Bill had put on a Miles Davis album, and now he awkwardly bobbed his head to it. He sat in the big yellow chair across from Yale.
He said, “Roman will be here soon.” Roman was one of the two PhD candidates who’d be starting as paid interns after the New Year thanks to Mellon Foundation grants. Yale hadn’t met him yet, but Bill had been Roman’s master’s thesis adviser a couple of years ago, back when Bill’s position was academic. Roman would be working with Bill again this coming quarter as a curatorial assistant; the other intern, a woman named Sarah, would work with Yale. “He phoned to say he had no running water, had to dash over to shower at the gym. The life of the grad student, no? I don’t miss it. Charlie, did you do graduate work?”
“Not a day of it,” Charlie said, and didn’t add that he’d dropped out of university. The best Yale could reconstruct was that Charlie had stopped classes but just hung out for three years on and around the campus of King’s College, galvanizing people and leading protests and being, generally, the crown prince of gay students. Charlie wasn’t likely to explain this all to Bill, and Yale was relieved when he excused himself to help Dolly in the kitchen. Charlie was no cook, but he was fantastic at grabbing up a pot to scrub.
Yale said, “I think we simply have to drive up to Door County again. You and me this time. You can talk to her, and I’ll talk to the lawyer.” He steadied his overfilled glass; the red wine had almost splashed onto the arm of the cream sofa. “It’s not like she won’t be home. It’s not like she’ll be having a party.”
“So just show up unannounced?”
“She’s ninety. We don’t have time to wait.”
Bill sighed, looked around the room as if someone might be hiding in the corner, eavesdropping. “I want to make sure you understand what you’re getting into,” he said.
“I do. The worst case is very bad.” It was a scenario that involved their trying to get the art but failing, or (less likely, but still possible) procuring the art and then learning it was forged. In either case, Northwestern would lose Chuck Donovan’s money for nothing.
Bill said, “If Cecily gets word of what we’re doing, or if it comes out badly in the end, she’s going to take this higher and higher up the ladder, just to cover her own behind. It’s only two million, but she’s—things haven’t gone well for her lately.” He scooted his chair closer to Yale, and the back legs caught on the edge of the pale oriental rug, curling it over on itself. “I’m willing to try to take the fall for this, because they’re not going to fire me. For one thing, I’m actually still tenured. But I can’t guarantee what would happen. They might be determined to fire someone simply to prove a point, and that person would be you.” Yale wasn’t sure who they were, but he nodded. “I doubt they’d throw the entire gallery to the wolves, although—”
Charlie stuck his head back through the door. “I’ve been instructed to check your wine glasses!” Yale raised his full one and took a sip; Bill gave a big thumbs-up. It must have been clear they were talking business, because Charlie vanished silently.
Bill said, “Dolly’s already on me to retire. I figure I’m putting in two more years at most. And listen, I’ll stake the tail end of my career on this, and gladly. But you’re a young guy, Yale. You’re at the start of things. And we’re shooting the moon.”
A year ago Yale might have let his nerves back him out of the whole thing, but he felt ready now. He was full, the past few weeks, of an energy he couldn’t name. It might have had to do with the way Julian had looked at him at the fundraiser, the residue of feeling chosen—or it might have had to do with the evidence all around him that life was short, that there was no point in banking on the future instead of the present.
He said, “I want to do this.”
“On a tangential note,” Bill said, pointing a long finger, “let’s talk about interns. Bear with me, because it’s related. So, there’s Sarah and there’s Roman. Both excellent. You were going to have Sarah, but I’ve been