The One Safe Place (6 page)

"Mr. Mevin?"

"Depends. Are you the book feller?"

Don wondered in passing whether the man beyond the door was mispronouncing an old-fashioned S as a bibliographical joke. "Sure am."

"You'll have a name then, will you?"

"Don Travis."

"That's the lad."

A series of noises of bolts and chains descended the edge of the door, which then protested a good deal about opening to disclose a short hall papered with dimness. The tenant, who was so short Don could look down on the three lines of grey hair which linked his ears across his mottled head, swayed backward from foot to foot, retying the cord of his ankle-length tiger-coloured dressing-gown. "Step over," he advised.

In place of a welcome mat, Don saw just in time, a line of barbed wire was nailed to the carpet. Barbed wire framed three sides of the front door too, and the inside of the letter-slot, and Don was wary of touching the door to shut it until Mevin laughed at him. "You're fine once you're in. 
There's been a few unwelcome sorts have gone hopping away, right enough. Yank, eh?" he said in a tone which suggested he was telling Don what to do, and vanished crabwise into the front room.

Don heeled the door shut and followed. The small room was occupied almost entirely by books, though there was a black and white television with a screen no larger than the spread of Don's hand beneath the window. An announcer was saying, "If you're travelling toward London on the M1—"

"I'm not, you silly prat," Mevin said, and switched him off. "Thought you sounded Yankee on the phone. Something wet?"

"It's a bit early for me."

"Just tea, pal. Always kept me company when I was a watchman. That's where I learned the ropes," Mevin said, indicating barbed wire which surrounded the net-curtained window, and added with a faintly injured air, "It's made."

"In that case, thanks."

"Be having a look at my library. There's a good few Yankee items I brought back when I was on the freighters. You won't have seen some of them too often, I'll wager," Mevin said, and swayed away along the hall.

Don pressed the squeaky brass light-switch down to augment the sunlight which hung from the window, and saw yet more books. Books were piled on the mantelpiece above a fireplace strewn with sooty newspaper tied in knots; they couldn't have been stacked any higher on two of the three infirm chairs without toppling over the chair backs, they surrounded the carpet as though they'd sprouted from the skirting-board below the musty wallpaper. Don sank to his knees to examine the books on the floor, many of which retained their dust wrappers, and the damp he'd been smelling reached up through the carpet for him.

By the time Mevin returned with a plump mug and its leaner relative, Don was squatting in front of a chair piled with books. "You won't find some of those on a church stall," Mevin said.

Don stood up to accept the heavier mug. "I've been surprised by what I've found."

"Not the likes of Henry Miller, though. Bet he's worth a bomb, specially in that kind of nick. Don't worry, they're legal here now. The police won't give you any bother."

Don fed himself a token sip of lukewarm mud. "Unfortunately that's the drawback, that they've been published here."

"Aye, only these were first," Mevin said, screwing up his face as though to wring thoughts out of it. "That's what they pay for in your trade."

"First printings are, but these aren't, you see."

Someone walked past the window, and Mevin ducked to peer at their legs. "Afternoon, Mr. Corcoran. Hope the nags were kind to you today," he muttered, then tilted his face toward Don. "You aren't telling me all these books are common as muck."

"I wouldn't presume to do that, because most of the authors—well, they aren't names I'm overly familiar with."

"Call yourself—" Mevin began, then slurped his tea instead. "The late missus had a lot of time for them," he said with a hint of menace, "and you'll find plenty like her in Manchester."

"I believe you, but I don't know if I see them in my shop."

"You want to advertise more, then. Get yourself a block in the yellow pages. I nearly didn't find you, you're in such piddling little type. You'd think you were ashamed of yourself." Another pair of legs strode by, and Mevin ducked lower. "Afternoon, Mrs. Devine. Got a ladder there. Here, puss, puss, puss," he called, rubbing his thumb and forefinger together, and stared at Don as though to convince him he'd seen nothing of the kind. "I've got to sort my laundry out for the daughter if you want more time."

Don had been surveying the rest of the books while raising the mug to his lips and letting it drop. "If this is the lot I've seen it, thanks."

Mevin drained his mug and spat some tea leaves into it. "So let's be hearing your offer."

Don imagined the amount of space the books would occupy in his shop or in the trays outside it, and saw how much work the basement needed, not that he could justify too significant a contribution. Maybe the condition of the books would indeed help him sell them. "What would you say to two hundred, two hundred and fifty pounds?"

"You wouldn't want to hear it, pal. Double it and double it again and add the number you first thought of and then slope off if that's the best you can do."

"I assure you, Mr. Mevin, I'm trying to be generous."

"Don't bloody strain yourself." Mevin went to the window and gazed up at the deserted street while bumping his mug along the lowest stretch of barbed wire; then he swung around in a crouch, leaving the wire jangling. "The daughter wants me to give the randy books the push before 
I move in with her in case the grandchildren get their grubbies on them, and the rest aren't my meat. Come close to a thousand and I'll shake hands with you."

"I'd raise my offer if I could, but honestly—"

"You're not a Jew as well as a Yank, are you?"

Don wasn't, but he couldn't have felt more outraged. "If you're going to put it that way—"

"Better learn how we do business over here, then. I'll be seeing what I get from someone who doesn't mind splashing their money around, in the yellow pages for a start." Mevin seized Don's mug, dunking his fingers in the tea. "Watch where you tread on your way out. I won't be paying your hospital bill."

"Interesting to have met you," Don murmured as he stepped over the barbed wire and groped for the front-door latch, but couldn't prolong his sarcasm when he glanced back out of the sunlight and saw the stooped man watching him along the gloomy hall. "I hope you find someone more amenable," he said, and hurried to the Volvo, wondering what comments Mevin might be addressing to his legs.

Bookselling brought worse encounters, he thought as he pulled on the seatbelt to hush its complaint, and better ones too. Only last week he'd found on a church stall a near fine first of a Conan Doyle novel. A regular client in Georgia had snapped that up before Don had had a chance to list it in his catalogue. Any good British finds were assured an American buyer, which was why Don had visited Britain several times, latterly accompanied by Susanne and Marshall, both of whom had grown so fond of it that when Susanne, having been observed by a visiting lecturer at Florida Atlantic, had been offered the opportunity to teach the same course in Manchester—

The sound of high heels interrupted his musing as they halted by the car. A young woman, perhaps not so young once he saw through her makeup, leaned down to gaze at him across the passenger seat. "On business, love?"

"No other word for it. At least I just was. You don't mind if I—" She wasn't wearing much of a skirt, Don noticed, and wondered belatedly if she might after all not be a resident questioning his right to park. He pressed the button to lower the window she was gazing through. "Sorry, what did you ask me?"

He knew as soon as he spoke. She'd said not "On business" but "Want business." Her gaze was losing patience. "Oh, right, got you, yes, no, thanks anyway," Don gabbled, almost knocking his glasses to the floor as he shoved them higher on his nose. "Excuse me," he saw himself repeating in the mirror as he twisted the key twice in the ignition before the Volvo deigned to start. He pulled out without checking for traffic, and for a moment couldn't think whether he was driving on the correct side of the road.

He was, but away from home. Retracing his route past the woman didn't appeal to him, and so he turned right when he could, only to find that the next street which should lead to the park was sentineled by two No Entry signs with terse words added to the horizontal white space on each red disc. He made for the nearest main road, where the three-story houses were split into pairs by gaps not much wider than a man, and a small green bus was chugging from side street to side street as though searching for a bus stop. Brightness was hopping up and down a group of traffic lights half a mile onward, and the route sign which preceded them indicated that he should drive straight on, contrary to his instincts.

The road forked, and he took the rightward curve to be his route. It led to another gathering of traffic lights, before which a black Peugeot was parked on double yellow lines, an orange sticker in its window signifying that the driver was disabled. "Must be some zippy cripple," Don mused, not the kind of comment he would have made if there had been anyone to hear, and hoped that the driver couldn't read lips. Don glanced at him in passing and received such a hostile red-eyed glare that he didn't even consider asking for directions. The lights ahead turned amber, and he trod on the brake. As he did so the driver of the Peugeot jerked a phone away from his face and swung the car out from the curb.

He obviously expected Don to drive through the amber so that he could follow through the red. Don saw the black car rush toward him in the mirror, and pressed his shoulders and the back of his head against the seat-rest and snatched his foot off the brake pedal. His head filled with a stench of burning rubber that seemed to epitomise his panic. Then the Peugeot veered around him, so close he felt the Volvo shake, and slammed to a halt in front of him.

He tramped on the brake again, barely in time. The stench had become a sour taste in his mouth. "You nematode," he called the other driver, which helped his lips not to shake. "You pedicule. You fumarole, you—" He was trawling his mind for further insults when he met the glare of the red eyes in the Peugeot's rear-view mirror.

They were accusing him of having caused the incident, and that was more than he could take. He grabbed the magnifying glass and pretended to scan the registration number of the Peugeot, mouthing it, though in fact the two cars were so close together he couldn't see the plate. He laid the glass beside the book and saw the red eyes bulging with rage in the mirror. The man's shoulders writhed, and his upper body lurched toward the gearshift, though the traffic lights were still against him.

He was going to back his car into the Volvo, Don realised in disbelief. He clutched his own gearshift in order to reverse, just as a green bus bumbled out of the last side street he'd passed and blocked the road behind him. Then a long white police car bearing a tubular crest of unlit lights arrived at the intersection from the right and indicated a right turn. The traffic lights ahead of the Peugeot began to reach for green, and the car roared away along the left-hand road.

Don braked in case the police went after the Peugeot, but the police driver frowned at him. The bus emitted a sound more like a burp than a honk, and Don sent the Volvo across the intersection, almost stalling in his haste. The lights were already changing behind him, and as the bus cruised after him the police car swerved to overtake both it and him.

As its crest brightened he was sure it was about to howl and force him to stop. It sped away, its tube unlit after all, and he saw that only a wedge of sunlight between houses had caused it to appear to be switched on. "Not guilty," he told himself, with a wry grin at needing to be told, and followed the police car around a prolonged curve of the road. Suddenly its crest and its other lights blazed, and it raced into another main road, halting traffic bound for the centre of Manchester.

That was the Wilmslow Road, the half a mile of it which was occupied by Indian restaurants and sweetshops and grocery stores, and Don was almost home. Unlike the police, he waited for the traffic lights to give him the signal. Two cars crossed in front of him after they should have, and the red facing him was just sharing its glow with the amber when he saw a black Peugeot approaching far too fast behind him.

Surely it wasn't the same car—surely the driver couldn't have hung back until the police were out of sight. Nevertheless Don took off at speed across the intersection before glancing in the mirror. He saw the Peugeot swing around a turning car with barely inches to spare and rush after him. The sight almost blinded him to the ambulance which was backing out of a hospital entrance ahead of him.

He hadn't time to think or waver. He trod hard on the accelerator pedal, sending the Volvo past the rear of the ambulance, which kept coming. In the mirror he saw it reverse into the path of the Peugeot, and braced himself for the sound of the crash as he steered the Volvo into the nearest side street. But there was no crash. Instead he saw the Peugeot skid around the ambulance, straighten up with a screech of its smoking tires and roar after him.

At that moment all he knew was that he mustn't let himself be followed home. He drove past the turn he would have taken, and the next, and saw the Peugeot hurtle into the road behind him. He was already becoming lost in the maze of balconied three-story houses where quite a few of the streets turned corners only to lead to dead ends. He almost lost control of the car as he swerved into the next side turning—left or right, the meaning of the words had been crowded out of his head. He would have cornered again immediately, except that a cyclist with a wicker basket full of groceries on her handlebars was pedalling leisurely across the junction. She raised her greying eyebrows at him as he put on speed and swung into the middle of the road in his hurry to hide in the next side street, where an old man stripped to the waist was craning with a stick over the wrought-iron railings of his balcony in an attempt to dislodge something from the branches of a sycamore which sprouted from the corner of the sidewalk. There was no Peugeot in the rear-view mirror as he drove as fast as he dared to the corner—no sign of the Peugeot as he braked hard at the sight of a dead end less than a hundred yards ahead.