Picture This

‘In that case do you have an address for her?’

‘Not unless you’re an immediate relative, which I’m guessing you’re not.’

‘No, but I have important business to discuss with her… ’

‘Can’t help you, mister. We have a strict policy on giving out personal information. Now if you excuse me, I have a patient to attend to.’

Inside the supply cupboard Latisha exhaled in relief as she heard Felix’s footsteps recede into the distance.

*

Latisha carried the box over to Susie, cradling it like a child. She was reluctant to hand it over; it felt like surrendering her memory of her time with Maxine, the exclusivity of it.

The first thing Susie pulled out was the photocopy of Girl in a Yellow Square of Light. The yellow patch of light on the floor had been encircled, with a question mark in the centre. Gabriel Bandini’s address and phone number were scrawled over the top.

‘I went to his place,’ Latisha explained. ‘I think he’s working with Felix, making the Hoppers. There was old pigment, old gesso, old paintbrushes and them blank sheets of paper I sent you – dozens of them hidden under the bed. Lord knows what he needed them for.’

‘The provenance,’ Susie informed her. ‘But I’ve never heard Felix mention anyone called Gabriel, and he’s definitely not one of his artists.’

‘He keeps him hidden, like he keeps parts of himself hidden. Even Maxine knew that,’ Latisha replied. ‘Didn’t stop her from falling in love with him,’ she added ruefully.

‘He’s dangerous and dangerous is exciting: reminds you why you’re alive. Besides, we all compartmentalise, in one way or another. And he’s one of the most talented people in my world.’

‘Some of us have enough danger just making a living and putting food on the table,’ Latisha snapped back, wondering what she could do to make the woman wake up to the evil of the man. She looked back inside the box, and spotted a photo at the bottom. ‘Maxine was lost. See how lost she is here.’ She held the photo up.

It was an image Susie recognised immediately: Maxine and Felix on Felix’s balcony, mugging for the camera in crazy hats, a half-eaten meal in front of them. It was almost exactly the same setting and atmosphere she’d experienced at Felix’s apartment the first night she’d slept there. It was as if he’d duplicated the whole event – only with a different woman.

‘And here’s the pendant.’ Latisha drew the chain and pendant out of the box; it had exactly the same small ruby set into a rose-gold Celtic cross. ‘The only reason I can think that she wasn’t wearing it when she died is that they’d had a quarrel, and she’d taken it off.’

Susie stared down at the pendant, trying to assimilate all the information at once. The psychology of a man who needed to seduce two very similar women – both English, both artists – with exactly the same gestures, marking them with the same jewellery, perhaps even taking them to the same places, possibly playing the same humorous maverick role? Why, what was he after? What could Maxine and she give him in return? Art? He had that anyway, so why go to so much trouble? A sudden nausea swept through her, distracting her.

Noticing the change in her expression, Latisha put her hand on Susie’s arm. ‘You okay? You need a bucket or something?’

Susie took a couple of deep breaths. ‘It’ll pass.’

Sighing, Latisha got up heavily and put a kettle on her gas ring.

‘How far gone are you?’

Startled, Susie crossed her arms over her stomach. ‘Is it that obvious?’

‘No. Four, five weeks, I’m reckoning.’

‘I’m not going to keep it.’

Latisha waited until the water had boiled, filled the coffee pot, then carried it over to the table. She studied the artist’s face. ‘How old are you?’ She had difficulty telling how old some white women were; sometimes they appeared much younger, sometimes much older. She found it even harder with red

heads.

‘Thirty-eight. I never planned to be a mother, it’s an alien concept to me.’ Susie didn’t like exposing herself this way, yet Latisha had a way of pulling out the truth.

‘Big logical complicated words for a simple truth.’ Latisha laughed, pouring out two cups of hot liquid, putting one in front of her. ‘Chicory. Good for nausea. A 38-year-old woman with more money than she knows what to do with. You’ll keep the child. She’ll be a daughter to you.’

‘How do you know it will be a girl?’

‘Symmetry of nature. So you going to help me prove the truth about Felix Baum or not?’

Susie sipped the chicory drink. It was bitter but it pushed the nausea back down. She pulled the image of the Hopper towards her. ‘First thing we need to do is get hold of some of the letters Felix claims are the provenance for the painting and compare the ink and paper to the blank sheets you found.’