Friday Flash: The Artist's Defence

He knew she wasn't going to buy one, he'd developed an instinct for it. The elderly woman was moving along the shelves, inspecting the little stone heads, her face mirroring their grotesque expressions, but she wasn't going to leave with one.

"I've never seen anything like these," she croaked.

He smiled politely.

"Where do they come from?"

"An African tribe. I import them directly. It's a Fair Trade scheme."

"That's nice."

"A well was recently built there with the profits," he continued, his gaze drifting through the shop window to the street beyond. It was raining.

"I'll bring my son next week," she said, putting her plastic rain cap back on. He wondered if there was a special shop for people over seventy, shelves filled with flimsy rain hoods, pear drops and lavender water. "He likes this kind of thing."

He said goodbye, doubtful she'd remember. Soon after a couple entered. He remembered the husband peering in a few days before.

"Oh, you were right!" the wife gasped, pulled to one expressing an agonised grimace. "They're extraordinary!"

The husband came to the counter. "Saw these last week," he said, his voice leaning towards the bombastic. "Reminded me of our time in Africa. From a tribe are they?"

"Actually, no," he replied. "We found them in the loft of our house. We think the sculptor lived there. We tried to trace the relatives, but had no luck, so we opened the shop. We donate a portion of the profits to a charity for struggling artists."

"That's jolly decent of you," the man said. "Perhaps he imported them from Africa."

"Perhaps," he said. "I hadn't considered that."

Ego bolstered, the husband returned to his wife. He suspected he was a retired Major, and that they'd start a collection. Something to talk about after their dinner parties, the air filled with cigar smoke and a longing for colonialism. They chose three heads and paid in cash. The till rang brightly.

He polished some of the heads, taking care not to look too closely at them, until a family came in. Rain water dripped from their umbrellas and rivulets of green slime ran from the children's noses. He forced himself to smile.

The mother didn't notice him, she had the grey skin and hollow eyes of the chronically sleep deprived. The father gave a curt nod, ignoring his children, a girl of about two and a son who looked about seven years old, as they went straight to the nearest shelf.

"Don't touch," the mother said weakly as the boy pulled the nearest head off the shelf.

"It's heavy!"

He left the counter to crouch next to him. "It's carved from solid stone,"

The father took a call on his mobile as the mother pursued the toddler. He stayed next to the boy, knowing this child would crack the glass shelf if he replaced the head, and that the slimy little monster would enjoy it.

"It's ugly." Like so many that looked into the eyes of the heads, he mimicked its expression, making the shop owner shudder. "Did you make it?"

"No."

"Who did?"

He leaned as close to the boy as he could bear to. "Want to know a secret?" he whispered. "I don't really know who makes them. All I know is that every morning, when I come in to open the shop, there are new heads on the shelves."

The boy's eyes widened, then narrowed swiftly. "You're having me on."

"It's the truth. I've noticed they look remarkably similar to children who come in and pick up things they shouldn't touch."

The boy's eyebrows wavered as he struggled to gauge whether his words were truth or lie. He handed the head over and the shop owner inspected it. "This one looks like a child who was here last week. He smeared bogies all over my glass shelves. Then that night…" he drew his forefinger across his throat, made the noise of a man being garrotted.

The boy's father called him and he rushed to his side, throwing a fearful glance back at the shop owner who smiled and said goodbye to the parents. He cleaned the smears off the polished stone, left by the boy's sickeningly sticky hands, and returned it to its place, satisfied.

It was getting dark. He flipped the sign on the door over to 'closed' and locked up. He stuffed the cash from the till into his pocket and went upstairs.

The flat was cold and dark. He switched on lamps and the electric fire but nothing took the chill away.

He caught a glimpse of himself in the hallway mirror. "Come on," he said to his reflection. "You can't put it off any longer."

He climbed the second flight of stairs up to the attic room and opened the door slowly. She was hunched over, sitting on her chair in the corner, casting a frightful shadow onto the far wall like a fairytale witch.

He crossed the room, making the candle flame waver, the scraping sound of her industry setting his teeth on edge.

"The demon has been so angry today," she said, hearing his footsteps. "But I've found a new one to keep him away. Look!"

She twisted in her chair and thrust a half carved head towards him.

He looked at her sallow skin, her drawn cheeks, matted hair that she refused to let him comb. Her arms were blotched and bruised, she'd been pinching herself again. He squeezed his eyes shut against the urge to snatch the carving from her and dash it against her skull, putting them both out of their misery.

"Come downstairs," he said but she twisted back into the corner, sculpting again.

"I'll just finish this one, then the demon will be gone for good."

Crumpling, he thought of the shelves of heads in the shop below. "That's what you said last time," he said, and left her to her madness.