by John Boyne
He didn’t know whether it was his hair that continued to fascinate her or whether she just couldn’t hold his gaze; in truth he found it hard to look directly at her either after everything they had been through. If he could go back twenty years, he wondered, would he have jumped overboard as the ship passed through the English Channel or would he have come anyway and faced what was to come?
‘I think we need to talk, Owen,’ said Stella quietly and he nodded.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, I think we probably do.’
6
IT WAS WELL PAST noon by the time that Gareth Bentley was washed and dressed and ready to present himself to the outside world. His hangover was pulsating slightly behind his eyes but had not developed as painfully as he had imagined it might earlier. Still, his whole body felt like it was in denial, skin pale and wan, hair lank, limbs uneager for movement. But he liked the house at this time of day. His father would be at work, his mother would be out having lunch with her friends or shopping, and Sophie and Nell, if they were around at all, would be hiding out in the basement or taking their early afternoon hours off.
He padded downstairs in his socks and made a pot of tea, leafing through the morning newspaper which was laid out on the breakfast table as usual, although there was nothing much of interest to be found there. He stretched out, yawning extravagantly, and was considering retiring to the living-room sofa for another snooze when the telephone rang and he drifted out to the hallway to answer it.
‘Hello?’ he said in a distracted tone but there was silence on the other end so he repeated himself. ‘Hello?’ he asked again.
‘Hello, yes,’ said a gruff voice immediately in reply. ‘Who’s this?’
‘Who’s this?’ asked Gareth, half amused, half irritated. ‘Who’s this? You phoned me!’
‘Yes, who is it?’ said the voice.
‘It’s Gareth Bentley,’ he said, not eager to continue with this line of questioning. ‘Who are you looking for?’
‘Ah yes, Gareth, you’re the one I’m after. It’s Quentin Lawrence here. I’m sure your father told you I’d be in touch.’
‘Quentin Lawrence,’ said Gareth to himself, trying to recall where he knew the name from. It rang a distant bell.
‘Now I just needed to talk to you about Monday,’ said Sir Quentin. ‘I have a long fraud trial beginning in Newcastle so we’ll be going up on the Sunday evening train. I’ll need you to take a note for me during the proceedings, of course, but also to organize the luggage and the tickets. Can you come round here Sunday afternoon, say around four? I realize it’s a bit in at the deep end but there’s no harm in that.’
Gareth listened, unsure what the man was talking about. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I think you must have the wrong person.’
‘Nonsense,’ said Lawrence. ‘You’re Roderick’s boy, aren’t you?’
‘Well yes, but—’
‘You don’t have a brother, do you?’
‘No.’
‘Then you’re the one. You’re my new pupil. Now come along, let’s not waste time on all of this, I need to make sure that you—’
While Sir Quentin Lawrence twittered on about train timetables and four-star hotels, Gareth remembered where he had heard the name before. His mother had mentioned it earlier in the day when she’d been trying to rouse him from his bed. This was the fellow who was to be his mentor in chambers. For a moment or two he developed a new-found respect for his father for managing to put his plan into action without so much as consulting him. It was a good job, Gareth realized, that he had gone to the Unicorn Ballrooms the night before or he might well have had no choice but to accept.
‘I’m sorry, Mr Lawrence,’ began Gareth but he was quickly interrupted.
‘It’s Sir Quentin,’ said the man on the other end of the phone proudly.
‘I’m sorry, Sir Quentin,’ he said, correcting himself. ‘I think there’s been some sort of misunderstanding.’
‘Misunderstanding?’ Sir Quentin asked irritably. ‘I don’t see how. Your father asked me as a particular favour to—’
‘Yes, I’m aware of that, only my father didn’t know that I’ve found another position in the meantime.’
There was an offended silence on the other end. ‘You’re going to another chambers?’ Sir Quentin asked in appalled disbelief, as if he’d just announced his intention to vote Labour at the next general election.
‘No, not to another chambers. To an entirely different career altogether.’
‘A career outside the law?’ he asked, even more dumbfounded.
‘Yes, that’s right.’
‘Well don’t be ridiculous, boy. You studied at Cambridge, didn’t you? I did so myself and look at me now. Why on earth would you move to a different career? Nonsense. You stick with what you’re good at, that’s what I say, and you won’t come undone. Now if you can just manage to get round here by four on Sunday then I can—’
‘I’m sorry, Sir Quentin,’ said Gareth quite affably. ‘I do appreciate the opportunity you’re giving me but there’s simply no way I can accept it. I’ve already given my word to my new employer.’
‘To your new—?’
‘But thank you anyway, I do appreciate the offer. And thanks for calling. Goodbye then,’ he said, replacing the receiver on the cradle gently, and grimacing. He stood there tensely, waiting to see whether anything would happen, and sure enough it rang again within the minute and this time it sounded, if such a thing were possible, even angrier than before. He chose not to answer it, however, and simply stared at the device, willing it to stop and leave him in peace. Finally it did and it didn’t ring again. He breathed a sigh of relief and returned to the kitchen.
A key was heard in the front door a few minutes later and his father appeared. The two men looked at each other warily along the corridor, knowing that they were currently in the middle of mediation talks but that the person organizing them—Roderick’s wife, Gareth’s mother—was not present to keep the peace. Wishing that the kitchen door had been closed so that he could have retired to the library without appearing rude, Roderick walked down the passageway and poured himself a cup of tea from the pot. They spoke without exchanging any opening pleasantries.
‘Your mother tells me that you may have a new position organized already.’
‘Yes,’ said Gareth. ‘Just last night, actually. I don’t know all the details yet.’
‘Well I’m pleased to hear that you’re starting to take things seriously,’ said Roderick, who didn’t want a fight. ‘It’s about time you buckled down and started thinking about your responsibilities.’
‘I don’t have any responsibilities,’ said Gareth, wondering whether he’d forgotten a stray wife or child somewhere who was pleading for his attentions.
‘You have responsibilities to your mother and me,’ said Roderick sharply. ‘Who brought you up and fed you and clothed you and gave you a decent education that apparently is of no interest to you now.’
‘Yes, well…’ muttered Gareth, looking away, unable to catch his father’s eye. ‘I suppose if you put it like that.’
‘I do put it like that. Now this new job. It’s with Owen Montignac, isn’t it?’
‘That’s right, yes. Do you know him?’
Roderick shook his head. ‘I knew his uncle a little,’ he said. ‘Just socially, of course. But I’m sure if he’s a Montignac he’s a good fellow, his uncle certainly was. What does he do anyway?’
‘It’s all land deals, I believe,’ said Gareth, who had picked up that nugget of information from his mother and really didn’t have any idea what Montignac did on a day-to-day basis. He had of course seen the business card with the details of the gallery on it but he couldn’t imagine that there was a position there for him; after all he didn’t know anything about art. But if this Montignac fellow really was a property magnate then there might well be something interesting that he could do for him. ‘We haven’t discussed the ins and outs of it yet. I’ll be speaking to him soon.’
‘And you’re sure this is what you want to do?’ asked Roderick.
‘I think so, Father. I just don’t think the law’s for me. Sorry,’ he added with becoming humility.
Roderick nodded and looked a little sad. ‘Well I can’t say I’m not a little disappointed,’ he said. ‘I would have enjoyed having you in the family chambers. But if your mind’s made up…’
‘It is, Father. I really think this is for the best.’
‘Well there we are then. As long as you’re happy.’ Roderick attempted a half-smile, which Gareth appreciated because he knew it was difficult for him to accept this change of profession. ‘I’ll have to give old Quentin Lawrence a call, though,’ he mused. ‘He’ll be expecting you next week. I called in a favour on that and he won’t let me forget it, if I know him at all.’
Gareth nodded, unwilling to offer any further apologies, but chose not to mention the phone call of earlier.
‘You’re not sitting today?’ he asked after a long silence.
‘No,’ said Roderick, shaking his head. ‘A witness went down sick. We couldn’t go on without him. I’ll quite value the few days off if I’m honest.’
‘Lucky you,’ said Gareth, as if his whole life didn’t consist of sitting around doing nothing.
‘Just do one thing for me,’ said Roderick before he would allow the conversation to end. ‘Just find out a little more about this Montignac fellow before you commit yourself to anything.’
‘But you said you knew him. You said he was a decent fellow.’
‘I said his uncle was. And generally the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree although…’ He looked at his own son sceptically, as if he was proof that the axiom wasn’t always true. ‘Just do a little research, that’s all I’m asking. It’s always wise to know who you’re getting yourself involved with.’
‘All right,’ said Gareth, eager to please his father now that the difficult task of persuading him that he shouldn’t be a barrister had been completed successfully. ‘I’ll see what I can find out. He’s a friend of Alexander Keys so I’ll speak to him.’
‘Good,’ said Roderick. ‘I’m probably being overly cautious but it does no harm to be sure.’
Gareth agreed and felt relieved when his father left the room, heading towards his study. As he followed him a few minutes later and began to walk down the corridor he heard the phone ring again. He slipped his shoes on by the front door and left the house quickly, closing the door behind him as quietly as possible while his father went to apologize to Sir Quentin Lawrence, now sadly left without a pupil for his difficult fraud case, due to begin the following Monday morning in Newcastle Crown Court.
7
‘IT’S VERY QUIET, ISN’T it?’ asked Stella, looking around at the handful of browsers making asinine comments about shape and form as they examined some of the more preposterous pieces on display at the Threadbare Gallery. ‘I wonder that you can make a living here at all.’
‘It gets busier later in the afternoon,’ explained Montignac. ‘We only actually sell a couple of pieces a day but they’re ridiculously expensive.’
‘It’s hard to see why.’
‘If we sold them for what they were actually worth then we’d never get rid of any of them. The only way to shift them is to fool people into thinking that the price tag matches the artistic merit.’
‘They’re all very…’ Stella bit her lip, trying to find the right word, not wanting to insult her cousin if she could help it. ‘Very contemporary,’ she settled on finally. ‘Quite challenging.’
‘Utter rubbish, you mean,’ he said.
‘Well yes. If you want to put it like that.’
‘I’m well aware of how bad they are,’ he said, lowering his voice so that none of the customers could hear him. ‘This gallery is one of the greatest con-jobs on the London art scene. Still, if people want to waste their money here and pay my salary while they’re at it, then who am I to stand in their way?’
Stella nodded. She watched her cousin as he settled down behind his desk, sifting through the mail and a couple of catalogues which had just arrived. There was a mass of papers threatening to spill over on to the floor and she had a rare urge to help him tidy up but resisted it, not wanting to make herself too familiar. He hadn’t bothered to get a seat for her so she pulled one over from beside a window and sat down opposite him.
‘So,’ she began, wondering why she hadn’t spent more time preparing for this conversation before actually embarking on it. ‘Last night didn’t go terribly well.’
‘No,’ he replied, shaking his head. ‘No, I suppose not.’
‘I didn’t expect you to just leave like you did. Walking out like that before anything was settled. There are still so many things we need to talk about and—’
‘Things that we need to talk about, yes,’ said Montignac pointedly. ‘You and I, Stella. Not the two of us and Raymond.’
‘Raymond’s my fiancé, Owen, you know that,’ she said with a sigh. ‘I can’t just exclude him.’
He gave a small, slightly embittered laugh and looked away, shaking his head. ‘Remind me to send a note to Margaret, will you?’ he asked. ‘She’s been trying to contact me and I haven’t returned her calls.’
‘We’ve all been trying to contact you, Owen,’ she said. ‘You never answer your phone. You don’t respond to letters—’
‘I’m very busy, Stella,’ he said, interrupting her. ‘Some of us need to work for a living, you know. We don’t just get things handed to us on a silver platter.’
She sighed and leaned back in the chair. ‘Is that what this is all about?’ she asked.
He shrugged his shoulders.
‘Owen, I knew nothing about what Father was planning,’ she said in a determined voice. ‘Absolutely nothing.’
‘Really.’
‘Yes, really. And even if I did, which I didn’t, but even if I did I’m not going to apologize to you for my own father singling me out in his will. The way the Montignacs have traditionally left their money … well it’s outrageous when you think about it. Personally I feel quite proud of him that he took a more forward-thinking approach. I mean for heaven’s sake, we’ve even got the vote now; inheriting the Montignac estate, in comparison, would seem rather minor.’
The bell over the door rang and two more customers came into the store and started examining a somewhat obscene sculpture that was too close to Montignac’s desk for them to be able to continue the conversation comfortably where they sat. He nodded towards his cousin and they walked back upstairs towards the mezzanine floor which remained empty.
‘What bothers me,’ he said when they were alone again, ‘is the way everyone keeps sympathizing with me on my loss. As if the only thing I was interested in was the money. Why should I care if your father chose to exclude me?’
‘But you do care.’
‘I haven’t given it a second thought,’ he said without conviction.
Stella stared at him. ‘Why do you think he did it anyway?’ she asked after a few moments. ‘Could it have anything to do with Margaret?’
‘What does it matter?’
‘Well I just need to know whether you’re going to continue ignoring me for the rest of my life because of something my father did, or whether I’m going to get my cousin back? Which is it to be?’
Montignac sighed. He could see the unhappiness in her eyes as she said this, the truth of how much she felt for him, and it made him sick now to remember how he had once felt the same thing for her. How easy it would be, he thought, simply to move towards her, lift her from the floor and send her over the balcony, crashing to the ground below. How many of his problems would be solved in a simple move. When they were children he used to play a game with her where they would stand facing each other silently for as long as possible and then he would stamp one foot forwards, lunging towards her without actually making contact, and she would always scream and fall backwards; they had played it over and over again for years
and she’d never managed to prepare herself enough for the shock to remain still. The idea came into his head unbidden now and he realized that two of the customers downstairs had left and the others were out of sight. No one would ever know. No one would be able to prove anything and he was her only heir. He steadied his feet on the ground beneath him, keeping his mind a blank to prevent himself from thinking about it and—
The ping of the bell over the door sounded again and he snapped out of it, looking down to see Jason Parsons returning with a couple of sandwiches for their lunch, waving one of the bags up towards him. Stella looked around too and turned back to him irritably.
‘I thought we were having lunch together,’ she said.
‘I can’t,’ he told her, stepping back again, out of temptation’s way. ‘We have a delivery coming later this afternoon and we have to clear some space. I don’t have time for anything but a sandwich at my desk I’m afraid.’
She sighed and turned away, moving towards the wall and looking at the painting of the stripes and circles, the one whose overhead light Montignac had been repairing when she’d arrived.
‘That’s not too bad actually, is it?’ she said.
‘Yes, I quite like it too,’ he replied. ‘I don’t know what I was thinking of taking it for here. It’s far too good.’
‘Who painted it?’
‘A young artist from Hackney. Name of Hutton. He’s done another few as well but they’re pretty dreadful and have sold quite well for us. I can’t get rid of this one at all.’
‘I mean it’s not wonderful,’ she said, correcting herself. ‘But it shows some promise.’
Montignac turned away. He wished she would just leave. Seeing her standing there in front of him brought up such a wealth of emotions that filled his head and made him want to scream in frustration. The memories of their childhood, the things he had done to please her, how remorselessly his cousin had betrayed him. No one could make him feel as twisted inside himself as she did. He was torn between wanting things to go back to the way they once were and wishing he had never known her at all. He had an urge now to hold her.
‘You know you’re going to have to try harder with Raymond,’ she said, turning back to him. ‘He’s really a very decent fellow if you get to know him.’