The Painter's Friend

by Howard Cunnell

  An opportunity? I said.

  Yes, Kaplan said. For the pictures to become the face of the regeneration project. To give it credibility. Something a little different to attract investors and settlers. There are half a dozen islands along this stretch of river. I own them all. We’re going to build houses, marinas, wave pools, businesses. Transform them.

  You want to use my pictures to hide the fact that you’re driving people out of their homes? I said.

  You sound like my daughter, Marina said.

  She had been still and quiet and I thought she had fallen asleep. The glass Crow had filled for her was empty. I hadn’t touched mine.

  You should have let her talk to the police, she said. You ruined her Alex. You ruined my baby. You and that dirty boy.

  She began to cry silently.

  Kaplan, with no expression on his face, briefly put his hand on his wife’s shoulder.

  I’d like to show you something Terry, he said.

  Crow and I followed Kaplan out of the room. Nobody said anything to his wife.

  Kaplan’s heels struck against the shining floorboards and the reflected sound was loud in the house.

  The light in the picture-lined corridor he steered me down made his hair seem blue. My boots thumped against the floor but made no echo.

  A large room full of paintings.

  A picture window looked out onto the lawn and down to the dock with its muted lights. The brightness in the room crushed my ability to see anything beyond the dock. The island and our settlement of boats did not exist.

  The room smelled of stale cigar smoke and strong spirits. There was a thick, half-smoked cigar in a glass ashtray on a round table. The table was crowded with framed photos of Kaplan with military men and, I guessed, important politicians or businessmen, none I recognized.

  There was a framed series of drawings by Burke Damis on the far wall. Sketches for the famous Colombian series. The carnival at Barranquilla.

  There was also a small drawing by Ariel Galton. A floating grid, rough gold and coral pastels in a sequence that seemed random but was not. The drawing annotated with pencil-written numbers I knew to be measurements. Worked up, the finished painting would be huge. I’d never seen it, but I imagined the painting as light held in space, the colours alive and pulsing. Transmitting blasts of pure emotion.

  Sir Evelyn says you’re an admirer, Kaplan said.

  She was the only real painter we’ve had in years, I said.

  Terry, Crow said.

  Filling the wall behind me was one of my pictures. The show that never was. The painting of the group of ex-miners I’d met on a beach in Kent. Watching two of their number fighting. Bare-chested in the cold. Pastels. Red submerged under white skin. A sand-blown car park. Ice cream vans parked for the winter. Split colour field. Grey overcast sky, ochre ground. Watchers in black clothes.

  Seven men, all told. None had worked since the pits closed. After the strike. In the end they were too old to work. Too old to fight, but it was an honour match. One man was revealed as a scab.

  The seven men had walked to the car park from the union club where they came, separately and together, once a fortnight to drink the subsidized beer. A bitter wind came off the grey sea, but the fighters took off their old suit jackets and clean shirts to settle their business for the same reason they had all left the warm and neat union club.

  The strike had been over for more than thirty years. If you didn’t have your good name what did you have? Lost everything else. The alleged strike-breaker was a stranger in the area who believed his history was unknown. Passed himself off as a good man. Long time ago but not long enough. Recognized. The accused man told to choose an opponent. Chose his accuser.

  Bodies ghostly pale, somehow glaring on a sunless day. Marked by jagged sawtooth scars. Work injuries visible on the clothed men as missing fingers, one shoulder held lower than the other. The wind whipping paper rubbish off the tarmac. A fist smacking against cold flesh at too long intervals. Heavy breaths. Gasping and finite. The watching men stone-faced under caps. Silent. Duty. Take no pleasure.

  The scab was put down by weakly thrown punches that had been travelling for decades. Six men left the beaten one alone on the ground. Back to their pints and songs in the union club. A small, unknown museum decorated with the faded honours of the past.

  The picture reminds me of my father, Kaplan said.

  I don’t see how, I said.

  My father fought for everything he had. Said we had to break the power of the unions to get free. You had to go after the toughest. The miners, the printers. Agreed with Thatcher. Winning the miners’ strike was the moment we got our country back.

  Wasn’t worth having back by then, I said.

  Terry, Evelyn Crow said.

  Nobody does anything unless it’s for profit, Kaplan said.

  Kaplan wrote something on a piece of paper. Handed it to me.

  I put down my still-full glass. Looked at the amount. Looked at Crow.

  We can talk about the numbers, Crow said.

  I want you to sell me the paintings Terry, Kaplan said.

  They’re not mine to sell.

  Kaplan laughed.

  You were right, Kaplan said to Crow. The famous pride.

  I think what Terry means, Crow said, is that the pictures belong to the people. Terry would have to get their agreement.

  No, I said, you’re wrong. The paintings have been given to a charitable trust. I don’t have any say in what happens to them. If you want to buy the paintings, Mr Kaplan, you’ll have to negotiate with the trust.

  What damn trust?

  Kaplan’s friendliness was gone, evaporated like the alcohol in his wife’s glass.

  You told me he was coming here to sell me the pictures, he said to Crow. You told me it would be straightforward.

  Straightforward the way you got this? I said, looking at my painting.

  Who runs this trust? Crow said.

  Nancy Rose.

  That’s a name unknown to me, Terry.

  She’s John Rose’s daughter.

  Crow looked blank.

  I’ve never heard of him, Kaplan said.

  You just offered me a lot of money for his picture, I said.

  The old man on the bridge, Crow said.

  John Rose died in this house, I said. Alexandra helped me try to save him. She was brave. I liked her.

  Kaplan glared at me. Something of what he felt for his daughter flared up and was visible and dangerous.

  Alex told me all about it, he said.

  Nancy is more than happy to deal with you, I said to Kaplan, provided certain guarantees and conditions are met.

  What kind of guarantees? Kaplan said.

  No mooring fee increase for boats that have been here over two years. Investment. A day care centre. Somewhere for the kids to go. Nancy’s got a list.

  I’ll bloody well take them down, Kaplan said.

  That would be a bad idea, I said. The paintings are not on your land. The bridge and the weir belong to the council.

  What’s in it for you? Kaplan said. What are you, sixty? You have no money. You’ll become like these men. Fighting in an empty car park.

  Some things are more important, I said.

  Terry, Crow said.

  You dirty bastard, Kaplan said.

  Now Alex, Crow said, take a moment. Just consider, if we do this right it could be very good for you. Laurel Archer’s film could do wonders.

  Crow gestured towards the painting of the miners.

  The value of Mr Godden’s work, he said, might sharply increase. In fact I’d say it was highly likely.

  Marina appeared at the open door. In the light of the hallway, I could see the grey in her red hair.

  There’s somebody outside, she said.

  You’re drunk, Kaplan said.

  Said my goodbyes. Kaplan said his through a closed mouth. Marina followed us to the door, bumping into walls and furniture as though she had woken up in a str
ange house. When I left she was standing in the lighted porch, staring into the dark. I walked across the midnight lawn, the border plants and flowers making soft black cut outs. There was nobody out there.

  Some things are more important. Who did I think I was, John Wayne? Didn’t matter. Looked forward to calling Nancy Rose. Crow was in. Could see himself getting paid. Would sweet-talk Kaplan because it was required. It might work.

  Down the steep lawn from the house to the river, I could smell as though for the first time the air that I’d been breathing for over a year. River air. Familiar now. Soaked earth that was never dry, so that the heavy dampness felt ancient. Sometimes so thick and close I could taste it in my mouth and nose, like having earth shovelled onto my face. As I came near the dock some sharpness I couldn’t name at first cut into the dampness.

  The dock was wet though there had been no rain. Kaplan’s big cruiser, bow forwards and tied alongside, glistened. Stepped onto the dock, my boots echoing. Bent and put my fingers to the wood. Water sounded hollowly against the hull of the cruiser and more deeply against the pilings. Everything was soaked in petrol.

  I stepped down into the Zodiac and began untying her from the dock piling. The rope was slick in my hands. There was petrol on the water.

  The tender began to rock so that I had to sit down on the transom. River water came towards me in a low terraced swell. I heard the engine before I saw Gene, at the bridge of his restored boat, coming out of the gloom. No lights running. Nameless and unpainted, a half-seen ghost of a boat.

  Whatever engine he’d salvaged from God knows where idled with a soft churning hum.

  Terry, Gene called softly.

  Face smeared with dirt and black grease.

  Gene, I said.

  Saw the tender, he said. Been waiting.

  What are you doing here?

  Where’s the dog? Gene said. Where’s old Red?

  You selling us out Terry?

  Gene, I said, we won Gene. Don’t do this. You don’t know. We won.

  You must be back on the piss Terry, Gene said, you believe that.

  Alexandra appeared alongside Gene and passed him a kid’s bow and arrow set. The girl’s red hair was crushed under a dark cap.

  What’s she doing here? I said.

  I’m here because I want to be, Alexandra said.

  She’s just a kid Gene, I said.

  I can speak for myself, she said.

  This won’t help you, I said.

  How could you possibly know what will help me? she said.

  I’ve lived longer than you, I said.

  You know why Michael really died? she said. Because he could only measure his worth against all this.

  What John Rose had said when he first told me about the mooring fee increase: I reject the measure by which I am found wanting.

  Get your boat moving Terry, Gene said.

  I put my hand on the Zodiac’s inflated bow, put my hand to my nose.

  It all burns the same, Gene said. Whichever side you’re on.

  He had an arrow fitted to his bow, the head of the arrow bulky with some kind of wrapping.

  You’re going to fuck everything up Gene.

  Everything’s already fucked up, he said. They won’t send divers. Won’t spend the money. Say it’s not a priority. Spend the fucking money when they thought I killed him. Michael never mattered.

  Michael’s not forgotten Gene, I said, he’s up on the bridge.

  Underwater, Gene said. You painted him underwater.

  Gene, I said.

  I’m not going to tell you again, Gene said, and raised the bow.

  I backed the boat away.

  Gene nodded at Alexandra and she lit the end of the arrow with a lighter. The arrowhead flared into flame.

  Gene there’s fuel in the boat.

  I should fucking hope so, he said.

  Doors crashing open and more lights going on in Kaplan’s house. Kaplan and Crow appeared at the top of the violet lawn.

  Who’s out there? Kaplan shouted. That the fucking painter?

  Terry! Crow shouted. Terry!

  Gene winked at me as he raised the stave of the bow higher.

  Fired. The flaming arrow made a fiery arc in the night sky. Lighting up the darkness. The arrow missed the cruiser and landed on the dock and the dock began to burn. Alexandra lit another arrow and Gene raised the bow and fired again. I could hear him laughing. There was a popping sound and the cruiser burst into flames.

  I looked away. Pointed the Zodiac into the headwind.

  Made for the island with everything behind me on fire, the faint sound of sirens becoming stronger in the distance.

  The boats and watching islanders were cast in reflected fire. Burning fragments of boat and wooden pier swirled and drifted across the river, dissolving in mid-air or falling harmlessly onto me, into the boat, the water. The fire did not reach as far as our side of the river, though the sparks kept falling as I came alongside Vesna.

  I saw Danny and Stella, watching, lit up by the blaze, but they didn’t see me.

  Anthony Waters held Perseis close. Maybe he heard the tender, I don’t know, but he turned and saw me. We stared at each other, until Waters broke the gaze and turned back around. Perseis never knew I was there. Poor kid, I thought, good luck to her.

  I went aboard.

  Red was gone.

  The cabin door forced open. All over the boat, more drops of blood that was not blood. I grabbed a torch and the makeshift rope lead and went out the door, shouting her name. The river was all violet and magenta. Kaplan’s dock and cruiser still burned fiercely. Great clouds of charcoal smoke churned upwards. Massive blood-orange flames were reflected in the sky. The air tasted of burning diesel. More sirens sounded from the mainland.

  A long way downstream I could see the faint blue light of a police launch moving fast in midwater. They’d be here soon, and coming onto the island with more cops and security guards and anybody else Kaplan could wake up and get out of bed. Even McNab and Hatchet Face. He’d send everybody to the island. All looking for me. They wouldn’t believe I had nothing to do with it. I had to find Red before they came.

  I followed her trail into the forest. Under torchlight the red marks were black. The dragging weight of my body, all the dark surround, seemed to fall away. I lost the trail or the trail stopped. Ahead of me was the work site. Dogs barking. There was a radio or a phone playing tinny music. Night security.

  The two huge German shepherds barked and snapped their jaws and jumped at the fence. Not chained, but running free inside.

  There were dark stains on the fur of both of them. A long handled chisel was jammed between the gate handles either side of the lock mechanism. The gate may have been locked, but there was no padlock I could see. There were small dips and scooped-out places on the ground by the fence where the dogs had been digging. Two men in cheap black uniforms sat in the hut. The guards. Big and Not So Big. The chairs and a small table were the only furniture I could see.

  Seen my dog? I shouted, my hands on the fence.

  I shook the fence. The bigger of the two men took his feet off the table and stood up. Moved stiffly, like he was hurt somewhere. Said something to his partner. Faces lit up by the sodium-yellow light.

  I moved away from the fence. The smaller man shouted at the dogs and eventually they stopped barking. I pointed at the German shepherds, one prowling along the fence line, one sat on the ground mouthing and licking at something that seemed caught in its fur. Both bitches, but big dogs, with huge heads and thick paws.

  I pointed at the dogs and pointed at me.

  My dog, I said, have you seen her?

  The big man shook his head, and pointed into the forest. The not-so-big guard said something in a rushed voice, and the big man said something hard and fast that shut him up. The other man took something lead coloured and threw it to the corner of the room so that it landed heavily.

  I went back into the forest. Michael’s stones. I switched
off the torch. Silver-edged ceramic hearts span slowly in the trees. Wind chimes and dream catchers. I stood surrounded by kids’ pictures. Many had Red in them. Easy to pick out because of her brightness. Red running in the forest. Inside a ring of children. Swimming in the river. Always at the heart of things. Sometimes a white-faced man in dark clothes is with her. In one he has his arms around the dog, and is smiling.

  John Rose had carved a rough picture of Red on the wood of an old fruit box and put it in a tree. Cheap wood, light as balsa, with that almost honey colour, and in the darkness of the forest Red’s picture was a source, something precious, giving off a kind of magic-hour light.

  I kept calling Red’s name, quieter each time, then I stopped. I figured I’d gone far enough to convince the men in the hut. The German shepherds had been wet around the mouth. Their fur was stained with something dark. No padlock on the gate.

  There was an iron skip filled with rubbish, building materials, supply bags, rubble from the cleared ground.

  I found her hidden behind some plasterboard discards. She was stuffed inside a bag that had been full of cement. When I lifted her out of the bag she was covered with strange pearl-like beads made from the grey cement thickening with her blood. I laid her on the ground. Around her throat there were strings of these red-grey beads, and many more down the centre of her where she had been ripped open. Her lips were drawn back from her teeth and her mouth was open, like when she was asleep and dreaming, but she would not dream any more. I lifted her paws, saw the broken nails wet with blood. The brave light in her eye was gone for the first time.

  I kneeled before her. I put my hands in her fur and rubbed it against the grain like I had the first time I’d seen her, and she had been no bigger than my hand. She was already cold. I picked her off the ground and cradled her. I buried my face in her fur and then I laid her back down. I kissed her.

  Wait there, sweetheart.

  I doubled back, making a big loop through the trees to come out behind the work site and the security guards’ hut.

  The moon was up, and followed me between the tall dark trees. Walked softly, holding the rope and belt so that they did not drag on the ground. Sodium-yellow light showed in a small back window. Also a door.