Read Online To Fear a Painted Devil by Ruth Rendell - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Ruth Rendell
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noise that sounded like a snort. Smith-King whistled, then broke into a hearty laugh.
The women expressed varying kinds of horror, squeals, hands clamped to mouths, but only Freda sounded genuinely distressed. She was standing dose to Greenleaf. He heard her low gasp and felt her shudder.
‘Definitely not my cup of tea,’ Nancy said. ‘Imagineforgetting it was there and then coming face to face with it in the night on your way to the loo!’
Greenleaf was suddenly sickened. Of all the people in the Selby’s spare room he was the only one who had ever seen an actual head that had been severed from an actual body. The first one he had encountered as a student, the second had been the subject of a post-mortem conducted on a man decapitated in a railway accident Because of this and for other reasons connected with his psychological make-up, he was at the same time more and less affected by the picture than were the other guests.
It was a large picture, an oil painting in a frame of scratched gilt, and it stood propped on the floor against the watered silk wallpaper. Greenleaf knew nothing at all about painting and the view many people take that all life—or all death—is a fit subject for art would have appalled him. Of brushwork, of colour, he was ignorant, but he knew a good deal about anatomy and a fair amount about sexual perversion. Therefore he was able to admire the artist for his accuracy—the hewn neck on the silver platter showed the correct vertebra and the jugular in its proper place—and deplore a mentality which thought sadism a suitable subject for entertainment. Greenleaf hated cruelty; all the suffering of all his ancestors in the ghettos of Eastern Europe was strong within him. He stuck out his thick underlip, took off his glasses and began polishing them on his alpaca jacket.
Thus he was unable to see for a moment the face of the man who stood near him on the other side of Freda Carnaby, the man whose house this was. But he heard the intake of breath and the faint smothered cry.
‘But just look at the awful way she’s staring at that ghastly head,’ Nancy cried, clutching Oliver’s hand. ‘I think I ought to understand what it means, but I don’t.’
‘Perhaps it’s just as well,’ her husband said crisply.
‘What is it, Tamsin? What’s it supposed to be?’
Tamsin had drawn her fingers across the thick painted surface, letting a nail rest at the pool of blood.
‘Salome and John the Baptist,’ Marvell said. He was quickly bored by displays of naiveté and he had gone to the window. Now he turned round, smiling. ‘Of course she wouldn’t have been dressed like that. The artist put her in contemporary clothes. Who painted it, Tamsin?’
‘I just wouldn’t know,’ Tamsin shrugged. ‘It was my grandmother’s. I lived with her, you see, and I grew up with it, so it doesn’t affect me all that much any more. I used to love it when I was a little girl. Too dreadful of me!’
‘You’re never going to hang it on the wall?’ Clare Miller asked.
‘I might. I don’t know yet. When my grandmother died two years ago she left all her furniture to a friend, a Mrs. Prynne. I happened to be visiting her a couple of months ago and of course I absolutely drooled over this thing. So she said she’d send it to me for my birthday and here it is.’
‘Rather you than I.’
‘I might put it on the dining-room wall. D’you think it would go well with a grilled steak?’
They had all looked at the picture. Everyone had said something if only to exclaim with thrilled horror. Only Patrick had kept silent and Greenleaf, puzzled, turned now to look at him. Patrick’s face was deathlywhite under the cloud of freckles. Somehow the freckles made him look worse, the pallor of his skin blotched with what looked like bruises. When at last he spoke his voice was loud and unsteady and the icy poise quite gone.
‘All right,’ he said, ‘the joke’s over. Excuse me.’ He pushed at Edward
The women expressed varying kinds of horror, squeals, hands clamped to mouths, but only Freda sounded genuinely distressed. She was standing dose to Greenleaf. He heard her low gasp and felt her shudder.
‘Definitely not my cup of tea,’ Nancy said. ‘Imagineforgetting it was there and then coming face to face with it in the night on your way to the loo!’
Greenleaf was suddenly sickened. Of all the people in the Selby’s spare room he was the only one who had ever seen an actual head that had been severed from an actual body. The first one he had encountered as a student, the second had been the subject of a post-mortem conducted on a man decapitated in a railway accident Because of this and for other reasons connected with his psychological make-up, he was at the same time more and less affected by the picture than were the other guests.
It was a large picture, an oil painting in a frame of scratched gilt, and it stood propped on the floor against the watered silk wallpaper. Greenleaf knew nothing at all about painting and the view many people take that all life—or all death—is a fit subject for art would have appalled him. Of brushwork, of colour, he was ignorant, but he knew a good deal about anatomy and a fair amount about sexual perversion. Therefore he was able to admire the artist for his accuracy—the hewn neck on the silver platter showed the correct vertebra and the jugular in its proper place—and deplore a mentality which thought sadism a suitable subject for entertainment. Greenleaf hated cruelty; all the suffering of all his ancestors in the ghettos of Eastern Europe was strong within him. He stuck out his thick underlip, took off his glasses and began polishing them on his alpaca jacket.
Thus he was unable to see for a moment the face of the man who stood near him on the other side of Freda Carnaby, the man whose house this was. But he heard the intake of breath and the faint smothered cry.
‘But just look at the awful way she’s staring at that ghastly head,’ Nancy cried, clutching Oliver’s hand. ‘I think I ought to understand what it means, but I don’t.’
‘Perhaps it’s just as well,’ her husband said crisply.
‘What is it, Tamsin? What’s it supposed to be?’
Tamsin had drawn her fingers across the thick painted surface, letting a nail rest at the pool of blood.
‘Salome and John the Baptist,’ Marvell said. He was quickly bored by displays of naiveté and he had gone to the window. Now he turned round, smiling. ‘Of course she wouldn’t have been dressed like that. The artist put her in contemporary clothes. Who painted it, Tamsin?’
‘I just wouldn’t know,’ Tamsin shrugged. ‘It was my grandmother’s. I lived with her, you see, and I grew up with it, so it doesn’t affect me all that much any more. I used to love it when I was a little girl. Too dreadful of me!’
‘You’re never going to hang it on the wall?’ Clare Miller asked.
‘I might. I don’t know yet. When my grandmother died two years ago she left all her furniture to a friend, a Mrs. Prynne. I happened to be visiting her a couple of months ago and of course I absolutely drooled over this thing. So she said she’d send it to me for my birthday and here it is.’
‘Rather you than I.’
‘I might put it on the dining-room wall. D’you think it would go well with a grilled steak?’
They had all looked at the picture. Everyone had said something if only to exclaim with thrilled horror. Only Patrick had kept silent and Greenleaf, puzzled, turned now to look at him. Patrick’s face was deathlywhite under the cloud of freckles. Somehow the freckles made him look worse, the pallor of his skin blotched with what looked like bruises. When at last he spoke his voice was loud and unsteady and the icy poise quite gone.
‘All right,’ he said, ‘the joke’s over. Excuse me.’ He pushed at Edward
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