“Happy to.”
“You can’t look, Rollo. You’re too fucking critical.”
“Yeah, my life story.” He took his brushes and went around to the wall on the far side, where his easel and a high stool were set up, and went to work on a still life.
Xenia lifted her brows and shook her head. She was a tiny woman, five feet tall if she went on tiptoe. Her long black hair framed her face when it was down, and fell halfway down her back. She had brown eyes that snapped and daggered, and a thin nose over strangely full lips and a delicate chin. She looked like a caricature of a little china doll, but with the temper of a coiled rattler.
They went up steps to the loft where generous street and side windows let in painter’s light. She turned on more fluorescent bulbs and pointed to an oil she was working on, a twelve-by-fourteen, on a piece of canvas that looked like it came over on the Mayflower.
“Why the ratty old canvas?” asked Bradford. “I thought this was going to be one of your good ones.”
“Look at it, weirdo.”
“It is one of your good ones. Reminds me of some of those other small portraits you did. This one of your relatives or just a good face?”
“What do you think?”
“Not a relative, for damn sure. I like it. Why are you bitching?”
“I’m always bitching.” She pushed up against him and rested her breasts on his chest, then reached up and pulled his head down and kissed him. Then he kissed her back, picked her up, and carried her to the sofa where she slept. He sat down easily and she stayed on his lap.
“You don’t feel a bit bitchy to me,” he said. “Now what’s the trouble?”
“Oh, nothing I can tell you. I thought I had four paintings like this one sold, a kind of set, different faces, same background, same general look, only different people. At the last minute the guy changed his mind and said he could sell only two of them. There go two sales. That’s enough to make me into a wild, clawing hellcat.”
“Ouch, X, I know how that hurts. Hey, I only sold three of my cheapies last month. Didn’t make enough to pay my share of the rent. Hey, I know hurt.”
She stared hard at him, her brown eyes going soft. She pecked a kiss on his cheek. “Hell, you’re only here half the time. We should cut your share of the rent on this place.”
“No way. I’m in, I can make the fee.” He lifted her off his lap, pushed her to her feet, and stood. “Hey, I need to get some work done. I saw some wild ocean lately and this small boat on it almost in trouble, just one man in it fighting for his life.”
“Go,” she said. Xenia sat back down on the cot and looked at her painting. Then she sighed, got up, and went to work on it.
“I’ll be next door when you want coffee,” Bradford said. He went across the hall and into another room with the same front view, and turned on the soft fluorescent lights. There were three partly finished oils. One on an easel, two leaning against the wall. He went to work on the oil of a fishing boat tied at the dock down near Seaport Village.
A half hour later, Xenia knocked on his door and came in. She had on the same clothes, see-through blouse and all.
“Some people came in downstairs. Rollo must be out on the sidewalk dragging them inside. Let’s take a look.”
There were six people in the small showroom. Three men soon surrounded Xenia at her paintings, looking mostly at Xenia’s breasts, and only now and then at the six paintings on display.
Bradford found a thin man with a scar on his right cheek and flaming red hair who stared pointedly at one of the moonlight-on-waves oils on display that Bradford had done over a year ago.
“I like it,” the redhead said. “Gives you the idea that there’s a lot more there we can’t see, just what the moonlight shows us in the streamer of light across the whole painting.”
He moved to the side six feet and stared at it again. “I like the waves. You have them down perfectly. Have I seen your work before?”
“This is the only place I show,” Bradford said.
“A shame. I like this one. How big is it?”
“Thirteen by twenty, a rather strange size, but I liked it.”
“Yes, the proportions are exactly right. I’ll take it. How much is it?”
“One ninety-five, but if—”
The man held up his hand and stopped him. “Young man, never cut your prices. Never. Your work is worth more than that, but I’ll pay what you ask. I may be back to look for another. I’m putting in a new restaurant bar with a marine theme. I’m trying to patronize only San Diego artists, but I can’t find everything I want. Do you have any more marines in the back room?”
“Yes, two, but they aren’t framed. One is of—”
“Bring them out. Let me take a look. Framing is no problem.”
Bradford hurried up the stairs, and took two oils he had done six months ago and never had framed. One was of a fishing boat just casting off from Seaforth sport fishing pier with twenty eager fishermen on board getting their gear ready. The other was of a wave crashing into the rocks out on the Mission Beach jetty. He took them down and held them.
The redhead nodded. “Yes, the jetty. Good. I’ll take that one too. How much do I owe you?”
Bradford was stunned. “This jetty is a hundred and fifty, so that makes three hundred and forty-five.”
The redheaded man nodded. “You shouldn’t take checks, since you have no way to clear them. I have enough cash.” He took a roll of bills from his pocket and peeled off three one hundreds, then dug a fifty out of the inside of the roll. “Here, that’s close enough. Can you wrap them up? I don’t want to get them gouged before I hang them.”
Ten minutes later the customer was gone. Only two lookers were still in the showroom, and half the wine and all of the cheese and crackers were gone. One man was talking with Xenia. He looked at her paintings and then at her breasts. She moved her shoulders so her breasts rolled, and the man laughed.
“You do a self-portrait in that blouse and I’ll buy it,” he said.
She slapped him gently. “You are bad, bad. But I kind of like it. How ’bout this nude on velvet? She’s got bigger tits than I do.”
They both laughed, and the man shook his head and walked away.
“Zippo. I struck out again,” she said. “Maybe I should cover up the boobs. They seem to draw all the attention. Maybe that blouse, the green one that shows about an inch of cleavage.”
“That might be better, but just for the shows.”
“You’re bad too. Did I see you score?”
Bradford held out the four bills for her to see.
“You lie, Brad, you lie in your teeth.”
“No lie. Two of my marines. He’s opening a new bar somewhere with a marine theme. Hope he comes back.”
Another artist, Hoya, came around from his display. He was darkly Mexican, and his paintings were almost primitive with wild blacks and oranges. “Not tonight,” he said, smiling. “Maybe next week. I’m out of here.”
At ten they shut off the lights. Rollo went home. Xenia was the only one of the six artists who lived upstairs.
“Come on up,” she said to Bradford. “Want a beer?”
They popped the tops and sat and looked at the paintings. Bradford kept looking at her work in progress. “I like it,” he said. “It has that Rembrandt feeling without being so stodgy. The colors are muted and faded almost. Yes, I like it. How much do you charge for a near-master like that?”
“Twenty thousand,” she said, her eyes sparkling.
“Sure, and I just sold two for fifty grand each. Sorry, I had no right to ask.”
“Hey, big-selling painter. What’s the chances of my getting laid tonight?”
“I’d say pretty fucking good.”