by Ashley Dyer
She clicked smartly into business mode. “I’ve already informed the chairman of the board; he will have told the director; our immediate family know, of course.” Her eyes darted to the laptop. “It should be possible to contain it.”
“Complete containment is often difficult in such circumstances, despite everyone’s best efforts,” Carver said, gently. “And once it is in the public domain, you will want to shield your children. Manchester Police will arrange for a family liaison officer to advise—”
“I’ve told them I’m quite capable of dealing with this without outside interference,” she said firmly.
“I’m sure,” he said. “But they can also keep you informed about the progress of the investigation.”
“Oh, I didn’t realize . . .” Her face crumpled for a second, and she stood and took two quick steps away from them, seemingly appalled at her sudden loss of control.
“Do you collect art?” Ruth asked, looking at the artwork around the room.
It seemed exactly the right question. Mrs. Fenst cleared her throat and smoothed her skirt before sitting down again; just as a police officer might fall back on their training in a dangerous situation, Mrs. Fenst’s social training kicked in. Required to make polite conversation, she was able to regain her composure.
“I dabble,” she said. “But my purchases are mostly for my shop, or for clients.” She must have seen a question on Ruth’s face, because she added, “I have an interior design business based in Wilmslow. Marcus is the serious collector—I mean, he was. His bank even sponsors a prize for new talent.”
“Artistic talent?” Ruth said.
“Well, yes . . .” Mrs. Fenst seemed to understand that she’d said something significant, but wasn’t sure what that might be.
“So there’s a competition?” Ruth said. Her tone was perfectly neutral, and Carver was happy to let her take the lead.
“The Alderson Bank Art Awards, yes. As well as grant applications—small one-off payments for a specific project—you know the sort of thing. Marcus has chaired the judging panel for the award for the past five or six years.”
Carver glanced across to Ruth. This could add another layer of meaning to Art for Art’s Sake.
“Who manages the entries?” Ruth asked.
Mrs. Fenst looked stricken. “Do you think that had something to do with Marcus’s—with what happened to Marcus?”
“We’re simply running down every possible line of inquiry,” Ruth said smoothly. Her calm, unreadable expression seemed to mollify Mrs. Fenst. She took a sip of coffee before asking, “Does it attract many entries?”
“Hundreds,” the widow said.
“Who else was on the judging panel with your husband?” Carver asked.
“I’m not sure—they tend to rotate. Jim Barrow would know—he owns a gallery in Manchester. Marcus drafted him in to help with the grant applications initially, but now he helps with the judging process, too. I can give you his contact details.”
“It would be helpful to see him today,” Carver said, “if you could set that up.”
“Oh, of course—I should have thought . . .” Her self-possession slipped; she clattered her coffee mug onto the glass tabletop, reached for her phone, and began frantically searching her contacts list.
“It’s really good of you to do this,” Ruth murmured in that same warm and reassuring tone, and the widow became calmer, scrolling through her contacts with more purpose.
A moment later, she tapped her phone screen; her head came up, and she tucked a curl of hair behind her left ear as she put the phone to it. “Jim?” she said. “It’s Anna. I have two Merseyside Police detectives here with me.” She paused. “I’m afraid so. Look, I know you’re busy, but might you have time to speak to them, if they come over now?” She glanced at Carver and gave him a nod. “That’s awfully good of you.” She hesitated. “Jim—they want to keep this under wraps for now.”
She listened to his reply. “Yes . . . Yes, thank you, I will.”
Carver avoided looking at the sculpture on the landing as they collected their coats: he’d seen enough torment for one day.
“What was that?” Ruth asked.
They were in the car again, winding their way through the tree-lined streets, some of them in soft green leaf.
“What was what?”
“When you saw the sculpture on the stairs,” she reminded him. “That.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“You freaked out.”
Shit.
He forced a laugh. “I really don’t know what you mean.”
She swung the car in to the curb and yanked the handbrake on so hard the back end dipped. “You’re such a liar.”
“Ruth, what the hell is this?”
“This is me not being partisan,” she said. “This is ‘objectivity.’ You looked at that sculpture like you’d seen a ghost.”
He scoffed, though he felt sick. “Rubbish.”
She turned to face him and he saw red-hot anger.
Tell her the truth, for God’s sake. He opened his mouth, but the words stuck in his throat.
“All right,” she said. “Let me give you my perspective: I’ve been your unofficial driver since you came back to work—which is fine, except you’ve asked me again and again to take you on ride-alongs when I should’ve dropped you at home, per protocol—this afternoon, this journey being one example of many. You’ve blanked in meetings, and I’ve covered your arse. You’ve forgotten names and dates and times, and like a partisan idiot, I’ve supplied them for you.”
“And I’m grateful,” he said. “But—”
“No buts, Greg—you can’t have it both ways,” she said. “You can’t tell me to be nonpartisan and objective, but only where it doesn’t concern you. You can’t tell me to ask difficult questions—but not of you. You looked like you’d pass out when you saw that sculpture—and now I want an honest answer: What did you see?”
He took a breath, let it go slowly. “A person,” he said simply. “I thought it was real and . . .”
“So you’re hallucinating again?”
“No.”
She slammed her palms against the steering wheel. “Jeez, don’t lie to me.”
“I’m not,” he said. “I wasn’t hallucinating, but I am having distortions of perception.”
“Isn’t that the same thing?” The question seemed genuine.
“I’m told not.”
He saw her log that one away.
“I am experiencing hallucinations—but that wasn’t one of them. I’m having flashbacks, too.”
She faced the front and her hands slid from the wheel into her lap like they’d suddenly become boneless. “Then we really are screwed,” she said.
He laughed, and she said, “You think this is funny?”
“No.” He turned to her. “It’s just that those are almost exactly the words I used to my therapist.”
“It was the therapist who told you the difference between hallucinations and distortions of perception?”
He nodded. “You told me I needed to open up to someone, and you were right.”
It felt so good to be honest with her, he felt foolishly, humiliatingly close to tears.
“You were right,” he repeated, just to hear the sound of it, “and I was wrong.”
She blinked.
“I’ve been such a damn hypocrite, lecturing you on balance and perspective, while putting you in this impossible situation.”
“Okay . . .” For once, it seemed, Ruth Lake did not know how to respond.
“I have to tell you something,” he said.
“Greg, it’s okay.” She seemed suddenly appalled.
“No, listen,” he said. “I have to tell you. And if you decide you can’t do all those things you’ve been doing to make it possible for me to work—well, then I’ll understand. I’ll step away from the investigation and take time out—even resign, if I have to.”
Her eyes widened. “Jesus, Greg
, don’t—”
“I froze,” he said, before he could argue himself out of it.
“What?” She frowned; apparently this was not what she’d expected to hear. “When?”
“Yesterday, at Karl’s flat. I froze.”
Ruth shook her head. “No.”
“Yes.” He took a breath and exhaled slowly. “I had a full-blown dissociative episode.”
“No,” she said again. “You were with me all the way.” She looked into his face as if she expected him to crack a smile, tell her it was all a bad joke.
“I didn’t know where the hell I was, Ruth. I thought I was—Shit . . .” He wiped a hand over his face. “I don’t know what I thought.”
“I . . . Greg, I’m sorry. I didn’t even . . .” She faltered.
“You shouldn’t be apologizing,” Carver said. “I’m the one who put us both at risk. All because I convinced myself that if you want to get through PTSD, all you need to do is grit your teeth and keep going.”
“PTSD?” she echoed.
“Yeah.” He stared at his hands. “That.”
“I never thought I’d hear you say those words.”
“Technically, those are letters,” he said. “Not words.”
She huffed a laugh, but her eyes shone with tears. “Even so,” she said.
“I want you to know I’m dealing with it,” he said. “I mean, properly dealing with it—with a therapist.”
“A therapist?” she said, sharp as knives. “Not the therapist—as in the job-appointed shrink?”
He smiled; this was one of the reasons he loved working with Ruth. “A therapist,” he confirmed. “A specialist in . . .”
“PTSD,” she said. “It’s okay, you can say it.”
“So what d’you say?”
She shifted into first gear and pulled out. “You do realize you’ve put me in an impossible situation—again?”
“Oh, God . . . Ruth, I’m—”
He shot her a guilty look, and realized she was smiling.
“You’re okay with it, then?”
“Oh, I didn’t say that,” she said.
“Whatever you want, I’ll do it.”
She tapped the steering wheel with one finger, working out her list of demands. “You go to the sessions and you do the tasks they set you—that’s both therapists.”
“Of course,” he said.
“And you’re completely honest with me,” she said. “If you need a break. If you start seeing hobgoblins or ‘distortions’ or whatever—you tell me. And if I tell you it’s time to go home—you go home.”
“Wait a minute,” he protested. “Who’s the boss here?”
“That’s the deal,” she said. “Take it or leave it.”
Ruth Lake had a way of disconnecting her emotions that went far beyond normal cop distancing—but Carver could see that she was covering extreme emotion just now. If he refused, their partnership was over.
“It’s a deal,” he said. “All terms accepted.”
She slid him a sideways glance that said she would not be taking his promise at face value.
58
By the time they arrived at the swanky shop front of Barrow Fine Art, the gallery was closed for the night and perforated black metal screens covered the windows. The lights were on, but it was impossible to see inside. Ruth pressed the doorbell at the side entrance and Jim Barrow appeared a minute later. He was younger than Carver had expected, with a shock of red hair he gelled into an impossible quiff.
“Come through,” he said. “I’ve been setting up a new display in the main gallery.”
He led them through to the front of the shop, past metal and stone sculptures, plinths highlighting smaller works, glass cabinets ranged with pottery and glasswork. A young woman and a skinny youth were hanging a painting on the wall; they gave Carver and Lake no more than a cursory glance before continuing.
“Remember—spirit level,” Barrow said in passing.
A painting half a meter high and three meters wide had been hung on one wall, with nothing to obstruct the sight line. It was thickly daubed with acrylic paint that looked like it had been applied with a palette knife rather than a brush; silver and dove grays darkened to blue grays and black.
Carver couldn’t take his eyes off it, and the gallery owner said, “Oh, that. It’s called—”
“Depression,” Carver said.
“You know the artist?”
Carver blinked. Did I say that aloud? “No, I—”
“Oh, wow . . .” Barrow walked around Carver, eyeing him up and down as if he were a new exhibit. “You’re a synesthete. That is very cool. So is the artist—this piece was made for you.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Nonsense—you’re attuned.”
“Thanks, but even if I had a wall big enough, I don’t think I’d survive it,” Carver said.
“Point taken.” Barrow stood for a moment, one arm across his chest, his chin resting on the fist of his free hand. “You know—he does happy work, too. Lemme show you.”
Light on his feet, Barrow bounced to a panel off to the right of the big painting and set at forty-five degrees to it. He raised a hand in a dramatic gesture, indicating a picture in the same dot-and-daub style, but in this one the color palette was an explosion of gold, buttery yellows, lemon, and white; it looked like sunshine and happiness.
“I mean, isn’t it?” Barrow said, as though Carver had said something. “The technique is called impasto—the paint is practically buttered onto the canvas—that’s what gives it these rich, sexy, sumptuous tones. It is sexy, hm?”
Dashes of green flecked the work, and Carver couldn’t help but respond to the uncompromising exuberance of both the picture and the gallery owner. “If we could speak in private, Mr. Barrow—this is rather urgent . . .”
“Oh, God, sorry, yes—I get a bit manic before a big exhibition. Note to self: take a lithium pill. This way.” He headed off to the far side of the room and disappeared behind another panel.
Carver exchanged a look with Ruth, and she covered a smile.
The panel concealed a door into a passageway that gave access to the gallery owner’s office. As they arrived, Carver was surprised to see Barrow taking a pill with a sip of water. It seemed he wasn’t joking about the medication.
Barrow’s office was modern and minimal, the walls of the room bare but painted in a two-tone design with black lines forming a kind of artwork. A glass table served as his desk; a laptop and a notepad were the sum total of clutter, the built-in cupboards hiding the rest, Carver supposed.
Barrow set the water glass on the table and offered them a seat in two ’50s-style retro armchairs. He took a third, facing them, his hands trapped between his knees.
“So,” he said. “You wanted to know about the Alderson Award?”
“That’ll do for a start,” Carver said.
“It focuses on art in public spaces, including monumental sculpture, installations, and friezes for public buildings. Art submitted may be permanent, or ephemeral.”
Carver frowned. “Art that doesn’t last?”
“Street art, graffiti, displays designed to decay—we had a lot of exhibits based around entropy this year. A reflection of the times we live in, I fear.”
“Did Mr. Fenst fall out with applicants over the award?”
Barrow rolled his eyes. “These are artists, Chief Inspector. You may have noticed that I don’t have artwork in my office. Why? Because the minute a possible exhibitor sees another person’s art on the walls, their hackles are up. You can see their little brains working: ‘Why that artist and not me?’ Or they think you couldn’t possibly understand or appreciate their work if you have that artist on your walls. It just gets so bloody, it’s simpler to have none at all.”
“When you say ‘bloody’ . . .”
“We do have a strict rule for the award—judges’ decision final; no correspondence, no appeal, et cetera, but you know how it is—some people don’t think
the rules apply to them.”
“Any names come to mind?” Ruth asked.
“I’m not good with names.”
“Did Mr. Fenst mention any worries, anyone hassling him?”
Barrow took a breath and looked to the top-right corner of the room as if something was written there. But after ten seconds his shoulders sagged and he exhaled in a rush. “Sorry,” he said.
“You haven’t announced the winner yet?” Carver asked.
“We’re still on the long list—or were. They’ll have to appoint someone else from the board to chair.”
Carver could see he was itching to pick up his phone and make the call.
“I’d wait for them to contact you, sir,” he said.
“Oh, shit, yes, of course—discretion and all that.”
“Do you keep records of applications?” Ruth again.
“We do. At least, the bank does—I just sit with Marcus and zip through the submissions as they come in—decide which of them are worth a second look.” He looked suddenly stunned, and Carver wondered if he’d remembered something important.
“Mr. Barrow?” he said.
“I’ve just realized,” Barrow said. “He’s really gone.”
Carver gave him a moment, and he leaned forward and picked up the water glass. His hand trembled as he held it to his lips to take another swallow.
“How does the submissions process work?” Carver asked.
Barrow turned his head in Carver’s direction but seemed to have trouble focusing on his face. “What?”
“The submissions process,” Carver repeated.
“For the award?”
“Grants, too.”
“The artists write a page or so, explaining why their project should be awarded a grant, or considered for the award,” he began. As he spoke, gradually he became less dazed, and his pace picked up. “Most artists send images or video electronically. Once they’ve been sifted to ensure eligibility, Marcus and I decide the long list. We send for the real thing if they’re short-listed—if that’s even possible—given that some submissions are street art. We arrange a face-to-face meeting so that the judges can quiz the short-listed entries.”
