Behindlings (36 page)
Contravening just about every bloody…
The Police –
Double yellow
There’s justice for you
– and the girl – the boy-girl from earlier – walking in the gutter:
hood up – forward – back. Light striking her face; like a small, sharp, well-peeled shallot –
Plain
Clean
Neat as…
Small terrier, dancing hyperactively –
Despicable breed
Estate agent at Katherine’s front window –
Briefly
The Police making their way over, knocking…
Dewi held his breath.
Had a suspicion –more than a suspicion –that he was
in
there (should’ve got home earlier. Should’ve ripped that senseless agent limb-from-limb: Edward –
Edward,
damn him –he of
all
people should’ve known better).
Ted opened the door and ushered… ushered…
Everybody but the one person who…
Dewi rubbed his hands across his face (hands still smelled of wood varnish, underneath). The rain came again, light as icing sugar tipped from a shaker.
He waited –
Waited
The white van suddenly left with a ferocious
screeeeech.
He closed his eyes –
Barn Owl
Keening for its mate in the damp-blanket night
He opened his eyes again.
Now only the girl remained –
Little cocktail onion
Clean as a whistle
Pickled in sweet vinegar
And then –
No
– almost as if she suddenly –
No
– almost as if she instinctively –
No
She turned around and looked straight into him –
Blackness
Tiny pickling –
and spoke –
Little lamb
Bleating into steam
Bleating into nothing
It was then, and then only, that he finally knew Josephine.
These situations were the stuff of comedy, Katherine mused, if it wasn’t you, and they weren’t constantly happening, and you weren’t constantly
pissed,
and your bladder wasn’t
exploding,
and the doorbell wasn’t ringing and ringing and
ringing –Stuck
Managed to drop her fag into her lap. Retrieved it with a yelp, but moved much too quickly, yanking the wire (if possible) even tighter around her throat –
Stuck
The indignity!
How did she…?
How had she…?
And to be discovered by
Dewi.
To be
found
that way –
Spare key under the little pot-bound bay tree
– and then to try and explain, but the words wouldn’t come and… And the way he’d
looked –
‘
Did he do this to you?
’
He kept… He kept…
‘
Did he push you in here?
’
‘
Did he tie this wire around your throat?
’
‘
Why do I smell burning?
’
‘
Why are you bleeding?
’
‘
Why all these feathers everywhere?
’
When he lifted her –like she was a newborn kitten –so gently –
Those reliable hands
Voice running fast and smooth as a sea-bound river
– and pulled her free and untangled her and re-aligned her and rearranged her…
She was…
She
felt…
But to see her so…
Urgh!
‘
Just… just hold on a second, Katherine… Why are…? Where are you…?
’
Hand over her mouth, she ran to the toilet, nearly pissing on the tiles before she made it there. Found the door –the bolt –pulled it sharply across –lunged for the bowl –the pan –the sink –
Anywhere
He kept on calling through the door –
And calling
Like in a dream
– and the calling would only –
It must end
It must end
– the calling would only
stop
once she’d told him where they were–
The
bar.
The fucking
BAR.
It was
torture.
And then, once she’d told him –
I TOLD YOU, DIDN’T I?
– he’d only go when he was
entirely
certain that she was… That she’d be…
Oh the caring! So unbearable!
‘I’M FINE.
GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!
’
She told the towel and the tiles and the toilet paper. She told her knickers and her elbows and her pubic hair –
So sordid, this thin body
So soiled
– ‘GET OUT AND J
UST LEAVE ME!
’
He promised her faithfully –pressing down on the door handle,
whispering, his lips pressed first into the wood, then into the metal –that he wouldn’t, he
wouldn’t…
He would not interfere.
Ted made them pause for a moment under the bus shelter so that he could call his aunt and warn her…
‘Just leave it in the oven, Auntie. I can’t… Well, if you’re worried, turn it off. I can always heat it up later… No, that’s… I… It’s very… Don’t miss your…’
(Wesley’d kindly loaned him his phone for the call’s duration, then briskly took it off him again once the conversation was over.)
And they’d hardly… they’d barely got in through the door –
Smoke and beer and condensation
Fug
The sudden quiet
The stink of chicken wings in spicy…
– before this crazy fucking Welsh
mountain
came tumbling in after them; howling,
wounded.
Like an injured stag after the rut. Tossing his head.
Baying.
Rearing up.
Wesley (in the three previous seconds) saw the thin man –Art –straightening up by the bar –his face –a look of…
The Policewoman, deep in conversation…
The ceiling fan…
A spare chair by the…
Huh?
Ted had… Ted put out his… Ted was grabbing his…
Didn’t…
Tried to
…
Turned towards
…
FUUURRGH!!
Nose-spit-teeth-splinter-feet-neck-hand-table-elbow
Floor-Floor-Floor
Had to –
Wuh?
– had to stand up –
If I am to die then let it at least be on my…
– stand up –
Woooooooo-oooo-ooooh!
That was… that was…
Air like a merry-go-colour-spiattered-whizzz-sniff-blood
He glanced around him –
Each and every individual thing as bright as bright as…
CRUNCH!
– Was felled like a tree for a second time.
Hang on…
– Wooden boards. Soles and shoes and fag butts and bottle tops and –
Dé-jà…
Did I not just do this before?
Must… must get up…
I am…
I am…
Geauuuurgh!
–Up.
He cocked his head –
If only
I could just…
Wesley blinked, bemused –
Ox, bellowing
– he blinked again –
Is this connected to me?
These strange sounds?
This garble?
Should I perhaps…?
Uh…
Ears: atten-
shun!
‘WHY ARE YOU
DOING
THIS TO HER?’
Ox-arm swings to contain the entire… the
entire…
Wesley glances around the room, but not really seeing anything.
We are
all
in this, he thinks, with satisfaction –even glasses and ashtrays are implicated. What a grand
sweep
he has there. What a grand…
But why am I the only one he’s hitting?
Wesley focusses, finally, on the ox-mountain, the fist –
Jeeeees!
– light smearing out of him –
Hooooo
Nearly slipped over…
Feel of table under palm –so firm –so solid
He loved that feeling, then.
This table feeling goes straight into my top ten
Oh shit
He’s going to hit me again
Prepare for it
(Preparing makes it worse, actually)
Who said that?
Uh…
Wah?
He spun around, unsteadily –
There is other stuff
Other
Something high-pitched
From the… the… the…
Back
I hear a little bird singing
She is saying…
Hang –
Hang –
Hang on…
Whisky-whisky-whisky-eyes?
I think I saw this girl in a dream once and she stabbed me to death with an icicle
And Ted is… Ted is…
Wesley turned his head –
The thin man…
I am…
There is a big, black gap, and it…
Wooahh!
… and it doesn ‘t make any…
Wesley took one huge, exploratory step –
I am Mr Neil Armstrong,
And I need to… to… to… to… guh…
Barflies,
This is just a stopover;
105, maximum.
Please do not tarry,
For the sense God gave you will not do you good
Where all is equal – twelve foot under.
Remember The Phoenician
Whose handsome bones were picked in whispers?
Remember Phlebas?
Listen to the waves,
Hear them calling…
Kew-we-we-wu
Leading you ever-onward to sweeter nothing
A tall, rather ineffectual looking, ginger-haired man was suddenly introducing himself to Arthur – gently and very formally – halfway up the seven front steps of the old Rio Bingo Hall (or, to give it its proper title – and neither man was anything if not absolutely punctilious in such matters – the
Canvey Leisure Centre;
substantial physical evidence of which buzzed and blinked balefully above them in foot-high, luminous, black and yellow lettering).
He snaked his hand across the front of Wesley’s belly.
‘I’m Edward, Wesley’s estate agent,’ he said, stammering a little, ‘and I’m not… I’m not
involved,
directly.’ His eyes unfocussed for a moment and his hand went limp. ‘I mean, not… not
directly,
’ he repeated, with just a fraction less certainty.
Wesley was currently unable to stand unsupported. He had an arm around each of Ted and Arthur’s shoulders. His chin was cut and pinkening-up, while the usually unobtrusive cheekbone under his left eye was highlighted by a white-green bump.
Many people watched them from the opposite pavement, restrained by – and lounging against – the pedestrian railings. About a dozen or so; fifteen, maybe.
Arthur heartily wished it would rain and drive them all back inside again. He wasn’t accustomed to the attention. Didn’t thrill to it, particularly.
He adjusted Wesley’s weight and then shook Edward’s hand.
‘I’m Art,’ he said, ‘we were supposed to be meeting up in the bar. My involvement is…’ he paused, thoughtfully, ‘
tangential.
’
Ted looked impressed (to understand so completely – so
effortlessly –
your relation to a situation was creditable enough, but then to have a wide-ranging
vocabulary
with which to express it? That was… that truly
was
compelling).
In those few, brief seconds Arthur fully apprehended Ted’s gullible nature –
Oh Arthur Young
You stinking liar
‘I suppose it might be…’ he muttered, glancing around him shiftily –
Stinking
Stinking
‘It might be a good idea to take him somewhere a little more…’
Not long before the rest of the pack get wind of this in the Lobster Smack
Come storming on over
‘To take him somewhere a little more…’ he repeated, staggering slightly.
Wesley was heavy. Arthur’d seen the punches he’d taken. Wouldn’t be surprised if he suffered major concussion, although –
Frankly
– this might be…
uh…
Quite useful, really
‘I have the keys…’ Ted whispered, pointing back across the road,
‘to the agency. But with the picture window and everything… it’s all fairly public. There’s a back room – a bathroom – but it’s really much too tiny…’
Arthur was momentarily concerned about his rucksack – still in the bar. And the girl. The local girl. He couldn’t help wondering whether… if she…
That was quite some display she’d put on in there. Saved Wesley’s bacon –
More’s the damn pity
– although he couldn’t –
This is ridiculous
help –
well –
secretly admiring her
chutzpah
(however deranged), her crazed intrepidity.