Luke may or may not live in a garret, thought Hanlon as she walked through the chi-chi charm of Dean Village, but if he does it’s in a really nice area. Dean Village was like her idea of what a small Swiss or Austrian town might be like. It was so incongruous, in this grey, cold, northern city. The narrow streets, the cobbles, the omnipresent roar of the Water of Leith in the gorge that it ran through, the occasional wood-framed or timbered building. It didn’t look like her idea of Scotland at all, and certainly not the kind of place where painters went to suffer for their art.
Hanlon found the address without too much trouble. As she suspected, it was no penniless artist’s hovel. Far from it. It was a three-storey stone building with a couple of turrets overlooking the river. She was reminded of Cameron’s Gothic pseudo-castle. They did seem to like turrets in Scotland. She put architecture from her mind and frowned. From what Morag had said about Luke she had been expecting a dilettante student, not someone obviously doing well through his art.
Once again, there was a disturbing question mark between a Morag version of events and reality. He lives in a garret, on very little money, on baked beans and dreams… Aurora was his meal ticket, if you ask me. Those had been Morag’s words. Luke did not look like a man in need of a meal ticket. How much can I trust what you say, Morag? she thought. She found his name on the intercom, L Bastien, and she was buzzed in.
She walked up the stairs to the top flat; light poured in through narrow windows on the staircase. On the second floor the door was open, and a slim youth dressed in a paint-splattered shirt over a T-shirt and jeans, worn espadrilles on his bare feet, was standing in the doorway.
‘Are you Hanlon?’ he said.
‘Yeah.’
‘Do come in…’
Luke Bastien was twenty-three – Morag had said that he was Aurora’s age – but looked about seventeen, absurdly young. He had dark curly hair, ringlets, not too dissimilar to her own, but her hair was quite coarse and his looked fine. He had long dark eyelashes, the kind that many women would kill for, and high cheekbones with full lips. He was extraordinarily good-looking in a feminine way. Hanlon somehow doubted he’d been captain of the rugby team at school.
The door from the stairs into his flat gave onto a small hall with three doors. She could see a bathroom to the left, a closed door in front of them and, through an open door, a living room. He led her into this.
It was a large space. It had a kitchen area at one end and a kind of breakfast bar separated it from a small sitting area with a sofa and a couple of chairs.
‘Have a seat.’ He gestured at the chairs. She sat down on one and Luke kicked off his espadrilles and sat cross-legged on the sofa. He pushed a hand through his dark curls; he had several silver bracelets on his slim arm that slid back and clattered as he moved.
‘So, Aurora…’ he said.
‘She’s gone missing,’ said Hanlon, ‘or hadn’t you heard?’ She studied his face for signs of guilt or worry. Luke showed none of these.
Luke sighed. ‘I had heard, yes, but I’m sure she’ll turn up. Aurora’s strong.’
‘When was the last time you spoke to her?’ she asked.
‘I’m not sure, a while ago.’ He looked meaningfully at her. ‘You do know we’ve split up, don’t you?’
‘I didn’t. I’m sorry.’
‘No, it’s fine, one of those things…’ He smiled. ‘It was amicable. We’re still good friends.’
Luke certainly didn’t seem heartbroken.
‘So when was the last time you saw Aurora?’ she asked.
‘I really don’t know… let me check my phone.’
He looked at the screen and frowned. ‘Not for a couple of weeks. I guess I haven’t heard anything from her since we split up. That was a Sunday.’
A couple of weeks ago, a Sunday. That was just before the night that she came back from the meeting, thought Hanlon. She looked at Luke. How amicable was it really? Had he been dumped for another man? She couldn’t imagine that he would be any danger to anyone. It would be hard to imagine Aurora fleeing in terror from Luke, but stranger things had happened.
‘Why did you split up, if you don’t mind me asking?’ she asked.
Luke scratched his head, and sighed. ‘The classic reason: selfishness. I’m an artist, Hanlon – if you’re in my life you play second fiddle to painting. She’d want to go out, to a club or to a restaurant or to see people. I’d just want to work. You can’t blame her. I certainly didn’t.’
It certainly sounded plausible. She also really could not see Luke as the kind of man to terrify anyone, and Aurora had been seriously frightened, according to Morag, when she disappeared. Although, and this was beginning to worry Hanlon, she only had Morag’s word for that.
‘Aurora was terrified when she left her flat, according to her flatmate. Do you know what could have caused that?’
Luke frowned. ‘I would take anything Morag said with a pinch of salt if I were you.’
‘How do you mean?’
Luke said thoughtfully, ‘She’s given to exaggeration, but, more to the point, everything she says or does is based on what she can get out of it. She’s very self-centred, sly even, so…’
Hanlon nodded. She could see that Luke was a shrewd judge of character, or appeared to be.
‘Did Aurora have any enemies that you knew of? Anyone she was afraid of?’
He shook his head. ‘Only herself.’
‘How do you mean?’ she asked.
‘She had a very self-destructive side to her,’ he said, ‘and that went with a monumental temper too. Sometimes she directed it inwards and hurt herself, sometimes she’d lash out…’ He sighed. ‘She was unbalanced. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn she had enemies.’
‘But you liked her?’
Luke laughed. ‘Opposites attract. I’m quite calm. She liked that. We got on well.’
Luke fell silent, then, ‘Do you want to see a painting of her? How I saw her?’
Hanlon was intrigued. ‘I’d love to.’
He uncoiled himself from the settee and stood up, motioning her to follow. They went into the hall and then he opened the door that had been closed and he motioned to her to go in.
‘My studio.’ More than a hint of pride in his voice.
She went inside. ‘Wow,’ she said.
The studio was large and lit by natural light flooding in through the floor-to-ceiling windows. There was a spectacular view over the village and the Water of Leith below. The studio was located in one of the turrets that she had noticed from the street.
The first impression was of disorderly, painterly clutter. There were canvases stacked against the walls. There were two canvases on easels, a table covered in artist’s paraphernalia – she had a chaotic impression of tubes of oil paint, brushes and rags. The two canvases were pictures of Aurora, one of her getting out of a bath, the other in her underwear sitting on an untidy bed, playing with her phone. Hanlon hadn’t realised that Aurora was so tattooed. They ran across her shoulders, her arms, her pubis.
‘She could get this picture tattooed on her,’ she suggested. ‘It’d be like infinite regression.’
Luke laughed. ‘Yeah, like mirrors reflecting mirrors.’
She moved closer to the easels. The paintings captivated her. They were hyper-realistic; she knew little about art but there was obviously tremendous technical skill in the pictures as well as an intense quality of feeling. In the painting of her in the bath she looked relaxed, the water dripping down her skin unbelievably realistic. In the one with the phone there was an almost palpable feeling of tension and anger. The pictures also looked strangely familiar and not just because she had seen a fair few photos of the girl. She suddenly recalled Hamish Cameron, Aurora’s father, had one very similar hanging on the wall. Aurora’s back must be relatively tattoo free. Now she could see that the table in front of her was the same table that she had seen in the painting on the wall in Cameron’s study. Luke must have painted it. It seemed bad enough to have a picture of your daughter naked – to know it had been painted by her boyfriend of the time, Hanlon thought it a bit creepy.
‘I like painting her,’ Luke commented. ‘She’s very paintable.’
‘She’s very good-looking,’ was Hanlon’s comment.
Luke shrugged. ‘Sure, but so’s the girl who works in the pub across the road and I don’t want her to model for me. I need more than looks. It’s character that’s important, and Aurora certainly has that.’
There were some other canvases on the floor, turned to face the wall. ‘Want to see a few more?’
She nodded and he turned three of the canvases around. Luke wasn’t restricted to painting people; there were a couple of almost impressionist pictures of Edinburgh street scenes. The same attention to detail and the same unsettling ability to convey the character of a place. They weren’t the attractive touristy parts, like Dean Village or the area round the castle; these were tough, mean places. In one of them there were three street kids, feral, thin-faced. You could feel the air of menace and violence hanging over them. She knew the type, in trouble since they could go to school, brought up in foster homes or with negligent, junkie parents in rancid social housing. They would have an almost family connection with a local firm of solicitors. Juvenile prisons then the adult version.
‘Kids from Muirhouse and Pilton,’ he said, ‘couple of miles that way—’ he pointed ‘—but a whole world away in terms of life.’
‘Do you know them?’ she asked. It seemed odd to think of Luke hanging out with these street kids. They could eat him for breakfast.
‘Mmhm, they let me draw them, I buy them cider and Super strength lager in return.’ He grinned. ‘They think it’s hilarious that I could make a living painting. They like patronising me, like I’m some kind of oddity. But I think they’re a bit flattered too.’ He looked sad suddenly. ‘I suppose I’m the only person who’s ever shown any interest in them, other than the police and social services.’
She decided to bring up the painting on Cameron’s wall. ‘Do you know Aurora’s dad, professionally?’ she asked.
Luke nodded. ‘Hamish, yes. I’ve met him a few times. He wanted me to sign on as one of his artists. I said no.’
‘Why did you do that?’ Hanlon asked. ‘Isn’t he one of Britain’s top dealers?’
‘Oh, yes.’ He smiled, a man with a keen sense of his own worth, ‘But he wants too much in commission. That’s fine if you need your career boosting. There’s a lot of shit art out there and if you’re on Cameron’s books, people will buy you. Regardless. He’s got the kind of clout that can make markets.’
‘But you don’t need that?’
He shook his head. ‘I’ve got talent.’ He smiled; she was suddenly aware of Luke’s self-confidence. He might look like a slightly ditsy kid but there was a rock-hard adult sensibility underneath. She could see what had attracted Aurora to him. ‘I’ll let you see my cuttings file – I’m a genius, seemingly. According to Apollo magazine and The Spectator. But seriously, I’m doing OK. And I’ve got an agent. And I’m his biggest artist. With Hamish, I’d only be, what…’ he screwed his face up ‘… maybe number nine, maybe lower.’ He laughed. ‘Much higher in terms of ability, but not sales. One of these—’ he pointed at Aurora ‘—will currently set you back ten grand, and it’ll be twice that next year.’ He shrugged. ‘So it goes… Also, she’d have gone mad if I’d signed up with her dad. She hates him.’
‘Do you know why?’
Luke frowned. ‘She blames him for her mother’s death – they were close. She would have left me if I’d gone with Cameron. She feels very strongly about him.’
‘How did he react when you turned him down?’
‘He wasn’t that happy, but he’s a pragmatist.’
‘Did he know you were going out with Aurora?’ she asked.
Luke pointed to the pictures: Aurora naked, Aurora in her underwear.
‘I guess he maybe had his suspicions,’ he said drily.
Well, Cameron’s relations with his daughter and Luke were secondary to her main purpose here.
‘Do you have any idea at all why she might be in hiding?’ asked Hanlon.
‘Not that I know of,’ he said, ‘but I guess she must have some kind of reason if she ran off like that. I can’t fathom it out myself. I’ll ask around, see if anyone I know has any ideas, although I’m not that optimistic.’
‘Do you know anyone that she might be staying with?’
Again he shook his head. ‘No, but maybe she’s not in Edinburgh any more. If someone’s after you, why not just get on a plane?’
‘Because her passport’s still here.’ Again, we only have Morag’s word for it, she thought.
‘OK, then.’ Luke shrugged. ‘Why not London or Glasgow? Tunbridge Wells, to pick a place at random? Llandudno? She could be anywhere.’
‘It’s a good point,’ said Hanlon, ‘but people usually run to places they know. I’m here now in Edinburgh. I’ve got a few other leads to follow. I’ll be in touch.’
He nodded. ‘Do.’ He hesitated. ‘Look, I know I sounded a bit callous, but I do like Aurora a lot, and she is a strong woman, believe me. I mean, God knows she’s got her faults – she’s got one hell of a nasty temper, and she can be physically violent.’ He shook his head. ‘I’ve seen it – it’s quite frightening. So she’s no pushover physically, and she’s strong mentally. She managed to give up drugs, she managed to somehow do enough work to be doing well on that MA course, her tutors love her, she managed to survive quite a lot of shit in her life, she’ll survive this. Of that I’m sure. But please, come and see me whenever you want.’
Hanlon nodded. ‘I’ll take you up on that.’
‘Please do.’ He looked at her speculatively. ‘I’d like to paint you, if you have time.’
‘Really?’ That was unexpected. ‘Why?’
He looked at her seriously. ‘Because you’ve got an interesting face.’
She grimaced and touched her black eye. ‘Because of this?’
He smiled. ‘I don’t know you, Hanlon, but I can guess that it’s not the first time you’ve been in a fight.’
‘That’s true,’ she said. He was a good judge of character, she thought.
‘I’m an artist, I notice things,’ he said. ‘So will you sit for me?’
‘I’ll give it some thought,’ she promised. I wonder if it’s flattering to be told you have an interesting face? she wondered. As a compliment it sounded a bit double-edged.
She left the flat and walked slowly back to her car.