Darkmans. Nicola Barker

       ABACUS BUILDERS LTD

      Harvey Broad owned four mobile phones, three of which he kept neatly suspended, at his hip, in his ‘builder’s buddy’ (a kind of construction worker’s gun holster) which was fashioned out of an expensive-looking sandy-coloured leather (‘This is a prototype, Guv. Have a guess at what kinda hide that is…Pig?! Pull the other one! That’s Buffalo, mate. Straight up. Got her designed and crafted, to my own specifications, by a female in Norfolk who imports the skins, wholesale, from Yank-land and makes all kinds of shit out of ‘em…’).

      Also dangling from this heavy-duty charm bracelet were a torch (‘This here, my young friend, is the Surefire Millennium Magnum. Ain’t she a pretty one? Wanna proper butcher’s? Let me unhook her for ya. Nah, mate, nah. Don’t touch. I’ll run through all the functions just as soon as…

      Right. So this baby is totally water and shock resistant. Blasts out 500 Lumens. See that? Take a guess at how much they rushed me for it? Take a wild guess…Five pounds? Oi! Does this kid know the value of money or what?! How does 392 dollars grab ya? I say dollars because this here torch is the first choice of the American Military; and trust me, those geezers don’t mess around wiv’ their hardware…’)

      A protective face mask (‘New one every day, sure as eggs. Don’t ever fuck around wiv’ ya lungs. You probably couldn’t tell by the look of me – I’m in fairly buff condition if I say so myself – but I only have three-quarters of the normal lung capacity for a man of my years. Got involved in a diving accident, in Malta, when I was still just a nipper. Bought me tanks off of some shonky army geezer. First time I used ‘em the bastards imploded. I was 25-fuckin’-feet under water. Nearly finished me off, it did…’)

      A pair of wrap-around sunglasses, of the type generally favoured by slightly psychotic, recently widowed, Dodge-driving American octogenarians (‘Believe it or not, my own dear wife Linda bought me these for thirty-odd quid off the Shoppin’ Channel. QVC: Quality, Value, Convenience. They’re totally, bloody indestructible. In the car I’ve got my Raybans – for smart – but these babies have what my oldest calls Unabomber Chic, and you just can’t put a price-tag on that.’)

      A little hammer, a set of screw-drivers and some pliers. (‘I like my tools how I like my women: small, well-crafted, lightly greased.’)

      A toy truck – a Monster Truck; a Dinky; ‘Bigfoot 7’, to be precise – neatly fashioned (by his own hand), into a key-ring for his customised Toyota.

      Bigfoot 7 was originally (he told a bemused Elen) an F250 Ford Pick-up with a 540-cubic-inch engine which had been painstakingly fitted with four, huge wheels (by a man called Bob Chandler – ‘a folk hero of the American car industry’) to enable it to perform a series of stunts (chiefly – so far as she could gauge – to drive over a line of old cars and lay waste to them. She wasn’t entirely sure why this was a good thing, and she didn’t dare ask. It just was, apparently).

      Harvey delighted in telling her how it took ‘three men three hours to change a single, damn tyre. Imagine that? It’s just completely bloody fucked!’). There were many Bigfoots (‘I mean some of these babies can jump over 200 feet…’), but 7’s claim to fame was that it had been used – to great effect – in the Hollywood classic Turner and Hooch (‘You ever see that film? You never saw it? Are you kiddin’ me?! I should lend you my copy. It’s about a dog detective. Stars Tom Hanks. The boy’ll fuckin’ love it.’).

      Harvey was also the proud owner of three of the first four As in the building section of the local phone book: AAABuilders and Plumbers PLC – which he called ‘Treble A’ whenever he answered the relevant phone (‘I always think it sounds a bit “Vegas”, somehow, a bit plummy, a bit flash. Know what I mean?’), Aardvark Builders and Plumbers inc, the advert for which was slightly larger than most, and doubly distinguished by a small etching (‘I paid through the bollocks for that – excuse my French’) of an anteater (‘a straight-up mistake,’ he told Elen, over his umpteenth cup of tea, on one of the rare occasions he actually visited their property, ‘but if some Smart Alec gets all up on their high heels about it, I always says, “Well here’s a nice idea, mate: why don’t we just forget all about your plumbin’ disaster and head off on a fact-findin’ trip to the f-in’ zoo instead?”’).

      Aardvark attracted chiefly a female clientele. Men, by and large, were impressed by Abacus Builders and Plumbers Ltd (‘To this day, I still don’t really understand what an Abacus is. No word of a lie, Helen. Apparently it looks something like a kid’s toy.’).

      Three adverts out of the initial four (which – all things considered – was pretty impressive), but ‘pole position’ (as Harvey would have it) remained in the vice-like grip of Garry Spivey, genial (if iron-fisted) proprietor of A Priori Builders Ltd.

      Spivey’s apparently effortless alphabetical ascendancy rendered Harvey (his deeply competitive runner-up) almost incontinent with rage. In fact it was the very first subject he’d interrogate prospective clients on (through a highly unconvincing mask of subterfuge and bullshit…‘Just a couple of last things, Sir, to help out the suits in our Marketing Department…’) before he’d even contemplate contracting to work for them.

      Isidore (and Elen) were no exception –

      Harvey (cornering Dory while Elen went off to make some coffee): So how’d you actually get to hear about Abacus?

      Isidore: The phone book.

      Harvey (in tones of some surprise): Not a personal recommendation, then?

      Isidore: No.

      Harvey (rapidly removing a smart-looking electronic palm from his pocket and scribbling everything down on to it with a tiny, metal pen): That’s interestin’, very interestin’…

      Isidore: I just looked you up in the building section.

      Harvey (still scribbling): Is that so?

      Isidore: Yes.

      Harvey: And Abacus was the first firm you tried?

      (The conversation is briefly interrupted at this point by a phone call in which Harvey is heard to tell his interlocutor: ‘I don’t know, mate, but it might be septicaemia. Yeah. Heel blister. Curse of the new trainer…Nah. ‘Course I can’t spell the fucker. I ain’t a soddin’ doctor. Tell him it’s blood poisonin’. It’s the same thing, yeah? Tell him to have a bloody heart, mate. This is Life or fuckin’ Death, ya with me?’)

      Harvey (slotting the phone away – Isidore noticed, idly, that it was the blue Nokia): So you was tellin’ me about how you initially came to contact