Black Valley by Charlotte Williams Page A

artist they were showing might well be one of their protégés.
    She spotted Mari heading for the drinks table. This time, she was alone.
    ‘There you are. I wondered where you’d got to.’ Mari gave her a hug.
    Jess hugged her back. ‘You seemed to be busy.’
    ‘Mmm. I was.’ Mari sighed. ‘Lovely guy. Works for the Millenium Centre.’ She sighed again. ‘Married, unfortunately. No kids, though,’ she added after a
moment, brightening.
    ‘He looked quite keen.’
    ‘He was. But I can’t go in for all that cloak and dagger stuff. Not at my age.’ Mari put her head on one side, scrutinizing Jess’s appearance. ‘You know, that up-do
really suits you. Very
continentale.
’
    Jess rolled her eyes, but she was pleased at her friend’s compliment. She often felt a little dowdy next to Mari, who was always the epitome of glamour, whatever the occasion.
    Mari drained her glass. ‘Let’s go up and take a look at these paintings, shall we? Then we can sneak off. I don’t want to get stuck listening to a load of speeches.’
    They walked up the grand stone staircase, Mari teetering on her platforms, hanging on to the brass banister for safety. When they got to the upper floor, Jess lingered beside the cabinets
displaying the old china. She’d always loved wandering around the museum. It was a fine early twentieth-century building, constructed as part of the capital’s civic complex, with a
graceful art deco interior. When the children had been little, Jess had often taken them there, to the natural history rooms to look at the filmed volcanic explosions and the woolly mammoths that
bellowed and moved their heads mechanically. Since then, over the years, she’d dropped in occasionally to visit the collection bequeathed by the Davies sisters, two spinster daughters of a
Victorian coal baron who’d spent their fortune on the groundbreaking art of their day. There were Turners, Corots, Millets, Rodins, Cézannes, and a fabulous array of Monets. Part of
her felt she owned these paintings; whenever they were loaned out she missed them, and was glad when they returned. That was one advantage of living in a small capital city: you felt affectionate
towards its treasures, rather than overwhelmed by them.
    Once inside, Jess and Mari worked their way around the Morris exhibition. The paintings on show were striking, if not exactly to Jess’s taste. They were extremely large, and very dark in
colour, mostly brown and black with only a few specks of greenish grey, petrol blue and ochre. They were painted in oil, and covered in streaks of what looked like coal dust. Now and then, the
streaks caught the light, showing a gleam of silver.
    ‘These are awful,’ whispered Mari. ‘Don’t you think?’
    Jess gave a non-committal shrug. Mari was always too quick to form an opinion, in her view.
    Mari went off and stood by the door, ready to make her getaway. Jess continued to walk slowly round the room, gazing at each painting, waiting to see what might happen. She knew from experience
that there might be more here than met the eye; she’d often, in the past, gone to an exhibition and been unmoved, only to find herself thinking about the works later. She had a feeling these
might have the same effect.
    At the far end of the room was the largest canvas, spanning almost an entire wall. Beside it hung a nineteenth-century painting borrowed from the museum’s collection. It was one that Jess
knew well, a charming portrait of a goose girl by Jean-François Millet. The girl leaned on a stick, guarding her flock, the dawn light casting a soft glow over her, lending her the grave
dignity of a biblical figure. At first, Jess wondered what she was doing next to the great black slab of the Morris painting. Then she looked closer at the girl’s face, and noticed, for the
first time, the look of exhausted dejection on it. Despite its fairy-tale setting, the painting was by no means romantic; the child – for she was not