A Darkening Stain

He left and I put the phone back on the hook. I went out on to the balcony and watched him appear underneath me. He glanced up and nodded. He hailed a taxi moto and just about managed to get his leg over the back of it. He waved without turning round and the moped wobbled off into the orange-lit pollution of the city. I waited five minutes and put my call through to Carlo in the Hotel de la Plage.

We met in the booze section of the supermarket. I told him what he wanted to know and that if he was going to follow he’d better be discreet but keep close because if it was going to happen it might be sudden and it might not be in Grand-Popo. Carlo fingered the bottles and nodded with his bottom lip between his teeth.

‘You want to tell me how to do my job some more?’ he asked.

I picked two bottles of white wine off the shelf.

‘You didn’t tell me he’d taken a beating since the photograph.’

‘He has?’

‘He’s a mess,’ I said.

Carlo tutted, shook his head.

‘Machete attack in Liberia,’ I said, as we walked past the fruit on the way to the checkout. ‘Lucky to survive.’

‘Mr Franconelli said he was a hard man.’

‘They tell me the peaches are good.’

‘Maybe I’ll get a kilo,’ said Carlo.

‘You do that.’

7 (#ulink_2464b200-5322-591a-afbd-7981f7d3bc8b)

I got back home at 8 p.m. with the two bottles of Sancerre. Heike was in and on the iced water. I joined her and she served me with a raised eyebrow.

‘I don’t mind watching you get off your face, you know,’ she said.

‘Maybe I mind,’ I said. ‘Don’t want you to see something you don’t like.’

‘Something I’ve never seen before?’ she said, snaking an arm around my neck, crushing me into a kiss.

‘I was going to say…something that could sneak out after I’ve had a few which you’ve never noticed before, being in the same condition, as you are most of the time you’re with me.’

‘You think I could stay young and beautiful drinking the way you do?’ she said, stroking my face hard, trying to iron out those creases.

‘I was also going to say that sobriety’s a very unforgiving state.’

‘Then you must be a very forgiving person,’ she said. ‘But with nothing to forgive. You’re flying already. I could smell you from the door.’

‘That Sancerre’s going to go down as well,’ I said. ‘And when I’ve finished this glass of water I’m going to have a Grande Beninoise. I’ve been talking a lot and it’s dehydrated me.’

‘I’m glad you’re not reforming just because you’re going to be a father.’

‘Maybe in the last few months before D-day I’ll start trying to be good.’

‘They’ve already got a brain after two months. They hear things.’

‘But they don’t know what they mean.’

‘Babies are very tonal,’ she said.

‘It’ll learn to sleep to the clinking of glass.’

‘Because it’s all crap after that.’

‘Well, I’ve just been told I’m very interesting.’

‘By your drinking pal?’ she said. ‘That’s a very sad thing for you to be saying, Bruce Medway.’

I opened the beer and drank it like I said I would. We sat down to eat, a Spanish chicken dish called chilindron, which was good for the climate. The chilli kept the sweat up. I idled over the Sancerre while Helen cleared the plates and brought the Red Label out, which she put down with a thump and a sigh. I sent her back with it and she gave me one of her half-lidded, muddy-eyed looks that told me I wasn’t fooling her.

‘Don’t hold back on my account,’ said Heike.

‘I’ve got to go out tonight,’ I said.

‘Oh yes?’

‘Clubbing.’

‘Anybody I should know?’

‘It’s work.’

‘You shouldn’t bring it home with you.’

‘I wouldn’t, but the guy I want to see runs a bar down the Jonquet and it doesn’t get going until midnight.’

‘Which bar?’

‘A place called L’ouistiti. I’m told it means “marmoset” – you know it?’

‘I’ve had a drink in there before now.’

‘Who with?’

‘An American Peace Corp worker. It’s their after-work joint. Grim, unless you like grunging it.’

‘You know me, Heike,’ I said. ‘Who was the Peace Corp worker?’

‘Robyn.’

I dead-eyed her.

‘With a “y”,’ she added.