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“Now at eight point five … eight point five, and we have nine. That is nine million over here on the
phone! Nine million two …”
Holy hell! It’s going to ten million. That’ll finance a lot of fantasies. I craned my neck to look for
my driver, who was no longer shadowing me. Maybe he had joined the other drivers in the lobby.
“Ten million dollars, we are at ten. Ten point four, that is ten million, four hundred thousand …”
Left, right, right, left, the two remaining bidders each spurned the other on, the blonde on the phone
never losing her cool, the woman in glasses becoming increasingly agitated. My heart played along,
spiking with every raised hand. This was way more exciting than sports!
“Ladies and gentlemen, we are at eleven million and one hundred thousand dollars. Do I hear
eleven two? We have … eleven two,” said the auctioneer, pointing his hammer at the bespectacled
woman whose arm was becoming heavier and heavier. The blonde’s remained steadily aloft.
“Eleven three? Yes, we have eleven three on the phone. Will we get eleven four?”
The pause weighed on the room. All heads now turned to face the woman in the thick black glasses.
Maybe because she wasn’t some disembodied voice on the phone, I suddenly wanted her to win. But
alas, the blonde’s arm spiked calmly at the last price.
“We have eleven point four from anonymous bidder number eight up front … eleven point four …
do we have eleven five?”
The woman in the glasses lifted a tentative hand.
“We have eleven five—”
“Fifteen million!” boomed a familiar voice from the back of the room.
It took me a second to realize who it was, because he was no longer wearing his uniform. My
driver, Dante, stood there, in a dark suit that looked freshly pressed, a white shirt neatly tucked into
the slacks, and his cap, sunglasses and ill-fitting jacket gone. He looked alarmingly sexy, a hand slung
in a pocket.
“Are you a registered bidder?”
He pointed to the late arrival, the nervous blonde at the phone table.
“That is my company’s representative, Isabella, from the Central Bank of Argentina. She can vouch
for my funds. You can hang up now, Isabella. I am so sorry I’m late.”
Dante—or whatever his real name was—raised the temperature of the theater from simmer to boil.
The auctioneer, now flustered, turned to find the bespectacled woman’s head resting in a hand,
defeated.
“So then … it is fifteen million … going once … going twice … and sold to the gentleman in the
dark suit. Carolina Mendoza’s Red Rage goes for fifteen million. A record, ladies and gentlemen. A
smashing record!”
Applause broke out in the theater, but my hands held firm to my armrests as I watched Dante stride
over to the losing bidder to shake her hand. The crowd continued to clap as Dante posed for pictures
in front of the painting. The auctioneer, after a quiet word with Isabella, motioned me down the stairs
to the telephone table, now cleared of everything except an elaborate certificate carefully centered on
a leather blotter.
“Isabella tells me the fifteen million dollars has already been cleared. Unless you have any
objections to an unregistered bidder purchasing the painting, you may sign the transfer of ownership,”
said the auctioneer, handing me a fancy pen with a feather tail, and adding, “It is an enormous amount
of money. Impressive.”
He also seemed unnerved by this handsome man who had infiltrated these somber, private
proceedings in such a strangely dramatic way. But what do you say when someone drops fifteen