Ivory (12 page)

Martin had
spent all day with the children. He had taken them to a midday
showing of the latest Pixar animated movie at the Renoir Cinema at
the hideously modernist Brunswick, then worked with them on
drawings and paintings in his loft studio, teaching them and
encouraging them and having fun with them. Throwing himself into
family life for the first time in months. Being the dad his father
had never been. Being the dad Martin had always promised himself
that he would be. Oscar did have a burgeoning talent.

Cornered with
George he had received a text on his mobile phone and had been
surprised to see it was from Donnie across the room with Jenny. “HE
LIKES YOUR PAINTING. THAT’S WHY I ARRANGED THIS HORROR SHOW OF A
DINNER PARTY. HE’S GOING TO OFFER YOU £2000 FOR YOUR WORK. CHARGE
HIM £2,500 AND MAKE THIS NIGHT WORTH-BLOODY-WHILE.”

“
Yes, and he did give you the £2,500,” Jenny reminded him in
George’s defence.

“
He did.” Martin finished making the tea. “I thought writing
the cheque in front of everyone was a nice touch. I felt like a
tradesman.”

“
You are an artist, and George paid you the compliment of
demonstrating that your work is appreciated and how much your
talent is worth.”

Martin rolled
his eyes and rummaged through the breadbin. It actually did feel
good to sell a piece of work. He really should think about putting
a collection back into a gallery and regain some of the recognition
he used to have. He had some work in the studio, if he could do a
couple more pieces that bridged his individual works it could be
done. “So what will the money do for us? Replacement car, the new
kitchen we have been talking about for the past five years, or
repair that leak in the roof to replace the bucket that has been
sitting in the loft for eighteen months?” There were no cakes
behind the bread. He opened the tea-towel drawer and peered into
the back. No cakes there either.

“
Car. No question.”

Martin nodded
in agreement.

“
You won’t find them. With the three of you sniffing out cakes
and sweets all day I have to get inventive from time-to-time. But
you deserve a treat. Try the washing machine. One of the few places
no one in this house but me goes to.”

Martin threw her a lopsided smile then opened the glass door.
At seeing that there was indeed a Tupperware container stored in
the washing machine he shook his head in disbelief. He pried the
tub open to find cupcakes piled high with pink butter-cream icing.
“Not just
any
cupcakes… Marks and Spencer’s cupcakes.”

“
Only the best for you. I live to please my
husband-the-artist.”

Martin took a
hearty bite and groaned with pleasure at the rich sweetness that
poured itself over his tongue. “That’s so good.”

Jenny sashayed
over to him, a sparkle in her eye. She fingered icing off the cake,
touched it to his lips, then to her own and slipped it into her
mouth and sucked at it seductively. He kissed her lips, could taste
the sweetness. She pressed herself against him and their kiss
turned from a lip kiss to a deep mouth kiss.

“
I can feel something… Is that because of the cake or
me?”

“
Both. The cake and because you bought it for me.”

“
You got the cake, now what do I get?”

He dropped the
cake on the work top and pawed at her dress, pulled it down over
her shoulders, exposing her bra and chest as he kissed her neck
roughly. “Thank you Marks and Spencer.” She whispered breathlessly
into his ear.

He hitched her
dress up to her waist, clutched at handfuls of her upper thigh and
buttocks then lifted her up onto the worktop. She fumbled with his
belt and the button of his trousers, his trousers fell to the floor
and she pulled his boxers down and took him in her hand. She worked
her firm grip on his hardness until he could take it no more. He
pulled her underwear to one-side and entered her. Within a few
minutes they were into ardent throws and both were grunting,
groaning and biting their lips. She ignored knocking the remnants
of his cupcake on the floor and he ignored stepping on it. In
moments it was over and they were both sitting opposite each other
against the kitchen units on the cold tile floor, the clothes
pulled back up to cover themselves in case the children should be
drawn down by their noise and commotion.

After some
time, Martin spoke from a sensation of feeling good about himself.
“Did you enjoy it.”

“
Are you asking me to rate your performance?”

Martin
laughed, as he reached up for another cupcake. “Kind of, but not
about that. Today, the evening?” He bit into it and Jenny smiled
wistfully without answering. The mouthful of cupcake lost some of
its taste. He swallowed. “Does that mean you didn’t?”

Jenny shook
her head and the smile broadened but was tinged with sadness. She
took the cupcake out of his hand for herself. “It’s been a great
day. You have been fantastic with the kids, we actually left the
house to go and do something other than run down to my parents or
go shopping. We had fun.” She broke a piece of the cake off and
chewed it thoughtfully, as if stalling for time. “I guess I worry
just how long this will last.”

Part Two

“
Art is a revolt against fate”

Andre
Malraux

Chapter
Nine

Martin only
wanted to paint her. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel
of the Focus parked in a Victorian street, lined with leafless
trees in Islington. He sat hunched down in his seat and watched the
house that he was parked opposite. Like many of the houses in the
surrounding area it was a house of blackened yellow bricks with
sash cord windows. Unlike the surrounding streets of three-story
terraced houses with basement rooms, this street held two story
detached properties with front gardens. This house was one of the
only detached houses he had seen in the street and was larger than
any of the other houses, it stood out from its neighbours by
appearing as if it had been lifted out of the street, turned 45
degrees and then replaced, being the only house with its main door
at the side of the property. It struck Martin that the house had
been alone at one point and the rest of the street had grown up
around it as the city had expanded. Its design becoming a prototype
for the cloned houses that now ran uniformly down both sides of the
street. It was somewhat neglected with its windows clouded with
dust, their deep green paint bubbled, cracked and flaking away.

Martin’s
vantage point was obscured from being hunched down in his seat and
the screen of a box hedge that ran the length of the garden wall.
Martin had kept his vigil for two hours. What had started as a
Saturday morning drive had led him to the address Richard had
reluctantly given him the day before. Richard had followed Ivory
here several times. It was Ivory’s home.

Martin ducked
further down in his seat as a woman turned down the path and closed
the gate behind her. His heart throbbed into his mouth at the sight
of her. Ivory was wearing a close fitting black dress. Her pale
hair was down and strands of it sailed in her wake as she walked.
He leaned forward against the steering wheel to follow her route
down the alley at the side of the house to the main door.

He froze as
she stared in his direction. To move whilst caught in a casual
stare would reveal himself to her. She stared through him and he
wondered if he was obscured by a reflection in the glass of his
window. She made several more furtive glances, and although her
face gave no flicker of emotion, her actions seemed suspicious.

Ivory leant
forward, almost doubling over. She snaked a white arm through the
letterbox and pushed herself up against the door, her arm working
in right up to the shoulder as if she planned on squeezing herself
through that entry instead of using the door itself. After several
jerks of her body that suggested her arm moving, Ivory pulled
swiftly out of the letter box, not stopping to manoeuvre her elbow
or wrist from its sharp metal jaw. A swift action that produced a
key. She opened the door and disappeared within the house.

Martin relaxed
in his seat now that she was gone, but his heart wallowed in a
dirty pit of self-disgust at his voyeurism. He wondered if that was
how Richard had felt. Martin checked himself in the mirror. He
looked nervous, pasty and grey. The result of more nightmares.
King’s bloodied corpse came to life every time he fell asleep. As
if King hid in the darkness behind his eyelids. A Lovecraft demon
possessing him, ready to prey on his sanity the moment he tried to
rest.

King’s death had made the
Independent
so
at least one worry had been settled. It hadn’t splashed the
front page but was buried deep within. The title of the two inch
article read ‘Pimp killed.’ The rest of the story was almost as
short and informative. It explained how
‘Terrence King’
had been found dead
in the lounge of his first floor flat in Arven Road. His death
seemed to be the result of a struggle. The article said that any
further information had been hard to come by as a ‘veil of silence’
had fallen on the occupants of Arven Road. The article claimed that
the police had declared that the list of people with possible
motives for killing King grew longer as their investigation
proceeded. The article claimed he was a disliked man, who was a
pimp and an amateur hard core pornographer as well as being
involved in dealing drugs. However much Martin had managed to relax
since reading the article the guilt had still remained.

Martin stepped
from the car and locked it behind him. He crossed the street and
dodged the odd puddle that dotted the drying streets. Martin tried
to walk as casually as he could down the path. Careful not to look
at the windows should Ivory appear at them. It would be all he
needed for him to lose his nerve.

Martin stood
at the large green door. The door’s brass coloured letter box,
knocker and numbers were mottled with reddish brown corrosion and
spotted with drops of rain. Martin rapped the knocker with fingers
that tingled with electricity but felt weighted with lead rings. He
cleared his dry throat and swallowed hard at the feeling of ash in
his mouth.

He waited. He
stepped off the step and then back on it. He stepped back on the
path again and looked around anxiously. He wondered if Ivory had
seen him and wasn’t going to answer. She gets knocked down by a
car, and then the driver won’t leave her alone, creating a scene
with her pimp that ends in a horrific death, and then turns up at
her home. He swore at himself under his breath, finding it
incredible and ridiculous that he was there.

With a sense
of pressure, should his knock be answered, he turned for the path
to make his escape. He glanced casually to the door and was
startled to find that where the door had been, a large man stood in
its place. Ebony stood before him, without the large smothering
coat he had seen him in last, in well pressed black trousers and a
leather waistcoat zipped up over a cream Nehru shirt buttoned to
the neck. He still seemed a giant immovable man. His white eyes
spread wide as if they had forgotten they couldn’t see.

Ebony’s ears
caught Martin as his feet scuffed the gravel. “Who is it?”

“
H-Hello, I wondered if I may speak to Ivory.” His voice
emerged in fluctuating tone like a radio being tuned in. Martin
surprised himself that all his words had managed to fall out in the
right order. He coughed to clear his throat and then repeated
himself with a more even tone.

“
I know you,” the man muttered. His eyes narrowed as his
concentration sharpened.
“I never forget a
face.”
He smirked broadly. “I know your
voice.” He explained dryly and impatiently.

Although the
comment was playful enough there was something in the gravitas of
his words that suggested his blindness might be a ruse. Martin
recalled how easily Ebony had navigated himself through the
presumably foreign environment of the hospital. Martin introduced
himself again.

“
I know
why you are here,” he
growled. “But I am sure that
you
do not
understand why.”
There was pity in his face. Ebony stepped away from the door and
retreated to the end of the hallway cluttered with stacks of books
and papers and called out Ivory’s name in his curious German
dialect.

Martin was
stunned as Ivory trotted down the wooden stairs, her smooth pale
legs picking their way through steps crammed with similar stacks of
books. She wore a full-towelling bathrobe and her hair was wet and
plastered to her head like the night of the accident. Ivory stared
at him with her curious eyes. He wondered if they were capable of
anything but staring. Her head cocked to one side as he had seen it
do before when it appeared she was trying to understand something.
Maybe as she was mute it was her way of gesturing to know what he
wanted.

“
Hello. Are you okay?

“
After what happened the other night.

“
With King.

“
After…” Martin struggled to find words to describe the
events. “… the accident.”

Martin stood
for some time waiting for an answer. “Are you okay?” She might be
mute but she could at least nod and put him out of his misery.
Elated relief surged within him as she nodded in reply. “I was
worried. I – I didn’t know what to do. It was awful. A dreadful
thing that happened. I – I am sorry I came to King’s flat. I’m
sorry if my presence set off what happened. None of us should have
had to experience that. I thought the car accident was the most
terrifying moment of my life – then that happened.”