Chapter 28
Schuyler didn’t come out and say it, of course, but it’s what he was insinuating: that Judith was mentally ill, that she invented the stalking story, that she…killed herself.
Stunned by the phrase, Paul forgets to exhale a chest full of smoke and bends over, coughing.
A woman wearing an unfashionably long skirt walks a wide circle around him; he focuses on the black leather of her low heels, the reassuring sound of an ordinary woman walking.
When he recovers, he straightens and looks around at the small, orderly houses lining the streets.
They all resemble Judith’s house: small brick ranches with tidy lawns.
He thinks of Judith in this destabilizing new light with a deep, physical pang, and begins putting one foot in front of another.
Loosened a little by the forward movement, Paul asks himself if what he’s thinking—what he thinks Schuyler is thinking—could really be true.
Having known her—calm, steady, and quiet as she was—he can’t see the detective’s idea as anything but outlandish, even offensive.
But he felt it, didn’t he? Felt the truth of it in that stifling small office?
And beyond that, there was evidence—or a lack of it, rather: no stalker in Judith’s portraits, no fingerprints on the murder weapon, no sign of her attacker anywhere.
And now he knows how psychologically scarred she must have been—and he himself has offered photographic proof of her troubled mind.
Schuyler let the various strands of this theory hang separately, but Paul gathers them together quickly and hangs on, despite his own revulsion and resistance: Judith did this to herself.
It only makes sense, he thinks, walking now at a furious pace, if Judith’s mind were warped enough to make her believe she was being stalked, to see the man over and over again, to hear his words, even feel his touch.
Was that possible? And most of all, could her mind have really brought her to the point of stabbing herself?
Killing herself? He thinks instantly of Malcolm, his psychologist friend.
They haven’t met up for a while, but he could buy him a drink and run it by him—in strictest confidence.
My god, if it were true…it would be a stunning draw for the show.
He flinches from the thought at first, but as the seconds go by, he begins to understand why it might be not only beneficial but also necessary.
This is part of Judith’s story, after all: Judith the artist, the photographer, the public figure.
Posthumously, sure, but that’s all the more reason for Paul to broadcast what he’s learned.
The story of her life doesn’t belong to him, or even to Judith anymore.
And certainly not to Tom Stanley. All of it, all of her, belongs to the viewing public: art critics, gallerists, and Judith’s growing cadre of fans.
Even fans like Charlie, yes, he thinks with an internal flinch.
They need to approach her work and view it with the full story in mind; it will change how they perceive and critique it, how they place it in the scope of art history.
This has nothing to do with Paul, really!
He’s merely the vessel, the mediator, bringing it all to light for the public good.
He has a duty to do it, as her mentor and manager.
Paul loops back to his car with a determined stride.
Tomorrow, he’ll visit the library to search for the Somerset Daily Register article; he wants to be able to refer to its specifics while he’s writing.
Because even if he ends up discarding the suicide theory, he has to use her childhood attack.
That alone would alter the narrative around Judith: the woman who survived one attack only to die, years later, in another.
He’ll also read any follow-up articles he can find, about the search for her attacker.
Schuyler said the man had “vanished,” just like Judith’s murderer; Paul wants to make sure that’s the case, and he wants to glean anything else he can from Judith’s hometown rag.
Then he’ll run it all by Malcolm. He veers toward the nearest pay phone booth to make his call.
He reaches Malcolm’s secretary and leaves a message that reads: Please call Paul Sorenson. It’s urgent.