Damascus (15 page)

For last-minute luck Henry crossed his fingers and closed his eyes and recalled his vision of Miss Burns. Older, English rose, spectacles from reading so much, small affectionate cat and hair in a schoolmarmish bun. Greying hair, or brown hair, or she had black, blonde, red hair. She was rich, virtuous, fair, mild, noble, of good discourse, an excellent musician (woodwind), and her hair could be of whatever colour it pleased God. It didn't really matter, although it would be nice to be right about the cat.

He went over to the ticket-window where Clive Milnes, veteran bookie and former member of the Ulster Defence Regiment, waited to take his bet. Henry glanced back at the TV screens, but the display had changed again, switching to a promotion of some of the wilder bets always on offer to the reckless. You could bet on anything in Britain: the chances of sighting rare birds or the probable dates of the deaths of famous people. You could speculate on the date of an Irish ceasefire, or the length to the second of the Queen's Christmas speech, or the recent employment history and physical condition of Elvis. It was as if life was only a wager where nothing was ever certain. Some things were more possible or more plausible than others, obviously, but all these bets created the impression that nothing was ever impossible: you could probably put money on it.

At this point, Henry would have liked to stake all his father's money on the long-shot of getting engaged to Miss Burns by the end of the day. It would be a way of showing faith, as if he could make it happen just by having the courage to make the bet on it. Following the same principle he would make several side-bets, even at longish odds, that the first man to answer the phone had been an old and harmless friend of the family. As for the second man, the younger one, Henry would bet it was just a boy delivering a pizza, or maybe a younger brother. He would bet, anyway, that it was a voice of no importance.

The afternoon horses for Newcastle were back on the screen, and Henry pushed most of his father's bundle under the grille for the unfancied
Mr Confusion
in the High Society Rated Handicap at 2.30. Clive Milnes, bookie, former UDR man, father of five, said:

'That's a lot of money.'

'It's my lucky day.'

‘Then it can't be mine.'

Clive Milnes, bookie, former UDR, father of five, often dreamt he was an astronaut. He licked his thumb and counted the notes. Conversationally, because the British people liked a bit of conversation, Henry asked him if he thought
Mr Confusion
had a chance.

‘Everyone has a chance, my friend. However, if this horse comes home a winner I'd call it a miracle.'

‘Miracles happen though, don't they?'

‘It is not unknown. Unfortunately.'

Clive Milnes, bookie, UDR man, father of five, dreamer of outer space, coveter of the new Peugeot 405, wished he had this much money to put on a horse. He pushed Henry's ticket back under the partition.

Mad Dog John Maxey, son of the former Romford Raiders' coach,
Oberhof
tattoo (fore-arm), recently charged with Grievous Bodily Harm, looked up sharply and asked Henry how he planned to spend his winnings. At which point Matthew Beeston, former director-general of the NED, dressed as a beggar, pursued by the Child Support Agency, fell through the door and just about managed to stay on his feet. He swayed alarmingly, trying to focus on Henry, and the TV screens, and then both at the same time. John Maxey, Mad Dog, son of the Romford Raiders' coach,
Oberhof
, charged with GBH, set free by the Crown Prosecution Service, stood up and shoved him back out to the street. Then he focused his attention exclusively on Henry.

‘Nice holiday maybe? The Algarve. Lovely. Malta's not bad at this time of year.'

Henry wanted to be outside again, away from the accumulating, distracting, demanding weight of the full lives of other people. He wanted to concentrate on the ideal future he planned to enjoy with Miss Burns, where holidays would be intimate affairs somewhere at the British seaside, involving a little inshore yachting and idle games of bowls and special trips at dawn to catch crabs from the local sandbanks.

‘Well where then?' said John Maxey, Mad Dog, son of the former Raiders' coach,
Oberhof
, GBH, freed by the CPS, bound over to keep the peace, and casual nutcase. ‘Back home is it?'

Henry remembered Belfast, and it suddenly seemed vitally important to avoid all the terrible avoidable things which could happen to him before he met Miss Burns. Now was not the time to be the victim of an arbitrary stabbing, or to be run over or stoned or kidnapped or poisoned or fall from a high place, nor for that matter to be hit by fireworks or attacked by a lunatic racist.

He quickly backed out of the shop, and immediately collided with Matthew Beeston, former director-general of the NED, dressed as a beggar, pursued by the CSA, who only needed a handful of coppers to see himself right again. Henry peeled off most of what was left of the money and gave it to him, just in case there was a God watching. He couldn't afford to be picked out and punished by untimely lightning, not now that Miss Burns was so close.

After he met her it would all be different, of course. She was going to save him from all this.

It is the first of November 1993 and somewhere in Britain, in Ipswich or Harrow or Walsall or Llanelli, in Ilkeston or North Walsham or Motherwell or Leigh, Hazel Burns has given up boys. She is sixteen. To replace the excitement of the opposite sex she has embarked on a life of crime, and as often as once a week she takes a bus into the town centre where she steals money from kind old people and students. It couldn't be easier. She has her own collection box and depending on what's in the news she attaches a sticker for the
Leukaemia Research Fund
or
Mencap
or
Corda
or
Help
the Aged
or the
Webb Orphan's Fund
. The trick is to smile brightly and project the image of suffering children, who would all smile as brightly if only they could. Most eager to be robbed are casual acquaintances of the family who vaguely remember Hazel's disabled sister, and unhappy students who look at her breasts. Towards the end of the afternoon, Hazel empties her collection box and launders the loose change by taking it to the Post Office to buy phonecards.

‘It's good to have a hobby,' her Dad says, too busy to see it's not a collection.

It is now early evening on an overcast Monday in November, and it seems a long time since Hazel's last adventure in crime. Sitting in a new and bigger (Dad is Salesperson of the Year ‘93: china cormorants) but otherwise familiar front room, Hazel watches her mother hunched over the desk scrutinising recent bank statements from Lloyds or Midland or Natwest or the TSB. Hazel stays well out of range, sorting phonecards in thematic order on the coffee table. She asks if anything shows up yet.

‘I can't see anything.'

‘If he was having an affair it would show up somewhere in his bank statements.'

Hazel's mother is in need of drugs, of tranquillisers or uppers or downers. She angrily swipes a stack of statements off the desk and yells at Hazel.

‘You know a damn sight too much, young lady! Go to your room!'

And then just as suddenly her face creases and she rushes over to the sofa to apologise. Hazel keeps on grouping the cards because these mood-swings are nothing new, inspired as they are by the pills in the bathroom in packets marked Valium or Mogadon or Methydrine or Amitryptolene. They can make her mother lose track of what she's supposed to be feeling. ‘Marriage is a ritualised alliance,' she unexpectedly says. 'It's like a sports team.'

‘Do sports teams make people happy?'

‘I never expected to be happy.'

Hazel stands up. She says she's going for a walk.

‘Why?'

‘Fresh air. You know, the great outdoors.'

‘Don't speak to me like that.'

‘To play in traffic, talk to strangers, the usual.'

Her mother snatches up the newspaper and slaps it with the back of her hand. She hopes Hazel knows what she's doing, because no-one wants to see her end up as the next
Drug Coma Girl Dies
girl.

And with this familiar warning ringing in her ears Hazel pulls on her overcoat, stuffs a pocket full of miscellaneous phonecards, and steps out into a light drizzle which is always about to stop. She can take several different routes to a choice of phone-boxes, depending on whether she wants to walk through the new Wimpey or Barratt or McAlpine showhomes and out into the country, or past the MGM Warner UCI Odeon multiplex and from there into town. It doesn't matter much because she knows all the routes by heart, and time passes uneventfully as she thinks of other things, like perhaps her mother is right and her father has love affairs all the time, or even worse, one big love affair which never ends. It seems unlikely, considering all the time he spends selling instant chicken soup in Jerusalem or yarmulkas in bulk to New York mayoral campaigns. Perhaps he's having an affair abroad with someone who doesn't speak English, if that counts, but it's more likely that he's simply far too busy. And besides, nothing shows up on his bank statements.

She turns right at the multiplex showing
The Piano
and
Mr Wonderful
and
The Fugitive
and
Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story
. Decisions, decisions. Even though she's only sixteen, Hazel has all sorts of decisions to make, like should she change her A-levels and does she want to take a gap year before going to University? Does she love Sam Carter? She sometimes sleeps with him, but this is mainly statistics: most girls her age are doing it. She hasn't made the subsequent decision to turn it into love, which she believes is no more than a decision made or not made, depending on personal preference and the time of your life. No thunderbolts for her and Sam then, though Hazel often finds herself wishing for a more romantic type of romantic love, which would happen to her whether she liked it or not.

She is now waiting outside the phone-box (a fumbling, bent-backed, white-haired old lady is inside, of the type Hazel routinely robs of a Saturday). It's still raining but Hazel likes to wait in the rain. Being rained on is authentic, as is feeling a slight chill because this is November and winter's on its way. In mild discomfort she senses the residue of real life which concentrates itself in the sharper pains reported every day of the week in newspapers. Real life is everything which isn't her undramatic and comfortable existence, and she finds crime authentic precisely because it feels out of character. She often thinks back to the car crash, if only to reassure herself that at least once she knew a moment of real life sensation, but the crash also reminds her of Olive as she is now, swimming in championships, exploring waterfalls, trying to get in contact with a disabled luge team. She stays out late overnight and rolls home drank in the morning, sozzled on real life ever since she realised it made no difference whether she cared or not. In fact it makes a huge difference: not caring looks like a lot more fun.

Out comes the old lady (‘All yours, my dear') and in goes Hazel, sheltering inside the glass box with its glass sides, the rain needling its way past the scratches of
Laura loves Gary 2
and
Elliot Dies Tonight
and
Utd 1 QPR 1
. The rain is in the trees and under the tyres of cars as Hazel arranges a selection of phonecards on top of the telephone. She likes to buy picture-cards showing minority sports (bowls, yachting, ice hockey, basketball), or famous British people no-one's ever heard of (Edmund Blunden, Helen Sharman, Spencer Perceval, Alfred Mynn) or illustrated domestic advice (Phone Home!) or sometimes even poetry
(wavering blue floor of a skiff in the field's river softens a gash of red down the slant wreck of brick)
. Hazel always keeps the cards after they're used up. Each one is like a solid artefact left over from her rebellion against her mother, as she carelessly talks to a stranger for dangerous ages which she can later take home and measure in units. If it wasn't for her mother's paranoia, Hazel could have made these calls from home. But her mother tends to listen in on the extension, convinced Hazel only ever speaks to drug-dealers or young men who mend motorcycles.

She selects a card with a seagull on it advertising a holiday in Malta and feeds it into the machine. Spencer answers the phone himself and there are no introductions, no hums and has, just him talking and her talking, his words and hers spinning each other to ground. They talk about yesterday, today, tomorrow, they play games, they gravely and not so gravely discuss the meaning of life. Hazel wants to know if Spencer thinks she should take a gap year, and then has to explain what it is.

'Is this before or after we meet up?' Spencer wants to know.

But Hazel isn't going to risk ruining it all by actually meeting him. Spencer will take one look at her body and her blonde hair and he'll want to put it in, just like all the others. Instead she tells him that the real meaning of destiny, the way they both keep moving round the country, would be a chance meeting in a place neither of them had ever been before. ‘We probably wouldn't even recognise each other.'