Such a lesson in Blaskin’s unspeakable behaviour I didn’t need, me, who would never get into the situation of having to hit a woman. It was taboo in my blood and bones, no matter what the provocation. The very notion of striking Frances would be the end of all things to our marriage. I was sure Blaskin had never smacked my mother around in their young days, a relationship which had been too short for him to think of it anyway, but if he had she would certainly have given two for his one, if not three.
You didn’t knock any woman about, so when Blaskin’s arm came back to give Mabel a further slam I gripped it firmly in mid air. “Leave her alone.”
I didn’t know who was more disappointed, he or Mabel, to go by their looks, but supposed I had stopped him only to retain the good opinion of Sophie, on the assumption that she disapproved of the goings on. I didn’t care what he and Mabel got up to alone in the flat, but I kept my hold on his wrist. “If you must, wait till we’re not here.”
He lit a cigar, and blew a perfect smoke ring towards the ceiling. “I hope you don’t think she’ll thank you for it.”
Mabel looked at me, in fact, with anguish and contempt. “You shouldn’t interfere, Michael. I can take care of myself. When I want your sort of person to take pity on me I shall ask for it. I have my pride, after all, and if you can’t see that you shouldn’t come between Gilbert and myself.”
I wondered whether Blaskin hadn’t given her a secret signal to demolish my character now. He threw back his prick-head for a donkey laugh. “Life’s hard, Michael, especially with a woman like her.”
What could I say? What more could I say? He was about to embark on another long monologue across the continent of his interior wasteland, but Mabel, a hand at her face, and standing out of range, said: “I still mean every word, Gilbert. You really must mend your ways.”
He was amiable. “How, darling? You know I love you too much ever to do such a thing. You’d soon get tired of me if I did, and you know it.”
“But there are limits,” she said, “and if you don’t soon recognise them I really shall have to leave you.”
“And where will you go?”
She looked too smug for her own safety. “I’ll live in a women’s commune.”
Sophie took my hand, and pulled me to sit down, as if the eternal to and fro arguing of Mabel and Blaskin had at last tired her out.
“I seem to be the recruiting sergeant for such organisations,” Blaskin said, “though I did think that by now they were somewhat passé. The sort of woman who runs to one of those was born hating men. She began of course by hating herself, and because it made her seem an interesting personality to some poor man, he fell in love with her. Twenty years later, when the man’s eaten up and destroyed, she comes out of the potting shed and goes to live with a woman in a commune.”
“God will strike you dead for saying that.”
He looked up from his whisky. “You mean He’s a lesbian? And yet, darling, since he may well be, I promise to do my best from now on, and mend my ways.”
Ignoring Sophie’s laugh, Mabel was about to make some response when the telephone split the air into fragments. “Answer the blasted thing,” Blaskin told her, and when she picked up the receiver a shout inside made her jump. “It’s Lord Moggerhanger, and he wants to speak to you, Michael. In no uncertain terms, he says. Oh why must all men swear?”
I was glad of an excuse to escape the atmosphere of iniquity. “Yes, sir?”
The familiar voice bounced into my ear. “Why did you purloin all those Monte Cristos from my Roller?”
I was having none of his treating me like a common thief. “Parkhurst took them. Or Jericho Jim.”
“Those jailbirds only smoke the modern equivalent of Woodbines.”
“Tell the robbing bastard to go to hell,” Blaskin yelled.
“I heard that,” Moggerhanger said. “You can inform that rubberhead that he still owes me ten thousand on my autobiography he never wrote.”
“His remark wasn’t meant for you, sir.” I had no inclination to fight on two fronts. “He’s rehearsing a play, and that’s one of the lines.”
“And it’s about a crooked drug dealer who owns most of Soho,” Blaskin ranted, to the wrong person, I thought. “I’m calling it The Rat Trap, and it’ll run in the West End for forty years.”
“Shut up, you cunt,” I told him.
“Michael,” Moggerhanger said. “I’ve never been referred to as one of those before. Apart from it being a vile insult to the ladies, you had better watch your step.”
“I was talking to my father, Gilbert Blaskin.”
He chuckled. “That, I have to say, makes a difference.”
Blaskin was dancing with mischief. “Blind Samson in Gaza will have nothing on me when I bring his drug empire crashing down.”
My hand hadn’t gone over the mouthpiece quickly enough for Moggerhanger’s sharp ears. “The writer at your elbow,” he said, “will go a step too far some day. I know he’s one of England’s greatest novelists, and as I’m patriotic I can only applaud him for it, but if he’s not careful he’ll end up without even the wherewithall to hold a pen, except for his two left toes, which would slow him down somewhat. Tell him to shut up so that we can get down to business.”
“What business is that?” I asked.
“Don’t have anything to do with the scumbag,” came loud and clear from Blaskin.
After a silence I said again: “What did you have in mind, Lord Moggerhanger?”
“Michael, need you ask? For a start, kill him. Kill that irresponsible braggart. Go on, what are you waiting for? Now. This second. Do it now. It’s an order. Kill the swine.”
“But he’s my father.”
“So where’s the problem? If he had five pretty children and a doting wife I could understand. But if someone had told me to kill my father and promised fifty quid I’d have done it like a shot — well, perhaps two shots, just to make sure. Anyway, before he gets in another assegai shaft at my integrity all I have to say is I want you over here as soon as possible. I’ve got the job of a lifetime for you. It’s right up your street.”
Phone down, Sophie disentangled herself from Gilbert’s arms. “What was that about?”
“Nothing.” I was blazing with rage. “But I have a job to do here first.” I pulled out the gun Bill had given me in Greece, and aimed it at Blaskin’s heart from six feet away, “and it’s to murder my father. Sorry you couldn’t have had him for longer.”
Hands went up before him. “Michael, if you shoot you’ll have it on your conscience for the rest of your life, because unluckily for you they don’t hang people anymore. Oh, I already feel sorry for all your mental torment.”
I could never tell how serious he was, though I hoped for a shade of human fear. “You want to ruin my prospects, you bigoted old goat.”
Of course, he only laughed. “All right, then, kill me. Go on, release me. Do what the Germans and Italians failed to do. Feel good about it. Put me out of my misery. Do me a favour — but send me to where Mabel can’t get at me.”
The gun wasn’t loaded anyway, or I wouldn’t have been stupid enough to pull such a stunt, but at the click of the safety catch Mabel interposed herself between us. Blaskin tried to push her aside, but she was stronger than him and, I think, never happier in wanting to die for him.
“I can’t even get myself killed,” he winked, “and have one of the most interesting obituaries in literary history.”
I simulated rage. “I’ll kill you both, then.”
“Michael, you really wouldn’t send us into death hand in hand, would you? A more vindictive scheme I can’t imagine, and from my own son as well. Even though it would be useful to put in a novel I wouldn’t be here to do it.” He shook his head. “But Mabel and me together for eternity? Oh, no!”