J. M. Taylor

Art is Long

 

Father Bryce hung up the phone, having convinced Gertie Stallworthy to organize a gallery tour for her Retirement Club, which he would “guide” at twenty dollars a blue-haired head. They were going to “The Art of Sin” at Bailly’s Gallery.

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Bryce had never had a purposeful turn of mind. Pasty and rotund, he spent most of his time figuring out new ways to be lazy. The only thing that had led him to be a priest in the first place was that, in school, he’d had a certain facility with Latin. And though he enjoyed the naughty bits of Ovid better than the Book of Timothy, he thought a pleasant sojourn in St. Ronan’s parish would be the perfect way to live out his days.

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Usually he took to hiding in the confessional, where he could hear the petty sins of his feeble parishioners: Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been a week since my last confession. Since then, I have had impure thoughts about Pat Sajak, and coveted my neighbor’s lawn gnomes. But when he had to do something, it was always a fund-raiser like this, and old Bishop Coady thought he was the best thing since church wine.

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*

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David Henshaw put the finishing touches on his latest piece, another screed against an ex-girlfriend. This one was Molly. When he had met her at the studio in school, her clothes were filthy, but she was beautiful. They got to talking, and he brought the conversation around to clothing. As he expected, she was embarrassed by the state of hers, and he was able to use his line: “I have a washing machine,” he said. “If you want, you could come over, and while the wash is on, we could have dinner...” It was better than “Want to see my etchings?” To his surprise, when they woke up the next morning, she still seemed interested in him.

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David let himself fall for Molly. He even brushed and trimmed his red beard to meet her parents. Then she’d walked out one night, not long after the washing machine broke down. All she’d left was a shower-full of shampoo bottles, and a case of multicolored condoms. The box of condoms had been a joke they laughed about as they fumbled in bed. What color would it be tonight? They experimented with layers as well, using their art school knowledge to create a palette of lust. It got uncomfortable quick. But this inspired David to make real art, not the immature, raw stuff he’d done before. A statement.

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And so he created “Latex of Renewal.” Poking holes in the condoms to symbolize the risk of pregnancy, the growth of art from restrictions, he arranged them on a canvas like dots, building a woman’s face. He was limited in his palette, their chromatic couplings notwithstanding. Her face was yellow, her dress red and purple, her hair—symbolizing his hope she would become a spinster—was blue. Only after he had seen the call for artists at Bailly’s Gallery did it occur to him that adding the word “Our” before the title would make a neat pun, since the blue hair could be interpreted as a veil. What difference did a title make if it got him a show?

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*

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The day of the show, Harry Bailly was going out of his mind. The wine he kept in the cellar had turned to vinegar, thanks to an overactive steam pipe, and the plumber, who was supposed to have been finished this morning, kept finding leaks farther back along the pipes. Right now Bailly could hear him banging away in the ceiling like an avenging demon.

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“I’m getting out of this business,” he said to his assistant, a mousy girl named Alyssa, as she arranged half a dozen just-delivered bottles next to a plate of wilting cheese. He had come up with the idea of the show, “The Art of Sin” after he’d seen a surge in Bible movies. It seemed like a good time to make a profit on prophets, but today his prospects looked dim.

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He scanned the installations and the artists. Meredith Dover taught watercolors at the Adult Ed Center, but he was scared by the perky watercolors, depictions of her least favorite public figures. They were supposed to add up to a modern version of “The Garden of Earthly Delights”, but the caricatures, smoking joints and doing other foul things, looked hideous. Meredith, her perky hair revealing red enamel earrings, had some serious angst, and he felt sorry for her.

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Then there were Byron Jones and Ramona Diaz. Jones was the only real artist in the group, right down to the goatee. He had chosen a lion as his subject. (Pride, get it?) In a series of iconic images, the king of the jungle had been shackled by the lady lions, and had bloody marks where his claws had been pulled out. It must have worked for him, though, because Diaz, a militant feminist if there ever was one, was hanging on his arm like a cheerleader. Her “Portrait of a Whore/Saint” was nothing more than a few angry black slashes, with a halo and bright red vagina. Bailly couldn’t tell if she was genuflecting or straddling a body. Maybe both. Then again, the whole thing was such a mess, it might have been neither.

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Finally, there was that smelly David Henshaw and his ridiculous condom monstrosity. The hell with them, Bailly thought. I just better sell something tonight.

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*

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Just before Bailly opened the door, David Henshaw noticed that some of the glue had come loose, and a couple of rubbers had fallen off. Luckily, he had a few in his wallet. He turned and saw Alyssa moping by the refreshment table. He waved her over.

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“Hey there,” he said. “Could you rustle up some tape or glue?” She brought him a bottle of rubber cement, and he patched the face. Perfect.

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At six o’clock, Bailly opened the door with a flourish, and Father Bryce swept past him with his harem of old ladies. They were followed a little later by friends of the artists, mostly Meredith Dover’s students, eager to see their teacher’s masterpieces. In a few minutes, Bailly was happy to note, the place was full of talk and gasps, while people helped themselves to the free wine. He knew you’d have to be drunk to buy some of this stuff.

Bryce led his cohort of crones through the show one artist at a time. He started with Meredith Dover’s watercolors. It wasn’t until he had begun his talk that he could see what the characters were doing, and by then it was too late. He banked on the thick glasses before him to help him lie about the blow jobs.

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“Here we have an exemplum.” The ladies were impressed by the Latin word. “This is a collection of... um... personalities, some of whom are... ah... praying. Yes, this one is looking quite... satisfied... that her prayers are being answered by the smiling saint above her.”

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When he had run out of believable explanations, Bryce led them to Byron Jones’s lions. “As you know,” he began, “the bloody lion represents St. Mark’s torture in Egypt.” He couldn’t for his life remember which saint the lion actually represented, or whether Mark had been tortured, but he didn’t care. He just needed to recite a few plausible pronouncements, and he had long since learned that the bloodier the tale, the more likely people were going to believe it.

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Next, he started towards Ramona Diaz’s section of the room. But her black and red scrawl was far too obvious. He steered them away, though not before Ione Fitzgerald had caught a glimpse of that flaming red vagina. She was still sputtering when he turned their attention to David Henshaw’s piece.

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Bryce looked at the portrait, wearing the traditional blue of the Virgin Mary, and knew that he was in serious trouble. Even he, the most benign fraud ever to wear a collar, was offended by the blasphemy. He stood before “Our Latex of Renewal,” blocking as much of the painting as he could. But the old ladies swayed and scrunched, getting a good look, and he heard phrases like “Gone too far” and “Straight to hell.”

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Bryce coughed and said piously, “Mary traditionally wears blue, so that even illiterate peasants would recognize her...” Panic cleared his mind, and though most of what he said was woven of whole cloth, it was truly inspired. As he expounded on art history, the women began to come around. But then Ione cried, “Mothah of Gawd! It’s alive!”

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Bryce hardly dared to turn, but Ione was so loud, the entire room swarmed around them. He wanted nothing more than to disappear, never to preach again. But instead, he turned. The condoms were growing, standing up in the worst form of erectile dysfunction. One by one, first on the face, then throughout the canvas, the limp rubbers stiffened, edging out from the frame. The two blue eyes were the most prominent, giving the image a cruel aspect.

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A number of gallery-goers dropped to their knees, and hands furiously made the Sign of the Cross. Bryce’s moment had come.

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“Folks,” he cried, “Don’t kneel! This is unholy.” He had used the words before, his voice always hitching on judgments he didn’t believe, but now he felt a power surging through him that he had never known.

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“Hey,” answered a voice in the back. “That’s my work you’re talking about.” Henshaw tried to push forward, but Gertie Stallworthy stopped him.

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“You may have glued those... things to the wall, young man. But now Mary is angry with you.”

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“That’s Molly, not Mary!”

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The crowd had fallen into a chant of prayers, and Bryce was shouting over them, “This is not an apparition! You’re praying to an abomination!” Bailly stormed around the room, unsure whether he had just hit the jackpot, or if he was ruined. Jones scooped up an armful of wine and Ramona followed him outside. Somehow, it seemed as though the number of chanting people was growing.

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In dismay, Bryce turned from the devilish miracle. Where did those candles come from? he thought. There were now so many people it was hard to move, and a group of worshippers became ushers, leading the faithful up for a glance, and then leading them to the side to make room for the next person. It was as if a corps of religious shrine builders had been dispatched to the gallery. A delegation, led by Meredith Dover herself, took down the rest of the installments.

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Bailly tried to stop them, but they forced him out of the way and carried everything through the back door, tossing the lions and loins into the parking lot.

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Bryce had to concede defeat. The wave of heresy had drowned out his first honestly held beliefs. Slowly, they pushed him out of the way, until he was standing by the door, next to Henshaw and the bewildered plumber, who had just emerged from the back room.

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“All I wanted was to make some money,” the priest said.

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“All I wanted was a gallery show,” said the artist.

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“It’s a show, all right,” said the plumber. “I tell you, I thought they were going to burst right through that wall.”

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“What were you doing there?” Bryce asked.

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“A pipe burst,” he said. “There, you can see where it soaked through, just above that picture of...Jesus, are those rubbers?”

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They left the gallery. The plumber, never to be paid. Henshaw, to the all-night laundromat. Father Bryce, with no idea where he was heading.

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Bailly’s Gallery became a pilgrimage site, and, far from making a profit, Bailly found himself responsible for cleaning the tiny bathroom every few hours and hauling out food wrappers. He never sold a thing.

 

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J.M. Taylor cooks up his sinister fantasies in Boston where he lives with his wife and son. He has appeared in Tough, Wildside Black Cat, and AHMM, among others. His first novel, Night of the Furies, was published by New Pulp Press and his second, Dark Heat, by Genretarium. When he’s not writing, he teaches under an assumed name. You can find him at jmtaylorcrimewriter.com and on Facebook at Night of the Furies. Bienvenue à la Danse, J.M..

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