Page 23 of The Dead Come to Stay

the front, however. She crossed the room with purpose, and despite being the most striking person in the room, didn’t raise

much of a glance. Between that and her expert navigation, Jo gathered, she was at the York museum rather a lot.

“Here we be,” Chen said, stopping in front of a large portrait. Seated as subject was a corpulent man in black, his abdomen

filling the bottom of the frame, one arm resting on a near-invisible chair. His face, long, flat, topped with a wave crest

of white hair and ending in a double chin, appeared vaguely surprised. “What do you know of Lord Leverhulme?”

Jo ran through her mental Rolodex. Leverhulme . There was a story she’d read...

“He hated the painting of himself, didn’t he?” Jo asked.

Chen clapped her delicate hands.

“Very good and very sanitized,” she said. “Have a close look at the canvas, not the man.”

Jo did so. A faint line appeared above the man’s head, and beneath, and on either side.

“You are standing before the headless painting,” Chen explained. “Leverhulme didn’t dislike it, he despised it. Was ashamed

of it, even. Told Augustus John it didn’t favor him at all. John told him to pick up a paintbrush and fix it himself. He picked

up scissors instead.” Chen’s eyes sparkled, and she flourished the sapphire-bearing hand toward the now-hard-to-mistake rectangle.

“Cut his own head right out of the canvas, but by some mistake, the housekeeper packaged it up and returned it to Augustus

John. He called it the grossest insult and took the story to the papers.”

She stepped to the side of the portrait to reveal more of the museum curator’s comments along with a reproduction newsprint:

Beheaded Portrait , it read.

“Imagine, pet. Artists went on strike. People protested in the streets. They even burned Leverhulme in effigy. How very dare he?”

Jo looked again at the painting. The man in the picture did not look pleasant. Self-important, perhaps, self-indulgent, but

also curiously vacant.

“He looks—repulsive.”

“Oh yes,” Chen agreed. “Augustus John painted the inside on the outside, you see? A psychological portrait. That is what made him singular; that’s why he’s a master. He never painted to please the sitter. Now come, child. The gem of the

collection is a portrait of Dylan Thomas, fellow Welshman.”

That, at least, was a name Jo knew well.

“‘Do not go gentle into that good night,’” she quoted—words the poet wrote as a plea for a dying father.

“That’s the one,” Chen agreed, turning her cheekbones up toward the canvas. “What do you make of young Dylan?”

Jo found herself mentally tracing brush strokes. This later painting lacked the careful rendering he’d done for Evelyn’s.

It was as though his style grew disheveled, the subjects revealing themselves in bolder but less precise strokes. Yet looking

at the portrait, Jo felt she knew Dylan Thomas. It was so different from the heavier, swallow-cheeked man whose brow shadowed large eyes in famous black-and-white

photos. Instead, here was a youth, almost feminine, bright red curls hugging a high forehead, full lips like a rosebud, slightly

parted. And the eyes: strange faraway eyes, wide with something like naive expectation married to the acceptance of fate.

Behind him, black-and-blue clouds were streaked in angry white. Here was storm, uncertainty and yet acceptance and a willingness

to walk on. Do not go gentle.

“Like Joan of Arc offering humanity to nothingness,” Jo said.

“Ah, pet! That is the perfect interpretation,” Chen said, her eyes moist and approving.

Jo felt a blush surging up the back of her neck.

“Can—can I ask about your painting? The one Aiden bought,” she said—not very slyly returning to her still-unanswered questions. “Why is it called Hiding ?”

Chen’s eyes creased at the edges. “Can you visualize it?”

“Oh yes.”

“Good. Tell it to me. Just like you did with this portrait.”

Jo felt slight panic. “I’m not—definitely not an art critic.”

“Try,” Chen encouraged, her voice humming approbation. “Just speak it.” There was something strangely disarming about the

way Chen asked, and it galvanized Jo’s natural need to answer. So she closed her eyes and brought the painting into view.

“The black dot reminds me of a lost shoe,” she said. “Like Miss Havisham’s lost shoe. We only ever see her wearing the one;

the other is left behind. That can’t be the point . But it’s the first thing I think about.”

“Very well. And what do you make of the red background?” Chen asked.

Jo chuffed at her bare arms. “It’s bright but it’s not warm. And it’s loud . I don’t know why it’s so loud, but I look at the gray streaks to give my eyes a break.” Jo found herself thinking of the

hotel carpeting. “I think it’s angry.”

“Ah,” said Chen, “a small, forgotten thing, clinging to a thin veil in the midst of a red, red rage? I think you understand

the painting very well.”

Jo opened her eyes.

“But what’s hidden in it?” she asked. “I can’t tell that.”

The old bell was ringing; there were connections, but she just couldn’t see them yet. Colophon, Calliope, Centennial... Smeg... Chen reached out a gentle hand and laid it upon Jo’s, which had accidentally turned into a thumb-hiding fist.

“The artist,” she said, her voice a quiet rasp. “ I was hiding. Being out, being yourself in the bad old world, it’s hard and it’s grim. When I had my first art gallery opening,

I couldn’t face the crowd. I just couldn’t do it.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing. Everything. I went home and I attacked a canvas. I told Aiden it was a talisman, a bit of magic to trap the old, scared self and all her rage. I left it there in the painting, and I walked right on out into the sun.” She turned slowly in place, looking at all the art at once.

“Augustus John had a bit of that magic in reverse.”

“Dorian Gray?” Jo asked. For a moment, Chen’s eyes were a blank, but then they fired to life.

“Ah—perhaps! Something like that. He told people things about themselves they wanted to stay hidden. You can’t hide in an

Augustus John portrait. He painted to reveal hidden truths.”

Jo felt a shiver run through her, as though she was wearing skin a size too small.

“Evelyn,” she whispered, thinking of her far-away expression, the angle of her eyes that was still wrong, mismatched from

her body, “off” somehow. Her body was in a posture of longing. Expectation. The way she seemed both retiring but resisting,

the effect of holding back passion. “Oh. Oh no. He painted her in love .”

A head tilt, a nervous movement of hands, a quickening of pulse; each could be an indicator if you read them right, and each

might be hidden or ignored. But once rendered as a painting—one to be hung with Lord William and Lady Gwen Ardemore—the revelation must surely have been imminent. Gwen, long-suffering, barren, in what was

probably a marriage of convenience and consolidation of wealth... maybe she could countenance an affair. But could she

hang it on the wall in her own home?

“Did Gwen destroy the painting?” Jo asked. “She couldn’t bear to see the proof each day of her husband in love with someone

else?” She hadn’t meant to say it out loud, but Chen’s hand gave hers a squeeze.

“Your uncle Aiden thought so. And now, I think it’s time I tell you a story. Not here, of course. But I know the perfect place for tea and cake.”

***

MacAdams waited until ten past the hour, ensuring Ashok and Annie would already be seated and saving himself the awkwardness

of playing host. They sat at a corner table, sipping still water and chatting idly. Surveillance was the guilty pleasure of

the detective, and so he indulged: Ashok was a trifle younger than Annie; he had a fresh face beneath thick black hair and

expressive eyes of amber brown. He smiled. A lot. Annie smiled, too, her cheeks flushed by the warmth of the day. Also she

was now looking right at him. A sixth sense, he long decided. She’d got him on her radar somehow.

“James!” said Ashok, who darted up and shook his hand with police-rookie enthusiasm.

“Hello, Ashok. I appreciate you taking the time.”

“We ought to be appreciating yours,” Ashok said. “I’m so happy to help.”

“And it’s the only way we’ll get you to a meal,” Annie added, popping up to mime a cheek kiss.

MacAdams took a seat.

“How’s the baby?” he asked. Green had reminded him to send a congrats card for the arrival of young Edward, named for Annie’s

father.

“Noisy and not sleeping, your average eleven-month-old,” Annie assured him. “Tell Green thank you for the card.”

MacAdams wondered why they bothered pretending he did any of the usual niceties himself. He had half a mind to tell her he’d

changed the curtains. The server came and went while they finished the small talk. MacAdams ordered fish and chips and out

came the notebook and pencil.

“Hammersmith,” he said.

Ashok nodded and leaned his forearms on the table. “It’s a good firm. I know a few of the architects who work for them. Top-notch

people who really enjoy the work. But that’s what makes their business in York so odd.”

“Stanley Burnhope suggested he’d received complaints about Ronan Foley,” MacAdams said. “The manager of a certain build in

York that went wrong.”

“He should, if Ronan was overseeing that development. That site should have been finished a year ago. The designs were simple

enough, just a mixed-use space on the other side of the Ouse River—not far from the 1237 motorway. Not even their usual thing.

Low-brow, almost.” Ashok talked with his hands, and almost upset his water glass. Annie saved it.

“Have they done jobs in town before?” MacAdams asked, moving his own water out of reach.

“Not usually. They did the new facade of a larger hotel a few years back. Modern aesthetics are a little out of place in York.”

MacAdams couldn’t disagree; the firm seemed better fit for the city center of London in terms of their look.

“So why take on something like this at all, then?” he asked. The food had arrived; he permitted himself chips between questions

but hovered over his notepad all the same.

“Honestly? It’s been hard all round for that sort of thing. Brexit, various shutdowns, new trade sanctions.” Ashok took a

healthy bit of his chicken salad before adding, “If you’re mainly office high-rises, it’s a tough time to be an architect.”

Gridley had, in fact, taken a good look at what Hammersmith produced since about 2016.

There were golf clubs and art centers, a few theater rehabs and several (very high end) condos, but they won awards for being the cradle-to-grave company for design and construction of tall glass buildings.

But their finances seemed very sound, and despite the empty offices, there hadn’t been a single layoff in either the architectural or real es tate side of things.

Perhaps that was unusual in itself. He made a note to check back.

“Are you suggesting they lost interest in the project, somehow? Not good enough for them?” MacAdams suggested.

“Not sure. But they’re going to lose the project entirely if the Lord Mayor has a say,” Ashok said, and Annie piped in:

“Part of that building is supposed to house a community center. People are angry it’s been stalled, and I don’t blame them.”

“Especially since the city would have to find another set of real estate developers, at expense,” Ashok added. “Which means

a change in space use.”

“To retail, probably,” Annie sighed. “Because we need more of that .”

MacAdams worried the conversation was about to veer toward the state of public programs. He tapped his pencil against the

table.

“Would you say delay is the biggest complaint, then?” he asked. “I got the impression that personalities may have been at

odds.”

“Oh that,” Ashok said. Yes, MacAdams thought, that. “It was fine until the city put pressure on the job manager. I never met the man, but he had words with the council leader

and his deputy. You’d have to be gormless, yeah? You don’t take the piss when it comes to city council.”

“Ashok!” Annie admonished and Ashok blushed to his dark eyebrows. First time MacAdams felt some fellow feeling for the man.

“Sorry! But it’s true.”

This was the first plausible, business-oriented motive MacAdams had come across, as far as Burnhope was concerned. “How much

money would Hammersmith stand to lose on a job like this?”

“Probably not more than they could stomach,” Ashok said with a shrug. “It’s more about reputation, though.”

“Especially if bigger jobs are thin on the ground,” MacAdams added. Could Foley have been jeopardizing Hammersmith’s position in a new niche? Or did his mismanagement in York do more than annoy the locals?

“Anyway, this Foley hasn’t been around all that much. That’s frankly the problem.”

“Absence, not presence,” MacAdams clarified. Foley couldn’t very well spend much time in York if he was twice a month in Abington

with his lady friend, could he? He dipped his chips in brown sauce, still ignoring the fish. “Tell me, Ashok, what about the

property now? Is it still active?”

“I haven’t been by it, so I’m not sure. As far as I know the city hasn’t pulled the plug yet, so it’s not out of Hammersmith’s

hands.”

MacAdams had a sudden desire to see the property himself. If derelict, would it be locked up? Better to go first to York Central

Station. If Foley had made an ass of himself, the city wouldn’t mind some poking about. He might get surveillance on the place.

“I need to make a call,” he said, pushing his chair back.

Ashok pushed his chair away, too. “I need to answer one,” he said, winking at Annie. “Be back.”

MacAdams watched him disappear in the direction of the WC.

“Don’t be scandalized, James,” Annie said. “When you have toddlers, it’s all potty humor.”

“Right,” he said, because what else did one say to that? “This has been very useful—today—meeting here.”

“And you’re about to do a runner on lunch, aren’t you,” she said, looking at their half-finished plates.

“I’m sorry, Annie.”

“No, you’re not,” she said with a laugh. “I’ve not seen you this engaged with a case since... possibly ever.” She narrowed

her eyes over apple cheeks and pretended severe scrutiny. “There’s something different about you, James MacAdams.”

“I doubt that,” he said.

“No, it’s true. Your slacks have been ironed.”

“I can do laundry, Annie.” He hunted out a ten-pound note for his portion. Annie batted it away, so he stuck it beneath Ashok’s

plate.

“He’s a good man, isn’t he?” he asked.

“Yes, he is,” Annie said and smiled. “I’m happy.”

“I’m glad,” MacAdams said. And he meant it.