Martin Amis - Lionel Asbo

‘Go with Uncle Li,’ he said unsteadily. ‘Good boys.’ He felt, just now, that if Lionel hit the dogs in front of her then Dawn might give up utterly. ‘Go with Uncle Li.’

Lionel shortened his grip with a sudden tug and the dogs, leaning backward, skidded from the room. There came the sounds of wrenching and rending, the giddy-up of the steel reins, the slammed front door.

‘… Maybe I should’ve stood up to him.’

‘Don’t talk bloody stupid,’ said Dawn. ‘D’you see his eyes?’

‘Yeah. What’s happened to his eyes?’

‘He’s stopped blinking! … They’re murderer’s eyes.’

Des and Dawn went and looked: the bedroom door torn off its hinges, the room itself stacked deep from floor to ceiling, Lionel’s sweats and mesh vest in a loose knot in the passage …

‘There goes our nursery,’ said Dawn.

‘No. No. I want a youth. And he’s not stopping us.’

‘Oh, Des, you’re mad. The things you say.’

‘I want a youth,’ he said. ‘And he’s not stopping us. I want a youth.’

Just before midnight Des spent a largely speechless half-hour with his gran. Grace sat facing the window, and when he spoke to her she just waved him away … There were no pets allowed — in the old people’s home singled out by her son. And so Des returned to Dawn with the kitten Goldie zipped up and purring in his windbreaker.

‘THAT’S ABSOLUTELY FINE, Mr Asbo. Don’t give it another thought, sir. And have a fantastic day.’

It wasn’t hard to see why Lionel was so very much happier in the South Central — the asymmetric ninety-suite high-rise that loomed like a whimsical robot over the stubby bohemia of north Pimlico. As fancily priced as the Pantheon Grand (and the Castle on the Arch and the Launceston), the South Central described itself, in its publicity material, as the heavy-metal hotel . It catered to rock stars, and not just to heavy-metal rock stars. And not just to rock stars: in its candyishly bright and airy public rooms you might glimpse a recently imprisoned bratpack actor, an incensed fashion model, a woman-beating Premiership footballer — and so on. In brief, the core clientele was rich and famous; and none of them got that way by work of mind. Lionel, at last, had happened upon his peers.

There were never fewer than three plasma TV sets at the bottom of the swimming pool on the back terrace, plus a selection of iPod docks, camcorders, laptops, and minibars. Day-Glo crime-scene tape frequently adorned the entrance to this or that forbidden passageway — illegal firearms, assaults, investigations of rape (statutory and otherwise). There were often fire engines snorting and sneezing in the forecourt — but no ambulances: the hotel deployed its own medical teams to cope with all the pharmaceutical misadventures and the more serious self-mutilations. Similarly, the floodings, the wreckings, the sometimes storey-wide devastations were taken care of by squads of discreet and cheerful young men in sky-blue jumpsuits.

Thrown out of the Pantheon Grand, thrown out of the Castle on the Arch, and thrown out of the Launceston, Lionel was intrigued to learn that nobody had ever been thrown out of the South Central. Zero Ejections , it said in his desktop brochure. Anti-social behaviour, among the guests at least, was considered a civic virtue; and the incorrigible monotony of Lionel’s criminal record (often reinventoried in the press) was widely admired. His prestige, here, was boundless, his legitimacy beyond challenge. But it hadn’t gone away — the internal question mark, like a rusty hook, snagged in his innards.

* * *

He made several good mates during his short time there. Scott Ronson, the arthritic, lantern-jawed rhythm guitarist of a band called the Pretty Faces. Eamon O’Nolan, the two-time World Snooker Champion (who was always doing community service for various unambitious misdemeanours — roughing up referees, relieving himself in pot plants, and the like). Lorne Brown, the winner of a huge reality telethon (a month in the South Central was one of his prizes). Brent Medwin, the (teenage) cokehead Manchester City midfielder, both of whose parents were in jail (the mum for living off immoral earnings, the dad for manslaughter). Hereabouts, Lionel Asbo could just relax and be himself, freely mingling with his fellow superstars.

Lionel sounded fine. For instance,

‘You watch. We’ll do you at Upton Park. Then we’ll come to your place and nick a point,’ he might say to Brent Medwin ( we being West Ham United).

‘The important thing about fame? Don’t let it change you personality,’ he might say to Lorne Brown.

‘So that’s how you do it. You pick the bird you like and send one of you deaf roadies to go and bring her in,’ he might say to Scott Ronson.

‘I can get stun. I can get screw. But I can’t get deep screw. The white always jumps off the table!’ he might say to Eamon O’Nolan.

Or else Lionel was in the Los Feliz Lounge with Megan Jones, going through the interview requests (and the assorted business proposals) over a cup of cappuccino. Megan had a strategy for her client. Now Lionel. No one wants to see a multimillionaire with a scowl on his face. You’ve got a lovely sense of humour. Just let it shine through. And we’ll turn you into a national treasure . Lionel nodded absently; he was gazing, as he often gazed, at the plasma screen above Megan’s head. Uh, yeah. Okay , he said, and wiped the froth off his upper lip. They were occasionally joined by Megan’s number two, Sebastian Drinker. Drinker noticed the peculiar way Lionel reacted to the sound of nearby laughter: his head jerked round like a weathervane in a cross-wind.

Every suite had a balcony, which took pressure off the smokers (and gave all the parasuicides somewhere conspicuous to threaten to jump from). And anyway, there was the Sepulveda Cigar Saloon in the basement. It featured video games and pinball machines, a snooker table (the swerve Eamon could put on the cue ball: defied the laws of physics!), and a full bar (twenty-four-hour and self-service). The food was good, the waiters prompt, the pornography decent, the gym ever-empty. And though he continued to inspect certain properties (a Canary Wharf penthouse, a fourteen-room mansion flat in Chelsea), Lionel had no plans to move.

There were large screens in all the public rooms at the South Central — a soundless succession of clips and images, newsreels, silent movies, Miss World, Sputnik, 101 Dalmatians , chorus line, death camp, Bela Lugosi, Victoria’s Secret, goosestep, wet T-shirt, moonshot, Dumbo , what the butler saw, grassy knoll, catwalk bikini, Bikini Atoll …

‘Yeah, but I don’t use those girls,’ said Scott Ronson (he meant the frilly little half-clad fans who gathered daily in the roped-off area just to the left of the forecourt). ‘They’re too young, half of them. I use the uh, the in-house amenity. We all do.’

‘Eh?’ queried Lionel. The two of them were enjoying a few mid-morning Bloody Marys in the Beverley Bar. ‘What amenity’s this?’

‘On your phone there’s a button marked Companionship. Press that.’

‘Then what?’

‘They put you through to this chummy bloke at the escort agency. Then you give your specifications … You know. Blonde. Big tits. Whatever. Dead confidential. And bingo. It’s addictive, mind.’

Lionel said, ‘I’m not bothered.’

A day or two later he took his lunch in the Watts Diner — with Brent Medwin and Eamon O’Nolan.

‘Give it a go,’ suggested Brent. ‘I told the bloke, I want a woman with a bit of class. No tattoos. Next thing I know, I got fucking Snow White stood over the bed. For a flat grand!’