BLINDFOLD

by Lyndon Stacey

  He had revived the flagging Aga, and had porridge thickening in a pan on the top by the time Rachel put in an appearance. She padded in on slippered feet, wearing jeans and one of her hugest, hairiest jumpers, to be greeted with pleasure by Elsa, who rubbed, purring loudly, around her ankles.

  `Oh, fickle feline,' Gideon said reproachfully. `Only five minutes ago you swore you wouldn't look at another if I let you have the top of the milk. Now look at you!'

  Rachel laughed, bending to stroke the beautiful, flecked coat. Gideon tapped the saucepan sharply with the wooden spoon to get Rachel's attention. `Porridge is ready. Sit yourself down.'

  She hesitated, looking half-shyly at him through a cloud of dark hair.

  `I'm sorry about last night, Gideon. You must think me very silly.'

  `I don't.'

  `Well, the thing is, I just wanted to thank you, for not - well, you know...'

  He raised an eyebrow quizzically, then said, `Do you want brown sugar or white?'

  It was a lovely morning once again and Gideon was glad when Pippa called to invite Rachel out for a ride. Not only would it do her good to get out of the house, but also Gideon had a mind to visit Lyddon Grange again. He was prompted by a telephone call from Naomi who was tired and rather emotional after a sleepless night at the Sanctuary.

  There had been, it appeared, one disturbance after another. It had started with the telephone ringing every couple of minutes and the caller hanging up the moment they had answered. Whoever it was had, unsurprisingly, withheld their number and Tim and Naomi had been forced to leave their receiver off the hook; something they disliked doing in case anyone tried to call about a sick or injured animal.

  The disruptions had continued with a number of fires being set

  in the farm's outlying fields. When Tim had cautiously investigated, he discovered that piles of old car tyres had been ignited, probably with petrol, and they continued to burn throughout much of the night.

  Things were relatively quiet then until just after two in the morning when the helicopter began circling overhead. At this point, Tim had telephoned the police, who promised to send a car out to investigate as soon as they had one free.

  The helicopter had departed about two minutes before the police car drew up. The officers who accompanied the vehicle were very sympathetic but gave it as their considered opinion that the fires were set by kids having a bit of fun, and as the helicopter was no longer in evidence, were afraid that there was little they could do.

  Naomi begged them to stay around for a while, sure that something else would occur, and they did for thirty silent and uneventful minutes. At this point, however, they received a call about a drunken brawl outside a nightclub and apologetically took their leave, saying that it now looked as though things had quietened down for the night.

  Barely five minutes later, the first of several fireworks exploded above the Sanctuary.

  `And you still think it was your next-door neighbours?' Gideon asked.

  `Who else?'

  `If only we knew why they want the place so much,' he said thoughtfully. `I wonder if old Milne would give anything away.'

  `Even supposing you could get to see him,' Naomi said, sounding tired and dispirited. `From what I've heard, he's pretty much of a hermit. Maybe that's why he wants Hermitage Farm,' she added with a feeble attempt at humour.

  'Ah, but I have an invitation.'

  `You have?' Naomi was disbelieving. `Why on earth would he invite you?'

  `Because I am a fellow artist, my dear!' Gideon announced grandly.

  `Yes, but hardly world-famous, you must admit,' she pointed out with sisterly frankness.

  `Well, okay. I was surprised too. But apparently he's seen some of my work and he said there was "a lot to like about it". So there. Official recognition.'

  `I'm impressed,' she said, sounding anything but. `But seriously, he's not likely to tell you anything, is he?'

  `Not intentionally, maybe,' Gideon admitted. `But it's worth a try, isn't it?'

  Naomi agreed, warning him to be careful, and Gideon had hung up wondering what to do about Rachel while he was out. He could hardly leave her on her own, under the circumstances. Now that problem was solved, he was free to go visiting.

  Meredith Milne, when Gideon was finally ushered into his presence, was more than a little taken aback, and to be honest, Gideon couldn't blame him. He must have felt rather like someone who, having issued a vague invitation to people met on holiday, suddenly finds the whole family on his doorstep less than a week later, suitcases in hand.

  To Gideon's relief it had once more been Renson who answered the door. He'd a strong suspicion that from what he'd heard of the man, he wouldn't have found it so easy to bluff his way past Slade. As it was, he'd stepped in on Renson almost before the door was fully opened, saying that Milne was expecting him and that he'd be obliged if Renson would show him in.

  At this point, finding his visitor already in the hall, Renson made his first mistake, that of shutting the front door behind him. He protested that Milne hadn't mentioned Gideon's visit, at which Gideon laughed and said he'd never met anyone as absentminded as Meredith. He'd then turned towards the nearest door and asked, `Is he in here?'

  Thrown off balance again by Gideon's obvious intention to make himself free of the house, whatever his objections, Renson made his second mistake when he said, `No, not in there. He's in his studio,' and waved a hand towards the stairs.

  Gideon immediately set off in that direction, allowing himself a small, secret smile as Renson hurried to follow him, protesting all the while.

  Thus Milne found himself the recipient of a completely unexpected - and just as completely unwanted - guest, and being a man of solitary habit, he took no trouble to hide his annoyance.

  `What in thunder are you doing here?' he demanded, his snowy brows lowering like stormclouds. He was wearing, as before, a much-stained painter's smock with a red and white kerchief knotted around his neck.

  `I'm sorry, Mr Milne, I tried to stop him,' the hapless Renson began in his own defence, but Gideon cut in, ignoring him. `You invited me,' he informed Milne in tones of mild astonishnient. `Have you forgotten?'

  `That's what he told me,' Renson asserted eagerly.

  Milne also ignored him. `I did?' he asked Gideon, no longer totally sure of his ground.

  `Of course you did. Just the other day. You told me - oh, I say,' he interrupted himself providentially, `isn't that the watercolour you exhibited at the Southampton Exhibition?' He transferred his whole attention to the massive harbour scene on the wall behind Milne.

  The artist followed his gaze helplessly. `Er ... one of them, yes. In 'ninety-eight. You were there?'

  'Not exhibiting,' Gideon replied with perfect truth. He had never been to the Southampton Exhibition in his life. Nautical art, while all right in small, select doses, was not really his cup of tea. Mentioning the exhibition had been a calculated gamble that had paid off. His foot was, metaphorically, in the door.

  `Shall I call Slade?' Renson offered, vainly trying to win back a little favour.

  `What? Are you still here?' Milne said testily, as if noticing him

  for the first time. `Go on. Go away! Haven't you got anything else to do?'

  Renson left.

  Gideon looked around him at Milne's studio. It was impressive, to say the least. Everything that an artist's studio should be. It was a corner room that Gideon guessed had originally been a bedroom and light came into it by way of four large windows, two in each of the outside walls. Now it contained none of its original fittings beyond a huge vanity sink and mirror in one corner, and adjustable blinds had replaced the curtains. A range of work surfaces had been built in down one side, into which a stainless-steel sink and drainer unit had been plumbed. Under the work surfaces, wide shallow shelves held rolls of canvas, sheets of paper and mounting card of every conceivable hue, and on top, trays contained hundreds of tubes, pots and cakes of paint, brushes, pencils and pens. P
alettes and mixing trays lay on the draining board, and several liquidholding receptacles were dotted about, along with bottles of turpentine, white spirit and linseed oil, and pots of varnish.

  Paintings, sketches and photographs lined the upper parts of the walls, presumably to avoid the fading effects of direct sunlight, and countless dozens more lay in stacks against the inner walls. The man was prolific, if nothing else, one had to give him that.

  Gideon wondered if he would feel more inspired to work if he had a studio like this one. With something that was akin to regret, he decided that it would probably make little difference. Art, whether good, bad or indifferent, had to be a calling and he just wasn't getting the shout. He had a feeling that with him it would always remain more of a whim than a compulsion.

  Two or three works in progress stood about the room on easels and Gideon gestured towards the closest. `May I?'

  Milne nodded. `Go ahead.'

  The painting was in oils and depicted a Spanish fiesta. Horses, dark-haired girls in bright, flounced skirts, and proud young men in wide-brimmed hats and red sashes, all dappled by sunlight filtering through the branches of an avenue of trees. The style was

  Impressionist and the effect dynamic. Gideon could almost hear the flamenco guitars and the clopping of horses' hooves on the cobbles, and yet when he looked closely there was no detail at all, merely suggestion.

  Milne was watching him for a reaction. `I spent the summer in Andalucia last year,' he said.

  `Is it finished?' Gideon asked; the eternal question with which most artists tortured themselves. Would that one more touch of the brush turn the thing into a masterpiece, or take it to irretrievable ruin?

  `I'm not sure,' Milne mused, frowning slightly. `What do you think?'

  Gideon looked at it again. `I'd say so. It's not a style I've ever been very successful with. I always try to do too much. It takes courage to stand back and leave it alone.'

  `D'you like it?'

  `It's beautiful,' Gideon said simply. He had come prepared to flatter for the sake of his mission but found he had no need to do so.

  `It's well enough,' Milne said with a shrug. `I shan't know until I come back to it whether it's finished or not. I cover them up for a couple of weeks and then look at them again with fresh eyes. Sometimes then you can see properly what has been staring you in the face for days.'

  `You're so right,' Gideon said. `Sometimes when I see pictures I've done for people in the past, it's as much as I can do not to say "let me have it back, I can see where I went wrong now".'

  He wandered across to the next easel which held a portrait of a small child in a party dress, sitting with her arm round a spaniel. It was beautifully crafted but a little sugary for Gideon's taste.

  Milne came up to stand beside him. `We all have to eat,' he stated without apology. `This is the bread and butter that makes the jam possible.'

  `Andalucia?'

  `Yes. Andalucia. And this year, Normandy.'

  `I envy you,' Gideon said honestly.

  He looked at several more of the paintings, enjoying both them and the company of their creator a lot more than he had expected to.

  After twenty minutes or so, Milne summoned the longsuffering Renson by means of what appeared to be the original household bell system, left over from its Georgian beginnings. When he arrived, he was immediately despatched to fetch coffee and biscuits.

  The barely concealed surprise evident as he received this command confirmed Gideon's impression that guests were rarely welcomed to Lyddon Grange. He had a feeling that Renson had been expecting to escort him out rather than fetch refreshments for him. And he was quite sure which task the man would have preferred. Gideon favoured him with a particularly sweet smile as he left the room.

  Milne was eager to continue their interrupted discussion on the relative merits of board and canvas, but recalling the reason for his visit, Gideon drifted over to one of the windows. Below him rough-cut lawns and rhododendrons covered the fifty metres or so to the tree-lined boundary, beyond which he could see the Sanctuary's field and the back of the stables.

  `You've certainly got a nice position here,' he remarked into a slow spot in the rather one-sided debate. `How far does your land extend?'

  Milne was rather taken aback by this sudden change of subject. `Oh, there's fifteen or so acres. I don't go out there much, it's always too damned- cold and there's nothing to paint.'

  `It's wonderfully quiet and secluded here. No bother from road noise or neighbours, I should imagine.'

  `I must have it quiet. I can't concentrate with noise going on around me.' Milne frowned at the very thought.

  ,I expect Slade takes care of all that.'

  'Slade takes care of everything. I don't know how I'd manage without him,' he said with a surprising degree of warmth.

  `Still, you'd hardly know the wildlife sanctuary existed from here, would you?' Gideon probed gently. `I shouldn't think you'd hear anything of them at all.'

  Milne's bushy brows were beginning to lower again. `Well, they're only rabbits and things, aren't they? Though why anyone would want to bother with vermin like that is beyond me entirely. Look, I didn't ask you here to admire the view. If you want to do that, I'll get Renson to give you a guided tour of the gardens!'

  Gideon turned away from the window. He'd learned little or nothing but had obviously pushed as far as he could without arousing suspicion. `I'm sorry,' he said. `I'm not really into gardens, it just seems such a lovely haven for an artist.'

  `That,' Milne explained, much as you would to a backward child, `is precisely why I bought it.'

  `How long have you been here?'

  `Oh, forty - fifty years, I forget exactly. I bought it after my first London exhibition, soon after the war. It'd been used by the army as an intelligence HQ or somesuch.' He waved a hand at Gideon. `And you, Mr Blake? Where do you live? One of these horrid, modern, two up-two down places, I suppose.'

  `Three up-three down, actually. But sixteenth-century, not twentieth.'

  Milne grunted. `Yours?'

  `No,' Gideon admitted wryly. `I haven't had my first London exhibition yet.'

  The older man favoured him with a long, hard look, eyes narrowed. `Are you laughing at me?' he asked abruptly.

  `At life.'

  Once again the look, then, `Where's that wretched man got to?' and an imperious prod at the bell push.

  Coffee and a selection of chocolate biscuits duly arrived, were dispensed and enjoyed, and after another in-depth discussion on technical matters that were, quite frankly, beyond Gideon, Milne decided that the audience was over and Renson was summoned to show the visitor out.

  As Gideon left he paused beside a handsome seascape hung on the wall opposite the studio door.

  `I like that. One of yours?'

  `No, no, of course not! It's a William Templeman. There's another one downstairs. If you come again I'll show you,' Milne offered. `I don't buy a lot; mostly only if there's a danger of something decent being sold abroad. I can't abide the thought of classic British art being hung in foreign galleries. The Americans especially have no real appreciation, they're just acquisitive. You're too young to have heard of Darius Sinclair, I suppose?'

  Gideon shook his head. `Actually, no. My mother's the proud owner of two small charcoal sketches by Sinclair.'

  `Then you're probably aware that the Americans would have made off with the major part of his life's work if they'd had their way, the thieving magpies! And for what? For status, that's all. Philistines!'

  `Some other thieving magpie got that collection, if I remember rightly,' Gideon observed. His mother had kept the newspaper cuttings in a scrapbook. A number of very highly rated oils and watercolours by Darius Sinclair, stolen while in transit to the auction rooms.

  `Yes, well, that's as maybe.' Milne pursed his lips. `Anyway, when I can afford to, I buy one or two pieces destined for export, and when I die they'll be gifted to the nation.'

  Gideon smiled as he shook
the man's gnarled brown hand. Rude and intolerant Milne might be; even so, you couldn't help admiring his dedication.

  At the foot of the stairs, closely followed by the sullen Renson, Gideon came face to face with a man he hadn't met before, but needed no introduction to tell him that this must be the infamous Slade.

  Of no more than average height and build, he nevertheless filled the gloomy hallway with his presence. Maybe ten years or so older than Gideon, Slade had dark hair flecked with silver, and steel-grey eyes in a strong-featured, deeply tanned face, the whole giving an impression of latent power and determination.

  `What the hell are you doing here?' were his opening words, and Gideon was slightly taken aback.

  `I was invited,' he replied. `What business is it of yours?' Beside him, Renson drew an audible breath.

  `Is that true?' Slade demanded of Gideon's escort, who shrugged unhappily but didn't answer. Slade obviously hadn't expected him to, for he continued with barely a pause, `Well, don't just stand there like an idiot, show him out!'

  Whereas Milne snapped and shouted, Slade's voice was low and controlled but with an underlying air of menace that spoke volumes. Gideon was reminded of his sister's description of the man: `Smooth. Like a dangerous snake, beautiful but deadly.'

  He felt she was probably right. He was certainly handsome: white teeth, expensive haircut, and clothes that needed no labels to advertise their designer credentials. Also, maybe as a statement of personal toughness, a gold earring in one ear.

  Meredith Milne must be a more generous employer than one would imagine, Gideon mused. But then to a man who wanted the world kept from his door, Slade would presumably be worth his weight in gold earrings and designer suits.

  He allowed himself to be ushered to the front door where he paused on the threshold. `Nice to meet you, Mr ... er ... ?' 'Slade.'

  `Mr Slade, of course. Well, I expect I shall see you again. Meredith said to drop in any time. 'Bye for now.'

  Gideon turned his back on Slade with satisfaction. He and Milne had certainly not reached first-name terms but for some reason his presence in the house had put Slade out, and some spark of contrariness made him want to punish the man for his rudeness.