Abberton. Framed, signed, dated 2007. I forced myself to close my eyes, then open them and look again, to make sure it was real. I walked towards the picture, seeing nothing else; it might have been the only thing in an otherwise empty room. Now I understood why the name of the woman Aidan said he’d killed had sounded familiar, even though she’d never introduced herself to me. I’d done plenty of paperwork for Saul; I’d probably sent her a bill or a receipt, or seen her name on one of the ‘Work Pending’ lists Saul used to pin up everywhere.
That same name was painted in neat black letters in the bottom right-hand corner of the painting in front of me: Mary Trelease.
It took me about four seconds to realise that if Mary Trelease had painted Abberton in 2007, Aidan could not have killed her years ago. He’d made a mistake. I felt myself swell with relief. Of course he wasn’t a killer. I’d known that all along. All I needed now was to find him so that he could see the picture for himself, but the woman from the TiqTaq Gallery had said she’d seen him heading for an exit. What if he was in a taxi on his way to King’s Cross?
I was unwilling to move from TiqTaq’s stall. I knew I couldn’t let Abberton out of my sight. It was my evidence—indisputable proof that Aidan hadn’t done what he thought he’d done. It occurred to me that there might be more than one Mary Trelease, but I quickly dismissed the idea. Even if there were dozens or hundreds of women with that name, the artist who had assaulted me in Saul’s gallery had to be the one Aidan thought he’d killed. She was a painter; he framed pictures. They both lived in Spilling. It couldn’t be a coincidence. Perhaps they’d had a fight. She might have attacked him—a hypothesis that seemed entirely consistent with what I knew of her character—and he’d defended himself . . . My mind raced ahead, going through the possibilities, but I couldn’t focus on anything for long. Shock was still slamming through me and I couldn’t think coherently.
‘I need to buy a painting,’ I said to the woman with the dyed hair. ‘That one there.’
She shrugged. If I wanted to forget about the man I’d been looking for and boost her profits instead, that was all right by her. ‘Great,’ she said, though her tone and manner conveyed little enthusiasm. She hadn’t looked to see which picture I’d pointed at. ‘Let me dig out the relevant forms.’ Languidly, like someone with all the time in the world, she bent to open a desk drawer.
‘Can you put the “Sold” sticker on first?’ I asked, trying not to sound as impatient as I felt. ‘I don’t want anyone else to see it and think it’s still for sale.’
She laughed. ‘You might not have noticed, but people aren’t exactly queuing up. I’ve barely had anyone glance in my direction since yesterday morning.’ Pulling the lid off a pen with her teeth, she said, ‘Right, I’ll fill in my bits, then I’ll hand it over to you to do yours. You know you pay the total upfront? It’s a fair, so there’s no deposit system.’
I nodded.
‘We take cash, cheques, all major credit cards. Which picture is it you want?’
‘Abberton,’ I said. It was a lie. I didn’t want it; it was the last thing I wanted. Neither did Mary Trelease want me to have it. She had made that clear enough. I couldn’t put a picture on my wall knowing the artist didn’t want it there. As soon as I’d found Aidan and shown him Abberton, I would give it away—to Malcolm, I decided. He often made admiring remarks about my art collection.
Please let Aidan still be in London, I thought. I didn’t want to have to take Abberton back to Spilling. The idea of having it in my home was unthinkable. Already I felt oppressed by it in a funny sort of way, even though I hadn’t touched it yet and didn’t own it. I had always known it was an object that possessed a certain power—that was what had drawn me to it in the first place—but now that its maker had traumatised and humiliated me, the force of the picture seemed wholly negative. It was ridiculous, I knew, but I was afraid of it.
‘Abberton,’ the woman repeated slowly, writing it on her form. ‘Artist’s name?’
‘Mary Trelease.’ I was surprised to have to tell her. Saul Hansard wouldn’t have needed to ask. How could she represent her artists properly if she wasn’t familiar with the titles of their work? Everything about her demeanour suggested indifference. I wondered how much commission TiqTaq took. Aidan had told me most galleries take fifty per cent, even the ones that make no effort to promote an artist’s work.
‘Mary Trelease?’ The woman looked up at me, seeming suddenly nervous. For a moment, I was terrified she was about to tell me something I knew to be impossible. You must be mistaken. Mary Trelease died years ago. She was murdered.
The young woman walked over to Abberton and tapped its surface with the biro she was holding. ‘This is the picture you want?’ The disbelief and annoyance in her voice let me know that I was making life difficult for her.
‘Yes.’ I took my credit card out of my wallet to show her I wasn’t going to back down, waited for her to say I couldn’t have Abberton—Mary Trelease had told her to sell the painting to anybody but me. But I hadn’t told this woman my name; how could she know who I was?
‘Sorry, my mistake,’ she said, a rueful smile appearing on her face. ‘It’s already sold.’
‘What? But . . . it can’t be. There’s no red dot on the label.’ I noticed for the first time that there was also no price, nothing written beneath the title and Mary Trelease’s name. All the other pictures on TiqTaq’s stall had prices apart from one or two that were labelled ‘NFS’—not for sale—and their labels were printed. Why was Abberton’s handwritten? Had it been added at the last minute?
‘I told you—I made a mistake. Someone bought this picture yesterday.’ The smile was still there but it was straining to stay in place. ‘I meant to put a “Sold” sticker on, but I never got round to it. I was rushed off my feet.’
‘You told me it had been quiet since you got here,’ I blurted out. ‘I don’t believe the picture’s sold. Why won’t you sell it to me?’ I had to be allowed to take Abberton away with me. I had to. Aidan needed to see it; it would make everything all right between us again, as if his confession last night and his anger today had never happened.
The young woman screwed her eyes up, the better to inspect me: this crazy specimen that had put itself in front of her. ‘Do you think I don’t want to make money? I’d gladly sell it to you if it was for sale.’
A combination of confusion and desperation had emboldened me, and I spoke to a complete stranger as I never would have dared to if there had been less at stake. ‘Show me the sales form,’ I said. ‘Show me your copy, the yellow copy.’ I indicated the form she’d been filling in for me. All the artists and galleries at the fair had the same ones, with three layers: white, yellow and green. Aidan and I had watched Gloria Stetbay’s assistant fill one in yesterday and keep the yellow copy for herself.
‘This is ridiculous.’ Dyed-hair woman tried to laugh, but it wasn’t convincing.
I walked towards her. She moved to stand in front of Abberton , as if she feared I might snatch it off the wall. ‘You represent Mary Trelease, is that right? If her painting’s up on your stall, that means you must represent her.’ Aidan had taught me the basics about how the art world worked. ‘If this picture is sold, I’d like to buy something else by her. Does she have other work that’s available?’
‘I wouldn’t know that sort of thing. You’d have to pop into our gallery on Charlotte Street and—’
‘Is someone there now, one of your colleagues?’ I wasn’t going to let it drop. She was lying to me, and I would force her to admit it. ‘You could ring and ask them. Tell them you’re with someone who’s keen to buy any painting you’ve got by Mary Trelease, as long as it’s signed, dated and recent.’
‘There’s no one there who’d . . . Look, I’m not . . .’ She was getting flustered. She spread both her hands and lowered them slowly in a calming gesture. ‘To be honest, I don’t think we’ve got any other stuff by her, okay?’
‘Do you represent her or do
n’t you?’
‘I’m not going to discuss details of the gallery’s relationship with a particular artist . . .’
‘An artist who refuses to sell any of her work,’ I snapped. ‘I’m right, aren’t I? Mary Trelease sells her paintings to nobody. Why not?’ I was certain my hunch was correct. Mary often used to bring in pictures for Saul to frame, ignoring me as she walked past me time after time, yet he never put her work up in the gallery. Saul always exhibited paintings by the artists he framed for; he used to tell me all the time that it was the best way to advertise his own work as well as theirs. So why not Mary’s?
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said the woman. ‘All I know is, we’ve sold one picture for her. This one.’ She jabbed her thumb at Abberton. ‘There’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t un-sell it. I’d be happy to sell you any of the other stuff you can see here. Everything else is available.’
I shook my head. ‘If Abberton’s sold then whoever bought it will be back here to collect it, won’t they? Did they say when?’ An art fair wasn’t like a gallery exhibition, Aidan had told me the day before. You didn’t have to wait until it finished to collect your purchases—you could pick them up any time before the end of the last day.
I got no answer, so I kept pushing. ‘Are they coming to collect it? Or did they pay extra to have it delivered to their home? Can you check that for me, on the yellow form?’
‘No, I can’t. Even if I knew, I couldn’t . . . Look, I really don’t see how I can help you any more. I hope I’m not going to have to call security.’
This shocked me, the idea that someone could feel threatened by me. ‘I’ll go,’ I said. ‘Just . . . could you do me one favour?’
She eyed me suspiciously, waiting for the worst.
‘Could you make sure the picture stays where it is until I come back? I don’t care about buying it—I don’t want it. But I need to show it to my boyfriend and . . . I don’t know where he is.’
‘The tall bloke in the donkey jacket you were looking for?’
I nodded.
She sighed, and seemed to soften. ‘I’ll do my best,’ she said, ‘but if the buyer comes to pick it up, there’s not an awful lot I can do.’
I left without saying thank you or goodbye. I’d wasted enough time already. She was right. Assuming Abberton really was sold and she wasn’t lying, the person who had bought it could arrive to collect it at any moment. I ran outside and stuck out my arm to stop a taxi, then realised there weren’t any, only several people who looked as if they were waiting. One glanced at his watch, sighed and walked off down the road.
‘Come on,’ I breathed through gritted teeth. A taxi had to come. I had to get back to the hotel—that’s where Aidan would be. He’d have gone back there to check out, to pick up our bag and the Gloria Stetbay. A taxi appeared, and a woman in a grey trouser suit with a mobile phone pressed to her ear moved forward to greet it. She opened the back door. I ran at her with my wallet already open and offered her twenty pounds if she’d let me take it instead. It was an emergency, I told her. She looked unconvinced, but took the money and stepped back, relinquishing the cab.
At the Drummond, I told the driver to wait outside for me. I didn’t have the patience to wait for the lift, so I ran up four flights of stairs to room 436. I banged on the door and called Aidan’s name. ‘Please be here,’ I whispered. ‘Please.’
The door opened, but not very far. I heard footsteps walking away. I pushed the door fully open, banging it against the wall. Aidan stood in the centre of the room with his back to me. Short of leaving me stranded outside in the corridor, he couldn’t have been less welcoming. I didn’t care; I knew this bad patch would end as soon as he’d heard what I had to say. ‘Mary Trelease, ’ I panted.
He swung round.
‘What does she look like?’
‘I don’t know. That depends how long it takes a body to decay. You’d need to ask a pathologist.’
‘Skinny, masses of black curly hair that’s starting to go grey, cut-glass accent, bad skin—lined, like a much older woman’s. Pale brown mole beneath her lower lip that’s shaped like . . . like a double-ended spanner, sort of. Or how you’d draw a dog’s bone in a cartoon . . .’
Aidan roared and flew across the room at me, clamping his hands around my arms. I screamed, frightened by the strength of his reaction. ‘What are you saying?’ he demanded. ‘Where did you get that description from?’
‘I’ve met her. Aidan, you’ve got to listen to me. You haven’t killed her. She isn’t dead. She’s an artist, isn’t she? Remember the woman I told you about, the one I had a run-in with at Saul’s gallery? It was her! The picture she brought in, the one I wanted to buy—I’ve just seen it at the art fair, on a stall belonging to a gallery. TiqTaq, they’re called. The painting’s called Abberton. It’s of a sort of person, but with no face . . .’
Aidan released me, staggered back across the room as if propelled by a physical force. ‘No,’ he said. Flecks of white had appeared at the corners of his mouth. He wiped them away with his hand. He’d started to sweat. ‘Shut up. Shut up. You’re lying. What are you trying to do?’
‘You got it wrong!’ I told him triumphantly. ‘You didn’t kill her, years ago or at any other time. She’s not dead. The picture I saw, Abberton, it’s dated 2007. It wasn’t framed when I met her six months ago, but since then she’s had it framed. She’s alive, Aidan.’ I didn’t need to ask if the woman I’d described was the right one; his face was white with terror.
‘I killed Mary Trelease,’ he said. ‘But maybe you’ve known that all along. Maybe that’s why you turned up at the workshop asking for a job, and why you’re telling me this now.’ Fury blazed in his eyes. ‘Who are you really, Ruth Zinta Bussey?’ His sarcasm shook my heart. ‘What was the plan?’ He walked towards me slowly. ‘Make me fall in love with you and then wipe me out? Drive me insane? Is that going to be the extent of my punishment, or is there more to come? Are you going to go to the police?’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about!’ I sobbed. ‘There’s no plan. I love you! I’m not trying to punish you, I’m trying to make you see that you’ve done nothing wrong. Come back to Alexandra Palace with me and I’ll show you the picture, Abberton . I’ve got a taxi waiting outside.’
He looked at me, through me. ‘Abberton,’ he said in a hollow voice. ‘You’re telling me I’ll find a picture called Abberton, by Mary Trelease at the Access 2 Art fair?’
‘Yes! Dated 2007. But you’ve got to come now—the woman on the stall told me it was sold. I think she was lying, but I’m not sure, and if someone comes to collect it . . .’
Aidan picked up his wallet and the black hold-all, and pushed past me into the corridor. He left the Gloria Stetbay picture—my engagement ring substitute—leaning against the wall. Watching him slam the door on it, I knew the answer to the question I was too scared to ask. Our engagement was off. Aidan wouldn’t mention it again.
By the time I got to the taxi, he was sitting in it as if he’d been there for hours, shoulders hunched, his face a grim mask. ‘Get in,’ he said. I didn’t understand. He was acting as if he was forcing me to go with him, when I was the one who had suggested it. ‘Alexandra Palace,’ he told the driver. ‘As fast as you can.’
‘Talk to me, Aidan, please,’ I begged him. ‘What happened between you and Mary Trelease? Why did you think you’d killed her? Why do you think I’m trying to drive you mad? Why would I?’ I’d been so certain that the nightmare would be over as soon as I told him about Abberton, but it wasn’t; I couldn’t bear the disappointment. I buried my face in my hands and started to weep.
‘Don’t cry,’ said Aidan. ‘It won’t help.’
‘Please, tell me what’s going on!’
‘I shouldn’t have told you anything. I should never have mentioned her name to you.’
‘Why don’t you trust me? I don’t care what you’ve done—I love you. I should have said that last night, as soon
as you told me, but I was confused. I knew it wasn’t right—I knew you could never kill anyone!’
‘Keep your voice down.’
‘That’s why I clammed up, not because what you’d told me changed how I felt about you but because I didn’t believe it could be true. And the name Mary Trelease—I knew I’d heard it before, but I couldn’t remember where. I must have seen it when I worked for Saul, on a bill or something.’ I stopped, out of breath.
Aidan didn’t look at me, but he took hold of my hand and squeezed it. He was staring out of the window, thinking hard, concentrating on something I couldn’t see or share, something from his past. Almost whispering, I asked, ‘Did you and Mary Trelease have some kind of . . . physical fight?’ I pictured Aidan pushing her, her falling, knocking her head against something. Aidan panicking, fleeing the scene, assuming he’d killed her . . .
‘Shhh,’ he said, drawing out the sound as he exhaled slowly. As if I was a child, still young enough to accept comfort without substance. I knew then that there was no point asking him anything else.
We arrived at Alexandra Palace and I paid the driver. ‘Do you remember the stall number?’ Aidan asked me.
‘It’s opposite Jane Fielder’s stall, number . . . number . . .’ The churning in my head had dulled my memory.
‘One seven one,’ he said.
I followed him as he pushed past people milling in the aisles, browsing idly as Aidan and I had the day before. It seemed like a lifetime ago. ‘There it is,’ I blurted out when I saw Tiq Taq’s sign from a distance. I looked at my watch: three o’clock. I’d left to go back to the hotel at half past one. My throat tightened. Blood pounded in my ears.
The woman with the dyed blonde hair had gone. In her place was an older woman with a pre-Raphaelite hairstyle—a long plait coiled into a conical bun at the nape of her neck. She was wearing a white linen suit, a clingy red scoop-necked T-shirt and brown sandals with coloured beads on them. Her face, hands and feet were tanned. As we approached, Aidan said, ‘There’s nothing there that’s anything like what you described.’ He turned away in disgust.
The Dead Lie Down: A Novel Page 19