Engineman Read Online Free PDF

little shaveskull."
    "My bike, my hair; they're me, Eddie. It's not a damned statement, it's who I am."
    He turned a gentle smile on her. "It's what your father made you, Princess. A rebel."
    Before she could find the words for a half-hearted denial, the chime on the vid-screen sounded, floating up from the open window in the lounge.
    "That'll be for you," Eddie said, and turned his gaze back to the interface.
    Ella hurried down to the lounge, arrived breathless and pressed the accept stud. She sat on the recliner as the screen flared into life. She just had time to arrange the collar of her wrap before Carmen Vasquez appeared, standing beside a marble fireplace and smoking a cigarette in an ivory holder. She wore a long, black strapless gown and, with her tanned oval face and Latin poise, looked as though she'd just stepped off a cat-walk.
    "Ella, darling - I received your call." She had the socialite's practised ability of dispensing endearments without really seeming to mean them.
    "I hope I didn't interrupt anything," Ella began.
    "Of course not. I had intended to call you anyway."
    "You had? You can tell me who bought Conversion ?"
    Vasquez drew on her cigarette, her cheeks hollowed. She exhaled and fanned away the offending smoke with a languid wave. "Part of the deal, Ella darling, was that the buyer should enjoy absolute anonymity. I'm afraid it's not my place to divulge client's private details."
    Ella felt as though she'd been chastised. "I don't suppose you have any idea which planet the buyer-"
    "All I can tell you is that my client was an off-worlder," Vasquez said coolly. "If I were you. I should be thankful for the fee you received."
    Implicit in which statement, Ella thought, was the suggestion that Vasquez thought the fee exorbitant.
    "Ah... I was wondering about my latest piece," Ella ventured.
    "Actually, it's that I was meaning to call you about."
    "It was? I didn't mean to rush you. It's just that - well, it has been two months..."
    Vasquez nodded, tapping a centimetre of ash into an onyx tray on the mantelpiece. She returned her attention to Ella. "As a matter of fact, the piece has been causing me no small amount of difficulty."
    Ella's heart sank. "It has?"
    "It's a rather angry piece, isn't it?"
    Ella was taken aback. "Well, I suppose it is."
    Vasquez frowned, examined the length of her cigarette. "It's full of anger and hatred."
    Ella was at a loss for words. She feared what was to come. She shrugged. "It's a personal statement, of course. It's how I was feeling at the time."
    Vasquez was staring at her. "But didn't you know, darling - hatred is out at the moment."
    "Excuse me?"
    "Hatred, anger, rage - my customers don't want to adorn their walls with such images. Hatred is out."
    " Out ?" Ella echoed. She tried not to laugh. She could hardly believe what she was hearing. "But art... art's supposed to reflect reality."
    "Reality does not exclusively consist of anger and hatred, Ella, darling."
    She wanted to shout that her reality did.
    "Ella..." Vasquez began in a placatory tone.
    Ella leaned forward. "Look around you. The world is full of hatred. Look at what's happening in Africa, China. Christ, look at Europe!"
    "But there are other images you could employ."
    "I don't want to employ other images!" Ella cried. "I'm angry. Look, for Chrissake. Look!" And before she could stop herself, she picked up the screen and staggered with it over to the window ledge. She turned it around, so that the relay cameras presented to her agent the street scene, the crumbling buildings opposite. She wished she could carry the screen around the ghetto with her, so that Vasquez might witness all the filth, the poverty and the wretchedness.
    She swung the screen back to face her. Vasquez wore an expression of fastidious distaste. "Europe is fucked. The people who live here are fucked. And you want me to paint bunches of flowers. I paint from experience, damn you!"
    "If you intend to take that tone-"
    She swept on, "It's