“A friend came by the next morning and knocked on the door. He said there had been an accident, and he’d come around praying we hadn’t taken the Twentieth Century Limited. Showed me a copy of the newspaper saying it had crashed, fallen into a river, many killed. No mention of Felix or Levon. A few days later I got word that the paintings were all gone, that Levon and Felix were dead.” She paused. “Everything I loved was lost.”
“What did you do?”
“I wandered about, out of my mind with grief, blaming myself. They had done so much for me, taken risks, and paid with their lives. I had to get out of town, get away from everything that reminded me of Levon. I put on a pair of trousers and one of Levon’s old jackets. He used to talk about how he’d dressed his sister like a boy when they were driven out of their village, back in eastern Turkey. Dressed as a man, I felt safe traveling alone. The jacket still smelled like Levon.”
“That’s when you became Totto?”
“Yes. Since I’d already tried on a new identity with Clyde, what was one more? This way, no one could find me and start asking questions about Levon. I could simply disappear, leave my fury behind me.” A wisp of a smile showed, briefly. “I ended up teaching art back in Arizona, where I grew up, eventually settling in an old mining town called Jerome.”
“Did you paint?”
“No. Never again. But I stayed tuned in to the art world. I’d get the auction catalogs from New York in the mail, subscribed to all the magazines. Watched as the brilliant few of our contemporaries hit it big. I read that the Grand Central School of Art had been closed, abandoned. Last summer, I saw the listing for The Siren.”
“Wait, just last summer? When did you come to New York?”
“In September.”
Virginia remembered Doris calling Totto the “newbie.” She’d assumed it meant he’d been working there for, say, sixteen years, versus Doris’s seventeen. Not six months. The combination of Totto’s advanced age and Grand Central expertise had thrown her. “Seeing your work up for auction must’ve been a shock.”
“I went to a canyon and screamed until my voice was hoarse. It was mine, but how to prove it? No one would believe me. Then I remembered the watercolor, how I’d tucked it on top of the storage cabinet and forgotten about it. I had to come back, see if it was still there. It wasn’t. When I saw the crates, I figured maybe it had been put away and began working my way through them on my lunch hour. I wasn’t going to give up until I’d scoured every one.”
“Why did you leave it up on top of the cabinet in the first place?”
“That was where I stored most of my work, after the students had cleared out for the day. I didn’t want the director to know I was painting for myself during class. At the time, I didn’t think anything of it. The oil was painted later, away from the school. Where did you find the watercolor?”
“Behind the storage cabinet. One corner was sticking out; we must have knocked it from its hiding place when we . . .”
“We what?”
Virginia was certain she was turning the color of rhubarb. “I was up here with a man.”
“I see.” Clara muttered under her breath. “The type of woman who’s only good when she’s on her back.”
“It was from behind, actually.” She couldn’t believe she just said that.
One corner of Clara’s mouth lifted, a dint of humor.
“Anyway, that blue color caught my eye. Why didn’t you just look behind the cabinet in the first place?”
“I tried. Damn thing is anchored to the wall, there’s no light, no way to tell.” She threw up her hands. “For God’s sake, have I proven to you that I’m the artist? That I’m Clyde or Clara Darden or whoever else you want me to be?”
She had no doubt of Clara’s story.
But even though Virginia had discovered the painting, she’d also surrendered it.
Clara took Virginia’s silence for doubt. “Follow me.” They walked deeper into the art school, down the long hallway. At each room, Clara narrated a story. About her first illustration class, the students, the art exhibits. New York during the 1920s came to life through her words, Clara’s eyes sometimes blazing with anger, other times wet with tears. The school truly was full of ghosts. Virginia imagined them streaming through the hallway, whispering between easels.
Clara pointed to one of the bigger studios. “This is where Levon used to teach. I took his class once, on a dare.”
“What was Levon like?”
“Passionate, sometimes bullheaded. Always engaged with whoever was in front of him. He’d suffered terribly as a child.”
“And Oliver?”
“Privileged. Beautiful and knew it. He supported me early on. Without him I might not have made it as far as I did, but he made sure I remembered that. He thought he could live out a life of an artist through me, I think, and resented my success.”
“How did you get the job at the information booth?” They circled back toward the entrance.
“I knew someone who knew Terrence.” Clara stopped in the small foyer. “How much do you want for it?”
“For what?”
“The watercolor.”
“No, that’s not it. I don’t want your money. You should have it; it’s yours, rightfully so.”
“What have you been doing with it, shopping around for the highest bidder?”
“No. I wanted to find out more about it, about you. Over the past couple of years I’ve lost so much, and the watercolor gave me hope that eventually I’d be okay. I know that sounds strange. But I loved it.”
“Loved?” She leaned forward. “Why past tense?”
“Well, that’s the tricky part. I don’t have it. It’s with the Lorettes.”
“Irving Lorette?”
“Irving and Hazel. I was told to talk to them. They said they were going to get an expert at the MoMA to examine it.”
“And?”
“They lied, and now they won’t give it back.”
Clara’s entire body went rigid. “Bastards. What were you thinking, giving it up like that?”
“I have no idea how the art world works. I assumed they were doing the right thing.”
“You fool.”
Virginia’s defenses rose. “It certainly didn’t help matters, you sending me threatening notes. I was terrified. You tried to come after me in the school that one time, right? When I ran out the door?”
“I came in to try to figure out where on earth you’d found it, then realized someone else was already in here. What you heard was me trying to hide inside one of the closets.”
How ridiculous. “We were frightened of each other!”
“This isn’t some zany comedy. It’s not funny.”
“No kidding. You had some guy mug me at knifepoint and try to steal the watercolor.” Virginia grew indignant at the memory. “I could’ve been killed. You should know that right after that terrifying incident, I handed it over to the Lorettes, happy to be rid of it, at least temporarily. So it’s partially your fault they have it now. Why on earth did you do that?”
“I watched as you waited in line at the Lost and Found, then didn’t follow through. I offered the guy twenty bucks to follow you and grab the portfolio case. I didn’t know he had a knife. I didn’t want you to get hurt.”
For a moment, the two stood off against each other. Until Clara hung her head. “It’s all lost. Again. Without that watercolor, Clara Darden is just a footnote to history. If that. Levon gets to be celebrated and revered. I loved him, but nothing has changed, almost fifty years later.” She leaned back on the wall, all fight drained away, fighting back tears. “You ruined it all, you meddling, ignorant fool.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
March 1975
Clara should have never come back. She felt like a paper-thin shell of a person. An apparition, sitting in this abandoned art school. Better yet, a relic, just like the dried-up paint cans and brittle brushes.