Chapter 12
Thursday afternoon, Paul stands on Tom’s doorstep with a pit in his stomach; will Tom ruin all his beautiful hard work?
All the hours he’s spent culling the best twenty prints—an impossible job—from the wealth of Judith’s photographic archive?
He could, Paul knows, but he tells himself he won’t let him and grips the portfolio handle tightly, as if to keep Tom from snatching it.
When the door swings open, Paul puts on a smile and simulates an air of relaxed confidence.
“How’s it going, Tom?”
“Fine,” Tom says bluntly, leading him right to the dining room table.
Paul hears the silent command: Go on, lay them out.
He opens the case, glad to avoid any delay.
He’s brought ten backup photographs in addition to his top twenty, but he doesn’t plan on using them.
He’s fiercely committed to the twenty he’s chosen, to convincing Tom of their rightness.
But he can’t be too forceful with Tom Senior, he knows. He’ll have to walk a careful line.
When Paul finishes arranging them in two neat rows, the men stand side by side, staring down with their arms crossed over their chests. Tom flicks his eyes over the photographs as if they were alien specimens.
“I don’t understand,” he says quietly.
Though Tom’s confusion doesn’t surprise him, Paul blurts, “What?” then quickly shakes it off. There’s a beat before Tom explains.
“I don’t understand how these are good. I know I’m a rube, but can you explain them to me? These don’t look like her other pictures—and they don’t look like the pictures I’ve seen in Life.”
Paul feels a moment of impatience—Pearls before swine, he thinks—then reminds himself to tread gently, to be generous.
Tom hasn’t seen most—or any—of these before, and he must be shocked to see the real Judith—not the mother and wife, but the artist, the individual—in print after print.
Paul switches into teacher mode and begins by pointing out the colorful self-portrait of Judith in front of the liquor store.
“Okay, this one. First of all, she was right to use color film, instead of black-and-white. She’s captured the light perfectly, the way it hits those bottles and makes them shine like gems. And Judith’s face is beautifully lighted, too.
” He pauses here, letting Tom soak up the image of his wife.
Unless it’s upsetting to see her so vividly alive.
He can’t tell from Tom’s expression, so he pushes forward.
“If you look at the expression on her face, though, it’s mournful. It makes a stark contrast, and we start to see those bottles in a new light—like brightly shining bottles of poison. Do you see what I mean?” Tom is nodding like one of Paul’s rapt students. Has he won him over so easily?
“Her dad was a drinker,” Tom says. Paul tries not to show his surprise.
“He was unpredictable as hell. He wasn’t around much, and her mother had died.
Judith was mostly raised by her grandma.
Grandmother, she called her. She was a real, uh, character.
Not the warmest person, by Judith’s account, but I never met her.
” Paul makes a sympathetic sound. He wants Tom to keep speaking, keep sharing insight into Judith’s life.
He’s envisioning a block of his own words printed boldly on a gallery wall: Judith Stanley’s work subtly highlights her personal struggle to overcome a troubled childhood haunted by a mother’s early death, a father’s alcoholism and neglect, and a grandmother’s coldness…
Tom would be furious if that ever came to pass, but Paul can imagine what he likes.
When the silence drags on, he continues.
“You can see how her…background informs the picture. How the image is both a siren call to the drinker—a bright, colorful beacon—and a stark warning at the same time. It’s poignant. Unnerving.”
Tom doesn’t respond, only stares at the picture intently. Paul wonders if he’s getting through to him, opening his eyes to the glories of Judith’s artistry. He’s patting himself on the back when Tom says, “I don’t know if Judith would want that one out in the world, then, if it’s saying all that.”
Paul has to scramble now, kicking himself, to steer Tom in the right direction.
“I understand your hesitation, Tom, I really do. But I think we need this one. It really shows her prowess for composition.” Tom doesn’t need to know that every single one of Judith’s prints shows her prowess for composition.
“And remember, most people looking casually through a magazine wouldn’t overanalyze it the way I have.
They’d think it’s pretty and move on. I can’t help overthinking it—an occupational hazard, I guess.
” He grins familiarly, but Tom isn’t looking. He’s staring down at the photograph.
“You can use this one. You can use all of them,” Tom says at last, waving his hand over the group of twenty.
Paul gapes at him, speechless. He thought he’d be here all evening, haggling over every last print.
He thought he’d have to swap out a few for his backups.
But no, Tom is giving in—quickly and completely. After ten minutes!
What’s the catch? he wants to ask—but wouldn’t in a million years.
“I don’t think the magazine is going to want them, though,” Tom says, breaking through the uproar in Paul’s mind.
“I mean, I know you’re an expert, but Judith was a housewife.
A mother. She raised her kids and cooked dinner.
She didn’t have any art credentials or anything.
She didn’t have any fancy connections. I know you do, but…
it’s fine if you want to try. I’m fine with it. ”
Paul understands now: Tom is giving in because he thinks Paul will fail.
More important, he thinks Judith will fail.
As much as Tom loved his wife, he can’t see her clearly, even after her death—even with the evidence of her greatness staring him smack in the face.
Paul was right; just as he thought, her exquisite photographs would have sat moldering in their boxes, unobserved and possibly discarded one day like trash.
A mother’s hobby. So he was right to lie, to force the Stanleys’ hands.
He wants to give a triumphant shout, but instead he presses his lips together until he can muster a semblance of constraint.
“Thank you, Tom. You’re right, it may well come to nothing.
But I’ll try my best. And I promise to take good care of the photographs—all of them.
I’ll hold on to everything for now, if it’s all right?
In case Harper’s wants to see more.” Tom agrees to this and the men shake hands—simple as that.
Easier than Paul ever imagined it would be, which makes him nervous as he drives away.
Now there’s nothing between him and his meeting with Marty at Harper’s tomorrow.
A good thing, of course: the day he’s been waiting for.
But he doesn’t feel jubilant or sure, the way he did when Tom acquiesced.
He wonders if the man has infected him with doubt.