A Bright Moon for Fools (20 page)

Slade saw the curtains shut and moved back behind the bus. He opened the glove compartment and took out the dive knife. He left it on the seat. They swept along the dark road,
around sharp corners, up and over headlands, past cars heading to Rio Caribe.

He looked out to the black ocean. He turned on the radio. It was playing salsa. He turned the dial until he heard music he recognised. Christmas appeared again in the rear window. The bus went
round a bend. The radio played ‘If you’re going to San Francisco’. The bus reappeared. Slade waved. Christmas stepped away from the window. In his rear view mirror Slade saw The
General sitting on the back seat. He turned around but the cat was gone. He drove along watching the mirror. He pulled alongside the bus. The curtains were open. He could see Christmas.

After twenty minutes they approached a town. They passed a small, illuminated dock, a hotel, a twenty-four hour
arepa
restaurant surrounded by mopeds. Slade drove alongside the bus. There
was Christmas. Slade dropped back. The road became tree-lined. It rose to a rough park on a cliff. There were street lights. Another hotel, graffiti that said ‘
EXXXON MOBIL ... HIJOS DE
PUTA
!’, a Masonic temple, boarded up and rotting. Then they were in the town and slowing beside a long white wall. Slade could see the tops of buses. It was a terminal. The bus indicated
left. It turned in and Slade followed. The bus drew into a bay. He parked up, took the knife, put his jacket over it and ran across the forecourt. He got there before the bus had come to a stop.
There were travellers milling about, people selling street food, men with whistles.

The bus doors opened. Slade looked up at the driver who said something to him. Some passengers came down the steps. Slade let them pass. Then he got on the bus. People were standing up, taking
bags down from the rack, leaning over seats, talking to each other, looking at him. Slade saw Christmas at the back, still in his seat. He headed down the corridor, pushing past people who were
trying to get out.

Harry Christmas.

The fat man was trying to hide behind his hat.

“Peek-a-boo,” said Slade, picking the Panama off his face, but it wasn’t Christmas. It was a Venezuelan man. He was asleep.

S
itting there as the bus had swooped around the bends, Christmas pushed the butt of his hands into his eyes.
Up on two legs, man! Think –
you have to bloody breathe and bloody think
!

He clambered out of his seat, half-waking the man next to him and went back to talk to the bus driver. He took out Bridget’s wallet. He opened it. There was picture of Judith and Bridget
with their arms around each other. He took out fifty dollars and offered it to the bus driver in exchange for opening the door when they went around the next corner.

“Are you crazy?”

“You don’t want fifty dollars?”

“You want to jump off my bus?”

“You see that car? The one that has been following us since Rio Caribe? The man in that car is trying to kill me.”

“What?”

“Look at me. I swear to God it’s the truth.” The bus driver glanced at his eyes.

“Why?”

“Because – because he just came out of prison for killing someone and he went to prison because I saw him kill that person and I told the police and now he’s tracked me down to
Venezuela and he’s trying to kill me!”

“He’s a gringo?”

“He’s a gringo, he’s a murderer, and please, for the love of God I’m begging you, I have a wife and child – look at them, this is their picture – and
you’re the only hope I have left and all you have to do is open the doors at the next bend. You slow down, he goes out of sight for a second, I jump, that’s it. Here, please, in the
name of God, fifty dollars, take it!”

“
Señor
, I—”

“One hundred. One hundred dollars!”

Christmas went to the back of the bus. He could see Slade waving. He stayed there until they turned a corner. Slade’s car disappeared for three countable seconds. Then it
was back. He went to his seat. He crouched in the corridor beside the sleeping man, shook him awake and offered him his hat if they could swap places. Christmas handed the man his Panama. Still
half-asleep the man took it, examined it, shrugged, moved next to the window, pulled the hat onto his head and promptly fell back to sleep. Christmas carefully opened the curtain.

He went to the front of the bus. He gave the driver one hundred dollars. That left him twenty dollars and 260 bolívares.

“You’re going to hurt yourself,” the driver said. “You’re crazy.”

“I am alive,” said Christmas. He went down the steps to the door. The verge was changing width, sometimes down to no more than a yard before a steep drop into nothingness. The doors
gassed open.

“Next one,” said the driver, watching Slade in the rear view mirror. The verge widened. Christmas felt the rush of wind, the smells of sea and fumes and vegetation. He saw the long
grass rushing past.

“Ready,” said the driver. They swung round the bend, the driver watching the mirror. “Now!” and a fifty-eight year old, overweight, injured man with fear in his guts and
a memory that you had to try and stay loose in a fall, leapt from the bus into the dark.

Crunch.

Grass and branches. Spinning and crashing through undergrowth, his mind empty but for the prayer that he would not fall off a cliff. Christmas came to a stop.

He looked up into the night and heard the fading engines. Panting, Christmas moved his limbs, anticipating pain. His ribs stabbed him. His shoulder felt dislocated. Christmas turned over and
pushed himself up a little so he could see beyond the grass. There were no cars within sight. Clearing twigs from his neck, he lay down again, listening to crickets and wiping his face. He heard a
noise and lay flat, but it was nothing. Christmas slowly got to his feet, keeping his eyes on the road, wincing and cursing until he caught sight of tail lights curving over the next headland.

Scratched, broken and hobbling, he tried to walk along the verge but the grass was too thick. He went onto the tarmac. Headlights came over the brow, heading back towards Rio Caribe, so he
hopped back into the grass and lay down, muffling himself against the pain. It was a truck. Once it had passed he got back onto the road again. Another set of headlights approached. He resisted the
impulse to hide. He couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t Slade, but he had to risk it, telling himself that if Slade had seen him jump he would have stopped immediately. Christmas whispered
another prayer and stuck out his thumb. Rio Caribe was too far to walk. He had to get off the roadside before the bus arrived in Carúpano.

The car slowed to a stop. Christmas covered his eyes and squinted. It was an elderly couple. They had never seen a hitch-hiking gringo before.

Christmas eased into the back, biting his lip against the pain. He smiled. The relief overtook him. He started laughing. It hurt, but he couldn’t stop.

“You OK?” said the man.

“I’m just very happy,” said Christmas, “that you stopped. I got lost.”

“Where are you from?”

“England,” he said, laughing and the couple were laughing now too, though with bemusement.

“Where are you headed?” said the woman.

“Guiria,” Christmas laughed.

“We are going as far as Chacaracuar, OK?”

“That’s great,” he said, rubbing his eyes, “Wherever.” He felt for Emily’s book. What if Judith hadn’t told him to take his jacket? “Thank
you,” he sighed, chuckling. “Oh, Jesus Christ, thank you, thank you.”

S
lade checked every face on the bus, every face outside it, underneath the bus, in the luggage compartment. No Christmas.

“Fat,” he interrogated the driver, forcing the photograph into his face. “English – that hat there – that one—” louder, over and over again, but the
driver refused to talk to him. He shook his head. “No English,” he said. The other passengers wouldn’t talk to Slade either. The driver had told everyone that he was a gringo
murderer, just released from prison. Slade went back to the driver. His coat slipped. The driver saw the dive knife and started yelling for help. Slade left the bus. Men approached. They began to
encircle him. They were shouting. His coat fell away. He held the knife in front of him and backed towards his car.

He got in and shut the door. Some of the men tried to block his path. He drove into them. They got out of the way, kicking the car. Slade sped out onto the road. Another car had to emergency
brake, horn blaring; more voices swearing, but Slade was on the other side of the road, heading back to Rio Caribe.

The vehicle slid along the dark coast. Inside, Slade punched the dashboard, again and again. He roared and yanked at the steering wheel and punched the roof and took the knife with his free hand
and stabbed the passenger seat in the legs and chest. Then he pulled his arm right back and stabbed it through the face and left the knife sticking out. He panted. He dug his hand into his pocket
for the map drawn on the napkin. He stretched it over the steering wheel with both hands, examining it, accelerating.

Judith and Bridget were in the kitchen. Bridget had driven around and around Rio Caribe, getting increasingly cross until she decided that the only possibilities were that he
was getting drunk somewhere or had already made his own way back.

“What do you mean you lost him, you stupid girl?” Judith was gulping from a glass of wine. “Look at this bloody dinner! The guests are going to be here any minute and
they’ve all come to meet him and – oh God, it’s a disaster! How could you?”

“Have you listened to a single word I’ve said? I told him to wait by the
licorería
and when I got there he’d gone and that, Mother, is not my fucking
fault!”

“Don’t you swear at me!”

“Well, stop shouting then!”

Judith downed her glass and crossed her arms. “I mean what’s he going to do? He hasn’t got any money.”

“I gave him my wallet. He’s got plenty of money.”

“You did what?”

“I said, ‘Take my wallet, buy the booze, I’ll meet you back here.’ I told you.”

“Oh.”

“Look, Mummy, I think we both know what’s happened, OK?”

“Whatever do you mean?”

“He’s an alcoholic. He’s in a back room in Rio Caribe somewhere pissed out of his mind, probably passed out by now. Tomorrow he’ll wake up and—”

“Shut up!”

“Mummy—”

“He wouldn’t do that to me!” She began to sob, “... it’s my birthday.” Bridget took a deep breath. There was a knock at the door. “Oh Christ!”
said Judith, wiping her face. “They’re early. Perfect. Just perfect. Haven’t even put my face on and everything’s ruined and Harry and—”

“Mummy,” said Bridget, taking her by the shoulders. “Calm down, OK? I’ll take care of the guests. You go and get ready. I’m sure Harry’s going to turn up any
minute. I’m sure he’ll realise the time and he’s probably on his way right now in a taxi or something, OK? All right?” Judith exhaled and nodded. Bridget gave her a hug, and
then walked through the house to the front door shouting, “Just a second!”

She pulled open the door to meet the boiling eyes of a large white man with a burnt, unshaven face. He looked deranged, as if he had just walked out of a train crash. Bridget stepped back.

“Is he here?” Slade demanded.

“Excuse me?”

“Fucking Christmas! Harry fucking Christmas!”

“What?”

“Is he here?” Slade pushed past her and stepped inside.

“Hey!” she said, “HEY!” He went into the courtyard. He looked up at the doors. “Hey, I’m talking to you! What the fuck do you think you’re doing? Mummy!
Call the police!” Judith came out of her bedroom.

“What’s going on? Who are you?”

“Harry Christmas. Where is he? Is he up there?” Slade ran upstairs and Judith backed away.

“What the hell are you doing?” shouted Bridget. Slade was on the landing, pushing open doors. “Mummy, where’s the phone?”

“What the bloody hell is going on here? You! Young man, I’m talking to you!” bellowed Judith, following him around. “How dare you go barging around my house like this?
Get out! Immediately!” Slade ran downstairs. Judith ran down behind him and over to her daughter, pulling her close.

“He was here though, wasn’t he?”

“Get out of my house this instant!” yelled Judith, “This instant!” Slade pulled the photograph of Christmas from his back pocket.

“Who’s this?”

“Oh my God! Harry! Why have you got Harry’s picture?”

“So you do know him.”

“What is going on here?” demanded Bridget.

“Don’t fuck me about!” threatened Slade, “Where is Harry Christmas?”

“Harry
what
?”

“He’s called Harry Christmas. He’s a thieving piece of shit and I’m looking for him and I know he was here and want to know where the fuck he is
now
,
understand?”

“What are you talking about?”

“You’ve been conned. He’s a conman, his name’s not Strong, it’s Christmas, and I want to know where the fuck he is right the fuck now!”

“A conman?” stammered Judith. “What on earth are you talking about? Right, that’s it! Now get out! Get out and leave us alone!” Slade wasn’t listening. He was
running his eyes over the daughter. She had an inquisitive, feline face with cunning little shoulders. She was wearing a miniskirt and a bikini and she knew he was telling the truth.

“Mummy,” she said, “where’s the phone?”

“It’s over there. Call the police.”

“I’m going to – just a second. We need to – just wait a second.” Bridget went over to a side table. She picked up the phone. She got through to a friend in England
whom she told to put ‘Harry Strong, novelist’ into a search engine and pull up some photos.

“What does he look like ...?” Bridget’s face began to fall. She turned away. “So he’s not fat? At all?” She looked back at her mother. “How old? ...
Right. Shit. No moustache? No, OK ... Look, I’ll call you later and explain. No, everything’s fine ... Thanks – OK – Bye.” Bridget cocked her head to the side and
sighed deeply. “Mummy ...”

Judith sank to the floor. “No, no, it’s not true, it’s not true, no, Harry, please, no, it can’t be true ...” She exploded into tears, weeping from her lungs and
her gut.