E "Chasing Tail"

Chasing Tail

If there's one thing I'd change about my life, it'd be running out of
cigarettes that night. Everything else - the girl, the old woman, the
stupid mistake, it was all attributable to those damn cigarettes.

I'd been under pressure anyway. There's no money in sales these days
and the letters kept coming in from the credit companies. Half of them
wanting to lend me more money, the other half being very pointed about
the amounts outstanding. It got to the stage where I was just sending
the credit offer letters off to the firms I owed and suggesting that
they fill in the application for me and just take the money.

This wasn't any sort of way to go on. On top of that, I'd stopped even
hiding the whiskey bottles from Jan. Before, I'd always put them in the
cistern, but I got sick of running the shower to hide the noise of me
moving the lid to get the sauce. I knew Jan was going to leave me soon
anyway, and the only thing I was going to miss was the bacon and eggs
she cooked me on a Sunday.

Before the cigarettes, it was my lungs that had got me into this mess.
I'd been doing pretty much okay before then. One stupid phone call that
led to them running squealing to the cops.

I'm no heavy breather. I have asthma.

Didn't stop me spending a night in the cells, losing a perfectly good
job because of the scandal and having to work for a firm that tries to
hawk vacuum-cleaners onto gullible ageing saps.

She was one of them. Not the oldest and not the most gullible, but
judging from the candlesticks and holiday brochures, she was doing okay
for money. She watched me go through the tired, bored motions of
demonstrating the wonderful ways in which the Torricelli vacuum far
surpassed any other.

"It seems like a nice hoover, " she said, as I tipped a small white bag
full of soot onto the carpet. We're trained to respond to this, hoover
is a brand-name and it is my in to point out just how favourably the
Torricelli compares with Hoover in terms of suction and longevity. I
couldn't face it and just kept pouring that soot. Sometimes I feel so
sick to my stomach that I could just keep pouring damn soot forever and
then just leave.

"Not as pretty as a Dyson though. "

That really is a word that raises my hackles. That's all I hear, every
house I go to. My son told me I should get a Dyson.

She didn't want to buy the Torricelli in the end, not that I blame her.
Even when I showed her photographs of the mites that live in her
carpet, that only the Torricelli can get rid of, she didn't budge. A
lot of these old women, they are prepared to have you come in so that
they've got someone to talk to.

"Look at this mites, " I said, "I could get on my hands and knees and
fill a jar with these mites. You got a jam jar or something ? "

She didn't want me to fill a jar with carpet mites.

I left her my card anyway. Sometimes they change their mind. Not often,
but if I don't sell four of these cleaners in the next few days, I knew
that I'd lose even this crummy job.

That night, I couldn't face going back to Jan. I'd even pulled the
suitcase out of the loft for her, to make it easier to leave me, but
she still hadn't gotten round to it. I just wanted to hit bottom and
she was getting in the way. I thought I'd probably get some ham and
eggs, maybe watch a movie.

The rain slicked down and my trousers got damp. I don't like the rain,
it makes me smell bad and I stay damp for too long.

I patted my pocket and pulled out a crumpled pack of Marlborough.
Empty. One cigarette, broken almost in two. I tried to smoke it,
holding it in the middle at the break, but it seemed so pathetic I
almost burst into tears right where I was. Sometimes you have to feel
sorry for yourself, sink right down and then you just gather the
strength to pull yourself out of it.

There was a bar nearby and I went into it, to see if there was a
machine. There was, but the bar was nearer. I decided to order a drink,
purely to get some change.

The girl behind the bar was pretty. Dark black hair, vivid red lips and
a scarlet dress. I've always been bad for girls in red. What can you do
? She had a smell about her, like when you sand down a real nice piece
of wood, that sort of clean, real smell.

She looked at my case while she fixed me a gin.

"What's in there ? "

"Vacuum cleaner, " I tell her, taking off my hat and fanning my face
with it, "I sell vacuums. "

"I know you, " she said, raising one eyebrow in a way that made me fall
in love with her before I'd even touched the gin, "You were at my
grandmas today. "

I stayed in the bar that whole night, chatting to Red while she ate
green olives and threw ice cubes into the fan. The cubes shredded up
real good and the fan made a clunky kind of noise as it spat slivers of
ice around and a fine spray of water. She was a real piece of
work.

It was no surprise to me that she ended up talking me into all kinds of
stuff. It's my own fault, but I'm weak for women. I'm weak for
everything you can think of - money, the horses, booze, cigarettes,
action.

When we finally kissed, she tasted of olives and she smelled even more
like wood up close. She had the most beautiful legs, so smooth and
tapered. It did things to me. I didn't feel like a damp-furred loser
anymore. I felt like I mattered, like I could do things that were
important.

Red showed me a photocopy she'd taken of her grandmother's bank book.
That old lady was loaded. Red said she was waiting for the right guy to
come along, someone she really felt she could be with, then she'd ask
her grandmother for a little money and they could get married, start up
a business of their own.

This was all sounding real good to me. I left the case with the
Torricelli vacuum cleaner in the bar; I knew I wouldn't be needing it
anymore.

The next day, I still smelt a little bad from the rain, so I put on
some cologne before I left the house to meet Red. The suitcase was
still there and I checked inside. Jan had put in three or four bits of
clothes, but only enough so that it wouldn't inconvenience her when she
decided to stay. She wasn't ever going to leave, so I would just have
to beat her to it.

Red told me that things had not gone well with the old lady. She hadn't
been prepared to give up any of that money, although she had plenty to
spare. And she was old, she had nothing of any consequence to spend it
on.

I should've seen where this was going. But I'm dumb. That's my nature.
I'm not a cunning sort of guy.

Red told me how she stood with the money. She'd get the lot when the
old lady died. She had no other relatives. She showed me the photocopy
again. She told me how we'd get a place out in the country, have our
own business, maybe a farm and raise some chickens. She took my hand
and put it on her leg. It felt cool to the touch and it seemed forever
from her ankle to her thigh.

So it turned out that I would be needing the Torricelli case again. Red
had put it to one side. She'd thought this through. She was doing the
planning, to make things easier. I like smart women. They don't often
get interested in me though.

"I didn't tell her that it was you I was in love with, " she said, "So
when you go back to try once more to sell her the cleaner, she won't be
suspicious. "

That was true enough. She invited me in quite eagerly. I guess she
didn't get a lot of visitors. I ran through the usual patter with her,
but this time it didn't feel boring, I felt nervous the whole
time.

Could I really do it ? Really just kill this old lady, who'd done
nothing to harm me ? Sure, she was standing between me and a dream life
with Red, but it was still going to be tough.

"It's just not as pretty as the Dyson, " she said sorrowfully, and
that's when I clunked her with the damn Torricelli. It wasn't tough at
all, it was the easiest thing in the world. That's the sorrowful part,
how easy it was. There was no more to it than turning off a tap or
blowing out a match when you're done with it.

I smashed up some stuff, opened a few drawers, the idea was to make it
look like a burglary. I was about to leave when I remembered the pile
of soot on the floor. I'd have to vacuum that up, or it'd look really
odd.

Red came in, just as I was doing this. She took in the body and flashed
me a grin. She pointed out where the bedroom was and although I was a
little concerned, I wasn't about to refuse. She whispered to me that I
was to be rough with her, that's what she wanted.

Of course it was. That's exactly what she got. It looked real good to
the cops when they busted in on an anonymous tip and found an old lady
dead and her killer ravishing the granddaughter. Red told them
everything, it was just a completely different everything to the story
I've just told you.

They were never going to believe me. I'd just got out on the heavy
breathing charges and those three pigs all gave phoney evidence against
me, told how I'd threatened them, harassed them. Red looked a picture
in the witness box. I really felt like throwing my head back and
howling. In some sense, it had all been worth it.

I just wanted to set the record straight, is all. Us wolves ain't
always the bad guys.