Ian Hamilton - The wild beast of Wuhan

She fell asleep without much more thought about Glen Hughes. But the emails from Maria and her father crowded into her mind, and it was her father who came to her as she slept.

In recent months Ava had been having a recurring dream about Marcus. She and her father were trying to catch a plane or a ship in some unknown city on their way to some other unknown city. More often than not she lost him in the attempt. This night, for the first time, her half-brother Michael entered the nocturnal drama. Michael and her father were inseparable; it was always she who was getting lost, who was searching. She woke just as the three of them had reached an airport terminal, only to be shuffled into different check-in lines that meandered through different buildings, towards different planes.

It was seven o’clock; she had slept long, if not well. Her father and Michael dissolved from her mind and Glen Hughes re-entered it. She rolled out of bed, boiled water in the hotel kettle, and made her first Starbucks VIA instant coffee of the morning.

She quickly downed two cups, scanning the morning newspapers, and then thought about taking a calming run before she remembered that her tracksuit was at the cleaner’s. She pulled a Steinum sweater over her T-shirt and Brooks Brothers black linen pants and headed downstairs and out onto the High Street. It was another dreary day, without a patch of blue in the sky. She crossed the High Street and began to walk briskly up Church.

The Hughes Gallery was half a kilometre from the hotel. It was larger than Ava had envisioned, taking up the equivalent of two storefronts. A large double door made of a dark wood separated two windows. On the left door the word hughes was affixed in brass letters; on the right door was gallery. Both windows had the name painted discreetly in the lower left corner. There was a solitary painting in each window, artists Ava had never heard of, their style distinctly abstract. She looked inside. The gallery ran so far back that she couldn’t see the end of it, only a jumble of statues and paintings.

She turned and walked back to the hotel. The gallery was impressive and looked prosperous. That only reinforced the doubts she had about her ability to leverage Glen Hughes.

The weather was starting to turn nasty; the wind picked up and the sky began to spit rain. Despite the sweater she felt a chill. By the time she reached the High Street the rain had intensified and she knew a run was now out of the question.

As she walked into the lobby she saw her dry cleaning hanging near the concierge’s desk. It was ten to nine. Pretty damn good timing, she thought, as she carried it to her room.

She hung up her clothes in the closet and went to the window. The rain was now lashing sideways.

Ava made herself another coffee and then sat at the computer. She logged in to her emails with little expectation, but near the top of her inbox was one from the Hughes Gallery, saying Mr. Hughes couldn’t see her at eleven but was available at ten. She replied, saying she’d be there.

She showered quickly, not bothering to wash her hair. Standing naked in the bathroom, she applied a touch of lipstick and a hint of mascara and dabbed her Annick Goutal perfume on her wrists and at the base of her throat. She brushed her hair and then pulled it back and fixed it with her ivory pin. She went to the bedroom and put on a bra and panties, her black Brooks Brothers shirt with modified Italian collar, and black linen slacks. The Shanghai Tang cufflinks looked perfect against the black. She fastened the gold crucifix around her neck and then added the Cartier watch. Then she slipped on the new alligator heels and stood back to look at herself in the full-length mirror. Professional and ready for battle, she thought.

She heard thunder and walked back to the window. The rain was still pelting down. She packed the Sorensen letters in her Shanghai Tang bag and headed downstairs to the business centre to make an extra copy of the documents for Hughes in case the need arose.

On her way out, the concierge offered her a choice of umbrellas. She took the largest one, which had wilson golf printed on it. Even with the umbrella she felt the effects of the rain as it splattered off the sidewalk and wet her shoes and slacks. The walk felt twice as long as it had earlier, but when she got to the gallery door it still was only ten to ten. She tried the door but it was locked. She huddled in the doorway, the umbrella pointing towards the street.

“Come in, come in,” a woman’s voice said suddenly as the door opened behind her.

Ava slid in and was greeted by a tall, slim young woman with a mop of blonde hair styled into an uber-chic Afro. She wore a short, tight red designer dress that showed off her long legs.

“You must be Ms. Lee. My name is Lisa. Mr. Hughes is in the back. Let me take you there.”

Lisa guided Ava through the space, which was filled with numerous paintings, statues, and ceramics. When they reached the other end of the gallery, Lisa opened a door and led Ava into the office area. All the doors were closed but one, which opened into an office where a tall man in a brown suit sat at a desk. He had thick dark blond hair and a long, thin face and pointed chin. When he looked up at Ava, she saw that his clear blue eyes were not close-set the way Helga Sorensen had described. Ava felt her stomach sink.

“Mr. Hughes, Ms. Lee is here,” Lisa said.

Ava stood in the doorway to the office.

Hughes stood and extended his hand. “I’m Edwin Hughes,” he said.

“Ava Lee.”

“Have a seat,” he said, pointing to a chair across from his desk. “Would you like anything? Coffee or tea?”

“No thanks,” Ava said, noticing the painting on the wall behind him. It was the Tower Bridge. “A Derain?”

“Yes, that’s very observant of you.”

She continued to stare at the painting as she struggled to find a way to initiate the conversation.

“So, Ms. Lee, you represent a Hong Kong firm?”

“I do.”

“We haven’t done much business in Hong Kong. Japan has been kinder to us as a market.”

He has a lovely voice, she thought. And he paces his words quite carefully. “I don’t mean to be impolite, but I was actually expecting to see Mr. Glen Hughes,” Ava said.

“My brother is no longer associated with this part of the business,” he said calmly.

“I see.”

“I assure you, whatever gallery business you were planning to discuss with him, you can discuss with me.”

“I’m not so sure that’s true.”

He looked quizzical. “Ms. Lee, you are sounding mysterious.”

“I’m sorry, this is awkward.”

“Awkward? That’s rather a strange word. It’s paintings you’re here to discuss, I presume.”

“Yes, it is.”

“Then there’s no reason to feel awkward. That is my business, after all.”

He said it matter-of-factly, and Ava responded in kind. “I was going to talk to your brother about the Fauvist art he’s been commissioning over the past ten years or so, the art he sold through the Great Wall Antiques and Fine Art Gallery in Hong Kong.”

“The most recent piece of Fauvist art was painted in about 1910, Ms. Lee.”

“I am aware of that. This gallery commissioned the works. They were fakes, of course, designed to mislead my client.”

“This gallery did no such thing,” Hughes said, his voice calm but his eyes hardening as he looked across the desk at her.

“I have a signed statement from one of the artists who was paid to paint them, and I have copies of correspondence between your brother and the painter discussing the project. The correspondence from your end is on gallery stationery.”

She sat back, waiting for a reaction. Instead he said, in the same even tone, “What foul weather has brought you and word of my brother to my door?”