Earthly Delights Part 16

'Good,' said Daniel. 'Goss, go get Meroe. Tell her it's an emergency,' he added. 'Tell her that you can mind her shop.'

'Cool!' Goss raced out. I pictured the scene. Goss selling the wrong kind of newt eyes. Goss telling fortunes with the wrong kind of cards. Goss telling the customers that magic was so cool. In spite of the seriousness of the situation, I smiled.

Daniel caught the smile. He was thinking the same thing.

'She can't go far wrong with "you will cross water and meet a tall dark handsome stranger who is like totally cool like Tom Cruise",' he suggested.

Carol/Cherie had felt our attention turning away from her and didn't like it.

'Who's Meroe? What's happened to Mum?' she demanded.

'Divorced,' said Daniel. 'She stuck with your a.s.sailant. Your father divorced her for it. This woman is Meroe the witch, and I'd moderate my tone, if I were you.'

'A witch?' Cherie was impressed. 'Not the Sibyl's Cave witch? Everyone says she's mega cool. And powerful. I've got one of her talismans.'

'The very same. She's been looking after your father. I'd be polite,' Daniel advised.

He didn't need to warn her. By the time Meroe, hair flying and trailing a sky-blue silken wrap, sailed into the shop, Cherie was very biddable.

Goss had already explained the situation. Meroe inspected Cherie. Cherie allowed the inspection.

'We must clean your face,' said Meroe firmly. 'He will need to see you as you are, not as you choose to face the world. And you shall see him as he is. Come with me. You too, Corinna,' she ordered, and I fell in at heel as well as Cherie. Auctoritas, as the Prof said. Meroe definitely had it.

Daniel sat down behind the counter and patted Horatio.

Meroe took Cherie into her own bathroom and they emerged, ten minutes later, heavily scented with some aromatic oil. Cherie now looked like her picture. She had a strong, determined chin, a pale complexion, a high forehead and sharp, intelligent eyes. I could not read her expression. All her emotions were tightly corked. And were likely to go off with a bang.

'Oil of ...?' I asked, sniffing.

'Sage,' said Meroe. 'For clarity. Come,' she ordered, and we followed her into the lift. Meroe had her usual basket. Cherie clutched her leather handbag closer to her bosom. I was hoping that she wasn't armed. She might have spent three years contemplating revenge on a father who had betrayed her. Or she might just be intending to tell him that he was a b.a.s.t.a.r.d and walk out. In which case, she would about finish off poor pathetic Andy Holliday. He would dive into a bottle and in due course they could just pour him into his grave.

Meroe calmly entered the door code and we went in unannounced. Andy was lying in his T-chair, almost watching some football. He turned his head as we came in. He wasn't drunk, but he had definitely been drinking. Cherie stopped dead and stared at him.

Meroe left them there and went across the room to open the door of the second bedroom. I had no idea what she was doing. I felt like I should incant something because this meeting had every chance of going horribly wrong.

'I saw the poster,' said Cherie in that tight voice.

'Baby?' asked Andy Holliday, trying to get to his feet and wallowing in the chair.

'Is it true?' she demanded.

He wrenched himself upright and stopped just out of touching distance while he stared avidly at her, from head to feet and back again.

'It's you,' he said. 'I looked for you everywhere and I couldn't find you.'

Cherie nailed him with her hard eyes. 'Is it true? Do you believe me now?'

'I believe you,' he said. 'I think I always believed you, but your mother ... but I got rid of her. I believe you,' said Andy Holliday, sagging down to the carpet. 'I believe you.'

'Daddy?' she said in a high, child's voice. They stayed just where they were, frozen, Andy on his knees on the floor, Cherie poised to run. Something had to happen to break the impa.s.se and I could not imagine what it would be.

Then Meroe brought the large white teddy bear out of the second bedroom and thrust it into Cherie's arms. She was shocked out of her bitter concentration and her face crumpled immediately. She dropped down to join her father and buried her face in the teddy bear's fur. Andy Holliday embraced her and began to cry.

'You brought Pumpkin Bear,' she wailed. 'Daddy, you brought Pumpkin back.'

Meroe joined me at a distance. She lit a small dish of gums and set it down on the marble table. I stole a cigarette from the packet and lit it. Ah, sweet G.o.ddess Nicotine, how I still miss your worship. I inhaled deeply.

'I put a few drops of that Charlie perfume on the bear,' she said. 'Scent is more evocative than sight, sometimes. The frankincense will cleanse some of their bitterness and fear. They'll be all right. I'll come up and see them tonight.'

'You're amazing,' I told her. She grinned her witchly grin and draped the azure silk around her shoulders. 'Come along,' she said. 'I have to get back to my shop. I've left Goss in charge, and though she is mostly a sweet girl ...'

'With you all the way,' I said, stubbing out the smoke.

The pair on the floor had forgotten that we were there and I'm sure they never noticed that we had gone.

Meroe ran back to the Sibyl's Cave before Goss could sell someone the wrong ingredient for a magic potion and I went back into the bakery and evicted Daniel from the chair. My need was greater than his. I had interrupted Jason's reading practice in mid-recipe and I gestured for him to go on.

'Mix lig ... liggly?'

'Lightly,' suggested Daniel.

'Spoon into greased m.u.f.fin pans and bake at three-fifty for ten minutes,' Jason concluded triumphantly. 'What happened upstairs?' he asked.

'It's all right,' I said to Daniel and Jason. 'They had a reunion and are presently sitting on the floor, hugging each other and crying. Not that it wasn't tense. Meroe was wonderful.'

'Well, duh! She's a witch,' said Jason. 'That's nice. Suze is in hospital and Cherie Holliday is home. That's a nice day,' he said.

And so it was. So far.

I did not know why Daniel was staying with me, but it did allow me to leave the cleaning to Jason. He looked very nice in his overall and white shoes, very much the baker. Probably more than I was, at least from the tracksuit. I went to see if the Prof was home and interested in some good news. He was, both.

'Send to slay the fatted calf, for this my son was lost and is come home again,' he quoted. 'How nice, how very, very nice.'

'It was touch and go for a while there,' I told him.

'Well, naturally, it would be. Happy endings require preparation. They don't just spontaneously arise, like mushrooms. Good of you to come to tell me, Corinna.'

He was dressed in a very nice suit. He looked dapper.

'Going out?' I asked.

'Lunch at the University Club,' he said. 'Likely to be sadly boring but the food is always good. Nice to be able to walk without that wretched stick too.'

'Where is it?' I looked around. 'I meant to have a look at that Anubis head handle.'

'Oh, sorry. Mr Pemberthy borrowed it this morning. He's twisted his ankle or something, poor man. May I escort you to the elevator, Madame Boulangere?'

'Delighted,' I said, accepting his arm.

When I got back Jason was well into the scrubbing and Daniel was sitting with Horatio, Heckle and Jekyll on the stairs. They looked very comfortable together. I ducked across to the Cafe Delicious and bought lasagne for three. Then I thought about it and doubled the order. I still had a recovering drug addict to feed. And he was also a teenage boy. Put that together and you have an appet.i.te which could dine at Olympic gold-medal level. You have a boy who could eat whole cities into subjection.

The scrubbing lasted another hour. The lasagne lasted six minutes. Jason wiped his mouth, ate a casual baguette, polished off the last of the Coca Cola he had bought to refresh his labours and sighed. He was, I believe, actually sated at last. For, oh, I don't know, minutes, before he would be hungry again. I gave him the bag of food and he changed clothes and left with a 'bye'. That was another innovation. Usually he just vanished.

'He's improving,' said Daniel from the other side of the clean floor.

'I wish I knew where he slept,' I said.

'Flagstaff,' said Daniel. 'He's there every night. He gets fresh rations from each circuit and even Sister Mary has limited him to three sandwiches and two cups of soup each time. Though she did say that G.o.d loves a willing eater. Which he is. Can you lend me your couch for a few hours? I'm going to need some sleep. Also a shower? I had to carry an OD to where the ambulance could get to him. I'm feeling grubby and I've got to go out on the van again tonight. Then we might have some dinner?'

'My ablutions are your ablutions. My couch is your couch,' I said formally. 'But I'll be using the desk in the parlour, so why not have my bed? You will have Horatio as company but he's very civilised. If you don't want him, shut the door. I'll just do a few ch.o.r.es here and I'll be right up.'

He kissed me gently. He seemed very sleepy and I let him go. My mystery man. Perhaps he really was a vampire. Then I pottered around a little, washing Jason's clothes and sticking them in the dryer for the morrow. I was still not relying on Jason. It was nice to have him but Daniel had warned me that at any moment Jason might revert to Jase and vanish. I could still do the whole baking on my own. I was just wondering where I was going to find another shop a.s.sistant after Friday when I was aware that someone was standing in Calico Alley. Leaning on my doorpost. A big man in a Blues Brothers suit. Last seen beating my a.s.sistant baker and knocking out one of his teeth.

'Yes?' I asked in my best middle-cla.s.s voice. 'Can I help you?'

'That boy,' he said in a gravelly tone probably borrowed from the G.o.dfather. Or maybe the Sopranos. I don't watch Mafia films much. Unless there's really nothing else on.

Or Animal Planet has reset to crocodiles. Or sharks. Or crocodiles and sharks. Both of which were closely related to the man in the doorway.

'Which boy?' I elevated an eyebrow.

'Jase,' he snarled. I decided not to be too clever.

'He's my a.s.sistant,' I said. 'Jason.'

'He been working for you long?'

'A couple of weeks,' I said. At the time it really seemed like that, though in fact it was only a week.

'He always here early in the morning?' he asked. I did not like this at all. The man was big, strong and unpleasant. I edged my hand towards the mobile phone into which I have programmed the police emergency number. I switched the phone on. It beeped. His eyes flicked to it.

'I start at four,' I told him. 'When the ovens come on.'

'And he's here?' he demanded, with menaces.

'Yes. What are you asking all these questions for? I've told you, he wants to be a baker and he has to start at four. Who are you, anyway?'

He made a very fast movement. It could have been the death of Heckle, but alley cat reflexes never fade. As a hard heel came down, viciously, towards Heckle's exposed white belly, he did a lightning wriggle which would have broken an eel's back and wasn't there when the heel cracked into the flour sack. I yelped and pressed the speed dialler on the phone.

'I've just called the cops,' I said. 'Do stay and wait until they come.'

'You want to be careful with them vermin,' he said, and grinned at me. A s.a.d.i.s.t. Great. Just when it had seemed like such a nice day. I felt sick to the pit of my stomach. I also felt that if I could reach the breadknife I would have cut this man's throat. In a church. But I knew about bullies. Some will be placated if you do just as they wish. Some can be confounded if you do something unexpected, like not reacting to the attempted murder of your cat. I decided to try this. I wanted him out of my bakery, out of my life, as soon as possible. The only way to win this cat-and-mouse game, as the Cat said in Red Dwarf, was not to be the mouse.

'What do you want with Jason?' I demanded. I wasn't confident of the way this interview was going but I could get Daniel to warn Jason to stay away if his hunters had grown this bold.

'If you ain't lying,' he said, 'we don't want nothing to do with the little c.u.n.t. You can have him. You better not be lying,' he told me.

'You can check,' I pointed out. 'Everyone knows what time I start work. Now, if there's nothing else ...?'

'Nah,' he said. He stepped back from the doorway and I shut the door in his face. I locked both locks and heard the steel wards snick home. I threw the bolt. I cancelled the emergency call. Then I burst into tears. I found Heckle and hugged him while he growled and told me what he would have done to the b.a.s.t.a.r.d if he hadn't been twenty times his size and had such hard hoofs. I spread kitty treats recklessly to apologise for belonging to approximately the same species as that creature.

Then I went up to my own apartment. I found Daniel neatly asleep in my bed. I slid in behind him, embraced him as though he was a large, breathing teddy bear, and fell instantly and heavily asleep.

We woke at six, when the light moves across the window and falls on the pillow. Daniel turned over, exclaimed, 'What?', felt over my face and grunted, 'Oh.' Having thus explained to his own satisfaction where he was and who was lying next to him, he opened his eyes and said, 'h.e.l.lo, Corinna.'

'h.e.l.lo, Daniel.' I snuggled closer to him, then forced myself away. 'Let's go and get some dinner.'

'We could just stay here,' he said dreamily. 'Very nice bed. Nice cat. Nice company.'

'No, I'm getting up, I need to talk to you.'

'Talk here,' he offered, but released me when I sat up. I had gone to bed in my clothes and I felt frowsty. I shed them and went into the bathroom and had a short, scalding shower and put on clean clothes, which always makes me feel better. When I returned Daniel was sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee. I don't know how he makes it so fast. Some sort of magic, perhaps. Meroe would know.

'So, what's wrong?' he asked.

I told him about the Blues Brother and his attempt to kill Heckle. My voice shook.

'I wonder what our Jase has been doing?' said Daniel into his cup. 'As I said, he really should be too minor a player to attract heavy duty attention from the John Smiths. Tell me exactly what he said. Tell me slowly and don't leave anything out.'

I complied. It was not a pleasant retelling. Daniel tugged at where his beard would have been if he'd had a beard.

'You did well, ketschele. Got out of an interview with Big John unbruised. Not many can say that. You must have reminded him of his parole officer. Well, whatever it is they are investigating, it must have happened after four in the morning and you have given Jason an alibi. Inadvertent and, as you say, false, but it might distract them. I don't see any major harm in Jason but the mind boggles at what he might have done, or been on the edges of.'

'Do you know anything about Jason? Such as why he left home?'

Daniel delivered a report like a police officer, in a monotone. 'He was the third child in a big multi-father family and they all picked on him. Dysfunctional families quite often have a scapegoat. The pyschs used to think that it had something to do with relationship by blood-the cuckoo in the nest theory-but it doesn't. They can elect any one kid and make his life h.e.l.l. Jason managed okay until the latest stepfather decided that he really couldn't stand having Jason around and threw him out.'

'Just like that?'

'Just like that.'

'How can his mother allow it?' I protested. What a romantic thing for me to say. My own mother had left me ploughing barefoot through icy mud because she didn't believe in shoes. They cut off a child's natural contact with the earth, she thought. I had the chilblains for months. And the pneumonia for weeks. If Grandma Chapman hadn't rescued me I would have died, because Father didn't believe in antibiotics. Mothers, forsooth. Families, forsooth! Daniel took my hand.

'Imagine this. You are born into a dysfunctional family yourself, where no one cares about you. Even worse, you are alternately hugged and slapped, neither for any good reason. You know that no one loves you. You are starving for affection. You lie down for the first boy who asks and you get pregnant. Then the boy leaves and you only have the baby and you know that the baby will love you alone, except that's not what babies do, and you are miserable and trapped and even lonelier. Then another boy comes along and the same thing happens again. After three or four children you don't have your looks anymore and you have to accept older and possibly violent men, and they still leave you, partly because you now have a brood of underfed, insecure children with no manners.'

'That's awful,' I said.

'Yes,' agreed Daniel. 'Jason's mother might have really wanted to love him but she had to choose between Jason, who was difficult and aggressive and actually believed it when they told him he was stupid, and the latest boyfriend who, this time, might stay with her.'

'How old is Jason?'

'Fifteen.'

's.h.i.t,' I said.

'Quite.' I drank coffee. Daniel drank coffee. Horatio sat on the windowsill and tried to outstare the setting sun. He does this sometimes. I've never kept count but the score is probably about fifty-fifty sun/cat.

'Where shall we get some dinner?' I asked.