by Robyn Sisman
“A girl gave it to you, didn’t she? Black hair, red dress.”
For answer, the doctor tipped the envelope within Malcolm’s reach. “Perhaps you’d like to check the contents?”
Of course he bloody would, seeing as how it was his property, addressed to him. Malcolm mustered a graceless “Thanks,” snatched the envelope and picked roughly at the glued flap, careless of his manicure. Finally he managed to insert a finger and rip open one end. A sharp shake, and the disk slid into his palm, smooth and precious as a wafer of gold.Yes! Malcolm turned it over to check the label, but relief was already flooding through him, pumping him full of confidence. Figg was unstoppable. Figg was a winner!
The doctor was watching him. “Everything all right?” he asked.
What was his game, Malcolm wondered. Why wouldn’t he say who the girl was? Did he know anything, or was he just a “messenger,” as he’d claimed? Doctor or no, Malcolm could willingly have throttled the truth out of him. But he was too canny for that. Oh, yes. However much stress he had suffered from all the palaver with Molly and the disk, he didn’t want any funny rumors going round the conference, any hint that Figg had lost control. Best to play it cool.
He flapped the envelope carelessly against one palm. “Secretaries, eh?” He gave a dismissive snort. “Drive you nuts. Heads like sieves, gabble-gabble-gabble in the ladies’ toilets, whining for promotion after two minutes. Then, just when they might be of use, they bail out and leave you up shit creek without the proverbial.”
“I take it that’s the missing paddle.” The doctor nodded at the envelope.
“What? Oh, yeah, got you. Stupid girl forgot it, didn’t she? Didn’t even have the guts to give it to me herself. Too frightened.”
“I wonder why.”
Malcolm looked up sharply, but he saw nothing in the doctor’s expression except curiosity. Malcolm eased himself back against the cushions. “It’s a tough old game, marketing,” he confided. “My bosses are tough bastards. I’m a tough bastard. I have to be.” He narrowed his eyes and nodded confidentially.
“See, a creative unit is like a pride of lions,” he elaborated, half remembering a pep-talk given by some weirdo Yank in a baseball cap on one of his training courses. “The top lions are top because they fought their way up. They’re strong, they’re hungry. Sometimes they may look as if they’re lying around half asleep, but they’re thinking, right? They need the other lions, er, lionesses to go out hunting for them, to provide without question what they need to keep the pride ahead of its rivals. That’s the deal. You don’t get a lioness moaning, ‘Do I really have to kill two gazelles today? Wouldn’t a zebra do instead, or a—a—?’ ” Malcolm’s store of knowledge about the wildlife of the savannahs suddenly failed him.
“Warthog?”
“Jackpot! You’re quick. That’s why you’re a top lion.” Malcolm gave an approving nod. No harm in buttering up the old quack.
“But your secretary?”
“That’s it, isn’t it? Couldn’t get into the pride ethic. Didn’t like it when the top lion snarled at her.” He sighed. “Molly just didn’t have the killer instinct.”
“Molly? Is that her name?” The doctor leant forward. “Molly what?”
Before Malcolm could answer, they were interrupted by a tinny rendition of the Indiana Jones theme tune.
“My phone.” With a possessive smirk Malcolm reached into his breast pocket. “Could be important. Be with you in a tick.” He stood up, punched a button and put the mobile to his ear. “Yep, Figg speaking.”
“Oh, Mr. Figg, thank goodness I’ve reached you!” A female voice wittered down the line. “It’s Fran Clearwater here. I’m terribly worried about my daughter Molly. She didn’t ring me when she got to Paris, as she’d promised, and when I contacted the hotel this morning they told me she’d never checked in! She’s not been home either. Her flatmate gave me some garbled story about . . .”
Unbelievable. Malcolm muffled the squawking with his hand and rolled his eyes at the doctor. “I’ve got the bloody mother now. I ask you!”
Rocking on his toes and casting exasperated glances about the lobby, Malcolm waited until the woman finally ground to a halt. “All I can tell you,” he said crisply, “is that I last saw Molly yesterday afternoon. She did not, in the event, accompany me to Paris, and she is no longer in my employ.”
“Why not? What happened? Did you upset her in any way?”
“Did I—” Malcolm choked at this upside-down version of events. He clasped his forehead with all the histrionics of a footballer shamming injury from a non-existent tackle. A sneaked glance between his fingers confirmed that the doctor was watching. “Suffice it to say,” Malcolm enunciated, “that her work did not reach the high standard expected by Phipps Lauzer Bergman, professionalism-wise.”
“What nonsense!” The mother practically burst his eardrum. “Bloom ’n’ Veg thought the world of her. No one had a better eye for a ripe melon. I don’t think you’re being straight with me, young man.”
Malcolm gaped at this outrage. “Completely mental,” he whispered to the doctor, jabbing a finger at his phone. Secretly he was relishing this little drama, with his captive audience of one. He strutted back and forth on his miniature stage of carpeting, raising his eyebrows, flexing his shoulders, tapping his foot.
“The fact is, Mr. Figg, no one has seen Molly since she set off for work at your office.”
“May I ask exactly what you are inferring?”
“I’m asking for your help! Molly was working for you. She was going to Paris with you. Suddenly she’s disappeared. Have you no sense of responsibility?”
“I’m her employer, not her father,” Malcolm shot back. “Ex-employer, at that.”
That silenced her. Malcolm looked triumphantly at the doctor, inviting his approval, and was unnerved to find the blue eyes watching him stonily. The yattering started up again in his ear.
“. . . must be very wrong. I know my daughter. She would never go off like this without telling me. Never!”
Typical mother. No idea what their kids were up to. If Molly wasn’t in Paris, how come he’d got that disk so quickly? Malcolm couldn’t resist giving a knowing chuckle.
“What does that mean?” the mother pounced. “You know something, don’t you?”
“All I know is that your daughter is over twenty-one, and if she wishes to divulge her whereabouts to you, she will no doubt do so.”
“Are you telling me she’s in Paris after all?”
“I don’t say she is and I don’t say she isn’t.”
“For heaven’s sake, Mr. Figg, please help me! I’m going crazy here.”
“Unfortunately that is not my concern. Now, since I have nothing more to add and my time is at a premium—”
“You’ve got her there somewhere, haven’t you? Oh, my poor baby!”
“I am not prepared to bandy words with you any further, Mrs. Clearwater. Good-bye!”
With a flick of his thumb Malcolm cut her off. He swung round to gauge how his performance had been received and was gratified to see that he had the doctor’s full attention. The man was half out of his seat, mouth open, eyes wide with what could only be admiration. Malcolm could barely refrain from taking a bow. His mother always said he’d made a lovely Toad at Wanstead Primary, and could have hit the big-time in Holly-wood if Marketing Studies had not claimed him first. He contented himself with a modest smile of acknowledgement and the merest flourish of his “walnut” phone before dropping it back into his pocket. His inner lion roared. Figg had triumphed again.
12
Act normal, Molly told herself. Stop smiling that idiotic smile. But it was impossible. She heard his name in the whisper of wheels and sigh of brakes as the Métro train swept her through dark tunnels. She saw his face in the fathomless black of the windows, and felt his fingertips on her neck with every draft of opening doors. Now, as she emerged from the station and climbed into daylight, the shadows of maple leaves on the pavemen
t seemed to welcome her like waving hands. Sunshine poured its warmth onto her hair. The air was heavy with the narcotic sweetness of afternoon. Each breath was like a swoon.
Concentrate. There was a billboard-style local map bolted to the railings outside the station. Molly took the precious fragment of cigarette packet out of her bag, and double checked the address Fabrice had scribbled last night: Musée Rodin, rue de Varenne, 7e. She carried it over to the map and with her forefinger traced a route from the “Vous êtes ici ” arrow. It gave her a jolt to see how close she was, and instinctively she turned her head as if expecting to find him already at her shoulder. But the pavement was empty, apart from a foraging pigeon. A glance at her watch showed that she still had five minutes in hand. She set off southward under a rustling canopy of trees, matching her pace to an inner beat of happy anticipation. How romantic it was to be meeting at a museum. It showed that Fabrice respected her as a woman of intelligence, not just a pick-up in a club.
Who exactly was Rodin? Molly scoured her brain for facts. She was fairly sure he was a sculptor, maybe a painter too. French, obviously. Nineteenth-century, probably. Dead, anyway. The Thinker : that was Rodin, wasn’t it? And the little ballet dancer with her nose in the air—or was that Degas? Why, oh, why hadn’t she consulted her guidebook? Fabrice would think her ignorant and trivial. And she wasn’t!
Should she take off her jacket or leave it on? The Métro ride had made her a little sticky, but she still wasn’t quite comfortable in the red dress. Might it seem too blatant to turn up with half of her body on show? (“Are you kidding? ” she could practically hear Alicia bellow in her ear.) Molly compromised by keeping the jacket on but sliding it back to semi-expose her shoulders, in a manner that might look casually sexy while secretly cooling her armpits. She prayed that, after the magic of last night, her appearance in daylight would not disappoint him too much.
Here was the rue de Varenne already. The sight of the navy enamel street sign, with its bold white letters, squeezed her ribs tight. As she turned left she could see railings, the entrance to a large house obscured by topiary, a huddle of middle-aged tourists at a ticket booth. That must be it. There was no sign of Fabrice.
Nevertheless, expectation caught in her throat and fine-tuned each nerve ending. She was acutely aware of a slight give in the hot tarmac under the soles of her boots; of a policeman standing in silhouette under a distant archway, wearing a cap shaped exactly like an upside-down saucepan; of the spicy-sweet scent of roses drifting from an unseen garden. Her knuckles hurt. Molly discovered that she had crossed the fingers on both hands so fiercely that when she shook them loose, bloodless patches still showed white on the skin.
She was here. Where was Fabrice? She dithered by the ticket booth, scanning the shifting groups that thronged the entrance, unsure whether to buy a ticket—or two—or simply wait. It was exactly half past three. You couldn’t say he was late. Not yet.
And then she saw him, sauntering toward her from a stone bench where he had been waiting for her in the sun. A current of pleasure rippled out from the pit of her stomach and up her back. He was wearing sunglasses, a long-sleeved T-shirt that drifted loose at his waist, his leather jacket slung over one shoulder. The sunglasses made him look wonderfully dangerous, but she couldn’t read his expression. Would he still like her? Did she look okay?
“Salut, Molly.” She wasn’t sure if she had moved forward, or if he had come to her, but suddenly he was standing in front of her, the cleft of his chin and the long curve of his lower lip level with her eyes. He put his hands lightly on her shoulders and kissed her on both cheeks, French-style. He smelled faintly, deliciously, of sweat.
“Salut.” Molly darted a smile, and tugged self-consciously at her skirt.
They stood awkwardly in silence. Last night’s familiarity had receded. He looked different—taller, his face broader through the cheekbones and narrower at the jaw than she remembered, his hair longer. She wished she could see his eyes.
“Shall we go in?”
As Fabrice gestured toward the open gates, Molly saw that there were two tickets in his hand. She wanted to thank him, or offer to pay. She wished she could think of some easy, witty remark to make him smile, and recapture the intimacy of last night. But for the moment any fluency in French had deserted her. Tongue-tied, she paced beside him along the gravel, and for the first time took note of the scene around her.
Ahead lay a two-story mansion, serenely proportioned with tall windows, a central pediment and matching turrets, built of a mellow stone on which slanting sunshine bestowed the fuzzy bloom of ripe apricots. It was very beautiful. Molly could see through the open doorway, right across an airy hall and out to a seductive-looking garden at the back. Here at the front was a lawn, too, its immaculate condition preserved by a sign that warned, “Pelouse interdite.” It was flanked by severely clipped hedges, and flowerbeds running in dead-straight parallel lines. Those must be the roses she had smelt. (Hybrid teas: how her mother would scoff!)
Fabrice had stopped. “I adore this place,” he announced, with a fierceness that evoked an answering leap inside Molly. Imagine if Fabrice were a great artist—imagine living with him in such a house, possessing all this beauty and spaciousness in the heart of Paris. She pictured him toiling in his studio while she wrote great novels upstairs, the two of them strolling together through the garden in the evening light, discussing their work, perhaps picnicking under an ancient tree (she would be an effortless cook), before mounting the steps to a breezy bedroom where—
“Rodin is a passionately interesting artist,” Fabrice continued, turning away from the main path to lead her toward a group of clipped yews where a few tourists loitered. “At every visit one sees something new, even in the most familiar works.”
Molly followed meekly. It was silly to expect him to pay attention to her. People went to museums to look at the exhibits, not to talk and hold hands. Besides, she had nothing interesting to say.
One of the tourists had stepped back to raise a camera to his eye. Molly realized that she was staring straight at an enormous bronze sculpture set high on a plinth. “The Thinker! ” she exclaimed, without thinking. “Le Penseur,” she said—was that the correct French? Belatedly she saw the words carved on the plinth in letters large enough for a four-year-old to decipher.
Fabrice did not bother to acknowledge her statement of the obvious. He was prowling around the statue, examining it intently. He even took off his sunglasses. Feeling faintly snubbed that he had not done the same for her, Molly prowled after him at a respectful distance. The figure sat, massive and brooding, at least half again as large as life, gaze abstracted. He was unashamedly naked. Molly noted the muscles of his angled back, the spread of his toes, the jut of flesh between his legs, the lifelike manner in which the knuckles squished his lips as he supported his head on one hand.
“I wonder what he’s thinking,” she heard herself say—a daft, trivial, girly question she would have snatched back if she could.
But Fabrice answered at once: “The sculpture represents Dante, thinking about his poems. You know Dante?”
“Of course.” The Inferno, Beatrice, et cetera.
“But it’s symbolic, you understand. It could be any man—any woman,” he added courteously, though without conviction, “engaged in the creative effort.”
Molly nodded, and looked again. There was an arresting tension between the inwardness of the pose and the physical potency of the figure. She felt a stirring of interest, outweighed by the consciousness of her vast ignorance. She turned to Fabrice and asked humbly, “Tell me about Rodin. Show me what you see.”
He made a puffing noise, as if so much explanation was beyond him—or, worse, beyond her. Molly might have felt crushed if at that moment she had not caught sight of something marvellous over his shoulder. “Look!” She pointed.
The sun had projected a shadow of The Thinker onto one of the cones of clipped yew, perfectly framed within the tawny green. The sculptur
e’s shape was intriguingly distorted, but so sharply outlined that one could distinguish the separate fingers of the figure’s resting hand. At first Fabrice didn’t understand what she was showing him. Then his face lit up. Ah, oui! It was fantastic. He’d never seen that before. How fascinating, how instructive to observe a three-dimensional shape reduced to two. “You see,” he told her, with a teasing smile, “you have a good eye.”
“No.” But Molly felt herself revive under the warmth of his smile, like a statue come to life. For the first time today she felt a connecting thread spin out between them, and hold.
As they strolled toward the house, Fabrice told her about Rodin: how he had failed to get into art school and was forced to work as a decorative plasterer and ornamental stonemason for the buildings of Paris; how his sculptures were repeatedly rejected for being ugly, pornographic, even too realistic for, bien sûr, Rodin had also taken anatomy classes to understand the configuration of the human body (the accusation that he had cast one of his figures from life had been un grand scandale); how, even when he was famous enough to be offered commissions, the work he produced was nearly always judged unsuitable or remained unfinished. It was only toward the end of his life that he became internationally famous, and not until after his death that one recognized he was, in fact, a genius. But that, said Fabrice, with a magnificent shrug, was always the fate of the artist.
His French came at Molly in a rushing tide of rising and falling sound, full of precise consonants, liquid vowels and purring gutturals, too fast for her to understand everything. But she understood his enthusiasm. She understood the fire in his eyes as he spoke of his hero. She loved the expressiveness of his hands and the sensual thrust of his lower lip when he groped for the next thought with a “Mais, euh . . .”
Despite her intention as a conscientious tourist to check out the Louvre, museums were not usually Molly’s favorite haunt. She felt she was not a visual person, and that her ignorance rendered her views pointlessly subjective. Windowless galleries leading one into another made her claustrophobic. But she was prepared to love this museum because Fabrice did, and as soon as she entered the house she found it was easy. The airy proportions of the rooms were in themselves a delight. Windows were flung open to birdsong and greenery on every side. There were burnished parquet floors, fireplaces and cornices of restrained, pleasing design. The sculptures were arranged so that one could walk right round them and peer close. Though one could not touch them, their tactile quality was immediate and intimate. It took a while for her to realize that this was because of the work itself. Nudes predominated: a naked male torso in mid-stride, a marble woman curled in sleep; flying figures, beseeching figures; bodies lustfully entwined or unbearably strained in struggle. The nakedness in itself was powerful. But more than that, passion rose off the sculptures like steam. These were not just bodies: they were human beings caught in the extremities of emotion.