A Fifth of Bruen: Early Fiction of Ken Bruen
- Автор: Бруен Кен
- Год: 2006
- Язык: английский
- Год: Busted Flush Press
- ISBN: 978-0-9767157-2-6
- Жанр: Триллеры
Электронная книга - «A Fifth of Bruen: Early Fiction of Ken Bruen». Краткое содержание книги:
He’d been Ford’s friend for ten years. “For sins of a past life,” muttered Ford. Very heavy sins. Ford was currently a social worker. At thirty-six years of age he’d been in many occupations. Most of those he would no longer admit to. At one low point, an English language teacher. Worse, English as a foreign language and he certainly found it to be that. The final revenge of a lone Irishman on the English according to Dalton. Ford knew he was in deep trouble when he began to speak like students. “How you say”, he remembered with deep shame. Twelve years he’d been in London and social working for the previous two. Prior to that he’d been open to suggestions and still was.
On Clapham Common today a wino had waylaid him. Ford had seen him coming and began the discreet weaving. This usually put him beyond the wino by the vital beginning of the plea. He misjudged it or perhaps the wino weaved better. Face to face.
“Please, sur,” in that tone between servility and surliness.
“I’ve no change,” snapped Ford, hating himself.
“I’m not begging,” and this in a grievously offended voice.
The wino pushed a greeting card under his nose. It was a book token for almost fifteen pounds.
“Are you a reading man?” he asked.
“Bring it to the book shop for a refund,” said Ford.
“They’ll only give books,” he said. “You can’t drink bloody books.”
Ford certainly agreed with this. He gave the wino his loose change and fled. He hated that the winos were Irish, another point for the English to cave. How many years of English language teaching would cancel that?
He stopped at The Rose and Crown. The barmaid was blowsy and many sheets to the wind. He got a large gin and her full lit smile. He should have had what she was having. Pity enwrapped him. As an antidote he played “Run Around Sue” in his head — he’d found it on a juke box in Camden Town a few weeks back. A punk rocker glared and immediately after selected “The Men Behind the Wire.” In passing Ford he hissed, “Get real, granddad.” True to tell, Ford’s hair was thinning rapidly. How did you fatten hair? Now he kept his music internal and his hair on despair. A man nearing seventy sat carefully down near Ford. He had a full rich head of hair. Fat in fact, seethed Ford. The man peered intently at a five pound note which he ironed flat, then caressed and even smelled it. A sigh then.
“Excuse me, son?” he asked.
Ford moved nearer and the old man held up the fiver.
“It’s not a ten, is it?”
“No — no, it’s a five.”
“Ar — agh.”
Ford felt like a murderer. Should he have lied? And then what? All horrible complications would surely follow. Pity leaked further. Ford rose for a refill.
“Can I get you a drink,” he offered.
“Ger off, I’m too old for pooftahs,” he roared.
Ford went straight out the door and came here. Just in time to hear Dalton’s statement and end a pitied day.
At work Ford had begun in a wild flush of enthusiasm. Full of fellowship and ideals, he reckoned on putting the “h” back in “humanity” in London’s South East. Above his desk he hung Balzac’s “Nothing prepares you for the heartless cruelty of people.” A young black seeing it had asked, “The man from Brixton?”
His first client was a young Scottish girl, Angela, whose boyfriend beat her regularly.
“He’s a good ’un though,” she said. “He works and he doesn’t drink.”
“Rare qualities indeed,” said Ford, “he just works on you.”
Early in February she had appeared with both eyes blackened. Ford had suggested very strategic things to her. As she left she smiled at Ford as if he understood nothing and said, “He does it to show his love.”
“Let me know what he does for Valentine’s Day”, Ford said.
He had initially believed the tone he needed for social work was a light ironical one. This he adopted till a West Indian punched him in the mouth roaring, “Don’t get ironical with me sahib.”
On first arriving in London, Ford had made the big mistake of handling fruit at a vegetable stall. The owner came screaming and spitting bile and aggravation.
“Never handle the fruit.”
Since then Ford had seen countless other fruit vendors achieve instant psychosis as some hapless foreigner touched their product.
He felt there should be a large billboard on the White Cliffs of Dover proclaiming “Don’t touch their fruit.”
Ford was big on control. Uneasiness gripped him when any area of his life slithered away. Yet he frequently drank heavily, thus forfeiting any personal direction. A lot of things got away from him then. Control definitely headed the pack. As the other faculties blurred, it leaped to win the stampede. Riddle him that.
Movies were his passion. Like Joseph Stalin, he had a penchant for the old American gangster stories. When men were men, and women were glad of it. He’d been to see Ordinary People and Judd Hirsch as the psychiatrist says, “I’m not big on control.” This soured that for Ford. He even read Judith Guest’s novel to see if that line was there. Oh sweet control! At such times Vikki spoke in his head. Ford once said “I love her because she loves me.” Not the worst reason, he thought as he’d thought so many times before. Without bitterness, and sometimes even without regret, he didn’t love anyone now. Not that heart-stopping, dizzying obsession that quakes your whole world. You didn’t know whether to sing or puke. Once — oh yes. But a long time ago. “It wouldn’t come again,” he said aloud. Moreover, he didn’t believe he had anymore what it took to rise to such heights. Such a level of one-dimensional obsession.
Ford didn’t figure it required youth as much as energy, and he was all out of energy. “God help us,” he added. This was an Irish benediction or condemnation, depending on your circumstances. Emotionally, Ford’s words were woesome and he sometimes realized it. Vikki would say “Sweetheart, if you’d listen to Leonard Cohen sing ‘Dance Me To the End of Love’ you’d be grand.” Maybe a lot of things, but he didn’t feel then or now that grand was one of them. Grand really applied to hotels or weather. He didn’t think you’d go far on grand emotions, not in South East London anyway.
On his fourth pint after work that Friday, Ford began to loosen up. Social work, jeez it was anything but social. His director, named Neville Whitlow, said a thousand times daily, “We can only try, children.” A pompous ass. Ford found him pretty trying. Children! For beggars sake! That a grown man would address his staff as that. Ford seethed anew.
Neville was from Suffolk and this explained a lot. “There were two types of Neville down there,” said Dalton on one of his rare visits. The Neville who stays put and the one who leaves. To be exactly identical in London. The director made the mistake of attempting to talk sensibly to Dalton.
“Are you a social worker, perchance, a socialite, mate?”
“Do you mean socialist?”
“Watch my lips, mate: now real S-L-O-W — socialite.”
That was that.
To calm himself, Ford dismissed all thoughts of work.
He liked to muse on great book titles. A few were outstanding. By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept. Sure you’d have to grab that. He’d yet to meet a woman who didn’t love that title. In fact he’d yet to meet a woman. My Brilliant Career. Another cracker. Was she kidding, you thought. Irony. Right! Lay that ole irony down with a trowel and book awards yet mentioned. For his own book he’d title In Santorini I Greek Mis-spelt Your Name. Get the yuppies and the sour-ass romantics. The greek-o-philes would nod knowingly and shell out. Powerhouse Sex. In truth to tell, he’d sell it thus. Big red letters on a black jacket. Nowt else. Full of plunging and ravaging with buttocks heaving and bosoms hopping. Big buckets of sweat and grunting. ‘She felt his manhood throb’ type passages. Ford’s own favorite was “love weapon” pronounced with a slight slur. “She unsheathed his love weapon.” Not the easiest line to mutter with a straight face. Let’s get down to fierce basics, thought Ford. The hero would be named Ramrod. Then Ford’s mood darkened as the jukebox played Willie Nelson’s “Loving Her Was Easier”. Next would come ole Waylon Jennings. Ah, stab my unprotected heart. Tis a while since he’d felt anything throbbing at all.