The Emerald Lie

I was having breakfast in the GBC, the neon nightmare.

Two fried eggs

Fat heartaches sausages

Fried tomatoes (at the green café)

Fried mushrooms

Black pudding

Kidding about the last one

Pot of scalding tea.

You can’t, just can’t, have coffee with a fry-up.

Halfway through this feast, a shadow fell over me. Looked up.

Emily.

Pissed, in the American sense, launched,

“What did I tell you, eh? Follow my lead, what was not to understand about that?”

I put my fork down. It’s impolite to point with it, never mind sticking it in her fucking eyes. I said, quietly,

“F-u-c-k off.”

Worked.

She went docile, said,

“If I could just sit a moment.”

She reached into her bag, took out an e-cig, and I spotted a book, part of the title, about grammar, by

Sally Wallace.

WTF?

Sally Wallace, mother of David Foster?

No way.

I went,

“Why are you reading about grammar?”

She was still staring at the remnants of my breakfast in a sort of fascinated horror. She said,

“If we’re going to catch the Grammarian we need to know about motivation.”

Jesus.

I asked,

“The fuck is with the we?”

Her eyes took on that hard hue, she hissed,

“You owe me, buster.”

Ah, fuck, she was just plain flat-out nuts but she wasn’t finished, said,

“Bedsides, I’m writing a mystery novel.”

Well, why not, if every literary hack was taking time out from the serious vocation of literature and slumming in genre, she would be just one more opportunist. I said,

“Crime.”

“Excuse me?”

In that sharp edgy interrogatory tone we’d imported from American sitcoms. I said,

“This is Europe, we call the genre crime.”

Would she concede, would she fuck?

Said,

“The mystery is why the hell I’m bothering to tell you, fellah.”

Whack-o.

Easing up, I tried,

“You got a title?”

Big satisfied smile.

No

One

Weeps

on

Sesame

Street.

“Catchy,”

I said.

She seemed pleased with that, and then,

“I’m going to write a crime novel channeling David Foster Wallace, blend in the rules of grammar, have a broken-down PI, an enigmatic femme fatale, and oh, for the punters, a lovable scamp, as in the dog, not the PI.”

I smiled with no feeling of amusement, said,

“You really love to mind-fuck.”

She shook the e-cig as if that would miraculously provide the needed hit, said,

“Not just the mind.”

Before I could counter that, a man came bustling in, walked rapidly to the table, extended his hand, said,

“You did it, big man. Didn’t think you had it in you.”

It was Tom Shea, who had recently fired me from the investigation into his daughter’s death, and he seemed genuinely delighted. I asked,

“What are you talking about?”

He gave Emily a quizzical look, asking,

“Can we speak in front of her?”

Emily said,

“I’m his lover.”

Took him... and me... aback.

She smiled, added,

“In truth I’m his trophy wife. We have a love lust gig going. He loves me and I do the lust bit.”

He took a moment to rally, then,

“I thought you were a deadbeat, Jack, and then you take out the whole office on the docks, and the American bollix is in there.”

The fire I’d heard about on the docks, Jesus.

I said,

“Good grief, I didn’t do that.”

He winked, fucking winked, said,

“Smart.

Deny

Deny

Deny.”

I’m on that page.

“Needless to say, if the Guards ask, I can provide an alibi for you and there will be a sweet bonus in the mail. Payback is a lovely bitch.”

And he was gone.

I tried to get my mind around the office being burned and, worse, a man dead. I looked at Emily, said,

“I swear on my father’s grave...”

She held up a hand, said,

“I know you didn’t do it.”

I felt a giddy relief, stammered,

“Thanks. Thanks for believing in me.”

She gave a harsh laugh, said,

“Idiot, it’s not that I believe in you. It’s more that I set the fire.”