Starship Summer (Starship Seasons, #1)(9)

Hawk grunted. “Venus swanned into the yard looking for scrap which she wanted to turn into art. She was everything I disliked in a person: vanity, pretension and a breathtaking egotism.”

“So Hawk tried to cure her in the only way he knows.”

“That’s unfair, and you know it,” he remonstrated. “Venus threw herself at me, and I was stupid enough to respond. Which, I think, is understandable. I mean, look at her, Conway. Admit it, she’s beautiful.”

Venus stood before a nearby graphic, a contemplative finger to her lips. Six feet tall, slim as a ballerina, she had elegance and poise and—Hawk was right—an undeniable Latin beauty.

I nodded. “And she knows it.”

Maddie said, “Would you be smitten, David?”

I shook my head. “Not my type.”

Hawk defended himself. “I was low, hadn’t had an affair for months, and then Venus decides she wants to slum it with a barbarian. I mean, who am I to refuse?”

“You’re so gallant, darling,” Maddie mocked.

“What is it with you two?” I said, glancing from Hawk to Maddie.

Hawk laughed. “We love each other, really.” He stopped and looked across the dome to the bar. Hermione Venus had moved from the exhibition and had cornered Matt Sommers who was gripping a bottle of beer and trying to appear politely interested in what Venus had to say.

“Come on,” Hawk said. “Matt looks like he needs rescuing.”

As we moved to the bar, I hung back to observe the reaction of Venus to Hawk’s sudden appearance. She was laying a hand on Sommers’ sleeve with cloying familiarity, and stopped talking suddenly when she saw Hawk.

“Oh, Hawksworth. This is an awkward time—Matt and I were just discussing the possibility of an exhibition in MacIntyre.”

Sommers smiled diplomatically, but I sensed his relief at Hawk’s arrival. “It’ll do some other time, Hermione. Look, why don’t you come over to my place next week, and we’ll discuss it then?”

“Why, that’s so kind of you, Matthew. I’ll hold you to that.” And she swept away, giving Hawk an icy smile en passant.

“Just in time,” Sommers said. “I could have been here for hours. What are you drinking?”

Sommers bought a round of beers and Maddie introduced me. “A friend of ours, just moved to Magenta. David Conway.”

“Welcome to Magenta, David,” Sommers said, taking my hand in a strong grip. He spoke with a slow, confiding Alabama drawl, his every word accompanied by a smile.

I mentioned that I was from Vancouver, and that my wife had stocked some of his reproductions.

Sommers shook his head, as if in wonder. “Know something, David? I still find it hard to appreciate that people across the Expansion buy my work.” The sentiment was, I thought, genuine, and not false modesty.

“I like the crystals,” I said.

“But the graphics do nothing for you?”

I hesitated. “Well… To be honest, compared to the crystals—” He saved me further embarrassment. “I know. They’re weak. They don’t work.”

“Matt,” Maddie said, “I don’t know about that. They have something…”

“But not what I wanted to say,” Sommers went on. “They’re third rate. I wasn’t trying. I turned them out because I mistakenly thought that producing something was better than producing nothing. I should have scrapped the lot.”

“You’re too harsh on yourself,” Maddie said. Behind her, Hawk winked at me.

Sommers said, “Not harsh. Honest. I’ll ceremonially burn the graphics when the exhibition’s over. Why don’t you all come along? We’ll have a party.”

I thought I caught something in his tone, a bitterness at odds with his easy-going manner.

We chatted amongst ourselves for fifteen minutes; when Sommers asked what had brought me to Chalcedony, I made something up along the lines that I’d always wanted to visit the planet, that it had seemed a suitably quiet place to retire to.

Sommers looked up. Someone was signalling to him from the exhibition area: the Mayor, gesturing with a microphone.

“Christ,” Sommers said. “They want me to say a few words.

What’s the fascination with artists’ words, for godsake? Don’t the pieces say all there is to say?”

“The price of fame,” Hawk quipped.

“Yeah, you can keep it,” Sommers said. “Look, this place closes in an hour, but the bar upstairs is open till midnight. I’ll sneak off and meet you there at ten, okay?”

“Lovely!” Maddie said.

“Catch you later,” Sommers said, and strode off towards the gesticulating mayor.

While Matt Sommers murmured platitudes into the microphone, Hawk bought a round. Maddie was looking unhappy. “What is it?” I asked.

“Matt,” she said. “He isn’t himself lately. For as long as I’ve known him he’s been optimistic. Now he’s… I don’t know. He seems increasingly bitter these days.”

“You know artists,” Hawk said. “They go through these phases. I wouldn’t worry about it.”

“I know Matt,” Maddie replied tersely. “And I know there’s something wrong.”