‘I’ve never heard such crap. Get the hell out of here!’
She started to get up and I got a grip on her biceps around the bracelet and pulled here down. She flexed the muscle and resisted, but I put on more pressure. ‘Listen, lady. I don’t give a fuck what drugs you peddle to who. I don’t care if you turn on the whole North Shore. I just want to see Mountain.’
She sneered at me, and the frustration and anger that had been bottled up in me for days came out; I needed to hurt someone and she was closest. I gripped her arm tighter. ‘I don’t care if you imagine people raping you and report it to the police. You can imagine me raping you if you like.’
She smiled suddenly and almost sweetly. It was as if I’d said the magic word. She tapped my hand with one long finger and I let her go. ‘That’s better,’ she said. ‘I’ve decided that you’re an interesting man after all. Let me get you a drink.’
‘You’re not going anywhere.’ I spoke in what I thought was a firm voice, but I felt less dominant, and anchored to the spot.
‘No, no, of course.’ She waved in the direction of the bar and made a gesture with her hands to indicate a drink. It was okay by me; my throat was dry from the heat and the smoke, and Deirdre Kelly’s bad smell and sudden switch in mood had strung me out and made me nervous. The topless barmaid came over with a bottle of champagne and a glass on a tray. The party seethed around her, and she had to lift the tray to get it clear of grasping hands. Kelly cleared a hand aside with a swift chop and stroked a fish-netted thigh as she took the tray in her other hand.
‘Not bad, eh? What d’you think of her?’
‘She’s well-built,’ I said. ‘When’s Mountain due?’
‘He’ll be along.’ She dismissed the barmaid with a light slap and poured me out a glass of champagne. ‘I won’t do anything to stop you seeing Bill, on one condition.’
I didn’t answer; I didn’t fancy bargaining with her. I drank some champagne and looked at the angry red mark I’d made on her arm. I felt a burning in my stomach- champagne’s not what it was.
‘On condition that you let me listen to your conversation.’ She took the glass from me and sipped; her lipstick purpled the edge.
‘That’d be up to him.’
‘Oh, he’d let me. He lets me do anything I like.’
A man fell into the pit, and Kelly eased herself away from him and closer to me. There seemed to be just as many people in the room as before, but fewer of them were standing up.
‘When did you see him last?’
‘Today. This morning.’ She leaned closer and her odour was gamy, feral. ‘We made love all night.’
‘That so? When does he find time to write?’
She laughed, not the cackle this time but a fluid, oily sound. ‘Not when he’s with me, I can promise you that. His writing’s brilliant, like his fucking.’
‘Have you read it?’
‘No, but he’s told me about it.’
I knew she was lying, and she knew I knew. She took the glass, drank some wine and spilled some more on her dress. The stain showed black on the dark silk.
‘Consume myself, starting with my own brain.’ I sounded like Orson Welles. I smiled and said it again.
What?’ she gasped.
‘What?’
‘You said something.’ She shoved aside the man who had fallen into the pit and had rolled over. An arm flopped down from floor level and hung in space between us.
‘No, I didn’t say anything.’ I looked around the room for the nearest door, just in case of trouble, but there was no door. The mirror ran from the ceiling and down all four walls. I blinked and the mirror shattered into a kaleidoscope of colours that blinked back at me. The people changed into dwarfs and giants; I tried to focus on the nearest faces and the features went rubbery and all shapes went angular like in a Picasso painting. A huge nose grew out of a man’s rubbery face and pressed towards a woman’s swollen breasts. Then the breasts shrank and the woman’s chest went concave and the nose pressed in and in.
I tried to stand up but Deirdre Kelly pushed me down like a mother cat tumbling one of her kittens. The music shrilled and screamed; I put my hands over my ears to shut it out, and my ears felt huge, wet and terrifying. Kelly’s rank breath flooded over me.
‘You’re passing out, Mr Somebody. You’re going to be sorry you hurt me.’
I was sorry already, and wanted to say so. My stomach lurched and my head fell towards my knees and I didn’t care where it landed. It passed my knees and went on falling.
24
When I came out of it, I felt as if I was lying around in four or five separate pieces. Reconstituting myself was agony but I made the effort. I wriggled and twitched and made mental contact with the furthest off bits. When I was back in one piece I found that the piece was tied at the wrists and ankles. I was naked and in a room I had never seen before. That made for a very uncomfortable feeling, the familiarity of my body and the utter strangeness of the room.
If I was still in Apartment Seven, this had to be the locked room off the hallway. It wasn’t hard to see why Dee Kelly kept it locked: the room was painted black from floor to ceiling; there was enough concealed lighting for me to make out objects in the room from the propped-against-a-wall position I’d wriggled into. A big low bed dominated one corner; a couple of upholstered chairs were over by one wall and there was a six foot high padded post jutting up out of the black carpet in the centre of the room. I squirmed to get my head around for a look along the wall. There seemed to be irregularities in it, protuberances that broke up the smooth, black surface. They were irregularities all right-chains and manacles in a dull, non-reflective metal like night-fighting weapons. I looked with alarm-sharpened vision at the bed; it had ropes and chains attached to its headboard; along another wall was a rack containing whips and canes and other objects I couldn’t identify and didn’t want to.
My arms were drawn together under my thighs and my wrists were tied; I was sitting with my knees drawn up and the knots of the ropes around my ankles were underneath, below my calves. When I could move my hands without wanting to scream, I tried to get my fingers to work on the knots, but it was impossible. No give in the rope-expert job. I had a raging thirst and could still hear, through the throbbing inside my head, the sounds I’d heard before I’d passed out, although I was pretty sure that the room was actually dead quiet. At least things were restored to their normal shapes and sizes, if you could say that bondage beds and chains and manacles had normal shapes and sizes.
I was registering these comforting, orientating thoughts when a section of black wall swung in and William Mountain entered the room. I recognised him, although he was incredibly changed. He was clean-shaven with short hair. Drastic weight loss had left the skin of his face loose and plastic-looking. His body was strong and well- conditioned; there could be no doubt about that, because all he was wearing was a pair of skin-tight leather pants. He came across and looked down at me; his eyes were wide open, red-veined and mad. Those eyes were the most frightening thing so far in ten minutes or so of rising fear. He squatted down easily in front of me, and the fat lines around his waist were minimal. The light leather creaked.
‘Cliff Hardy, how nice to see you.’
His smile was simple, unaffected, genuine. I’d never seen him smile out of an un-hirsute face before, and the effect was obscene.
‘Mountain,’ I croaked. ‘Great joke, Bill.’
He shook his head slowly. ‘No joke, Hardy.’
‘We’ve got a lot of talking to do,’ I babbled. ‘I’ve been looking for you for…’
‘Days, weeks, I know.’
‘You know? How? Look, these bloody ropes’re…’
‘I didn’t exactly know it’d be you. I’m a bit surprised, actually. I thought you only did clean work, or cleanish. This is a dirty job-working for them.’
