Artistic Licence (6 page)

‘How did he get hold of it? Did you leave the neg lying around in your darkroom?’

‘No, I did not! It was stolen from the recycle bin on my laptop.’

‘Shite!’

Thea hadn’t talked to anyone about this for a long time. ‘I lent him my laptop. I didn’t need it. I never suspected he’d look in the recycle bin –’

‘Why would he do that?’

‘Either because he’s a nosy bastard, which is my preferred option, or that the machine was running slowly and he wanted to clear the recycle bin, which is his story. Either way he came across a JPEG, which is a saved image, which mentioned the name of these celebs.’

‘You’d never tell me who they were?’

‘Quite right. I never would.’

He grinned. ‘Go on, then.’

‘Well, he double-clicked and got a full-page picture of someone very famous, very commercial, in glorious colour, in a very tasteful but erotic pose.’

‘You mean, she was naked.’

Thea nodded.

‘And you’d taken the picture?’

She nodded again.

‘How’d you get to do that?’

‘The family wanted a series of special, intimate shots for their personal family album. I stayed with them for a week, taking shots of them eating breakfast, having a barbecue, that sort of stuff. Then one day the woman, whom I’d got to know quite well by then …’ Thea paused reflectively. ‘I think she was a bit lonely and found me easy to talk to, although I’m quite a bit older
than she is.’

‘I can understand that part.’

Thea ignored this. ‘Anyway, she wanted me to take a picture of her naked, wearing this special antique jewellery her man had given her, in a copy of a pose in an old master they had.’ She glanced at him. ‘No, I’m not telling you the name of the old master, either. That’s confidential too.’

‘So you took the shots?’

‘Yes. She told me later that she’d found a lump in her breast and was frightened she might have to have a mastectomy. She wanted her husband to have pictures of her in case. The lump turned out to be benign in the end, but at the time she was frightened. Anyway, after I’d had them processed I gave her the negatives. It was very sensitive material and I knew her husband would be worried about them getting into the wrong hands.’

‘But she wasn’t?’

Thea shook her head. ‘She’s very young and she was so worried about the cancer that I don’t think she gave the negatives a thought. She hadn’t told anyone but me and the doctor about the lump.’

‘Poor child!’

‘Exactly.’

‘So how did the image get on your laptop if you were so careful?’

‘Not careful enough. She liked the colour shots, but she also wanted one in black and white. She thought I’d have to come and take another, but I told her I could take the colour out on the computer, tone it up a bit and she could say what she thought. When the job was done I deleted it, but forgot about the recycle bin.’
She sighed. ‘I suppose you could say I was careless, but quite honestly, it never occurred to me that anyone would look in my recycle bin.’ She made a face. ‘Unlike my clients, I’m not used to people grubbing about in my dustbins, even my virtual ones.’

‘So were they furious with you when you told them?’

‘Initially, because the husband thought I might be trying to blackmail them, but the wife, who’d had her all clear by then, convinced him that was the last thing I’d do. I was extremely upset and she knew I wanted to give up photography. Anyway, to cut a long and dirty story short, they gave me some money, out of gratitude.’ She smiled. ‘No, I’m not going to tell you how much. But after I’d sold my flat in town and paid off the mortgage, it was enough to buy my house and set myself up as a landlady.’

‘That was decent of them, though I expect they could afford it.’

‘Of course they could afford it, but it was very decent of them. An—I mean, the girl, insisted that if I hadn’t warned them the picture would have been all round the European press, if not our own. She thought if I felt I had to give up photography, the least they could do was to give me some way of starting again.’ Thea looked at her glass for a moment. ‘I wouldn’t have taken it, but A—she said that they spent millions on people they didn’t even like, and that I’d helped her and that she really wanted to give me something. Basically, because my life and career had been ruined because of that creep.’

His expression seemed to demand a little more explanation. ‘I’d realised by then that generosity
sometimes involved taking as well as giving.’

Rory was silent for a few seconds. ‘Men are bastards, that’s the top and bottom of it.’

Thea sighed. ‘Well, yes, I won’t disagree with you there. But to be fair, I didn’t
have
to give up photography. I’d just had enough of traipsing around the country with half a hundredweight of equipment hung round my neck.’

‘Oh? So he didn’t ruin your career after all?’

‘What he tried to do was much worse. But the only thing I regret is that I didn’t get a chance to take a Stanley knife to his suits, or anything satisfying like that.’

‘Clothing ripped in anger? Now there’s an idea. Imagine them, a heap in the middle of the gallery, under a pile of torn-up love letters and photographs, stained with wine and aftershave and less mentionable fluids. It might make my fortune.’

‘Feel free to use it. I won’t demand a cut.’

He laughed. ‘Not my thing at all, I’m afraid. So now you’re a landlady?’

‘Yup. With a house full of lodgers in a sedate Cotswold town, which has a university. Which reminds me, I should give them a ring.’

‘Doesn’t sound very fulfilling.’

‘Oh, it’s all right, I suppose. Mostly I like the kids. And it keeps me, just about.’ She finished her brandy with a sigh.

‘You don’t sound like you’ve reached the happy ending to your story.’

‘Happy endings don’t exist in real life. It’s all just compromise, isn’t it?’ She wanted him to agree with her, to tell her to ignore the yearning she felt when she
wasn’t fully occupied, the feeling that something was missing in her life. Then suddenly she chuckled. If he knew what she was thinking he would assume that what was missing was a man.

‘What’s funny?’

‘Nothing, really, something just tickled my imagination.’

‘And you’re not going to tell me what?’

‘No. Let me get you another brandy.’

‘Only if you have one too. My mother warned me about beautiful women who ply me with alcohol.’

Thea really laughed now. ‘I don’t think it was the likes of me your mother had in mind.’ She waved her hand, caught the waiter’s attention and ordered the drinks.

He curled his fingers round his brandy glass and regarded her with his head on one side. ‘It occurs to me you’re wasted being a student landlady …’

‘… with a part-time job.’

‘You need a proper life.’

‘Like you’ve got one. Derr!’ She sounded so like Petal that she laughed and realised at the same time that she was slightly drunk.

‘No, I haven’t. But between us we could make one.’

Thea suppressed more laughter. ‘That sounds like an improper suggestion to me.’

His smile reflected hers, only much more charmingly. ‘It could be, only to begin with I’ve got a proper one – at least, not one my mother could object to.’

‘Which is?’

‘You come to Ireland and look after me for a bit, have some time on your own to do some real
photography, lap up the scenery, feel the wind in your hair and the sun on your face …’

‘Do you write poetry in your spare time by any chance?’

‘Now you’re mocking me. I mean it. I could show you another life.’

‘I’m sure you could, but why should I swap looking after student lodgers for looking after you?’

‘Because there’s only one of me, I’m very undemanding and I have a pregnant dog.’

Thea shook her head. She was drunk, but not incapable. ‘Thanks, but no thanks. I’ll have my little holiday and go back to reality. You can’t run away from yourself, you know.’

‘But do you need to? Yourself seems in fine condition to me.’

He really was very attractive. His eyes were clear greeny blue, with maddeningly curly eyelashes. His hair was curly too and his mouth, large and generous, curled up at the edges.

‘Well, it’s sweet of you to ask me, but I couldn’t possibly.’

He produced a battered ring-bound notebook from his pocket. ‘Here, I’ll give you my address, in case you change your mind.’ He scrawled something on a sheet and tore it out. ‘You fly from Stansted to Knock, which is an international airport.’ He added this bit of information with a sort of mocking pride. ‘I’d pick you up from there. It’s not far.’

‘It’s very kind of you, but I won’t change my mind.’ She took the paper and tucked it into her handbag. She would keep it as a little ‘might have been’, if ever she got too fed up.

‘You never know. People do.’

She smiled a little wistfully. ‘I think we should have a cup of coffee.’

‘With another brandy?’

‘Definitely not.’

He ordered the coffee and she shut her eyes and let the hot Provençal sunshine warm her face and chase away thoughts of lodgers, her boring job and the tail end of winter which could take weeks to turn into a proper spring.

‘Oh, it’s you!’ Molly’s voice, strident with surprise, startled Thea into opening her eyes. Molly was frantically trying to disengage her arm from Gerald’s, but because of the large bag she was holding she was finding it difficult. Molly had an odd expression, which on anyone else would have been guilt. There was no sign of Joan.

‘Hello,’ said Thea, ‘come and join us. Did you buy anything nice, Molly? Where’s Joan?’ She was feeling more than a little sheepish herself. Sleeping with a strange man was always wrong, even if it was in full view of the public.

‘We’re just having some coffee,’ said Rory, ‘can I order some for you?’

Molly glanced at Gerald, then regarded them both with tight lips, obviously wondering if their sin was greater than her own. ‘Joan felt tired and returned to the hotel for a nap. We went back later – to see if you wanted to join us for a patisserie,’ she added quickly, in case Thea thought she’d gone to the hotel for any other reason. ‘And you weren’t there. I thought you were writing postcards?’

Molly’s strange behaviour made Thea wonder if she and Gerald really had been up to something when, until now, she’d assumed their flirtation was entirely harmless. ‘No, I took a few photos and then felt like some lunch.’

Thea could tell that Molly was longing to ask if she’d arranged to meet Rory, or whether they’d met by chance. She looked from one to the other, and then at Gerald.

Rory helped her out. ‘And I was lucky enough to see Thea sitting here and persuaded her to order lunch for me, too. My French is rubbish, isn’t it, Gerald?’

‘Tiger Tours don’t employ you for your languages,’ said Gerald, pulling out a chair for Molly. ‘Just as well, really, eh?’ He laughed heartily.

Molly might have been one of a string of handsome middle-aged ladies he dallied with on these tours. Maddening though her friend undoubtedly was, Thea didn’t like the thought of her being used.

Gerald sat down too and held up his hand. ‘
Garçon
.’

‘I’ll have a brandy,’ said Rory quickly, ‘and so will Thea.’

Thea was certain Gerald had no intention of ordering drinks for them as well as for Molly, but as the waiter wrote it down on his pad, before looking expectantly at Molly, there was nothing he could do about it.

‘I’il have a lemon tea, please, Gerald,’ said Molly, ‘if I may.’

‘Certainly.’ He turned to the waiter and ordered in French. He went on long enough to have ordered them an entire meal, more, Thea felt, to show off than because it was necessary. She and Rory had managed
perfectly well earlier.

To stop Rory and Gerald from looking at each other as if they were fans of rival football teams, Thea said to Molly, ‘So, what did you buy? Did you get the shoes you wanted?’

‘Yes and a matching handbag.’ Molly was torn between wanting to show off her loot and tell someone off – Rory for ordering brandy, or Thea for flirting with Rory. Possibly because she didn’t know what Thea and Rory had been up to and was in a dubious position herself, she got out a cardboard box. ‘There – what do you think?’

Thea thought that another handbag and pair of shoes added to Molly’s dozens made no difference to anything, but she murmured politely.

‘They were a bargain,’ Molly explained. ‘Because of the strong pound.’ She went on to name a figure which was still enormous, strong pound or no strong pound.

‘And what did you buy?’ Thea asked Gerald.

‘Me? Oh, nothing. I leave the shopping to you ladies. If I bought knick-knacks in every town I lead a group in I wouldn’t be able to get into my flat.’

As Molly hadn’t bought knick-knacks and Thea personally objected to being ‘you ladies’ she said, ‘But some shoes might have come in useful, don’t you think?’ She looked down at Gerald’s highly polished brogues. ‘Those must be awfully heavy to clump around in all the time.’

Molly shot her a furious glance, Rory choked into the last of his coffee and Gerald took a breath to tell her that he had all his shoes hand made in London and that they lasted him for years. Fortunately for Thea, the waiter arrived with the drinks.

*

Later, back at the hotel, Thea lay on her bed while Molly made up her face. She was still annoyed with Thea, although what about Thea wasn’t sure. She questioned her about her lunch with Rory. ‘Did you ask him to join you?’

‘No, he just did. I think he was lonely. He’s been in France painting and he wanted a little English company.’

‘But he’s not English, is he?’

‘No, Irish. Is that eyeliner you’re using?’ Thea didn’t care what Molly was doing to herself, but she was fed up with her questions.

‘Yes. You have to be terribly careful with it, or it looks dreadfully tarty.’

‘Did you do a make-up course or something?’ Anything to stop the cross-questioning – cross in both senses.

‘When I was a girl I went to Lucy Clayton and learned how to put make-up on there.’

‘How fascinating! Do tell me about it.’

At last Molly was satisfied with herself, sprayed eau de toilette on to her wrists and glanced at her watch. ‘Hell! It’s nearly half past and you’re not ready. Do hurry up. Gerald hates it if anyone’s late. Especially for the
dinner adieu
– you know, they have them on ships.’