“And then?”
“First, allow me a small interlude to peruse the dessert menu. People say the chocolate soufflé here is to die for. Perhaps a nice sweet wine to wash it down, as long as I’m not overstepping my bounds, of course. I must admit all this talking has left me positively parched.”
I flagged down the waiter, and George-Harrison made a signal for the sommelier. With his conditions met, Morrison continued.
“The Stanfield & Glover gallery thrived in New York, eclipsing even its sister location in London. The economy in postwar England didn’t bounce back quite as assuredly as our own, you see. In late 1948, Hanna and Robert moved into a new home on the top floor of a building at the corner of Seventy-Seventh Street and Fifth Avenue. Hanna had always wanted a view of Central Park, but this was beyond her wildest dreams. The Upper East Side has always been considered swankier than the Upper West, with snobs flocking there in droves, although why, I can’t say. Hanna should have been the happiest woman in the world, and yet the city began to choke the life out of her. Robert’s own business was growing exponentially. They’d already opened locations in Washington and Boston, with a third on its way in Los Angeles. Hanna barely saw her husband anymore and spent most of her evenings alone in their vast apartment. While once the stuff of dreams, the view out her window at night became a nightmarish ocean of darkness. The situation put their marriage at stake, even though Hanna still loved Robert deeply. She felt that only a drastic change—like having a child—would save their marriage.”
“I thought she was unable to bear children.”
“As did she, but there are always ways for the wealthy to get around infertility. In July of 1949, in honor of the five-year anniversary of their arrival in New York, Hanna presented Robert with the deed to the family estate in Baltimore, at last ready to make the move. Robert took no offense at her buying the property in secret. Hanna had just given him the keys to the legendary Stanfield estate! It was a dream come true, one he had long since abandoned in defeat. For him, it was a gift born of pure love.
“While the estate was being renovated and restored to its former glory, the couple made arrangements to relocate their entire lives to Baltimore. New York was only two and a half hours by car, and Hanna had staff in place at the gallery to whom she knew she could entrust the business from a distance with total peace of mind. Besides, most of the major deals of that time tended to close outside the city or at major fine art auctions.
“In 1950, around the same time your mother came into the picture and not too long after he moved back to London, Glover’s health took a turn for the worse. He was diagnosed with a severe form of pancreatic cancer that would swiftly claim his life. He called Hanna and begged her urgently to pay him a visit, all without revealing anything about his condition. As soon as she arrived in London, Glover informed her that he had decided to retire and offered her the chance to buy him out of the business altogether, with an initial asking price so low that Hanna refused outright. Glover’s inventory of art alone was worth double what he was asking for the entire business! Yet, the art dealer reminded Hanna of a second cardinal rule in their trade: the true market value of a piece is only as high as someone is willing to pay. He knew that running a gallery from the other side of the ocean would be a source of unnecessary grief for Hanna, especially since she now had a child and had set down deep roots in Baltimore. The gallery itself meant nothing to Glover. It was just a space he rented, nothing more. He led Hanna down to the safe where he kept his most cherished and valuable works of art, and asked her to make an offer on each and every last painting. In reality, Glover reminded her, as his partner, she already owned half of each painting anyway.”
With that, Morrison took his last bite of chocolate soufflé. For a terrible moment, I feared he would leave without revealing the part of the story I had been the most desperate to hear from the very start.
“This sure is intriguing,” I cut in. “But can you please tell us what happened between my mother and her parents that caused all those years of bad blood?”
“Patience now, patience. All will be revealed. Hanna took full inventory of Glover’s collection at his insistence. Methodical as she was, it was really nothing more than a formality; she already knew every piece in Glover’s collection by heart. Hanna herself had maintained Glover’s register with utter diligence and precision. Everything between them was open and transparent, without the slightest room for doubt. Every time Glover bought or sold anything, Hanna would know of it immediately. There was never any gray area . . . until all at once, Hanna found herself staring into a world of gray, her eyes landing on a painting that made her heart stop.”