Too Far Under (29 page)

I didn’t want to argue with her, but I was
determined to get some answers. “You might be right, but before I
make any decisions, I need some information. Like how many of her
paintings have sold this year? How many do you have in storage, and
how many of those are you actively marketing now? What prices are
they selling for?” I waited.

She closed her eyes. Then opened them and
looked me in the eye. “I’ve been putting off telling you this,
Cleo, because it’s not good news. Only a few paintings have sold
this year and those for lower prices than I’d hoped. It seems that
Martha just doesn’t have the fan base she used to have.”

My heart sank. How could this be happening?
“How many exactly and for what prices? Show me the figures,” I
demanded.

“All right, Cleo, take a look.” She called up
a database on her computer and typed in “Martha Donnelly.” A page
came up, showing that only three paintings had sold this year, each
for around $1,500. These were large framed oils—48” x 60”. I was
stunned. Gramma’s large paintings have usually sold for $5,000 or
more. I stood there staring at the page in disbelief.

“How did this happen?” I asked. “And why
didn’t you tell me earlier?”

“The art market is down overall,” she said.
“And a lot of Martha’s fans were older than she is, so they’re not
around anymore. Her work isn’t as popular with younger collectors.
I decided to go ahead and sell at lower prices and take the loss to
get her name out there again. I didn’t tell you because I kept
hoping sales would pick up.”

I wasn’t ready to accept this dire forecast
without doing some research of my own into the art market. But I
couldn’t see much point in discussing it further with Faye.

I struggled to contain my anger. I wanted to
get out of there before I lost my temper and said something I’d
regret. “Okay, thanks for the information,” I said as I turned to
leave. “I guess I need to think about whether I can find some other
way to come up with the money.” As I headed off toward the front
door and let myself out, a wave of sadness washed over my anger. I
realized that I was grieving for all that Gramma had lost to her
horrible disease, and missing Grandpa more than ever. He would have
handled this tough situation she was in so much better than I
could.

Pablo had invited me to a family dinner at
his parents’ house that evening. I enjoy hanging out with his
family so I looked forward to the evening as a welcome break from
my worries about Gramma. I drove out to his house in Longmont so we
could go together in his car to his parents’ house nearby. It was
so good to see him and get that big hug I’d needed all day, that I
found myself in tears.

“Hey, what’s going on,” he asked as I pulled
away and fished in my pocket for a tissue. “Is this about Vernon
Evers?”

“No,” I said wiping my eyes. “It’s about
Gramma. But I don’t want to be late for your parents. I’ll tell you
on the way over.”

As he drove, I filled him in on the new place
the Shady Terrace staff was setting up, Gramma’s need for money to
move there, and what I had learned from Faye that afternoon. “I’m
so frustrated,” I said. “I don’t know what to do next.”

“Hey, we can work this out,” Pablo said.
“After dinner let’s go over to my house and do some searches on the
internet to see what we can find out about prices for paintings. We
can look up some artists we know or know about and see how their
prices stack up against what we expect. And we can see if we can
find any of Martha’s paintings for re-sale and check the asking
prices.”

“Thanks. That’s a great idea,” I said as he
parked the car in front of his parents’ Victorian house in the
historic district of Longmont. As I always do, I admired the wide
tree-lined street and the meticulously cared-for houses, especially
Pablo’s family home. Pablo’s father remodeled the house himself,
restoring the woodwork and hardwood floors, and added a large deck
in the shady back yard.

His parents Fernando and Juanita welcomed me
to their comfy home with open arms and loving words. In many ways I
feel more comfortable with them than I do with my own parents. I’m
pretty sure they would like to see Pablo and me married, but they
never bring that up—at least not with me.

It was too cool for the deck on that October
evening, so we sat in their spacious living room where Juanita had
laid out a platter of tiny corn tortillas topped with refried
beans, chopped tomatillos, onions and cheese. Pablo grabbed us each
a cold beer from the kitchen and we munched on the snacks while his
parents bombarded me with questions about what I’d been doing.

I was partway through telling the story of
Gramma’s predicament, when Pablo’s sister Sofia arrived with her
husband Eduardo and their two young kids, three-year-old Miguel and
five-year-old Lucia. The kids were excited to see us, especially
Pablo, and to show off their new shoes—black Spiderman athletic
shoes for Miguel and shiny pink patent Mary Janes for Lucia. After
we oohed and ahhed over the shoes, Lucia turned to Pablo and said,
“Where’s Mia? I want to show her my shoes.”

Pablo looked surprised. Apparently he hadn’t
realized that five-year-old girls tend to be both talkative and
indiscreet. If he’d been bringing Mia to family gatherings and
hoping to keep that a secret from me, his cover was blown.

“Hush, Lucia,” said her mother before Pablo
could answer. “You have plenty of people here to see your
shoes.”

“But I want to show them to Mia,” she
whined.

Juanita jumped up and took Lucia’s hand,
“Come, Lucia,” she said, pulling her in the direction of the
kitchen, “I need you to help me get some juice for you and
Miguel.”

Pablo also sprang to his feet. “Hey Miguel,”
he said, “Let’s go out back and see how fast you can run in those
new shoes.” Miguel grinned and followed Pablo.

I wasn’t happy to find out that Mia was still
hanging around and that Pablo had brought her to events with his
family, but I didn’t want to deal with those feelings that night. I
had way too much going on to add another problem to my already
overloaded brain. And in all fairness Pablo and I don’t have an
exclusive relationship and that’s as much my choice as it is his.
Plus, I didn’t want to talk about Mia with Pablo’s family any more
than they did with me.

I quickly engaged Pablo’s sister Sofia in a
conversation about her impressions of local nursing homes. Sofia’s
a hospital nurse, so I figured she could tell me something about
the condition of patients who came to the hospital from various
facilities. She had a lot to say, unfortunately none of it very
encouraging. By the time Juanita called us to the dinner table, I
was more convinced than ever that I needed to find the money for
Gramma to move to the new place.

Dinner was a delicious dish of lean pork
marinated in a Mexican spice and citrus mixture and sautéed with
onions, peppers, garlic, jalapeño chili pepper, tomato, and
cilantro. We piled the succulent mixture into soft flour tortillas,
which we rolled into cone shapes and topped with fresh avocado
salsa. Heaven!

I relaxed and let the Mia episode go, so I
could enjoy the evening. Not to say I wouldn’t bring it up with
Pablo later, but I couldn’t see any point of obsessing over it
during dinner. And Pablo was being especially attentive and
engaging. We ate, drank, talked, laughed at the kids’ cute
comments, and lingered at the table over dessert the way families
do when they take time from their busy everyday lives to enjoy each
other’s company.

After we’d all pitched in to clean up and do
the dishes, Sofia and Eduardo took their kids home for bed. Pablo
and I left also, respecting his parents’ habitual early
bedtime.

We headed over to Pablo’s house. He rents,
but needs a house rather than an apartment so he can use the garage
and basement for his sculptures. It’s a quiet two-bedroom brick
ranch—standard issue with white walls, beige carpet, beige
mini-blinds. Pablo’s furniture is basic as well—beige futon couch,
black wooden entertainment center and matching coffee table. But
the place comes alive with Pablo’s own style because of his
abstract metal sculptures scattered in various nooks and corners.
The cats, dogs, chickens and other animals that he builds from
rusty steel tools, blades, gears and other recycled stuff, create a
quirky welcoming committee of silent pets.

I hadn’t mentioned Mia on the way over and
neither had he. I considered asking him about her before we started
our internet search on art prices, but decided against it. My upset
over Mia was less important than my concern for Gramma. I wanted to
get to the internet search; I wanted to continue enjoying Pablo’s
company; and I didn’t want a repeat of an argument going
nowhere.

We started with Google searches on some
artists whose work we knew. But we found that rather than listing
prices for their art, most of the artists suggested customers
purchase their work through galleries or contact them directly for
price information.

“They’re probably not putting prices up
because it will upset the gallery owners if the artist undercuts
them by selling their own work on a website for less than the
gallery prices,” Pablo said. “Which we can do when we’re not paying
the gallery commission.”

“Right,” I said. “So let’s look at some
gallery websites for prices.”

We started with galleries in the west and
southwest—Denver, Santa Fe, Taos, L.A., San Francisco and Seattle.
Some galleries showed prices, others didn’t. Prices varied by
artists and we hadn’t heard of many of the painters, so it was hard
to judge whether or not prices were lower than usual.

“Let’s look on eBay,” Pablo suggested. “Lots
of art is on there, so it might be easier to find work by artists
we know. Or maybe even some of Martha’s work up for re-sale.”

On eBay, we clicked on art, then clicked on
paintings. The site showed over 38,000 paintings for sale by
dealers or resellers, nearly 3,000 for sale by artists, and another
8,000 or so unspecified. We began to browse through the listings,
which included original oil paintings, watercolors, and acrylics of
all sizes; as well as giclee prints and other reproductions. But
the prices were much lower than Gramma’s work. Many were priced at
under one hundred dollars and most were under a thousand.

“I don’t think we’re going to find much work
comparable to Gramma’s here,” I said scrolling rapidly through the
pages. But just as I was about to close the site, a familiar image
popped up. “Wait—I see one of Gramma’s paintings,” I said, clicking
to enlarge the image. It was a luminous abstract of Colorado’s
state flower—the white and lavender columbine—nodding gracefully on
a sunny mountain slope. Gramma had named it “Flower Power.”

“No, Cleo,” Pablo said. “That’s not Martha’s
work. Look there, it says it’s original art signed and dated by the
artist, Monique Hixon.”

“But I remember that painting,” I insisted.
“This Monique Hixon must have copied Gramma’s work. And look at the
price. Good grief! She’s selling it for $250. Gramma’s probably
sold for $5,000. How can she get away with this?”

“We don’t know yet if she’s getting away with
anything,” Pablo said. “Let’s not jump to conclusions. We can try
searching for Monique Hixon to see what else she has on eBay.”

“Okay,” I said, typing the name into eBay’s
search box. I clicked art as a category, then started the search.
Several hundred listings for this Monique person popped up. I
scrolled through and found five others that I was sure were
Gramma’s. All were listed for sale by eBay seller TheBestArt4U in a
private auction. No information was given about either the artist
or the seller, except the seller ratings which showed good
performance on shipping time and providing the item as described in
the listing.

I was steaming mad. “This is fraud,” I
screeched, jumping up and pacing the room. “No wonder Faye thinks
we can’t get good prices for Gramma’s paintings. If people can get
these cheap reproductions, why would they buy her originals?”

Pablo stayed in his chair and didn’t react to
my angst. “Has Martha already sold these paintings that you think
this woman copied?” he asked evenly.

“Yes those have all been sold,” I said
impatiently, continuing to pace. “Oh, and I just remembered, they
were all photographed for a book of her paintings, which is
probably how Monique or whoever she is was able to copy them.”

“Okay they’ve been sold. So these copies, or
whatever they are, aren’t competing with Martha for sales. At most
they’d be a problem for someone re-selling the works.”

“Sold or not, they’re Gramma’s copyrighted
images,” I groaned. “If collectors who’ve bought her work see those
copy-cat paintings selling for a fraction of the price they paid,
they’ll feel cheated and won’t want to buy any more of her work. I
can imagine all her artworks becoming worthless. It’s a disaster
for her.” I circled back to stand in front of him. “How can you be
so calm about this scam? How would you feel if someone was copying
your work?” I shrieked. “We need to report this woman to the
police.”

Pablo laughed. “Cleo, I am the police,” he
reminded me. “And I know we have to get the facts before we can do
anything.”

Bottom line, I knew he was right about
getting the facts. So I sat with him at the computer for another
two hours doing internet searches. EBay doesn’t make it easy. We
couldn’t find out anything about the seller or the so-called
artist. And when we looked at procedures for reporting problems, it
was all about issues of not getting what you ordered. We finally
discovered eBay’s Verified Rights Owner (VeRO) program where people
can report violations of their intellectual property rights, but
the instructions said that only the intellectual property rights
owner can report potentially infringing items or listings.
Obviously Gramma was in no position to make a report and anyway I
wouldn’t want to upset her by telling her about this scam.