Slow Poison - Chapter One

Chapter One

Amsterdam, 1986

Killing Time.

Red lights glowed like cinders in the crisp December air. Trim shivered in Armani camel, watching the doorway of the Casa Rosso. This was the evening of the third day. He watched and waited, smoking an hour away, waiting for The Six. Den, Pete, ‘Dog’, Mart, Kev and Ritchie; feral pack animals, careering through the City of Love, leaving a trail of phlegm and expensive scratches, wrist-high on Mercedes lacquer.

On that first evening in The Victoria, they had exploded into the restaurant, destroying his reverie. He closed the leather-bound diary he was reading to watch the swell and swagger of denim. His chest felt tight, his mouth dry. He hardened. On an impulse, he followed them into their night, moving rivet-close in the crowded streets. They could be useful. He would need someone like them.

On the morning of the third day, he watched them spew through the steel exit doors of the Sleep-Inn on the Rozengracht, groping their way into the bright winter sunshine, unwashed and unshaven, a breakfast of beer in progress. He watched them curse at the waves of cyclists, teetering through their group, bells clamouring.

“Fuckin' Cloggies! Why don’t ya look where yer fuckin’ goin’!”

When at last The Six emerged from the depths of the Casa Rosso, he limped behind them as they roared down the urinous alleyways of The Walletjes, chanting their tribal anthems in tuneless tenors and baritones. Few windows in those dark clefts escaped the lick of their felt-tip pens.

He watched them crumble their hash in shadowy doorways. He watched them crack the window of a Showarma bar on the Kloveniersburgwal, watched them run from the honing steel and curses of the Israeli owner. He found them again as they stormed The Victoria, rattling the ashtrays and coffee cups in the glazed sidewalk conservatory.

“You don’t know nuffin about fuckin’ tactics.”

“Lissen! The fuckin’ ref was well out of order.”

“Yeah, yeah...”

“Who was there? I was fuckin’ well there, that’s who!”

Trim followed quietly, sat at a corner table and felt for the diary in his coat pocket. A waiter was suddenly at his shoulder, pen poised.

“Sir?”

“Spa Citroen, alsjeblieft.”

The pages of the diary had yellowed with age, the pencil marks almost faded to invisibility. In the half-light of the piano bar, it was hard to make out the words. He pulled the decorative candle closer, but not too close. Just near enough to enable reading.

July 3rd 1939. The summer cottage. The two of us, sequestered in pastoral seclusion. Lowing cattle, bleating rams, sheep. We find green berries ripening in the hedgerow. Behind the cottage, wisps of early mist rise above the clover. Ghosts, listlessly undecided between earthly delights and paradise.

His heart slowed to the beat of a dozen fists. The Six were mobile again, slamming themselves into the outer edge of the Bechstein baby grand. Trim closed the diary and leaned back into the shadows. He sipped his Spa Citroen and looked around the half-empty bar. He lit a Sobranie, blew the smoke into the candle flame and focussed on his prey.

Two couples sat at their table, half-hidden from Trim. Fretwork shadows played over their faces, candlelight gleaming in their eyes. Glyn and Janet, Fred and Becky.

Fred Farthing was a big muscular man with brush-cut black hair and a broad, tanned face with full lips; part hidden by a bushy moustache. Becky was younger, in her mid thirties, neat and pretty, bobbed brown hair, natural make-up, soft spoken. Fred sat grinning, his fat, un-manicured fingers curled around his glass, warming the cheap champagne.

“I’m looking forward to this!” said Fred, rubbing his ample belly.

“You eat too much for your own good!” laughed Becky.

“When I lose sight of me shoes, I’ll start worrying!”

“It’s not your shoes you should be worrying about!” said Glyn.

Glyn Wood was plump, with wispy, ginger hair showing advanced signs of receding. He and Janet were holidaying with the Farthings. The party were in a bright mood. This evening’s meal was Fred’s treat. Glyn had done the honours the night before with a show, champagne and a small phial of Anais Anais for each of the ladies. Glyn was a software salesman, his first respectable job. Janet, all M&S and Waitrose, worked in ‘Pumpkin Pie’, a whole food restaurant in Stroud. Glyn and Janet were pleasant friends.

Out in the street, a barrel organ played, catching the last of the rush hour crowds, infusing the air with merry calliope renditions of Arlen and Berlin tunes. Inside, the Bechstein resonated with the percussive rapping of the grubby fingers of The Six. ‘Fuck this and fuck that…’

“Right!” Fred was standing, raised glass in hand, “I’ve got a surprise for the girls tonight.”

He winked knowingly at Glyn, who smiled bemusedly. Fred handed Becky and Janet each a small gift-wrapped cube, first to Becky, then to Janet. Sinterklaas paper. A sticker read ‘SURPRISE’. Fred watched them both excitedly with his grin widening across his flushed face.

“Oh, Fred, it’s beautiful!”

Inside the packages were small black cases, which hinged open to reveal tiny diamond pendants hanging from fine gold chains.

“Oh, Fred, I don’t know what to say. I’ve never seen anything so lovely” said Becky.

Fred moved behind Becky’s chair. He helped her clasp the pendant around her neck. He stooped to kiss the nape of her neck before sitting down.

“Love you.” he whispered.

Janet held her gold chain taut, sending the diamond spinning, catching candlelight in the facets, and filling the dark shadows with unwanted light. Trim with the diary started at the unaccustomed brilliance.

“Come on, Glyn - do the honours!”

Janet angled her neck so that Glyn too could act the gallant. He fumbled with the clasp and leaned over to Fred.

“I don’t know, Fred, you’re a dark horse. I wondered where you went this aftie.”

Glyn put his arm around Janet’s shoulder as he sat down. Becky smiled at Janet. Fred slipped his big hand between Becky’s thighs under the cover of the tablecloth and drew her attention back to him.

“I must say WE were wondering where you’d got to as well,” said Janet in a voice full of mock rebuke. “This is a wicked city for an innocent little lad like you to be let loose in. Right Becky?”

The meal arrived. Steak, chips, runner beans from a can, applesauce and limp winter lettuce; a wholly unsuitable last supper. The waiter left them to it.

“Great. Look at this!” said Fred, sprinkling his meal liberally with salt and pepper. They all helped themselves to the vegetables and salad and began to eat.

“Oh god!” Becky spluttered into her napkin, “My beans taste of Lifebuoy Soap.”

Becky explored her mouth with a tentative tongue, wary of what else she might discover.

    Voices drifted across from the Bechstein.

“Fuckin’ will, you know! I’ll fuckin’ bottle em!”

Fred looked up, looked across, clenched his fists, and shouted at The Six.

“Keep it down, lads, there’s ladies present.”

“Can’t fuckin’ see none!”

Fred laid his napkin down and began to rise.

“Don’t be daft, mate,” Glyn said, “you can see how pissed they are.”

Fred tried to ignore them, but the mood was gone, Becky was suddenly distant, swirling Merlot to freshen her mouth. Fred pulled his chair closer to the table. Glyn attempted to stitch together the lost moments.

“Here’s to us!” he said, “Cheers!”

The four friends raised their glasses once more and clinked them together. Fred finished his steak and half of Becky’s in silence, and they ordered exotic ices from the waiter.

“Aaah!” said Glyn, “This is the life.”

“TWATS! I’ll fuckin’ have em!”

The Bechstein.

“Coffee?”

“TWATS! I’ll fuckin’ nail ‘em!”

“No, I’ll have tea,” said Becky “I’m dying for a cup.”

Music filled the piano bar. Not the distant barrel organ, not the muzak from the foyer. The music came from the sextet of savage voices humping the piano.

“CITY! CITY!”

The taut strings of the baby grand boomed out under the flat of their callused palms.

“CITY! CITY!” 

The waiter looked on helplessly, the cropped skulls and rude tattoos beyond his wildest dreams.

“CITY! CITY!”

The coffee came, biscuits nestling in saucers. The four shifted uneasily on their chairs.

“I thought you wanted tea.”

Fred was bristling.

“It’s all right. Coffee’s fine.”

“I’ll change it.”

“No, don’t make a fuss”

But the waiter had already escaped.

They began to make plans for the evening ahead. Glyn had tried unsuccessfully each night to steer the ladies toward the blush tints of the Red Light District.

“It’s only a bit of fun. Why not?”

A party of Americans came in noisily and set the candles shivering in their slipstream. The bar was filling up.

“I’m not going into any of those shows.” Janet insisted.

“We’ll just go window shopping!” Insisted Glyn. “Just a bit of fun, that’s all.”

Three girls, with wet, stringy hair, came through from the foyer and sat at a table near the window, near Trim. The waiter glided in to serve the party of Americans with their Cokes and Buds. Fred called him over on his way back to the kitchen.

“Waiter.”

A poised pen, a trembling hand.

“We’ll have some more coffee, and some Drambuie.”

Fred covered a noiseless burp with his hand and shifted slightly on his chair.

“I’m off to the Gents.” All this booze has got to me.”

Glyn rose and followed Fred into the foyer. Den and ‘Dog’ swivelled round on their bar stools. Kev muttered something under his breath that made them all snicker. Then Den and ‘Dog’ turned a full circle.

The Gents’ was in the souterrain, reached by a dimly lit narrow flight of freestanding, filigree staircase, its dainty treads carpeted in deep purple plush. The hallway between the Gents’ and the basement disco was floored with terracotta. A malodorous melange of stale tobacco and perfume oozed from the open doorway of the disco, promisingly named ‘Madonna’s’. The DJ and a cocktail waitress were chatting just inside the entrance, across from the Gents’ with its glass-partitioned urinals and blue-lit junky-proof booths. Fred stomped across the terracotta and smashed open the door to the Gents’ with his forearm.

“Christ! I’m so fucking depressed, I feel like fucking topping myself.”

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