longer and we’d be lookin at a bombsite!’
‘You’d better hope there’s nobody still up there, eh? Lyin unconscious with the fumes, waitin for you to save them.’
‘If there is somebody still up there they’re well past savin, let me tell you. The place is like a piggin slaughterhouse! There’s blood everywhere!’
The officer smoothened his uniform, troubling, even, to pick and discard a hair – possibly imaginary – from beneath its police insignia, and setting his hat on his head he adjusted it just so: this, after all, was nothing he had not seen before. Wearing a condescending expression, he motioned for calm, as though, very, very slowly, he were bouncing, simultaneously, with the flats of his palms, two imaginary basketballs.
‘Never bloody mind calm!’ harped the residents. ‘The place could go up any minute!’
‘Standin there bloody preenin his-self! Is this what we’re payin our taxes for?’
And he was prepared to wait all day if he had to. This the officer indicated, as heads got hotter and tempers flared, by resignedly tapping the toe of his boot on the wet, stony surface of the road, or duurrrumming with his finger tips on the thin, hollow-sounding metal of the police car’s roof, by casually glancing at his watch, or upwards at the heavens, or affecting to inspect his fingernails.
The sirens of his associates were growing ever nearer and louder.
Eventually, the exasperated gathering was rendered speechless at his antics.
‘Thaaaat’s better,’ said the officer. ‘Now, what seems to be the trouble?’
The young constable was quick to intervene, striding briskly round the police car and managing, just, to preserve some kind of order. Absorbing insult and criticism, while fully understanding their concerns, he proceeded to skilfully extract, piecemeal, from the justifiably irate residents any and all relevant information, to wit: there was a strong smell of gas issuing from the apartment on the first floor and the condition of its interior would certainly seem to be indicative of a violent, a very violent, disturbance.
‘Leave this to me,’ said his superior cocksuredly, and, with all eyes trained unfavourably upon him, he strutted casually, even suavely, to and through the building’s main door.
Slowly, then slowlier still, it swung closed behind him, its hydraulic door check making the last six inches of its trajectory take what felt like an eternity. But, at long last, he heard the gentle click of the lock and, abandoning his casual suavity, all but lunged for the stairs, climbing them two at a time and pulling at both banisters to hasten his ascent.
‘Did you hear that? Did you hear that? “Bombsite”! “Slaughterhouse”! It’s too good to be true! And lightening never strikes twice they say. If it’s as bad as they’re making out up here I’ll be back in the headlines tomorrow: “Hero officer revisits superstar death house”. I’d better start preparing my response. And who knows? I might even get my picture on the cover this time: neither proud nor humble. Solid. Dependable. The dependable face of law enforcement. Nice! The public’ll lap that up…’
He took a sharp half-turn onto the second flight of stairs.
‘…Or, better still, the telly! I could make the six o’clock news! “Yes, yes, such tragic incidents are, sad to say, all part and parcel of an officer’s daily routine.” Ha ha! That’s the tone, all right. The all-in-a-day’s-work approach. I can always alter the wording when I get a better idea of what it is I’m dealing with. And if I conduct myself well enough it could even lead to more TV work. A regular spot on Crimewatch, say, might not be out of the question. Got to be first on the scene, though. There’s nothing in this game for two in a bed!'
Those rival sirens grew louder now than ever, and then they abruptly ceased. There was no time left to lose.
On the first floor landing he stopped before the door, all that now stood between himself and celebrity. He had kicked in this door once before, without a moment’s hesitation, in a crowd-pleasing act of bravado. But now (he glanced back over the banister), now alone, with no audience to play to, he allowed himself a look through the letterbox. What he saw there...
‘Oh, my God!’
...surpassed in its terribleness...
‘Oh, my God!’
...the very highest of his hopes.
‘Forget the newspapers! Never mind the telly even! This – oh, my God – this is the stuff of movies!’
Very gently (he would be hard put to say why) he lowered the flap of the letterbox, raised himself upright and practically tiptoed back from the door. His heart beat fast in his chest, and so violently that he fancied he could hear its echo, sounding through the empty stairwell. Even the smell of the gas, a should-be reminder of the situation’s deadly seriousness, could temper his excitement but slightly. Pulling himself together, he readied his stance, concentrating his aim just left of the door handle, willing himself to action. One good kick was all it would take to send the door crashing inwards and see him step triumphantly over the threshold. He again glanced over the banister. The others were nowhere in sight. There was time enough still to rehearse the manoeuvre. He – once – lifted the sole of his boot to the level of the door handle and tentatively planted it in the spot just beside it, before lowering it again to the floor. He – twice – lifted the sole of his boot to the level of the door handle and tentatively planted it in the spot just beside it, before lowering it again to the floor. He – three times – lifted the sole of his boot to the level of the door handle and…
The door suddenly opened, as if of its own accord, and a fireman, clutching his helmet under his arm as he removed his heavy gloves, emerged from the other side of it.
‘Over to you,’ he remarked in passing. ‘I don’t envy you, though, I must say. It’s none too pretty in there! Mind you, I’ll probably need to go down here now and talk to these reporters. I don’t know what’s worse, eh?’
He was by now halfway down the first flight of stairs, and was about to descend the second flight when he shouted back up to the officer:
'You might want to start in the kitchen.’
24
An accumulation of saliva had begun to dribble out over the brow of Ryan's drooping lower lip, and bead after bead abseiled onto his chest before trickling slowly down the zip of his tracksuit top to where a bulge at the pouch pockets stemmed their flow.
‘How did he end up in such a state so quick?’ asked Billy.
‘Cunt can’t handle his drugs.’
Billy was puzzled.
‘Coke, though?’ he said.
Concisely, candidly, Tony enlightened him.
‘Aw, what did you do that for?’ said Billy. ‘The guy’s all right.’
‘I couldn’t give a fuck if he’s the nicest fuckin guy in the world,’ said Tony. ‘This is not about him. It’s about what he stands for, and I needed to get him into this state so he wouldn’t put up any resistance.’
‘Resistance to what?’
‘I’m goin to teach him a lesson.’
‘Aye, so you keep sayin.’
‘Right, then.’
‘But I thought it wasn’t about him.’
‘It’s not.’
‘So, eh...?’
‘What fuckin “so, eh”? The cunt needs to learn!’
‘Learn what?’
‘Learn a fuckin lesson!’
‘Aye, but...’
‘Aye, but, what?’
‘Aye, but, what lesson?’
‘I’m goin to make a fuckin example of him.’
‘Aye,’ said Billy patiently, ‘but how?’
Tony abruptly turned and left the room. He returned moments later carrying an old fashioned Polaroid camera.
‘Tan-ta-ra-ta!' He sang (akin to the French “voila!”) holding up the camera for show. ‘We’re goin to take a few fuckin publicity shots!’
Billy was less excited.
‘Oh, right,’ he said. ‘Publicity shots. Of a pop star wasted on drink and drugs. Scandalous! His career’ll never recover! Are you familiar with the exp
ression “there’s no such thing as bad publicity”?’
Now it was Tony’s turn to raise an incredulous eyebrow.
‘No such thing as bad publicity?’ he exclaimed. ‘You should know me better than that.’
And he tossed the camera onto Billy’s lap.
An Incidental Disclaimer
It should at all times hereafter be borne in mind that by this late stage in proceedings neither Billy nor Tony were quite their usual selves, and if on the whole they appear relatively unaltered – the odd slurred word, bleary eye and stagger excepted – it is no doubt because during the course of this long day a quantity of this and a quantity of that – uppers, downers, mild hallucinogens and alcohol – had, like a system of checks and balances, kept them on a fairly even keel. But (and it is this in particular that should not be forgotten) the keel itself, the entire keel, was now immersed so far beneath the surface (they were, after all, ‘loaded’) that the true shape of things, the stark forms of objective reality, appeared greatly softened and distorted.
Temporary insanity? Diminished responsibility? While their heightened state may in part explain how, paradoxically, they came to perform the subsequent low act, how Billy could allow himself to stand more or less idly by, even taking photographs, while Tony took what he doubtless perceived to be only fitting revenge on someone who for so long had defiled and defaced popular music, it should not in any way excuse it.
Crouching, Tony grabbed Ryan by the ankles, and, with all the tenderness of a lackey lifting his wheelbarrow, scooped up his legs. Tucking a foot under each arm he wheeled