From Fitzroy's Private Diary (Extract 49)

I first met Celeste at a diplomatic dinner. At the time she was widowed, the relict of a senior ambassador taken before his time. I never understood why she was there. However, it seems those in diplomatic channels held her in high esteem. Whether that was due to her ability to host, or her place in the art world, I really don’t know.

The first thing she ever said to me was ‘I want to see you naked.’ Now, I have never been without my admirers, but this blatant accosting caused my monocle to drop from my eye. I managed to keep a straight face, but the wretched eye glass gave away my reaction. Never wore one again. Anyway, she laughed uproariously and explained she was a sculptress looking for a well-defined male model.  I thanked her for the compliment, but explained I was already fully employed.

I thought that was the end of the matter and having several people I needed to have quiet words with, quite forgot about her. At the end of the evening, as I was brought my hat and coat, she appeared again, and asked me if I had thought further on her suggestion. I brushed her off with the minimum of politeness and left.

She was not an unattractive woman. I imagined around thirty, and she had that harsh brazenness that some women develop when they have to frequently stand their ground in male domains. Usually I am full of admiration of this type, but she had caught me off guard, and her laugh was too loud. Once more I forgot about her.

The next week I received at my public address, my city flat, a large bunch of Morning Glories, Sweet Peas and Peace Lilies. With it came a card that asked if I had reconsidered, and was merely signed with a C. I couldn’t quite bring myself to toss the flowers, so I asked Griffin to reassemble them into three bouquets and regifted them to several ladies of my acquaintance, including relative of an older generation who had recently been hospitalised. I later received a letter from her daughter, who I despised, thanking me, as it had cheered the old woman up immensely. Worse still, having misguidedly sent this gift, she began to update me with regular letters and even suggested we had luncheon together in town. Sadly, I found my work schedule could not allow such frivolity. I lived in fear of what would happen at Christmas, the invites, the cards, all the familial obligations I had so painstakingly divested myself of. I blamed such re-entanglement on the wretched Celeste and called down curses on her head nightly.

I continued on my path of ignoring the pest, much as I would have done with a small sticky child. But the gifts kept coming. Never anything extravagant. A bottle of port. A truckle of Stilton. A side of smoked salmon. And all with the same message. I explained to Griffin, in a fit of anger, that this damned woman was after my body. I could have elaborated further, but he can be very prudish and immediately left the room. He avoided having more than the briefest of conversations with me for several days.

By now this whole ridiculous charade was bothering me far more than it should and distracting me from work. I had failed to discuss the matter with Griffin, and I didn’t think Alice would react sensibly to my problem. She would either laugh or go into one of her absurd fits of jealousy (she has a husband and I am not him).

Eventually, I wrote a note to the blasted woman. I told her that if she produced a bust of my mother to my satisfaction, I would also pose for her. I enclosed a photographic likeness of the painting of my mother.

As she was supposedly one of the foremost sculptors in the land, according to her admirers, I thought it unlikely she would agree to my demands. I had done my research and I knew that such a commission would normally cost hundreds of pounds. Also, I very much doubted that a woman of such limited empathy would be able to catch either the beauty or the sensitive intelligence of my mother’s face.

The gifts stopped coming. Alice and I went on with our missions. We navigated the pathways between friendship and colleagues, and I still had to iron out Alice’s feelings of possessiveness towards me. She appeared perfectly content in her own marriage and had never suggested we should be more than friends, but she disliked it immensely when I flirted with other women for the sake of the mission. It was all very annoying, and so I forgot completely about Celeste.

Then, four months after I sent the letter, I received a heavy and carefully wrapped parcel. When opened it revealed a bust of my mother so perfect, I confess I had to blink back a tear.

There was nothing for it, I should have to honour our deal. Then I noticed at the bottom of the box a small card bearing a date, time and rural location. It crossed my mind there and then that it might be a trap, but I could not back out of the agreement. So, on the stated date, I drove to the location, where I found Celeste’s airy studio.

She came out to greet me and complimented me on being a man of my word. I bristled slightly and said I could be nothing else. We went inside. To my relief no one else was present, but I began to feel rather uncomfortable. I asked what would happen to the statue and was told it would be displayed at an exhibition in London early the next year, along with some other pieces she had been working on. She said she would send me tickets.

I must have paled because she told me that she only wanted my body (this made me feel even more uncomfortable). Then she explained she had a rough idea of what I might do for a living, and so had decided that she would put another head on my shoulders. Her problem, she told me was finding physically fit, wiry men, who were prepared to stand naked in front of her for several hours at a time.

At this point I sat down in a chair as I had come over unexpectedly faint. However, for all her brashness earlier, she became a consummate professional as she explained what he needed from me. She also said that she thought I would gain from the experience.

I gritted my teeth and went behind the screen to undress. I have never been ashamed of my body, but I had never posed naked on a podium while a dressed woman circled me, eyeing me from all angles. I went through a cascade of emotions as she studied me, none of them pleasant.

My only relief was there was no tape measure in sight. I had wondered if, like a tailor, she would take measurements. Fortunately, not.

It is surprisingly tiring to stand perfectly motionless for any length of time, but my training helped. On subsequent sessions I found I could move into a meditative state and consider matters I had yet to resolve with remarkable clarity.

There were seven sessions in total. Over this time, I became more and more comfortable in my own skin. But when Celeste asked me what I had learnt during the experience, I decided to tell her of my strongest revelation. I said I now had some inkling of how women felt when they were watched by predatory men, who concentrated on their form rather than their brains. Celeste laughed at that and said that all men did it to attractive women all the time. Almost all, I answered.

The insight I had from this experience helped me understand more than ever the opposite sex, and this has aided in all aspects of my life, both personal and work. Celeste and I remained friends for a while - indeed it was when visiting her, looking for fresh milk at a nearby farm, that I found Jack (Celeste kept the most disgusting of kitchens at the back of her studio). When she felt she didn’t need to be bold, she transpired to be an excellent conversationalist, who thought deeply about the world and the people in it. Our friendship only cooled when she married a very senior political figure, and the nature of my work meant I had to distance myself from her.

I still have the bust sitting in my lounge, and my stone doppelgänger, with a far less handsome visage than my own, stands in a London gallery, for all to see and admire.