Doing Business by Jeremy Beadle

Author:Jeremy Beadle
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2016-03-29T13:00:00+00:00

5

Barmy Billy sat at the bar of the Adonis Club, talking quietly to his drink. In the half-light he almost looked tolerably attractive. You couldn’t see the unshaven fluff on his childish pink cheeks, the tidemark on his neck, the grime and grease in his fair hair; you couldn’t tell how filthy his revolting padded anorak was. You couldn’t see these and other legacies of weeks of sleeping rough, interrupted only by the rare nights he struck lucky with a punter — and no punter ever took Barmy Billy home twice. When he looked up and saw me with Darren, he perked up and, guess what, asked me if I’d buy him a drink. His voice had a caricature West Country simpleton bumpkin twang. Darren gave me a warning look.

‘Remember what I told you, Gordon,’ he muttered. He leaned down and talked directly into Billy’s ear. ‘Gordon’s not going to buy you a drink, so you can cut that out. He doesn’t want to waste his money on a daft prat like you. So you can cut that out.’

‘Darren ― ’ Billy essayed a plaintive tone. His pleading look was rather undermined by a slight cast in his eyes.

‘Don’t start all that. I’m still fucked off with you about Gareth and all that the other week.’ I had been told the relevant story, but it was only an unremarkable tale of minor deceit. Billy wasn’t capable of successfully pulling off even the smallest-time crookery.

‘I didn’t do nothing. Nothing what you wouldn’t do anyway.’ Darren tutted. ‘Come on, Gordon. We’ll get a drink downstairs.’ He turned away, stepping towards one of the club’s two fruit machines. Each of these always had a little crowd, because of the vast hundred pound plus cash jackpot that was promised (and hardly ever won). The boys would often pass long evenings at these, spending nearly five times as much as they ever got out of the things, disconsolately pushing the buttons. I don’t play them myself and I don’t finance other people’s addictions to them because the odds against the player tend to the hyper-astronomical.

As I turned to Darren, Billy caught my arm and began to stroke it. ‘Stay here, Gordon. I ain’t bad, not really. You’ve got to do what you has to, what else can you do? Take me home, I ha’n’t got anywhere to go. You always said you’d take me back. If you can’t do favours, what can you do? Take me home with ^you, I really need the money.’

This is a fair sample of Billy’s style. Often he’ll try and shove bits of his body up against you ― what you might call the hard sell ― but the content of his sales patter is usually along these lines. Strange gnomic pronouncements alternate with whingy demands and bare-faced requests. Of course, there is a long and honourable literary tradition of fools who are really wise and whose simple remarks accurately diagnose and expose the truth of the human condition. But do not be fooled.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.