Eighty Days Red

by Vina Jackson

  The make-up and hair took about an hour, and by the end of it, I barely recognised myself. My eyes were smouldering, coated in thick black eyeliner, grey shadow and fake eyelashes so long that when I opened my eyes the lashes tickled my eyebrows. Jess had slicked my hair into a high quiff, and had highlighted the contours of my face with various pots of powder so that my cheekbones stood out like a cat’s. Combined with the leggings and the jacket, I looked like a bit of a tough bitch really, a femme fatale. Not the kind of girl that you would introduce to your mother.

  ‘Arch your back a little more. That’s it.’

  I’d been slow to catch on to the posing at first, and Grayson, at first endlessly patient, had eventually given up and arranged my limbs for me. As he did so, I felt that familiar slow burn, just an inkling of a thought, recognition of the way that he was taking control of my body which fanned the flame of a flickering idea until it became a fully blown fantasy. Before I knew it, I was responding to his instructions in the same way that I had responded to Dominik’s. Old habits die hard.

  He paused for a moment, flicking back through the shots onscreen to check his work, as I struggled to keep my legs still and my back arched at exactly the same angle so he wouldn’t need to readjust the lighting.

  ‘Try it with the bra off,’ he said. ‘The bra breaks up the line of your skin, I think.’

  ‘Oh, sure,’ I replied casually, struggling to unclip the hook at the back without moving too far out of the position that he’d spent so long manoeuvring me into.

  I did my best to hide my reaction, not wanting to make the photographer feel uncomfortable, but by the time that we got to the nude shots, my nipples were erect, and my panties were wet.

  ‘No,’ he said, as I started to kick off my Louboutins, ‘leave the shoes on.’

  Dominik had said exactly the same thing to me once, when I had performed for him nude in the crypt, with Lauralynn playing the cello, blindfolded behind me. The memory sent another sharp pang of desire throbbing through me, though it wasn’t directed at Grayson. He just happened to be here, caught in the shadow of my peculiar sexual quirks and the memory of a failed previous relationship.

  I swallowed hard, tried to concentrate on the task at hand, or at least to will my nipples into submission. I couldn’t even pretend that I was cold, as he had the heating up high and his flat was toasty. It didn’t help that he was really quite attractive, both in and out of his fetish gear. He was tall and lean, with friendly, grey-blue eyes that smiled when he talked, and he had a way of holding the camera that made it seem as though it was an extension of his body, in the same way that I felt when I held a violin. His posture, the way that he moved, seemed so much in control of each detail of the shoot.

  He’d set up a dark backdrop, and put a black sheet down on the floor. I was surrounded by lights which he was adjusting so that half of my body would be in shadow, to produce a mysterious, artful rather than pornographic effect. Each time the flash went off, a bright white light glared, not enough to blind me, but enough to concentrate the feeling that I was being watched, on display, the object of a voyeur; even if that voyeur’s purpose was professional rather than sexual, it still had the same effect on me. I was glad that Grayson’s focus was fixed entirely on getting the picture and that in the scheme of things, I was as much an object to be posed and lit in the right way as the violin. I just hoped he didn’t notice that my thighs were beginning to get slippery when he enlarged the pictures for retouching.

  Every now and again, Jess would pop into the room to offer us another cup of tea, brush some more powder on my face or fix a stray lock of hair into place. Her touch was feather light, and she’d clearly seen enough naked women in her life to not give my body a second glance. I’d always concentrated on seeing the good in myself, and did my utmost to avoid reading diet magazines or mulling on any perceived flaws, but I still wondered what the other women were like that he usually photographed. I felt a little like I had when Dominik had commanded me to dance after Luba’s incredible performance in New Orleans. Very much like an amateur, playing at something that wasn’t really me. I was a musician, not a model.

  But the idea of being stuck in a situation that I was not in control of, out of my depth, watched, at the mercy of another’s commands – all of these things just intensified my arousal.

  We did a few shots standing, with me delicately positioning the violin and my hands and arms in ways that would cover all of the bits that couldn’t be printed in a mainstream magazine, and then a couple of me sitting, with my legs spread and the body of the violin sitting between my thighs, and my head either resting on the neck of the instrument looking soulfully into the distance or staring provocatively at the camera. I remembered, at last, what the Australian photographer that I had dated briefly had said to me about posing – that I should try to imagine feeling whatever emotion I was trying to portray, and ideally make the camera part of it. So, he’d said, to look sexy, imagine the camera lens is a phallus, or whatever else it is that works for you.

  I tried this, turning all of my focus and frustration and aiming it directly at Grayson’s long lens, as he snapped away.

  ‘Woah,’ he said after a few shots. ‘That’s great but I’m not sure if you’re going to be able to use these, depending on what sort of magazine you’re planning to send them to, of course … maybe you could try closing your legs a little bit?’

  ‘Actually, I wouldn’t mind having some more … personal shots. Just for me.’ I felt my face flush a brilliant scarlet. ‘If that’s outside your remit for today I don’t mind paying extra for them. If you don’t mention it to my agent.’

  ‘So they weren’t joking about your rock rebellion, then, huh?’ he chuckled. ‘I’m happy to do whatever you’re comfortable with, and don’t worry, your secret is safe with me.’

  From that point onward, I became more and more daring, and more and more turned on.

  ‘Pose like you’re making love to the violin,’ he said, ‘instead of the camera.’

  I switched my focus, so that rather than seeing his lens as the object of my sexual attention I imagined my violin not as a phallus but as a memory holder, the core of all the experiences which had, perhaps, not made me the way that I was but which had formed the stepping stones of the path that I’d chosen to travel down. Memories of Dominik were the first to come rushing back, and the most powerful, and almost all of them were associated with music, with the Bailly. That violin was gone, but the memories still belonged to me. Playing for Dominik on the bandstand on Hampstead Heath, in the crypt, in the apartment in New York, waiting for him to come home to find me nude with my violin in hand. It had been my symbolic message to him that a part of me was his.

  ‘These are amazing,’ Grayson said at the end, when he quickly ran through the shots he’d downloaded onto his big computer screen. ‘I’ll make the colours punchier, get rid of the noise, cut out the odd distraction in the background, all that kind of thing, but other than that there’s very little retouching. I like them raw, like this.’

  ‘Yes. They’re beautiful. Thank you.’ I felt a strange sense of gratitude to the photographer for managing to catch something so personal in an image. The expressions on my face were the thing that got me, that made me gasp, when the shots appeared onscreen. The look in my eyes was pure sex, but not in a tawdry, porn-star way. I looked like a siren, as if my whole being had been cast in pheromones instead of atoms. And I really did look as though I was making love to my violin.

  He promised to email me all of the files, so that I could select the ones that I liked best for retouching, and I thanked him again and managed to get dressed, with fumbling fingers and my heart racing. I’d forgotten my embarrassment over being the only naked person in the room in front of the photographer and the make-up artist. I just wanted to hurry home, to find some space alone to ponder the thoughts and memories that seemed to have taken permanent root in my head.

  Knowing that if I headed either to Chris and F
ran’s or to Viggo’s I would have company, I took a detour into the park outside Grayson’s house, by the cemetery. I sat down on one of the park benches and stared at the old stones that formed the foundations of the church which towered into the sky. Churches usually give me the creeps, but this one didn’t. The stones were a pale grey, almost white, and not crumbling or covered in moss. On closer inspection, the building had a lightness about it, a grandeur that was uplifting rather than eerie.

  I found the entrance and went inside. The main door was locked but I was able to get into a large, circular room, made from the same pale stones that reached into the sky, several storeys over my head. I leaned against one wall, enjoying the coolness of its touch, and gradually slipped down to a crouch.

  I wanted Dominik desperately. Not just to fuck, for once in my life. I wanted to talk to him, to feel him fold me into his arms, to lay my head on his shoulder and run my hand over his chest. I just wanted to be with him.

  He was with Lauralynn though, and it was too late for regrets. I had made my bed, and now I was sleeping in it.

  But I could at least hear the sound of his voice, and maybe find a way to get my Bailly back, the instrument that still somehow connected me to him.

  I pulled my phone out of my bag.

  8 Parisian Melodies

  The phone rang. It was Summer.

  Dominik had been waiting for days now, since they’d shared a coffee in Brighton. Arguing with himself whether he should phone her or not. Yearning to hear the sound of her voice, to feel her close again.

  But every time it just didn’t feel like the right moment. Coming across her in Brighton had been a genuine coincidence but phoning her first now would feel stalkerish, he feared.

  Time and time again, he’d dialled her number but not called, riven by doubts and hesitation. He’d since contacted LaValle and had told him about the theft of the Bailly. He had wanted to gather information on the likely market for stolen musical instruments. LaValle had given him the name of a go-between who happened to live in the Paris suburbs and sometimes facilitated matters when it came to the less legal sides of the business. The dealer had sounded amused to hear that the notorious Bailly was still creating waves, as if its theft lent further credence to the Angelique legend.

  Dominik wanted to discuss the development with Summer. Twice today already he’d tentatively reached for the phone on the desk as if it were a lump of hot coal. He’d gone for a walk on the Heath to clear his mind, only to find a message from Summer on his return. After all this, he had missed her! How quickly should he now return the call?

  The vibration of the phone as it stuttered across his desk snapped him out of his reverie.

  ‘Dominik?’ It sounded as though she was right there next to him.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It’s me, Summer.’

  ‘I was hoping you’d call.’

  ‘Were you?’ She couldn’t hide her pleasure on hearing his words.

  ‘Of course. Still no news of the Bailly?’

  ‘No.’ The disappointment in that one word was heartbreaking.

  ‘I’ve been given the name of someone who might be able to help. It would mean having to go to Paris, though …’

  ‘Paris?’ Summer exclaimed. ‘We’re going there next week. Performing. Opening our tour at La Cigale.’

  ‘That’s wonderful,’ Dominik said.

  ‘If you arranged to go at the same time, you could come to the concert, it would be great. I’d have you put on the guest list, of course. Would you? Please?’

  ‘I’d love to,’ Dominik said.

  ‘After the gig, maybe we could meet up for a coffee. Have a longer chat. I’d really like that, Dominik …’

  ‘I always wanted to take you to Paris.’

  ‘I know, but we never got round to it, did we?’

  ‘Isn’t it a bit late now?’ said Dominik, brushing away an emerging wave of depression. ‘Will Viggo Franck be there also?’

  ‘Maybe,’ she said. ‘But we have a … loose arrangement, you know.’

  ‘Loose?’

  ‘Anyway, just a chat for old times’ sake. I’m sure Lauralynn won’t mind, will she? You can bring her along if you feel you need a chaperone,’ she joked.

  ‘Lauralynn’s in the States right now. Family stuff.’

  ‘Oh.’

  There was a heavy silence, as both considered the situation.

  He thought he heard Summer take a deep breath on the other end of the line, as if she was summoning her determination.

  ‘Come to Paris,’ she said calmly.

  Dominik smiled. ‘Now who’s giving orders,’ he said with an amused tone in his voice.

  He heard her gently giggling.

  ‘Maybe I should take the initiative again,’ Dominik suggested.

  ‘The initiative?’

  ‘Giving you orders …’

  For a brief moment, he felt he had gone too far, become overfamiliar. Time had passed, things had changed. That particular game was over.

  ‘Maybe you should?’ Summer’s voice was curiously muted. Her bedroom voice. Her intimate voice, the one that went with the darker lipstick she would wear at night.

  ‘Hmm …’ Dominik considered. ‘I don’t quite think asking you to appear naked on a Paris stage is advisable at this stage,’ he pointed out. ‘Too many Frenchmen in the audience to begin with.’

  Summer laughed.

  ‘Maybe I’ve reached the stage where I don’t have to take orders or suggestions any more,’ she said.

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Come to Paris, Dominik. I’ll have your name put on the list. The gig is at La Cigale, on Boulevard Rochechouart. On the nineteenth. The promoters tell us it’s a good venue to play, has a great vibe.’

  ‘I will,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll think of something,’ she added.

  ‘I’m sure you will,’ Dominik said, relief flooding through his veins.

  The Eurostar train arrived late at the Gare du Nord, following unexplained technical delays on the line. The colours of sunset were spreading across the Paris sky as Dominik disembarked and made his way to the cab rank.

  He dropped his overnight bag at his usual hotel on the Rue Monsieur-le-Prince, close to the Odéon, and went in search of a meal. The whole area had been colonised over the past years by new-style Japanese restaurants so he didn’t have to step more than a few minutes away from the hotel doorstep.

  He knew Summer and Groucho Nights had been put up by the gig’s promoters on the other side of the Seine, but old habits died hard and he felt more comfortable staying in the Latin Quarter, an area where he had spent much of his youth. His room was small and sparse, but all he required was a bed and a roof above his head; anything else would have proved a distraction.

  Dominik planned to contact the go-between, the man LaValle had put him on to, early the following morning.

  At first the man, who called himself Cavalier, sounded suspicious. But when Dominik explained that the questions were all tied in to the research for a new novel and provided details of his identity, his interlocutor suddenly seemed to warm to him.

  ‘Ah, a writer. I like writers!’

  He hadn’t read Dominik’s novel but had actually heard about it. Ironically, France was one of the countries where, in translation, his Paris novel had not sold particularly well, as if local readers were offended by the presumption of a foreigner writing about their own country.

  Cavalier had an appointment in town that same afternoon, and agreed to meet to avoid Dominik having to take a train all the way to his pavillon in Nogent-sur-Marne. He suggested a cafe off the Boulevard Saint Germain, Les Editeurs, a literary sort of place, he indicated, ‘where they even have shelves full of books all around the walls of the cafe. Amusing, no? Maybe they have yours?’ This was just a few minutes’ walk from Dominik’s hotel so pretty convenient.

  It was an odd feeling, knowing he was right now in the same city as Summer. That she was on the other side of th
e river going about her life. The fact that she had, unknown to him, only been a stone’s throw away in Camden Town in London for several weeks already somehow didn’t have the same emotional immediacy. Paris made it feel both real and unreal, a bittersweet pull on his heartstrings.

  ‘Collectors they come in all colours, you know,’ Cavalier said. He was younger than Dominik had expected. A slight, pencil-thin man, with his jet-black hair brushed back and culminating in a ponytail that peered out from the back of a rakish fedora. He wore a checked jacket and dark, perfectly ironed trousers with a razor-sharp front crease.

  ‘I’ve come to that conclusion too,’ Dominik said, bluffing his way into the conversation. ‘It’s not the money, you see, that’s not the reason they get involved in theft and all sorts of illegal activities. Once they own something, they have no mind to sell it again, let alone for a profit.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘They do it for beauty. Pure and simple. I even know certain book collectors who hoard rare editions for the sake of it. They never even read actual books, let alone those they own.’

  ‘I was more interested in the underground market for musical instruments.’

  ‘Instruments, books, artwork, jewellery, carpets, it’s all the same to them,’ Cavalier continued. ‘Greed, pure greed, if you ask me. The wealthier collectors even arrange to have items stolen to order …’

  ‘Is that where you come in?’ Dominik asked him.

  ‘I couldn’t say,’ Cavalier answered with a broad smile colouring his lips. ‘I’m merely in the information business. Assisting all parties to the best of my ability.’

  He took a sip of his pastis. It smelled revolting to Dominik who was adding water and sugar to his citron pressé.

  ‘So is there anyone notorious for seeking out rare violins?’

  ‘Ah, you come to the point! Let me guess, is this about Monsieur LaValle’s famous Bailly, the Angelique?’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘How interesting. An instrument with a most fascinating history. Isn’t it strange how sometimes stories have a way of becoming self-fulfilling?’