Big Lies in a Small Town - Diane Chamberlain Page 0,74

magnification visor, while Nathan played games on his dad’s computer.

“You have to forget you’re an artist,” Oliver said, as he demonstrated brushing the paint onto an abraded area. “Think more like a technician. You not only want to match the color of the area where you’re painting, you need to match the texture of the paint as well. The level of the gloss, too.” He showed me how to reduce the gloss of the paint by mixing it with a little silica, fine-tuning the result until it matched Anna’s oils.

“Got it,” I said. I watched Oliver use short pointillist strokes with a tiny brush, touching the canvas with the gentlest care, but I was remembering what Nathan had said about not going to Smith Mountain Lake with him and felt like putting a comforting arm across his shoulders. I glanced at Nathan where he was engrossed in the computer. Spoiled little guy. I supposed most twelve-year-olds were just like him, only thinking of their own needs. Their own wants. I hadn’t been that way, though. No one could ever have accused me of being spoiled.

“If you want me to check your work the first few times, just ask,” Oliver said, bringing me back to the here and now. “Might be a good idea.”

I smiled at him from under the visor. “You worried I can’t do it?”

“The paint’s just different than what you’re used to,” he said. “But I have confidence in you.”

By the end of the day, I’d inpainted one tiny square inch near the upper left-hand corner of the mural. It was only background, only blue sky, nothing like what I’d be dealing with later—one of the Tea Party ladies’ missing eyelashes, for example—things that would truly matter, but Oliver declared my work competent. His faint praise told me it was quitting time for the day and I was relieved to slip the visor from my head.

Standing back, I looked up at the speck of paint that had taken me so long to apply. August fifth, I thought. One short month away. Slowly, I shook my head. This was going to be impossible.

Chapter 30

ANNA

January 17, 1940

Anna stopped in the library on her way to the warehouse, hoping to pick up some art books for Jesse. Peter had borrowed some of the library’s books on drawing, and when Anna suggested to Jesse that he do the same, he replied, “Ain’t no colored library here, Miss Anna.” She’d been more frustrated than surprised at that news. So she checked out some books for him herself, wondering what the librarian would say or do if she told her she planned to put them into the hands of a colored boy. But she behaved herself, quietly checking out the books without comment. She thought people talked about her quite enough already.

She’d been working on the cartoon alone in the warehouse for a few hours when an unfamiliar man suddenly pushed open the door and strutted into the space as though he owned it. Anna stepped back from the cartoon, charcoal pencil in hand, unsure if she should be frightened or angered by the intrusion.

“You’re Anna Dale?” the man asked, his voice deep and gruff.

“Yes, and you’re…?”

“I’m Riley Wayman,” he said. “Theresa Wayman’s father.”

Oh, she thought. Theresa Wayman’s father and president of the bank. She set down her pencil and walked toward him, dusting her hand off on her smock before holding it out to him. “How do you do?” she asked, but he seemed to want nothing to do with her hand. She felt him eye her up and down, taking in her slacks, her charcoal-smeared smock, her oxfords. A cold wind had blown into the warehouse with him and Anna shivered despite the warmth her two space heaters were putting out.

“I want to know why you brought in this colored boy and kicked my daughter out,” he said.

“I didn’t kick her out,” Anna said. “Theresa told me you wouldn’t allow her to work with me if Jesse stayed. She chose to leave.”

“She was with you first.”

“But I have room for three students to work with me and Jesse was referred to me by his art teacher,” Anna said. “I would have loved to have Theresa stay. She’s quite talented.” Was she? Anna hadn’t actually seen any of her work. “It was her choice to leave.”

Riley Wayman folded his arms across his big barrel chest and looked at the cartoon, frowning. He studied the drawing for so long and so silently that Anna