Nicola Barker - Darkmans

Kelly’s eyes bulged at this near-perfect kiss-off.

‘And by the way…’ Beede continued, benevolently, ‘if you were hoping for a visit from your mother any time soon…’

(Her mouth quickly snapped shut again. Oh God . The very thought almost calcified her entire bone-structure)—‘…then you’ll be delighted to know,’ he purred soothingly, ‘that she’s here.’

The cat had found sanctuary in its basket. Only a piercing pair of china-blue eyes were now visible, peeking out at him, anxiously, from the creaking confines of its smart, wicker corral. Kane blew an idle raspberry at it, and the cat hunched down even lower, emitting a strangely haunting, dog-like yowl.

He glanced around him. It’d been a long while since he’d ventured inside Beede’s bedroom, but during this considerable interim, a dramatic transformation — a revolution —had taken place.

Where previously Beede had been the master of decorative understatement (books, reading lamp, bed, eiderdown, matching Victorian dark-wood cupboard and chest of drawers) now the place was like some kind of Aladdin’s cave: a veritable bring-and-buy sale of disparate objects, for the most part stacked up in crates (which now covered — floor to ceiling — three of the four walls).

The crates had been turned on to their sides, so that the items within were individually showcased; almost as if inhabiting their own miniature plywood theatres. Kane remembered staging theatrical endeavours of this kind himself, as a boy, in cardboard boxes; with badly painted back-drops, a batch of plastic animals and his Action Man — but–

Hey…

— surely Beede was taking things a little far here…?

Even the cat’s basket had been placed inside a crate. And each crate

— Kane scowled as he bent down to inspect one — was tagged with a crisp, white label containing a date, a description of the item — eg:

13.08.2002

Three coffee mugs c. 1997

One bears the inscription: The world’s best fisherman

Cup three has slight chip on lip

— as well as a digital image of the item/s in question neatly affixed underneath.

Kane found himself staring at the photograph of the mugs for some minutes–

Has Beede completely lost his marbles?

Or is it me?

Is it the weed?

Has my fantasy/fact facility become utterly jumbled?

He was finally stirred from his reverie by a hoarse cough from the cat–

Hairball?

He moved over to inspect its crate (squatted down to read the label):

22.12.2002

Blue-point Siamese

‘Chairman Miaow’, aka ‘Manny’

Three years old

Neutered male

He stared at its photograph, then directly at the animal–

Hmmn.

A good likeness.

The cat returned his stare, unblinking.

Kane’s mind suddenly turned to the chiropodist–

Ella?

No

Ellen?

He thought about her hands and her long, plain, brown hair–

Uh…

Then he focussed in on his foot. A small verruca, hidden underneath the arch (which he’d possessed — almost without noticing — for seven years? Eight?) had actually been niggling him for several weeks now (new trainers — he reasoned — with slightly higher insoles. A different distribution of pressure, of body weight…That’d set it off. Those tiny, jabbing sensations. Those sharp bouts of ferocious itching–

Urgh ).

He flexed his toes and stood up. His phone vibrated inside his pocket. He took it out and inspected it, stepping back. As he stepped, he kicked into a tray of damp cat litter. The grey granules peppered the surrounding carpet.

‘ Shit ,’ he looked down, scowling, lifting his feet, gingerly.

Now what?

He shoved his phone away, squatted down and scooped a few of the granules on to his hand, wincing, fastidiously, as he dropped them back into the tray again. As they fell he noticed that the base of the tray had been lined with–

Not newspaper, but…

— a letter…Handwritten. He tipped the tray up slightly to enable him to read it more easily. At the top of the page was the heading: Ryan Monkeith Road Crossing Initiative.

Ryan Monkeith? The name rang a bell, for some reason. He frowned for a moment, struggling to remember…

Ah…Yes!

But of course!

Ryan Monkeith — son of Laura — Laura with the dodgy tranquilliser habit — Blonde Laura — Scatty Laura…

It’d been all over the local news the previous year–

But Laura never…

— after he’d been killed crossing a road close to one of the new developments — a pedestrian blackspot…

The A292?

The Hythe Road?

The A251?

They were trying to build a bridge or install a crossing or something–

Weren’t they?

In his honour?

— to be funded by his grandad or uncle or godfather. Some powerful local contractor…

Kane inspected the letter. It was the second page.

‘…people like yourself,’ it said, in a feminine hand, ‘with your background in local politics, fundraising skills and the confidence of the local community…’

Kane snorted, dryly. The next section was smudged. But further down…

‘…different sides of the fence, but after a tragedy of this magnitude we hope a certain amount of…’ more smudging ‘…and that’s why we feel your involvement would be especially…’

Blah blah

His eye was caught, briefly, by something at the bottom of the page–

‘Isidore has been amazing — you’ll be more than familiar with his energy and enthusiasm. He recommended you very highly…’

Gaffar popped his head around the door.

‘Is fix,’ he announced, smiling broadly.

‘What? You fixed it already?’ Kane slammed down the tray. ‘You fixed the rug? Seriously? ’

Gaffar threw out his arms in a shrug of pseudo-modest self-aggrandisement.

Kane followed him back through to the living-room. He located the precise spot where the burn had been (just next to the side-table), squatted down and tried to find any sign of it. Nothing . Not a damn thing.

‘ Jesus ,’ he muttered, ‘you’ve even…the burn went right through to the rough fibre underneath. How’d you get rid of that?’

’I just turned it around, you imbecile,’ Gaffar explained, smiling, ’and hid the burn under the sofa.’

Kane glanced up. ‘So you’re from Turkey? You really know about this stuff, huh?’

Gaffar nodded. ‘Turk.’

Then he paused. ‘Kurd,’ he modified.

‘Did you train in this kind of shit?’

’Are you kidding me?’ Gaffar snorted, haughtily. ’Do I look like one of those rough-thumbed, short-sighted, carpet-weaving cunts?’

Kane peered down again, feeling the spot with his hands. He was in love with the job Gaffar had done.

‘You’re a genius, man,’ he murmured, gazing up through his lank fringe again. ‘What’s your name? Gaffar? I owe you big-time, Gaffar. You are an unbelievable fucking God-send . You’ve saved my fucking life here.’

Gaffar tipped his head, bashfully (although he found himself a perfectly fitting receptacle for Kane’s panegyric). ‘Uh…an’ look …’ he clumsily stuttered, in his makeshift English, pushing his hand into his suit pocket and deftly withdrawing a small, neat disc of semi-transparent plastic ‘…Under sofa, lid , eh?’