Two to Tango (Nick Madrid)

by Peter Guttridge

  "The same person who pushed those bones down on me," I said, ignoring the eyes swivelling towards me as we emerged in the sunlight.

  "You think that someone did it deliberately?" Catherine said, waving at a taxi that was cruising by. "Bit paranoid aren't you?"

  "Trust me-it happens in my life all the time"

  The old Beetle Catherine had flagged down was even more decrepit than the one I'd come in. My door on the passenger side wouldn't close properly. This time I had a seat belt but nothing to clip it into-presumably the drivers shared the complete kit between them.

  The gear stick wobbled alarmingly as the young driver charged through the streets, maneuvering between big forties American cars.

  He stopped for petrol before he took us out to the hotelputting in a tiny drop, just enough for the journey. I wondered if he would leave the meter running-though that presupposed he had a meter, something I'd seen no evidence of.

  Away from the main roads the streets were deserted. But in every bar we passed men were watching the TV with rapt attention. Our taxi driver paid us absolutely no attention, but then he was leaning half over into the passenger seat trying to listen to the football match on a tinny radio sellotaped to the dashboard.

  He told us Peru were playing Uruguay. Driving back on the main road, he was hunched over his wheel, head dipped almost below the windscreen, weaving in and out of traffic. When Uruguay scored to make it 2-1 I thought he was going to drive straight into an oncoming bus.

  My head felt no better and in consequence conversation between Catherine and I was minimal but there was a great deal of physical contact as we slid backwards and forwards along the back seat.

  The taxi driver finally looked at me as I paid him off outside the hotel. As he set off almost collided with another taxi since he was looking back over his shoulder at me.

  "Was my tip too generous or do I look really peculiar?" I said to Catherine.

  She smiled and led me towards the mirrored facade of the hotel.

  "Are you still hearing singing?" she said.

  I started to reply, then caught sight of myself in the mirror and understood why. Fitted neatly round my head, like bleached bandanna, was a circle of bone.

  Catherine let out a peal of laughter as she lifted it off my head.

  "Better now?" she said, stroking my hair. "I'm sorry, Nick, but it looked so great planted there on your head."

  I looked at it.

  "You let me wear this-"

  She gave me a hug and a kiss on the lips.

  "I said I was sorry."

  I turned it round in my hand.

  "What is it anyway?"

  "The ileum-half of the pelvic area."

  "Should I take it back?"

  She just grinned, then left me in the lobby to go for a soundcheck.

  Nobody was around to observe me lugging a band of bone up to my room. I put it on top of the telly, brushed off my clothes and took a long shower, all the time turning over in my mind the things that were happening. Had someone tried to kill me?

  But who could be after me? Horace, because he knew I had his papers? Conchita, because she guessed I'd seen her rendezvous with the young thing?

  Benny was an outside possibility. He just might not have liked me asking questions about his relationship with Otis.

  My money was on Horace, but only because I didn't like his socks-which I agree is not the best way to judge people.

  Everyone was meeting for dinner in one of the restaurants on the beach before the concert.There was time for a yoga practice. It should have been great to be able to draw a full breath without feeling light-headed, but what with the dust and the water sloshing around in my sinuses, it was hard going.

  When I got to the reverse postures-the headstand, handstand, and shoulder stand-I could feel this sludge shifting in my head and when I stood up a little trickle came down my nose.

  The meal in the restaurant was par for this particular course, i. e. started well then sank into total chaos.

  The restaurant was little more than a very large tent with wooden flooring laid down over the sand. At the end nearest the sea there was a clear plastic wall so that you could watch the waves roll in.

  Otis was being remarkably sensible, drinking only Inca Cola, the drink of Peru. Some of the others, especially Benny, were hitting the pisco sours. I have no idea what they're made of but I knew from my own experience in Bogota that they went down very easily and made you suffer later.

  We had an enormous meal of scallops followed by sea bass in olive oil. Everything seemed to be going smoothly, although I was catching glances from Horace, Conchita, and Benny all through the meal. Horace looked bored. Conchita smiled- complicitly?-and Benny smirked.

  On his way to the toilet Benny stopped by my place and leaned over my shoulder.

  "Hear you're a demon water-skier-ever thought of giving lessons?"

  Fuck off was the expression that sprang unbidden to my lips but I merely smiled tightly. I've been insulted by experts. Often.

  A roving trio of musicians were moving from table to table playing `Latin American Ballads We Have Loved,' the vocalist getting a nice little throb of emotion in his voice.

  Beatrice had just stopped by when the musicians approached Conchita and Otis.

  "Catherine told me you had a bad experience in some catacombs today." I had a big lump on my forehead where I'd got a Glaswegian love bite from some fifteenth century skull. She touched it gently. "Are you okay?"

  The trio struck up with a truly appalling version of John Lennon's "Beautiful Boy," about his son Sean when he was a baby.

  "You think I look bad, you should see what's left of the other guys," I said. Beatrice laughed and started to say something. I never heard what it was. There was a roar from the other end of the table.

  Otis obviously didn't think much of the band's rendition either. I looked in time to see him rear from his seat and push the nearest band player hard. He fell against the singer's maracas-I know how cheap that sounds but he really did. The singer fell against the violinist.They toppled like skittles and I heard one of them squeak, which I took to be because the violinist's bow had gone somewhere it wasn't meant to be.

  Otis picked up his chair, shrugged Conchita off, and raised it above his head to bring down on one or all of the hapless trio. As he did so a dozen flash bulbs went off.

  Otis reared round and an unerring picture of King Kong came into my head. I spotted the photographers, virtually a wall of them, at the same time that Ralph wrestled the chair expertly from Otis's hands and hustled him firmly away.

  At the same moment Richard jumped up from the table.

  "Get their frigging films," he shouted to no one in particular. A moment later he was herding the photographers with the help of our security man into a corner, despite their resistance and the very vocal intervention of the maitre d'.

  I saw one photographer head for the exit. Richard gave chase, but whether by accident or design-who knew who was on the take here-one of the waiters got in his way and the guy was out the door and away.

  Richard threw up his hands and went back to the other photographers. It was bedlam over there.The security guys were trying to get the cameras, the photographers were holding them off, everybody was bellowing.

  It was only a matter of time before somebody pulled a gun and my worry was it was going to be one of our guys.

  I went over to Richard and touched his arm. He ignored me, so I gripped harder. He swivelled, fist balled and ready to punch me. Seeing me, he held back.

  "Fuck, Nick, not now. Can't you see I got a situation here."

  "Yeah, and you're handling it all wrong."

  "I can't let these guys leave here with their film. These pictures get published and we're in deep doo-doo. This was a frigging set-up."

  "Even so you can't do it-these guys were going about their legitimate business."

  "This is no time to go into a freedom of the press spiel. We're here as guests of
the President's wife. She sees us abusing her hospitality, we got a major diplomatic incident"

  "She hears how you worked over her press you got worsebecause if they turn against her because of this she'll really be pissed off."

  Richard paused in his attempts to drag a camera from round the neck of the nearest photographer, which was just as well since the guy was choking on the strap and only seemed to have a few more seconds of breath left in him.

  "What do you suggest?"

  "You've got to let it go, man. Let them I reached over and prised his fingers off the guy's camera. "Contain it some other way. Get Conchita over here now to calm things down-everybody adores her. Then do what you do best-hit the phones the minute these guys are out the door. These pictures won't be in the press until tomorrow. The President's press corps will be on duty all night-talk to them."

  Richard was quick, I'll give him that. "Bring Conchita," he said to one of the security guys. "How do you say `sorry' in this language?"

  I waded in with Richard to placate the photographers, the waiters, the other diners. Conchita came over and did the rounds, we ordered up champagne for the diners, handed out free concert tickets to the waiters and the snappers.

  Later, Richard and I walked back to the hotel together.

  "So how do I contain it? Christ, you can see the headlines: Rock Star Guest of President's Wife Attacks Local Musicians In Drunken Rage.We're meant to be about peace and love, man. Peace International are going to freak when they hear about it, too."

  "That headline is way too long," I said absently. Then: "I didn't know the President's wife was supporting the tour."

  "It's been kept hush-hush but it was going to be announced at the gig tonight."

  "She's going to be there?"

  "Not here. Machu Picchu. Was going to be there"

  "What makes you so sure it was a set-up?"

  "If it wasn't, it was a very, very unfortunate coincidence them playing `Beautiful Boy."'

  "So badly, too."

  "I don't think it was the quality of the performance Otis objected to-Nick, have you been taking prescribed drugs you're not telling me about?Your reaction is a bit odd."

  "Sorry, it's been a bit of a giddy day one way and another. What's the problem with `Beautiful Boy?"'

  "You've heard his recording of it from way back?"

  "Sure. Great."

  "Recorded it for his son Paul."

  "I didn't know he had a son Paul."

  "Not many people do-the mother wanted it that way. Ever wondered why he never ever plays it on stage, it never turns up on his best-of CDs?"

  "I'm wondering now."

  "He recorded it; the week the album came out mother and child were killed by a hit-and-run driver. Guy was never caught. Otis was devastated."

  "I didn't know"

  "Hardly anybody does, which is why if it's a set-up it's been done by somebody who knows him very well."

  I let that go for a moment as we entered the foyer of the hotel.

  "You've got to tell the President's wife, get her press corps to tell the press."

  "He's kept it secret all these years."

  I shrugged. "The secret's out and you might as well milk it. Get the sympathy vote."

  There was a sudden gleam in Richard's eyes. Told you he was quick.

  "You're right, you're right. Nick, I owe you. I've got to go and work the phones. I'll catch you later."

  He hurried away leaving me alone to ponder what I'd observed immediately after the fracas at the restaurant had erupted. Horace, part way down the table, glancing up then continuing to eat his sea bass as if nothing was happening. And Benny, leaning against a pillar, across the room from the toilet he'd been supposedly heading for, a gleeful look on his sallow face.

  I lay on my bed for half an hour then locked myself in the bathroom for another half hour-the salt water was having a deleterious effect upon my person. I got in the lift to the lobby at around eleven. I'd been mulling over the different things that had been happening. Call me selfish but I was more concerned for the moment with the threat to my life.The lift stopped at the second floor and the doors opened.

  Horace stepped in. He had his hands in his pockets and he was wearing a white linen suit with black brogues. I wanted to say, "No!" but before I could worry more about his sartorial ineptness he leaned towards me and said in a sinister voice, right out of some British black and white B movie from the fifties:

  "You got something of mine?"

  He was standing toe to toe and looking up at me. Given the disparity of our heights my immediate thought was to wipe my nose, just in case. My second thought was that I hope he didn't have X-ray eyes or he'd see the documents in question in my side pocket.

  I wondered for a moment if he was going to try some rough stuff. It didn't seem likely but maybe he'd heard what a pushover I was.

  "Have I?" 1 finally said. I know it wasn't much of a response but I still had bits of dead people in my gums, possibly thanks to him.

  Before he or I could say more the lift reached the ground floor and the doors sprang open. Horace half turned.

  "Just coming looking for you," Bridget said.

  Horace looked from her to me then stepped out of the lift.

  "Nasty bruises," he called back as he headed for the door.

  "Shit, yes," Bridget said, giving me a hug as I stepped out of the lift. "Who've you been upsetting?"

  "Do you want the list?" I said.

  "Let's just put it down to another disappointed lover shall we?" she said.

  "No, listen, Bridget, there's some bad stuff going on here."

  "With you around, when isn't there?"

  "Help me out tonight, will you?" I said. "Things could get hairy."

  "Yeah, yeah," she said. "Let's get going."

  The taxi was a lot better than the one I'd taken earlier, until I noticed the cigarette in the driver's mouth.

  "Oh God," I said, "he's smoking."

  "So?" Bridget, who is always quitting tomorrow, said testily. "The window's open."

  "Roll-ups," I said.

  Bridget didn't get it until the driver was overtaking on the first bend. Overtaking on a bend is in itself a little foolhardy. Rolling a cigarette two-handed at the same time ...

  As best I could, I filled Bridget in on what had been happening. I'm not sure how much attention she paid, clinging to me as she was.

  When we reached the stadium, there was a bit of hassle getting her in. Security was tight.

  "Don't they know who I am?" she said grandly.

  "Not a clue," I muttered.

  I had to get Ralph along. He came down in his usual bad mood but, credit to the guy, he did sort it.

  "Chaos tonight," he said. "Even Otis lost his pass, needed a new

  I felt I could trust this guy -aside from Richard, probably the only person on the tour that I could.

  "Ralph, we need to talk about what's happening," I said.

  "We got nothing to say to journalists."

  "I'm not after a quote, you dufus-"

  "Dufus?" I could almost hear his muscles ripple.

  "I want to talk to you about who's doing all this."

  "I told you-nothing to say to journalists."

  With hindsight of course it was foolish of me to get hold of his shoulders and try to shake him.

  "Look, I've got information might be useful," I said in a Minnie Mouse sort of voice. I was backed against a wall, his hand tight on my windpipe, his knee thrust between my thighs poised to do me serious and probably permanent damage.

  "That'd be a first," he said, before suddenly releasing his grip and sinking into a crouch.

  "Pick on people your own size," Bridget said to him, pulling her hand from between his legs. She tottered off on her high heels, calling back over her shoulder: "And thanks for the pass."

  "Ralph," I said as he crouched there. "I really do have some useful info." He was remarkably big about it. He took me into an office and, as the Joe Blo
ws opened the gig, I told him about, well, everything.

  That's to say: Conchita's secret meeting, Horace's paperwork, Billy's smirk at the restaurant.

  He was a bright guy, he didn't need it spelled out.

  "I'll get back to you," he said, sliding from the room.

  I lost Bridget early in the night. So much for her helping me out. I hung out at the side of the stage for a while watching Catherine do her bit with the Joe Blows. She had a couple of nicely judged solos, one blowsy and sassy, the other slow and melancholic.

  I was getting another beer from the green room when Ralph and Conchita appeared at my elbow She was in her stage costume-a short backless, damned near frontless, electric-blue dress.

  "I theenk you and I have a misunderstanding to clear up."

  I waited for her to say more.

  "In Baza, the person I was talking to was my brother."

  "He looked like a-"

  "I know what he looks like. And he is. He fell into bad company. My stepfather, he's involved. I try to get him to see sense but he don't want to. He likes the life."

  "The money you're earning, can't you-"

  "Buy him out of the business? He don't want out and he don't need money. If he survives he'll make more than me."

  "But it means you're compromised," Ralph said.

  "Everybody is compromised on this fucking continent," Otis said. He had come up quietly behind me. "Man, don't you get it? Everybody is on the take.The other year the Peruvian police arrested two high-ranking navy officers for running cocaine shipments to Europe on navy ships.

  "Can you imagine? The frigging navy. These guys packed 220 lbs of the powder apiece in the engine rooms of their ships in the harbor at Callao. Every trip to Europe they dropped the stuff off in whatever port they docked in.

  "And God knows why the police arrested them, since most of the security forces are involved in drug trafficking anyway. So these guys were arrested for justice? I don't think so-probably they poached on somebody else's patch.

  "Shit," he went on, "these guys even use the President's own jet, a Peruvian Air Force DC8, to smuggle toot.A while back the police hauled 38 lbs of the stuff off it.Ten senior air force officers were about to set off on a goodwill tour of Europe-that's the kind of goodwill people understand. These people been doing it for years-regular flights to London, then Amsterdam they were offloading the stuff."