telling Dimmy to lay off on the interest payments."

He stopped cold. "Say that again."

I repeated it.

"Who's your friend?" he asked with amiable suspicion."Someone with an interest in art. He knows Dimmy and said he'd fix it. You and Sandra can probably go back home now."

"Honestly?"

"True blue."

"How in the world did you do it?"

"Well..."

"Never mind. Perhaps it's better I don't ask, you shouldn't question miracles, they're too few and far between." He popped the cap from a brown bottle. "This is great, really. I don't know what to say-except thanks-and that I don't plan to go home just yet."

"Yeah?"

He glanced around to see if anyone was in earshot and lowered his voice. "It's Sandra. You see, she's, well... it's her and Alex. You know... last night." He took a swig off the beer. "I was a bit out of things, but not that far out. Maybe I'm supposed to get upset since she's my sister, but she's a big girl now and-"

"Why should you stand in the way of romance?"

"Exactly! To tell the truth, I'd like to see her safely married or whatever to whoever-or is it whomever? Anyway, having Alex for a brother-in-law can't be much worse than having him for a friend, and she could do worse herself. Besides, it would get her out of my hair, that awful little walk-up we live in, and into his hair and a very cozy house, which is just what she needs."

"I hope it works out for you."

"Same here, so I won't come out with the glad news for a while yet, and I'm going to be fairly well oiled or at least look like I am before I turn in tonight to give them plenty of opportunity for more innocent sinning."

"Very considerate, but if you don't mind a personal question- "You've saved my life, so feel free."

"I was wondering about his late wife."

"Oh. That." His face fell. "What d'ya want to know?"

"Why did she kill herself?"

"Oh, I thought-" He caught himself and started over. "There you have me, friend.

It took us all by surprise. I mean Celia and Alex had their rough moments like any other couple, but when she... well, it left us all flabbergasted. She seemed very normal and all. Normal, you know? It fairly tore Alex up. He looked like death himself for a while. I think that party last night was the first time he's really been out of the house since it happened."

"She leave a note?"

"Yeah, she said she just couldn't go on any longer. It was next to her on the car seat. You know how she died?"

"Yes, Reva mentioned it to me."

"Reva." He smiled. "Lovely girl... It shocked her, too. She and Celia were very good friends, they were both models. Celia married her artist, and Reva's about to, so I suppose they had a lot of notes to compare on the subject, not that Alex or Leighton are even remotely alike."

"How so?"

"They both paint and wear clothes and eat food, but beyond that they're night and day, stylistically and temperamentally. Like all that business in the studio, it was taken care of with a minimum of fuss and bother in about a quarter hour, right? If you'd gone to Leighton for the work you'd still be talking- and talking. He's more showman than anything. If someone comes to him for a commission he puts them to a lot of trouble so they think they're getting their money's worth. Then he'd have your girl sitting for a couple hours every day for two or three weeks so you think he's really earning his fee."

"That's what we expected with Alex."

"And he didn't give it to you. Art is a business with both of them, but Alex just gets on with it, and if people are disappointed with the lack of show, the finished product makes up fork."

"I'll say. That sketch he did was really great."

"And you don't need to worry about the painting, he'll do something to knock your eyes out."

"How did you two get together?"

He laughed. "It's been so long I hardly remember, we both go so far back. His family had money and mine didn't; he had the polish and I had the spit. I used to get him into a lot of trouble taking him off to pool halls and other fun places, then he'd show me how to look at things and draw them. We both had watercolors down by the time we were out of grade school. He'd won a few prizes and me, too, and then one day I sold something. It convinced me this was a way of making a living without working-that and the occasional c.r.a.p game."

"And if you left the c.r.a.p games alone you could make a living," said Sandra, coming in with a broom and dustpan. "Is he telling you the sad story of his life.

Jack?""Not so sad," defended Evan. "I enjoy every moment." To ill.u.s.trate, he drained off the rest of the beer and raided the box for another. Sandra rolled her eyes in mock suffering and left for the studio.

Evan grinned beatifically. "Before yesterday she'd have given me a five-minute lecture on gambling, drinking, and other forms of peaceable sport. Now she's so occupied with Alex it takes the pressure off me. Isn't love wonderful?"

I had to agree. "She and Alex have known each other just as long?"

"Not really. He was my friend mostly until we got older, then he went off to study in Paris for a couple of years. When he returned she started to notice him, but then he was off to New York getting established. He came back just after the crash; famous, quite thoroughly married to Celia, and off Sandra's eligible list."

"That's a funny way to describe a marriage."

"It applied to them. I liked Celia well enough, but she was a bit self-centered-no, that's not the word..."He eyed the dwindling contents of the beer bottle. "I think this stuff is starting to get to me."

Before he could decide on his definition, Bobbi, Sandra, and Adrian walked in.

Bobbi was pulling on her brown velvet gloves.

"All finished?" I asked.

"Jack, you should see the things he has in there, it's absolutely wonderful. Alex should have it in a gallery or museum. They're all too beautiful to be shelved up out of sight."