Benjamin Wood - The Ecliptic

‘There’s plenty of bread and yoghurt over there. Even Ardak can’t mess that up.’

‘I’ll have something at dinner.’

‘I knew you’d find an excuse.’

‘Is everything all right?’ Q asked.

‘Perfect,’ I said, and smiled. In truth, the instant I saw Gülcan missing from the serving pass, my pulse had started thrumming. I was expecting the provost to come down at any moment, to command the attention of the mess hall with a clap of his hands. Eat up, everyone, he was going to say. Knell has some important information. .

But all that happened was Mac leaned into Tif’s ear and said, ‘Knell’s getting out.’

‘Huh?’

‘She’s painting again. I just came from her studio. In a few days, she’ll be off.’

‘Mac, don’t ,’ I said.

‘Come on, I’m proud of you.’ And, glancing at Q, she said, ‘There’s a canvas at her place the size of a billboard. I haven’t seen what’s on it yet, but if we ask her nicely, we might get a little preview.’

‘Are you serious?’ Q said.

‘It’s true that I’ve been painting again,’ I said. ‘I don’t know about the preview.’

‘That’s wonderful!’

‘We’ll see. I’m not quite done.’

‘You will let us see it when you are, though, right?’ Mac said.

‘Possibly. Probably. I haven’t decided.’

Pettifer stood up from the table, rattling dishes. ‘Excuse me. I’m not having any more of this slop. I’m going to see what else there is.’ He carried off his plate towards the kitchen, walking as fast as I had ever seen him manage. The back of his shirt was striped with sweat. The balding crown of his head was pink and sore-looking.

‘What’s bitten him?’ Mac asked.

‘You could’ve been a little gentler with his ego,’ Quickman said. ‘He’s only just got used to the thought of you leaving. Now you’re staying put — although, I’m still not a hundred per cent certain why that is yet — and suddenly it’s Knell who’s off. Tough on the system, all this being glad for other people.’

Mac laughed softly. ‘I told you: I’m not satisfied with the play yet. A thousand plot holes to work out. You know how it is.’

‘Ah, yes, I remember. Plot holes. The council fixes those, eventually.’

She grinned.

‘Well, spare a thought for Tif and me, when you get home.’ Quickman brought his pipe out of his pocket. ‘Because the only way we’re getting out of here is if somebody comes back to collect our ashes. Which, I can assure you, is not halfway as romantic an ending as it sounds.’

The mushrooms were not dry enough to powder. A full day next to the boiler had left them white and shrunken, but I needed them to desiccate. Still, when darkness came, I unhooked two of the driest garlands and stripped them clean. I had to try, at least, to make one batch of paint. And there was a sample on my wall, still gleaming blue, that I knew had been made in the earliest stage of my experiments with the pigment, when I had used much damper fruitheads. Those first few nights, spent keenly testing out the possibilities of the stuff, toying with mixtures of emulsions and pastes, had yielded one daub of shining paint that I hoped I could now replicate. The hardest part was deciphering my handwriting in the margins of the little canvas square: some of the 7s looked like 1s, some of the 9s looked like 8s. But I was thankful to my father for instilling such a methodical streak in me that I could always bank on the lees of my work to be accounted for. Never bin your scraps , he used to say, if I stood watching him repair a table leg or fit a new U-bend in the kitchen. One day that bit of junk you threw away will be the only thing that does the job.

Ground up in the mortar, the damp mushrooms formed a viscid blue cement. I was light-handed with the oil, following the measurements on the sample, and after some persuasion with the muller, it became more pliable, until I had a paint as thick as clotted cream. I had the instinct to thin it out with turps, but held off, knowing one mistake would spoil the entire batch.

The radiance of the paint was a good start. And the tone seemed rich enough for what I needed. It did not take so naturally to the brush head, falling off in tiny clumps — I had to hold my free hand underneath to catch them — but once I put the first stroke on the canvas, it cooperated. The smooth opacity of the stuff gave off the most resplendent sheen. If anything, the moister pigment helped me realise a better outcome than I ever could have planned.

I worked it in the same way as the other paints, in sweeping, fluid gestures, and, although it sputtered out towards the end of every brush load, there was an easy slide to it across the nap in the first motions — I could sculpt it, add textures and inflections as I dragged and shoved the bristles.

The two circles I had left to dry the night before were still vibrant, slightly shivering on the canvas. The final, thickest circle overlaid them in the middle section, creating an effect that I had never seen before in ordinary paint: an ache that I could see and feel at once, as though it were not solely in the fabric of the thing itself but somehow part of me. I had made a simple thing so resonant with sadness, so pure in its substance, that looking at it made me grieve. Tears rushed from my eyes and I could not wipe them fast enough: they putted on the workbench, oozed along my neck. I felt ready to collapse with tiredness and relief. The picture showed glimmering blue circles in a void, growing in intensity as the eye passed left to right. An abstraction of a complicated truth. A way to comprehend it. The Ecliptic , I would call it. The only painting I refused to sacrifice. The one real thing I ever brought into the world.

Ender was sent to get me. He must have been watching for some sign that I was up and moving, because no sooner had I got the kindling lit and fuming in the stove, he came thumping on the door. I was in my dressing gown and halfway to the shower. He did not even wait for me to let him in. The door ripped open and he stood at the threshold with the bright afternoon behind his back, snatching a hang-down strip of tape from the frame above him, as though it were a party streamer. When he saw that I was barely dressed, he did not apologise, just turned his head away, covered his eyes. ‘The provoss asks for you to speak with him,’ he said. ‘He has told me to make certain you will come. So you will come now, yes?’

‘In a moment,’ I said resolutely. ‘Let me put something on.’ I took a bundle of clean clothing to the bathroom and got dressed, washing at the sink, taking more time about it than I would usually have done. The creases of my eyes were streaked with hard white paint. My fringe was greased and gungy. After I had washed myself, a sediment of dirt clung all around the basin.

Ender was still on the threshold when I emerged. He gave me a dismayed look and tucked his pocket watch inside his waistcoat. ‘You are too late now for lunch,’ he said. ‘But there is salep and ayran and fruit, if you want it.’

I shook my head.

He gestured to the covered canvas leaning on my wall. ‘You are working?’ he said, lifting an eyebrow.

I replied, ‘I was . How cold is it out there?’

‘Excuse me?’

‘Do I need a coat or not?’

‘No. There is sunshine, lots of sunshine.’

I put it on anyway. Ender huffed.

‘Let’s get this over with,’ I said.

The old man led me along the curving path instead of cutting straight across the grass as normal. He walked just a stride ahead of me and kept craning his head back, as if to check that I was still in grasping distance. From behind, his silver hair looked impossibly dense. Sprigs of it splayed out from the pleats of his long ears and almost twinkled in the sunlight. He had a lurching gait that seemed to pain him. As we went up the portico steps, he stopped to hold the door for me. And then, all at once, I was leading him instead, through the hall and up the stairs. I passed Crozier and Gluck on the landing. They both said quiet hellos to me, raising their coffee cups. It was the first time I had ever been glad of the sight of them. I smiled and wished them both good afternoon, and Gluck was so surprised that his response got caught up in his throat. ‘Yy — er, ya,’ he said. ‘You too.’ The old man was still in my wake, his nostrils wheezing. We went up another flight, over soft carpet (I wondered how many guests before me had made this same walk of condemnation) and clipped along the corridor together until we reached the provost’s study. ‘You wait,’ he said, rapping the wood three times.