He stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her, hugging her tight, pushing his face into her hair. It smelled of lemons and cinnamon.
“Oh my gawd!” She stifled a giggle.
“Pretend you know me, it’s important.”
He straightened up, feeling his cheeks glowing. His hands rested on her hips and down the tops of her backside. The muscles pulsed as she first pulled back and then stepped forward right under his chin. Scooping her along with his arm, he urged her back into motion.
“Are you completely barmy?” she asked.
“Just act along and keep your voice down.”
“It’s original, I will give you that.”
It was about twenty yards to the staff entrance of the castle. Lawrence became the world’s greatest actor pacing across a stage, dumb, his lines forgotten. The entire terrace to his right fell silent. He heard an incredulous whisper: “An officer, with that?” Jaw tight with anger, sweat dripping from his armpits, he kept his chin up and pace slow. They stopped just before the entrance, where two amused marines were watching them.
“What’s your name?”
“Sarah-Kelly. Yours?”
“I’m Lawrence. Do you know the Smith Grill?”
“I do, but—”
Lawrence pulled his crooked grin.
“But what? But what time?”
“It’s a dear place.”
“I’ll pay.”
“Suits me,” she said, ducking her face and smiling.
“Seven o’clock tonight.”
“Will we get a table?”
“It’s expensive. You can always get a table.”
“All right then.”
There followed an awkward pause, in which she stared across the gardens and fidgeted with the handle of her briefcase. He stooped and kissed her on the mouth, then turned and walked briskly away.
The point had been made. She was with Cost-Centre Lieutenant Aldingford. Now she had cover.
*
So that was how he met Sarah-Kelly Newman. He could see her face a foot from his, feel her blonde hair on his cheek, smell the perfume she made from lemons, cinnamon and vanilla oil. Like him, she was blonde and pure white. There had always been a nebulous suspicion of racism around them. That would have been fine on certain sovereign lands—the Shellingfield clan had a reputation for ‘shade preferences’—but it was not fine on Krossington land. Lawrence had sensed a subtle ‘bad smell’ expression from the waiters. Sarah-Kelly and he were utterly ostracised at the one officers’ dance they attended. Maybe that was the real reason he got fogged, he broke too many social taboos… And he had no friends or family looking out for him. Denouncing a fellow officer was only the catch of a trap door he had cut for himself. Yeah, it was not so hard to understand this fate now.
Chapter 6
Lawrence yearned to rest behind his own eyelids, the only private life available in the Night and Fog. However, he still had the evening shift of this first day to get through. His feet ached in the new boots. The collar of the stiff new overalls chafed his neck. He found himself looking back with nostalgia on the empty, supine days in the hold of the barge, sharing with the doomed load on the far side of the bulkhead a merciful ignorance of what life was about to serve him.
In the Dining Hall, men weaved from the counter with plates of pig’s cheek or kidney, roast potatoes, boiled pigeons’ eggs and cabbage. The food at least was one thing to be thankful for. By the time Lawrence had collected his dinner and edged back towards the tables of Gang 4, there were no places near Spiderman, Ugly Toes, or Yip-Dog, or anyone else he knew in passing. He asked if he could take a place between a couple of value he recognised from the gang. They nodded and beckoned him in.
“You the new boy then?” asked the chap on his right.
He had a round, cheery face with heavy, upswept eyebrows like a bird’s wings. When he spoke, he shut his eyes and slid his elbows about on the table top. To Lawrence, he seemed a bit of a clown.
“Yes, I’m Big Stak.”
“I’m Buttons.”
“And I’m Pig Tit.”
Pig Tit was a short chap, who looked like a piglet due to his upturned nose. He had small, chubby hands and stumpy limbs. Lawrence noted that Buttons’ tag was Gamma162 and Pig Tit’s was Gamma163. Possibly they arrived on the same barge.
“The grub is good here,” Lawrence said. In this banality, he was aware of how he was already getting absorbed into the place, by an irresistible process of blunting. He had spent the day up to his waist in drowned bodies and then dragging skin off cadavers, now here he was gobbling down roast potatoes. It had to be that way, for without food he could not work. If he did not work, he was done for. “It’s strange how fast you get used to this place.”
“You’ll settle in no problem, I’ve had my eyes on you, you’re a stallion. It’s not that bad here, if you make the best of it.”
Pig Tit giggled.
“How did you end up here?” Lawrence asked.
“Best not to talk about that,” Buttons said. “It doesn’t matter now, we’ve all had past lives that are over. All I can say is that personally, I’m as well off here as I was there.”
“Maybe better off,” Pig Tit said. The two men giggled again. This was getting on Lawrence’s nerves. He speeded up eating. Buttons’ hand slipped off the table and made a stealthy excursion up and down Lawrence’s thigh.
“Very nice. You’re very white—and blond. You from a racist family?”
“No. Do you mind…?”
“Oooh! My apologies.” Buttons leaned around Lawrence and winked at Pig Tit. “He’s choosy!”
Pig Tit giggled. Lawrence tossed the knife and fork onto his plate and stepped out backwards clear of the bench.
“Leaving us are you?” Buttons glared up at Lawrence. In a waspish voice, he said: “You’re a natural born wanker. Have fun with your right hand.”
Pig Tit giggled.
Lawrence drifted about for a minute, aware his face was burning in self-consciousness at standing alone like a spare prick. After some embarrassment, he saw a yard of bench free at the end of
