Judith Merril - The Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy 7

I picked up another brush, wondering what shape I would tease this pool into. But then a really weird thing happened. I noticed that as a shape formed in my mind, the same shape would form on the canvas. I mean I didn’t touch the canvas or anything. The black pool of paint just took on what I was thinking. I worked through a series of shapes and finally hit on a very good one. It had a sort of cosmic quality: a nucleus, with five interrelated drips spiraling around it.

I stepped back. The black form was in a very nice place, the tension was practically perfect. I was pleased and was admiring my work, when I began to get the feeling that somebody was watching me. You know that feeling you sometimes get in a bus or a subway and you look up and sure enough you meet the eyes of a character across the aisle. A detective or something. So I looked up.

On the bed where I had put the rock was a girl. At first I thought she was Olivia. She was the same size, small, that is, had the same immature and somewhat nondescript face, and was wearing, as Olivia always did, a black turtle-neck sweater and blue jeans. But the eyes that were watching me were not Olivia’s. Olivia’s eyes were gray, as I’ve said, and sort of dull. These eyes were a burnt-sienna color. And over there on the dark side of the room they were glowing as if someone had lit a couple of little bonfires behind them.

“Good morning,” I said.

She didn’t answer. She sat there watching me, her elbow on her knee, her pointed chin resting on the palm of a somewhat pudgy hand.

“Do you know,” she said finally, “you’re the first man I’ve ever seen. Ever, that is.”

She shook her head slightly, as if to clear it, and looked at me again.

“How did it happen, sister?” I asked. ‘They had you locked up?”

“In a sense,” she said.

I carried my canvas across the room and set it up against the wall.

“It utterly overwhelms me!” she exclaimed. “I can see that one must exercise fantastic control.”

I looked at my picture to see if it was that good, and shrugged my shoulders modestly.

“I wasn’t talking about your picture,” she said. “I was talking about sex. This is the first time I’ve ever experienced it. You know, where I come from we don’t have any sex. We have something entirely different.”

“And what is that?” I asked.

“Oh, it’s a really grisly performance. It takes eight of us, and it’s run by the Department of Weights and Measures. It’s quite heavy.” She patted the bed. “Do come and sit beside me.”

I said, somewhat nervously, “Perhaps you’d better come over here and sit on this chair.” Since she didn’t move, I added, “As a matter of fact, I’m afraid you’re sitting on a rock.”

“No, I’m not,” she said, a little coldly. “Besides, it wasn’t a rock. It was a meteorite.” A small, reproachful wrinkle appeared on her forehead. She drew up her knees, and in a slow, weary way put her head down on the pillow. “I’m not happy,” she said. “It’s very evident that you don’t like me.” She began to look as if she were going to cry. “I gave a lot of thought to my appearance before I came. I’ve always heard that artists like you, who’d been through the mill, who’d really had it, wanted something quiet around. Something not too exciting. Something they call a studio mouse.”

I began to feel sorry for her. I crossed the room and put my hand on her shoulder.

“Listen, sister,” I explained, “the trouble is, I’ve just had one of what you describe. And I’m not too anxious to get mixed up with another.”

“Oh,” she said, lightening up considerably. “So that’s all it is. Why, that can be taken care of in no time. Do you like my eyes?”

“Yes.”

“Do you like them better this way?” As she spoke her eyes changed from brown to a brilliant blue. The color of the morning-glory in the sun outside.

“Anything else?” she asked.

At first I thought I wasn’t functioning properly. I put my hands over my own eyes and looked at her again. Then I went to the window. The grass was still green, the sky still blue. And across the marshes, across Acabonic Creek, I could see Seymore Harris’ red Jaguar speeding along his private causeway. Colorwise, my eyes were O.K.

“Anything else?” she had asked. Slowly I grasped the significance of her remark. Evidently, all I had to do was to make a suggestion or so, and she would change into my conception of the perfect woman. The trouble was, I’d never done any work with the figure. I’d always painted abstractions (I’d studied with Hans Hofmann). I wasn’t sure I could carry the job through. So I went to the stepladder where Olivia had put some of my books and took down a large volume.

“Have you ever heard of Leonardo da Vinci?” I asked.

“Oh, yes,” she said brightly. “He was one of ours. How did he make out down here?”

“Not at all badly.” I handed her the book. “I’ve always admired his women.”

She leafed through the papers. “They seem,” she said, “they seem to me to be a little old-fashioned. Wouldn’t you like something less passé?” She pointed to a picture of Jacqueline Kennedy that I had tacked up over the sink. “Who’s that over there?” she asked. “Couldn’t I combine a little of that with a little of these?”

“If you like.”

“Then put your hands over your eyes, the way you did a moment ago, and count backward from ten. Very slowly.”

I covered my eyes as she asked and started to count. At eight, I heard the town siren give a wail, there was a fire somewhere. At five, I began to notice a complicated perfume, as if the room were filling up with flowers. And then I heard an automobile horn on the road below. A very expensive horn.

“Now, darling,” she said. “Now…”

She was flawless, absolutely flawless. She was, to be sure, generally Leonardo, though I had the impression that he might have painted her some years after he had died, when things in Italy were more sensuous, more worldly. But her hair was definitely Jacqueline. She had kept her blue eyes.

“Do you approve?” she murmured, smiling and holding out her hands toward me.

She was completely irresistible. I took her in my arms.

“Who,” she asked, “is that utterly fascinating man coming up the path?”

I turned to see.

“It’s Seymore Harris, the dealer,” I answered.

He was striding up the path with all the purpose and vitality that had brought him such success in business. He was very smartly done up, in crushed-raspberry trousers and a well-cut plaid jacket. This was topped off with a handsome beret, the whole costume suggesting that he was a man of two worlds — which indeed he was, for he could move with us and with the others. His strong face was a type that often appeals to women: it was full of charm and animal cunning.

“Look,” I said abruptly. “I’m afraid Mr. Harris has come to discuss a private matter. Would you mind going upstairs?”

“Where’s upstairs?” she asked.

I grabbed the stepladder, shook the books off the steps and set it up under the trap door.

“Come!” I ordered. “Right up here.” And she followed obediently.

Seymore Harris was knocking on the door below. I said to her, “Just make yourself at home on the sofa,” and she sat down. A small cloud of moths arose before her beautiful and bewildered face. I descended the ladder, then slammed the trap door above me.

“Hi, Seymore,” I said.

He was surveying the studio with evident distaste. “God knows how you artists can stand it. This place is in a mess.”

“I’m sorry, Seymour; Olivia’s left me.”

“Hmm,” he muttered. “Hmm,” and sat down on the bed. He lifted his handsome nose and began to sniff appreciatively. “Boy, you must be a fast worker. Fleurs d’Amour. Made by Reynal Frères. The most expensive perfume in the world. Costs eighty-two dollars an ounce.” He gave me a crafty, sympathetic smile. “But don’t think I’m criticizing. I guess everybody knows my weakness. Women!” he snorted. “Women! You know, fella, the only women worth a damn are the ones you meet in dreams.”