A Nearly Perfect Copy - By Allison Amend Page 0,85

even exist? Had Klinman commissioned the art or was he being manipulated?

She sent Klinman a brief message asking him to call her. Then she was sorry she had done so from the office. That would increase her liability. She made a mental note to buy one of those calling cards next time. She was getting better at this. Pretty soon she’d sleep through the night.

Part Three

Fall 2007

Elm

Elm tripped over a cable that hadn’t yet been taped to the carpet. She caught the edge of a chair, banging her elbow in the process.

“Watch out, Mrs. Howells,” one of the facilities guys said. “You okay? We don’t want you to sue.” He laughed; she wouldn’t sue her own family. Still, she heard a little derision in his voice.

“I’m fine. Can’t get rid of me that easy.” She looked at the empty room, numbered chairs at the ready, red carpets vacuumed neatly. In this room her fate would be decided.

She walked to the front to check on the catalogs. “They’re almost all gone,” the receptionist said. “Don’t worry.” She pressed on her earpiece to receive a call.

Elm took a catalog, though she had plenty at her desk. She paced back across the floor and went up to the mezzanine gallery. There they were on display, in a row like solitaire cards: Indira’s Mercat and her other treasures, alongside the rest of the items to be sold. Elm felt the old thrill of seeing her pieces come to auction. When she had made her first acquisitions, she felt almost like the artist. The power she had over the drawings was enormous. She decided their reserve, how they’d be listed in the catalog, where they would hang, what part of the mailing list might be interested. Then she waited anxiously in the back of the auction room for the lots to be called, as nervous as a pianist at her first recital.

The day waned, the hour of the auction approaching, Elm’s anxiety mounting. Her first few auctions had been heady, then Elm settled into the routine and began almost to dread them. They seemed to be the worst part of her job. Procuring and curating works was worthwhile, noble, even. But selling them, and to the highest bidder, no less, seemed lacking in respect. So she had stopped thinking of the auctions as mercenary affairs and instead began to view that part of her job as a necessary evil. She put her head down and did what she was supposed to do. And then Ronan died and it all seemed even more like a shadow puppet show, like something someone else was doing.

The room was filling up, some of the regular characters—George de Marie Bosque, the drawing collector; the man whose name she could never remember who wrote that blog artsnob.com; and a curator from a nascent Impressionist art museum. He’d come in before the auction, explaining that he wanted to add to the already impressive collection donated by its founders, the Lees, wealthy Asian Americans. There were some dealers and art advisers, and a celebrity she recognized as being from one of those forensic television shows. Relay was there too.

Elm stood off in the wings. From there she had a clear view of the mounting platform as well as the audience. She waited until 7:00, then 7:05, when the auctioneer called for attention. The room was about two-thirds filled. Three auction agents were on phones at the side of the room, taking requests from anonymous bidders or those who could not be present at the auction. Usually these were Russians, eager to spend their new wealth. Though they especially liked contemporary pieces, they occasionally spent vast amounts of cash on important older items.

The platform spun slowly, and the first drawing was displayed. A Woodridge that Indira had consigned garnered an appreciative murmur from the crowd. Elm’s bladder clenched. The auctioneer announced the minimum of $120,000, and the bidding began. The curator from the Lee museum raised his paddle. The auctioneer acknowledged him by name. Then a severe-suited woman Elm didn’t recognize pushed the bid to $130,000. An older man, shirt slightly wrinkled and jacket shiny, raised again. Elm saw he had missed a spot shaving, a small patch of dark near his chin. She’d noticed that about older men; they had a neglected air, like the damp pages of an old book. No one to oversee their ablutions.

Elm wasn’t sure how she felt about the auctioneer, Petr Hoosman, a Dutchman who wore patriotic orange