Neal raised his eyebrows.
“At all.”
Neal looked at Allie, who was making a very successful effort to look indifferent. Colin snatched the book out of her hand, opened the window, and threw the book into the street. Allie rolled her eyes.
“I get all dressed up,” she said, staring pointedly at Neal, “like a little lady… and I wait in the bar.”
“Where…”
“Where I have one drink, that’s all, and I wait for Neal to come get me. Neal introduces me to Mr. Wonderful and leaves. I ball his brains out and I take my time about it. I make it last. Then I take my money and come straight back here.”
“What else-”
“I take it easy on the smack.”
“How easy?”
“One pop.”
He offered her a beer. She offered him her middle finger.
“Colin?” he asked.
“We wait for an hour outside Albert ‘all, if she doesn’t come out, we go to the tube station at Covent Garden. We watch for you. If you have your jacket off, then it’s fucked and we make an ‘asty exit. Jacket on, we follow you into the street. We get into the cab behind you. Follow you to the buyer’s ’ouse. Wait outside. You come out- an’ you better come out-with two bags. One wi’ our money, one wi’ yours. You give us ours and get back in your cab. We sit in the cab for five minutes so we don’t know where you’re takin’ your nicker, you mistrustful bastard. You meet us ’ere, later. We hide you till it’s safe.”
“Vanessa.”
“I wait here by the phone to take messages. Sexist and boring.”
“Questions?”
There weren’t any. They’d been over it so many times the past two nights that they didn’t want to take a chance that he’d make them do it again.
“All right.” Neal stood up and stretched. The rest of them hustled for their drug of choice. Colin opened two pints and handed Neal one of them. Vanessa and Crisp lit a bowl of hash and flipped on the telly. Allie slipped into the bathroom.
“She’s a junkie,” Neal said.
“She’s not.”
“How many times a day now?”
“Two or three. Just little pops, rugger.”
“Not in her arms, I hope. Goldman sees needle tracks, might turn him off.”
“This little piggie went to market, this little piggie stayed ’ome. This little piggie went wee-wee-wee…”
“Doesn’t it bother you? You love her, right?”
“She’ll get off it.”
“Yeah.”
Neal stepped out on the balcony. Colin followed him.
“Five now,” he said. “A thousand a month for two months, assuming I’m still in one piece.”
“Done.”
Oh, Colin, Neal thought. You agreed to that one awfully fast. What are you up to?
“I’ll take Alice shopping tomorrow,” Neal said. “Get her something killer.”
“You do that, Neal lad.”
Yeah, Neal, Colin thought, you go shopping. I’ll go shopping.
23
Colin hated tea. Hated the smell, the taste, even the feel of it as it slithered down his throat. He had sworn when he split the home scene that he’d never choke down another cup of the omnipresent shit the rest of his natural life.
Nevertheless, he sipped it graciously as he sat in a booth in the back room of the Hunan Garden across the table from a smiling Dickie Huan.
Dickie Huan was a middle-aged Chinese who had several restaurants, an unshakable faith in free enterprise, and a great tailor. On this particular afternoon, he sported a dark gray three-piece pinstripe, a silk salmon shirt, and a blood-red tie. Aware of Dickie’s sartorial sensibilities, Colin had done his best to dress for the meeting. He was aware that his all-white suit looked a bit gamy compared to Dickie’s conservatism, but it was the best he could do for the occasion.
“How is tea?”
“Super.”
Dickie Huan also hated tea, but believed in tradition. He smiled gently over his raised cup. “What brings me the pleasure of your visit?”
Colin swallowed hard. This bit needed great balls. “I’m looking to expand my market.”
Dickie Huan said nothing. This was obvious. Everybody was looking to expand his market.
Colin continued: “I want to enlarge the scope of my operation.”
Again, Dickie didn’t respond-just for fun.
Colin spit it out. “I want to buy heroin from you.”
“Everyone does.”
Colin tugged at his collar. The tie felt like a noose around his neck. “I understand you’re expecting a shipment.”
Dickie raised an eyebrow and smiled, although he was very pissed off that this round-eye freak with pins through his ear knew this much about his business. “So?”
“I want to buy a piece of it.”
“Where will you get this kind of money, Colin?”
“I’ll ‘ave it. Saturday.” Give myself a day to take care of Neal, he thought.
“Saturday is not today.”
What are you, a fortune cookie? Colin thought. But he said, “I’ll buy up to twenty thousand pounds’ worth.”
Dickie took a long time to answer. He wanted to phrase the insult just right. “I usually don’t sell such small allotments.”
“Then you must have a small amount to spare.”
Not bad, Dickie thought. Not bad at all. “Sorry, Colin. I have promised another party every little bit.”
Colin took a big chance. He thought for a moment about his fingers becoming Moo Goo Gai Colin, and then said, “I can put you into markets that John Chen can’t touch.”
Dickie’s burst of Cantonese obscenities brought three waiters trotting to the table. One carried a double Beefeater with a twist. The other two hastily cleared the teacups as their boss regained his composure. “How you know so much?” Dickie asked as he knocked back his drink.
Colin felt a sweet surge of confidence. “I keep me ear to the ground. Now, Dickie, this bit is just the first. I can put you in markets all over the city. Places Chinese can’t go.” Dickie Huan needed no reminder of the unsubtle racism of Britain’s punks. He colored slightly at the insult but decided to ignore it for the time being. After all, he wouldn’t mind expanding his own markets.
“Why you come to me, Colin?”
Colin smiled his most engaging smile and told the truth. “You’re the only one who might give me credit, Dickie.”
So the punk comes to the chink, Dickie thought. Outsider to outsider. He liked the symmetry of it.
“Come on, Dickie. I’ve never let you down on the hash deals, have I?”
“That is child’s play, Colin. Heroin is real business.”
“Then think about real business. Think about where I’ll be selling your heroin. Twenty thousand is just the start.”
Dickie Huan thought about it. He had indeed told John Chen he could have the whole shipment. But he could give Chen twenty thousand back, tell him that the shipment was smaller than he’d thought. A chance to break into the round-eye neighborhoods didn’t come every day.
“Come back into the kitchen, Colin,” Dickie said. He saw Colin turn pale. “You see too many films. Come on.”
Colin followed him back into a little steamy kitchen, where a half dozen sweating cooks were getting ready for the dinner crowd. Dickie leaned against a big, squat wooden chopping block. “Colin, you know if I save a piece for you, I cannot offer it back to the other party.”
“You’ll never miss him.”
Dickie nodded and said something in Cantonese to one of the cooks. The cook handed him a meat cleaver and stepped aside as Dickie grabbed a large piece of pork and slapped it onto the chopping block. Dickie was the son of a Nathan Road butcher and knew what he was doing. With rapid strokes, he chopped the piece of meat into slices and then whirled the cleaver again and chopped the slices into little squares. The whole demonstration took ten seconds, then he swept the cubes of meat into a pan. He hadn’t as much as touched the sleeves of his three-hundred-pound suit. He looked up at Colin and smiled. “Twenty thousand pounds. Saturday night. Don’t disappoint me, Colin.”
Colin left the restaurant whistling. Meeting Neal had been luck, he knew, but a lot of blokes would have settled for the twenty thousand. Colin had the balls to go for the big time.