Boys and Girls (41 page)

Blackie was nodding slowly as he lowered his glass.

‘I know. I'm ahead of you. I've just been trying not to …'

‘Mm. Yes. Hurts.'

‘Furiously. Strange. How I've come to … love her, really. Only woman I ever have, except for Letitia. And that was decades ago. Long before I lost my mind and married fucking Mylene.'

‘Why not Letitia?'

‘Oh. Well. Long story. But would you want to marry someone who was out every evening, serially unfaithful, slobbed around the house all day, smoking and drinking?'

‘Mm. No, I suppose not …'

‘No well – nor did she. Dumped me. That was that. But look we've just got to, you know Alan – do something about it, I mean.
Eighteen
 …! Jesus Christ Almighty …'

‘Cruel. Too cruel. But that's the ghastly thing – that's why it makes a terrible sort of sense. Not going to be mooning around another old fart, is she? No offence, Blackie old man.'

‘No no – none, ah … I assure you. Taken, dear man. Christ, though … But yes I do see. Beautiful woman. Still quite young …'

Alan pulled his chair right up close to Black's – topped up their glasses and looked at him frankly.

‘Blackie … there's something I don't understand. Why did you go and tell Amanda what I'd said to you? And
when
, Christ's sake. I only said it to you just before you went up to bed.'

‘Yes. Well I'm glad – I think I'm glad – that you, ah – asked me that, Alan. Because I would've had to tell you at some point. And this, this might as well be it. The point, I mean. Seeing as it appears to be a day of discovery …'

‘Sorry, Blackie. Lost me.'

‘Well you see, Alan … I didn't in fact
tell
Amanda, no. She heard you say it. To me. She was here, you see. At the time. Yes. Behind those curtains over there, in point of fact. Or was she behind the sofa …? Makes no odds, really. All sounds very cloak and dagger, but there it is. Point is, she was here. With me. In this room. Yes. Couldn't understand what on earth she was up to, but now, maybe, I more or less do. I mean to say – no psychologist, but in the light of what Susie has done to her …'

‘Look I'm sorry, Blackie, but I haven't the slightest bloody idea what in God's name you're talking about. She was here in this room, you say? I never saw her. Be plain, can't you?'

‘I can be, yes, and I shall be. Last evening – you were out. Susie was, Christ help us, out as well. I was reading.
Mayor of Casterbridge
. Know it? No? Do recommend it. Riveting. One of his finest. About a man who sells his wife. Oh Lord. Anyway – here I was, in this very chair, and Amanda, she walks in and sits down. Just about where you are now. Starts talking to me.'

‘Amanda? Sat down and started
talking
to you? Good Lord. Never done it before, has she?'

‘Not ever. Not once. I should have remembered that. So yes, I do recall thinking to myself, mm – this is all rather odd.'

An understatement. Well look – this is Amanda's father, after all, who I'm talking to now. So I think it is as well to be circumspect. I tried not to notice her at first, made a pretty poor fist of it. Well Jesus – you should have seen her, you really should have been there. Let's face facts: what I was doing was my damnedest not to
ogle
the poor child. Never seen her in that light before – never so much as even crossed my mind; not so much an admission of my ever-encroaching age as the facing up to the daily need for a candid confrontation with reality. Because my years of self-delusion were now, I hoped, finally behind me. And by the time she eventually shifted from her chair, I'd read nearly three whole pages of Hardy and had failed to absorb a single bloody word.

‘Amanda … what do you imagine you're doing …?'

‘Just touching your hair … why? Don't you like it?'

‘Why are you doing that? It's rather … thin.'

‘Silky, though. You like Mum, do you?'

Her skirt, well of course I'd observed it was short, but now as she moved up her arms – sifting around still on the top of my head, she was, as if for treasure, or maybe for the lurking of lice – it rode up on her thighs, bit by bit, higher and higher. The scent all over her was maybe Susie's, but I have to admit that she wore it well. Her eyes were glassy: she might have been drinking.

‘Not silky, is it Amanda? More like a scouring pad.'

‘Yeh … it is a bit. So do you, Blackie? Like her?'

‘Well of course I … Wouldn't be here otherwise, would I? Would we all? Amanda … what in God's name do you think you're—!'

‘Just
touching
, Blackie. What's the matter? Are you, like – what are you? Freaking? Don't you like to be touched? I think
you do. But she's old, isn't she? Mum. I thought men liked younger girls. I mean – you're old, yeh, like mega … but still.'

Black so yearned to be firm. To be amused and adult over this. To take up her fingers from close to his groin and bid her quietly to resume her seat or else – better – leave the room entirely. On the other hand there was not the slightest possibility of his doing any such thing; so far, he was still clutching on hard to the covers of his book, but it was touch and go how much longer that was going to last. Her hair was teasing his forehead, and her little breasts, plumply cheeky little plums, were beginning to dance before his eyes. So Black just closed them, willed himself to become a young boy again – just a boy and a girl is what they'd be then, and where's the harm in that? The innocent thrill of exploratory contact … And at that moment, for good or bad, there was a shuffle and slam in the hall, and Amanda had made a dive for it. Black was on his feet in the blur of an instant – fastest he'd ever done it, and he didn't even grunt.
The Mayor of Casterbridge
fell to the floor, and suddenly the room was filled with Alan. Black had tried to put him off, but he'd insisted on a drink and a chat. He was barely aware of what he was talking about – just saw Alan moving his mouth – until he said what he said about Susie. And then the doorbell was clanging – Alan shot away, thank God, and there was that little minx Amanda again.

‘Well fuck me, Grandad: that was a close one, wasn't it?'

Black was reddened – shocked by the implication of collusion, and stung by this new and cruel note of jeering. At least, Jesus, he hadn't … touched her. But still, but still – he should not have been playing the boy: he should at least, shouldn't he, have striven to be the boy who was imitating the man? But the thing is, Jesus oh God … when she was there
and then all over him … she just had looked so very terribly
fuckish
 …

‘So you see, Alan … she sat down and started talking to me – and then you came in, and that was that, really.'

‘Mm. But why did she—?'

‘Yes well. Hide, you mean? Yes well. Been asking myself the very same question. Children, you know. Bit of a prank, I expect.'

Alan was watching him closely.

‘But earlier you said … that you weren't now too surprised that she had done what she did. What is it, Blackie, that she did …?'

‘Nothing. God. Well nearly nothing. Tell you the truth, Alan, I think she was just making fun of me. Wouldn't be the first time a young woman has. I think … well, if she perceives Susie to have gone and messed up her, I don't know – relationship with this boy … Jesus Christ: can it really be
true
? Too too incredible. What's his name, by the way? The boy. Not that it matters.'

‘Harry, the sod's name is. And she gave me his address.'

But what I was saying, Alan, is … um … oh fucking hell. What was it, Alan? What I was saying?'

‘Er … what, before about Harry, you mean? Oh yes – what Amanda was up to.'

‘That's it. Good man. Yes – I think it was maybe just a child's attempt – touching, really – to spoil, um, something of her mother's. Think so? Could be. Needn't be. Might be total balls.'

Alan nodded briefly.

‘I'm sorry, Blackie, that you were put through … taunting, shall we say. Having seen her in the garden just now, I would
fully understand it if – even fleetingly – you saw her as looking, well …'

‘Mm. Well she did look a bit … now you come to mention it. But there we are. Water under the, um … The thing we've got to put our minds to now is Susie, and this blasted Billy problem. Bridge, Water under the, um …'

‘Harry, his name is. The bastard. Well what do you suggest we do? I mean, Christ – you know Susan. If she wants something, she's bloody well going to have it, isn't she?'

‘Yes, oh yes. There's no point whatsoever in our confronting Susie. Only add coals to the, er – damn,
fire
. No no – it's this Harry we've got to approach. That right? Harry? Teach him the folly of his ways.'

‘How do we do that?'

‘Well there are two methods, tried and tested. Bribery or intimidation. Reason is out – you cannot reason with a boy in lust. Envy the bastard – well of course I do. To be so very young that one day you have nothing, not even leeway, and then God goes and bestows upon you, oh – such a gift. Then you know that everything in the world is suddenly possible. Except, of course, ageing and death, which will never ever strike you down. Bliss. Shame, really, that we have to stamp on it – if it were any other woman on earth, I'd wish him the best of British. But we do have to, stamp on it – and soon. And firmly. If he's broke, as I imagine he is – all people of his age are, aren't they? – I daresay a grand or two might do the trick. Otherwise …'

‘Otherwise what? You come out with a knuckleduster?'

‘Ha ha. Very droll. Obviously not. But I have, you know, had dealings in the past with a certain party who is no stranger to certain, um – tactics. Met him through the friend of a friend
of God knows who. Huge man, he was – black as coal and covered in jewellery. Extraordinary. Went by the name of Beef Jerky.'

‘You're joking …'

‘No no – I assure you. He gave me at the time all sorts of pointers and tidbits of information when I realised I could no longer allow my wife to go on living. It was her or me, fundamentally.'

Alan sat back in his chair and widened his eyes to the utmost.

‘Yes – it is rather shocking, I suppose. Hearing it for the first time. But me, I'm thoroughly used to it by now. I'd offered her everything, you see – divorce, house, money, anything a woman could ask for. But no. She seemed to exact the greatest satisfaction in life from staying where she was, and tormenting me beyond endurance. When she became openly psychotic, Mylene, I tried every avenue open to me to get her locked away, but there was always some damn reason why she couldn't be. Then she started to come at me – with a meat axe once, as I recall. Regularly hit me with things. Can't have it, can you? One day, I have no doubt, she would deliberately or else as a result of yet one more quite insane and instantly forgotten assault, have killed me. Simple as that. So I thought I had to get in first. You see. And I got all sorts of information – poison, gun with silencer, certain knots – very interesting, those were – and the guarantee too to supply all the equipment. I am obliged to you, Mr Jerky, I said to him, but I think I need something altogether simpler, more natural and explicable – less
criminal
, if you know what I'm driving at. And that's when he told me: cases like this, he said – Lord, had he seen life, that man … death too, of course – cases like this, he said, falling
down stairs is always favourite. Explained about rucked-up rugs and maybe faulty stair rods. Mine of knowledge. I paid him – said to him oh
thank
you, Mr Jerky, I am indeed indebted to you. He smiled so broadly, I remember – took a pride in his work, you could tell. He patted my shoulder, grinned his grin. And then he said “Call me
Beef
 …!” Nice chap.'

‘And … you …?'

‘Yes yes. Best way, really – because she was always prone to a bit of a tumble, Mylene. Gin, you see. So yes – got it done, you know. Wasn't smooth. Made sure she'd drunk a bit on top of all of her pills – it was her, in those days, took all the pills … mm, the pill has yet to be invented that could have turned that one around … and yes, anyway, got her to the top of the stairs, you know – and the seam in the carpet, seen to it that it was frayed a bit, had marginally, ah, come undone, as it were … and then, well –
whoosh
, basically. Clatter clatter. Bit of a thump.'

‘And … she …?'

‘Well no: wasn't. That was the problem. I mean to say, she didn't look too merry, just sprawling down there – all in a twisted heap, sort of style. Unconscious. But dead she wasn't, no.'

‘So what did you …?'

‘Well only one thing I could think of. Had to, so to say, stay within the system, didn't I? The master plan? So I – and Jesus, don't ask me how I managed it, because she'd grown big, Mylene, over the years, big woman she'd become – but somehow I dragged her all the way up again, and then sort of encouraged another little tumble. Clatter clatter. Bit of a thump. It was all becoming somewhat familiar, and even a little bit fond.'

‘Christ. So what happened then?'

‘Well then, of course, I had to canter down after her and assess the situation. I hadn't quite decided whether to phone her doctor or else plump for 999.'

‘So what did you go for? Christ, Blackie – this is all so amazing.'

‘Mm – 'tis, I suppose. Well neither yet, as it happened. Bitch wasn't dead, was she? Could barely believe it. Stubborn, you see – always was. Thought I might after all have to summon up a weapon from my friend Beef. But then you've lost the element of domestic accident, haven't you? You see. So there was only one thing for it.'