‘Okey-doke,’ Nikki said as the door started to swing closed again. ‘I’ll say bye to Dad…’
Emma looked at me.
Oh-oh, I thought. Now what?
‘Great kid,’ I said to Emma, nodding towards the closing door. ‘Love her to bits.’
‘You all right?’ Em said. She looked genuinely concerned. I relaxed.
‘Tired,’ I said, honestly.
‘I heard Jude gave you a hard time.’
‘It was mutual, but yes.’ I sighed, yawned. ‘Oh, dear. Sorry, sorry.’
‘It’s all right.’
‘Jude and I agreed to disagree,’ I said. ‘Although, come to think of it, I’m not sure we even agreed that.’
Emma nodded, looked down at my chest briefly. She put one hand out and touched my arm, patting it. ‘You get some sleep.’
‘Best idea I’ve heard all night.’ I held the door open for her.
‘Night, Ken. You take care.’ She kissed me lightly on the cheek, just like her daughter had. She turned at the top of the stairs as I was opening the door to my bedroom, and gave me a small, brave smile. She raised one hand hesitantly, then went quickly down the steps.
I stripped to my underpants and got into the bed. I went to sleep thinking about Celia, hoping she was well and safe with her family on Martinique. I did this quite often these days. Part of me hoped that by going to sleep thinking of her I’d see her in my dreams, but so far this hadn’t happened.
I slept well for about half an hour until some people piled into the room, turning on the light and looking for their coats. I told them where they were, then once they’d gone I got up, pulled on my trousers and went through to the official cloakroom and pulled all the coats and jackets off the bed and hung them over the banister rail outside. This didn’t stop another group of drunks coming into the room, turning on the light and looking for their coats.
I took the bulb out of the central light fixture and the next time somebody came in, muttering about coats and clicking the light switch about ten times, I snored very loudly until they went away.
When I wake up I’m dressed as an SS officer with my cock hanging out. I’m handcuffed to the bed and there’s gaffer tape over my mouth and Jo’s; they rape her, slit her throat and leave her lying on me. They’ve taken stuff to make it look like a robbery gone wrong and the boat’s been holed so when the tide rises I’ll drown.
‘Ah!’
‘Ken?’
‘Fuck! Shit! Fuck! Fucking hell!’
‘Ken! Come on! Just a dream. Whatever it was. Just a dream, a nightmare. Hey, come on…’
‘Dear fucking Jesus Christ almighty.’ I flopped back down onto the bed. My heart was hammering like an engine, I was breathing like I’d just run a marathon. ‘Oh, God.. ’
Jo took me in her arms and cradled me. ‘It’s okay. Everything’s all right. Calm down, calm down…’
‘Oh…’
‘That’s not like you.’
‘… Fuck…’
‘Okay now?’
‘Yeah. Okay. Okay now…’
Only I wasn’t okay at all.
Jo fell quickly asleep again but I spent a long, long time looking round the darkened, slightly tilted bedroom, swallowing hard, catching the occasional whiff of sewage and decay coming from the mud outside, listening for ominous gurgling noises from the bilges, searching for heavies hiding in the shadows and shivering as the sheen of sweat dried on my skin.
I lay waiting for the dawn to come up and the tide to come in, waiting for the waters to raise us again, bring the Temple Belle level once more, smother the faint smell of death and restore balance.
‘Hello?’
‘Hey, Mrs C.’
‘Ooh! Is that that man from the radio? Kennit, how are you doin, ma darlin?’
‘Got a bit of a cold, but apart from that, fine. And all the better for talking to you, Mrs C. And how are you? Beautiful and sexy as ever? Beautiful and sexy as the last time I saw you? On the big wheel, wasn’t it?’
‘Oh, hell, honey, I’m more so. More so! You a terrible man. I tell me son on you, you see if I don’t do juss that.’
‘Mrs C, you mustn’t. My unbridled passion for you has to stay a deep and terrible secret, otherwise Ed would be terribly hurt. I mean, suppose you seduced me and then fell pregnant?’
‘What? At my age? Oh, lissen to you, you rogue man! Ha!’
‘I’d have to marry you; I’d be Ed’s father. He’d never forgive me.’
‘Stop! I’ll bust meself. Where’s me hanky? Oh, you surely are a terrible man. I’d get the boy himself to give you a serious talkin to but he’s in France or Rome or some damn place like that, honey, so you’ll have to call his mobile.’
‘No problem, Mrs C. Actually I knew he was away; I just wanted an excuse to hear your voice.’
‘There see now, you bein terrible again.’
‘I just can’t help myself. It’s the power you have over me.’
‘Terrible man, terrible, terrible rogue of a man.’
‘Okay, Mrs C. I’ll try Ed’s mobile. It was good talking to you. Oh… I did want to have a word with a friend of his, too. Ah… Robe? Yeah; Robe. Would you have his number there at all?’
‘Robe? What you want to talk to him for, hon?’
‘… Sorry, just blowing my nose there, Mrs C. Excuse me.’
‘You excused, hon. So, what’s this you wantin to talk to Robe for?’
‘Ah, yeah; I was talking to somebody. In a record company. Ice House? They’re pretty big. Apparently the company, the record label, it’s looking for security people; bodyguards, that sort of thing. For artists, rap artists, when they come over from the States. I just thought Robe could do that, maybe. I mean, these are often pretty serious people themselves, ex-gangsta, a lot of them; they wouldn’t have any respect for the average white kid with broad shoulders who’s used to turning people away from clubs because they’ve got the wrong footwear. Robe, however, they’d relate to. But it’s straight work, and well paid. I know he could do it. Could lead to, well, who knows?’
‘Be a lot more respectable than what he usually gets up to, what I hear. Robe is Yardie, Kennit. He dangerous. Too many guns. He’s not welcome in this house no more. Ed don’t see him that I know of.’
‘I realise that. Ed and I were talking about him, not long ago. That’s why I thought maybe this could be a way to get him out of that sort of life. I thought maybe if I could have a word with him…’
‘Well, I don’t tink I got his number here, but I can get it, I suppose.’
‘It’d be great if you could, Mrs C. Of course, I’d understand if you didn’t want to say anything to Ed. Nothing might come of this, we have to accept that. But, you know; nothing ventured, and all that.’
‘Well, you probably on a wild goose chase here, honey, but bless you for tinkin of it. I call you back, that okay?’
‘You are a saint and sexy. I adore you.’
‘Ah! Stop it now!’
I’d decided I might be developing a crush on my dentist. Of course I wasn’t and I knew I wasn’t, but the idea seemed nice; there was something oddly relaxing and carefree about it. Maybe it was some very mixed up Freudian thing, given that my dad was a dentist, maybe it was because Mary Fairley, BDS, was Scottish, from Nairn, and had the most wonderfully soft, burring accent I’d heard since I’d moved to London, maybe it was the whole thing about lying almost flat with my mouth open, entirely at this woman’s mercy while some gentle music played and she and her almost as attractive assistant spoke quietly, professionally to each other, but whatever it was, I had almost convinced myself I felt something for her. Mary was chunky of build but delicate of movement and touch; she had sandy hair, grey-green eyes, a sprinkling of freckles across her nose, and breasts that got ever so slightly in her way sometimes, necessitating a quick, twisting movement – the bodily equivalent of a hair-flick – while she was leaning over me.
I gazed up into her eyes, wishing we didn’t have to put these safety visor things on these days. Although, given that I seemed to have picked up Nikki’s cold, that was probably no bad thing; I had to raise my hand and stop the dental work a couple of times to have a good sneeze.