by Primula Bond
I’m not frigid.
As dawn blossoms over my drowsy face, what makes the wetness spring and spark is the wondering of how Gustav Levi’s mouth would feel, kissing me right there.
FIVE
I have actually run some of the way to get here. I tell myself it’s only because I’m desperate to get my cameras back.
He’s told me which way to come and now I’m in a street on the other side of the river, practically next door to the Savoy Hotel in fact. But Polly is long gone.
I didn’t wake up until midday. The first thing I did was look for Gustav Levi’s business card. And I couldn’t find it. I tipped my jacket upside down, inside out, shook it. It was plain white, thick, his name in a thick black Modoni font. I tried to envisage the number across the bottom. I couldn’t. I hadn’t even read the card. I must have dropped it in the street. At the party. In Pierre’s red car.
I slammed my hands down on the bed. Then I forced myself to count to ten and walk to the window and back ten times. My camera. My cameras. Think. My life’s work is stored in there.
My mobile phone buzzed on the table beside the bed. I can’t think who that is. Please not Jake. And I’ll kill Polly if she gave Tomas my number. I don’t want to have to find the words to put him off. No. Stay calm. It could be one of those galleries. Number unknown.
‘Yes. Serena Folkes here. Hello?’
There was a pause. Then, ‘Ah. Serena.’
His voice was even deeper than I remembered, pouring treacle. My knees went from under me and I fell onto the bed.
‘Gustav! Mr Levi. Oh my God. You don’t know how happy I am to hear from you!’
He chuckled. I could hear low voices and brisk footsteps in the background. He sounded as if he was an echoing room.
‘Maybe you could come and show me how happy?’
‘How did you find me?’
‘The wonders of technology, Serena. I just made a note of your mobile number when you left your phone with me in the bar last evening. If you go to your contacts you’ll see I’ve added myself in there, too. So now we’re both armed with vital information. I told you I wanted to see you again, and I meant it.’
I just stared stupidly at the phone.
‘You do want your cameras back, don’t you?’
Yes I did. I do. And so it was arranged.
This must be it. There’s a flight of steps and big glass doors up ahead of me, but before I reach them and check the address I stop to look at the publicity poster attached to the approaching railings.
There’s no obvious gallery anywhere nearby, but the poster shows a sepia photograph of a group of comely women reclining on a sofa, with tumbling black hair, plump bodies, and can-can corsets and stockings. They are incredibly dated, girlishly coy, mostly, their backs turned to the camera to show mooning white buttocks and big bovine hips and shoulders, but the eyes gleaming under curled fringes are vacant and old as the hills.
I guess they are from a collection of dirty postcards of fin-de-siècle Parisian prostitutes, or a clever reproduction. They are certainly faded. Patches of the background are missing or cracked where the old processing ink has peeled away from the paper, but the women are intact.
I run my hands over my own rounded hips. I’ve made a real effort today. After we’d arranged to meet I told myself as I showered and dressed in Polly’s glittering white bathroom that today is the day to make some changes.
So I’ve shed Rena the scruff in her jeans and biker boots, and I’m wearing a dress. Well, he told me that this was business and that I was to come to his office, so businesslike is how I want to be. It won’t go amiss for my other appointments, either. So it’s not only a dress, but a black jersey dress, flaring on the hips, wrapped tight across the bust, severe yet softened by these shiny black boots. Flat, not heeled. I can’t masquerade to that extent, let alone pound the streets of London in heels. And a cropped black Cossack jacket with velvet collar and cuffs and military silver buttons.
At the last minute I pull on the beret for comfort, but this time I wear it low over my forehead Garbo-style.
I continue on up the polished white steps and read the name above the door. It says The Levi Building. It’s not as phallic as some City buildings. None of the structures along the Embankment reach any higher than Big Ben. But it’s no less hulking and impressive for that. The words swim into focus. The Levi Building. So he owns the whole shebang?
The lobby is vast and echoing. There is a chrome shelf, not even a desk, in the middle of the place, and a lady sitting bolt upright behind a switchboard of buttons. She looks like a spooky Mary Poppins. Black hair pulled back into a bun so tight that her face is dragged back with it. A black broderie anglaise blouse pinned with a cameo brooch. She glances up and without speaking pokes out a long plum-painted fingernail to press a button marked Levi.
‘Is everything around here named after him?’ I ask. My voice hisses across the black marble interior as if I’m in church.
‘Penthouse office. Top floor.’ Her voice is high, as if holding a top note.
The lift spits me out at the top, and I am dazzled by the blaze of light. It’s hard to know where the light comes from, whether I’m facing north or south, even.
‘Ah, Serena. How lovely to see you again.’
A pin man appears in the distance, etiolated and thin like an alien just about to step out of the blinding interior of the mother ship. I rub my eyes and step towards him. He seems to be wearing a suit and a white shirt today, but before I can focus properly he takes my hand and shakes it formally. He holds it for an extra moment.
‘I’m so glad you took my phone number,’ I gibber, as we start to move back towards the light, one of my hands still in his. ‘I would be absolutely lost without my cameras!’
‘Your head is like a sieve, so it’s lucky I’m a magpie. Gloves, cameras–’
How familiar his deep, calm voice is. I only met him yesterday.
There is a cool, tomb-like atmosphere in this place. I still can’t see clearly, but I think we are in a corridor. He turns right and leads me into another big space but this is insulated. Not warm, but not cold, either.
He drops my hand and leaves me standing in this vast, warehouse-like space. He walks towards another window but the light in here is less glaring, and finally I can focus. I turn in a full circle. There are more of the French photographs, blown up, on one wall, and others, sepia, black and white, none coloured, but I’m assailed, as any visitor would be, by rolling flesh, and plump women, and vivid nakedness.
‘You’ve brought me to a gallery? This is awesome. A real inspiration. Exactly the kind of venue I’ve dreamt about.’
‘Not just any gallery, Serena.’ There’s a click. On goes an oversized chrome Anglepoise lamp by his desk and there he is, springing back into my life. Someone who looks just like him, anyway, but this guy is scrubbed and brushed today, those eyes blacker, deeper, more glittering in contrast to the cleanly shaved cheeks. The formal tailoring makes him seem taller and broader, but the fine fabric also restrains him, restrains all that restless energy.
He stands and moves differently, slowly, considerately, the jacket creasing slightly as he bends his arms, the trousers revealing nothing of the long legs I saw in their jeans last night. The body that pressed against me. No hint of the manhood, what lies beneath. He moves almost in slow motion, but not his hands. They are restless as ever. They pluck the middle buttons, doing and undoing. The man I know as Gustav Levi is someone who stalks misty London squares at night, wrapped up warm but unshaven, wild eyes watching.
Apart from a giant vase of lilies in the corner tall enough to bathe in, there is nothing else visible in this space.
As the light snaps on the lively photographs leap away into the shadows cast by the winter afternoon light.
‘This is my gallery.’
I walk towards the window. Behind him the river flows dark and fast past the London Eye and the South Bank opposite, multi-coloured lights winking
off the various bridges spanning the Thames.
‘What can I say, Mr Levi? You said you were an entrepreneur, but this? You own this place? This whole building?’
‘That’s my name on the door. And more besides, Serena. You could say I’m multi-national. London. Paris. New York is currently being conquered.’ He takes a pen out of his breast pocket and taps it against his chin. His mouth is hard today. Both lips equally unforgiving. ‘I’m a walking, talking, living corporation. Mostly I own and lease galleries. I prefer to try to keep art in my life, but I do own other kinds of industrial space, too.’
‘A real tycoon. I should have been nicer to you.’
We stare at each other for a moment. He does indeed look every inch the tycoon. The knot of his dark red tie with a pattern I can’t decipher from here is tight up against his Adam’s apple. He’s so cool, and handsome, all that contained power, but his fine face is etched with a tiredness I didn’t see yesterday.
And I was right. He’s closer to forty than thirty. As if he knows what I’m thinking he fiddles under the knot of his tie, undoing the top button.
‘Meeting you made my day, Serena.’
Oh, the eyes. How they glitter with life.
Look at me again, then, Gustav.
His thumb is poised to punch at the top of his pen as if it’s misbehaved. ‘But you’ve changed.’
‘So have you.’
‘I look like this every working day. But you’re all – neat and tidy! What’s happened to Calamity Jane?’
‘She’s still here, but I thought I’d make an effort.’ I run my hands over my new, svelte outline. ‘My cousin left loads of clothes in the flat and told me to help myself. And I’ve got a lot to do today. Places to go, people to see.’
‘Appointments made?’
‘Not new ones, no.’ I grip the handle of my portfolio. ‘I needed to get my cameras back first.’
He sits on the edge of the desk, swinging one long leg. Shut away from the world this is how a master of the universe looks in the flesh. His eyes are chips of black ice. This intense attention, scrutiny almost, must be part of his business technique. Because it’s certainly working.
‘The beret. They way you’re wearing it today. It’s less the impoverished artist, more the student from the Left Bank. Très chic. Who knew you were two different women, rolled into one?’
If it wasn’t for the very slight swinging of his foot in its polished black brogue, he could be a waxwork. One of his own exhibits. But the whole room, the whole building vibrates with his aura. And best of all, he is totally zoned in on me. Again I am the only person in his world.
‘Who’s to say you get either? Look, I shouldn’t keep you, Mr Levi. You must have so much to do. So many deals to cut. So many fortunes to make. But thank you for looking after my camera.’
‘You told me to guard it with my life, and that’s exactly what I did.’ He folds his hands on his leg in an effort to keep it still. ‘I told you I had a proposition for you, so I’ll get straight to the point. I want you to hold all your other appointments. I don’t want you to rush off anywhere, Serena, because I’ve had a look at your work and I like it. I think I can help you. I want to help you.’
‘My work? How did you take a look?’
‘Simple.’ He picks up my camera bag, takes out the Lumix. ‘You just switch on this little device, press the screen button and presto. Scroll through all the images.’
I laugh at the faux advertising speak. ‘I should be very cross with you for invading my privacy, Mr Levi. For all I know you could have copied the lot onto your computer by now, even though they’re my intellectual property!’
‘Industrial espionage. I like it. But not nearly as much fun as just coming to a good, old-fashioned, quid pro quo arrangement, eh?’
There’s a brief, easy silence between us. I glance at him, his eyes holding mine, then walk past him towards the light, suddenly exquisitely self-conscious in my dress, aware of my legs, exposed as they swish in their stockings. I’m trying to walk elegantly in the shiny boots. If I feel a fraud dressed like this, I’m a fraud who is about to make something happen.
I sit down on the broad window sill. The light is behind me so he’s at a disadvantage now. He’s forced to swivel sideways.
‘So what did you see on my camera?’
He holds his fingers up and counts them off. ‘The little witch at the back of the line falling over. The others all standing there, huffing and puffing till she got up again. The streetlight casting those triangular shadows from their hats. But much more besides. I seem to have got a kind of potted history of your life. Well, your travels anyway. Egypt. Morocco. France.’
‘And there’s more. Venice, that was my favourite. Here, in my portfolio.’
‘Which I will look at, too, if you’ll let me. There’s so much talent here.’ He walks over to the other end of the window sill and wags his finger at me. ‘I’m not just saying it. I know how tough it is when you’re starting out. And what I can see in front of me is a girl who could use a break.’
‘Yes, I could. Of course I could.’ I grip the edge of the window sill. ‘But I’ve only just got to London. I’ve got to give it my best shot. There’s lots of places to try before I start taking charity.’
‘Who said anything about charity?’ He slams his hands down on his knees. What did I say yesterday about crossing him? About those hands being able to twist necks? ‘Don’t be so stubborn, Serena. Everyone needs a leg-up in life, especially in the arts world. And I’m just the guy you need. I’m not kidding you.’ His black eyes are deadly serious now. They are boring into mine, boring into all that misplaced pride, clumsy resistance. They’re sucking me in again. ‘I’m the answer to your prayers.’
I feel unbalanced, dizzy. Rest my back against the cold glass as I wait for the prickling goosebumps on my skin to subside.
‘You know nothing about me,’ I say softly. If we keep talking at least I can stay here a little longer. I wish I could press myself against him again, touch him, have his arms pinning me there, stopping me from leaving.
‘That’s not strictly true. I learned a lot about you last night. And now I also know you have talent.’
He stands. God he’s tall. I get a crick in my neck just staring at him. He comes towards me, fans his fingers under my jaw, pauses, strokes a little further down my neck. ‘Last night’s chance meeting will prove to be a stroke of luck for both of us.’
‘How?’
His black eyes are devouring me again. Glittering, and deep, drawing me further in. Less demonic today. More mesmeric. Something is being drawn out of me. Not my energy. Quite the opposite. It’s resistance and anxiety he’s taking away. I feel as if I’m being charged up, like I’ve been plugged into the mains.
His hand rests on my cheek a little longer, then he stands abruptly and goes back to sit behind his desk. Steeples his fingers.
‘I’m in danger of losing my concentration,’ he says, clearing his throat. His hair finally gives up and falls away from where he’s combed it back. ‘I’m going to have to come clean and admit that you have an extraordinary effect on me, Serena. I thought you’d walked out of my life yesterday, off to your party.’
‘I didn’t want to go.’
‘Your cousin must have been chuffed you made it. Your friends.’ He cuts through me, pushing his hair back. ‘But I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you since yesterday. So let’s start again. Let’s turn this into an interview. Please take a seat.’
‘All a bit formal?’ I laugh, but he waves towards the white leather chair in front of his desk. Obediently I change seats.
‘Too right. Now. I have mounted photographic exhibitions many times, as well as fine arts, installations. Even concerts. I’ve sponsored some very famous names while they were struggling to get a foot on the ladder. So not only can I afford to take a risk with an emerging talent like yours, Serena. I am positively seeking out fresh blood.’
‘You make me sound l
ike a rare steak.’
‘The rarer and bloodier, the better.’ He grins. His face goes light. It’s totally unexpected, like a flash of lightning on a sunny day. I’m liking his interview technique. ‘Come on. We all have to take leaps into the dark. How else are people going to notice you or your work? I can offer you the venue, the publicity machine, the marketing. The media exposure.’
I sit very still, very quiet. I’m still digesting what he said about being unable to stop thinking about me.
‘What’s in it for you?’
‘Well, firstly it has all the promise of a very lucrative, no, rewarding partnership. I’ll have priceless modern art on my walls. It’s essential to keep one’s finger on the pulse, especially with fledgling talent. Maybe I’ll even buy some for my private collection at home. And if we work towards a sell-out between now and Christmas, from there on in you’ll be able to charge whatever you like for your work.’
‘That really is a leap of faith. It all sounds too good to be true, Mr Levi.’
‘Gustav.’
‘So what’s the catch?’
He taps his fingers against his lips. So suave. So scary. His eyes sparking with a kind of mischief now.
‘I don’t see it as a catch. I see it as something beneficial for both of us. Like I said, a quid pro quo. You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. Because I have seen something daring and brave in you, Serena. I’ve seen … well, I think we get on. Yes?’
The way he’s staring at me now. Even behind his desk. Behind his hands. He’s doing something to me. I cross my legs, aware of how bare they feel under this dress. Also aware, with an inward gasp, of a softening dampness.
‘What’s daring and brave got to do with your showcasing my work?’
‘Because of how I want this to go. How I propose you repay me.’
