the toga ended.
“What do you call it?” Steiner asked. He was speaking to Robbie. “Classical? Neo-classical?”
“I call it bad art,” Robbie said with a grin, “but at the same time I think I understand why this woman wants it. It has an emotional quality to it that’s quite striking. The elements may be classical—the sort of thing one might see in old steel engravings—but the feel gothic. And then there’s the fact that the principal figure has her back turned. I find that very odd. On the whole ... well, one can’t say this young lady has chosen the best picture in the joint, but I’m sure she’s chosen the most peculiar one.”
Rosie was still barely hearing them. She kept finding new things in the picture to engage her attention. The dark violet cord around the woman’s waist, for instance, which matched her robe’s trim, and the barest hint of a left breast, revealed by the raised arm. The two men were only nattering. It was a wonderful picture. She felt she could look at it for hours on end, and when she had her new place, she would probably do just that.
“No title, no signature,” Steiner said. “Unless—”
He turned the picture around. Printed in soft, slightly blurred charcoal strokes on the paper backing were the words ROSE MADDER.
“Well,” he said doubtfully, “here’s the artist’s name. I guess. Funny name, though. Maybe it’s a pseudonym.”
Robbie shook his head, opened his mouth to speak, then saw that the woman who had chosen the picture also knew better.
“It’s the name of the picture,” she said, and then added, for some reason she could never have explained, “Rose is my name.”
Steiner looked at her, completely bewildered.
“Never mind, that’s just a coincidence.” But was it? she wondered. Was it really? “Look.” She gently turned the picture around again. She tapped the glass over the toga the woman in the foreground was wearing. “That color—that purply-red—is called rose madder.”
“She’s right,” Robbie said. “Either the artist—or more likely the last person to own the picture, since charcoal rubs away fairly rapidly—has named the painting after the color of the woman’s chiton.”
“Please,” Rose said to Steiner, “could we do our business? I’m anxious to be on my way. I’m late as it is.”
Steiner started to ask once more if she was sure, but he saw that she was. He saw something else, as well—she had a fine-drawn look about her, one that suggested she’d had a difficult go of it just lately. It was the face of a woman who might regard honest interest and concern as teasing, or possibly as an effort to alter the terms of the deal in his own favor. He simply nodded. “’The ring for the picture, straight trade. And we both go away happy.”
“Yes,” Rosie said, and gave him a smile of dazzling brilliance. It was the first real smile she had given anyone in fourteen years, and in the moment of its fullness, his heart opened to her. “And we both go away happy.”
5
She stood outside for a moment, blinking stupidly at the cars rushing past, feeling the way she had as a small child after leaving the movies with her father—dazed, caught with half of her brain in the world of real things and half of it still in the world of make-believe. But the picture was real enough; she only had to look down at the parcel she held under her left arm if she doubted that.
The door opened behind her, and the elderly man came out. Now she even felt good about him, and she gave him the sort of smile people reserve for those with whom they have shared strange or marvellous experiences.
“Madam,” he said, “would you consider doing me a small favor?”
Her smile was replaced with a look of caution. “It depends on what it is, but I’m not in the habit of doing favors for strangers.” That, of course, was an understatement. She wasn’t even used to talking to strangers.
He looked almost embarrassed, and this had a reassuring effect on her. “Yes, well, I suppose it’ll sound odd, but it might benefit both of us. My name is Lefferts, by the way. Rob Lefferts.”
“Rosie McClendon,” she said. She thought about holding out her hand and rejected the idea. Probably she shouldn’t even have given him her name. “I really don’t think I have time to do any favors, Mr. Lefferts—I’m running a little late, and—”
“Please.” He put down his weary briefcase, reached into the