PART THREE - PARIS
- 4 -
As the sound of snipping scissors was replaced by running water, Saphy shut the door between bedroom and bathroom, leaving Gabe to his own thoughts. He certainly had a lot to think over given what had happened over the last couple of days, a few mysteries that seemed solved only to present new mysteries in their place. So, the naiads had killed the National Gallery victim, but who was she? Come to that, who were they? Could they really be mythical water spirits protecting their supernatural secret?
All of these mysteries played on Gabe's mind, but he was too tired really to focus on any. His head still ached from the day before and he kept finding himself distracted by the sounds of the shower through the thin wall separating the two rooms. Next door, Saphy was singing. Gabe could hear the muffled sounds of her voice, not the most impressive vocal performance, singing, "You better watch out on what you wish for. It better be worth it, so much to die for."
Of all the mysteries that Gabe was puzzling over, his travelling companion was probably the greatest. Her moods infuriated him, yet he admired the passion with which she believed she was right about virtually everything. He longed to feel that kind of passion about anything, but the only thing that had ever stirred him that way was the story he had once loved to read and re-read. The one in the book that Saphy had given him. The book that she had stolen from the college library. The book that had started another argument between them.
Saphy seemed to wear her heart on her sleeve, quite literally in terms of all her tattoos, and yet Gabe sensed there was more to her than met the eye, more of her story beneath the surface than that which was written on her body. Gabe might not have the strength of tastes and opinions as Saphy did, but he had always prided himself on his ability to read people, to see them through his camera lens and come to some understanding of them. With Saphy, this kind of ability was beyond him and that was beginning to make her a mystery that fascinated him every bit as much as the mythical fountain they were searching for together.
His thoughts were interrupted by their subject exiting the small bathroom wrapped in just a towel. Her hair was now short and spiked up in a completely different style to the neat bob she had sported before. As it dried, the bright red colour of the dye became obvious, every bit as stand out and distinctive as the purple that it had been before. Saphy might have changed her look, but she would still never blend in with the crowd. Maybe she would never be able to suppress that part of her that sought to show off her individuality.
As she sat down on the bed beside him, Gabe couldn't help but notice that the towel barely covered her dripping wet skin. Rivulets of water still ran down her naked skin and Gabe watched it weave between the dark ink of all her body art. He had only seen Saphy before in vests, t-shirts and jackets. Now he discovered there was far more written and drawn across her body than he had thought before. He wondered just what it all meant to her. Just above the level of her towel, he could see the beginning of a quote inked into the small of her back, just below her shoulder blades. It read "Oh mother, dear..."
"What's that?" he could not help asking.
"Hmm?" Saphy replied, deep in thought, before noticing him reading her back, "Oh, that. It's just a song lyric," she slid the towel further down to reveal the rest of the quote, "Oh mother, dear, we're not the fortunate ones", and, in doing so, revealed a little of her chest on the other side, "It's from Girls Just Wanna Have Fun."
"Cyndi Lauper?" he asked with surprise.
"Yes. What's wrong with Cyndi Lauper?" she became defensive, pulling the towel back up to cover both lines, grasping it against her chest just like the Venus statue at the Louvre.
"Nothing," Gabe said, worried she might close up to him, even while her inked body was most exposed, "It's just a bit surprising to see on you, that's all. This morning you were wearing a Rancid t-shirt. It's hard to square that with a love of 80s pop."
"Well, I'm a complicated woman, ok," she said, and Gabe could not help agreeing, "It's a great song and I agree with the sentiments. I can take inspiration in how I live my life from a pop song as much as from classical verse. It's true. All I really want is fun, but it's never that easy."
Gabe was impressed. She was, albeit warily, revealing a bit of herself to him, and he did not mean the flesh she was baring. He could tell that this could be the way to best understand her, to learn the meaning behind those things that she had decided to have permanently etched into herself. On one arm there was the now familiar female symbol, Venus' mirror, and, above it, a series of colourful rainbow stripes. The other arm was covered in Chinese figures. At the top, four symbols were in a row, a rectangular shape with a series of horizontal lines across it, another with a cross in the middle and then two far more complicated patterns.
"So, what does this one mean?" he asked, pointing to this row of Chinese letters, his finger nearly brushing against her wet skin.
