Ian Sansom - The Bad Book Affair

“Ah, well. Where’d ye go? The health center?”

“Yes.”

“Who’d ye see?”

“Dr. Withers?”

“Ach, for goodness’ sake. What d’ye go and see him for?”

“I didn’t have a choice.”

“He’s a complete header.”

“Really?”

“Aye. Of course. They’re all the same. He give you anything for it?”

“For what?”

“For the stress and strain of being Israel Armstrong?”

“Yes, he did actually.”

“Good. Mind ye, much longer ye won’t be need of it.”

“Why not?”

“’Cause ye’ll have disappeared completely. Sight of ye! Good feed’s what ye need, never mind medicine.”

“Anyway,” said Israel. “Much as I enjoy your hilarious craic and banter, Ted, shall we go? Are you ready?”

“Do I look ready?” said Ted, indicating his apron and tea towel.

“No…Not really.”

“Well then. I need to turn off my curry.”

“Shall I come in and wait?” asked Israel.

Ted huffed.

“It is quite cold out here, actually,” said Israel, putting on his best shivery face.

Ted huffed again but allowed him to enter.

“Mmm,” said Israel as he stepped across the threshold and the curry wafts became all-embracing waves. “That really is curry.”

“Aye,” said Ted. “And what’s wrong with curry?”

“Nothing. I like curry.”

“Good. Because you’re not having any.”

“No, I don’t want any, it’s fine,” said Israel. “But do you often have curry for breakfast?”

“It’s for my tea, ye eejit. D’ye not plan ahead?”

Israel didn’t, actually, plan ahead at all. Gloria had always planned ahead. She worked out everything in accordance with a great scheme-as if she had been born with a ready reckoner in one hand and a five-year day-to-view diary in the other. Gloria planned not just weeks or months but years in advance. If she wanted to be doing something in, say, two years’ time, she simply worked backward, step by step to the present, and worked it into a grid. It was like the mind of God. If God was a highly organized young lawyer. Which, clearly, he wasn’t. What God needed was a wife. God needed Gloria. So did Israel. If he’d planned ahead properly he’d be living in a brownstone in Brooklyn, going for breakfast with Paul Auster. He certainly wouldn’t be picking up Ted in a mobile library van in the middle of the middle of nowhere and discussing his curry making.

“Good idea,” he said wistfully. “Planning ahead.”

“It’s not exactly rocket science,” said Ted.

“No,” said Israel. “I didn’t really have you down as a curry kind of a man, though.”

“Aye, well you might want to reexamine your prejudices, then, eh?”

Ted disappeared into his kitchen. Israel followed. The kitchen was spotless and ancient: a shrine to wipe-clean Formica. There was a small table in the middle of the room, set neatly with breakfast things: a loaf of bread, butter, jam, a brown teapot.

“Sorry to hear about yer man Pearce,” said Ted, dessert-spooning up a testing mouthful of curry.

“Yes,” said Israel.

“When’s the funeral?” said Ted, shaking corrective pepper into the pot.

“Friday, I think.”

“Is the house open?”

“How do you mean?”

“So people can call in and pay their respects.”

“I don’t know,” said Israel.

“I tell ye what,” said Ted, spooning a second testing mouthful of curry.

“What?” said Israel.

“Perfect!” said Ted, referring to the curry. “It’s a reminder to us all, isn’t it?”

“What is?”

“Yer man Pearce. If ye can put yer elbows out in the morning and ye don’t touch wood, ye’re doing OK.”

“What?”

“If ye…Never mind. Anyway,” said Ted. “While I get myself ready, could ye-”

But Israel was over at the stove inspecting the curry.

“The smell’s lovely,” he said. “How do you make your curry?”

“How do ye think?” said Ted.

“I don’t know. I’ve never made curry,” said Israel.

“Never made curry.” Ted shook his head, as though this confession was tantamount to admitting to never having had a bath. Israel hadn’t had a bath recently either, actually.

“Do you have a recipe?”

“I do not,” said Ted, appalled.

“Is it lamb?” said Israel, peering in.

“Mincemeat,” said Ted. “Half a pound of mincemeat, some carrots, some onions. Potatoes.”

“Really?”

“Aye.”

“It doesn’t sound like curry, actually,” said Israel.

“Does it not?”

“No,” said Israel. “That sounds more like shepherd’s pie.”

“And then I add some curry powder,” said Ted.

“Ah.”

“Curry,” said Ted decisively, turning off the heat and putting a lid over the saucepan.

Before his recent listlessness Israel’s repertoire had been slowly expanding. He had perfected a number of simple recipes: sautéed mushroom on toast, tomatoes on toast, cheese on toast, cream cheese on toast, beans on toast. He was particularly fond of toast flavored lightly with salt and pepper. It was, admittedly, a largely toast-based repertoire, but it served its purpose. It was all going well until the toaster broke: it was a blow to him. There was a burning smell, and the toaster stopped working. He’d changed the fuse. No good. It must have been the element. He didn’t know how to fix the element.

Thinking about his recipes and smelling the curry, his appetite was now well and truly whetted: he felt like Winnie the Pooh faced with a honeypot. He found himself helplessly eyeing up the breakfast things set on the kitchen table.

“So,” Ted was saying, “I take it you’ve sorted this trouble with the Morris girl, then?”

“Not exactly,” said Israel distractedly.

“No?” said Ted. “It was on the news earlier.”

“Was it?”

“Aye. A twenty-nine-year-old man is helping police with their inquiries, apparently.”

“That’d be me,” said Israel, wrenching his thoughts and his gaze away from breakfast. “Do they have to tell people your age?”

“And how are the police inquiries going?” said Ted.

“I have no idea,” said Israel. “I’m sort of working on the case myself now.”

“Working on the case yourself?”

“Yeah.”

“Aye, right, Columbo,” said Ted. “That woman put you up to it, did she?”

“What woman?”

“Flashy Annie, yer journalist?”

“No,” said Israel.

“I’ll bet she did,” said Ted. “Sticking her…bits in where they don’t belong. No good’ll come of it, if you ask me.”

“Ah, well, funnily enough,” said Israel, “I was going to ask you, actually.”

“No!” said Ted.

“Hold on, I haven’t-”

“The answer’s no,” said Ted.

“I haven’t asked you yet!”

“Well, whatever you’re asking, the answer’s no,” said Ted.

“What, you’re not going to help me out?”

“Correct.”

“Why not?”

“You want a list of reasons?”

“Well, no, but-”

“First of all, it’s not my problem. Second of all, it’s not yours. And third of all-”

“Yeah, all right,” said Israel. “That’s plenty of reasons, thanks.”

“-the girl’ll turn up soon enough anyway. She’ll be raking about with her mates somewhere.”

“Right. Well,” said Israel. “I’ll just go it alone then.”

“With yer fancy woman.”

“She is not my fancy woman.”

“Well, if she’s not, ye’ve a funny way of showin’ it. Anyway,” said Ted conclusively, “if ye just tidy up my breakfast things there and I’ll-”

“Actually, Ted,” said Israel, nodding coyly toward the breakfast things.