The Painter

by Will Davenport

  'You took your time in the loo. I asked Ellen.'

  Relieved at the honesty of that reply, she let her suspicion go.

  'Does your mum know a lot about history?'

  'Hull history, mostly. She's mad about it. Reads everything. That's why she did all that work for Mr Parrish. She's always borrowing bits and pieces off him. She does extra night cover at the Project. Doesn't need to. I mean, she's the boss, she could get out of it, but she gets by on a couple of hours' sleep and she reads the rest of the time. If it's quiet.' He fell silent and she guessed he was thinking of a day when it hadn't been quiet.

  'So what else did she say?'

  Don frowned. 'He wasn't just a politician. He was a bit of a diplomat, maybe even a spy. Oh and she said he was certainly a turn-coat.'

  'Meaning?'

  'Meaning he was on Cromwell's side right through the revolution, then when the King came back, he persuaded everybody he'd always been a royalist so he got elected to parliament. But all the time, he was off on funny foreign trips, cloak-and-dagger stuff.'

  The Minerva was at the end of the row of warehouses which flanked the old docks. It was long and thin and it stuck out to face the Humber with a narrow bow-fronted prow, rounded off to split the cold winds that might tear in from the estuary.

  Amy sat Don down at an outside table, away from the other drinkers, and went to get two beers. When she came back out, she could see right away that the short respite was already over. He was hunched in his chair, turned awkwardly away to the wall and the reason lay in the noisy family who had moved in to occupy the adjoining table. He looked as if he wanted to be somewhere else and she thought wherever he is, he brings his leaving with him. All brisk and smiling, she pushed past the family, their pushchair and their two quarrelling toddlers and put his glass down in front of him.

  'To His Coy Mistress,' she said. 'I remembered. That's his big one, isn't it? I don't think I know any of the rest.'

  'That's the only one I know. It's the only one anybody knows, I think.'

  It was a good sign, she thought, that he took her offer of distraction eagerly. She craved a normal conversation with him, a conversation without an edge. A conversation that would answer this breathless expectation building in her.

  She thought. 'How does it go? Something about winged chariots?'

  'That's it.'

  'If you know it, you tell me.'

  He laughed and it was a wonderful thing. The laughter opened the curtains behind his eyes. Until that moment of his unforced laugh all that pulled her to him was dark, his coiled energy, his panther walk. She knew that staying too long in the darkness would inevitably chill her and here at last was the chance of sunshine, of something more durable.

  'If you think I'm going to spout love poems at you in public, you can think again. People might get the wrong idea.'

  'In private, then?'

  'No. Then you might get the wrong idea.'

  Before she could ask anything else he went on, 'My mum told me he worked for Milton. Did you know that?'

  'John Milton? Paradise Lost Milton?'

  'That's the one. Milton had some government job under Cromwell. Something to do with foreigners because he spoke lots of languages and Marvell did too.'

  'Go on. Remind me. How does the winged chariot one start?'

  He might have done it. He smiled as if he was about to. He even opened his mouth to say something which could have been the first line but the older of the two toddlers at the next table forestalled him. It was a boy of indeterminate age whose sole contribution to the high noise level at the next-door table until this moment had been to wail very loudly that its father had brought the wrong flavour crisps. Now it came, or rather waddled because crisps were clearly the main part of its diet, to their table in order to place on it the half-full plastic beaker it had been holding. The beaker was an unpleasant sight, containing a mush of some purple soft drink into which it had crushed the rest of the packet of the wrong sort of crisps. Its parents were smiling indulgently as though they expected Amy and Don to be impressed by this clever trick.

  The child banged the mug down on the table with a challenging thump and stared at Amy, It seemed to be saying, Well? Want to make something of it? Normally she loved children, but she was prepared to make an exception for this one. She was facing the wrong way for the parents to see her face so she narrowed her eyes and gave it a hard look. The boy stared back truculently, banging the mug so that liquefied crisps splashed on Amy's knee, then it turned its gaze to Don.

  Then it screamed.

  She caught up with Don a hundred yards back down the dockside, but only by running as hard as she could.

  'He only screamed because I trod on his foot,' she panted.

  'Balls. You were nowhere near his feet.'

  'He's just a kid. A horrible bloody kid at that. Forget it.'

  Don didn't even slow down and she was still half-running to keep up. 'Listen to me,' he said, 'I make children scream. The sooner I get to grips with that the better. I make children scream and I always will. Can we go?'

  'Go where?'

  'Back to Paull Holme. Builders don't scream.'

  He said nothing all the way back and she could think of nothing to say.

  At the house, he was out of the car and away before she'd got the handbrake on and the Hawk swooped on her before she could go after him.

  'You're back then.'

  'Indubitably.'

  'Come again?'

  'Yes, I'm back. I found him. He was …'

  'I know where he bloody was.'

  'You 'do?' She looked at him indignantly. 'You knew all the time?'

  'No, I knew at four fifteen when the evening paper came.' He thrust it at her.

  'HAVE-A-GO HERO GETS A GONG', said the front-page headline. She scanned down the story. Mindful of the sub judice rules, it glossed over the speech. Then she saw the other photo, the one of her, with the caption that read 'Mystery Girlfriend Emma Bovary'. The copy said, 'Friends were speculating on a romance between the injured hero and leggy blonde Emma Bovary who refused to answer press questions at the award ceremony.'

  'Well?' said the Hawk, staring at her with an indignant expression on his face.

  'Well what?'

  'Is it true?'

  'I don't think that's any of your business.'

  She tried to walk away but he leapt in front of her. 'Oh yes, it is my business. It's very much my business.'

  'Look, Mr Hawkins,' she said, takinga deep breath. 'He's an extraordinary guy but he's in a terrible state and I don't know if I have the time or the strength to nursemaid someone like that. I like my guys to be fully functional. Having said which, don't worry, I am not about to give him a hard time. He's doing that quite well enough himself.'

  'What the fuck are you on about?' said the Hawk, clearly mystified.

  Amy did a lightning-fast review of all she had just said and began to suspect she had just made a fool of herself.

  'Weren't you talking about the romance bit?'

  'No, I bloody wasn't. I don't give a fuck about fucking romance, I was asking you about your name cos I can tell you here and now that if you're stringing me along with a false name for the tax people, I'll have you off this site before your feet touch the ground.'

  'I'm Amy Dale,' she said, 'What are you talking about? What name?'

  The Hawk looked at the paper, 'Here. It says you're called Emma something. Emma Bovary.' He looked at her in surprise. 'Don't laugh. It's no laughing matter.'

  She shook her head and walked away. It was too late to start work. Everybody else was knocking off and Amy, reluctant to talk to anyone, walked round to the far side of the house to find a quiet place. There, in an overgrown clump of rhododendron, a brick-built arbour, three walls and rotting wooden roof, still sheltered an old bench. She sat down, unsettled by the day, staring moodily across the fields, wondering what kept her here in this pressure-cooker of a house where every conversation, every decision seemed
surrounded by perilous consequences. The car keys were in her pocket. It would take five minutes to throw her clothes in a bag, gather her brushes and go. What kept her?

  Don kept her.

  A man approached, whistling. She curled herself up small, squashed in the corner of the seat, but it didn't hide her from Dennis who came round the corner holding his old tray.

  'Brought you a cuppa,' he said.

  'How did you know I was here?'

  'Is that how you say thank you where you come from? I saw you from the window.'

  'And you thought I came out here because I needed a cup of tea?'

  Dennis gave her a hard look, put the tray on the ground and sat down beside her. 'No, as it happens, I came out here because I thought after the load of old crap you've been listening to today, you might just want to hear some truth.'

  'And how do you know I've been listening to a load of crap?'

  'Because I can read, okay?' There was the same edge in his voice that she'd heard when he'd tried to lay claim to Amelia's book. 'I read the evening paper. I know what they said at that bloody ceremony and I know you were there because you're spread across page two in glorious black-and-white.'

  'All right, Dennis. Spit it out. What makes it a load of crap?'

  'I tell you what I'll do. I'll go and get Vin's version, shall I? The way he told it to me when I saw him in the cells. It makes very convincing reading.'

  She shrugged her shoulders. 'Just tell me.'

  'Vin's a truthful boy, Amy, always has been. That's part of his trouble. When the cops ask him what he's on, he tells them. When they ask who he gets it from, he tells them that too. It's cost him blood. Vin says he saw Don take the saw from the council truck.' Dennis saw Amy stiffen and nodded emphatically. That's right, Don took it. Vin followed him in. He saw the woman try to stop him and he saw what Don did to her with the chain saw. Then Vin says he saw red. He's not a strong lad but he went for Don, rushed him from behind, knocked him over and he got the saw off him. That's when Don got hurt but then Don got it back and Vin reckons that would have been the end of him if the others hadn't come downstairs. That's the way Vin tells it, and you know what, Amy? I believe him. It's not just blood being thicker than water. You read it and you'll believe him too.'

  Dennis's voice had a growl of violent desperation in it, quite unlike anything she had heard from him before. This was Dennis with no holds barred, no disguise. Amy thought she wished she had never heard this Dennis. 'Why would he do that?' she asked.

  'Because he's got a black hole where his soul ought to be,' said Dennis savagely. 'He's as unstable as they come. It's all about Parrish and his mother. That winds him up so tight he goes manic, right off his head. He was after them. That was why he took the saw in there.'

  It was more than Amy could take. 'Leave me alone, Dennis,' she said. 'Just go.'

  'Will you read Vin's version?'

  'Tomorrow,' she said, more to get rid of him than anything else.

  Dennis stared at her, then nodded. He got up. 'This isn't about me and Vin,' he said, 'I'm not telling you to score points. The lads don't know the half of this. I'm telling you to keep you safe, between you and me. Think about it.'

  He picked up the tray, the mugs of tea untouched, and walked away. But it wasn't just between the two of them. Amy, deeply disturbed, stood up too. Needing a change of scene, she headed down across the field towards the river and behind her, behind the back wall of the shelter, Don uncoiled himself from the place where he had been crouching, shielded by the bushes, and watched her unseen.

  As she walked down the field, Amy tried to balance versions of the truth in her mind. Jealous Don, jealous Dennis, Acquisitive Dennis. He wanted Amelia's book. Don wanted what exactly? Her? The book? She didn't know. Was Don just as interested as she was in getting at the old story or was that just a tactic, a shared interest to make sure she believed him?

  She jumped down the ha-ha's drop and skirted the meadow beyond until she arrived at rough scrubland bordering the river. Sitting on the bank, she looked along the shoreline. Seagulls were pecking and fighting over some dead thing in the edge of the ripples. A speedboat screamed, jumping and thumping over the estuary waves. It was far out from the shore and the sound of its crashing impacts reached her so late that it seemed to be colliding with a solid, invisible ceiling every time it rose into the air. How far out was it? The world was full of questions but this one provided a harmless distraction. What had she counted as a child between the lightning and the thunder? Seven seconds, she thought, seven seconds to a mile. There was only a second between the sight and the sound of the boat. A seventh of a mile, two hundred and fifty yards.

  Ridiculous, she thought, it was much further away than that, then realized that the crash could just as easily go with the impact before the one she had counted. There was no certainty to be found in anything. She switched her attention to what lay right in front of her, on the edge of the mud, where a line of stumps of rotten wood stuck out tracing the decayed framework of a landing stage, and then it dawned on her that she might well be looking at the very place where the painter, trying to come ashore, had fallen into the water. More questions. How long did wood last? It seemed important. They'd replace a jetty as it rotted, wouldn't they? But would these big old timbers rot quickly? Could these have spanned 340 years? Could they be the same ones?

  Amy wanted this to be the spot, wanted to imagine the arrival of the rowing boat, the splash as the painter fell in and the laughter of Amelia and Marvell.

  'It is the same place,' said Don behind her.

  'Don't do that,' she said, whipping round.

  'Don't frighten you?'

  'No – don't read my mind. Why do you say that?'

  'They're oak, those pilings. They may look rotten on the outside, but try to stick a knife in and it's like solid iron an inch under the surface.'

  'You tried?'

  'Yes. I brought you this. Parrish left it for you. He was looking for you.'

  'This' was a fat envelope. It could wait.

  'How did you know I was here?'

  'I saw you walking down.'

  She guessed, quite wrongly, that he'd seen her from the window.

  'I thought the Emma Bovary thing was pretty funny,' he went on.

  'Hallelujah. I'm glad someone's finally understood it. The Hawk thinks it's my alias for the Inland Revenue.'

  He smiled and the power of the smile pulled her a little nearer to his camp.

  'How did you hear about it?'

  'Some thoughtful person pinned a page from the paper on my door,' He sat down, as she knew he would, on the concealing side but he was close enough to her for a chemical, electrical magnetism to flicker unsettlingly.

  'So this really might be where he came ashore?' she asked.

  'The track down here runs in a little dip. It takes a lot of feet and a lot of years to do that. Now, just imagine it.' He held up his hand as if for silence. 'I'll tell you what happened.'

  'All right.'

  'Amelia's up early and she looks out and sees his ship, Dahl's ship, has come in during the night. The Godspeed, She comes racing down here because she's dying to see her old man. Hasn't seen him for ages, can't wait to get her hands on the living, breathing flesh of him, horny as hell I should think. There's the little boat coming. Can you see it? Just out there. Two seamen rowing?'

  'I see it.'

  'The catch is, it's got the wrong people in it. Not Dahl but friend Marvell and I don't think she likes Marvell very much. Also there's this old man she's never seen before. How would you feel?'

  'Disappointed.'

  'Like crying, I should think. Marvell skips on to the jetty, all teeth and pretty words. They don't notice the old bloke until he goes arse over tit into the water. There. Did you see it?'

  'What a splash.'

  'That cheers up Amelia. Marvell thinks it's the funniest thing ever. But the laugh's on them really, isn't it?'

  'Why?'

  'Becau
se they haven't a clue who he is,' he said. They have no idea that the man they're laughing at is the most famous painter in the world. Don't you think that's funny? I do. I think it's pretty funny when people can't see the plain truth right in front of their noses. What did Dennis tell you?'

  The abrupt switch caught her off balance.

  'He said …'

  'He said I had the saw and Mad Vin was trying to save them from me?'

  He looked hard at her until she had to nod.

  'And you believed him?' She stayed silent, dismayed by the rasp in his voice. No words came to her. 'Did you believe his druggy nephew was telling the truth and I wasn't? Did you believe I wanted to kill my own mother? Don't you think it's a bit more likely that a deranged screwball with his veins full of heroin and a grudge against her might just have been the guilty party?'

  'Of course I do.' Her words were faint but his voice softened when he heard them.

  'Amy, I tried to warn you about Dennis. I know he can be funny but he's not what he seems. You shouldn't be alone with him.'

  'Come off it.'

  'I mean it. He's been inside.'

  'In prison? So? So have lots of people.'

  'Not for what he did. Young girls.'

  'How do you know?'

  'Someone told me.' He stared across the river. 'He's trying to get close to you and I don't trust him one bit.'

  She didn't believe him, but both of them were looking for a way out of the conversation. Amy was still holding Parrish's envelope in her hand and Don looked down at it. 'Do you want to have a look at that?' he asked. 'He said it's something to do with Rembrandt.'

  The envelope had their names on it, Amy and Don, an accidental intimacy that startled her so that she looked at him just as he looked back at her, straight into her eyes for a moment, his own eyes widening. She reached up, knowing the risk, and touched his cheek, his scarred cheek, and felt him flinch as she ran her fingers lightly across it, stroking the scar. The tips of her fingers tingled but, like an angler striking too early at the bite, she lost him. It was too much. He turned his head away.

  Neither of them heard Peter Parrish approach and Parrish, seeing how it was between them, stopped in his tracks to give them space.