Flying Too High by Kerry Greenwood

artist’s living quarters, which were in neat array; at the other a bed, and a model’s throne covered by a worn velvet cloth in Phryne’s favourite shade of green. There was a delightful scent of buttered toast. The artist, attired in a very old shirt and flannel bags, was crunching the last crumb. He was not much taller than Phryne and had fine brown eyes, which smiled. Otherwise he looked just like his portrait.
    ‘I’m…’ began Phryne, and the artist waved his tea-cup.
    ‘I’m delighted to meet you, signorina . You have just the limbs that I require. You can put your clothes over there, and call me when you are ready.’
    This was interesting. She had been mistaken for a model. Paolo had already retreated behind the screen and Phryne had often modelled for artists in her days in the apache quarter of Paris. She shrugged out of her coat and boots and hung the rest of her clothes on the hook which seemed to have been placed there on purpose. She took her seat on the model’s throne and called, ‘Ready.’
    Paolo, having finished his tea, appeared and flicked the cloth off a small clay model. It was a nymph, hair in disarray, accepting the embraces of a satyr with evident pleasure. The delicate limbs wrapped the hairy goatskin haunches, and she leaned back in delight against the embracing arms. Although the detail of the genitalia was decorously covered by thigh and hand, it was evident that both bodies had just joined. The satyr was crouched, and the whole structure depended upon his cloven feet and the long legs of the nymph, whose toes were just touching the ground.
    Technically, it was a difficult piece, presenting intriguing problems of mass and balance. Of itself, it glowed with an innocent eroticism and good humour.
    ‘It is lovely,’ commented Phryne. The sculptor looked as surprised as if his anatomy textbook had just spoken.
    ‘Thank you, but the curve of this arm is not right. Will you lean back a little more, signorina , and bend your wrist down…no, it does not work. You need something to embrace.’ Paolo left the clay and dived for Phryne, arranging her limbs around him.
    ‘You see, she is joined to him, thus…move that leg a little…and his arms are holding her weight…thus.’
    Phryne’s mouth was near the artist’s, and his arms were very strong. She relaxed a little, and he shook her.
    ‘ No, no, no ! She is not languid, she is afire with passion. The body is thrust against him, with force, to engulf him. So.’ He leaned forward without warning and kissed one breast, then the other. Her nipples hardened. The Renaissance head bent to suckle. Phryne gasped. Her hands tightened on his back. She arched. For a moment, he held her strongly, and he felt her tremble.
    ‘Later. Do not move,’ he said, stuffing a big cushion into her arms.
    Stunned, Phryne clutched the pillow, frozen with tension into the position she had been placed. Clay flew. She heard it fall with sad little sounds to the floor. She could not see the progress of the figure, but Paolo was pleased.
    ‘Oh, excellent, excellent…now the shoulder…do not move.’ Phryne was torn between rage and laughter. The studio was getting very cold. She fell into her model’s dreaming trance and recalled the Paris studios where her dearest friends had been surrealists. She had once been offered a Dada dinner, which consisted of boiled string. She heard the sculptor calling her as if from a long way away.
    ‘ Vieni, carissima . See what you have done. It is finished.’
    She untangled herself from the cushion and bent her stiff limbs. Paolo seized her and rubbed her into mobility with his large, strong hands, then led her to the covered model.
    ‘See, bella , what you have wrought. For weeks I have been trying to capture that curve, that intense clutch—and there it is. It is complete.’
    ‘What shall you cast it in?’
    ‘Silver-gilt, nothing else. Nothing else is good enough for such a work. I thank you from the bottom of my