Chapter Eleven
Michael stood back out of the street lamp’s range, glad he had allowed Mister Kasov to lend him a sweater. It hung beyond his fingers and below the hem of his jacket by a substantial distance, made him feel ridiculous but helped against sharp wind smelling as if it had come from somewhere with seaweed. Michael pulled up a sleeve and looked at his watch again. Gordon wasn’t late but every crawling minute increased his anxiety. He thought about walking to the end of the block for a third time then decided not to in case he missed the car. There weren’t many Ford Granada’s about in this region but Michael hadn’t asked its year and knew the shape had changed recently. In this light, no body color would be easy to identify.
He thought about Gordon and winced a little. Not mentioning the reason for their meeting had felt like a good idea two hours ago in the comfort of Mister Kasov’s parlor. Now he wasn’t sure. Talking about the attack on Ralow over the phone would have given his maybe-friend an opportunity to say no and save a ten mile drive, which was why Michael hadn’t done it, but guilt about that had now begun to make him uneasy.
A large car turned out of the junction to his left and began rolling his way, speed dropping. Michael could see faces at the windows. More than one wasn’t good and he stepped out of sight behind a huge concrete pot that stood on guard by the library’s side steps. The car stopped. He heard two car doors slam and voices calling goodbye. The car pulled away and the sharp rap of high heels on pavement began to fade. Michael gave them a count of twenty then peered out. Gordon was standing by a different car at the kerb, looking puzzled.
He caught movement and, embarrassed, Michael called out, “Hello!”
Gordon called back, “Hello yourself,” and waved him forward, adding, “Come and get in, it’s freezing!”
Michael did it. The car was warm and smelt of tobacco smoke.
Gordon offered his Dunhills and Michael barely hesitated before taking one then said, “Thanks for coming.”
Gordon lit their cigarettes as he said, “How could I resist it: A sudden disappearance from the hospital and this mysterious phone call? I know I didn’t give you my number. I’m pretty certain I didn’t tell you the town I live in either.”
“You didn’t,” Michael said. “Just that it was thirty miles from the hospital. I looked you up on a map and then in the library phone directories.”
Gordon raised his eyebrows, saying, “So it’s important. Well, here I am. Get warmed up and then you can tell me.”
Michael sat back in the deep seat. Gordon’s presence and the cigarette in his hand felt as if the rules had changed. For a few seconds the temptation to dump everything on him and wait for instructions began to swamp previous thoughts. The words were on their way, almost spoken but Michael stopped them in time, closing his teeth with the effort. Mister Kasov’s comment about aggression and doubting his ability to protect Laura still bounced in his head and told him, as he stared at the misting windscreen, that capitulation of that sort, offering it all to Gordon, would be a shoddy response, maybe suggesting things about Michael Porter that didn’t have to be true.
He said, words bumping together, “Ralow tried it on with me yesterday, for sex I mean. Squeezed my bum cheeks and fingered my arsehole after that session I had to go to and made it clear I was to let him fuck me or get committed or reported to the cops. I punched him several times. Too many times I think.”
Gordon blew smoke and said, “Bloody hell. Maybe that’s what it was about at the hospital then.” He made a sound between a snort and a laugh then continued, “It was buzzing at Hadenley last night and none of the staff would say why. I caught a couple of limp-wrist gestures and a lot of sniggering, but that was it.” He swivelled round for a better look at Michael. “How badly did you punch him?”
Michael hesitated then said, “Not sure. I hit him twice in the face, pretty hard and once with an elbow in the gut. He didn’t get up afterwards. I think I knocked him out. I didn’t hang around.”
“Sounds like he had it coming.” Gordon looked out of the car’s side window at a street sign and asked, “Is that why you’re…what…about forty miles from home? Scared he’d set the police on you?”
“Right.”
Gordon asked, “Alone?” Michael took a slow pull on the cigarette. Gordon glanced at him and went on, “I ask because I heard voices in the background when you phoned. One was a young woman.”
“Laura,” Michael said.
Gordon released a long sigh, almost a word then said, “Was that necessary?”
He reached across and ground his cigarette out in the small ashtray. They both watched it smoulder and die.
Eventually, Michael said, “There are reasons.”
“That you don’t want to talk about?” Gordon asked.
Michael had thought he was going to explain it all but heard himself say, “Not yet.”
Gordon nodded. “Okay, so what can I do for you?”
“I need to know how much trouble I’m in.”
“You don’t want to find out in person?” Gordon asked, waited for a nod of agreement then continued, “Do you believe Ralow would have followed up his threat: have you committed or reported to the police if you didn’t give him what he wanted?”
“In a heartbeat. Then he could do what he likes to me for six months.”
Gordon thought about it then reached into the glove compartment, saying, “There’s a quick way, I suppose.” He looked at the coins in his hand. “I can phone the ward and ask for Ralow. See what the reaction is.” He looked up, adding, “There’s a box just over there.”
“Thanks.”
Gordon smiled and opened his door as he said, “No trouble at all.”
Michael watched him make his call then dial again. The second time he talked longer, once glancing towards the car. Michael had to work at not letting fear overwhelm his embryo courage, tell himself that Gordon wouldn’t report him to the police. He was still struggling with it when the man came back.
Gordon slid on to his seat, closed the door and said, “That was interesting: wary ward sister asking who I was. When I told her and said I had a case to discuss with Ralow, she said he was on indefinite leave. That used to be jargon for suspended or burned out when I worked around the health service. No mention of being attacked and I gave her every opportunity to explain.”
Michael frowned, saying, “I don’t understand.”
“Me neither,” Gordon said. “Which is why I phoned that copper friend we talked about. He’s retired as I told you, and bored out of his head. He jumped at the chance to talk to a few old mates on the force. He’ll make some calls and get back to me.”
Michael took his hand away from the door handle as Gordon went on, “Now we wait. Do you have a place to stay?”
Michael said, “I think so.”
“It’s a cold night for just thinking so.”
“All right, we have,” Michael said, wondering why admitting it made him feel angry.
Gordon sighed then said, “I’m not trying to trap you, Michael. I can’t pretend that I think you did the right thing with Ralow although I can understand why you did it. I won’t do anything to harm you or Laura or drop the cops on you.” He smiled then continued, “I also won’t say you can trust me either because you don’t know me that well.” He put a hand inside his jacket and produced a wallet. “Here’s…” He counted, “ten pounds. That should keep you fed and housed for a couple of days if needed. You can call it a loan if you want. I’m easy.”
Michael took the notes, saying, “Thanks Gordon, I won’t forget this.”
Gordon laughed then said, “I should damn well hope not! It took my old dad a month to earn that. He brought up four children on it really badly.” He glanced at his watch then went on, voice apologetic, “I’m due at a meeting soon, so…”
Michael opened the car door slightly and said, “Thanks again. Is it okay if I call you tomorrow, about eight?”
Gordon nodded then switched on the ignition and said, “I’ll be there.”
Michael climbed out and shut the big door. Gordon gave him a wave as he pulled into traffic.
Walking back to the shop, Michael wondered how much Laura had told her new friend Mister Kasov, while he had been gone. In the few minutes they had managed alone after he phoned Gordon, Michael had told her to keep it simple if the old man asked but rattling the shop’s old brass doorknocker, he was uncomfortably aware that he hadn’t said enough and wondered how deliberate that might have been.
Laura opened the door smiling.
She asked, “How did it go?” Michael showed her the money. She said, “That’s a good start,” and let him move past her, then shut and locked the door.
The small proprietary gesture irritated him.
In the parlor, Mister Kasov sat folded in the single easy chair reading a leather-bound book that looked too heavy for his thin wrists.
He peered over his glasses and asked, “I trust all went well?”
“Well enough.”
Laura shivered, saying, “Take your coat off, it’s brought the cold in.”
Michael did as he was told and she hung it up behind the door. Mister Kasov’s half amused smile as his eyes followed her, took the edge off Michael’s growing irritation at the way Laura was making herself at home, and he made an effort to push the emotion away.
He said, “Gordon checked with the hospital. There’s no news about…what happened.”
Laura said, expression ready for noise, “I told Mister Kasov about Ralow.”
The old man didn’t speak, just watched Michael’s face, his own expression unreadable.
Eventually Michael asked, “So, what do you think, Mister Kasov? Pretty stupid thing for me to do?”
The old man lowered his book. “Did your friend think so?” he asked. Michael nodded. Mister Kasov glanced down at the pages, open on his lap and continued, “This is VatrinskIt’s Human Violence.”
The book closed with a thick snap. “What does he know? I met the man once. The nearest he ever came to violence was carving roast meat with a blunt knife.” He tapped his head. “All theory, all philosophy, all shit.”
Laura said, “Oh,” and sat down.
The old man looked at her, saying, “I surprise you with my vulgarity?” He wagged a finger at himself. “An old librarian with nothing left but his books must be a friend of gentleness?” He smiled then added, “Maybe I should be telling you that all the wisdom of the world is crammed on to these shelves. Well, so it is. All the nonsense and culture-serving lies are there too. The trick, as always, is working out for yourself which is which.”
He rubbed his face then pointed behind him at a cupboard stacked with bibles and huge books with English and Arabic writing on their spines, saying, “Back there, those holy works, most based on women as property. ‘Natural’ laws reworked to serve rulers of dead cultures, to keep them in unquestioned power. So many volumes fit only for doorstops.”
Michael said, “You sell them all.”
The old man smiled at him. “Why not? I am a pragmatist. I sell packaged words, not truth.”
Laura wriggled then asked, “Does that mean you agree with what Michael did?”
Mister Kasov said, “Powerful, confident men are hard to stop with words. This Ralow has wronged our friend here and will understand that. He will not forgive Michael for knowing it too. I think violence was an acceptable response in the circumstances.”
Michael asked, “Does my story buy us a bed for the night?”
“Michael!” Laura yelped then glared at him.
Mister Kasov chuckled and tapped the book on his lap. “Aha, like Scheherazade. Quite right: paying for my second-hand experience of your plight, in my world of second-hand literature. It is a good bargain.” He pushed the huge book off onto the fragile table beside him then stood in two movements: hands to chair arms, rocking, and then upright. He took a ragged breath then said, “I retire early. Come I will show you what I optimistically call the spare bedroom.”
* * * *
Michael sat on a pile of books wrapped in brown paper while Laura made up the bed. He had offered to help and was glad when she said no. Tiredness hung in his head, a solid presence now, drooping eyes and shoulders. He felt content to let the world happen to him for a while in the company of the woman he loved and experienced no urge to worry about his future, unaware that something he could do nothing about owned a different place in his mind to the nebulous “maybe” danger of his obsessive worrying.
Laura made a small sound and he smiled as she bent to tuck and fold, admiring the shape of her buttocks, still obvious in the baggy tracksuit. She flipped a look back and caught him. Instead of the usual comment, she turned her bottom away, blushing slightly.
The blush deepened. She said quietly, “We don’t have nightclothes.”
“That’s a problem?”
“I don’t want us to wear dirty things in a clean bed. I can’t. It’s the way I was brought up, sorry. I won’t sleep.” Michael struggled to chase her point down. She helped, saying, “I need us to sleep naked. Just sleep.”
“That’s okay with me.”
“Thanks,” Laura said, too much gratitude in her voice and face.
Michael frowned, asking, “What for?”
“Not saying something crude.”
“Too tired.”
“Me too.” She pointed at the narrow bed with its thick, creased sheets turned back then added, voice wobbling slightly, “You first.”
Michael began to undress. Laura nodded as if counting in her head then unzipped the tracksuit top. Michael turned away and climbed out of his jeans and underpants. Looking at them with distaste, he promised himself a shopping trip tomorrow. When he looked round, Laura had her back to him. She stood naked except for the small white bra, buttocks flexing slightly as she struggled to unclip it, hands behind her. His body was immediately interested and he scrambled into the bed. Laura dropped the bra, moved backwards and slipped in to into her side then put herself as near the edge as she could manage before lying down and covering her body.
They lay there for a few seconds. Michael, experienced the faint heat of her along his whole length.
Eventually, he said, “We’re being silly. We’ll both fall out if we try to sleep like this.”
Laura murmured, “I’m all right.”
“No you’re not. Come here.”
He put an arm round her middle. She resisted slightly, a fractional tightening of muscles, then let herself be drawn towards him. The cleft of her buttocks touched his erection and he was immediately dizzy with it, almost missing her quick intake of breath.
She said, “Michael…” and tried to ease an inch between them.
He sniffed her hair and whispered, “Ignore him he’ll go away if we don’t pay him any attention.”
She giggled then said, “Are you sure?”
“Positive. I’ve known him all his life.”
She reached back with one hand and said, “I don’t mind petting him if you want.”
Michael took the wrist gently between his fingers and laid it on her hip. Trying to focus his eyes on the soft hairs of Laura’s nape, he said, “No, he’s fine. He’ll get fed up soon, believe me.”
There was a brief silence then she said, “I love you so much.”
Michael whispered close to her ear, “I love you too. Go to sleep.”
Laura snuggled her bottom into his lap and sighed. Michael tried to think of something else. Lather didn’t enter his mind.