‘Whatever you want. Whatever it takes. Just ask Beede – I’m old and rich and incredibly spoiled.’
‘But what about the Lada?’ he wondered. ‘I thought the Lada had a certain…uh…swagger…’
‘We’ll do a deal,’ she sounded delighted by the idea, ‘we’ll do a Part Exchange.’
‘I’d need to see her first, obviously…’
‘She’s a he. I call him The Commissar.’
‘I’ll have to see him, then.’
‘Fine. Come on over.’
Kane turned the key in his ignition. The Blonde coughed then started to hum.
‘So how’d I reach you?’ he asked.
‘Reach me?’ he could almost hear her smirking. ‘But you already reached me, dear,’ she said.
Gaffar was – much to Beede’s intense exasperation – every inch ‘the showman’ on the fruit aisle (all he lacked was a spot-light, a costume and a drumroll): he serenaded the bananas; he juggled the apples; he plucked a black grape from a large bunch, balanced it on his chin, then flipped it up into his mouth and swallowed it, whole.
His jaunty mood was sustained – quite convincingly – as they journeyed through the vegetables: he was perky by the broccoli, tranquil by the onions, sanguine by the potatoes…
The first clue that anything was even remotely amiss manifested itself as they drew abreast of the avocados (a certain stiffness of gait, a sudden quietness). By the time they’d reached the tomatoes (a distance of 2 feet on, at best) his good mood had taken a serious nose-dive (nervous yawning, uncontrolled scratching, a thin line of sweat on his upper lip).
At the beetroots – ‘God have mercy!’ – he seemed merely a shadow of his former, extrovert self: his complexion looked pallid, waxy, almost ashen; his lips were moist and quivering; his eyes started slightly from their sockets as they ransacked the shelves…
But the radishes, it seemed, were to be the final straw.
‘No.’
He ground to a shuddering halt in front of them, gesticulating weakly.
‘Is enough.’
He passed Beede the shopping list and the basket. Beede handed him back his knapsack and his helmet.
‘Okay,’ Beede sighed, ‘let’s just get this over with, shall we?’ And off he went.
He followed the list as best he could –
Cucumber, spring onions, celery…
– but there was some confusion around the issue of the type of mixed salad required, so he grabbed both – the bag and the sealed plastic bowl – and went off in search of confirmation.
Gaffar, meanwhile, was idling dreamily in the cheese aisle, quietly weighing up the distinct culinary virtues of Gorgonzola, Feta and minted Halloumi.
Beede strolled up behind him. ‘So which is preferable?’ he asked. ‘The unenvironmental plastic tub or the horrendously overpriced shredded stuff in the bag?’
Gaffar turned, saw the tub held cruelly aloft, and promptly swooned.
He turned right at the public phone box and into Ox Lane (just as she’d instructed), then right again down Barnfield. ‘There’s a line of normal-looking houses,’ she’d said, ‘intersected by a small, dirt track. Take the track. And do watch out for the geese…’
‘I’ll drive carefully,’ he assured her.
‘No. I mean you watch out,’ she explained. ‘They’re savages. Just sound your horn as you pull up, then sit tight. I can’t come out myself – I’m right in the middle of something – so I’ll send a dog to guide you. Two dogs. I’ll send Koto and Pinch. Do exactly as they ask and you should be just fine…’
Should?!
She wasn’t exaggerating. The geese (white-feathered, blue-eyed, mud-splattered, brightly beaked – beautiful geese, he supposed – if he’d been in a mind to consider a goose beautiful –
Am I in that mind?
– he gazed at them, quizzically –
Uh…No.)
– were strident, vicious and hysterical. There were about thirty of them, in total, and as soon as he applied his brakes they surrounded the car like a gang of little hooligans; battering at the paintwork, jabbing at the metal trim, honking cacophonously.
The general sense of affray was only exacerbated by the sudden arrival of five or six huge turkeys which patrolled the outer perimeter of the fuss, gobbling indignantly, like a posse of grey-suited prison guards, drawing back their necks, imperiously, shaking their wattles (like fat bunches of keys), and somehow producing a curiously hollow booming noise (how? With their throats? Their wings?), like the awful, reductive bang of a cell door closing at the far end of a distant corridor.
Kane unfastened his seat-belt and lit a cigarette. His hand – he realised – was shaking slightly. He tensed it up into an impatient fist and gazed around him, with a scowl.
It was certainly an unusual property –
A small farm?
A big smallholding?
He was parked in the cobbled courtyard which was full of old –
Junk
– farm machinery and surrounded by an ugly confusion of large sheds, barns and garages.
The courtyard itself was somewhat unkempt and exceedingly muddy. He adjusted his feet and peered down at his fine, white trainers –
Damn
The house –
Or cottage?
– (he glanced up again, wincing at the racket) seemed ancient (if not particularly charming); it was small, single-storey and entirely covered – ceilings, walls – in old, red tiles. It looked as if it’d once consisted of two storeys, but had hunkered down during an especially cruel storm, perhaps, or had taken a piece of bad news too much to heart, and had sunk, with an awful sigh, into the hollow refuge of its own foundations.
The windows were hung at awful angles. He shuddered. And the chimney? Utterly wonky. Like it’d been sloppily sketched on – as an afterthought – by a simpleton.
He checked his watch, then drew, impatiently, on his cigarette. He’d done just as he’d been instructed and had sounded his horn – once, twice – as he pulled up (how long ago now? Two minutes? Three?) but there was still no sign of deliverance; no dog, certainly, although he could’ve sworn he saw a curtain twitch – in the cottage – and the hunched outline of a small figure within (possibly a child), carefully observing him.
He sounded the horn again (setting up a terrifying chain-reaction among his feathered compatriots, who blared back at him, discordantly), then reached into his pocket and withdrew a tiny, neatly sealed polythene bag containing five or six white tablets. He pulled open the seal, took one out and swallowed it. Then he slid his fingers back in, removed a second, and swallowed that, too. He closed his eyes for a moment and drew a deep breath.
In his mind’s eye he suddenly had a clear vision –
No…
– an idea?
No…
– a perfect memory of geese – not these geese, but another breed, a different variety, a grey-brown variety with pink bills and pink feet –
All carefully dipped in tar, to preserve them, for the journey
There were hundreds of them – almost thousands – and they were being driven, in a messy line, a clucking, parping stream, along The London Road –
Hang on there:
Dipped in tar?!
Journey?!
He – Kane –
Right.
Yes.
That’s me…
– was sitting –
I’m high…
Up high
– he glanced down, in his mind’s eye –
Good Lord!
– astride a pony, watching them pass with a sense of casual impatience. He was hungry. Part of him was idly wondering if he might steal one –
Steal a goose?
– but geese – he knew, from hard experience –
Really?!
– were far too noisy for casual abduction.
He opened his eyes again.
Wow.
He inspected his scholarly hands �
��
?!
– which were anxiously fingering the polythene bag –
Just four left
Calm down
Calm down
Two was more than enough –
– then shoved it back, impatiently, into his pocket. He sucked on his cigarette. He thought about phoning again, or putting on some music…
Then finally –
Finally
– (how long now? Five minutes? Seven?) a dog slunk into the courtyard from one of the larger barns. A sheepdog, but a terrible advert for the breed: skinny, sly-looking, filthy, with large bald patches along its flanks and an utterly naked grey-blue tail. It crawled along the cobbles, approaching the car at an angle, but never looking at it directly, and never confronting a goose (the geese – in truth – seemed all but oblivious to it). So submissive was the beast that it looked as if its nerve might just give, as if it might simply slink past…
And so it did. Straight past, into a shed opposite.
‘Great.’
Kane folded his arms, irritated.
A minute or so later a second dog arrived; bigger than the first; fatter, but equally filthy. It seemed indifferent to the activities of the first dog. It sat, yawned, then leaned over and gnawed, neurotically, at its own hind leg –
Fleas.
Yes…
– Kane frowned –
I have a treatment for fleas –
A special powder…
– he chuckled –
What?!
He stopped chuckling. He shook his head. He blinked again, lifting his hand (like one of those ineffectual little cranes which clumsily snatches up small baubles in a glass box at the arcade) and suspending it, indecisively, above the horn…
Should I sound it?
But he held off.
The second dog (meanwhile) had stopped its gnawing and was gazing around the courtyard, casually. It sneezed. It surveyed the geese, nonchalantly. It slowly stood up –
Now what?
Kane frowned. He stubbed his cigarette out, keeping his eyes closely trained on it.
Then suddenly, without warning, the geese all turned, as one. Kane also turned. He saw the first dog – the sly dog – emerging from the opposite shed. And nothing had changed – so far as he could tell – it was still low to the ground, eyes askance but non-confrontational. Yet the geese had sensed something – a difference about it. Or maybe it was merely the combination of the two animals, in conjunction – a mathematical issue; a matter of basic goose geometry.
The second dog remained standing, its ears slightly pricked, its eyes glued on the first. The first dog carried on moving – slinking forward – very slowly. And gradually – almost miraculously – a path was forming. Waves of bright beak and white feather were parting – an escape route was being forged for him, a direct route from the driver’s door to a large barn, opposite. Kane frowned, confused. He’d presumed (he wasn’t really sure why) that he’d be escorted into the cottage.
Even so, he took his chance. He opened his door and slowly eased his way out. His exit was accompanied by a flurry of muted parping. Several geese rose up, flapping their wings at him. The second dog lifted its tail. That was all. The parping stopped. The wings were promptly folded.
Kane stood, indecisively, wondering whether to seek refuge in the barn or to throw caution to the wind and try and leg it over to the cottage. But his route was currently blocked. He took a tiny step forward (at an angle to the path) and became gradually aware of a monotonous humming…
No.
Not so much a hum, as…
Shit.
A growl
He glanced over towards the first dog. The first dog was crouched low and baring its teeth at him.
Fuck
He put his hand to his phone, and then caught himself doing it –
What are you gonna do, you prick?
Ring the Emergency Services?
Order a fucking pizza?
He dropped his hand and started walking to the barn. One step, two steps, three steps. Then the pills kicked in, or he changed his mind, or something –
Something?
A spirit of pure devilry?
– overwhelmed him and he turned and started running, sprinting, arms flaying – with a crazy whoop – towards the house.
What exactly happened next Kane couldn’t entirely fathom. An explosion? An implosion? All he could really be sure of was that everything went to hell. That fragile sense of order, of equilibrium – collapsed. The geese went wild and attacked. The dogs – in turn – attacked the geese (as if this – at some level – was what they’d always secretly yearned to do). If there was a Pandora’s Box for farmyards then Kane had just unwittingly lifted open its lid.
There was barking, braying, parping, howling, feathers flew…Kane felt a tearing at his legs. He put out his hand. Something inarticulate was yelled –
Is that me?
Or someone else?
A shot was fired –
A shot?
A goose was felled. Two geese –
With one shot?
– and the others scattered.
He glanced up, clutching his calf, cursing.
A woman stood before him, holding a shotgun. A tiny woman, sharpfaced, wearing a woolly hat, clogs –
Clogs?
– and a long, beige, butcher’s-style apron.
She strode forward and gazed down at the geese. One was still moving. She slammed down a clog on to its throat and promptly dispatched it. Then she grabbed both birds (huge birds; one in either hand), hauled them up (by the neck) gave Kane a filthy look, turned and marched back over towards the cottage.
‘Excuse me…’ Kane said.
She glanced over her shoulder.
‘Purrups jast di as yi tald nixt teem,’ she said, gesticulating, irritably, goose in hand. ‘Eejat!’
Eh?
‘So would you care to refresh my memory,’ another – slightly more familiar, yet rather more imperious – voice suddenly rang out, ‘about what it was exactly that I instructed you to do when you pulled up?’ He turned.
In the entrance to the barn stood a second woman, petite and lean, her bright-white hair pulled back into a glossy ponytail, a halfsmoked cigar propped behind her ear. She had dancing, chartreuse-green eyes – boozy eyes – and a pair of the most astonishingly flirtatious charcoal brows: dark, hand-painted brows which decorated her fine-boned face like two fabulous pieces of Chinese calligraphy.
‘You told me to sound my horn and wait for the dogs,’ he said.
‘Precisely.’
She wore overalls: scruffy, paint-splattered, in dark denim, matched with a pair of neat white gloves.
‘So I sounded my horn and I waited,’ he insisted.
‘And the dogs came…?’
‘Yes,’ he shuddered. The pills were kicking in (but hadn’t they kicked in already?). ‘Eventually.’
‘And they cleared a route for you?’
‘Uh…’
He looked regretful.
‘But you decided…?’
‘I thought you’d be in the cottage.’
He pointed.
‘But I’m in the barn, Kane.’
She pointed at herself. ‘Hello. This is me…’ then smiled and indicated behind her, ‘and this is the barn.’
‘I see.’
‘Well I suppose it’s going to be roast goose again,’ she sighed, turning, ‘poached goose, pan-fried goose, stewed goose…’
She disappeared from view. He didn’t immediately follow her. He’d presumed (incorrectly, as it transpired) that she’d want to have a quick look at the car. And then there was this smell – a strangely evocative yet familiar smell – which’d wafted out with her –
Beeswax?
His eyes grew unfocussed as he sniffed the air.
‘What are you waiting for?’
‘Huh?’
He started.
She’d popped her head back aro
und the door and was scowling at him, irritably. ‘Not caused quite enough carnage for one day, eh? Secretly hankering after Round Two are we?’
‘I hear you’re planning on moving the cafeteria upstairs,’ Gaffar could hear Beede saying, ‘or out the back, or something…’
‘Who told you that?’
Darkmans Page 38
