‘Go on, surprise me.’
‘He’s saying,’ whispered Murk, leaning forward, ‘that he’s got gear to sell, and he’s looking for a UK buyer, and would I be interested.’
‘What sort of gear?’
‘Es. He’s got five thousand pills he wants to sell, and if the price is right he can get hold of a regular supply. As much as five thousand a week. Apparently, the first batch is already in the country, waiting to be flogged.’
Stegs looked at him sceptically. ‘If he’s as big a star as you say he is, how come he’s getting involved in something this risky?’
‘He’s a victim of market forces,’ answered Murk in a voice that suggested he was imparting some great wisdom. He took another leisurely drag on his Marlboro Light and sat back in his seat, nodding sagely through a cloud of smoke. ‘You see, the thing is, these days porn stars ain’t meant to look like porn stars. It’s all like amateur stuff now; the girls and the boys are meant to look like everyday, normal people, not like beautiful models with plastic tits or giant wangers. Tino’s a handsome bloke with ten inches’ worth of prime sirloin, an allover tan and a funny accent, and nowadays that’s just no good. You’d have more chance than him at the moment, Stegsy. It’s just the way it’s going.’
‘I’ll take that as some sort of back-handed compliment.’
‘You might want to think about it, you know. It’s an easy way to make a few quid. It’s not hard work and you get to fuck some very attractive young fillies. As long as you don’t mind being watched and you can get it up on demand, then you’re laughing.’
For one terrifying moment, Stegs actually did think that it might be quite a nice little career move. It would certainly solve his ongoing problem of not getting a great deal of action domestically on the bedroom front. The passionometer chez Jenner had been stuck round the zero mark ever since the missus had got pregnant, close to a year and a half back now. But he quickly scotched that one as he pictured himself stark bollock naked and freezing cold in someone’s front room with a balding director in a medallion who thought he was Martin Scorsese telling him what position to get in while a camera crew prodded around his nether regions trying to get close-ups of areas best seen from long distance and on panoramic. In Stegs’s experience, there was no such thing as easy money. Unless, of course, you were Trevor the Murky one.
‘So he’s out of work then, is he? Your mate?’
‘Yeah, things ain’t going so good for him at the moment. There’s been a bit of a scandal as well. He’s only a young lad, our Tino, and a bit overenthusiastic where the chicks are concerned.’
‘And?’
‘And, he got caught fucking a fourteen-year-old.’
‘Christ! The dirty dog.’
‘It wasn’t like that really. I mean, they’re a bit more liberal about these sort of things over in Holland. The age of consent’s like twelve or something, so it’s not frowned on like it is here.’
‘Perverts.’
‘No, no, come on now, Stegsy. When in Rome, and all that.’
‘I’m not in Rome.’
‘You know what I’m saying. Anyway, as it happens, the porn fraternity share your concern at such unwelcome actions. They don’t like that sort of thing — the shagging of chicks so young by their up-and-coming stars. It’s not good for the export business. So they’ve sort of frozen him out. And then there was his accident.’
‘His what?’
‘His accident. He was doing a film a few months back fucking this bird in the wheelbarrow position — you know, holding her up in a semi-handstand while doing her from behind.’
Stegs was horrified. ‘What? That’s a real position?’
‘Come on, Stegsy, get with the Kama Sutra. Of course it is. Provides just the sort of deep penetration a young woman requires. Plus it’s very useful exercise. Builds up your biceps and triceps.’
‘Sounds fucking knackering.’
‘Ah, well, there’s the problem. Tino’s perhaps not as fit as he thinks he is. Too many late nights, and all that. Anyway, there he is, doing this bird at ten to the dozen, just building up a head of steam for the money shot, when he gets a sudden attack of the cramp, mid-thrust. He yelps in pain, stiffens up, so to speak, and can’t fucking move. The director’s going mental, the bird on the receiving end wants to know what the fuck’s going on because obviously she’s a little uncomfortable, and Tino’s just stuck there, legs bent, rooted to the spot, with all the lower-body flexibility of a breezeblock.’
Murk stopped to savour the moment, chuckling heartily. Stegs joined in, unable to help himself.
‘What the fuck happened?’ he asked.
‘Apparently, he was stuck like that for three hours. They had to take him to Casualty in the back of an ambulance with both of them stark bollock naked and him still inside her.’
‘Ah, fuck this, you’re making it up.’
Murk nodded, still chuckling. ‘I am, as it happens. That last bit, anyway. Still, I have heard it’s happened before. And on a porno as well. The rest of it’s true, though. Tino’s not having it easy getting hold of money, and one of his contacts within the industry is this director who’s also fallen on hard times. Apparently, the fourteen-year-old Tino shagged was this bloke’s girlfriend, and he’s like fifty or something. Anyway, he’s the one who’s the source of the gear. Him and Tino have gone into partnership. The director’s producing the goods and Tino’s job’s to find a buyer and transport the stuff to where the transaction’s going to take place. Which is where I come in. I think I must have mentioned to him at some point that I liked to indulge in tablets of a recreational nature, and so he thinks maybe I’d be a useful business partner as well. He was offering the whole batch at six grand.’
‘What did you say?’
‘I said I wasn’t in the market — cashflow problems, and all that — but I knew a bloke who might be.’ He grinned happily. ‘My mate, Stegsy. As reliable as he is trustworthy. Though I did say you’d probably only pay five for that sort of bulk.’
Stegs nodded. ‘A wise move. I don’t like to fork out too much for my pills.’
‘Exactly. Anyway, I told him I’d try to make contact with you and set up some sort of meeting. What do you think?’
Stegs thought it incredible that informants like Trevor Murk could be quite so blase about double-crossing and thereby ruining the lives of people they were meant to like, and, since he was suspended, he said as much. ‘Doesn’t it bother you that your actions are going to send that poor bastard down for two, even three, years, minimum?’
Murk looked genuinely upset by the question, as if Stegs had just accused him of something heinous he hadn’t done. Like shagging his best friend’s missus in the wheelbarrow position. ‘I can’t fucking believe you’re getting like that. You lot survive on the sort of info people like me are good enough to provide — at considerable danger to ourselves, I might add. I didn’t ask him to come offering me gear, did I? If he’s stupid enough to try and flog five thousand tabs to someone he once starred in a porn film with, he’s got to accept the, you know, consequences, hasn’t he? It’s dog eat dog out there, Stegsy. You know that. You don’t bite, you don’t fucking survive. Anyway, you were the one who called him a pervert. Why are you suddenly getting all moralistic about it? Found God or something?’
Stegs stubbed out his cigarette and took a drink from his beer. ‘No,’ he said eventually. ‘If I found God, Trevor, I’d put him back. No place for someone like him in my life.’