Hold Back the Night

by Abra Taylor

  Sander's small cruelties had ceased, to be replaced by a dark and brooding passion that meant as much time was spent in his bedroom as in his workshop during her visits. Miranda could not help but become aware of what was happening upstairs, and although Domini avoided discussing it with her, she knew Miranda approved. She had the idea that Miranda hoped it might end in marriage ... possibly for her own sake as much as for her brother's. If Sander married she would no longer have the responsibility of caring for him and could follow her own heart.

  Overtired by trying to do too much, Domini began in early spring to restrict her visits to two a week, even less if her will power behaved, or if Tasey had to miss day care because of the inevitable childhood episodes of sniffles and croup.

  When informed of the reduction in the number of sessions, Sander had made no comment beyond a brief tightening of the jaw, which Domini interpreted as annoyance that her private life should interfere with his wishes. Wanting her as a model, he had become more careful of her feelings. Although pride and male arrogance were a part of his nature, he was no longer so tempestuous in anger, although he remained satisfyingly so in bed. As long as she betrayed no compassion and no emotional involvement, Sander was considerate, ardent, at time dryly humorous or even engaging in his manner. When sudden arrivals knocked on the door of his workshop, he now draped a cover over Domini before answering, a change of attitude for which she was exceedingly grateful. On occasion, depending on who was at the door, he draped his damp sheets over the sculpture too. He never spoke of love, nor did Domini.

  For a time she had dared to hope he would. There was sometimes a tenderness in him in the moving moments after they had made love, when he would hold her close and stroke her hair or simply lay his hand gently alongside her cheek as if to read what changing emotions might be patterned in her face. At such times his own expression would remain remote and unrevealing. But on occasion during the sculpting sessions, when he thought himself unobserved, she would see a fleeting anguish flicker across his face, an expression than closely approximated her own hopeless feelings about the affair.

  At the beginning that passing pain, so seldom sighted and so swiftly masked, made her wonder if his feelings were becoming involved more than he cared to admit. But one day while modelling, she forced a conversation that sounded the death knell to such wishful thinking.

  'Have you ever been in love?' she dared to ask.

  He stiffened. 'I hope that's not a leading question. I don't believe in love.'

  'Just idle curiosity.' Domini paused. 'All those years you spent in Paris ... surely you weren't so cynical then? There must have been someone.'

  'There were quite a few,' he said harshly. 'Women come and go and they mean nothing to me, especially now. In the dark one female is much the same as another.'

  Domini thought he was lying. He had once loved Nicole, she knew that; and she was also fairly sure that Nicole's desertion must have soured Sander's attitude towards women. She waited until he was touching her again, stroking her side to determine the exact flare of hip bone in the indolent posture he had asked her to assume. 'There must be some woman you remember from Paris,' she prodded.

  'And if there was, how should that be your concern?' he countered with little inflection, but his hand came to a halt. Domini wondered if she detected a tremble in his fingertips. Or was it mere imagination?

  'Because I imagine she was one of your models, like me,' Domini said. 'I'm curious about the competition.'

  'Ah,' he said unrevealingly, and his hand went back to its task.

  'Was she your last model?'

  'I've told you, life sessions don't always end up in bed,' he retorted misleadingly.

  Domini thought about squeaking bedsprings, and old jealousies came spilling back, surprising in their intensity. Her voice was a little stiff when she replied, 'Maybe not, but don't tell me hers didn't!'

  'And what makes you so sure?'

  'I've seen pictures of the sculptures you did of her.' Domini plunged compulsively on, uncaring whether the memories were painful to Sander or not; his evasiveness was a goad. 'One or two of them looked like they had been done after love-making, not before.' Sander's face was impassive as stone, neither confirming nor denying. Splintered with jealousy, Domini added, 'What was her name?'

  'Nicole,' he said, frowning down at the hip he could not see. Domini saw a small pulse ticking in his temple.

  'Did you love her?'

  'Love is a word that's not in my vocabulary,' he grated discouragingly. 'It implies a certain depth of emotion.'

  'And you've never felt that deeply?'

  'Women are too fickle to be worth the involvement.'

  Domini's reactions to that comment were very mixed. If he thought of Nicole as fickle that was well and good, but she resented being put in the same category. She made efforts to curb the tautness in her tone, without much success.'Well, then, did you... care for her?'

  'Look after her … pay her way? Yes. Is that what you want? To be paid for your services, as she was?'

  Usually Domini ignored barbed comments such as these, inflicted as they were out of Sander's embittered and eternal night. But this time she longed for him to dispose of Nicole forever with some damning verbal condemnation. 'No, I mean, did you like her?' she pressed.

  'Of course. If I didn't like a woman, I wouldn't take her to bed at all,' he said in a clipped tone.

  Domini's fingertips began to curl more than her pose called for. 'Then you must like me.'

  'Well enough,' he cut back, 'for the purposes you serve.'

  Domini glared at him, her eyes hot. 'Do you like me as well as you liked that... that woman Nicole?'

  'As a model or as a mistress?'

  'Both,' Domini said, frustrated that he would speak no words betraying any emotional tie to her. Did he really cast her in the same mould as Nicole?

  'If I dared to say she was better at either of those things, I'd have no model whatsoever for this sculpture.' Sander's stance challenged Domini in some obscure way. 'Choose the answer that pleases you best,' he finished curtly.

  That particular answer didn't please Domini in any way at all. If he cared so little about giving her the benefit of the comparison, perhaps he still carried some kind of torch for Nicole. How could he still feel anything for the selfish bitch after what she had done?

  'Do you still think of her?' she pressed, her voice a little sharper.

  'Clearly I'm doing that right now,' he returned acidly, running his powerful fingers into the hollow beside Domini's hip and punishing her persistence with pressure a little too extreme for comfort. 'But if I'm thinking of Nicole, it's only because you're forcing me to do it against my will. Once a woman is out of my life, I prefer to put her out of my mind altogether. I'd rather concentrate on the one at hand, which at the moment happens to be you. By the way, you're allowing yourself to get too bony for my liking.'

  'At the moment happens to be me!' Domini retorted, because she could not prevent some small outburst of jealousy. 'You make me feel like temporary help! How long am I going to last?'

  Sander's dark eyes glittered. With an arrogant and deliberate assertion of the rights she had ceded to him, he allowed his hand to slide downward to an openly intimate position. 'You'll last as long as you continue to satisfy me,' he retorted insolently as he took his liberties. 'And I think I'd like to be satisfied right now.'

  'Damn you,' Domini gasped, abandoning her pose and trying to twist away. But already the point of no return had been reached. Holding her in submission with a sweep of his muscular arm, Sander dropped his dark head to the pale flare of her hip, passionately kissing what he should have been sculpting, and before long they were clinging as they climbed the stairs to his bedroom, Domini as urgent as he and no longer asking for the words of endearment he chose not to say.

  When she loved him so desperately, how could she deny him anything, even when his demands were issued in such peremptory and loveless fashion?

 
; The sculpture of Domini progressed with agonizing slowness. This time the face was not left unfinished, and Domini saw … as Miranda must see, and as anyone but Sander could see when the sculpture was not shrouded … that it was the face of a woman deeply in love. There was sadness in it as well as sensuality. Sander spoke only of the sensuality, and if he detected the range of other emotions expressed in Domini's eyes and mouth and rendered faithfully by his talented hands, he failed to remark on them. Perhaps the subtler nuances were transmitted by his fingertips without actually registering their meaning on his brain.

  In the passing months he had started and finished other pieces equally large. Some of them were stored in corners of the workroom; some of them were stored in the basement of the gallery; some were stored in an empty room on the third floor. All other sculptures were of subjects other than Domini … Joel, Miranda, the attractive nurse who lived down the street, and others whom Sander had been able to cajole into sitting either clothed or unclothed. The nudes awakened no particular jealousy in Domini, as Nicole had, because with her heart she knew full well that for the time being Sander's only sexual obsession was herself. And with her heart she also knew that he was deliberately stalling the completion of the large clay model, declaring himself unsatisfied with this aspect or that, because he wanted her afternoon visits to continue and was too proud to suggest she come for the sole purpose of occupying his bed.

  On several occasions and with no great sense of guilt, Domini had surreptitiously removed some of the tiny maquettes he had done in the early days. Sander was too obsessed by his larger sculptures to even note that they were missing. Domini had made the plaster of Paris moulds herself and arranged for a foundry to cast them in bronze, twenty copies of each. Unknown to Sander, Miranda was handling the small bronzes in the gallery, and though unsigned they were selling very well, especially the figurine of a faceless man and woman entwined in the act of love. Domini had long since recovered her initial investment at the foundry, and as the sculptures sold for a modestly substantial amount, there was no need for Miranda to urge Sander back to the construction of toys.

  With relief Domini noted the signs of easing finances during her visits. The toys, as well as the bronzes, were producing a decent revenue, and one of the younger artists handled by the gallery was beginning to enjoy some small success as well. A telephone appeared on the sales desk, and Miranda reluctantly admitted that prior to Christmas it had been taken out due to non-payment of bills. A new table materialized to replace the one Sander had preempted for his sculptures. Miranda bought a couple of flattering new dresses, and upstairs the light bulbs became a brighter wattage. A few small repairs were done to fix the fallen plaster, and Domini noted with pleasure that a wallpaper sample book had joined the pile of old art magazines on top of the gallery's sales desk.

  The workshop itself changed, tools of carpentry and workbenches giving way as the number of finished sculptures grew, until one day Domini decided it could no longer be called a workshop at all. It was a studio, a sculptor's studio, less sunny and pleasant than some but a studio all the same.

  One chance conversation with Miranda produced for Domini a deeper understanding of the financial problems that had plagued Sander for four years, and also filled her with dismay. 'It would have helped,' Miranda sighed at one point, 'if he had received payment for the sculptures he did while he was in Paris. But he didn't. There was some funny thing about his dealer advancing money by mistake because of a murky arrangement with a man named D'Allard. For some reason this D'Allard seemed incensed … made a fuss about putting money out of his own pocket. Sander didn't explain the whole thing, but he told me that because of the circumstances he had to reimburse the man. In lieu of cash, he had to sign everything over to D'Allard ... all of the finished sculptures at his dealer's, and even some things in the workshed he used. I think they all sold, but Sander didn't get a penny.'

  Domini felt ill. So her trouble had all been in vain after all. Losing her father from his stable, D'Allard must have set out to recoup the money he had advanced for her own indifferent art. No doubt Sander knew what the foolish young Didi had tried to do too; it must have been explained to him at the time. Not vengeful by nature, Domini nevertheless remembered with spiteful pleasure that D'Allard must have suffered considerable losses when her father severed connections.

  With her problems easing, Miranda's face began to look less pinched and thin, except when her mind turned to wistful thoughts of Joel. Domini thought they were probably having an affair but didn't feel it was her place to pry. One day Miranda did, however, admit that she was familiar with Joel's apartment. 'It's not very grand,' she said. 'Only three bedrooms, ail quite tiny. For now, he can't afford anything bigger. His restaurant does well, but he's still paying off the bank loan he got when he started up.'

  Domini gathered that two extra people could not possibly move in to share Joel's quarters on a permanent basis. Miranda, maybe; Sander never. All the same, if the financial picture continued to brighten, maybe a solution could be found. Domini knew Miranda was hoping.

  As for Sander, Domini realized wryly that he was too possessed by his need to sculpt to even notice that money problems had become less pressing. In doing the sculptures, he had indeed been helping himself, although he might not yet know it. Along with the satisfaction Domini felt came the bitter realization that should he ever become truly successful, he might soon feel no more need of her at all. For sculptors of note, models were easy to come by ... and so were mistresses.

  Domini's finances were easier too. Her bank-book showed no great balance, but it did show a balance. Grant Manners had awarded her the job as hoped, reaffirming that her initial judgement of him had not been too far amiss. She had lunched with him several times, purely business luncheons during which he remained affable and charming, pressuring her in no way for a relationship she clearly did not want. She liked him and knew he liked her, and there the matter remained. Oh, why hadn't she been able to fall in love with someone nice and easy like that?

  'Another of the bronzes sold!' Miranda declared happily as Domini came through the gallery door one day at the end of June, when the heat wave had still not broken. In the humidity her cotton shift was clinging over damp skin, and even without nylons and wearing light sandals she felt uncomfortably hot. It was cooler in the gallery, thanks to a somewhat cranky air conditioning system, a relic of more prosperous days when Miranda's husband had been alive. The cooling system didn't extend to the upper floors;

  Domini knew to her sorrow that the third floor, due to poor insulation in the old Victorian roof, was like a blast furnace.

  'That's wonderful, Miranda.' Domini smiled. 'It's about time I filched another maquette, don't you think? Or shall I just get some castings from the moulds I've already made?'

  'I think it's time I started looking after all that,' Miranda decided, displaying some firmness. She looked at Domini, her grey eyes clear and friendly. 'I can manage it now, you know. Believe it or not, this heat is good for business! People come in to get cool and sometimes stay to buy. All this year I've had good tourist traffic ... and some decent things to sell. It makes a difference.'

  'In that case why don't you think about having one of Sander's big pieces cast?' Domini suggested eagerly. 'The one of Joel sitting dejectedly on an old chair is a simply marvellous study.'

  Miranda shook her head and made a face. 'I'd have something big cast if I thought for a moment I could sell it. But in some things I'm a realist, Domini. The customers who walk in here wouldn't pay the price I'd have to charge for a large piece like that. Truthfully, Sander needs a better dealer than me. Preferably a chic uptown gallery, one with a good reputation.'

  There was no way Domini could dispute that, because it echoed her own sentiments exactly. There were many reputable and important dealers in SoHo, but the best of them featured works more avant-garde in nature than Sander's. He was an individualist, not a follower of fashions in art; Domini would have called his w
orks contemporary classics. Some of the studies he had done were more experimental than the sculpture of herself, but they were still firmly rooted in realism. They would do well with dealers such as the one that handled Domini's own father, but they wouldn't mingle well with Campbell's soup labels and overblown comic strips and collapsed plumbing fixtures made of soft plastic.

  But such tact as she had acquired over the years forbade Domini to agree with Miranda too strongly, thereby casting a slur on Miranda's little gallery. She murmured a vague 'Maybe.'

  And then, obeying the internal compass that pulled her to its own personal magnetic pole, her eyes turned restively towards the stairs. A brief conversation with Miranda had become a ritual part of her visits whenever she had a few moments to spare, but today she didn't feel like prolonging it. Since the start of the heat wave she had not liked to think of Sander sweltering over his sculptures in the confinement of a poorly insulated house. He refused to sit in the cool of the gallery because of an in-built hatred of being on public view. Troubled by the confined life he led, early in the year Domini had pushed and prodded him to start walking outdoors, something he had not been given to doing on his own because he disliked carrying his white cane or accepting help from strangers. Miranda, anxious for his safety, had also had to be convinced. But now Sander did sometimes venture alone within the range of a few familiar blocks, usually at night when he felt more comfortable about his cane. During the day he still avoided such outings.

  But in weather like this there was little relief to be had on the streets; they were like blast furnaces too. Ought she invite Sander to her loft, which was somewhat cooler due to its high ceilings and white paint? Or would that be a mistake? She decided it would. Sander never asked questions about Tasey, and Domini scrupulously avoided the topic herself. To take Sander to the loft would be to take him into a world where traces of Tasey were everywhere, and Domini didn't think she could bear a situation like that.