Page 37 of Theo of Golden

Asher chuckled. “But I do have to admit, mystique, even if it’s a pretense, can be helpful for business, can’t it? I think sometimes that serious art buyers aren’t very interested in paintings by someone as ordinary and unmysterious as me. Maybe if I were a little more brooding, buyers would take my art more seriously.”

Theo grinned. In such a short time, the elderly man and the young artist were talking like old friends. They remained standing in the entrance hallway.

“I don’t mean to be impolite,” the gentleness of Theo’s voice dispelled any chance of that possibility, “but would you tell me about these?”

He nodded and gestured toward the painting of the lone tree in the field and the four framed letters.

Asher nodded. “I’ll try. The letters are easy. When I was a little boy, I told my mom I wanted to be an artist. Somehow, she got the addresses of these famous guys and helped me write letters to them. I can’t imagine what I said, but those three responded. The fourth is from her father, my granddad. He didn’t give much credence to the notion of artistic temperament and could be pretty hard on my mother at times, but he was really nice in his letter to me.

“My hunch is that she wrote cover letters and put them in with mine. She was a great encourager. I think every obscure artist, which is most of us, needs at least one of those. Anyway, she had these letters framed for me when I graduated from art school. It feels a bit like name dropping to have them here, but, really, they say more about her than about the artists who wrote them.

“I had the idea once that, if I ever made a mark in the art world, I’d write those guys to tell them how their letters helped me. I’m not even sure they’re alive anymore, and I surely haven’t made a mark in the art world.”

“Asher, I’m sure they would be very pleased with what you’ve accomplished.”

“Thank you for saying so.”

Theo pointed to the painting. “And the tree in the field?”

“Yeah, that one is a bit of a mystery. It was one of Mom’s favorites, but she would never tell me much about it. You see the inscription here? ‘Me, painting you, painting’? I don’t know who the ‘me’ or the ‘you’ are, but it’s nicely done, don’t you think?”

Theo nodded. “It is. Do you think she might be the girl at the easel?”

“Funny you should say so. That’s my theory, but whenever I asked her about it, she just laughed and said she would neither admit nor deny the allegation. Once when I asked her, she pulled her dress above her knees and said, ‘Do these legs look like those?’ So who knows? It was certainly like her to stand in a field painting. I just don’t know the when or where or why of this one.

The two men stood for a matter of seconds studying the small painting.

“How about another cup of coffee?”

They returned to their chairs and, for the next couple of hours, shared a sprawling, meandering conversation, in which a random word or phrase would trigger another story and another, ad infinitum. Theo offered more than once to leave so that Asher could work, but the artist asserted his independence, claiming that, as his own boss, he could work whenever he wanted.

“This conversation is my work today,” he said.

As part of that work, Asher tried to learn details of Theo’s life. But, just as Shep and Tony and Minnette had discovered, the old man proved to be an artful dodger. It was Theo who continued to ask most of the questions, and it was the young artist who was somehow lured into giving long, revealing answers.

For instance, “Asher, how did you settle on portraits as a specialty?”

Asher nodded. “Well, I had just gotten out of school; undergrad, master’s, doctorate. I had lots of education, but I didn’t have any customers.

Unlike Mr. Van Gogh, I was hoping to sell some of my work before I died. And, as I mentioned, I’ve always liked to draw people.

“There used to be a little restaurant called the Magnolia a couple of miles from here in an upscale part of the city. It was where lots of the well-to-do women in town used to eat lunch after their morning bridge games. My mother was friends with the young couple who owned the place. Well, that couple had twins, a boy and a girl. I had just gotten back to town and my mom, God bless her, volunteered me to do a portrait of them. But she insisted that the owners hang the portrait in the restaurant, right behind the cash register, for at least a month before taking it home.

“So, I did the portrait, delivered it, and helped the owners hang it properly. Even that little bit of self-promotion was uncomfortable for me, but by the time I got home, five calls and five commissions were waiting for me. I was elated. Mom was too. I suspect she had something to do with those five phone calls, since they all came from family friends. That’s about the closest I’ve come to ‘marketing’ myself, even after all these years. Mom’s strategy worked. The calls never stopped after that. So, there you have it. The story of Asher, the portrait artist.

“Now, Theo, let me ask you a question. I’m doing too much of the talking. Really, why are you buying the portraits at the Chalice? I’m grateful, but I’m curious too. Do you know the people whose portraits you’re buying?”

Theo shared the explanation, the mysterious impulse, behind his purchases. He was good at telling his story by then.

“No, I don’t know the people. I don’t meet them until I give them their portraits. But before I deliver the portraits, I look, look, look at them. Don’t laugh, Mr. Asher — excuse me, Asher — but sometimes when I eat my meals at home alone, I bring a picture to the table and set it across from me. And while I eat, I study that face.”

Theo tapped his forehead. “Maybe I am a crazy old man? Voílà! But by the time I meet them at the fountain, I feel as if I know them, at least a bit. That’s why I find your work so interesting. It’s as if you make it possible to look not merely at the face but through the face, to the heart of the person. To the possibility of the person.

“I’m certain that some of the people see themselves clearly for the first time when they look at your drawings of them. I wish you could be there when I give them their portraits. It’s so wonderful.”

“Well, Theo, that’s awfully nice of you, but I have a hunch it’s your words that are bringing the portraits to life. Some of them have been on the wall, speechless, for months, and nobody seemed terribly moved by them. From what I can tell, you take them down, cast a spell on them, and, all of a sudden, they have something to say. My niece, Minnette, sure thinks so.”

Theo shook his head. “Asher, it would please me greatly if that were the case, but I think you give me too much credit. I simply help people sit still long enough to see what is already there.”