The Complete Short Stories: Volume 1. Adam Thirlwell

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      Most of the stockade was in a continuous state of uproar, sounding something like a crowd in a football stadium, and as he led her out among the baffles he picked their way carefully through the quieter aisles. Around them voices chattered and whined fretfully, fragments of conversation drifted aimlessly over the air. Somewhere a woman pleaded in thin nervous tones, a man grumbled to himself, another swore angrily, a baby bellowed. Behind it all was the steady background murmur of countless TV programmes, the easy patter of announcers, the endless monotones of race-track commentators, the shrieking audiences of quiz shows, all pitched an octave up the scale so that they sounded an eerie parody of themselves.

      A shot rang out in the next aisle, followed by screams and shouting. Although she heard nothing, the pressure pulse made Madame Gioconda stop.

      ‘Mangon, wait. Don’t be in so much of a hurry. Tell me what they’re saying.’

      Mangon selected a baffle and listened carefully. The sounds appeared to come from an apartment over a launderette. A battery of washing machines chuntered to themselves, a cash register slammed interminably, there was a dim almost subthreshold echo of 60-cycle hum from an SP record-player.

      He shook his head, waved Madame Gioconda on.

      ‘Mangon, what did they say?’ she pestered him. He stopped again, sharpened his ears and waited. This time he was more lucky, an over-emotional female voice was gasping ‘… but if he finds you here he’ll kill you, he’ll kill us both, what shall we do …’ He started to scribble down this outpouring, Madame Gioconda craning breathlessly over his shoulder, then recognized its source and screwed up the note.

      ‘Mangon, for heaven’s sake, what was it? Don’t throw it away! Tell me!’ She tried to climb under the wooden superstructure of the baffle to recover the note, but Mangon restrained her and quickly scribbled another message.

       Adam and Eve. Sorry.

      ‘What, the film? Oh, how ridiculous! Well, come on, try again.’

      Eager to make amends, Mangon picked the next baffle, one of a group serving the staff married quarters of the University. Always a difficult job to keep clean, he struck paydirt almost at once.

      ‘… my God, there’s Bartok all over the place, that damned Steiner woman, I’ll swear she’s sleeping with her …’

      Mangon took it all down, passing the sheets to Madame Gioconda as soon as he covered them. Squinting hard at his crabbed handwriting, she gobbled them eagerly, disappointed when, after half a dozen, he lost the thread and stopped.

      ‘Go on, Mangon, what’s the matter?’ She let the notes fall to the ground. ‘Difficult, isn’t it. We’ll have to teach you shorthand.’

      They reached the baffles Mangon had just filled from the previous day’s rounds. Listening carefully he heard Paul Merrill’s voice: ‘… month’s Transonics claims that … the entire city will come down like Jericho.’

      He wondered if he could persuade Madame Gioconda to wait for fifteen minutes, when he would be able to repeat a few carefully edited fragments from Alto’s promise to arrange her guest appearance, but she seemed eager to move deeper into the stockade.

      ‘You said your friend Gallagher sweeps out Video City, Mangon. Where would that be?’

      Hector LeGrande. Of course, Mangon realized, why had he been so obtuse. This was the chance to pay the man back.

      He pointed to an area a few aisles away. They climbed between the baffles, Mangon helping Madame Gioconda over the beams and props, steering her full skirt and wide hat brim away from splinters and rusted metalwork.

      

      The task of finding LeGrande was simple. Even before the baffles were in sight Mangon could hear the hard, unyielding bite of the tycoon’s voice, dominating every other sound from the Video City area. Gallagher in fact swept only the senior dozen or so executive suites at V.C., chiefly to relieve their occupants of the distasteful echoes of LeGrande’s voice.

      Mangon steered their way among these, searching for LeGrande’s master suite, where anything of a really confidential nature took place.

      There were about twenty baffles, throwing off an unending chorus of ‘Yes, H.L.’, ‘Thanks, H.L.’, ‘Brilliant, H.L.’ Two or three seemed strangely quiet, and he drew Madame Gioconda over to them.

      This was LeGrande with his personal secretary and PA. He took out his pencil and focused carefully.

      ‘… of Third National Bank, transfer two million to private holding and threaten claim for stock depreciation … redraft escape clauses, including non-liability purchase benefits …’

      Madame Gioconda tapped his arm but he gestured her away. Most of the baffle appeared to be taken up by dubious financial dealings, but nothing that would really hurt LeGrande if revealed.

      Then he heard –

      ‘… Bermuda Hilton. Private Island, with anchorage, have the beach cleaned up, last time the water was full of fish … I don’t care, poison them, hang some nets out … Imogene will fly in from Idlewild as Mrs Edna Burgess, warn Customs to stay away …’

      ‘… call Cartiers, something for the Contessa, 17 carats say, ceiling of ten thousand. No, make it eight thousand …’

      ‘… hat-check girl at the Tropicabana. Usual dossier …’

      Mangon scribbled furiously, but LeGrande was speaking at rapid dictation speed and he could get down only a few fragments. Madame Gioconda barely deciphered his handwriting, and became more and more frustrated as her appetite was whetted. Finally she flung away the notes in a fury of exasperation.

      ‘This is absurd, you’re missing everything!’ she cried. She pounded on one of the baffles, then broke down and began to sob angrily. ‘Oh God, God, God, how ridiculous! Help me, I’m going insane …’

      Mangon hurried across to her, put his arms round her shoulders to support her. She pushed him away irritably, railing at herself to discharge her impatience. ‘It’s useless, Mangon, it’s stupid of me, I was a fool –’

      ‘STOP!’

      The cry split the air like the blade of a guillotine.

      They both straightened, stared at each other blankly. Mangon put his fingers slowly to his lips, then reached out tremulously and put his hands in Madame Gioconda’s. Somewhere within him a tremendous tension had begun to dissolve.

      ‘Stop,’ he said again in a rough but quiet voice. ‘Don’t cry. I’ll help you.’

      Madame Gioconda gaped at him with amazement. Then she let out a tremendous whoop of triumph.

      ‘Mangon, you can talk! You’ve got your voice back! It’s absolutely astounding! Say something, quickly, for heaven’s sake!’

      Mangon felt his mouth again, ran his fingers rapidly over his throat. He began to tremble with excitement, his face brightened, he jumped up and down like a child.

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