by Liza Cody
Smister pulled my door open. ‘It had to be you,’ he said by way of greeting.
‘Have a toffee,’ I said.
‘Waaah!
‘Ow-ow–ow!’
‘Call 999,’ Jade said.
‘The radio’s knackered and my phone’s broken.’ The taxi driver staggered over to open Jade’s door.
‘Nuns don’t own phones,’ Smister said.
‘Next time, get a car with two airbags.’
‘There won’t be a next time. This is all your fault. You’re dumped.’
‘This is all your fault,’ Smister said to me. ‘Cherry’s kicked me out.’
‘This is all your fault,’ ancient Connor yelled at everyone.
‘Actually,’ Satan said, ‘this is my doing. Where’s your sense of humour?’
‘Get me out of here,’ Jade and Connor yelled together.
‘You just slammed your bleeding brakes on in the middle of the road,’ the taxi driver said.
‘You were tailgating,’ Fergus said. He limped over to Jade’s side of the car and looked helplessly at the airbag. ‘Aren’t these supposed to deflate automatically?’ Blood was seeping through the bandage on his knee.
‘I didn’t stand a chance,’ said the taxi driver.
‘It’s your fault,’ Jade yelled. ‘I have two nuns as witnesses.’
Smister and I looked at each other.
‘Pray.’ Smister pulled me aside. He spoke with his hands folded and his head bowed. ‘You’ve no idea the bother you’ve landed me in,’ he said. ‘I’m so fed up with this nun shit. But Cherry gave me the old heave-ho. She’s kept my medication, and I can’t get to my clothes. I’m scared what she’ll do. She’s chopped up all Pierre’s frocks. Can you believe it? She knew who he was when she started going with him. He never deceived her. But she’s been trying to turn him into a “proper man” ever since. If she wanted the kind of boyfriend she could take home to Daddy she should’ve picked one.’
‘Doesn’t surprise me,’ I said. ‘I told you she was the Devil’s daughter.’
‘No you didn’t. You were just jealous of her and Electra.’
Hearing her name, Electra came over to greet him. Whatever his other faults I thought Smister was genuinely fond of her.
‘Got any dosh?’ he asked, stroking Electra’s neck.
I showed him my hands. I was holding a ten pound note and a bag of toffees.
‘That won’t take me far.’
‘It’s for Connor. Satan keeps giving him back to me. It’s not fair. It wasn’t me who kidnapped him.’
‘Well, Pierre and me would never have even heard of him if it wasn’t for you. And shut up with the Satan malarkey – it isn’t clever.’
We stared at each other. I was pleased to see him even though his pretty face kept morphing into a capuchin monkey’s.
‘You’re ratted,’ he said. ‘What’re you on? Gimme some.’
‘She cut up all Pierre’s dresses?’ I wanted to hear more bad things about Miss Self-Righteous. It made me feel better about hating her. ‘What about the wigs?’
‘Threw them out into the back garden. It was raining. She’s a cow.’
‘Miss Malice is a moo-cow,’ I hummed happily.
‘She changed all the rules. She came on like she totally accepted who we were. But after a while it was, “Just this once, take me someplace where you wear a smart suit.” Then it was, “But my family think you’re a freak.” She only put up with me because she thought she could change Pierre and then force him to chuck me out.’
Fergus and Jade came over. Her feathers were ruffled and she was squawking and pecking everyone in sight. She sat on Fergus’s right wrist with her claws clamped so tightly it looked as though his skin would break and bleed.
‘You’re the other nun,’ Fergus sad to Smister.
‘You’re my witnesses,’ Jade said. ‘I’ll need your names and addresses for the insurance form.’
‘I love a nice package in spandex,’ Smister muttered.
I said, ‘There are three of us – itinerant nuns – Poor Clares – since the bailiffs repossessed the convent. Bailiffs have never understood the vow of poverty.’
‘Excuse me?’ Jade cocked her head on one side and shook her wings.
She should’ve been a crow, I thought, but in fact she was a turquoise and yellow macaw. Fortunately her feathers were too ruffled for her to recognise insanity when she saw it. She handed me a Hello Kitty notebook and a pink ballpoint pen. I wrote, ‘Sister Angela Mary and Sister Josephine Mary’ and gave Ms Malice-Moo’s address. I thought Jade and Ms Malice would get along famously. I was doing them both a favour.
The taxi driver said, ‘I need witnesses too. She jammed on her brakes. How was I to know? Her brake lights were out.’
‘They are now.’ Fergus pointed to the crumpled back of the Honda and the shattered glass on the road.
I wrote ‘Breaks brakes’ on the dirty envelope the taxi driver gave me. I added Ms Moo’s address. He deserved to go to the party too. I folded the envelope carefully and gave it back to him. Nobody thanked me.
I handed the bag of toffees to the macaw. They did belong to her after all and Poor Clares are honest about that sort of thing. I said, ‘Give Connor one of these three times an hour. We’re off to find reinforcements. Back soon.’ I walked away with Sister Smister and Electra.
‘Squawk!’ screeched the macaw.
‘That’s right, leave me with a bunch of… you don’t even know, do you? They could be child abusers,’ screamed Connor.
‘Oy,’ said the taxi driver.
‘Not so fast,’ said the Devil. ‘I haven’t finished with you yet.’
‘Well, I’ve finished with you,’ I said, although it doesn’t matter what I say – it’s the Devil’s intentions that count. My association with free will ended the minute I fell in love.
‘That doesn’t mean you forgot the difference between right and wrong,’ Electra said, trotting along at my side. ‘Even now – you know you shouldn’t leave a baby with strangers.’
‘I’m a stranger,’ I protested. ‘But he was left with me.’
‘And getting stranger all the time,’ Sister Smister said. ‘Now give!’
We’d turned a corner and were out of sight of the car crash. I backed into a doorway and he hid me while I fumbled in my robes for the diazepam.
‘A fat lot of good that’s going to do.’ Electra sniffed around my feet. I ignored her while Smister and I popped a couple of caps.
‘It’s my nerves,’ he said. And indeed, for a pretty nun, he looked remarkably frazzled.
‘Have you been crying?’
‘Oh, well spotted,’ Electra said, licking his hand sympathetically.
‘I’ve lost everything,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what to do. I have to get back into the house for my medication. If I don’t keep taking the tablets I’ll be bearded and flat-chested in no time at all. And if I can’t get at my frocks I won’t be able to show myself to my sweet endocrinologist. But Cherry took my keys.’
‘That’s what you get when you can’t control yourself,’ I said. ‘If you’d thought for one minute about your endocrinologist and less about Zach this might never have happened.’
‘And what a bust that turned out to be. He’s obsessed with his sister. It’s sick. They seem to fancy the same men. He wasn’t interested in me at all. It’s all your fault. The nun thing was your idea. And now I’m stuck with it.’
‘Where are they now – Débris d’Or?’
His sudden cheeky grin lit up his face. ‘It was brilliant – Cherry came home for lunch and found Tantie in the kitchen making omelettes. They’re occupying her house. They said, like, “property’s theft” and they won’t leave.’
‘So you won’t be giving my dog to Ms Malice, then?’
�
��That was never the idea,’ he said without even blushing. ‘You know you can trust me – we’re mates.’
Without even thinking about it we followed Electra into a churchyard and sat down on a Victorian gravestone dedicated to Sarah Anne, wife of, daughter of, sister to, three men – all with surnames and occupations. Was it common practice, I wondered, for Victorian blokes to use a woman’s grave for professional advertising? We used it for a sofa and leaned against each other waiting for serenity to kick in.
I remembered that we really were mates. A year ago he wouldn’t have dreamt of dosing me with Antabuse. Although that’s not strictly true – he is easily swayed by superior forces, and his need for expensive womanly accoutrements leaves him vulnerable to threats. In short, he’s weak and unreliable. But a mate’s a mate.
He said, ‘Every one pretends to be what they’re not sometimes.’
‘I don’t.’
We both looked at my rumpled black habit and burst out laughing.
He went on, ‘I mean, like, when you’re in love and you pretend to be more like your lover than you are.’ He sighed tragically. ‘But Cherry didn’t do that. She didn’t want to change herself, she wanted to change Pierre. How can she say she loves him if she doesn’t want him to be what he is? If she tries to destroy what’s important to him?’
Before I loved the Devil I thought I was an honest and decent woman. I didn’t change for him. He showed me up for what I actually was, deep down in my heart and soul – a dirty, dirty bad girl. My hunger for love overcame all ethics and honesty.
‘But you didn’t try to change him,’ he persisted.
Try to change the Lord of Dark Inadmissible Truths? Maybe I should’ve tried. Even a pitiful effort counts for something.
‘He wasn’t the Devil, you silly old mare,’ Smister said. ‘You’d rather do anything than be alone. That’s all it was – a lonely woman and a greedy guy.’
The King of Broken Hearts laughed and said, ‘You were only honest through lack of opportunity.’
‘I wasn’t stealing for gain, I was stealing for love.’
‘And did you find love?’ Smister was sneering. He always does when we get to this part of the story. He said, ‘You loved but you weren’t loved. You were used. Doesn’t matter why you did it – it was still stealing.’
I was losing clarity by the bucket load. It wasn’t a joined-up conversation.
Smister said, ‘You’ve got to help me get back into the house.’ And he said, ‘Where am I going to live?’
And I said, ‘Pierre has the keys.’
‘Maybe. But I don’t know where he is. I was going to find him when I saw you.’
‘He drove away in the Ambo – and we passed it a couple of minutes ago. It must’ve broken down and he abandoned it.’
‘Are you going to help me or what? If you went to Cherry’s front door and knocked, maybe I could creep in through the kitchen. Zach and the others wouldn’t give me away.’
‘Do it,’ said Mr Trouble-maker Supreme. ‘You want to get back at Cherry, don’t you?’
‘Plee-ease?’ Smister got up.
Without support I nearly toppled over. Electra left a particularly interesting gravestone and came to lay her head against my knee. ‘Are we going to see Cherry?’ she asked.
‘No,’ I said.
‘You promised,’ Smister protested. ‘You can’t be so squishy-brained you forgot already.’
Can’t I? ‘I didn’t promise. When did I promise?’
‘Just now.’ In a nun’s habit Smister looked impossibly young and honest.
‘Did I?’
‘Of course you did,’ said Il Fibberino.
‘I didn’t hear,’ said Electra, the truth teller. ‘But I’m hungry, thirsty and tired. Cherry has food, water and a soft carpet.’
Stalling for time I said, ‘I meant, Pierre has the keys to the Ambo. He stole it back from Louis.’
‘Who’s Louis?’ Smister’s eyes had the gauzy fey sheen they get when he’s bombed.
‘The angry Débris d’Or.’
‘Right.’ He didn’t have a clue what I was talking about but he nodded sagely.
I thought, I can’t stand this any more. I can’t go to Cherry’s house and I have to get out of this pious costume. It would be so much easier if I actually was a nun. If you ignore small deficiencies like the fact that I believe in the Devil but not in god I think I’d make quite a good one. All I need is some penitence and humility. I’ve got the poverty bit down cold. At least I’d be fed and I’d always know what to do.
‘Stop laughing,’ I said to Smister.
‘I’m not laughing. When did I laugh?’
I could hear laughter. I covered my ears.
Electra, said, ‘Hurry. He’s leaving us.’
Smister was already at the graveyard gate.
Electra said, ‘You can’t let him go back on his own. He’ll fall among thieves. You know he will.’
I stood up. A gravestone hit me in the ribs. I thought I could just lie there and sleep.
‘Wet grass,’ Electra pointed out. ‘You’ll catch your death.’
‘What a good idea,’ I said, but she was already trotting after Smister.
I got up and followed her even though I knew she was going to the place where I didn’t want to be. I could hear sirens braying in the distance. Sirens and disembodied laughter were the soundtrack to the day, and they didn’t foretell a peaceful future.
16
Betrayal
I want you to remember that none of this was my fault.
‘Chaos theory would say otherwise,’ said the Master of Muddle. ‘If you hadn’t mentioned Kerrilla Cropper’s child… ’
‘If Kerrilla hadn’t asked me… ’
‘And a butterfly flapped its wings in Ecuador,’ he said with a self-satisfied smirk in his voice. ‘Butterflies are my favourite tool. Haven’t you figured it out yet? I just love butterflies and good intentions.’
‘Belt the fuck up,’ said Smister. ‘You’re making a show of us.’
‘I shouldn’t be here,’ I said. ‘And especially Electra shouldn’t be here.’
‘You’re helping me out. You owe me after everything I’ve done for you.’ He didn’t pause to explain but took a deep breath and marched up to Cherry’s front door. There was a knocker and a bell. He used both. I was checking in all directions for police cars so I didn’t have time to object.
Cherry pulled the door open so quickly she might have been waiting for us.
‘Go away,’ she yelled.
‘But look,’ Smister cried, ‘I’ve brought your dog back.’
‘So you did,’ she said coolly. She snapped her fingers. Obediently, Electra stepped towards her with a polite wave of the tail. Smister gave her a shove from behind. Cherry caught her and pulled her inside. Quick as a rat up a drainpipe, Smister followed. Cherry slammed the door in my face. Two seconds of absolute treachery.
‘You treacherous skanky scabby old cow,’ I screamed at the door. I didn’t know who I was screaming at – Cherry, Smister or even Electra. Cherry was the enemy. They both knew that, and yet they were both cuddling up to her.
‘Thieves,’ I screamed, ‘whores. Diseased insects crawling on the face of humanity – call yourselves human beings? Turds, arse-wipes… ’
‘Atta girl!’ said my one true friend, the Fiend.
‘She’s already called the police,’ a neighbour said, poking his head out of an upstairs window. ‘And if they ain’t here in two minutes flat, I’ll call ’em myself.’ He waved a mobile phone at me. ‘Don’t think I haven’t complained already. The street’s been on the skids ever since she moved that darkie feller in. I’m not supposed to say that but it’s true. And now it’s foreigners and religious fundamentalists. Don’t tell me it ain’t – I can hear the singing. And your language! That’s
no way for a nun to talk. You should be ashamed.’
‘I’m not a fucking nun!’ I tore off the hated wimple and the cold damp wind shrivelled my scalp. ‘I’d like to skin the mean bastard who thinks it’s a good idea to dress women in long black sacks. You can’t move and you can’t run or breathe and everyone calls you Sister instead of your real name.’ Off came the black batwings. ‘You have no freaking identity. You might as well be in prison with a sodding number instead of a name. I’m not a number or your bleeding sister. And I want my dog back!’
A rumpled pile of empty black fabric lay at my feet. Now I was just wearing a red shell suit. And I was cold. Very cold. ‘And keep your fat nose out of my business,’ I went on, although I was running out of gas and needed a huge swig of red wine and a good idea.
‘I’m not fat, I’m disabled,’ he yelled back at me. ‘You people – if you ain’t looking at me like I’m some kind of nut job, you’re overlooking me like I don’t even exist, or you say straight to my face I’m sponging off of the state. At least you can get out and about. I can’t. I’m stuck here with four walls for company and I can’t even go downstairs without the Home Help, and she’s two hours, forty minutes late, the lazy bugger.’
‘At least you’ve got four walls.’
‘At least you’ve got two working legs.’
‘At least you’re warm.’
‘At least you can make a cup of tea when you want one.’
‘I would if I had a poxy kitchen,’ I yelled. Then in the millisecond of opportunity I said, ‘I could make you a cuppa, if you want. Or help you downstairs.’
‘Think I’d let someone like you in my house? You swear like a squaddie and you ain’t even brushed your hair for a week.’
‘Take it or leave it.’
‘Beggars can’t be choosers.’ The exchange of clichés seemed to reassure him. After a moment’s hesitation he said, ‘I got a panic button. One wrong move from you and I use it.’ He threw down a bunch of keys.
His house was exactly like Ms Spiteful’s. But where hers was pink and girlie, his was brown and neglected.
It wasn’t that he didn’t have legs – just that they were inadequate to carry his bulk very far. There was a walking frame by the bed, a wheelchair by the door, numerous handrails and a stair lift.