Lady Bag (12 page)

Chapter
19

Electra Needs A Roof Over
Her Head

E
lectra is the only companion I need. We’re alike. Neither of us likes the smell of charity shops—even up-market ones in Chelsea. The mould spores made Electra sneeze and the righteous volunteer asked me to tie her up outside in the rain.

‘I’m going,’ I told Smister. ‘Good luck with Barbie Girl.’ Because that’s how I pictured him after the operations—all pink and plastic with no genitals at all except for a couple of torpedoes sticking out at chest level. But he wouldn’t look like that; he’d be a mess of wounds, swellings, bruises and stitches. His nether regions would look like my face when I was in hospital and it would probably be weeks before he could piss without a tube. He’d be one very sick little bunny. And all because he wanted to be a real girl for the likes of Kevin and Craig. Who would beat him till he was a mess of wounds, bruises and stitches again. Because even the most brilliant surgeon in South America couldn’t change his taste in men or his need for abuse.

I blundered out of the shop, making the little bell above the door dance in protest.

‘Come on,’ I said to Electra. ‘We can’t care about him.’

‘No,’ she agreed. ‘It hurts.’ But she turned round and looked at the jangling shop door.

We walked on for a couple of steps before she said, ‘But he’s your daughter.’

‘
He
said she was Josepha Munrow, and you know he’s a dirty liar. I don’t trust him.’

We walked on. The rain pattered like applause on my umbrella and I knew we were doing the right thing.

A long time ago I trusted the Devil. I had no doubt about him even though I knew he was too good for me. I knew I wasn’t loveable and yet I believed he loved me because he told me so. I was that simple. I wasn’t about to make the mistake of believing another guy, even if he thought he was a girl.

Electra sneezed again.

‘What?’ I said. She looked so forlorn that I knelt down in front of her, protecting both of us with the umbrella. Her ears were hot—too hot—and her nose was dry. ‘What’s wrong? Talk to me.’ But she didn’t. She stood, her head drooping and her shoulder blades poking up like dinner plates in a drainer.

I hate it when she won’t answer—it means I have to work it out for myself—even when I’ve had a bastard day, starting with a fire and smoke inhalation, going on to being accused of fraud in the national press.

‘Oh,’ I said, getting it at last. ‘You were there too. You nearly died and you’ve been trudging through the rain ever since.’ I blamed myself. I was wasting time and energy thinking about who I shouldn’t trust when my true friend was suffering in silence. Obviously she was ill and exhausted and I would have to find somewhere dry for her sleep. Soon.

Gently I ran my thumb along her snout, between her weepy eyes and over her skull. She closed her eyes and leaned against me.

A hand fell on my collar.

‘Momster, you great hairy wart,’ Smister said. ‘What’re you up to—running out on me like that?’

‘Electra’s sick. We need somewhere warm and dry.’

‘Like a pub?’ He was such a cynic.

‘Feel her ears,’ I said. ‘Look in her eyes. Smell her breath.’

‘No thanks.’ But he squatted down too and fondled her ears. ‘She’s got a fever? Should she see a vet?’

If you’re a dog owner and you’ve been homeless for any length of time you’ll know that even animal charity vets expect to be paid, and in order to qualify for free veterinary care you need to show that you’re on housing benefit; which of course is hard if you haven’t got a house. Some people think that it’s cruel for the homeless to own dogs. But she’d be dead by lethal injection if I wasn’t allowed to keep her.

I said, ‘She needs a warm, dry place to sleep and plenty of clean water. If she’s still sick in the morning I’ll get help.’ Because I suddenly remembered that there was a Blue Cross clinic in Victoria that didn’t discriminate against homeless dogs. Bless their hearts.

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘I can always find a place. You know that.’

‘We can’t do abuse anymore,’ I said flatly.

‘What are you babbling about?’

‘Kevin,’ I said, ‘knocking you about. Electra can’t be upset like that again.’

Smister leaned towards me and petted my head as if
I
were the dog. ‘Look—I’ve bought you a present.’ He rummaged through one of his bags of pink goods till he found a pair of men’s trainers. ‘I know they’re only Reebok, and the ones you’re falling out of are Nike—but they
will
fit and they’ll keep you dry. Hey, Momster, what’s the matter? I know they aren’t Nike or Adidas but there’s no need to cry.’

‘Why do you want those cruel operations?’ I blubbed. ‘You’re perfect the way you are—even though you’re a dirty liar. And you’re in love with pain. I hate that. I don’t want you to get hurt.’

‘It’s only a pair of trainers,’ he muttered. But we clung to each other, protecting Electra from the rain for at least two minutes.

In the end he said, ‘Stay here. I’ll find us somewhere. Thank fuck its August and all the students went home to their mummies.’ Then he was gone. August? I was gob-smacked. If I’d had to guess I’d have said it was March. So much cold grey rain.

I huddled over Electra in a doorway and fed her clean bottled water from the palm of my hand. When she’d had enough I made a nest for her in my new raincoat and she went to sleep.

I felt alone and unprotected. I had nothing, no bedroll, no layers of clothing, nothing to survive on. All I had was a sick dog and a new pair of shoes. And socks! I found what looked like a brand new pair of white sports socks rolled up neatly in the toe of one of the shoes. I put on socks and shoes. Warm, dry feet made me sleepy and I closed my eyes.

Smister said, ‘Wake up. You look corpsified and you made three pounds fifty while you slept.’ He put the money into the pocket of his new second-hand jacket.

I climbed out of sleep and onto my feet. Electra stirred and whimpered just once. I fed her more water from my cupped hand. I felt terrible about waking her. Sleep is a dog’s best healer. I wondered how I’d feel if it turned out I’d sacrificed Too-Tall’s life for Electra’s and then Electra died as well.

She limped and I shuffled. We followed Smister up one street and down another, zigzagging into scruffier neighbourhoods until at last we came to a mean, narrow house with dirty windows. There were five doorbells and the front door was wedged ajar with a small piece of cardboard. We slid into a dark, dank hall. Junk mail and fliers crunched underfoot.

‘There’s nobody here,’ Smister whispered. ‘All the fridges have been turned off. The flat in the basement’s the best—well the driest and there’s a door out to the yard at the back for Electra.’

I swallowed hard and said, ‘Thanks for the shoes and socks.’

‘I didn’t know your size,’ he said, ‘so I asked for a pair of canoes.’ He pushed open a door and we went down into a dusty pit. There were three rooms, kitchen and bathroom. I guessed the landlord had been packing tenants in like baked beans because each small room had three beds in it. There was a table, two chairs and a little TV in the kitchen. Nine beds and two chairs; no room for clothes or possessions. This was accommodation for illegal migrant workers or students.

But what might be rotten conditions for them was luxury for Electra and me. She had a bed and three blankets all to herself. I lifted her onto the mattress and she went to sleep without saying a word. I covered her with a blanket. Her ears were still hot and I could hear wheezing when she breathed.

‘The roof leaks,’ Smister said, ‘and so do all the windows except down here. It will be safer if we don’t show any light. There’s an electric shower so that’s where I’m going now. I can’t put myself about looking like this, and I smell like an old chimney.’

‘I liked you as a nun,’ I said.

‘Me too.’ He sighed. ‘I was a brilliant nun. But the blessed habit went up in smoke, didn’t it? Listen to me—the blessed habit—I sound like you when you’re off on one. Were you brought up by Jesuits too?’

‘Everything I know about human suffering I learned from Satan’s mouth.’

‘Bollocks. You’re just a bit barmy is all.’

‘And I need a drink.’

‘I’ll get you one, soon as I’ve had a shower. Gimme some money.’

This was familiar territory. It was greed, not generosity, and I could handle it without blubbing. As he’d already pinched the money I made on the Kings Road I ignored him and crawled under Electra’s blanket, snuggling up to her—just to rest my eyes which were still sore from the smoke.

I woke up hours later. Smister was sitting on the end of the bed wearing a silky frock I’d never seen before and holding a flaming candle. He had a bloody, fishy, alkaline smell which came over quite clearly in spite of his perfume. His eyes were heavy and his pretty lips were smeared and swollen.

He said, ‘Don’t you want to find out who beat you half to death and killed your friend?’

‘I haven’t got any friends,’ I said. He was squeezing the life out of my heart. I think it was because of the shoes and because he found Electra a house when she needed one. I’m not used to people being nice.

I gave Electra some more water and took her out into the yard. The sky was turning slate grey but it wasn’t raining. She did her business among a thousand cigarette butts.

Smister was still sitting where we’d left him staring intently at the candle flame so we took a different bed. But before we snuggled down I blew out the flame and took the candle away. I didn’t think I could stand another fire just yet. I pushed him over so he was lying on his side and covered him with a blanket.

‘But don’t you?’ he mumbled. ‘Y’know, want to know?’

‘I want to sleep. I want to be safe. I don’t want anymore violence.’

‘Not good enough.’ He turned his back on me and lay silent.

Just as I was dropping off again he said, ‘You’re right I was a brilliant nun. I was a brilliant nun since I was eleven.’ He coughed and I could hear the wet weepy smoke still in his lungs. After a minute he started muttering again.

‘What?’ I wished he’d shut up and take his hand off my heart. But he said, ‘I keep asking myself, was he a beastly priest or a priestly beast?’

‘I’m trying to sleep.’ Why was he hurting me? He had no right. He wasn’t my daughter.

Smister turned over and mumbled, ‘Either way, he made me feel special.’

‘Not good enough,’ I said and turned my back on him. I think if I could’ve been bothered to feel them his ears would’ve been hotter than Electra’s.

Chapter
20

The Doggy Who Burnt Her Toes

I
had a shower in the morning—if it was the morning—and persuaded Electra to have one too. Both of us were smoke-damaged and we used Smister’s shampoo to loosen the grey greasy grime and send it in dark spirals down the plughole. I dried us both off on thin brown blankets.

She was moving stiffly, but she was hungry. I fed her half what she usually ate with lots of clean water. I do look after her, I really do. She eats before me and when there’s no wine to be found she drinks before me too. She’s quite wrong when she says I forget about her.

Smister had pinched some pills and about ten quid. But as I’d gone back to my old habit of stashing money in my clothes I wasn’t broke this morning. My hands were shaking and I badly needed to stock up on the red, but I didn’t feel as awful as I’d expected.

I packed a couple of the thin blankets in my backpack, and then Electra and I waited behind the front door till we thought no one was watching. We sidled out into the street. I was coming back but I wanted to be ready in case of emergencies. I wouldn’t be ready without a first aid kit, a polythene sheet and a bedroll.

But at the first shop I came to I remembered other stuff like mouthwash, Alto Rica coffee, milk and cornflakes for Smister because he couldn’t start the day without coffee and cornflakes.

I thought, I’ll buy this crap for him and I’ll share it, but when it’s gone, I’ll be gone too. By that time Electra will be better and we can lose ourselves on the street again. I won’t allow him to corrupt us with soft living and wanting things.

And as Electra still wasn’t well, I bought the kind of dog food that prolongs the active life of a pedigree. Because she is a pedigree greyhound from a line that goes back to Henry the Eighth or whichever arsehole started racing dogs for sport.

I bought the first aid kit from a proper chemist. It was expensive because it had a pair of scissors in the box. Outside the shop, I spread one of the brown blankets on the pavement and started to bandage Electra’s legs and paws. There were plenty of poor to middling people who are fond of sick animals. For once it wasn’t raining. Rain is death to generosity.

While I was bandaging Electra I was sneaking mouthfuls of red to steady my hands. After about forty minutes I’d collected five pounds, seventy-two pence and I was feeling almost normal.

‘Thank you,’ Electra said. ‘You can stop now. I’m beginning to feel like an Egyptian mummy.’

‘Never mind that,’ I said, ‘you’re sick. You need good food and plenty of rest.’

‘And you need to stop drinking before you spend every penny on more red and get completely hammered.’

‘But this is how we live.’ It was true. We live one day, one hour at a time. If we have money, we eat and drink. We don’t save money for a rainy day because all days are rainy. She should understand this.

‘I do,’ she said, ‘believe me. But that was before life got so dangerous.’

But I didn’t feel in danger. I felt we were where we belonged and that in my fedora and raincoat I was as anonymous as an old chip packet blowing in the wind.

But she was right and I was wrong. Old chip packets don’t appear on morning TV with their dogs. Old chip packets don’t throw up on glamorous TV presenters’ shoes. People who didn’t wish me well were looking for me.

A little girl said, ‘That’s the doggy from off the telly.’ She dragged her mother over to us.

The mother said, ‘Did the poor dog burn her feet? Here let me give you something for the vet’s bills. I know what that’s like. We had to have our Tommy put down last year. He wasn’t eating on account of his bad teeth and we couldn’t afford to get treatment for him.’ She gave me one pound, twenty-three pence.

The little girl, who was petting Electra, said to anyone who looked even two percent interested, ‘This is the doggy who burnt her toes.’ She was a cute little pixie in a scarlet plastic raincoat so she drummed up quite a bit of business for us. A hurt dog and a cuddly little Tweety-pie are a killer combination. She petted Electra with her sticky hand. Electra glanced at me nervously. It started to rain again. I packed away all the lovely coin the beautiful people gave us. I took one more swig and packed the bottle away too.

‘Oh dear,’ Pixie-pie lamented as her mum tried to hurry her away. ‘The doggie’s bandages are getting wet.’

‘They’re like shoes,’ I assured her. ‘When the flood hits us and all the little fishes come to nibble her dying toes, she will be saved.’

The little girl burst into tears. Her mum caught her hand and dragged her away, giving me a look I would have to scrub off later with holy water.

When we staggered home Smister was still in bed, curled up in his blanket. I wanted to tell him about my success so I shook him awake.

‘Fuck off,’ he said ‘I’m sick.’

‘No you’re not. I got you coffee and cornflakes. You smell horrible.’ It was my turn to criticize. He was always telling me I needed a shower. ‘Go away,’ he mumbled. ‘I’m hurt and sick, and it’s all your fault.’

Everything’s always my fault. I climbed onto Electra’s bed and went to sleep. I’d been out earning a living so I’d deserved it.

Smister didn’t get up the next morning either. I brought him coffee and cornflakes in bed. He didn’t even sit up to eat and drink. He just lay on his side and spilled as much as he put into his mouth.

‘Are you Lady Muck?’ I said. ‘What did your last servant die of?’

‘Who the hell are
you
?’ Smister said in his weakest little girl voice.

‘You know who I am.’ I was quite upset by the question so I took a trip to the kitchen for a slurp of wine.

When I got back, Smister said, ‘You aren’t who it says on your credit card.’

‘You nicked my card again?’

‘It was never your card.’

‘Then whose pocket did you steal it from? You’re a thief and a fruit fly.’ I stormed out, pausing only to grab a bottle from the fridge.

Electra said, ‘Maybe you should’ve stayed and listened.’

But I wanted to go back to the spot where we’d done well before so I didn’t listen to her either and we hurried through the rain to the chemist shop. She was limping and didn’t seem very happy, but I knew she’d feel better when I’d bought us some goodies.

Just as I was about to open my bag to get out the blanket and the bandages I smelled the thick layered scent the homeless carry with them on a rainy day. I looked up because I knew then that I’d strayed onto someone else’s patch. A pair of granite eyes looked straight into my eyes and out the other side.

I didn’t recognise him, but the hair on the back of my head stirred in a cold whisper of warning.

Hiding under umbrella and fedora, I shuffled off as fast as I could. Electra kept up in spite of her poor legs. She was spooked too. At the corner we looked back and saw him watching us, a looming shadow of a tattered man in the rusty remains of a leather cowboy hat.

We hurried on. At the next corner I turned again and he was still behind us. He didn’t seem to be walking. He was just
there
.

I wanted to run to the student house and lock a proper door against him. But Electra wouldn’t let me. ‘You don’t want him to know where you sleep,’ she panted. ‘You can’t lead him to Smister.’

Ahead, I saw Fulham Broadway Station. And that’s where he caught me.

Well, it wasn’t me he caught—it was Electra.

The tattered man in the cowboy hat wrenched her scarf out of my hand. He doubled it and pulled it tight around her throat, choking her till her eyes bulged.

‘No!’ I cried.

‘Yes,’ he snarled. ‘Gimme what you got or the bitch dies.’

‘Heugh!’ Electra coughed.

‘What have I got?’

‘Gelt. Hundreds. I saw you get it on the telly. And you got the brass neck to be out on the cadge again today.’

‘But I haven’t got any left.’

‘Bollocks.’

‘My… my daughter got most of it, and I had to pay the rest to the vet.’

‘You’re lying, you arseholed old sow.’

‘Look at my dog. She’s sick. Animal doctors cost an arm and a leg.’

‘Heugh!’ said Electra.

‘Fuck you,’ he said, twisting the scarf even tighter. ‘Gimme what you got. That’s my pitch you were going to steal. There’s rent to pay, you thieving bitchwhore.’

There was a torn magazine on the floor by my feet. I bent quickly and picked it up. I was completely fed up with being frightened of big blokes. I rolled the magazine into a tight cylinder. Electra was hanging from his hand as if by a noose. He shouldn’t have done that.

I stepped up close to him and stabbed him in the Adam’s apple with the rolled up magazine while screaming, ‘Fuck off!’ into his face.

I bet you never thought a gossip magazine was a deadly weapon. It’s true that it won’t wound you or make you bleed. But, rolled up, a magazine is as strong as a stick. It won’t bend. If you attack throat, eyes or droopy man bits you can do a lot of damage.

His mouth opened like a barn door. Nothing came out except a guttural rasp. But he didn’t fuck off so I kneed him in the groin.

The tattered man grabbed for his throat with one hand and his nuts with the other, letting go of Electra’s scarf as he doubled over. She sprinted away into the rain.

‘Electra,
wait
,’ I yelled. But she ran out into the traffic. Her bandages trailed behind her, turning grubby and soggy. She may be old, but she’s still a greyhound and much faster than me. I only caught up with her because a bandage snagged on a supermarket cart. She panicked, struggling to escape, pulling the cart towards her as she tried to get away. I was trembling too, but with elation. I’d been threatened by a violent bloke—but I won, I won, I won. Chalk
that
up to the archetypal victim!

‘Electra,’ I said, ‘calm down. We got away. We’re alright.’

She hardly heard me. She was so scared that the look in her eyes hurt my heart and made me ashamed. She’d been cruelly treated because she was
my
friend.

I gathered her up in my arms and held her till she stopped struggling. This is why I’m glad I don’t have a real daughter. Your enemies can get at you through the people you love.