This is so relaxing… in fact it’s the most relaxing time I’ve spent in fucking years! Just doing nothing, letting your thoughts slowly unravel and meander.
Vicky… how uncharacteristically quiet she’s been the last few days… no emails or texts returned… like I’ve somehow upset her. What the fuck did ah dae? She can’t be up the kite after the flunky burst, cause she had her period on, and in any case, she scoffed that morning-after pill straight away.
Does she know about Marianne? Could she tell?
Marianne lied about no shagging anybody, cause she defo rode Sick Boy’s brother-in-law. And obviously Sick Boy himself. Who else?
Fuck, they thin wisps ay air coming through that straw… I cannae hear or see anything…
BEGBIE!
I’m at his mercy! He could just cut off ma fuckin air supply right now!
What the fuck… cool it…
As they say in the movies: if the cunt wanted ays deid I’d already be deid…
Stay fucking calm.
Fuckin itchy knob, but I cannae scratch it cause I dinnae fuckin ken whae the fuck’s watching…
Funny but this sortay staeted oaf as barry at first but it’s gaun aw sortay messed up cause one ay ma nostrils is jist pure seizen up, like, then it pure shuts, like wi aw the ching n snotters… oh man… the second yin… ah pits muh hand up in the air… ah cannae breathe!
Help ays, Franco!
Ah cannae breeeethe…
Frank Begbie is still on the phone with Martin, but has shifted the discussion from suitable London exhibition venues onto his own area of interest. — If Axl Rose saw that fuckin catalogue, he’d be right in for that yin ay Slash. Just get it oot tae his people.
— Right, I’ll send it to his management, and also the record company.
— Call Liam Gallagher’s lot, and Noel Gallagher’s n aw. And they boys in the Kinks, the Davies brothers. There’s a huge market in the music business we huvnae even started to tap intae.
— I’m on it. But, Jim, I’m conscious of your time, and the commissions are rolling in.
— Ah’ve plenty time.
In the workshop, Danny Murphy, rendered blind, deaf and anosmatic, rises from his stool in terror, tearing at the set block of wet plaster-concrete mix that encases his face. He stumbles over Mark Renton. Alarmed by the weight on him, the sensation of tipping off the stool and tumbling to the floor, Renton reflexively grabs out, striking at something. Feeling a walloping blow to his side, Simon Williamson panic-strickenly raises his hands, trying to pull the heavy object from his face.
Frank Begbie hears the banging, thrashing sounds, and abruptly ends the call. He returns to find the studio in chaos. Spud, arms and legs spreadeagled, lies immobile, on top of a flailing Renton, while Sick Boy has collapsed across a trolley. Franco grabs a huge set of stainless-steel cutters and tears north from the side of Sick Boy’s neck, pulling open the block, exposing his grateful face as he fills his lungs. — Fuck… fuck sake… what happened?
— Some cunt was fuckin aboot, Frank says, in a voice that strikes terror into Sick Boy. It is almost signalling the return of someone much feared, whose impending presence is hinted at, but as yet unconfirmed. Sick Boy sees it in the eyes staring at him, inspecting the latex mask, before looking to the imprint in the discarded block, noting it has set as a mould. — Good… Franco Begbie purrs, hauling in a breath, seeming to slip back into the mode of artist Jim Francis.
Franco pulls Spud’s almost weightless figure from Mark Renton. He falls to his knees and starts giving Renton the same treatment as Sick Boy.
— Will I take this off him? Sick Boy asks, reaching for the block that covers Spud Murphy’s face.
— Leave it! Franco first snaps, then adds, more gently, – Ah’ll see tae it… as he cuts and tears Renton’s casing from his head.
A gasping, jerking Renton can suddenly breathe, as he feels the air and sees the light flood in. Then Frank Begbie is lunging at him with a pair of industrial cutters. — NO, FRANK!
— Shut it, I’m taking this oaf for ye!
— Ay, okay… thanks, Frank… Renton wheezes in gratitude. — Some cunt fell on ays, he moans, as Frank Begbie springs the mould from him. Then Franco is over to Spud Murphy, now a thin, motionless body sticking out from a block of concrete.
— I was smacked by some bastard, Sick Boy says, pulling the latex mask from his face.
— It wisnae me… Spud fuckin fell on toap ay me! What was he playing at? Renton rises, staring at the immobile body on the floor. — Fuck… is he okay?
Frank Begbie ignores them, cutting through the block, then tearing it from Spud’s head. He rips off the latex mask. Spud doesn’t respond to a hearty slap across the chops, so Begbie pinches his nose and sets to work on him with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Sick Boy and Renton look at each other in trepidation.
Frank lurches back as Spud’s lungs explode into life, puke shooting across the floor, then trickling out from the side of his mouth as Franco spins him onto his side. — He’s awright, he announces, before helping Spud to sit up, propping him against the wall.
Spud gulps in air. — What happened…?
— Sorry, bud, ma fault. Fuckin phone. Franco shakes his head. — Loast track ay the time.
A snigger suddenly ebbs from Renton. First Sick Boy looks at him, then Spud and Franco, compelling him to ask, — What’s the worst job you’ve ever had?
The laughter is loud and tension breaks from them like wild stallions smashing out of a corral. Even Spud, through a fitting cough, is moved to join in. When there’s a lull, Sick Boy looks at his phone and turns to Begbie. — Is that us done?
— Aye, thanks for your help. If you have to get off, go ahead, Franco nods, then turns to the others. — Mark, Danny, ah could do wi a wee hand.
— What can we do? Renton wonders out loud.
— Help ays cast my ain heid.
On this news, Sick Boy finds himself inclined to loiter, as they assist Franco in putting on his own latex mask. Then, as he had done to them, they encase his head in the Perspex box, and start to pour the concrete-plaster mix around it. The timer on the clock is set. As the block solidifies, Sick Boy play air-humps at it, to Spud’s and Renton’s mild amusement. As they know through experience, Franco will hear nothing now, yet they opt to remain silent.
At the allotted time, they tear off the mould. The freed artist calmly inspects the indentation of his own face in the concrete block. — Good work, boys, it’s perfect. He immediately starts to cast all the heads from the impressions, filling them in with clay. Once they set, he explains, he will do the eyes by hand, from photographs he takes of them all. Then he’ll take the moulds to a specialist forge to be cast in bronze.
Sick Boy is now fascinated, and in no hurry to leave. They chat more easily and when the heads finally come out of the kiln, the others are shocked, not at their own images, but that of Frank Begbie’s. There is something about it, gaunt and tense, still with hollows for the eyes that he will add later. It isn’t a representation of the man now in their company. The head looks like how he used to appear; full of psychotic anger and murderous intent, and that is before he has filled in those blank voids. It is the mouth; it twists in a familiar cold sneer, which they haven’t yet seen in the Jim Francis version. It chills each man to his bones.