End of the World Blues

by Jon Courtenay Grimwood

  “Tokyo.”

  “Ahh,” said de Valois. “That would certainly help explain her lack of English.” He glanced at Neku, his gaze sliding over her naked breasts and tiny G-string. “I think it would be good if you asked her to join me for a drink.”

  Perhaps Kit was wrong to treat this as an invitation, because Mr. de Valois’s smile froze at his counter-suggestion that perhaps Neku and he should think about getting home, now that Mr. de Valois had his consignment and Kit had made his apologies.

  “Not yet,” said de Valois. “You see, we still need to agree on a price.”

  “There is no price,” Kit said. “The consignment is yours. All I’m doing is returning it.”

  Armand de Valois’s laugh was loud enough to make Neku flinch. “Not a price for me,” he said, with a grin. “For you, for causing me problems in the first place.” He nodded towards Neku. “Also her, if you want her back I will require a transfer fee.”

  “She’s Kate O’Mally’s granddaughter.”

  De Valois looked irritated. “Other people would kill you,” he said. “I am being generous, very generous. In future you will work for me. As will she. But first, we have business.”

  When the music stopped it left Neku frozen in mid swing. “Tell her to come here,” de Valois said, looking at the girl.

  Instead of climbing from the stage, Neku vanished through a door at the back and when she reappeared it was wearing a tatty silk dressing gown that reached her ankles and was tied tightly around her waist. Sweat dripped from her face and a pulse beat steadily in her neck. Kit could smell her from five paces away.

  “I need a shower,” she told him.

  “Later,” said Kit, keeping to Japanese.

  “What did she say?”

  “That she needs a shower.”

  Mr. de Valois grunted. “There’ll be time for that later,” he said. “Tell the girl I have a job for her. A very suitable job.”

  So Kit did.

  Neku’s eyes were arctic, devoid of light and so cold they made Kit shiver. It would have been better if a sneer or scowl gave anger to her face, but instead she smiled, almost blandly. “Tell him I’m always willing to help.”

  Things moved swiftly after that.

  From somewhere a chopping board was produced, along with a stained Sabatier knife and a chrome bucket full of ice. Armand demanded rubber bands and when these failed to appear announced that string would have to do.

  “You ever seen this done before?”

  She had, Kit realised, having translated Armand de Valois’s question. Which was more than could be said for Kit, unless one counted films. Because he’d just worked out what was about to happen.

  Kit only knew a gun had been pulled when he felt its muzzle touch the side of his ear, a cold kiss just behind the hair line. Alfie’s hand was shaking. A poor start for someone holding an automatic so cheap it lacked a safety catch.

  “Taking my drugs, trying to trick me, and not showing sufficient respect. Three transgressions,” said de Valois, handing Neku the knife. “That means you cut three times, one joint after another.”

  He smiled while he waited for Kit to translate.

  “My finger,” said Kit, meaning, My finger, not that man’s throat.

  Neku weighed the blade in her hand.

  “Just do it,” Kit said. “And we’ll get ourselves out of here.”

  She knew exactly where to make the first cut. Placing Kit’s left hand face down on the board and positioning her knife above the first joint of his little finger, Neku slammed her palm across the back of the blade.

  Fuck.

  The severed tip of a finger was rolling across the board before Kit even registered the pain, but by then Neku had his hand back on the board and her blade against the same finger, one joint lower.

  A slam of her hand and two segments of finger rested beside each other.

  “Take the last joint,” said Neku, “and I’ll have nothing to tie off.” Barely bothering to wait for Kit to translate, she held Kit’s hand to the board and repositioned her knife.

  “She’s good,” said de Valois.

  “The best,” Neku said, in fractured English.

  Armand de Valois laughed. “Okay,” he said. “Tell her to have this one on me.”

  Cutting a length of string, Neku bound the last section of finger and tied it off in a quick knot. “One section you can re-attach,” she whispered, “two is much more difficult.”

  She was supporting him. Her single hand beneath Kit’s elbow to brace his entire weight, should he need time to compose himself.

  “We’re done here,” Kit said.

  “Almost,” promised de Valois. “But first, Ben…your finger, it hurts?”

  Of course it fucking hurts.

  “A little.”

  What was he meant to say? A lot, hardly at all… it was, Kit suspected, a question to which there were only wrong answers.

  “Luckily,” said de Valois, “I have just the cure. Sixty-five percent pure and freshly delivered. Here we go—” wiping the Sabatier on a beer mat, de Valois dipped the blade’s tip into an open bag of heroin.

  “Lighter,” he demanded.

  Robbie held a flame beneath the blade, until the metal tinged orange and dreams began to spiral from the oily mess.

  “Come on, Ben,” said de Valois. “Let’s make friends.”

  A million dreams twisted towards a nicotine-stained ceiling. A hundred thousand nightmares and every shade of longing in between. All Kit had to do was lean forward and inhale the smoke.

  He made his decision without even realising there was a decision to make.

  Twisting the hot blade from Robbie’s fingers, Kit moved before anyone had time to react. A sizzling slash to the throat, a smoky drag across both eyes, and Kit was almost done, his final strike hissing its way under de Valois’s chin and through his soft palate, braising his tongue.

  A thing done with moderation may be judged insufficient.

  A cold click told Kit that the slide had been pulled back on Alfie’s gun. So this is the way the world ends, he thought. With a Chechen gangster blinded and a bullet through my head.

  When one thinks one has gone too far…One has probably gone far enough.

  “Let it go,” ordered Robbie.

  Alfie hesitated, and in that moment of hesitation, Robbie leaned forward and tapped the heel of his palm under the knife, driving the blade clean through the roof of de Valois’s mouth and into his brain.

  “Arsehole,” he said.

  CHAPTER 52 — Sunday Night, 1 July

  While Neku finished washing in the staff bathroom behind the stage, Kit ran through her parentage again, simplifying it, just to make things really clear. The more Kit iterated his points, the more convincing they sounded.

  Walk with a man a hundred paces… Kit’s smile was sour. He was planning to walk far more than that in the company of Robbie and Alfie, assuming they all got lucky.

  “Shit,” said Robbie. He’d been a foot soldier when he originally met Kate O’Mally, standing silent while she ripped strips from some local don. It was, admitted Robbie, unlikely Mrs. O’Mally had even known his name, for which he remained extremely grateful. As for Alfie, the boy was too young to have those kind of memories. He’d heard of her nephew though. You didn’t cross central London without getting Mike Smith’s permission first. At least people like Alfie didn’t.

  “You mean,” said Alfie, “the girl is Mr. Smith’s cousin?” It was an interesting update in the lexicon of fear.

  In unspoken agreement, Alfie and Robbie moved to the bar and got themselves a whisky chaser, washing the spirit down with a bottle of Beck’s. Robbie lit the teenager’s cigarette for him, because Alfie’s hand was shaking too badly to work the lighter. Neither would look at Neku when she returned from rinsing out her mouth, splashing water on her face, and whatever else she’d been doing in the staff bathroom.

  “How many ways out of here?” asked Kit.

  “Onl
y one,” Robbie said. “Why?”

  “Because it’s a trap,” said Kit. “Gunmen are out there, waiting…” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder towards the corridor. “And we’ve got about half an hour before someone blows down that door.”

  “Oh shit,” said Alfie. “You were telling Mr. de Valois the truth?”

  “Yeah,” said Kit. “It’s a bad habit of mine.”

  “But he had his own man in the drug squad.”

  “I know,” said Kit. “But Sergeant Samson has been suspended. I bet he didn’t tell de Valois that.”

  Alfie looked sicker still. “How many ways?” Kit insisted.

  “Front door, side windows…”

  “Both covered,” said Kit. “Anything else?” The two men shook their heads. “Over the roof? Across a back garden? Come on,” he said. “There must be another way.”

  “Attic,” Alfie said. “Round here most houses have linked attics.”

  “Probably walled up. Mortgage regulations,” Robbie added. “My brother used to be a builder.”

  “Then you know how crap they’ll be,” said Alfie.

  Having left on all the lights and restarted the music, Kit, Neku, Alfie, and Robbie went up the stairs two steps at a time. And unlikely as it sounded, the rubbish stacked on the club stairs got worse the higher they climbed. The first floor had changing rooms, if such a label could be given to a room stripped of everything but a mirror, overhead bulb, and a cracked lavatory in one corner.

  “Those are mine,” said Neku, grabbing a handful of clothes in passing.

  “Was mine,” Kit said, tossing segments of finger into the open bowl and pausing to check it flushed properly.

  When Robbie and Alfie looked at each other, Kit wondered if it was the finger or discovering that Neku spoke proper English after all. So abandoned was the next level that its floors had been painted white with pigeon shit. A broken window showed where the birds got in. A short run of ladder led to the attic and a hole in the roof above revealed night sky.

  “You go first,” Kit told the boy, who did as he was told. It didn’t actually matter to Kit in what order Alfie and Robbie climbed. But simple commands, easily obeyed, kept the two men under his control.

  Robbie was right, a wall had been built; and Alfie was right, because the brickwork was crap. Cheap cinder blocks had been stacked clumsily on top of each other and glued into place with cowpats of dripping mortar.

  “Amateurs.” Robbie sounded personally offended.

  “Makes it easier,” said Alfie, producing a lock knife and grinding it into a crack between two blocks. “I’ll need some help,” he said.

  So Robbie stepped forward and together the two men sawed at the crude mortar, reducing it to dust. “Buggered,” said Robbie, but he was talking about the blade.

  “No matter,” Alfie said. “We’re done.” And he proceeded to kick down the wall with a quiet ferocity that spoke of current anger or a lifetime of unresolved issues.

  The attic next door was also empty, in better condition than the one they’d just left, and, best of all, not bricked up on its far side. A partition had been built, but this was made from flame-proof board and Alfie tore it down without even having to be asked.

  “Okay,” he said. “We’re above the Golden Balti.” Catching Neku’s glance, he added, “That’s the local take out.”

  Which left the Japanese girl little wiser.

  A flight of steps led down to a small landing stacked with empty ghee tins and a large wooden crate reading Rajah Spices. Someone had set up a canvas bed in a bathroom. A copy of a local Bengali paper lay open on the floor.

  “Quietly now,” said Kit.

  The floor below held a storeroom, customer lavatories, and a bemused-looking waiter who was obviously wondering about the noise. When Kit put his hand to his lips, the man nodded.

  No one challenged Kit, Neku, and the other two as they filed through the crowded restaurant, squeezing between a large group waiting for take away near the door. And no one made a fuss when they reached the street outside, crossed the High Road, and cut under a railway arch into a passage that led to a car park beyond.

  “We’re square, right?” asked Robbie.

  Kit nodded.

  “I mean, for real? It was a mistake, right? We didn’t know she was…” He glanced at Neku, who stared back. It was Robbie who looked away.

  “I’m cool with you if she is,” said Kit.

  After a moment, Neku nodded.

  “That’s settled then,” he said, turning to include Alfie in the conversation. “None of us were here,” said Kit. “You didn’t see me and I didn’t see you. If anyone asks you, just stick to that.”

  Somewhere away to his right a black helicopter came thudding low over the houses, a siren fired up three streets away, and a thunder flash could be heard, rattling shop windows like fireworks. Brigadier Miles had obviously just told her boys to go in.

  CHAPTER 53 — Sunday Night, 1 July

  Trying to ride a motorbike with an amputated finger was a bad idea. The actual practise was worse. Every gear change make Kit chew his lip and fight to keep his hand on the bars. He’d probably have been crying with frustration if the night wind hadn’t got to his eyes first.

  The Suzuki belonged to Alfie and was the machine Kit would have expected. Cheap, flashy, and done up with after-market accessories. On the plus side, the tank was full, the machine was licenced, and Alfie had been pitifully willing to offer Kit its use.

  It was the wrong side of midnight when Kit left the motorway. There was no need to kill the lights as he approached speed cameras but he did it anyway. Kit liked the way darkness turned the black top to an icy strip, lit by little more than the sodium glare of a village nearby.

  At a service station south of the M25, he stopped to refill the bike and use the bathroom. As an afterthought, Kit asked Neku if she wanted a coffee. In return, she asked him a question of her own.

  “Why did you kill him?”

  So he told her.

  Sitting next to a glass window, in a café deserted enough to have been ripped from an Edward Hopper painting, Kit explained about the debts he owed. How he’d never really fallen out of love with Mary and why he let Kate O’Mally drag him back from Tokyo.

  Kit realised half way through his story that Neku knew none of this. And then he realised no one did, except No Neck, Micki, and that other girl the day Mary’s postcard arrived; and they didn’t count, because he’d been drunk and they’d been careful not to mention it again. Almost everything that mattered to Kit in the last fifteen years had happened inside his head.

  Conversations with ghosts.

  He’d kissed a girl and it was the wrong girl or the wrong time. He’d lived badly and lived well and neither felt more real than the other, because everything after Josh was counting bells. Like Mary, Kit had just been adding and subtracting to keep the devil at bay.

  All those lives snuffed out in the cross-hairs of an M24 sniper rifle needed shifting up one, to make space for the truth. Josh killed himself but Kit had provided the reason.

  “You’re sad.” Neku’s voice was matter of fact.

  “I’m cold,” said Kit, taking the coffee she offered. It was sweet and still hot, bitter from having stewed in a glass flask on a ring for the previous hour.

  “Losing a finger does that,” Neku said. “It’s the shock. My brother…” Whatever she was about to say got lost when Neku took herself to the restrooms. She was still wiping her mouth when she got back.

  “How are you?” Neku asked Patrick Robbe-Duras, when Pat finally stopped fussing about the damp and cold and how Neku must feel after such a long ride in the middle of the night.

  “I’m okay,” said Pat, sipping his whisky on the rocks.

  Neku smiled. Their next discussion involved whether or not another coffee would keep Neku awake and her insistence that all Japanese girls hated hot milk, so that was out of the question.

  “No tradition of keeping cows,” she said
.

  Pat nodded, doubtful.

  After this, as the conversation turned to biscuits versus cake, Kate caught Kit’s eye and nodded towards the kitchen door.

  “Good idea,” said Neku, hooking ice from Pat’s glass. “Chill your finger,” she told Kit. “Then cut back the knuckle and sew the flesh shut.”

  Kit took the ice Neku offered. Smiling, when he realised Kate’s mouth had dropped open.

  “I can do it later,” said Neku. “If you’d rather.”

  Leading Kit along a corridor, Kate opened a heavy door to reveal a very traditional-looking study, lined with books Kit doubted she’d ever read and hung with a Gully Jimson nude probably chosen years before and barely looked at since. Cigarette smoke clung to a leather armchair, and a waste paper basket overflowed with newspapers. It looked like a room no one had bothered to clean in a very long time.

  “You want me to do it?” Kate asked, nodding at Kit’s injured hand.

  Kit nodded his head.

  Kate O’Mally was surprisingly good with a knife. Well, surprising to Kit, who’d always assumed her nickname of butcher indicated clumsiness, not skill. All the same, it hurt like fuck and there was no other way of putting it. Slicing back flesh, Kate cut free gristle and bone, flicking the remains onto her desk. It looked like one of those chewy bits of chicken.

  She let Kit sew the ends together.

  “Pat arrived this afternoon,” said Kate. “Just turned up in a taxi, collected his cases, and told me to pay the driver. Said he’d come back for good if I’d accept that Mary was gone.”

  “What about his own house?”

  Shrugging, Kate said, “I hardly dare ask. You need a drink?”

  Kit shook his head.

  “Don’t suppose I should either.” Seating herself at the desk, Kate rummaged through a drawer until she found a Partegas box. “Want one of these instead?”

  The cigars were dry and burned too quickly, but Kate and Kit still sat there and smoked them anyway, watching curls of smoke obscure the ceiling. Kit understood what Kate was doing. She was ensuring he understood this meeting was social. They were no longer enemies. In her own way, the rituals Kate O’Mally lived by were as rigid as those Yoshi had followed.