The Tied Man
I didn’t know what the hell to say to that. I just gave an ungrateful sigh of exasperation and pulled the sweater over my head.
‘It’s just your colour,’ Henry enthused.
‘And you can fuck right off,’ I said, but he was right. It was never going to be anything less than perfect if Lilith had anything to do with it. So I sat and drank my second pint, enveloped in a rare warmth that wasn’t entirely to do with the latest addition to my wardrobe.
We sat there for the best part of an hour. Inconsequential banter for the most part, but I couldn’t remember last time I’d enjoyed a quiet beer so much.
With hindsight, I should have marked the date in a diary – it would be the last time in a while before any of us felt like smiling again.
Chapter Fourteen
Lilith
Blaine draped herself over several thousand pounds’ worth of ancient sofa and watched me work with an unnerving blend of amusement and close scrutiny. As I had predicted before my arrival she had decided on the final pose for her portrait, so I was stuck with the cliché of ‘Woman, Reclining’.
She was ebullient, relaxed and entirely naked. The fanciful theory that a person’s life was etched on their physical form – be it despair, happiness, or in this case sheer depravity – was entirely disproved by Blaine. That, or she already had a huge portrait of herself slowly decaying in the attic. A woman twenty years younger would have envied her: there wasn’t a blemish on her ivory skin, and her discreetly enhanced breasts hardly moved no matter how she positioned herself.
‘So, do you ever…’ she began. I had come to dread these moments: her attempts at light conversation now felt more like interrogation.
‘No.’
‘Before I’ve even finished the question?’
‘No, I never get turned on. It’s work. Simple as that.’ Which hadn’t always been true, but the less Blaine knew about me, the more secure I felt.
‘It’s no wonder people think you’re psychic,’ Blaine laughed, amused rather than offended. ‘Such self-control. I’ve always found it to be one of the bonuses of my line of work, if I’m honest. Perhaps you’ve never had the right sitter: some irresistible man to break through the ice.’
‘I doubt it.’
‘Or maybe some irresistible woman? There are some very interesting rumours surrounding you, after all.’
‘Which should be placed in the same file as my seven abortions, planned sex-change and profound belief in alien lizards ruling the nation,’ I lied.
‘For someone with such an ability to dissect others, you’re a veritable Swiss bank vault yourself, aren’t you, Lilith? Perhaps I should send Finn to sit for you again.’
‘Mm,’ I said by way of reply, in a way that suggested I was now too engrossed in the task to respond.
As technical drawings, these final sketches were near-perfect, but that morning I hated them more than ever. Even at this stage, long before the meticulous blending and layering of pigments that would leave me red-eyed for weeks from working inches from the canvas, I had come to dread working on the piece. Only a need to earn my freedom kept me going.
*****
Blaine spent only two hours with me, announcing that she would be too busy to do a full sitting, as if that were a bad thing. Just as I was revelling in the relief of being left alone with a pile of mute and pliable preparatory sketches instead of the real thing, I heard the first distant crash from somewhere in the vast house; the distinct sharp sound of ceramic shattering against stone. Grateful for the diversion, I rested my brush on the easel’s shelf and went to investigate.
*****
It looked as though the kitchen had played host to a particularly malevolent poltergeist. An entire dinner service appeared to have been sacrificed to the slate, and by the far wall a pool of milk seeped in streams around jagged little islands of atomised crockery.
In the centre of this devastation crouched Henry, oblivious to my presence as he picked up the wreckage piece by piece and placed it in a crumpled supermarket carrier bag.
‘Need a hand?’ I asked from the doorway.
Henry started at the sound of my voice. ‘Oh, Lilith… Sorry, I didn’t… Be careful in your bare feet, dear – you’ll rip them to shreds if you come in here.’
I hardly needed the warning as I cautiously began to make my way to his side. ‘What the hell happened?’ I asked, already sensing what the answer would be.
Henry confirmed my fears. ‘It was Finn. He, well – you can see, really. It was unfortunate that I’d just finished washing up – another five minutes and there’d have been nothing out for him to break.’