A Dark Matter Episode 38

The blue flame of the blowtorch flickered as the woman moved her hands about. “Maybe, I think Derek committed himself to the psych ward again. In and out of that place. He struggled to pay rent anyway, so I reckon the owner would be happy to see someone else.”

“Could I have a look at it?” Jenny said. “Mohammed will have a spare key but he’s not around.”

“Are they all the same?”

“More or less.”

“Could I check out yours, just for two secs?”

The woman thought for a moment then opened the door.

Jenny walked in, the smell of welding strong.

The room was dominated by a six-foot sculpture made from rusty scrap, shaped into an embracing couple, two naked women.

A cut-down car door panel had been beaten into the shape of a leg and lay on the floor beneath the sculpture, as if the woman in the embrace had just been in an accident.

The rest of the room was cluttered with old metal junk, bigger pieces on the floor, smaller ones on a long table. A large sink, a corkboard, posters everywhere. The room was surprisingly light, much bigger windows on this side of the building flooding the space.

Jenny chewed her lip. “Have you got a number for Mohammed?”

The woman went to the table and lifted a bent business card. “He’s more likely to answer in the evenings.”

Jenny took the card. “Thanks.”

Back at the door, she turned. “It was a friend of mine suggested this place. Liam Hook?”

The woman nodded in acknowledgement. Jenny waved along the corridor. “Which one is his, out of interest?”

The woman pointed with her chin. “Last one down the other end.” “Thanks.”

And the door closed.

Jenny walked to Liam’s studio, knocked, nothing. She looked around then stepped back and kicked her boot against the handle. The door juddered in the frame.

She booted it again and again, pausing after each time to look along the corridor. Then a fourth kick and the wood of the frame splintered around the lock. Two more hefty boots and the door swung open. She looked around then went in. The room was full of large canvases, racks of them stacked against the walls, two on easels in the middle of the room, another two laid flat on the floor.

There was a table full of paints and brushes along one wall, a sink and draining board covered in paint splatters, cups and jars, dirty rags and towels.

Jenny approached the easels. The paintings were six feet by four, swirling abstracts with recognisable elements, skulls and flowers, spines intertwined with vines, animal body parts intermingled with tree roots, soil and earth.

She touched a canvas in the corner, rubbed her thumb against the material. She wandered round, soaking it in. The two on the floor were similar, brighter, more blooms and petals blending into hair and fur.

She flicked through the stacked canvases, more of the same, strong shapes disappearing into shimmering backgrounds.

She walked round the sink and table, inhaling the turps and paint fumes which reminded her of DIY, doing up the flat in Porty with Craig before Hannah was born, sheets covering the floorboards, the pair of them full of optimism.

She returned to the pictures in the middle of the room. They were very good.

She looked around. There was nothing in here but painting equipment, no desk or drawers, no laptop, nothing perverse.

So this was it, his dirty secret was that he was a talented artist? It didn’t make sense.

She looked at the damaged door, sucked in the paint smell one last time, then turned and left.

The woman in the picture was pretty, blonde hair in a mess, flowery blouse askew with one hand tight on the baby’s rump

Hannah

She stared at the name on his door. “Longhorn” made her think of someone boasting about his big manhood, and she tried to shake an image of a naked Peter Longhorn.

She knocked on the door, no answer. She knocked again just in case, cleared her throat. She tried the handle and the door opened. She breathed then went inside and closed the door behind her.

The trusting nature of academia. She imagined burglars walking into the building and going through the offices like locusts, stripping the place of everything electrical, phones, laptops, Kindles, ipads, all into a giant van.

Peter Longhorn’s office was small and tidy, a narrow window with a view west of grey brick and white-framed windowpanes.

Posters for symposiums and conferences on the walls, a framed picture on the desk of a woman in her early 30s smiling and holding a baby who was fumbling with a melting ice cream cone, bib around her neck and sunhat on. The woman in the picture was pretty, blonde hair in a mess, flowery blouse askew with one hand tight on the baby’s rump.

Hannah scanned the room – piles of papers, textbooks, journals, scientific dictionaries.

She went to his desk, cheap chipboard and plastic moulded corners. There were locks on each drawer but they all opened.

The top drawers were full of pens and Post-its, other people’s business cards.

She went through them, doctors and professors from other institutions, nothing obviously weird.

She flipped through notebooks full of equations and diagrams.

Next drawer down was more paperwork, brown folders full of essays and exam scripts, all marked.

She lifted them out and felt around at the back of the drawer space, nothing. Put them back.

The final drawer had conference and laboratory brochures, ranging from pamphlets to thick, glossy prospectuses. She pulled them out and riffled the pages, seeing if anything fell out.

Nothing. She shoved her hand into the empty drawer, her fingers shifting dust as she felt around. And touched something.

More tomorrow.

A Dark Matter by Doug Johnstone is published by Orenda Books, as is Black Hearts, his latest in the same series. www.orendabooks.co.uk