by Will Self
quickly and intently to the right and the left – there’re no Bosnians,
buggers or Bashi-bloody-Bazouks, just trays piled high with dirty
crockery and glasses. The Butcher withdraws, muttering, Hotel?
I don’t think so – more like a twenty-four-seven knocking shop.
He shuts, bolts and chains the door … Prince Albert? Be awkward
when strip-searched … Flash-to-bang the whole encounter took
seconds: Have you met the Butcher? he asks of the Queen-sized
sagging centre stage – asks also of the purple-brown carpet and the
surpassing-grim wallpaper … sooner or later one of us will have to
go … and asks most especially of a panoramic photograph showing
the Manhattan skyline by night that’s pasted on the opposite wall
and uplit by another fluorescent tube concealed behind a trompe
l’œil sill. It’s this oddity – a false window on to a fake world, with
real red drapes swished to either side – that led the Butcher to
request this particular room when he checked in. Not that he wishes
to pretend he’s on Park Slope rather than two hundred yards from
Piccadilly Gardens, it’s rather that the room’s windowlessness – a
function of its position, deep in the core of this big and surpassing
solid old building – means it’ll be … impossible for the office to reach
me … No, really, have you? He advances, semi-erect penis dowsing,
towards the blunt brows of the World Trade Center’s twin towers
… Because if you haven’t, you may well be finding this propensity
he has for speaking of himself in the third person rather … arch?
The Butcher allows the towel to slip from his adorably slim hips – so
his long slim cock springs up, head questing … eye seeking: But,
really, you mustn’t be annoyed … he strokes its silky shaft, its
velvety tip … Squilly will explain, won’t you, Squilly? Be a dear,
Squilly darling, and … oblige? The Butcher’s slightly rubbery
features quiver in the New York night-light – he’s one of those
handsome yet nondescript men who can transform their appearance
… with the slightest grimace – or merest moue. The only feature that
cannot be annulled is the warning triangle of his isosceles nose:
mornings, shaving, the Butcher pushes this dorsal fin to one side,
relishing its cartilaginous squeak and steadily slices … flesh out
of foam – blood in the snow … Schafe können sicher weiden, yeah,
right … Squilly, by contrast, is a wary creature with hooded eyes,
who speaks with a slight lisp, his words dragging themselves over
his drooping bottom lip and past his nascent jowls. He’s also just a
little bit more top drawer than the Butcher – with a hint of clipped
nindeteen-fifties diction clinking in his moist mouth. He says,
I shall oblige, Butchie … then goes on … Well, the Butcher here
is a confirmed illeitht –. Can’t you ever say anything properly,
the Butcher interrupts. It’s illeist – illeist! Unperturbed, Squilly
resumes: My extwemely close and vewy dear friend the Butcher,
here … As I thay, he had a difficult childhood – some might say
traumatic. There was neglect, certainly – abuse, too. His mother
was an intruthive – not to say manipulative – prethence, while
his father –. Okay, okay … the Butcher breaks in again, I think
we’re all perfectly aware of what went –. – While his father was a
still more manipulative absence, nowhere to be seen while poor
ickle Butchie was getting fiddled about with by the bad mens –.
– All right, all right, Squilly! That’s quite enough –! – My theory is
it thorta fractured the poor little mite – thplit him in two –. – And
that’s what created you, Squilly, isn’t it? – Yeth, that’s what created
me, Butch, I’m your thub-personality, born in the bathtub at Colindale
Avenue on the thirteenth of June nineteen thixty-seven – d’you
wemember, Butch? – Yes, yes, I remember … He remembers his
mother, Maeve De’Ath, spread-arsed on the toilet wedged between
sink and tub, I remember … the string of amber beads spawning
on her stagnant bosom, I remember … the prominent mole on her
prominent chin … an inedible niblet … Ooh! she cried, your willy’s
squirting! She lunged awkwardly forward to give the offending
member a light slap … almost a caress. She did it again annagain,
while sing-songing, Squirty-willy, squirty-willy, squirty … Steam
curled, rubber ducks whirled – Actaeon was torn! and Squilly was
born! How does it feel, Squilly … the Butcher oozes sarcasm …
to’ve been conceived through the union of two such infantile words:
squirt – and willy. Really, you’re nothing but a baby-name for a little
boy’s penis. – Weally? Weally, Butch – weally? If I’m that, what’re
you, weally, if not a typical sex-obsessed man who likes nothing
better than talking to his own perthonified prick! Come, come,
Squilly, the Butcher says, still stroking the rapidly engorging …
matter in hand. You better than anyone understand there’s far, far
more to it than that, don’t you? – Oh, yes, I do, Butch – of course
there ith. – ’Cause you were the one who first talent-spotted me,
weren’t you, Squills? You got to me long before that stuffed shirt,
Doctor Opie, didn’t you? – Yeth, I spotted your talent, Butch – and
I was your first handler as well, helping you into your firtht thkin
when you were knee-high to a coffee table. You remember it, Butch?
– How can I ever forget it, Squillster … The Butcher shivers
deliciously: his penis is fully erect now – a great curving prong, fully
ten inches long, which quests for … There’s no ac-tion! Every time
I phone you, I just wanna put you down! The silent scream winds
around the Butcher’s head – and Squilly’s. – I wecruited you, that’s
true – and I’ve handled you ever since. I’m handling you right at this
moment, as it happens … He is: he’s handling the Butcher, even as
the Butcher is handling Squilly … but there’s more to it than that,
isn’t there, Butchie-dearest? There is indeed a great deal more to it
than that – for they contextualise each other, the Butcher and
Squilly, filling in all the background details of whichever scene they
happen to be … acting out. Narrative, too, they doo-doo-doo for each
other, so propelling their partnership forward in a wobbly bubble
of their own repartee: along strip-lit corridors, down dark roads
and up narrow streets – into hidden doorways, up back stairs and
into … hell’s darkest chamber. – And all the while, one or the other
of us keeps on Boughing out the commentary – there has to be a
commentary, has to be a mannish boy in a sheepskin coat with
a microphone … You’re listening to him NOW! Don’t sit there
with your mouth hanging open like a fucking MONG! ’cause
he might put that THING! in your ARSE! or your CUNT –!
Arse for preference, though, Butch, Squilly says – and the Butcher
momentarily stills, legs prettily parted, one shoulder back, beautiful
face downcast. Oh, my Antinous! Squill
y exclaims, grabbing for
his cock – but the Butcher slaps his hand away. – That’s not something
we talk about! Besides, we don’t want to die of fucking
ignorance – now do we? To which Squilly throws back his head and
laughs. – Look at us – dancing licentiously in the noddy, swirling
round in a cesspool of our own making –. He breaks off: the
Butcher’s hands are at his throat – he can taste the Butcher’s dogged
breath. – Not now, Squills, that’s not something we talk about at
all openly, is it? That’s p-perfectly c-cowwect, Butchie, Squilly
stutters, and, relaxing his grip, the Butcher continues: We only
talk of such things in our safe place, after we’ve thoroughly swept it.
Our safe place, where we arrive separately, leave separately, and no
one ever knows we’ve been … You’ve handled me for years now,
Squilly, so you know this better than anyone … He falls silent,
and the two stand looking at nothing through the same pair of
empty eyes. Eventually, Squilly says, I turned you, Butch, didn’t I?
And the Butcher concedes: You did, Squills – you turned me
because you’re older and wiser. You understand the ways of the
world – and, most importantly, how to keep those ways secured,
for we are the wise shepherds and our job is to watch over them
all so –. Schafe können thicher weiden, Squilly lisps – and the
Butcher translates: So sheep may safely graze is about the size of
it – that’s why you turned me, Squilly. You turned me this way …
He begins to execute his own version of a piqué turn … and you
turned me the other way … he reverses his twirl … and now I
don’t know any more if I’m an agent or a double agent, or a triple
one, or … the Butcher spins faster … Baryshnikov – but ballsier!
He starts singing: You turned me right round, baby, right round …
His penis audibly whirrs, a rotor, slicing the flock wallpaper and
the Manhattan skyline to shreds … The Butcher sees bollocky bags
full of dead bodies lifting off from a dull and dusty plaza – sees the
PeeEllAy helicopters hover over the Western Hills – sees the
scrotums slashed and the bodies … fall. He slumps down on the
bed, his head crammed full of writhing flesh, blinded by fear flashing
from dying eyes, deafened by howls and the poppling of
small-arms fire. Squilly says: C’mon, Butchie – you’ve gotta bweak
a few eggs if you want to make a weally lovely omolette aux fines
herbes, you know that … But the Butcher says nothing, only sits
massaging his synthetic features, his blue-black hair twined in his
pianist’s fingers. Squilly’s having none of this: What is it we always
thay, Butch, when we’re feeling a bit queathy? Fuck off, Squilly, the
Butcher grunts. Thay it! Squilly barks, Thay it with me, Butch –
thay it! And then they chant in unison: The pro-fess-ion-al skill of
esp-i-o-nage con-sists en-tire-ly in the ex-ploi-tat-ion of hu-man
weak-ness … And when this is done the Butcher finds himself
standing by the wardrobe wearing clean white Calvin Kleins —
which was how he’d introduced himself to the greedy little woman
in the big ranch house … out of South Fork via Chester earlier that
day. When she’d the temerity to laugh, the Butcher encouraged
her hilarity by retrieving from his pocket the folded page he’d
torn from a magazine, unfolding and holding it up so she could see
Mark Wahlberg, naked except for his Calvin Kleins … hand on his
squilly. Ha, ha, ha, she’d chortled, don’t be ridiculous, that’s not
eyedee. When the Butcher next spoke they’d been in the oppressively
fitted kitchen and the dodgy strap was in his hand. How
d’you know anyone is who they say they are? he’d remarked conversationally,
Because they’ve got a photograph with a name written
underneath it? He sighed heavily: C’mon … logically speaking,
there’s no reason why the name should designate the photograph –
let alone the person the photograph’s of … This critique of the lazy
inferences afforded by sight had been lost on the greedy little
woman, since by then she was slumped down between the dishwasher
and the deepfreeze, altogether disconsolate since her tell had
been … so fucking simple. After he’d flashed the strap and begun
backing her down the hallway, he’d heard a radio playing in an
upstairs room: JayWhy, programatically sucking ministerial cock.
The woman was an uneasy listener – her eyes roving hither then
thither. So they’d detoured to recover a large bundle of dollar bills
wrapped in clear plastic and duct tape from the dirty-clothes
hamper in the airing cupboard, and a much larger one of Swiss
dinars … scimitar-wielding horsemen riding through a calligraphic
cloud … from a hatbox in a walk-in wardrobe. Both packages were
lying on the breakfast bar … What’s the recipe today, Jim? when the
Butcher said his piece: Here’s the thing about people like you –
stupid greedy people like you. Y’see, you can’t help thinking you
matter, and that the world is there for you to exploit as you see fit.
Of course, even a stupid greedy person like you understands in her
heart of hearts that she doesn’t and it isn’t – but it’s damnably hard
to maintain objectivity, isn’t it? We-ell, you relax, pet, while I tell
you how things’re going to be from here on in … – But the greedy
little woman couldn’t relax – she rocked back and forth on her
fat arse, she pulled up the leg of her naff slacks to scratch at the
blubber barely contained by her … pop socks! The Butcher had
almost relented – told her the revolver was nothing of the sort, its
chambers quite unable to spin round, round, baby, right round …
He’d almost relented – but didn’t, because he’s the Butcher, and no
self-respecting butcher ever undertakes a job without his chopper …
Outside, it’d been an early-summer afternoon in well-to-do outer-suburban
England – the ranch house was set back from the road
and there were no eyes on. He’d opened the door of the double
garage to find a crappy old Austin Metro … the little lady’s runabout,
and a brand-new metallic-black Three Series Beamer … his
work car when he’s not abroad. Well, well, well … the Butcher
thought … they are doing … well. His own work car was parked
half a mile away on a busy thoroughfare – it was a bog-standard
rental hatchback he’d rendered still more inconspicuous by suckering
a stuffed Garfield-the-Cat to the offside rear window. He’d
driven it back to the airport, and in the car park – butcher that he
is – gutted Garfield, removing a small veeaitcheff transceiver and
replacing it with the wads of currency. As he’d done so, he’d run
the plays … What would happen to the stupid greedy woman – and
Fechner, the marginally more clever operator who’d set up the front
companies to buy the precursors, organised the supply lines and
done much of the laundering? The stupid greedy woman was
undoubtedly too stupid to work out who the Butcher was
working
for – let alone whether his employers had authorised his house call.
By the time he’d left she’d been whimpering, pleading for mercy: it
was … most unsavoury – especially when she’d grabbed his free
hand and pressed it against her sad sack. She might, the Butcher
hypothesises, kill herself – or Fechner’s partners in the enterprise, a
nasty bunch out of Skopje, could well oblige once they found out
about her sloppy accounting … It was possible Fechner hadn’t simply
been using her, but had some sort of emotional investment – in
which case there’s a possibility they’ll make a run for it. The Butcher
pictures the odd couple, gone to ground in a guesthouse in a far-flung
market town … China Pekes on the fire surround – Will you be
wanting tea in the morning? Any which way you sliced it, there was a
zero-probability of any blow-back – so, as he’d stood there in the
kitchen, wearily regarding a poster of a demi-nude hunk cradling a
naked baby in his denim lap, he’d shown her some snaps of his own:
tiny whey-faced bundles dumped at the foot of a mud-brick wall,
somewhere in a patch of ochreous nowhere, while he let Squilly do
the talking, because there’s something about Squilly’s bweathy lithp
that really puts the wind up ’em … The Squillster had gently pointed
out that her greed had contributed, in part, to the deaths of an
estimated three thousand children. She didn’t know … ? Hadn’t
realised? Oh, dearwie, dearwie me, Squilly had said, waggling
his slack old thespian’s face, I do tho hate to be the bearwer of
bad tidings … Fortunately, he was able to suggest something she
could do by way of expiation … Taking the woman by her crimped
and greying-out-at-the-roots scruff … orf we jolly-well went: the
Butcher led her about the ranch house, pointing out its suicidal
features: the big pot of jellies in the bathroom … I knew would be
there, and regarding which he gave her clear instructions about …
exceeding the stated dose. Back downstairs, he’d jerked her along to
Fechner’s gun cabinet – which he’d already located … in the obvious
place. Hunched up in the utility cupboard, to the accompaniment of
a ticking meter, the Butcher had expertly cracked its combination
lock … doddle for a man who can do a Number Four Manifoil in
