The Swan House (50 page)

He led me down a long hall and out a back door of the main building. All around us were footpaths in the midst of flowering gardens. I had never seen so many colors in the dead of winter!

“The gardens are beautiful!” I exclaimed.

“Yes, we were fortunate to find another gardener who takes as much pride in the gardens as Mr. Becker did.”

We wandered in and out of paths, and in the winter chill, I pulled my coat around me. Dr. Clark took out a set of keys and stopped beside a low brick building, half hidden by magnolias and ivy. He pushed open the door, and we stepped inside.

Dr. Clark flipped on a light switch. The room was small, clean, windowless, and definitely not heated. On the floor and in makeshift shelves sat a number of unframed canvases. Some were portraits and still lifes. Others looked more like the raging winds in Henry Becker's painting. Still others had a pastel soft calm to them.

“These are your mother's paintings.”

I gasped. “Mama painted all of these?”

“Yes, Miss Middleton. Yes, she did.” He was quiet for a moment as I registered my shock. “We all knew your mother had a lot of talent. I suggested to her several times that she let these paintings be seen—even at a small exhibition at Resthaven. She always refused. So we gave her this room. This is where we have stored her paintings for many years now.”

I stood in the middle of the refurbished tool shed and just stared. My eyes kept darting from one painting to the next. Never would I have guessed that each of these canvases was painted by Mama's hand. Suddenly I blurted out, “Are the three missing paintings here? Are they in this room?”

But Dr. Clark squelched that intuition with a slow shake of the head. “No. I'm sorry, Miss Middleton. They're not.”

“So what happened to them? Do you know anything about the exhibition at the High Museum?”

“Yes. As I said, your mother wanted for her work to be seen in her different styles. I wholeheartedly agreed with her, although I didn't much see the need for the pseudonyms. But she insisted on keeping them.”

I walked up close to one painting, practically putting my nose on it as Carl might have done. The signature was splashed across the bottom in a hurry:
Henry Becker
. “Your mother didn't want notoriety. She simply wanted to paint. And when she painted, she felt better. My job was to protect her interests to the extent that it was helpful to her. Your mother came to trust me. She asked me to help her arrange for an exhibition at the High. But she was also terrified of rejection, even after art experts had examined her work and given it praise.”

“But why?”

“Miss Middleton, your mother had built a comfortable reputation in Atlanta as a portrait painter, reproducing on canvas the faces of children. But to her, that was not true art. True art was an almost magical experience. It was not calculated—it was free and fast and caught in a moment in the forces of nature outside. Here at Resthaven, she rarely painted inside. She painted nature and whoever or whatever happened to be caught in nature at the time.”

I thought about all the different paintings she had done of the Swan House, sitting at the end of the yard with her easel planted in the grass. Dr. Clark was still talking.

“She finally decided on three paintings that she wanted to donate to the High Museum. I helped your mother work things out with the curator of the museum. He agreed to present the paintings as work by three young Southern artists. He met with your mother and understood that she wished to remain protected from the limelight.”

“And what went wrong? What really happened to those three paintings? It's very important for me to know.”

“I don't know, Miss Middleton. They disappeared on the eve before the opening of the exhibition. We had kept them here in the studio, wrapped up and ready to be taken to the museum. I'm terribly afraid that your mother destroyed them. She had a history of destroying her work in moments of extreme anguish. A terrible loss.”

“This place wasn't locked up?”

“Well, yes, we kept it locked, but your mother had a key. She liked to bring other patients to this room and show them her paintings. At times we had different canvases on display in the art studio.”

“And no one questioned her? No one from Resthaven?”

“Of course she was questioned—by the police, by the curator, by me. I met with your mother, and she insisted that she had not destroyed the paintings. That was all she would say.”

“Well, you should have told Daddy! These paintings here should have been given to us! We at least deserved to know about them!”

He flushed and smiled sympathetically. “Of course, of course. But after I saw the effects of the strain of the exhibition on her, I didn't want to push her. She was coming along, though. She wanted so much to tell your father and others she loved. And I believe she would have. In fact she fully intended to talk to your father on the European tour. Perhaps she did.

“At any rate, your father knows now, Miss Middleton. I called him the week after the crash and explained everything to him. I invited him to come to see the paintings, which he did. Even now he is deciding what should be done with them. There is no rush. You have all been through so much.”

My head was swimming. “Daddy knows?”

“Yes, he does, Miss Middleton. That is why I felt free to talk to you today.”

I felt tears welling up in my eyes and mumbled, “Would you mind if I stayed here for a little while?”

“Stay as long as you wish, Miss Middleton. Let me turn on the heat. Please have the secretary tell me when you are finished.” His voice was soft, and his gaze rested on me for a long moment. “You know, your mother did a lot of writing while she was here too. And one of her journals was all about her art. I believe she wanted you to see it someday.”

“For me?”

“Yes, I think she saw an artist in you too.”

I swallowed hard. “A journal? For me?”

“Yes, it was part of her therapy. Not simply drawing and painting, but writing about how she felt.”

“Could I see it?”

“Of course you may. I'll have the nurse bring it to you. Good day, Miss Middleton.”

“Thank you, Dr. Clark. Thank you so much for your time.” And then I added, “And for everything you did to help my mother.”

I stayed in that shed for the whole afternoon, until the secretary came to tell me that Trixie was waiting for me. I spent my time studying the paintings and then intermittently reading from my mother's journal.

This is true art—this is letting the colors and feelings tell their story without preconceived thought. This is the magic that I have been seeking, the perfection of my skills. I like the way the tree is suggested in different hues of color with the complementary color reflected in the sky. I like the way you can feel the wind because of the way the leaves are moving.

She was talking about a painting of the gardens, and as I studied it, I found myself nodding with her description. It was a stronger painting than the perfectly posed portraits. It made me shiver a little, feeling the chill in the brittle leaves of a thick old oak. The painting was signed
Henry Becker
.

I could not quite figure out the paintings that bore the signature of Leslie Leschamps until I found Mama's own explanation in her journal.

I have experimented with painting inside, away from nature, here at Resthaven. I much prefer the natural light of outdoors, but I have wanted to paint a few subjects from memory. I have found it much more difficult and much more satisfying than a simple portrait. I am reminded of the intense pleasure I felt in painting Mary Swan all those years ago. I knew her soul, and so it was hard and painful and wonderfully liberating to put it onto canvas. So I have experimented with this type of portrait painting again.

And I found to my great delight a portrait of Daddy. He looked like he had been surprised by Mama's entry into his study. He had a brightness in his eyes and an urgent, happy smile as he leaned forward on his desk. In a second he would be out of his chair and coming toward the door, coming toward Mama. She had painted an expression on Daddy's face that I had only seen a very few times. But, I thought to myself with relief, one of those times had just happened during our date at the club.

I would always afterward remember that afternoon in the shed at Resthaven as my private art lesson from Mama, as I read of her struggles to paint truthfully, to paint from her soul. She had even hidden a treasure in her journal, just for me.

I worry for Swannee. She has the same creative bent that I had at her age, but she doesn't know what to do with it. And how do I encourage her when my own path has been so very rocky? What shall I say to her so that she will pursue the passion, the dream? I don't want her to hurt the way I've hurt. May she not walk down the same path, stumbling and fumbling and feeling the searing in her heart! I want her to float gracefully, like the swan in her name, on a serene lake. But no, I will not condemn her to peace if her destiny calls her to something else. She will fly.

Her words were the confirmation I had sought without knowing it. The confirmation that Mama cared and loved and wondered for me, even in the midst of her own struggles.

Months ago Daddy had said to me,
“There seem to be a whole lot
more paintings than we knew about.”
And then he had changed the subject. He must have been referring to these paintings after receiving the phone call from Dr. Clark. Now at least we could talk about it. Together we could decide what to do with Mama's paintings. At least there was nothing secret between us anymore.

Nothing except the Raven Dare.

The Raven Dare. The reason for the whole investigation. Fate is a funny thing. I am sure if Mama had been alive when I started trying to solve the Raven Dare, I would never have discovered the truth about the paintings or seen the ones she had painted while at Resthaven.
Well,
I thought to myself, sitting in that shed,
I have done my job
. I had found out everything possible about the missing paintings, and the only other person who could clear up the mystery was dead. I had a sinking feeling that the Dare was going to die its own quiet death, far away from the limelight, just as Mama would have wanted.

I would present my case to Mrs. Alexander and the Wellington seniors, and leave it to them to decide. It was the best I could do. And maybe it didn't really matter so much anymore. What were three lost paintings, when I had solved the riddle of my mother?

We were halfway home and Trixie had heard every detail of my afternoon at Resthaven.

“So, Trixie, did Mama ever tell you why she got so depressed at certain times of the year?”

“You don't want to know. Quit asking me such hard questions, Swan, for goodness' sake. Just leave it be.”

“Did something happen to Mama to make her depressed all the time?”

“Like I said, you don't want to know.”

“You want me to ask Daddy, don't you?”

Strangely enough, she said quickly, “No! No, don't ask JJ.” Then with a miserable sigh, “This is the absolutely last thing I'll tell you, Mary Swan. I can't bear to keep remembering. But I know your daddy will never tell you because I don't think he knows.”

“He doesn't know?”

“Your mother only mentioned it to me once, and we never ever brought it up again. Her doctor at Resthaven knows, though. I'm pretty sure of that.” She took out a cigarette. “Your mother wasn't an only child, Mary Swan. She had a sister, Anne, about four years younger than she.” She let that register.

“Evelyne and Ian were insanely happy to have another daughter. And your mother adored her little sister. One beautiful spring day on that big cotton plantation, Sheila was helping her mother push the baby carriage along the road when Anne started choking. Your poor grandmother panicked and started screaming at Sheila to do something, to run get help. Evelyne tried to dislodge whatever was stuck, but to no avail. By the time Sheila came back with help, the baby was dead. Evelyne was cradling her baby and wailing.

“And when she saw Sheila, she started screaming at her. She slapped her and told her it was her fault that Anne died because Sheila hadn't gotten help fast enough. And Evelyne refused to see Sheila for a week.” This Trixie confided in a whisper, through blurred eyes. “And then your grandmother started drinking. It was a terrible tragedy. It almost killed your grandparents. And Sheila was such a sensitive child. I think she died inside with her baby sister. And every year in the spring, she would sink into depression. I don't think your grandmother ever forgave Sheila, and I don't think Sheila ever forgave her mother either. She told me that her mother ruined her life by making her live with a guilt that wasn't hers.”

I was silent for a long time.
No wonder,
I kept thinking.
No wonder
Mama was so very fragile
. I wiped my eyes and whispered, “And now Mama's gone too.”

“Yes.”

“When did Mama tell you these things?”

“When I'd come over in tears with what Tony was putting me through. Ella Mae would watch Lucy, and your mother and I would drink ourselves silly and smoke a pack of cigarettes at a time. That's how we survived. Talking and crying and then laughing hysterically and drinking and smoking. I don't recommend it, Swan. But that's how we survived. And one day, when she was in that state of mind, she told me her story. And that's why your mother struggled so much with depression. At least, that's what I always thought.

“Now, no more questions! None. It is all terrible and tragic. Nothing more, Swan.” And with a last puff of smoke, she crushed out the cigarette in the ashtray and was silent.

As I told Trixie good-bye and walked into the house, I realized why so much of my mother's life had been hidden from me. It was tragic and much too much of a tormented story for a child to handle. Daddy had been right to hide it from me. I slipped into the
atelier
. With one hand I held a paintbrush and dabbed color on my very first and only painting. With the other I wiped my eyes.