Vail by Trevor Hoyle

chance. How about a cashmere scarf?’ he said to me, rummaging for the item in question. ‘Hardly worn, sir. Good as new.’
    Somebody thrust a pair of tan brogue shoes under my nose. ‘Two packets of sandwiches and that can of orange squash. Look at them! They’re your size.’
    I struggled to stand up, holding my box protectively under my arm. I could hardly move for the press of bodies. Somebody got hold of my T-shirt and I yanked free.
    â€˜All right then,
one
packet of sandwiches and a can of orange.’
    â€˜I don’t want your shoes.’ I tried to get out and tripped over legs and feet.
    â€˜Real platinum …’
    â€˜Cashmere …’
    â€˜Hardly worn …’
    â€˜Get-that-box,’ said another, younger, harder voice.
    Head down I went for the door, the pack after me, stepping on things and people in a mad headlong rush. Somebody got a hand on my box and I kicked backwards with my heel. I collided with some people coming in through the swing doors and there was a general mêlée of confusion: curses, shouts, screams and shocks.
    Outside in the sunshine I ran a few paces and then slowed to get my breath back and not attract attention. Petrol.
    I got my hose and two-gallon can and did a casual walkabout on the outskirts of the parking area. A car with DISABLEDDRIVER NO HAND SIGNALS in the back window looked promising. If the driver was thalidomide with rudimentary limbs and knobbly stumps for fingers it could mean that his petrol cap was of the press-on non-locking type. So it proved. In went the hose, a quick suck on the end to draw the petrol below the level of the tank, and gravity and the law of fluid displacement did the rest. Easy-peasy. Just as I was removing the hose a thin boy, – a youth I suppose you’d call him, – sidled round the back of the car and stared at me from the corner of his bloodshot eye. He wore a holey yellow T-shirt with the legend NUKE ARGIE SCUM on a mushroom cloud printed across the chest and denims cut down to shorts with frayed bottoms. Grimy bare feet in laceless Adidas training shoes with the stitching coming undone. I clenched my fists to hit him.
    â€˜Heading for the Smoke, squire?’ he inquired softly. His teeth had never heard of Pepsodent.
    â€˜No, Timbuktu.’
    â€˜Where’s that?’
    â€˜Just south of Leicester.’
    â€˜Got a
melyn cribo
?’
    This was underground argot for a yellow card. ‘No, why, do I need one?’
    â€˜If you’re going to the Smoke you do. No
melyn cribo
, no work.’
    â€˜I’m not looking for work.’
    â€˜How about a Resident Alien permit?’
    â€˜You sell those too?’
    â€˜Anything you need, sunshine.’
    A Resident Alien permit would be useful. Without one I wouldn’t be able to get medical treatment for Bev. Hospitals were strict about who they admitted these days. ‘How much?’
    â€˜What have you got?’ The boy or youth motioned with a scrawny undernourished hand that we ought to move away from the car in case the owner lurched up. His forearms, I noticed, were hard and shiny and lumpy with old puncture marks and scar tissue.
    â€˜Not a lot of anything,’ I said. ‘Petrol any good to you?’ The boy or youth shook his head. ‘What then?’
    â€˜Wife? Daughter?’
    â€˜Both.’
    â€˜A double-header for a Resident Alien permit while you watch.’
    â€˜Suck my cock instead,’ I said.
    â€˜Suck mine for a
melyn cribo
.’
    â€˜It’s probably pox-ridden.’
    â€˜No blood, just a clear discharge. You could rinse your mouth out with petrol after.’
    I toyed with the idea of battering him senseless and taking everything he had. Dump his body along the motorway somewhere and let the crows have him. Was he too smart to carry the stuff on him?
    â€˜I’ll do without it,’ I said. ‘You’ll give them both a