Conman

by Richard Asplin

  She held it out. We all stared at it.

  “Your passport?” Jane said. “Oh this gets better.”

  “Your bag’s in the cab. Are you coming?” Laura blinked timidly. God she was good at this.

  “Laura? Just – Tell … tell my wife. Tell her who you are. Cut this shit out right now.”

  “I don’t –”

  “Right NOW!” I screamed.

  Lana began to wail.

  “Tell her? I … I don’t understand. Has it worked? Did the plan work? Do we have his money?”

  “Not a penny,” Edward said, coming in from the hall, thumbing off the phone with a portly reptilian sneer. “Not an effing penny. My daughter caught me just in time. No emergency transfers, no money. Whatever you were pulling, you pair, you arsed it up. But you’ll pay for this. The police are on their way.”

  “Bastard …” Jane sniffed softly, voice cracking like a child. “You bloody … How could …” but the word was swallowed. Swallowed by a gulping wave of tears.

  “Jane. No Jane, wait,” I flustered, the world bending away, buckling, bucking me like a Rodeo. I reached for my family.

  “Let … go of me! Let go of me!” Jane bellowed, face collapsing, fingers tight and white about Lana, barging past me, thundering up the stairs.

  “Jane wait!”

  “Sweetheart,” Edward hollered. “Sweetheart, don’t let him …” and he turned to me, face torn with fury. “Oh you’ll pay for this. It’s been a long time coming, but you’ll pay for this.” Spittle popped and glistened on his ruddy chin. He turned with a waddle and began to puff up the stairs after his daughter. “Sweetheart, Daddy’s here …”

  “’Afternoon,” Laura smirked softly, leaning in. “How are ya?”

  I just stared at her blankly.

  “You want to say hello to the guys?” she whispered. “They’re all in the cab –”

  “Don’t –!” I hissed, spinning, spitting, eyes flashing, nose to nose. “Whatever you’re doing. Whatever this is? I … I want you to stop. I want you to stop now. This is my family.”

  “You ever worship someone? Adore them and not be adored back? It’s destroying.”

  “What?”

  “Your whole world. For three aching, lonely years?”

  “I don’t … what are you – ?”

  “C’mon, we did tell you, Neil. Portly chief executives, rolling chins in cashmere cardies,” Laura whispered. “Laying down wine and laying down nannies? You can’t be surprised?”

  “Oh God …”

  “That’s where the real juice is. Never had a problem they couldn’t solve with the flick of a Duofold and a wave of a secretary? Christopher did tell you.”

  “This whole …” The room began to swim again. I tasted coppery adrenaline, woozy and wet. “But … but wait,” my heart hammered and hammered. I felt my throat tighten. But not with fear. With excitement. Hope.

  With realisation.

  “Ha,” I barked. “Yes, ha! He never did it!”

  “Whom?”

  “Edward! HA! Nothing’s been lost! No transfer took place! Nothing’s been taken!”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Jane caught him in time. You’ve taken nothing!”

  “Money, you mean? Oh Neil …” Laura pouted, head cocked. She reached up and stroked my cheek tenderly, soothing, like a nurse. “Sweet thing, you really haven’t thought about this at all have you? Poor dear. Poor –”

  A distant muted thud from upstairs.

  Voices.

  “Oops,” Laura whispered, pinching my bottom. “Showtime.”

  “Get your fucking –”

  “Neil,” Laura whined suddenly, loudly, grabbing my sleeve. “Did it work? Did he do it? The money?”

  “Pity you never used any of this cunning at your real job, lad eh?” Edward boomed, appearing at the top of the stairs red-faced and wobbling, a scrap of paper in his hand, his daughter tucked safely behind. “Might have made something of yourself? Like father, like son though, eh?”

  Like father, like son.

  Of course the dame’s in on it. The dame’s always in on it …

  “Oh, I’ll have you for this. I’ll have you …”

  “Dad,” Jane sobbed as Edward began to judder down the stairs.

  “You’ll want this back will you? For your next trick? Your notes?” and he read aloud from the other side of Andrew’s tatty paper. “They were at least agonisingly … what’s this, agonisingly aware of the easy money in the vicinity, and convinced it was theirs for a few words in the right key. EBAY 5pm Less sleep. Less sleep. O’Shea. Breath mints. Matches. Zippo. Bic,” Edward growled, balling up the note. “I knew it. I knew it all along …”

  “Edward,” I protested. “Edward please, I … Jane. Jane I love you. I love you, please you have to believe me! I didn’t know anything about this. Any of this!”

  “Neil, Neil leave it,” Laura whined, tugging my sleeve again. “Let’s just go.”

  “Hoy!” Edward yelled, appearing at the bottom step, jabbing me hard with an aristocratic digit. “You stay away from my family, you hear?” Edward turned to face Laura. He looked her up and down, lip curled and loathing. “Told you he could make you rich, did he?”

  Laura looked at me. Then up the stairs where Jane sat, clutching the banisters, sobbing.

  “It was … it was all his plan,” Laura said with contempt. “He’s wanted out of the marriage for months but knew you’d cut him off without a penny. Said you’d bring the family lawyers in, take everything he had.”

  “Don’t,” I begged. “Don’t listen, Jane –”

  “So he said he’d come up with a scam. That I was to meet him here with his bags and the plane tickets.”

  “God. Oh God,” I screamed, world falling away from me, knees buckling, refusing to lock. I grabbed the banisters. “Please.” A hard, dry ache writhed about my insides, gripping them hard, leaning on my heart, my guts.

  “I’m sure you can tell the police all about it.”

  “Neil?” Laura said, touching my shoulder.

  “Get off me!” I bellowed. “Jane. Jane!”

  “Neil!” Laura shouted. “What’s … what’s going on? The plane. Forget the money. We’ll survive. We have each other …”

  “Jane –”

  “Neil!”

  “Jane please … I love you!” I said, throat fat and tight. “Jane. Jane please you have to believe me.”

  Laura was at the door, talking. Shouting.

  “Jane please. For Lana’s sake –”

  “What?” Jane sniffed, looking up. But not at me. Over my shoulder. Past me. She was looking at Laura. “What did you say?”

  “I said he can keep the watch. He can keep the watch but I’m going. I’m going now,” and Laura turned on her heel, wrenching open the door and marching down the steps into the November afternoon.

  “What watch?” Jane said, rubbing her tears with her sleeve.

  “I … I don’t know!” I said. “I don’t know what she’s talking about. I don’t know what anybody is –”

  “Give it to me,” Jane said, swallowing hard and standing, moving down the stairs.

  “Poppet, leave him,” Edward soothed. “Leave him, it’s all over now. Shhh.”

  But Jane kept coming. Towards me.

  Towards me.

  I hauled myself up, holding out my arms.

  “Jane. Jane please …”

  She pushed past her father, reaching out to me.

  “Oh God Jane,” I said, tears coming, tears brimming. But no. Jane grabbed my wrist, hard, twisting it, teeth bared.

  “Aghh! Jesus!” I yelped, knees buckling as Jane wrestled with the clasps on my chunky wristwatch. “Aghh!”

  She tore it from me, spinning away tearfully.

  “It’s … it’s just a fake,” I said, slumped, wrist stinging. “Christopher … It was part of a trick …”

  “A fake?” Jane sniffed. She turned and looked at me, holding the watch out. “Fak
e? This is …”

  “Poppet, easy now –”

  “This is about five grand’s worth of watch. She give this to you, did she?”

  “No. No, I swear on Lana’s life, no.”

  “On La –” and Jane’s jaw dropped, winded, stumbling backwards. “You … you …”

  Jane stared at me. She looked back at the watch I’d had on my wrist for two weeks. Warm and sweaty, dotted with blood. She turned it over, twisting it in the hall light to look at it more clearly.

  “What?” I said. “What?”

  “On Lana’s life, you said,” and Jane let go of the watch. It fell, almost in slow motion, tumbling like a gold ribbon, hitting the block wooden floor with a crack.

  Jane and her father turned from me, climbing the stairs.

  A siren pined somewhere in the distance.

  Swallowing hard, weak and shaking, I lifted the watch in trembling fingers, peering at the cracked, syrup-spattered face. Twelve diamonds glinted in the surface.

  I turned it over. To where an inscription was.

  Where one had always been.

  To Neil, it read. To count down the hours until we are together. Lx.

  I closed my eyes. Tight. Wanting more than I ever wanted anything, to awake somewhere else. At my desk, listening to Dionne Warwick. In my shop, John Williams rumpety-pumping on the stereo.

  Next to Jane and Lana in the chill blue cold of our Putney bedroom.

  I opened my eyes.

  Alone in a Chelsea hall.

  In the street I heard the bubbling rev of an engine.

  Eyes wet, vision dimpled with tears, I staggered up, turning, toppling out into the cold afternoon.

  The cab sat at the kerb, the back window crowded with shadows.

  You want to say hello to the guys?

  I fell down the front tiled steps and slapped across the pavement.

  You ever worship someone? Adore them and not be adored back?

  I stumbled towards the black doors.

  Your whole world. For three aching, lonely years. It’s destroying.

  I fell against the metal door. Angry. Angry, confused and tired. So very tired.

  “What ho old fruit,” Christopher beamed, pumping down the window releasing a sweet plume of pipe smoke. “Hoped you’d come to see us off. No hard feelings.”

  “What’s interesting about the whole procedure of course,” the smartly dressed gentleman at Christopher’s side piped up, gaily. “What your Watchdog and your Daily Mails don’t realise is that innocent parties are never involved. Oh they like to suggest those we catch out are poor victims. Poor me, they beat their breasts. Why me? But it’s drivel, of course. I mean imagine the logistics of picking marks at random. Poppycock.”

  He was a very smartly dressed gentleman.

  What my father would call, well spoken.

  A poofy fellah.

  “It’ll come out of your shirt by the way,” Andrew added. “The syrup. I did always love your shirts. Loved everything about you in fact. Long time ago, of course.”

  Andrew still had a little syrup on his lips. Some, for some reason, in his hair. I looked down. He had some on his hands too, but then that could have come from Christopher.

  What with them holding hands as tight as they were.

  “I told him,” Christopher cooed. “He’s a good-looking fellow. His wife? Jane? Buys him lotions and moisturisers. What with that and the gargantuan superhero groins and biceps on his walls. Well, it’s no wonder Andrew here spent three years hoping you’d …”

  “Oh don’t embarrass him,” Andrew said.

  “Wh …” I mouthed, lips dry, head thudding. “Wh …”

  “Why?” Andrew said. “Justice, dear boy. Man’s to mete out and man’s alone. Who else will even the eternal score? God?” and he smiled.

  I stepped away from the window, winded. Breathing tight and short.

  “Posit this. I love you and you don’t love me back,” Andrew said. “My whole world. For three aching, lonely years. It’s destroying. Agreed? Observe the sentencing though. I am destroyed, you are not. I am dejected, you are not. Is that fair? Is that justice?”

  “I … I didn’t –”

  “My act was to see beauty in another. To forgive faults and foibles and worship unconditionally. Yours to reject this worship. To ignore, to pity and to condescend. But it is I who is sentenced to spend the rest of my days alone. Outcast, a hole where my stomach used to be …”

  “Hole where your – ? Oh you do make a scene,” Christopher sighed, but Andrew pushed on.

  “In a world this crazy, someone must even out the score, don’t you think Neil? What was it you said? Revenge?”

  “Revenge?”

  “On he who forced me to grow up? Who stole everything, who turned me into this corporate machine.”

  “Me? You said you were … two people … Robbed. Two –”

  “They talked like I knew them. And they took everything. Everything that mattered.”

  “Shit. Shit no, Andrew please –”

  “One Christmas. No remorse. No hesitation.”

  As he spoke, Andrew reached into his jacket. One by one he removed his notebook, penknife, matches, Zippo, fountain pen and notebook, stacking them on the vinyl seat next to him.

  “Turned, just like that. Stripped me. Inside and out. Childlike, thoughtless and selfish. I was just a wreck. Physically. Mentally.”

  “Please Andrew, you never …”

  “Changed everything. How could it not? Just so angry. Found myself collapsing. Just sitting down on the floor, wherever I was. Shaking. That people could be so …”

  “Don’t,” I said. I blinked hot, frightened tears. “Please don’t. You have to come inside. Explain. Tell Jane …”

  “Ah, here we go,” and he produced a small box. He held it in his hand, turning it slowly. “I’ve never forgotten,” Andrew said. “They’ve never let me forget. And I’ll never stop hating them either.”

  A siren grew louder over the high Chelsea rooftops.

  “That was … that was a lifetime ago. How can you – ?”

  “Yes. Time. The greatest get-out clause in the world. Now it’s me who’s in the wrong. Me who’s the bad guy. All pity vanished. Suddenly I’m childish. Immature. Obsessive. Hung-up. Move on, man. It was a long-time-ago. Lighten-up, get over it. You’re off. Scot-free, screwing some other poor blighter. Leaving me to sit alone being pitied by my few remaining friends,” and he gave Christopher’s hand a tight squeeze.

  “It’s all … all been just revenge?”

  “Like you said, it’s a dirty word. But it’s what you deserve. The law of the street. Eye for an eye. You have to do it properly though, like I told you.”

  “Pr-properly?”

  “Painfully. A long, long life of misery and regret. Live with it. Make them suffer.”

  They both grinned. The engine revved, a tubby Irishman at the wheel. Bullish, stocky.

  A whisky barrel in a suit.

  I turned back to the house. Up the three tiled steps, at the wide front door, Edward stood, stubby arms folded across his chest. One of his chins up. Defensive. Protective.

  I would never see his daughter again.

  I would never see my daughter again.

  The siren was louder now.

  A long, long life of misery and regret.

  “Neil, sweetheart?” a voice said, the cab door sliding squeakily from my hands, engine revving again. “Neil? Before we go?”

  I turned back. Andrew was looking at me.

  Leaning forward.

  His hand was swathed in a tight, talcy surgeon’s glove.

  He held out a small velvet box.

  Live with it. Make them suffer.

  “Ten years late darling, but you might as well have this now,” and Andrew tossed it to me through the small window.

  I caught it in cold, shaking hands as the cab pulled away down the wide, quiet street.

  Quiet, but for Edward.

  Shouting m
y name.

  Over the sound of an approaching siren.

  now

  “Cheng? Cheng, it’s me again … No, no I’m still at The Atlas. Been telling my new friend here about the last … Has your buyer … ? Shit. He’s there … !? But I asked you, I begged you!? A few hours! I said, hold it for …”

  Hey, how long have you and I been … ? Right, right exactly.

  “Cheng? My friend here says it’s only been … but you promised! … Yes, yes I know, but I need it back! I told you, Edward and the police are talking about charging me with … I understand but I’m begging you. Please try and appreciate … it’s my one chance at … Then whatever they offer, I’ll beat it … Yes I know what I said a few hours ago, but why don’t you let me worry about the how … ? Okay. Okay ask him and call me back.”

  God.

  Sorry, sorry I’m getting … It’s just he has my one – barman? Another drink. And hey – one for my new best friend here?

  Sorry. I didn’t mean to … I’ve taken up enough of your –”

  Huh? Happened when?

  Well.

  They made me go back inside. The police, I mean. To Edward’s sitting room. Sat me down. Listened to Edward’s version of events.

  Jane stayed upstairs with Lana. Away from me.

  Christ, Jane.

  Where’s the phone, I should … Notebook, breath mints … I put it down –

  A-ha. I should try her again. Try and explain …

  Jane Jane Jane …

  It’s ringing.

  Listen, thanks for … well, for listening. I didn’t mean to –

  “Hello, hello Jane, I – ? Edward please. Don’t hang up. Let me talk to … I wouldn’t, I didn’t, I love her! It was all … I can prove it, please, just tell her to hold on. I’m waiting for … hello? Edward, are you – ? Edward?”

  Shit.

  I don’t know what I’m going to do if Cheng doesn’t –

  Ahh, drinks. Drinks, thanks so much. Cheers.

  S-Sorry, let me clear some … put all this stuff … letters … matches, my Zippo … there we go.

  God. Now I only hope I can trust Cheng. I mean who’d … who’d have thought it? That first day in halls. Unpacking. Putting up posters.