19

Ada was painting very near the place where she had thought she would set up her own easel. Attempting a stealthy retreat, Clarice heard her name called out.

‘Hello,’ she said demurely.

‘I’m not in your spot?’

‘Not at all. I was just heading over there.’

‘Would you like to see what I’m doing? I’d love to have your opinion.’

‘Yes, of course.’

For the first time, with a strangely soft feeling, Clarice saw what the others meant when they said Ada copied her. The half-finished board, quite light, had an airiness she almost knew. The painted landscape did not show the real but gave a sense of it. The gentle pinks and oranges were familiar, as were the apparent looseness and the concealed restraint. It was evident, however, that a hand other than her own had done it. Perhaps Clarice could have, some years earlier, in another life. Noticing the board’s potential, she felt a certain egotism.

‘It’s beautiful,’ she said. ‘I wouldn’t do anything differently.’

‘Really?’ Ada turned, smilingly confused, gushing, ‘I can’t believe I showed you. I admire you so much.’

She was disturbed by the idea that Ada might not continue painting, might abandon it, as so many did, when it was such an aid for survival. And she could have talent— whatever that was. Suddenly stern, she said, ‘You shouldn’t be self-deprecating. You’re committed to your art, aren’t you? Willing to take it as far as you can?’ The girl may have been of a kind whom doubt would limit rather than galvanise; worse, she was intelligent and would probably realise it. Clarice gazed at her a little furtively, as if staring at doubt.

Ada did not sidestep; her pleasure over Clarice’s approval left her unguarded. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘It’s hard for me. You make it appear easy.’

Clarice snickered. ‘I’m sorry if I gave you that impression. It can be torture, actually. Of course, I don’t compare the suffering to . . . the real suffering of a soldier, say . . .’ Though, sometimes, she did. ‘It’s a delicate kind of torture,’ she said, wanting to send herself up. ‘Tiring. Discouraging, often. You hate yourself and then you start again. You mustn’t waste any time admiring me.’ She looked at her hands, at her trolley that would soon reveal what it was hiding. ‘The easy part is the way you go somewhere . . . else, where you can be,’ she grappled, her eyes moving to the water, ‘if not your true self—I think I said that once, I was clumsy—then merge with some sort of truth. Merge. Truth. How grand. Just in flashes. When I say easy, I mean a relief.’

Something happened with the light that distracted them, a darkish opal gleam as the sun made its withdrawal felt. When she looked into Ada’s face again, it was fragile and thoughtful and Clarice regretted never having invited her to the house or sought her out; but she did not really do friendship, not like that. It had to be very spacious.

‘I’d been hoping we’d get a chance to chat,’ Ada said. ‘We hardly ever see you. Except from a distance, when you’re working.’

‘At a distance, working.’ She laughed. ‘That’s my natural state.’ She had the distinct impression that Ada knew about Arthur and did not judge her.

‘I’m still boiling about that blasted review.’

‘Oh, yes. The lady has no right . . . It’d slipped my mind.’

They both laughed briefly, but somewhere the conversation had taken on a mournful atmosphere. There was a silence.

‘Galleries should be buying your paintings, not just friends,’ Ada complained.

Clarice imagined this happening, dreamed of it, though only at night, when her visions were more grandiose or desperate. Such ideas never occurred to her on a beach. But she realised now there must have been gossip about who was and was not buying her work.

Ada made as if to put her hands on her hips, then thought better of it. The paintbrush in her right hand had the cheeky elegance of a cigarette holder; slight and unassuming, she was elegant. ‘You don’t paint as a Lady Painter should.’ She had said it before, on the phone.

Clarice glanced again at the board, which became more magnetic, the more you looked; it undeniably had something. ‘Nor do you.’

After a moment, Ada said, ‘You have to leave your mark.’

She did not understand: whose mark? How so? And then she grasped it. ‘For posterity? In the annals of art history?’ She was laughing and they laughed together again, better this time, though there was still that sombre edge; they met each other’s eyes.

‘When you stray from flowers,’ Clarice told Ada, ‘when you turn your back on decoration and try to find your own way out here, you’re done for. As far as They are concerned.’

‘But you keep on.’

‘You keep on. Ada, you have to.’