by Jessie Keane
‘Then ditch him. Get another one,’ said Marcus. Christ, how she went on.
Paulette blew out her lips and flounced over to the bed and sat there, looking at him.
‘Actually, I’m getting tired of the modelling,’ she said with a sigh.
‘Do something else then.’
Paulette’s eyes sparkled suddenly. ‘We could get married. Make it legit.’
Here we bloody go, thought Marcus. She’d skirted around the marriage thing before, but this was the first direct approach.
‘We’re not getting married,’ said Marcus. ‘Get a new agent. Get some better jobs. And don’t mention that again.’
He walked over to the bed and stood looking down at her, tried to fathom out what the attraction had been in the first place. But all he kept thinking about was Clara Hatton and those violet-blue eyes of hers. He undid his tie, started unbuttoning his shirt.
‘Get those bloody jodhpurs off,’ he snapped, because he was aroused again.
Paulette stopped pouting and gave him a smile.
37
‘What do you know about infinity?’ asked David.
Bernie stared up at him. She could see infinity in his sweet blue eyes, she thought. Since that first visit, she’d come to the studio often. David was gorgeous. Or he would be, if he’d put that fag out for five minutes; it was making him squint. That was the scent she was coming to associate with him; tobacco mingled with Old Spice. She watched him in admiration and listened dreamily to the Marcels crooning ‘Blue Moon’ on the desk radio.
David was dressed today in chestnut-coloured cord trousers, a baggy white shirt and a sheeny brown waistcoat. His long face was soulful, his sandy-brown hair pulled back in its usual ponytail. He chain-smoked and chewed his nails to the quick, but that was OK; he was an artist, highly strung, he could turn a brat of a child into a cherub through the power of the lens, could turn a plain bride into an angel. Bernie understood taut nerves; she suffered from them herself, after all.
She had already learned so much from him. She admired the fact that he hadn’t followed that flashy newcomer Bailey and gone into high-end fashion shoots for Vogue, even though that was where the money was. Bailey, Donovan and Duffy – the Black Trinity, as Norman Parkinson called them – they were famous. But David was worth much more in her opinion. He was a social photographer, he had high principles, and if it didn’t pay much, well, so what.
She was sitting at the desk in the tiny reception area of his rented studio, surrounded by brown woodchip walls on which were hung large gold-framed misty close-ups of brides, beautifully contrived portraits of couples, a lovely oval canvas of two children, darkly lit in a Rembrandt style, and posed beside a cream-coloured Victorian nursing chair.
Bernie was cutting corners off 5 x 3½-inch proofs, matching the negative number to each one, then writing that on the back, beside the studio stamp.
‘Infinity? I know it’s on the camera lenses, but apart from that? I don’t know much about it,’ Bernie said, watching as he turned the costly Leica camera over in his agile longfingered hands.
He’d taken out a huge loan to buy it, he told her when she’d asked, and a Hasselblad too. The Leica was 35mm and lighter, more easily portable for portrait shoots, but the Hasselblad had a bigger negative, and a fabulously ‘soft’ lens; it was perfect for weddings.
‘I don’t know why I have to cut the corners off these wedding proofs, either,’ said Bernie.
‘Isn’t it obvious? You cut one corner off every proof because otherwise customers will hold on to them and put them in frames or folders and not order proper prints. With one corner missing, they can’t do that, can they? A proof is just that: a sample to order from, that’s all. So the customer has to take a note of the neg number on the back, and order more prints from the studio, instead of pinching the proofs and using those – thereby taking the food out of my mouth.’
Bernie frowned at the prints. There was so much she didn’t know. She didn’t begin to understand the process of photography – and David wouldn’t let her into his darkroom down in the basement, couldn’t risk any light penetrating that red-tinted black hole of his. Which was awkward, because he kept the filing cabinet in there with all his paperwork and negatives stored inside it, and she had to wait for him to come out before she could go in.
‘What if you put the studio stamp on the front, across the print?’ she asked.
The door onto the street opened, dinging the little bell overhead.
David straightened. ‘Tried that. Big trouble. Customers complaining the stamp was across the faces, or they couldn’t see the pattern on the dress. Tried a gold blocking machine, too, but that wasn’t popular either.’
He turned, putting on a big smile for the customer who’d entered. Then Bernie saw the smile instantly drop away from his face.
Standing just inside the door was a striking sight. It was a hugely tall black man – easily as tall as David himself, but solid with it, not skinny – and he was wearing big looping chains of gold around his neck and wrists, a black Stetson hat on his head and a long black-and-white pony-skin coat that nearly touched the floor.
‘Yasta,’ said David, and all at once his manner was obsequious. When his smile reappeared, it looked sickly.
He’s afraid of him, she realized.
The man came over to the desk, looked down with molten brown eyes at Bernie. ‘And who is this?’ he asked, in a voice so deep it seemed to come from his boots.
‘This is Bernie. Bernie Dolan,’ said David. ‘Bernie, this is Mr Frate.’
Yasta Frate reached out a hand, took one of Bernie’s in a bearlike grasp, and raised it to his lips.
‘Charmed,’ he said, and Bernie had to fight the urge to snatch her hand back. Then he turned his attention to David. ‘Want to talk,’ he said. ‘Might have something for you.’
‘Right! Let’s take a walk,’ said David, and led the way to the door. He glanced back at Bernie.
‘Can you call the customer when those proofs are ready?’ he said. ‘See you,’ he called over his shoulder, and was gone.
38
When Jamesy’s sister, Susan, dropped that bombshell about her having been there on the night of the fight, Fulton, who was standing on her doorstep and on the verge of leaving the place without ever knowing, said: ‘Why didn’t you fucking well say so?’
Her lips puckered up in a scowl. ‘I’m saying so now, ain’t I? Of course, if you don’t want to hear about it . . . ’ She was starting to shut the door in his face.
Fulton put one shovel-like hand up, stopping the door closing. ‘Let’s not be hasty.’
‘No. Let’s not, eh? So what’s it worth, this information you’re so keen to get?’ asked Susan, her eyes narrowing with avarice.
Fulton exerted sudden force on the door and Susan staggered back, tripped over her own carpet slippers and nearly fell on her arse in the hall.
Fulton pushed his way inside, closing the front door behind him. He grabbed Susan by her frizzy blonde hair and walloped her against the wall. Then he leaned in close and stared into her startled eyes.
‘Hey! What the f—’ she started to holler, then saw the look in his eyes and went quiet.
‘You see what happened to Jacko that night? Did you?’
‘Look, don’t take offence over the money thing. A girl’s got to live, you know,’ she babbled.
‘Tell me what you saw.’ He slammed her head against the wall again.
‘All right!’ she panted out. ‘No need for that. I saw him getting a pasting, OK? But I was running outside, everyone was running, it was a madhouse in there. It was only when I got out in the street that I realized Jamesy wasn’t behind me, and I didn’t dare go back in. They did for Jamesy, that lot. Curse their black souls.’
‘What else?’
‘Nothing. I was waiting for Jamesy to come out, and he didn’t. It was hours . . . then when it had all quietened down, I went back in, and found him on the floor. The state of him! I
called the ambulance from the club.’
‘You didn’t see Jacko?’
‘No, I didn’t. I was so upset about Jamesy, I can’t be sure, but I don’t think Jacko was still in the club when I went back in there.’
‘Who’d you see fighting with Jacko?’ asked Fulton.
‘The thin one with the ’tache who’s always there. The one they all call Pistol Pete, ’cos he’s a hit with the girls.’
Fulton went to a phone box and checked in with Ivan.
‘What you been doin’ down there? Taking a fucking holiday?’
Fulton bristled at that, but after all Ivan was The Boss. He had taken The Chair, had kicked Dad into second place.
‘I’ve got a job down here, I’ll hang around a bit.’
‘What sort of job?’
‘Door work.’
‘Fuckin’ hell.’ Ivan sounded disgusted. He ran a big dealership that was expanding all the time. Had cash to burn. Door work? Granted, you could make a fair whack on the side dealing, but there were better jobs.
‘I like it,’ said Fulton obstinately. He did too. It was bloody heaven, because he saw her, Clara, nearly every day lately, saw her passing through the clubs. Sometimes he even talked to her. She seemed to be good friends with that limp-wristed fucker Cotton.
‘You still looking?’ asked Ivan.
‘Sure I am.’ Fulton told him about Jamesy, and the sister.
‘Well, keep it in mind,’ said Ivan, not too bothered because Ma had gone off the boil now, she was getting old and it had got to the point where she sometimes thought he was Jacko, so what the fuck.
Then the pips went and Fulton put the phone down and headed back to his flat, made himself some tea and went over to where he had set up a corner table, a sort of shrine to her. He had the handkerchief there, and now he had her comb too, with a few strands of her hair still attached to it. He picked up both items and sniffed: smelled her perfume, so faint, so tantalizing.
One day she’ll be mine, thought Fulton.
He didn’t believe these ‘engagement’ rumours.
She wouldn’t marry Toby Cotton, for God’s sake.
She couldn’t.
39
This wedding, Clara’s second, was totally different from the first. It was grand, no expense spared.
‘I love fine things, my darling, and you are extremely fine. Nothing’s too good for the wife of Toby cotton,’ said her fiancé, kissing her cheek warmly. And he set out to prove it too.
Clara’s wedding gown was designer, a shimmering cascade of chiffon over the finest ivory silk. Her shoes were handmade white satin, her bouquet a waterfall of white lilies. Toby took a keen interest in what she was going to wear on the day.
‘But it’s unlucky, isn’t it? For the groom to see the wedding dress?’
‘Bullshit,’ said Toby, and so they had a lot of fun together, touring the boutiques and department stores. But none of the dresses met with his approval, so he took her to an atelier near Bond Street where they found the right, the perfect designer, who made her wedding dress.
‘You look so beautiful,’ said Bernie, twitching around, arranging the veil as she and Clara stood with a silent, moody Henry on the church steps. Much as Clara disliked the idea, Henry was her only male relative and so was to give her away.
‘How’s it going at school?’ she’d asked him brightly when he arrived, trying to connect with the Henry she’d once known, the sweet little boy, and not with this bulky, hardeyed, fifteen-year-old stranger.
‘Shitty as ever,’ said Henry, and that was the end of that.
Clara thought that Bernie looked beautiful too, her bronze-tinted hair and pale pink complexion offset by a deep moss-green satin dress with three-quarter-length sleeves and a bouquet of antique pink roses, but Clara’s day had been somewhat blighted by her sister’s insistence on inviting along ‘the slum photographer’ as she always now thought of David Bennett.
She hoped that Bernie wasn’t getting too close to that man. He had a poor look about him; even now, all dressed up for the occasion, you could see his collars and cuffs were ragged, his clothes were badly fitted and shiny with wear. Granted, he was OK to look at in a pale, over-tall, thin Byronic way – a look that was guaranteed, she thought, to tug at Bernie’s soft heart-strings – but she didn’t want anything serious developing there.
The atmosphere between Henry and his elder sister was frosty, although Clara was pleased to see that boarding school had at least given him some polish. He was taller than her now, and looked quite thickset and handsome in his dark morning dress.
Girls must swoon over him, Clara thought, and then she thought of the manic darkness in Henry’s soul and she shivered for those girls and wished they’d stay away.
The groom almost eclipsed the bride on the day of the wedding. Toby wore a bespoke buttercream-coloured three-piece suit to match Clara’s gown, and an ivory straw Panama hat. And while her side of the church was nearly empty but for her brother and sister and David Bennett, his was packed with scores of Bohemian types in trailing scarves and exuberant hats.
They warmly exchanged their vows. Then, at last, she was Mrs cotton and the huge house, the lavish clothing and the life of safe comfort she’d craved were all hers.
After the reception – held in a massive marquee in the grounds of Toby’s house, with guest appearances from some of Toby’s newly discovered bands – she retired to the master bedroom with Bernie and slipped into her going-away clothes for the honeymoon trip to Venice.
‘Oh, this is so lovely,’ sighed Bernie, zipping up her sister’s pale taupe gown and then slipping the fawn cashmere coat, trimmed at the cuffs and the collar with ginger fox fur, onto her shoulders. They were travelling first all the way. Better than first, Toby had told her: by a private jet he’d hired for the occasion.
‘Help me with these . . . ’ said Clara, and Bernie reached behind her sister’s neck to fasten the clasp of a double string of real luminescent pearls. Finally Clara picked up her gloves and bag, slipped her feet into her elegant flesh-coloured courts. There in the mirror, the sisters stared into each other’s eyes and smiled.
‘Do I look all right?’ asked Clara.
‘Wonderful.’ Bernie chewed her lip, as if hesitating over saying something more.
‘What?’ asked Clara. ‘Spit it out, Bern.’
‘Do you love him, Clara?’ she asked at last.
Clara’s eyes locked with Bernie’s for a long moment. Then she smiled and shrugged. ‘Yes, of course.’ She did love Toby, in her way. He was a dear, dear friend to her, which was quite enough – more than enough.
There was a knock on the door and Bernie went to open it. Henry stepped inside and leaned back against the closed door.
‘You look very beautiful, Clara,’ he said.
‘Thank you, Henry,’ she said politely, feeling that slight stiffening of distaste that she always felt in her brother’s company. Henry’s voice was deep now, his attitude both condescending and guarded.
‘Pity it’s all going to be wasted on that prancing fairy,’ he said.
Both Clara and Bernie gasped in shock at that.
Henry smiled.
Clara went over to where he slouched arrogantly against the door, hands in pockets, one ankle crossed casually over the other. That stance reminded her of Marcus Redmayne, and today of all days she didn’t want to be reminded of him. ‘Take that back,’ she said.
‘Why should I? It’s what he is. But he’s rich, and that’s all that matters.’
‘Take it back,’ hissed Clara.
Bernie rushed over. ‘Clara . . . ’ she said, putting a restraining hand on her arm.
‘I’m not taking it back,’ said Henry.
Clara lashed out, striking Henry across the cheek. His skin reddened instantly and he put a hand up to his face.
‘How dare you stand here in his house and say a thing like that?’ Clara shouted.
‘You’re such an act, Clara dear,’ said Henry, s
miling, dropping his hand away from his face as if her blow had been no more than a moth-wing brushing against his skin. Which probably it had. Henry was growing up very fast, and very tough, scowling at everything – angry, it seemed, at the entire world. His words reminded her of Redmayne too, stopping her outside Toby’s club: You’re some act.
‘What do you mean?’ she snapped.
‘Clara . . . ’ said Bernie again, hopelessly.
‘I don’t know how you do it, I honestly don’t,’ said Henry. ‘Crawling into bed with that old drunk Hatton, and now with this poncy bastard. I suppose you do know what he is, and the things he’s into? Maybe you don’t. And you hit me again, sister dear? I’ll hit you straight back.’
‘I’ve done everything for this family,’ said Clara icily. ‘Everything. Just to keep us together and keep us fed and housed.’
‘Keep us together? You couldn’t wait to get rid of me,’ he said.
Again she saw it, she saw it all, flashing through her brain. Her mother lying dead, Bernie’s tears, their desperate flight from the slums, and then Henry, this twisted little bastard, stealing from her purse and then – horrifyingly – murdering Frank’s dog.
‘Get out,’ she said, her heart breaking. He was her brother and once she had loved him. But no more. He had become a monster, a thing beneath contempt.
‘Pleasure,’ he said, turning and opening the door.
‘Get out and don’t come back!’ yelled Clara as he closed it behind him.
40
Later, Clara could admit that she had known there was something amiss right from the start. She spent her wedding night alone in the master bedroom, while hearing the noises of laughter and singing still going on downstairs late into the night. She didn’t mind. Not then. Exhausted after the hectic day, she slept deeply and awoke next morning, refreshed, ready for the upcoming trip to Venice.
Their hotel, an exclusive haven on the island of Giudecca in the Venetian lagoon, offered a water taxi service over to St Mark’s Square, and the day after their wedding Toby took advantage of that service before she was even awake.
