Friend of the Devil

“And you slept with him?”

“Well . . . yes.”

“This was the first time you’d met him?”

“Yes. Winsome . . . what is it?”

“Nothing.” Winsome shook her head. “Go on.”

Annie took a long swig of wine. “He turned out to be a bit younger than I probably realized at first, and —”

1 2 2

P E T E R R O B I N S O N

“How young?”

Annie shrugged. “Dunno.

Twenty-two, twenty-three, around

there.”

Winsome’s eyes widened. “A boy! You picked up a boy in a bar and slept with him?”

“Don’t be so naive. These things do happen, you know.”

“Not to me, they don’t.”

“Well, you’re obviously not going to the right bars.”

“That’s not what I mean and you know it. I’m serious. I would never go home with anyone I met in a bar, and I would certainly never go home with someone so young.”

“But Winsome, you’re only thirty!”

Winsome’s eyes blazed. “And I would still never go to bed with a twenty-two-year- old. And you . . . how could you do that? It’s sick.

You must be old enough to be his mother.”

“Winsome, lighten up. People are starting to look at us. Maybe if I’d had a baby when I was eighteen I could be his mother, okay? But I didn’t, so cut the Oedipus shit.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about.”

“I never knew you were such a prude.”

“I am not a prude. You don’t have to be a prude to have . . .”

“To have what? What’s your point?”

“Moral standards. It’s not right.”

“Oh, moral standards, is it now? Not right?” Annie drank more wine. She was starting to feel dizzy, and more than a touch angry.

“Well, let me tell you what you can do with your moral standards, little Miss High-and-Mighty! You can shove them—”

“Don’t say that!”

Annie stopped. There was something in Winsome’s tone that caused her to back off. The two of them shuff led in their seats awhile, eyeing each other. Annie poured herself some more wine. “I thought you were my friend,” she said finally. “I didn’t expect you to go all judgmental on me.”

“I’m not being judgmental. I’m just shocked, that’s all.”

“What’s the big deal? That’s not the point of the story, anyway, his F R I E N D O F T H E D E V I L

1 2 3

age or having a one-night stand or smoking a couple of joints, or whatever it seems to have put that hair up your arse.”

“Don’t talk to me like that.”

Annie held her hand up. “Fine, fine. I can see this isn’t working.

Another bad idea. Let’s just pay the bill and go.”

“You haven’t finished your wine.”

Annie picked up her glass and drained it. “You can have the rest of the bottle,” she said, dropping a twenty- pound note on the table.

“And you can keep the fucking change.”

T H E S O U N D of a car screeching to a halt in front of his cottage around half past nine startled Banks. He wasn’t expecting anyone.

The only person who usually dropped by on spec was his son Brian, but he was supposed to be rehearsing in London with his new band.

Well, it was the same band, really, The Blue Lamps, but they had replaced Brian’s songwriting partner and fellow guitarist. Their sound had changed a little, but from the couple of demos Brian had played him, Banks thought