by Iain Banks
You find a hose attached to a tap beside the doors; you remove the hose, throw one end over the breeze-block lintel of the empty pen, pull it through the chicken wire and tie it under his armpits. He makes a moaning noise as the hose tightens round his chest; you start to haul him upright, but the hose breaks and he falls back against the gate. "Shit," you say to yourself.
Eventually you have an idea. You lift the gate off its hinges and lay it down on the floor beside him. Then you roll him over onto it. He makes a noise somewhere between a moan and a snore.
You secure his wrists and ankles to the chicken wire with the plastic ties, using two at each point. You've tested the ties yourself; they look flimsy but you couldn't burst one when you tried, and you've seen US police on television use similar devices instead of handcuffs. Only you're not sure how strong the chicken wire is, so using two on each wrist and ankle and tying them round different hexagons in the wire seems a sensible precaution. The hounds are still barking intermittently, but they're making less fuss than they were. You use a length of the hose to tie his waist to the angle-iron strut that makes a Z-shape through the gate. You undo his belt and pull his trousers down; he has a deep tan from a holiday in Antigua last month, fading now. You haul and scrape the gate over to the wall of the empty pen, then you squat behind the top of the gate and heave it and him up, sucking in your breath and grunting and then pulling the gate up still further and then letting the top edge of the gate rest against the wall of the pen you took the gate from. The gate rests there at an angle of about sixty degrees.
He's starting to come round. You change your mind about letting him talk and take the electrical tape from your day-pack and bind it round his mouth and the back of his neck, through the wire, so that his head is held tight too. There is some blood leaking from under his long fair hair; it trickles down the nape of his neck and onto the collar of his shirt.
Then, while he's still making moaning noises through his nose, you take the two cut-out bits of newspaper and the little tube of glue from your day-pack and stick the articles onto the breeze-block wall straight across from him, one on either side of the gate. The dogs inside leap up and snarl at you as you do this, shaking the chicken wire.
The headline of the first article reads EX-MINISTER IN IRAN ARMS DEAL ROW, and in smaller writing underneath it says, "It was my judgement that the interests of the West would best be served if the Iran-Iraq War went on for as long as possible."
The headline of the second article reads PERSIMMON DEFENDS CLOSURE PLANS — "PRIMARY CONCERN SHAREHOLDERS', and underneath are the words, "1000 jobs go after only five years as grant runs out."
You wait for him to come round but he's taking a while. You were impressed by how far the house is from any others, and decide that rather than the silenced Browning you brought you will risk using the shotgun he was carrying in the back of the Range Rover. You go back out to the car and fetch the gun and a box of cartridges. You lock the door behind you again.
He's awake, though his eyes look glazed and uncoordinated. You nod to him as you walk up and stand in front of him, slotting a couple of the brown-red cartridges into the gun. His eyes move oddly as he tries to focus on you. You are wearing dark blue overalls and a skiing balaclava similar to the one you used in London. The gloves you're wearing are black ski-silks. The Rt Hon. Edwin Persimmon MP is mumbling behind the tape and still trying to focus on you. You wonder if you hit him too hard with the cosh, and whether you ought not just to do it with the gun here and now and forget about the rest because it will be quicker and less dangerous for you, but you decide to stick to the plan. It's important; it shows that you are not just some nutter, and the extra risk lifts you onto another plane of chance and luck.
You turn and go to the pen full of foxhounds; they start barking again. You work both barrels of the gun into one of the chicken-wire hexagons at about waist height, until the gun fits, then you angle it downwards, bend slightly so that your shoulder is firm behind the stock of the gun, and fire both barrels into the mass of snarling dogs.
The gun kicks against your shoulder. The noise is stupendous in the breeze-block space. Smoke rolls through the pen, where one dog lies blown in half, two more are lying prone and whimpering on the concrete and the rest are barking madly; several of them are running round furiously in tight circles, scattering straw. You break the gun; the cartridges pop out and one of them hits Mr Persimmon in the chest. His eyes are wide and he is shaking the chicken-wire gate he's tied to with all the might he can muster. You reload the gun without taking it out of the mesh, then aim more carefully and fire a barrel at a time, killing two more of the dogs outright and wounding three or four. The smoke is thick for a moment, and tastes acrid in your throat.
The dogs sound frenzied now, howling high and anguished. One of the animals is still running round all the time, but it keeps slipping on the blood. You reload and fire again, killing another two of the foxhounds, leaving maybe half a dozen of them still leaping up at the walls and barking. The one running round in a circle is bleeding from one back leg, but hasn't slowed down.
You turn to Mr Persimmon and pull the bottom of the balaclava up over your mouth, and above the squeals and the howls and the barks you shout, "They enjoy it really, you know!" and wink at him. Then you reload the gun and blast another couple of them. You avoid the one running round in circles because you've decided you like that one.
The smoke makes you cough. You put the gun down and take the Marttiini out from the sheath in your right sock. You go over to Mr Persimmon, who is still shaking the gate he's tied to as best he can. It starts to slide down the wall with a scraping, grating noise, and you haul it upright again. His eyes are very wide. There is a lot of sweat on his face. You feel quite sweaty too. It's a warm evening.
You've left the bottom of the balaclava up so he can see your mouth. You go close to him so that he can watch you only through his left eye, and over the whimpers and whines and the few weak, hoarse barks from the pen opposite, you say,
"In Tehran, in the main cemetery, they had a red fountain; a fountain of blood, to the martyrs who died in the war." You stare at him, and hear him trying to say or shout something, the noises coming down his nose sounding clogged and distant. You're not sure whether he's swearing at you or pleading with you. "Those found guilty of capital offences during the later stages of the war weren't shot or hung," you continue. "They were made to contribute to the war effort too."
You hold the knife up so he can see it. His eyes can't go any wider.
"They bled them to death," you tell him.
You crouch down in front of him and make a deep downward incision into his left thigh, opening the artery to the air. The scream comes down his nose as he shakes the chicken-wire frame. The bright blood pumps out and up, spattering onto your gloved hand and jetting upwards in a pink spray that soaks his underpants and rises as high as his face, freckling it with red. You alter your grip on the knife to cut into the other leg. He's rattling the chicken-wire gate for all he's worth but everything holds and the gate can't slide forward because you're squatting there in front of it, blocking it with your boots. His blood spurts fiercely, shining in the overhead lights. It runs down both his legs, and drips off his underpants; it runs down to the trousers round his ankles and soaks into them.
You stand up, reach forward and take the neatly folded handkerchief out of the breast pocket of his jacket, flick it open and wipe the blade of the Marttiini on it until the knife is clean. The knife comes from Finland; that's why its name has such a strange spelling. It hasn't occurred to you before, but its nationality seems appropriate now and even funny in a grim sort of way; it's Finnish and you've used it to finish Mr Persimmon.
The blood is slowing now. His eyes are still wide but they look glazed again. He has stopped struggling; his body hangs limply, though he's breathing hard. You think he might be crying but maybe it's just sweat on his face, which is very pale now.
You actually feel rather sorr
y for him because he's become just another dying man, and so you shrug and say,
"Oh, come on; it could have been worse."
You turn and pack your stuff away and leave him there, the blood only dribbling now, his skin very white beneath the tan.
Some of his blood has gathered on the concrete in front of him, and joins with the pool slowly spreading from the cage full of dead or whimpering dogs.
You put the lights out and hold the Browning up at your shoulder as you open the door and then check the grounds outside with the night sight.
I want to weep. I'm with Y but she's brought her husband along. They turned up together at the paper but when reception rang through they just said that she was there so I went skipping down the stairs like a kid on a promise and then I saw them together in reception standing looking at the display showing staff photographers" most recent efforts and my heart sank into my shoes. Yvonne; tall and lithe and sveltely muscular in a dark skirt and jacket. Silk shirt. Black hair short, trimmed to the nape in a new, even more severe haircut, but jutting peaked over her forehead. She turned to me just as my face was completing its fall. She smiled apologetically.
And William, turning too; broad, handsome face bursting into a grin when he sees me. William; blond as Yvonne is dark, built like an Olympic oarsman, perfect teeth, and a handshake like a gorilla.
"Cameron! Good to see you! Been too long. How are you? Okay?"
"Fine, fine," I said, smiling as sincerely as I could, nodding up at him. William is high as well as broad; he towers over me and I'm a shade over six foot. Yvonne put her hands on my shoulders and kissed my cheek; she's almost my height in her heels. Heels; she prefers flatties and only wears heels because they bring her ass up to the right level when I'm taking her from behind. As she brushed her lips across my cheek I smelled her perfume: Cinnabar; my favourite. I exchanged pleasantries thinking, So much for taking the afternoon off.
"Right." William clapped his hands together and rubbed them together. "Where are we going to go?"
"Well, I was thinking of just popping down to Viva Mexico…" I said (and almost added "as usual'), looking plaintively at Yvonne's bright red lips.
"Na," William said, grimacing. "I fancy some oysters. Let's go to the Cafe Royal, what d'you say?"
I said, "Umm…" I thought, Oysters…
"Our treat," Yvonne said, taking her husband's arm and smiling.
I met Yvonne and William at university, back in the cusp of these times, our years at Stirling neatly bracketing Thatcher's first and second victories.
They were doing business-studies courses. He was from Birmingham, though his parents were Scottish. She was from Bearsden, outside Glasgow. They met in the first week and were an item when I bumped into them in the sports pavilion a term later, one Saturday afternoon when William was about to play rugby and Yvonne was looking for a squash partner. I'd been waiting for my opponent — a guy from my media-studies course — to show for half an hour and was about to give up and head for the bar when Yvonne suggested we played each other. She thrashed me. We must have played a couple of hundred games over the years since then and I've beaten her exactly seven times, usually when she's been about to go down with — or is just recovering from — a cold or some other ailment. I blame the drugs, and the fact that, apart from the occasional athletic sex session with Yvonne, a fortnightly game of squash is about the only exercise I get.
Yvonne and I were just pals until she and William moved to Edinburgh three years ago and one time when William was away she and I met to go and see — of all things — Dangerous Liaisons, but never made it to the film because we just got drunk in the pub instead and somehow started kissing, and then in the taxi on the way back to Cheyne Street had to be told to cool it by the driver because we were practically fucking on the back seat. We got half a metre inside the front door of the flat then it was knickers down, trousers down, and a knee trembler against the wall, her head forced forward by the gas meter and my backside getting cold from the draught coming in through the letter-box.
We usually make it to the bed these days but it's been an interesting and varied physical relationship and Yvonne swears she does things with me she'd never even mention to William, whose predilections seem to begin and end with quite liking his wife to wear a basque and stockings. Considering he looks like such a broth of a boy it's slightly disappointing to be told he's squeamish about blow jobs and quite horrified — however politely and apologetically — at the idea of going down on Yvonne. So that, plus wrestling covered in baby oil, eating ice-cream from her vulva, pretend rape and bondage sodomy are all treats reserved for me, apparently.
So we're sitting in the Cafe Royal after a breezy walk down North Bridge and William has slipped a dozen live oysters down his throat (Yvonne and I had chowder) and we're talking computers because I use them and I'm interested in them and William works for a company that makes them; their Scottish manufacturing base is in South Queensferry but the company's HQ is in Maryland in the States. He was due to fly out there today but just as he was about to kiss the lovely Yvonne goodbye this morning and leave their delightful, triple-garaged, split-level lounged, sauna'd, jacuzzi'd executive villa with ensuite facilities and satellite dish set in an exclusive walled prestige development amongst mature trees with a residents-only country clubhouse, restaurant, pool, Nautilus gym, squash and tennis courts, he got a phone call telling him the trip had been postponed for a few days.
We're sitting at a table in a corner of the restaurant; William and Yvonne sit side-by-side on a green leather bench seat opposite and I'm on an ordinary chair, directly across from Yvonne. She's playing footsie with me under the table, her shoe off, her black nylon foot stroking my right calf. I'm assuming the starched white tablecloth is long enough to hide this.
Meanwhile I'm talking about 486s and clock-doublers and the up-coming P5 chip and CD-ROM and there are at least three things going on in my head because part of my brain's busy handling my conversation with William, another part is revelling in the sensations being produced by his wife's foot sliding up to my knee, giving me a monstrous erection under my napkin, and a third part is sort of sitting back listening to me talk to this cheery, affable man I'm cuckolding and it's thinking what a cool bastard I am, and how chatty, informed and charming I'm being while suffering this delicious, hidden, public, prick-engorging distraction. We're talking about multi-tasking and I almost want to say to him, "You want to know about multi-tasking? I'm doing it right now, pal."
Yvonne is looking just a little bored with all this computer talk, which is probably why she started fondling my leg in the first place. She's not into computers; she's into bankruptcy management. Straight from university she joined a small firm specialising in easing the death throes of failing businesses. She's been all over Britain doing this stuff and last year they made her a director. It's not a small firm any more. Growth industry.
She delicately stifles a yawn and sits back in her seat, and I take a sudden breath which I have to disguise with a cough as her foot suddenly slides up between my legs. I foolishly lift my napkin to dab my lips after the pretend cough, and Christ, there's her foot resting on the front of my seat, her stockinged toes flexing forward to stroke my cock through the material of my trousers. I put my napkin down again quickly and return to the subject of full-motion video from CD-ROM, hoping nobody saw her foot. I don't think so. Could have been embarrassing if there'd been a waiter nearby. I surreptitiously pull the tablecloth over my lap and her foot as well. She's sitting back in her seat grinning slightly at me, toes curling and uncurling as they stroke me.
I lift my champagne flute, nodding wisely at something William has just said.
"Anyway, must dash for a slash," he says, rising. Yvonne's foot tenses against my crotch, but she doesn't take it away.
Yvonne and I watch him go then we lean over the table towards each other at the same time.
"God, you look fuckable," I tell her.
"Mm-hmm," she says.
She shrugs. "Sorry about all this."
"Never mind. God, you look fuckable."
"Want to meet up the day he goes?"
"Yes," I gulp. "Yes yes yes."
"Take off your shoe and get your foot up between my legs," she says quietly. "I'm not wearing any knickers."
"Oh, Christ."
An hour later and I'm standing in the gents toilet back at the paper with my right sock wrapped round my dick, masturbating. The smell of the sock clings to the skin around my nose; before I wrapped it round my cock I sat sniffing it, hauling its scent deep into my lungs. This is the second wank I've had; I really was about to come as I sat there eating my lobster with Yvonne's foot stroking my crotch and my foot up her skirt. I had to excuse myself, withdraw my foot, get my shoe back on and walk awkwardly down to the gents in the Cafe Royal to pull myself off before I disgraced myself at the table. Barely had to touch the thing. This is taking only a little longer. The sock reeks with a fiercely erotic woman-scent. Thank God we were eating seafood. Yvonne… Ah, here we go…
"Cameron. You all right?"
"Fine, Frank."
"You look a bit pale."
"Feel all right."
"Good. Carse of Gowrie."
"Pardon?"
"Carse of Gowrie. You know; near Perth. Guess what the spell-check prefers?"
"I give in."
""Curse of Gorily"!"
"Stop it, you'll make me cry."
"There's a better one —»
"Look, Frank, I've really got to do some research," I tell him, grabbing a notebook and heading for the library. Hell, I have to work with the guy; better to stage a tactical retreat in the face of the utterly unamusing spell-check running-jape than lose the rag and tell Frank where to stick his software.