by Ivan Pope
‘I don’t look after them all myself. Well, really I sell them on, but I keep an eye on them.’
‘Are they slaves?’
‘Most of them I guess you could call working girls. For sure, they aren’t really expecting such a hard life, but that’s their problem. If they fight too much, they become keepen. Or worse.
‘This trade started because there were more girls than we knew what to do with. Now they have more protection and there are fewer. They are less stupid, so we have to work harder. There are laws, they keep introducing laws. It’s no fucking good, they can get all the laws they want, it won’t stop. Fucking EU.’
He was losing it. Allen wanted the real story, not a paranoid rant. He thought that Roger might have been taking his own drugs. He had never heard such a confession from a trafficker. He was fascinated but didn’t know where this would go.
‘What do you get from it?’ he said.
‘Money,’ said Roger. ‘Money and satisfaction. You know I worked for the government?’ he said. ‘I was a good boy. I went to my university, even though my father said I never would. I made a new life, I invented myself, got a good job in the service. You can’t even imagine how set up I was. Even today, I could walk into many drawing rooms, private dining rooms, where the power happens, and it would be as if nothing has changed. Good old Roger, they would say, he has been away. How are you Roger, how are things?’
‘Shit happens,’ said Allen. He knew what had happened. Roger had done a stretch as a sex offender. If people didn’t care it was because they didn’t know the real Roger.
‘What happened,’ said Roger, ‘is that I got tricked and trapped. That, and my own fucking needs.’
He leered over the word needs, pushing Allen to read a lifetime of depravity into that single word.
‘What happens is that thousands of men, women and children get brought into this country every year. They come in lorries, in cars, in aeroplanes, in ships. They come because they want to come, and they come although they don’t want to come. They come to work and they come to marry, but mostly they come to fuck – even if they don’t know that. It’s all about money. They come from the poorest countries there are. Don’t think they’re queuing up from rich places to come in with me – there are other routes for those people. These people come in if they want to or don’t want to. Sometimes someone else wants them to come in, they’re just the contraband.’
Roger was sweating heavily, it dripped around his collar.
‘I provide a service to the shittest of the shit. Don’t get me wrong, they are good people. The girls don’t argue. Once they are in, they mostly get passed on and I never hear from them again.’
Unless you own them, thought Allen. ‘Mostly?’
‘Unless I own them,’ said Roger.
Allen saw that Roger had created a sacrament around trapped people, that the souls in his caves were there for some almost holy reason. They were sacred places where his followers could worship. But what a bunch of followers, the dross of a post-industrial Europe, fucked-up labourers and professionals with the same calling. They told each other that there was some validity to this behaviour, that a higher calling cancelled out the evil they did. But Roger was adamant that he’d created something new in the world, and something not new.
‘It’s an old, old practice. It comes from ancient times. You have to understand that. Originally it was voluntary but in time it had to become involuntary, of course.’
The others caught up with them and Roger swiftly stopped talking. After that it ran from good to bad, as it so often had in his past. As the alcohol kicked in, Allen got into a big argument with a tall, muscular man called Carlos, though neither could really understand what the other was saying. It was one of those very drunken arguments where the original point is soon lost.
‘Anyway,’ he said, ‘Roger likes you.’
Allen had moved on from caring, resting his head on his arm on the wet table, but that sentence brought him back into the room.
‘What?’ he drawled.
‘He never invited a real outsider in before. Will he be showing you his keepens?’
Allen grunted, pretending disinterest. ‘I didn’t know he had any,’ he said.
‘Oh yes,’ Carlos said. ‘He’s got a whole zoo, under his flat.’
Now Allen’s ears were pricked awake. ‘Under the flat?’ he said.
‘Well, you see, downstairs,’ said Carlos. Carlos looked nervously across at Roger but he was deep in loud conversation, shouting to be heard above the music. Allen didn’t see – couldn’t see – how that would work. He knew he was too inebriated to think, but he put the knowledge away for the morning, telling himself he’d better fucking remember.
Then they were up and there was another bar, even smaller, crowded with stony-faced men in leather jackets. Here they drank a strong aniseed spirit in small glasses, throwing them back every few minutes.
‘The motherland,’ shouted a ruddy-faced drunkard in a leather coat. ‘The motherland,’ his party responded and they downed their shots. ‘And fuck the Jews,’ countered the drunkard, but they ignored him.
Allen’s grasp on the world, and later his memory, slipped from this point on. They were stumbling down a dark street, he and Roger, holding each other up.
‘Whereiswe, wherethefuckiswe,’ he slurred over and over until Roger told him to shut up.
At one point he woke up in a doorway that smelled of piss, all alone. He jumped up in fear and staggered out into the road. Catching sight of Roger outside a brightly lit shop, he shouted, ‘Fuckyou, what you doing?’ at him.
Roger gestured with a wrapped food item. Allen could feel the ocean of alcohol he was swimming in. He felt sick and knew that later this was going to hurt.
He came to on the couch in Roger’s flat, covered in a big heavy piece of material. He was wearing underpants, T-shirt and socks. He swung his legs off the couch and stood unsteadily, his bladder pressing upon him with its urgency. He felt his way around the walls and into the short corridor, and a grey light.
At the toilet he stood streaming piss, small, sicky shivers running through him. He steadied himself with an outstretched hand on the wall and he knew that if he pissed for any longer, he would throw up where he stood.
Finally, it was over. He straightened up and turned slowly around. The woman, Alicia, stood there in the hallway, in the dim grey light, colourless and naked, her small breasts and black slash of pubic hair exposed in the early morning light. He stared at her, feeling the huge sadness and unreachable fear welling. Then he turned unsteadily and lurched past her, back onto the couch where sleep quickly took him again.
He woke to find her knelt in front of the couch, her mouth around his dick, working the flaccid flesh. He pushed her away and turned his back.
Blackness. Morning.
Allen woke with the dawn light and the usual hangover, and could not return to the void of sleep. He looked around the flat. His jeans were folded neatly on a chair. He had no idea who had put him to bed. Probably Roger, he thought, more likely that woman, Alicia. In the unfamiliar flat he slowly worked himself upright and shuffled across the room to the kitchen. It was clean and tidy, every surface wiped down. Copious glasses and mugs sat in a cabinet. He was used to waking up in filthy flats filled with a jumble of dirty crockery – this one was a pleasure, if anything with a raging hangover could be described as such. Finding a glass, he filled it with water and drank deep. The water had an unfamiliar tang, something chemical but not too unpleasant. He wanted his co-codamol, his headache pills, something for this ache, but knew he’d forgotten to bring any with him. That was par for the course, never the thing you wanted when you wanted it.
Finding his way back over to the sofa where he’d spent the night, he looked for his watch and found it stuffed under a cushion. He lay back full length and closed his eyes, willing sleep to return. Nausea swept over him again and again, but just as he thought a dash to the toilet was becoming inevitable, he
unexpectedly lapsed into sleep.
When he woke again, Roger was sitting in an armchair at the foot of the sofa holding a cup of tea. He nodded down to the floor and said, ‘I made one for you.’
Allen’s phone rang. He scrabbled around for it in his trouser pocket. Emily. Desperate not to sound hungover, he tried out his voice for the first time that day. She was unhappy with him for not ringing again the previous night. He angled his head away from Roger, speaking low so he couldn’t overhear. Not that it really mattered but it bothered him as invasive. Any connection between Roger and Emily, however tenuous, grated on him. He hadn’t called, it was true, but there wasn’t much he could do about it. He’d been on the piss, she’d slipped his mind, it happened. Had to happen.
‘You’ve had a call,’ she said. ‘Your mate the copper. Something about a Jennifer. Something new. You should call him. Don’t know anything more than that.’
‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘Love you.’
‘Everything alright?’
‘No problems,’ he almost whispered.
‘Love you too. Looking forward to seeing you home.’ She rang off.
Roger was looking at him a bit too hard. ‘Girlfriend again?’
Allen nodded.
‘How you feeling, old chap?’ he said. ‘You do look like shit.’
Allen felt like shit.
He didn’t want to be taken in by Roger’s posh boy persona – at this point in the morning it really got to him. He wanted to shake him away and lie back down, but didn’t feel confident in the other man’s house, so he smiled amicably.
‘What time is it?’ he croaked, reaching down for the hot mug of tea.
‘About ten,’ said Roger. ‘Tea alright?’
‘Thanks. Jesus, I felt rough earlier. Feel a bit better now,’ Allen said as he levered himself up onto one elbow.
‘Well, big day today?’ said Roger.
Allen wondered what game they were playing now. He was getting flashbacks from the night before, details revealing themselves to him. Drinking. The bars. Staggering around the backstreets. And then, slowly, a memory of what Carlos had told him: was it made-up boasting or drunken revelation? Under the building? What the fuck did that mean? A basement? Where would the entrance be? He put it out of his mind for now.
And Alicia trying to suck his dick. Fuck, what was that all about?
‘What’ve you got in mind?’ he countered. He wanted Roger to reveal his world to him. He wanted to know what Roger had.
The Takers’ and Keepers’ Club
Roger held Allen’s arm in complicity as they left his flat. They walked to the lifts and Roger punched the buttons. After a wait of several minutes, one side opened with a grinding sound and they climbed in. ‘Twenty-seven,’ he said, leaving Allen to press the key. The lift lurched, wobbled and then moved upwards, slowly screeching and making clanging sounds. No indicator gave away what floor they had reached. After what seemed like several long minutes, the lift crunched to a halt and the door screeched as it opened. Allen looked out. A thin man in a worker’s cap stood waiting to enter. A sign behind his head read ‘18’. The man stepped in, the doors closed unwillingly and the swaying perambulation of motion upwards started again. Finally, the lift stopped again, the doors opened and they stepped out. On the wall opposite a small illuminated box displayed the floor number: 27. Roger turned to the right and Allen followed him out into a similar hallway, the floor covered with mottled grey vinyl tiles, the walls scuffed and marked, painted in institutional yellow and some form of ancient green. The corridor receded into the distance, lit by fluorescent tubes which gave off a reluctant morbid glow. Each side was lined with dark wood doors and on each door a metal number and a small letterbox. Some doors were personalised with a doormat. Very little marked out the different doors. From somewhere came a strong smell of … what? Antiseptic mixed with cooking vegetables? Roger strode down the centre of the passage and stopped in front of a door with a small square of obscured and reinforced glass.
‘Here we are. Righty-o.’ He rapped on the door with his knuckles.
Allen felt a wave of paranoia sweep over him. Roger, recognising this, said, ‘Don’t panic, old chap. They won’t be interested in you, except as a friend.’ He purred over the word friend. ‘You are safe with me.’
Someone pulled the door open, gave them a once over, and they were in. The small, thin man who had opened the door to them and Roger engaged in a complicated routine of hugs and backslapping.
The flat was the same size as Roger’s but in reverse, a mirror image of where he had spent the night. It overlooked the motorway and now he could see the distant city centre. It seemed at once both grubby and grandiose, the style of over-optimistic socialist building projects. The room was thick with cigarette smoke: Allen’s eyes smarted. A smell of cooking pervaded the flat. Not cabbage, not unpleasant, but redolent of continuous cooking in a small space along with body odour and something else that he couldn’t quite place, maybe cough medicine. Sheets of torn material mostly covered the windows and where light did penetrate it fell at an odd angle, picking out patterns in dust and smoke. In the corner the blank screen of a huge, ancient television reflected the scene back to its inhabitants. Underfoot, a surprisingly clean and bright yellow carpet stretched from wall to wall. From a side room came the sound of laughter as a door opened and Alicia emerged, carrying a tray laden with bottles of beer. A group of pale unshaven men slouched on cheap couches and chairs, chatting and smoking. Their eyes darted towards Roger and Allen as they entered, then returned to their conversations. The surfaces of several tables were covered with beer bottles and overflowing ashtrays. It looked as if a party had been in progress for several days and some of the occupants of the room showed signs of exhaustion.
He stared at the assembled cast. Some stared back. This must be them, thought Allen. The faceless ones. Some lay as if asleep, legs spread wide, heads on the edges of sofas or chairs. Some wore American sporting gear, baseball and truckers’ caps, chinos. A couple were dressed in military fatigues, others wore tatty suits. Their ages ranged from what looked like a tall, spotty teenager to a couple of old men with sunken eyes who sat bold upright at the back of the room. Some were overweight, some thin to excess.
As his eyes adjusted to the half-gloom of the room Allen realised that there was more activity going on than he had thought. A couple of more smartly dressed men sat at a small table to the right of the room, and a skinny woman passed through with a tray of small teacups. Pushed from behind by Roger, he shuffled around everyone and eventually reached the back of the room.
A tall, dapper man in a dark green suit and tie entered and stood in front of the assorted audience. A buzz of anticipation arose quickly. The bodies took note and sat up to look towards the front. The man looked around with interest, but his eyes met no-one’s. He held himself as if he were addressing an audience of several hundred, though there were fewer than twenty people present. It was as if he were operating on a different plane, not really in the room. He spoke calmly and authoritatively; he was living the subject matter even as he spoke.
He glanced at Allen. ‘You all know why we’re here,’ he said. Allen hadn’t expected a formal meeting with a chairman calling them to order. He wondered about a rule book and privately laughed at the thought.
‘It’s good to see you all again. As you know, this meeting is not taking place.’ He paused for the small laughs that broke out. He spoke in good English but with a strong accent that didn’t seem like anything Allen had heard before.
They didn’t know he’d waited years for this moment, that he’d long known of their group but never thought he’d sit in with them. They seemed individually familiar, a cross-section of the underclass of Europe with a few highflyers scattered in. A few years in prison, you meet them all, he thought. They are of a type, there’s not much originality in lowlife. Then again, he realised he wasn’t much of an original either, if it came to that. Allen’s world was filled with people on a
mission that they had little chance of successfully undertaking. Not that it mattered now. Here he was, in the lion’s den. These are the worst of the worst, he thought.
‘Gentlemen,’ the man continued, like an affable compere at a pub quiz, ‘welcome to the club. I’d just like to cover the ground rules quickly. First, this meeting isn’t taking place, of course but, if you get asked about it, we’re a carp fishing club.’ The assembled room laughed, this seemed to be an old joke.
‘Now, I’d just like to explain a few things for the benefit of our newer people.’
‘The act of taking has a huge and traumatic effect on the person who is taken, but an even greater psychological impact on the taker. The moment of taking may have been worked towards for months or years, run again and again as a movie in the mind of the taker. Up to this point it is a fantasy. But now it is real, you are in the process of becoming a taker. The act of taking is, by necessity, brief yet intense, violent and overwhelming. To some, this moment is so overwhelming that you do not, cannot, progress to keeping. To the taker, this moment may manifest itself as a still and silent moment experienced as a dream sequence, or it may become a bloody, screaming, inchoate life-and-death struggle. The taken may realise in an instant that they have one chance and that fighting is a high value response, or they may acquiesce in the take, frozen through fear or a lack of understanding.’
He paused and stared intensely at the audience, catching an eye here or there. They sat in silence, maybe dreaming their own dreams or anticipating returning to their lairs.
‘Your aim is to minimise public attention from this point on, to effect a clean take and to move on swiftly to the keeping stage. Of course, often the taking is a failure, in which case it ceases to be a take and becomes a news story. It may also, depending on circumstance, become the end of the road for the taker. It may lead to arrest, exposure, imprisonment, disgrace. But, although the success of a take is of the highest order to the taker, without a keep, it becomes just another sad story and is soon forgotten. Pretty much everything will be known about it, about you, shortly, even if you make no mistakes. The taken may be released, freed or killed. Whatever the outcome, a taking without a keeping is a failure and does not bring you within the ambit of the Takers’ and Keepers’ Club.’