By the time I had mopped my head with a bath towel, and could see halfway properly, it was too late, because she had sensibly run away. Resembling a vampire just back from a lavish breakfast in some remote Transylvanian village, I wrapped the soaking towel around me and followed her into the kitchen, where I intended putting her hand into the microwave.
She stood by the sink, hands locked together and thrust towards me, shedding tears as copiously as my injured head was welling out blood. “Oh, Gilbert! Oh, my darling! Oh, I’m so sorry! How was I to know? I felt playful and loving, and wanted to give you a thrill. Oh dear me! It’s the first time I’ve done anything like that. Oh, my dearest!”
“Next time,” I yelled, “just think beforehand, then try a dummy run on somebody else.” A blow can be given playfully in certain situations, but here was something which called for a serious application of brute force, and seeing as how I had just about recovered from the shock, yet was still to a certain extent under its influence (as who wouldn’t be?) I had time to reflect on, and wind up my strength for, a blow which, though it might not draw such a quantity of life-blood as continued to gush out of me, would certainly have sent her sprawling across the table in the living room.
To my everlasting regret the doorbell went loud and clear, and with an agility I had never seen in her before, she sprang away from her Nemesis to answer it.
The pain in my head was biting, and I prayed she would come back before I fainted, so that I could continue where I left off. The towel around my waist barely soaked up blood running down my shoulders and chest, so I took a couple of tea towels from the drawer to carry on swabbing.
Mabel said in her huffiest tone at the door: “You can’t come in. He isn’t dressed yet. Write a letter, and make an appointment. Oh no you don’t. Keep back!”
Considering the peril she was well aware of having in store, her remarks showed character of a high order, when to stop whoever was coming in would save her from immediate retribution. Perhaps she thought it best to get the pounding over with, and not have worse to look forward to when I would be feeling somewhat stronger. In the meantime I padded my bloody footprints across the living room to pour a large brandy.
Whoever it was must have pushed by her. A man with the longest arms I had ever seen stood in the doorway, six feet tall and well built, his smile of nonentity showing a row of crocodile teeth, one of which was missing. “Are you Mr Blood?”
I was quite sharp with him. “What the bally hell does it look like?”
He stepped forward so that Mabel, comprehending the situation more quickly than I was able to at that moment, took the clutch of red roses from his large hands before he thought to let them go willingly. “Sidney Blood,” he said with delight and surprise. “So I’m meeting the real Sidney Blood at last.”
“My dear chap,” I said, “you couldn’t have found him painted a more characteristic colour. It’s a red letter day for you. I was in the bathroom cutting up an income tax inspector, who came in during the night claiming a hundred thousand pounds arrears of tax. It was sad, really. He pleaded for his life, told me he had children to consider. As if I cared. Cut and thrust. I was demented. No mercy. Cut and slash.” I swigged off half my brandy. “You’re not from the tax office, are you? And if not, who might you be.”
“Kenny Dukes, sir, Mr Blood. I’ve read all your books. I read them over and over again. You’re a genius. I’ve wanted to meet you all my life.”
I turned to Mabel, feeling more human at a fan appearing so early in the day. “Get my dressing gown, and another bath towel for my head. I’ll deal with you later, you stupid playful bitch.”
Kenny Dukes smiled, presumably on hearing sentiments to be expected from Sidney Blood. “You’ve not only made my day, sir,” he said with his diabolical bottom dog lisp, “but a whole years of Sundays as well.”
“I’m glad to hear it, Mr Dukes. You’ve made a contribution to my day as well, so sit down and join me in a brandy.”
“Oh, sir, I couldn’t.”
“When I say sit down, Mr Dukes, you do so. I was a major in the army, and stood no nonsense from the other ranks. Don’t let the fact that I’m covered in blood put you off. I saw far more than this in the War.” I encouraged him further by giving him a half-pint glass of brandy, of which he immediately sent a good part down, his Adam’s apple wiggling as if a couple of amorous cockroaches within were going at it like billy-ho to keep the species on the march. When I asked what he did for a living — such information always useful for my books — he looked me solidly in the eye: “I’m a criminal, sir.”
I flaked half-dried blood from my fingernail, to hide my joy at his artless revelation. “And I’m a novelist, so that makes two of us.” I called into the kitchen for Mabel to bring us breakfast. “We’ll start with porridge.”
“Mine’s a proper trade, sir.”
“Is it, then?”
He emptied his glass. “I’ve been at it a long time.”
“I suppose you served an apprenticeship?”
His eyes, from a sort of phlegmy blue, came even more alive. “Oh yes, sir. I went to a lot of places, but I haven’t been inside for a long time.”
“Why is that?”
“I got good, didn’t I?”
“I assume you’ll have breakfast with me?”
“Oh yes, sir. It would be a privilege.”
“Good at what, though?”
“Nicking things. And GBH. I knock people about. Cut ’em up. I do it so quick they don’t know it happened because I’m a long way off before they feel the blood. Another thing is, if I get witnessed, Lord Moggerhanger puts his mouthpiece Arnold Killisick on the case. The beak loves me by the time Mr Killisick’s finished saying what a good lad I am, and that nobody as innocent as me should even be in the dock. Mr Killisick brings my mother up in a Rolls Royce to sob at the beak how I take her to church every Sunday. She tells him I sing like an angel in the choir, and serve tea to lads at the youth club to stop them turning into juvenile delinquents. By the time she’s finished I’m crying as well. And the beak don’t send me down, see?”
“It sounds as if you live in a criminals’ paradise.”
“I do, sir. In this country you can get away with anything. One of the beaks had been a social worker, and he let me right off. I didn’t even get fined. He gave the police a right bollocking.”
“As long as your mother stands by you.”
“Oh, she does. She’d do anything for a box of chocolates. Loves the ride through Streatham with all the neighbours looking on as she waves from the Rolls Royce like the Queen.”
His mention of Moggerhanger reminded me that three years ago the latter had asked me to ghost his autobiography, and paid a generous advance, but my stomach turned, yes, even mine, over the material that came to light. So I pulled out of the contract, much to his annoyance, and I still haven’t returned the money. I wondered whether this call by one of his henchmen wasn’t a ruse to extract it from me, though I couldn’t imagine it, because even he would be wary of getting on the wrong side of Sidney Blood. “You said your employer was Lord Moggerhanger?”
Kenny’s eyes gleamed. “I’ve been in his employ nearly twenty years, and I’ve never known a gaffer like him. He’s lavish. He looks after his own, he does. Treats me like a dog, but he’s a real gentleman. I’m not working today, though, so I’ve come to see you.”
“I’m happy you did, Mr Dukes, despite the awkward moment, with all this red paint over me.”