Art of Murder

4

An isosceles triangle of light. Legs apart.

Time for a break,' said Gerardo. 'Afterwards we'll try another effect.'

Clara closed her legs and the triangle disappeared. She was standing with her back to the two men, facing the window, her hair a flaming red, her body edged in rays of sunlight. She was painted in pink and ochre tones, with highlights of ivory and pearl. Her spine, the perfect 'V of her lumbar region and the fleshy cross of her buttocks were a natural earth colour. Gerardo and Uhl had chosen these tints after careful study of the lines they had painted on her skin. They gave her a porous swimsuit and a colour cap, which she put on in the bathroom. Her primed skin and hair absorbed the colours perfectly, there was no need for varnish or fixing agents. Gerardo warned her that all the colours were provisional, and that they could all be modified over the next few days. So were the colour of her eyes – brilliant emerald green – that he had painted with a corneal spray, and the deeper pink lip outline he had drawn on her face. Finally, with gloved hands he swept her wet hair up into a small bun. When he threw the gloves into the wastepaper basket, they spattered the floor with drops of fake blood. 'You're done,' he said.

Clara left the bathroom and walked towards the living room, trailing the smell of oil paint in her wake. The first thing she did was to examine herself in the mirror. She could see the figure they were aiming at beyond the sketch: a young girl by Manet, tall, slender, red-headed, and with muscles clearly distinguishable from one another, but not violently so: as if drawn by an expert. In the sunlight, her hair was a shiny haemorrhage. She liked what they had done. She wished this was not just a sketch, that the unknown work they were painting with her would be exactly the same.

They had set up a video camera on a tripod and a powerful photographic studio spot, but to begin with they filmed her adopting different positions in natural light. It must be a beautiful day outside, Clara thought, as she stared at the open window in front of her, but in the room, with its cream walls and parallel lines of the floor, everything was bathed in a bright glow, as if she were inside a prism. She longed to have some free time to be able to explore outside. 'Your food is in the kitchen,' Gerardo told her.

She walked carefully back to the bathroom in order not to crack the paint on her body, and put on one of the robes hanging on the door. She usually liked to wear something when she had been painted so she would not spoil it while she ate or rested.

In the kitchen, a surprise was waiting for her. Her food tray was in the same place as the previous day, but this time Gerardo was sitting opposite her. He was taking the top off a pizza he had heated in the microwave. So it seemed they were going to eat together. She wondered where Uhl was, and why he had not joined them. She guessed there must be serious disagreements between the two men. Throughout the morning, this had been obvious from their raised voices, terse orders, and long periods of uncomfortable silence. It seemed obvious to her that Gerardo gave in to his older colleague, either because he admired him, or perhaps simply because Uhl was a rung higher on the Foundation ladder than he was. Clara decided it was best to be discreet.

She sat down and pulled the plastic cover off her tray. Her meal consisted of two triangles of sandwich with some kind of mayonnaise at the edges, grapes, wholemeal bread, margarine, cream cheese, a salad, a herb tea and an Aroxen juice with added vitamins. Before she picked up a sandwich, she took her prescribed pills with a sip of mineral water. Gerardo was busy devouring a slice of pizza.

They started to chat. He praised her quiescence, and asked who her teachers had been. She told him about Cuinet and Klaus Wedekind, and of the week she had spent in Florence working as a sketch for Ferrucioli. She could only eat very slowly, nibbling small pieces of sandwich, because the oil paint on her face pulled at her jaws, and she did not want to spoil it. As she was spreading a thick layer of margarine on the bread, she tried out a smile with her freshly drawn lips. 'Don't be mean. Tell me what you're doing with me.' 'Painting you,' replied Gerardo. She stifled a laugh, but insisted.

'No, seriously. I'm going to be one of the works in the "Rembrandt" collection, aren't I?' 'I'm sorry, sweetheart, I can't tell you.'

‘I don't want to know which figure I am, or the title of the painting. Just tell me if I'm going to be a "Rembrandt". '

'Listen, the less you know about what you're doing, the better, right?' 'OK. Sorry'

Suddenly she felt embarrassed at having insisted. She did not want Gerardo to get the impression she thought he was more malleable than Uhl, easier to get artistic secrets out of.

They fell silent. Gerardo was playing with the top of a bottle of Coca-Cola he was drinking. He seemed out of sorts. 'Did my question upset you?' she asked concernedly.

His reply cost him a great effort, as though it was a difficult but unavoidable question.

'No. It's just that I'm a bit annoyed… not with you though, with Justus. The same old thing. I told you he has a very special character. I know him well by now of course, but sometimes I find it hard to take…' 'How long have you worked together?'

Three years. He's a good painter – I've learnt a lot from him.' He looked towards the bright midday of the window. In profile, his face still seemed very attractive to Clara. 'But we have to do everything he says. Everything.'

He turned to look at her, as if those last words concerned her much more than him. 'He's in charge,' he added. 'He's your boss.' 'And yours, don't forget.'

Clara nodded, rather disconcerted. She did not know quite how to interpret what he had just said. Was it a warning? A piece of advice? She recalled the strange examination Uhl had given her the day before. When Gerardo said she had to do everything Uhl ordered, was he only talking about painting?

She finished the slice of wholemeal bread and picked up a grape in her shiny pink fingers. Seeing the curtains at the kitchen window, she remembered what had happened the night before. To change topics, she decided to mention it. 'Listen, there's something that…'

She stopped, and pushed the pips out of the grape. Gerardo stared inquisitively at her. 'Yes?' 'Oh, it's nothing really.' That doesn't matter, tell me anyway.'

He leaned towards her, elbows on the table. He seemed genuinely interested. Clara was touched by his apparent concern, and decided to tell him everything.

Tast night there was someone prowling outside the house.

Once when the timer went off I saw him looking in through the window. Then he vanished.'

Gerardo was staring at her. 'Don't tease.'

'I'm serious. It scared me to death. I went to the window and couldn't see anyone, but I'm sure I didn't dream it.'

That's strange…' Gerardo stroked his moustache and chin in a way Clara had already noticed. 'There are no other people round here, only farms the Foundation owns.' 'But I'm sure I heard footsteps close to the window.' 'And you went over but didn't see anyone?' 'Aha.'

The young painter looked thoughtful. He pushed around some pizza crumbs. Under the shirtsleeve at the top of his left biceps, she caught sight of a tattoo.

'Maybe it was someone from Security. They sometimes patrol the farms to make sure the canvases are all right… Yes, I'm sure it was someone from Security.' 'Are there canvases in the other farms then?' ‘You bet, sweetheart. We're full. Lots of canvases, lots of work.'

The thought that it might have been someone from Security reassured her, and did not seem at all unlikely. She was about to ask more when a shadow appeared between the light and them. Uhl had come into the kitchen. Clara realised something was wrong almost before she saw him. The painter was staring at her, face twisted with disgust, and muttering in unintelligible Dutch. 'What's he saying?' she asked.

Before Gerardo had the chance to reply, Uhl did something extraordinary. He took hold of the lapels of Clara's robe and tugged at them with all his might. His movement was so violent and unexpected that he pulled her to her feet, and she knocked the chair over. Uhl grabbed the robe belt and untied it. Clara's quivering breasts were exposed. 'Hey, what are you doing?' shouted Clara.

Gerardo had also stood up, and appeared to be arguing with Uhl. But it was obvious that the older man was winning. Stunned rather than angry, Clara closed the robe over her body. She could see that some of the paint on her stomach was smudged.

'No, no. Take it off,' Gerardo snapped. Take the robe off?'

'Yes, take it off. You're not supposed to be wearing anything, OK? The colours are very sensitive and could be damaged. I should have told you before. Justus is right. I…'

Uhl interrupted him, slapping the wall impatiently right next to Clara's head, as though to hurry her up.

'What's the matter?' she said indignantly. 'What kind of behaviour is this? I'm taking it off, dammit! See?'

Uhl snatched the robe from her and stormed out of the kitchen. Clara was fuming.

'What's his problem?' she asked.

'Go on eating and don't say a word. He has his ways, that's all.'

For a moment she caught Gerardo's gaze, and through her emerald-green corneas defied him to repeat that absurd phrase. 'He has his ways.' She did not know what most irritated her: Uhl's crazy behaviour or his assistant's submissive attitude. Then she decided to give in, reasoning that in any case she was only the canvas. She bent down, snatched up the chair and sat her sticky wet buttocks on the edge of the seat. She unscrewed the top of her Aroxen drink. Nothing has happened, she told herself. If the paint gets spoilt, that's their fault.

Gerardo did not say anything more. He finished his meal, and they went back to work.

The sun had moved round the window, so they lit the sidelight and tested the shadows and effects in silhouette. Clara was still stunned. Her initial disgust had given way to a sense of astonishment at Uhl's weird attitude. She seriously wondered whether he was ill. Neither of the painters said a word to her. It seemed obvious that the incident had affected the play of forces in their unstable triangle: Uhl was still hard as flint, while Gerardo had apparently taken on the role of shock absorber between the two of them. Although he did not speak, every time he came close to change her position he tried to smile, as if saying: Just be patient. If we're on the same side, it'll be better. But this newly discovered sympathy was even more unbearable than Uhl's ridiculous conduct.

In mid-afternoon there was another break. Gerardo told her there was a juice and an infusion in the kitchen. She did not feel like either, but Gerardo insisted quite forcefully. She, of course, made no attempt to put the robe on again. She went into the kitchen and found the juice, but the sachet of herbs was on the edge of the saucer, and the cup was empty. She filled it with mineral water and put it in the microwave. She did not feel at all cold or uncomfortable standing there completely naked, only rather strange: she was used to wearing some protection when she had a break and her body was painted, so the order to remain nude still surprised her. While the microwave hummed in the background, she looked at the landscape she could see out of the triangular gap in the curtains: she caught sight of tree trunks, a hedge in the distance, a path. It looked as though they were very isolated.

The microwave pinged. Clara opened the door and reached for the steaming cup. At that moment, a shadow flitted past her.

It was Uhl. He was wiping his hands on a rag, and did not even look at her as he came in. She turned the other way as well. She put the cup in its saucer and tore the sachet open. Uhl was moving around behind her. She had no idea what he was up to. She guessed he had come to get something out of the fridge, but did not hear the door. She became edgy as the silence continued. She was about to turn round to see what Uhl was doing, when all of a sudden she felt a hand between her thighs.

She started, and turned her head. She saw Uhl's eyes deep in his glasses only an inch from her face. Almost at once, his other hand gripped the back of her neck and forced her to go on looking to the front. She heard his hoarse Spanish: 'Don't move.'

She decided to obey without asking anything. The situation did not surprise her too much. In theory, she was a canvas. In theory, he was a painter. In theory, the painter could touch the canvas he was working on at any time and in any way he felt inclined to. She had no idea what kind of work they might be doing: perhaps even the fact of seizing her so brutally in the kitchen was part of it.

She breathed in to relax herself, and stayed with her hands on the edge of the sink. The fingers were feeling the inside of her left thigh very slowly, but because she was covered in oil paint, the sensation she got was not one of fingers touching her. She did not for example feel the warmth or cold of someone else's skin, or the extra sensations she might get from being stroked: it was simply the presence of two or three blunt objects moving over her flesh. They could just as well have been paint brushes.

The hand continued to climb; the other one was still gripping her left shoulder roughly. Clara tried to distance herself from those fingers which were not fingers or human flesh, but jointed rubber tubes climbing – still very calmly and gently – up the most sensitive part of her thigh. She wanted to believe it all had an artistic purpose. She knew the boundary was very difficult to establish: Vicky, for example, was constantly crossing it in both directions. The other humiliating possibility – that Uhl was abusing his position – would have led her to violently reject it. But so far she did not want to imagine this was the case.

So she stayed as still as she could, controlling her breathing, even though she knew what was the final and obvious destination of those fingers. The blue of the window, which she looked at steadily, hurt her eyes. He's in charge. He's a very strange man, but he's in charge. Could Gerardo have been preparing her for something he knew was going to happen?

The fingers spread out over her sex. Clara clenched her muscles. The fingers brushed lightly against the lips, but hesitated, as though waiting for some kind of reaction. But Clara had made up her mind not to move, to do nothing. She stood still, her legs slightly open (a triangle), her back to the painter. She held her breath, and all at once felt the fingers move away. The hand on her shoulder also disappeared. She turned her head, wondering what he would do next. Uhl was simply staring at her. His thick glasses and prominent forehead made him look like some monstrous insect. He was panting. His eyes were wild. A moment later, he left the kitchen. She heard him talking to Gerardo in the living room. She waited a few seconds, finished preparing her drink still looking towards the door, and drank it as though it were a bitter medicine. Then she did a few simple relaxation exercises.

When Gerardo called her back to work, she felt a lot more composed.

Nothing else happened that afternoon. Uhl did not touch her again, and Gerardo only gave her brusque orders. But while she was posing motionless and covered in paint, her mind was racing. Why did Uhl behave the way he did? Was he trying to abuse her, to frighten her, to stretch her the way Brentano did?

The only way for an artwork to behave in this confused, almost dreamlike world of body painting was to stay stretched and develop strategies for not surrendering, if things got any worse.

She was sure this was exactly what would happen, and soon.

She thought she would not sleep that night, but she immediately fell into an exhausted stupor.

She had no idea at what moment she felt once again that someone was watching her.

Lying naked, face down on the equally bare mattress, her mind slipped in and out of sleep. At a certain moment, the window, lit by the pale chalk of moonlight, suddenly darkened in shadow. But the shadow also made a noise in the grass.

She sat up as gracefully as a gazelle. There was no one outside the window.

Yet an instant before, a fraction of a second before there was no one, the rectangle had been filled with a silhouette. She was sure it was a man.

She sat craning her neck in the darkness until a crazy wail made her shudder with fright. Her heart in her mouth, she recognised the sound as coming from the timer. She groped along the floor like a blind woman until she found it next to the mattress, and switched it off. She did not know why it had been on, because Gerardo had told her there was no need to use it that night. Her heart was pumping the blood through her veins. The beating felt like bubbles bursting in her temples. The house was one vast silence. Yet she experienced exactly the same feeling as she had the night before. And if she strained to listen, she thought she could hear the rustle of grass in the distance.

Whatever the truth, and even taking the best interpretation into account (that for example it was a Foundation security guard, as Gerardo had said), that mysterious presence disturbed her far more than anything else. She swung her legs off the mattress and took several deep breaths. After Uhl and Gerardo had left she had taken a shower to wash the paint from her hair and body. Without oil paint all over her, the terror felt more real, more immediate, less absorbing.

She waited a few moments, and could no longer hear the rustling of footsteps in the grass. Perhaps the man had left, or perhaps he wanted to be sure she had gone back to sleep. She was far too nervous to think at all calmly. But she knew several breathing exercises that would soothe her like a balm in only a few minutes. She began with the easiest, still trying to locate the exact source of her fear.

One of the things that had always terrified her most was the possibility that a stranger might come into her room at night. Jorge laughed whenever she woke him up in the early hours to tell him she had heard a noise. Fine. Just face up to your fear and you'll conquer it.

She got up and walked across to the dark living room. Her breathing exercises had given her a false sense of calm that made her movements stiff. She had had an idea: she would call Conservation and ask for help, or at least advice. That was all she had to do. Just go over to the phone, dial the only number available to her, and talk to Conservation. After all, she was valuable material, and she was scared. She ran the risk of being damaged. Conservation had to help.

She remembered that the lights to the house were all in the entrance hall. She walked quickly out of the living room, into the dark hall and up the three steps to the front door. She flicked on and off the switches like someone firing rapid rounds against a hidden enemy. But she did not see anything strange. The full-length mirrors impassively reflected all the usual shapes. The tripod and the studio spot were exactly where Uhl and Gerardo had left them. The photograph of the man facing away from the camera was still there, and he still had his back to her (‘‘ would have been very different if he were looking towards you now, wouldn't it?). Beyond them, the three black windows in the living room and the back door looked exactly the same: they were shut and appeared protective.

She ran her primed tongue over her primed lips. She did not want to look at herself in the mirrors because she did not want to see a face with no eyebrows or lashes, only two eyes and a mouth (three dots opening into a terrifying triangle) beneath a cap of fine blonde hair. She was not in a sweat (there were no drops sliding down her skin or converting her brow into a gentle kind of polder, like those scattered throughout Holland), and she had no saliva to swallow, but both of those sensations were present, as punctual as stopwatches: the effort of her sweat, and the invisible agony of the lump in her throat. The sense of terror was still inside her, jagged and quivering. All the paint in the universe could do nothing to hide that.

Calm down. You're going to go over to the phone and dial. Afterwards you can close the blinds, one after the other. Then you'll be able to get back to sleep.

She edged like a sleepwalker towards a shrinking telephone, a telephone at the far end of a vanishing point. She did not want to look towards the windows as she was approaching it. For precisely that reason, she looked at them. All she could see were dark panes of glass that reflected her naked, yellow-hued body. The thought flashed through her that if she did see any kind of figure appear at one of those rectangles, she would go into a coma, become cataleptic, would turn into a vegetable and spend the rest of her days drooling in some asylum or other. It was as fleeting an instant as that of feeling giddy, a fraction of time no watch could measure. Horror had unbuttoned his mac in front of her and flashed his sex at her. There. The blinking of an eye. Then the feeling passed. And she had not seen anything at the window.

She reached the phone, picked up the navy-blue card and began very carefully to dial the number. Now she was standing directly in front of one of the windows. Beyond the wall of branches and wind, the trees and the night arched over everything. She must be completely visible to anyone watching from outside. Let him watch all he wants, thought Clara, just so long as he doesn't come any nearer.

'Good evening, Miss Reyes,' a young man's voice said into her earpiece. He spoke perfect Spanish. His voice was as reassuring as a Gouda cheese or a pair of clogs. 'How can we be of assistance?'

There's someone prowling round the house,' she blurted out. 'Round the house?' 'Outside the house, I mean.' A moment's silence. 'Are you sure?'

'Yes, I saw him. I've just… I've just seen him. Someone looking in at the bedroom window.'

'Is he still there?' 'No, no. I mean, I don't think…' Another moment's silence. 'Miss Reyes, that's completely impossible.'

She heard a creaking sound behind her. She was so concerned about looking at the windows she had forgotten (My God!) about looking behind her.

'Miss Reyes…?'

She turned round slowly as if in a dream. Or like a hanged man swinging round after being kicked in the side. She turned round in slow motion, on a carousel ride that presented her with distant images of the room (the man facing the other way, and so on…)

'Hello… are you still there…?' 'Yes.'

Nothing there. The room was empty. But for that split second, she had filled it with nightmares.

‘I thought you'd hung up,' the voice from Conservation said. 'I'll explain why what you said can't happen. All the farms around you belong to the Foundation, and access to them is limited. The entrances are guarded day and night by security staff, so that…'

'But I have just seen a man at the window,' Clara interrupted him. Another silence. Her heart was beating wildly.

'Do you know what I think?' the man replied, his voice changing as if the explanation had just become crystal clear to him. 'That it's very likely you're right, and you did see someone. I'll explain. Sometimes, especially when there's new material, the guards do go up to the houses to make sure everything is all right. And Security has been a bit worried about the safety of our canvases recently. So don't worry: it's one of our men. Just to make sure, here's what I'll do. I'll call Security and ask them to confirm they're patrolling the area. They'll take all the necessary steps. And please, don't leave the telephone. I'll call you to tell you what they say.'

She found the silence that descended as she waited for him to phone her back much easier to bear. She was beginning to feel sleepy again when it began to ring. The voice was as reassuring as before.

'Miss Reyes? It's all sorted out. They've confirmed to me in Security that it is one of their men. They say they're sorry, and promise not to disturb you again…' 'Thank you.'

'In any case, I should tell you that all the Foundation's agents are properly identified with red badges in their lapels. If you see the man again and can make out his badge, there should be no problem. Now why don't you go back to bed and, if you like, leave a light on. That way, the agent will not have to approach your window to be sure everything is all right, and he won't frighten you.' 'Thanks a lot.'

'Don't mention it. And should you need anything else, don't hesitate to…'

Blah, blah. The usual polite phrases, but they had their effect. When she hung up, Clara felt much calmer. She drew the blinds of the three windows in the living room, the ones in the kitchen, and at the front of the house. She checked that the front and back door were secure. She only hesitated for a second before going into her bedroom. The window reflected the light from the empty room like a tank of black water. She went over to the window. Here, just a few moments ago, there was someone looking in.

It was someone from Security, she told herself. She could not remember having seen a red label on his lapel, but then of course she had not had much chance of seeing it. She closed the blind.

Despite what the man from Conservation had suggested, she did not want to leave any lights on. She went back to the front entrance and switched them all off. Then she walked back into the completely dark bedroom, lay on her back on the mattress, and stared up at the dense blackness of the ceiling. She did another breathing exercise and soon fell asleep. She did not dream of her father. She did not dream of the mysterious Uhl. She did not dream at all. Carried away by her exhaustion, she slipped pleasurably into unconsciousness.

The man hidden in the trees waited a while longer, and then crept towards the house once more. He was not wearing any badge.