Jessie Keane - The Make

‘More toast?’ offered George.

Alfie nodded. He still hadn’t spoken much, apart from to give his name. That bothered George. He looked even younger in daylight, and that bothered George too. To think of a kid like this wandering about on the streets. And what had been going on between Alfie and that bastard waving the knife around?

George lifted a finger to Bert the café owner. ‘Can we get some more toast over here, when you’re ready. And two more teas?’ He had no trouble making himself heard over the hubbub of noise in here. George had a voice like a foghorn – and a laugh like a bronze gong.

While Bert got busy with the toaster, George thought back and tried to recall what the man in the long black leather coat had been yelling at Alfie before George had decided he was crazy enough to intervene. Something about ‘the man’. That was what the man wanted . . .? It was driving George nuts. He’d drunk hardly a thing that night, but still he couldn’t remember fuck-all. Mostly because he’d been scared right out of his brains.

‘Alfie?’ he said.

There were other patrons in the café; it was a good place, one George and Harry often frequented. It was busy, bustling with life. Outside it was cold, but in here it was hot, everyone talking and laughing and eating, the windows steamed up, the coffee machine hissing and frothing; it felt cosy.

Alfie looked up at George’s face.

‘How old are you, Alfie?’

This was a point that really bothered George. The boy looked very young. He must be a minor. He shouldn’t be out on his own like this. Shit, anyone could have picked him up, and what George really ought to do was take him to the nearest cop shop, see about getting him home. He had said as much to Alfie earlier this morning, and had been alarmed to find Alfie halfway down the stairs half an hour later. George had caught up with him. ‘No police!’ Alfie had shouted. ‘No police!’ Five minutes more, and the kid would have been out on the streets again, prey for any loitering monster. It made George’s blood run to ice, the thought of that.

So – no police. Not yet, anyway. That was cool with George. He didn’t want involvement with the filth if he could avoid it, anyway; he’d done dodgy deals around town a few times, fly-pitching and ripping off a few tourists, minor stuff, but it was best to keep a low profile. Alfie was just staring back at George with those big baby-blues that seemed to hold so many secrets. He said nothing.

‘Come on, Alf. Straight up, how old are you?’ George persisted.

‘Fourteen,’ said Alfie with a quick grin.

‘Holy shit.’

‘Kidding,’ said Alfie with a roll of his eyes at George’s gullibility.

George tipped his head to one side and looked Alfie in the eye. George played a mean hand of cards. The Doyle poker gene had not passed him by. He was ace at reading people’s reactions, but angel-faced young Alfie flummoxed him. He could read his accent, no problem. Well-bred. Nicely rounded vowels. From a good background, that much was obvious. So what had he been doing, wandering around the dangerous night streets with someone waving a knife in his face?

‘Which is it then?’ he asked. ‘Fourteen? Fifteen? Sixteen? What?’

‘Seventeen. That’s the God’s honest, George.’

George stared across at Alfie. ‘You going to tell me what happened with that guy, Alf? The one in the alley?’

Alfie’s smile dropped away. The shutters went down. He said nothing.

‘Alf?’ prompted George gently.

Alfie exhaled sharply and sat back in his chair. He looked into George’s eyes. ‘Please let me stay, George,’ he said. ‘Please.’

George pushed back his chair and leaned back too, puffing out his cheeks with exasperation. Bert came and put more toast and tea in front of them. George nodded his thanks and looked at Alfie.

‘Seventeen?’ he asked. Alfie could easily pass for younger, with that puckish, elfin, Peter Pan quality, the big eyes, the golden mop of hair; he’d look twenty when he was thirty-five. He’d look fifty when he was ninety.

Alfie nodded and dived into the toast.

George felt a smile forming on his face again. ‘Seventeen, with a tapeworm.’

He watched the boy eat. There was something about the boy eating that just made George feel happy. Maybe he was a compulsive feeder – certainly he fed himself with a vengeance. But it was more than that. George knew the state Alfie had been in last night. Shaking. Shot away. His eyes huge from the after-effects of some drug or other. And then, during the night, the boy’d had nightmares. George had heard him crying out, rambling on about dungeons and shit. He had tried to ignore it, but it had gone on, and on, and he’d thought, fuck it, he’s going to wake Harry up in a minute; Harry is not going to be a happy bunny.

So he’d gone through to the lounge, and there had been Alfie, curled up in a corner of the sofa bed, sobbing. George had sat down in his vest and boxers and said hey kid, what’s the matter? You okay?

And then, because Alfie had seemed so distraught, he had put his arm around him and hugged him. Saying over and over, it’s okay, hush, it’s all right, what was it, a bad dream? It’s okay, you’re safe.

After about an hour, Alfie had lain down again, and finally drifted back into sleep. George had felt tears prick his own eyes, he was so affected by Alfie’s distress. George had sat there, watching him for a long time. Watching over him, sort of.

Like he was doing now. Caring for him, feeding him, and feeling glad that the haunted expression in his eyes was starting to go.

‘Say I can stay. Please,’ said Alfie again, past a mouthful of toast.

George stared at Alfie. ‘It’s a small flat,’ he said.

‘Please.’

Harry wouldn’t be happy. Said the place was too small to swing a cat anyway, but with three of them in there . . . and fuck it, what if Cuthill found out? He’d stick the rent up at the very least, or – worst-case scenario – boot their arses out the door. And then where would they be? He’d be damned if he’d go back home again and watch that creepo Claude pawing his mum day and night. Yuck.

‘Okay, you can stay,’ George heard himself saying, frightened that if he said no Alfie was just going to leg it, vanish into the warren of streets and never be seen again.

He’d have to square it with Harry, that was all. It would work out. It would have to.

Chapter 16

‘You are joking,’ said Harry.

‘Nope. Deadly serious, my man,’ said George, handing Harry a sheet of A4 paper that had just been coughed out by the printer beside his small computer station in his shambolic bedroom. ‘Your assignment – should you choose to accept it,’ said George, sending a collusive grin to Alfie, who was sprawled out on the bed watching all this going on, ‘is to escort Ms Melissa Whitehead to a family wedding. She’s a bit of a dog, I grant you, but she needs an escort for this do, if she ain’t going to look like a total lost cause to her nearest and dearest.’

‘Oh my God,’ said Harry, staring at the photo. It wasn’t pretty. ‘If she wants a shag, I’m definitely not going to be up to it.’

‘Unkind, unkind,’ tutted George. ‘And speaking of such delicate matters, you know that cougar, the one you also worried you wouldn’t be able to do the deed for . . .?’

Harry looked up. ‘Who, Jackie?’

‘See, you’re on first-name terms. And, my boy, your face lit up at the very mention of her. I think it’s lurve.’

‘Don’t be a prick,’ said Harry. ‘What she say?’

‘Needs you – and no one else, I might add – you specifically, to escort her to another do.’

‘Oh.’ After the Covent Garden incident, Harry thought she’d never want to see him again. He felt cheered, all of a sudden, and Melissa Whitehead didn’t seem quite so daunting after all.