The meanest Flood

jaw-line pitted with a day’s growth of blue beard.
    She waited long enough for him to be assaulted by another bout of uncertainty.
    ‘Mr Nott?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘My name is Marie Dickens. I want to talk to you about your work. Can I come in?’
    J. C. Nott shrugged and moved aside to let Marie pass. ‘First room on your right,’ he said.
    It was a high-ceilinged room with a desk and a battered grey-metal filing cabinet. There were modernist paintings on each wall and a stand-alone art-nouveau lamp. On the desk was the head of a woman cast in some form of plastic. The head had no eyes and a hair-style reminiscent of Princess Anne.
    ‘Are you a journalist?’ the man asked.
    ‘No, I’m a private detective.’ Marie indicated a chair. ‘May I?’
    ‘Please.’ He watched her sit then perched himself on the edge of his desk. ‘I’m not sure how I can help you.’
    ‘What is it you do, Mr Nott? How do you make your living?’
    ‘I’m an artist,’ he said. ‘I make models.’
    ‘And your customers?’
    ‘Pardon?’
    ‘Your customers. Who are they?’
    He shrugged. ‘A cross-section. I have customers all over the country, many overseas.’
    ‘Would you describe them as collectors?’
    ‘Some of them are collectors, yes. What’s this about?’ Marie glanced at the head on the desk again. It wasn’t comparable to the other models she’d seen. In spite of the lack of eyes there was something compelling about it and this compulsion wasn’t connected with any lifelike quality. The head was elongated, reminiscent of sculptures by Modigliani and Brancusi with their linear features borrowed from African and Oceanic tribal masks. It was undoubtedly modern and yet encompassed medieval carving and classical sculpture. She took in J. C. Nott’s long fingers and wondered if it was possible to combine art with the production processes she’d seen in Harrogate and Huddersfield.
    ‘If I wanted a model, Mr Nott, something that I could take to bed with me at night, would you be interested in the commission?’
    He barely hesitated. ‘I might, if I found it interesting. But you’re being hypothetical, aren’t you? You don’t want to commission my work, you want me to answer your questions.’
    ‘Suppose I wanted a model which had real hair, would that be possible?’
    ‘I can buy it by the hank.’
    ‘And pubic hair, can you buy that, too?’
    The man smiled, one of those dawning smiles of recognition. He had good teeth, Marie noted, and reflexively drew her tongue over her own teeth. There was a moment in the space of his smile when she thought she knew him. This was a man who made dolls for other men to take to their beds, but he had no need of a doll for himself. There was a quiet confidence about him. He knew the power in his hands, in his long fingers, and that was enough for him. Everything else would follow in its course.
    ‘We’re talking blonde pubic hair, aren’t we?’ he said.
    ‘Yes, that’s what I was coming to. Was it so obvious?’
    ‘I made a model for a local customer,’ he said. ‘The stipulation was for blonde pubic hair from an organic source.’
    ‘And you found it?’
    ‘Eventually, yes. There’s a couple of salons which collect pubic hair for merkins. I was able to buy the raw product.’
    ‘Merkins?’
    That smile again. ‘A merkin is a pubic hair wig. Some people don’t have pubic hair for one reason or another, they don’t grow it, or they lose it and they’re embarrassed. So they wear a merkin. Used to be popular in the Middle Ages when there were plenty of lice around. The ladies would shave their hair off to get rid of the infestation, then they’d need a merkin for those special occasions. Nowadays it’s more of a fetish.’
    ‘And your customer’s name?’
    ‘Is a trade secret, Ms Dickens. If I gave out information like that I wouldn’t have any customers at all.’
    Marie crossed her legs. She leaned forward and said, ‘A blonde pubic hair with some kind of plastic residue on the stem was found at the scene of a murder.’
    He tried to do the smile again but this time it wouldn’t come. ‘That doesn’t make it the same hair I used,’ he said. ‘It could have come from anywhere.’
    Marie didn’t reply. She watched him.
    ‘Oh, come on,’ he said. ‘My customer wouldn’t be involved in anything like that. I know him. He was here last week.’
    ‘I’m not here to hang anyone,’ Marie said. ‘If the guy’s innocent I’ll look elsewhere.