Fascinated Read online

  ‘I was raised in the gutter, Frank. Can you believe it? Look. There’s the gutter. When they knocked down the street I had it removed and set right here in the hothouse floor.’ He shuffles to the water’s edge and stares at the worn granite slabs that form a kerb to the goldfish pool, emphasising his words by giving the stones a gentle poke with the tip of a scuffed red shoe. ‘That’s history staring back at you.’

  ‘It’s a shame about the fish.’

  ‘Yeah. Maybe I’ll get some terrapins.’

  ‘I need a telephone …’

  ‘Conrad.’

  ‘I need a telephone, Conrad. I have to phone my wife.’

  ‘You’re married. That’s good. A man needs a woman to call his own.’

  ‘She’ll murder me when I get home. I’ve been missing so long she probably thinks I’ve been kidnapped.’

  Conrad smiles. He takes Frank gently by the arm and shuffles him deeper into the jungle. ‘What’s your game?’ he asks abruptly, when they’ve walked a few yards along a narrow cobbled path. He catches Frank’s elbow with his hand and gives it a confidential squeeze.

  ‘What?’

  ‘What’s your racket?’

  ‘Marketing.’

  Conrad looks pleased. He grins and grinds the elbow between his fingers and thumb. ‘My grandfather worked the markets. They were hard times. He made a living selling scratchings.’

  ‘I sell fruit,’ says Frank.

  ‘Do you know how I made my money, Frank? Security. Staggers Security Holdings. People paid me to protect them. I’m worth a fortune. I started out forty years ago as a bouncer at the local dance hall. And now I’m worth a fortune.’

  ‘Why did they need protection?’

  ‘That’s a very good question, Frank. A very good question.’ Conrad blinks and looks amazed. ‘That’s what they often said to me when I offered them my services. “Why do I need protection?”’

  ‘What did you tell them?’

  ‘You have to know what frightens them, Frank. You have to look into their dreams. A lot of men think they’re fearless, but they lack imagination! It’s a wicked and dangerous world. You have to demonstrate the dangers. When you fire their imaginations they soon need protecting from themselves. They frighten themselves into buying life assurance.’

  They push through the dripping undergrowth, into a glade of star-shaped flowers where butterflies as small as snowflakes scatter into the shimmering air.

  ‘You threatened them?’ ventures Frank. The hair prickles against his neck. His scalp seems to shrink and pull on his skull. This is a dangerous conversation. This shambling bear in the pantomime frock is a gangster. A man who makes money from menaces. The sweat springs from his hands. He makes a little performance from peeling off the jacket and rolling the sleeves of his shirt.

  ‘You’ve got it wrong, Frank,’ says Conrad patiently. ‘They paid me to look after them. I never did them harm. I never laid a finger on them. I left that to a man called Hamilton Talbot.’

  ‘And he was your partner,’ suggests Frank.

  ‘Yes. We were partners. That’s true. But I had a name for law and order and he was the devil for mischief.’

  ‘What kind of mischief?’

  Conrad wags his head and makes a sucking sound through his teeth as if tormented by memories. ‘He was the prowler in the attic. The bogeyman beneath the stairs. The smiling stranger at the school gates. The burning rags pushed through the letterbox at midnight. The acid attack in the supermarket. The bacon slicer filled with fingers. He was nasty. Very nasty.’ He shuffles forward to pick at a cluster of flowers and loses one of his shoes. It comes adrift from his foot and slithers into the shrubbery.

  ‘And what happened to him?’ Frank demands as Conrad tramples into the gloom.

  ‘He went crazy when I retired. I couldn’t control him. He still works a territory south of the river. But there’s something wrong in his head. He’s a very twisted man, Frank. He thinks I’m trying to persecute him.’

  He bends to retrieve his shoe and the frock sags open at the throat, the necklace rippling under his ears. Frank glances quickly into the frock, half-expecting to catch sight of breasts, an old gorilla’s dugs, dark and hairy as coconuts.

  ‘The men who nearly killed Webster last night …’

  ‘The Cockers,’ says Conrad.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘They’re Hamilton Talbot’s men. They’ve been hunting Webster for weeks. They’re making his life a misery.’

  Frank watches Conrad struggle to stretch the shoe to his foot, his weight balanced on one gaunt leg, using his fingers as ramrods to pack down the scruff of his heel.

  ‘I have to find a phone,’ he says softly, turning and blinking the sweat from his eyes. He feels scared and sick with heat. He doesn’t know how to escape the maze.

  ‘I can’t let you loose, Frank. You’re not safe on the streets. I wouldn’t forgive myself if something happened to you …’

  Frank swivels his head, scowling, defiant. ‘Are you threatening me?’

  ‘I’m protecting you, Frank. The Cockers are killers. They’re professionals. Murder and mutilation.’

  ‘Yeah? What do they do for fun?’

  ‘They hurt dogs.’

  ‘What’s to stop me walking out of here?’

  ‘I’ve got a ten-foot wall trimmed with razor wire, video surveillance and armour-plated security gates. I like to sleep secure in my bed without having some little nut-brained yobbo breaking into the house at night and pissing over the carpets.’

  ‘Listen. I just went out to post a letter. I don’t know what happened. I don’t care what happened. I didn’t hear anything. I didn’t see anything. I just want to go home and change into my own clothes.’

  ‘It’s a dangerous world, Frank. Think about it. As soon as we turn you loose the Cockers will be waiting for you. They’ll trail you home. They’ll find your wife …’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘Do you know what they do to women?’ whispers Conrad, clutching his necklace against his neck. He trembles. His mad eyes bulge with secret horrors.

  Frank shakes his head. He doesn’t want to be told but then, despite himself, he’s seized with a morbid fascination.

  ‘It would turn your stomach …’

  Now Frank imagines Jessica forced to confront these evil bastards. He thinks of them breaking into the house, catching his wife alone, snatching at her ankles and wrists, grinning as they slash at her clothes, dragging her down, prising her open. He thinks of her naked, weeping, bleating, crawling from the house to the street.

  ‘What?’ shouts Frank the good citizen. ‘What harm have I done?’

  ‘You helped Webster,’ Conrad says softly. ‘You’ve done enough to get yourself turned into dogs’ meat.’

  A panther yawns like a thunderstorm. The monkeys scream and take fright, clattering through the canopy.

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I want to look after you, Frank. You could help Webster settle the score. He’s not a young man. He’d appreciate your help. It should only take a couple of days, it’s a simple street-cleaning operation.’

  ‘I’ve got an important meeting with the chairman of the Gooseberry Guild this morning!’ protests Frank. ‘I’ve got to get to the office …’

  Conrad pays him no attention. He spears his nose with a finger and squints at his jungle flowers. ‘You thought you were going to die last night, Frank. What were your last thoughts?’

  ‘I thought, Jesus, I’m going to die. And then I thought, thinking I was going to die was going to be my last thought and I tried to think of something else to keep myself alive.’

  ‘That’s right,’ says Conrad. ‘You didn’t think, Jesus, I’m going to die – I wish I’d spent more time at the office.’

  Frank shrugs and a butterfly spills from his shirt.

  ‘This is an exciting opportunity for you,’ Conrad murmurs peacefully, as if the matter is already settled. ‘The chance of a lifetim
e. Webster is the last of the big-hearted bruisers. He’s an artist. You could learn a lot from him.’

  ‘What happens if I get killed?’

  ‘We always look after widows and children.’

  ‘I don’t want to get involved!’ insists Frank, chopping at the air with his hands. ‘I just want to get back to my wife.’

  Conrad says nothing, bored by the effort of conversation. He takes his guest by the elbow and silently leads him back to the pool.

  ‘Valentine will give you a phone,’ he says at last, gesturing towards the door. ‘Ask her to buy me some terrapins. A couple of dozen. Different colours.’

  Frank stumbles from the jungle to find Valentine waiting for him. She’s wearing a simple cashmere sweater and a pair of sailor’s canvas pants that balloon from a snakeskin belt. Her long black hair spouts from her head in a pony-tail.

  ‘I want to talk to Webster!’ he snaps, shaking out his crumpled jacket. Webster will explain this madhouse. He owes him something for trying to save his life. He punches a sleeve with his fist and pulls the jacket over his shoulders, groping for the second sleeve with his arm twisted behind his back, bent forward, getting tangled, spinning around in a ragged circle like a dog snapping at its own tail.

  ‘I thought you wanted to talk to your wife,’ says Valentine mildly. She steps back as he thrashes out and finally wins control of the jacket.

  Frank, gasping for breath, his face and neck glazed with sweat, nods miserably.

  She leads him across the marble hall and into a room with yellow walls and an intricate plasterwork ceiling freckled with sunlight from a single window. The room contains a massive Victorian ebonised bookcase filled to the brim with bumptious pot-bellied vases and bowls. There is nothing else in the room but a leather armchair and a heavy, old-fashioned telephone on a carved lacquer Chinese table.

  Valentine makes a tour of inspection, following the edge of the carpet. ‘You can use the phone on the table. Take your time. When you’ve finished I’ll take you to Webster.’

  Frank sits down at the carved lacquer table and waits for Valentine to leave him alone. She turns away, ignoring him; the pony-tail sweeps the curve of her neck. She walks the room with slow, kicking strides like someone wading through water.

  The door clicks shut.

  Frank springs from the chair and hurries across to the window. He brushes back the curtain and tries to force open the heavy oak frame. The window is locked. He slinks back to the table and picks up the telephone.

  He dials the number and listens to the distant ringing tone, thinking of the telephone in his own living room. Jessica running to answer it, clambering into the sofa cushions, tilting her head, wedging the mouthpiece into her shoulder, pulling and stretching the flex with her fingers. She has a habit of curling around a phone call as if she’s afraid the voice in her ear will flutter from her embrace and escape.

  ‘Jessica?’

  ‘Frank? Thank God! Where are you?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ He sounds like a drunk who, falling asleep on the last train home, struggles awake an hour before dawn to find that he’s marooned in the shunting yards.

  ‘What happened to you? Are you OK?’

  ‘Yes. I’m fine. I had an accident …’ He tries to swallow the word but it slips out before he’s had time to retrieve it.

  ‘What kind of accident? Frank? Are you hurt? Where are you? Tell me what happened!’

  ‘Nothing happened – there was a fight at the end of the street when I went down to the post box – it was just some stupid argument – a couple of drunks – I don’t know why I got involved.’ He’s making a mess of it, stumbling through an account of the Cockers, trying to make them sound like clowns instead of professional killers.

  ‘What the hell are you talking about?’ Her voice sharpens with resentment. ‘I was so frightened I went to the police. I didn’t get to bed last night. I’ve been ringing around the hospitals. Why didn’t you call me? Are you hurt?’

  ‘I’m not hurt, for Chrissakes! I’m OK. A few cuts and bruises. I had to take one of them home. He wanted me to stay with him.’

  ‘You stayed with him?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘All night?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Wait a minute, Frank. Let me get this straight, I’m tired. I didn’t sleep. You went out to post a letter and decided to spend the night with some drunk that you happened to meet in the street. Is that the story?’

  ‘I know it sounds crazy.’

  She’s tired and dazed and disappointed. Her relief at hearing his voice again, knowing that he’s alive and kicking, has dwindled into irritation. ‘Why didn’t you call me? You could have been dead or anything!’

  ‘I couldn’t call you.’

  ‘Frank, where are you?’ She’s growing more suspicious. She doesn’t know if she wants to believe him. There’s something wrong. It doesn’t make sense.

  ‘I don’t know!’ he shouts impatiently. ‘I’m lost!’

  ‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’ she yells back at him.

  ‘I don’t know the exact address. It’s a house. A big house.’

  ‘Well, are you coming home or what?’

  ‘Jessica, listen to me. I want you to call the office and tell Bassett to cover for me at the Gooseberry Guild meeting this morning. It’s important. Tell him I’m sick or something.’

  ‘Call him yourself!’

  ‘Please, Jessica. I need your help.’

  ‘Frank, are you in trouble?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘You’re in trouble. For God’s sake! What the hell is happening there?’

  ‘You won’t believe me.’

  ‘Try me.’

  ‘I’ve been kidnapped.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  The door opens and Frank glances up to find Valentine standing in the room. ‘Forget it,’ he says quickly, trying to smother the phone with his hand. ‘I’ll call again …’

  ‘Frank, get back here!’ Jessica screeches. ‘Do you understand me? I want you home!’

  ‘I’ll call again …’

  But the phone is dead.

  ‘Feeling better?’ Valentine asks him as he slams down the receiver. She smirks, watching his confusion, mocking him.

  ‘Where’s Webster?’ he demands, grunting, pushing his hands against his knees to lever himself from the chair.

  ‘We keep him locked away in the attic.’

  He follows her from the room and through a series of corridors that lead to the back of the house. He has the sensation of strolling through an abandoned hotel. The silence presses down on him. Beyond these closed doors he imagines expensive, stagnant rooms, furniture wrapped in shrouds, carpets bearing no footprints. There is nothing to be heard but the creaking of his own shoes.

  Valentine takes him to a servants’ staircase tucked away at the end of the house.

  ‘Ask him to give you a razor,’ she says as she leaves him to climb through the dark to the roof.

  Webster stands waiting for him at the top of the stairs. He’s wearing a woodland camouflage shirt and battered corduroy trousers. He looks solid and reliable, like a prosperous city banker setting out on a camping trip. He smells of soap and spearmint toothpaste. His face has been scrubbed until it shines.

  ‘Frank! How are you?’ He reaches out and pumps Frank’s hand as if he’s recovered a childhood friend.

  ‘I’ve been kidnapped by a man in a frock.’

  ‘Is that right?’ He grins and his big face glows with pleasure. His pale eyes are flecked through with copper. His teeth have been threaded with gold. ‘Did he make any ransom demands?’

  ‘He wants me to help you search out the Cockers.’

  ‘That’s an idea!’

  ‘Do I have a choice?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What happens if I don’t oblige him?’

  Webster wags his head. ‘The Cockers are animals, Frank. They’ve built their reputation on senseless ac
ts of violence. It you don’t go looking for them, they’ll come looking for you. There’s a gang war down there on the streets and you’ve just been press-ganged into service.’

  Franks looks at Webster and tries to imagine this strange old man storming through doors and somersaulting through plate-glass windows.

  ‘I don’t believe this is happening.’

  Webster smiles, wraps an arm around Frank’s shoulders and takes him into a small room with a bare scrubbed floor. There are framed photographs on the walls, foxed faces fading like ghosts into the brittle, varnished paper. The ceiling, slung from the window lintels, vaults to the whitewashed chimney-stacks in a sagging sheet of plaster, broken by beams and the stumps of rusty iron pegs. In one corner of the room a pair of chairs keeps company with a metal table.

  ‘I wish I’d never tried to help you,’ grumbles Frank.

  He shrugs himself loose and moves away to one of the windows, pressing his face against the glass, squinting down through the rain at a high brick wall marking the edge of the garden.

  ‘Don’t say that, Frank.’

  ‘Those bastards tried to kill me! They hit me so hard that I nearly swallowed my brains!’

  Webster retreats to a chair and pulls a packet of biscuits from a pocket in his camouflage shirt. Ginger biscuits glazed with a shell of sugar. ‘That’s why you need protection. You’re my responsibility. I know how to look after myself.’ He carefully opens the packet and crunches a biscuit into his mouth.

  ‘That’s not how it looked last night, Webster.’

  ‘That was different. They took me by surprise.’

  ‘If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather go home and take my chances,’ says Frank. He’s already late for work. He thinks of the crowded office, the cluttered desk, the smell of damp coats and dripping umbrellas. The thought depresses and worries him. If Jessica has delivered his message Bassett should already be preening himself for the meeting with the Gooseberry Guild.

  ‘How do you fancy your chances, Frank? How do you fancy a fire bomb thrown through your kitchen window at three o’clock in the morning? How do you fancy the Cockers playing games with your wife?’

  ‘What do you want from me?’

  ‘Nothing,’ says Webster, brushing sugar from his shirt. ‘You’re a civilian. I don’t expect civilians to fight my battles for me. I’ll be taking you along for support. You’ll be my caddie.’