The Arrogant Artist

by John Creasey

  Before Mannering could ask how he was expected to help, while the girl placed a small but shapely hand on Forrester’s knee as if to urge ‘Keep quiet’, the young man spoke with great precision, obviously determined that there should be not the slightest doubt or misunderstanding.

  “I am potentially a very great artist indeed,” he declared. “And I do not want a time-wasting job. I need a stake – a patron – who will give me a year or even two or three, while the art world begins to understand and value my work. That’s what I need, Mr. Mannering. And as you make a fortune out of art, including paintings, I decided to give you the chance.”

  As he finished his head was high with a kind of pride that most people would have regarded as arrogance.

  The girl, lips quivering and eyes misted, turned her face away.

  Chapter Two

  Good, Bad or Indifferent

  It was a curious fact, but Mannering became aware of the girl only on the perimeter of his mind yet was acutely aware of the young man. Coming from most people his attitude, his challenge, would have been simply rude, or brash, or big-headed. And it was each of these. Yet there was something beyond them. Tension showed at Forrester’s lips, which were so beautifully-formed that they looked as if they were carved. His hollow cheeks and pointed, bony chin heightened the impression that he was hungry-thin, but it was the eyes, grey, fierce looking, deep-set beneath jutting eyebrows, which made him look out of the ordinary: a predator. His hair grew far back from his forehead but left a prominent widow’s peak, like an arrow pointing from his forehead to his hawked nose.

  All of these things took time to assess; during that time Thomas Forrester did not shift his gaze, and colour came slowly to his cheeks. The girl now watched Mannering, a puzzled expression on her face, as if she could not understand why he had not simply told her Tom that he had no time nor patience with him.

  At last, Mannering smiled faintly.

  “You mean that I should be proud to sponsor you, as a patron of the arts, not that I should invest in you as a possible up and coming artist who could one day make me money?”

  “I didn’t say that.” Forrester’s lips seemed dry and he had some difficulty in getting the words out, “I think you—well, someone, should sponsor me and take a chance whether he ever gets his money back.”

  “Why you?” asked Mannering, when the others had been poised for ‘Why me?’.

  The girl now sat upright, eagerness in her eyes, body poised. Forrester was momentarily taken aback, but for the first time a gleam as of humour shone in his eyes. It softened and humanised him.

  “Because I’m good.”

  “How can you prove it?”

  “I’ve hundreds of paintings which will.”

  “Where are they?”

  “In my—” Forrester hesitated, glanced at the girl and said: “In Julie’s flat.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “In Fulham – and not the fashionable part.”

  “How many of the paintings have you sold?” inquired Mannering, not slackening the pressure of his question one iota.

  Forrester drew in a hissing breath.

  “None. But that doesn’t mean—”

  “It means that so far the paintings aren’t saleable, unless—” Mannering’s voice sharpened: “You haven’t tried to sell them.”

  “Tried,” breathed Forrester. “We’ve done everything short of going down on our knees and begging someone to buy one. There was one foul dealer who said he would buy one every time Julie went to bed with him; that’s as near as I ever got to a sale.”

  Now his face had become alabaster pale, his lips quivered, his eyes were glittering.

  “What did you do to him?” asked Mannering, interestedly.

  “I knocked him down.”

  “I see,” said Mannering, as if approvingly. “But—” he looked at Julie with a smile—“in this day and age, as I understand it, a lot of young people don’t believe in a one man, one woman society.”

  “In this day and age,” reported Forrester thinly, “the generation gap is almost unbridgeable. If you think I’m a pimp who will live off money Julie earns with her body – my God. I ought to smash your face in! ”

  “Tom,” breathed Julie, speaking for the first time since Mannering had started his questions.

  “So you are an upright young man full of great moral scruples,” Mannering said drily. “How old are you, Mr. Forrester?”

  “I’m twenty-three. What the hell has that got to do with you?”

  “If I’m to support you I need to know.” When Forrester didn’t answer, Mannering went on: “Have you ever earned a living?”

  “I—yes.”

  “For how long?”

  “I—my God! I don’t have to answer these questions.”

  “When you came here and asked for my sponsorship you laid yourself open to these questions,” Mannering pointed out.

  “They’re wholly irrelevant!”

  “Then let me make them relevant. I need to know how old you are and I need to know for what proportion of your adult life you’ve supported yourself and for how much of it you’ve been supported by others. Am I your first sponsor-to-be? Or has there been a string of them?”

  This time the spate of questions seemed to engulf Forrester, and to subdue if not to crush him. For the first time he looked away from Mannering, and then slowly turned to Julie and at the same time began to get up. In a dull voice, he said: “Come on. Let’s go.”

  “Tom—”

  Forrester stood upright, and put a hand on her shoulder. “I said let’s go,” he repeated in a manner which held all the arrogance he had shown at the beginning of the visit. Now he seemed to be exerting not simply control over the girl, but ownership; whatever he said, Julie must do.

  For a few seconds, Julie sat as if undecided. She did not attempt to get up. She glanced from Forrester and back to Mannering, a frown wrinkling her smooth, broad forehead. Still without moving, she asked: “Mr. Mannering, are you considering Tom’s proposition?”

  “Of course,” Mannering answered.

  “You’re going a bloody funny way about it,” growled Forrester.

  “You are a bloody difficult man to deal with,” replied Mannering in the pleasantest of voices. “I haven’t seen any of your work but if you’ve so many pictures you must be dedicated to painting, and if Julie remains so ardently loyal and full of faith there must be more of a man as well as a painter in you than I can see from the outside.” He paused long enough for Forrester to reply but the youth seemed so surprised that he couldn’t find words. So Mannering went on: “Have you had other sponsors?”

  “No,” growled Forrester. He gulped, and then went on: “I inherited enough from my father to keep going for five years. For the last year, Julie’s kept me.”

  She started up. “Tom—”

  “Well, I have lived on you,” Forrester growled, and he turned back to Mannering, placed his hands on the desk and leaned forward so that their faces were almost level and only a foot apart. “And I’ve lived with her out of wedlock. Does that shock your conventional soul?”

  For the first time since they had been here, Mannering was angry – very angry indeed with this young man who used the girl as a weapon with which to strike out to hurt, ignoring the fact that in doing so he hurt her. But Mannering did not respond in anger. That was not only for the girl’s sake; it was perhaps a kind of sixth-sense, probably no more than a kind of commonsense, which told him that this youth might have a touch of genius; and genius was rare indeed.

  At last, he said: “Yes, Forrester. It shocks me that you should tell a stranger that. But I am not interested in your domestic life or the moralities. I’m not even interested in whether you are an unpleasant or an aggressive young man. I am interested in whether you can paint, whether you have the spark. Most men of genius go through periods when they are utterly odious.”

  Forrester breathed: “My God! I could break your neck!” He grabbed Julie
’s arm again and pulled, and this time she didn’t resist: it was almost as if she knew that there could be no reasoning with Tom; no hope at all. So, she went out with him. Mannering pressed a button on his desk and the door opened mechanically. He moved to the passage, but there was no need to follow, for Forrester was striding ahead, Julie some feet behind him. She had long, shapely legs which drew the gaze of both Armitage and Rupert Smith.

  Bristow emerged from behind the bench covered by the partition.

  “Did you hear that?” Mannering asked.

  “Yes. And odious was the word,” Bristow agreed heartily.

  “It certainly drove him out,” Mannering observed. “So he’s really sensitive on one spot. Bring the tape in, will you? I’d like to hear that fascinating conversation over again.”

  Bristow picked up a small battery-type tape recorder and went into the office with it. The recorder had been switched on and the conversation had been taped as Bristow had listened-in at a muted loudspeaker. Mannering could have switched this off from his office but had wanted the recording made, as he did nine out of ten interviews in the office. It was a much better way of recording a business conversation than making notes or having a shorthand typist present.

  In one corner of the shop a cupboard with a door of carved oak panelling contained thousands of these recordings, while other files in his office and behind the partition had been transcribed, and copies were in fire-proof filing cabinets.

  Bristow plugged the machine into a socket attached to the desk as Mannering sat on a corner of the table. Every word came through clearly, even every nuance; and when it was finished, Bristow said grimly: “A nasty piece of work.”

  “A nasty show of manners,” Mannering remarked. “And a lot of desperation.”

  “He’s driven himself to it.”

  “Oh, I know, I know,” Mannering said. “Is it any less painful if you put the thorns on your own head?”

  Bristow, his face so clean-cut, his clipped moustache stained brown with nicotine, wearing a white gardenia in the left-side lapel of his pale grey suit; unplugged the recorder and took out the tape.

  “I could feel sorry for the girl,” he said, “but not for that young oaf.”

  Frowning, Mannering said: “I hope I didn’t drive him too far.”

  Bristow gave a half-laugh, and remarked: “You couldn’t. No one could.”

  Then a telephone call came from a Roman dealer who was visiting London and who said that he had some Michelangelo cartoons which might interest Mannering. They were on view in Rome, if he, Mannering, could combine other visits to the continent with a look at the cartoons it might be to his very great advantage. Mannering promised to ring back. Almost at once another call came, this time from a senior officer at New Scotland Yard.

  “Sorry to worry you, Mr. Mannering, but do you think you could spare Bill Bristow for a couple of hours this afternoon?”

  “I’m sure I can,” responded Mannering. “Whether he’ll want to come is another matter! I’ll put you through.” He switched the telephone to Bristow, had a swift mental image of Julie, whose surname he didn’t know, and of Tom Forrester. Bristow had no time at all for Forrester and it certainly looked as if he had made a most uncomfortable bed for himself, but there was still a spark of interest in Mannering’s mind. Before long, Bristow tapped at the door and, when he came in, looked excited.

  “They want you back at the Yard,” hazarded Mannering.

  “Just for a few hours,” replied Bristow. “They think they’ve found some of the Fiora Collection and would like me to examine the stones.”

  “I hope to goodness they’re right,” Mannering said fervently.

  Bristow had spent months, spread over several years, searching for a collection of rubies and emeralds stolen from a Mayfair house some seven years ago, and he was as eager as ever to see them recovered. Mannering had four appointments in the office that afternoon and so would be in all the time; Bristow being out would cause no problems.

  He, Mannering, went out to a small club-restaurant for lunch, walking to St. James’s Street, his stride long and brisk.

  Every time he saw a long-haired youth, he thought of Forrester; and every time he saw a girl in a mini-skirt he thought of Julie. He was reminded of them again when he found himself sitting across the long table from Paul Bayonard, who owned several small Mayfair art galleries and had an interest in some provincial ones in or near big cities. The service, by a middle-aged woman dressed in a black dress adorned with an old-fashioned lace cap and apron, was very good; the English fare even better.

  Mannering had steak, kidney and oyster pie; Bayonard, a trout with sliced almonds.

  “Paul,” Mannering asked, “have you ever heard of a young and struggling artist named Forrester?”

  “Forrester, Forrester,” echoed Bayonard. “The name rings a bell. What does he do?”

  “He is a self-styled genius,” declared Mannering.

  “What, another?” Bayonard raised his eyebrows. “Don’t say he fooled you, John.”

  “I haven’t seen his work yet,” Mannering said. “He has a very pretty girl-friend, named Julie, who—”

  “Oh, now I remember!” Bayonard’s eyes lit up. “He’s the chap who punched Parsons on the nose – presumably for making improper proposals.” Bayonard leaned forward to inspect. “Your nose seems all right, I must say.”

  “And will remain so! What does Forrester do?”

  “He used to be good at fakes – or copies, but he won’t do them any more, his artistic soul revolted. He concentrates on his form of sex art in great variety but never in quality. He must have been refused by more galleries than any other artist under fifty, and turned down with damning regularity. How did you come to meet him?” Mannering began to dissemble and was helped when a newcomer sat down next to him and another by Bayonard. The first was a provincial antique dealer who had obviously come deliberately to sit next to Mannering, who was among London’s top twelve dealers – and so judges – in the world. The other owned a large Chelsea art gallery not far from the Town Hall. The conversation became general until, when they were drinking coffee, Bayonard asked the other picture expert: “John says he’s interested in Tom Forrester, Stephen.” Stephen, young, long-faced, nearly bald, with well-cut clothes and beautifully kept hands, raised artificial-looking dark eyebrows.

  “Don’t be,” he advised.

  “Why not?”

  “He is the inevitable second-rater who thinks he is a genius.”

  “Sure?”

  “Yes. Touch him, and you’ll burn your fingers.” Then Stephen grinned, and asked teasingly: “Who approached you – Forrester or his Julie?”

  “Both together,” answered Mannering.

  “No wonder you’re interested! But the answer is still ‘don’t’. Have you told him about how he broke Parsons’ nose?” Stephen asked, eagerly.

  “So it’s broken now, is it?”

  “A hair fracture, I’m told, and that won’t do any harm if it teaches Parsons to keep his paws off the girls. Funny thing,” he went on, “but some of these young people who live together in trial marriages, as one might say, are more fiercely protective of their mates than a lot of staid married couples. There must be a moral for the times in that.”

  A general laugh rewarded this sally.

  Mannering left soon afterwards, reaching Quinns with only five minutes to go before his first appointment. Two dealers and two old customers came in quick succession, and it was nearly five o’clock before he had finished and could relax. Bristow had not yet returned but it proved to have been a quiet day in the shop; one of those days when he felt he could safely leave early with Armitage and Rupert Smith in charge. But he had hardly opened the door than Rupert called out: “Telephone for you, sir! A lady.”

  There was an instrument by the door, which closed as Mannering placed the receiver to his ear and announced: “John Mannering.”

  “Mr. Mannering,” a girl said. “Tom’s tried t
o kill himself. Please come and help him—please.” Before Mannering had gone much further than realise that it was Julie, talking of Forrester, she went on as if in despair: “It’s 17 Riston Street, Fulham. Oh, please come!”

  Chapter Three

  Noose and Knot

  Riston Street, Fulham, was not far from Wandsworth Bridge, in an area which all new and tall buildings had by-passed. It was still much as it had been half-a-century before. The houses were in short, narrow terraces. Each house was two storeys high and each had a slate roof, but there much of the similarity ended. Some had brick walls in front of tiny gardens or yards which saved the front windows from abutting the street. Some were near derelict; others shone in new high gloss paint, and while most were white with a red motif of bricks round the doors and windows, some were blue or green or yellow. One, at a corner was vividly purple.

  Number 17 was drab; unpainted; unadorned.

  A few small cars were parked on either side of the street but there was plenty of room for Mannering to park. He had come in a Morris station wagon, used for Quinns as a delivery van, not in his own Allard; yet even the wagon was resplendent here and a few people, already home from work, glanced at it and at him with curiosity reserved for the unfamiliar. Mannering was not only handsome but taller than most, and his Savile Row tailor did full justice to his broad figure.

  He stepped into the narrow porch of Number 17, half-turned, and banged his elbow. As he rubbed it, he caught his knuckles on the rough brick surface of the porch, so little room was there. Then he espied two bell pushes, one white, one black, on the wooden door frame, and above the top one was a typewritten name: Forrester.

  So Forrester had taken over Julie’s flat!

  Careful not to graze his fingers again, he pressed the bell. There was no immediate response, so he rang for a second time. Soon he heard hurried footsteps which grew louder as someone came running down the stairs. He backed a little as the door opened, and Julie stood there.

  She was dressed exactly as she had been at the shop, but her eyes were huge and bright and her face alive with alarm – and suddenly with enormous relief.