Saturn Over the Water (11 page)

‘I’m glad to hear it, Mrs Candamo. I liked her when she was showing me Mr Arnaldos’s collection.’

She was ready to go now, and stood up. ‘She can behave sometimes like a spoilt child because she still is a child, not a woman yet although it is quite time.’ She didn’t move then, as I expected her to do, but stood there looking hard at me. ‘Mr Bedford, why did you come here?’

‘Because I was invited, Mrs Candamo.’ I said it lightly and smiled at her, hoping she wouldn’t notice that she’d startled me.

‘Of course. But that is not what I meant. And of course you know that. But I must attend to my work.’ She turned and began moving towards the door.

‘Is Dr. Steglitz still here?’

‘He left for Lima about an hour ago.’ She stopped at the door, and faced me without opening it. ‘We have many visitors, coming mostly to see the Institute. And today you take lunch there.’ And then the smile vanished. I could barely catch what she said. ‘So be careful, please, Mr Bedford.’

Before I could ask her what she meant, she’d gone. I spent the next half hour playing a useless guessing game with myself. What was wrong with me as an investigator was that after travelling about six thousand miles I didn’t know where and how to start investigating. But I knew how to look at pictures, so off I went to Rosalia’s studio. I took my three
gouaches
along with me, in the hope she’d have a mount or two that would fit them. Not that I wanted to take her mounts, only to look at my
gouaches
framed in them.

I found some mounts. She’d everything up there, more gear of every sort than Picasso would have known how to cope with. I took a good look at my
gouaches
in the mounts – not bad, though they’d lost some of their original blaze and glory. I had to hold out against digging round for some tubes of
gouache
and then touching up the sketches a bit. But I’m not a genius, I just have some talent, and so I felt I’d been the self-centred artist long enough. I left my own work where it was, at the door end of a long table, and began to look at Rosalia’s. There were lashings of it, some framed, some not. It easily divided itself into a Paris, a New York and a recent Peru period. Not that it was representational; on the whole it was trying not to be. It went in for
tachisme
, action painting, bashing around on the edge of that inner world Steglitz talked about; but some representational bits had crept in, so to speak, when she wasn’t looking. I picked out ten of the least revolting, all fairly recent, put them in line, and concentrated on them.

I was still considering them when Rosalia came tearing in. She might have been fired here by rocket from some Espresso in the King’s Road, Chelsea. Her hair was a mess. There were dabs of blue paint on her chin and right cheek. She was wearing a shapeless short smock thing, and underneath that a pair of those tight pants that make nine girls out of ten look silly and were certainly dead wrong for her. I’d have hated the sight of her even if she’d been in a good temper. I knew I was in for a scene, and the way she’d come charging in, looking like that, made me almost ready to welcome one.

‘I’ve changed my mind,’ she shouted. ‘Stop looking at my pictures. Go away.’

‘Oh – for God’s sake!’ I sounded disgusted and I hope I looked disgusted.

‘You needn’t look at me like that. Just go away.’ She came forward and I think if she’d been holding anything she’d have thrown it at me. ‘It’s my studio – and I don’t want you here.’

‘And I never asked to come here. How many times have you to be told?’

‘Oh – shut up! And go away.’

Then I put my hands just below her shoulders and held her firmly at arm’s length. She didn’t say anything, just glared at me. I glared back at her and rocked her a little as I talked. She could easily have pulled away, but although she still seemed very angry, she never tried. ‘Now, Rosalia ducky, you’re going to listen to me for two minutes even if it means I’ll have to hitchhike back to Lima today. You can’t have your own way all the time, even if your grandfather’s ready to buy the
Beaux Arts
and the Slade and give them to you on your next birthday. Now stop being a rich spoilt child – and give yourself a chance. I’ve been looking at your work – ’

‘I won’t listen, I won’t listen,’ she cried, not knowing now whether to be angrier still or to burst into tears. ‘Just go away, that’s all. Go away.’

‘It’ll be a pleasure. But first you’re going to listen for a minute.’ I still had my hands on her and now I gave her a shake. ‘This work of yours isn’t good – but it could be a lot better quite soon. The chief trouble is – you’re divided in your mind. You’re trying to be four different kinds of painters all at the same time, and it can’t be done. The next thing is that you’re working with a messy and rather sour palette. Your colour’s never clear, crisp and appetising. It’s too mixed up – like you.’

She pulled herself away and swore at me very rapidly in English, French and Spanish. But having relieved her feelings, she was quiet again long enough for me to give her some technical advice that isn’t worth repeating here. When I’d finished, she glowered at me for a moment and then, while I was filling and lighting a pipe, she went and stared at my
gouaches
. When finally I moved towards her, she looked up.

‘I suppose you think you’re wonderful.’ The disdain was tremendous. No man has ever been able to talk from that height.

‘No, I don’t. But I know what I’m trying to do, even though I don’t often succeed in doing it. And I earn a living trying to do what I want to do. If you think that’s easy, you try.’

‘I never said it was easy.’ She didn’t look at me, and her voice was sulky. ‘Take these mounts if you want them. Or anything else.’

‘No, thank you, Rosalia.’ I picked up the sketches. ‘I don’t want anything of yours. You keep it, keep it all.’ I walked straight but rather slowly to the door, without even looking in her direction. Just as I was quietly closing the door behind me I thought I heard her crying. I didn’t care. The way she’d interrupted me in there, shouting like a spoilt child and looking like a beatnik’s pad pal, just when I was trying to get to her through the pictures, had somehow given me a bad jolt. I was still feeling raw round the edges and sour inside when I found my way to the place where I was lunching.

It wasn’t hard to find because it was in the central building, the only Institute building that had more than one storey. The room itself was clean, bright and uninteresting. I haven’t spent much time with scientists, but they always seem to me to live in the same atmosphere, which somehow has had most of the interest, colour and life drained out of it. I sat at lunch between Dr Guevara, the director, who seemed absent-minded and rather worried, as if an experiment was going wrong somewhere, and Dr Schneider, the head of the medical section, the one who was not unlike Soultz but shorter, darker, hairier. Because I was in a bad mood and feeling impatient, I decided not to waste much time talking about nothing to Schneider. I was here to investigate, wasn’t I?

‘I met your friend Dr Magorious at a dinner party in London.’

‘It is not surprising,’ said Schneider. ‘He enjoys social life, I understand. You had some talk with him?’

‘Not much. We didn’t take to each other. What does he think is wrong with the English?’

‘Ah – Soultz told you about his letter to me. It is not a question of something being wrong but of a recent change in the national character. His account of it is rather technical – it would not interest you, I think, Mr Bedford.’

I know I wasn’t being very clever, but I felt I must find out something. ‘When Dr Soultz told me yesterday that you didn’t find Joe Farne very co-operative, what did he mean?’

This didn’t seem to worry Schneider. ‘Again, it is all rather technical. Farne was doing some research here on synthetic proteins. He had made some progress and wished to publish his results. But it is the policy of the Arnaldos Institute – and it is clearly stated in our contract with all scientists employed in research here – that no results can be published without the permission of the Institute. Farne strongly resented this. He refused to continue his work here. So he left us.’

‘Soultz doesn’t know where he went,’ I said.

‘Then you may be sure nobody here knows where he went,’ said Schneider. ‘Are you undertaking some commission from Mr Arnaldos to paint something here, Mr Bedford?’

I told him I wasn’t, and explained that I only found myself in Uramba because Arnaldos and I both happened to know Sam Harnberg. Having no interest in science, I went on to explain, the Institute wasn’t really my concern, though I’d no doubt it was doing a wonderful job for Peru. He said that it was, and then talked about South America in general. Dr Guevara came out of his worry to join in this, and then lunch was over. There were eight or nine of us round the table and we were moving to take our coffee in the little lounge next door when Schneider, who’d gone over to speak to Soultz, intervened to say that I was taking coffee with him and Soultz in Soultz’s room.

As soon as I sat down, and before the waitress who had brought the coffee had left the room, I knew they were feeling hostile. But I didn’t care, being still in the same mood. It started as soon as the girl had gone.

‘Yesterday, Mr Bedford, when you and I talked, you gave me the impression you had never heard of Farne before.’ Soultz spoke and looked as if he had just been taken out of the refrigerator. ‘But today, when you spoke of him to Dr Schneider, you called him
Joe
Farne.’

‘Do not try to deny that,’ said Schneider sharply.

‘I think we are entitled, as you say, to an explanation,’ said Soultz, now the director of personnel on a very high horse.

‘And I don’t think you’re entitled, as we say, to a dam’ thing,’ I told them. ‘When I’m asked to lunch I don’t sign a guarantee that I’ll tell the exact truth. And if I suggest on Thursday that I don’t know Farne and then on Friday I call him Joe, that’s my business. And as I don’t work for the Institute, it isn’t your business, Dr Soultz and Dr Schneider. Just blame it on the English national character, running down and getting dodgy. Dr Magorious’ll know.’

‘If that is your attitude, Mr Bedford,’ said Soultz, who wasn’t as cool as he tried to appear, ‘then you cannot object if we inform Mr Arnaldos that your real purpose in coming here is to make inquiries about Farne.’

‘Go ahead. I won’t object. You won’t spoil anything. I’ve hardly seen him and I’m not angling for a commission, as you seem to think. And his granddaughter is just a pain. So go ahead, tell him what you like.’

It was Schneider’s turn. ‘You admit then that this is your real purpose?’

‘I’m not admitting anything. You’re doing the admitting, both of you. I haven’t been very clever, but you’ve been worse. Because if there wasn’t anything fishy about Joe Farne, then why this session?’

Soultz suddenly lost his temper, as these over-cool types often do. ‘And why are you so stupid?’ he shouted. ‘The man was here – then we agreed he should go – that is all – ’

Schneider interrupted him. ‘Mr Arnaldos created this Institute, and maintains it at great expense. He is now an old man, not strong, easily tired. We do not wish to disturb him in any way if it can be avoided. At the same time the Institute must be protected – ’

‘Against what?’ I asked him. ‘And what’s wrong with it?’

‘No, Soultz, allow me to reply to this.’ Schneider stared at me a moment. He had curious murky yellow eyes, which might have belonged to some intelligent unknown animal, but there was some kind of sincerity burning in them now, and I could hear it in his voice. ‘You are an artist, not a scientist. If you were a scientist you would know the reputation of the Arnaldos Institute. Many famous scientists have commended it. But because you are an artist and we live in a very strange world now, then you may have some ridiculous ideas about this Institute – that we are planning biological warfare or discovering fantastic gases or death rays out of science fiction. Mr Bedford, I assure you – no, I swear to you on my honour as a good scientist – that nothing of this kind is happening here. All our research is of a familiar kind, except that it has a regional ecological limitation – for Peru and perhaps Chile.’

‘What’s Joe Farne doing in Chile?’ And as I spoke I glanced very quickly from one to the other. They told me, both at the same time, they didn’t even know Farne had gone to Chile; but their eyes had already told me that they did know. ‘The British Embassy in Lima told his wife he’d gone to Chile,’ I said. ‘Then she received a letter from him posted from Chile. How did he leave here?’

‘My relations with Farne were far from cordial,’ said Soultz, all iced up again. ‘I did not arrange his transport. I did not see him go. And I have nothing more to say about him.’ He got up and looked pointedly at his desk.

Schneider saw me out. I told him he had been convincing about the Institute. ‘You are welcome, as I am sure Dr Guevara told you,’ he said, ‘to come at any time and see what we are doing. If our researchers cannot always publish their results, that is because of a condition originally laid down by Mr Arnaldos. As for Farne – if you are inquiring about him on behalf of his wife, which is what I believe now, then I would seriously advise you not to waste your time trying to find him in Chile. It is not a very wide country but it is very long, much of it very far away from any convenient centre. There is something else I must tell you, Mr Bedford. Farne had taken to drinking heavily before he left us. He might be sorry if you did find him. You might be sorry too. There is a strange pull to earth in South America that some Europeans cannot resist. Why not paint a few pictures for Mr Arnaldos, who will pay you well for them, and then go back to London?’

‘Like hell I will,’ I said, but not to Schneider, only to myself as I went back to the big house to collect my painting gear. When I had got it, I looked into Mrs Candamo’s little office, which was off the corridor leading to the hall. I told her I was going to try a fairly distant sketch of the Institute, and asked her if I could take along something to keep my thirst down. After she had telephoned the kitchen department, speaking in Spanish, of course, and we were waiting for whatever they would bring along, she said: ‘You have seen Rosalia’s pictures, I know. Can you tell me what happened?’

‘She burst in on me, just at the wrong moment. However, I was able to tell her a few things that might be useful, if she ever takes advice.’ I gave her a very brief outline of what I thought of the girl’s painting, and probably sounded a bit sour.

Mrs Candamo sighed. She was a hefty woman and could sigh in a big way. ‘Such a pity! Now you do not like her, do you?’

‘Not my type, Rosalia – no. By the way, Mrs Candamo – ’ I stopped there because at that moment a bottle of lemonade and some fruit arrived. After I’d stuffed them into my knapsack, I started again: ‘By the way, Mrs Candamo, what did you mean this morning when you told me to be careful?’