Nicola Barker - Behindlings

Ted burst into the office just in time to witness an effervescent Leo (his moustache as wayward as an ill-constructed corn dolly) going online — the familiar whistle, the clang, the boink…

‘When I finally track him down,’ he said, pointing at Ted with one accusing hand, hurriedly typing in an address with the other, ‘I am going to swing for him first, then you, straight after.’

‘Is Eileen alright?’ Ted asked — his eyes travelling, ineluctably, towards the cloakroom door (the paintwork around the hinges still detectably shabby), the new mirror beyond it — however — in pristine good order (if fractionally larger). He swallowed hard but maintained a veneer of calm, removing his coat, his scarf, and neatly hanging them on the pegs provided.

He was certain Eileen must be okay. Fundamentally. Wesley was — he frowned, thoughtfully — like a funfair ride; if you agreed to climb on board (if you paid for your ticket and passed all the restrictions regarding age and size), then you were pretty much dutybound to feel a little weak and wobbly by the time you clambered off again at the other side. That was the whole…

But what if…?

No.

I need to believe… (Ted’s thoughts tripped over each other like the pages of an open book blowing in the breeze; like a daydreaming schoolgirl stumbling on a chink in a city pavement.)

I need to believe in someone —

So let it be him

‘Extremely distressed,’ Leo snarled, ‘her face — her neck — all scratched up. Her nails broken. Tearful. And refuses to breathe a word about it to anybody, has offered no convincing…’

The phone began to ring. Ted walked over to answer it, keeping his eyes fixed — all the while — on Leo and the computer.

‘Hello?’

‘I need you,’ Wesley said. ‘Bring me some rope. Heavy rope. At least twenty foot of it, and a box of eggs, and the librarian. Meet me by the flyover.’

He hung up.

Ted slowly replaced the receiver, feeling the strangely unruly burden of this new responsibility — and yet the corresponding lightness of suddenly not giving a shit about anything else or anybody.

I am his sop, he thought.

There

Leo was still frowning at the computer, twitching the mouse around, grumbling. He was patently accessing the Wesley site.

I should say something, Ted thought, but he didn’t. He merely watched on, instead, as the screen went dark, lit up, and the now familiar graphics for the Behindlings Home Page slowly downloaded.

‘Where is she?’

‘At home. Getting ready for work.’

‘Is there anything I can do for her?’

Leo was frowning at the screen and twiddling his moustache.

‘What possible good could you do anybody?’

‘I thought I might…’

‘Think again. It’s currently a police matter.’

Ted’s eyes widened, ‘She called in the police?’

‘Nope. I did. I bumped into Bo earlier, on my way over here. He said he’d seen her conferring with that Wesley character — yesterday — in the library. He said Wesley had a reputation for dalliances with library staff.’

‘That’s just a silly rumour,’ Ted asserted, ‘and Bo of all people should know better.’

Leo glanced up, combatively, and that exact-same moment — as if in retaliation — the computer commenced a quite abominable squealing. He winced. Turned. The screen went black. It went red. It went absolutely haywire.

‘What the fuck’s going on here?’

He fought with it for a minute, then swore, yanked the mouse from its socket and threw it into the air. He swiped it — like a shuttlecock — with the palm of his hand. Made a hit (brought down the details of a Shop To Let display in the forefront of the window with it).

‘That’ll be the virus,’ Ted calmly observed.

‘What?’ Leo turned. ‘You knew there was a virus and you didn’t think to warn me about it?’

Ted did not flinch. He stood his ground.

‘Everybody knew about the virus, Leo,’ he said –

Used the name

Must use the name

— then he tipped his head to one side, his face a mask of determined impunity. ‘I’m needed somewhere,’ he announced, looking on coolly — was there even a glimmer of mockery in that stare? — as Leo bent down to grapple with the plug, then banged his head on the drawer, then swore.

Ted walked to the door, took his jacket and scarf down from the peg, pulled them back on again. ‘What a terrible…’ he paused, turned, caught sight of the short-haired girl — Josephine Bean — rapidly disappearing down a skinny alleyway, the stately arrival of a police car, flashed back to that hollow moment the night before when he’d stood in the same spot and had witnessed Eileen scurrying past in her curious purdah (Arthur crouched down low in Leo’s chair)… and yet… and yet best of all — and most vividly — he saw that pond –

Pond

— in his mind’s eye; that floating pond; that exquisite unlikelihood of weed and water and fish and air…

‘What an unbelievable fuck up, eh?’ he sighed distractedly, feeling an impious flutter in his belly –

No –

— a capricious tingle (more-like), rapidly succeeded by a voluptuous spasm —

Oh God —

Oh Jesus Christ!

I finally belong somewhere

— as he nipped smartly, neatly, through the door.

‘I need you to come with me,’ Hooch informed her; appearing almost from nowhere, grabbing her arm as she stood by the counter, and then steering her — at full speed — out of the Wimpy and onto the High Street.

‘I can’t, ’ Jo almost yelped, dashing down her money (he was pinching her, she was struggling to hold two steaming cartons of coffee), ‘I’m waiting…’

‘Doc,’ Hooch said, ‘I know exactly who you’re waiting for.’

They arrived on the pavement in perfect tandem with a police car which was pulling up, with sinuous efficiency, outside the agency (Jo thought she could see the agent inside, newly arrived; he hadn’t been there five minutes before — she’d checked — and another man, a short man with a mad, ginger moustache, sitting at his desk with a face as bright as a matador’s flag).

‘Double shit. ’ Hooch swore, espying the police and yanking her a hard, sharp left into a thin nook between two shops. This unsalubrious alley smelled of piss and sulphur. It contained several rubbish bins and quantities of litter.

‘The fucking police are everywhere in this town.’

He let go of her arm and ripped off his hat (in such a way — with such gusto, such aplomb — that she wouldn’t have been surprised if a trained white dove had been left sitting there, its pink feet poignantly skedaddling on his waxy pate). He struggled to catch his breath.

‘I’ve had enough of you,’ he finally said.

Jo smiled. She thought he must be kidding.

‘And before you…’ he held up his hand, ‘before you do all of this blah blah blah… ’ (he waved the hand around, dismissively), ‘I know exactly who you are and why you’re here.’

Josephine’s fingers tightened around her paper coffee cartons, but she didn’t utter a word, she just waited, benignly, for some kind of explanation.

‘The Turpin girl…’ Hooch continued (fully intent upon providing her with one), ‘rumour has it that you slept with her father. You were still a schoolgirl. He was the local headmaster…’ Hooch sounded unbelievably bored by the facts he was disclosing, ‘but you weren’t terribly discreet, were you? Or careful, for that matter. You got yourself pregnant. Katherine helped you to get rid of it — presumably to try and salvage what remained of her dad’s career. Your family became involved. Your three hulking brothers… and whatever they did…’ he ruminated on this fact for a moment, ‘well, it must’ve been pretty, bloody persuasive, because everything suddenly got all twisted; what with the graffiti; your comparable hair colours — Katherine’s bad reputation…’