“The preview,” Richard explained. “For the press and the VIPs. They wanted to do two nights, but I told them I’m old.”
“The sixteenth,” Serge said. More than a week from now. Fiona hadn’t thought that far ahead. “And a big party in two nights!”
“I’ll—sure,” she said, in what she hoped was a vague way.
“The other thing is the nuisance. They’re shooting some kind of film on this street. An American one, romantic comedy I believe. Or at least they promised no explosions, no car chases. It’s this block and the next two down. I don’t even know when they start, but it’s soon. I’m afraid you’ve walked into a zoo.”
“It could be interesting,” Fiona said. She was thinking about how Claire used to want to be a director, the way she’d recite entire scenes of Annie Hall or Clue from memory. Maybe things had changed, but the old Claire would have wanted to scope out the filming, to stand behind the barricades and watch the action.
Serge said, “This connects to the third thing.”
“There’s a third thing?”
“Oh, that’s a surprise, shush! Trust me,” Richard said, although Fiona didn’t think her skepticism had manifested on her face, “it’s a good one. A very good surprise. Listen, honey, I’m glad you’re here. I know the circumstances aren’t ideal, but it’s damn good to see you.”
“It’s good to see you too.” Really she’d never seen this version of Richard before, this markedly old version. Everyone seemed to hit old at a different point, but sometime since she’d seen him last, Richard had hit it.
It was 9:07. She sat on the floor next to where the phone was still plugged in and dialed the PI’s number. A woman picked up, speaking rapid-fire French, and Fiona panicked. “Hello?” she said, and the woman repeated herself, even faster. Fiona handed Serge the phone, a hot potato. “Allô?” Serge said, and explained that he was calling on behalf of Fiona Marcus (“Blanchard,” she corrected) and that she was here now and ready to meet. At least this was what Fiona assumed he was saying. “Bien,” he said, and then covered the mouthpiece and whispered, “What time?” Fiona shrugged helplessly, and Serge said things she didn’t understand and hung up. “Half an hour, Café Bonaparte.”
“Oh.” This was good news, great news, but Fiona didn’t feel prepared, hadn’t changed or looked in a mirror, hadn’t expected to meet the guy till the afternoon, had no idea where this café was.
“No worries. I take you on my motorbike.”
1985
Cecily and her gold Mazda were already outside the gallery when Yale arrived out of breath. It was drizzling, and he hadn’t managed an umbrella.
She said, “I brought coffee.”
So he sat there, wet, in the passenger seat, holding the hot McDonald’s cup, trying to warm himself palms-first as she drove north.
“The first thing you need to know,” Cecily said, “is that Nora’s granddaughter wants to be involved, as well as her lawyer. But there are no financial planners, which is either a gift from above or a very bad sign.”
Yale wondered how Fiona fit into it all. Presumably, the granddaughter was her cousin. No, her second cousin. Was that right?
“I’ve got music in the console.”
Yale found some classical tapes and mix tapes and both volumes of Billy Joel’s Greatest Hits, the first of which he opted for. It started in the middle of “She’s Always a Woman.”
He said, “So this could all be for nothing.”
“Well. It could always all be for nothing. There are people we spend years on, we spend a lot of money on, frankly, and in the end they give everything to some cat-spaying charity.”
“Okay, then I’ll say—the artists she mentioned, in that letter? They’re just very unlikely. Especially Modigliani. He’s kind of a red flag artist. Everyone thinks they have a Modigliani, and no one does.”
“Hmm.” She took a hand off the steering wheel to twist her earring.
“But good forgeries cost a lot of money. Forgers go after people with cash to throw away.” He didn’t want Cecily stewing for the whole trip. And, he realized, he didn’t want her to turn the car around. The make-up sex with Charlie had been good, if not worth the fighting, but he didn’t want to be home right now. He wanted to come home tomorrow afternoon, exhausted, with stories, and he wanted Charlie to be exhausted too, and he wanted Charlie to say, “Let’s get takeout,” and then Yale would say, “You read my mind,” and they’d sit on the couch eating Chinese with disposable chopsticks and watching prime time. If he came home tonight, that wouldn’t happen.
They crossed the Wisconsin border, and they passed the Mars Cheese Castle and then the brown sign for the wooded Bong Recreation Area. Yale said, “I bet frat boys steal that sign constantly.”
“What do you mean?” She’d had enough time to read it; she was looking straight at it.
“I mean, to hang in the basement. They steal stop signs. I’d think they’d want a bong sign.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Oh. It’s just a funny word.”
“Hmm.”
They bought Yoplaits and Pringles at a gas station, and Yale took over driving. He hadn’t driven much since he’d moved to the city, but he’d learned in high school, had even spent two summers delivering pizza in his father’s car—and once he figured out the clutch, everything was muscle memory. Cecily opened a folder across her lap and said, “What we’re hoping for is a flat-out bequest. She hasn’t given to the annual fund since 1970, and those were small gifts. Which, optimistically, might just mean she’s a bit of a miser. Sometimes those wind up being the largest bequests, for obvious reasons. If she’s not on top of her finances, we might aim for a percentage rather than a cash amount. People like that tend to underestimate how much they have. She thinks she has five million, leaves us one million, when actually she has seven point five, and twenty percent is a lot more.”
“But she was only—” Yale stopped, remembered to ask a question. “Why do you suppose the letter was only about the artwork?”
“It might just be what’s on her mind. Maybe she’s promised the money to her family, but doesn’t want to disperse the collection.”
She seemed to see this as only a minor inconvenience. Cecily must have been well practiced at cutting down the heirs’ chunk of an estate. It hit him that perhaps Fiona was in this old woman’s will. Hadn’t Fiona said that Nora had especially loved Nico? And wouldn’t it follow that she was fond of Fiona too?