Story in Two Parts - Part One - where I Follow a Man.

*

I follow him. Actually, it is not really a decision, it is just something I do, I don’t know why. He walks along the main road: a dirty orange bus and people standing looking at shops, the ambling pace of mid-morning shoppers. There is a small market selling vegetables. I wonder for a moment how much these people earn, they exchange such tiny sums. 

 We go through a vast covered market, like a railway station, where meat is sold. Huge carcasses hang from racks above, ruby dark: there are ranks of pigs heads in the fridges below, then vast glass ice boxes of pigs knuckles, tails and ears, strangely white, arranged along a concrete corridor beneath the high glass roof. Men with ruddy faces and blood smeared smocks wield giant cleavers, hacking at corpses or standing shouting, “pigs’ trotters, fresh pigs’ trotters”, or “leg of lamb, leg of lamb” as I follow the man, a silhouette among many. 

 Presently we leave, walking down a narrow street where the buildings are decorated with ornate copulas and domes though the street level is dirty and spoiled.  I pursue the man through a park; a small park like a square in the way that the buildings, stony, solemn, press round it. The grass is soft under my shoes: I’m silent. I watch; he stops and fumbles in her pocket for something taking out a handkerchief, but as he does so I see something fall to the lawn. But he doesn’t notice: he walks on, not picking it up, blowing his nose, and then replacing the handkerchief in his pocket. I follow him to where he once stood, easily finding there between the blades of grass: a brass Yale key, a door key. 

 We leave the park, I am about 100 metres behind him. He walks along a narrow road up to a block: it is a tenement and the front door pushes pen without a key. I can see him mount the stairs, the darkness of the interior, and the way the deep gloss paint dark red gleams from the light which passes through from the block back door, and I smell the sharp smell of disinfectant. I hear his steps on the heavy stair, ascending. Then he arrives at his flat, I presume. 

I don’t follow him upstairs but it seems that he is not the floor above but the third floor, the penultimate floor. So I wait there in the lobby just before the back door where a bicycle old and dusty stands. I hear the footsteps, as they descend. And I wait until I hear them leave the building. I rise and mount the stairs myself. There are two flats on each floor. I reach the second. But which door? The first door is newly painted, the surface dark red, and gleaming. The second is black and dirty. I chose the second, I do not know why. 

 I insert the key. I turn it: it does not turn easily. I turn the key harder, my thumb pressing against the brass of the key: the lock clicks open, I enter.

*

Beth, or The Missing Girl. Part 2

I set out the dinner things in my dining room before leaving for work that morning in anticipation of our returning there. The day passed quickly. I worked in a travel agency which specialised in tours for elderly people. Often their tours had a cultural element: I was responsible for setting these elements up; finding guides and organising itineraries. I had spent the day in discussion with the Austrian Board of Tourism. They were going to find a guide who spoke English for a day in Vienna. That day would be concerned with the Secession in Austria.

My desk was at the back of the hop. At the close of day I heard the door open.

I looked across: it was a woman. But it was not Beth.

She turned to me: hello

Hello, I said

Do you do any trips to Russia, she asked.

Madam, I said, I strongly advise you against visiting Russia. It's government is scarcely legal and the whole place is awash with cannibals.

She broke into a laugh. I've been to Russia many times. I want to know about going to St Petersburg. My mother wishes to go to see the Hermitage.

I went to get her the brochures.

She left. Ten past six. No-one.

Perhaps Beth was late. I decided to wait. I went through he racks straightening things. I went into the kitchen and tidied the mugs. I got a cloth from there and a can of furniture polish and I sprayed it on the surface of the desks. Then I polished them with a cloth.

I got sick of waiting. I dialled her number. No reply.

I went out of the shop. There was no-one standing outside.

Then I got a call at home some days later in the morning at 9am.

"Is that Clancy?"

"Yes," I said

"Maybe you don't remember me. Its Cath."

"O."

"I'm Beth's sister."

"Ah," I said

-Well," she said, "You should know something."

"What," I said

"Beth is dead," said the voice.

"O," I said.

"Yes," she said.

She put down the phone.

*

That can't be right, I thought.

Beth, or The Missing Girl. Part 1.

I want to tell a story: an entertainment or a diversion; something to delight you or make you think.

But all I have on my mind is Beth.

Some months ago my mother forwarded me a letter from Beth. The letter was quite general. She was now living in London, in Hackney. There was a telephone number too.

I called it immediately.

"Hello, it's me, Clancy."

"Clancy! I wondered if you would get my letter."

"Yes, I got it today. How are you? Long time."

"Yes," said Beth.

"You're in London now?" I asked

"Yes, I moved some time ago."

-What are you up to?

"Nothing much. This and that."

"Okay," I said. Something about her reply made me feel guilty; something in the tone of voice, as if I had betrayed her by not making more effort to keep in touch. That sense of guilt impelled me.

"Do you want to meet for a drink?"

"Ok," she said. I didn't recognise the tome from the person I knew. There was something listless about it.

"Why don't you meet me after work?" I said. "What about tomorrow, or today if you're free."

"Tomorrow," she said.

"Ok, I said. "There was a lag in the conversation.

"Meet me after work. 112 Farringdon Road."

"What time?"

" I finish at six. Come then."

"Okay," she said. She put down the receiver, It feltoddly final about that. I didn't get it.