by Helen Zahavi
‘Which I’m not.’
She watched the movement on the screen.
‘You got it with you?’
‘The briefcase . . . ?’
‘The money.’
‘No.’
‘Oh.’
He slipped the hip-flask back in his pocket.
‘So I’ll be walking back to the car, see, carrying a good few grand, and I’m thinking: am I going to be mugged today? Is today my mugging day?’
‘You waste your brain on stuff like that?’
‘Course I do.’
‘But you’re a yob,’ she hissed.
He looked at her reproachfully.
‘Yobs have feelings too, you know.’
‘Well you needn’t worry.’
‘You reckon, do you?’
‘I mean you won’t be mugged. It’s not going to happen.’
‘Not ever?’
‘Never.’
‘You sure of that?’
‘I’m positive. I’ve got this feeling in my fanny.’
He smiled at her.
‘You been thinking of me?’
‘Each waking moment.’
‘I’m warming to you, darling. I’m liquefying, at this moment.’
‘Well don’t start dripping.’
He touched her cheek.
‘Such a sweet young face, and such a dirty mouth.’
‘Have I?’
‘What?’
‘A sweet, young face?’
He didn’t answer, just inched towards her.
‘You know what I’ve got to do now, my love?’
He began clicking his knuckles, perhaps out of habit.
‘Got to search you, sugar, so just relax.’
He was leaning over, blocking the picture.
‘Pat you down, then off we go.’
So slim she was, he could wrap a hand round both her wrists.
‘Pockets first, if you wouldn’t mind.’
You could almost hear his wideboy grin.
‘Then all your little nooks and crannies.’
She kept her eyes on the screen while he felt her. Kept them locked on the screen while his palms pressed over, and under, and slowly around. He frisked her very carefully, taking his time, a methodical man. Like kids they were, like a courting couple, clamped together in the dark.
‘Sorry, sweetheart, but I’m only checking. Have to be sure, see . . . ’
The brandy gusting from his mouth.
‘ . . . have to be certain.’
He slipped a hand beneath her skirt. A rueful shrug.
‘Henry’s orders, what can I tell you.’
His fingers brushed against her crotch.
‘Enjoy yourself, he said. You have a good time, he said. Just keep it tasteful, cause we don’t want any scenes, old son, we don’t want the punters getting distressed. That’s what we truly do not want.’
He pressed his mouth against her neck and murmured in her ear.
‘I mean we both know Henry, don’t we? Likes to observe the niceties, see. Got his sense of Fatman decorum. So I’ll do my best, I said. Anything for a mate, I said. So here we are, and away we go.’
He felt her moisten through the cotton and allowed himself a grunt of satisfaction.
‘Just remember, right? I’m not like Billy. Because I’ve always liked you, haven’t I? Basically, I mean. You know that, don’t you?’
‘That you like me?’
‘Deep down,’ he said.
‘Down where?’
‘Down there.’
The fingers wormed between her thighs.
‘Be mine,’ he breathed.
‘My heart belongs to Henry.’
‘But your cunt belongs to me.’
‘I want the colonel, not the corporal.’
‘Not a nice remark.’
She removed his hand and placed it in his lap.
‘Never said I was nice, Merv.’
He leaned his head towards her. Whispered in her ear.
‘You want to forget him, precious. He’s an old man, see, and they shouldn’t let the old do things like that. It’s what I’d class as out of order. Makes me shudder, frankly. Should be a law against it, if you want my opinion.’ He quietly sniffed. ‘And even if you don’t.’
‘You think you’d make me happy, Merv?’
‘I think you’d be ecstatic.’
‘And you’d do what I want . . . ?’
‘I’d do anything you asked.’
A cautious glance.
‘Within reason, that is.’
She nodded slowly. Sounded fair enough. She fixed her gaze on the screen, and said:
‘So you’d kiss it, would you?’
A sudden intake of wideboy breath as he mulled this over in his brain, and then he murmured:
‘Course I would.’
He smoothed down his tie and examined his nails.
‘You pay me enough, and I’ll kiss it for you.’
She shook her head.
‘I never pay for it, darling.’
He shrugged his shoulders.
‘And I never kiss it, sweetheart.’
They grinned at each other in the cossetting dark, almost friendly, almost bonding.
‘Glad you’re coming back,’ he said. ‘Thought maybe you wouldn’t, after what happened . . . ’
She looked confused.
‘Sorry, Merv? Miss something, did I?’
‘The other day,’ he prompted. ‘That bit of unpleasantness . . . ’
‘Oh, that.’ She pulled a face. ‘One of those things.’
‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘What I thought, too.’
He glanced at the screen. It was a kiddies’ movie, and he’d seen it before.
‘Hope Joey didn’t mind too much, cause it was just a laugh, see, a bit of fun. So I hope he’s not gone off in a sulk, hope he’s not going to be an arsehole . . . ’
Pause for unembarrassed burp.
‘ . . . no pun intended.’
Hot in there. He loosened his collar.
‘How is he, anyway? Bit green round the gills? Bit pink round the edges? Bit tender, is he? A bit inflamed? Because he should have used some Nivea, shouldn’t he. You tell him from me, so he’ll know for next time — he should smear on the cold-cream and it won’t be so bad. Just ponce along to Boots and buy himself a large-size tub. Tell him Mervyn said, and give him my best. We were mates, see, darling. That’s why I care.’
He slid himself down, made himself comfortable.
‘So tell me, darling, how’s your lad?’
A soft voice floated from behind:
‘Surviving.’
A nylon wire flicked through the air. Mervyn lifted slightly in his seat. His body gently arched, the legs began to tremble, and Joe was leaning forward, head bent low so he’s nearly butting, almost kissing, grinning hard through gritted teeth, quietly weeping as he pulled the cords, as he crossed his hands and pulled them tight.
The ripples spread along the seats and made them shake, as in a train. It felt like sitting in the train when it goes over the points, when two tracks merge and the wheels almost jump. The train begins to shudder as it cuts across the intersection, and you feel it in your seat, you feel the movement in your seat. It spreads across your back and between your legs, and everyone’s staring at the floor because the train’s vibrating in their crotch, which makes them happy, for a moment. Or at least contented, if they’re hard to please.
It didn’t take long, once Joey started. Ninety seconds, give or take. You’d think it might take longer, but it didn’t. Even someone like Mervyn, someone in a pale grey three-piece suit, with a fobwatch in his waistcoat pocket, in hand-made shoes and aftershave, with a tasty business up and running, a well-dressed yob with slicked-back hair, even such a man can still be snuffed out fairly quickly.
You have to get up right behind him, though. You’ve got to come up close behind, and you slip the cord around his neck and quickly pull it tight. But nice and smoothly, not
hing nasty. Then you listen to the sound he makes. You tilt your head, and cock an ear, and listen very carefully. The final, mortal gurgle of the one who held you down. And you realize something, if you’re Joey. Your brain kicks into gear again, and you realize something beautiful: They’ve always said revenge is sweet. But it’s more than sweet. It’s a crème brûlée.
He didn’t look like a dead man when they’d finished. People see what they expect to see, and you don’t expect to see a dead man in the Gaumont, Leicester Square. Comatose, perhaps, but not quite dead. She’d brought along the morning paper, and she covered his face, for decency. Then she slid a hand inside his jacket, fumbling for the holster. He hadn’t brought along his dosh, but he’d remembered to bring his automatic. Bastard hadn’t brought the money, but at least he’d brought his pistol, bless him.
She gave herself three blissful seconds to hold it in her hand — a loaded, matt-black pistol in her small and dainty hand — then dropped it in her bag and zipped it neatly shut.
‘We going, Joe?’
He didn’t answer. He took her by the arm and they walked up the aisle and into the foyer. Keep on moving, they’d agreed. Look self-absorbed, and don’t look back. So they’re quietly talking, almost smiling, just two young sweethearts on a date.
Into the street, and the comforting roar of a confident city, the reassuring stink of Leicester Square. She watched the girls go walking by. Not like me, she thought, they’re none of them like me, she thought. They haven’t sat there in the dark, with Mervyn’s thigh pressed hard against their own, with Mervyn’s smell, and Mervyn’s scent and Mervyn right beside them, and felt their lover strangle him, felt him be garrotted, felt the man they let inside pull tight on both the cords. Choke the air from Mervyn’s lungs. Snuff him out entirely.
Joe led her down a side-road, took a left, then left again, and they were in a yard, an unlocked space with cardboard boxes and polystyrene.
‘Where’s this?’ she said.
‘Just somewhere quiet.’
He had a bloodless face. Cadaverous, almost. Worse than Mervyn, if one’s honest. She touched his hand.
‘You all right?’
‘Yeah I’m all right.’
Pale blue sky and winter sun. Just him and her and an empty courtyard.
‘So what now, then, Joey?’
‘Thought we’d play a game.’
‘You mean another one?’
‘Yeah, another one.’
‘What kind of game?’
‘It’s called the can-be game. Know it, do you?’
She shook her head.
‘It’s simple, really, got very few rules. I mean it’s all a matter of who I can be. Cause I can be Joe, or I can be Henry.’
She gazed at him, at the broken mouth and the drained-out eyes.
‘Be Joey, Joey.’
His body seemed to shrivel. He became smaller, rounder, feminized. A sweet young boy, not one to take advantage.
‘May I kiss you?’
He held her hand so gently she could barely feel it, barely feel the pressure of his fingers on her skin. Didn’t press or rub against her, didn’t want to take what wasn’t freely given.
‘May I hold you?’
The one she loved, the self-effacing one she loved.
‘Be Henry, Joey.’
He wrapped his fingers in her hair, jerked back her head and jammed his broken mouth on hers. He pushed his tongue between her teeth and rubbed his groin, his hard, hot groin, against her crotch. Then he pressed her back against the wall, pulled down her tights and pushed himself inside, he shoved himself inside, he pressed his mouth against her neck and tunnelled his way inside.
* * *
CHAPTER 24
Billy eyed the daughter uneasily. Every time she passed she seemed to brush against him. Nothing obvious, not so close he could shove her off. Not her, he thought, too fucking smart. She’d just sidle past and brush him with her fingers, sometimes with her hips, her large and generous hips, which made it even worse. So Rubenesque she was it made him want to gag, just stick his fingers down his throat and gently retch. For he didn’t like them round like that. The curves got on his nerves.
He’d parked his car down the Lambeth Road, and was saying hello to Albert, passing the time of day in Albert’s Cash-and-Carry. Bonding, so to speak. He always went there, of a Friday. Nice and regular, never fail. Every week, come rain or shine, like a healthy bowel movement. Bit of certainty in an uncertain world. You wanted Billy on a Friday, you had to shoot across the water, you had to trickle down to Lambeth, for there the lad would be.
So he’s in the office behind the shop, nursing a mug of milky tea and eyeing the plate of assorted biscuits. A small heap of banknotes lay on the desk, a little pile of tens and twenties waiting for collection. Old man Albert was sitting opposite, holding his cup while his daughter poured.
‘Enough!’ he hissed. ‘I said enough!’
She banged the teapot down. Lulu, her name was, the skinhead reflected. A touch assertive, unlike her dad. Lulu by name, and lulu by nature. Chestnut hair, which she combed a lot. Fourteen years old and a total pubescent. Hormones, he shuddered. Excessive secretions. When he stole a glance to check if she’d grown, he found her gazing back at him. Got a cheek, he thought. Got a fucking nerve.
‘All right, then, Lulu?’
‘Fine, thanks, Billy.’
The tea was burning him through the mug.
‘School nice, is it?’
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Did Social Trends, today. About gangs and stuff, and why people join.’
‘What did teacher say?’
A bell came ringing through the wall as the shop-door opened.
‘He said it’s because of alienation.’
‘Good word, that . . . ’
‘Peer-group pressure, and the need to bond.’
‘You swallow the textbook?’
‘Is it right, though, Billy?’
He spread his legs, leaned back in the chair.
‘What d’you reckon, sweetheart?’
She thought about it for a moment.
‘I think you just like hitting people.’
He grinned at her.
‘You on the till, are you?’
‘Might be,’ she said.
‘Cause you better get back, then.’
‘You think so, do you?’
‘Better not keep the punters waiting.’
She tossed her hair.
‘I never keep them waiting, Billy. Wouldn’t do that, see. Not to a punter.’
And she gave him the benefit of her schoolgirl smile, edged slowly out and pulled the door shut behind her. Billy stared across the desk.
‘You want to watch her, Albert.’
‘Don’t I know it.’
Billy sometimes wondered what would happen if the old man died, and the girl took over. He’d never collected from a tart before, and he wondered what he’d have to do if she started proving troublesome. He had his standards, and he wasn’t one for hitting women, unless they really asked for it. Whatever they might say, he did his best to let them be. But if they begged for it, if their names were Donna bitch and they went down on their knees and begged, he was always ready to do his duty, he’d do his best to be obliging.
A sudden recollection of an unploughed field in Hertfordshire. The field, the mist, the grinning boys. The slap of skinhead palm on tender girly cheek. The reddening face, the swelling mouth. He found the vision immensely pleasing and reached for some strawberry sponge. Fragility, he told himself. Can’t beat it.
‘Turned out nice,’ Albert murmured. ‘Bit of winter sun, eh? Can’t be bad, Bill, can it.’
‘Billy.’
‘Can’t be bad, Billy, can it.’
‘No.’
The shopkeeper’s eyes were running again. Every winter they started to water, and every summer the tear-ducts dried up. Flood and drought, the skinhead realized. Like in the Bible. He sipped his tea. The steam was flowing up his f
ace, and his feet were sweating inside his boots. It worried him, when that occurred. He’d read this article on jungle-warfare, how squaddies got infected feet. Wet-foot, as the paper called it. They got a kind of fungus between their toes, and he hated things like that. You ended up lying flat on your back, stuffed with drugs and completely helpless. And all those nurses, prodding with their nursey hands. He put the mug down and eyed the money.
‘Doesn’t look like much there, Albert. Recession’s over, or haven’t you heard?’
‘I got overheads, haven’t I.’
Billy sighed.
‘We’ve all got those.’
Albert spooned some sugar into his cup.
‘There’s some boys,’ he muttered, ‘little bastards.’
‘What boys, Albert?’
The man stirred his tea, lowered his voice.
‘Hooligan types, if you know what I mean.’
The skinhead nodded. He knew what he meant.
‘I mean they walk right in and help themselves.’
‘It’s a cash-and-carry. You got a sign outside.’
‘But they’re all carry, aren’t they. Not a lot of cash, see?’
‘How much they taking?’
‘Varies.’
‘Roughly . . . ’
Albert narrowed his eyes.
‘About four hundred.’
‘A month?’
‘A week.’ Albert shook his head. ‘Four whole ton a fucking week. I got a problem, here, Billy. You know what I’m saying?’
‘I hear you, Albert, but what can I do? It’s the area, see. It’s a rough old place. You ought to set up somewhere nice, somewhere where you won’t get hassle.’
Albert shrugged.
‘Like where?’
‘Like . . . ’
Billy dredged his brain for images of niceness and gentility. The names of suburbs loomed inside his head, while market towns enticed him with their wholesomeness. Finally he muttered:
‘Cheltenham.’
‘But I’m here, son, aren’t I. My business is here, and my problem is here, and I’m meant to be getting protection, see.’
The skinhead lifted a warning finger.
‘You complaining?’
‘I’m not complaining. Just losing money.’
Billy shrugged.
‘Money isn’t everything.’
Albert stared, mid-swallow.
‘You made a joke, there, Billy.’