The Pot Thief Who Studied Georgia O'Keeffe Read online

  “Sure. I’ll start,” she said with her usual enthusiasm. “Give me one starting with a.”

  “Avoidable.”

  “How is that autological?”

  “Because the word itself can be avoided.”

  “Oh, right. Give me a letter.”

  “O.”

  I thought about it while she did and couldn’t think of one. I was wishing I’d given her an easier letter when she said, “Old.”

  “That’s good. I couldn’t think of one that starts with o.”

  “Here’s another one—olde.”

  “You already said that.”

  She shook her head. “This one has an e on the end.”

  “Wow. You’re as good at this as Sharice is. She always beats me.”

  Angie arrived with our second round. I sipped my New Mexican limeade—also known as a margarita—to make sure it was as good as the last one. It was.

  Susannah asked me why Sharice hadn’t yet had the reconstructive surgery.

  “Dental hygienists don’t make all that much, and the operation is really expensive, so I—”

  “No! Please tell me you didn’t volunteer to help her pay for it.”

  “Of course not. Volunteering to pay would make it sound like it matters to me.”

  “That is so understanding.”

  “And on top of that, I like the way her butt looks and don’t want a scar on it.”

  She threw a chip at me.

  “Charles Webbe came to see me today.”

  “They’re probably still trying to figure out where all the money from Schnitzel went.”

  “I don’t doubt it, but that wasn’t why Charles dropped in.” I told her about the incident at Blackbird Buvette. “Charles offered to have a man-to-man talk with the guy who hassled Sharice. He also predicted more problems, said that’s what happens when a white guy has a black girlfriend.”

  “And you probably told him about one of your SAPs.”

  I have a growing list of astute observations about humankind. Each is a Schuze Anthropological Premise, abbreviated by Susannah as SAP because she says that’s what you have to be to believe them.

  “No, but I did tell him I don’t think of Sharice as my black girlfriend. I think of her as my girlfriend who happens to be black.”

  “I know you think that’s a significant distinction, but most people probably think it’s splitting hairs.”

  “Before you were dating Baltazar, you dated Rafael Pacheco. Do you think of those two as your Hispanic boyfriends?”

  “No. I think of Baltazar as a nice guy with sexy eyes. And since Rafael slithered away, I think of him as a snake.”

  I laughed. “I wonder if Georgia O’Keeffe thought of Juan Hamilton as her Hispanic boyfriend.”

  “Juan Hamilton isn’t Hispanic. His real name is John Hamilton. His parents were missionaries or something in Latin America, and he grew up there and adopted the name Juan. And the rumors about him being her boyfriend may or may not be true. He was fifty years younger than her, but I’d like to think they were lovers just to turn the tables on that geezer Stieglitz.”

  “But she and Stieglitz were at least married.”

  “Right. He was fifty-eight when they met and the most powerful person in the entire art world. She was twenty-eight years old and totally unknown.”

  “Maybe it was true love.”

  “More like true lust. He used her, Hubie. He used the apartment he lived in with his wife to take nude photographs of O’Keeffe and deliberately timed it so that his wife would walk in on them. She threw him out, which is what he wanted but didn’t have the courage to ask for.”

  “Well, he did make her famous.”

  “He made her famous initially, but she made him famous in the long run. He wouldn’t be as widely known today if it weren’t for her. And someone else would have eventually shown her work. It was the paintings that made her famous, not the man.”

  I thought about the nudes of O’Keeffe we saw in the exhibit Susannah took me to. There was something creepy about knowing her husband took those photos.

  In addition to the early nudes, there are thousands of other pictures of O’Keeffe, some of the most famous taken when she was in her eighties, her fierce independence more obvious than in the younger years. The wrinkles from the New Mexico sun couldn’t hide her beauty, even in her eighties and nineties. No wonder there were rumors about her and Hamilton. She was the most photographed woman of the twentieth century. I thought about the words to Elton John’s “Candle in the Wind”:

  Your candle burned out long ago

  Your legend never did

  I doubt that Georgia O’Keeffe worried about her legend. She was too busy doing what she loved.

  11

  Susannah left for her night class—it’s Modern American Painters this semester—and I strolled back across the plaza knowing my cupboard was bare. I hadn’t bought groceries in weeks because getting to the store by bus and returning with sacks while using crutches was too much hassle. And now that the cast was off, the battery in the Bronco was dead.

  It’s hard to save either money or your waistline living on restaurant food. I was craving something simple. What I got instead was spaghetti pie, courtesy of Miss Gladys Claiborne, proprietor of the eponymous Miss Gladys’s Gift Shop two doors down from me, where she took up residence after her husband died. Most owners of the galleries, eateries and specialty stores in Old Town retreat to their suburban homes after locking up for the day. Miss Gladys and I are the only two on our street who actually live here, and we have a symbiotic relationship. I provide security for her, and she provides food for me.

  The reality falls short of the theory.

  As a woman raised in a bygone age, she believes a man provides security. Fortunately, she has never needed me to come to her rescue. I suspect she would put up a better fight against an intruder than I would.

  Her cooking … No, you can’t call it that. Assembling is the more accurate word. Her casseroles are assembled from ready-to-eat foods used in the exact quantity of the packages they are sold in. Thus, teaspoons, tablespoons and cupfuls give way to cans, jars, bags and cartons.

  Her spaghetti pie contains one package of spaghetti, one bag of Parmesan cheese, one can of Wolf Brand Chili, one can of Ro*Tel Original Diced Tomatoes & Green Chilies, one container of Philadelphia Savory Garlic cooking cream and one bag of shredded mozzarella cheese.

  “The spaghetti and Parmesan make the crust. Doesn’t that just beat all? You just throw them together and press them against the bottom and sides of a baking dish. Then you dump in the can of chili and the Ro*Tel. You mix the cream cheese and mozzarella together for the topping. Then just bake it until the crust is golden.”

  As usual, she brought the casserole in a bag made from gingham and embroidered with an image of the gazebo in the plaza. I don’t know what gingham is made from, but it must be a sturdy fabric to hold a ceramic plate, a glass baking dish in a cozy warmer and a thermos of sweet tea.

  The fact that she can carry such a load is the basis for my assessment of her odds against an intruder.

  Although Miss Gladys’s concoctions are seldom on the approved foods list of the American Heart Association, some of them are surprisingly tasty. This one was not. I know this is almost un-American, but I do not like pasta with its slimy texture and cardboard taste. The only reason people think they like it is because it’s usually slathered with marinara or some other misuse of perfectly good tomatoes.

  “Just look at that,” she said, her blue eyes sparkling. “The spaghetti is the exact color of a pie crust and the mozzarella topping looks like buttercream frosting.”

  “Maybe I should save it for dessert.”

  She laughed at my ploy to avoid eating the pie and poured me some sweet tea. The fact that I was able to choke it down with a smile
is testament to my fondness for Miss Gladys.

  12

  The indigestion started only minutes after Miss Gladys departed. I was beginning to think Wolf Brand Chili must be named after its main ingredient.

  The Old Town Guild was having one of their dreaded Business After Hours events at La Placita. I walked to the southeast corner of the plaza and crossed the street into the eatery where Susannah works the lunch shift.

  Despite the fact that I rarely attend these events, my name tag sat on a table next to those of the other no-shows. I pinned it to my jacket and headed for the hors d’oeuvres table, where I found the perfect remedy for spaghetti pie—pico de gallo, a proper use of the noble tomato. I spooned some onto a plate, grabbed some tortilla chips and stepped into the line for the cash bar.

  A man fell in line behind me and said, “Hello. I’m Glad.”

  “About what?”

  “No, that is my name, short for Gladwyn,” he said, pointing to his name tag, which read Gladwyn Farthing.

  “I’m Hubie,” I said.

  “Your name badge is wrong.”

  I looked down to see if I had picked up the wrong tag.

  “No, that’s my name—Hubert.”

  “I meant you have it in the wrong place. You should pin it on your right lapel.”

  “I’m left-handed.”

  “Doesn’t matter, does it? You still shake with your right hand, which means you should have your tag on the right because that’s the side people see as they shake your hand.”

  Now I remembered why I don’t attend these things—inane conversations.

  As you may have guessed from his name, he was English. He looked to be in his sixties. He sounded like a character in Downton Abbey but looked like one in Looney Tunes; namely, Porky Pig. Pursed lips, pink skin and a blunt nose.

  “Thanks for the tip about name tags,” I said, hoping thusly to bring our chat to an end.

  “Doesn’t matter you have it on incorrectly. I already knew who you are.”

  “Oh?”

  “I’m told you may have commercial space to let.”

  I was waiting for him to finish the sentence when it dawned on me that he was using let the way we use lease.

  “I do have a vacant space, but I don’t have it listed.”

  “I didn’t get the information from an estate agent. I got it by asking about. Have you any interest in letting it?”

  Letting it what? I wondered.

  My shop and residence are in an adobe built by Don Fernando María Aranjuez Aragon in 1683. At some point during its 333 years of existence, it was divided into three parcels. I own the east third. Miss Gladys owns the west third. I lease the middle third from Benny Orozco, who is descended from Don Pablo Benedicion Verahuenza Orozco, who bought the building from its original owner for fifteen pesetas in 1691.

  When the middle third became vacant, I leased it because I thought I wanted two shops, one featuring traditional Native American pottery and one featuring my copies. Running two stores proved to be a hassle, so I reconsolidated.

  Now the leased space sits empty while I make monthly payments. It makes no economic sense, but at least I’ve come to realize why I leased it in the first place. It wasn’t because I needed two shops. It was because I didn’t want to risk having a body-piercing emporium or pawn shop as a neighbor.

  “How would you use the space?” I asked Glad.

  “Casual clothing—jumpers, trainers, plimsolls, swimming costumes—that sort of thing.”

  The perfect business, right? Nothing noisy or open late. No rowdy customers. No cooking smells. Never mind that I have no idea what a plimsoll is and that a bathing costume sounds like something Esther Williams would wear at Halloween. This could be a way to get those lease payments made by someone else.

  “I might be interested. Would you like to see the space?”

  “I have already done so. Looked through the glass door, you see.”

  No, I thought to myself, if you looked through the glass door, I wouldn’t see—you would see.

  “How much will you let it for?”

  “It’s a thousand square feet, and retail space in Old Town goes for about a dollar a foot.”

  “A thousand a month is beyond my budget. I have a proposal. The town I come from, Ludlow, is home to many sole-proprietor shops. When the shopkeeper has to run an errand or visit a doctor’s surgery, he closes up and posts a notice. We in England are used to it. But you Yanks seem less patient. You expect shops to keep regular hours.”

  I could have sworn he said shoppes. I could almost hear the extra letters. I nodded my agreement to his observation.

  “I propose that I mind your store when you are away, and in consideration thereof, you reduce the lease to eight hundred.”

  Since eight hundred is the exact amount I was paying Benny Orozco, I was tempted to accept his offer on the spot. But I hesitated.

  “I’ll stand you a drink,” he said.

  We had reached the front of the line. He ordered a pink gin. I asked for a Tecate. He paid. We found a table, worked out the details and made a toast to our new business arrangement. The good fortune of meeting Glad was a small step toward solvency.

  13

  Sharice walked into Spirits in Clay the next day around noon with a young cheetah on a leash.

  Geronimo yelped, then bolted headlong into the door to the workshop. Bouncing off it didn’t injure him—his head is more skull than brain. He popped back up and began clawing furiously at the door, looking back every few seconds to make sure the cheetah was still on its leash.

  I took pity on him and opened the door.

  “Sorry,” she said, laughing. “I should have called to warn you, but I wanted it to be a surprise. I don’t like laughing at Geronimo, but you have to admit he doesn’t quite live up to his name.”

  I made a feeble attempt to defend his courage. “Well, he’s never seen a cheetah before.”

  “It’s not a cheetah. It’s a Savannah cat.”

  “Wow. They grow them big in Georgia.” The beast was twice the length of a dachshund and a whole lot taller—it came up past Sharice’s knees.

  “It’s not from Georgia. Savannah cats are a cross between a serval and a domestic cat.”

  “I know cats are domestic, but I’ve never known one to be servile. Only dogs seem anxious to serve their masters.”

  “Not servile. Serval, with the accent on the first syllable. Servals are a breed of wild cats from Africa.”

  “Africa?”

  “Don’t worry, it’s not an ethnic thing. I’m not going to start wearing dashikis and grand boubous.” She laughed. “Unless they’re designed by Coco Chanel or Yves Saint Laurent.”

  She let the animal off its leash, took a beanbag from her pocket and threw it in my direction. The cat sprung into the air and caught the beanbag in flight. Then he landed on the counter in front of me. He leaned in my direction and stared into my eyes. Then he gave me a swat on the nose, jumped off the counter and returned the beanbag to Sharice.

  “He plays fetch?”

  “He does.” She threw the beanbag at the door. He ran it down, brought it back and dropped it at her feet.

  “He likes you, Hubie.”

  “He took a swipe at me.”

  “Yeah, but he kept his claws in. That means he likes you.”

  Probably a good thing. It was clear I’d be unable to fend off an attack from him, and Geronimo had already demonstrated how much help he’d be.

  “His name is Benz. Kathy bought him about a year ago, but she has to give him up because she’s marrying a guy who’s afraid of him.”

  “At least he has some sense, although marrying Kathy makes me wonder.”

  Kathy is one of the other assistants in Dr. Batres’s office. She cleaned my teeth the first time I went there.
<
br />   “I’d forgotten you know her. Why did you ask for a change?”

  I couldn’t hide the sheepish grin. “I saw you in the next room.”

  “I’m glad you switched.”

  “Me too.”

  “Servals tend to be like dogs—attached to one person. So before I agreed to take him, I had a long talk with Erik and Kurt Durnberg, the guys who sold him to Kathy. Funny you mentioned Georgia. The Durnbergs’ cattery is right next-door in Florida. It has a cool name: Soignés Savannahs.”

  “More French. What does it mean?”

  “Elegantly dressed.”

  “Describes you both.”

  “Thanks. Erik and Kurt told me Savannahs can also have an attachment to a second person, and for Benz, that’s me. I would cat sit when Kathy was away. I fell in love with him the first time he stayed with me. I was still living in that dreary apartment on San Mateo, and he cheered me up. I wasn’t dating, so he was about the only company I had away from work.” She paused. “I’m hoping you’ll be spending a lot of time at my place.”

  “Me too.”

  “You won’t mind Benz being there?”

  “Not at all. You two look stunning together—both so lean and lithe. But I may have to put Geronimo in therapy.”

  14

  That cinches it. She’s in love with you. And she sees it as permanent. Wait …” She cupped a hand to her ear. “Are those wedding bells I hear?”

  “Just because she got a cat?”

  “It’s not getting the cat—it’s the timing. She was living all alone in what she admits was a dreary apartment, and she loved having Benny for company.”

  “Benz,” I corrected.

  “With a z like in Mercedes?”

  “Mercedes doesn’t have a z.”

  “Sheesh. Anyway, the cat is the only bright spot in her life. But she doesn’t buy one or adopt one from the shelter. And why not?”

  She took a sip of her margarita and looked at me.

  “She’s allergic to cats?”

  “Why would she take Benz if she’s allergic to cats?”

  “Because Savannah cats are hypoallergenic.”