The High Season(59)

“So when did you two meet?” Daniel asked.

“At the Memorial Day party,” Lark said. She giggled. Under the influence of champagne and wine drunk too fast, she’d turned into a teenager, half sullen, half giddy.

“I gave Doe a dare.” Then she laughed again. “Doe, a dare, a female dare!”

“It was such a great party,” Doe said. “This fish is superb.” Once she’d been at a gallery dinner in Miami and someone had said that. She’d practiced saying it later, when she was alone. This fish is superb.

    “A dare?” Daniel asked.

“To get you to take off the hoodie,” Lark said. “I let her in the house to interrupt you.”

“The house is so exquisite,” Doe said. Exquisite was another word she used to slip into conversations when she felt outclassed.

“Thank you. I always say it’s like heaven, if God had taste,” Daniel said.

“I never heard you say that,” Lark said. “It’s a little self-serving, don’t you think?”

Doe rushed in to fill the silence as Daniel shot Lark a cool look. “Anyway, I never got to you,” she said. “But she took me to lunch anyway.” She put on her brightest smile, hoping Daniel would be deflected. “Such a good cause, protecting the farms.”

Daniel passed this off with a short chopping gesture. “Doomed. And yet another big check I wrote for my daughter whose career seems to be spending my money on plants.”

“Oh, no, let’s not go there,” Lark said. “I refuse to have the career conversation now. Why can’t I just enjoy my summer?”

“Because I gave you a deadline of September first last September first. Which means you had a year to find your path.”

“I don’t see why you get to give me deadlines.”

“Because I’ve given you three years to plant flowers at that so-called farm of yours.”

“It’s not So-Called Farm, it’s Larkspur Farm—”

“It’s called fifty million dollars, that’s what it’s called.”

“It’s not like you gave me fifty million dollars, Daddy.”

“I’m on the hook for it, and that’s the same thing. You have an MFA. You had about fifteen lunches—with Aggie and Larry and Amy and everyone I could possibly line up—”

“I did the MoMA thing, I had a job at a gallery. It’s not for me, okay? All I did was make copies and file things.”

“You worked on that exhibition.”

    “Like I said, I made copies and filed things. Then I stood around in a little black dress at the opening.” Lark ate a forkful of spinach. “That gallery was bullshit. They came up with busywork for me. It was obvious they just wanted me for decoration.”

“You’re going to be twenty-seven in September and you don’t have a career.”

“So who would hire such a loser old crone anyway, Daddy?”

“Forgive me for thinking my intelligent and talented daughter should have a career.” Daniel swiveled his attention back to Doe. “Doe, tell me about your museum. How long have you worked there?”

“Two years,” Doe said. “Technically I’m part of the membership department, but I also handle all the social media. That’s my real interest.”

“Do you enjoy that?”

“Visibility is a commodity, just like everything else. So, yes. I like to get coverage for things I believe in.”

“Excellent. And what’s your big ambition?”

“World domination, of course.”

“Ambition, I love it. Did you hear that, Lark?”

“Sitting right here, Pop.”

“Tell me about the Belfry. What’s the collection like?”

“We don’t have an art collection. We have historical artifacts. Like Benedict Arnold’s buttons.”

“Buttons?” Daniel’s fork stayed in the air.

“A small historical collection. Kids love it. We also do contemporary art. There’s a project space in the barn for special exhibitions.”

“Contemporary art—that’s Lark’s big interest.”

Lark rolled her eyes and took another gulp of wine.

Before the waiter could glide in, Doe refilled her own glass with wine she would not drink, just so she could place the bottle closer to Daniel. Lark would have to reach past him to get it. “Ruthie and Tobie have done some great exhibitions. When we get a review in the Times, Ruthie bakes a cake.”

    “Is it that much of an occasion?”

“They don’t cover much regionally,” Doe said. “So, yes. We also run educational programming, classes, lectures. During the year we bus in schoolkids from all over. Ruthie started this pilot program to get underserved schools through the doors.”

“Sounds worthy, that’s great. Giving back. I heard your director—Ruth, did you say?—might be leaving.”

Doe frowned. “I don’t know. I mean, Ruthie is fantastic.” Had Mindy and Catha’s plot gone this far, that gossip had flown all the way over Peconic Bay? And since when would someone like Daniel Mantis care about someplace like the Belfry? “Anyway, it’s a terrific museum,” she said.