Laurie, Hugh The Gun Seller

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think? I mean, if trying to hit someone in the middle of a flak jacket isn t awkward . . .
But he wasn t listening to me. That wasn t like him either. They want you to go on, he
said.
Well, of course they did. I knew that. Catching terrorists was not the object of this exercise
and never had been. They wanted me to go on, they wanted it all to go on, until the setting was
right for the big demonstration. CNN right there on the spot, cameras rolling - not arriving
four hours after the event.
Master, said Solomon, after a while, I have to ask you a question, and I need you to
answer me honestly.
I didn t like the sound of this. This was all horribly wrong. This was red wine with fish.
This was a man wearing a dinner jacket and brown shoes. This was as wrong as things get.
Fire away, I said.
He really did look worried.
Will you answer me honestly? I need to know before I ask the question.
David, I can t tell you that. I laughed, hoping he d drop his shoulders, relax, stop
frightening me. If you ask me to tell you whether or not you ve got bad breath, I will answer
you honestly. If you ask me . . . I don t know, practically anything else, then yes, I will
probably lie.
This didn t seem to satisfy him much. There was no reason why it should have done, of
course, but what else could I say? He cleared his throat, slowly and deliberately, as if he might
not get the chance to do it again for some time.
What precisely is your relationship with Sarah Woolf?
I was really thrown now. Couldn t make head or tail of this. So I watched while Solomon
walked slowly backwards and forwards, pursing his lips and frowning at the floor, like
someone trying to broach the subject of masturbation with his teenage son. Not that I ve ever
been present at such a session, but I imagine that it involves a lot of blushing and fidgeting,
and the discovery of microscopic specks of dust on sleeves of jackets that suddenly require a
huge amount of attention.
Why are you asking me, David?
Please, master. just. . . This was not Solomon s best day, I could tell. He took a deep
breath. Just answer. Please.
I watched him for a while, feeling angry with him and sorry for him in just about equal
parts.
" For old times sake," were you about to say?
For the sake of anything, he said, that will make you answer the question, master. Old
times, new times, just tell me.
I lit another cigarette and looked at my hands, trying, as I d tried many times before, to
answer the question for myself, before I answered it for him.
Sarah Woolf. Grey eyes, with a streak of green. Nice tendons. Yes, I remember her.
What did I really feel? Love? Well, I couldn t answer that, could I? Just not familiar
enough with the condition to be able to pin it on myself like that. Love is a word. A sound. Its
association with a particular feeling is arbitrary, unmeasurable, and ultimately meaningless.
No, I ll have to come back to that one, if you don t mind.
What about pity? I pity Sarah Woolf because . . . because what? She lost her brother, then
her father, and now she s locked in the dark tower while Childe Roland fumbles about with a
collapsible step-ladder. I could pity her for that, I suppose; for the fact that she gets me as a
rescuer.
Friendship? For God s sake, I hardly know the woman. Well what was it, then?
I m in love with her, I heard someone say, and then realised it was me.
Solomon closed his eyes for a second, as if that was the wrong answer, again - then moved
slowly, reluctantly, to a table by the wall, where he picked up a small plastic box. He weighed
it in his hand for a moment, as if contemplating whether to give it to me or hurl it out of the
door into the snow; and then he started rummaging in his pocket. Whatever he was looking for
was in the last pocket he tried, and I was just thinking how nice it was to see this happening to
someone else for a change, when he produced a pencil torch. He gave me the torch and the
box, then turned his back and drifted away, leaving me to get on with it.
Well, I opened the box. Of course I did. That s what you do with closed boxes that people
give you. You open them. So I lifted the yellow plastic lid, actually and metaphorically, and
straight away my heart sank a little lower still.
The box contained slide photographs, and I knew, absolutely knew, that I wasn t going to
like whatever was in them.
I plucked out the first one, and held it up in front of the torch.
Sarah Woolf. No mistake there.
A sunny day, a black dress, getting out of a London taxi.
Good. Fair enough. Nothing wrong with that. She was smiling - a big, happy smile - but
that s allowed. That s okay. I didn t expect her to be sobbing into her pillow twenty-four hours
a day. So. Next.
Paying the driver. Again, nothing wrong with that. You ride in a cab, you have to pay the
driver. This is life. The photograph was taken with a long lens, at least a 135, probably more.
And the closeness of the sequence meant a motor-drive. Why would anyone bother to take . . .
Moving away from the cab towards the kerb, now. Laughing. The cab driver s watching
her bottom, which I would do if I was a cab driver. She d watched the back of his neck, he
was watching her bottom. A fair exchange. Well not quite fair, perhaps, but no one ever said it
was a perfect world.
I glanced up at Solomon s back. His head was bowed. And the next one, please.
A man s arm. Arm and shoulder, in fact, in a dark-grey suit. Reaching out for her waist,
while she tilts her head back, ready for a kiss. The smile is bigger still. Again, who s [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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