Darling Sweetheart

by Stephen Price

‘What a good idea. I’ll make an appointment right away then they can give it to the police to update their records.’ He took her arm. ‘We’ve gottae get outta here.’

  Once outside on Princes Street, Proctor didn’t feel quite so trapped, but every passer-by was still a suspicious onlooker and every flash of yellow a uniformed police officer. He led Annalise down a flight of stone steps into Princes Street Gardens.

  ‘What’s wrong, fallguy?’ Froggy snickered from her belt. ‘All that dope making you paranoid?’

  ‘Shut up!’ he hissed. He grabbed Annalise’s cloak and pulled it closed. ‘Put that stupid frog away! We need to blend in, not walk around goin’, “Look at me, I’m a Grade A fruitcake!”’

  A lorry driver had dropped them on the outskirts of the city and they’d caught a madder-and-white bus into town. For all its dark stone beauty, central Edinburgh was crowded and threatening after the wide open spaces of Fife. Proctor fumbled in his jacket pocket for his Whitesnake cap and pulled it on, followed by his cheap sunglasses.

  ‘Where’s your shades? Get them on you!’ He led her to a park bench under a tree. ‘Now, you sit here and don’t move, don’t talk to anyone and, most of all, don’t let that cretin under your coat talk to anyone, especially not you! I’ll get the tickets. I stand a better chance of not being recognised on my own.’

  Annalise watched him go then looked up at Edinburgh Castle, looming high above her on its volcanic plug.

  Proctor went back to the station and bought two tickets without incident. But instead of fleeing again, he loitered around an instant photo booth, using its vanity mirror to study the concourse. Satisfied that he wasn’t being watched, he strode over to a telephone booth and made a brief call.

  He returned to the gardens to find Annalise waiting obediently on the bench. Daylight was fading, so they mingled with the tourists around the Old Town, the High Street and the Grassmarket – where better to hide a pair of strangers than among a constantly moving horde of strangers? They didn’t dare chance a sit-down meal in an enclosed restaurant and so settled for shop-bought sandwiches, eaten as they wandered like hungry ghosts through the cobbled streets and darkened alleyways. Close to midnight, when the London overnight sleeper train was due to leave, they returned to Waverley and boarded with minutes to spare. Their cabin had two narrow bunks and white plastic walls. Proctor drew the blind.

  ‘Thank Christ!’ He threw himself onto the bottom bunk and opened his tobacco pouch as the train pulled out. Annalise took her cloak off and hung it on a hook, exposing Froggy.

  ‘I think you’ll find,’ she pointed at a notice, ‘that the entire train is non-smoking.’

  ‘So I’ll blow it out the vent.’

  ‘Does it ever occur to you,’ Froggy chipped in, ‘that smoking so much dope might be turning your mind into mush?’

  ‘Ha!’ he snapped. ‘As opposed to convenient bite-sized pieces, like yours? You use a bloody child’s toy to say the things you havenae the balls to say yoursel’! You’re an emotional pygmy, Annalise Palatine! You live in a pretend world – a spoiled bloody adult who behaves like a backward bloody child!’

  The instant the cabin door slammed behind her, Proctor regretted his outburst, but his luxuriant anger did not subside until, muttering to himself, he smoked his joint through the air vent. He didn’t enjoy it; instead of relaxing him, it made him feel even more paranoid. He checked the outside corridor; a station screamed by in a wild burst of light, making him jump, before rattling blackness reconquered the carriage windows. The corridor was empty. However, the toilet cubicle at the top of the corridor was occupied; he crept along and put an ear to the door. Sure enough, he heard a muffled sobbing. He tapped gently. The sobbing stopped.

  ‘Hey. Can I get you a drink from the bar?’

  There was no reply, so he went and bought two large brandies. When he returned, the toilet was still occupied. He tapped the door again, but still no answer, so he returned to the cabin, killed the light, lay on his bunk and sipped the burning liquid.

  He must have dozed off, because he woke with a start to see a black shape reaching over him. He recoiled in fear; there was a buffeting whoosh as an oncoming train passed and he remembered where he was. The shape was Annalise, climbing into her bunk. The mattress above his face creaked as she settled into place. She didn’t speak and lay still.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said eventually. ‘I’m tired and stressed out and I said things I shouldn’t have said.’

  ‘Don’t apologise.’ Her voice was small. ‘It’s all true. You heard Evelyn describe my father – I must be just like him.’

  ‘Don’t be daft – that’s not true.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Look, I’m just sorry, all right? I think you’re a lovely person. People. Whatever.’

  ‘You don’t believe in Froggy.’

  He sighed. ‘I don’t believe in anything, except man’s inhumanity to man. But that’s my problem, not yours.’

  She was quiet for a time. Then, ‘Ben…’

  ‘Yeah?’

  Her mattress creaked and the black shape reappeared, accompanied by the shuffle of bare feet on carpet. ‘Move over.’

  ‘Uhh… is that a good idea?’

  ‘Just because I’m unhappy doesn’t mean I need sex. I only want to lie beside you.’

  ‘What about Froggy?’

  ‘He’s asleep. If we’re quiet, he won’t hear us.’

  Knowing he shouldn’t, Proctor shifted over as far as he could, which, in the narrow bunk, wasn’t much. Somehow, she squeezed in behind him, holding herself in place with an arm draped over his chest. He could feel her breath on the back of his neck.

  ‘Sorry,’ she whispered. ‘I’m not very good at this sort of thing.’

  Grunting and wriggling, he rolled himself around to face her. She held on tightly, to stop herself from falling backwards out of the bunk.

  His answer was hoarse. ‘For a hundred thousand different reasons, you and me shouldn’t do this sort of thing.’

  His words were barely spoken before their mouths joined. His was dry and tasted of tobacco; hers was like a long, cold drink of water.

  It must have been a couple of hours later when the cabin door opened, invading their dark, private little space with light from the carriage corridor. Groaning, Annalise rolled over and fell on the floor. Luckily, she was still fully clothed. Proctor jumped up and banged his head off the top bunk.

  ‘What the f–’

  ‘Tickets, please.’

  The inspector was an elderly cockney with pebble glasses and a neat white beard. He hunched in a uniform that seemed several sizes too big and his cap sat at a precarious angle on his head.

  ‘Are you serious, pal?’ Proctor spluttered. ‘It’s the middle o’ the fuckin’ night!’

  ‘It’s my job ain’t it?’ he protested. ‘S’awright for you wiv your nice cosy bed! I’ve got to do me rounds no matter what time of the bleedin’ night!’

  Proctor buried his face in his hands. ‘Tell me this isn’t happening…’

  The inspector fumbled with his metal ticket-punch and dropped it on Annalise’s foot.

  ‘Ow!’

  ‘Sorry, Miss…’ He bent to pick it up. She handed it to him. ‘Thank you, Miss. God bless you, Miss.’ He straightened himself, holding his back. ‘First time in our sleeper service, is it, Miss?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then you may not be aware,’ he patted the upper bunk, ‘but there’s a perfectly good bed for you up ’ere.’ Blearily guilty, Annalise felt around for the ladder.

  ‘I’m tired of this,’ Proctor snarled with real venom in his voice. ‘I just want you to know that I’m very, very tired of this.’

  ‘’Course you’re tired, Sir,’ the man soothed, ‘so if I can just see your tickets, I’ll be on my way.’

  Proctor produced the tickets from his jeans pocket and angrily thrust them out. Annalise climbed into the top bunk and curled up beside Froggy.

  ‘Do
n’t put those lips near me,’ Froggy snapped. ‘I know where they’ve been.’

  ‘Oh, be a good cuddly toy and go back to sleep.’

  The doddery inspector dithered and fumbled. She heard Proctor snap the door lock, cursing quietly but murderously.

  ‘’Night,’ she whispered, but he just went on cursing so she drifted off to the clack-clack-clack of the wheels on the track.

  At the same time, about a hundred and fifty miles farther south, someone else was about to have their rest disturbed. Minor pop star Jimmy Lockhart lay in a darkened ward in St Mary’s Hospital, Paddington. His fractures had not yet healed, but, then again, they were nowhere near as bad as the press was making out. Hospital sucked – how bloody stupid he’d been to jump off that speaker stack; too much coke before the gig. However, as he’d drifted into an uneasy sleep that night, Lockhart had not been thinking about Angalise Palatine, but about his manager, Donnie Driscoll. He had not seen Driscoll for two whole days, and the man was not returning his calls. And nothing troubles a troubled artist more than unreturned calls. What could it mean? That their remaining tour dates were cancelled instead of postponed? That Driscoll was angry with him or about to stab him in the back? Lockhart couldn’t understand what was going on; after he’d recovered from Annalise’s bizarre visit to the ward, Driscoll had seemed in ebullient form. Still, he had tried his mobile, his home, his office, their record label, the other band members, even their local pub in Camden and most of their mutual acquaintances, including three drug dealers – but no one knew where Driscoll was. Or maybe they did know and were pretending not to. Lockhart was worried – not about Palatine (she was history) and not about Driscoll personally, but about what the unreturned calls might mean for his career. Was Lone Blue Planet conspiring to get rid of their lead singer and hire a new one? Was everyone pissed off at him for wrecking the tour?

  He dreamed he was in Iceland, where a snake was wrapping itself round his face. He knew it must be a dream, because they don’t have snakes in Iceland and because Annalise was nearby, dressed as a soldier, smoking a cigarette, cradling a machine-gun and watching as the snake forced itself into his mouth. He wanted her to help, but she just smiled. And he couldn’t move his hands to pull the snake off his face, so he made himself wake up.

  Hospital – he was still in bloody hospital.

  He went to reach for his glass of water. He grunted. He still couldn’t move his hands and there really was something wrapped around his mouth. The painkillers! Those stupid bitch nurses have fucking paralysed me, he thought. He rolled his head and moaned. His reading light snapped on. He blinked. He expected to see a nurse, but instead there was a man by his bed: a man with very thick eyebrows, a beanie hat and a golden earring in one ear. The privacy curtains were fully drawn but, from the silence on the ward, Lockhart could tell it was the small hours. He raised his head. His wrists were lashed to the metal bedstead with heavy black gaffer tape and, of course, his legs were encased in plaster. The same tape must have been fixed across his mouth, because he couldn’t speak. He moaned again, but the man grabbed him by the hair, showed him a penknife then held the sharp tip close to one eyeball. It hurt to be grabbed by the hair, but what really scared Lockhart was that the man wore surgical gloves and a doctor’s uniform. For a stomach-turning moment, he thought he was about to be blinded in some grotesque, unscheduled operation. But slowly, the man withdrew the knife, released his hair and raised a rubber-sheathed finger to his own lips. Lockhart understood – he was to be quiet. He nodded, in terrified agreement.

  Apparently satisfied, the man then extracted a large manila envelope from his tunic. From this, he took a handful of A4-sized photographs. He held one up to Lockhart’s face. It showed a bland, brown-brick building. Lockhart met the man’s eyes in desperate puzzlement, but he then held up a second photo, a close-up of a sign on the building. It said ‘St Catherine’s High School’. The next photograph showed a group of girls leaving the school. There were three of them; they wore drab, petrolgreen uniforms and looked about thirteen or fourteen. The next shot was a close-up of their faces. One had red hair, the other was blonde and the third Asian. Lockhart’s heart stopped as he remembered a Bristol hotel room. He became vaguely conscious of a hot liquid that filled his pyjama bottoms and spread across his sheet. But the man was relentless; the next photo showed the three girls entering a corner shop. In the next, they stood at a bus stop, eating crisps. This one was held up to Lockhart’s face for quite some time. Children, the photograph said – these girls are children. Lockhart closed his eyes but felt the point of the penknife against his cheek. The man tapped the photo with it – he was not allowed to look away. His eyes filled with tears. It seemed an age before the man finally set the photo down. Then, he lifted a newspaper. ‘LOVESICK LOCKHART’, the front page said, with snaps of him, Annalise and Harry Emerson. The man wagged a rubberized finger and shook his head, before putting his finger to his lips once again and holding it there. Even through his tears, Lockhart got the message. He nodded again. The reading light went out. There was no further noise except the sleepy breathing of the other patients. He had no idea at what point the man actually left. Thinking all sorts of awful thoughts, he lay awake in his cold urine until the duty nurse made her first round. She had to use scissors to remove the tape from his wrists and pulling it off his face really hurt, but no matter how many times she asked, he refused to explain how it had come to be there or why his bed was covered with photographs of schoolgirls.

  About eighteen hours later – just before dusk the following day – a well-dressed woman in her early thirties parked a Saab convertible in a street off Clapham Common in south London and, carrying a Waitrose shopping bag, admitted herself to a large detached house. She closed the door and the ground-floor windows lit up. Proctor stepped out of the shadow of a chestnut tree opposite, walked up to the door and knocked. The woman opened it suspiciously, keeping it on a chain. Proctor spoke to her, nodded apologetically, then hurried back to Annalise, who waited under the tree.

  ‘Shit!’ he cursed. ‘I really thought that was it! But she’s Louise Miller and she’s never heard of any bastarding Leon.’ Disappointed, they ambled off across the common. Annalise consulted a piece of paper, tucked inside a London A–Z. ‘Just one left, in Clapham North.’

  ‘I can’t walk another step – my legs are fallin’ off.’

  ‘Come on, I know this area, it’s downhill all the way.’

  ‘You said it.’

  ‘You’re the one who insisted on walking all the way from Euston. Not that it bothers me – I like walking.’

  ‘So you keep reminding me. But the second we step into a taxi, a bus or a tube, we’re toast. People know you.’

  ‘No they don’t. They only think they do.’

  ‘I meant, they know your face.’

  ‘Sorry.’ She reached for his hand, pulling him to a halt. ‘The new dispensation: we don’t fight, okay?’

  ‘Bugger the new dispensation!’ Froggy called from her belt. ‘I haven’t had a fight in ages!’

  Annalise fastened her cloak and raised her hood. ‘sorry,’ she repeated. ‘But you must admit, he’s been very well-behaved all day…’

  Proctor rubbed his forehead, as if he had a blinding headache. He hadn’t, but he felt as if he ought to. Instead, his mind whirred like a washing machine on permanent spin cycle. Annalise, on the contrary, seemed calm, accepting, matter-offact. He wanted to kiss her again, but he couldn’t tell from her demeanour what she wanted, except to find Leon bloody Miller. However, every so often during the course of that day, she had casually touched him in a way that she hadn’t done before – extending her hand to be helped down steps, brushing up against him as they waited to cross a road, sitting that bit closer when they stopped to drink bottled water. Things had changed between them and Proctor was torn between the torturous anticipation of new intimacy with a fabulous-looking woman and the sure and certain knowledge that he should not be getting involved with her. Th
at knowledge, of course, only heightened his anticipation further. He also knew that he was dog-tired and that all he wanted out of life was a hotel room, a hot shower, a huge joint, a bottle of brandy and Annalise Palatine naked in his bed. Oh, and that stupid frog locked in a soundproof cupboard or, better still, stuffed in the nearest incinerator. Yet, here he was, in the chilly gloom of Clapham Common, fruitlessly searching for someone he didn’t particularly want to find.

  At eight o’clock that morning, after leaving the relative safety of their sleeper carriage in Euston Station, Proctor had deposited Annalise in a quiet corner and visited an internet café, where he had printed off a list of all the L. Millers in the Clapham area. There’d been five. Using a payphone, they had eliminated three. The fourth didn’t answer; the fifth was ex-directory. They had spent most of the day walking across the city. They had crossed the river at Waterloo and followed the South Bank, past the buskers, the human statues and the crowds queuing for the London Eye.

  When they had finally reached the expensive-looking street off Clapham Common, Annalise was sure of a result – it looked exactly the kind of place where a wealthy old film producer might live. But there was no one home, so they had watched the house for nearly three hours before the woman in the Saab convertible arrived to shatter their expectations. Now, they trudged wearily down Clapham High Street, towards the much less salubrious Clapham North; grass and trees gave way to cheap double-glazing, gaudy neon and dreary brown brick. The moon edged out from behind a black sponge of cloud, pale as a used slice of lemon. Following their A–Z, they entered a large, rundown complex of apartment blocks, littered with half-wrecked cars and knots of hard-faced youths in baseball caps and hoodies. They attracted stares but no direct challenges, looking, Proctor supposed, pretty rundown themselves – he too wore a baseball cap and Annalise a hood.

  ‘So how come you know this neighbourhood? It doesn’t seem your sort of style.’

  ‘Before my father died, I lived in a bedsit not far from here. I had nothing, but it was the happiest time of my life.’