The Latecomer, page 43
“What?”
“I’m telling Lewyn about the Rizzoli drawings,” Stella said. “Not just a film subject.”
“Oh no?” I said.
“They met because of the Rizzolis,” said Ephraim. “At the Outsider Art Fair.”
“Re-met,” his mother corrected. “I’d already begun working on Rizzoli, though there wasn’t much to film. I’d found a couple of people who’d known him, but there wasn’t a lot of expertise around. Even as a concept, Outsider Art was brand-new, and frankly, at that time, there was only room for one artist.”
“Henry Darger?” Lewyn asked.
Stella sighed.
“Who’s Henry Darger?” I said.
“The Pelé of Outsider Art,” Lewyn said. When I looked blank he added: “The soccer player everyone’s heard of even if they don’t know anything else about soccer.”
“Oh. Well, I’ve never heard of him. Either of them.”
“I loved that your father bought the Rizzolis from the dealer. Certainly there wasn’t any financial upside, absolutely no prospects at all for Rizzoli back then. When I saw the rest of the art he’d collected I really understood what an outlier Rizzoli was, for him. I know he did that for me, so I’d have access to the pictures. And because they were right here, right up the street, I was able to film every piece in detail, which has really been a godsend since I haven’t laid eyes on them since 2001.” She paused. “I asked her for them. Your mother. While we were working on our agreement. Actually, I begged her for them. Not just because of my film. They were a part of my story with your father. Finally, she said she didn’t have them and didn’t know where they were, and if I brought them up again she would terminate our negotiations and I could move out of the house. I didn’t believe her, of course. That she didn’t know. But I had to let it go. I’d already spent a year with a lawyer I couldn’t afford, and I was exhausted and in debt. I loved the Rizzolis, but I didn’t need to own them. I needed to own this house.” Ephraim put his hand over hers. Stella nodded. “I don’t know if your mother understood what those pictures represented to me, or if it was simply because I was asking for them. But I do know that it became something really painful for her, and I felt terrible about that. We were both grieving, and we were both angry. But when Salo was alive, those pictures were in the warehouse, and after I asked for them they apparently were not. Or so I was told.”
“They’re not there,” Lewyn interjected. “We looked, just this morning. And in all the years I’ve worked in that building, I’ve never seen a single piece that matches the pictures I saw online, let alone an entire collection. I would absolutely give them to you if I could. But I don’t know where they are.”
“Harrison does,” I said.
All of them looked at me.
“He does. He wouldn’t tell me. But he does. Mom does, too. I mean, if Harrison knows, Mom knows.”
“Well,” Stella said, after a moment, “after the film airs on PBS, a lot of people will want to see those pictures. Maybe they’ll be more willing to comply with the museum’s request than they were to mine.”
“I don’t think they’ll be willing,” I said. “I think it will take something more. I think we’ll need to come up with something else.”
And we began to work out what that something else might be.
33
Tabula Rasa
In which it is established, once and for all, that Oppenheimer is not a particularly common name
I dressed up a bit for my appointment at Rochelle Steiner’s law firm, which was on Madison Avenue and Forty-Fourth Street, right around the corner from the Cornell Club, where she had once climbed onto a chartered bus, chosen a seat next to the toilet, and set a number of complicated, long-ranging things into motion. It was a general law firm, and it looked to be evenly balanced in terms of women and men, which might have been one of the reasons Rochelle picked it (and after Harvard Law, a clerkship for a New York State Supreme Court judge, and the obvious fact that she was ridiculously good at practicing law, she probably had her pick of attractive options). A woman showed me into the office one afternoon a couple of weeks later, and from the beginning it didn’t go as I’d planned. Which is not to say that it went badly. Just … not as planned.
“Phoebe Oppenheimer,” said Rochelle Steiner. She got up from behind her desk. “Well.”
I’d been doing pretty much everything I could do to seem older than seventeen, from the go-to-work skirt I’d bought for an internship at Wurttemberg the summer before junior year to the mascara swipe, and I was instantly thrown, but I did my best to crawl back into the saddle. “Hi, my name is Phoebe.”
“Yes. Phoebe Oppenheimer. Like it says here on your file. Which my assistant prepared for me when you made your appointment.” Rochelle held it up: a generic red folder, with a name on the label: Oppenheimer, Phoebe. “You’ll recall that you gave my assistant your name.”
I nodded. Exactly thirty seconds in and I was bested. No longer trying to seem older than seventeen, now I was trying to seem older than ten.
“Yes.”
I took the seat Rochelle Steiner was pointing at. The desk between us was wide and covered with an old-fashioned blotter, which made no sense given the oversized iMac desktop weighing it down. The walls were not crowded, the better to focus on her college and law school diplomas in oversized frames, and a photograph of a very young Rochelle, standing beside a woman in a sleeveless yellow dress.
“I used to know a couple of people named Oppenheimer,” Rochelle was saying.
“Oh? Well, it’s a common name.”
Rochelle threw her head back and howled with laughter. It was so surprising I could only stare at her.
“I’m certainly not falling for that one again,” she said, after a moment. “Phoebe Oppenheimer. Sister of Sally and Lewyn, I presume. And that other one, from Fox News. What a shanda.”
I could not disagree, so I said nothing.
“The last time I saw you was on a beach on Martha’s Vineyard. September 10, 2001. A hard date to forget.”
“I’m afraid I’ve forgotten it. Given I was in diapers at the time.”
“I’m sorry. And your father. I’m so sorry about that. I shouldn’t be cavalier. Even before what happened the next day it was already awful and surreal. In fact, you might have been the only member of your family I didn’t loathe when I left your house that night.” She stopped. She looked intently at me. “Wait. Do you even know what I’m talking about?”
“I know enough,” I said. “There’s been a lot of Come-to-Jesus in my family over the past month or so. Oppenheimers, as I think you might know, are not natural sharers of information. I figure I’ve got a few more months to get them sorted out before I take off.”
Rochelle raised her eyebrows. “Where are you going?”
“Oh God.” I shook my head. “Not you, too! We just met!”
“I meant … well I guess you’re going to college. I wasn’t asking where.”
“Sorry,” I told her. “Little sensitive.”
Then, without any forethought, at least on my part, the two of us smiled at each other.
I hadn’t been shown a college-era photograph of the woman on the other side of the desk, so I would not be in a position to appreciate the transformation until later, but it was impressive. Rochelle Steiner was still short and still thin, but she no longer looked like a middle schooler trying to pass for a grown-up. The wavy hair she had once braided into submission now landed where it fell, mainly in curls, and the complexion that had stubbornly clung to adolescence had at last moved on. Rochelle wore a simple wool dress and not a single piece of jewelry or lick of makeup. She looked as if it took her about four minutes to get herself dressed in the morning.
“So. Phoebe Oppenheimer. How may I help you today? I doubt you are having an intellectual property issue, and I certainly hope you’re not filing for divorce. Which leaves me with what you told my assistant when you set up the appointment.” Rochelle held up the folder again, then opened it. A single blank sheet of paper was clipped inside. “Tabula rasa.”
I sat forward in my chair. “We’re having—my brother and I are having—a family issue.”
“Which brother? You have two, I seem to recall. One of them lied to me from the moment we met, the other, as I said, I barely knew, but I still want to smack him.”
“You and me both,” I agreed. “Actually, I have three brothers, not two. Which may or may not be relevant. I brought you this.”
I reached into my bag and handed Rochelle Steiner a copy of the letter from the American Folk Art Museum. (The original I had finally delivered to our mother the day after I’d seen Harrison. I had to, since he was obviously going to tell her about it.) When the lawyer finished reading it, she said: “Yes?”
“These artworks were once a part of our father’s collection. They were kept in a warehouse in Brooklyn which my father purchased in the early 1980s. The rest of his art collection is still there, but these particular works have disappeared. Lewyn and I believe that our mother removed them, sometime around 2002, 2003.”
“Well, that’s certainly her right. Unless your father specified otherwise, his surviving spouse is the default heir to his estate. Is that the case?”
I nodded.
“Then they’re her property. She can move them, store them, throw them in the Hudson River if she wants. I hope she hasn’t, it sounds like they’re important, and probably valuable. But there’s no legal issue.”
“We also believe that our father intended them not to be included in his collection. We think he meant them to go to someone else. A woman he was involved with.”
Rochelle raised her eyebrows. “Well, I’m sorry to hear that. Sudden deaths often create this kind of difficulty. Things that don’t get settled while the person is alive, or they’re kept secret and have to come out eventually. Learning about the deceased person this way, it’s got to be very painful for you. And …” she added, “your brother.”
“Well, it’s been a process. What would you advise us to do?”
“Do?” Rochelle sat up. “I’d advise you to talk to your mother. It’s the only thing you can do.”
“But I have,” I said. “Weeks ago. She insisted she knew nothing about it. Refused to discuss it further.”
“Well, I’m no therapist, and I don’t even know you, but I have to say, I’m surprised you’d take that without a fight. Talk to her again. Tell her you won’t let her off until you understand what it means. Tell her if she’s trying to protect you, she can stop. Tell her that if she’s trying to be vindictive, she should stop for her own sake. You could tell her you love her, too. That might accomplish more than anything else, since you’re the youngest and, as you put it, about to ‘take off.’ You’d be amazed. A lot of intractable issues suddenly become very pliable when people start telling other people they love them. Assuming it’s true, of course.”
I thought about it. It was true. Of course it was true. Only just at the moment it had gotten lost behind a couple of other truths. After a moment I said: “Can I ask you something?”
“Keep it short,” Rochelle smiled.
“Are you married?”
Rochelle didn’t say anything right away. I could tell that she was weighing a kaleidoscope of potential implications as they slipped in and out of position. “I was,” Rochelle finally said. “I’m not. Now.”
“Huh.”
We sat in less than comfortable silence.
“It’s a personal question,” Rochelle Steiner said.
“Yes, and I appreciate your answering it. Why did you, by the way? Answer it. If I may ask another personal question.”
Rochelle went silent again. It was interesting, I thought. I resolved to be more like this, myself: not to speak until I was ready. Obviously, people waited for you.
“My mother died,” Rochelle said. “About four months ago.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
“You asked why. I think that’s why. I’m not at my usual strength. I’m wobbling a bit.”
“You were close to your mother?”
“Very close. But she wasn’t a well woman. She needed a lot of care.” She shook her head. “Now we’re really off the tracks.”
I nodded. “It’s okay. I mean, it’s okay with me. Did she have … cancer? Or something like that?”
“No. Well, yes, at the end, but she’d been ill for many years. Since I was a child. And I was responsible for her. Now I’m not, so it should all feel easier, but somehow it doesn’t. Also, I’m her executor, which ought to be very straightforward since there’s not much money involved, but I can’t seem to close out the estate. My mother filled up her house with absolute junk, for years. Just packed it in. And every time I go out there, to make a start on it, I end up opening the front door and just looking at it, for hours, and then closing the door and leaving. Okay!” she said brightly. “That’s enough. Let’s get back to your problem.”
“But you solved my problem. At least, you gave me something to try. Actually, I’d like to return the favor. Help you solve yours.”
“Well, thanks,” Rochelle said, getting to her feet. “But I prefer the usual formal invoice for services rendered, which comes to zero in your case, since we’re calling this a pre-hire consultation. Besides, as I said, my mother’s gone. And her illness, unfortunately, couldn’t be fixed with declarations of love. I can attest to that.”
I got to my feet, too.
“I wasn’t thinking of that part,” I told Rochelle Steiner. “I was thinking about the house. I mean, if it’s all right with you, I know a person who could help with that.”
34
Excavation
In which Sally Oppenheimer describes the refraction of pain, and Phoebe Oppenheimer gets hired
On the Monday of Thanksgiving week, Sally’s employee Drew backed the Greene House Services truck into Lorelei Circle in the Hamlet of Ellesmere, Long Island, where I waited with her former roommate, Rochelle Steiner, each of us with a large Dunkin Donuts cup in one hand and a chocolate cruller in the other. Neighbors in the cul-de-sac, forewarned about the coming of the truck, had offered no resistance to this inconvenience, relieved that the injured house was finally being dealt with. A few of them had even turned up to help, which I thought was nice but which only seemed to cause Rochelle additional discomfort. She was very discomforted, this much was obvious, even to me, and I’d only met her once in person and spoken to her on the phone a few more times. Now, with the truck easing backward and the neighbors watching, I think I finally understood the magnitude of what Rochelle was dealing with. The professional, accomplished, and clearly brilliant woman beside me was quietly losing her shit.
It wasn’t the reunion that I’d imagined. When Sally emerged, she hugged me but shook hands with Rochelle from as far away as she seemed able to stand and still execute the gesture. Then she said something respectful about Rochelle’s mother, and how sorry she was to have been called under such circumstances.
“I haven’t even started,” Rochelle told her. “And it’s been months.”
“That’s completely normal,” said Sally. “And you have started. If you hadn’t, I wouldn’t be here.”
I started to think it might be all right after all.
My sister and Rochelle went inside, and I helped the man named Drew to set up a tent just off the porch, and a line of tables under that. He didn’t say much. When I asked if he’d been working with Sally for a long time, he only grunted, though not unkindly. But when one of the neighbors offered him a coffee I saw him hesitate, then accept. He took a donut, too.
When they emerged, Sally brought Drew inside, and Rochelle came and stood beside me. “Apparently this isn’t the worst she’s seen,” said Rochelle. “That’s pretty sobering. But maybe she’s just being polite.”
“Oh no, I’m sure not,” I said.
“It’s nice of you to come out for this. Don’t you have school?”
I did have school. I also had school tomorrow, and a half day on Wednesday, but I’d decided to miss all three. I was a senior, after all, and I had college applications to work on, or at least that was what I’d told my homeroom teacher, who signed the formal excuse for my absence. It wasn’t true. I had already completed the only application I intended to submit. And I’d also submitted it.
“I wanted to be here,” I told Rochelle. “Not just to help out. The thing is, I’ve never seen Sally work. I know she’s good at what she does, but I’ve never had an opportunity to watch her. I hope you don’t mind.”
“Of course not,” Rochelle said. “That’s really nice. It must be nice to have a sister.”
I smiled. “It is. And brothers. I love my brothers, too.”
Rochelle nodded. We weren’t going there, apparently. Yet.
Lewyn had wanted to come out. He had asked me more than once, and even called Sally to talk it over. Both of us told him no, but for different reasons. Sally was nervous enough about seeing Rochelle again, and didn’t need the additional stress of Lewyn’s obvious emotions, so I sat him down and laid it out for him. It isn’t your time. This is about Sally.
He understood, or said he did. That morning he had seen me off to the Barclays Center where I’d caught a train to Ellesmere. Probably, now, he was working at the warehouse and pretending he didn’t care that both his sisters and the only woman he had ever loved were all together, and up to their elbows in trash.
It was that bad and worse, I discovered, when Sally allowed me inside. By then I had on a disposable white suit over my clothes, rubber gloves, and a dust mask over my nose and mouth, but I still couldn’t escape the feeling that I was wading in bioactive muck. The house was dense with broken-down matter, papers and plastics, abandoned food and piles of clothing, much of it still on store hangers. Little could be salvaged, but Sally was a maniac for recycling, and bin after bin filled up under the tent. Rochelle seemed to hold it together fairly well, until, at around noon, she unearthed the first relic: a debating trophy, behind piles of crumbling newspapers in a downstairs cupboard. “Let’s go out for a bit,” I heard my sister say.
