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(by Edward Zeusgany and Alex Anders, © copyright 1998, all rights reserved)
He left the house early, the usual pattern of his days; a quick breakfast and out the door. He didn’t feel comfortable at home, except in his own little room. It was like not being quite welcome. His parents weren't unkind to him. He got nice presents on birthdays and Christmas, but there was a kind of indifference that he could sense. He was used to it, he was resigned to it. His name was Alexander. Sometimes he called himself, “the great,” but never out loud.
He rode the bicycle he got four years ago when he was nine, a used, no frills, mountain bike with faded paint. He zipped down town and around the Town Hall and out on the pier. Cars were already crowding the municipal parking lot. The tourists were flocking for early departures of the whale watch boats. He stopped and exchanged a few words with some other local boys, two on bikes and two on blades.
Then he was off again, up Winslow Street past the library and the hardware store. A little further on he saw an artist with an easel set up, sitting on a camp stool with brush and palette in hand. Alexander continued as far as the Ice House and took a left, then another left onto High. At Cooper he cut back to Winslow. He wanted to have a peek at whatever the artist was painting.
*****
On other occasions, Stewart had noticed the one legged boy peddling a bicycle around town. There was no attempt to hide the defect. The boy ‘s pant leg rode up over the prosthesis which was a slender, shiny, metal shaft that disappeared into a sneaker. From the action of the leg, Stewart inferred that the amputation was below the knee. But the way the kid rode seemed no different from any other. Lots of energy was being burned off.
The boy went past, first in one direction, then, a short while later, in the opposite. Perhaps a half hour passed and the kid was back again. Stewart supposed that he was curious, but he paid no more attention, concentrating instead on his work. An hour later Stewart sensed that the kid had stopped just behind him. He had heard the tires of a bicycle approach, then the sound abruptly ceased without anyone passing him.
*****
The painting on the canvas was little more than shapes in various colors. Even so, Alexander recognized the buildings and between them the bay, some boats, the pier with the fish house at the end. He watched the artist work for a few minutes. Shades of color were slowly altered, but the whole still lacked the sharp lines of reality. It looks fuzzy, Alexander thought, and none of the things are those colors really.
He took off again toward the west end of town, the “Fashionable West End” it was called by real estate agents. Down past the Coast Guard Station a ways and then back to check on the artist’s progress. Some details were beginning to emerge. There were hints of clapboards, of reflections in windows, of waves in the bay.
“Are you going to put in some seagulls, or some buoys?”
“Perhaps. Do you think I should?”
“Well, they’re there.”
“That’s true, but if I tried to include everything, I would never finish and the painting would look cluttered.”
Alexander thought about this for a while. When he tried to draw he didn’t get that far. Nothing looked like it was supposed to. “So, are you or aren't you?,” he asked.
“What?”
“Going to put in seagulls and buoys?”
“I’ll decide later, when I have a better idea of what the whole is going to look like. But I’ll try to put some in for you. Anyway, I’m finished for today.”
Alexander liked the idea that the artist would add a seagull or a buoy just for him, but was concerned that he may have been pestering the artist and that’s why he was leaving.. “Is it OK if I watch you paint when you come back?”
*****
The following day the boy appeared shortly after Stewart set up. After exchanging names, Stewart gave Alexander five dollars and asked the youngster to go to The Coffee Pot for him and to get something for himself too.
While Stewart continued work on the painting, Alexander would observe for a while and then take off on his bicycle. Returning, he would quietly watch the progress, except when he saw that three seagulls had appeared in the sky. Then he got excited and asked if they were his seagulls.
“Of course.”
“How about some mooring markers and buoys for lobster pots?”
“Patience, patience,” the artist replied.
Toward noontime, Stewart began to pack up his equipment. Alexander saw how much stuff there was and offered to carry some of it. Stewart gave him the wooden box that contained his paints and brushes; taking the easel, canvas and stool himself.
*****
When they got to Stewart’s house on Bangs Street, Alexander asked him if he had any coke. So Stewart invited the boy in. On the ground, Alexander had a somewhat awkward walk, slightly bent at the knees and waist, but he carried the paint box quite easily.
The offer of a coke, diet, because that was all that Stewart had, became an invitation to lunch. While Stewart made salami sandwiches, Alexander looked around the large front room that served as both sitting room and dining room and had a galley kitchen in one corner. To Alexander, the furniture was all old, used stuff. The paintings on the walls were old too and weren’t by Stewart. There were a lot of odd objects, for example, an ivory and silver mug, and a little stone stature of a funny looking man with a peaked hat or hair, Alexander couldn’t tell which.
“Where are your paintings?” he asked.
“In the back. I’ll show you, bring the box.”
Stewart picked up the rest of his paraphernalia and went down a short hallway to a door that opened onto a much larger room with a bare floor. There were canvases stacked up against the walls, a large heavy wooden easel, several small tables, glass jars holding twenty or thirty brushes each, and a lot of other clutter.
“Put that down anywhere,” Stewart said. He showed Alexander a few of his paintings. They were different from the one he had just been doing and different from each other, though the boy couldn’t say how exactly. Then Stewart suggested that they eat lunch.
*****
The next day Alexander looked for Stewart at the place where he had been painting, but he wasn’t there. When the artist hadn’t appeared by 10 o’clock, he rode over to the man’s house and rang the bell, it had a hand crank with a porcelain knob.
‘Hello, Alexander,” Stewart said. He seemed surprised, but he stepped aside to let the boy in.
“How come you’re not painting today?”
“I am, but not outside. I’m doing studio work.” And he led Alexander to the back room. There was a canvas on the easel, but not the one of the houses and the pier and his seagulls. This one was a scene of a bench in front of the Town Hall and had five men on it, Two were sitting alone and three seemed to be together and talking, one was eating ice cream out of a paper cup.
“Have you finished the other painting?”
“No. I’m letting it rest for a while. When I come back to it, I’ll have a better idea about what else I want to do. Something more, for sure, but what I don’t know.”
“Can I see it?”
“It must be the last in one of those stacks. See how they touch only at the top so that the surface of the painting doesn’t touch the stretcher of the next one?”
“Stretcher?”
“That’s what the wood part is called. The canvas is stretched over it.”
“Uh Huh.”
“Well, after you find it and have a look, put it back the same way. Oh, and it’s still wet so hold it only by the outside edges.”
“How long does it take to dry?”
“That depends. Sometimes a few hours, sometimes a few days, sometimes a few weeks. Some paints take a long time to dry.”
Alexander found his painting and had a look at it. He looked at some of the others, too, but only the four that were at the ends of stacks. Although he was very careful, some of the edges had paint on them and he got some on his fingers. Stewart showed him how to clean it off with turpentine and a paper towel.
Alexander worked up the courage to ask, “Could you do a painting of me?”
“Yes, if you wanted me to.”
“What kind?”
“We’d have to think about that. I have a some prints that you can look at that might give you some ideas of what you would like. You can go through them in the other room while I finish up here.”
*****
From a cupboard, Stewart had brought out several large folders. Each one contained many sheets of paper of various sizes and each sheet had a picture on it. Most were in color, but some were black and white, a few were brown and white. One folder contained, what Alexander found out later, were called “still lifes,” another set were all “landscapes.” Finally he came across one that was full of pictures of boys, boys alone, boys together, boys and girls, boys with adults. But by the time he decided that he should go through this folder one by one, Stewart had returned and it was time for lunch.
It was the same lunch as yesterday. Alexander asked Stewart if he had any potato chips, but he didn’t. And, after he finished his sandwich, he asked Stewart if he had anything for desert, but he didn’t have that either. Stewart explained that he was too fat and that was why he didn’t keep such things in the house.
Indeed Stewart was pretty chunky not to mention old. Alexander figured that the fellow was fifty at least; short, fat and fifty. But he wasn’t ugly or anything. His hair was mostly gray and cut short and he was clean shaven. But most of all he was friendly, and willing to pay Alexander some attention.
Finally, Alexander asked if he could come back the next morning to look through the folder of prints. Stewart said that he had to go to Orleans in the morning, but that he would be back about two in the afternoon. If Alexander would like to come over then, that would be alright. Alexander said that he might.
*****
Stewart drove into his parking spot a little after one o’clock, parked and then hefted the grocery bags up the three steps to his door and into the kitchen. He puttered around, it was a cleaning day, a straightening up day. The door bell didn’t ring until a little after four. Alexander had lost track of time, he said. He couldn’t stay long. He had to be home by five. Stewart asked him if he would like tea and a couple of cookies.
“You have cookies?” the boy asked. “What kind?”
“Chocolate Chip. You can have milk or coke if you’d rather.”
“No, I’ll have tea. Did you get the cookies just for me?” Alexander asked a bit sheepishly.
“Well, you were the excuse,” Stewart admitted, somewhat more sheepishly.
*****
The following day was gloomy with clouds and drizzle. Alexander slept late for a change and didn’t get to Stewart’s until nine-thirty. He spent the morning looking through he folder of prints and thinking about the painting he would ask Stewart to do of him. Later, he went into the studio to see what the artist was working on.
“A lot of those kids are wearing costumes,” Alexander announced.
“What kids?”
“In the folder.”
“Oh. Well, those were the kinds of clothes people wore when the paintings were done. But we can get costumes if that’s what you want. If I can get the right kind of drape then I can create the right colors and textures on the canvas?”
“Huh?”
“Well, take this painting.” Stewart indicated the composition on the easel, the one with the five men on a bench. “These people were never on the same bench at the same time.” He showed Alexander three photographs. One showed the three men on the right, the ones in conversation. In the second, there was only the man on the left end, and in the third the guy in the middle, but with other folks who didn’t make it into Stewart’s picture. It wasn’t even the same bench in all of the photos.
“In the same way, I could change the look of this fellow’s shirt; to plaid, for example, or stripes. It’s easy to change the pattern of the fabric or the colors. I can copy those things from a different photograph or an ad in a magazine. Changing the cut of the shirt, the way it fits him, the way it hangs on him, ‘the drape,’ is harder to do.
Alexander decided that he needed to look at the prints some more in order to make a decision.
*****
This day they had potato chips with their salami sandwiches. Alexander thanked Stewart for getting the chips, but did he only eat salami. The fellow explained that he tended to get a preference for one thing and that would last a while, a few months, before being replaced by a different but equally persistent predilection.
Stewart asked what kind of sandwiches Alexander preferred. The boy replied that he liked peanut butter, that he used to like peanut butter and jelly, but he didn’t care for the jelly so much any more. And he did like salami but not all the time, though it would be better with some lettuce once in a while. Maybe his favorite is cream cheese and olive, except in the winter grilled cheese is really good, or grilled cheese and tomato. Alexander had a long list of things he liked.
*****
Stewart’s refrigerator and cupboards became less sparsely supplied, at least with regard to lunch and snack items. The latter were needed because Alexander’s visits were unpredictable. What was certain was that he would be hungry, however indecisive he might be about what he would like to eat.
It had taken the boy a long time to make up his mind about the sort of portrait he would like to have painted of him. They had long talks about the various possibilities. There was always something that Alexander didn’t like about one option or that he liked better about another. Sometimes they would wander off the subject not realizing it for a quarter hour or so.
The resolution began to emerge when Stewart observed that the problem might be that they were thinking about what would be the best picture rather than what should be the first to be painted. After that choices began to be made, it would be himself and his bicycle. But what arrangement of boy and bike? Should he be sitting with the bike behind him, or just about to mount the bicycle, or on it already?
Stewart shot a roll of film and they examined some different possibilities. One photograph had been taken from an angle above with the bicycle lying on its side and Alexander sitting in front of it but a little off to one side and looking off to the horizon. They both liked that one.
But what about background? They took a long walk around town and took more photos. One location was on a small hill in the cemetery. Alexander objected that he didn’t want to pose in public or want grave stones in his picture. He had to be reminded that Stewart could paint the background from the photograph and could leave out anything he didn’t want to include.
Then Alexander had to settle upon clothes, and whether or not he should wear his cap. He did this at home, trying on several outfits and looking at himself in the mirror. While he was doing this, his mother came in and saw clothing strewn over the bed. She asked what he was doing. “Just looking at what I have,” he told her. He had never seemed that particular about his appearance before. He’s growing up, she thought.
*****
At the first posing session Alexander felt odd about bringing his bicycle into the house. He wondered why that couldn’t be added from a photograph like the background, but Stewart explained that he worked from photographs when necessary not from preference. He couldn’t very well ask the five men on the bench to come there everyday at the same time and pose.
“Why at the same time?”
“Light and shadows.”
“Will I always have to be here at the same time then?”
“No. During daylight, but otherwise it doesn’t matter. The windows in this room face north so the shadows don’t move and we can control lighting with lamps.”
In one part of the room Stewart had recreated the hill by making a large mound of pillows covered by a rug. Using the photo as a guide, Alexander was positioned on the “hill” and then Stewart placed the bicycle with the handle bars turned so that the front wheel stuck up in the air. This resulted in the boy and bike together being nearly the shape of a 30-60-90 right triangle.
The easel was placed in front, but instead of a canvas it held a sheet of paper tacked to a panel. Alexander wanted to know why Stewart was going to paint on the paper. He explained that he wasn’t, that the first step was to do some drawings to see how the composition would look and perhaps to make some changes.
The artist stood on a box in order to be looking down on the scene they had created. Then he directed Alexander to move his arms and hands in various ways and to turn and tilt his head. Cautioning Alexander not to move, he finally began to draw.
*****
Until now, Alexander had not considered what it would be like to pose. The first few minutes were novel and, therefore, interesting. But it wasn’t long before he wished he could move. By shifting his eyes he could get a peripheral view of Stewart, but not a really good look. And it felt funny to be sitting still while someone else was looking at him so closely. Gradually he became bored with what he could see comfortably.
Like most models, he withdrew into his own mind. Alexander began to wonder if he was going to be able to do this after all. Not even fifteen minutes had passed and already he didn’t like it. On the other hand, he did want a picture and Stewart had gone to a lot of trouble. Stewart had done all this only because he had asked him to. So the youth tried to forget his discomfort and think of other things.
*****
“Let’s take a break.”
Stewart got down from his box and put his pencil down. Alexander got up and stretched.
“l’ll make some tea. Do you want that or coke?”
“Coke, please,” Alexander said, then, “Are you gay?”
“Yes.” Stewart had expected this question to be asked sometime.
“Do you have the hots for me?”
“It’s more like the warms.”
“The warms?”
“Yeah. At my age I don’t get the hots, like you do. I get the warms.”
“I like guys sometimes, but mostly I like girls.”
They completed a second posing session. After lunch, Alexander said that he would probably be back the next day.
*****
It was three days before the boy returned. Stewart had told him that he needed the same clothes for posing, so he brought them in a paper bag and left them at Stewart’s house. He couldn’t very well wear the same things all the time. Alexander used the bathroom for changing.
Although they limited the posing sessions to one about every other day, Alexander visited for longer periods and nearly every day. He had lots of other things to talk to Stewart about and he liked looking through the art books and magazines or just watching some TV while the artist worked on other projects, read his mail or balanced his check book.
One afternoon, Alexander was again going through the folder of art prints of boys. “Some of these are nudes,” he said.
“Sure.”
“Were you hoping that I’d choose one of them as an idea for my painting?”
“I thought it would be pretty unlikely.”
“But did you hope I would?”
“Not really.”
“If I did want a nude painting, could you give me two good legs?”
“Sure, if that is what you wanted. But then I’d like to do one the other way.”
“What other way?”
“With the prosthesis.”
“Why?”
“Well, there are a million kids with two legs. A boy with a metal leg is more visually interesting. And, besides, I like you the way you are.”
“What if I didn’t want you to paint me like that?”
“Then I wouldn’t.”
Alexander reflected that, whenever he mentioned that he liked a particular thing to eat, it appeared within a few days. When he asked for a painting of himself, Stewart made one for him. If he didn’t like posing much, Stewart accommodated him, the same way he did when Alexander wanted to talk or watch something specific on TV.
“Would you do anything I asked you to?”
“Well, not if I thought it would harm you, or if I thought it would harm me.” Stewart paused and then continued, “Otherwise, yes.”
*****
After school started in the fall, the pattern of the relationship between Alexander and Stewart was radically altered. On school days the boy would spend a couple of afternoon hours at the artist’s house. Saturday and Sunday were less predictable. Sometimes Alexander would be there for most of the day, sometimes not at all. However, the nature of the interactions between Stewart and Alexander changed ever so little and over a long period of time.
When they were watching TV and sharing a snack, Alexander began to sit closer to Stewart. Sometimes their knees would touch. Alexander learned how to brew the tea and would make it while Stewart was painting. He stopped using the bathroom to change clothes. He pointed out that he had a good body, should another painting require it.
Alexander did have a good build, not exceptional but good. Nor was he unusually good looking. He was a nice looking boy, a little above average in appearance. Except for the missing limb and an occasional zit, there were no defects.
The first painting was nearly done. Alexander liked it very much, although he didn’t think that it looked altogether like him. Something was different about the boy sitting on the hill with his bicycle beside him and looking off into space. It was as if the kid in the painting was expecting something or waiting for something. Only whatever it was never happened, because it wasn’t real life.
Alexander still did not like having to sit still for so long to have his picture painted. He complained of getting stiff. One day, after posing, he asked Stewart to rub his shoulders for him. Thereafter, that became a regular thing.
*****
When the painting was finished, Stewart asked Alexander what he wanted to do with it. The youngster hadn’t thought about that. If he took it home, he would have to explain how he got it. What would he say? He didn’t want to tell his parents that he was spending so much time with Stewart. But why not? There was nothing going on that he was ashamed of. There was nothing going on.
He thought they might tell him to end these visits. Not because they really cared that much, but because they might see it as their duty. Then he could ignore it and do what he pleased. He didn’t think that they would really make trouble, but he wasn’t so sure. So Alexander decided to leave the painting at Stewart’s house. Could they put it in the front room?
Stewart explained that he didn’t hang his own pictures because he wanted other things to look at the rest of the day. He didn’t want his next work to be too influenced by something he had previously done. So, until they thought of something better to do, they propped it against the wall of the studio where Alexander could look at it when ever he wanted.
*****
Alexander really wanted a painting of himself with two legs. He wanted to see what he would look like whole. It would be a kind of restoration, not real but better than nothing. But he didn’t want to be naked, so he looked for a classical pose with the private parts covered in some way. There were a lot of those.
He didn’t want to be Narcissus, because he didn’t like the story. Eros was OK but he didn’t like the wings, Apollo was too old. Dionysos seemed about right. He wanted a manly pose, so standing up holding a glass of wine to the light was chosen over some form of reclining.
He would be shown with grape leaves about his head and loins. So Alexander could pose in his briefs. He would only have to push them down a little over his hips. The grape leaves could wait to the end. But he couldn’t hold his arm in the air for very long, so he needed frequent rests.
*****
“I keep getting a hard on.” Alexander smiled ruefully, as though apologizing.
“That’s normal.”
“You don’t mind?”
“Not at all. It’s rather nice, actually. Only I’ll have to show it poking out through the grape leaves.”
“You wouldn’t!”
“No, not really. But it would make an interesting statement.”
“Would you give me a blow job if I asked you to?”
“You’re underage, it’s illegal.”
“It’s illegal even if I asked you to?”
“Even if you begged on your hands and knees.”
“That’s stupid.”
“Maybe. How do you know you wouldn’t regret it later, say when you decide to become a Baptist preacher?”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“The most improbable things sometimes happen. You know, there must be someone who has noticed you coming here so often. Sooner or later, your parents or someone else may ask you what you’re doing here all the time.”
“I’d never tell on you.”
“You wouldn’t want to, and you probably wouldn’t. But the police can put an awful lot of pressure on a kid.”
“I’m a lot tougher than you think,” Alexander said, sticking out his chest and flexing a biceps. “And you didn’t say you wouldn’t.”
“And you didn’t ask me to.”
*****
Stewart’s idea for the painting was to use a nature setting as a background, but one that would look like an artificial backdrop, similar to those used in early photography. This would be done by employing muted colors, stylized plants, and a final wash of light gray. The image of the boy would be as realistic as his abilities would allow.
The artist set up two easels. He prepared two 36” by 24” canvases. First, the background was painted on each. This part went fairly quickly. Then the figure was slowly developed. One painting was for Alexander, the other was for Stewart.
*****
One afternoon, Stewart arrived home from an unexpected medical appointment to find Alexander sleeping on the sofa. The boy had let himself in with the key that Stewart had given him some time ago. As it was getting late in the day, he woke Alexander at once.
“What time is it?”
“Quarter of five,” Stewart replied.
Alexander jumped up, kissed him on the lips, and shot out the door. “Gotta run!” he hollered.
Stunned, Stewart sat down at once, for this was their first real kiss. There had been other occasions when it had seemed appropriate for Stewart to lightly kiss some part of Alexander, but this was different and very welcome.
After a while, Stewart wandered into the studio. There were now five Alexander paintings, as he called them. He took a long time looking at them and at the unfinished sixth.
*****
“You never asked me how I lost half my leg.”
“I figured you’d tell me when you wanted to.”
“But you never ask me anything. Aren’t you interested?”
“I’m interested in everything about you, but I want to let you tell me things or not.”
“I want you to ask me things.”
“OK, how did you lose your foot?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” Alexander contorted his body in mock reluctance.
They had been returning from a family get together at his uncle’s. He was five at the time. His mother was in the back seat because she had had too much to drink and needed to lie down. At an intersection, another car slammed into the front, right side of their car. It was just bad luck the way the metal had twisted and cut into him.
His parents felt guilty about the accident. They didn’t like having a defective child and felt guilty about that too. As long as Alexander was there, they couldn’t forget it.
*****
As Alexander progressed through high school, he asked Stewart’s assistance as editor, sounding board, tutor. This, in turn, provided a way to inform his parents of the artist’s existence and plausible reasons for evening visits. They were indifferent to these arrangements.
Meanwhile, the boy in the paintings got older. Mythological subjects were abandoned for ordinary scenes: kid daydreaming, kid puzzling over math problem, kid reading, kid stepping out of the shower, etc. Most were fully clothed, but some way was made to let the prosthesis show, if only slightly and now and then, the unadorned stump.
Sometimes, Alexander snuck out at night. He would let himself in, get undressed and ease into bed with the artist. It took him a while to convince Stewart to sleep nude. If the man went to bed in boxers and sweat shirt he got right to sleep, but naked he tended to lie awake, listening and hoping for the front door to squeak.
*****
One night, Alexander said, “You never ask me to do anything for you.”
“Well, I’m happy with what you choose to do.”
“But I want you to ask me for things.”
Stewart whispered something in the boy’s ear.
“But that’s nothing, don’t you want to ...,” and he whispered something back.
“I’ve never done that. Whenever I tried, the thought of hurting makes me go soft.”
“When was this. Have you been going with other boys?”
“It was a long time ago.”
“Does it hurt when I do it to you?”
“No.”
“Well, then ...”
“It’s the thought nevertheless.”
“Well, you don’t have to if you don’t want to.”
“Thank you.”
Alexander did as Stewart had asked him to, very slowly and all the time looking into his eyes. and smiling at the dreamy expression on the artist’s face.
*****\
On another night, quite a while later, Alexander woke up to feel wetness on his good leg. Then he noticed a foul odor. “You shit the bed too,” he said, and gave Stewart’s shoulder a shove. It took him a minute to figure out what was wrong and then he cried.
*****
Two months later and two weeks before his graduation from high school Alexander received a letter from a lawyer. There was a bank book enclosed. He remembered, then, signing a form for a joint savings account with Stewart. The artist had told him it would be a little college fund for him. He was expecting a few hundred dollars. The balance was $27,616.88.
His mother started talking about how all the furniture in the house was old and scratched. Alexander was glad that he had just turned eighteen. He canceled his plans to attend the local community college and bought a new bicycle.
Alexander spent the next year visiting colleges in New England, sitting in on classes and talking to students and faculty. He finally decided upon Hampshire College, where they seemed to appreciate the unusual student.
*****
Most of Stewart’s paintings were sold at auction, where they commanded modest prices. He was considered a competent but minor artist. His antiques did much better. The house was sold and all the proceeds went into a trust that was held for Alexander until he reached the age of 35.
As more years went by, Stewart’s artistic reputation grew gradually. The paintings increased a in value, and therefore survived, but for the most part they did not stray from the local area. A small museum on Cape Cod organized a retrospective from works loaned by local owners. These folks were delighted, a few years after that, when news reached them that a hitherto unknown cache of the artist’s work from his last years had been accepted by a major museum and would be given a special exhibition.
*****
The afternoon before the public opening of the exhibition there was a private reception attended by museum officials, invited guests and the donor and his family. All the paintings were of the same model, a one legged boy, except for one painting that showed the lad with both limbs intact. The canvas next to it was the same size and the same scene, a boy adorned only in grape leaves and looking at a glass of wine held aloft as if judging the color.
At first glance the only difference seemed to be the leg. The two legged boy had a serious expression, in the other there was something that suggested mischief. And if one looked very closely at the vine around the lad’s middle, there was a place where the grape leaves seemed to be pushed slightly forward and to either side, and the smallest bit of flesh tone was visible that could be something about to peek out.
A distinguished looking gentleman, the donor, a retired investment banker, was looking at this painting. A small child, presumably one of his grandchildren, tugged on his sleeve. “Grampa, that boy has one leg just like you.”
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