Darkmans. Nicola Barker
responded to (‘What am I?’ he’d sometimes mutter. ‘A dog to be whistled at?’).
He used his own phone continuously (had to, for work), but he chiefly relied on its texting facility, and if – by chance – he was awaiting an urgent call, he’d set it on to vibrate (a vibration he could just about tolerate – it didn’t shriek or keen or insist) and then shove it, carelessly, into the front pocket of his denim jacket.
The brick-orange phone continued to sing.
Kane re-entered the flat, strolled over to Beede’s desk, placed his hands on to his knees (bending from his hips, keeping his legs tensed – like a linesman at a tennis match) and gazed down at the phone, scowling.
Still – still – it rang. He expostulated, sharply, then crouched down and curled his arm around the pile of magazines (accidentally snagging the top few with the turned-up cuff of his jacket and pulling them down on to the carpet –
Damn!)
He grabbed the receiver –
Wow…
Heavy
– then placed it, tentatively, to his ear. He didn’t speak.
And at the other end of the line?
Silence.
‘Hello?’ Kane whispered, finally.
(Was this an entirely different world, this Beede-phone world? Was he speaking into some kind of supernatural vacuum, into a sphere utterly beyond everyday concepts of the here and the now?)
‘Beede?’
Male. Young-ish. A pronounced German accent.
‘No.’ Kane stood up, smartly (the highly coiled, creamy-white wire connecting the receiver to the phone stretching itself, languorously).
‘No. This is Kane, his son.’
‘Kane?’
‘Yes.’
Kane nodded.
‘Beede’s son?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is Beede there, by any chance?’
‘Uh,’ Kane glanced nervously around him, ‘no. No, he isn’t.’
‘Oh.’
Long pause
‘I suppose you could always try him at work,’ Kane volunteered, helpfully.
‘Yes. Yes. That’s true. I could. In fact I was. But this number suddenly just…it just popped into my head. Out of the blue. It was really…really quite odd. So I grabbed the bull by the horns and I just…I rang it.’
‘I see.’
‘You know how that happens, sometimes?’
Eh?
Kane frowned and cocked his head.
‘Although I’m not sure if he ever…’ the German muttered, distractedly.
Pause
‘…I’m not sure if he ever actually gave it to me. The number. I just plucked it from…How to describe it? I just plucked it from the air. From…from the ether.’
Longer pause
‘Isn’t that odd? Do you think that’s odd?’
Kane cleared his throat, nervously, not really sure how to answer.
Silence
‘Perhaps you could leave him a message?’ he finally suggested (impressed by the quiet, somehow. It didn’t drag. It was dynamic. It crackled. Was that a German thing? Did the Teutonic races have some special kind of strangle-hold on the high-quality conversational hiatus?).
‘Beede’s son…’ The German mused, reflectively, as if calling something very peripheral to mind.
Kane said nothing.
‘Beede’s son, Kane…’ he repeated, this time rather more emphatically.
Kane merely scowled.
‘Kane. Yes. But of course…’ (a connection was suddenly established), ‘now I remember: you shared a coffee together, didn’t you, earlier this morning?’
Was that a question, Kane wondered, or just a bald statement, posing as one?
‘Although – and I’m being brutally honest here,’ the German confided, ‘when I actually looked over towards the window – the window where he pointed (and I can see it now, very clearly, in my mind’s eye) you were gone. The window was empty. So there was no way of really…of really knowing…’
‘We did meet,’ Kane butted in, impatiently, ‘quite by chance. Just before lunch. At the French Connection.’
‘That’s it!’ the German sounded gleeful. ‘That’s right! That’s exactly right! The French Connection! Ha!’
Kane took a small, nervous step back, a move which the phone line gently resisted.
‘What did you say your name was, again?’ he asked, feeling a sudden, sharp twinge of paranoia.
‘So you’re absolutely positive, then,’ the German barrelled on, determinedly, ‘and I mean totally certain that you met Beede there for coffee this morning?’
‘Why wouldn’t I be?’ Kane fired back, defensively.
‘God, yes…I remember the fort…’ the German muttered (heading off, without warning, on a sudden tangent) ‘…the children’s fort. The fort is significant, but I’m not entirely sure…uh…’
‘Who are you?’
Kane was now officially freaked out.
‘Isidore,’ the man answered plainly (perhaps a little startled by Kane’s forceful tone). ‘Didn’t I say so before? I’m sorry. How incredibly rude. Forgive me. I’m Isidore. Dory. Beede and I do the tours together.’
‘Pardon?’
Kane didn’t follow.
‘The Ashford Tours. I’m the chauffeur. Beede’s my guide.’
‘Ashford Tours?’
Kane still wasn’t quite up to speed.
‘Yes…Although it’s just a side-line, really. And your father’s been so caught up in his work at the laundry lately…Security’s our main function – keeping keys, guarding empty properties, a little light detective work…’
‘Beede is your guide?’
Kane was struggling to catch on (I mean Beede? A guide? That old sourpuss? Welcoming people? Putting on a show? Being informative? Friendly? Obliging? Beede being positive? About modern Ashford of all places – the source of all his gloom? The heart of all his disappointments? Had the world finally gone absolutely bloody barking?).
‘A great guide. A brilliant guide. Your father is quite a remarkable man,’ the German observed, dryly (was it dryness, or something else?), ‘but I’m sure you’re already very well aware of that fact.’
‘Oh yeah…’ Kane mumbled,