High society Read online

  ‘I’m only mad for it with you,’ she assured him as they lay together in each other’s arms, and then, after a long, thoughtful silence, she added, ‘Do you think it’s because I lost my father when I was little that you’re so attractive to me, Peter?’ Not, perhaps, the most flattering suggestion to make to one’s older lover.

  ‘No, I imagine it’s because of my ravishing good looks and awesome sexual powers.’

  ‘That too, of course. That goes without saying.’

  ‘In politics nothing goes without saying and saying many many times.’

  ‘This isn’t politics, Peter. It’s our life together.’

  Once more the burning light of sexual power and professional good fortune that had lit the path of Peter’s inner man since he had almost simultaneously begun his political and sexual rebirth flickered a little. Life together? Not a comfortable phrase.

  ‘We should be beginning to think about making a move,’ he said. ‘I’m due in the house.’

  But Samantha did not seem to wish to move. ‘I was eleven when he died.’

  ‘Ah. I can’t imagine how awful it must have been.’ What else could one say?

  ‘It was cancer, but he and Mummy managed to keep it from me until nearly the end. Do you know that for five years afterwards, until I was nearly sixteen, I wrote a poem to him every single day? Every day I would wake up early, thinking about him, and I would set about my poem, eleven lines it had to be, one for each of the years he was in my life.’

  Peter glanced at his watch. It was not that he wasn’t interested in Samantha’s life, but an appointment with the Party Chairman was not something to be taken lightly. If Samantha was aware of Peter’s impatience she ignored it.

  ‘Sometimes it made me late for school. I’m sure all the poems must have been very similar. How could they not be? But I always tried, each time, to feel his love and his passing in a new and immediate way. It didn’t matter, anyway, because each morning at eleven o’clock I’d destroy my poem. I’d leave class, or whatever I was doing, hide away and burn it and blow kisses to the face that I saw in the flames. I thought that the smoke carried my love and my sorrow up to heaven where Daddy would read what I’d written in the air.’

  This was the first time that Peter had seen Samantha cry.

  ‘Eventually my mother made me see a psychiatrist. She had no choice, I’d become an obsessive. I hadn’t even begun to let go. The woman I saw was very good and really helped me. Slowly but surely we broke up my cycle of dependence on Daddy’s memory. I stopped writing my poems every day and even began to talk to boys, but every now and then, ever since, once a week or perhaps once a fortnight, I still do my old thing — not necessarily eleven lines or at eleven o’clock, my shrink cured me of that — but nonetheless I still write to Daddy and send my thoughts in smoke to heaven…’

  The tears were really rolling now and Peter felt moved to cry too.

  And then Samantha’s face changed. Despite the still wet tears a radiant smile lit it up. ‘Except not now, Peter. Since the day I met you I haven’t written him a single word.’

  Samantha kissed Peter gently on the lips. Her hand stole down inside his trousers. Her warm lips were at his neck. But Peter Paget did not feel like sex any more, and it was no longer the lateness of the hour that was distracting him. It was the intensity of Samantha’s emotions. What a shock, what an extreme shock to get into bed with a happy-go-lucky young sexpot and then find oneself in the arms of a complex and damaged individual. Samantha had exploded into his life naked and unencumbered. Now, it seemed, her baggage had arrived.

  THE PRIORY CLINIC

  Well, as I say, I had suddenly become aware of the fact that I and my little posse of young dance partners were getting further and further away from the main body of the party, but I didn’t have time to get scared because at that point my whole evening was brought to an end when I was pretty much forcibly ejected by this big man called Henry. He was some sort of police community liaison officer, and suddenly he thrust himself between me and the young men. They didn’t like him at all, they called him Judas because he was black and he worked with the police, but he faced them down anyway.’

  A WAREHOUSE PARTY, BRIXTON

  You get outta here right now, woman! You get right back where you come from. Dey’s cabs outside. Get in one!’

  The boys gathered round behind Henry, their hard cockney accents a contrast to his soft West Indian lilt.

  ‘ey, chill, you Jamaican motherfukka! We jus’ dancin’ wiv we bitch. Ain’t nuffing to do wiv you.’

  Henry kept his eyes firmly on Emily, and said, in deliberately exaggerated Caribbean tones, ‘I said piss off, woman. Dis am’ no touris’ ‘traction. We am’ here so’s we can ‘muse you.’

  ‘You have no right to talk to me like that! I’m just dancing! I was invited here. You don’t like me because I’m white, do you? Admit it!’

  ‘Dat’s right, girl. Dat’s for sure. Right now I don’t like you ‘cos you white.’

  ‘Well, that is just totally racist. I think you’re being totally racist!’

  THE PRIORY CLINIC

  Henry just laughed at that and then turned round to the boys. I couldn’t hear a lot of what he was saying, but he was obviously taking all the fun out of the situation because after a brief altercation they just turned round and strutted off. Then Henry grabbed me by the arm and half dragged me outside. He was very angry and he didn’t like me at all. He kept asking what the hell I thought I was doing there, going on about me being a tourist come to look at all the black people, which I thought was terribly unfair. After all, I had been invited to the party, sort of. But when we got outside the cold air hit me, and I saw how angry he was. Then the drug let-down began.’

  BRIXTON HIGH ROAD

  Those boys don’t know who you was, honey, but I do, oh yeah. I read the papers on account of somethin’ ‘bout the front line gonna be in ‘em most days and usually not too complimentary. You’re that wild-child chick, right? Always dancing with royals and gettin’ married to Tommy Hanson or whatever. For sure you’re all those boys needed.’

  ‘Why did you force me out of that party?’

  ‘Because you’re a fuckin’ tourist an’ you were liable to get a lot of stupid young black men into a lot of trouble.’

  ‘What the hell do you mean? I was just dancing!’

  ‘You were just being a pissed, stoned, half-naked little cock teaser, sister! Shaking your I’ll’ ass at those boys and — ’

  ‘I was dancing!’

  ‘Listen! You was gettin’ herded towards a dark room by a bunch of very drunk, very horny guys! Now I don’t think they would have been so stupid as to try an’ do nothing to you, but somethin’’ bad coulda happened either to you or more likely to them.’

  ‘To them?’

  ‘Exactly, sister. I saw you, all hysterical an’ full of yourself. I saw you kiss the front guy and squeeze his ass.’

  ‘I was dancing!’

  ‘So supposin’ you got inside that room and suddenly one of them tries to push things too far and you’d got scared an’ shouted rape! Or else you let him have a piece but tomorrow mornin’ when you’re straight you starts to think about what happened and your rich daddy finds out an’ says his sweet I’ll’ virgin flower bin defiled by a gang o’ dirty black men!’

  ‘I can look after my — ’

  ‘Look at you, woman! You are completely wired! You are totally fucked up! Any thin’ coulda happened in there and who would ever know the truth? Maybe they’d ‘a piled into you. Maybe you’d ‘a let ‘em. Either way nobody gonna be happy in the mornin’. You think we need that? You think those fuckin’ boys who is already bottom of the pile ain’t got enough problems in life without no tourist from the Home Counties dancing in jiggling her pooties in front of der face an’ maybe blowing the whole damn community sky high? You’re an important woman, a celebrity. If you get into trouble people gonna know ‘bout it and the cops ain’t never gonna let it go till th
ey bust some black boys, and that’s gonna start a fuckin’ race war! We do not need that shit, woman! So go an’ buy your drugs and get your low-life fuckin’ kicks somewhere else!’

  THE PRIORY CLINIC

  Til never forget the look of contempt on that man’s face as he pushed me into a minicab. That was when I decided to come here. I took the cab to my place, picked up some cash and some slightly more sensible knickers and headed straight here for help. I really am sick of being an idiot, and as I said I’m grateful to Tommy for helping me realize that. I’m even more grateful to Henry, even though he hated me so much. Thank God a look of contempt was the worst thing that happened that night.’

  BRIXTON HOSPITAL

  It wasn’t the worst thing that happened that night.

  Two hours before Emily had finally got into a cab and had headed north of the river, Trevor, the Rastafarian who had pulled her from the gutter and taken her to his home, was shot. Now he lay in hospital, badly wounded but nonetheless anxious to make a statement.

  ‘Listen, just ‘cos I’m a Rastaman don’t mean I’m a fucking Yardie. I work in a bike shop. I don’t know what happened, right? We was just chillin’ in my house, man. Having some music, smokin’ some weed like we always do. My old lady was home from work, man, she’s nearly one of you lot ‘cos she’s a traffic warden and she got your name on her shoulder. She’s cookin’ up some nice lamb for me dinner and everyt’ing is cool. I had had some friends round before…No, I knew them all, except for some crazy white chick. Emily, she was called, I think, but anyway, it don’t matter, guy, because they had all gone off raving and it was just me and the missus. So like I say everyt’ing is cool and nice, when suddenly this white geezer just walks in off the street. We keep our door open most times because a lotta guys coming round and I don’t wanna be getting up for no door when I’m sitting all comfortable. So this geezer walks in and I knew for sure that he was very badly fucked up, man. He had that look, he was crazy on drugs, too many drugs, he had tracks all over him, man, his arms, his neck, fuck knows where else, and he was staring like a fuckin’ mad dog or somet’ing. So right away I’m thinking he wants to score and he’s seen a black man smokin’ in his house and maybe he thinks I’m chasing the dragon or wha’ever. So I starts to tell him that I don’t do no horse and I don’t deal not’ing anyways and I don’t let no one in me house but me friends and that he should fuck off soon as is convenient, as long as that is right now, when he shouts, ‘I’m taking your bitch! Motherfucker! She gonna work for me!’ He got some French accent or somet’ing, I don’t know, European for sure, so I tells him I don’t know what the fuck he’s talking about and then fuckin’ hell he gets out a fuckin’ gun and shoots me, man! I couldn’t believe it! I ain’t never even seen a gun and the geezer shoots me, except he’s so fucked up he shoots me in the leg like you see and then BAM! He gets a big pot of lamb stew round the head because my old lady she don’t fuck around, you know what I’m saying? Also, you do not fuck around with her. So down he goes and that’s when we called you geezers. I don’t know why he shot me ‘cept he definitely thought I had some woman that he wanted, which I can tell you for sure, guy, I don’t. That’s all I know.’

  DALSTON POLICE STATION

  North of the river, at Dalston Police Station, another type of interview was being conducted. Commander Leman was watching it through the glass of a two-way mirror. A woman and a teenaged girl faced each other across a table. The girl was very distressed. Her make-up was streaked with tears and her hands were shaking. The woman, a detective who specialized in sexual crimes, took the girl’s hand.

  ‘I came back from the toilet, I finished my drink and then this man came over to our table and said he was the manager.’

  ‘Can you describe him?’

  ‘No, we were in a club. It was dark and noisy. He was just a man, that’s all. He said that there was a phone call for me. He knew my name.’

  Commander Leman knew the girl. She was a friend of Anna, his daughter. Anna to whom only a few hours before he had been handing out Tommy Hanson merchandise. The desk sergeant at the station knew that the girl was a family friend of the Lemans and so had alerted the Commander to the situation. The distressed girl’s name was Joanna, but Leman knew her as Jo Jo.

  He watched her through the glass. She was trying to form a sentence but was having difficulty speaking.

  During the previous weekend this same girl had been with Anna in the rumpus room of the Leman household, watching Grease for what was probably the hundredth time.

  ‘I remember walking across the club and the lights and everything…and then, nothing.’

  Jo Jo had been found unconscious in a doorway at around four a.m. The police had been searching for her ever since her friends had raised the alarm at around ten thirty. Commander Leman knew that Jo Jo sometimes went to adult places with older girls. That was a part of her life that he had strictly forbidden Anna to join. When she was found, Jo Jo had been difficult to rouse, and her speech was slurred. The officers who discovered her reported that her clothing was in considerable disarray.

  Everything was pointing in one unimaginably terrible direction. One word pounded away in Leman’s brain, one horrible, horrible word.

  Rohypnol.

  VICTORIA COACH STATION

  There had been an accident outside the coach station and the traffic was stationary. Jessie’s coach had been waiting for over an hour and she had fallen into conversation with the old lady sitting beside her.

  ‘All us girls who worked for Francois knew that he was goin’ tae crash and burn. Well, we were all goin’ taste, but that swine was way ahead of us. Ah suppose if you’re a pimp there’s no’ a lot taste do most of the time except take drugs and that’s what he did. All the time Ah knew him he was taking drugs and during that time he got stupider and stupider. Pretty soon he wasnae bothered what kind of shit he was taking. We used tae talk about it a lot because now that he was all fucked up he couldnae beat us up so easy, and we used to ask ourselves why don’t we just leave? He had a gun, of course, but ye know, we could have just grabbed it offa him when he was crashed and put it in the bog. We could ‘a run, Ah swear. Any time, we could ‘a run. Why didn’t we? Well, ye know the answer. Drugs. What else?’

  The old lady had not known the answer, but she was learning fast.

  ‘We’re all nearly as hooked as he is, and Francois was our supply. We didnae know any different, we only went out to work, we had no other life. So we’d whore and gi’ him the money and he’d buy shit and take most of it hi’sel’ and give the rest tae us, and we’d go out and whore again. That was why Ah never went tae the police when he was beating me, or after he had basically kidnapped me in the first place. Because the thing Ah wanted most in the world was illegal, and the thing Ah did tae get it was illegal. Ah walk the streets and Ah take heroin. That’s ma life. The cops wouldnae protect me. They wouldnae be remotely interested in me — they have tae earn a living catching speeding motorists.

  ‘Anyway, Ah wouldna thought Francois could ‘a got any more fucked up than he was, but a coupla weeks ago he really began tae surpass himself. He’d been down tae Brixton to score some gear and had stayed away all night. When he got back to the wee flat we all lived in, which he got offa the council free because he reckoned he was unemployed, he had definitely emigrated taste Planet Paranoid for good. From that moment on he only went out when he absolutely had taste, tae collect our money or score. The rest of the time he just laid about on his bed, jumpin’ at every sound and peekin’ out the windows. Well, we just put it down taste the drugs, of course, but this mornin’ we found out that he’s reason tae be nervous. We was all sittin’ about after the night’s work — fortunately non o’ us wi’ any needles stickin’ out our arms — when about fifteen cops suddenly smashed down the door an’ nicked the bastard. We thought it was a drugs bust, o’ course, an’ that we was all for it, but it turned out they just wanted Francois.

  These cops were firearms officers, ye
see, which as ye know is very heavy shit indeed. They was all shoutin’ and pointin’ their guns at Francois because it turned out that when he’d gone taste Brixton that night he’d been completely screwed up on bad shit that he’d shot some black fellah in his living room. The police didnae tell us why, they just bunged him on the floor, cuffed him and took him away. An’ good riddance, say I.’

  ‘So that was it. Suddenly Francois was oot o’ the picture, because there was no way he was getting out on bail, and so us girls was finally free of his clutches. Four skinny, dirty teenage whore slaves had suddenly got themselves free. Got out from under one of the biggest shites that ever walked on God’s earth.

  ‘So what was our reaction?’

  The old lady, who was no fool, suggested that perhaps it had something to do with drugs.

  ‘Well, it’s obvious, isn’t it? Ye’d ‘a been the same if ye were a junkie whore. Sheer terror, was our reaction. Where the fuck was we gonna get hit up? Where could we get a fix? We’re zombies, that’s what we are. Slaves tae the brown. We’ve lost our free will, we’ve no minds of our own and no life but the one Francois had made for us, and we was absolutely shittin’ it without him.

  ‘Get this. We wanted him back. We actually wanted the bastard back. Can ye believe it? Ah still cannae believe it. The man was an evil vicious bastard and he destroyed ma life, but if the police had offered him bail us girls would have gone out and whored for it there and then.’