Gone

FOURTEEN

TOO STUBBORN TO ASK NATHAN TO EXPLAIN HIS REMARK about Olivia Seasons’s paintings, I remained silent as I followed my friend out the private entrance, past the orchid house, then into a one-room studio that felt smaller because its windows were shuttered.

“See?” Nathan said, pulling the door closed. “She didn’t want anyone peeking in here. That alone should tell you something.”

I didn’t reply. In appearance and mood, the studio was the polar opposite of the orderly rooms where Olivia lived. It was a chaos of color and canvases, most of them stretched on frames, several sitting unfinished on easels, many more hanging limp as animal skins, tacked as a patchwork mosaic on every wall. The space had a nice odor of linseed oil and wood, but it did nothing to disperse the atmosphere of shadows and secrecy.

Voice low, Nathan said, “Personally, I think she’s pretty freakin’ good. The orchid stuff, she was copying Georgia O’Keeffe, that’s obvious. But her original stuff-it looks pretty recent-she’s a troubled girl, but she’s got talent. You mind if I take some shots to show Darren?”

I shook my headno and hissed, “Shush!” which froze Nate where he stood.

For more than a minute, I stood motionless, letting my eyes adjust, allowing details to come into my head without seeking anything in particular. Even in silence, the room echoed with Olivia’s presence, a frantic energy that had been trapped inside these four walls even as she, using paint and brushes, had sought to escape from… from… from what in my soul I felt to be the truth… or at least suspected was true.

Even so, I tried to comfort myself with answers that were easier, less personal. Had Olivia painted such sensual, potent images to escape the captivity of her father’s home? His wealthy friends? Escape the boredom of a life that provided her with everything yet demanded nothing?

Yes. That was an important point-a separate truth that had not yet registered in my heart because such an existence was outside my experience. Growing up wealthy, I realized in that instant, was dangerous for an outsider like Olivia-as it would have been for me. It might be a clear advantage for women who grew comfortably into their own skins, who inherited confidence as naturally as I’d inherited size 10 feet. But for a young girl who was awkward and shy, wealth might rob her of the need to fit in with the outside world, as well as the strength and gradual courage required to strike out on her own, and make a living.

Beside me, Nathan asked softly, “You okay?” He was asking for permission to at least move, if not talk.

I nodded. “I needed some time, that’s all. I didn’t expect this.”

“There’s nothing crude about her work,” Nathan, the boyfriend of an artist said, defending an artist I already empathized with more than he would ever understand. “They’re impressionistic… sensual,” he added. “Sure, obviously sexual, too. Lots of frustration… maybe even rage. You think?”

No-I knew but didn’t reply. When Olivia was done painting orchids, banyan trees became her subject. No, her obsession-there were dozens of photographs tacked up on the easels and walls, mostly close-up shots, which reflected the microview she painted from. Whole canvases devoted to a cluster of leaves or a single muscled bough. Banyans are unlike other trees in that they claim increasing amounts of ground around their trunks by dropping air roots to support the weight of their limbs. After many decades, a banyan tree resembles a luxurious mound of green that sits on an acre of poles-a visual mix of masculine and feminine that Olivia recognized and had used.

In her paintings, a lone branch resembled legs partially spread, a single leaf created a feminine triangle. A buttressed trunk had the muscularity of a strong man’s thigh, a dangling root thick as a hawser was so unmistakably phallic that it caused me to turn away but also sparked inside my abdomen a familiar burn that had been with me off and on for the last several days.

“Before the gym rat came along, you say, she dated only one other guy?” Nathan was following me as I moved around the room, which was irritating because I had to guard how I reacted to a painting or risk one of his all-too-accurate gibes.

“Gym rat?” I said, then realized he meant Ricky Meeks. “There was a guy a few years ago who got her into cocaine, but he didn’t last. She was smart enough to dump a loser like that and move on.”

“She’s about the same age as us?”

I replied, “A year younger, born in late May.”

“God help us,” Nate said. “One Gemini hunting for another Gemini-there’s four times the chance you’ll both end up lost. And she’s dateless and single just like you.”

“Mr. Seasons isn’t paying you to crack jokes,” I answered with a chill. “He’s paying us to find his niece. A fact you might consider is how careful someone like Olivia has to be when it comes to men. I’m referring to these paintings, how it might explain her frustrations. Do men want her for who she is? Or are they only after her money?”

“From what I’ve heard so far,” Nathan replied, “it’s neither. No wonder she ran off with the first guy who came along.”

“Stop being mean,” I shot back. “We don’t know for sure she’s with Ricky Meeks. Or that it happened like you’re saying.”

“Bull crap. She’s with him, and you know it. Look around the room-that girl had so much sexual tension built up, I’ll bet she went shooting out of here like a balloon.”

I faced Nate, hands on hips, and squared my shoulders. “So what! Even if she’s with him, Olivia didn’t leave with a man like him because she wanted to. She’s got her own mind and she’s too smart. He drugged her or forced her, or something. I’ll bet you money on that.”

Nathan smiled and was remarking on my protective attitude but then stopped and squinted at me, his bald Buddha head shining. “Why’s your face flushed? It’s not hot in here. And it’s not because you’re mad.” His smile broadened while his face swiveled from me to the painting of the engorged dangling root I had been ignoring but was still close enough to see from the corner of my eye. “Hannah,” he said finally, straight-faced, “I think you’ve found your soul mate. Good news is, he’s hung like a fire hose and won’t leave the lid up. Bad news is, he’s a freakin’ tree.”

I started to say something sharp in reply but then began laughing. Couldn’t help myself because of the boyish look of innocence on Nate’s face that was pure fakery but also reminded me of our school years when he had been puny and I’d backed down more than one bully who was tormenting him.

“You’re a mess,” I said. “Go wait in the truck and play video games,” then gave him a shove to clear my path. I had noticed another garbage bag in the corner and wanted to have a look.

Several minutes later, Nathan was asking, “What’d you find? What are you reading? From the look on your face… Hey, you want me to call the cops?”

I had found the missing entries to Olivia’s journal, ten detailed pages crumpled into a ball so tight that only a strong man could have done it. Much of it was written in her shorthand code, which would take me a while to decipher. “Quiet,” I replied, then nodded to the contents of the bag, part of which I’d dumped onto the floor. “Take a look. There’s a balled-up canvas in there, too. Why would she throw away her own paintings?”

Even before Nate had gotten the canvas spread out on a desk, I recognized the charcoal curves of a man’s broad bare shoulders and a face that was featureless but for two ears like spiked horns, a spit curl, and a wolfish leer.

“He didn’t let her finish it,” I said, feeling a building anger, “because Olivia was painting the truth about who he is-not just what her eyes saw.”

Nathan replied, “You wanted proof they’re together. I guess this is it.”

The same might be true of the missing pages I’d found, but I needed time alone to decipher the girl’s shorthand. “We shouldn’t be in here,” I said, “she wouldn’t like it. Where’s the screwdriver? You need to fix that hasp.”

Nate did it while I moved the sickly orchid from Olivia’s bedroom to the orchid house, where the air was dripping hot on this June afternoon but still felt fresher than the studio where the missing girl had locked away her secrets.

I was so preoccupied with what we’d seen and found, we were halfway home before I took a break from the missing pages and checked my messages. There was one from Gabby Corrales, asking me to call about tomorrow night’s party; several from Loretta, who was swearing, she was so mad, the neighbors had hired a backhoe to destroy the rest of the Indian mound; and one from Cordial Pallet that provided some hopeful news.

“An old fishing partner of his knows where Ricky Meeks fuels his boat!” I told Nathan, who was driving.

“Where?”

I said, “At a little marina near Marco Island,” but was thinking, Just like Mr. Seasons hinted at to begin with.

“The Ten Thousand Islands?” Nate said. “Did he name a place? The area’s huge.”

I was thumbing numbers into my phone. “That’s what I’m going to find out right now.”