Last Tango in Aberystwyth an-2

by Malcolm Pryce

  Ionawr tugged at my hand and we pushed our way through the doorway at the back and down the corridor, past the private rooms. The sound of revellers clapping in time to the Latin beat pursued us. But as we trudged deeper and deeper into the labyrinth of the pier the sound faded and gave way to the moan of the sea, a thick intoxicating boom — like blood pounding in our ears — as if the corridor was an artery leading us to a giant heart. At the very end, the entrance guarded by a curtain of clacking wooden beads, was the toffee-and-opium-apple den. We clacked our way through.

  The room was filled with hot sickly-sweet smoke and in near-pitch darkness, the only light a few candles and the red glow from the ends of the pipes. There was no music or any sound at all except the noise that recumbent people make when they change position or draw on a pipe; or suck a toffee apple before groaning softly.

  Ionawr led me to a man somewhere in the room, I couldn't say where. He lay reclined on a mat on the floor, a tray of toffee apples before him, and next to it an opium pipe. He looked up slowly and the flickering reflections in his eyes said that he was still with us, after a fashion.

  'This is the man I was telling you about,' said Ionawr, although it was unclear which of us she was talking to. He reached out a feeble hand and we shook.

  'You want to know about the Dean?' His voice was husky and thin but steady.

  'Yes,' I said.

  'It was all a terrible mistake,' said the monk. 'A terrible, terrible mistake. If the man is dead it will be on my conscience for ever.'

  'Tell me what happened.'

  The monk took a bite from one of the toffee apples and then said dreamily, 'I just drifted into it, really. For a while I was a monk down at Caldy Island, until I found out how they had lied to me. All the tales about them making Benedictine — it wasn't true. You never get near the stuff. All they sell in the gift shop is home-made mint sauce and scented soap. And the communion wine is piss ... So I ran away and ended up in Aberystwyth at the Seaman's Mission. And before long I became a gofer for the druids, a runner I suppose you'd call it. Doing errands and things, making drops and that. That's how I got the valise. I was supposed to deliver it to a Raven. You know what that is, I suppose?'

  'It's the name for a male agent who ensnares a female agent by seducing her.'

  'Yes, an assassination technique more properly known as a honey-trap, although it is more usual for the man to be the victim, for him to fall victim to a beautiful girl he unaccountably befriends in a bar. I was told to expect this man and to give him a valise.'

  'Who paid you to give him the case?'

  'I've no idea. I'm just a link in a chain. I know only the link that comes after me, not the one that comes after him nor the one that preceded me. That's how it works.'

  'And you gave the case to the Dean by mistake?'

  The man cried out in pain. 'But how the hell was I supposed to know, dammit!? Look out for a dark, cruel, cold-blooded killer, they said. With a feather in his cap. And then this chap turned up and I was having a drink with him that night in the bar and I said, 'What do you do for a living, then?' And he said, 'My trade is death. To me it holds no sting; to me flesh is just meat and the cold impersonal cut of steel as commonplace as the pen is to the clerk.' Well, what would you have done?'

  'But he was an undertaker.'

  The monk's voice rose in anguish. 'I know, I know! You think I'm not aware of that? It was just a harmless piece of shop talk to him. And the bloody feather he just found on his window-sill that morning. That's pretty, he thought, it's such a lovely day I think I'll put it in my hat. The fucking idiot!'

  'And after that, the Raven turned up?'

  'That's right. Wearing one of those coats they sell in Peacocks for nineteen ninety-nine. I thought it was a bit corny myself, dressing like that, but who am I to judge?'

  'And what was in the valise?'

  'How would I know?'

  'You mean you didn't look?'

  'Are you mad? It was sealed. You think I would be stupid enough to break a seal, like?'

  'I would have.'

  'That's because you don't know these people like I do.'

  I stood up, dizzy and disorientated in the darkness, and made for the glimmer of light that betrayed the outline of a door. Just before I reached it a hand grabbed the edge of my trousers. I looked down and beheld a sight that has haunted me ever since. The wreck of man I had once known: Valentine. He lay there so thin and emaciated his face had become a gargoyle and on his lower arm the flesh had grown so thin you could see the candle shining through. Valentine the former style-guru of the druids, his Crimplene safari suit now filthier than the carpet in a pub toilet. His mouth pulled back in a rictus of pain like a snarling dog. I kneeled down, staring in wide-eyed horror at this shattered piece of humanity.

  'Valentine, what happened out there at the sanatorium? What did you see?'

  The words kindled a feeble light in the empty pits of his eyes. A tiny, quivering gleam like the stormlamp of a wanderer taking refuge from the tempest in an empty house.

  'What did you see out there? What was it, this Ysbyty Ystwyth Experiment?'

  The grip of his hand on my trouser-leg tightened slightly, like the claw of a wren. Then, slowly, his mouth opened and through teeth the colour of caramel he whispered, 'The horror! The horror!'

  Then there was strength inside him for no more. His head fell back to rest on the bench; he closed his mouth, exhausted at the effort of those six syllables. I tugged my trousers away from his childlike grip and left him staring at the ceiling with eyes bigger than saucers, waiting for release of death.

  As I left the club I saw the cowgirl's holster hanging up by the door and, making sure no one saw, I slipped the toy gun into my pocket. Outside, the pavements were wet with spray from the sea. Patrons were starting to leave. I kissed Ionawr and pressed some money into her pocket and told her to go. I had things to do that night that it was better she didn't see. But no sooner had she left than I was cheated of my dark design. In a riot of drunken giggling, Mrs Bligh-Jones climbed awkwardly into the back of Jubal's car and stuck her legs through the wound-down window, wiggling them until a shoe fell off into the gutter. And Father Seamus, with whom I had an appointment tonight, got in the front and the car sped off.

  The shoe lay in the gutter next to the drain, a tawdry spoor of a Cinderella with size twelve feet. I took a half-step and scooped it up on to the pavement with the toe of my foot. Then I kicked it towards the cleansing sea. It toppled through the air like a rugby ball, over the white crossbar of the railings. It did little to lift my despondency. The moment called instead for an act of penance.

  I walked up to the stand and ordered a hot dog. As I waited, breathing in the rich perfume containing all the disappointments of my life, I thought of Myfanwy. Who had been on the other end of the line? Was it her? Where was she calling from? South America? How could it be and yet why could it not? There was no way of knowing, and yet my heart was deeply troubled. I took the hot dog and walked off into the night and thought of Mrs Bligh-Jones, the heroine of Pumlumon. True, she might have lost an arm up on that mountain, I thought grimly, but who could deny that in return she gained a kingdom?

  Chapter 12

  It was just a comment passed in an Aberystwyth bar. After half a lifetime presiding over the mortal remains of Aberystwyth folk, he decided to go and see where the course materials came from. Just a passing comment made to a harmless stranger in the sort of bar where the strangers never are. My trade is death.

  I stirred the tea in the pot and set out two cups then leaned back in my chair and let the hot fug of the paraffin heater lull me. Calamity walked in and I poured the tea as she emptied her schoolbag on to the desk: copper wire, anti-rheumatics, nylons, chocolate, fake library tickets ... and a packet of sugar marked 'Property of the Red Cross, Geneva'. The last item out of the bag was a packet of bird seed. I asked her what it was for.

  'Custard Pie asked me to get it.' She looked at me slyly.

/>   'You went to see him, then?'

  'You said I could.'

  'I know.'

  'It wasn't as bad as you think. He was quite friendly, really. The guards think he's lost it. Do-lally.' She twirled an index finger next to her temple to demonstrate his mental state.

  'And he asked you for bird seed?'

  'There's an air vent leading up to the ground, he thinks he can tame some birds like the Birdman of Alcatraz.'

  'I suppose he can't eat it and fly out of there. But just be careful. Make sure you sell it dearly. Tell him to give you some information about the Dean and then when he does, say: "You call that good information! The whole town knows that, give me something I don't know." Or something like that, OK?'

  'Right.'

  'And be careful, whatever you do, don't trust him.'

  Calamity took her tea and stood staring out of the window. 'Actually, Louie, I was thinking, seeing how dangerous this project is, I may need a heater on this one.'

  'Put on a jumper, like your mum keeps telling you.'

  'You know what I mean, stop messing around.'

  'What are you talking about?'

  'Not that sort of heater — you know, a heater.'

  'A heater?'

  'Protection ... an equaliser ...'

  'A what?'

  She sighed loudly. 'A rod, an iron, a gat ...'

  'You mean a gun?'

  'Yes.'

  'Sorry, kiddo, you're only licensed to carry a catapult.'

  'I'm serious, this is a crucial aspect of the case.'

  'Is that so?'

  'I get the feeling it all hinges on this, we can't afford any mistakes here. I could take yours.'

  'I haven't got one.'

  'Yes you have, it's locked in the sea-chest. Mrs Llantrisant told me. The key's taped behind the picture of Noel Bartholomew.'

  I changed tack. 'Calamity, as long as you work for me, you'll never carry a gun. I never carry one and it's probably the only reason I'm still alive.'

  A floorboard creaked and we both looked round. The door opened and Gretel stood framed in the doorway. 'Hi! Can I come in?'

  She was wearing a hessian trouser suit and a wide-brimmed hat and had painted her nails scarlet. I had an awful feeling it was an attempt at glamour. There was also something slightly stilted and unnatural in the way she walked, as if her recent exposure to the tarnished streets of Aberystwyth was causing her to affect a growing worldliness. I poured out another tea and Gretel told me the news. The Dean had telephoned her and pleaded with her to call off the sleuths.

  'He was very angry with me,' she said. 'He said there were some very bad men looking for him who wanted him dead and having two bungling private detectives hunting him was just making it easier for them.'

  I nodded thoughtfully.

  'He knew you'd been to the hotel and the Seaman's Mission and the Komedy Kamp at Borth. And he said Mister Marmalade was ... was ... what's the word?'

  'Whacked,' said Calamity.

  'What!?'

  'Whacked. He got whacked. That's what we call it in this business.'

  I looked at Calamity who ignored my questioning gaze.

  Gretel looked puzzled. 'I don't think he said that, it was something else.'

  'What does it matter,' said Calamity. 'Whacked, smacked, topped, zapped, greased, rubbed-out or bought the farm, he's dead and they did it.'

  'Who?'

  'We don't know.'

  Gretel put her fist into her mouth and made a sort of weeping sound. 'Do you think they'll ... they'll ... what was it?'

  'Whack him,' said Calamity helpfully. 'Who knows? But don't worry, we know what we're doing.'

  Gretel went to the bathroom, and Calamity said simply, 'What a dipstick.'

  'And she's paying us money, so be nice.'

  'She's definitely holding back on us.'

  'You think so?'

  'You don't? All this weepy stuff for a professor? It's all fake.'

  'How do you know?'

  'Whoever heard of someone hiring a private detective to find their teacher?'

  'In the real world people do all sorts of things you wouldn't believe.'

  'And her body language is all wrong. The crying, that's always a tough one to fake.'

  'They looked like real tears to me. Or has she got an onion in her fist?'

  'They're real but she's doing them in the wrong places. Textbook stuff. Crying inappropriately and not crying at the appropriate time. It's a giveaway.'

  'She just did that?'

  The toilet flushed and we stopped and when Gretel came back it was to a silence that fooled no one, even someone as unworldly as her.

  'Talking about me, are we?' She sat down. 'I've been thinking, maybe we'd better call off the hunt.'

  Calamity went and sat down on the edge of the desk and invaded her personal space like the cops do. 'Getting cold feet? Losing your bottle?'

  'B ... b ... but what if they whack him?'

  'If they really want to kill him,' I said, 'it's even more reason for us to find him first. Calling us off will just make their job easier.'

  'That's if he was telling the truth,' said Calamity.

  'What do you mean?' blurted Gretel. 'Of course he's telling the truth. Why wouldn't he?'

  Calamity put a mean face on. 'How do I know? Why would anyone ever dream of telling a lie? It beats me. Right from the cradle we're taught to tell the truth, and yet there are all these people out there who don't do it. I don't get it, what about you, eh, Louie?'

  I tried again to flash a warning look at her but she deliberately avoided it.

  'The Dean never told a lie in his life,' said Gretel.

  'Yeah, but what about you?'

  'What about me?'

  'You haven't exactly been telling us the truth, whole and nothing but, have you?'

  'W ... w ... what do you mean?'

  I slid down in my chair, trying to get my foot towards Calamity under the table.

  'This Bad Girl stuff for instance —'

  'I don't talk about her -'

  'That's a lie for a start - you never stop!'

  I managed to get my foot across and kick Calamity. She jumped slightly and shot me a furious look. Then she eased herself down off the desk and stamped on my foot.

  'I ... you ... how dare you?' said Gretel.

  'You didn't tell us he made a pass at her one night and tore her blouse, did you?'

  'He didn't ... who says ... how did you know?'

  'It's my job to know, I'm a detective.' She took out a notebook and read from it. 'She was a hussy and she shouldn't have been there, huh? More interested in drinking and partying than learning about Abraham; and when it came to the Ten Commandments she only knew how to break them. And then there was the incident with the Dean; by rights he was the one who should have been thrown out on his ear but the wives of all the other tutors got together and hey presto! off she goes. Not that she cared of course, it's what she wanted all along ... am I getting warm?'

  Gretel stood up angrily. 'I won't stay another second to hear the Dean's good name dragged through the mud like this. Good day to you both.'

  After she had slammed the door I held my hand out for the notebook. Calamity snapped it shut and put it in her pocket. I stood up and took a step towards her. She moved round to the other side of the desk. 'Let me see.'

  'What for, don't you trust me or something?' 'There's nothing in it, is there? You made it all up.' She shrugged. 'So what if I did? They're in it together, you mark my words.' She walked out.

  I took the cowgirl's gun out of my pocket and put it on the table. It was a real beauty. Replica cowboy Colt 45, the 'Peacemaker'. It had been adapted to light cigarettes with a flame that appeared where the hammer hit the pin. Everything worked as on a real one: the chamber spun, the blanks slid in and out, the trigger mechanism worked. You'd need to know a lot about guns to tell it wasn't real. I slid it into my jacket pocket and went out to make my peace with Father Seamus.

&nb
sp; The inside of the confessional booth was warm and dark and comforting, like the inside of a womb, and almost as intimate with its air of shared secrets. I leaned my head against the wooden side and said, 'Father I need spiritual guidance.'

  'That's why I am here, my son.'

  'It's not easy.'

  'Take your time.'

  'I need to know whether shooting a priest is a mortal or a venial sin.'

  The sound of forced, uncertain chuckling came through the grille.

  'I suppose it depends which priest,' I added.

  'Louie, that's you, isn't it? What are you doing? This is God's house.'

  'How come he let you in?'

  'This is no place for jokes.'

  I stuck the gun through the grille. "Who's joking?'

  'My God! Dear Louie, what on earth has got into you?'

  'I could ask you the same question.'

  'This is about last night, at the club, isn't it?'

  'How was the Vimto?'

  He forced a laugh.

  'Or did you turn it into wine first?'

  'Louie, when the Lord calls upon you to do his work, you cannot quibble at the sort of establishment —'

  'Of course not. Jesus was never too proud to enter a house of fallen women.'

  'That's what I tell myself.'

  'Yeah, I bet you do. I don't remember the bit in the Bible where he drank Vimto from their shoes, though. Must have missed that bit. Still,' I said, slowly twisting the gun chamber and letting the sound of the clicks fill the booth, 'you must get thirsty standing on that battlement all night. Eyes smarting in the frost. Denying the soft pleasures of Mrs Bligh-Jones's palliasse.'