Hilary Mantel - Beyond Black

“Mum,” she says, “did you run away with a circus?”

“Oh, circus, that was a laugh!” Her mum is merry from three strong lagers. “Your Uncle Morris was in that circus, he did sawing the lady in half. He wanted me to be sawed but I said, Morris, on your bike.”

“What about Gloria?”

“Oh yes, they sawed Gloria. Anybody could saw her. She was that sort of girl.”

“I don’t know what that sort would be. The sort of girl who lets herself be sawed in half.”

“Yes, you do,” her mum says, as if she is prompting her to remember. “They was always practicing on you. Morris, he liked to keep his hand in. Used to say, you never know when the old tricks will come in useful, you might have to turn your hand to it again. Many’s the time I seen your top half in the scullery and your bottom half in the front room. I seen your left half out the back in the shed and your right half God knows where. I says to Morris, I hope you know what you’re doing, I want her stuck together before you leave here tonight.”

Mum takes a pull on her can. She sits back. “You got any ciggies?” she says, and Al says, “Yes, I got some here somewhere, I nicked ’em for you.” Her mum says, “That’s nice: it’s thoughtful. I mean, some kids, they only go nicking sweeties, just thinking about themselves. You’re a good kid, Ali, we have our ups and downs, but that’s in the nature of mother and daughter. We’re alike, you see. That’s why we don’t always see eye to eye. When I say alike, I mean, not to look at obviously, plus we’re not in the same class when it comes to brains, you see I was always quick when I was at school, and as for weight I was about half the weight of a whippet, whereas you, I mean, you’re not the sharpest knife out of the drawer, you can’t help that, love, and as for your size it’s no secret some men like that type, MacArthur, for instance. When I took his deposit on you, he says, Emmie, it’s a good thing you’re not selling her by the pound.”

She asks, “Did MacArthur say that?”

Her mum sighs; her eyelids flutter. “Al,” she says, “get me one of my new blue pills. The helicopter ones. Would you?”

What year is this? Al runs a hand over her body. Has she breasts now, or just the promise of them? There is no point, when it comes to your own flesh, trying to knead it into precision; flesh doesn’t yield that kind of answer. She pours the hot milk onto a spoonful of instant coffee. Then she is too weak to do any more, and she sits down.

“They used to disappear you,” Emmie says. “For a laugh. Sometimes you’d be gone half an hour. I’d say, here, Morris, where’s Alison? That’s my only daughter you’ve disappeared. If she don’t come back I’ll sue you.”

“And did I?” she says. “Come back?”

“Oh yes. Else I really would. I’d have seen him in court. And Morris knew it. There was all sorts of money tied up in you. Trouble is with me I couldn’t keep me books straight.”

“You didn’t have books. You had a vase.”

“I couldn’t keep me vase straight. Bob Fox was always dipping in it. And then the boys fell to quarrelling about who was to go first at you. MacArthur put down his deposit, but oops! You see, I had borrowed money off Morris Warren. Morris said money owed counts for more than money down. And he wouldn’t leave it alone, I’m owed this, I’m owed that.”

Al says, “He’s still the same.”

“But then Keith Capstick got in anyway, before either of them could do the business, on account of your turning to him after the dog bite. The ones that weren’t there when the dog broke in, the ones that didn’t witness it, they couldn’t understand the way you was wiv Keith, making up to him and kissing him and all. So there was bound to be disputes. So then they was mired in a three-way fight. And MacArthur come first versus Keith, and Keith got a pasting.

“But Morris, he just maintained the same, Keith Capstick owes me money, Mac owes me, he said Bill Wagstaffe owed him, I could never see how that was, but I suppose it was a bet on the horses and boys will be boys. Morris said, I will go to my grave buried with my little black book saying who owes me what, I will never rest till I get my money’s worth, dead or alive.”

“I wish I’d known,” Alison says. “If I’d known all he wanted was a refund, I could have written him a cheque myself.”

“And Aitkenside,” her mum says, “was overseeing it all. Thank the Lord for Donnie Aitkenside. He was advising me, like. But then how was I supposed to make a living, after you was offering all-in for a shilling? I even lent you my nightdress, and that’s all the thanks I get.”

“You said I was a good kid.”

“When?”

“A while back.”

“I changed my mind,” said Em, sulking.

Her coffee is cold, and she raises her head to the tap-tap-tap . Mr. Fox, are you there? Are your friends with you? Click by click, she lifts the kitchen blind. Dawn: there is a dazing light, a bar of thunderous black across the sky: hail-stones are falling. These summers since the millennium have been all the same: days of clammy unnatural heat, sapping to the will. She puts her fingers against her forehead and finds her skin damp, but she couldn’t say whether she’s hot or cold. She needs a hot drink, to banish that deep internal quaking; I could try again, she thinks, with the kettle and a teabag. Will the police come back? She hears the neighbours chanting Out out out : a swell of distant voices, like a choir.

“Jesus,” Colette said. “Where did you get this clapped-out dodgem car?”

“My garage lent it. It’s only temporary. A courtesy car.” Gavin looked at her out of the tail of his eye. “You look done in,” he said.

“Done in,” she said. “Tired out.”

“Washed up,” Gavin offered.

“Look, I realize this isn’t convenient for you. I promise I won’t be in your way. I just need a few hours to catch up on my sleep, then I can think straight. I’ll soon put my life to rights. I’m by no means penniless, I just need to work out how to extricate myself from my ties with Alison. I may need to see a solicitor.”

“Oh. She in trouble?”

“Yes.”

“Small businesses going under all over the show,” Gavin said. “Easy to run up a tax bill. They claim there’s not a recession, but I dunno.”

“What about you, did you get fixed up?”

“Bit of contract work. Take it as it comes. Here and there. As and when.”

“Hand to mouth,” she said.

For a while they drove in silence. The suburbs were beginning to wake up. “What about Zoë?” Colette said. “What will she think about me turning up like this?”

“She’ll understand. She knows we used to be related.”

“Related? If that’s what you call it.”

“Married is a relation, isn’t it? I mean, you’re related to your wife?”

“She’s got no cause for jealousy. I shall make that perfectly clear. So don’t worry. It’s just for the emergency. It’s strictly temporary. I’ll make sure she knows that. I’ll soon be out of her way.”

“Anyway,” her mum says, “Gloria got sawed once too often. And then they had to get rid of her, didn’t they? It wasn’t even on the premises, that was the big nuisance of it. They had to fetch her back as consignments. But then the dogs came in handy, didn’t they? But Pete said, you got to watch them dogs now, Keith. You got to watch dogs, once they get a taste for human flesh. Which was proved, of course. With the dog flying out at you. And then the way he cleaned his dish, when you served him up a slice of Keith.”

She leaves the house now, young Alison, she leaves the house at Aldershot, kicking open the back door that is swollen with damp. MacArthur sees her go. He winks at her. It has rained that day and the ground is soft underfoot as she makes her way towards the lockup garages.