Guns in the Gallery

With Fennel, Jude had quickly realized that they should start each session with a traditional massage, for which she rubbed a little aromatic oil on to her hands. The young woman’s frame was full of tension. The gentle force of Jude’s hands could ease that, and also feeling the contours of the girl’s body gave an insight into what was happening in her mind.

As ever, while she massaged, Jude talked. What she said was relatively unimportant. If the client wanted to contribute to the conversation, fine. If not, equally fine. What was important was Jude’s tone. Together with the magic wrought by her hands, the soft warmth of her voice helped to put the client at ease, to make them more receptive to the therapies that followed.

That morning Fennel was disinclined to talk. No problem. Jude chatted casually about the visit she and Carole had made to Butterwyke House on the Saturday. She observed, but did not comment on, a new tautness in the girl’s body when mention was made of the Walden experiment. The tension increased when the name of her sister Chervil came up.

When Jude finished the massage, Fennel was lying on her back, considerably more relaxed than she had been when she entered Woodside Cottage. Jude wiped the oil off her hands with kitchen roll and said, ‘Are you happy lying there or do you want to sit up?’

‘Lying’s cool,’ said the girl drowsily.

‘Did you bring some of your recent artwork?’ This was a suggestion Jude had made at a previous session. Fennel Whittaker was a talented artist. She had started at St Martin’s College of Art, but had been forced to give up the course halfway through her second year. The cause had been a complete mental breakdown. She had suffered two before as a teenager, but the one at college had been the most severe.

In fact, she was lucky to be alive. Living at the time in a Pimlico flat her parents had bought, Fennel had made a suicide attempt, washing a great many painkillers down with the contents of a whisky bottle. She’d also cut her wrists, but fortunately missed the arteries. It was by pure chance that Chervil had dropped into the flat, found her sister unconscious and summoned her father. The incident had been followed by six months’ hospitalization for Fennel in the most expensive private clinic the Whittakers’ money could buy.

She had emerged on a strong regime of antidepressants, which did seem to improve her condition . . . so long as she took them. But Fennel Whittaker was still the victim of violent mood-swings and seemed to be permanently on the edge of another complete collapse.

In her manic phases, however, she produced a lot of art and, from what Jude had seen of the stuff, it was very good art. For that reason she had suggested that Fennel should bring along some examples of her recent work to their next session, in the hope that the paintings might offer some clues as to the the causes of her depression.

‘In the carrier by the sofa,’ the girl replied lethargically.

Jude picked up the bag. ‘Do you mind if I have a look at them?’

‘Be my guest.’

She shuffled out a handful of paintings. They were watercolours that had been done on ordinary copy paper which had curled a bit as they dried. But though the medium was a subtle one, there was little restraint in the images depicted. The predominant colours were dark, deep bruise blues, slate greys interrupted by splashes of arterial blood red. So violent were the brush strokes that at first Jude thought she was looking at abstracts. But closer scrutiny revealed that the paintings were representational.

Each picture showed the body of a woman, young, shapely, but twisted with pain. Their features were contorted as they struggled against restraints of chain and leather, the red gashes of their mouths screamed in silent agony. But a defiance in their posture and expressions diluted their bleakness. There was suffering there, but also a sense of indomitability. Tormented as they were, Fennel Whittaker’s women would not give up anything without a fight.

‘And these are recent works?’

‘Yes. All done since our last session.’

A week then. ‘You’ve been busy.’

A shrug from the massage couch. ‘When I’ve got ideas I work quickly.’ But the way she spoke was at odds with her words. She sounded apathetic, drained, only a husk of her personality remaining after the threshing storm of creativity that had swept through her body.

‘Well, they’re very good,’ said Jude. ‘A lot of pain there.’

‘Yes,’ Fennel agreed listlessly.

‘Don’t you get a charge from knowing that you’re doing good work?’

‘I do while I’m actually painting. I look at it and it feels right. Every brush stroke is exactly where it should be. I feel in control. Then I look at it a couple of days later and . . .’ She ran out of words.

‘And what?’

‘And I think it’s derivative crap. I can see the style I’m imitating and I’m just deeply aware of all the other artists who have done it better over the centuries, and all the artists who’re even doing it better now.’