Jasper Fforde - Early Riser

The apartment would have been utterly unremarkable, in fact, but for one thing: dominating the bedroom wall was a painting of Clytemnestra, depicting her just after she had murdered her husband. The portrait was spectacular not only by virtue of subject, but also for its size , occupying the wall from floor to ceiling and in a large ornate gilt frame that had been trimmed at the bottom to allow it to fit. Clytemnestra was topless and wore a curious half-smile upon her features, her chin raised with a sense of good-natured sociopathy.

History does not relate exactly when during the Winter Clytemnestra had murdered Agamemnon, and it was a subject of much conjecture. If committed at Springrise it might have been an impulsive act; dismissed as mal à le dormir , the fog of sleep. The more generous artistic renditions had her looking skinny and confused. In contrast, this painting had her depicted with the easy confidence of life-affirming weightiness. The artist was here suggesting it was an act of premeditation; that she had stayed up, murdered Agamemnon soon after he’d slipped under, then descended into the Hib with her slowly decaying husband by her side. It changed the interpretation of her character, and her motivations – little wonder there was much academic debate.

‘Who’s the topless bunny with the blade?’

I jumped with fright and spun round.

Standing in the middle of the room was a woman wearing paint-streaked dungarees and a large and very baggy man’s shirt. Her raven-black hair was knotted high in an untidy bun that was secured with a pencil, and she was drying some paintbrushes with a rag. She was looking, not at me, but at the painting of Clytemnestra.

‘I’ve got a better question,’ I said. ‘What are you doing in my apartment?’

She turned to look at me and I was suddenly struck by her dark and brooding good looks. She had piercing violet eyes, a faintly Ottoman appearance and high, expressive eyebrows. She was about ten years older than me, and was, without any question, an extraordinary-looking woman. But her appeal was more than simple beauty; there was a bearing, a spirit, a strength .

‘The door was open and I was intrigued,’ she said, ‘and anyway, it’s not your apartment,’ she said. ‘It’s Suzy’s.’

‘Oh, yes,’ I said somewhat awkwardly, ‘right.’

It was not a winning response, but I was transfixed not just by her looks, but by her manner , a heady mix of allure and confidence. I knew then that I would never see a more striking individual as long as I lived.

‘Still awake?’ I asked.

‘I like to stay up,’ she said. ‘I live four doors down. Never came in here, though. So: who’s the bunny?’

‘It’s Clytemnestra,’ I said, walking closer.

‘Ah,’ she said, suddenly understanding, ‘the premeditated viewpoint.’

We both stared at the painting for a moment.

‘And,’ I added, trying to sound intelligent, ‘a cautionary lesson in co-hibernating.’

‘We never hibernated together, my husband and I,’ she replied absently, ‘not after watching Zeffirelli’s Winter Crossed Lovers .’

She was referring to the scene where Romeo wakes to find Juliet next to him, expecting his bride but instead finding little but taut skin stretched across her bones, and the dark stain of putrefaction upon the bedsheets. I saw the film when I was nine, and that image never leaves you. Years later, Baz Luhrmann played the scene entirely on DiCaprio’s face. He didn’t need to show us Juliet’s remains; Zeffirelli had already planted the horror in our minds.

‘Did it work out for her?’ asked the dark-haired woman. ‘Clytemnestra murdering her husband, I mean?’

‘She and her lover got to rule Mycenae for seven years.’

She nodded approvingly, still staring at the painting, but I was more interested in her. The nape of her neck, her unpierced ears, and her jet-black hair that seemed to have a soft luxuriance about it. She turned and caught me looking at her, so I looked away, then realised that was too obvious so looked back – and felt myself fall into her gaze, as one might fall into the charms of an exceptional painting.

‘You’re a Winter Consul,’ she announced.

‘Does it show?’

‘You wear it heavily, like a cloak. Are you sure it’s what you want to be?’

‘I’m… not sure.’

‘I always think it’s best to be sure of at least one thing in life.’

‘And what are you sure of?’ I asked, trying to maintain a credible conversation.

‘That I’m no longer sure of anything ,’ she replied, with a sudden air of melancholy. She tipped her head on one side, paused for thought, then offered to paint my portrait for five hundred euros, unframed. I had neither the time nor the funds to be painted, but very much liked the idea of more time in her company, especially if it involved her staring at me intently, for whatever reason.

‘You could find a better subject,’ I murmured, indicating my face. I’d come to terms with my looks soon after biting off Gary Findlay’s ear. All the frustration I’d ever had was discharged in that one violent event. Gary lost an ear, but I gained clarity and became the curator of my own appearance.

‘Are you Pool or kinborne?’ she asked.

‘Pool.’

‘My husband was Pool.’

And then, quite unexpectedly, she placed a soft hand on the twisted side of my head. The only person to have touched me there was Sister Zygotia and Lucy, once, when she was drunk. My eye twitched and I felt a shiver of fear run up the side of my body. She had no right to be so forward, but the intimacy, even without affection, was curiously thrilling in a way that was difficult to explain. But I was deluding myself: she was older, Alpha, and completely outside and above the profile of a potential partner. I was being unutterably foolish, and put the thoughts to the back of my head.

‘I might find a better subject, yes,’ she said, gently pushing my head into profile with an index finger on the tip of my nose, ‘but not one of such… inspiring intrigue .’

It was the finest compliment my appearance had ever received, [47] It still is. and I blinked rapidly to hide the dampness that had risen to my eyes.

‘Then I accept.’

‘Come on, then.’

I caught a whiff of her scent as she turned on a heel and walked past me, a delicate mix of oil paints, fresh laundry and musk. We walked around the circular inner corridor to the room on the opposite side of the building and she beckoned me inside. Every inch of wall space was covered with canvases and anything not hung was stacked against the walls.

There was one painting that dominated: an impressionistic rendering of Rhosilli beach on the Gower Peninsula, fully six foot wide and three foot high. In the background was the beached wreck of the liner the Argentinian Queen , rusting away to inevitable collapse, the blue paint just visible beneath the encroaching rust. There were wispy mare’s tails in the sky, the headland merely a jagged profile in the distant haze. In the foreground, on the large and otherwise empty beach, was an orange-and-red parasol of spectacular size and splendour. Hidden beneath it were two bathers, partially obscured and sitting on a blue-and-white striped towel.

It was a remarkable painting, and I told her so.

‘It’s tolerable,’ she said with little emotion. ‘I call it: There will always be the Gower .’

‘I visited many times,’ I said, mesmerised by the painting, ‘when the wreck was about this intact.’

‘Collapsed into the sea now,’ she said, ‘the inevitable action of wind and tide. Did you ever stop off at Mumbles Pier for cockles, bacon and laver bread on toast?’