Chapter 39
Everything is going beautifully, Jahan says—not with words but with a glance he and Paul share across the overheated, boisterous room full of images of Judith’s face.
Paul, inhabiting his role seamlessly, tells everyone he meets “how it happened,” how he recognized Judith’s genius the first time she showed him her pictures. As the evening wears on, his voice grows hoarse. His jaws ache from smiling.
“I thought she was just a bored housewife, trying to pass the time by taking a photography class,” he begins, laughing along with his listeners for the hundredth time.
“I wasn’t that interested when she asked if I’d look at her work, but it’s my job, so I said I would.
When I slid them out of the envelope, they took my head right off.
” Here he makes an exploding gesture with his hand at the top of his head, and his listeners respond with murmurs and exclamations of wonder—and once, even a round of applause.
He tells them Parade Girl was the first one he really fell for, he couldn’t look away from the stark pain and beauty of it.
“Of course, knowing what we know now about Judith’s…
troubles, it’s easy to see how Parade Girl reflects her own damage, her…
mental distress,” a teacherly Paul says to one small group of solemn, sympathetic faces.
They pepper him with questions: When did you first suspect Judith had killed herself?
Do you really believe it’s true? Do you think she knowingly staged it to look like murder?
He’s certain they’ve heard him answer these questions in interviews, but they still clamor for the live version.
With a grimly set face that’s something of an act by the end of the first hour, Paul tells them he hates to say it, but yes, he truly believes she killed herself.
He walks them through his evidence and reasoning, reminds them he confirmed his suspicions with a psychologist, and thinks gleefully of Malcolm, who would hate to hear him airing his professional opinion to everyone in sight.
He thought Malcolm might pop back up to berate him when the first television show aired, or when subsequent interviews aired, but he never did.
His silence and absence are damning, Paul supposes, and their long friendship is over, but so what?
Here he is, after all, making new connections, new friends, left and right and all around. His pockets bulge with business cards.
When he’s finished telling his version of Judith’s story, the women make tutting noises; the men sigh—and then eventually they shake his hand and move on to other groups, where they share what he’s said, and Paul is left, drained yet elated, to face a new threesome or foursome of eager listeners.
In rare free moments, Paul scans the growing crowd.
Though he hasn’t thought of them lately, the Stanley men come to mind.
How could they not, on this night? Paul looks idly around for their faces, unsurprised when he doesn’t find them.
He doubts they’d brave an event like this, even if they wanted to confront him in person.
They’d be afraid to see Judith’s photographs boldly displayed on gallery walls—getting the much-deserved attention Paul has ensured—and they wouldn’t love the crowd, either.
He’s relieved by their absence, but he hasn’t been that worried about the possible threat of Tom and Tom.
It would be unpleasant, of course, if they berated him or tried to sue him, but he’s protected now, just as Jahan promised he would be.
Cushioned by the eminent Doven Gallery and his own growing fame.
And soon enough, the Stanleys will start getting checks in the mail—the room is full to bursting with eager buyers, after all—something sure to make their gripes evaporate for good.
Paul greets several groups of his students as he moves through the room, all of them awed by the glamour of the night.
But there’s no sign of Charlie. Unlike with the Stanleys, he almost wants to see her.
It’s a twisted desire—he wants to see her as she is now, after what happened between them.
But he can’t really imagine she’d be up for a night on the town.
She might never again be up for a night on the town, he thinks, like a friend sympathetic to her pain instead of the man who traumatized her.
It’s hard to think of himself as the man who traumatized her, especially when he looks around at the bright walls, the rich crowd, the glorious photographs; it doesn’t jibe with where and who he is now.
He tells himself to imagine it never happened, and it isn’t hard to do.
“Paul, Paul, it’s so wonderful to meet you. Tell us how you found Judith…” A stout, elegantly dressed couple approach, standing before him and smiling deferentially. Collectors, he thinks, from the look of them; he’s getting good at recognizing every type of art lover in the room.
In the midst of retelling his tale, Paul hears the faint sound of a spoon tapping the side of a glass.
He clenches for just a moment, thinking of the little speech Jahan asked him to give.
Just a few brief lines about himself and Judith, but the thought of speaking in front of this enormous group—now spilling out the propped-open front door—is daunting.
The room quiets more quickly than he imagined it could, and he finds himself on the front row of a loose circle of all the attendees, who’ve cleared a small space around Jahan.
Jahan looks him in the eye as he lifts his glass.
“We welcome you all to the Judith Stanley show!” Jahan says, and there’s a roar of mingled shouts and applause.
“So many people have been involved in putting together this fantastic show…” With mounting anxiety, Paul listens to Jahan praise his hardworking staff.
He hopes the gallerist will forget about his speech—but Jahan is not a forgetful man.
Soon, he winds inevitably toward his conclusion, which includes Paul’s name…
“and would never have been possible without the extraordinary Paul Sorenson.” Another rowdy round of applause, and Paul steps forward, feeling abashed, but also like a rock star.
He’s fine to speak now, more than fine. When the crowd quiets he begins, making sure to scan the circle and hold people’s eyes as he speaks.
“Judith Stanley was a remarkable talent, as you can see here tonight. I’m so grateful to Jahan and his team for making this possible, and so thankful, really, for the moment when Judith walked into my classroom, all those many nights ago, out in the wilds of suburban New Jersey,” he says to laughs.
“She was taking the class as a hobbyist, I assumed, as a woman whose children had grown and left the house and needed—”
His eyes catch on a particular pair of eyes. Dark and liquid, shimmering.
Charlie stands across the circle from him, somehow.
Has she just arrived? He notes her satiny, sleeveless blue dress and the two black circles around her eyes.
The long, deep-looking scratch along her right cheek.
Dark bruising around her bare neck like a choker and bruises evident along both her bare arms, too.
Did he do all that? He didn’t, no. He knows he didn’t.
She’s wearing makeup, he thinks, she’s putting on an act, but it doesn’t matter—people are casting their eyes in her direction as she stares at Paul.
She reminds him of Parade Girl, which hangs just behind her, over the heads of the crowd.
But Parade Girl’s look is full of hurt; Charlie’s is full of rage.
She knows, he thinks, and swallows. Was it the groan that escaped him when she cut him? Or had she already recognized him by then? It doesn’t matter now.
He has to go on—the crowd is shifting, exchanging glances. Jahan is staring at him, slightly open-mouthed. Worried Paul’s nerve has failed him.
“And I—I had never seen such beautiful photographs, really. She was just—Judith was just—just a unique—”
Charlie steps forward to the center of the circle, holding Paul’s gaze as she bares her pale, damaged flesh to the crowd.
Paul sees men and women in the back row standing on tiptoes, craning their necks to see her.
He can’t let this happen. He has to take control somehow, be the first to speak, try to contain her, whatever her intentions.
“Folks, this is one of my NJCC students, Charlie Levin. Incredibly bright girl and a huge fan of Judith’s. I’ve invited her here tonight to talk about Judith’s work, to give you the student’s perspective. Charlie?”
He gives her a hard look, a look to match the man in the ski mask. He can almost feel the mask’s fabric against the skin of his face, feel the power it gave him. Feel her fear along the length of him, thrilling him.
“Paul Sorenson did this to me,” Charlie says, her clear voice ringing out.
“He followed me home last night and attacked me in the parking garage. He’s been stalking me for a while now, mostly through letters and stuff, but he didn’t touch me until last night.
” She lifts her arms as if to display them and immediately, a flashbulb or two pops.
Paul jerks his head to the right, sees journalists, photographers, pushing through the crowd.
They don’t have to push hard; the crowd parts for them.
Several photographers kneel in front of Charlie to get the best angle.
She changes her pose then and clasps her hands before her, looking demure and sad and traumatized.
“She’s lying,” Paul says, his voice croaking. “Look at her closely, it’s makeup!”
There’s a collective horrified gasp. Jahan, across the way, his face drained of color, looks at Paul like he’s an appalling lump of flesh—not the man he’s thanked and praised profusely in recent days. Paul notices people edging away from him, drawing back from him as if he were diseased.
“I did nothing wrong! This girl has been harassing me. She’s the one who wrote letters, called me, made threats.
Terrible—terrible threats. She’s a sick fan, that’s all.
Obsessed with Judith. This is revenge for—for telling everyone how Judith died.
For telling the truth. Trust me, everyone.
This is all a show!” His voice echoes in the silence.
The people stare at him as if he were mad, and he feels mad, he feels like Judith must have felt in her final moments, pressing a knife to her own flesh.
“Look, look what she did to me! You can’t make this up!
” He pushes up his shirtsleeves as quickly as he can with his trembling hands and tears off the bandages covering his wounds.
They look like nothing, simple cuts next to the severe—if fake—damage to Charlie’s flesh, but he flashes his arms around to the audience, who watch in riveted silence.
“Those are defensive wounds I made when he attacked me. I had a little knife. Just like Judith had,” she adds, tears clotting her voice. “I wonder if there are other scars on Paul’s body somewhere, where Judith swiped at him before he killed her.”
Another collective gasp.
“I didn’t kill her! You and everyone know I didn’t kill her! The police cleared me! She did it herself! You all know this!” Paul screams, and scans the faces for a single sympathetic soul, but everyone frowns his way—even the ones who smiled and simpered just minutes ago.
Precious minutes ago. When he was the shining star.
“I did not kill Judith Stanley! I did not attack Charlie Levin!” he screams, and then he turns, pushes through the bodies packed tightly around him with their mouths agape, and runs for the door, their voices shouting after him:
“Stop him!”
“Someone, grab him!”
But no one does. He pushes out into the night and runs as fast as he can, certain there are footsteps pounding, voices shouting after him.
He runs faster, dodging traffic and heading south toward home as he imagines the scene back at Doven.
The crowd will be clustering around Charlie now as she accepts a man’s large mackintosh, buttoning it up so her bruised-looking body is covered, protected, no longer visibly shivering.
People will ask if they should call the police, if she needs medical attention, and Charlie will nod with a soulful, damaged look in her eyes—or she might say no, that she’s already contacted the police, already sought medical help.
She’s all right now. Now that he’s gone.
Now that people know what he did to her, and what he probably did to Judith, too.
Everyone will want to hear her theory of how Judith died.
She’ll tell them she doesn’t know for sure, but since Paul attacked her, why wouldn’t he have been the one to attack Judith, too?
Out of jealousy, or the sense of an opportunity—or both.
Her listeners will nod thoughtfully or shake their heads as if they’ve never heard anything worse, as if they can’t believe they were just fawning over such a depraved man.
Meanwhile, in the background, Jahan will be quietly assuring his collectors and comrades that Paul Sorenson is gone, out of the picture completely.
His introduction on the wall will be painted over, the catalogs will be edited and reissued, his name will be erased from any connection with the show.
And in the meantime, here are Judith’s pictures.
Aren’t they marvelous? he’ll ask. These are the real focus of the night.
Don’t let that terrible mess with Paul convince you otherwise.
They won’t—Paul knows they won’t. They’ll buy every last print, and Jahan’s staff will collect orders from those demanding more.
The gallery will profit, Jahan will profit, the Stanleys (grudgingly) will profit—even Judith will profit, in posthumous fame.
Not Paul, though, who’ll be left without a shred of all the bright things he’s gathered to him in the exhausting, exhilarating weeks since Judith died.
When Paul finally stops running for a moment and stands, wheezing, by a house on a quiet residential street, he hears no sounds of pursuit, only the normal city noise: cars honking on the adjacent big avenue, a cat yowling in a nearby backyard, someone pulling his trash can to the sidewalk.
When Paul turns to stare wild-eyed behind him, there’s no one.
Nothing. Only the circle of yellow light cast by a nearby streetlamp.
He stands outside of it, tense and waiting, watching from the shadows.