by Alex Connor
Her face expressionless, Bobbie controlled her anger and regained her poise. She would have to find something else to think about – to keep her occupied. Something to take her mind off her loss for a while. Turning, she moved back into the drawing room and began to flick through the Sotheby’s catalogue. She would think about the Feldenchrist Collection for a while. Paintings wouldn’t change, grow old, divorce her or die. They would endure, as would the Feldenchrist name. Not as a family, but as a collection.
It was something to hold on to, Bobbie told herself, then paused. Who was she kidding? Paintings were important, but they weren’t going to fill the longing to be a mother. Her thoughts crystallised as she drew in another breath. Perhaps – if she found a child quickly – she wouldn’t have to cancel the party and lose face. She could just postpone it.
She wanted a child. And, by God, she was going to get one.
19
‘Leon, is that you?’ Ben asked, startled by his brother’s tone when he picked up the phone on his landline. ‘Why haven’t you returned my calls? Are you all right?’
‘Fine.’
‘You don’t sound fine.’
‘I’m busy.’
‘Why didn’t you call me back? I left messages all day.’
‘I told you, I’m busy!’ Leon snapped, his tone petulant. ‘What’s the fuss about?’
‘Something odd’s happened.’
‘Same here,’ Leon added wryly, thinking of how close he had come to collapse, and the run-in at the Prado with Jimmy Shaw. But he wasn’t about to confide in Ben, to give his brother the satisfaction of being right.
‘Why? What happened to you?’
‘Nothing,’ Leon said hurriedly. ‘Go on with what you were saying.’
‘The police came to see me today. They found a murder victim in London – a man with your mobile number in his pocket.’
‘Who was it?’
‘That’s the point – they don’t know yet. It just seems strange, that’s all. I mean, that’s your personal mobile number – you hardly ever give it out.’ He paused, then carried on. ‘Don’t use that mobile again. Toss it. Get yourself another one.’
‘Was my number written on a piece of paper?’
‘No, it was on the back of one of my cards.’
‘Oh … So, did you write the number on it?’
‘No, it was written in your handwriting, Leon. I recognised it – the funny way you write the number four.’
There was a pause on the line before Leon spoke again. ‘Who was the murdered man?’
‘His face was virtually destroyed. I couldn’t recognise him. But we’re doing a reconstruction here—’
Stung into action, Leon was quick to react. ‘What about Goya’s skull? I hope that’s being worked on first—’
‘Francis has already done it,’ Ben said patiently. ‘That’s one of the reasons I was ringing you. The reconstruction looks good. I’ve seen it—’
‘And?’
‘It’s Goya. What d’you want me to do with it?’ He waited, expecting an answer. ‘Leon, are you there?’
‘It really is Goya’s skull …’ He was whispering, hardly audible. Unnerved, spooked.
‘Are you OK?’
‘I dreamt it would be Goya’s and it really is …’ Leon’s exhilaration fluttered, then faltered as he remembered Jimmy Shaw. The enormity of the situation overweighed his excitement and he found himself – as always – turning to Ben for reassurance.
‘Gabino Ortega was asking me about the skull—’
‘How did he know about it?’
Leon stood up and closed the window. Even though it was hot and the room would be suffocating within minutes, he didn’t want to risk being overheard.
‘I don’t know how he heard. No one was supposed to know apart from me, the Prado, and obviously the builder who found it.’
‘D’you think he talked? Regretted giving the skull to you when he could have sold it to someone like Ortega?’
‘No! Diego Martinez is a simple man, a good man. His father owed our parents a favour and it was his way of repaying them. By giving me the skull …’ Leon trailed off, clinging to the phone. ‘I told Gabino Ortega it was a fake, that I’d got rid of it. I said I’d given it to the church for burial.’
Knowing Gabino Ortega’s reputation, Ben was wary. ‘Did he believe you?’
‘I think so … no, probably not.’ Leon turned away from the window. ‘Gabino’s brother, Bartolomé, lives in Switzerland. He’s the respectable face of the Ortega clan – and he’s desperate to solve the riddle of the Black Paintings. We’ve talked about it on the few occasions we’ve run into each other at auctions – he’s always asking me how my research is going. As though I’d tell him!’ Leon’s voice speeded up. ‘He’s obsessed by Goya. He’d do anything to get the skull off me.’
‘But you said it was Gabino who approached you.’
‘Yes, it was. But think about it! Gabino would want to get the skull for his brother. He’s always sucking up to Bartolomé, because he funds his lifestyle. Gabino would see the skull as a way to ingratiate himself. Besides, he’s here in Madrid. He probably thinks he has a better shot at getting it than Bartolomé in Switzerland—’
‘Leon—’
He wasn’t about to be interrupted.
‘Gabino’s a thug. Everyone knows that. Their grandfather killed his own wife, for Christ’s sake! Of course they couldn’t prove it and bought the police off. With that kind of blood in your veins, it’s no surprise Gabino turned out the way he is. Always in fights. All kinds of rumours follow him around. I heard he’d—’
‘Leon,’ Ben said quietly, ‘donate the skull to the Prado. That way it belongs to Spain and no individual can own it.’
‘Give it away?’ Leon shouted. ‘Are you bloody crazy? Can’t you see that all these people who want it only prove how important it is?’
‘Who are “all these people”?’
‘What?’
‘You said “all these people”, but you’ve only told me about the Ortega brothers. So who are they?’ Ben was silent for a minute, then pushed his brother. ‘Leon, tell me what’s going on.’
‘The other day … a man approached me in the Prado. A big fat Englishman. Sick, very sick.’ Leon automatically wiped his hand down his trouser leg as though wiping off all traces of Jimmy Shaw. ‘He said someone had hired him to get the Goya skull. Said that he had a buyer for it. He warned me that the man was very dangerous—’
‘Christ!’
‘He scared the hell out of me!’ Leon admitted. ‘He offered money, any amount I wanted – just said that if I had any sense I’d get rid of the skull. He said, “If you knew what’s coming to you, you’d sell it to me now. You’d get the fucking thing off your hands and keep yourself safe.”’
‘Go to the police—’
‘He said he was trying to save me. And that I could save him.’ Leon thought back. I’m trying to save you, Mr Golding. Please, save me. Once he had started to confide, he couldn’t stop, his panic rising. ‘That was two days ago. I came back home and I haven’t been out since. Just been working on my theory about the paintings. Just stayed home working … you know, working …’
Anxious, Ben tried to calm his brother down. ‘How did you leave it with Gabino Ortega?’
‘I said the skull was a fake.’
‘And the Englishman? Did you get a name?’
‘No.’ Leon glanced at the paper half hidden under the desk lamp. ‘Just a mobile number.’
‘Give me the number.’
‘I won’t have time,’ Leon said suddenly.
‘Time for what?’
‘To finish! To finish!’ he cried, distraught. ‘I nearly solved the last part this morning … I have to write it down, Ben. If I don’t get there first, I’ll lose. Someone will get the answer before me; they’ll get the glory—’
‘What answer?’
‘To what the Black Paintings mean!’ Leon snapped. ‘I’ve got it s
olved. I know what Goya did. Why he was ill. I know something that could have changed history. But I need the skull back now. I have to get it back!’
Ben could hear the staccato rhythm of his brother’s voice, the threat of hysteria which always precipitated another attack.
‘Leon, you are taking your medication, aren’t you?’
‘I don’t want the fucking medication! It makes me slow; I can’t think when I take it. I’ve found out so much – things you wouldn’t believe—’
‘I don’t care about your work, I care about you. I’m worried about you.’ Ben’s voice was steady. ‘Go to the police—’
‘Fuck off!’
‘OK, then give me the number of the man who approached you—’
‘Why?’
‘I’ll give it to the police.’
‘And then they’ll know about the skull!’ Leon shrieked. ‘It would be all over the papers within hours. You’re worried about me now – what about then? When it’s public knowledge, how many more people will want to get hold of it?’
‘Then do what I suggested, Leon. Get it off your hands. Donate the skull to the Prado. Make an announcement publicly so everyone knows you don’t have it any more—’
‘I can’t give up on it! I’m inches away from telling the world what happened to Goya. I can’t just walk away now!’
‘You can’t do this alone—’
‘I’m not doing it alone! Gina’s trying to help—’
It was the last thing Ben wanted to hear. ‘Gina!’
‘She told me that we have to keep the skull safe. She wants to protect me and my work.’
‘What the hell does she know about it?’
‘We had a seance—’
‘Oh, Christ, Leon!’
‘The medium thought that if we had Goya’s skull we much be able to reach him.’
Incredulous, Ben struggled to keep the irritation out of his voice. ‘You really think you can get in contact with Goya?’
‘Why not? The medium contacted Detita.’
The name swung into action and with it a malignancy which took Ben straight back to his childhood.
‘Detita is dead. No one can bring back the dead. Detita is dead and Goya is dead, Leon … Listen to me. This is bloody ridiculous. You can’t let people fill your head with all this crap. As for Gina, I know you care about her, but she’s not reliable—’
Leon dropped his voice, almost shamefaced. ‘She’s done some research on the internet for me—’
‘Please, stop this.’
‘I can’t,’ Leon replied, his tone distant, resigned.
Behind Ben, the door of his consulting room closed suddenly, making him jump. Looking round, he checked that no was listening and then realised that he was clinging on to the phone so tightly the bones of his knuckles were straining against the skin. The hand found in the Little Venice canal came into his mind unbidden, followed by an image of the head the police had found later, the face mashed into nothingness.
‘It’s dangerous, Leon. I told you people would be after the skull – I knew this would happen. Didn’t I say we had to keep it quiet?’
‘I have to get on with my research—’
‘You’re endangering yourself.’
‘I just have to write up my notes and it’s finished. I’ll stop then, I promise. I just have to get it down on paper … Anyway, not everyone’s against me. Some people are trying to help me. Some leave messages, others get in touch over the internet.’
Ben could feel his skin prickle. ‘Do they know you have Goya’s skull?
‘But I don’t, do I?’ Leon replied. ‘You have it.’ There was a note of malice in his voice, suspicion mixed with anger. ‘Don’t treat me like a child, Ben. I’m just as important in my field as you are in yours. This is my big chance and I’m not going to let anything stop me. Even you.’
‘I’m not trying to stop you—’
‘You’re jealous, aren’t you?’
‘I’m just worried about you—’
‘Stop worrying about me!’
‘Leon—’
‘Stop getting in my way!’ he replied, his voice speeding up. ‘I need that skull! I want it back! It was given to me! I need it. It’s mine!’
And then the line went dead.
BOOK TWO
What cruelty, for discovering the movement of the earth,
For marrying whom she wished,
For speaking a different language,
For being Jewish.
CAPTIONS GOYA WROTE UNDER
SOME OF HIS DRAWINGS
Quinta del Sordo
Madrid, 1821
Impatiently, Arrieta flicked away the insects. Then, leaning back in his seat, he looked slowly around the bedchamber. Below, the doctor could hear the sound of a woman’s footsteps, then her voice as she called out to a little girl, Rosario. Was it true that the child was Goya’s? That he and his housekeeper, Leocardia Zorrilla de Weiss, were lovers? His gaze moved back to Goya’s face, counting his pulse rate. It was too fast, but the artist was unmoving, apparently asleep.
Almost choking in the heat, Arrieta opened the window further and leaned out. In the distance, over the heat haze, he could see the roofs of Madrid and knew that in the court the returned King, Ferdinand VII, would be plotting further pogroms and retaliations. No one was sure why Goya had moved to the farmhouse, but it was rumoured that it was to escape the restored Inquisition. The ailing painter wouldn’t have wanted to stay in Madrid under the Inquisition’s nose while they sniffed around his private life. After all, Leocardia was a relative by marriage of Goya’s son, Xavier – a matter which could easily inflame the religious zealots. And besides, the Inquisition had been interested in Goya before, condemning his paintings of the Clothed and Naked Majas as obscene. The pictures had even been confiscated.
The model – believed to be the sensational Duchess of Alba – was dead … Arrieta sighed, remembering the woman who had been Goya’s lover. Haughty, imperious, beautiful, she had intoxicated many men and inspired spite from the women of the court. Fearless, she cared little for convention, her reputation and beauty drawing Spaniards out on to their balconies to watch as she passed. Goya had painted her many times – as a duchess, a witch and a whore.
But the last time Arrieta had seen the Duchess of Alba she had been passing in her coach, unrecognisable, desperate as she had signalled for him to approach.
‘Dr Arrieta,’ she said, her face hidden behind a dense veil, ‘I think you might find me much changed.’ Carefully she lifted the net, exposing her features. The skin had peeled from her cheeks in weeping patches and the tip of her nose was eaten away. Around her lips blisters crowded the bare gums. And her hair, once waist-long and lustrous, had thinned, exposing the scalp beneath.
What …?’
‘… happened to me?’ She held his gaze, still brave. ‘I am poisoned, Dr Arrieta. And I will die … When you see Francisco tell him I loved him more than all the others. Tell him when you last saw me I was still beautiful. Lie for me.’ She let the veil fall back to cover her face and tapped on the side of the coach. A moment later it moved off and she was gone. Two days afterwards news of the Duchess’s death was gossip in Madrid. She was buried in haste. Whispers of poisoning and the involvement of Godoy, the Queen’s lover, circulated the capital.
Francisco Goya never recovered from her loss.
And yet now he had another lover, Arrieta mused, thinking of Leocardia. But this woman was no duchess, no sumptuous aristocrat. This female was country-smart, ambitious, impatient and cold. Black hair, white skin, dark as a rook, and a listener at doors. No victim, this woman. Something else entirely. An odd companion for the painter’s old age. A strange ally at the Quinta del Sordo.
But then the farmhouse had become a madhouse of its own … Dr Arrieta thought back to the night he had been called over the river, the water seeming to sweat with that molten boiling of earth into sky, the sun swelling like a pustule against the flank of blue. Moving
into the cool interior of the farmhouse, Arrieta had waited for his eyes to adjust to the dimness as a lumbering figure approached him.
‘Arrieta,’ Goya said, staring into his doctor’s face, ‘I’ve been working.’
He had pulled at the younger man’s sleeve, the smell of oil on his hands, a paint-spattered coat masking his naked upper body as Arrieta followed him into the dining room. A heavily carved dining table had been pushed up against one wall, the shutters half opened to allow some light, and much heat, to enter. In the middle of the wooden floor a bowl of luridly yellow lemons had given off an orchard scent.
As Goya had continued to tug at his arm, Arrieta had followed the painter’s gesture towards the far wall. Nervously he had moved closer towards the huge image. Painted directly on to the plaster, the monstrous vision of Saturn shimmered in its meaty colours, the god maniacally tearing off the head of a nude.
‘Remarkable,’ Arrieta had said finally, as the artist drew his attention to the wall behind them.
This time the doctor had taken in a breath. The picture had also been painted directly on to the wall, but this time it was long and narrow, stretching almost the width of the dining room. Its meaning had been immediately apparent to Arrieta. It was a painting of a witches’ Sabbath. But there was no gaiety in this depiction, no courtly titillation. The witches were gnarled, mad women, who in real life would smell and be scabby with lice. And the huge billy-goat shape of the Devil was no pictorial effect, just a blackened, inhuman misshape.
