“Edna. Edna!” Betty Thorndike was leaning across the table trying to get Edna Clark’s attention, while one of the Merkinson twins – Betty thought it was Hilda but she couldn’t be sure, they both looked so alike – returned to her seat and dropped her handbag onto the floor beside her. Hilda – if it was Hilda – had been to the toilet more than fifteen minutes ago, while everyone else was still eating, her having bolted her food down in record time, and had spent the time since her return talking to Agnes Olroyd, as though she didn’t want to come back and join them: they were a funny pair, the Merkinsons.
When Edna turned around, from listening – disinterestedly – to John and Mary Tullen’s conversation about conservatories with Barbara Ashley and her husband, she was frowning.
“What?”
“He’s been a long time, hasn’t he,” Betty said across the table, nodding to the watch on her wrist. “Your Arthur.”
“He’s had a lot,” Edna said with a shrug. The disc jockey on the stage put on Glen Campbell’s Wichita Lineman.
“Oh, I love this, me,” Mary Tullen announced to the table, droopy-eyed, and promptly began trying to join in with the words, cigarette smoke drifting out of her partially open mouth.
“You’ve been a long time, Hilda,” said her sister Harriet, pushing her plate forward. Hilda noted that the food had been shuffled around on the plate but not much had been eaten.
“Been talking to Agnes Olroyd.”
“So I saw.”
“She was asking me about the robbery,” Hilda said.
“Robbery? I thought you said nothing had been taken.”
Hilda shrugged. “Robbery, break-in-it’s all the same thing.”
Hilda worked at the animal testing facility out on Aldershot Road where, two days earlier, she had come into work to discover someone had broken in during the night-animal rights protesters, her boss Ian Arbutt had told the police – and trashed the place.
Not wanting to talk about the break-in again – it having been a source of conversation everywhere in the town the past 36 hours, particularly in the Merkinson twins’ small two-up, two-down in Belmont Drive – Hilda’s sister said, “How’s her Eric?”
Hilda made a face. “His prostate’s not so good,” she said.
“Oh.” Harriet’s attention seemed more concentrated on Edna Clark.
As Mary elbowed her husband in the stomach, prising his attention away from a young woman returning to a nearby table with breasts that looked like they had been inflated, Betty Thorn-dike said to Edna, “D’you think he’s all right?”
Edna said, “He’s fine. He always goes at this time. Regular as clockwork. Doesn’t matter where he is.” This last revelation was accompanied by a slight shake of her head that seemed to convey both amazement and despair.
“I know,” Mary Tullen agreed. “It’s common knowledge, your Arthur’s regularity.”
“But he’s been a long time.” Betty nodded to Arthur’s unfinished meal. “And he hasn’t even finished his dinner.”
“He’ll finish it when he gets back,” Edna said with assurance.
Behind her, somebody said, “There’s no bloody paper down there.”
Hilda Merkinson knocked her glass over and a thin veil of lager spilled across the table and onto her sister’s lap. “Hilda! For goodness sake.”
“Damn it,” Hilda said.
Edna threw a spare serviette across the table and turned around. Billy Roberts was sliding into his seat on the next table.
Sitting across from Billy, Jack Hanlon burst into a loud laugh. “You didn’t use your hands again, did you, Billy? You’ll never sell any meat on Monday-smell’ll be there for days.”
Billy smiled broadly and held his hand out beneath his friend’s nose. Jack pulled back so quickly he nearly upturned his chair. He took a drink of Old Peculiar, swallowed and shook a B &H out of a pack lying on the table. “If you must know,” Billy said, lighting the cigarette and blowing a thick cloud up towards the ceiling, “I used my hanky.” He made a play of reaching into his pocket. “But I washed it out, see-” And he pretended to throw something across the table to his friend. This time, gravity took its toll and Jack went over backwards into the aisle.
As Jack got to his feet and righted his chair, Billy said, “I flushed it, didn’t I, daft bugger. But I was worried for a few minutes when I saw there wasn’t any paper – course, by that time, I’d done the deed. They need to check the bloody things more regular.” He blew out more smoke.
“Aren’t you going to tell somebody, Billy?” Helen Simpson asked, her eyes sparkling as they took in Billy Roberts’s quiffed hair.
“Can’t be arsed,” Billy said. “There’s some poor sod down there now – probably still down there: he’ll have something to say about it when he gets out,” he added as he did a quick glance at the entrance to see if he could see anybody returning who looked either a little sheepish or blazing with annoyance.
“That’ll be Arthur.” Edna looked over her shoulder at Betty. “I bet that’s my Arthur,” she said. She tapped Billy on the shoulder. “That’ll be my Arthur,” she said again.
“What’s that, Mrs Clark?” Billy said, turning. “What’s your Arthur gone and done now?”
“He went to the toilet ages ago. Billy says there might not be any paper. There’ll be hell to pay if there isn’t.”
Harriet Merkinson shuffled around in her handbag, produced a thick bundle of Kleenex and she held them out. “Here, why don’t you take him these?”
Edna nodded. “Thanks, er-”
“Harriet,” said Harriet.
“Thanks, Harry-good idea.” She passed the tissues back to Billy and gave a big smile. “Here, be an angel, Billy and go back down and push these under the door for me.”
“You haven’t been down to the gents, have you, Mrs Clark?” There was a snigger at the last part from Jack Hanlon. “You can’t get sod all under them doors.”
“Well, can’t you knock on his door or something?” She nodded to the table behind her. “He hasn’t even finished his meal.”
Hilda looked across at Arthur’s plate and noted that it didn’t look much different to her sister’s – the only difference was that one meal was finished with and the other wasn’t.
When he got back to the toilet, Billy saw one of the young waiters about to go into each cubicle to fasten a new roll of tissue into the dispenser. “Somebody tell you, did they? Was it Arthur Clark?”
The boy shook his head, his cheeks colouring. “It was some bloke, don’t know what he’s called,” the waiter said, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “Said he’d come down and a lot of the-” The boy paused, searching for the word.
“Traps?” Billy ventured.
The boy smiled. “Said a lot of the traps didn’t have no paper.”
“When was that?” Billy asked.
“Well, when he was down here, I suppose,” he said, frowning and holding up an armful of toilet rolls. “I just said-”