The Portrait

Let me explain. I told you often about getting up at five every morning in the icy Gorbals lodgings I stayed in, going to work with a slice of dried porridge in my pocket for my lunch; of working with chilblains on my fingers in winter, of never seeing daylight for six months of the year. Working from seven in the morning to seven at night six days a week with four days holiday a year. Turning out drawings of cogs and machinery, architectural plans, biscuit tins, posters—anything that came in. Rarely even knowing what it was for or who it was for. Bleak and joyless, no? Well, no. To you, of course, it is so far removed from anything you have experienced that it must seem so, and I confess I made it sound as grim as possible. I wished to be like you in those days, to feel and think as I ought. But I wasn’t really telling the truth. I don’t look back on that time of my life with a shudder at all.

Even working for the magazines in London had its enjoyable side, though the work was hard and the pay terrible. Spending an entire day outside the Old Bailey to catch a glimpse of a murder suspect so a sketch could appear to spice up the account, the faces distorted to look properly criminal, is a good training for the portraitist of an Impressionist tendency. You work fast, and there is no time for artistic vapours. You see, run off a sketch on the omnibus back to the office, have ten minutes to finish it off, if you’re lucky, then off on the next assignment. Not that anybody ever really looked at the result.

There was one man, accused of killing his wife for her inheritance, who had a passing resemblance to the prime minister. Just to see what would happen, I put in a real sketch of Lord Salisbury, complete with hooded eyebrows, high-domed forehead and opulent beard. I even dressed him up in a proper frock coat. “Man Charged with Brutality and Theft,” was the headline, and my picture of the prime minister underneath. I waited for laughter, or at least to be dismissed from my post. Scarcely anyone noticed at all, except for my fellow journalists. Those illustrations were just decorations, to break up the monotony of the print. All my labour was there simply to give a little variety to the page, so the reader would not get too bored and start looking out of the window of the omnibus instead.

Don’t you also regret the lost enthusiasm of youth? Look back to that time when all was new and fresh, when nothing was known, all was to be discovered? When every joke was classic, every piece of tomfoolery a delight?

Perhaps not; your youth was so different to mine. Certainly I was afraid when I went to that drawing office in Glasgow, even though the relief of leaving home was so great that almost anything was preferable. The size and horror of the big city, the loneliness, the cold, all chilled me. But it was exciting to feel such intensity in the world. Before I had only had such extreme emotions from the inside; only guilt and the fear of God and mother had made me feel so alive.

And I met people such as I never dreamed existed—wastrels always joking and blaspheming; drunks who could do a better job after half a bottle of whisky than most men sober; the occasional bully; the more frequent saint. I became the mascot of them all, just as I became your mascot when I came south. But the difference was that they wanted nothing from me.

They taught me, too. The one thing I had been good at in school was drawing; I could do plans of complicated machines far beyond the capabilities of my fellows at school, but when I got to the workshop I realised I could do almost nothing; that my pride was misplaced. More than anything, it taught me never to think I was finished.

I started learning, as I had never learned before or since. And if I am often scornful of the technical failings of others, it is because I know how hard it is to acquire good technique. I acquired mine by constant labour and study, year after year, day in and day out. It did not come naturally or easily, and it is the one thing I am truly proud of. Naturally I protect my skill against those who dismiss it as redundant, or old-fashioned. To get what you want—exactly the effect you have in your mind and no other—you have to have mastery, otherwise you are like a man trying to speak English with only a limited vocabulary. Unless you have that range, you end up saying what you can say, not what you mean. And once you do that you begin to tramp the road of dishonesty, persuading first others then yourself that there is no difference between the two.

PERHAPS IT WAS the show that brought about such a change in you. The Show, I should call it, complete with capital letters, because it was the start of a revolution in our poor little island, was it not? When the gales of revolution, the French revolution, swept over us all, violence unleashed, the reactionaries cast aside and consigned to history, where their poor bodies now rot, a-mouldering. With you as the Robespierre, pulling strings behind the scenes, rewarding some and condemning others to professional death.

Even then, I was struck by your ruthlessness, the way you took control of the various artistic groups, rigged elections so that your creatures became the secretaries, the heads of the hanging committees, stamped out all dissent. The way you wrote manifestos and issued them in everyone’s name. The way you so consistently attacked those who dared disagree with you. Dear me! The polite world of English art had not seen anything like it before; was unprepared for such an assault. Pity the poor person who got in your way. Pity Evelyn, who became an object lesson in the dangers not of opposing you but merely of not supporting you.

All this must go into my portrait, but it is difficult. In the first picture I caught it, simply because I painted what I saw but didn’t understand what I was looking at. But it is all there, in the way the shadows play across the face, the way I managed to give your eyes that slightly withdrawn, waiting look. Had you asked me at the time, I would have said I was showing up your reticence, a slight fear of the world that you normally hid. I would have congratulated myself on seeing the soft core of your being. But I would have been wrong; what I was painting was your patience; the way you were waiting for the right moment before you launched out; the contempt you had for everyone—painters and critics and patrons—who needed to be disciplined, and controlled. I was painting the burning desire for power curled within you.

And in this second one, I must find a way of depicting power achieved. It would have been easier had you been a general or a politician; then I would have had five hundred years of props to make my point. I could have painted your army at its moment of triumph, and subverted the image by showing the dead and dying in their midst. Or a politician making a speech at the hustings, moulding an audience of the poor and the hungry so that they vote to remain so. Military power, political power, religious power are all well-painted phenomena; each has its attitude and stance and set of the jaw. But a critic? How to depict the power of such a man when I can follow in no giant’s footsteps?

YOU’RE NOT REALLY interested in how I came to live on this island, are you? At least, it would be unlike you to be so concerned. But I’ll tell you anyway. It will be your punishment for that fatuous politeness you so often affect. It wasn’t planned. I didn’t work out in advance what was the perfect place for me. On the contrary, it took many months of wandering before I got here. Don’t think, by the way, that it marks my submission to your artistic principles, that it demonstrates my acceptance of the French model. Quite the contrary. There is no art here, as you may have noticed. The fads and fancies of Paris are of no more interest to these people than they are to the aldermen of Dundee. Indeed, they think of Paris as an enemy, when they think of it at all. Spending time, energy or money on paintings is all but incomprehensible to them; fighting over it is totally so. They have the sea. It is all they have and all they need.

So I came to a place with no artistic history, where what I do is regarded with blank indifference. I am, I think, the first person ever to wield a brush on this island. There is no predecessor, no artistic colony of like-minded souls, no earnest matrons desperate to have me for tea or dinner. Just the fishermen, their stolid wives, semi-literate children and the sea.

I remember telling you once that I had always wanted to live by the sea. You, of course, thought it was about painting and went on about the possibilities for tactility in the seascape—was that the absurd word you were using then?—in the way the paint could represent light and water. You missed the point, of course. The point was to have all that nonsense washed away. Being by the sea is like a permanent baptism; the light and air hypnotises, and your soul is washed by vastness. You see what true magnificence is, and it is not something that can be put down on a canvas. When you paint, you either represent what you see or project yourself through what is in front of you. Confronted with the sea, you realise the uselessness of both. You cannot humanise the sea. It’s not like all those mountains that are so popular, with merry peasants walking down tracks or harvesting corn. The sea is movement and violence and noise. You remember that Géricault painting, The Raft of the Medusa? A failure; a cop-out. All these people being heroic and desperate, dominating the canvas, as if they were the point. Put people on the ocean and they are irrelevant and ridiculous, not heroic. They can be swallowed up in an instant and the sea doesn’t even notice. Think of that boy on the beach. But did he paint that? Did he even try to depict the magnificence of it all? No; he twisted it around so that it is yet another tale of people battling terrible odds, of human suffering and courage. How pathetic. The sea is not there for men to be heroes on.

There I go again; I know. But that is why I came here, you know; that is what I was looking for when I left England. It took some time to realise it, of course. I was making it up as I went along. When I took the train from Victoria for the Channel, I thought that I would go south, to the sun and the light, follow in the footseps of everyone else. So I did, for a while. I left my luggage at Boulogne, to be sent after me when I knew where I was going, then headed for Provence. I only stayed a few weeks; there was something in the place that disgusted my Scottish sensibilities. I could feel myself becoming sentimental, even as I stood on the balcony of a hotel in some town whose name I’ve forgotten. Cézanne could do it, no doubt; find the sublime in those people and landscapes. He is the only one of your protegés who is truly remarkable, head and shoulders over the rest of them. In half a dozen little pictures, he changed reality. Provence now looks like a Cézanne painting. It cannot be seen in any other way. Perhaps if I’d never gone to that exhibition of yours, I might have come up with something different, but it would not have been as good, and I was determined not to copy.

Besides, they’ve had it too easy. All they have to concern them is the wind, and they complain about that incessantly. They have never had to bellow their defiance of fate. No-one who drinks wine grown in their own fields has. Besides, what was I to do? Paint bull fights and olive groves? So I moved on, headed for Spain, and stopped in a town called Collioure; stayed there for a few weeks. But the Mediterranean! So blue, so civilised, so warm! None of the ferocity I needed; none of the battle or the terror that the sea should have. At least there I learnt what I was looking for, so it wasn’t a wasted voyage. It’s a poor place, benighted and grim, and I thought when I arrived that it would be perfect. I stayed in a cheap hotel for a week, and found it very peaceful. The people have their own particular inbred beauty, but it is a civilised place, really, if you scrape a little below the poverty and the hardship. That “but” is important. There is a good stone port, and castle, a handsome church, a hotel, some shops—all too much. I got so far as negotiating to take a little house in the village, and thought I would be happy there. So I would have been; that was the trouble. The night before I was due to move in, I walked along the quayside; cloudless night, stars twinkling, a warm wind coming in off the sea, and I felt this strange panic sweep over me. I wasn’t looking for happiness.

So on I went, waiting for that feeling of being there. Do you know what I mean? The feeling that you are home, even though you have never been there before. The sense that where you are is where you should be. I can describe it no better than that, I’m afraid. It’s not a feeling you get in a big city, as when you are in London or Paris you are never anywhere in particular. So I avoided the towns and took the train slowly up through France, sometimes coming close, sometimes trying to persuade myself that I had found what I was looking for, because it was a long voyage, and a frustrating one. I wanted it over, and took no real pleasure in the trip. The landscape, the sights, the architectural marvels, were not important. They were not what I was chasing.

And I ended in Quiberon, a poor and depressing place, as I’m sure you noticed, and was not especially tempted by it. But I wandered down to the port to kill time until I could continue my journey, and saw a fishing boat unloading their catch onto the quayside. I had been looking for some time before I realised that I could understand what the men were saying. Not the understanding that is filtered through learning and education, mind, but real understanding, without even having to think. They were speaking the Gaelic. A distant variant of Scottish, of course, but close enough to the language I learned from my grandmother when I was packed off to her to live whenever my father was out of work and couldn’t afford my keep. Fairly often I spent months there, and she spoke Gaelic to me only. She was a gentle woman with a fierce pride that was expressed only in these words. Unlike many, I never tried to forget the language, even though it was of little use to me.

And those fishermen reminded me of her through their conversation. A strange accent they have, with dozens of words and expressions that are different, but just recognisable. So I asked them, in Gaelic, where they came from. They found my speech as odd as I found theirs, but the curiosity of a man so obviously foreign speaking to them in something close to their own tongue tickled their fancy, and they responded. They were the first people I had had a decent conversation with in weeks, they shared a drink with me, told me of a little house which I might rent. I was home. My journey was over. I crossed over with them the next day.

I’ve only left a few times since, to go to the morgue in Quiberon to study my corpses or to pick up some paints and canvasses. You think I am in exile, I see myself as being in refuge. Not the first Scot to be so, either. I have an illustrious forebear. If you want, go back to the church, and look at the statue. Saint Gildas. Another man of the Clyde, although a bit before my time. I must say he had escaped my attention before I came here, but Father Charles told me all about him. Gildas fled the tumult and beastliness of England and took sanctuary on this island so he would not have to submit to the opinion of others who considered him a heretic. Thus the version of the story I was told.

A perceptive man, our priest. He says little, but sees much. You still haven’t been to visit him, I note.

The islanders welcome me in their fashion, but think I’m a bit crazy as well. No-one else has chosen to live here for 1500 years, and no English—they think of me as English despite everything, which is a big disadvantage—since the smugglers were defeated half a century ago. No-one stays unless they have to, or if they can think of anywhere better to go. They don’t even have any people spending the summer; nobody in their right mind would come to Houat, to this island with no running water, where it is devilish hard to get fuel for your fire or food for your plate. But here I stay, and here I would have stayed forever, had I not summoned you here and had your presence not reminded me of the advice I gave to Evelyn—that a painting unseen might as well not exist. I am thinking—no, I have decided—to go back, to re-enter the fray; but on my terms only.

What was that again? I summoned you? How dare I presume? You wrote to me, did you not, proposing the commission for a portrait? Your attempt to begin my reintroduction into the world of English art, the only one that matters to folk like us, poor though it be. To lure me back and help me take up the reins once more. No, no, my dear friend! We are trying to look below the surface now. It was I who summoned you; I who knew you would come, would have to come to see me. I lured you here. I needed to see if you would come.

I have written few letters in the past couple of years; my bank has received most of them, and they have not been so important. My demands on its services are small these days. One was important, though; the short note I wrote to your protegé Duncan a few months back. That I laboured long over, once I knew what I must do, because I knew you would read it. That was the letter which brought you here; to which you had to respond, if all was as I thought.

One sentence only, in fact, made you pack your bags and take the train to Paris, then out to Quiberon, the fishing boat over to the island, and walk across it until you arrived at my door. One short sentence made the difference. “I hope you and William are still friends; many have drowned in his displeasure.”

You read things, words and pictures, with an intensity greater than any man I have known. You seize on the little detail—a colour contrast, the shape of an ear lobe, the crook of a finger, one malformed sentence, a curious use of words, and tease it until it gives up its secrets. But what secret did my letter conceal? It tantalised, that clumsy sentence, but remained mute.

It was no slip of the pen, my friend, not a piece of babbling from someone losing touch with reality, a poor joke made by someone forgetting even the basics of English grammar. I wanted to see if you would come. It was the final test, every word considered and laboured over. Besides, I needed you here, if I was ever to break through the block which has stopped me painting anything truly satisfying.

I THINK it’s time to tell you what made me leave England. You’ll love it; it will appeal to your egotism. You did. It began at half past nine on a Tuesday morning, May 10, 1910. I was sitting having my breakfast, and cursing the weather, as it was dull and cloudy and I wanted brightness for a picture I was working on. At the very least I knew I would be doing nothing at least until lunchtime; maybe not even then. So I decided to read the Morning Chronicle and take my time over my scrambled eggs and coffee that my landlady had just brought me. I started, as I always did, with the notices and advertisements, then worked my way through the news, foreign and domestic, then, for a final pleasure, turned to the reviews.

I had been looking forward to it; Evelyn’s show had opened a couple of days before, and I knew there would be something. At worst, only a little mention; at best, something more fulsome. I didn’t know who’d be doing it; the Chronicle is always cagey about that, for some reason. It was the sort of show some young lad would be given to review, not important enough to justify paying some figure of influence. She was scarcely known, after all.

The reviews for your show had run the previous week and were dreadful, the letters from outraged colonels and academicians had followed. Your show was a perfect disaster critically, and a fine success in every other respect. In a matter of days, everybody in the country who cared for such things now knew the names of Gauguin, Seurat, Degas, and all the others.

I thought this boded well for Evelyn; she was likely to benefit from not being part of your group. Besides, I thought the critics would have exhausted their stock of vitriol on you, and would find it agreeable to say something nice for once. But no; they were having too good a time hurling abuse at the French, and most journals had passed her by to give over more space to you. Only the Chronicle ran a review, an anonymous one as occasionally they did. Better than nothing; any review at all was a good start. And the moment I started reading, I knew that you had written it. You have a style with words as distinct as any artist’s with paint. The way you cluster adjectives, the rhythm of the sentences, the complexity of your subclauses, each one diving into another so that the meaning is almost lost as your thought races on—no-one writes like you. I’m sure I wasn’t the only person who recognised it, although I could see why you didn’t want your authorship generally known. You liked to think of yourself as a gentleman, after all.

We are back to my hobby horse again. The surface and the instant impression. Meet you, and one imagines you to be the perfect gentleman. Meet Evelyn for the first time, run off a sketch of her, rely on the artist’s intuitive judgement and instant assessment and what do you get? A skinny little thing, who looks as though her lip might start trembling at any moment. Those slightly sloped shoulders; the sign of someone turning in on herself and afraid of reality. And sex, and femininity? Forget all that. A professional spinster, who would shudder should any man even think of touching her. A fearful timorous creature, easily broken. Inconsiderable, and not to be taken seriously. Some people stand alone because they are strong and disdain the world; others do so out of fear, desperate to belong and be accepted but not knowing how to do so, afraid of being spurned. One look and it was clear Evelyn was in the second category.

Thus the dubious insight of the modern artist. But look at her as Raphael might, that lover of women. Or Rembrandt, who saw people’s souls with his godlike gaze, or Vermeer, who could paint depths and levels of calm and show the turmoil within total placidity, and you see something different again. Then you see the brittleness, the force of will which impelled her to sacrifice everything for the single goal of being a painter. Not to make a living, not to be a success; those are low things, not worth the candle. But to follow her own instincts until she was content with what she produced. She wanted my biscuit tin, to get to that point which I have approached only once in my life. But her standards were higher than mine; she was one of those souls who can never be content in this life.

You can’t understand any of that; don’t even pretend you can. For you art is politics, and Evelyn would not bend to your will. Why is it that you have had so much trouble with women when you find men so easy to control? Do women have to be bullied in different ways? Is another style required, one which is beyond your skill? Your wife. Evelyn. Jacky. You failed with all of them. Did they perceive something we did not? Did they see a weakness known only to yourself?

Let me look at you. Do you know, I think I must have hit on it. You are truly angry at last. Was it the slip in mentioning Jacky, perhaps? After days of provocation, you have finally opened up to me. A new emotional register on your face, which I must take into account.

Come, come! Don’t be cross! I am only doing my job, you know. You have had it always too easy. No portraitist has ever pushed you this far; that’s why all the pictures of you I have seen are so terrible. Oh, fine for public presentation, I have no doubt. They would look good in the dining hall of your Cambridge College, or on the walls of the Athenaeum. But they present the public face, not the inner man. They have the personality and insight of an encomium. What was it Oliver Cromwell said to Walker? “I desire that you paint me warts and all.” Those other portraitists not only left out the warts, they didn’t even notice they were there. Nor did I first time round. But not this time, and I am determined the next will be even better.

No; that’s it for the day. I am tired, and you have been punished enough, I think. It is time we parted; I have my duties to perform.

Which ones? Oh, good heavens, there are so many of them on this island. I must make sure the tide is coming in, that the sun is setting, and that the wind continues to blow. Have you been to see the fort yet? You should; it is a sad enough spectacle to make anyone thoughtful. Built by Vauban, that great military engineer, to fend off the English. I don’t believe it was ever used for that purpose. The English turned up anyway, and the good folk of this place know fine building stone when they see it. Whole walls, escarpments and abutments and whatever they call them, have vanished in the night, turned into docks and houses and shelters. One of the strongest forts in Brittany, falling to pieces because no-one loves it, while the little church, unprotected by the state and far weaker in construction, is in fine shape, sustained only by the affection of the populace. I will leave you to figure out the moral for yourself. That’s where I will end up, I think. The next few days will be important, and I need to prepare myself for what is to come. I find being in that church helps me, for some reason. Father Charles encourages it; he says quiet contemplation is as good as prayer or instruction. Not that he disdains instruction, although he teaches in hints, rather than in injunctions.

I occasionally test him, which is a bit naughty of me, set him a moral conundrum and see how he copes, all in the guise of asking for direction. What would happen, Father, if you knew of a terrible sin, but were the only person to know of it? What if you knew no-one else would believe you even if you told someone? What should you do?

“You should find a way of redeeming that sin,” he replied.

Easier said than done, I replied. A fluffy answer.

“Look into yourself,” he said quietly. “You are a painter. Does the sin make you angry? Then use that anger to paint. Does it make you sad? Use that. Was it a sin against another person? Try to help them. Against yourself? Then try to forgive.”

But what if you can’t forgive?

“Then find a way to do so. True sinners often suffer worse fates than those they hurt. Like the murderer who receives a just punishment. Then forgiveness comes more easily.”

He has taught me much, the good father. I have come to rely on him greatly in the past year or so. He is a comforting presence, and has helped me more than he knows.

Come back early, if you will. There is a chill in the air first thing, and that suggests the weather is breaking up. There will be a storm soon, and that means bad light and slow progress. I need to get this all finished, otherwise the ending will be postponed for a week. You needn’t concern yourself, though: it is already too late to leave. The seas are too rough, and no boat will be able to take you back to the mainland for days.

DO YOU KNOW, I had a sleepless night last night? Nothing unusual about that, I suppose, but this was worse than usual. Much worse; I tossed and turned because I was angry. Not with you particularly, but with myself. I had this sudden horrible feeling that I had made a mistake.

I should have painted you outside. Not simply because the light would have shown up your character the better, but because it would have made you uncomfortable. The inside is your sphere. The drawing room, the gallery, the dining room, the restaurant. You are a creature of the interior. Outside in the fresh air you shrivel a little, become less than yourself, a touch uncertain. Afraid, even. That fear, I realise now, is part of you, always there but hidden deep down under your never-ending movement. What are you afraid of? Not other people, or at least not anyone you have yet met. Some circumstance you know you will one day encounter but which has not yet materialised. A hint, perhaps from that long week in Hampshire when I was painting that first portrait; your son was sitting on your lap—such a good, devoted father you are—and dropped a glass on the table. It shattered and dozens of shards of glass spun across the table, onto the floor. The noise was remarkable, I remember. It didn’t just break, it positively exploded. An expensive glass, too; good crystal, a present from your wife’s family. Some of the fragments scudded across the table towards you. And do you know what I saw?

Let me tell you. You moved your child—both hands round his waist—you moved him very quickly a few inches as you turned your head away. But not to safety; not out of the way of the shining, twinkling fragments. Into their path. You moved your own child’s body so he would serve as a shield. Oh, ’twas but a moment, but I saw it, although I forgot it immediately afterwards. It couldn’t be right, could it?

Yes it could. You were prepared to use the body of a three-year-old boy to protect yourself. It was an instinctive response, a tunnel which suddenly opened up, allowing a little light to fall onto your soul. An incident of perhaps one part of a second, maybe less, before the tunnel closed once more. A laugh, a jocular remark, a good-natured reassurance that the boy was not to mind; it was only a glass. Tousled his hair. The servants called in to sweep up the mess. Another glass brought; the child sent out to play in the garden once he had been checked to make sure no sharp fragments had lodged in his clothes.

It doesn’t make any difference. Or does it? Why do I feel that half a second cannot be erased by hours, days, years of different behaviour? Why is it that half a second gives the lie to a reputation for fearless courage and audacity, built up over so many years? Because it is the truth, and because the child knows it too. It is his inheritance from you, that moment. Whatever is beyond your control frightens you; that is why you must control everything and everyone. That’s why I should have painted you outside. Above all here, where there is nothing but nature, and when the storms come, they are violent beyond your imagining. Not the storms of paintings, not the colourful storms of Turner, or the well-behaved and disciplined storms of someone like Vanderwelde; not something that can be neutered by three-quarters of an inch of frame. Not beautiful, either; that is a misconception. Real storms are ugly and brutal; there is little pleasing aesthetically in them; their appeal goes much deeper.

We are coming into the storm season. Shortly, perhaps even tomorrow, we will go for a walk, you and I, along the cliffs. Don’t look so worried; we will wrap up well, and face your fears together, stand in the howling gale and shout our defiance at all the uncontrollable forces in the world. You must not turn me down, you will never have the opportunity again; it is a once in a lifetime offer that I am making. It will be worth it.

Shortly after I arrived here, you see, I was down at Madame Le Gurun’s by the port during one of those storms. I had walked down there to see if there was any bread, but didn’t realise quite how quickly the weather can deteriorate, nor how long the storms can go on. So I thought that I would have a drink and sit it out for an hour or so. It made me feel quite foolish; the storm eventually blew itself out after three and a half days. I stayed only for three hours before boredom drove me out into the worst of the rain, to walk home. How I made it I don’t know, because it was pitch black and the wind was too strong for any lantern.

I got lost, and wandered too near the cliff face. Not much of a cliff, as you will see. Quite a gentle, low thing; you can scramble down to the beach in good weather, when the tide is out, and arrive scarcely even breathless. At night, in a storm, when the tide is pounding waves against the rocks, it is another matter entirely. One slip and you’d be gone; I nearly went. I was more petrified than I had ever been before in my life, and when I got home, the fire was out and a window had blown in; my papers were soaking and all over the place. A few hours of weather had reduced my life to ruins and had cut me down to a shivering, whimpering carcase. I needed a fire, urgently. And I needed to block the window. I used sketch pads for one, and a canvas I’d been working on for the other. My art saved me; the first time, to be frank, it had ever been of any use at all. I recommend both, by the way; sketch pads are good quality paper and burn well; canvas thickly covered in oil paint is a perfect way of keeping out the rain.

I ramble; my point was that while I was in the bar, a fishing boat came in, and the crew tumbled in for hot brandy to revive themselves. They were exhausted, exhilarated. The wildness of the storm had communicated itself to them. Their eyes burned, and their faces had been lashed by the rain into beauty. Even their movements had an extraordinary elegance; after fighting against the sea for many hours, moving across a room, lifting a glass, talking in a normal voice was absurdly easy. There was a life in them that burned all the more brightly because it had come close to being snuffed out altogether. And their women responded to it as well; even the most shrewish of them gathered round with renewed interest, touching them and showing in countless little ways that they were aroused by the danger. I bet that, even though some of the men were so tired they could barely stand, that many a baby was conceived that night. Storm babies, they are called.

Good life; bad art. I studied them carefully as they sat there, talking so quietly and with such animation. The high-flushed colouring of their cheeks, the animation of their eyes, their movements alternating between quickness and langour—but the langour of exhaustion, not the drawing room variety of the bored. Such ugly pictures they would have made. Those excessive colours, those poses which would be so absurd once the movement was taken out of them. You could produce a fine picture, but it would have been such a poor reflection of the reality it would scarcely be worthwhile.

How to put into paint the steam rising from their clothes, the palpable mixture of excitement and relief, the fear and the exhaustion? Not the physical tiredness; that is fairly straightforward, though still hard to do. I mean the spiritual exhaustion of someone who has faced death and been reprieved. Someone who has to confront the fact that being alive is the thoughtless gift of the unknowing, uncaring sea. Or of God, if you prefer it, as they probably do. It cannot be done, because paintings exist only in the beholder’s mind, and few people have any understanding of such violence. Such a picture would register only within the limited repertoire of the gallery viewer. They would see the squalor of the bar, the filth of the clothes, the unshaven tiredness of the men. And would put it in the tradition of genre pictures, stretching back to the Dutch, or liken it to one of those sentimental confections of the Victorians, The Sailors’ Rest, or some such.

And yes, I did paint it, because I was ashamed that I was still reluctant to take a chance. I worked for weeks on it, and I am proud of the result. It is the finest thing I have ever done, for I nearly fell off the cliff that night, and I had some glimpse of what true terror, and true relief, is like. I captured it in my painting.

Here it is; underneath this old pile of canvas. I won’t ask you what you think; I don’t care, anyway. Yes, I know; it is small, compact. Focussing entirely on two of the men, and one of the women. You see how they are huddled; the slope of their shoulders turning in on themselves? It is the colouring I am proud of most; bright blues and greens; none of the dark interior browns I would have used in the past. I have painted heroes, the equal of the Greek myths, men who have battled the gods and survived. Not the downtrodden and oppressed poor, not people you are meant to feel sorry for. You don’t see it, I am sure. I can tell by your eyes. But you have never felt fear; the nearest you have come was a few fragments of glass scudding towards you across a mahogany table. You have missed something important in your life; perhaps we might rectify it before you leave. As I say, I intend to show you a storm, and there will be one before tomorrow is out.

YOU MUST ADMIT I was right about the weather. Clear blue sky one day, and the next day—this; all the more impressive for being so immediate. It’s cosy enough in here at the moment, mind; you will not shiver while you are with me. We will sit here in the warmth for all the world as if nothing is going on outside at all. Don’t you find the noise of the wind enthralling? It sounds sometimes as though the whole house is going to be ripped off its foundations and blown out to sea. You can feel the walls shake, and the screaming of the wind outside is sometimes deafening. You wait; we’re a long way from the peak yet.

But you must be chilly from the walk over, even if you are bundled up in coats and sweaters and scarves. Have you ever travelled anywhere without catering for every possible type of weather? I bet you have full morning dress back at Madame Le Gurun’s, just in case. Have a glass of wine to warm you up. I’ve warmed it slightly by the fire, added a few extra ingredients such as you need on a day like this. Drink it down! There’s plenty more, and it will make all the difference.

I am nearly done with you, you’ll be glad to hear. I think this will be your last day. The finishing glazes, the last touches I can add later. I would prefer you not to be here in any case; the final manipulation of you into what I want is best done from memory, for that is the moment the picture leaves reality and approaches something altogether superior.

Yes, I have finally made up my mind. In a month or so I will pack up here and re-enter the world. It is time, and my demons are exorcised—will be, at any rate, after today.

Why today? Because today I finish. Finishing with you and going back to London are one and the same, it seems. Now I fully understand why I left in the first place. Of course, it was Evelyn who was the trigger, perhaps you have realised that already, but she was not the whole reason.

I never could figure out when exactly you decided she was an enemy. Did it start that day in the atelier? Over Sarah Bernhardt? Because she didn’t want to be part of your circle of admirers? It was a long time before it took form. Let us return to that look of yours as you examined her first sketch in the atelier; that confusion I tried so hard to understand. First the look of appreciation. She was a handsome woman in her frailty; beautiful, even, in the right light; her wispiness made one want to sweep her up and protect her, or crush her. They are the same impulse. She was tall; light brown hair done up quite primly in a way that suggested an attempt to hide deeper passions, pretending to be respectable. You appreciated that; there was some attraction.

That was part of the glance; the underlying first element. Then there was another level; the preparation of scorn. No-one you found attractive could possibly paint at all well, so you readied yourself to be patronising. A compliment. Not at all bad, my dear. Really; I have seen a lot worse. You have some talent. . . .

And then the third layer, one of confusion and shock as you looked at her sketch of that pathetic arrangement and realised that all your instincts were quite wrong. She could draw. In a few simple lines she had caught those objects, pinned them down and made something miraculous out of them. Yes, yes, the technique was faulty, the skill had not been learned. But there was something there you didn’t expect to see, and it threw you into temporary silence. And when you did offer some comments, she scarcely heard them. She was studying what she had done and had no time for what anyone else thought.

A fault. A definite fault, so I had learned over the years. You must always listen to what other people have to say; anyone can make a useful comment, even a critic. She listened to you, but was not convinced; was not persuaded you were sole possessor of the truth. The attraction, the ability, and the deafness to your words. The three vital elements which could slowly brew up into enmity. Listen to that wind! Blowing up nicely now. More wine? Are you beginning to feel warmer? More relaxed?

I often wish I had given different advice about that exhibition at the Chenil, or that she hadn’t listened to me. I wish I had told her to turn it down. Show your pictures to individuals only; wait awhile; the opportunity will come again, when you are truly ready for it. But I didn’t; I said I thought she should grab the chance with both hands because that is what I would have done. But then, I did listen to other people’s opinions, moulded my work to what they wanted. She took my advice, but had I not been the advocate she probably would have turned the chance down, and would not have exposed herself to you.

You do not attack merely for the pleasure of it. I must give you credit; you normally take no joy in the public demonstration of your power, as long as you have it. You could write filthy reviews of many an artist; live in London and you are spoiled for choice. But you do not. Your silence is comment enough. Yet with Evelyn you acted out of character. What you did seemed unnecessary. The greatest critic in the land going out of his way to pulverise an artist who is scarcely known? Why bother?

Oh, it was effective; a little masterpiece. So many half truths, hidden bits of violence strung together into a seamless quilt of polite invective. And funny! You deployed the one thing Evelyn was truly afraid of, to be ridiculed. “It is regrettable that the posturings of the well-born female should now be accorded the privilege of public exhibition, when once they surfaced only when the men had been left to their brandy.” “There may be a few who find genius in mediocrity; this reviewer, alas, is immune to its charms. . . .” “There are failures that are complete, and failures that are partial, tho’ if anyone paints enough, consistency in poorness cannot be assured.” You see, I can recall every word.

And then the demolition of the pictures; every bit as thorough as the job you did on poor Anderson. Except that you tried too hard; you overstretched yourself, and strove for effect. No metaphor left undoubled, no sentence simply put. When you took Anderson to pieces your language was spare; this was florid. With him you were direct and spoke in words unadorned; with Evelyn no literary device—and you are master of them all—was unused. But it was empty, your abuse. No reason was given for your opinions, no arguments were advanced. You did not prove her inadequacy, merely asserted it.

For the first time in all the years I had known you, you had lied. You stepped over an invisible but crucial line. I had long had my doubts about the importance you gave yourself, but I could never before claim that you were anything other than an honest man. With that article you entered the darkness of calumny and deceit. The last threads of loyalty snapped, completely and irrevocably. You lost your protection, the only thing which gave immunity from vengeance. The only thing which had always made me forgive you.

Because her paintings were good. You knew they were good, and you had known it ever since you first met her. You unleashed your power in an ignoble cause, to protect and advance yourself alone. You became an outlaw, acknowledging no restraint but your own power. You sinned against the very art you existed to protect and nourish. And you know what I think about sin. And punishment, of course. Let me fill your glass once more. I see the colour coming back into your face nicely now.

It wasn’t even about her pictures, was it? Nor even your desire that there should be no challenges to those French-men you were championing. Nor even her dismissive attitude to you. Had it not been a review of her exhibition, you would have found something else. Some humiliation, some slight, the more public the better. Because you were frightened, desperate. You thought the triumph that you had just won might be torn from your grasp, that your reputation might be ruined.

Shall I tell you how I am so sure? Because you are here. Because I wrote Duncan a letter with that phrase in it—“many have drowned in his displeasure”—and you came, after nearly four years of forgetting that I existed.

I was surprised by the whole business, I must admit. Trumpeting the bohemian ethic in a literary journal is one thing, taking part in it yourself is quite another. I always assumed yours was a paper amorality, designed to titillate the salons but not so much that it reduced your standing. Even so, many a man has survived worse scandal with their reputation enhanced. Or was it an aesthetic matter? Was it, perhaps, that you didn’t mind the world knowing you had accidentally sired a little reproduction of yourself, but recoiled at the idea of who the mother was? Did you shudder at the idea of the sniggers that might go around if it became known that you were conducting a squalid little bedsit affair with a woman of such epic vulgarity?

With Jacky, of all people? A man such as yourself should bed only the crème de la crème, no? The greatest poetesses, the daughters of earls, playwrights or artists. Or at least someone with five hundred a year of her own. Not the artistic equivalent of a flower girl. Such people are all very well for artists. Expected, even. But for a critic? Dear me, no! And to commit the solecism of getting the woman pregnant? Oh, the fun of it!

So unlikely that my incredulous laughter was instrumental in persuading your wife that her unease was merest fantasy. You owe me much. The first I heard of any of it came from her, and she was so bothered at her suspicions and jealousy she came to me specifically, and risked humiliation to raise the subject. She wrote, asking to see me over a matter of some importance. I was bemused and agreed, not least because I wished to find out what it was all about. She had always rather disapproved of me; I was not her sort of person at all. She had not forgotten my visit to Hampshire to paint your portrait, and did not forgive bad behaviour. The very idea that she might need me I found somewhat exciting.

She arrived exactly on time—she was as punctual as you were late. Curiously, I had little experience with dealing with lady visitors; the only women who ever came to my studio were either models or clients. I did not know what to do with her, and all the inadequacies of my upbringing burst forth. I felt as though I should offer her tea or something, and the realisation that even after all these years I could still be made uncomfortable by a woman like her brought out all my natural rudeness.

I think she very nearly left without explaining why she’d come, but she was desperate. Eventually my discomfort exhausted itself and I asked her what she wanted, although I imagine I added something to the effect that if she could be quick then I would be able to get back to my work. No-one could say I wheedled my way into her confidence; quite the contrary.

“It is about William,” she began. “Have you heard any stories about him?”

“Many,” I replied. “He is one of those people who generates stories; it is part of the way he has become influential.”

Her distress was by now so obvious even I could not bring myself to continue her torment. She was beginning to look absurd, and that was unfair for someone so naturally sure of herself. Quite old-fashioned, she is; I had never realised it before. Something of a survival of the last century, tightly bound into her clothes, straight-backed and unbending. No-one would want to paint her now, I think; she does not have a modern air. Millais, perhaps, might have done her justice, and conveyed that plush velvet and window-closed soul of hers. I felt myself beginning to lose interest, so told her to sit down and explain a little more clearly what she wanted. It was not what I said, you understand, but the way that I said it that made all the difference. She only needed the barest hint of sympathy to let loose all her woes and become a different person entirely.

“I have been worried for the last few months. You no doubt think me a silly woman, with foolish ideas. But William has always been the best of husbands. . . .”

“Indeed he has. I have often wondered how he manages it. I know I never could. But then, he is married to you, and that is a powerful incentive to good behaviour.”

She blushed. “I know that men are not like women,” she began, “and I know that being faithful does not come easily to them. . . .”

“Oh. I see.” Her look of steely self-control as she brought herself to this point was far better explanation than anything she had said.

“Have you noticed anything, or heard anything? I know you would not think it proper to say, but if you knew the agonies I have suffered in the last few months, you would pity me.”

I had a choice here, you see. My response could take two forms; I could exploit the situation, feed her fears, offer her false sympathy and reap the rewards. For they were on offer, you know. That most virtuous of women could easily have fallen into my arms then with only the slightest encouragement. Millais’s women were often fallen, or about to fall. What a glorious triumph it would have been! And rather a pleasurable one, I imagine. I was always intrigued by that combination of icy control and the occasional flash of the eye, the way the façade sometimes failed to hide a hint of hunger. But, alas, you were my friend.

I sprang to your defence. I had seen nothing and heard less. Which was true, I had seen progressively less of you over the years; we were moving ever more definitely in different circles. Had you been having a grand affair, no doubt I would have noticed. But Jacky was not the sort of person you took to the opera, or entertained to lavish dinners. A squalid little encounter once a week in a Bermondsey boarding house could easily pass unnoticed, although when we were closer I would have caught even that. Only a wife might notice something amiss, and then not enough to form any solid conclusions. So I told her that any changes she noticed should be put down to your preoccupation with this great exhibition you were planning. She had to understand how all-consuming such a thing could be. “It is a terrible thing to say of a man, but faced with a choice between Cleopatra and a painting of Cleopatra, William would take the canvas.” She should not worry, I told her, firmly but gently. All would be well and her foolish fears would be soon forgotten.

She left soon after, giving me a look of such gratitude I half regretted my altruism. I bathed in the warm glow of my virtue for some time afterwards. But as she stood by the door, she turned, and her face hardened. “I am glad of what you said. It is the one thing I would never have forgiven in him.” And, by God, she meant it. The calm way she said it frightened even me, and I had nothing to do with it. I never realised quite how proud, quite how conventional she was. You must have known all too well, and knew what her reaction was likely to be. How would it be, William, to have to earn your own living for once? To give up the house, the works of art, the weekends at country houses, the balls? To have to become one of those hand-to-mouth bohemians you praise at a distance? That’s what her look implied. Having a mistress might be acceptable in Chelsea; it was not in Mayfair, and certainly not with a wife like yours. You tried to straddle both worlds, and for the first time you risked losing your balance.

So how could you make such a slip? I do not ask how you could do such a thing, consort with a common shop girl when a beautiful if somewhat well-controlled woman was already yours. That is all too clear; there is something quite horrible in a woman who will not bend to your will, when everyone else not only bends but breaks at your very nod. But the magnitude of the mistake! You, who had never taken a false step in your life! That is something I cannot understand. It almost makes you human. Almost makes you deserve sympathy—would do, except for the way you reacted. But Jacky? What was it? Was it sleeping with a woman artists slept with? Is that your frailty, that all along that was what you wanted to be? Does your unstoppable desire to control and direct painters come from a frustration at not being one yourself? I cannot believe it, and yet I cannot think of any other reason why you would choose her. Did you talk of tactility with her, after the passion had passed? Seek her opinion on Post-Impressionism? Or did you enter into her enthusiasms and quiver with anticipation as she showed you her latest rouge? Or was it the squalor of it that you needed; some respite from the beauty and aestheticism? A sordid and furtive animality to act as counterpoint to all that refinement. I hope you were satisfied with your choice, but I doubt it. You were no more able to arouse Jacky than I could, of that I am sure. Perhaps it was the payment that excited you, the reduction of human emotion to cash transaction?

I am being provocative; I apologise; I do not wish to set your weak heart a-flutter. There is a reason for it, though. I would like to see you angry again, to see you lose control for once in your life, in my presence. Otherwise Jacky will have triumphed over me, for you lost control with her, did you not? Hence the grey-green in my picture, to set off the shadows and echo the darkness back into your face. You will see it soon enough. The shadow in the background, the perfect man with the monumental flaw. The way the light falls on your face and is absorbed, so that there is a hint of something hidden behind. It is the fear that is in your life; a contrast with the earlier portrait, which has none of that, which has the blue and red of boundless self-confidence, of a world waiting to be tamed, a man who does not know his own weakness. Combine that with a slight hunching of the shoulders, as if you are protecting your soul from reality, and the point will be made, for those who can see. Only a true friend can do that, put that in. Only me.

I know about it only because Jacky came to see me a few weeks before her death to ask my advice, because I was your friend and would know best what to do. And because she feared to say anything to Evelyn, her friend and confidante, who could have given your wife a lesson or two in puritanism, so I thought. She shook her head when I suggested Evelyn might be a more appropriate person to talk to. “I couldn’t,” she said. “She’d never talk to me again.” There was fear in her as she said that; she made me promise I would tell no-one; certainly not Evelyn. Only I was to know.

Which just shows how desperate the poor girl was. Do you know what she said? That she had “compromised herself with a gentleman.” I was so delighted with the phrase—if you try it you will find it rolls around the mouth like a fine cigar—that I didn’t quite grasp what she was talking about for a while. She wanted to know what to do. She arrived at my studio just as I was beginning work, so I was probably rather brusque with her; I thought she probably wanted money or something to get her jewellery back from the pawnbrokers.

But no; she was compromised. And with a gentleman. I suppose a working man would merely have got her into trouble. Her face was a picture. I don’t mean that harshly, you understand. I’m not being comical. But as a model she always had this perfect deadpan look about her. No frown or smile ever troubled that pink face of hers; not with me, in any case. I didn’t hire her for her emotional register. Now, all of a sudden, she was a portraitist’s dream. The levels of emotion were extraordinary; shame, despair, hope, the pleasure of attention, fear. And something else as well, which I couldn’t pin down. Something fierce, almost animal-like. It was that look which ultimately brought you to sit in my chair here.

The interaction was ludicrous, of course; she talked in this bizarre language which was her own special parody of a drawing room conversation, so it was difficult to understand her at times. But eventually all became clear enough. She was pregnant; you were the father; and what could she do about it.

My initial reaction was one of complete indifference, once the astonishment at your foolishness had subsided. Such things happen, and they happen to people like her all the time. But then there was that fierceness. Do you know, I do believe things might have turned out differently had her expression not been so magnificent, and if she had not placed herself—quite by chance—by the window so the early morning light illuminated it perfectly? The way that emotion transformed her from a silly little woman into a queen, an empress, a goddess, even; the way her eyes shone and her skin took on a fiery grandeur; the tilt of her head as pride and defiance took over her soul. I could have sat her down and painted her then and there, just for that look. I knew that I should do my best to banish it, make sure that it never crossed her face again, to put out that light in her eyes forever. But it would have been a sin to do so. She was beyond beautiful, and her beauty was caused by the thought of that child. So I didn’t try to persuade her to do the sensible thing and go to the angel-maker, as the French so delicately say. Not because of her, or you, or because of what was right, but because of the effect of the light turning on her face. I gave her what she truly wanted. She hoped I would lend her the money for the abortionist. I told her to have the baby.

And, I may say, I gave her some practical advice as well. That she should write you a letter informing you of what had happened, and asking you to contribute to the upkeep of your joint creation. I considered for a moment that she should also assure you that the secret would be safe in her hands. That she would not approach you nor threaten you in any way. That she would leave London and be as discreet as if she did not exist. But I decided against the idea. No, I thought. Let him sweat a bit. Let’s worry him a little. It’ll make him more generous. A mistake. I underestimated you.

Good God, man! All she wanted was ten shillings a week! Less than you spend on wine. She had nothing, and wanted nothing except that little brat. And she knew what she was giving up, as well. She knew that her chances of a dutiful husband and a little parlour and a respectable life would all but vanish once she had someone’s bastard on her hands. Even her friendship with Evelyn might well evaporate. She would be all on her own, and she was willing to take the risk. It wasn’t much she was asking of you, and it wasn’t blackmail. Even had you refused, she wouldn’t have done anything. She wasn’t like you.

But that was not the point, was it? The point was that she decided to defy you, go against your wishes. And that was unforgiveable. And even more unforgiveable were the actions of the person behind this plot to blacken your reputation. Jacky could never have written that letter to you; it was too well-phrased, too suggestive. Too well spelt. So who could it be? Who in your circle could be behind this? Not Henry MacAlpine, for example, who would never dare attack you, who was too much the fawner and flatterer. No; only one possible person who knew Jacky could give her such advice. Your attention turned to Evelyn.

What did you see in your mind—the two women, sitting together, giggling as they plotted to destroy your marriage, bring you to ruin? The ruthless fury of womanhood scorned, relentless in their pursuit, never resting until they had taken their revenge? Did you imagine that she was going to start spreading stories about you? That she would write to your wife? Did you think that Evelyn wanted a hold over you, to guarantee that you favoured her? Were you so puffed up with your own importance and so sure that everyone had the same values as you did?

They paid a heavy price, by God they did. When I read about Jacky being dragged out of the river, my heart skipped a beat. The reporter quoted the police. Part-time prostitute, pregnant, killed herself in desperation. Happens all the time. Open and shut, no mystery, racing results from Sandown in the next column. Maybe it was even true. How should I know? I have no evidence to suggest otherwise, except for the memory of the way her face glowed in the light through my window. A woman like that wants to live, will do anything to cling on to life. Such a person needs the life torn from her by force.

Did she scream and struggle, William? Did her fingernails scratch on the stone parapet? Did she thrash in the water before she went under? Did she hear you as you crept up behind her in the dark? Probably not, because even Jacky could have taken you on in a fair fight. And what about you? Was your poor weak heart thudding, threatening to tear itself from its moorings as you pushed her? Did you hurry away with your cloak up around your face? Or did you stay and keep watch, to make sure she sank and never came to the surface again? I don’t even ask if you felt remorse, or guilt. I know you too well; you decided it was necessary. It was done. She was punished for her impudence. She didn’t matter. People don’t, do they?

One more glass of wine; but no more. I don’t want you falling asleep on me, you know, and it is easy to do if you have too much of this. It is a deceptive brew, more potent than it seems when you drink it.

You cannot send a man to the gallows because of a tilt of the head in the sunlight. Not when you are so desperately trying to convince yourself that it cannot be true, when you range over your memories, reorganising your past to persuade yourself that a friend could not possibly do such a thing. Suppose I went to the police. They would make enquiries, and conclude there was no substance to the suggestion. But you would hear of it, and know who had said such a thing. So I kept quiet once more, and a week later you moved on to ensure that nothing Evelyn ever said about you, nothing she knew or suspected, would have any effect either.

I saw Evelyn after Jacky was found, and she had seemed calm enough on the surface, at least. Those years of careful upbringing were being put to use. She was most upset, she said, in an even voice. Upset, distressed, but not overly so. She passed no comment on the circumstances but politely, and somewhat coldly, took her leave. Her exhibition was to open the following day, she had a lot still to prepare. She was anxious.

Why should she be any more than regretful, after all? Jacky was just a model, however valued. A friend, perhaps, but what friendship can there really be between two such people, so different in outlook, upbringing, temperament and tastes? And many people become preoccupied, distracted, when they are preparing for a show. I put it out of my mind, in the same way that I tried not to think of Jacky. I succeeded there; I even forgot to go to the funeral. I was working, trying something new and different which I couldn’t get right. I kept trying and trying, almost stopping but then going back for one last attempt. And when I finally gave up, the effect I was chasing still unachieved—it was too late.

I knew I should feel guilty about my callousness, so when I saw the review of Evelyn’s exhibition, I thought I would expiate my sin by going round and making sure she was all right. Better to succour the living than waste time on the dead, who hardly need our support anymore. So I went round to her studio, though I didn’t know if she had even seen the review, or worked out who had written it. She was the sort who didn’t bother reading a paper, after all, and many a painter studiously avoids them until their exhibition is long closed. I guessed, of course, that she’d be upset if she had. Who would not be? It is a horrible thing to be publicly brutalised like that. You do not know, of course; you have only carried out such assaults, never yet been on the receiving end. The way the mind reacts is interesting, I suppose; an incredulity followed by a rising desire to turn away, which is so easily defeated by the necessity of reading it all. The battle to remain detached, unconcerned, the slow realisation that this defence is crumbling. The mounting panic as the words flow over you, metaphor by metaphor, insult by insult. The terrible fear that what you are reading is the truth, not merely the opinion of one biased, malevolent man. The way the words come as you answer the charges—words which no-one will ever hear, for you know there can never be any response; the critic will never have to account for himself. It is not done.

And then, the hatred. The blind but utterly impotent loathing of the man who has done this, so coldly. The way obtuseness has become insight, and stupidity intelligence, and cruelty a passing entertainment for the reader. The realisation that the review was written with pleasure, seeing in your mind’s eye the smug look of self-satisfaction as it is finished.

Finally, the belief, as all your defences and self-confidence suddenly crumble. The belief that the words are true, that you have been exposed for what you are, because the words are there, in print, on the page. The overwhelming conviction that what you are reading has an authority which overwhelms your self-belief, that the author has seen through you and exposed you for the fraud you really are. And this lasts, believe me. It does not go away quickly or easily, however strong you are. They gnaw at you, those words, bring you to the brink of madness, because you cannot shake them out of your mind. Everywhere you go you hear them, echoing in your mind. Only the most worldly, most cynical, can resist their power. You could, no doubt. I couldn’t, which is why I toadied to people like you for so long, and had to come here when I decided to do so no longer.

Ah! My friend, it is another—yet another—experience you have missed in your life, that realisation that someone wishes to do you harm, and has successfully done so without meeting any resistance. It is a great hole in your existence.

So I realised she might well be distressed; but I supposed that fury would sustain her, especially if she realised who was the author. She had, as you always guessed, a very high opinion of herself. It is odd how the greatest arrogance can be contained within the most timid creatures. Besides, she didn’t like you, although she was too polite ever to say so. Her opinion was contained in a vague shadow that once passed over her eyes when you were mentioned.

It took me about an hour to get to Clapham, I remember, and I also remember becoming annoyed as I walked, because it was drizzling with rain and cold; annoyed with you for what you had done, annoyed with Evelyn’s possible unhappiness, and annoyed with myself, because I discovered that I could not even rush to the side of a beloved colleague and friend without thinking of myself. Not only seeing myself offering aid and comfort, but also feeling irritated because my working day had been disrupted. That was callous of me, was it not? Truth is everything, and I cannot pretend to gallantry I did not feel. I was preoccupied with a picture I was trying to complete for the New English exhibition; my portrait of that Woolf woman, and I was proud of it. It was a good likeness, which captured her odd mixture of discontent and complacency, and she had already made it clear that she disliked it. She never said so, of course—that would have spoiled her notion of herself as being above such vanities—but I was getting under her skin, tormenting her a little by showing her things she could never see in a mirror.

But it wasn’t there yet, and I had worried about it all week and almost decided to give Evelyn a miss for a day, so I could worry some more. Eventually my notion of chivalry triumphed, and I did not turn back on Westminster Bridge and retrace my steps to my easel. I never did finish that painting, in fact, and it was one of the ones I threw out when I left. But I left my mind back in the studio, along with my brushes, and thought about my composition all the time as I walked to Clapham, thought about it as I rang the doorbell and exchanged pleasantries with the landlady, and still thought about it as I tiptoed up the stairs and opened the door.

And still thought about it as I stood there, in the doorway, looking at Evelyn’s body, hanging there from the big iron hook in the centre of the room. I was annoyed; only later did I try to construct a feeling of anguish, but that didn’t cover it up at all. A woman, one I loved, was dead, and I was annoyed that I might not now get a portrait finished in time. It’s these moments, I think, that reveal the true man; the instinctive reaction before manufactured and trained good behaviour can take over. You have a glimpse of what lies underneath the conventional responses, and in my case I saw a monumental selfishness.

Well, shock, perhaps. The mind sometimes cannot absorb certain things and takes refuge in the normality of daily concerns. I still think that is merely an excuse. I do not know how long my initial annoyance would have lasted, how long I would have stood in the doorway staring, how long it would have been before I came back to life and did something. Not that there was anything to do. She was dead, had been for hours. Methodical as ever, she’d prepared it all with care. Thick cord, obviously newly bought from a shop, just the right length. Proper slip knot, stand on a chair, and—kick. No chance of changing her mind at the last moment, no way of getting out of it. She wanted to die and she did. She was competent at everything she attempted.

And I saw the result. The face contorted and discoloured, the tongue sticking out, the odd angle of the neck, the looseness of the limbs. The chandelier pushed out of true by her body hanging at an angle, its cheap glass decorations tinkling slightly as the wind came through the door. A still life, all femininity eradicated and, like the boy on the beach, the image has stayed with me ever since.

A carefully arranged tableau. On the desk was the newspaper, open at the page with your review, and at the bottom she had written in a small, neat hand, “written by William Nasmyth.” She knew, you see. Does it comfort you, William, that even a woman in such distress could recognise your style? That your personality is so distinctive it proclaims itself even in such circumstances? I hope it makes you swell with pride; it is quite an achievement, after all.

But you had a still greater triumph, for beside the newspaper with your review was another, with the notice of Jacky’s death inside it. And underneath that, the same hand had written, “ruined by Henry MacAlpine.”

She thought I was the father of that child, William! She thought I had driven Jacky to her death, that I had shamed one and betrayed the other, taken her friend away from her. She held me responsible for it all, and never knew about you! Doesn’t that make you laugh, at last? You must see the funny side, surely, the thought of that woman hanging there, dying by her own hand, cursing me with her last breath! I didn’t take it in; I didn’t want to take it in, and so I allowed myself to be distracted. I turned away from her body, and saw the last part of her careful mise en scène.

Around the walls, turned to face the room for the first time, were all those paintings she hadn’t put into her show, which she had been so frightened of me seeing.

Pictures of Jacky, painted in a way I could never have managed, and which made me realise all my failings. She had painted a person, not merely a model striking a pose to challenge the artist’s skill. Her Jacky had character, personality. She was a real woman, suffused with emotions, tenderly and gently depicted, not some mannequin hiding behind the blank face of compliant stupidity. She had seen through the coarseness, the silliness, and found something beautiful; not merely a voluptuous body which I saw while I spent my time showing what a clever technician I was. Jacky sitting, lying on the sofa, curled up in front of the fire; in each one she saw something special and touching, and painted it with a loving hand. And her self-portraits shone with warmth as she sat close to Jacky and looked into her eyes, or with loneliness when the room was empty. This was what she had wanted, what no man could provide, why she rejected me out of hand. I could never have brought out those expressions in her; didn’t know it was possible.

But there were others as well, pictures of both of them entwined, stretched out together, passionate and unrestrained, intimate and pornographic, doing things that even now make me shudder. Shocking pictures, with faces distorted by depravity, bodies twisted out of shape in their striving for each other. And she had used the light, not hidden herself away in darkness. By God, she had used it as no one had ever tried before. Each picture was suffused with brilliant dazzling colours, the flesh tones green and purple and red, the sun shining off sensuous limbs that splayed out in ways no life model could ever emulate. The complex bundle of angles and curves on their bodies. Celebrating even as they abused the majesty of the human form, God’s image, and reduced it to the obscene and the grotesque. The sun shining through the windows even gave them haloes as they mauled each other, as though their depravity was the stuff of saints. The eyes, too, I remember, staring out so calmly, shining brightly as they gazed out of the frames, daring me to disapprove, amused at my shock. No gallery could ever put such things on its walls. No man could ever have painted them. I never imagined a woman would ever dare.

Even now those pictures haunt me; I dream of them, they come to me unbidden as I lie in bed at night; I try to put them out of my mind but even now, after four years, I cannot. I’ve tried everything—long walks, sleeping draughts of every sort prepared by the pharmacists of Quiberon, prayer, confession. Nothing works. These were not subtle paintings; not Manet’s Olympia, where all is left to the imagination, the pose so careful and decorous, the viewer drawn into the picture so that the obscenity is in your mind and the painter can plead innocence. There was no coyness about these. Anyone who looked at them was an intruder who had no right to be there. I remember one most of all; Jacky was on her knees in front of Evelyn who was naked on the sofa. There was no joy on her face: this was not a portrait of the lover touched by the divine. This was devilish and violent, her face twisted, her body tense, an exultant scream coming from her mouth. What could that have to do with love or tenderness? This could not be that frail, dainty woman I knew? But like your moment with the shattered glass, I knew this was the truth. This was what she truly was, degraded and foul.

Those pictures made me tremble; I thought it was the shock of seeing Evelyn hanging there, but it wasn’t. It was knowing her for the first time, and being revolted by the way she let loose what was within her and revelled in it. To do such things, think such thoughts and paint it as love. Not to see it for what it was, what it must be, but to turn it into art such as no-one has attempted before.

It was the scream of her landlady, coming up the stairs to bring her a pint of milk, stopping behind me as she saw inside the room, dropping the bottle on the floor so it smashed and the milk ran into the room, that brought me back to reality. Or rather knocked me out of it entirely, for I scarcely remember a single thing after that. Not of what happened, in any case. I suppose someone called the police, the doctors, somebody must have cut her down, taken her off to the morgue. Presumably some member of her family arrived, at some stage. I must have given statements to the police, talked to her father. I do not remember any of it. All I know is that eventually I was on a cross-channel ferry, feeling I could breathe again for the first time in weeks. Between opening the door to her room and hearing the hooter of the ferry leaving the harbour, there was nothing at all except the memory of those pictures.

As the days and weeks passed I became ever more angry at her for daring to have a life unseen and unsuspected until you destroyed the only two things she truly valued and brought it all into the light. You cast down a terrible, perverted animal; even the wildest of bohemian London would have recoiled at those images, been overwhelmed and revolted by their passion and power. The work that was truly close to her heart, which came from what she was, could never be shown in public to anyone. Should I have been grateful to you, William? You exposed Evelyn for what she truly was, made me see the error of my ways in even being friends with her. Should I not thank you, old friend, for rendering yet another service to me?

But you destroyed much of me, as well. You took away my belief that I could see people in their faces and know them. You took away someone I loved and replaced her with something monstrous and twisted. The Evelyn I knew I can now scarcely recall; all there is left is that picture leaning against the wall, and the corpse which swung there, hating me as she died. Had your ruthlessness not intervened, nothing would have changed; I would never have known. Life could have gone on, and I would have my wife and house in Holland Park, my students and my riches.

For much of my exile I have hated her, but of late that has become weaker; even that terrible picture can no longer excite my disgust in the way it once did. I wish you had seen it; she was a good painter, you know, something extraordinary, and this was proof that would have convinced even you. She had taught herself to experience the extremes of passion and had learnt how to turn it all into painting. No-one I know has ever come close. Can I hate forever someone who managed such a thing? Who succeeded when I always turned away and flinched, compromised and sought the good opinion of people like yourself instead? Who was prepared to risk all and lose everything? Of course I hate her for where it all came from. I have abused her and scorned her memory for being what she was. I have tried to learn how to wish her soul happiness, and to mean it. But I cannot; not even the church can accomplish such miracles, it seems. My forgiveness lies only in the memory of her achievement, awful though it was.

I will cast her out entirely, now; she must not find any further place in my thoughts. I will find another way of calming my nights, so I no longer see those images when I close my eyes. I will forget them, and then they will have gone forever. I will replace them with the image of another friend, more twisted than she was. I have painted your soul in this picture, William, as much as I can; you may look at it now. Come; I will turn it round so you can see it without having to move; I think that wine I gave you is responsible for making it so difficult for you to stand. The strong flavour you so dislike hides many things. Don’t worry; it will do no more than make you a little groggy. I know this; my sleepless nights have made me experiment with many a potion, and I know the effects of them all. This particular one merely induces a certain lassitude and weakness, but does not bring any sort of oblivion.

Now, what do you think? You can look at yourself as you are. Do you see the coldness I have put in around your eyes? The cruelty of the mouth, the calculation of the chin? I hope you notice that the background is entirely dark, for there has never been anyone in the world but yourself. The shadows I am particularly proud of, there is no dominant light source, you see; rather it seems as though the light comes from within you. You illuminate the canvas, because you are the source of all certainty and truth. Set it up beside the older one and you will see the point I’m making, I hope. All the cleverness, the intelligence, is still there, the cultivation and the appreciation of beauty. But you have wasted your gifts, used them wrongly, lost the right to possess them.

Do you know, I’m proud of this? It really is a very good likeness of you. Deceptively easy on the eye, at first glance; only if you look closely do you begin to see its subtleties. I’ve come a long way in the past few years, I think. I am beginning to paint what I want to paint, rather than an approximation of it.

It’s not finished, of course. You can see that, certainly. You miss nothing where painting is concerned. It’s unbalanced. The first is a portrait of a man whole in mind and body; the second shows the corruption of the soul, but as you have noted, I have been a little flattering over your appearance. I’ve made you a touch younger-looking, less weakened than you are. A deliberate trick on my part; I am not falling back on old habits. The parallel corruption of the body will come in the last part of the triptych, which I will begin soon. It will never be seen while I am alive, of course; never could be, any more than Evelyn’s could be shown. But she taught me that is no reason for not painting something; perhaps the most truthful pictures must be hidden.

I don’t know, and I don’t really care. All I know is that I am looking forward to the challenge of the next part of this project. It will not escape me this time; it will be no rapid sketch for a newspaper, no missed opportunity or failure. I will work on you until I have you down, have no fear of that. I told you, I think, how I could not get that boy, because I did not know him in life. He was abstracted, just a pattern of shapes and colours. I will rectify that. I will heighten those greens without fear; make the eyes confront the viewer more directly. The way the sea erodes the flesh and exposes the bone structure I will depict with love. It will be an extraordinary work, something that will stick in the memory and replace those images that dance in my head when I try to sleep. A work that will last for all time. Worth the effort, I think. Even you would approve, critic though you are. I can see it in my mind so clearly.

I hope you understand all this; it is at your bidding, really. You are the one who suggested I go back to England, after all, and this is the only way I can think of which will allow me to return with an easy conscience. I couldn’t spend the rest of my life watching your success and knowing that at your heart you are a cruel, pitiless man, who can destroy others without a second thought. Surely you realise that? Such a person deserves no admiration or happiness. I could not accept a good review from you, nor yet a bad one. I could not belong to any club, show in any exhibition, be associated with any gallery, which had contact with you, and you have contacts with them all. I could not tolerate your sin and your success. I toned in your skin with green and brown in my portrait, shadowed your face to show that I understood the darkness of your mind.

This one on the easel here can go to the Royal Academy exhibition; it will make a fine last tribute to an old friend and will probably rekindle my career very handsomely. They won’t realise the flattery they see is more than mere obsequiousness, and will pay to have the same in their own portrait; I will happily oblige them. Then I’ll present this one to your widow; I was the last person to see you alive, your oldest friend; it will be a kind gesture to assuage her grief. She will be grateful and—who knows?—maybe more than gratitude will result. I would make her a better husband than you did, old friend.

THE STORM is reaching its peak. We must hurry; sometimes they blow out so quickly you are almost deafened by the sudden silence as the wind drops from gale force to nothing in a matter of seconds. You must experience its power first hand, otherwise you will never understand what I have been talking about. It will make the days you have spent sitting listening to me worthwhile. You must try, even though you are so feeble now; I will support you and ensure you get there. Do not worry. I will guide you to the best vantage point, so you can see what violence really is.

We will take the path by the cliffs, I think. It is beautiful on a night like this, with the wind blowing and the ground still wet and slippery from the rain. All alone, for no islanders will be out on a night like this. You will feel that surge of danger I have mentioned, and know what it is to be afraid. It is more exhilarating than you can imagine, for it is foolhardy to venture near the edge. Many a man has slipped along there, and there is always the risk of falling into the sea. No-one could save anyone who does, no matter how quickly they run to the village and raise the alarm. Not even a strong swimmer could survive the undercurrents and avoid being dashed to pieces on the rocks, to be washed up, torn and broken, when the sea is finished with him.

Come with me now. I will not take no for an answer.