Duma Key(135)

"Who is she really, Daddy?" Ilse asked softly. "Besides the little old lady who lives down the lane, I mean?"

I said, "According to reports, at one time she was the Sarasota art scene."

"I don't understand why that gives her the right to muck up our lungs with her cigarette smoke," Linnie said. The vertical line was returning between her brows.

Ric smiled. "Oh, ch rie, this after all the bars we-"

" This is not there, " she said, the vertical line deepening, and I thought, Ric, you may be French, but you have a lot to learn about this particular American woman.

Alice Aucoin murmured to Dario, and from his pocket, Dario produced an Altoids tin. He dumped the mints into the palm of his hand and gave Alice the tin. Alice gave it to Elizabeth, who thanked her and tapped her cigarette ash into it.

Pam watched, fascinated, then turned to me. "What does she think of your pictures?"

"I don't know," I said. "She hasn't seen them."

Elizabeth was beckoning to me. "Will you introduce me to your family, Edgar?"

I did, beginning with Pam and ending with Ric. Jack and Wireman also shook hands with Pam and the girls.

"After all the calls, I'm pleased to meet you in the flesh," Wireman told Pam.

"The same goes back to you," Pam said, sizing him up. She must have liked what she saw, because she smiled and it was the real one, the one that lights her whole face. "We did it, didn't we? He didn't make it easy, but we did it."

"Art is never easy, young woman," Elizabeth said.

Pam looked down at her, still smiling the genuine smile the one I'd fallen in love with. "Do you know how long it's been since anyone called me young woman?"

"Ah, but to me you look very young and beautiful," Elizabeth said... and was this the woman who had been little more than a muttering lump of cheese slumped in her wheelchair only a week ago? Tonight that seemed hard to believe. Tired as she looked, it seemed impossible to believe. "But not as young and beautiful as your daughters. Girls, your father is by all accounts a very talented fellow."

"We're very proud of him," Melinda said, twisting her necklace.

Elizabeth smiled at her, then turned to me. "I should like to see the work and judge for myself. Will you indulge me, Edgar?"

"I'd be happy to." I meant it, but I was damned nervous, as well. Part of me was afraid to receive her opinion. That part was afraid she might shake her head and deliver her verdict with the bluntness to which her age entitled her: Facile... colorful... certainly lots of energy... but perhaps not up to much. In the end.

Wireman moved to grasp the handles of her chair, but she shook her head. "No let Edgar push me, Wireman. Let him tour me." She plucked the half-smoked cigarette from the holder, those gnarled fingers doing the job with surprising dexterity, and crushed it out on the bottom of the tin. "And the young lady's right I think we've all had quite enough of this reek."

Melinda had the grace to blush. Elizabeth offered the tin to Rosenblatt, who took it with a smile and a nod. I have wondered since then I know it's morbid, but yes, I've wondered if she would have smoked more of it if she had known it was to be her last.

vi

Even those who didn't know John Eastlake's surviving daughter from a hole in the wall understood that a Personage had come among them, and the tidal flow which had moved toward the reception area at the sound of Mary Ire's exuberant shout now reversed itself as I rolled the wheelchair into the alcove where most of the Sunset With pictures had been hung. Wireman and Pam walked on my left; Ilse and Jack were on my right, Ilse giving the wheelchair's handle on that side little helping taps to make sure it stayed on course. Melinda and Ric were behind us, Kamen, Tom Riley, and Bozie behind them. Behind that trio came seemingly everyone else in the gallery.

I wasn't sure there would be room to get her chair in between the makeshift bar set-up and the wall, but there was, just. I started to push it down that narrow aisle, grateful that we'd at least be leaving the rest of the retinue behind us, when Elizabeth cried: " Stop! "

I stopped at once. "Elizabeth, are you all right?"

"Just a minute, honey hush."

We sat there, looking at the paintings on the wall. After a little bit, she fetched a sigh and said, "Wireman, do you have a Kleenex?"

He had a handkerchief, which he unfolded and handed to her.

"Come around here, Edgar," she said. "Come where I can see you."

I managed to get around between the wheelchair and the bar, with the bartender bracing the table to make sure it didn't tip over.

"Are you able to kneel down, so we can be face to face?"

I was able. My Great Beach Walks were paying dividends. She clutched her cigarette holder both foolish and somehow magnificent in one hand, Wireman's handkerchief in the other. Her eyes were damp.

"You read me poems because Wireman couldn't. Do you remember that?"

"Yes, ma'am." Of course I remembered. Those had been sweet interludes.

"If I were to say 'Speak, memory' to you, you'd think of the man I can't recall his name who wrote Lolita, wouldn't you?"

I had no idea who she was talking about, but I nodded.

"But there's a poem, too. I can't remember who wrote it, but it begins, 'Speak, memory, that I may not forget the taste of roses nor the sound of ashes in the wind; That I may once more taste the green cup of the sea.' Does it move you? Yes, I see it does."