On Turpentine Lane(71)

“Do you even know these people?”

“I’ve met some of them. The rest are friends of friends, supposedly collectors. A couple are dealers.”

“A drink?” Nick asked me. “Mr. Frankel? You all set?”

My father answered by raising his highball glass.

“Fine. Be right back.”

“Nice fellow,” my father said, once Nick had left.

“He is. I thought that’s what this night was supposed to be about. I’d meet Tracy and you’d meet Nick.”

“Plenty of time for that.”

Did he mean plenty of time before we left or plenty of time over the course of our lives? I didn’t ask, because a woman who looked too much like Tracy to be anything but her sister was trying to get my father’s attention, shouting “Hank!” in our direction.

“Is that woman addressing you?” I asked.

“Be right there,” he told her, and to me, “She’s Tracy’s sister. I think this one’s Stephanie.”

“She’s calling you Hank.”

“Tracy started that. She likes it better than Henry.”

“Hank Frankel? That’s ridiculous.”

“We need you!” Stephanie yelled.

“Give us a minute,” I called to her. “I’m his estranged daughter.”

“That wasn’t necessary,” my father scolded. “Now I’ll have to explain that we’re not estranged and that was your idea of a joke.”

Nick was back, holding two martini glasses. “Am I interrupting something?” he asked.

“Not at all,” my father said. “I’ve been summoned. You’ll excuse me?”

“Just tell me one thing. Are you enjoying this?” I asked.

“It’s part of the job,” he said. “The schmoozing, the networking.”

“I didn’t mean that. I meant the big picture—living in apparent nouveau-riche luxury with a woman young enough—”

I stopped myself. I was brought up better than that. I was a guest in this woman’s home. Plus, Nick was looking reproachful.

“This isn’t the time or the place,” my father said. “I’ll be back as soon as I see what Stephanie wants.”

What could I say besides okay, fine, go pitch your wares?

Nick was also managing a glass plate on which sat two mini pigs in a blanket and two deviled eggs. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ve been told it’s glatt kosher.”

It was my first laugh since we’d crossed the Newton town line.



The caterer had brought a roasted chicken stuffed with prunes for the small family dinner that followed the party. As soon as we two couples were seated in a room tromp l’oeiled to resemble a gazebo, ivy enclosing us, Nick asked how the evening had gone saleswise.

“These things take time,” my father said.

“Believe me, I’ll follow up,” said Tracy.

Nick said, “It’s like in fund-raising: we plant the seeds, then we water them, tend them, and hope they bear fruit.” He winked at me. Reggie’s favorite simile.

“For whom do you fund-raise?” Tracy asked.

Wait. Tracy didn’t know where we worked? I must have started stabbing my chicken breast in a newly aggressive manner because she rushed in with “It’s for a school, right? A boarding school?” And to Nick, “This came after your walk across the country? Do I have the right sequence?”

“Wrong guy,” he said.

Tracy shot an accusatory look at my father.

“That was an ex-fiancé, you might recall,” he said.

“We work for a private day school,” I said. “Everton Country Day. I’m head of Stewardship, and Nick was just promoted to director of Development.” And to prove that I was a less self-absorbed human being than she, I asked how old her daughters were, their names, and, come to think of it, where were they this evening?

“Chloe, thirteen, and Alexis, almost ten. They’re with their father, skiing.”

I said, “Now I remember—it was the older one’s bat mitzvah that brought you and my dad into . . . contact.”

“I don’t think I know how you discovered Mr. Frankel’s work,” said Nick.

Tracy beamed. “I was at a restaurant on Beacon Hill, and I noticed they had a Matisse on the wall—not a print, but an oil painting. I called our server over, pointed, and said, ‘That Matisse? Do you know who did it?’ She said, ‘I’ll ask.’ And before we left, she came back with the manager’s business card with your father’s name and phone number written on the back with just the word artist.”

“So you called?”

“The next day! I told him how I’d been blown away by the brushwork, and asked him if he copied any Impressionists or just certain favorites, certain subjects. He said, ‘Give me a for instance,’ and I said, ‘Marc Chagall,’ and one thing led to another, especially when I mentioned that Chloe, even at twelve, was an art lover and an upcoming bat mitzvah.”

My father must have sensed that I wasn’t appreciating the pride and relish with which their storybook meeting was being narrated. He took over with a dismissive “So she came to my studio and we tossed around some ideas, and she left with a very rough sketch.”