Jane glanced in at the doors again, as they walked on down the hall. Their sitting-room at home seemed naked in comparison – just a chintzy three-piece suite, circa 1980, and one print, of Van Gogh’s Sunflowers. This house breathed Art and Culture, both with capitals, and she felt a shade uneasy, as if she’d entered a new world, and didn’t know the signposts. That bronze bust on a plinth, for instance, and spiky metal sculpture – were they priceless modern art, or Isobel’s own handiwork? She’d no idea, and dared not ask, for fear of revealing what a dunce she was.
Upstairs was much less daunting, though even on the landing there were several modern paintings – one she seemed to recognise: a charred and arid landscape, daubed in murky pigments. ‘Is that Christopher’s?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ said Rowan, frowning. ‘I hate the way he always makes things ugly. I mean that’s actually a beauty-spot, just a mile or two from here, a place which people flock to, because the view’s so glorious, yet he has to go and spoil it.’
Jane said nothing. The picture magnetised her, seemed to draw her in to the sweep of barren hill. She wouldn’t call it ugly – oppressive maybe, violent, but also grand and solemn.
‘He did a portrait of my mother about fifteen years ago, made her look quite hideous when she was still young and rather stunning.’
‘I couldn’t see it, could I?’
Rowan shrugged, pushed the door in front of her, which opened to reveal an unmade double bed, a cluttered dressing table, and at least a dozen pictures jostling on the walls. The portrait was the largest; dark and deeply shadowed, save for the gold flame of the hair.
‘It’s almost cruel, I’d say – the way he’s made the flesh so slack, and sort of hacked her into pieces.’ Rowan turned her back, dismissing it, started sorting out her mother’s clothes, which had been left jumbled on the bed. Jane stayed where she was, gazing at the face, a fragmented face exploding from its frame; the veins like knotted ropes which seemed to serpent from her hands, give them writhing life and power; one breast half-suggested, then lost in teasing shadow. She tried to check the likeness, but it was difficult to concentrate. Other painful images were fighting in her mind – Christopher and Isobel closeted together while he explored his willing subject, probing her and penetrating; the artist and his sitter intimate, familiar, bonded by the portrait, fused in it and merged. So he had known her fifteen years or more. She could never rival that, would never be the subject of an expensive formal portrait.
‘You seem pretty taken with it.’ Rowan shook out a patchwork skirt, returned it to the wardrobe.
‘Well, it’s got your mother’s energy.’
‘Energy! She looks more or less demented. I think what it really shows is Christopher’s attitude to women. He’s got to put them down, make them vile and loathsome. Not that I’m surprised. He’s already gone through several wives, which is always a bad sign.’
‘Several?’ Jane swung round.
‘Anne’s the third, and I think the only reason she stays is she’s so busy with her own career she hardly sees him anyway. You’d think he’d quieten down a bit now he’s an old age pensioner.’
‘A what?’
‘Well, jolly nearly, anyway. He must be coming up to sixty.’
‘He … he doesn’t look it.’ Jane leant against the wall, light-headed suddenly. It must be simple hunger. What was it to her that the artist was a fossil, a man older than her father, who’d chucked two wives on the scrap-heap? ‘Look, I … I’d better have that wash.’
‘Gosh – sorry! I should be showing you the bathroom, not my mother’s art collection. Why not use the basin here, though? The bathroom’s such a mess. I’ll fetch you a clean towel.’
‘I couldn’t borrow an old sweater, could I? This tracksuit’s really filthy. I came out in a hurry, and …’
‘Yeah, ’course. I’ll dig one out.’
Rowan padded back with two towels, an emerald sweater, and a pair of hot-pink dungarees. ‘I’ve brought you these, as well. They’re my favourites, actually, though they must be ten years old. Mum bought them as a present for me in the Portobello Road, when I was a horrid spotty schoolgirl with no clothes except my gym-slip.’
Jane mouthed her thanks, blinking at the colours.
‘If they’re a bit too long, you can roll the bottoms up. And do help yourself to talcum or anything you need. It’s all there on the dressing table.’
‘But won’t your mother mind if I monopolise her room?’
‘Mind? Of course she won’t. Anyway, she’s busy. Mum’s a super cook – except for rice, I suppose, which she always seems to murder – but she likes to take her time. If she invites you round for breakfast, expect your eggs and bacon at half past twelve, or one, and if she calls it brunch’ – Rowan grinned and shrugged – ‘we’ll probably eat by tea-time. Don’t rush, anyway. I’ll wait for you downstairs.’
‘Thanks,’ said Jane, then went to run some water, glancing at the unmade bed – sheets crumpled, slightly grubby, both pillows on the floor. She could well imagine Isobel tossing through the night, active even in her sleep, churning up the bedclothes, flinging pillows right and left as she threshed in scarlet dreams. What had Tom been like – the surgeon, the dead husband – vivacious, like his wife, or a quiet unruffled foil to her? There were photos of him everywhere – a tall and bony man, with a fringe of boyish hair, which contrasted with his wrinkled face, his worn and veiny hands. It must have been difficult for Rowan to have had her father die when she was only in her twenties. She felt a certain bond with her. They had both lost something vital, someone irreplaceable, except Rowan had a mother still, and a brother two years younger, who also featured widely in the photographs downstairs. All those smiling snapshots of brothers, fathers, kith and kin, were genuine in Rowan’s case, not sham, as in her own.
She picked up the wedding photo standing on the dressing table – a slimmer shyer Isobel beaming at a young unwrinkled Tom. She tried to picture them in bed together, the first night of their honeymoon; Isobel’s warm willing flesh melting into Tom’s – except it wasn’t Tom, but Christopher – an ardent violent Christopher, reaching out to Isobel, paint-stained hands grazing down her back, mouth open and …
She splashed cold water on her face, tried to kick the artist out from Rowan’s mother’s bed. It was clear Rowan didn’t like him. Could that be a danger-sign, mean that Isobel and Christopher had in fact been closer than they should? She unzipped her tracksuit-top, scoured her neck and shoulders. Who cared anyway? Why should she upset herself about a man of nearly sixty who was obviously quite past it? She finished washing, sprayed herself from half a dozen bottles – deodorant and skin-tonic, and at least four brands of scent – then pulled on the green jersey, the showy dungarees. She had never worn such brilliant boastful colours, normally tried to lose herself in grey or brown or navy. She fastened the wide belt, examined her appearance in the mirror. She looked older somehow, wilder, a daring sort of girl, artistic and bohemian, who might well be the assistant to a famous stained-glass artist – one still in his thirties, who had never married, ever, and was waiting for a soul-mate.
She strode back to the kitchen, wishing she had green suede boots like Lisa’s, instead of grubby trainers. Isobel was on the phone, alone, plumped down in a chair, shoes kicked off, skirt rucked up, spewing words in torrents, only pausing now and then to chew a wedge of orange, or mop juice from her chin. The brunch seemed quite forgotten. The gases were all off, the table still not laid. Only the cats and dog were eating – a tabby on the worktop licking butter from a plate; the boxer and the ginger tom gulping down some scraps. Isobel suddenly looked up, saw Jane at the door, startled to her feet, clutching the receiver.
‘Rowan!’
‘No, it’s Jane.’
‘Who?’
‘Er, Rose.’
‘Rose! You really threw me. You looked exactly like my daughter when she was just about fifteen. It was like jolting back ten years. Yes, I’m sorry, Eve, I’m here still
, but I’d better ring off now. These poor loves are all starving, and … Rose, pop through to the sitting-room. The others are in there. Tell them nosh in fifteen minutes. Yes, Eve, of course I’ll see her, only …’
Jane paused outside the sitting-room, too shaken to go in. Isobel had called her Rowan, and she herself had forgotten she was Rose. How confusing it all was. She had been wondering for a month now what her real names were – the name that she’d been given as soon as she was born; the surname of her mother – or father, if she had one. ‘Rose,’ she kept reiterating, before she joined the party and forgot herself again. ‘Rose, Rose, Rose, Rose, Rose.’ She liked the name, would stick with it – her third name in eighteen years.
‘Rose!’ the others all exclaimed, as they praised her change of outfit, told her she looked fabulous.
‘Wow!’ grinned Mark. ‘You’re blinding us. I’ll have to get my sunglasses.’ He was sprawling on the floor, squeezed up to make room for her, yanked two cushions down for her to sit on. She didn’t need to talk much, since his red-haired sister, Lisa, was recounting a long story about her other, younger brother, who had been expelled from public school, then set up a market-stall with a cousin aged sixteen. Brother, sister, cousin – how casual it all sounded. Normal for most people to have siblings and real families. Maybe she did, too – rebel brothers, red-haired sisters, just waiting to be found. She glanced down at her emerald sleeve clashing with the pink knee underneath it. Could that be really her? Perhaps her mother was an artist, who’d worn flamboyant clothes herself, had a house stuffed full of sculptures, with portraits on the walls. The artist-mother swelled, filled her head, the room. She’d had so many mothers in just the last short month – countesses and raddled slags, teenage drop-outs, pop stars.
‘What d’you do?’ asked Kathy, leaning down to offer her some nuts. ‘For your job, I mean.’
‘I work for a stained-glass artist,’ she said, what she hoped was nonchalantly. Maybe art was in her genes, and she would reveal some natural flair, prove indispensable.
‘You’ve met him, Kath,’ said Rowan, pulling at a loose thread on her sweater. ‘You know, Mum’s friend – Christopher Harville-Shaw.’
There was a sudden awkward silence. Kathy cleared her throat; Rowan peered intently at her hands, as if she were reading something printed on them, which required her total concentration. Jane shifted on the floor. Was there some mystery about Christopher – something he’d done wrong? She crammed in more cashews, choking down a spurt of anger, as well as just the nuts. What right had they to judge him? None of them could make a stained-glass window, or create red birds which ripped right through your mind. She reported Isobel’s message about food in fifteen minutes, deliberately changing the subject before she lost her cool.
‘Multiply by four,’ said Rowan, uncurling from her chair. ‘We’d better have a drink, to fill the hole.’ She rummaged in the sideboard, juggling several bottles. ‘There’s not a lot of choice – a tiddly bit of gin, some sherry which looks past it, one measure of Jack Daniels, and something called Kahlua.’
‘I’ll have that,’ said Mark.
‘What is it – a liqueur?’
‘Yes, Mexican, I think. Sort of coffee-flavoured, and pretty strong, as far as I remember. I had some, once, in Acapulco.’
Rowan filled a glass and sniffed it, nodding her approval. ‘Some for you as well, Rose?’ Jane paused. She never touched liqueurs, had been warned since she was twelve or so about the dangers of strong drink. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Why not?’
‘Let’s have some music, too,’ said Gill, joining Rowan at the sideboard, and annexing the gin. ‘Has your Mum got any records?’
‘Only symphonies and stuff. Or there might be some of Hadley’s. I’m not sure if he took them when he moved out to his flat. If you rifle through that cupboard there, you might dig out something interesting.’
Jane gulped her dark liqueur, which set her throat on fire; the first innocuous coffee-tang followed by a scorching searing aftertaste. She felt strangely hot already, as if the fireball of her wasp-sting had affected her whole body. Perhaps she had a temperature, or was sickening for some virus. Wasn’t brandy medicinal, so why not Kahlua?
Gill had found a record, put it on full volume. The whole room seemed to tremble. Jane could feel the carpet shaking underneath her, the ornaments and sculptures shuddering on their ledges – or was it her own body, pulsing from the sting? Somebody was speaking to her, but she couldn’t make the words out. ‘Yes,’ she said uncertainly. Safer to say yes, to hold on tight, not let herself unravel.
‘What’s the record?’ Neville yelled above the din.
‘Glen Miller’s Swinging Big Band,’ Gill bellowed back, thumping out the rhythm on her thigh. ‘It was either that, or Verdi’s Requiem.’
‘Let’s dance,’ said Lisa, springing up and grabbing hold of Neville.
‘Dance? You must be joking. It’s not even lunch-time yet.’
‘Who cares? I’m feeling bouncy. And that rhythm’s really great. Come on, you old fogies! I’m your compère for ‘‘Come Dancing’’.’
The man in purple corduroys whisked Jane to her feet, pushed the chairs and sofa back, then clutched her to his chest; elbows out, head tilted. ‘We’re Gavin and Sharon and we both live in Southend. We’ve been dancing seven years together and our hobbies are canaries and …’
Jane tried to force a laugh. He’d been drinking the Jack Daniels, exhaled it in her face as he hummed a boom-boom descant to the band. She stumbled suddenly, felt Uncle Peter’s sweaty hand groping her bare back; could smell his whisky breath, mixed up in her mind with the sweet and poisonous taste of Southern Comfort. She closed her eyes a moment, dizzy and disoriented. The music was the same – dangerous whining saxophone, angry pounding drums.
‘Excuse me,’ someone said. It sounded like her own voice. She was trying to pull away, escape her Uncle Peter, leave that wild hotel room, the sixty-seven guests; but the dance-floor slowly somersaulted, and she was swaying, tipping, plunging down to meet it.
Chapter Nine
‘Better?’ Christopher enquired, hardly bothering to look up from his desk.
‘Yes,’ said Jane. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘What are you sorry for?’
‘Well, fainting, being ill, not turning up on Monday.’
‘You can’t help being ill.’
‘No,’ she said, though she still somehow felt responsible. After all, she had let the wasps in.
‘Isobel was worried, said you had a temperature. Are you sure you should be up?’
She nodded. ‘It was just a sort of freak thing. The doctor said a sting can do that sometimes, affect you like an allergy, make you feverish.’ She suddenly looked up, realised what was missing. ‘Hey,’ she said, swinging past him to the window. ‘What’s happened to the birds?’
‘They flew away,’ said Christopher.
She stared. The whole studio looked different; lighter altogether, without the fiery panels masking the main window, yet somehow also barren, as if someone had undressed it, removed its fancy clothes. A presence had been lost, the sense of speed and vigour, the almost dizzy motion of threshing beaks and wings, the whip and snap of scarlet.
He smiled at her shocked face. ‘Don’t worry, they’ll be back. I packed them off to be fired. I usually do my own firing – and it’s a damned sight cheaper, actually – but I’m getting really pushed for time, and it’ll save at least a week. Fortunately, my fee for that commission was rather on the high side. Not that Adrian seemed to mind.’ He laughed, stubbed out his Marlboro. ‘I reckoned if he can make five hundred grand from one hiccough on the stock market, or a flicker of his screen, then he’s hardly going to fret about a minor bill like mine.’
Jane gazed out at the sweep of fields which had been blocked from view till now. It seemed wrong to mix up money with stained glass. Oh, she knew it was his livelihood and he had to earn his bread (or maybe his smoked salmon), but she disliked his mocking tone, his s
uggestion he could rook the rich. He must be pretty rich himself, what she’d call top-drawer. He always looked well-heeled, even now, in working clothes – jeans and husky sweater. Did men of sixty still wear jeans, or had Rowan been exaggerating, adding on a decade merely to insult him?
He was poking at his fag-end, as if he regretted having put it out, or hoped it might revive. ‘This Civic Centre job is going to be the big one, Rose, so I need to free my time and energies for that.’
‘But what about the window?’ Isobel’s commission. Isobel had nursed her, cooked her meals the last few days, even bought her clothes. She didn’t want Tom’s window pushed out in the cold.
‘I’m working on the preliminaries now, hope to finish it by the end of March. I’ve been in touch with Anthony – the vicar – discussed my plans with him, and we both agreed that Easter would be the ideal time for the dedication ceremony. I mean, it fits the Resurrection theme, and has all the connotations of new life, rebirth and so on. The only disadvantage is that Easter’s very early, and what with Christmas in between, I’ll have to get my skates on, and I’m definitely going to need some extra help.’
‘You mean, you’re hiring an assistant?’ Jane tried to keep her voice cool; sound casual and offhand.
‘I’ve got one.’ His voice was cool as well; his attention on his work again.
She dragged back to his desk, stood level with his shoulder. He must have fixed it up while she’d been away at Isobel’s, taken advantage of her absence and her illness. Or maybe Isobel had phoned him, changed his mind, given him the same long and rambling spiel she’d received herself last night: how she was basically unsuited to the job, and could hardly help an artist when she was totally untrained, might even prove a hindrance. She had listened in glum silence, wondering why the older woman was trying to warn her off. Was it genuine concern, or grudging envy?
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