The Muse (23 page)

‘No – that's not – I do. I do. I spoke to Cynthia. She said you've been miserable.'

There was quiet on the line. ‘I was miserable.'

‘You're not miserable any more?'

He was silent again. ‘I shouldn't have rushed in like that,' he said.

‘No, it's fine – I mean—­'

‘I won't ever say what I said to you again.'

‘I see.'

‘Not if you don't want me to.'

‘I don't really know what I want you to say, or not say, Lawrie,' I admitted. ‘I just know that when I heard you were miserable, that made me sad. And I realized I'd been miserable too. And I was wondering whether it might be a bit easier – if we were miserable together.'

Quiet on the line again. ‘Are you – asking me on a date, Odelle?'

I didn't – couldn't – say anything. ‘Well, there's a first time for everything,' Lawrie went on. ‘Thank you. Let me just check my diary – oh, no need. I'm free.'

A pleasurable warmth spread through my stomach and I couldn't hide the smile in my voice. ‘Convenient,' I said.

‘Isn't it?' he replied. ‘Now, where would you like to meet?'

 

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

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Publishers

....................................

XIII

W
e met early the next morning, as early as we could, in the middle of Skelton Square, before I started work and Lawrie went in to see Reede. He was clutching a bottle of champagne. ‘For your first published story,' he said, handing it over. ‘That's vintage, you know. Sorry about the dust. Nicked it from the house.'

‘Gosh, thank you.'

‘Actually . . . I knew about the
London Review
.'

‘What?'

‘We do take modern periodicals in Surrey, you know. I read it.' He looked down at his shoes. ‘It was just brilliant.'

‘Shut up.' I took the bottle, my head about to explode with pleasure. I read the label:
Veuve Clicquot
. ‘Lawrie, can we start again?' I said.

He sighed. ‘I don't know if that's possible.'

I sat down on the bench, trying to bat away my despondence. I was so sure he'd say yes. He was here, wasn't he? ‘I suppose not,' I said, looking up at him.

‘You could hit me over the head with that champagne bottle,' he suggested.

‘What?'

‘Knock the memories out of me. But then I'd lose the first time I saw you, reading that poem. Or the first time I spoke to you; those yellow rubber gloves. Or the way you pretended to like the Bond film, your nose all wrinkled up. Or when you out-­danced me at the Flamingo and the manager offered you a job, or when you told me about that idiot in the shoe shop. Or when we had that shepherd's pie, and I messed everything up. It's all part of it, Odelle. It's not going to be perfect. Personally, I don't want it to be. I'd go through that horrible drive up the A3 again, just for the sweetness of hearing your voice after so long. I wouldn't change any of it. I don't want to start again, because that would make me lose memories of you.'

I couldn't say anything for a moment. Lawrie sat down next to me and I felt the warm solidity of his body. I took a deep breath. ‘I – get scared,' I said. ‘I don't know how else to explain it. I get feelings that I'm lost, that I'm no good, that if someone likes me there must be something wrong with them.'

‘But why?'

‘Well, if I knew that, Lawrie . . . and when I met you, I told you things I'd never told anyone. Then you swept in with your declaration that you loved me, and – well – it felt that like you were filling out a form, obeying some pattern.'

‘A pattern?'

‘Of what ­people do, what they think they're supposed to say.'

‘No one tells me what to say.'

‘But I also realized I didn't want you
not
to say it. I just wanted you to say it – when I wanted to hear it.'

He laughed. ‘You really are a writer, aren't you? All right. How about, whenever I feel that I might be about to say I've fallen in love with you, or that I love you, or that you're wonderful, we agree on a sign that such a declaration is coming – and you recognize the sign, and give me the go ahead or not as to whether I can say it.'

‘You make me sound mad.'

‘I'm joking. I'm sorry. Whatever you need. I just want to see you, Odelle. Is that OK?'

‘Yes,' I said. I hesitated. ‘More than OK.'

‘Good. Right,' he said. ‘Let's go and hear what the venerable Mr Reede has to say.'

•

‘Good morning, Odelle,' Quick said, stopping smoothly at my door. Lawrie had been with Reede for about thirty minutes. Quick looked tired, a little apprehensive. Her appearance was a world away from my first week, when she had breezed up to my typewriter and suggested a light lunch – in order to pick my brains – for what exactly, I still wasn't sure.

‘Good morning, Quick.'

She froze, her eyes on the champagne bottle standing on the desk. ‘Where did you get that?' she asked.

I swallowed, intimidated by the look on her face. ‘Lawrie gave it to me.'

She turned her gaze to me. ‘Friends again?'

‘Yes. He's here. He's talking to Reede,' I said. ‘I think they're discussing the exhibition.'

‘I know they are. I scheduled the meeting.' Quick came in, closing the door. To my surprise, she walked over and sat down opposite me, taking the bottle in her lap. ‘Lawrie gave this to you?'

‘To say well done for getting “The Toeless Woman” published. Is there something wrong with it?'

She ran her thumb across the neck, leaving a clean smear through the dust. ‘It's vintage,' she said.

‘I know that. Quick—­'

‘Odelle, what happened on Friday night—­'

I sat up straighter. ‘Yes?'

‘It shouldn't have happened. I broke a professional barrier when I told you about my illness. I've compromised you. I've compromised myself. I don't want the attention.'

‘You've done rather a good job of getting mine, though.'

She looked at me, sharply, but I refused to shrink away. ‘I want you to know – that whatever happens – your job is completely safe.'

‘Safe?'

Quick seemed to suffer a spasm of pain, and the bottle sagged heavily in her lap. ‘They've got me on rather strong painkillers,' she said. ‘No choice but to take them now. I'm hallucinating. I can't sleep.'

‘What are you hallucinating?' I said. ‘What is it that you see?'

I waited, barely able to breathe, my fingers drawing away from the typewriter and resting in my lap.

She didn't answer, and we sat in silence for a few moments, the clock on the wall syncopating my heartbeat. I took the risk. ‘On Friday night, you said that Isaac Robles didn't paint the picture. Do you remember that, Quick?'

Quick sat, staring at her hands. She was swallowing hard, her throat constricted.

‘Did he paint
any
of the pictures, Quick – the ones in the Guggenheim?'

Still, Quick remained silent.

‘If he didn't paint those pictures, who did—­'

‘All I wanted,' she said, abruptly, in clear distress. ‘I just wanted to see.'

‘What, what was it that you wanted to see?'

I watched in horror as Quick fanned her fingers open on the neck of the bottle, and the entire thing slid between her legs and cracked against the floor. The base smashed clean off and the champagne gushed between us, fizzing and pooling everywhere. She jumped up crookedly, staggering from the mess before us. ‘I'm sorry,' she mumbled. ‘I'm so sorry.'

‘It was an accident,' I said. I stared at Lawrie's ruined bottle, resting on the floorboards in a puddle of champagne. The green glass was so dark it was almost black, winking as the overhead lights caught its jagged edges. I'd never even got a taste. I swallowed hard and looked at Quick.

She was drained of colour. I knew the conversation was over, that I would get no further now. Would she go so far as to sabotage my present from Lawrie? I ushered her to her own office, and she leaned on me, snaking her arm through mine. I could feel her bones so easily through the skin. Now I knew about the cancer, I could see how ill Quick was; her pain, her brittle glamour. But it wasn't just the cancer in her body; I was also witnessing her psychological recalibration.

I wouldn't say her mind was diminishing, despite her protests of hallucinations and insomnia. It was almost the opposite to her body; an augmentation, Quick's imagination inhabiting more than just the present. Somewhere inside her memory, a drawbridge had been lowered, and the foot soldiers of her past were pushing through in serried ranks. She wanted to talk; but she couldn't. She didn't have the words.

‘Please lock the door,' she said, beginning to rally a little. ‘Odelle, I'm so sorry about your bottle.'

‘It's all right.'

‘I'll make it up to you in my will.'

Her black eyes glimmered with gallows humour. ‘Got a cellar in Wimbledon, have you?' I said in kind, trying to chivvy her spirits.

‘Something like that. Fetch my handbag, would you? I need the pills.' She moved slowly to the drinks table. ‘Gin?'

‘No thanks.'

I watched her pour herself one, breathing deeply, corralling herself as the clear liquid glugged into the tumbler. ‘Those are bloody strong,' she said as I handed her the pills. ‘I fucking hate them.'

The expletive, the bitterness in her voice, shocked me. I forced myself to sit, reminding myself I was a junior employee, and must be mute and mild. Pushing Quick to tell me things I wanted to know was clearly not going to work. I'd had my suspicions that it wouldn't, after the night with the telephone book, and now I had one smashed champagne bottle to confirm them. As frustrating as I found it, I had to be her blank canvas. Patience was never my strong suit, but as long as it kept her talking, it was better than silence.

‘There's a fellow called Barozzi in Venice,' she said, lowering herself into her leather chair and reaching for her cigarettes. ‘Works for Guggenheim. Around the time Mr Scott's painting was being made, Peggy Guggenheim was attempting to open a gallery in London.' Quick stilled herself for a minute, before finding the strength to continue. ‘She succeeded. The place was on Cork Street, before the war turned it on its head and it closed.'

‘I see.'

‘You don't. The point is, she – or others at her gallery – are good with keeping paperwork. Barozzi found some rather interesting correspondence in her archives, sent it to Reede, and he's beside himself.'

Cork Street
. I knew the name – it was the street that the pamphlet came from. My skin began to tingle. I was used to the twists and turns of Quick's conversational style, and knew I would have to keep up.

‘He now has evidence that Mr Scott's painting was a commission for Peggy Guggenheim, as a twin to
Women in the Wheatfield.
'

‘A twin?'

‘He's found a telegram addressed to Isaac Robles, which for some reason was never sent. It was destined for Malaga in Spain, dated September '36, enquiring how much longer she will need to wait for the “companion piece” to
Wheatfield
, which Robles had called
Rufina and the Lion
. Barozzi has acknowledged that no deposit was actually given Robles for the Rufina piece, otherwise Mr Scott could have found himself in a lot of trouble, given that he's apparently got no proof of purchase. The Guggenheim could have tried to claim it as theirs.'

I marvelled that Quick could be talking about another discovered telegram, as if the one hidden in her own house wasn't inextricably tied up with all this too. Not only was she acting as if the smashed champagne bottle was not deliberate sabotage, she was now pretending that our evening with the telephone book had never happened.

‘
Rufina and the Lion
,' I repeated. ‘That's what Lawrie's painting is called?'

‘That's what Reede believes. Ever heard of Saint Rufina?'

‘No.'

Quick sipped her gin. ‘The image of Mr Scott's painting fits the story perfectly. Rufina lived in Seville in the second century. She was a Chris­tian potter, who wouldn't kow-­tow to the authorities' rules when they told her to make pagan icons, so they chucked her in an arena with a lion. The lion wouldn't touch her, so they cut off her head. And with this mention of a “companion piece”, Reede believes he's found a connection between Mr Scott's painting and the more famous
Women in the Wheatfield
, which might change the way we look at Robles entirely.'

I gazed at her, feeling determined, ready to enter into a battle of wills. ‘But you told me that Isaac Robles didn't paint it.'

Quick slugged back another painkiller. ‘And yet, we have a certified telegram from a world-­class art collector, stating that it was intended as a companion piece to one of the most important paintings to come out of Spain this century, currently in the Guggenheim collection in Venice.'

‘Yes, but there was someone else in that photograph too. A young woman.'

I waited for Quick to speak, but she did not, so I carried on. ‘I think she was called Olive Schloss. In that letter at your house, it appears she won a place at the Slade School of Art around the time that Isaac Robles was painting. I think she painted
Women in the Wheatfield.
'

‘I see.' Quick's face was impassive, and my frustration grew.

‘Did you think she made it, Quick?'

‘Made what?' Her expression turned hard.

‘Do you think Olive ever made it to the Slade?'

Quick closed her eyes. Her shoulders sagged, and I waited for her to reveal herself, to release the truth that had been broiling in her ever since seeing Lawrie's painting in the hallway of the Skelton. Here it came, the moment of confession – why she was in possession of the telegram from Peggy Guggenheim and the letter from the Slade – how it was her own father who had bought Isaac Robles's painting, a piece of art she had created herself.

Quick was so still in her chair, I thought that she'd expired. She flicked her eyes open. ‘I'm going to hear what Mr Reede is saying,' she said. ‘I think you should come too.'

I followed her down the corridor, disappointed. I was getting nearer, I was sure. Why didn't she just speak?

WE KNOCKED ON REEDE'S DOOR
and were told to come in. Lawrie and he were sitting facing each other in the armchairs. ‘Can I help you?' Reede said.

‘Miss Bastien and I will be the ones on the front line once this exhibition gets underway,' said Quick. I saw how tightly she was gripping the door frame. She was torturing herself. ‘It might be wise if we were to sit and take notes, to understand what you're proposing.'

‘Very well,' said Reede. ‘You can sit over there, ladies.'

We looked to where he was gesturing; two hard wooden chairs in the corner. Either Quick was being punished, or Reede was blind to how frail she was. Lawrie caught my eye as I sat down; he looked excited, alive with the possibilities of his painting.
Rufina and the Lion
was propped up on the mantelpiece, and I was no less overwhelmed by its power than the first time I saw it, by how much that girl and the severed head she held in her hands had already changed my life. If Lawrie hadn't used it to try and take me on a date, would any of us even be sitting here today – would Quick be unravelling like this, despite her insistence on blaming the cancer and its painkillers?