by Andy Wiseman
A stocky looking guy was behind the bar, his back to Harry, reading a newspaper, unaware Harry was there. Adjacent to the end of the bar was a closed door with a sign that said ‘Private’, and in the lock of which was a bunch of keys. Harry cast a glance back towards the barman, who continued to read his newspaper, before then turning the door handle and pushing open the door.
The windowless room was about ten feet square, but seemed smaller. A lot smaller. Claustrophobic, almost. Harry focused on the contents of the room. Almost everywhere he looked, cardboard boxes were stacked up. An office desk and chair stood in the middle of the room, the desk cluttered with sales receipts and invoices - also sex toys: dildos, a whip, and something the size and shape of a cricket bat, which appeared to be made of thick black leather with dozens of small pointed studs fixed to one side. Harry’s sexual peccadilloes had always been a bit more ‘traditional’, so he made an educated guess the leather ‘paddle’, was an S&M thing. On the office chair sat an open cardboard box.
‘...Well, he’s not here yet, Lenny. You told me within the hour. Has he got my money?’ said the man who was perched on the edge of a battered and stained chaise longue, while staring at a TV screen, mobile phone in one hand, and large cigar in the other. The man was in his late fifties, early sixties, with a shock of white hair neatly swept back, well dressed in a jacket, trousers, and an opened-necked white shirt which helped to show off his perma-tan - probably gained from regular golfing trips to Marbella. This was the man known as Tricky Dicky, the ‘Pedlar of Porn’.
Aware someone had entered by the increase in music volume coming from the bar, Tricky turned. On seeing Harry, he impatiently waved him towards the cardboard box on the office chair, before turning back to the TV. ‘Lenny, I’m looking at it now, as we speak, and I gotta say, the quality is piss-poor. You assured me it was quality. There’s better free stuff, on the internet for Christ’s sakes. I mean, I can barely tell if the kid’s been penetrated or not.’ Harry turned his attention to the TV, where he saw a group of middle-aged men gang-banging a young boy and girl. ‘Watching a couple of thirteen year old virgins being gang-banged should be good viewing, Lenny,’ continued Tricky. ‘Profitable viewing. I want to see it all. Screwing, sodomy, buggery. I want to see the pain on their faces. The blood and the spunk. It doesn’t even get me hard, Lenny. Watching two dogs shagging in the street usually gets me hard. So if it doesn’t get me hard, how can I sell it?’ he said, loudly, while waving his cigar around to make his point. ‘...Whatever, Lenny. Whatever. He’s here now. Just walked in. Do me a favour, and don’t send me anymore crap,’ Tricky shouted down the phone as he stood.
At first, Harry felt sickened to the depth of his stomach as he stared at the horrific images on the screen; until, that is, the rage started to build-up inside him. The quality may not have been up to the standard Tricky would have preferred, but it was clear enough to see that the young boy and girl were unwilling participants because you could see the pain on their faces, also the terror. This wasn’t a gang-bang of consenting adults; it was gang-rape of children.
‘Hey, delivery boy,’ Tricky said to Harry, with a patronizingly fake smile on his face, ‘if you want to watch it, you gotta pay for it. I’m not running a fuckin’ charity here. Give me my money, and take that box of shite with you,’ he said, again indicating the box on the chair. Harry looked at the box, then finally back at Tricky, who just stood waiting, smirking.
Tricky watched as Harry reached towards the cardboard box, only to see him pick up the leather studded paddle instead. Harry then wiped the smile from Tricky’s face, the force knocking him off his feet, to collapse behind the desk. Harry followed, to then get down to the nitty-gritty of persuading Tricky to tell him where he could find Cutter.
A few minutes later, and slightly out of breath, Harry stepped from the room. He looked around. The barman was still engrossed in his newspaper and the punters were still engrossed with the anorexic pole dancer. The heavy techno beat continued. Harry then locked the door, removed the keys, and slipped away.
Tricky had told Harry what he wanted to know, relatively quickly, leaving Harry feeling cheated from being able to purge his anger on the vile pervert. So, as he left the room, he’d picked up Tricky’s cigar lighter from his desk, and then set light to the cardboard box that had held the DVDs.
He walked half a dozen blocks before he dropped the keys into an open grated road drain. He didn’t think it likely he would get caught for what he’d done. No one had really seen him to give an accurate description. The kid in the porn shop had barely looked at Harry when he’d arrived - or as he’d left, still ploughing his way through the mountainous stack of boxes. And Harry didn’t think the local plod would bust a gut for a lowlife like Tricky.
The pizza was now long cold, and barely touched. Harry reached behind him to place the box on the rear seat. His vantage point was Mollie’s car. After his visit to Tricky, Harry decided he needed some wheels. London buses were not always convenient, often requiring two or more changes to get from A to B. They were also, of course, subject to weight of traffic, and London was infamous for its congestion. Catching the tube would have been easier, but Harry’s fear of confined spaces ruled that out. Having a car also gave him an inconspicuous vantage point from which to watch Cutter’s flat. So, he’d caught a bus home to retrieve Mollie’s bag, then caught another to Mollie’s flat. Once there, he’d walked up and down Mollie’s street, pressing the car’s electronic key fob, until the hazard lights of a Volkswagen Golf Hatchback had flashed, unlocking the car. The fact that - technically - he was in a stolen car, and that Mollie’s insurance policy probably didn’t cover him, were merely inconvenient details to Harry. He didn’t hold out much hope of seeing Mollie entering or leaving Cutter’s flat, but it gave him time to think before he made a move.
Harry’s hangover headache had eased to a dull roar, and he now only felt partially shit. He turned his mobile phone on. It beeped a number of times: text messages informing him he had missed phone calls, and all from Izzy. How the hell had she got his number, he wondered, he certainly didn’t recall giving it to her. Harry gave his number out to hardly anyone - which was probably why he had few friends.
As he was deleting the text messages, the phone beeped again. Another text; and direct from Izzy. ‘What the fuck!..’ said Harry, unable to believe what he was reading. ‘Is that you in the Volkswagen Golf?’
Harry’s head jerked up, to look out through the windscreen. Movement drew his eye. Diagonally across the road, parked immediately below Cutter’s flat, was a gold coloured Saab convertible. Izzy was getting out of it. She waved as she jogged across the road towards him.
Harry groaned. Two thoughts flashed through his mind: he’d obviously let his attention drift, because he hadn’t seen Izzy turn up, and he wondered if he should quickly lock the doors.
Too late, the passenger side door was flung open, and Izzy threw herself into the front seat with enough youthful exuberance to rock the small car on its suspension, doing nothing to ease Harry’s headache.
‘Hello, Harry,’ she said, brightly and with an impish grin. ‘I was beginning to think you were avoiding me.’ Harry merely grunted, before returning to stare across at Cutter’s flat. Izzy couldn’t determine whether it was a grunt of denial or conformation. ‘I see you’ve borrowed Mollie’s car for your stakeout,’ she said, carrying on regardless.
Harry gave her a surprised glance. ‘How did you know it was Mollie’s car?’
‘I simply applied my highly tuned investigative powers to analyse and deduct,’ she said, straight faced. Harry raised a disbelieving eyebrow. ‘I went to your house, and your dear Major Jackson -’
‘Corporal,’ said Harry, interrupting.
‘Whatever,’ said Izzy, with a shrug. ‘Your Mr Jackson said he’d bumped into you as you were leaving home, and when he asked what you were up to, you said you were going to borrow a car to visit an old friend - very cryptic, Harry.’
‘T
hat doesn’t explain how you knew which car it was,’ replied Harry, making a mental note not to make passing conversation with old Mr Jackson.
‘That’s where my highly tuned investigative powers came into play,’ she said, with dramatic flair. Harry stared back, deadpan. ‘The small key ring attached to the car’s electronic key fob. The back slides up, and printed inside is the car’s make, model, and registration plate number. I saw it when you gave me the bag to look through. See, highly tuned.’ She then added, ‘But I’m sure you knew that already, because you obviously deduced the same.’
Harry flicked a glance at the key in the ignition, and the key ring dangling from it, to give another noncommittal grunt, before returning to his vigil.
‘So which one is it? Which is Cutter’s gaf?’ she asked, peering through the windscreen.
Harry looked at her. ‘Gaf?’
Turning back, she said, ‘Isn’t that what you Cockney geezers’ call a flat?’
Something else had been niggling at the back of Harry’s mind while Izzy had been rambling on. ‘How did you know where Cutter lived?’ he asked. Then, as Izzy opened her mouth to speak, ‘And don’t give me any bollocks about highly tuned investigative powers.’
She closed her mouth, pursed her lips, before then saying, ‘I figured our Mr Cutter is not the sort of person to stay in one place long enough to be registered for council tax, or to be on the Register of Electors, yes?’ Harry gave her a slow nod of the head. ‘But wherever he stays, he’s going to need gas and electric, yes?’ Another slow nod of the head from Harry. ‘I have a friend who works for a utility company. An ex-boyfriend, actually. We’re still good friends,’ she added, glancing at Harry. ‘Anyway, I rang him and gave him Cutter’s name.’ Harry didn’t look convinced. ‘His real name, obviously - Wayne Salter. He could hardly register with a utility company under the name of Mr Cutter, the psycho cat killer, now could he?’ Harry struggled to suppress a wry smile. ‘You still haven’t pointed out which one is Cutter’s flat,’ she then said.
‘I thought you knew.’
‘I do,’ replied Izzy, craning to see through the side window and establish the number on the building next to them. ‘It’s number forty four B. I was too busy looking for a parking space at first, to check out the house numbers. If this one is twenty three, then forty four must be over there, just about...’
‘Where the very visually bright, gold coloured Saab is parked,’ finished Harry.
‘Oh,’ said Izzy, simply. ‘Do you think he saw me?’
Harry was tempted to rub it in, but she sounded dejected, and he couldn’t be arsed. ‘I don’t think he’s at home.’
Izzy sat back, quiet. Thinking.
Harry heard her sniff a couple of times. He hoped she wasn’t going to start crying.
She sniffed again. Then, ‘What is that smell?’ she asked, looking around the car. She spotted the pizza box on the back seat. ‘Ooh, pizza!’ She reached over and flipped open the box, then shrank back in horror. ‘Oh-me-God! Don’t tell me you actually eat this... this... stuff?’
‘What’s wrong with it?’ asked Harry.
‘Well... I mean...’ Izzy struggled to articulate herself. ‘...What are they?’ she asked, tentatively poking the pizza with a well manicured fingernail.
Harry irritably turned his head to briefly glance at the box. ‘Anchovies.’
‘Christ, Harry. This is a smorgasbord of ‘surf and turf’ with a token topping of fruit. It’s a cholesterol killer! A colon crippler! A heart attack in a box! A -’
‘Give it a rest, for fuck’s sake.’
Suitably - yet reluctantly - rebuked, Izzy sat back, folded her arms, and pouted. God, he’s a sullen son-of-a-bitch. He gives a whole new perspective to ‘mean and moody’. She decided she was going to call him ‘Mr Monosyllabic’ from then on. It then occurred to her that she had never asked him if he was in a relationship. Was there a ‘Mrs Monosyllabic’? Probably not - and she certainly wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of asking. She also decided she wouldn’t mention she’d been trying to contact the police.
While they sat in silence, she secretly studied him. She was shocked to realise how rough he looked. Even in profile she could see that his eyes were bloodshot, and how tired and drawn he was. Other than the foul smelling pizza, there was another smell too, and that was the smell of stale alcohol. Izzy didn’t need her highly tuned investigative powers to see that Harry had hit the bottle; the alcohol was oozing from the pores of his skin. And what was with the leather motorbike jacket that looked and smelled like it had lived in a garden shed for the last ten years?
Looking at Harry, she found herself thinking back to her dream of the other night, where the ‘tall dark stranger’ was going to have his wicked way with her, plunging her into the delights of sexual depravity. Had it been a dream? Had her ‘Mr Darcy’ finally come in to her life? Looking at Harry at that particular moment, she thought probably not. ‘I presume Solomon told you where Cutter lived?’ said Izzy.
‘Mr Solomon didn’t know. Or at least said he didn’t know.’
‘Would he lie to you?’ Harry shrugged, continued to watch the flat. ‘Did you catch up on old times?’ she said, flippantly, instantly regretting it when she saw the expression on Harry’s profile suddenly change. It wasn’t exactly a dramatic change, Harry’s facial expressions, she’d come to learn, were as economical as his conversation. She saw his eyes briefly drop down to the dashboard of the car, not looking at it, but far away, lost in thought, before again returning to stare across the road. Realising he wasn’t going to say anything further, ‘So who told you where Cutter lived?’ she asked. Harry continued to stare out through the windscreen. ‘I bet it involved pain, didn’t it?’ She saw another slight change of expression cross Harry’s face. ‘Ha! I knew it!’ she said, loudly. She then proceeded to interrogate Harry as to his methods. Was it broken fingers? Kneecaps? Harry told her she watched too much television.
Harry felt thoroughly miserable. As well as feeling like a bag of shit, he was also very conscious that he looked and smelled like a bag of shit. He was sweating so heavily that he could smell it. He was worried what Izzy would think of him in his present state. But why was he worried? What was it about this young woman that both intrigued and attracted him, but also annoyed him?
They sat in silence for a while. It was after six in the evening, and now dark, the streetlights fully on. It was also lightly raining. They watched the hustle and bustle of the London commuters’ heading home after a hard day at work: the pedestrians stepping out with purpose, keen to be home and out of the rain; the nose-to-tail traffic at a more sedate pace, a moving river of light and rhythmic windscreen wipers.
So far, they had only seen one person come out of the building across the street, an unknown woman.
‘Why are you still doing this, Harry?’
‘How do you mean?’ he said, turning to her.
‘Why are you still trying to find the girl - Mollie?’ Harry merely shrugged. ‘After all,’ she continued, ‘it doesn’t look like you’re going to get paid. Wouldn’t you be better off getting your flats finished?’
Harry ignored the question.
‘The first time we met, you asked me if I was from the bank. I’m guessing you’re financially stretched?’
Still Harry said nothing.
‘I know what it’s like to struggle. I get a Junior Reporter’s salary, and my father recently cut my allowance,’ she said.
Harry stared at her. Allowance? Christ!
After a while, he said, ‘I guess it’s the right thing to do... The girl, I mean,’ he then added, to Izzy’s quizzical look, before turning back to look out through the windscreen. ‘I’ve never been big on doing the right thing,’ he said, quietly, more to himself than to Izzy, as he flicked the wipers to clear the rain.
They watched the rain slowly build to again block their vision.
‘What was it like in prison?’ asked Izzy.
‘Cramped,’ re
plied Harry.
‘It can’t have been easy. I would have hated it. Did your family visit you?’
Harry shook his head. ‘My mother died while I was on remand.’
‘And your foster brother?’
After a moment’s hesitation, ‘No, he’d be the last person to want to visit.’
It was clear there was a lot of animosity on Harry’s part, towards his foster brother, and Izzy was filled with curiosity as to what had happened to cause it. She wondered whether to simply ask Harry. She decided not to push it. Instead, ‘You always refer to your foster brother, but not your foster mother.’
Harry shifted uncomfortably in his seat. He flicked the wipers again. He then craned forward. Someone had just gone in the main door to the building they were watching. Harry felt certain it was Cutter. After a moment, a light came on in the first-floor flat, shining through timber French doors that led onto a small balcony. No sign of Cutter.
‘No doubt a psychologist would be able to explain the reason,’ said Izzy, oblivious to Cutter’s arrival. ‘Family!’ she added, with a shake of her head. Then, ‘I don’t think it’s going to work out with Jonathan,’ she said. ‘We’re two different people.’
Harry stared fixedly across at Cutter’s flat. The light was still on, but as yet, still no sign of Cutter. Harry could feel his heart beating faster. His mouth was dry. He was sure it was Cutter he’d seen enter. Further up the street he saw the unknown woman returning. He had to make a move, and it had to be now.
‘We just don’t seem to have anything in common anymore. He doesn’t take my views seriously. He doesn’t seem to listen to me anymore. The problem is we are from different worlds.’
Harry twisted around in his seat to reach for the pizza box, and from the footwell behind Izzy’s seat, he pulled out a full-faced motorcycle helmet. Izzy frowned on seeing this. Harry reached for the car door handle, paused, then turned back to Izzy and said, ‘The problem lies in the fact that you, lady, don’t live in the real world.’ With that, he jumped out, slammed the door behind him, and jogged across the road, weaving his way through the traffic to the other side, leaving Izzy open mouthed and speechless. She watched as Harry skipped up the steps to the front door, holding the pizza box in one hand, while slipping the helmet on over his head with the other. The woman they’d seen earlier was at the door searching through her bag, presumably for door keys. She turned as Harry approached. Izzy saw Harry gesture with the pizza box, pointing upwards. She saw the woman nod, unlock the door, and then enter. Harry followed, closing the door. After a few moments, a light came on in the ground-floor flat, which in turn drew her attention to the light in the flat above.
