Vienna

by William S. Kirby

  Boadicea had been one of the more difficult shoots to arrange. The statue was on loan from Franklin Court, a livestock magnate who kept the manikin in storage near his Mayfair flat. He had little tolerance for fashion or photography but greed was always in style. Czasky flashed enough money to free Boadicea during one of Franklin’s many vacations to the Canaries.

  Now there’s a man with a Spanish lover stashed away.

  After the shoot, the manikin would vanish back into storage.

  The London Clay to Flesh photographer was George Holt, a young gun Justine had worked with once in Italy. Despite his age, he’d racked up the hottest portfolio in the business. He’d even obtained his own measure of celebrity after a 4chan hacker released dozens of pirated images from his unpublished early work. The Internet’s hive mind appended a wistful soundtrack and the pictures went viral.

  Tall and on the lean side of athletic, Holt let his brown hair run free range, flopping down over his eyes. His face was so smooth Justine figured he had a doll’s chance of growing a beard. His dazzling talent was punctured by almost crippling shyness. He worked like a fire dancer, always at the edge of his subject.

  “I would like to have the ascending portion of the Millennium Wheel serve as the background for the initial medium shots, if that is okay, Miss Am. I see the concept of ascension as crucial to the premise.” Holt bit his lip as if he were asking her on a date. The last soul in the business not jaded by beauty. Justine wondered if that’s what made him so good.

  “It’s fine, George.” She liked working with him.

  Holt nodded. “Good. We need the manikin in the foreground on a narrow focal plane, maybe even fake a tilt-shift in post, and you medium distance in soft focus. Then we’ll progressively reverse the field in keeping with the theme of life from the inanimate. We can start with darker wardrobe to contrast the sky.”

  George took few photographs but gave copious notes to his younger sister, Emily, who served as assistant and business manager. Emily’s dishwater blond hair was held in a high tail by a twenty-cent band of blue elastic. Razor thin arcs for eyebrows and a dusting of light base on her cheeks. Melanin deficiency had left her eyes pale blue; stunning hand-me-downs from Slavic ancestors charging across windswept tundra. Wasted on a tomboy who didn’t know what to do with her angular beauty.

  She helped Justine with wardrobe, though they were only testing a few pieces before the next day’s full shoot. “So, what’s it like beating around the bushes?” she asked.

  “More difficult than pole dancing,” Justine answered.

  “I can imagine. What’s she like?”

  “Spookier than moonlight shadows in the woods.”

  “Yeah? How did she set her hooks in you?”

  “She doesn’t believe in any of this.” Justine waved at the clothes. “It reminds me there is more to life.”

  “A little young for philosophy, aren’t you?”

  “Young is a relative term in the biz.”

  “Point taken.” Emily paused behind a questioning look.

  “Yes?” Justine asked.

  “One of us has changed since Milan. You said all the right things back then, which was boring as hell. Now here you are, performing this agonizing, slow-motion implosion, in full sight of the public no less. It’s wonderfully cathartic. I like it and I want to meet the girl who caused it.”

  “I’ll bring her tomorrow. She needs to get out more.”

  “Does she really have … you know…” Emily tapped her temple.

  “You just say what’s on your mind, don’t you?”

  “George never will, so I have to.”

  Justine smiled. “She isn’t what I would call normal—whatever that means. You’ll have to see for yourself. You have to do me a favor in return.”

  “Yes?”

  “I want pictures of the manikin from every angle. I need them today.”

  “Why?”

  “That’s not part of the deal.”

  “A mystery then? I love mysteries.”

  “If you solve Vienna, tell me. She makes me want to scream ten times a minute.”

  Holt had the shooting schedule blocked out by mid-afternoon. Justine prepared to leave as Emily was convincing her brother to take pictures of the manikin. Justine turned to her. “Do you know a photographer named Sinoro?”

  Emily was silent while she thought it over. “Don’t think so. Why?”

  “Another mystery,” Justine said. “See you tomorrow.”

  Back in the suite, Vienna sat on the bed, wrapped around herself. She insisted they eat at the Savoy. “Mr. Sinoro still might show up.”

  Justine gave in, escorting her to the American Bar. “What did you do with the day?”

  “I used your laptop. Mr. Sinoro was right about David Andries’s father. Jorgan Andries was an architect working out of Oslo. He liked Byzantine design.” Justine caught the familiar delay of derailed thought. “Squinches,” Vienna said. A shift of her eyes and the original discourse resumed. “I think he was a distant relation to the northern branch of the Habsburgs, but no one online is certain. He was a member of the Order of Rahab.”

  “Rahab?”

  “Her house backed the great wall of Jericho.” Vienna rocked forward. “‘Your terror is fallen upon us, and all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you.’”

  Justine gave what she hoped was an encouraging smile. “Never heard of knights called that.”

  “One of ninety-three recognized orders of knighthood in Europe. They became allied with the Order of the Golden Fleece in 1728 when…” Vienna’s voice trailed off. “Anyway, modern members tend to be wealthy. I couldn’t find much about them.”

  “Why was Jorgan Andries booted?”

  “His son David was involved in a scandal. There were accusations of stealing books from an estate near Groisbach. I couldn’t find anything about that either.” Vienna turned away. “Why did you ever date such a chav?”

  “Assuming a chav is a bad thing, my only defense is that he smelled good and had perfect teeth.”

  Vienna shrugged. “I tried to find more about the Star of Memphis, but I either got Tennessee or the ancient capital of Upper Egypt.” She sat up schoolmarm straight. “The Greek translation of the ancient name for Memphis is what gave us the name ‘Egypt.’”

  Justine smiled at how this scrap of trivia brightened Vienna’s face. “Anything else?”

  “No.”

  “Thank you for looking, but that’s enough computer time. I want you to come with me tomorrow. I need help with wardrobe changes.”

  Panic sifted through the girl’s features. “I don’t know anything about that, and you have someone there who can help, don’t you?”

  “A girl named Emily.”

  “Get her to do it!”

  So much for jealousy as motivation. “I would be more comfortable with you.”

  Vienna spun a 180 without missing a breath. “I’ll help, if you want.”

  Justine’s BlackBerry cut in with the Talking Heads. Holt’s number came up. Justine remembered her frustration with Grant taking calls. “It’s from my photographer. Do you mind if I take it? Or should I wait?”

  Vienna looked as if the fate of the world hung on the decision. “It might be important.”

  She nodded. “Hey, George,” she said into the BlackBerry.

  “It’s Emily. I sent the manikin pics.”

  “Thanks.”

  “One more thing.”

  “Yes?”

  “You mentioned a paparazzi goon named Sinoro. Gary Sinoro?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He wasn’t a friend, was he?”

  “Hardly—wait, what do you mean?”

  “He made the BBC. His corpse got hung up on the Surrey Docks last night. Details have just been released. He was shot in the left temple. Small caliber gun.”

  No protection in his thug-life tattoo or triangle ear studs. “I didn’t really know him,” was all Justine could think to say. She hun
g up after a quick good-bye.

  “What was that about?”

  “We can talk later, in our room.”

  Justine felt a familiar weariness by the time they were back in the suite. It still amazed her how much energy a session took. Self-pity is the crutch of failure. Advice from her first manager. He’d been great until he fired up his Porsche in his Santa Barbara garage and asphyxiated on his lifestyle.

  “We have to talk,” she said to Vienna. The girl nodded and stepped to the bed farthest from the window, sitting Indian-style on its foot. Justine sat next to her.

  “Sinoro was shot last night. His body was dumped in the Thames.”

  If Vienna felt any remorse, she didn’t show it. “Do you think it’s a coincidence?”

  “No.”

  “I was worried you would be gasping for explanations, yeah?”

  “What do you make of it?”

  Vienna looked down. “I’m not a detective—I don’t know about causes of death or what might be learned from a body that has been under water for a day.”

  “That’s extraordinarily unhelpful.”

  “I’m sorry, Miss Perfect.”

  Justine clinched her jaw. “Let it go. We should take it to the police.”

  “And tell them what exactly? Don’t be daffy.”

  “They might be able to make something of it.”

  “Stupid times ten.” Vienna was almost screaming. “The police would make reports, and those would get passed into the hands of people with real power and they would know we’ve become suspicious and our bodies would be the next ones rotting in the Thames.”

  “Vienna, the real world doesn’t work that way.”

  “Don’t patronize me,” Vienna snapped. “It has always worked that way. Do you need proof? Operation Kratos and the slaying of Jean Charles de Menezes in London. The police did him right in and tried to cover it up. And the Redfern Riots—”

  “Vienna, shhh. It’s okay.” Justine realized the girl was terrified, her memory doubtless filled with numerous examples of lethal force employed by those in power. “We can’t sit and do nothing.”

  “Yes, we can. You’re not the true target or you would be dead. It’s not you.”

  “The manikins,” Justine said.

  “I already told you but you never listen.”

  Justine swallowed an angry reply. “And when the photo shoot is over? When they suspect we might know something? What happens then? They let us go?”

  Vienna shook her head. “I don’t know.…”

  “Now who’s being disingenuous?”

  Vienna slapped at the bed. “Why do you keep asking me? It’s not fair.” The girl sped through the words. “I don’t see that you have any ideas. I’m doing all the work and all you do is smile for a camera.”

  Justine felt the muscles in her chest go tight. “Like your sorry ass is in a position to judge me.” That was just for starters—the opening shot in a host of responses carefully locked away. Every drop of poison she’d collected in the California sunshine.

  Vienna was oblivious, wrapped in her own anger. “I don’t care and it’s true anyway.”

  Damn you!

  “Anyone could do it,” Vienna added.

  Justine closed her eyes, searched for anything to hold the words back. Heard her brothers laughing, out in the woods behind the house. Shaking cans of cheap pop and hitting them with hollow points loaded into Granddad’s old rifle. It happened impossibly fast. The can was there, sweating in the Georgia summer, and then there was nothing but aluminum confetti pushing through a fog of orange soda. Her turn. Father’s hand on her shoulder. “Don’t anticipate the shot. Partial exhale, straight back on the trigger.” And the can was gone.

  Justine let the images distract her. Partial exhale. She found her bedside manner. “Vienna, it’s okay. We have time to think this through. We can panic later.”

  “How can you joke?”

  “Coping mechanism from med school.”

  “It’s stupid.”

  “If things get bad, I can always bail out.” It worked well enough back in California.

  “That won’t stop what’s happening.”

  “Maybe.” Temper slipping away again. Talk about something else. “I had Emily take pictures of the London statue. Do you want to see them?”

  Vienna was silent, staring blankly ahead.

  “Vienna?”

  “Do you know a man in a plaid shirt?”

  “What?”

  “I didn’t see him very well. His shirt was a long tunnel of surface area and hypercubes.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “In Brussels. A man in a plaid shirt spoke to me after you left. He said to forget about what happened in Prague. I thought he was a rejected lover.”

  “Prague?”

  “Where you first noticed the manikins changing, yeah? Sinoro had a picture of you in front of the museum there.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me? What did this man look like?”

  “I couldn’t look at him; his shirt wouldn’t let me!”

  Justine saw the girl was on the ragged edge of tears. I’ll always be in retreat with her. “It’s okay. It might make sense later.”

  “I’m no good at all, just useless. I don’t understand anything that’s happening.” The tears came. “No wonder you hate me, just like everyone else does. Bog off! Leave me alone.”

  Justine felt her fingers clinch. The nightmare of Felton Gables all over again. “Forget it. Let’s get some sleep.”

  “I want this bed to myself. Go away.”

  And there was the grand sum of Saturday night in London. The most exciting Saturday night Vienna would ever know. The most exciting Saturday night Justine could hope for as long as she stayed with the girl. From fashion model to babysitter in one step.

  Off to bed, but not sleep.

  All you do is smile for the camera.

  Justine closed her eyes and saw Georgia sunlight passing through window sheers. Her mother sipping chai and working on lesson plans. A Ph.D. in literature from Stanford and she was teaching second grade in a nowhere school outside of Athens. Finger paint portraits and a pastel alphabet strung over the chalkboard. Such an unexpected door for shame to walk through.

  Upstairs, tucked away in the hall closet, the brittle glue in Dad’s college scrapbook slowly letting go of the past. Every picture and every article crowning John Ingles as the best young player in America. Maybe in the world. He’d toss the ball high and his racket would whip around and he would dance like a fencer. Another match point for John Ingles.

  There had to be times, late at night, ice in a pool of Scotch, when he railed at what had become of him. Sunday afternoon tee times and shooting pop cans with his kids. He’d amassed a fortune since his fall, but what was that next to what had been lost? Even his children deserted him. Jeff off to Michigan for a degree in marine engineering. Scott gone a year later, headed to Annapolis. All those lazy days spent tinkering with the boat, magically transformed into smooth confidence.

  Eighteen months after Scott left, Heather was bound for Stanford. Two years ahead of schedule. Nothing but blue sky. And when it came crashing down, it wasn’t just the children at Felton Gables. It was the drunk shivering in the ICU. The stoic child with the lethal blotch on her sagittal MRI. The laughing grandfather with the separated shoulder. An endless succession of story problems.

  Justine’s own condition was easily identified, unforeseen, and terminal to her career. Outside of a textbook, she didn’t want to see abscessed toenails or middle-aged men with the clap. There was nothing deep or mysterious about it. She hated every second of it. Late in her third year she compressed the entirety of her misery into a single thought: I could always run away to some shithole town and teach second grade.

  Halfway across the world and still losing sleep over it. Justine heard Vienna get up and walk to the table. Saw the blue glow of the computer screen. Closed her eyes.

  The final act had been br
illiant. Returning home for Christmas and helping Mom clean out the hallway closet. Dad’s scrapbook sitting on top of three manuscript boxes. Each box stuffed with cards and printed e-mails from kids Abigail Ingles had taught over the years. “I had to tell you how much I appreciate everything you did for us.” Lawyers and truck drivers and programmers. “You had a huge influence on my life.” Page after page.

  Justine had three days of contemplating how petty her world had become before it was back to Stanford for the spring semester. That didn’t pan out either. Prior to Christmas, she’d done a local-access commercial for a friend’s secondhand furniture store. A rep from a Frisco talent agency happened to see it while flipping through channels. He’d been waiting at her apartment. The money wasn’t great at the start, but it beat working on the latest case of fecal vomiting. Justine left school three weeks later. Headed for the top after all.

  All you do is smile at the camera.

  And the only person with the guts to call her bluff was too messed up to see the nerve she’d hit. Because it wasn’t as if Justine could win a tennis match, or design a ship, or inspire anyone enough to write back fifteen years later.

  The soft tap of Vienna’s fingers on the keyboard.

  A week before Justine quit med school she asked her father if he was bitter.

  “For a time I was,” he answered. “But ‘if only’ gets boring mighty fast.”

  “But you might have reached number one,” Justine said.

  John laughed. “Tell me, who won Wimbledon in, say, 1991? It wasn’t that long ago.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How about the Australian Open five years ago?”

  Justine was silent.

  “When is my birthday?” John asked.

  “August third.”

  “See? I have all the fame I can handle.”

  And the funny part? The perfect ending to the whole mess? There was every chance that the befuddled girl sitting a few feet away knew exactly who won Wimbledon in 1991.