Conman (8 page)

Lana began to hiccup and wake in her arms.

“Earl’s Court,” I whispered. “We were splitting the cost. Shhhhh”

“Don’t
shush me!
”

“Lana –”

“
Tell me!
”

“Maurice … shit. Maurice brought me all his gear. Boxes. For the fair. I didn’t know what was in them. I stored them in the shop cellar. You were in hospital. Then … I don’t know, a pipe burst …”

“
Oh!
So it’s a
burst
now? What happened to
leak
?” Jane began
to vibrate. Almost imperceptibly. Hands, teeth. Eyes wide and white. Lana gurgled, shifting in her arms.

“I thought … I thought I’d sorted it. But …”

“
But
?”

“Overnight. I don’t know what happened. Frost or something?” I suggested feebly.

“What happened?”

“I-I was going to tell you –”

“
Neil!
” she bellowed. Lana began her keening siren, little fists tight.

“I didn’t … You weren’t in a state to –”

“Oh so it’s
my
fault!”

“No! –”

“You idiot.
Idiot!
” and she pushed past me with a sharp elbow, storming down the hall. I scuttled after her, hands in my hair.

“I came in one morning and it was everywhere. The pipe was spraying this black … The boxes, all over the shelves. Maurice’s stock, everything I was storing. Pulped. Beyond salvaging. I lost half
my
stuff as well,” I pleaded. As if this made it all right somehow.

“What about the insurance?”

“Well usually, but
Maurice’s
stuff. Extra coverage, I …”

“You said you’d sent a cheque,” Jane said. She was standing by the worktop in our freezing kitchen, shushing Lana’s tears, jigging her in her arms. “When that letter first came and I asked you. You said not to worry. Said you’d sent a cheque to the insurance. Neil?”

“I know. I
know
. I was
meant
to. I guess –”

“
Meant
to? Great.
Grrreat
.”

I looked at her beautiful face, torn, twisted and bent with rage. I was empty. Spent. I had nothing to give.

“So how are you going to pay it?” she said flatly.

Not
we
, you notice.

“C’mon? How? Where are you going to get the mortgage money and thirty-six –” She was pale. Trembling. I was going to get a smack in the face or tears. I was bracing myself hopefully for a smack in the face. “
Tell me!
”

I opened my mouth and a little croak came out. I was breaking her heart and all I could offer her were frog noises.

“
God!
This,
this
is why you were looking at that
stupid
price book isn’t it,” she blazed. “That night? Seeing if you could bail yourself out. Isn’t it? With Dad’s present. Sell it. Isn’t it? Tell me.
Tell me!
” Jane shrieked, eyes glistening. The plush, embroidered, imported rug I had built her life upon had been tugged, with one sharp yank and her life was falling about around her.

“It’s all right, it’s all right,” I lied, moving gingerly forward.

“
It’s not all right!
”

I tried to hold them, but she turned her shoulder, writhing with rage. I stepped back, arms loose and shruggy, able only to watch as Jane strode out of the kitchen. I stood breathing deep, kicked in the gut, alone in the kitchen among the
£
2 car-boot kettle and the
£
25 ‘o.n.o.’ washing machine. I could hear Jane putting Lana to bed in the nursery next door, cheap blinds
clattering
, drawers slamming.

Deep breath. I moved out into the hall where I met Jane emerging, eyes red and raw.

“It’s all right,” I said. All I could say.

“How?” she said. Quietly, steadying herself on the banister. “How is it all right?”

“They’re old letters. I’ve sorted it out. Please,
trust
me. Let me
explain
, it’s okay shhhhhh, it’s okay …” and I folded myself around her shaking body. “It’s all going to be okay …”

Lies.

Of course lies.

But she was crying.
Crying
. I’ve never learned what to do with tears. I didn’t have teenage summers full of making-out and breaking up. I had teenage summers full of visiting my dad and watching
Batman, Backdraft
and
Beetlejuice.
I can’t deal with tears. Shouting and fighting I can cope with. I had a million comic-book pages full of instructions. But tears? There’s no response. What do you do with tears but hug and lie? Whatever words will stem the flow. Verbal duck-tape –
easy, it’s okay, don’t worry, trust me.

They say you should never trust a man who says trust me, I know. But what else could I give her?

The truth? Ha.

Jane didn’t want the truth. I mean, people don’t, do they? Oh
they
think
they do. They
tell
themselves they do. But they don’t. Jane didn’t. She wanted to hear that everything was going to be all right. That her husband hadn’t lied when he had promised to take care of her. That her father had been wrong when he’d said I was a scruffy waster. That I’d spoken to the insurance people.

That they would cover the damage. Valued customer,
twenty-eight-day-flood
cover, emergency call-out, blah-blah-blah. That was my role for the next few hours. To be the man she thought she’d married. The man I’d promised to be. Strong and soothing, using lies like Bonjela, cooling the ulcer of her anxiety.
There there, easy now, don’t worry.

I guess Jane must have bought it. It calmed her down, anyway.

I made tea. Cleared up the paperwork. Rubbed her feet, made soothy noises. While all the time of course, through all the lies, I was –

Well. Shitting my pants, obviously.

“You … you should write to them.”

“Write … ?”

“To everyone,” Jane sniffed, looking for a dry corner of her kitchen towel. “The solicitors, the bank, the skip-people. Let them know the situation’s taken care of. That they’ll get their money. Five
working
days, is it, this emergency cover?”

“Hn? Oh. Oh yes. Yes. I-I will,” I said, absently enough so I could claim to not remember.

Jane was curled in the chair, cushion hugged tight on her lap, feet tucked beneath her. The television (one owner,
£
25 o.n.o.) burbled the Channel 4 news. I was at the mantelpiece, surveying the damage. Lex Luthor had a little paint missing from his elbow and there was a white crease running across Joe Shuster’s shoe, but it didn’t seem to have worried him. He still stood, hands on hips, feet apart. Proud, strong, invincible. Pretty damned confident for a man in a trilby hat with his underpants over his suit.

“I can’t believe you didn’t
tell
me.”

“I know,” I said softly, swallowing the guilt, keeping it low. “I know, but we had a deal. You’ve got enough on your plate with the little one. It’s about time for her feed, isn’t it?”

“Just about. We should … what’s that? Is that new?”

Jane was staring at my tacky wristwatch. I waggled it and laughed and made some comment about a customer giving it to me. Chunky. Fake. Ha-ha, anything in the freezer?

Fortunately for me at this point, we were interrupted by a
toot-toot
from the street and a buzz on the intercom. Jane and I exchanged shrugs. Sniffing and wiping, Jane moved to the intercom in the hall. I went to the window.

A dull green Bedford van was at the kerb among the remains of Laura’s broken glass. First thoughts were another robbery. Same characters targeting the same street. But the bonnet was up, back doors open and a fluorescent Halfords repair kit was visible on the pavement. A figure sat in the passenger seat. An awfully formal car-jacking if it was one.

Jane wandered back in.

“A guy just needs some water for his radiator or something. Do you want to take him down a jug? I’ll see what we’ve got for tea.”

“Evenin’ mate,” Henry said from the doorstep, his Antipodean smile failing to reflect my rather British panic. Despite the chill, Henry was in a bright surf-wear T-shirt and denim jeans cut off at his calves. “Thanks for that,” and he took the jug and shuffled down the steps in his flip-flops to the van.

“What … ? Wh-what the hell do you want? How did you get this address
?” I hissed, jumpy, pulling the door to and following him onto the cold street. Under a black October sky, early Hallowe’en fireworks whizzed and whistled, bursting and banging brightly. “What are you
doing
here? Jesus …” I shivered, throwing anxious looks up at the soft light in the window above me. The television was flickering.

“Forgive the interruption old fruit,” Christopher said, pumping down the passenger window, letting a sweet plume of pipe smoke escape into the night. He sat, comfy in a dark tweed jacket and striped club tie. “Knocking up the ole homestead and such. But my grandfather’s clock, while too tall for the shelf and standing ninety years on the tufted Wilton, is whizzing around like a gumshoe’s desk fan.”

“
Gumshoe
? What do you
want
?” 

“Tick tock tick tock,” his pipe bobbed. “What’s it to be?”

My heart slammed hard, fingers cold against the edge of the van door.

“Consider the lilies of the field, Neil,” Christopher said, sucking on his pipe. “They do not sow or reap.”

“Yes, yes and they don’t rip each other off at three-card monte either. What’s your point?” I could feel panic spreading about my chest. My throat was closing, fat and tight.

“My point Neil, as I suspect you are aware, is that this planet of ours, this island earth, is divided into the strong and the weak. The hunters and the hunted. The circle of life, as Elton John
revoltingly
put it. Every mouse knows it is food for cats, every
antelope
that it is food for lions. Nature has designed us to freely exploit one another for our own good. It’s her plan.”

I jumped at the loud splash beside me. Henry poured the water into the kerbside drain.

Christopher was still talking.

“Now in the savannah, in the forest, these roles are irreversible. Antelopes cannot
choose
to be the hunters. Creatures are born
into
their roles and they do their best to survive. In
our
species, however,” and Christopher’s eyes flashed, “the playing field is more or less level. We can choose to be lions or we can choose to be antelopes. Everyone makes that decision for themselves. Now, you think that in a world thick with lions, those who
choose
to be antelopes are, what? Saints? Salts of the earth?”

A car hissed past us, headlights bright. A dog barked in the distance somewhere. A firework banged, lighting up the street in pink neon. The world dropped into silence again.

“No. These people are
fools
, Neil. Saps. Dunderheads. Boobies. Antelopes queuing up to put their heads into the lion’s mouth – too gutless to go hunting themselves.”

From the warmth of his passenger seat and the comfort of his logic, Christopher looked at me, eyes glinting. He plumed a little pipe smoke once more.

“Oh they’ll pretend it’s because they are ‘good guys’. Because they are fine upstanding citizens. Nice, honest fellows who don’t think that way. And I suppose as the lions gnaw at their throats, tearing them to bloody bits, they can lie back with a clear heart.
But the truth is that it’s because they’re fools. Fools who can’t grasp the rules of the game. But hell, good luck to them,” and he raised his pipe in a mock toast. “We are born screaming onto a cold and lonely planet, Neil. Three score years and ten and then we are food for worms. If you want to spend that time being poor, polite and picked-on like a martyr, go ahead. You’ll get a big turn out at your funeral, I expect.”

“But then so did Reggie Kray,” Henry drawled, handing me back my empty jug. He began to pile the repair kit back into the back of the van.

“Our mark is a fool. Simple as that. A greedy, dishonest –”

“
Dishonest
?” I said, hauling the sarcasm on with a truck. “Well mercy me, what next?”

“Lions hunting lions is at least a fair fight, Neil,” Christopher said without missing a beat. “You would prefer we targeted you? Your lovely wife?”

I swallowed hard. I turned and looked back up at the window, winter wind ruffling my collar, prickling my neck. The nets twitched and Jane was there, bathed in a cosy indoor glow, Lana bobbing on her hip. She tilted her head to one side. My wife. My family. My home.

Five working days, is it, this emergency cover
?

Hn
?
Oh. Oh yes. Yes.

“Look,” I whispered, a sick claw gripping my gut. “I need …” My stomach wriggled free and gave an uncoordinated back-flip, a feeble 3.2 from the judges. “I-I need
assurances
. It’s just a
consultancy
job. You didn’t tell me why you needed the information, I didn’t ask, right? I mean … Christ, I mean it’s not
dangerous
, right?”

“
At last when he was out on the street, he exclaimed ‘Oh God, how loathsome this is!
” Christopher warbled camply. “
Could I really? No, it’s nonsensical! It’s absurd. Could I really ever have contemplated such a monstrous act? It shows what filth my head is capable of though. Filthy. Mean. Vile. VILE!
”

“Chris?” Henry said, slamming the back doors. “You want to lay off the Dostoyevsky?”

“Forgive me Neil darling. The most dangerous part of your role my dear fellow, will be taking a crisp cheque for a hundred
thousand
smackerooni’s up to the poppet at your bank next Wednesday and handing it over without peeing your pants with excitement.”

“Wednesday?”

“November fourth. Five days Neil. That’s all it’ll take.”

Five days.

My heart thudded. A cold London wind flicked grit and ash about my face. Somewhere distantly the dog barked again. A siren whooped. Policemen. Out catching bad men.

“It sounds risky …”

“
But what had he said about risk
?” Henry said, shutting the bonnet with a clunk and twirling his keys on a finger.