'Then there's nothing to worry about,' Jean Shaw said, 'because I don't have any.'
On a stool in the darkroom LaBrava sat hunched over contacts of the stoned Cuban couple, Boza and Mendoza, who had posed for him this morning, moving a magnifier down the strips of miniature prints, deciding Lana had had the right idea ('How about one like this?'), the shot of her exposing herself was the best one. Not because of her bared chest, but because of her eagerness to show breasts that were lifeless and seemed too old for her, and because Paco, sitting below her in the wheelchair, didn't know what was going on. LaBrava felt sorry for the girl; he saw ambition but little about her that was appealing and believed she would be hard to live with.
He could look at this girl, Lana Mendoza, barely a name to him, and know her, while his mind was still upstairs with Jean Shaw, wondering.
Trying to see her clearly.
He caught glimpses of her in black and white from the past and now in soft color, the same person, pale features, the lady in lamplight, dark eyes coming to rest on him. Her eyes could do things to him without half trying. He believed she was beautiful. He believed she was vulnerable. He believed she looked at him in a different way than she looked at Maurice.
He had walked her down the hall to 304. In the doorway she said, 'I'm glad I came here.' She kissed him on the cheek. She said, 'Thank you,' and was still looking at him as she closed the door.
Was that familiar? Seeing her eyes and then the door closing, filling the screen. He wasn't sure.
Why did she thank him?
He didn't do anything, offer advice. He listened.
He listened to her tell Maurice she was serious. She didn't have any money. Really. Not money as you thought of having money. She wasn't living on Social Security. But, she said, she didn't have that much to begin with. Jerry hadn't exactly left her set for life. Not after the IRS got through with him. Three audits in a row. LaBrava listened. All of his tax shelters disallowed. They had to sell the house on Pine Tree. Then his stock portfolio went to hell, he took a bath there. LaBrava listened. Between the government and the market Jerry was almost into bankruptcy when he died. That's what killed him, Jean Shaw said. Maurice didn't say much. He listened, watching her almost sadly, and seemed to nod in sympathy. He did ask her how she was fixed. She said well, she had the income from her piece of the hotel, she had a few stocks, she could sublease the apartment and move to a cheaper place. She said, with that dry delivery, she could always make appearances at condominium openings. 'Screen Star Jean Shaw in Person.' A developer had suggested it one time. Or, she said, if things got really bad she could team up with Marilyn, the bag lady, work up a routine. Maurice, serious, said come on, don't talk like that. He told her not to worry about her financial situation, not as long as he was around. There was no mention again of Richard Nobles.
Now, in the darkroom, Joe LaBrava wondered which of her movies she had showed Nobles. He wondered why she had said, 'The way he walks around the apartment, looks at my things.' Like Nobles had visited her more than that one time, to see the movie.
He wondered about her eyes, too, if she used them in a studied, theatrical way. Twice, while Maurice was speaking, he had felt her eyes and turned to see her watching him. He saw her eyes as she sipped her drink... as she closed her door.
I'm glad I came here.
And heard a girl's voice say, 'Boy, you put in long hours, don't you?'
Franny Kaufman stood in the doorway. He smiled, glad to see her. He liked her, with the strange feeling they were old friends. 'The Spring Song girl. You moved in?'
'Sorta. A friend of mine has a van helped me with the heavy stuff, the boxes. I still have some junk to get tomorrow.'
'What room're you in?'
'Two-oh-four. It's not bad, I get morning light. I haven't seen any bugs yet.' She wore jeans and a gas- station shirt that said Roy above the pocket, intricate silver rings on her fingers. She turned, looking around. 'I didn't know you had all this.'
'It's the old man's, really.'
'I was just nosing around, seeing what's here.' She came over to the counter. 'Can I look?'
'Here, use the loupe,' he moved aside, off the stool.
Franny took off her round glasses, bent over to study the contacts through the Agfa magnifier, inching it over the pictures, stopping, moving on. He looked at her strange hair that he liked, frizzed out on both sides--it seemed part of her energy--and looked at the slender nape of her neck, the stray hairs against white skin.
She said, 'I've seen him around, but I haven't seen her. Which ones're you gonna print? No, wait. I bet I know the one you like the best. The one, the girl showing her tits. Am I right?'
'I think so,' LaBrava said. 'I'm gonna play with it, print it different ways, see what I get.'
'It's sad, isn't it?' Franny said. 'Except I get the feeling she's a ballbuster. I feel sorry for her, you know? But only up to a point. Was the pose your idea?'
'No, hers.'
'What's her name?'
'Lana.'
'Oh, that's perfect.'
'Yeah, Lana gets the credit.'
'But it didn't turn out the way she thought it would. You got something better. You do good work, Joe.'
'Thank you.'
'You do any nudes?'
'I have. A lady one time had me shoot her sitting on a TV set naked.'
'Coming on to you?'
'No, she wanted her picture taken.'
'Far out.'
'It wasn't bad. She started with a fur coat on. Then she says, 'Hey, I got an idea.' Lets the coat fall open, she's got nothing on under it. They always say that, 'Hey, I got an idea,' like they just thought of it.'
'I got an idea,' Franny said. 'Shoot me nude, okay? I want to do a self-portrait in pastels, send it to this guy in New York. I'm thinking life-size, reclined, very sensual. What do you charge for a sitting? Or a lying.'
'You can buy lunch sometime.'
'Really? But you have to promise not to send it to Playboy. This is for art, like Stieglitz shooting Georgia O'Keeffe in the nude. You ever see those?'
'They were married then.'
She said, 'They were?' surprised. She said, 'You know what you're doing, don't you?'
'Sometimes.'
'Are you tired? I mean right now.'
'Not especially.'
'Let's go outside, look at the ocean. That's the only reason to live here, you know it? The ocean and these weird hotels, both of them together in the same place. I love it.'
They walked through the empty lobby.
'Yeah, I think reclined. Unless you've got some ideas.'
'It's your painting.'
'I'm gonna render myself about twelve pounds lighter and straighten my hair. See if I can turn the guy on.'
They crossed the street past locked parked cars.
'I like your hair the way it is.'
'Really? You're not just being nice?'
'No, I mean it.'
And crossed the grass to the low wall made of cement and coral where she raised her face to the breeze coming out of darkness, off the ocean. 'I feel good,' Franny said. 'I'm glad I came here.'
'Somebody else told me that, just a little while ago.' He sat down on the wall, facing the Della Robbia, looked up at the windows. Faint light showed in 304. 'I'll tell you who it was. Jean Shaw.'
