What the devil had he taken Diana’s money for in any case? Twenty-six thousand pounds. It certainly wasn’t enough to reverse his fortunes. What was it then? Just a needless prolonging of the inevitable. What did he really think he was going to do here? Discover oil?
He took out the poetry book from his jacket pocket, Muerte y Memoria by Eugenio Montejo. It was Emily’s favourite book, the red jacket still clinging to the cover, always beside the lamp on her side of the bed. He used to read it to her when she was ill or when she couldn’t get to sleep. It had been a present from her beloved Venezuelan grandmother and Christmas hadn’t let go of it since the day of Emily’s funeral. She had always wanted to visit Guiria, her grandmother’s port town on the Caribbean side of the country. He’d promised that one day he would take her. Now he was going to take what he had left, this book. He would sit on the beach she’d dreamt of, read to her one last time and push the book into the sand. Christmas gave the book a kiss and put it back in his pocket. He sighed.
So this was the plan? He was just going to bury Emily again, spend all the money, go back to England, and then what – back to penury and disgrace? The bar was crowded and loud. He was alone. Was he to become one of those pensioners checking the coin tray of every public phone, shivering in his slippers, alone in a bedsit somewhere with nothing to keep him company but complaints? No, no, no – there was no going back. Better off adrift in foreign waters, playing his own tune even if the ship were going down. He was better here, unhindered, the sovereign of his own decline. Death and the banks had taken everything he ever had, but even they could not—
Oh stop it, Pops, for God’s sake, he heard Emily say, listen to yourself. Honestly – you’re like a child. A great big pissed fat child.
“Typical bloody woman!” Christmas announced to the bar, cocking his head to the roof. “You’re dead. Leave me alone!”
Shut up, Pops. You’re making a fool of yourself. Look – you’re annoying everyone.
“And why shouldn’t I make a fool of myself, Emmy, eh?” he thundered.
“Please, Señor—” said the barman.
“Who fucking cares?”
“Señor, your voice, please. Lower.” Christmas looked at the barman. He blinked and returned to his rum. A glut of tears rose in his throat. He drank it down.
Alcohol cloaked his mind. He would never remember Pepito coming into the bar, also drunk, embracing him noisily. He asked Christmas lewd questions about Lola Rosa and then ushered his brother, the owner, into the bar from a back office. The three men drank shot after shot of a clear, sweet liquid that Christmas could not pronounce.
At some point, Christmas left. Staggering under the weight of the booze, he wandered down the street. People approached him, whispering and propositioning. He waved and grunted them away. He stepped over a man asleep in the street. He walked on a few paces, stopped, took out twenty bolívares, went back, and stuffed it deep into the man’s grimy pocket. Somehow he made it back to the hotel. With assistance from the night porters, Christmas finally crashed into his room and collapsed onto the bed. The ceiling fan was on. He took off a shoe and then fell backwards again. He threw the shoe at the fan. It caught a blade, bounced off the wall and hit him in the face.
11
Slade stood in the doorway of the hotel room. He imagined various scenarios all at once: fights with assailants who had tried to catch him sleeping; hooded men counter-ambushed and disabled with devastating efficiency. There wasn’t enough room for exercises. The mattress looked thin. He shook his head and pushed past the concierge. With his kitbag on his shoulder, Slade walked through the lobby and out into the Chacaito district of central Caracas. He was in unfamiliar territory. The air smelt of damp trees, gasoline and fried corn. Salsa music swung in and out of hearing. Businesswomen trailed hair and cigarette smoke. He had not slept during the flight.
Slade was trying to decide whether he was bigger than most Venezuelans. The only other time he had been out of Europe was a trip to Thailand to have sex with prostitutes, and he’d enjoyed the sensation of being taller than the local people.
Two soldiers walked past, teenage recruits. Slade had tried to enlist in the army when he was eighteen but had walked out of the induction as soon as he realised it was full of men tougher than he was. He lied to everyone that he was kicked out because he had failed the psychological examination. Unable to accept authority, he told them. Too much of a lone wolf.
He sized up the two soldiers now stopping to chat with a woman and imagined how he would attack them: a blizzard of punches and kicks, balletic moves executed with a serene face.
Slade walked past a school belching children and saw a hotel. It was full. He walked further down the road. ‘Explosion del Poder Communal’ said the billboard. ‘Nadie detiene La Revolución!’ There were more hotels, but they were either full or too expensive or failed his strategic assessment. Light rain began to fall. Slade fell back into the familiar reverie about defeating Harry Christmas. He imagined calling Diana, saying the words ‘it is done’, then hanging up. She would stare at the phone, weeping tears of gratitude, desperate to be reunited. No one would ever dare to hurt her again. He could be summoned at an instant: her protector, a Saxon warrior, a vengeful ghost. Slade saw distant neon and followed a long wall covered in graffiti. ‘This is for Diana’ he imagined himself saying as he held Christmas’ body by its neck before administering the final crackling twist. As he realized that the neon lights were not a hotel but a bar, three men crossed the street, coming towards him in a hurry.
One of the men said something in Spanish. Another pulled out a screwdriver and pointed it at Slade. They surrounded him.
They were shouting, pushing him. One was tugging at the kitbag. They are robbing me, thought Slade, several seconds after it had begun.
Something heavy slammed into the side of his head. He let go of his bag as his hands went to his face. He felt blood. He was punched again in the neck and jaw. He went down and covered his head. ‘No! Please!’ he cried, begging them to stop, to leave him alone, as they kicked and stomped him. A shoe crushed his face against the pavement. They were still shouting and hissing in Spanish. One of them spat in his face. They ran off.
Slade lay there for several moments. Someone approached and asked him if he was OK. Slade rolled over and looked at the sky, at the young man trying to help and the unfamiliar buildings. He blinked and exhaled, then got up. Once on his feet he realised that he was shaking and the young man was holding his arm. Slade pushed him away and ran off up the street, gripping the side of his head. He was wearing the travel wallet around his waist. He still had his passport. He still had his money, his credit card and the photograph of Harry Christmas. But he had lost his father’s knife.
Slade was in a side street. He stopped running and crouched against a wall. He pressed his knuckles into his eyes and made a sharp, guttural noise as if this could clear away what had just happened. Slade stood up, wiping away tears. He went out onto the main road, trying to control his breathing and met eyes with a frail junkie sitting on the curb. The man had no shoes on, his clothes and body smeared with dirt and the constant breath of traffic. He had the physique of a child, eyes black with poverty and craving. Scuttling to his feet, he followed Slade, jabbering pleas with pinched fingers bobbing at his mouth. He tugged on Slade’s shirt. Slade told him to go away and turned down an alley. It smelt of burnt sweets. The man followed, begging and tapping his arm.
Slade suddenly turned, pushing the man against the wall. “Where’s my father’s knife?” Slade cried. The man looked at him in disbelief. He began to whimper. Slade headbutted him in the face, breaking his nose. The man was silent. He touched his nose and looked at his hand and saw the blood. Slade stepped back. He tried to give the man a roundhouse kick to the head. He only got as high as his waist but it still sent him flying into rubbish on the floor.
“Yes,” hissed Slade. Then he ran off.
12
Christmas woke with a
hangover. The outer shell of his body recognised the comfort of pillow and sheets, yet inside there was turmoil; unnamed forces raced about like frightened animals. His heart hammered at its cage.
He thought about beer, a cold, cold beer to slake his thirst. He imagined it fresh from an icebox, dripping lasciviously, erupting on his tongue with fountains of refreshment. He looked about him and spied a bottle of water. It was empty.
Christmas was so hung-over his head was a different shape. His eyes were smaller, his skull swollen. When he pulled on his hat and looked in the mirror it didn’t suit him any more. He went into the lobby but it was too shiny, too full of sheen. Everyone seemed to be staring at him.
“Mister Christmas,” said the junior manager, suddenly appearing before him. “Could you come with me please?” Christmas let out a deep sigh.
“How do I look to you?”
“Excuse me?”
“I said,” he repeated, holding his forehead, “how do I look to you? Do I look like a man who wants to have a conversation about mistakes that some credit card company has made, which don’t even matter, as I have plenty of cash, or do I look like a man who needs some remedial assistance of a liquid or deep fried nature, should he be denied which, may result in some unfortunate effluence all over your nice clean floor? Do I make myself clear?”
“Mister Christmas, while trying to make every effort—”
“This is an outrage!” bellowed Christmas, “Do you mean to hold me to ransom?” and with that he strode away from the startled manager.
Christmas hurried to the restaurant serving breakfast. He asked for a beer. He was given a Solera. He downed the thing and then looked at the bottle incredulously. How could they be allowed to get away with this? It wasn’t beer – it was some horrific soft drink, thin, weak, but yes – cold. He asked for another and ate a quail egg arepa, followed by a croissant, four fried eggs on toast, a bowl of honey porridge, a plate of potatoes fried with onion, a bowl of fruit salad and two double espressos. He signed his bill and returned to the reception desk.
“Now then,” Christmas started, “apparently there’s some problem with— ” He put his hand in his pocket for his wallet. It wasn’t there. He tried his other pocket. He tried all his pockets. “Sorry,” he said. “Just a minute.” He went up to his room.
Christmas strode through the door expecting his wallet to be on the sideboard. It wasn’t. It wasn’t on the bedside table. It wasn’t on the desk. It wasn’t by the sink.
He undressed the room, checking every drawer, every fold, every corner, every gap. He manhandled himself. He shouted and swore. He had felt it this morning in his jacket pocket, or had that been his passport? He went through his clothes. When had he taken it out? Where had he put it down? This morning? Last night? He checked the toilet. He checked the safe. He stood on the bed. He leant out the window. He sat down. He leapt up again. He checked the room again and again, whispering, “This is not happening, this cannot be happening ...” Panic swept through his system. He emptied his pockets, checking through his remaining bolívares, as if it could somehow contain a wallet between the paper notes. All together he had 263 bolívares in cash. His wallet contained four thousand dollars. He looked under the bed. He kicked the bed.
Christmas went down to reception, sought out the junior manager, asked where the nearest ATM machine was located and informed him that he was withdrawing the necessary funds right away.
Without dark glasses to act in his defence, Christmas was interrogated by daylight, the sun sitting in judgement while an unfamiliar, feverish city whispered and accused. He went back to El Barco. It was barely open. There was a different man behind the bar and someone else cleaning the floor. They looked at him blankly and shook their heads.
He went back to the hotel and made it to his room without being stopped. He searched it again. He went into the bathroom. He checked under the towels, in the bin, under the sink, inside the cistern. Then he sat down on the toilet and closed his eyes, seething black spells of hatred against the world. How could this be happening? He went and sat down on the bed. He took out Emily’s book and held it against his face, groaning. Why hadn’t he listened to her? Why hadn’t he put it in the room safe?
His secured credit card was undoubtedly out of funds. Apart from an emergency thousand pounds hidden away in London, the rest of Diana’s money he had already spent or gambled. He paced around his room until lunchtime. There was neither a friend nor a bank left in the world that would lend him a penny more. He was stranded. “Up on two legs, man!” he shouted at himself. “Pull yourself together!” Most of his money was gone. That was no longer the point. The point was: what was he going to do next?
Christmas rang room service. He ordered a large vodka and tonic, a bottle of carbonated water, cream of tomato soup, roast chicken with fried rice and vegetables and a cocktail glass stuffed with balls of sorbet. He consumed the lot, summoning energy for his next move. Then, as he had anticipated, the phone rang.
13
“I’m sorry to keep you waiting, sir,” said the duty manager as he hung up the receiver. “Actually Mister Christmas said he’s on his way down.
“Remember,” said Slade, “it’s a surprise.” The duty manager gave him a professional smile. The side of Slade’s face was bruised. He smelt of alcohol.
Slade sat beside a table fanned with magazines that faced the elevator doors. He took in the luxury that Christmas was buying with his stepmother’s money.
Once Slade had found a hotel room he had cleaned the blood from the cut above his ear and ordered a bottle of whisky. It was a wretched room that stank of cigarettes but he had taken it anyway, desperate for Caracas to be on the other side of a locked door. He sat on the bed staring at a television he couldn’t understand with toilet paper in one hand and a glass of fake scotch in the other, patting his head for new blood, hands starting to steady as he got drunk and retold himself what had just happened: how he had sprung to his feet as soon as the bandits holstered their guns and fled; how he chased them; how they disappeared into their own city like the rats they were; how if they had fought like men, he would have walked away from a pile of bodies with his kitbag still on his shoulder; how it was Harry Christmas’ fault. They were his men, sent to deliver another insult, another humiliation, another theft. Slade thought back to his first encounter with Christmas and cursed the fat man’s escape.
Diana had freely opened an account with her fiancé so the police were not interested when Christmas disappeared with her money. Slade had no idea she even had a boyfriend. He hadn’t talked to Diana in almost two years, though he often drove past her house and wrote letters and emails that were never answered.
When she called, she was so raving drunk he could hardly understand what she was saying. He went over to her house and she was crawling around the kitchen floor as if newly blind, empty bottles of wine everywhere, screeching and sobbing out the story of how Harry Christmas had betrayed her; how she wanted his legs broken; how she wanted him dead. Finally, he had a mission.
Diana started to droop and he gathered her up and carried her to bed and watched her sleep as he used to when he was a child, curling up on the end with the bedroom door locked against his father, her eyes swollen, his hands in hers.
The next day Slade started his own investigation. He found a tracking company on the internet and spent fifty pounds to find out where Christmas lived. He ignored the phone messages from Diana, apologising, saying she had changed her mind, ordering him not to do anything, and drove to a quiet residential street in Streatham, South London. He couldn’t find anywhere to park but drove around and around for more than an hour until he found a space from where he could still make out the front door of Number 14, Holly Avenue. He got out, walked over and rang the bell. No answer. He went back to his car and waited.
Slade was on a stakeout. For the first time in his life he felt a craving for doughnuts. He left the car and jogged up the road onto the high street, nervous that he migh
t miss Christmas. He found a Greggs bakery but they didn’t have any doughnuts left so he bought a tuna sandwich, a large bottle of Coca-Cola, a coffee, and a gingerbread man. Slade went back to the car, put the food inside, then rang the doorbell. No answer.
Listening to the car’s radio he ate the food and drank the coffee. He needed to piss. When there was no one around he urinated as fast as he could between two vans on the other side of the road. He went back to his car and waited.
In the glove compartment there was a Bowie knife and Slade practised getting it out and springing from the car. It got dark. He needed a shit. For an hour he fought the sensation as it grew ever more merciless, receding, coming back with greater urgency until, just as he was ready to shit between the two vans, one of them drove away. He was tormented by the certainty that the moment he took his eyes off the street, Christmas would appear. There was a pharmacy on the corner so he hobbled there and bought two packets of Imodium and some ProPlus. He went back to the car, nearly shitting himself. After swallowing half a pack of the antidiarrhoeals, the urge subsided, but his stomach hurt. He was sweating. He glared at the people who walked past and peered at him in his car going nowhere. It was the middle of the night. He had been there for more than ten hours. To stop himself falling asleep he took the caffeine pills and stayed awake all night until the dawn spread over the street.
When London woke up, vehicles sometimes blocked his view and he would curse and get out until they moved on. Another day of the shooting pains in his stomach, sticky clothes, the radio. He took more Imodium, more ProPlus. When he could no longer ignore the hunger Slade risked another trip to Greggs and bought bags of doughnuts and cookies and crisps so that he wouldn’t have to go again, but as he ate the urge to shit came back. He took a handful of Imodium. He was increasingly disturbed by the idea that Christmas might have already left town. He thought about breaking into Christmas’ house but he didn’t really know how to disable an alarm system.
A Bright Moon for Fools Page 6
