Of wee sweetie mice and men Read online

  Colin Bateman

  Of Wee Sweetie Mice And Men

  1

  Peace had settled over the city like the skin on a rancid custard. Everybody wanted it, just not in that form. The forecast remained for rain, with widespread terrorism.

  When it came, the steady drizzle forced diners off the sun deck of the Rose-Marie. They congregated in unhappy proximity in the hold of the old ferry, robbed of prime contact with the murky delights of a fading Belfast winter. They chatted in subdued tones, their only views through misted portholes, and picked in a desultory fashion at their food. For a while it had seemed exotic, lunching out on the river, something rich, something unusual. But now the reality of their situation was starkly apparent. They were eating burgers in the interior of an old rusty boat cemented to the side of a polluted river, and they could do better than that at home. Children were crying. Waiters were slow. The drink was warm.

  I followed Cameron up top again, our drinks replenished. The tables were awash with ketchup and rain. Seagulls cried for the spring and sparrows chirped optimistically for a rainbow. We leant on the rail and looked out over the river at the rubbish on the far bank.

  'This could be New Orleans,' Cameron said laconically.

  'Yes, Steamboat Bill, it certainly could.'

  I spat into the brackish water. It looked tastier than my pint.

  'So anyway,' Cameron said casually, as if he hadn't been working his way up to it all afternoon, 'what do you know about Bobby McMaster?'

  He gave me a little smile as he said it; everyone did when they mentioned McMaster.

  'Fat Boy McMaster?'

  He nodded. I shrugged.

  'How do you rate him as a fighter?' he asked.

  'Well, he's not Sugar Ray Leonard, but not many are.'

  'No, he's not that.'

  I knew Fat Boy McMaster well enough. I'd written a few articles about him over the years. Big, friendly guy, in the wrong profession. He'd been a heavyweight boxer for six years, the Irish champion for two. That, of course, meant nothing. It was like being in the Swiss Navy or the Dutch Mountain Rescue Team. He'd ventured outside Ireland three times, been beaten twice and drew once. A week before, his manager had somehow been able to wangle him a shot at the European title, stepping over a number of legitimate British contenders in the process. It had more to do with money than sense. He met Fabrice Benizon in Toulouse. Fabrice was no Ali himself, but had defended the title six times. Fat Boy accidentally butted him in the second round and took the decision on cuts.

  'He's the best heavyweight in Europe,' said Cameron, smiling again, 'he has the belt.'

  'The belt round my trousers would be harder to win, Sam.'

  I wasn't sure if I liked his smile. Too few teeth. He had a Dublin accent. I like a Dublin accent, in women, but it made Cameron sound cynical and manipulative. Shame how an accent can do that. His hair wasn't the best either, as if his mother had cut it with a broken bowl. But he wasn't a bad chap, for an editor. He was on his way to offering me an assignment for Irish Sports World, and he liked to lead up to offering me negligible money and abysmal working conditions by warm beering me in exotic locations.

  'What is it, Sam,' I prompted, 'an afternoon in a Sandy Row gym with the new King of the Ring?'

  He shook his head, then lifted his glass to his mouth and took several gulps, watching me with dark-rimmed eyes the whole time. He wiped his lips with the back of his hand. 'What would you say,' he said, 'if I were to tell you that Fat Boy McMaster was to fight for the world title in New York next month?'

  I snorted. 'The world title of what, eating?'

  'Boxing. The heavyweight title.'

  'I'd say catch yourself on, Sam. No fucking way.'

  'Yes, fucking way.'

  'Aye, Jackanory, Sam.'

  Cameron shook his head. 'I'm serious. I mean, it's not official, yet. Will be by the end of the week. You heard it here first. Fat Boy McMaster will fight Mike Tyson for the world heavyweight title in Madison Square Garden in three weeks' time.'

  I lifted my glass and emptied it into the river. 'Pish,' I said.

  'I'm serious, Starkey. I had it straight from the horse's mouth.'

  'Mr Ed, the talking horse, Sam?'

  'Mr McClean himself. You know he has the connections.'

  'I wouldn't let him connect my Christmas lights, Sam.' I shook my head. Tutted. 'Fat Boy McMaster is going to fight Mike Tyson? He'd have a better chance against that girl Tyson raped. You know as well as I do he's invincible. And Rocky Marshmallow expects to be in shape in three weeks? Wise up.' Cameron shook his head. 'Tell me some more, Sam. Then give me the punch line. And I'm not excusing the pun.'

  Cameron opened his palms sympathetically to me. 'I know it's hard to believe, Dan, but, like they say, it's a funny old game the fight business.'

  'Funny as a fire in an orphanage.'

  'Sure. But take Tyson. Since he got out of prison he's cleaned up the division. What is it, a year, and he's unified the four titles. Since he's the undisputed champ, there's a fairly straightforward punching order - he was signed to fight the official number two contender Marvin Simons on 17 March. Simons broke his leg in a car accident night before last, limped away from a four-milliondollar pay day in the process. Numbers three to five have all fought in the last month and don't want to take the chance at short notice. Beyond five there's no one of any real quality anyway, but Fat Boy winning the European title put him in at number eight. He may not be the greatest in the world, but he's white, and the fight's on St Patrick's Day. Any clearer to you now?'

  'St Patrick's Day?'

  'St Patrick's Day. Makes sense, doesn't it?'

  I nodded. 'Sense to McClean.'

  'Sense to McClean, sense to Tyson's people. I mean, you know his record, he's beaten everyone out of sight. It's hard to justify paying him millions of dollars every time he pulls on the gloves if he's just going to blow them away in the first round. I mean, Americans have the attention span of a midge anyway, but you can stretch a point. The fans were bored. What have they been looking for since Rocky Marciano? The Great White Hope. Make him Irish and you'll make a fuckin' fortune. You know what they're like over there. Most of them think they can trace their line back to Bernard the fuckin' leprechaun, and that's just the blacks. And see how crazy they go on St Patrick's Day? So along comes McMaster at just the right time. It's short notice, sure, but he's in shape from the European fight. Can you imagine the hype they'll put into it, Dan?'

  'Sam, don't get carried away. McMaster can barely fill a church hall here. He can't fight, he has the charisma of a bag of sugar and has more in common with tripe than hype. He is the Great Fat Hope. And you know it.'

  'Ach, Dan,' Cameron exclaimed, bunching his fists, 'don't forget he has these! A puncher's chance.'

  'He'll get killed, that's the chance he has.'

  'He won't get killed.'

  'Sam, you know as well as I do how many Tyson's put in hospital. And they were killing machines compared to Fat Boy.'

  Sam shook his head. 'You don't understand, Dan. Look at McMaster. What has he got? He's semi-pro at best. He spends a couple of hours in the gym and the rest stacking shelves in one of McClean's warehouses. What he earned for the European title wouldn't keep you in drink for a month. This is his chance to earn a million. To make something of himself. Jesus, Dan, you'd do it for a million.'

  'I'd have a better chance, for fuck's sake.'

  The rain began to thicken up. The birds stopped singing. The Lagan had a sullen, listless look about it. Everything looked as miserable as Fat Boy McMaster's chances of landing the title. The only sound was the tump-tump-tump of the rain on the deck. Even the children down below had stopped wailing. I fe
lt a bit sick, and it wasn't entirely the warm beer.

  I was always a fight fan. I had only a handful of years on me when I listened to the Thrilla in Manila on the radio. I remember Jim Watt singing 'Flower of Scotland' every time he defended his world title. The mass hysteria that followed Ireland's own Barry McGuigan to the featherweight crown. The sadly neglected but all-conquering flyweight king, Dave Boy McAuley. But McMaster was different. In Ireland he'd been okay, the biggest fish in a tiny pond. In the world ocean of boxing, he was less than plankton.

  His mentor, Geordie McClean, built his fortune in the insurance business, no bad thing to be in during Belfast's roarin' seventies, then branched out into supermarkets and pubs. Everything he touched turned to gold. He'd always been something of a boxing fan and a move into managing and promoting boxers had been a natural progression for an otherwise faceless moneyman who fancied upping his public profile. It could just as well have been politics, but he didn't have an honest enough face to lie convincingly in public. So now, by fair means or foul, he had landed the big one: a shot at the world heavyweight crown. It didn't matter that he was about to propel a piss-poor fighter from the undercard to the undertaker.

  'Imagine it though, Dan,' Cameron was saying, 'a Belfast boy fighting for the world heavyweight title.'

  'Yeah,' I said, 'what a way to go.'

  'Ach, Dan, there's no romance in you.'

  'You might say that.'

  'I don't like the sound of that.'

  'Yeah, well.'

  'You're still together, aren't you?'

  'Mind your own business, Cameron.'

  'How can you say that to me, Dan? Wasn't I best man at the wedding?'

  'Worst, as I recall.'

  'Ach, Dan.'

  'Truth, mate. We've split up. Not much more I can say really.'

  'How long?'

  'A few months.'

  'Ach, that's nothing. They say time's a great healer.'

  'Aye, I know. I get the stitches out next week.'

  'Jesus, I didn't like to say. She did that? Jesus, Dan, you're always breaking your fucking nose. What'd she do that with?'

  'Her fist.'

  'Fuck, maybe she should be fighting Tyson.'

  'She'd have a better chance, Cameron.'

  'Don't say that, Dan.' Cameron drained the last third of his pint. He looked behind him, then tossed the glass into the river. 'That was a bit stupid,' I said.

  'What?'

  'Tossing the glass overboard. It's pollution.'

  'What the fuck are you, the Green Hornet, Dan? All I did was throw a glass in. It'll sink to the bottom and some dozy trout'll get a bit of double glazing for his nest. You poured most of a pint of pish in, they'll be pulling bodies out of there from now till Christmas.'

  I shrugged.

  'So you're surviving okay anyway? You're still. at home?'

  'I have a bedsit. Wonderful.'

  Cameron tutted. 'It must be hard.'

  'Usually is, then I think of Trish and it goes away.'

  'Oh, bitch, bitch.'

  'Yeah, well.'

  'Humour masking a broken heart.'

  'Humour masking a broken nose. Sam, I still can't get my finger right up the left nostril.'

  'Of course, you could tell me to mind my own business,' he said. He looked into my face. His nose was short and turned up a fraction at the tip. His crack-bowled hair, as dank as the Lagan, was plastered onto a broad skull, and little streams of water ran down his face. I had no idea why we were standing getting soaked on the deck of a crap non-floating restaurant with only the annually reconstructed skyline of Belfast to impress us. No idea but the fact that I quite liked him and the knowledge that eventually he would get round to offering me some loose change.

  'Mind your own business.'

  'But did you never think of a second honeymoon?'

  'No.'

  'Rekindle the old love.'

  'Wishful thinking, Sam.'

  'Even if it was free? A good hotel, best city in the world, and a world heavyweight championship taking place down the road.'

  'Sam?'

  Cameron shrugged. It was a good shrug. Not up to my standards, but a good effort all the same.

  'I signed a deal with McClean for a book of the fight. Unlimited access to Fat Boy, McClean, the whole camp, the whole campaign. What do you think, Danny, could you do it?'

  I turned my back to the rail, splashed my foot down into a puddle. It was the best clean my Docs had had for months. 'You're asking me to write a book about something which is at the least misguided, at worst manslaughter.'

  'Yes.'

  'You're asking me to spend a lot of time with a no-hoper fat lad from Belfast who's about to get brained for no good reason but cash, and write a cheap exploitative book about it? And for good measure spend a couple of weeks with a woman who has tried to kill me?'

  'Yes.'

  'Okay,' I said.

  2

  The day after I was arrested for punching my wife I was asked to write a book about boxing. My life is full of cruel little ironies like that.

  Don't get the wrong impression. I didn't just punch her out of nowhere. I punched her out of self-preservation, seeing as how she'd already lamped me five or six times and I was leaking more blood than you'd get with the average shrapnel wound.

  No charges were brought. She calmed down a bit and I got sewn up. And so to the reconciliation.

  While Patricia was in the bathroom I slipped into her bedroom. I was looking for, but not wanting to find, evidence of some further infidelity. I was surprised by how spartan it was. The room, not the evidence. Patricia's domain was normally such a mess. But the carpet was clean, the bed was made, the walls were bare. The drawers were damp from being wiped. The only objects even vaguely out of place were a couple of paperback books by the bed. And a diary. And a pen.

  I heard the toilet flush and moved quickly back into the living room. There was certainly nothing to indicate another man. Suspicious in itself, on one level. That's just it, boss ... it's too quiet. The diary almost invited perusal. But I had called unannounced. So there was no suggestion of her deliberately leaving it there to cover her tracks by false testimony, unless she was in a state of constant readiness and then there would never be a man in the place anyway ...

  I told myself to shut up and stop worrying. I willed the knot in my stomach to disentangle. It wasn't that I didn't trust her ... it was just that I didn't trust her.

  Patricia emerged from the bathroom. She looked lovely. 'So?' she asked.

  'So what?'

  'To what do I owe the pleasure?'

  'You're experiencing pleasure right now? That's a good sign.'

  I followed her into the lounge. She sat in an armchair. Only room for one. I took a seat on the settee and tried to look inviting. It had never worked before.

  'I was just passing,' I said.

  'I was just going out,' she countered.

  We looked at each other for a long moment. I wasn't just passing, but she was going out. 'Where?' I asked.

  'Out.'

  'But where to?'

  'Just out.'

  I nodded. I didn't want to know. I did want to know.

  'So?' she asked again.

  I shrugged. 'Just thought I'd call round and see what you were up to. See if you'd had any deep and meaningful thoughts about the meaning of life or marriage. You know, anything you might care to share with me.'

  'No.'

  'Okay.'

  It had all seemed so simple in the car.

  She laughed. A friendly laugh. Not mocking. She wore a nice black blouse, black stretch pants and some moderately high-heeled shoes. Her make-up was perfect. Her eyes were still a little hollow.

  'Dan, you're scrunching your eyebrows up,' she purred. 'I know that look. You fear the worst. No, I'm not going out with anyone you need to know about. I'm going out with a couple of the girls from work. We've just finished a very big project and it's the first chance we've had to let o
ur hair down in ages. Okay?'

  I gave her the nonchalant shrug. 'Sure. When are you going?'

  'Soon.'

  'You want me to give you a lift down the street? The car's outside.'

  'No, it's okay. They're calling for me.'

  'It's no trouble. I don't mind. No strings attached, if that worries you. You won't have to kiss me when you get out.'

  'Dan. ..' It was just a one-syllable name, but she managed to change the emphasis halfway through, from an exasperated whine to an expression of slightly muted sympathy.

  'I'm sorry,' I said. 'I'm doing my best to get on with you, but it all comes out wrong.'

  'I know. Don't worry. I think I'm the same way.'

  The room was as bare as the other. A television, unplugged. The armchair, settee. A small coffee table, unstained. She'd had a massive clear-out. 'Not much like the house I remember,' I observed. Better, I might have added.

  She shook her head slowly. 'Not at all. I'm getting rid of bad memories, Dan.' She gave me a sad kind of smile. 'How is it? How are you coping?' she asked to fill the vacuum of my silence.

  'Fine. Fine. Y'know.' Jesus, it was like talking with a stranger. Right. Time for it. Talking of home, our home, led necessarily to love and marriage. 'Patricia,' I said, 'I was wanting to ask you something.'

  She nodded, half suspicious, and, I fancied, half fearful. A good sign. I had rehearsed several versions in the car on the way over, although thinking at the same time how ridiculous it was to be nervous about asking a simple question of a woman I'd been married to for so many years. But it was difficult, because a turndown without good reason would be tantamount to hammering the final nail in the coffin of our relationship. I needed the second coming of the Starkeys..

  I could spend ten minutes telling her how much I loved her, then mention New York. I could drop it into the conversation, see if she offered to come. I could say I was going off on holiday with someone, see if she got jealous, and then tell her she was the someone. Or I could just ask her if she wanted to go on a second honeymoon. Which is what I decided.

  'Fire away,' she said.

  'Do you want a divorce?'

  I sat back, pleased that I had finally gotten it out. It was only after a moment that what I had actually asked sunk in. I sat forward again. But the words wouldn't come.