LITMIR.BIZ

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Noel demands.

      ‘For my portfolio?’ Valentine asks, fixing him with a dry look.

      ‘Why else?’ He shrugs, grinning.

      ‘Why else,’ she echoes, smiling back.

      ‘So did you?’ he persists.

      ‘Nope.’ Valentine shakes her head. ‘It was difficult to get her to trust me and relax. I mean after all the fuss at the hotel …’

      Noel raises a tentative hand to his throat.

      ‘And – like I said – her English wasn’t all that great. She was really stressing out about making her flight in time. She’d lied to her husband about taking the trip. She’d told him she was visiting her sister in Osaka. She didn’t want him getting suspicious. She was planning to surprise him for their anniversary …’ Valentine pauses for a second, cradling Nessa’s tiny shoe in her hand. ‘Then, just when I was about to take the plunge and ask her, this guy turned up to read the meter and walked in on us by mistake –’

      ‘Hang on a second,’ Noel interrupts, alarmed. ‘Which guy? Not the hotel guy?’

      ‘Hotel guy?’ Valentine echoes, confused.

      ‘He said he’d come to read the meter?!’

      Noel snorts, derisively.

      ‘The hotel guy?’ Valentine repeats. ‘Which hotel guy?’

      ‘To read the meter?!’ Noel rolls his eyes. ‘Are you having me on?’

      ‘No.’ Valentine shakes her head, defensively, then she pauses. ‘Although …’

      She glances over towards the meter, frowning. ‘I’m not sure if he actually got around to …’

      ‘And you thought he was credible?’ Noel demands.

      ‘Credible?’ Valentine’s starting to look paranoid. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

      ‘Did he have all the official documentation and shit?’

      ‘Documentation?!’ Valentine exclaims, almost irritated. ‘He came to read the meter, Noel. He was perfectly nice and polite and professional …’

      ‘So you saw his badge?’ Noel jumps in.

      ‘His badge?’

      ‘You checked his badge?’

      ‘Yes. Yes. I saw his badge.’ She flaps a hand at him, dismissively. ‘I checked his badge. Of course I did. I’m not a complete idiot. He had a clipboard and this tiny –’

      ‘Although an impostor could forge a badge, easily enough,’ Noel reasons.

      ‘You think an impostor would have a tiny torch?!’ Valentine’s almost deriding him, now. ‘And a special, little mirror inside an old powder compact?’

      ‘Yeah. Sure. Why not?’ Noel bristles.

      ‘Well he wasn’t an impostor, Noel.’ She scowls. ‘He was just some guy. And if you’d come home on time, like you promised …’

      Noel glares at her, balefully.

      She rubs at her eyes, exhausted, as the child coyly whispers something into her ear.

      ‘Nessa needs the toilet,’ she murmurs. ‘Would you mind taking her up while I get started on some sandwiches?’

      ‘Can’t she use the potty down here?’ Noel groans.

      ‘Absolutely not!’

      Her voice is suddenly implacable. ‘We’re trying to encourage her into a set routine, remember?’

      Noel gazes down at the child, malevolently. Nessa grips on to her genitals, twists her legs together and grimaces.

      ‘I’ve got a headache,’ he mutters, thickly, ‘and I feel like shit.’

      ‘You’ve got a hangover, Noel,’ Valentine corrects him, almost tenderly, ‘and an extremely beautiful and brilliant two-year-old daughter’ – she pushes the child forward, very gently – ‘who really, really needs to do a wee.’

      

      ‘John Daly?’

      Stanislav battles to place him, mentally: ‘Isn’t he that fat, alcoholic red-neck with the weird, pudding-bowl haircut?’

      Ransom turns and inspects the boy with a haughty, almost pitying eye. ‘When I was a kid your age,’ he tells him, ‘there was only one golfer I ever gave a damn about. No one else even came close. The others weren’t fit to lick his shoes. He was a god in human form – a golfing deity. He single-handedly re-wrote the game’s rule book. D’you know who I’m talking about?’

      Stan shrugs. ‘Faldo?’

      ‘Faldo? Faldo?!’ Ransom’s horrorstruck. ‘Are you swinging on my dick?! It was Seve, you fuckin’ dipstick! Seve! Seve Ballesteros! It’s like …’ Ransom frowns. ‘One of the defining moments in my life was the birth of my daughter, Chelsea – four years ago, in Santa Barbara – but I can honestly say – with no word of a lie – that the defining moment – and I mean the defining moment – was watching Seve sink that final putt in the 1984 Open Championship at St Andrews. I must’ve been around …’ Ransom ponders. ‘I dunno, ten, eleven years old at the time. Man …’ – he shakes his head, almost forlornly – ‘I fuckin’ idolized Seve as a kid. I wanted to be his double. Seve was my hero, my role model. I wanted to be an artist, just like Seve was. Because Seve was the real deal. He was the Big Cheese. He was the golfing gorgonzola and I wanted to play exactly like he did – you know? All that amazing spunk and fire and recklessness? I dreamed about painting on the greens with my putter, the way Seve could. Because at his best, Seve was – without doubt – the most brilliant, the most explosive, the most creative player that gololf has ever …’

      Ransom pauses for a second. ‘Gololf,’ he backtracks, cautiously, ‘glol-ol-o-ol …’

      Then he sneezes.

      Stan stares at him, perplexed.

      ‘And a real dude, to boot,’ Ransom continues (pulling at his nose and sniffing). ‘Totally sharp. I mean totally sharp – an absolute Geezer, a Face. Seve was like the Sean Connery of golf …’

      He sneezes again. ‘… the Salvador fuckin’ Dali of golf …’

      He sneezes for a third time. ‘Bollocks!’ He shakes his head, blinking.

      ‘Is he still playing today?’ Stan wonders.

      ‘Seve was wild to the fuckin’ core.’ Ransom grins (ignoring the question). ‘Unruly – tempestuous. He redefined the game’s parameters. He broke the mould. And I loved him for it, man, I worshipped him for it, because I’ve always been a lawless, little bastard myself. A firebrand. I guess I’m just anarchic by nature …’ Ransom shrugs, then inspects Stan for a second, speculatively. ‘How about you, Poland?’

      ‘Pardon?’

      (Stan is momentarily thrown by his new moniker.)

      ‘Are you anarchic?’

      ‘Me? Uh. Oh. Yeah. Of course I am.’ Stan nods, emphatically.

      ‘Too fuckin’ right, you are!’

      Ransom ebulliently high-fives him. The high-five is accompanied by a sharp tearing sound (as one of the jacket’s armpits finally gives way). The golfer’s brows rise (his expression a combination of admiration and surprise – as if he thinks the teen has just discharged a loud fart). Stan returns his gaze – slightly bemused (plainly thinking the same thing about the golfer).

      ‘I mean I’ll make no bones about it,’ Ransom returns (with enviable focus) to the subject at hand, ‘I was almost too anarchic back then. I was pretty much completely, fuckin’ feral. I just flew by the seat of my pants.

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