by Rob Grant
Jeremy was slightly uncomfortable with the imagery, but he just shrugged modestly. 'I'm glad I could be of service, sir.'
'What that means, Jeremy, is that you are now our go-to guy. I've got another project for you, and it's a biggy. I want you to undertake the re-branding of the National Health Service.'
The re-branding of the NHS? That would be worth millions upon millions. Jeremy struggled very hard to keep his expression serious and intelligent, when all he really wanted to do was clap his hands, giggle uncontrollably and blow idiot, bubbly raspberries of delight.
'The NHS is becoming a bit of an albatross for us. People are starting to perceive it as a failure, which it is not, of course. It is, in fact, the envy of the world. We want you to realign that perception. You'll have a massive budget and pretty much carte blanche. This is big for us, Jeremy. Very big indeed. If it's not handled well, it could be an election killer. What d'you say? Will you be my go-to guy?'
Jeremy nodded. 'Frankly, Prime Minister, I'd cut my right hand off for that opportunity. In fact, I'd even cut off yours.'
The PM threw his head back and laughed raucously, and slapped Jeremy on the back. 'Excellent, Jeremy, excellent. Look, I'll get Dan over there to give you the full brief. You're going to want to tour some hospitals and so on. When you've done the groundwork and gathered your data, why don't we meet up and chat about where you might take it?'
'That would be wonderful, Prime Minister.'
'Oh, you can drop the formalities when we're off-camera, Jeremy. Most of these vagabonds and reprobates just call me "P".' And he turned round once again to share this jest with the assemblage of vagabonds and reprobates, who, once again, unless they had been bionically augmented, couldn't possibly have heard, but, once again, did their duty anyway. He turned back to Jeremy. 'Why don't we do it one weekend at Chequers? I'll get Dan to sort out a date with you. Would that be cool?'
Jeremy smiled and nodded. 'That certainly would be cool.' And he tried out his shiny new privilege: 'It would be very cool indeed, P.'
FIFTY
'Hayleigh?' Dad knocked politely on the cubicle door. 'Are you all right in there?'
'I'm fine.' She had to think quickly now. If they started putting two and two together, they'd come up with a hundred and fifty-seven, and any prospect of any kind of freedom henceforth would be a fond and distant dream. But all was not lost, not just yet. First things first, she carefully let the assassin's dagger slip into the bath. Mistake. Horribly, you could see it quite clearly on the bottom. In fact, if you were standing so the light struck it, you couldn't help but see it. It couldn't have landed shiny side down, now, could it? Of course not. Either she had to retrieve it, which was probably not possible, or she had to murk up the water somehow.
'I'm just washing my hair,' she yelled, and, hauling herself out of the chair, she dunked her head in the water.
'She's got a paper boxing glove on her hand!' Jonny yelled. 'The bloody loony.'
Crappy crap pudding. She couldn't do much at all if the pesky brat was going to scrutinise her every move.
Fortunately, her father came to the rescue. 'Get off the floor, Jonny.'
'She's a nutter, Dad.'
'Get off the floor. You'll ruin your uniform.'
'Barking, she is,' Jonny said, but he got up anyway.
There was no shampoo, of course. Nothing so straightforward in Hayleigh's wretched existence. All she had was the dreadful NHS soap. She unwound the towelettes, dunked the soap bar in the bath and started rubbing it in her hands to try to work up some kind of lather. It took a while, and it was awkward, balancing on one leg, and her purple hand was caning beyond belief, but bubbles did start forming eventually. Not nearly enough to serve her purpose, but when she rubbed her soapy hands through her hair, and dunked her head in the bath again, the water did start to cloud over, quite a lot. Her hair must have been fairly filthy. One more lather should do it.
'Hayleigh!' Dad was starting to sound impatient now. 'Come on, babe. I'm already waist-deep in unspeakable quagmire for letting you out of my sight.'
'Nearly done!' Hayleigh yelled back. She managed one more lather-up and dunk, and the deadly shard was no longer catching the light, as far as she could tell. She lowered herself back into the wheelchair and looked round for a towel, but, naturally, there was no towel. Did you honestly expect anything different? She grabbed the towelettes, but they didn't do a very good job of drying her hair. They collapsed into soggy fragments after just a couple of swipes.
'Hayleigh,' Dad called, 'if you don't come out pronto, I'm sending Jonny in after you.'
Oh, poo pie. That would be disasterama. The ugly little tic would find the dagger, for sure. He had some kind of homing instinct for weaponry. But wait, maybe she could turn this to her advantage. 'I need a towel,' she yelled.
At least one of them would have to go off and fetch a towel. Yes. Hopefully, even, both of them.
'Hayleigh, are you telling me you went in there to wash your hair, and you didn't take a towel?'
'I know. Thicko, aren't I? Forget my head if it wasn't screwed on.'
Which, of course, was Jonny's cue: 'It is most definitely not screwed on. It never has been screwed on. It probably drops off altogether when she's in bed.'
'Jonny,' Dad said, 'go and fetch your mother. Ask her to bring a towel.'
No, no, no. We could not have the Chief of the Chief of Detectives herself, in person, at the actual scene of the crime. That would never do. As Jonny's footsteps raced pell-mell out of the room, Hayleigh wheeled quickly over to the door, slid back the lock and opened it. 'Never mind. I'll dry it in the room.' She smiled her winningest smile.
'You're soaking,' Dad said. 'You'll catch your death.'
'Not if we hurry.' Hayleigh wheeled past him, trying to urge him to follow with telepathy. But her telepathic powers were clearly not up to the job because Dad peered into the bathroom and saw something.
'Oh, Hayleigh,' he said, recrimination in his voice. 'Look at that.' And he started walking towards the bath.
Hayleigh wheeled back to the cubicle door, and tried to keep the anxiety out of her voice: 'What? What's up?' She glanced round anxiously. How long before Mrs Monk arrived on the scene?
'This,' Dad said, and, rolling up his sleeve, he stooped and dipped his arm in the bath. He pulled it out again and held up the plug. 'You can't just leave the water for someone else to drain.'
'Excuse me? Wasn't it you who was telling me to hurry up?'
Dad was still looking into the bath.
'Come on,' Hayleigh urged. She had to get him away from there. 'I'm shivering, here.'
'Right.' Dad seemed fascinated by the swirling bath water, but he managed to drag his eyes away from it and padded back towards her, just as Jonny burst into the room with a towel, but, as far as Hayleigh could tell, no Mother in tow.
Jonny held up the towel and grinned proudly. 'Nicked it. Nicked it off a trolley.'
Hayleigh held out her hand -- the undamaged left one, of course -- for Jonny to pass her the towel, but, predictably enough, Jonny decided it would be infinitely better to sling it with maximum force straight into her face.
'Thank you,' Hayleigh said sweetly. 'You arsehole.'
'Welcome, bitch ho.'
Hayleigh started drying her hair. The towel was good cover for her bruised hand. Dad was staring at the mirror now. You could just about see the cogs in his brain clanking round. 'Hayleigh, tell me honestly, now: did you do that?'
Hayleigh looked at the mirror as if the massive damage she'd inflicted on it was somehow hard to spot, as if it didn't look at all like a jumbo jet had flown straight through it. 'Did I do what?'
'Of course she did it!' Jonny shrilled. 'She's always doing it. She hates mirrors. It's all part of her complete and utter mentalism.'
'Shush, Jonny, let Hayleigh speak.'
Hayleigh hung her head and nodded.
Dad shook his head sadly. 'Oh, Hay. We are going to have to get you back in with that thera
pist.' And he started wheeling her out of the loo.
She'd got away with it! Unbelievable. Jonny himself had furnished her with a completely credible alibi, bless his rancid little socks.
She was still towelling her hair when, halfway back to her room, she noticed her exercise book jammed down beside her hip, and suddenly remembered she'd left the suicide note on the bathroom chair.
She had left the suicide note on the bathroom chair.
Thank God Dad hadn't spotted it.
Stupid, stupid cow. What now? She couldn't just leave it there, could she? She'd signed the bloody thing with her full name, middle initial included. Why had she done it? She'd always known the note could turn into a liability. She ran through the text of it in her mind. Could she possibly spin it into something innocent? No, whichever way you looked at it, it was pretty unambiguous. She had to go back and retrieve it. And she had to do it right now, before Mommie Dearest got wind. She slammed on the wheelchair brakes. 'Hang on: we have to go back.'
'What?' Dad was irritated. He was doubtless already in for several painful lashes from the tongue, and he probably had a good idea of how the news of Hayleigh's latest mirror assault would be received in certain quarters. 'What now, Hayleigh?'
Rather than give him the opportunity to refuse permission, or, worse still, send Jonny scurrying back for it, she spun the wheelchair round, released the brake and headed off back towards the bathroom at such a lick, she probably left tyre burns on the corridor floor. 'Forgotten something,' she called back.
'Is it your head?' pig dog brother yelped in delight. 'Did you forget your head, you bloody spazmo?'
'Jonny,' Dad chided. 'You're not to use that word.'
'What word? Bloody or spazmo?'
'Neither,' Dad said.
Hayleigh glanced back. Dad was following her, damn it, and Jonny was dancing around him like Dash from The Incredibles. She just couldn't get enough speed out of the wheelchair to maintain a sufficient lead, especially since she had to reverse into the bathroom. She thought about going through head on and opening the door with her bad leg, but the lack of pain management meds in her system made that option untenable: she might very well pass out from the pain, and all would be lost. And she was so close, now, to getting away with the whole business, she didn't dare risk it.
Dad caught up with her at the door and took control of the chair. 'What is it you've forgotten?'
'I left some homework on the bathroom chair.'
Dad sighed, angrily, and pushed her towards the cubicle door, which was still ajar. Hayleigh saw the note immediately. She hadn't even had the foresight to leave it upside down. She reached over, grabbed it and stuffed it into her exercise book.
'You brought your homework to the bathroom?'
Hayleigh shrugged. 'Something to do while I waited for the bath to fill.' And at that moment, she glanced over at the gurgling, draining bath and caught a glimmer of a sparkle as the light hit the mirror shard in it.
She dropped her towel so Dad would have to bend over and pick it up. She looked up. The water was agitating the mirror fragment, and the reflection was darting about the ceiling like Tinker Bell.
Dad handed her the towel, and Hayleigh grabbed it off him. He started to turn towards the bath, so she launched the wheelchair towards him and caught him a savage blow to the shin.
'Bloody hell, Hayleigh!' He reached down to massage his leg.
'You can't say that word,' Jonny admonished, 'you spazmo.'
'Sorry, Dad. I'm trying to hurry things along here. Are you OK?'
'I'll live. Let's go, then,' Dad said grumpily, and wheeled her out again, limping slightly.
Crisis averted. Hayleigh clutched the exercise book to her chest. She would still have to dispose of the note, of course, and, since she would now be under the Ever Watchful Eye for the foreseeable future, she could only think of one way to do that safely.
She wondered, briefly, how many calories there were in a sheet of exercise book paper.
FIFTY-ONE
It wasn't until P and his coterie had availed themselves of all the photo opportunities, sipped drinks, rubbed shoulders and left the party that Jeremy finally got a chance to examine the contents of Anton's silver box. He stole into the lavatory in the club's VIP lounge. Outside, rock stars, pop stars, footballers and supermodels were really starting to party now the headmaster had left the building. He cracked open the box.
Now, Jeremy was not an expert in these matters. Far from it. But he knew, from Grenville Roberts' recipe for Victoria sponge cake, what ten grams of baking powder looked like. There was easily double that amount of powder in the box. Easily. Clearly, Anton hadn't intended it for his personal use alone. It was there to make the party go with a bang, as the Secret Serviceman had predicted. Was this how the big boys played it? It all seemed terribly seedy to Jeremy. What next? Pimping?
The lavatory door flew open and Jeremy snapped the case shut, guiltily. A young man and a young woman entered noisily and started necking quite seriously, running their hands up and down each other's bodies. Jeremy recognised them, not by name, though, but he knew they were both from manufactured pop groups. The woman was from Gurlz Banned, and the bloke was from Big Boys Cry. They were really getting into it, clearly oblivious to him, and when the lad's hand started tugging down the girl's thong, Jeremy thought he ought to make his presence known.
'Steady on, now, chaps. We'll all be wanting some.'
They didn't break off their foreplay. They didn't even seem embarrassed. The bloke just peered over the girl's shoulder and grinned at him. 'Wait your turn, innit? Wait your turn.' Then he spotted Jeremy's box, and that distracted him from his amorous endeavours. 'You got some naughty salt, mate?'
Jeremy had been on the brink of flushing the bloody stuff down the loo. He shrugged. 'I do indeed have some naughty salt. Would you like some?'
'Fuck me, yes.' His eyes were wide and he literally panted like a dog.
Having none of the paraphernalia of druggery, Jeremy tried to tip out a couple of lines' worth onto the marble sink top, but misjudged and a big pile cascaded out.
The bloke's eyes got even wider. 'Fuck me. Are you serious? That's half of Columbia there, innit.'
Jeremy shrugged again. 'Be my guest.'
'Right.' The bloke rubbed his hands. 'We are going to seriously partayyyy. Amy, fetch the girls.'
She tottered towards the door on shoes that were designed to enhance the shape of her legs for photo shoots -- and they did a very successful job of that, Jeremy thought -- but were impossible to walk in.
'Don't tell anyone else, though, innit.'
Amy nodded and left.
'Right.' The bloke rubbed his hands again. 'Let's get stuck in.' He patted his pockets. 'Fuck. Got a credit card?'
Jeremy took out his wallet and handed over his Amex. He'd considered using his Tesco card, but didn't think that would give quite the right impression.
The bloke chopped himself a generous line with Jeremy's Amex. 'Right.' He patted himself down again. 'Got a tenner?'
Jeremy took out his wallet. He only had twenties. He didn't suppose it made much of a difference.
'Cheers, innit.' He started rolling the note into a tube. 'Ain't got no cash, innit. Fuckers give us two hundred and fifty squid a week spending money. Can you credit it? Two hundred and fifty. Three number ones on the trot, they give us fucking spends. Hardly pays for the ganja.' He bent to the marble, and Jeremy looked away.
The bloke snorted mightily, then threw back his head and yelled: 'Fucking, fucking, fuck, fuck, fuck.' He looked round at Jeremy. 'That is some top fucking straight, innit.' He offered the rolled up note to Jeremy.
Jeremy shook his head. 'Maybe later.'
'What's your name, mate?'
'Jeremy.'
'Jeremiah.' The bloke grinned. 'I is Jase, innit?' and he held out his hand palm down. Jeremy shook it.
Amy burst back in, giggling. Two of the other gurlz from her banned tottered in after her in thei
r ridiculous heels, each carrying two bottles of champagne. Amy turned and locked the door. Jeremy was beginning to wish he'd known that possibility had been available to him.
'Here you go, girls.' Jase waved at the coke mountain, generous host that he was. 'Fill your boots.'
The girls all took a noisy snort. It turned Jeremy's stomach a little. It seemed a bit degrading, in his opinion. Porcine. The sort of thing you really ought to do in private.
When they'd all filled their boots, Jason took another trip on the merry-go-round, and went back to his foreplay attack on Amy.
The other two girls turned their attention to Jeremy, running their hands up and down the lapels of his jacket and licking their glossy lips.
'What d'you think, Justine?'
'I think he's well cute.'
'Shall we do him?'
'Get his cock out. Let's try him on for size.'
Justine knelt and started unzipping his flies, while the other one grabbed his neck and rather artlessly thrust her tongue down his throat.
Well, this was it. A dream come true. A threesome. A classic end to an epic day. And the girls were, no doubt about it, stunningly gorgeous. It was, after all, what they'd been hired for. They might not be the classiest women on the planet, or, by a very long way, the most intelligent, but they were, visually, stunners.
And what man wouldn't, in Jeremy's position?
It turned out, in fact, that Jeremy wouldn't.
Justine was still fiddling with his zipper when the other one finished her tonsil assault and stood back to lift her top over her head. Looking down at the fumbling girl on her knees suddenly caused a flashback to slam into Jeremy's head. He stepped back and said: 'Sorry, girls. I hate to be a party pooper, but I'm spoken for, I'm afraid.'