“That’s just like you, innit?” Morris said. His features convulsed with spite, he bounced up and down on the landing. “No bloody gratitude. You talk about when I was earthside, you give me the character of an evil bastard, but where would you be if it weren’t for me? If it hadn’t been for me, the boys would have cut you up a bloody sight worse. You’d be disfigured. Aitkenside said, she has to learn respect for what a knife can do, and they all said, all the boys, quite right, she has to learn, and your mum said, fine, you carve her, but don’t go carving her face, the punters won’t like it. She said, it’s all very well your squabbles, but when you gentlemen have all got bored of her, I’ve still got to sell her on, ain’t I? And I supported her, didn’t I? I backed her up. I said to Aitkenside, quite right, show her what’s what by all means, but don’t make her into a bloody liability.”
“But Morris, why did they do it?” Al cried. “What did I ever do to you? I was a child, for pity’s sake, who would want to take a knife and slice up a child’s legs and leave her scarred?” I must have screamed, she thought, I must have screamed but I don’t remember. I must have screamed but no one heard me.
“There was nobody to hear,” Morris said. “That’s why you have to have an outbuilding, innit? You have to have an outbuilding or a shed, or a caravan if you can’t manage that, or at least a trailer. You never know when you need to show some little shaver what’s what or hang some bugger what’s getting on your nerves.”
“You haven’t answered me,” Al said. She stood in his path, fingering the lucky opals as if they were weapons. He tried to swerve past her, but her aura, welling out and smothering him, forced him back. Gibbering with frustration, he condensed himself, and slid under the carpet, and she stamped on him hard saying, “Morris, if you want to keep your job, I want some answers. If you don’t give me answers I’m going to give up this game. I’ll go back and work in a cake shop. I’ll work in the chemist like I used to. I’ll scrub floors if I have to. I’m going to give it up, and then where will you be?”
“Ho,” said Morris, “you don’t frighten me, gel, if you go and work in the chemist I shall make myself into a pill. If you get a job in a cake shop I shall roll myself into a Swiss roll and spill out jam at inopportune moments. If you try scrubbing floors, I will rise up splosh! out of your bucket in a burst of black water, causing you to get the sack. Then you will be wheedling me around like you used to, oh, Uncle Morris, I’ve no spending money, oh Uncle Morris I’ve no money for me school dinners, I’ve no money for me school trip. And all the time going behind my back with the same sob story to MacArthur, and whining for sweeties to Keith. Too generous by half, that’s Morris Warren. The day I was taken over, there wasn’t five bob in my pocket. I was taken over and I don’t know how, taken over wiv money owing to me.” Morris began to whimper. “MacArthur owes me. Bill Wagstaffe owes me. I’ve got in my black book who owes me. Bloody spirits is devious, innit? Always some reason they can’t pay. ‘My pocket vapourized. Holy Bloody Ghost got my wallet.’ So there I was turning up airside, they says, turn out your pockets, and when they saw that was all the money I had to my name they bloody laughed. They said, you don’t work you don’t drink, me old mate. That’s the rule here. Then I got put on Spirit Guide. First I got Irene Etchells, and then you, God help me. I say God help me but the bugger never does. That’s why I bother wiv Nick, wiv Nick you get a career opportunity. You get sent on courses.”
“If you get promoted,” Al said, “nobody will be happier than I will. The only bit of peace and quiet I had was when you were on your course.”
“Peace and quiet?” Morris yelped. “How could you have peace and quiet? Wiv a past like yours? Not ten years old, and a man’s testicles on your conscience.”
“What testicles?” Alison yelled.
Across the landing, Colette’s door opened. She stood in her bedtime T-shirt, very white and severe. “That’s it,” she said. “I don’t intend to spend another night under this roof. How can I live with a woman who has rows with people I can’t see, and who stands outside my bedroom door shouting ‘What testicles?’ It’s more than flesh and blood can stand.”
Alison rubbed her forehead. She felt dazed. “You’re right,” she said. “But don’t be hasty.”
“It’s simply not acceptable conduct. Not even by your standards.”
Alison moved her foot, so Morris could slide from under it. “At least wait until the morning.”
“I don’t believe it’s safe to wait until morning. I shall pack a small bag and I shall send someone for the rest of my things in due course.”
“Who?” Al said, in simple wonderment. “Who will you send?” She said, “You can’t just rush off into the night. That’s silly. You owe it to me to talk it over.”
“I owe you nothing. I built your business up from scratch. It was a blundering amateur mess when I came on board.”
“That’s what I mean. Come on, Colette! We’ve been through such a lot.”
“Well, from now on you’re on your own. You’ve got plenty of company, I would have thought. Your special sort of company.”
“I’ve got my memories.” Al said. “Yes. That’s fine.”
She turned away. I won’t entreat you anymore, she thought. She heard low voices from downstairs. It sounded as if Aitkenside and the rest had come in and were making themselves a snack. Colette closed her door. Al heard her talking. For a moment she stood still, in astonishment. Who has she got in there with her? Then she realized that Colette was using her cell phone, and was making arrangements to depart.
“Wha?” Gavin said. “Who’s this?” He spluttered, coughed, blew his nose twice; he sounded like a bear that has been hibernating at the bottom of a pit.
“It’s not that late,” she snapped. “Wake up, Gavin. Are you awake? Are you listening to me? This is an emergency. I want you to get me out of here.”
“Oh,” said Gavin, “it’s you, Colette. How’ve you been?”
“I’ve been better. I wouldn’t ask, except I need to get out right now, and I need somewhere to stay, just for tonight. I’m packing a bag as we speak.”
There was a silence. “So let me get this straight. You want me to come over there?”
“Yes. At once.”
“You want me to drive over there and get you?”
“We used to be married. Is it too much to ask?”
“Yes—no—it’s not that—” He broke off. To consult Zoë, perhaps? Now he was back on the line. “The problem’s my car, you see, it’s—well, it’s in the garage.”
“What a time to pick!” she snapped. “You should have a little Japanese one like ours, never lets us down.”
“So why don’t you, you know, get in it?”
“Because it’s hers! Because she’s the owner and I don’t want a dispute. Because I don’t want her near me, or anything that belonged to her.”
“You mean Fat Girl? Are you running away from her?”
“Look, I’ll call a cab. Only be ready to let me in when I get there. It may take a while.”
“Oh, I’ve got wheels,” Gavin said. “I can come. No problem. As long as you don’t mind it. I mean, it’s not my usual standard.”
“Gavin, come now, in whatever you happen to be driving.”
She clicked the phone off. She put her hand on her solar plexus, and tried to breathe deeply, calmly. She sat on the side of the bed. Vignettes from her life with Al ran through her mind. Alison at the Harte and Garter, the day they got together, arranging the sugar straws and pouring the milk. Alison in a hotel in Hemel Hempstead, trying on earrings at the dressing table, between each pair dabbing at her earlobes with cotton wool balls soaked in vodka from the minibar. Alison wrapped in a duvet, on the night the princess died, her teeth chattering on the sofa of the flat in Wexham. As she hauled down a bag from the top of the wardrobe and pushed into it a wash bag and some underwear, she began to rehearse her explanation to Gavin, to the world. A vagrant hanged himself in the shed. The air grew thick and my head ached. She stamped outside my room and shouted, “What testicles!” She snapped her bag shut, and lugged it downstairs. At once she thought, I can’t turn up like this, what about Zoë, she’ll probably be wearing designer lingerie, maybe a one-off a friend has made for her, something chiffon, something silk, I wouldn’t like her to see these sweatpants, she’ll laugh in my face. She ran upstairs, took off her clothes, and stood before her open wardrobe, wondering what she could find to impress a model. She glanced at her watch: how long would it take Gavin to get over from Whitton? The roads will be empty, she thought. She dressed; she was not pleased by the result; maybe if I do my makeup, she thought. She went into the bathroom; painstakingly she drew two eyes and a mouth. She went downstairs again. She found she was shivering, and thought she would like a hot drink. Her hand reached for the kitchen light switch, and drew back. We’re not supposed to be here; the neighbours think we left. She crossed the room and began to inch up the kitchen blind.