The House at Midnight (3 page)

'Have you met him before?' I asked Michael quietly.

'Once, a few weeks ago. He's away a lot with work. He's phenomenally bright.'

Lucas came back with a tray of fresh glasses and two more bottles tucked under his arm. 'Three minutes to go.'

I decided my lungs were working well enough to manage a cigarette. One of the things I appreciated about my real friends, all of whom were around me, was that they never tried to make me give up, despite my asthma. They knew I knew I should and that was enough.

New Year's Eve was my least favourite night of the year. I didn't like the weight of expectation it carried, both in the sense that everyone felt obliged to have a good time, as if what they did would set a pattern for the coming year, and with the idea that this year would be different, as if on the turn of midnight we could cast off our old weak-willed selves and become new, better people. I especially disliked resolutions. You can take too many long, hard looks at yourself.

'Turn on the radio, Martha,' said Lucas, tearing the foil from one of the bottles. We were just in time: Big Ben had already started tolling. The sound of it made me shiver, as it always did. Another year gone.

'Happy New Year!' The cork flew out and Lucas poured the champagne, streams of bubbles running down the sides of the glasses. He handed me one and kissed me on the cheek, close enough to my mouth almost to touch my lips.

I returned his look as he pulled away. 'Happy New Year.'

'Happier, anyway,' he said. 'Cheers.'

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Danny turn to cut another lemon. I touched Lucas's sleeve. 'Let's go outside for a cigarette. He's doing more tequilas.'

We took our drinks and slipped out. Lucas snapped on the light in the passageway, which I could now see led to the kitchen. The chequered floor of the hall gave way to large flagstones and roughly whitewashed stone walls. I felt safe with him close to me. Of course there had been no one else in the house. I had imagined it in the panic of my asthma.

We took a turn just before the kitchen and came to a door that was heavily bolted. Lucas pulled back the locks and we stepped outside. At first I couldn't see anything but then objects began to draw themselves out of the night, edging themselves round with indigo and assuming form. We were at the side of the house on a sort of high terrace about fifteen feet above a garden, which stretched away from us over a great expanse of lawn to a rim of black trees. It was bitingly cold, even though we had taken coats from the stand. I looked at Lucas and made out chin, nose and glittering eyes. He handed me a cigarette and lit it, a small explosion of light. Above us, the stars were needle-sharp.

'There's Orion's Belt and the Plough. Can you see?' I pointed.

'I'm hopeless at constellations. People show me but I can never see them for myself.'

'I used to be like that. Until that time we went to Greece do you remember? - and someone showed me Orion's Belt and now I can always find it.'

We sat down on the balustrade that ran around the edge of the terrace and I swung my legs out over the drop. A sole milky cloud moved off the moon. Below us the lawn sparkled with frost.

'This is an incredible place. I can't believe it's yours.'

'I never imagined that Patrick would leave it to me. No, that's a stupid thing to say: who else would he leave it to?' He ran a hand through his hair. 'I didn't expect him to die, anyway, and somehow I thought the house would go when he did. It was so much a part of him.' The tip of his cigarette glowed orange. 'I got pretty much the lot. The flat in Hampstead is sold already and I've found an agent to sell the gallery and the stock for me. I couldn't do anything with it. I don't know the first thing about art and people bought from Patrick because of his reputation. I mean, who'd buy art from me?'

I shivered and moved closer to him for warmth. Without thinking, I slipped my arm through his. I had done it on a hundred other occasions but tonight it didn't feel comfortable and uncomplicated. In the past he wouldn't have thought anything of it but now Lucas turned to look at me and our eyes met for a moment. I looked down quickly in case he thought I was - what? Flirting? I was embarrassed that he might think that and yet part of me wanted him to. Something was shifting, I could feel it. Why had he told me that Patrick had hoped I was his girlfriend? And that kiss earlier. I wondered whether he would lean in and kiss me now but he didn't and the moment passed. We sat in silence, the garden below us completely still. Now that my eyes were accustomed, I could see it quite distinctly, the formal bed below us planted with pampas grass and leafless rose bushes, the lawn and the evergreen laurels that bordered it where it met the wall at the back of the house.

'You could do anything here,' I said after a while. 'There's absolutely no one to hear you.'

'I'm serious about what I said earlier. I really do want you - and the others - to think of it as your place. It's no fun being king of the castle if you're on your own.'

I put my arms around him and squeezed. 'You're brilliant.' After a little while, I grew more used to the cold and we stayed outside for some time, smoking more cigarettes and feeling the silence of the country night around us. Finally, though, Lucas stood up. 'Let's go in. I'm freezing my balls off out here,' he said, taking my hand as I swung my legs back over the balustrade.

Inside, Michael was asleep on one of the chesterfields. Greg and Rachel had gone to bed. The fire was burning down and the tequila was gone, the bottle on its side next to a pile of eviscerated lemon pieces. Martha was crouched at the stereo with a pile of CDs on either side of her. 'Can't decide what to play,' she said. Danny was sitting cross-legged in front of the dying fire rolling a spliff, the tip of his tongue sticking out between his teeth.

'Do you want another drink?' said Lucas, holding a champagne bottle up to the light.

I shook my head.

'Yeah, it's time for bed. I'll show you your room. I've just got to make sure everything's safe down here and set the burglar alarm. God, imagine if this place was broken into.'

Chapter Two

It was late morning when I woke and my room was suffused by a blank light, as if it had snowed during the night. I pulled out the heavy cotton sheets and went over to the window. It was cold out of bed. There wasn't any snow but the garden was white with frost. I stood for a while looking out at the long expanse of lawn, thinking how good it was to be able to stand there in a T-shirt without anyone to see. The house Martha and I shared in London was overlooked by the back of the terrace behind us and we had to keep the curtains drawn until we were dressed. There wasn't another house visible from here.

I had been so tired and drunk the night before that I hadn't paid much attention to the room. Given the size of the house it seemed comparatively small, although it was bigger than any I'd ever had. Being on the top floor, it must have been servants' quarters in the past. It was still simply decorated. The bed had a wrought-iron frame and at the foot of it there was a stout mahogany chest. There was a small fireplace, too, with an arrangement of dried flowers in the hearth and two crystal candlesticks on the mantelpiece. The walls, unevenly plastered and painted a milky white, were bare apart from a large oil painting over the bed. I knelt up on the pillows for a closer look. It was a classical scene, nymphs bathing in a river, their long blonde hair floating around them in the dark water. On the bank, entranced by his own reflection in the water, lay Narcissus. I wondered if it had always been there or whether Lucas had put it in my room, knowing I would like it.

My dress was in a silken pool on the rug; I picked it up and shook it out by the straps. It would have to be dry-cleaned before it was worn again but I put it on a hanger on the back of the door anyway. I changed into a navy jumper and jeans and put my boots on. Then I packed away my tights and shoes from the night before and made the bed, tucking the sheets in until they covered the mattress like fondant icing. As I pulled the door closed behind me, I checked that everything was tidy as if it were a hotel and not a friend's place at all.

It seemed that I was first up: everything was silent. I stood at the banister and saw the house in daylight for the first time. I had the feeling of someone left in a vast museum after hours, half alarmed, half excited by being alone with things that other people saw only under supervision. Below me was the whorl of staircases and landings and the chequered hall floor. Looking up, I saw that the roof was domed, something I hadn't noticed from outside in the dark. At the base of it there was a complete circle of windows and the white winter light poured through them.

Above my head was one of the most spectacular paintings I had ever seen. The inside of the dome was a painted bowl of almost unbelievable richness, myriad shades of blue and gold and pomegranate-pink and red, intricate and at the same time epic. It was like a secular version of a Renaissance church fresco. It depicted a convocation of the gods, a council or a drinking party. I thought of the scene at the beginning of the
Iliad
where the gods are lounging on Olympus, drinking and squabbling about whose favourite is going to be allowed to win the war while the human warriors are spilling their blood on the plains of Troy below.

At the centre of the tableau a figure I took to be Zeus lay on a golden couch. He was an exercise in controlled male strength, muscular shoulders and arms at odds with the relaxed pose, a head of shining black hair. He wore a white robe bordered in purple, a Midas-worthy amount of gold jewellery around his neck and wrists. There were rings set with huge gems on his fingers. One of his arms dropped idly over the arm of the couch towards a woman with hair the colour of dark chocolate, which wound down her back and over the white folds of her dress. She was on her knees, her spine a smooth curve as she bent to kiss Zeus' hand. The dress was slipping off her shoulder to reveal the round of one brown breast. At the other end of the couch, also kneeling, was another woman, also dark-haired and identically clothed, although her dress sat demurely on her shoulders. This goddess held Zeus' feet in her hands, her long white fingers closing gently around his toes. It wasn't immediately clear which of the goddesses the two women were. The one kissing Zeus' hand was obviously more sexual. The other was ethereal, her expression contemplative, even a little sad, as she looked away from the group into the sky that surrounded them. Perhaps the first was Aphrodite, the second Hera. Zeus looked straight down out of the picture, as if he were trying to establish eye-contact. His gaze was dark and unreadable. There was no anger in it but also no pleasure, no joy at finding himself king of the world.

Around the main group were arranged a number of other figures. There was an easily identifiable Ganymede with an ornate drinking bowl, his muscles taut under golden skin as he proffered it. A couple of other gods stood a little way back, leaning together conspiratorially. Again, I had no idea who they might be. Near the neat white feet of the goddess I thought might be Hera two children played, round and rosy like putti. Vines grew around the scene, curling up the legs of the couch, the bright-green leaves here and there revealing clusters of fat ripe grapes.

Abruptly the light withdrew and the painting faded. What sun there had been was gone. I gave the ceiling a last look then turned and made my way downstairs. Years of feet had worn away the centre of the pale strip of green carpet that ran down the landings like a stream. All the doors I passed were closed but I didn't think about what was behind them. My attention was on the art: the walls were bristling with paintings of extraordinary quality. On the main wall of the first-floor landing there was a huge Jackson Pollock. I had never seen one in the flesh before. I had to stop myself reaching out to touch the storm of red and black paint. A little further down at a platform in the stairs there was one of Julian Schnabel's famous plate portraits. I understood now why all the walls were white. The entire house was a display case for a world-class art collection.

We had breakfast in the kitchen, a large room with a black-and-white floor like the hall's and French windows that opened on to a walled garden at the back of the house. A long oak table stood in front of the glass and I looked out as we ate. The garden was still ice-bound. A fine film of glittering frost covered the paths and the leafless espalier trees trained up against the far wall. Most of the raised beds were empty, although there was a small herb garden and also a cluster of gooseberry bushes and raspberry canes. A robin pecked at the thin layer of ice on a puddle about five feet away until Martha dropped a knife. The noise reached him through the glass and he looked up and saw us for the first time, before taking off in alarm.

'You don't see that very often now,' said Greg, pointing at the ceiling.

I looked up. It was studded with black hooks. 'For hanging meat?'

'Like something out of an S & M parlour,' said Danny. 'Imagine having dead animals hanging in your kitchen.'

Martha grimaced and reached for the coffee pot. She poured me another cup, then filled her own.

'People had to be tougher then,' said Lucas. 'Nowadays everyone seems to pretend death doesn't happen.' There was a fraught silence, punctured only when Danny took a loud crunch into a slice of toast. Lucas smiled. 'This is a morbid conversation for the first day of a new year.'

'Sorry,' said Michael, appearing at the doorway. 'Completely overslept, obviously. Don't know what's wrong with me.'

'You work too hard, that's what's wrong,' said Martha. 'Anyway, we saved you some.' She got up and took his cooked breakfast out of the oven, where it had been keeping warm.

'Thank you, you're a sweetheart.' He gave her a kiss on the cheek.

After we'd washed up and tidied the drawing room, the others went out in the car to get cigarettes and the papers. Danny went off for a long bath and I asked Lucas to show me the house.

We started in Patrick's study, the only room on the top floor that was neither a bedroom nor a bathroom. 'He liked the atmosphere in here and the view,' said Lucas. I followed him over to the window and saw more or less the same as I had from my own, two doors down. The room itself was remarkably plain. It was painted white, of course, but there was a simple beige carpet under our feet instead of the Turkish rugs and rich fabrics of the rooms downstairs and even my bedroom. The curtains were plain green and there was no art on the walls. Two leather armchairs were the only furniture, apart from sun-bleached cushions on the window seats and a bureau.

I picked up the photograph that stood on top of it. It showed Patrick at what I guessed was his gallery, looking very seventies in a velvet jacket, sideburns and longish black curly hair remarkably like Lucas's. He was with Thomas Parrish, one of his most famous artists, and a feline woman in a Bianca Jagger-style trouser suit. He looked slimmer but otherwise very like the Patrick I had known. He was in the middle of the shot, his arms around the shoulders of the other two. It was the classic pose of people celebrating their success. Patrick and Parrish were grinning; I suspected they'd had a few drinks. The woman's smile was less open and although she was looking straight into the camera there was something guarded about her expression.

Lucas riffled the edge of a stack of paper with his thumb. 'As you can see, I haven't pulled myself together enough to sort through his stuff yet.' The desktop was like a still life in itself. There were piles of glossy catalogues, letters, invitations, postcards advertising exhibitions. A glass ashtray full of paper clips had found the one paperless patch. I took a step back. It felt like an invasion of privacy to be in the room, let alone looking over the paperwork. It was as if Patrick had only just walked away.

That feeling stayed with me as we did the tour. It seemed as though Patrick were one room ahead of us, slipping away just as we opened each new door. I've never been in a house that so strongly bore the imprint of its owner. All houses give clues to the people who live in them, in the decoration and the things left lying around, the photographs, the books, the tennis rackets, but this was something beyond that. It was as if Patrick's spirit, his energy, his fierce intelligence, the sheer scale of him, was manifested in this building.

Lucas hesitated in front of one door, his fingers on the handle. I looked at him questioningly. 'My parents' old room,' he said and opened it.

We went in and stood just inside. It looked much like any of the other bedrooms on this floor, several of which he had shown me. There was a large double bed covered by an embroidered throw with a wildflower pattern, a small table on either side. The large sash window gave on to the lawns by the front door and the drive beyond that. There was a low Victorian chair by the window and a tall chest of drawers. But if the appearance of the room was unremarkable, its atmosphere was different to that of the rest of the house. It had no energy. Instead the room had a mausoleum air; it was a sad place, closed off from life. I wondered if Lucas had crept away here sometimes, to try to imagine that his parents were still here, waking up in the bed or dressing for dinner. Only two things suggested who its occupants had been. There was no evidence of Lucas's father but on the top of the chest of drawers there was a brush and hand-mirror set and on the table to the right of the bed there was a silver framed photograph of a smiling gap-toothed Lucas aged about seven. I didn't want to pry by looking closer, especially when he was radiating tension beside me. Now I noticed that the throw on the photograph side was slightly rumpled, as if someone had lain down there to be closer to the person to whom the bed had belonged, to catch the trace of her old perfume on the pillows.

'I just wanted to show you,' he said. 'I don't want this room used. I'll tell the others.'

It was the perfect opportunity for me to talk to him about his mother and Patrick but again, tongue-tied, I let the moment slip away.

On the second landing we stopped and looked at the ceiling. There was no sun to illuminate it now and it looked more remote somehow, although just as beautiful. A door opened behind us and Danny appeared, damp from the bath and naked apart from a small towel tucked neatly around his hips. His body was slim but with just the right amount of gym-worked muscle. I looked away, embarrassed.

'Who's who, then?' he said. 'I don't do gods.'

'What do you think?' Lucas asked me. 'I've never been able to work it out. Obviously the guy in the middle is Zeus but I don't know about the women. Hera, do you reckon? But then who's the other one?'

I looked again for details that would help me interpret it but there were none of the usual symbols, the bows and arrows or winged feet or apples. 'There aren't many clues, are there? When was it painted?'

'It's modern, actually. Mid-eighties. I was eleven or twelve when it was finished. I remember being shown the whole of it for the first time.'

'Who's the artist?'

'I can never think of his name. I'm pretty sure he was American. There'll be paperwork; I'll find out for you.' As he moved away, I caught the scent of him, the expensive cologne that he once told me he started wearing because it reminded him of Patrick, and a hint of cigarette smoke.

'Lucas, the art here ...'

'I'm almost frightened by it,' he said. 'The responsibility.' There was a cracking sound above our heads and we looked up. One of the windows around the base of the dome must have been open because a bird had got in and was now thrashing around in the dish of the ceiling, unable to understand how it couldn't fly through into the false heaven beyond the painted figures. We watched as it grew increasingly panicked.

'What can we do?' I said.

'I'm not sure there is anything.' Lucas craned up. 'It's too high to reach, even if we had a net or something. We'll just have to hope it finds its way back out or comes further down.'

'I'll get dressed,' said Danny, going into his room.

We watched the bird for about a minute, its distress more and more obvious. Suddenly, with a great beating of wings, it swooped and for a moment I thought it had spied the open window. But instead of finding its way out, it threw itself against the glass. There was a dull thud, as if it had hit the windscreen of a car travelling at speed, and then it fell past us and landed below on one of the white flagstones. Lucas and I ran down to it.