A small vase of flowers sat on it, a framed photograph of Justine, ten years or so back when she looked a little like Whitney Houston, but she’d put on weight since then and her pretty face had filled out. It made Haile glad.
A neat leather blotter was on the desk, and a silver letter opener and an old, tired-looking computer terminal that was out of keeping with the rest of the modern décor. Again she pulled open each of the drawers in the desk, hastily rummaging through them before closing them again and turning her head back at the door every few seconds. That damn curator was out there again, pontificating over the painting. She remembered the way Christopher used to talk about the world of art to her, explaining images and themes and schools in paintings. Renaissance; Dutch; fête galante; impressionist; cubist; surrealist; Native American; the symbolists and precisionists such as Georgia O’Keeffe and Charles Sheeler, whom Christopher had particularly liked. He used to make her feel so good, made her feel intelligent, despite her lack of education, made her feel there might be a whole new, rich dimension to her life.
Then it was snatched away from her, and she went straight back to who she had always been, Haile Patchett, trailer trash from Brooksville, Florida-Home of the Tangerine! Only now she was a decade older, on a downward spiral, making money as an escort, pickpocketing her clients-her tricks-when she could, funding a constant and ever more expensive battle to keep her looks. How long would she be able to maintain the image before the cracks became too large to conceal?
She continued fishing through the desk’s middle drawer. It was full of papers. For a successful woman, Justine was pretty disorganized. But underneath all that was a file. Haile pulled it out, placed it on top of the desk, and opened it.
Then she heard the creak of the door and a furious voice behind her. “Just what the hell do you think you are doing?”
Justine Olegard.
Shit!
Haile grabbed the file and held it to her chest.
“I asked you a question.” Justine glared at her. “What are you doing in my office?”
“Nothing.” Haile shrugged.
“Nothing? What’s that in your hand?” Justine stepped forward and put out her hand. Haile held on to the file, refusing to let go. She couldn’t let Justine have it. Not now, not after all she’d done.
Justine lurched forward, trying to grab it out of Haile’s hand. “Give me that!”
Haile quickly moved back and stumbled, dropping the folder and its contents. She managed to avoid falling by grabbing the edge of the modernist coffee table, knocking over books and a small ceramic sculpture of a tall, thin, elongated man, which skidded to the floor and shattered.
Justine stood still for a moment, then said quietly “That was a Giacometti study. It’s priceless.”
She dropped to her knees and started picking up the broken shards, practically in tears. “Just get the hell out of here,” she said, shaking her head.
Too many people here. Too much stuff. Too many memories banging around in her head and none of them good. Belle had been trying her best, but she didn’t really do crowds; big gatherings made her nervous. She preferred the peace and quiet of her studio, the isolated life of an artist. She looked around: faces, so many of them familiar, but all of them were in little groups talking, and right now she didn’t have the energy or the courage to interrupt them.
Belle drained her wine, put down the glass, and scanned the crowd for the one man she was looking for. Tony Olsen. She walked directly over to him and said, “Mr. Olsen, I need you to do something for me.”
Olsen smiled. “Of course, Belle. Anything.”
“I need you to open the case housing my painting… Rosemary’s wishes.”
“Why would you want me to do that?”
“Please, Mr. Olsen. I promise you’ll understand as soon as you open the display case.” He stood a moment as if considering what to do, then Belle watched as he located Alex Hultgren and walked out of the room with him. A few minutes later both men reappeared and together with Belle went to the small oval room where Waves 27 hung.
Olsen unlocked the display case and opened the glass door.
“Please take the painting down, Mr. Olsen.”
“But I promised Rosemary it would never come down. Would you mind telling me what this is about, Belle?”
“Please. I also made a promise to Rosemary. Please do as I ask.”
Olsen carefully unhooked the painting from the wall. Belle pulled out a small Swiss Army knife, took hold of the painting, and before Olsen could object, sliced open the thick fabric backing of the frame. A Moleskine notebook fell from the interior.
“What is it?” Olsen asked.
Belle didn’t answer. She handed him the painting and opened the notebook to the first page, her hands shaking so much she could barely hold it. Then she turned pages, staring at the handwriting of her friend Rosemary Thomas, crushing away tears with her lashes.
She wasn’t even aware that Olsen had moved beside her watching as she flicked through the pages to the last entry. August 22, 2000. Ten years ago. The entry had been written the day before Belle had stood in the viewing room and had seen her friend laid out to die.
Belle had recently read that the death rows in U.S. prisons were known as cemeteries for the living. It was true. Rosemary had been dead for all of those months with the lethal-injection sentence hanging over her, as each of her appeals fell over, in turn.
Tony Olsen started making his way back to where the rest of the guests were assembled; Belle closed the notebook and followed. She couldn’t stop the pictures in her mind. Seeing Rosemary strapped down, wrists and ankles and chest, and how they had opened the curtains so that the witnesses to the execution could watch the deadly injection being administered. All of it came back to Belle now in hideous detail, the botched first attempt, those curtains being opened and closed, opened and closed, and the look on Rosemary’s face.
She could remember every moment of the long night before: Rosemary’s last night.
Rosemary had always been composed, almost regal in her bearing, but the stress had lined her face and stooped her shoulders. She’d sat in her orange prison tunic and white sneakers in the small cell, with no window and the CCTV camera ever watching her, and despite it all maintained her dignity to the very end. Belle could see Rosemary now, working away in a frenzy on the diary, writing that last entry.
When she had finished, they spoke for a while and she had held Belle’s hand, and finally she said, “Belle, let’s not talk anymore. Just sit with me.” And then: “Just make me one last promise. I want you to keep the diary. Those I’ve written about will know what it means. But I don’t want any of it coming out until after Leila and Ben are old enough. Do you understand? In my will, I’ve asked for a memorial service on the tenth anniversary of my death. That’s when I want you to read it, at the service, not before. Will you promise me that?”
Belle had promised.
Now she glanced at the diary, rubbed a finger over the leather cover and the pages as if to make sure it was real. She looked down again at the pages of that last entry. She remembered Rosemary cursing when her ballpoint pen ran out of ink and how Belle had to rummage in her purse to find another for her. Belle could see that place where it had happened, that change in color in the ink, from blue to black, now.
When she reached the reception area, she saw Tony Olsen going around the room, whispering into the ears of some of the guests. Silence took hold of the room as the chatter slowly died away. Eventually it seemed as if someone had hit a freeze-frame button on the event. Every single person in the room had stopped talking and was looking at her. Or, more accurately, at the object she was holding in her hand.