THE GHOST OF EROS, by Eve Fisher-1
2063 Words
THE GHOST OF EROS,
by Eve FisherIn thirty years, the village of Los Reyes went from a little fishing village to a popular expat/tourist center. Hotels, condos, and bungalows ate up the beach, while shops, restaurants and bars swallowed up the Old Quarter, which wasn’t nearly the loss some people said it was. Doug Benson owned the one prime piece of land not yet covered by condos or hotels. He’d bought it back when he really couldn’t afford three tumble-down beach shacks. As he grew richer, he’d transformed them into two cottages and his own comfortable home. He’d been offered ever-increasing sums of money for the property, but he rejected them all.
“He has money,” George Ortiz, Benson’s investment manager, told wishful purchasers, especially Monckton Powys of Intercontinental Hotels. “He doesn’t need any more.” It was an idea the hotelier would not, could not comprehend.
“I did not tell him that you might succumb to the lure of art,” George told Doug as they sat drinking on the deck one afternoon.
“I wouldn’t,” Doug objected.
“If you were offered Monet’s Waterlilies? Or Guernica’”
“Guernica? It’d give me nightmares. And Waterlilies needs a whole museum.” Doug watched as his wife Vicky came up the path from the beach. “Maybe the Chagalls in Nice,” he said. “I could go for that. A straight up trade. This place for the Chagall Museum in Nice.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” George replied.
Vicky walked up on the deck and asked, “What are you two laughing about?”
“George is going to try to trade this place for the Chagall Museum in Nice,” Doug replied.
“I like it.” She kissed him and said, “Listen, Doug, Dante’s got the manky Monk over there. I saw him through the window, trying to hide. They’re up to some kind of devilment.”
“Powys?” George asked. “I just got done—”
“Let them talk,” Doug interrupted. “He can’t do anything with my property. How’s the portrait coming?”
“He wouldn’t let me see it this morning,” Vicky replied. “Said it wasn’t done yet. And speak of the devil.”
Dante burst in, already talking: “A wonderful day. I painted all day long. Magnificent. The paint spread itself beneath me like the most willing of women. My whole spirit poured out onto the canvas. I tell you, it was magnificence, it was—”
“Did you get anything to eat?” Vicky interrupted.
“Dolores gave me lunch. A great plate of soup and then shrimps, curled little pink ones, like Vicky’s ears.” Vicky rolled her eyes. “Crema Catalana for dessert. Delicious. Why do you never make me that?”
“Because,” Vicky replied, “I don’t cook. Doug will tell you that.”
“You make a very good breakfast,” Doug said. To everyone’s surprise, Vicky blushed.
“You fed me soup,” Dante objected.
“I opened a can,” Vicky replied. “I toasted some bread.” Doug raised his eyebrows. “It was that time he had the flu.”
“See? You can do that, you can do anything,” Dante explained. “It is all in the application.”
“What’s Monckton Powys doing at your place?” Vicky asked.
Dante shrugged. “We are discussing paintings for his hotels. They will be merde of course, but very expensive merde. It is all he would appreciate. He can afford it.”
“As long as you don’t sell him mine.” Doug said.
“They are finished. That is why I am here.”
“They?” Vicky asked.
“Let’s go,” Doug said and hit the switch on his wheelchair.
Most of the artist’s cottage was studio space. Leaning against the wall, beneath the skylights, were two panel-sized portraits. One was a nude, blond, her billows of flesh shaded from rosy-red to faintest pink, glowing like a Renaissance pearl and floating upon a rich blue background that seemed to throb like the sea. Vicky.
The second was an almost complete reversal of the first: clothed, dark-haired, bone thin, curled in upon herself, except for the face and its haunted eyes, in blues against a faint pink background. Maria Paz, Doug’s first wife.
“I have named them The Body and The Ghost,” Dante said. Doug nodded, his face rapt. “Of Eros. Of Life. But you will doubtless call them something else. That is irrelevant. They are the best I have yet done. Two masterpieces. Someday, someone will pay a great sum for this.”
That snapped Doug out of his reverie. “In the meantime, I’ve already paid for them.”
“You knew about both,” Vicky said coldly.
“You paid,” Dante said, “but they are worth more than that.”
“And I’ve offered him double,” said Monckton Powys, coming out from the shadows.
“Like you give a damn about art,” Doug growled.
“How would you know?” Monckton asked. “You’ve never asked. Besides, I have a large new hotel that needs a lot of work.”
“You’ve always been a poacher,” Doug said, “but it used to be just women.”
“At least I never killed one.”
Doug flushed. “You bastard. If you hadn’t—”
“Blaming me for your inadequacies is getting very old—”
George stepped between them. “Doug, please.”
Doug took a deep breath and swiveled back to Dante. “How much more do you want?”
“This studio,” Dante said. “And a hundred thousand dollars—”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake!” Vicky cried.
“Enough money for me to live freely a few years,” Dante continued. “I will paint, paint, paint, like a madman. Nothing but paint. After, I will be like Picasso. Only better. I will live among my work. People will come to see it. They will want all my paintings. I will make their tongues hang out. But I will give them only the merde. That they can buy. The rest of it, I will keep until I find the right place. A museum. A church. A temple. That is how it will be.” By now his knife-colored eyes were nailed on Doug. “Do you agree?”
“I agree to the studio,” Doug said. “The rest is up to you.”
“The studio?” Monckton objected. “I’ve offered you millions for it!”
Dante said, “I will do what I will do. I will be what—”
“But,” Doug interrupted. “You cannot sell the studio as long as I am alive. Understood? As long as I live, this property stays as it is. There will be no condo or hotel here to block my view or my life.”
“This is ridiculous,” Monckton interrupted.
“You think that I would do that?” Dante asked.
“Do you agree to it?” Doug asked.
“The studio and the money,” Dante pushed.
“Wait!” Monckton interrupted again. “I have a serious offer on the table for you.”
“No, you don’t,” Doug replied without looking away from Dante. “Only the studio. You’ll turn that into money soon enough.”
“I need money now,” Dante said.
“Then sell the merde now,” Doug said.
“Do not mock me.”
There was a long, tense silence.
“All right,” Doug capitulated. “Ten thousand. It’s what I bought it for. You can live for a year on that.”
Dante nodded. “Agreed.”
* * * *
When they got back to the house, Vicky slammed the door behind them and said, “Why the hell didn’t you tell me about the other portrait?”
Doug wheeled over to the bar and said, “Beautiful, isn’t it? I knew he could do it. He’s a genius.”
“Did you ever—” Vicky began, shaking with anger. “No, of course you didn’t. You never once—”
“No, I didn’t,” Doug interrupted. “Because there’s nothing to think about. For Christ’s sake! Maria’s been dead for twenty years!”
“So what? You’re still bloody obsessed with her, why else—”
“Uh—why don’t we—” George interrupted, trying to stave off yet another fight.
Doug turned on him: “Shut up!”
“You got acquitted for killing her,” Vicky hissed. “Why the hell would you want a portrait of her?”
“Shut up!”
“In your house?” Vicky continued. “Is it guilt? Are you finally going to confess?”
David slammed his hand on the arm of his wheelchair. “If I wasn’t in this wheelchair, I swear to God, I’d kill you.”
“You can try. You might get bloody lucky again!”
“Jealous b***h!”
“I am not jealous! I am furious!” Vicky screamed. Then stopped. The silence weighed like iron. She took a deep breath and said in a low voice, “I don’t want a portrait of your dead wife hanging in our house—”
“It’s not our house!” Doug shouted. “It’s my house. It’s my house, my money, my paintings! Mine! Mine, mine, mine!” he yelled at Vicky’s back as she slammed out the door.
“Doug,” George said, standing up from behind the couch. “What the hell is going on?” Doug drained his glass and poured himself another with shaking hands. “Doug—”
“Don’t you start.”
“At least slow down—”
“Shut up. I can’t get a DUI anymore. I’ve done pretty much all the damage I can do to myself. And others. I keep telling Vicky—” Doug stopped and looked down at his hands. “What a mess.”
“She loves you.”
“Yeah, I know. I love her, too. So what? It’s all my fault, she’s wonderful, stood by me—but you know, it gets old. Nothing worse than someone who stands by you when you can’t stand yourself.”
* * * *
George wrote a contract, which was signed before witnesses and a notary. Mateo, nephew to Dolores the housekeeper, and a couple of friends helped bring the paintings over to the house and set them up on the south wall for the viewing party Doug demanded. As Doug sat and stared at the paintings, Dolores and Vicky worked out the menu:
“No one-bite tapas,” Vicky said. “We don’t want this bludger choking on them.”
“Do not worry,” Dolores said. “I will watch him like a hawk. We will make sure he behaves.”
Doug exploded: “Jesus Christ, I can’t even get out of this damn wheelchair—”
“Si, but you can still grab the tapas with both hands,” Dolores replied.
“It’d be so much safer if he just went after women,” Vicky said. As Doug glowered, she leaned over and kissed him, running her hands down his body. “Don’t you dare, mate. You’re mine.” He pulled away, sullen. “Okay, mate. Pout if you want. I’ve got to get party supplies. Mateo! Let’s go!”
The party was large and noisy. Vicky was everywhere, with or without Doug. Dante stood directly between the paintings, talking non-stop. George wandered away with Elena, the owner of El Matador. By the time they returned, the party had stopped, and in the corner Dr. Martinez worked on a choking Doug. Doug gasped, breathed, seemed better... then his eyes rolled, and he passed out.
“Hospital,” Dr. Martinez said, speed-dialing.
In less than fifteen minutes, Vicky, Doug, and Dr. Martinez were gone. Mateo remained to watch over the guests.
“No, please,” Mateo said. “Eat, drink.” But his body language said, don’t stay.
* * * *
Vicky returned a few hours later to a house empty except for Dolores and Mateo.
“How is he?” Dolores asked.
Vicky went past her into the kitchen—everything had been cleaned up and put away—got out the whisky and glasses and set them on the kitchen table. “He’s sleeping,” she said, pouring herself a stiff drink. She handed the bottle to Dolores and sat down. “He should be home tomorrow. Maybe the day after. They want to make sure he can eat by himself. Swallow. That kind of thing.”
Dolores moved her head slightly towards Mateo, who said, “That is very good news,” he said. “I will go home now, if that is all right?”
“Oh, of course,” Vicky said. “Go. And thank you for all your help. I will pay you—”
Mateo shook his head. “No, no, no.”
Vicky finished her drink. She asked Dolores, “Want another?”
“The one for now.”
Vicky poured herself another. Finally, she said, “You know I love him.”
“I know. It is hard. He is going to die. And until he does... ”
“The bloody fool! He knows how easily he chokes, and he still... I could kill him! It’s like when he had the bloody accident. He got tanked and roared out of here.”
“It was the anniversary of her death,” Dolores said, nodding at Maria’s portrait. “The guilt, it has never left.”
“I know.” Vicky sighed. “I can’t help but wonder if he feels so guilty because it was an accident or because it was on purpose... ” She shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t want to know. I just know that that last time, when he went out and smashed up, there was nothing I could do to stop him. I wanted to kill him, and he nearly killed himself. And then I was praying he would live. And then I wanted to kill him again. My God, is it always going to be this way? God, make him live! God, make him die! God, make him have sense!” The two women looked at each other and started laughing. “Oh, God, what am I saying?”
- Writer
