by L. S. Hilton
‘Spread your legs, now.’
She straddled a little, her hands still clutching my hair, I kept my tongue flat to her clit and worked a finger up her, then another, gliding through her flesh, pushing against the front membrane, licking a little faster, her juice and my saliva coating my chin, sucking and eating. She made to pull me up, but I wanted her to cum, wanted to bury my whole face in those velvety lips, to feel the spasm of her pleasure twitch against my hand, to find the prospect of my own pleasure in it. She was moaning now; for a moment I pulled back, and saw the silhouette of a man in the flickering candlelight of the stairwell. I didn’t mind if she didn’t. Keeping my hand deep in her, I reached up under her shirt, stretching to release her nipple from her bra, rubbing it in circles to the same rhythm as my tongue on her clit. I licked harder, faster, felt the first tightening on my fingers and twisted the hard button of flesh viciously as her orgasm took her. She gave a fox’s high scream, grating her nails into the base of my skull, lathering my face as she shoved her cunt against my mouth, then a deep sigh of release and she staggered back onto a divan, crucified. I rubbed the heel of my palm against my burning lips, tasting something dark beneath the mineral salt of her cum; nidoric, succulent. I put a finger in her mouth as I crossed to the huge gilt-rimmed looking glass propped beside the low bed. There was dried blood on my jaw, one rusty vampiric dribble.
‘Sorry about that.’
‘I don’t mind.’ I smeared it across my chin, gazing dully into my reflection’s deep eyes. There was a muted gasp from the stairs.
She giggled. ‘Come out.’
The Ukrainian husband appeared, sans television, fumbling himself back into his fly. She smiled, glorious, and held out her arms to us both. ‘Come here, cara. Your turn.’
‘I’ll be a moment.’ I left them and went down to wash my face at the kitchen sink. The brunette was still passed out on the chair, her hair trailing to the floor. I took a grubby velvet cover from a pillow and set it softly over her naked shoulders, then took off my shoes, blurring a bloody fingerprint onto the suede, and quietly let myself out into the alley. I wanted to feel the cool smooth stone beneath my feet. I hoped I had given her pleasure, was glad if I had, but – that was all. There was a sick dizziness in me, as though I had swallowed that whole bottle of bad grappa. I’d been a good sport, got her off, but there was no answering tug of need. I was empty, dull-nerved, absent. Even that then? Didn’t I even want that anymore? I wandered home, to check on the ghosts. That was all, I told myself. It was just the ghosts.
9
In every Venetian day there is one moment when the city is made entirely of silver. As the very last sliver of twilight slips beneath the lagoon, stone and water meld into an aquaforte engraving, tints of old pewter, shuddering argentate black and gleaming white gold. You have to look for it, to await its coming, but it is the moment when the city is most entirely and mysteriously itself. That moment was coming earlier now, but the days were still hot, and in the afternoons; the beaches on the Lido remained crowded. One afternoon, a week or so after my visit to the Marciana, I was thinking about taking the vaporetto and going for a swim; I was working conscientiously enough in the gallery on the plans for the new show, but by 3 p.m. the dead time in Italy, the day was dragging and I couldn’t really think of anything else I wanted to do. I was just about to pack up when I heard the door. I had the ‘Closed’ sign up, since we weren’t selling anything, but the visitor, a woman, from the sound of her heels, moved purposefully across the floor to my desk at the back of the space.
‘Elisabeth!’
It was the Russian woman from Carlotta’s party.
‘Elena. Um – hi. How lovely to see you in Venice!’
Elena was wearing a navy silk wrap dress and high wooden platform sandals, with a stiff-brimmed beige straw hat to protect the remains of her original complexion from the sun. A toning Hermès bag and a pair of huge Tom Ford sunglasses dangled from one hand.
‘Are you here for long?’
‘Just a few days.’ She looked uncomfortable. ‘Actually, I came to see you.’
‘Really? Well, unfortunately I don’t have a show up at the moment, as you can see, but –’
‘I thought you might like to take a coffee. We could . . . talk.’
‘Oh. Well, certainly. Where are you staying?’
‘I’m at the Cipriani.’
‘Of course you are. Well, I’m free right now, Elena. Perhaps you’d like to cross over? The gardens there are lovely and cool.’ Something about her air of distress made me speak reassuringly, as though to a lost child. She clutched at her throat and swallowed hard, then jerked her head to the right in a stage nudge.
‘I would prefer somewhere more – private. My husband is very protective, you see.’
I followed the line of her jaw and saw a besuited pair of thick shoulders and a squat neck silhouetted in the sunlight outside the gallery doors. A tight button-down collar almost concealed the hilt of an inked dagger just below the pit-bull jawline. If that was Elena’s bodyguard, I could quite understand why she wanted to lose him.
I gathered my things and took the keys from the top desk drawer.
‘Sure . . . I can shut things here for a while. Why don’t we go for a walk along the Zattere? Just on the water there. There are lots of cafés – we can choose one of those.’
‘Spasibo.’ She thanked me in Russian and stepped quickly out to the goon, pointing to the left, the direction we would take. He moved off and she hovered while I locked up.
‘He’ll be back in half an hour.’
We walked side by side towards the Gesuati, Elena glancing round to ascertain the proximity of the guard. After we’d exchanged a few remarks about the loveliness of Carlotta’s wedding, I made small talk, starting with the good old weather, then pointing out some of the sights across the channel on Giudecca.
‘Do you want to go into the church?’ I asked, as we paused outside the white baroque frontage. ‘The ceilings are very famous. Tiepolo.’
She assented, and I rooted some change out of my purse to buy two tickets. As we passed through the vestibule into the nave, I noticed that Elena crossed herself right to left, with three fingers folded, in the Orthodox style. I didn’t. The church was thick with the perennial scent of incense and damp stone. Neither of us so much as glanced at St Dominic ascending to heaven above us.
‘Elisabeth, I am sorry to be so mysterious.’
‘That’s OK. Just tell me how I can help you.’ My tone belied my impatience. What did the silly woman want?
‘Also for my English.’
‘Your English is excellent.’
‘It’s Soviet. We can never lose the accent. My husband says we pay three times as much for everything, just for the accent.’
‘Your husband?’ I prompted. Was she ever going to get to the point?
‘My husband is Pavel Yermolov.’
I hadn’t seen that one coming.
‘And he wants to divorce me.’
‘Oh. Elena, I’m sorry about that, but I don’t see –’
‘You will. Let me explain.’
She had recognised me, she said, when I visited Yermolov’s house some weeks ago. She had seen me eating with him. ‘I was trying to speak to him,’ she said sadly, ‘but that – that pig, he wouldn’t let me.’
‘That was you? On the cliff there? But your husband said it was a trespasser. In your own home?’
‘I know. It’s pathetic.’
Yermolov, Elena explained, had been planning to separate from her for a while. ‘He has women – pouf! What do I care about that? But we have also two boys, at school in England. Harrow,’ she added proudly. We had to pause there while her phone was produced from the Hermès and the children duly admired. ‘So, then I saw you at Carlotta’s wedding. I recognised you. I asked Carlotta, and she said you worked with art. So I did some research.’
‘I see.’ My hands were folded in my lap. I clenched them tight. I suddenly felt
cold, and it wasn’t the ecclesiastical temperature. What does she know? What does she want?
‘I learned that my husband had asked you to value his collection. Did he ask you to undervalue it?’
I hesitated, pretending to be distracted by a tour guide loudly explaining the frescos in German. What was this? Yermolov having another go – trying to get some vote of sisterly sympathy?
‘He didn’t mention a figure. Anyway, I turned down the job. I considered myself too inexperienced.’
‘He won’t let you.’
I’d worked that out. Yermolov was fucking with my head, but I’d been a bit busy, I thought, what with one thing and another. Time seemed to get the better of me since Alvin’s visit.
‘What do you mean?’ I asked, trying to focus.
‘Have you not noticed anything – odd, since you came home to Venice? Has a ghost moved into your flat?’
How could she know about that?
Yermolov wanted me to do the valuation, Elena went on, precisely because of my inexperience. He wanted the valuation low because, like many wealthy men, he was trying to reduce the official value of his assets before filing a divorce petition, in order to ensure a lower settlement. He would file in Russia, Elena believed, because Russian courts were conventionally more favourable to husbands, as well as more gentle about forcing them to reveal their worth. Yet a few recent cases had attracted unwelcome press, so for a man as rich as Yermolov it would be best if the proceedings were as discreet as possible. If anyone questioned the value of the collection, he wanted someone to blame.
That hurt. It hurt a lot. It was one thing to know that I didn’t think myself good enough for Yermolov’s pictures, quite another to learn that he didn’t either. I thought I had turned him down honestly, and had taken comfort in even seeing the pictures, coming closer to their aura than most others ever would. But he had only wanted a stooge, a straw man. Perhaps he didn’t take kindly to being refused, perhaps the antics in my flat were an attempt to bully me, but that wouldn’t explain the Stubbs postcard . . . I tried to concentrate on the conversation.
‘So it’s better for your husband if he divorces you in Russia. Not for you, obviously. But why should he care so much?’
Elena rolled her eyes. It was her turn to be impatient. ‘My husband is . . . well placed with the authorities. He wants to keep it that way.’
‘I see.’ I knew Yermolov had political connections – maybe a foreign divorce would cause a scandal?
‘Anyway, I hate him. He treats me like a prisoner, like an animal! And now he throws me away like an old shoe! He says our relationship is no longer “effective”.’
From where I was sitting, Elena didn’t look much like an old shoe. Her engagement ring alone would have rented a flat in Mayfair for a year.
‘I appreciate your confiding in me, and I’m sorry for your situation, I really am, but I still don’t see why you think I can help you.’
She looked around. ‘This place is giving me the creeps. Let’s go.’
I followed her patiently back to the quay, where we both blinked and shivered, blinded by the sudden glare of heat.
‘We’d better go back.’ She started walking slowly, holding my arm as though we were old friends. Her face was close to mine. I could smell her scent and see the fine feathering of lines around her mouth where the filler was beginning to slip. ‘So, my husband thinks he can get rid of me, like that!’ She snapped her fingers. ‘And he knows that if he does . . .’
‘Elena, please be clear. This isn’t making any sense.’
She turned and clutched my elbows. ‘I have been married to Pavel for many years. Thirty years. I have seen a lot, heard a lot. Without my marriage, I will be in danger. I know this. I need to have something, something that will keep me safe.’
‘But you will have money. Perhaps not as much as you feel you deserve, after so long –’
She dug her nails into my elbow. ‘It’s not money. Do you not read the newspapers? Russia is not Europe, whatever they pretend. If I am not married to Pavel, it will be . . . expedient – to get rid of me. People who are an embarrassment to the authorities find themselves in prison, or worse. I am under threat, can’t you see?’
Before I had time to reply that I didn’t see anything except that she was insane, Elena stepped away and, to my surprise and that of the tourist crowd, executed a perfect pirouette in her high chopines.
‘I was a good ballerina once!’ The woman was utterly mad. ‘I will collect you tonight. A little outing, to pay homage to Diaghilev! Shall we say here in front of the church, at 7 p.m.?’
‘Elena, please. I don’t think this is a good idea. I’m sorry, but I can’t help you.’
She turned back, the brittle gay smile wiped from her face. ‘Oh, but you can. When I first saw you with Pavel, I assumed you were a –’
‘Tart?’
‘A prostitute, yes. But when Carlotta told me what you do, I researched your gallery. Nice name, Gentileschi.’
‘Um, thank you.’
‘Silly of you to have mentioned it to the French police though.’
I gaped at her like a gigged frog.
*
Morning on the steps of Sacré-Cœur, my last day in Paris. I could smell it, the churned stink of garbage, exhaust from the tourist buses, marijuana, coffee. Renaud’s phone in my hand, a whole squad of gendarmes waiting at Charles de Gaulle for a girl with a fake passport who never made her flight. En route. Does the name Gentileschi mean anything to you?’ I’d texted them. Half caution, half audacity, the stupid, enticing compulsion of risk. I’d taken care of Renaud, so how could Elena possibly know? Was she responsible for the Stubbs postcard too? What the hell was happening here?
*
Elena was clearly taking pleasure in her revelation. I stared past her, along the quay, fighting the urge to shove her into the water along with a sudden sense of strangling claustrophobia, as though the twined circumstances that had brought me here were coiling around me, a hissing, rearing Hydra that could never lie quiet. I’d thought I was safe, clear of the past here in Venice, even if Alvin was still – Stop. Don’t think about Alvin. Focus on this mad bitch who’s trying to steal your life.
‘I have no idea what you’re talking about’ I said stiffly.
‘Oh, but I think you do. I need your help with a picture.’
She leaned even closer, her lips against my ear, as though she was sharing a particularly scandalous morsel of gossip. Somewhere ahead, I sensed the goon was watching us. ‘I think you are good with paintings, Judith?’
10
I spent the rest of the afternoon lying on my bed, pinned there by the frozen lead in my heart. Yermolov knew. Elena knew. Why didn’t I just take out an ad in the bloody Corriere della Sera? It was all I could do to stop myself peering under the bed to see if Romero da Silva was lurking there for good measure. This wasn’t going to stop. This wasn’t ever going to stop. What was I supposed to do? Pitch Elena Yermolov into the lagoon along with her bodyguard? Quite funny, that. At least, I could hear someone laughing.
I gave myself a mental clip round the ear. I had been right that the zersetzung was Yermolov’s doing – Elena’s use of my real name confirmed it. So who had told them? I replayed my conversation with Yermolov when we had dined in his summer house. Hadn’t he said something about Paris? I bit my knuckles in frustration. He’d known before he even asked me there. And I’d been so proud, so delighted. But this was not the moment to cosset my wounded pride. Elena’s garbled account about the divorce made some sort of sense. Yermolov had wanted me to undervalue the collection, had thought he could exercise pressure – excruciatingly plausible. But what about the ‘threats’ to his wife? I didn’t set much store by her murky talk, but Elena’s urgency suggested she believed her own story. She was prepared to challenge her husband, and she had mentioned a picture. This was, somehow, to do with a picture. So – the next thing. I couldn’t protect myself without knowledge. So I had to meet
her. Proceed slowly, learn all I could.
*
By 7 p.m. I had recovered my countenance. At the dock I was handed into a honey-toned Riva to join Mrs Yermolov in the low cabin. Black had seemed the right colour for a trip to the cemetery island of San Michele, silk equipment trousers and a plain round-neck jersey, but at the last minute that looked a bit too Ninja, so I added a heavy turquoise cashmere shawl against the evening breeze on the lagoon. We set off in silence over the milky jade water, admiring the endlessly perfect vistas of the Grand Canal, two ladies on a quirky romantic outing. The goon stood in the prow with the skipper, earnestly smoking. The boat pulled off right towards Cannaregio, and in a few minutes I felt the heavier swell of the open lagoon beneath us. I fancied a fag myself, but halfway through the crossing Elena started looking rather queasy, so it seemed kinder not to. When we drew up at San Michele, she stood for a few moments with her head bowed to her knees, not an easy manoeuvre in a corseted Versus evening dress and four-inch heels.
‘The boat will wait for us,’ she announced grandly. ‘Have you been here before?’
I hadn’t. Henry James might have said that Venice was the most beautiful sepulchre in the world, but it wasn’t an idea I’d recently felt the need to investigate.
‘He’s in the Greek section. Come on.’
Unlike the rest of the city, San Michele is neatly kept, bulbs of yew setting off the orange brickwork of the loggias. Elena’s stilettos twisted awkwardly on the gravel, but she glided on, holding her shoulders carefully, for Diaghilev’s benefit.
‘Here it is.’
The monument was cream and ivory stone, its commemoration carved in gilded Cyrillic. Elena sat down cosily on the next grave and produced a bottle of Stoli and three tea glasses from her handbag. ‘One for you, one for me, and one for the Master,’ she explained, pouring. We toasted the grave and each knocked back a shot before Elena emptied the third glass over the stone. I wondered if it was regular libations of alcohol that kept it so shiny. I lit the cigarette I had been planning and held out my glass for a refill.