Ken Follett - The Modigliani Scandal (1976)

Nothing turned to gold anymore. He went back in his mind to the time when he had begun to lose his touch. Deep in thought, he joined a bus queue and stood at the curb with his arms folded.

He had been at art school, where he had found that everyone else was just as good as he at putting on that ultracool, throwaway hip style which had stood him in such good stead for the last couple of years at public school. All the art students knew about Muddy Waters and Allen Ginsberg, Kierkegaard and amphetamines, Vietnam and Chairman Mao. Worse, they could all paint—but Julian couldn′t.

Suddenly he had neither style nor talent. Yet he persisted, and even passed exams. It had done him little good. He had seen really talented people, like Peter Usher, go on to the Slade or wherever, while he had to scrabble around for jobs.

The bus queue moved convulsively, and Julian looked up to see the bus he wanted waiting at the stop. He jumped on and went upstairs.

He had actually been working when he met Sarah. An old school-friend who had gone into publishing had offered him the job of illustrating a children′s novel. The money from the advance had enabled him to kid Sarah he had been a successful artist. By the time she found out the truth it was too late for her—and for her father.

The winning of Sarah had made him think, for a little while, that he had got his old touch back. Then it had turned sour. Julian got off the bus, hoping she would not be at home.

The house was in Fulham, although Sarah insisted on calling it Chelsea. Her father had bought it, but Julian was forced to admit the old sod had chosen well. It was small—three bedrooms, two recep., and a study—but ultramodern, all concrete and aluminum. Julian unlocked the front door and went in, up the half-flight of stairs to the main living room.

Three of the walls were glass. Sadly, one enormous window looked onto the road in front and another to the brick and pine end of a terraced row of houses. But the rear window had a view of the small garden, kept neatly by a part-time gardener who spent most of his twenty hours per week smoking hand-rolled cigarettes and pruning the postage-stamp lawn. And now the afternoon sun streamed in cheerfully, giving a pleasant glow to the golden brown velvet of the upholstery.

One of the low, wide chairs was graced with the long body of Sarah. Julian bent over and kissed her cheek perfunctorily.

″Good morning,″ she said.

He resisted the temptation to look at his watch. It was about five o′clock, he knew, but she had only been up since midday.

He sat opposite her. ″What are you doing?″ he asked. She shrugged. There was a long cigarette in her right hand and a glass in her left. She was doing nothing. Her capacity for doing nothing, hour after hour, never ceased to amaze Julian.

She noticed his glance wander to her glass. ″Have a drink?″ she said.

″No.″ He changed his mind. ″All right, I′ll join you.″

″I′ll get it.″ She stood up and walked over to the bar. She seemed to be taking great care where she put her feet. When she poured his vodka it splashed up out of the glass onto the polished bar-top.

″How long have you been drinking?″ he said.

″Oh, Christ,″ she said. The blasphemy sounded foul coming from her. She was a woman who knew how to make swear words count. ″Don′t start that.″

Julian suppressed a sigh. ″Sorry,″ he said. He took the drink from her hand and sipped it.

Sarah crossed one leg over the other, allowing her long robe to slip aside and reveal a long, shapely calf. Her beautiful legs were the first thing he had noticed about her, he remembered. ″All the way up to her shoulders,″ he had remarked coarsely to a friend at that first party. And her height had obsessed him ever since: she was a couple of inches taller than he even without her outrageous platform shoes.

″How did it go?″ she asked.

″Poorly. I felt rather snubbed.″

″Oh dear. Poor Julian, always getting snubbed.″

″I thought we agreed not to begin hostilities.″

″Right.″

Julian resumed: ″I′m just going to send out press releases and hope the hacks will turn up. It′ll have to be a good do.″

″Why not?″

″Because of the money, that′s why not. You know what I really ought to do?″

″Abandon the whole thing.″

Julian ignored that. ″Give them all cheese sandwiches and draft bitter, then spend the money on paintings.″

″Haven′t you bought enough?″

″I haven′t bought any″ Julian said. ″Three artists have agreed to let me show their stuff on a commission basis—if it sells, I get ten percent. What I really ought to do is buy the work outright. Then if the artist catches on in a big way, I make a pile. That′s how these things work″

There was a silence. Sarah offered no comment. Eventually Julian said: ″What I need is a couple of thousand more.″

″Are you going to ask Daddy?″ There was a hint of scorn in her voice.

″I can′t face that.″ Julian slumped lower in his chair and took a long pull at his vodka and tonic. ″It′s not just asking that hurts—it′s the certainty that he′ll say no.″

″Quite rightly. My God, I don′t know what made him fork out for your little adventure in the first place.″

Julian refused to rise to the bait. ″Nor do I,″ he said. He steeled himself to say what he had to. ″Look, couldn′t you scrape up a few hundred?″

Her eyes flashed. ″You stupid little bastard,″ she said. ″You touch my father for twenty thousand, you live in the house he bought, you eat the food I buy, and then you come to me for money! I have just about enough to live on, and you want to take that away. Christ.″ She looked away from him in disgust.

But Julian had taken the plunge now—he had nothing to lose. ″Look, you could sell something,″ he pleaded. ″Your car would raise enough for me to set the gallery up perfectly. You hardly ever use it. Or some of the jewelry you never wear.″

″You make me sick.″ She looked back at him, and her lips flared in a sneer. ″You can′t earn money, you can′t paint, you can′t manage a bloody picture shop—″

″Shut up!″ Julian was on his feet, his face white with anger. ″Stop it!″ he shouted.

″You know what else you can′t do, don′t you?″ she said. She pressed on remorselessly, turning the blade in the old wound to see it bleed afresh. ″You can′t screw!″ The last word was shouted, flung in his face like a blow. She stood up in front of him, untied the cord of her robe, and let the garment slip from her shoulders to the floor. She took the weight of her breasts in her hands, caressing them with her splayed fingers. She looked into his eyes.

″Could you do it to me now?″ she said softly. ″Could you?″

Rage and frustration made him dumb. His lips stretched bloodlessly across his mouth in a rictus of humiliated fury.

She put one hand on her pubis and thrust her hips forward at him. ″Try and do it, Julian,″ she said in the same seductive tone. ″Try and get it up for me.″

His voice was half a whisper, half a sob. ″You bitch,″ he said. ″You bloody woman, you bitch.″

He rushed down the back stairs to the integral garage, the memory of the row a twisting pain inside him. He flicked the switch that lifted the garage door, and got into Sarah′s car. She was the kind of person who always left the keys in the ignition.

He had never borrowed her car before, having been reluctant to ask; but now he took it unrepentantly. If she didn′t like it, she would have to lump it.

″Cow,″ he said aloud as he drove up the short, steep drive and turned into the road. He headed south, toward Wimbledon. He ought to be used to these quarrels now: he was entitled to a degree of immunity. But the familiar jibes seemed to hurt more with the passing of the years.