Espedair Street

by Iain Banks

  Maybe I should go up and see if she'd ever been a fan of Frozen Gold; she was talking to a couple of guys, but neither of them seemed to be all that close to her; I might — what was I thinking of? I put my glass down, frowning at it. Perhaps I had had quite a lot to drink. I usually only started thinking about accosting women and telling them I had been a famous rock star right at the end of an evening, mercifully shortly before the stage of total oblivion.

  Dammit, I felt pretty good. It wasn't fair of God or evolution or whatever to make drink so pleasant when it does you so much harm. I decided to slow down a bit; cocktails can be misleading.

  McCann came back to find me staring, mystified, at six large glasses full of drink. 'Did ye get some fur me too?' he said, sitting.

  'Ordered twice,' I explained.

  'Ah know that; ye ordered two roons; but ye've got three.' I scratched my head.

  'Waitress,' I said. Apparently I had ordered another round from that waitress, after all. I couldn't remember this, but it was the same waitress, and the right drinks, and she insisted I had ordered it, so...

  'Ye daft bugger,' McCann said, and attacked the first of the waiting triad of Killer Zombies. I shrugged and sighed, then launched into a Manhattan, vaguely wondering whether some cider ought to be included in the recipe, to make the connection with the Big Apple more obvious.

  Maybe not.

  The woman I'd seen at the bar was still there. Other foot on the brass rail now. Bum still glorious. Soft curvings. Peaches and apples and buns and bums, I thought, wandering. God almighty, women look so good. How do they do that?

  I stood in a bathroom in Jamaica once, naked, doing bodybuilder poses in front of the mirror for a laugh while Inez took off her make-up. I sucked in my belly and clasped my hands under my ribcage in that sort of over-and-under grip body-builders use, then swivelled on the ball of one foot and put one leg out to the rear, flexing the muscles on my arms. Inez sloshed water over her apricot scrub. I held my pose for a few seconds, looking at my patchy brown-white nakedness, then relaxed, and stood facing the mirror and shaking my head at my reflection. I looked myself up and down.

  'You know,' I said to Inez. 'When I look at the male body -' naked, especially — I wonder how on earth women can take men seriously.'

  Inez looked up for an instant, and made a snorting noise. 'What makes you think we do?' she said.

  I hope I looked suitably hurt.

  'Doan't you fuckin give me that shit, sonny!' McCann shouted.

  I was jerked out of my reminiscences. My eyes were still focused on the bit of the bar where the woman with the wonderful rear-end had been, but she'd gone. McCann was turned away from me, arguing with somebody sitting to our right. I was sober enough even then to think oh-oh.

  I looked over. McCann was face-to-face with a young man wearing glasses. 'Ah, away home, ye old fool! Don't...'

  'Less aw this "old", ye wee basturt! Don't you fuckin call me "old"!'

  The young man with the glasses turned to his mates, nodding back towards McCann. 'Fuckin calls me "sonny" then tells me not to call him "old"!' His two pals shook their heads. I could tell McCann was seething. I glanced around; a few people were looking at us, but so far the whole place hadn't started going quiet — always a bad sign — and the horizon was still clear of bouncers. The place was crowded and noisy enough to cover a minor verbal skirmish. Still time to get McCann away quietly.

  He sat forward, wagging one finger at the guy with the glasses. 'It's that sort of stupit, defeatist attitude like yours that plays right intae the hands of that fascist bitch!'

  I tugged at McCann's sleeve, but he ignored me, and with his other hand wiped his mouth free of some spittle. 'Aye, an dinnae you smile like that an look at yer mates either, laddie; Ah know whit Ah'm talkin aboot, which is mair than you do, Ah'll tell ye! Fuckin coalition... coalition?; just anuthir fuckin disaster fur the wurkin class...'

  'Ach, away ye go ...' The young guy waved his hand dismissively at McCann. I tried to pull him round to look at me.

  'McCann...' I said. McCann fended me off with his elbow; I still had a grip of his sleeve, and the shrugging motion he made pulled one side of his jacket off, showing his shirted shoulder beneath.

  So it was my own fault, I guess. Because (a) it must have looked to the young guy as if McCann was taking off his jacket for a fight, and (b) I pulled back at McCann's sleeve again (and noticed that the place was now going quiet, and that there was a large person in a dinner jacket making full speed through the parting sea of heads and shoulders towards us), and when McCann shrugged and pulled again, and looked half-round towards me, I was distracted by the bouncer steaming at full tilt towards us — with another now in his wake — and slackened my grip on McCann's sleeve.

  His arm, released, shot forward, and his fist connected with the face of the guy with the glasses. Hardly a punch at all; barely enough weight behind it to knock the guy's glasses off. In a less fraught situation we might have dealt with it, explained it, apologised, bought the bloke a drink, had a more sensible and measured discussion about the merits or otherwise of coalition governments...

  But no; instead, pandemonium.

  The bloke with the glasses reeled back a bit, more surprised than hurt; his two pals stood up and the nearest one reached over and swung at McCann, landing a smack on the man's head which lost some effect because it was at maximum range. McCann reared up and leaned forward, bringing the man who'd hit him well within reach; a left hook floored him; or at least tabled him; he went flying onto a table full of drink and rolled onto the laps of some shrieking girls.

  The man with the glasses was down on the floor, looking for them. I grabbed McCann from behind, under the oxters. This was partly to stop him hitting anybody else, and partly to drag him out of the way of the second pal of the bloke still scrabbling around on the floor; this guy — bearded, red haired — threw their table out of the way and charged at McCann.

  The table he threw caught the second bouncer right in the balls. I thought these guys all wore cricket boxes, but this one certainly didn't. He folded. The first bouncer was right in front of McCann; I hadn't seen him. I was still holding McCann under the shoulders, pulling him back so hard I was starting to fall over; I could feel the chair behind me starting to tip and slide, but there was nothing I could do about it.

  The bouncer put his hands out towards McCann's lapels. I had a sudden image of McCann having reverted to his old habits without telling me, and of the bouncer burying fish hooks in his fingers... but he didn't get the chance; McCann, arms trapped, used his legs as we fell back; one foot came up and cracked the bouncer under the jaw. He fell, we fell, and the guy who'd cracked the other bouncer in the goolies dived straight through the gap between us, right into the heavy wooden back of another chair.

  I rolled over on the floor as McCann wriggled free and jumped up. People were shouting and screaming and grabbing coats and drinks; some were leaving. The bearded guy was on his feet again and squaring up to McCann, while the guy with the glasses was getting ready to punch him from behind. I kicked a fallen table over at him, which distracted him. One of the bouncers was making weak moves to get at McCann and the other man. The guy with the glasses threw himself at me.

  Things were getting out of hand.

  I fended the guy off with one hand, deflecting him across an area of clear floor; he rolled across the carpet and skittled a couple of men over. I looked round to see McCann holding a chair over his head, back to the glass wall of the mermaid pool. The guy with the beard had found a fire extinguisher from somewhere; he heaved it at McCann, but it missed and slammed into the glass behind him.

  I half-expected the wall of glass to smash and fill the whole place with water, but it didn't happen. McCann retaliated with his own heavy artillery, chucking the chair back, catching the bearded man across one arm. Another bouncer made a flying rugby tackle at McCann, but hadn't allowed for the reaction from throwing the chair; as McCann went back against the glass, t
he bouncer shot across his bows and rammed a table with his face.

  Somebody crashed into me from behind; I fell over one of the bouncers. A foot caught me in the ribs and something landed on the side of my face; I jumped up, swinging wildly with both fists as people piled out of the place around me and bottles, glasses and chairs flew about; one glass went spinning up to disintegrate against a ceiling fan, showering the place with splinters.

  McCann was in the centre of the room again, trading punches with a bouncer at least a foot taller than him. Somebody bowled into me and I ended up on the floor once more; a table crashed down, narrowly missing my head; I punched a guy swinging at me with a champagne bottle — those things are heavy, let me tell you — and struggled up again.

  One of the ceiling fans — the one hit by the glass, I think — took a direct hit from a bar stool and fell; it dropped almost to the floor then jerked to a stop on its flex, bringing a shower of black and white plaster flakes crashing down. Incredibly, it was still slowly spinning, and the blades scraped rhythmically over the arm of a chair and the shard-covered surface of a table.

  McCann leapt up and butted his bouncer, flooring him. I ducked as somebody threw a glass at me from an emergency exit.

  There weren't very many of us left now; everybody seemed to have left. The bodies on the floor outnumbered those of us left standing. I saw four or five black-suited figures gathering behind the bar, and turned to McCann — dishevelled, and bleeding badly from the side of his head — to tell him to get out, but saw the man with the beard coming up from behind, a broken glass in his hand.

  There wasn't time to shout, but McCann must have seen the look on my face; he turned and caught the guy's hand, punched him in the belly, sending him back against the glass of the tank, cracking his head against it, then went to butt him.

  Maybe the blood from McCann's cut forehead had got into his eyes, I don't know. He didn't seem to see the bearded man slide unconscious down the glass and onto the carpet; McCann's head went swiping forward and crunched into the plate-glass wall of the pool.

  It cracked. There was a noise like a rifle shot, and I thought for an instant that it was the sound of McCann's skull splitting, then a line flicked up the glass wall, from top to bottom, and a thin, hissing spray of water leapt out at McCann's legs and torso.

  He swayed, dazed, and his legs started to go.

  I ran up to him, grabbed him as he slumped and got one of his arms over my shoulder. I half-knelt, then lifted and straightened, pulling McCann up again. I turned for the nearest exit.

  The four or five bouncers at the bar had become six, including a small, very angry looking guy who I suspected was the manager.

  They weren't behind the bar any longer; they were standing in a rough semi-circle in front of us, and three of them were holding pickaxe handles. A fourth one held what looked like the long lead weight out of a sash window. Number five slid a knuckleduster onto his large right fist.

  The manager was armed only with a cigar and a look of quivering, apoplectic fury.

  I wanted to swallow, but my throat had gone dry. McCann stirred, drew himself upright and wiped some blood from his face. The hiss of escaping water filled the bright space behind us with white noise. The still-spinning ceiling fan scraped laboriously across table and seat arm, grating on fragments of glass and highlighting the silence in the empty club with a hesitant beat like brushes on a snare drum.

  The manager looked at us. McCann took his arm from over my shoulder. A frightened-looking waiter closed an opened emergency exit. The bouncers moved just a little closer. Another got up from the floor, coughing. The manager looked round at him, then back at us. The backs of my legs were wet; either I'd pissed myself or the leak from the pool was soaking my trousers. McCann stooped suddenly and came back up brandishing a lager bottle. 'Never mind, Jim,' he whispered throatily, 'we'll sell ourselves dearly.'

  'Oh, Jesus,' somebody moaned.

  I think it was me.

  'Youse,' the manager said, pointing at me and McCann with his cigar just in case we thought he was talking to the bouncers, and seeming to have some difficulty controlling his voice, 'are go an tae regret this.'

  I wondered if they'd let us go if we told them we already did.

  The bouncers took a step forward. McCann snarled and without taking his eyes off them, flicked his arm back, smashing the lager bottle against the glass of the pool. The hissing sound didn't alter.

  I was listening desperately for the sounds of approaching sirens, but there weren't any, just that hiss from behind, and the scraping of the dangling, lopsided fan, like the noise of a nonautomatic record-arm at the end of a record.

  McCann brought the jagged-ended bottle back round in front of him and brandished it at the bouncers. They just smiled. The three with the pickaxe handles hefted them. The manager turned away. McCann's hand holding the broken bottle was shaking.

  'Wait!' I shouted, and reached inside my coat with my right hand.

  Everybody froze.

  It took me a second or two — as I fumbled inside my jacket pocket— to work out that they thought I might have a gun.

  It crossed my mind to try and carry on the bluff, but I knew it wouldn't work; they'd have to see a gun, and I didn't have one. I found what I was looking for and pulled them out.

  Charge cards.

  I flourished them at the manager. He shook his head once and turned away. The bouncers looked angry and started forward.

  'No!' I screamed. 'Look; this is a platinum Amex card! I can pay!'

  The bouncers hesitated; the manager looked round again, then came forward. 'Whit?' he said, then grimaced. 'What?' He said, more carefully. I gulped, waved the bits of plastic fiercely.

  'Platinum! I swear! And the Diner's Club; they'll confirm... just call them up. I promise; just ask. There's a number you can call, isn't there? Just ask them! Please! This wasn't our fault, honestly, but I'll pay for it! All of it! Just call up! A couple of minutes; if they don't say it's all right you can let these guys do anything you like to us, but just ask, just call up!'

  The manager looked unimpressed. He looked around the deserted, shattered club. 'Do you realise how much this is goan tae cost?'

  'I can afford it! I swear to God!' I tried not to shriek too much. McCann was taking no notice. He was trying to stare down three of the bouncers at once, and growling every now and again.

  'See that windae, on that pool?' The manager said, nodding behind us. I didn't take my eyes off him, but I nodded. 'That windae alone cost twenty grand.'

  'Call it thirty! ' I shouted, and gave a sort of anguished, hysterical cackle. 'Say fifty for the lot!'

  The man looked as though he was about to spit at us, or just shake his head and walk away and leave us to the bouncers, but I took a very tentative step forward, and with one hand outstretched, offered him the cards. He peered at them, then did shake his head, snatched the plastics from my grasp and headed for the bar. 'Don't let them move,' he muttered. The bouncers relaxed fractionally and just stood looking at us. I suddenly knew how a dying wildebeeste feels, surrounded by vultures.

  'There's no point in this,' McCann whispered hoarsely from out of the side of his mouth. 'Might as well get it over with now as later.' He rocked forward on the balls of his feet. I heard myself whimper; I grabbed him by one shoulder, still not taking my eyes off the bouncers, who were looking very alert again.

  'Oh God, please don't do anything, McCann,' I pleaded. 'Just wait a minute, will you? Please?' McCann shook his head and growled, but didn't do anything else. I could hear the manager talking somewhere behind the bar.

  The next couple of minutes passed with a glutinous slowness. The hiss of escaping water behind us didn't change, and the slow four-beat scrape of the wrecked fan seemed to drag time out like entrails from some sacrificial victim. The carpet under our feet slowly soaked with water from the pool behind us. The bouncers were starting to look impatient.

  The manager came back.

  M
y heart beat in time to the fallen fan, shaking my whole body. Felt like you could have heard it in London. The manager looked ill. Pale. I looked down at his hands. He was holding my cards, and an Amex voucher.

  A wave of relief swept through me with the intensity of an orgasm. 'Mr Weir?' the manager said, clearing his throat on the words. I nodded. 'Will you and your... friend come with me , please?'

  My knees almost gave way. I felt like crying. McCann started, and looked at me disbelievingly. One of the bouncers stared at the manager. The little man with the cigar shrugged, nodding at me and holding up the Amex card. 'Yer man here could buy the whole fuckin club...' he said. He sounded tired, almost sad.

  'With either card.' McCann dropped the broken bottle and stared at me, open-mouthed.

  'What did we say? Fifty thousand?' The manager bit on his cigar, seemed to hesitate. 'Plus VAT,' he said, as though swearing. I thought about quibbling, but didn't. The bouncer who'd got the table in the balls right at the start of the fracas had recovered and was leaning beside me on the bar as I filled out the Amex voucher (I checked the figures carefully; Jesus, even I hadn't filled one out for this much before).

  'That's amazin,' the bouncer said, dabbing at a small cut on his forehead with a napkin. 'Ah've got all your albums, know that?'

  I re-checked the voucher, nodded. 'Oh, aye?'

  'Aye; Ah went tae all yer concerts at the Apollo; an that wan at Barrowlands, remember?' I nodded. 'An the two in the Usher Hall; seventy-nine, that wiz, aye?'

  'Eighty, I think,' I said.

  The big guy nodded happily. 'Aye; Ah used tae think you guys wiz great. An you were really brilliant; you used to write the songs, didn't ye?'

  'Some,' I said, finally signing away fifty-seven and a half grand.

  I glanced over at where McCann was sitting on a bar stool, one of the waitresses sticking a plaster onto his head. He was looking at me with an expression I couldn't read.

  'Na; you wrote them all, didn't ye?' The bouncer by my sideinsisted. 'Aw those other names were just fur a laugh, were they no?'