by Hocking, Ian
“Touting for business.”
Something in his voice spoke directly to David’s stomach. He felt nauseous. Saliva squirted into his mouth. “Sorry, what?”
“Wannafuck?” asked the little boy. He was relaxed, but prepared to run. David realised that he had asked that question a thousand times and, with repetition, the meaning had melted away. It was now just a matter of mouth shapes and air.
David’s hand finally fell from the doorbell. He crouched down. His eyes were wide. He reached over to the boy and, with a gloved finger, turned his face. “You’re not a boy at all,” David said softly. “You’re just a little girl.”
Suddenly he wanted Jennifer.
“Alright, you’ve touched the merchandise. Cash or plastic?”
Her eyes were bright. Her cheeks were sunken. She had a large cold sore on her bottom lip.
“Can you come back?” he asked. “Twenty minutes? We can go somewhere.”
Twenty minutes later, David was sitting on the edge of his bed. He hadn’t removed his coat or his gloves. He had checked in, handed over his new, fake credit card, signed with his old, unreadable signature and found his room on the first floor. He had thrown his rucksack on the bed. Earlier, it had revealed a passport, driver’s licence, credit card, and a small brown envelope. He knew that he should open the envelope, discover its secret, but he did not.
He thought about the girl.
There was a knock at the door.
“Mr Harrison?”
Unforgivable, he thought numbly. Unforgettable. How could he have been so stupid? It was not a moment’s lapse. It had lasted years.
“Yeah,” he cakked.
The landlord opened the door a crack. He was a fat, nervous Welshman with a bushy beard. “Someone to see you downstairs.”
David kept his back to the door and dabbed at his eyes. He couldn’t remember the last time he had cried.
No, not true. Bruce’s funeral. Unforgettable.
“Thank you.”
The door closed.
David patted his pockets. He would need money.
Outside, he did not have to look far. She was waiting in the shadows. It was dark now. He glanced around. They were alone. She emerged and read his mind.
“They know where I am,” she said. “My friends.” Her breath made little white clouds.
“I’m hungry. Want to get some fish and chips?”
She frowned. “You want to eat.”
“Yeah. Come on. Name a place?”
“McCabe’s. It’s over there.” She indicated the direction with a shoulder. Her hands stayed in her pockets and David wondered what weapons she held. She did not let her eyes leave his until he walked past her. She fell in step. Her head reached his elbow. Her strides were fast and his were slow.
“What are your prices like, then?” he asked. The nausea swirled in his stomach again. That old feeling. It spread to his fingertips and they seemed to sparkle. He took deep breaths and concentrated on the horizon though, in the blackness, there was none.
She sniffed. “This your first time?”
“What do you mean?” he asked, playing for time he would never need. His mind was almost paralysed by the proximity of this child and what she was prepared to do. In his coat pocket he felt the reassuring weight of his stun gun. There was an alley coming up. It would do.
“The first time you want a bit of underage?”
He tried to sound relaxed. “No. Not the first time.”
“Oh.” She sounded uninterested.
They walked past the mouth of the alley. David seized her by the hood and hauled her in. He could lift her with one arm. Nobody saw. He crouched. Their eyes were level.
“Have me, don’t kill me,” she said quickly.
“You’re not taking me to a chippy, are you?” His voice was controlled. His policeman’s voice. Everybody trusts a policeman.
She shook her head. He saw the fear in her eyes and saw it was controlled too. She was calculating, weighing options. “What’s in your pockets?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
“Let me see.”
A car drove past. The light did not reach them but some reflections caught her eyes as a glint moving from right to left. Slowly, she produced her hands. In each one was a fair-sized rock.
Clever girl, he thought. “Drop them.”
He saw her calculating again: crash the rocks into his head like cymbals.
She dropped them.
“You’re taking me a to a get-together, aren’t you? You got some friends and told them you had a sure thing. They were going to knock me about, nick my cards. Anything else?”
Now her eyes fell. Their light faded. “You are a copper.”
“We’re going to walk out of here. We’re going to have some fish and chips and a chat. And if you still want me to meet your friends, there’ll be fucking aggro.” He brandished the stun gun.
“You going to kill me?”
“No, I am not.”
“You going to rape me?”
“No.”
“Then what? Then what?” She looked at the stun gun. He put it away. Her brow knitted. “Oh, I get it.” Her voice rose. “You’re a hero. You’ll go home to your little family in fucking Chelsea and brag about how you played Dr Bernardo up north. I don’t want your money and I don’t want to eat your food. You think fish and chips and ten minutes of good society are going to make me grow up and want to be like you. You sorry bastard.”
David stood up. He did so casually, but the girl flinched. He took out his credit card. “Hold your fire. I’ll pay for your time. We’ll have a chat. I want half an hour.”
Her eyes settled on the card. They stuck. “Why didn’t you say that before? I thought you were going to kill me.”
David snorted. “You did not.”
“I don’t know what I thought,” she said, looking at her shoes.
“Would you have believed me? That I wanted a talk?”
“No. They all say that. But who says I’ll believe you now?”
David looked at her. She was so adult. “Nobody. You say. You choose. I’m going to have some chips. Maybe a coke. Lashings of salt and vinegar. You?”
“You’re weird.”
She followed him when he left, with fast, long strides to match his.
They sat in McCabe’s under off-white light. McCabe, who was Turkish, whistled behind a large counter, battering sausages, fish and burgers and frying chips. The air was heavy with grease, the floor slippery with it. The place was empty. They had taken a table for two in the far corner. David let the girl sit so she could look out of the window. So she would feel safer. She had no reason to trust him. Between them were two unfurled portions of fish and chips. David busied himself with vinegar while the girl stared at her food.
“Eat it before it gets cold,” he said.
She bristled. “I’ll eat it when I fucking want.”
“Who are you?” he asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Your name.”
“My name is Janine.” She took a chip reluctantly. “What’s your name?”
“My name’s David. You have a surname?”
“Yes.” She ate a few more chips. At the counter, McCabe smiled at the father and daughter sharing a meal in his little chip shop. Janine lifted the fish and tore a great bite from the end. David watched her. She chewed once, twice and swallowed. “You have a daughter don’t you?”
“Sort of. I sent her away.”
She took another bite. With her mouth full, she waved him on. “Out with it, then. You’re paying me to listen – and paying well, by the way – so get your money’s worth.”
“My daughter is called Jennifer.”
“Me and her would get on like a house on fire, right?”
“Actually I’m not sure if she’s your type.” David glanced at her guiltily and Janine, seeing his expression, laughed. Particles of fish hit his fingers. “What I mean is,” he continued, “she’s quite
old now. She’s twenty.”
Janine nodded. That was obvious. “Why did you send her away?”
“I could give you facts: she was a genius, a real genius. The schools in this country couldn’t do anything for her. I decided, on a friend’s advice, to send her to a school in New York for gifted children. Sent her aged twelve. That was eight years ago. I think she works for the American government now.”
“New York. Fuck, you have money.”
He shrugged and watched, his mind idling, as a customer walked in and placed an order. It was an old man in faded jeans. “Yes, you’re right. I have money.”
“So what else could you give me?”
“Hmm?”
“You said you could give me the facts. But that’s not the whole story. Am I right?”
David ripped a chip from its sticky pile. He pointed it at her. “You know, you’re good. You could do this for a living.”
She nodded seriously. “Yes. Now what about the rest of story?”
“I...” he began, and Christ if he wasn’t near crying. He could suddenly feel his eyes, a tingling in his throat, and a juvenile sense of hopelessness. “Here we go: ‘I am not a good parent’. That’s it. That’s the whole story. Some people would spend millions on a shrink before they could say something like that.”
“You haven’t had my fee yet.”
David laughed and bounced out of his self-pity. “What about your own parents?”
“Ah, the psychiatrist cannot talk about herself. It’s a rule.”
“You have rules?”
“Of course. Let’s be professional. What happen to her mother? Did she leave you?”
David felt off-balanced. His smile weakened. “Her mother was killed a few months after she was born. There was an accident where we both worked. She died in my arms.”
“Bollocks.”
“Nope. It’s true.”
She leaned closer. Half-chewed food lay in one side of her mouth, forgotten. “Did she wake up just before she died, like in the pictures? They usually do that.”
“No. She was lying in corridor when I found her. It was dark, you know, really dark. But I found her anyway. She’d been hit on the head by something.”
“Someone?”
“Something.”
Inside, he was silent, his mind just listening dumbly to his mouth. “She was sleeping. Or rather, she seemed to be asleep. I tried to wake her but her mouth just fell open. She wasn’t breathing. I remember screaming, then someone led me out of the building. I kept thinking that she had died alone. I thought that was the worst part.”
“Hmm,” Janine said. Her fish was nearly gone. His was hardly touched. “Did you work in the World Trade Center?”
“You remember that. No. It was the year after.”
“Oh.”
“You want some more fish?”
“No thanks.”
David took his own fish and plonked it on hers. “What’s wrong with you?” she hissed. “I don’t want your fucking leftovers.”
He smiled and watched her eat it. “Stop fucking smiling,” she said, spitting fish.
“Sorry.”
She rolled her eyes. Again, so adult. Jennifer could roll her eyes like that.
“Guess what?” he said.
She stopped mid-chew. “Wha’?”
“I’m on the run from the police.”
Her relief was evident. She resumed her chewing. “I see.”
“They want me for murder.”
“They want me for shoplifting. Small world. Stop watching me. What are you, a fucking perv?”
David asked mildly, “What would you do without the word ‘fuck’?”
“That comes under the heading ‘philosophy’. I’m a street kid. Don’t you read Dickens? We’re more practical.”
“You’re –” David said, but interrupted himself.
Janine read his mind. She said, “I don’t really do it, you know.”
“Do what?”
“Have it off with people. For money. Like I thought you wanted.”
Something swept through David. Was it relief that he had been talking – playing Dr Bernardo, hero for a day – to the worst example of society’s failure, only to find that she had beaten him at his own game? She had played on his pity, eaten her meal, and now revealed the trick behind her sleight of hand.
And haven’t I done the same to her? Disguised myself as lowlife, and gotten what I wanted? A dry run at reconciliation?
“So you do what do you?” he asked.
“I lure them in and take ’em round somewhere. Back of the Horse ’n Groom. Down to the canal. Or Blackboy Road. Somewhere. Then me mates grab them and we rob them for money. Or cigarettes.” She stopped eating. “Sorry.”
David sighed and tried to push his chair from the table. It was stuck to the floor. He wormed his way out and put on his gloves. “Where are you going?” she asked.
“I’m going to sleep. In the morning I’ll ride on.” He leaned closer and winked. “Remember, I’m on the run.”
“Yeah, right,” she said, playing along. “I forgot. But what about your life story?”
“Life stories are boring. You should be thankful you only got the edited highlights.”
She shrugged.
David was motionless for the while. Then he said, “Janine, you want your money?”
She burped and nodded. “Oh, yeah. That. Make it a thousand.” She said it casually, too casually, ready for David to protest and rant. He did not.
“Got a card?”
She had it ready and handed it over. He connected the two and there was a little beep as the transaction was made. He gave hers back and pocketed his own. “Can I ask you something without you getting angry or saying ‘fuck’?”
“Maybe.”
He placed a gloved hand on her head. He didn’t ruffle her hair or pat her head. “Take care of yourself.”
“We’ll see.”
He walked out and Janine watched him leave. McCabe was smiling at the scene. Father and daughter eating out. He did not find it strange that the father had left without the daughter. He whistled a tune and went out back. Janine waited, picking at her fish bones, until she could wait no longer. She grabbed her card and checked the balance. Her eyes widened.
“Fucking bastardain fucker.”
David opened his rucksack and spilled the contents on his bed. Outside, it began to rain. He was glad to be warm and dry. He worried about the next day’s travelling. His coat and the rest of his clothes hung on the back of a wooden chair next to the mini desk and coffee-making utensils.
He ripped open the brown envelope. He smiled. Inside was an object the size of a bankcard but a little thicker. An Ego personal computer. There was an earpiece taped to the back. The warmth of his fingertips caused the surface to assume the shape of a woman’s face.
“Hello, Ego.”
“Who are you?”
“Professor David Proctor, at your service.”
There was a beep as his voice was identified. “No, I am at yours.”
“Oh, you.” David fitted the earpiece. “Switch to earpiece.”
“Done,” said the voice in his ear. He slid Ego into his wallet. There was some cash in envelope too. This he put into his coat’s inner pocket.
“Do you have any instructions for me, Ego?”
“Yes. Get to London Heathrow Terminal Five and open baggage locker J327.”
“Anything else?”
“No.”
David walked into his bathroom and turned the taps. A trombone sounded and under-pressurised water fell into the bathtub. “Who arranged my escape?”
“I have been asked to withhold that information.”
He nodded and began to scheme. The Ego model used a so-called ‘semantic network’ to encode its information. Knowledge was stored haphazardly, with items sharing semantic connections in a great web. Thus, “cat” had a connection to “dog”, but also to “paws”, “lion” and “yacht”. Even the m
ost efficient computer operator would find it difficult to barricade all the routes to that knowledge: connections to just one knowledge item might run into the millions. David set about probing those barricades.
“Where were you yesterday?” he asked.
Ego paused. “I was not active yesterday.”
“Think of a name, randomly.”
“Sam.”
“Why did you think of that?”
“I have no reason. That is what random means.”
“Touché . Tell me about Heathrow.”
“Heathrow Airport is the foremost centre for air travel in the United Kingdom. Last year alone –”
“Is that what you think?”
“No. I am reading verbatim from publicity material.”
“Do you love?”
“No.”
“Are you alive?”
“No.”
“Do you want to be alive?”
“I neither want nor do not want.”
“Do you have emotions?”
“No.”
“Who programmed you?”
“Dr Hilbert Nagarajan and his development team at Marquis.”
“Sing me a song.”
“Which song?”
“Daisy.”
“One moment.” There was beep and David heard a little hiss in his ear. The earpiece was picking up Ego’s attempt to access the internet via the wireless telecommunications network.
“Forget it.”
He went back to the bedroom and stowed the passport in the rucksack. Then he removed his clothes and brushed his teeth. Finally, he sank into the bath and felt the heat sizzling into his extremities. His genitals began to thaw and assume a respectable size. His fingers tingled. Muscles in his legs and back began to slacken.
“Ego, can you monitor local police frequencies?”
“Yes,” said the whisper in his ear. “They are, however, encrypted. The deciphering key changes each day at midnight. I could not decode today’s transmissions until tomorrow morning.”
“You are remarkably well informed.”
“Yes, I am.”
David sank a little lower in the bath. The brownish water washed over his stomach and lapped around his ears. He looked again at his stomach. Certainly smaller. In all the excitement, he was losing weight. “Ego, if I make a telephone call, can I be traced?”