Chapter 12
CHAPTER 12
Beau was sitting in the Red Lion, cursing his decision to make it the venue for a meeting he was having serious regrets about setting up at all.
He was having a drink with Joe, the technician from Goldsmiths who had been a great mate of his father’s, to see if he could eke any information out of him about what Matt might have been up to. Ugh , thought Beau, feeling slightly sick, although that might have been because of the swirly patterned carpet his feet were sticking to. He must have been out of his mind to suggest this place, but it had seemed the right way in with Joe, to say he wanted to have a drink in his dad’s local with one of his pub buddies.
It was all slightly desperate, because Beau knew Joe and his father would never have shared anything personal, but as they said in cop shows, any kind of lead might help.
Of course, Rey was the obvious person to ask. He was the one who’d been talking to that woman at the wake. He might know her name. But Beau didn’t see how he could bring the matter up with his mother’s best friend without triggering a conversation that he didn’t trust himself to have. Or how he could be sure Rey wouldn’t pass it on to Sophie. He had to keep it all close, Beau told himself again; it was the only way he could handle it.
He took a long draw on the lager, then drained the glass, opening his mouth in a grimace at the horrible metallic aftertaste. No, Joe was the only person he could think of and Beau was up at the bar ordering another pint of poison when he strolled in.
‘Hello, Beau, you soft little twat,’ said Joe in his raw South London accent, gripping Beau in a hug he thought might crack his ribs.
Beau had to smile at the burly man with his lined face and big grin with quite a few teeth missing.
‘Good call to come here,’ said Joe. ‘Take up your dad’s place in the Lion, claim his table.’
Beau glanced over to the spot where Matt had always sat. The perfect place to see – and be seen by – everyone who came in. It was empty.
‘That’s your table now, my boy,’ said Joe, clasping Beau’s biceps so hard he thought his arms might be permanently withered. ‘That’s how we do it round here.’
‘Great,’ said Beau, trying to sound enthusiastic. A lifetime season ticket to the Red Lion hadn’t ever been an ambition, but he led the way over to the table and they sat down.
‘So, how are you doing, my diamond?’
‘Oh, you know,’ said Beau. ‘Quite shit really, but you just have to keep going, don’t you?’
‘Ain’t that the truth?’ said Joe, necking half his pint in one go. ‘And what about your dear ma? How she’s getting on? I’m going to go down and see her soon, hang your dad’s paintings for her. I have suggested a few days for it, but she says she’s too busy working, which is good, right?’
‘Yes,’ said Beau. ‘Mum’s got a new project on, which is the best thing for her, but it would be amazing to get Dad’s work up. The new house is weird without it.’
They chatted a bit more and Joe got another round in. Beau took advantage of him greeting a pal to pour most of his lager into a half-dead houseplant next to the table.
‘Tell me,’ he said when Joe returned, ‘was there anything in particular my dad was working on that you knew of? His gallerist wants to do a full inventory...’ He trailed off. He really hadn’t thought this through.
Joe laughed. ‘Well, you know your dad, he was working on a million things, as usual. There was a lot of stuff in his studio at the college and the minute I heard the terrible news, I boxed it all up and put it in a safe place. Coded labels, so only I know what’s what. Didn’t want any greedy little hands poking around in there. So you don’t have to worry about any of that.’
‘Thanks, Joe. That was really thoughtful. Were there any particular themes you were aware of in that work? We’ve been through the stuff in his other studio and it feels like there’s not much new there, so we thought his most recent output must be at the college. There’s going to be a big retrospective and the gallerist doesn’t want to miss out on fresh, unseen stuff that could be in it.’
That bit was true. Jack had told him the gallerist had been hassling their mum about it when they were doing the unpacking. Uncle Seb had got on the phone in the end and told him to back off.
Joe looked thoughtful, poking his tongue into the gaps where the missing teeth had been. ‘Well, he hadn’t been doing so much of the video stuff lately. He’d gone back to a lot of drawing and he was always collecting stuff, as you know, so there’s plenty of random crap in those boxes. But there was one new thing he was getting stuck on – you know how he’d start going on and on about something?’
‘Oh, yes. What was it this time?’
‘Auctions. The posh ones. Sotheby’s, Phillips, those geezers... He was always going off there and then he’d come in the next day and do loads of drawings and sketches around that. As far as I could tell, he was planning to work up some installations on that theme. If you look through the stuff I’ve got boxed up, you should be able to see where he was going with it.’
‘Oh, that is interesting. I know some of his stuff has been sold in those auctions for a lot more than he ever got paid for it, so maybe it’s something around that.’
‘Well, let me know when you want to look in them boxes.’
‘Thanks,’ said Beau. ‘I will.’
And he knew he’d have to. Even though he dreaded it, with all his heart.