To the Ends of the Earth

by Michael Gouda

  “But some must weigh over a tonne.”

  “The heaviest weight, according to the Guinness Book of Records, lifted by a single guy is 2.85 metric tonnes.”

  “You’re making that up.”

  “Sh!” In the distance we heard the haunting, screaming cry of the peewit, or lapwing, and I suddenly shivered.

  “Come on,” said Lex. “We’ve got to make tracks for home—and bed.”

  “Yes, please.”

  I had forgotten, what with the events of the day, that I had promised to get in touch with Jacob, but it had carried the proviso that I might be working, so it wasn’t until about half past two of the following day—I had a job to do in the morning; it wasn’t exciting but it was time-consuming—that I rang him.

  He sounded depressed but cheered up a bit when I called.

  “Anything on the jobs front?”

  “I think I’ve been blacklisted. And it wasn’t me at all. The little shit had it in for me ever since I told him off for being late. And they always believe the so-called victim and never the accused.”

  “No, that’s not fair. But it didn’t come to court.”

  “Of course not. They didn’t have a case, but my name would be published and his hidden.”

  “Will they give you a reference?”

  The only answer was a hollow laugh.

  “Look, Jacob, I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I look after the job advertisements. If I see one that would suit you, I’ll hold it up for a day and tell you. Obviously I can’t hold it for longer than a day or the firm will start raising Cain, but it will give you a day’s start on everyone else.”

  And I did do it religiously for three days, each time checking if the job was suitable, if he thought he’d stand a chance. I even offered to write him a reference myself, but he seemed sunk into gloom.

  I would have carried on, but something happened, something so marvelous that it drove Jacob’s troubles out of my head, even brought a reproof down on my head from the editor for daydreaming, or as he put it, “looking like a wet wank,” whatever that is.

  You’ve probably guessed it already.

  Yes. Lex asked me to move in with him.

  Should I? Shouldn’t I? My cock said, “Go for it, Gloria.” My brain said, “Hang on for a bit. After all, how long have you known him? What if the sex is all there is, and we know how quickly that can wane and wither.” But I liked him as a person. We got on so well—apart from the fact that he was hiding something from me. But hadn’t I hidden things from him? Well, one thing actually—my deep-rooted friendship with Jacob. Lex wouldn’t mind that, I was sure, and perhaps when we were together, he’d tell me. No secrets, eh?

  Eventually I made a decision, which wasn’t really a decision, I was going to introduce him to Jacob. And what would that prove? If he hated Jacob, I’d say no? If Jacob hated him, I’d say no?

  And this was exactly what I did.

  Slightly apprehensively, and of course with Lex’s permission, I invited Jacob round to what could be our flat.

  Jacob was cautious, and I remembered his reaction to John Hornby. I gave him a big hug, hoping to put him at his ease. But he was still wary.

  Lex on the other hand was caring and considerate. “I understand you’ve had problems recently getting a job. I hear”—and he nods in my direction—“that you’re reliable and trustworthy, can work a computer, and are a Gas fan. That’s quite enough for me. I can offer you a job in my business. Don’t decide now. Make up your mind when you want and remember there’s no one else in the frame.”

  “Kevin may have spoken up for me, but what would I have to do?”

  “He tells me you’ve already been a branch manager. That’s quite enough for me.”

  Jacob was completely gobsmacked. His look went from wariness through confusion to smiling acceptance. “You’d do that for me, Mr Warrington?”

  “Call me Lex, please, out of the office.”

  So there was an office. I would grill Jacob when he got the full details, but at the moment, Lex was a prince. He’d passed the test. If there ever was a doubt, it was dispelled at that moment.

  Of course I would move in. “Come live with me and be my love, and we shall all the pleasures prove.” Yes. Yes. Yes.

  Chapter 5—Ménage à Deux

  I HADN’T worked long enough on the paper to qualify for my annual holiday, so we had to postpone our honeymoon, but that didn’t matter because I was so happy. Lex was happy too. He proved it in so many ways, like giving me expensive gifts, taking me out to places I wouldn’t have been able to afford, until I had to call a halt.

  “You’re making me feel like a little hausfrau whose only purpose is to sit at home and be worshipped.”

  “But I like giving you things.”

  “No,” I said. “In the end this is going to spoil the relationship. We’re both men with jobs to do and things to aim at individually, though I think you’ve probably reached yours already, what with all this.” And I waved my hand at the expensive things around us, which included a painting by a modern artist who was even now meeting with worldwide acclaim.

  “Just lucky, I guess. I bought that when he was a nobody and no one saw his potential.”

  “Nobody, schmobody, you never do things on spec.”

  “Even marrying you?”

  “Yes, that was a bit reckless, I agree. Do you remember what you said to me—admittedly it was in the heat of passion?”

  “Of course I do. ‘If you ever leave me, I’ll follow you to the ends of the world,’ and I meant it.”

  “You’re such a marvelous lover.”

  “I am, aren’t I?” he said complacently.

  Off the marital couch, bed, dinner table, in fact anywhere the fancy took us, life went on as usual. I got occasional good assignments, not as many as I’d have liked but enough to know that the editors appreciated me. I was of course no longer on appro and my salary was commensurately raised, not quite to the level when I had to start paying the student loans back, but pretty near.

  Lex, of course, had offered to pay off the loan himself, but I wouldn’t let him. I still hadn’t really found out what his job was.

  Sometimes I quizzed him. “Is it illegal?”

  “Not in the actual sense.”

  “Tell me, honey.”

  “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”

  “Is it MI5 or MI6?”

  “Not even warm.”

  “It is drugs, isn’t it? You wouldn’t have to go abroad so often if it wasn’t.”

  “There’s lots of jobs that take people abroad.”

  “Okay, tell me seventeen. And I wouldn’t want Jacob mixed up in something shady.”

  “Come over here.” And he wrapped me in his arms while I did things to him and he to me until the cares of the world disappeared in a swirling vortex of desire and eventual fulfillment.

  As the Bible says, “And behold, it was very good.”

  Jacob seemed to enjoy his new job that, as Lex had promised, was his and his alone. I interrogated him mercilessly, until he begged me to stop, about the nature of the work and how Lex was involved. Apparently, though, Lex seldom appeared in the office, and when he did, it was just to sweep through, dispensing smiles and questions regarding the lives of the staff, about which he seemed to have a compendious knowledge. The work was just an ordinary job, seemingly related to fruit importation but paying twice the salary of Jacob’s previous branch managership.

  No secrets to be divulged there, and my curiosity grew until I realized it might cause a rift between me and Lex, which I certainly didn’t want, so I dismissed it as far as I could and concentrated on my own career.

  Much of it was repetitive in that I had similar assignments, but the people were different and often interesting, and I tried to give a different slant on each one, probe a little deeper, gain that much more without being too intrusive. This was a talent that I never knew I had before, and it stood me in good stead. I think I was really being ap
preciated and hoped for even greater glory.

  And then I had an enormous stroke of luck, though it certainly wasn’t lucky for everyone. The actual details are boring, so I won’t go into them. The point was that a gentleman living in Bristol, had a complaint, which he wanted to bring to the attention of his MP, a Labour member whose surgery wasn’t until the following Saturday. He wrote complaining to the paper that this wasn’t good enough, and I was given the assignment of looking into it. I thought, Let’s make a ‘thing’ of it. I planned to go up to London and personally speak to the MP on his behalf. I emailed the MP, who replied immediately (that’s Labour for you) and arranged for tea with me on the terrace of the Houses of Parliament for the following day, Tuesday.

  Rail to London, Paddington Station, Underground to Westminster. I emerged into the metropolis with its smells of diesel exhaust, a flavour of curry (was it?), and hordes of people going about their business, either politely or pushing past without a sorry or excuse-me. It wouldn’t happen in Bristol, I tell you. Well, probably not.

  The Thames flowed smoothly if slightly murkily under Westminster Bridge (I wonder what Willy Wordsworth would think!) and I was just about to turn into the road, which led past Old Palace Yard and the entry into the Mother of Parliaments, as we rather boastfully call it, when there was a disturbance behind me.

  I turned towards an old-looking black taxi careering wildly along the pavement toward me. There were screams as it hit and knocked down several passers-by. From the direction it was taking, it was going to miss me by a country mile, so instinctively I felt for and produced my smartphone. Suddenly the vehicle swerved on and off the pavement, alternately knocking people down and then missing others. I sent up a private prayer and punched in 999, shouting “Ambulance and police, Westminster Bridge, urgent” at the woman who answered. I rang off and then switched to movies, following the taxi on its devastating path but ready to jump into any available refuge if it looked as if it was heading my way—I’m no hero!

  I filmed it as a woman was tossed into the air, her pram flattened. The taxi carried along the pavement for perhaps twenty yards, knocking down a young man and a couple of boys. It then returned to the road and tried to speed off, but it crashed into a building and stopped, the front left side crushed. A broken whir sounded as the driver tried to restart the engine. Then he got out, glanced around, shouted something, and raced off into the crowds of people who were either trying to flee or, driven by curiosity, coming to see what had happened.

  I watched the carnage with horror but took a few still shots of the scene. I know this sounds insensitive if not disgraceful, but the journalist in me took over, and anyway I didn’t know what to do to help.

  Then a thin man with grey hair stepped up with what looked like a measure of confidence. “I’m a doctor,” he said, going from one to the other on the pavement.

  He looked at me and indicated the young man nearest to me. Blood was gushing from a wound in his leg. “You seem to be fairly compos mentis. Hold this guy’s leg just here and press hard until the blood stops. Then just keep hold. Has anyone phoned for an ambulance?”

  “I have, and the police.”

  “Good man.” He was attending to the first woman who had been hit and was now lying flat on her back. He was pressing on her chest with both hands, one on top of the other.

  Gradually the blood from the guy whose leg I was pressing, right up near the groin, lessened and then stopped. I could feel his penis with the back of my hand.

  “Sorry about this,” I said.

  He smiled weakly. “No worries. In other circumstances, I’d enjoy it.” He sounded Australian.

  “The paramedics will be with you soon.”

  “What’s your name?”

  I told him. “I’m a reporter on the Bristol Gazette. Do you want your name in print? I’ll write it up as soon as they’ve got you into an ambulance. Front-page news.” I had an idea that I had to keep him talking. He was looking pale and drawn.

  “Yeah. I’m just over from Sydney for a holiday, Europe and here—and now this!”

  “You’ll be out of hospital before you know it. And if ever you’re down in Bristol, make sure you look me up.”

  More ambulances arrived, and a paramedic took over my charge. “Thanks, cobber,” Ozzie said. Do they really say that?

  One of the boys was crying, his leg bent at an unnatural angle. Broken, I thought, but unless there was some other injury, he would be okay, though in pain.

  I shuddered at the thought of the pram and its crushed contents.

  As I did so, I heard sirens, Police cars arrived, blue lights flashing.

  I didn’t seem to be able to do anything else constructive, so I took some more shots and then phoned a not-very-coherent account back to the paper, mentioning the doctor, the Australian guy, how many wounded I could see, the crushed pram. They would sort it out.

  A sergeant had a few words with the doctor, who pointed in my direction.

  He came over. “I understand you called the ambulance?” He took details, and I told him that I was actually a reporter and had taken a movie of practically the whole incident, including the picture of the driver, who had fled the scene.

  “There’s actually a shot of him turning back to look. I think I’ve got his face.”

  He seemed pleased and asked if he could have my phone. Now I guarded that with my life, so I said, “Better than that, I’ll phone the whole lot to your station.” And when he looked a bit doubtful, I added, “It’ll be much quicker. They’ll have everything immediately.”

  Eventually he agreed but watched me carefully as I sent everything through to his station, except my phone call to the paper. Mistrustful these London coppers, unlike our Bristol lot, who go around telling people the time and patting stray kids on the head. Not! They’d have you in an armlock soon as look at you, and touching a kid stood a great chance of an abuse accusation. What a life we live in, and then I remembered the guy in Alexandra Palace park and thought, Perhaps it always has been. I was becoming a cynic in my old age.

  So that was my second great scoop. Our local paper even got it out before the dailies, especially online. Only thing was I couldn’t see the MP because Parliament had become a crime scene with, for the time being, no one being allowed in or out.

  Before I went home, I paid a sentimental visit (You see? I’m not all cynicism.) back to Alexandra Palace. The building itself was as I remembered it—big and imposing, standing on top of its hill—but the clump of bushes where Jacob and I had played and been accosted had been tarted up and turned into a rose garden. No more playing tag there (you’d be scratched to pieces), and presumably no more lurking pervs. I sent a pic to Jacob with the palace in the background. Remember this? Where I saved your life, or at least your cherry!

  Got an answer almost immediately. Of course I remember Ally Pally, but what’s this about saving my life? He’d completely forgotten the incident.

  “TERRORIST ATTACK in London” screamed the headlines “by our special reporter on the scene” (my italics). Pictures were suitably cropped to exclude the dead and dying. My Ozzie got his name in, as did my photo of the face of the perpetrator. “Have you seen this man? The police need to interview him on possible”—Possible?—“terrorist charges. Do not approach. This man may be dangerous.”

  Lex of course knew about it immediately. He knew everything. I got a text from him in the afternoon. “Hear you’re the flavour of the month. Come back without a scratch, and I’ll kiss you all over.” Slightly embarrassing, but at least no one else saw it except perhaps GCHQ in Cheltenham, which I believe receives copies of every email sent. That must be the most tedious job ever, though I expect they’ve got a special computer that searches for any possible radicalizing words and reports them. Of course Lex’s message could have been a code!

  Slightly worn out and ravenously hungry, I arrived home, where Lex cooked me a marvelous meal and then fulfilled his promise.

  I of course was on top
of the world. Nothing could touch me. I forgot that “O Fortuna” from Karl Orff’s Carmina Burana warns that aspects of life are continually changing, either for good or bad.

  You’d think I could stay on a high for at least a couple of days but… I guess it was my fault, but I was up there, and I thought, bumptious arsehole that I was, that I could do anything, including that thing that had rankled with me ever since I’d moved in with Lex. I asked him, perhaps even demanded of him, that he tell me what his job was.

  He tried to be reasonable. “You know, during WW II, those girls at Bletchley Park kept their work secret from everyone until years after the war ended. I really can’t. You must understand.”

  But I wasn’t being reasonable. “You’re not a silly girl. You know I’d never tell anyone. We’re not even at war.”

  “Aren’t we?” And he tried to grab me in a hug, but I pulled clear.

  I knew I was behaving like a spoilt child, but I couldn’t help it. “I share every fucking thing with you. I think you should do the same. None of this stupid ‘If I tell you, I’ll have to kill you’ nonsense.”

  “Look, we’ll have a long talk when I get back.”

  “Get back? Get back? You haven’t even told me you’re going away. Where is it this time? Spain for another load of drugs?”

  “It’s just up to London. I’ll be back the following morning.”

  “Tell me before you go.”

  At this he got angry. I’d never seen him angry before, but his face darkened. His eyebrows drew together. “Stop it. Stop behaving like this. It’s silly. It’s childish.”

  “Tell me,” I persisted.

  Then he shouted, and I knew I’d gone too far. “No!” And there was a sense of finality in that shout as he turned and went out.

  The front door slammed, and I knew I’d done something terrible. “Lex.” It was almost a scream. I rushed to the door, shouting. “Lex, Lex, I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

  But as I reached the door, then flung it open, all I could see was the tail end of his car screeched away, leaving rubber on the road as it, and disappeared around the corner.