“Why Adelina Beach? Why not Hollywood or Beverly Hills?”
“Adelina Beach is adjacent to L.A. It has all the advantages of being close to the city but it has a reputation as an art town. The best and most exclusive galleries in Southern California have shops there. It’s the place to be for someone like me, an artist trying to establish a career.”
“I will miss you so much,” Lyra said. Tears filled her eyes.
“It’s not as if I’m moving to New York or the moon,” Vivian said. “You can come and see me as often as you like. All you have to do is get on the train. And I will come back to San Francisco on holidays and birthdays.”
“I know, but it won’t be the same.” Lyra used the sleeve of her robe to wipe her eyes. She managed a shaky smile. “But I will admit I have always wanted to see Hollywood.”
“We will tour Hollywood together the first time you come to visit me.”
Lyra’s visits had occurred with increasing frequency in the past several months. She had loved the sun and the beach and she had enjoyed acting as an assistant in the studio. Aware of Vivian’s financial circumstances—Gordon Brazier had followed through with his threat to cut off all funding—Lyra invariably showed up at the beach house with a gift of a new dress or a fashionable hat. Vivian’s mother had recovered from her initial emotional reaction and had begun to send lavish presents—shoes, jewelry, or a smart new handbag.
The result was that Vivian possessed a rather extensive wardrobe for a struggling photographer.
She pushed aside a new tennis outfit—unworn—and settled on what she had decided to make her signature professional style—a pair of black slacks with wide, flowy legs, a black silk blouse, and a jaunty little turquoise scarf. Square-toed, stacked-heel shoes fashioned of perforated black patent leather finished the look.
She crossed the bedroom to the dressing table and brushed her shoulder-length whiskey-brown hair so that it fell in deep waves. Next she uncapped her new crimson lipstick. There would be no hat and no gloves today. Hats and gloves were too formal, too traditional. She was an artist. She had to project the right image—that of a modern, unconventional woman; a free spirit. A woman who did not conform to the rules.
She had concluded early on that in art photography, as in every other area of life, looking the part was 75 percent of the challenge. Most of the rest involved the same quality it took to walk boldly past a police line armed with only her Speed Graphic—attitude.
Chapter 4
At precisely one o’clock that afternoon she stood in the back room of the Penfield Gallery trying to conceal her tension, afraid to let herself get too hopeful. Fenella Penfield was acknowledged as a force of nature in the Southern California art world. Her verdicts were treated as law by serious collectors and fashionable members of the public.
At the moment, she was bent over the first of the three prints Vivian had brought to show her. She studied it for a long moment and then straightened abruptly.
“Forget the landscape,” Fenella said. She pushed the picture of the storm-tossed Pacific aside as if it were yesterday’s newspaper. “It’s dramatic enough but unless you’re Ansel Adams, no one is interested in landscapes. They’re inherently boring.”
Vivian winced inwardly but she had been brought up in the hothouse social world of San Francisco. She knew how to conceal strong emotions. There was no point arguing about the marketability of the picture. It was Fenella Penfield’s gallery, after all. Her opinion was the only one that mattered.
Penfield was in her mid-thirties, a tall, thin, angular woman with a razor-sharp profile and the tight face of a dedicated smoker. She wore her dark hair in a severe chignon that emphasized her dramatically made-up eyes. She clearly relished the process of savaging the delicate feelings of vulnerable artists. She was well aware that she could make or break a career and seemed to believe that she had a divinely inspired mission to purify the art world.
The Penfield Gallery was located in a fashionable shopping district. The area had once been an exclusive neighborhood of large, two-story homes built in the Spanish colonial style. Fenella knew how to cater to her wealthy clientele. She always took care to park her elegant red Duesenberg directly in front of the entrance. The expensive vehicle, with its long lines and miles of gleaming chrome, was a visible symbol of class and luxury. It might as well have spelled out the message Don’t Even Think of Entering This Gallery Unless You Are Rich in neon letters. The upscale tone was carried through to the grand entrance and the stark white-walled showroom.
The back room of the gallery looked as if it had once been part of a grand reception hall designed to host large parties and social gatherings. Unlike the showroom in front, however, it was a typical gallery back room. Vivian had seen enough of them in the course of showing her portfolio to know. Framed and unframed paintings were stacked against the walls. Cartons and crates were piled on the floor. Large sculptures loomed in the shadows. The workbenches were littered with framing tools and materials.
At the rear of the shop a handsome staircase led upstairs to a balcony that ran the width of the room. There were more pictures and boxes stacked on that level.
Vivian understood why clients were impressed with the Penfield Gallery and she could certainly appreciate the smart marketing. But she had been raised in a wealthy household, a home filled with genuine Old World antiques, fine carpets, and beautifully polished furniture. It took a lot more than a handsome car out front and the severe, ultramodern décor of the showroom to impress her.
Fenella contemplated the image of the Adelina Beach pier in the morning light. An aging, dust-coated Ford was parked near the beach. A man and a woman stood next to the vehicle, gripping the hands of their two small, barefoot children. Everything about the couple radiated a mix of exhaustion and resolute determination. The children were wide-eyed and excited by the sight of the ocean.
It was clear that the family had not come to California on a vacation. They were there for the same reasons so many others had made the journey. Whatever lay behind them was worse than the uncertainty of their future in the West. They had come to find a new start; a new life.
“I call it Finding California,” Vivian said.
The photo had been entirely unscripted. She had come across the family on her way home after selling a late-night murder scene to Eddy at the Adelina Beach Courier. The sight of the weary family gazing out at the pier and the horizon beyond had made her pull over to the curb. The couple had agreed to let her take the picture. Afterward she had given them the twenty dollars she had just collected for the crime scene shots. They had acted as if it was a small fortune.
“I’m not the Farm Security Administration,” Fenella announced. “I have no interest in hanging pictures designed to promote Mr. Roosevelt’s New Deal.” She tossed the photo aside. “Besides, everyone who arrives in California on Route Sixty-Six takes a picture of the beach and the pier. I was hoping you would have something more interesting to show me.”