going to be like this all fucking day. Today it’s the fucking Irish, next week it’s the fucking Greeks and next month, wouldya believe it, it’s the fucking Puerto Ricans.”
“No problem,” said Joker. “I’m in no hurry.”
“Whatever you say,” said the driver. He began pumping his fist on the horn. “You English?”
“Scottish,” replied Joker.
“Yeah? I’m from Turkey. Great fucking country, America. Fucking great.” He continued to pound on the horn and swear at the traffic ahead. It seemed to Joker that the man’s swearing vocabulary was limited to the one expletive and that he couldn’t go for more than a minute without using it at least twice.
Joker looked across at the crowds walking by the shops. It was a cold spring day and most people were wearing long coats and scarves. The gutters were full of rubbish: old newspapers, squashed soft drink cans and empty cigarette packs. No-one seemed to care. A thick-set man in an expensive cashmere overcoat dropped a half- finished cigar onto the ground and it glowed redly until it was crushed by a white high-heeled shoe. Joker’s gaze travelled up from the shoe to a shapely leg that disappeared into a fawn raincoat. The woman was a brunette, her hair glossy and shoulder length. She brushed past a large black man who thrust a styrofoam cup at her and asked for change. The beggar shouted something after her but she showed no sign of hearing him and he waved the cup at a businessman who pretended not to see him. Eye contact seemed to be kept to a minimum as if acknowledging another’s existence would only lead to confrontation. The beggar saw that Joker was looking at him and he grinned. He ambled over to the cab, put a hand on the roof and bent down.
“Got any change?” he mouthed through the closed window.
Joker shook his head. All he had were the bills the Colonel had given him.
“Fuck off, why don’t you?” the cab driver shouted. “Leave my fare alone.”
“It’s okay,” said Joker. “No problem.”
“And get your filthy fucking hand off my fucking cab!” the driver screamed.
The beggar walked to the front of the vehicle. He was wearing a shabby grey wool coat, with the buttons missing, over brown trousers that were wearing thin at the knees and a stained green pullover. He was still smiling but there was a cold, almost psychotic, stare in his eyes. His neck muscles tensed and he reared his head back and then he spat a stream of greenish phlegm across the windscreen.
“You fucking animal!” the driver screamed. He switched his wipers on and they streaked the saliva across the glass. The beggar began to cackle, nodding his head backwards and forwards as he laughed. The driver pressed his windscreen wash button and thin jets of water crawled up the glass. “What the fuck is this city coming to?” the driver yelled rhetorically. The traffic began to move and the cab pulled away. Joker turned to watch the beggar and for a couple of seconds they had eye contact and he had a cold feeling somewhere deep inside as he realised that he didn’t have too far to fall before he’d have to live on the streets himself and he wondered how he’d make out in a city like New York without a home, without money. After he’d quit his job as a nightwatchman on the Isle of Dogs, he was out of work for almost six weeks and he’d come close to being destitute. If his landlord hadn’t agreed to wait for his rent, Joker knew he’d have ended up sleeping in shop doorways. He had no close family and no savings and he was all too well aware that there was no Government safety-net waiting to catch him if he fell. “Fucking animals,” repeated the driver.
“Yeah,” said Joker, not wanting to argue. “Can you drop me here?”
“I thought you said Thirty-seventh Street?”
“Yeah, I did, but I’m feeling ill. I’d rather walk.”
“Okay, okay. Whatever you want. Just don’t throw up in the fucking cab, that’s all.” The cab slammed to a halt and Joker thrust the fare through a small hole in a Perspex barrier that kept the driver insulated from his passengers. He opened the door and pulled his cheap suitcase after him. The outside air felt cold after the overheated cab interior so he walked briskly to keep warm. In the distance he could hear the wail of bagpipes and he headed towards them.
He found the parade heading down Fifth Avenue and stood among the watching crowds, the suitcase at his feet and his hands thrust deep into the pockets of his pea jacket. A group of kilted pipers were playing Mull of Kintyre. The pipers moved on, followed by a huge float in the shape of the Loch Ness Monster on either side of which had been stencilled the name of a Japanese computer company. Across the thoroughfare was an imposing white marble and stone Gothic cathedral and as the float moved by Joker saw it was called St Patrick’s.
Joker wondered how many of the spectators who were cheering and waving flags realised that the pipers and the monster were Scottish and not Irish. It didn’t seem to make any difference, everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. A gleaming fire engine rolled by, decorated with huge cardboard shamrocks and with the firemen all dressed in green. It was followed by a large float decorated like an Irish hill with large inflatable cows surrounding a huge yellow block with the word BUTTER etched into it.
Behind the float was a line of old American cars, all convertibles with big, sweeping fins and lots of chrome. In the back of each car were youngsters waving to the crowds and on the doors were printed cards with the names of what Joker supposed were television shows:
“Yeah, right,” said the clown dismissively and flopped over in his yard-long shoes to a group of children. Paper streamers were raining down from the skyscrapers overlooking the parade and one wrapped itself around Joker’s neck. He pulled it off and dropped it into the street.
A float sponsored by an insurance company rolled by, decked out in green with a trio of fiddlers playing an Irish folk tune while half a dozen girls danced a jig. Joker picked up his suitcase and began walking through the crowds.
He’d been in New York a number of times before and knew that there were several small hotels off 37th Street, close to the East River. He made slow progress along Fifth Avenue because of all the sightseers. A marching band of young black girls in silver spandex outfits and tall braided helmets overtook him in a flurry of whirling sticks, followed by young boys in similar outfits blowing brass instruments and beating drums. He decided to get off Fifth Avenue and waited until there was a gap in the parade before dashing across. Once he’d left the route of the parade the streets were relatively quiet and after a twenty-minute walk he was outside the hotel he’d chosen: The White Horse. It had been formed by knocking together two brownstone houses and refurbished on the cheap with plasterboard partitions, plastic light fittings and thin carpets. There was a small reception desk beyond the main door where a Hispanic woman was talking on the phone. She raised her eyebrows when Joker walked in but carried on her conversation. Joker put his suitcase down and waited. Eventually she pushed over a registration card for him to fill in. The ballpoint pen she gave him leaked and there were blobs of ink all over the card by the time he’d finished. She picked up the card, read it, took an imprint from his credit card and handed him a key, all the time talking into the phone. She gestured at a staircase to her right as she cackled away in Spanish.
Joker’s room was on the third floor, at the back of the hotel, where it overlooked an alley which was dark and forbidding even in the afternoon. A rusting fire escape wound its way down the building and Joker pulled open the window to take a closer look. It provided a back way out in an emergency but he was also well aware that it offered a way in for any intruder. He checked the lock on the window but he knew that it wouldn’t deter an enthusiastic amateur, never mind a professional. An air-conditioner was set into the wall underneath the window but nothing happened when he switched it on. He kicked it halfheartedly.
A small bathroom led off the bedroom, containing a shower stall, a cracked yellow washbasin and a toilet. A piece of paper was wrapped across the seat along with a note telling him that it had been sanitised for his protection. He picked up a glass tumbler from the shelf under the bathroom mirror and went back into the bedroom where he sat on the single bed and opened his suitcase. He took out a bottle of Famous Grouse and poured himself a decent measure. He toasted his reflection in the window. “‘If I can make it here, I can make it anywhere’,” he said, his voice loaded with sarcasm.
Howard sat in Theodore Clayton’s outer office, his leather briefcase at his feet. His father-in-law’s secretary kept flashing him sympathetic looks but Howard didn’t show his annoyance. If Clayton wanted to play infantile
