they’d made them up for the party: Kiki and Boris, Monique and Elvis, Geraine and Enjay. But, she reasoned, her name probably sounded ridiculous to those who didn’t know it was short for Elmira, a Tinsley family name that dated back to the seventeenth century. She felt Colin’s reassuring presence at her back and accepted the glass of red wine he proffered.
“You should see this man’s high kicks,” Dick said. “Watch out!” He swung his leg in the air, spilling some of his drink.
Elm forgave Colin immediately. She even inched toward him, as though they found themselves marooned in unexplored New Guinea being stared at by indigenous tribesmen. It reminded her of when they were first married, and right after Ronan died, when, for different reasons, they had clung to each other so tightly that the rest of the world seemed mere window dressing, incidental.
And yet Colin was in his element. He and Dick were laughing about their Budokon instructor, a muscle-bound lothario named Giorgio who would “crush ya as soon as look at ya.” Giorgio liked his class to find their “inna kick-ass” as well as their “levitational attitudes.” Originally from Queens, Giorgio was an inveterate name dropper; he had been trained by Billy Barken, who was some sort of guru, and Giorgio’s private clients included a nightclub impresario, several minor actors, and a reality television celebutante.
Elm sipped at her wine and smiled when it was appropriate. Exuberant people forced her into herself, to retreat back to her core. Colin expanded like a sponge. He did his Giorgio imitation, which Elm had never heard (had she?). All of Colin’s impressions were hilarious, if only because the accent was so ludicrous.
Elm looked over the shoulder of a short, curvy woman toward the Basquiat on the wall. It was one of his later works. Almost without realizing it, Elm left the circle, which had moved onto exercise trends of past and present—Fluidity, Jazzercise, aerobics, step aerobics, Tae Bo, Pilates—to examine it up close. It exuded a peculiar artificial lemon smell. Elm supposed it was from the cleaning supplies used in the house. Sometimes a canvas or a varnish will take on characteristics of its environment, the way people begin to look like their dogs. Elm followed a brushstroke while it dipped and whorled, then disappeared.
The curvy woman said, “Isn’t their art collection amazing? It would be easy to hate them, except they really love these paintings.”
“Well, then, I guess it’s money well spent.”
The woman extended her hand. Her nails were long and painted a bright shade of pink. “Relay,” she said.
Elm’s brow must have knit, because the woman added, “Seriously, that’s my name.”
“Elm.” The woman’s hand was warm.
“Well,” she said, as if to chide Elm for her equally preposterous name. “You want the tour?”
“Sure,” Elm said. “Are you? Do you …?”
“Art adviser.”
“Oh,” Elm said. She debated telling Relay what she did for a living. It inevitably changed the tone of the conversation. Art advisers relied on galleries for most of their purchases, since the clients were usually interested in contemporary art, but Elm’s auction house got occasional communications from those interested in the older works in which Tinsley’s specialized. If this woman knew that Elm was the specialist in Tinsley’s drawings department, she would probably butter her up in the hopes that Elm could tip her off if there was something undervalued hitting an auction, or a real find that was somehow underpublicized. Of course, this kind of insider trading was illegal but widely practiced. Elm made a habit of not consorting with the salesmen of the art world.
Relay took her into a long hallway with doors on one side. On the left was a large Pollock, an early work. She opened the last door and they entered the study. Across from a leather couch hung an enormous flat-screen television, and for a moment Elm wondered if that was the art she was supposed to see. Then Relay turned and pointed at an equally large charcoal drawing by Renoir, a study for Luncheon of the Boating Party. The table was more prominent in this sketch; it covered about 60 percent of the paper’s surface, and the “lens” was bigger, showing the table legs and feet wound around them, complete with two more Yorkshire terriers tearing at a piece of bread. A young woman who didn’t appear in the finished painting sat next to Aline Charigot, looking overwhelmed by the spectacle. In the back stood a boy whose features, blurred though they