F= They Ate the Truth 6

It is hard to concentrate on the little stupid jobs I have to
complete before the end of the day, a journey down to some flats in
Catford to serve a court application on some heroin addict who is about
to lose her kid, some invoices, a report to an insurance company about
a guy who is supposed to be crippled but still turning out to play
five-a-side footie with his mates.

All the time I do these things, I also think about Johann van Gibt. I
only met him once, he was very charming. Slightly tanned, but not
orange, hair that was ruffled, eyes that looked like they enjoyed a
joke. I felt that he had a presence, a gravity to him, with a mind that
had a weight that could pull you in. I wanted to spend longer talking
with him, but Chesterton took me away in the other direction, gave me
advice on the risks were the bugs able to breed.

Although he'd had all that thought going on, he was also attractive - I
could see that and I could also see that his eyes passed quickly and
appraisingly over any woman that passed by. In short, the idea of him
and Lorrie together was not too incongrous for it to be untrue.

Not much is known about van Gibt. I conduct a bit of a search on the
net. His early work on pheromones and pyschological complexes is
described, though dismissed by others in the field - he was trying to
produce fragrances that did more than smell nice or attract members of
the opposite sex - he was trying to build a scent that would reduce
depression without any of the addictive qualities or side effects that
were dogging Prozac and Seroxadat.

He was making a little money and had been signed up to work for a major
player in the fragrance world - not scents to do what he had speculated
about in journals, but washing up liquids that felt calming, scents to
spray around shops that were inviting.

Then, about five years ago, he just vanished completely, went off to
study insects. Nobody knew what he was doing, and every site with his
name in from the last three years has a simple message saying the site
was no longer operating when I try to connect to it. The sort of
message you see a lot on dead websites, but the messages aren't usually
word-for-word the same.

There had been some talk amongst us bug-guys for a while now that van
Gibt was going to come up with something even more sophisticated. He'd
managed the bugs with very little budget and he was now being backed by
serious money and resources.

I run through in my head the people I could talk to about van Gibt, to
find out what the latest on him was, or where I might find him. The
people I can trust won't know, the people who know I couldn't possibly
trust. The list ends up being one name - someone who will certainly
know and that I trust least of all, but at least have the advantage of
knowing that he's very dangerous. Chesterton.

What is there to do but go to see Lorrie ?

She looks fantastic when I get there, she's wearing a tight skirt that
finishes just below the knees and lipstick that looks moist and warm.
She also looks pleased to see me, which is a good sign. What the hell
am I doing ? Am I going to blow the best thing that's happened to me in
years just because I love solving puzzles ?

I study her face for a long time, while she smiles at me. There's
nothing behind her eyes, what I'm seeing is what there is. Who else can
you say that about ? She's got nothing that she's hiding from me. She
wrote me that cheque when she could have paid cash - if I'd asked her
about Johann, she probably would have told me.

Finally, I say, "I missed you, " and my fingers brush her bare
arm.

She tells me to come in and says that she was just boiling some water
for pasta, do I want some ? Tortellini, my favourite type.

"Just as long as it comes with some sort of sauce, " I say to her,
remembering Alastair.

"Tomato and chianti, " she says, as she takes her lovely calves towards
the kitchen, then looks back over her shoulder, "Is that okay? With
the? with your?? "

"I think it'll be fine, " I say, "Look on the jar, it won't have an ABV
figure on it. "

Funny, she says to me, she doesn't have many memories of alcohol. Guess
too many of them are weaved in with things she later regretted. Most of
her happy alcohol memories are of Scotch, holding a glass with chunks
of ice, not cubes, chunks hacked out of a big block, sitting outside as
the sun drops out of the sky or on the edge of a bed, slipping her feet
in and out of a pair of high-heeled shoes.

It ought to be hard to listen to someone describe the pleasures of
alcohol, it ought to make me want. But it is just so beautiful to hear
someone talk in an unrestrained way, not feeling guilty or anxious in
case their description sends me off on a jag. It makes me want, but
only her.

I move behind her and slip an arm around her waist, she feels so damn
good to hold. I kiss her lightly on the back of her neck, where her
hair ends.

"I've got a moral dilemma, " I say to her.

She drops pasta into the salted water, and turns the heat down ever so
slightly. I can see in the pan that there is a thin slick-like bubble
of olive oil in there.

"I love cooking, " she says, "But I hate baking. I like the stove and
not the oven. "

"Why is that ? " I ask her, pleased to be distracted from what I was
planning to say.

"Not sure, " she says, as we watch the little yellow tulipbud packets
of pasta sink and then rise in the water, "I think it's the attention,
doing something which you need to be there for, to work at. A cake you
just mix up then put in the oven and walk away. I like things like
risotto that you can't even leave, just even to run into the other room
and catch what is happening on television, something that needs you
there, fully attentive. Maybe risotto is like a baby. "

I don't have a moral dilemma any more. If I'm going to make a go of
things with this woman I have to respect what she wanted. If she wanted
to forget something, then who am I to go and find it for her ? It
doesn't matter if these were things that were painful or dangerous or
even if she just wanted to free herself of them, to move on. It doesn't
even matter if they were memories of her killing her husband (which, I
have to admit, has struck me as a possibility).

I cancel my plans of talking to her about Johann - which may well have
been useless plans anyway - if she had killed him, she wouldn't know
it. Instead, I shave some parmesan onto a plate for her, using a potato
peeler rather than the chrome instrument she keeps for the purpose. You
get more of a curl with a potato peeler.

We dish the food up and I note with pleasure that she puts the pans in
the sink and fills them with hot water - a little responsibility and
attention before pleasure, but not to the extent of washing and drying
that would kill the mood. My father always insisted on washing up the
pans before we could eat and it made the food taste dead to us, as we
sat at the table looking at his wet forearms flecked with small dabs of
white bubbles.

It is as we carry the food into the dining room that a shot rings out
and a bullet cracks through the glass window.