Banks, Iain - Walking on Glass by Banks Iain

Author:Banks, Iain
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Published: 2003-02-04T22:22:27+00:00

-MR SHARPE-

Drunk!

He sat on a park bench in the small triangular piece of ground which was called Islington Green. Mr Sharpe sat by his side; they were both drinking from large bottles of cider. Mr Sharpe was smoking a cigarette. Steven felt quite drunk.

'I mean,' Mr Sharpe said, stabbing at the air with his cigarette, 'they don't 'ave to stay where they fackin' well are, do they? 'Course they don't... do they?' Steven shook his head in case Mr Sharpe was really asking him a question. Most of the questions seemed to be rhetorical, though. He couldn't remember what Mr Sharpe was talking about now. Was it the Jews? The Blacks?

Scroungers?

Mr Sharpe was a small man of about fifty-five. He was going bald and his eyes looked yellow in the grey-pink skin of his face, which was lined with grey stubble. He wore a big old coat and working boots. He had approached Grout in the pub he had gone to, the Nag's Head.

Steven usually avoided pub drunks, and it was fairly obvious Mr Sharpe was the resident PD in the Nag's Head that lunchtime, but Steven was quite drunk himself, and apart from Mr Sharpe seeming to be encouragingly worried about conspiracies -Grout hadn't entirely given up the idea of finding a fellow exile and cooperating to escape together - Mr Sharpe had also displayed what appeared to be genuine good-heartedness when Steven told him it was his birthday. A few small tears had come to his eyes, in fact, when Mr Sharpe shook his hand for a long time and wished him many happy returns several times in a loud voice.

Steven had bought most of the drinks from then on, as Mr Sharpe wasn't working and didn't have very much money, but Steven didn't mind. He showed Mr Sharpe all the money he had, explaining that he had been paid off that day.

'The cans,' Mr Sharpe had said, spitting inadvertently, 'the fackin' cans; I bet it was them unions, wasn't it?'

Grout hadn't been sure about that, but he told Mr Sharpe he wasn't sorry anyway. He did say he couldn't spend all the money, of course, he had to keep some by for his rent and food and things, and he had to wait for his unemployment money. Mr Sharpe said he was quite right, but to watch out; there were plenty of smart jewboys and big black muggers around; the jewboys would swindle it off you and the niggers would slit your throat as soon as look at you.

After the pub shut at three, they went over to the Green with a couple of bottles of stout they had bought to carry out. Steven had bought Mr Sharpe a packet of cigarettes, too, and some matches. 'You're a gent, Steve, that's what you are; a gent,' Mr Sharpe had said, and Steven felt almost as good as when the policeman had called him 'sir'. He sniffed, eyes tingling.

They drank the bottles of stout, then Mr Sharpe said

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