So, as Lawton lay unconscious, blood caked to the side of his head and pooled on the parquet flooring, the Grail was gone.
***
Barney Thomson closed the door of the shop, turned the key, crossed the road to the shore side of the street and began walking along beside the white sea wall, face turned towards the breeze and the salty smell of the waves.
His night might have been considered a disappointment but he hadn't known what he was looking for. To end up in Garrett Carmichael's bed? Not at all; that was for others on the island, not him. Interesting conversation and a nice bit of food? That, generally, is the best you can expect from any dinner. The conversation had been curious and had muddled almost to a standstill after the Einstein incident; the food had been adequate. Barney had slid into some strange non-specific gloom and had lost interest. Consumed by thoughts of his impending mid-life depression, he'd suddenly found himself in need of time alone, to contemplate the great beyond.
So, as the evening had progressed towards dessert and coffee, he had felt the desire to talk gradually constrict within him, until his humour and sociability had disappeared into an angry and tight little ball at the centre of his stomach. Had been barely able to mutter a goodbye as Carmichael had left, saying that she needed to release her mum from the kids.
I'll probably need to apologise for being a miserable bastard, thought Barney, as a wave crashed against the wall beneath him, catching his face with the spray. He had stayed in the restaurant for more than an hour after she'd gone, drinking a further three cups of coffee and eating an execution of kiwi fruit on an echelon of baked Alaska. After that he had answered the pull of the barbershop, to do nothing more than open up and inspect the premises, turn out the lights, sit in one of the chairs and stare morosely out of the window.
Now he was walking forlornly along the front, heading back to his house for the night, wondering for how long this was going to be his life.
He took a last look at the sea, arrived at the door, checked his watch – still an hour before Mrs Donaldson's curfew – and walked in. Listened to the stillness for a second, then removed his shoes and coat and walked through to the kitchen. Didn't want anything else to eat, just thought he ought to report in to the camp commandant before retiring.
There was a man in the kitchen making himself a savoury snack. Caviar and cream cheese on Jacob's Cream Crackers. He looked up as Barney padded silently into the room in his socks. Rusty Brown, on whom Barney had bestowed the magnificent Kobe Bryant the day before.
'Barney,' said the old fella.
'Mr Brown,' said Barney. Didn't feel like talking.
'The lady of the house is just getting changed,' said Brown. 'One of the kids puked on her.'
Barney looked at the old man for a second, then started to turn.
'Look at this,' said Brown.
Barney turned back, the mother of all fuck-off expressions on his face. Brown ignored it.
'What colour would you say this was?' he asked, holding up the small 100g jar of caviar.
Barney stared at the jar.
'Black,' he said. 'It's caviar, it's black.'
'Come here,' said Brown, and he rose from the table and walked over to one of the work surfaces, which had a light attached to the kitchen unit above. 'Take a closer look.'
Barney ground his teeth. There's something about company that makes you realise that when you're so depressed your guts feel black and wasted, that it's not just that you're miserable; you're pissed off and miserable.
'Look at it,' said Brown. 'Come on.'
Barney stared into the jar. The caviar wasn't black. For no reason that he could establish he felt a wash of light.
'It's beautiful, don't you think?' said Brown.
Barney nodded. Brown was right. The caviar was a rich, dark, delicious purple. Black from a distance but on closer inspection it had so much more colour and warmth.
'Isn't that just the most wonderful metaphor for so many things in life?' said Brown, smiling, looking at Barney's face.
Barney just stared at the deep purple, strangely captivated.
'Don't you leave that jar open any longer, Rusty Brown, or the place'll be stinking of fish! That's the last thing we need!'
Neither man turned. Brown looked at Barney. A little smile came to his lips and he winked, for all the world like he was Burt Lancaster.
'Good night, Mr Brown,' said Barney. Rusty Brown smiled.
Barney looked at Miranda Donaldson as he walked past. She glowered in return. Neither said anything, until he was out of the room and walking through the hall to the stairs.
'Newton was an arsehole,' she muttered at his back.
He stopped. He didn't turn. He decided to ignore all the replies that automatically came to mind, then he started walking, the weight of the world on his shoulders, up the stairs.
Two Dumb Animals
Tony Angelotti smirked stupidly at Police Constable Gainsborough, who had taken his seat once more behind his desk and was contemplating a pot of Harrods No.372 Late in The Evening & Pissed Off Blend. The call had come through from a higher power to release the Italian, as most everyone who hadn't been stupid had known it would. The higher power who'd actually made the call had been part of the Strathclyde Constabulary, taking instructions from descending echelons of higher higher powers.
'You can leave now,' said Gainsborough.
The smile broadened. Tony slowly lifted his closed right fist and then raised the middle finger with deliberate panache. Or what he thought was panache, but clearly wasn't.
'Fuck you.'
There are moments as a police officer, although not too many in Millport, when you want to take a tight hold of your truncheon and bludgeon some muppet to a bloody pulp. Usually when these moments occur, you take a tight hold of your truncheon and you bludgeon the muppet to a bloody pulp. Sometimes, however, your hands are tied.
'You're free to go,' said Gainsborough coldly.
'I know,' said Tony. The smug smile began to take over his entire face, like some conceited and self-righteous cancerous growth. Gainsborough couldn't take it any more, turned away and walked into the small kitchen off the back of the outer office to put the kettle on.
Tony laughed, opened the door and stepped out into the sea breeze cold of late evening. Closed the door and stood looking at the small scene before him. Tiny, rocky bay, playing field beyond, street lights in an arc for two hundred yards or so to his right, running alongside the row of houses that included Miranda Donaldson and Randolph Grey and the Millerston Hotel; to his left, the sea stretching out to the dark islands across the firth. He pulled his jacket closer to him, felt the wind on his face. He breathed deeply and there was something in the smell of the cold air that reminded him of the smell of the warm Mediterranean of his childhood.
'What the fuck am I supposed to do now?' he muttered.
He was a little over a hundred and fifty yards away from his hotel but what with him being a single cell stupid shit, he just didn't know whether to turn left or right. Briefly considered walking back into the police station and asking for directions but the manner of his departure precluded that as an option.
He turned at approaching footsteps and tensed, wondering if this would be another stupid attack by way of the stupid policeman. It's what he would have done himself, after all.
'Hey,' said the new guy, 'you must be like, the Italian, yeah?'
Tony attempted to broaden his shoulders even more.
'So what?' he replied belligerently. 'What does that make you?'
'You're Tony, right?' said the guy, smiling. 'That is so cool.'
'Why?' said Tony, thinking that yes it was cool that he was Tony, but who was this presumptuous little shit to say it?
'Because, Dude-o,' said the guy, 'that's my name too. Totally cool. People call me 2Tone,' he added, and held out his hand.
Tony regarded his hand with the same disgust as the nickname and folded his arms. 2Tone was oblivious to the body la
nguage and turned his unanswered extended hand into some sort of gesture of solidarity.
'Cool,' he said.
'What is?' asked Tony.
'I like spoke to some other Italian guy, you know? A friend of yours, asked me to like, give you a message.'
Tony regarded 2Tone with suspicion.
'What friend?'
'Didn't, like, give me his name or anything. The guy seemed a little wired, kinda creeped me out a little, you know. But he gave me a couple thousand to pass something on and another couple of thousand in it for me if I keep my mouth shut. Just like, grabbed me in the street, you know. So, here I am, Dude.'
Tony was trying to work everything out. Of course, there was no way he had the intelligence to work anything out, never mind everything. In fact, when he finally thought to say, 'So, what is it you've to tell me?' it was a small moment of triumph.
2Tone nodded. This was his moment to pass on the two thousand pound message.
'All right. He says he's checked out of the hotel. He said you'd know what he meant by that.'
After grabbing 2Tone off the street, and with no knowledge of the fact that he was dealing with the son of his principal adversary, Luigi had realised that the conversation which would unfold with his Tony was going to be between two idiots. However, having already dragged 2Tone into it, he hadn't wanted to ditch him and explain the story to someone else.
'That means he's moved to another hotel?' said Tony.
'That's the thing,' said 2Tone. 'He's not gone to another hotel, he's incommunicado, you know, underground. He's like a fox.'
'Why?' asked Tony.
'He thinks you'll get, like followed when you leave here. Like, there'll be some dude following you and all. He's worried they'll lead you to him. Then he wouldn't be a fox, he'd be, you know, like a rabbit or some stupid waiting-to-get-eaten animal like that.'
Tony shook his head and stared at the damp road. What kind of idiot did Luigi think he was? And what if he had been followed? What were these pointless islanders going to do about it?
'So won't you be followed the minute you leave here?' said Tony, giving 2Tone the look that he usually received from Luigi.
'Like, it doesn't matter, Dude,' said 2Tone, smiling stupidly. 'Firstly, he's like totally going to pay me to keep my mouth shut. And secondly, it completely doesn't matter, 'cause I like can't tell anyone anything anyway. And I'm not going to see him again.'
'So how the fuck is he going to pay you?'
2Tone still smiled. He wasn't entirely sure about that but it felt like an effort to think about it, so he wasn't about to. He also still had some of the message to deliver, so he needed to focus.
'He also said you should like keep checking out the cathedral.'
'And what the fuck's he going to be doing?'
2Tone did a kind of rapper thing with his hands.
'Don'no, Dude,' he said. 'I'm just a guy, I don't know shit.'
Tony nodded at that one. It wasn't often he got to feel intellectually superior when in conversation with even the most marginally sentient of lifeforms.
'Anything else?' he asked.
2Tone nodded sagely, using a thoughtful face.
'Think we're done, Dude,' he said.
'Good,' said Tony. 'I can go back to the hotel. You can go back to being an idiot.'
'Like, yeah, total, man. Oh yeah, wait a minute,' said 2Tone, shaking his head, 'there is something else. I'm such a dork.'
He fished around in his pockets and dug out a small piece of paper. Tony took it roughly from him and read it quickly. He squinted, he looked up at 2Tone, he thought to inquire what the hell it was supposed to mean and then decided that there was little point in asking. He turned to go before remembering that he didn't actually know which way that was supposed to be.
'Which way to the George?' he asked, expecting 2Tone to be too stupid even for that.
'Like it's totally that way,' he replied, pointing him to his left.
Tony looked along the road and wandered off without any further inane discussion. 2Tone watched him go then stood contemplating what he was going to do with the next few minutes of his life, not being one for long term plans.
He noticed a movement in the police office and looked in. Gainsborough was watching him. 2Tone waved. Gainsborough nodded and then lifted the phone to Bartholomew Ephesian.
And Who Shall Be Able To Stand?
Jacobs returned to the house at a little after eleven o'clock. His evening had, for the most part, been completely unsuccessful. No Grail, no hand. He had already spoken to Ephesian on the phone, before completing his final errand of the day, so he knew that McGhee and Deluth had the hand and he knew what they wanted; and he had also passed on the news of Lawton's theft of the Grail, which he had then immediately regretted. Ephesian had difficulty handling situations that seemed to be spiralling out of his control. Jacobs did not yet think that that was what was happening here but equally it wasn't going smoothly. And he knew that his definition of out of control wasn't going to be the same as Ephesian's.
He stood in the large hall, listening. He had first gone to his own quarters to remove his coat and scarf and now had come through the short corridor which connected his spacious apartments to the house.
Sometimes his employer would be in bed by this hour but not tonight. Still too many things to discuss, the list growing rather than diminishing. He walked through to the dining room, with the small office off to the right, wondering if Ephesian would be standing in the dark, staring down on the dark grey of the firth, small tumbler of single malt in his left hand. Surrounded by quiet and darkness and solitude, the way he spent so many of his late evenings.
The two rooms were empty and Jacobs got his first feelings of unease. He went to the window and stood, as Ephesian usually did, looking down at the water. Did not see the same things that Ephesian saw. Then he turned and walked through to the study across the hall.
The room was illuminated by a small desk lamp but Ephesian was not in the large comfy chair by the window, which was where he always sat when he chose to take his sanctuary in here. Jacobs walked over to the book shelf which contained the complete works of Robert Louis Stevenson, pulled gently on the small hardback second edition of Virginibus Puerisque, then stepped forward through the doorway as it opened up before him.
He walked carefully down the stairs because he had not, after all, been a young man for some decades now and his eyesight was verging on the dysfunctional. Bottom of the stairs and the cellar room was in complete darkness. He flicked one in the row of six light switches and stood looking into the dim corners of the room. There was no one there; none of the thirteen chairs around the table occupied. He must have been wrong, he thought. Ephesian must have gone upstairs, perhaps for the first time in his life, dealing with stress by going to bed and trying to sleep on it.
As he was about to flick the light off, he heard the most meagre of sounds. He stopped, held his breath. This was a dark creepy room in the bowels of one hundred and fifty year old foundations, but it had never before spooked him in any way. However, today was the day he had for the first time in his life encountered a spirit of some sort, even if it was one who was stuck for eternity trying to get to the toilet, and his heart skipped; he felt his skin tighten. Yet he did not throw any of the other light switches. Swallowed, deep breath, banished the feelings of unease and stepped forward. He bent down and looked under the table.
When he saw what was there the feeling of unease vanished completely, to be replaced by instant determination. Another problem to be sorted out, another glitch to be added to the list and dealt with as summarily as possible.
It had been a long time since he had seen his employer in this state. Thirty years maybe, although there had been occasions in all that time when he had wondered if it had happened and he had just not been there to witness it.
When the stress became too much for him and Ephesian's brain could not cope with it, his only retreat was to fold his body
and his mind up into a small black ball, to make himself as insignificant as possible, to lock himself up in darkness and silence, surrounded by nothing, to reduce sensory input to virtually nil.
And so Jacobs was kneeling down, looking under the table, where Ephesian was lying curled foetally up as small as he could make himself, his head resting on the cold stone floor at an awkward angle.
'Mr Ephesian,' said Jacobs.
No response. Jacobs breathed steadily and checked his watch, knowing that this was something which would take a while.
'Mr Ephesian,' he said again. 'We need to talk. I believe I have solutions to most of our difficulties,' he added as an enormous lie, yet with the kind of assurance which he knew would be required for the next two or three hours, in order to coax Ephesian out from his protected world.
Craterous Skin
Barney lay in his bedroom, contemplating some of the great matters. Why is it, he was thinking, as he stared at the orange light cast from outside, that woman are so adept at spotting cellulite in other women? A man can look at a woman in a bikini for months and not notice if she has cellulite. He'll notice what her breasts are like for the first few weeks, then he'll move on to noticing the bum, legs and stomach. But if you were to quiz him on whether or not she had cellulite he wouldn't have a clue. He probably wouldn't even be able to tell if he was asked to establish it as a specific task. Women, on the other hand, seem to be genetically trained to notice cellulite within the first quarter second of visual contact, and everything else later. They have a specific part in their eyeball, missing from men, which sees only cellulite on thighs. This means that when they see some fantastically attractive woman on a beach or by a pool, it doesn't matter if she's slim and gorgeous with long legs and amazing breasts. If she's got cellulite, the other woman thinks, 'okay, we're level.' For men though, it's relegated to somewhere in the far far distance behind breasts and an ability to keep the fridge adequately stocked with the right kind of beer.
The Barbershop Seven: A Barney Thomson omnibus Page 124