Last Nocturne Read online

  Batchelor sat people one by one, feeling as though he was dealing cards, a hand of which no one knew the outcome. He pulled the chair out next to Florence on her left and parked Ruskin there. Then Alice Arbuthnot. He and Grand were pretty sure that Ruskin wasn’t a client of hers, present or past, so that seemed safe enough. Next to her came Whistler. Although that was quite close to Ruskin, the curve of the table meant that they wouldn’t have to look at each other. Despite Wilde trying to muscle in, Batchelor put Lady Blanche next, followed by Barnes, who sat down looking like a rabbit in the gaze of a stoat. Next to Barnes, much to Grand’s amusement, came Lady Wentworth, who sat with a loud cry of, ‘Must one?’ Watts was next, so at least she knew that her left hand would be in the grip of genius. At this point, the women ran out, so Batchelor and Grand had employed some lateral thinking. Next to Watts came Wilde, who was in seventh heaven, next to an artistic genius and still able to keep an eye on Whistler across the table, to make sure he didn’t get too friendly with anyone else. After that, the choice was random, simply making sure that Sir Coutts Lindsay didn’t have to hold hands with his staff, so it went Keen, Sir Coutts, Inverarity and Saunders, closing the circle on Florence’s right.

  ‘Is everyone comfortable?’ Grand asked, and got a mixed response, with, as expected, the loudest complaints coming in the strident tones of Lady Wentworth. Ignoring her, he smiled and rubbed his hands together in the manner of a fairground barker. ‘In a moment, Mr Batchelor and I will be blowing out all but a few of the candles, but there will still be residual light so there is no need to worry. If anyone does get distressed or concerned, please try not to break the circle, but instead just say either my name or Mr Batchelor’s and we will attend you immediately. We will be in the background, but watching and listening, so there is no need for concern. Does anyone have any questions?’

  Grand looked round the table. One hand went up.

  ‘Yes, Mr Keen.’

  ‘Before we go on with this farce,’ the QC said, ‘may I enquire whether this is some misguided attempt at self-publicity for the gallery? As if the doubtful subjects of many of the paintings is not enough.’

  ‘No,’ Sir Coutts Lindsay was quick to reply. ‘This is no doing of ours. And if this show isn’t soon on the road, Blanche and I are going home. We don’t keep late hours and certainly don’t sit around in the dark with a lot of strange people waiting for absolutely nothing to happen. We have watercolours to complete.’

  ‘Here, here,’ came from various parts of the table.

  ‘In that case,’ Grand said, ‘let’s get this show on the road.’ He was rather enjoying his showman persona.

  He and Batchelor flitted around the room, blowing out all the candles except those in the extreme corners. Someone had lit one candle on the high mezzanine, which was a nuisance, because he hadn’t meant there to be light up there, but it was too far away to blow out now and he wasn’t even sure how to get there.

  In the small gallery beyond, Lady Caroline Wentworth was having her clothing adjusted by Alexander Martin. In the few candles which Grand had allowed, he looked positively ethereal, the flames glancing off the perfect planes of his face and glinting off his hair.

  ‘You’re very lovely,’ she heard herself say.

  Martin glanced up from where he was pinning up a layer of calico and lace. ‘Tell me about it. It’s a bugger.’

  ‘Surely, you can’t be ungrateful.’ She could think of a dozen women who would kill to be in her position right now and two dozen who would sell their souls just to have his skin, his eyelashes, those lips!

  ‘Not ungrateful, no,’ he sighed. ‘Just rather tired of it. I do have a personality, you know, things to say. But no one ever notices. That’s why I have made such a thing about the filing, the photographic memory. Those things are nothing to do with how I look. I’m a bit of a slob at heart, but now it’s second nature to put things in rows, to come out with unconsidered trifles.’

  ‘Oh, poor you,’ she said, and wondered if it was excuse enough for a kiss.

  He stood up and she looked at him for a moment. He leaned forward and she lowered her lashes and licked her lips. This might be the moment when she threw caution to the winds.

  Close to her ear, his voice murmured, ‘Do we really need to blow these candles out? Because, to be honest, I am rather afraid of the dark.’

  She unpuckered and opened her eyes. Beauty was all very well, but sometimes a girl needed someone to watch over her. And Gan Martin was clearly not that man.

  ‘Are you ready?’ he whispered, unaware of what he had missed.

  ‘Ready,’ she said, and they went and stood just inside the door, left just slightly ajar.

  In the gallery, a pin dropping would have been deafening. Batchelor metaphorically doffed his hat to Florence Cook; even when not moving or making a sound, she completely dominated the room. Even Lady Wentworth was silent, possibly a world’s first.

  Under her thick veil, the medium looked around the table. Too many for her tastes, really, but the money was good and it didn’t need much work from her. All that nonsense with locked cabinets and your hand in hot wax was getting a bit much. There must be simpler ways of making a living. Lowering her voice, she murmured, ‘Will everyone please put your hands on the table, fingertips only. Arch your hands. That’s right. Now, make sure your little fingers are touching. Just touching, lady in pink. No need to grab.’ Ruskin and Whistler were for once united in their gratitude. Alice Arbuthnot gave in with good grace and just leant her little finger as provocatively as she could.

  ‘There are thirteen at the table,’ Florence went on, ignoring the cry of societal distress from Lady Wentworth, who had always gone to great lengths to avoid such a gaffe, ‘so I am expecting rather wonderful things tonight. Also, Mr Grand and Mr Batchelor tell me there are artists present, so the sensitive vibrations will be very strong.’

  Watts, Whistler and Ruskin preened themselves, joined to their surprise by Wilde.

  ‘Now, if everyone is comfortable, please be silent and wait. The spirits are near, I can feel them.’

  Soon the room was filled with a crushing silence, broken only by Wilde’s tendency to catarrh.

  A noise began to infiltrate the room. It was impossible to tell from where it emanated; it seemed to begin in each listener’s head, deep in the hind brain, where all fears begin. Even Grand and Batchelor, who had been told to expect it, shook their heads like a puppy with a fly in its ear. The great building took up the sound and magnified it, moaning from the high roof and making the pictures hum on their wires. The sound grew and grew, almost to the point of pain. Ruskin, who was a little deaf in his left ear, inclined his head to the right, closing his eyes to prevent the candle-glowing dark from disorienting him further.

  ‘Is there anybody there?’ Batchelor had always thought it a cliché, but now, cutting through the hum which was turning his bones to water, it carried a threat, that whatever was there was not an anybody any more, but an anything.

  The table gave a lurch and Lady Wentworth suppressed a scream. This had never happened in the table-turning evenings at Lady Fortescue’s.

  At the head of the table, facing down the gallery, the medium appeared to have changed shape. Ruskin and Saunders both looked down to check that her fingers were still in contact with theirs; it seemed hardly possible, as the woman had grown to a massive height. Her voice, like the hum, came from everywhere, and Barnes shut his eyes tight and in a high, small voice in his head called for his mummy.

  The table lurched again and this time continued to rock back and forth, in a mesmerizing rhythm. Florence’s voice was sharp. ‘Stop that!’ she said, and the table was still. ‘Who are you?’

  Points of light flickered into life along the gallery high above.

  Batchelor leaned in and whispered in Grand’s ear. ‘That’s clever. How is she doing that?’

  Grand shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Perhaps she arranged it with Martin.’

  ‘Oh.’ Batchelor
hoped so, because the lights were getting more and more, just little pinpricks against the distant ceiling, like stars on a frosty night.

  ‘Who are you?’ Florence demanded. ‘Do you want someone here?’

  ‘Yes!’ The voice roared from all corners. It was impossible to tell the sex or age. It was just a voice, echoing and dead.

  Florence shrank back to her normal size. It wasn’t easy to balance on a concealed stepladder and be frightened out of your wits at the same time. The voice was none of her doing and she had never experienced such a thing in her years of fleecing the great and good at séances.

  Behind their door, Caroline and Martin looked at one another.

  ‘Is that in the script?’ she asked him, in an anxious whisper.

  ‘Umm … no,’ he murmured. He didn’t like it when life left the script. ‘Perhaps she’s improvising. Wait and see, and if she doesn’t get back on track soon, you’ll have to go in anyway.’

  She nodded and pressed closer. He may not be as powerful as Matthew, but he was male, here, and between her and whatever was happening in the gallery. And for now, that would have to do.

  ‘Who do you want?’ Florence asked, when she had controlled the tremble in her throat.

  The answer was not so much a word as a scream, visceral and with the pain of the fires of hell in it.

  ‘This is very good,’ Batchelor muttered to Grand. ‘I can see why she’s quite pricey.’

  Grand kept his counsel. He had a sneaking suspicion that this was not the work of Florence Cook, Medium to the Gentry.

  When the echoes had died away, Florence spoke again. ‘I will ask the souls gathered around this table to speak their names and, as they do, I would ask you to let us know if they are the person you wish to speak to. Can you do that?’

  Everyone braced themselves for the scream, but none came.

  ‘Can you do that?’ Florence raised her voice and waited.

  ‘Yesssssssssss.’ The sound filled the great room, a sibilant full of menace and hatred.

  She turned her head to Ruskin. ‘Just speak your name, sir,’ she said. ‘Then go round the table, leaving time for an answer.’

  Ruskin went to speak, but found his lips were dry and his tongue somehow had cleaved to the roof of his mouth. He tried to raise his right hand to wipe his face, but Florence, feeling the movement, held on tight. ‘Do not break the circle,’ she begged them. ‘It will keep us safe.’ She was out of her depth, but rules were rules. She had a feeling that nothing was a guarantee any more, and promised herself that, after tonight, she would find a safer profession.

  Ruskin coughed and somehow got enough saliva to speak. ‘John Ruskin,’ he said.

  The voice, which sounded like the voice of the gallery, the echo making it sound as if all the frozen faces of all the models on all the paintings spoke in grotesque chorus, came again. ‘Who?’ it said and, even in his fear, Whistler could hardly suppress a chuckle.

  And so they went, one by one, around the circle, the voice muttering and hissing quietly as each one spoke. Some were not worried and spoke their names clearly. Mrs Arbuthnot knew that she had been personally responsible for the deaths of at least three gentlemen, but as they had all died with smiles on their faces, she felt sure that this terrible voice was not here for her. The Lindsays, likewise, had consciences as clear as the day. Barnes was too terrified for coherent thought, but was sure that being a policeman made a person invincible. He had read it somewhere in the rule book.

  ‘Lady Wentworth!’ The woman’s voice rang out and Grand had to admit to a grudging sense of pride. She was totally fearless. Or as stupid as an owl. But she talked the talk, all right.

  ‘George Frederic Watts.’ The old man lifted his chin and his Old Testament beard stood out defiantly.

  The voice was silent. There was not even a hiss.

  ‘Say it again,’ Florence urged.

  Again, the voice said nothing, but there was a sound like a rushing wind along the topmost gallery.

  Behind the door, Martin turned to Caroline. ‘It sounds as if something has gone wrong with her special effects. I think you should go on now.’

  ‘But … I haven’t heard my cue.’

  ‘What are you?’ Martin snapped. ‘Sarah Bloody Bernhardt.’ He reached round and pulled her into the doorway and gave her a push in the small of her back. ‘You’re on,’ he said, uncovering a dark lantern he had ready for the purpose.

  Into the silence, backlit by a sullen yellow light, an ethereal form floated into view. Its hair was long, its clothes diaphanous, its face white and melancholy. With it came the smell of water, of grass, of the outdoors. A low keening cry came from it as it wafted along the wall of the gallery, emerging from behind the medium to go round the table widdershins. As it passed, the guests around the table turned to watch, twisting their heads to see it go.

  Batchelor grabbed Grand’s arm. ‘Who the hell is that? Is it Katie King?’

  ‘Florence hasn’t brought Katie tonight,’ Grand told him. ‘Use your eyes.’

  Batchelor peered closer and shook his head.

  ‘It’s Caroline, you ass. I dressed her up as Evangeline French, but I don’t know what she’s doing. That wasn’t her cue.’

  There was a clatter of a chair as Watts leaped to his feet. ‘Evangeline?’ he said. ‘Evangeline? Is that you?’

  The spectre turned hollow eyes on him and extended an arm. A white hand emerged from the calico sleeve and a finger pointed at him.

  ‘Good girl,’ Grand breathed. ‘I told her she might have to improvise.’

  ‘Spirit,’ Florence said, relieved to be almost back in the plot. ‘What do you want of us?’

  Watts was standing open-mouthed, his hands spread at his side. ‘She can’t want me,’ he said, desperately. ‘I haven’t done anything.’

  Ruskin tutted. ‘Really?’ he said, in a stage whisper to the whole room. ‘Except that crime against humanity you call Sir Galahad. That armour!’

  Everyone ignored him. All eyes were on the spirit, who was backing into the shadows. It lurched and fell back.

  ‘The spirit is losing its grasp on the earthly plane,’ Florence cried. ‘Everyone, join hands. Mr Watts, I beg you, join hands.’

  Watts felt for the hands on either side of him, not taking his eyes off the spirit, which was almost invisible in the gloom under the Nocturne in Blue and Gold. The fireworks seemed to flash in the light of the few candles then, suddenly, all was dark, except for Martin’s lantern at the far end of the room. There was a sudden blast of air with a hint of decay in it and the spirit was gone.

  ‘Nice effect,’ Batchelor muttered, but Grand wasn’t there to hear.

  ‘Martin,’ the American was shouting, ‘turn that bloody lantern up. Everyone, find a candle. Light it. There’s something wrong here.’

  Martin dropped the shutters from his lantern and the light shone on his face. He looked like an angel floating there in the dark and Whistler, Ruskin and Watts all drew in their breath. If only they had paints and canvas right here, right now, what a picture that would make.

  ‘Where is she?’ he called to Grand.

  ‘I don’t know. Did she say she had a grand exit planned?’

  ‘No. We didn’t know what was going on. Everything was different to what we had rehearsed.’

  Wilde winced. To hear his Ganymede sunk so low as to mangle the English language caused him an almost physical pain.

  Bit by bit, the gallery came alive as candles were lit. With Martin’s lantern, every corner sprang to life, but of the spirit there was no sign.

  Perceval Keen spoke up as the voice of reason. ‘Of course, one knew that it wasn’t a real spirit,’ he said, ‘and was one to be the person paying for this utter farce, one would be formulating one’s complaint as one speaks.’

  ‘For God’s sake,’ Barnes said, in the anger of the recently frightened. ‘Speak English, can’t you? You’ll strangle yourself at this rate.’

  ‘Well said,’ Whistler chim
ed in. ‘Speaking for myself, I was almost scared to death. But from Mr Grand’s face, I would guess he was in on it and it is all a fraud. How it was done, God only knows …’

  ‘You’re right there,’ Florence Cook threw back her veil. ‘I think it was a real spirit at first, as someone who has never seen one but has seen a lot of fake ones. But I know that “Evangeline” was a real woman, and so where on earth has she gone?’

  ‘Do you mean,’ Lady Wentworth piped up, ‘that this was a fraud?’

  Lady Blanche Lindsay looked at her with disdain. ‘You mad old trout,’ she said. ‘You must be more stupid even than you look.’

  ‘Ladies, ladies.’ Inverarity attempted to pour oil on troubled waters and got a parasol round the head for his pains.

  Meanwhile, Grand had hauled Saunders out of the melee and was shaking him like a dog shakes a rat.

  ‘Hidden doorways,’ he yelled at him. ‘Fake panels. Where are they?’

  Saunders shook his head. ‘There aren’t any,’ he whimpered. ‘This is a bloody art gallery, not some castle in a ghost story. We don’t have priest holes and secret passages here!’

  Grand continued to shake him, for want of anything else to do.

  Whistler watched with horror. They were very near his painting and, if they weren’t careful, they’d have it off the … he cried out in pain as it hit the floor, the frame splintering and the canvas cracking across his famous butterfly signature.

  Ruskin laughed until it brought on a bout of coughing and he had to be ministered to by Alice Arbuthnot.

  Wilde peered at the space where the portrait had hung. ‘Gan?’ he said, raising his voice over the general din. ‘What’s that?’

  Martin looked closer. On the wall, where the painting had been, there was an irregularity in the panelling. Moving forward as if in slow motion, he reached out a hand and pressed it. On oiled and silent hinges, the panel slid away, leaving a black hole behind it.