They walk along in silence. Paul’s clenching and unclenching his fists. Yeah, trash the caff, that would be the thing. He imagines chucking chintzy cups and saucers all over the show, smashing them against the walls. Getting a can and splashing petrol over her frilly pink tablecloths. She’d suspect him, of course, but if he torched it, she couldn’t prove a thing. Of course he’d never actually do it, but the idea calms him down and he starts to breathe more like normal, not like he’s running a marathon.
‘You know what, Dad?’ says Ben when they get home and they’re waiting for the lift to take them up to the flat. ‘In the Low Lights with everyone yesterday, I was really happy.’
Paul looks down at him. ‘You’ll be happy again.’
‘I won’t,’ he says quietly, almost in a whisper.
‘Of course you will. Once this all blows over and we’re back to normal.’
‘Normal’s not the same as happy, Dad.’
At the flat, Ben goes straight to his room and locks the door. He doesn’t slam it or anything, which Paul’s half expecting. He just pushes it shut, sort of carefully, as if it’s the end of something. Like he really means it.
Paul puts on the kettle and drops a teabag in his Captain Birdseye mug, then gets a cold KitKat out the fridge and starts peeling off the wrapper. It’s like a reflex with him when he’s narked: make a cuppa, get out a four-stick double-K to dunk, then lick off the melting chocolate and nibble the warm crisp wafery bit until it’s all gone.
Then he thinks of Lord Jim and his digestives and he chucks the Kit Kat in the bin. And a surge of hot fury, like a red tide, sweeps through him, making his jaw jut and his fists clench again. Is this what it’s going to be like from now on, every time he goes to eat something he fancies? Is he going to see those fat dimpled fingers crumbling custard creams into a saucer, see all those rings, those fucking fake diamonds and sapphires for God’s sake, sinking into the sausage flesh so deep you can hardly see them? His arms, thick and pale as pork joints, and the smell of the athlete’s foot powder he has to sprinkle into all his creases to stop the jock-rot. Creases at his wrists, for fuck’s sake, and his elbows, let alone his stinking crotch and all those rolls on his belly.
He tips the unmade tea down the sink and pours himself three fingers of Bell’s instead. The hit settles him a bit, and he realizes he’s starving.
‘Ben!’ he shouts, taking out his mobile and scrolling down to the number for the curry place. ‘D’you fancy an Indian?’
When there’s no answer, he marches down the corridor and bangs the door with the flat of his hand. ‘Oy, sulky boy. Open up. I said I was getting a curry. What d’you want?’ More silence. Maybe he’s in the en-suite, on the bog or washing his hair or something. ‘Right, I’ll order for you. OK?’
A chicky tikka should tempt him out. How long can a hungry twelve-year-old keep up a sulk? Paul puts in the order then wanders back to the lounge. The restaurant bloke said it’d be forty minutes, which is probably an hour in real money.
‘Ben!’ he shouts again, shrugging on his jacket, ‘I’m just off down the Low Lights for a quickie. I should be back before the curry man, but I’ve left a twenty on the hall table just in case.’
What’s freaking him out, right, nearly as much as the fat homo on the sofa, is that Laura creature. It’s like everyone knew except him – the doctor, Ben, even Mr Camera most likely – and they were probably all sniggering about it behind his back. There should be a fucking government health warning on people like that, a tattoo or something, like you get on tyre retreads. She wasn’t bad-looking either, that’s the freaky part. If he’d been ten years older, he might even have asked her out. Christ, it doesn’t bear thinking about.
Paul’s that antsy he takes the stairs down instead of the lift and almost runs along the road past the ice factory. In fact, maybe he should take up running again; he’s still got all the gear somewhere. Run along the sea wall to Tynemouth every morning, like he used to with Nessa when she was on that fitness kick, which turned out to be her getting toned up for her fancy man, which put Paul off the whole idea when he found out. Still, it would be good to do something like that, something to tire him out, like, and stop him going bananas and wanting to smash things up. Because that’s what he really wants to do right now: kick the driver’s door in on that smart new Beemer, except it’s probably built to withstand that kind of thing. But that pansy little red Punto would buckle no problem. He could do them all, that whole row of little superminis parked along the front by the Italian place. Bish, bash, bosh. Crappy tinny girlie cars the lot of them.
When he was a lad, he got in with a gang who went out vandalizing every weekend. Nothing too serious, just empty buildings and that. He’s not sure why he stopped. It got boring after a while, he supposes. Then the lads started nicking things, and one of them got done, and he started to see where it was all leading: to a criminal record and a crappy council flat, and some mouthy chav with a double buggy on his case the whole time. So he started on the boat with his dad, and used the dosh to join the gym. Which was how he met Nessa, a few years down the line, so that was the end of that.
Well, the end of that chapter anyway, and the beginning of a whole other chapter. The his’n’hers chapter. The B&Q, nicey-nice, barley-white chapter. God, pretty much the whole of his twenties it was like living on two different planets: on the boat with the lads, with the nets full of fucking gurnards and dabs, and quotas doing his head in and the price of diesel going through the roof – then back to Nessa with her leotards and chilled Chardonnay.
Then Ben came and it all started to make sense. Striding down the Fish Quay with the bairn on his shoulders and the lads going ‘howay’. Showing him the boat, letting him have a go at the wheel, doing the whole ‘one day, son, all this will be yours’ bit. One of the things about fishing, that makes you stick at it, is the idea of handing it down to your son – the boat, the charts, the moorings; your good will with the dealers; everything you’ve picked up in thirty-odd years in the business.
Just walking past the Gut now and seeing the Wanderer bobbing there, with her ropes coiled and her nets sorted, gives him a thrill; makes him want to grab someone out the queue for the chipper and go, ‘See that one with the fresh paint job? She’s mine.’
He can see the Low Lights from here, with the doors open and the lads sat outside in the setting sun, with their tabs and straight glasses, or propped against the wall. And he’s already reaching round to his back pocket for his wad, practically tasting his first mouthful of Snecklifter – when he realizes he can’t face going over.
Because Nana’s told the whole fucking world about the film, hasn’t she? So they’ll be just full of it: the BBC man, what’s he like then, blah blah blah. When’s it going to be on, will they be filming down the Fish Quay, is he taking them out on the boat. And that makes Paul so fucking mad, because this has always been his place, where he could always go if he wanted a natter or a bevvy, or just a sit in the corner by himself with the Chronicle. But now he can’t face it. And it’s all that doctor’s fault.
So he turns round before the lads can spot him, and heads for Union Quay Stairs. And sprints up them, way too fast, so he’s puffed before he’s half way up; but he makes himself keep going, gritting his teeth, even though the blood’s pounding in his head fit to burst a vessel, and his thighs feel like sacks of concrete so he can hardly lift them, and his heart’s galloping like he’s heading for a heart attack. But at least it’s getting it out of his system.
At the top, his legs are like jelly and he flops down at one of the tables outside the Wooden Doll, which he could go into instead of the Low Lights, except it’s those two dozy kids behind the bar these days, whose dad set them up in the business, more money than sense, and it’s always full of their mates getting freebies, which irritates Paul, because the Doll could be a perfectly good pub, but they’re running it into the ground. Which brings him back to the boat, and the business, and Ben, and what the fuck to do about
the lad.
Then out of the blue he gets a flash of the bairn’s face after he’d run up the stairs to the flat that time, so full of all this stuff they were finding out at the library, about Annie and that, just jabbering away like any normal kid and looking so fucking happy.
Chapter Thirty-Two
2007
Paul’s left the front door swinging wide open behind him, a gesture far more aggressive and contemptuous than if he had slammed it.
Laura gets up to close it. ‘Oh dear,’ she says.
Mary sighs. ‘As you so aptly comment, oh dear.’
‘Oh, he’ll be OK,’ says Ian breezily. ‘I’ll go and have a word later.’
‘I’m not sure even your Caledonian charm will persuade Ben’s father to lie on that couch again.’
‘You’d be surprised what people will do to see their faces on the wee screen.’
‘It will take more than the promise of fifteen minutes’ fame to get a man’s man like that to accept a flamboyant forebear like Lord Jim. Paul’s a member of one of the most masculine subcultures in the country,’ Mary reminds him. ‘Women are not allowed to go out on a fishing trip, did you know that? Even in this day and age, it’s an absolute taboo.’
‘Shall I go after them?’ Laura peers through the curtains.
‘I think that would probably do more harm than good.’
‘But we can’t just let him drag the lad away like that. Did you see him, Mary? He was totally gutted.’
‘At least give his father time to calm down a bit.’
Laura sits down again. Then gets up again straight away. ‘It’s no good, I’m too churned up. You haven’t got any chocolate have you?’
Mary laughs. ‘No. Sorry.’
‘What about ice cream?’
‘I’m afraid not.’
‘Right, that’s me off then,’ Laura announces, grabbing a turquoise handbag. ‘People to go, places to see. See you kids later.’
‘So what happens to Ben’s therapy?’ asks Ian when she’s gone. He’s monopolized the sofa, sitting in the middle surrounded by small pieces of expensive-looking electronic equipment, which he appears to be attaching to one another with black wires.
Mary shrugs. ‘We’ll have to see. Once Paul’s calmed down, I may be able to persuade him to let me continue seeing Ben. But it might be the end of your film, I’m afraid.’
‘Shit. What a fucking mess.’
‘I think it’s quite interesting actually,’ comments Mary, leaning back in her analyst’s chair. ‘Setting aside the obvious torment of the poor man, you couldn’t hope to witness a better example of karma in the making. I’d say he’ll have at least one module to resit next time around, wouldn’t you?’
Ian laughs. ‘Homophobia 101, you mean? I don’t think he’s even signed up for the course in his current life.’
‘What will you do about the film?’
‘I’ll cancel the film crew for now, but all is not yet lost,’ he says, irrepressible as ever. ‘I’ll have a look at the footage I’ve got of Ben so far. There’s lots of good stuff in there. With a spot of clever editing, it might be enough – though I might have to pad it out with something else.’
‘Provided Paul agrees to you using it.’
‘He’s signed the consent form.’
Mary sits up. ‘You’d hold him to that?’
Ian shrugs. ‘What do you think those things are for? To deal with precisely this kind of eventuality, when someone gives permission then changes their mind at the last minute.’
The man’s ruthlessness still has the power to shock her. She wonders nervously what unpleasant surprises he might have in store for her later on in this process. Still, she sets that concern aside as something far more intriguing snags her attention. She opens her notebook, checks back through her notes and makes a few calculations. Then:
‘One good thing came out of that session,’ she remarks casually.
‘What’s that then?’
‘Well, I’ve just been looking at the dates, and it’s entirely possible that Lord Jim of the Jungle and Annie’s somewhat effeminate brother Jimmy are one and the same man.’
‘Good grief. How do you work that out?’
‘I can’t be sure – James was an incredibly common name at that time, so this is pure speculation. But we can calculate Jimmy’s date of birth from the 1891 census, and we know that Lord Jim was eighty-seven when we met him, because he kindly reminded us. Assuming that was in the mid-sixties—’
‘He was on about that music in the basement, wasn’t he? All that flower power stuff. Everyone in bare feet. ‘All You Need Is Love’. ‘If You’re Going to San Francisco’. Which would make it the Summer of Love – which, as everyone knows, was 1967.’
‘So how old would young Jimmy have been in 1967 if he was eighteen in 1898?’
‘OK. Hang on a sec.’ He closes his eyes, doing the calculation in his head. ‘Eighty-seven. Fucking hell. So Little Jimmy Osmond grows up to be Big Jim of the Jungle. That’s quite a transformation. Who would have thought it?’
‘Wait,’ says Mary, though her heart’s thudding with excitement. ‘I haven’t finished. We still have to make the link to Ben’s father. How old do you think he is? Thirty-nine? Forty? That would give him a date of birth somewhere in the late sixties – which is around the time Lord Jim died, according to Laura.’
‘Do you realize what you’re saying?’
‘I hope so.’ She beams at him.
‘No. I mean, think about that date. 1967. It might have been the Summer of Love for them, but it was the summer of the Long Sands for us.’ He grabs her hand. ‘When we met for the first time.’
‘We didn’t actually meet, remember,’ Mary says mildly, squeezing his hand then disengaging herself. ‘I merely noticed you on your surfboard.’
‘But we were both there, that’s the important thing. So was Paul, Lord Jim I mean – and Davy, aka Laura, had just been hired to nurse him. What’s the betting everyone else was there too? Ben and his granny, maybe even old Skip, for fuck’s sake. Christ, Mary. No wonder you’re so hooked on this stuff. You can talk about degrees of separation till you’re blue in the face, but when you’re faced with coincidences like this, it gives you the frigging goosebumps.’
Mary feels an uncharacteristic surge of triumph, which she attempts to contain. ‘I don’t think we should get too distracted by 1967 at the moment,’ she says carefully. ‘All the date coincidence suggests is that certain groups of souls may indeed meet – or seek one another out – repeatedly down the ages. What we need to work on right now is who else might have been present in 1898, when Annie disappeared.’
‘Go on, then.’ He picks up his multitasking phone contraption and looks at her expectantly, presumably poised, by some technological means, to take notes.
‘Well,’ she says, ‘if I’m right about Lord Jim, we now know the current incarnations of both Annie and her brother Jimmy. Unfortunately it doesn’t look as though we’ll get any more information from either of them for the time being. So what we need to do now is find out whether it’s possible to identify the current incarnation of anyone else close to Annie – her mother, for example, or her boyfriend – and interrogate them about what happened to her.’
‘So hypnotize me.’ He slips off his shoes, shoves the equipment to one side and prostrates himself on the sofa, opening his arms in a parody of submission.
‘What on earth makes you think you have anything to do with this? You’d never met Ben or Paul before this week.’
‘Excuse me!’ he objects indignantly. ‘I was the mysterious red-headed boy who so engaged you in 1967. Here, in North Shields. I was the lapdog you adored as an Elizabethan lady in the sixteenth century. I was the love of your life for a few ecstatic months in 1976. And I’m here right now, for fuck’s sake, at exactly the same time as Ben turns up on your doorstep asking for help. I would have thought that more than qualified me, wouldn’t you?’
Mary laughs. ‘The main thing
that qualifies you is the fact that you are both willing and available, indeed some would say “gagging for it”. Whereas Laura is off goodness knows where, Mr Skipper is in a perpetually vulnerable state, and Ben’s grandmother must be classed, for the time being at least, as in the enemy camp.’
‘You’ve forgotten to include yourself.’
‘Skilled though I am, I have yet to master the art of self-hypnosis.’
‘So it’s got to be me then,’ he says, grinning smugly.
‘Annoyingly, you seem to have achieved exactly what you want.’
‘Which is lying helpless on your couch, completely at your mercy.’
Naturally Ian wants to go ahead straight away, but Mary insists on taking a break first; she needs time to collect her thoughts and plan what she’s going to do. In terms of methodology, the session with Paul was a failure; there was no mention of his early life at all. So she’s worried she’ll be unable to direct Ian’s recollections away from his personal traumas – even assuming he knew Annie in a past life, which seems unlikely to say the least. Taking refuge in an age-old ritual, she sets out her mismatched willow-pattern tea set and fills the kettle.
‘Laura said you were both fishermen,’ says Ian, sitting at the kitchen table and leafing through a heap of her unopened post.
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘But I don’t have any evidence that we even knew each other.’ She wraps her hands around her cup and sips thoughtfully while he rips open a little pack of oatmeal biscuits purloined from the hotel.
‘You suspect you did though,’ he prompts, crunching up two biscuits in quick succession, cascading crumbs.
‘It’s possible, but I’ve never tried to cross-check past lives like this before. Theoretically it could get rather complicated. With Paul, for example, we were lucky in that there appear to have been no intervening incarnations. Lord Jim died in 1967 and Paul was born shortly afterwards. Assuming we’re right, of course.’
Herring Girl Page 26