Page 59 of The Chase
“So you’re a bit of a science buff?”
“I’ve always loved science.”
“Because science shows you how to control things?”
“Just the opposite. Science proves just how unstable the universe is.”
“It is?”
“It was created by the big bang.” He demonstrated an explosion. “Humanity is against the clock. Unless we change our ways.”
“I recycle.”
“There’s hope for us yet.”
I perked up. “It must be wonderful owning your own gallery.”
Happiness swept over his face, making him look younger, and those traces of tension lifted. “Yes.”
I smiled. “Who was your first?”
He set his glass down.
“My first wasMadame Rose Récamier,” I said softly.
He nodded, appreciating my cheekiness.
“She hung on my bedroom wall,” I continued. “Felt like she was watching over me.”
I knew every angle of her face, every shadow thrown on the canvas, every delicate brushstroke. There came a rush of guilt I’d not returned to The Otillie to visit her.
Tobias’s gaze met mine. “Fuseli,The Nightmare.” He watched my reaction. “Painted in—”
“1781.” A chill washed over me.
Johann Henry Heinrich Füssli had stunned the art community with his painting of a woman sprawled out on a bed seemingly asleep, or even unconscious, with an incubus crouched on her chest and his sinister glare peering out at us. The only other witness was a horse, nostrils flaring, emerging from behind a veil to witness the monstrous act of control the beast had over the woman.
“Why that one?” Uneasiness rose in my chest.
Waiting for him to answer, I downed the rest of my wine.
He lowered his gaze. “It represents entering another’s dreams.”
“Yes, it does.”
“It offers uncertainty. Drama. Possession.”
My mouth was still dry, but I was too shaken to reach for my water. “How old were you?”
“Ten.” He slipped into a warm smile. “When the realization hit me that art was capable of stirring a visceral response. Alighting the soul. Awakening a person consciously. That Fuseli haunted my dreams and terrified my days. There came an awareness of the inherit power of art to terrorize.”
“You didn’t love the painting?”
He grinned. “If I did, what would that make me, Zara?”
“Fucked up.” I let out a laugh.
“And some. I felt driven to save the damsel and kill the beast.”
