He was here to confiscate the so-called offensive painting and that alone, this Arthur *Kill*, disguised in another role. Even took the same first name this time. “Art like this shouldn’t happen in Saint Dennis,” the wife of a prominent town businessman said to the gallery owner on opening night. He countered that it was tasteful nudity, no naughty bits shown at all, “unlike, say, that one over there,” he said, pointing to another painting visible in the next room. “A bare bum! That doesn’t offend you but this does?”
“This one was done with more in mind. Chains!”
The gallery owner, raised in the North where his mama still lived (Illinois I believe), ruminated: I thought you Southerners *liked* chains and slavery. Maybe because the model isn’t *black*. But of course he kept all this to himself.
And so Arthur the policeman, gifted Shakespearean actor beneath the blue garb, was sent in by the powers that be to make a statement. Thing is, he helped seed the controversy in the first place, part of his overall plan.
“Oh Libra Neptune,” he quietly lamented from his position in front of the work while staring at it, contemplating the circumstances surrounding its composition. “I thought I paid you enough never to come back here.”
He also wondered if her unpictured cheeks had turned red again.
Sunklands 