The Bulgari Connection Read Online Free Page B

that painting was not a proper job. Off they’d go, to their smart well-appointed offices in publishing, or PR, or advertising or wherever, for a return on their labour far greater than any he was ever likely to achieve. And one evening they would simply not come home, but within a couple of days a brother, or some gay friend, or a father would turn up to take away their possessions.
    That the studio had a good North light, that crackling cold for some reason increased intensity of colour, had apparently not impressed them: the tenderness of his lovemaking could not make up for his reluctance to turn up the central heating. It had happened enough times – well, twice in as many months, within the last year – to make him feel this was to be the pattern of life and there was nothing much to be done about it. Yet he hated living alone. Art made a frugal bed companion. An older woman would surely be more sensitive as to how he lived, why he lived. It was true the skin round her jaw sagged a little, and curved lines ran between her cheeks and the corners of her mouth, and the division between lip and the rest was a trifle blurred, but she was the proper shape for a woman. He wanted to paint her. He wanted to be in her presence. He wanted her in his bed. Good Lord, he thought, this is love at first sight. He felt the need for a cigarette. He asked, nervously, if she minded. She had once, she said, been practically a chain smoker; but she had given it up in prison. It was so terrible in there it hadn’t seemed to matter if it was a few degrees more terrible still. He should go ahead. She didn’t mind. ‘Prison! What for …’ Walter was startled. ‘Attempted murder,’ she said.
    Lady Juliet swooped and carried Walter Wells off, like a cat grabbing its kitten by the scruff of the neck and running off with it to safety. The auction was about to begin.
    â€˜What exactly do you want me to say?’ he asked.
    â€˜How art benefits humanity, all that kind of thing. Don’t worry about it. How you look is more important than what you say. No-one will be listening, just watching. Sometimes no-one bids at all, and the auctioneer has to take bids off the wall. That’s so embarrassing. But with you and me both here we should get a good price.’
    Walter Wells, who was not accustomed to public speaking, demanded at least some prompting about the way in which art could serve humanity, and on the way to the plinth Lady Juliet told him to mention both the morality of aesthetics, and how suitable it was that the haves of the luxury trades – in which fine art was included – should do their bit for the have-nots. And perhaps a mention as to how she, Lady Juliet, had given her precious time freely, as the sitter.
    â€˜Wish me good luck,’ he’d said to Grace as he went. But she hadn’t replied, she was staring, along with everyone else, at a couple who had just come into the room. Even the string quartet faltered mid phrase. All eyes turned, as if to royalty, towards a good-looking older man in a very expensive suit – Walter had painted that particular Chairman of the Board type many a time, sitting behind some great burr-oak desk, or leaning up against a pillar at Company headquarters, dull, dull, dull – and a younger woman in a flame-coloured dress with a strong nose, a hard mouth, and a band of solid powerful gold around her neck; but who moved with a kind of focused energy, as if all the wind of the present, whirling around, had sought her out as its centre. Always hard to get on canvas, this kind of thing, this sense of the present made apparent, if only because those few whom fate so selected were seldom in repose. They never sat still.

7
    Doris Dubois and Barley Salt found themselves at a loose end after their Caesar salad and sparkling water lunch at the Ivy. Barley had once been in the habit of ordering the fried fish and the thick chips and mushy peas