Hotel Ambrose

Chapter 9.4

Sergeant Mark sent two constables with me. He told them they were looking for two Missing Persons, and he described Sophie and Fred, except he called Fred by a different name to Fred. He said to keep a close eye on the kid, which meant me.

The two constables took me out into the city. They started off complaining to each other about having to take some bloody kid walking around the city when they had so much bloody paperwork, and what did the Sergeant think they were, a couple of bloody babysitters? Then they asked me where I thought my friends were. I told them I didn't know where they were.

"Well we're going to have a nice little stroll then, aren't we?" one of them said. The other one laughed.

They walked with their thumbs hooked in their belts, side by side, taking up most of the footpath. I trotted along next to them, weaving around signposts and trees and bins. They talked to each other as they walked.

"Up for promotion?"

"Yeh. Probably won't get it though."

"Know who will, don't you?"

The other constable turned his mouth into an O and made a motion with his hand in front of it.

His friend laughed. "Have you tried getting down on your knees?"

They both laughed this time.

I ignored them. I was listening for the Cripple and the Singing Dogs.

"Whatcha so nervous about?" one of them said.

"Nothing," I said.

The cop looked at each other and shook their heads and grinned.

There was a lull in the traffic, and I stopped. Distant howls, carried on the wind. The two constables walked on a couple of steps before realising I wasn't with them anymore.

"This way," I said, pointing up a lane.

The constables looked at each other and shrugged. They followed me up the lane.

I could see the river up ahead now. A bridge went over it here, and barges were tied up along the banks. I could see a big park on the other side.

"Where're we going mate?" one of the cops said. "They in the river?" They both laughed again.

We came to the river. The dogs were somewhere upstream, but I couldn't tell which side they were on, so I led the police up onto the bridge. Halfway across I stopped at the rail and looked up the river.

On the city side a walkway ran alongside the river. Every fifty metres or so was an alcove with a couple of park benches in it. The Cripple and his dogs were in one of these alcoves. There was a dark space behind them that I thought was the lane. I could just make out the lamp post.

I turned and led the constables back the way we'd come. One of the constables looked at his watch.

"Not far now," I said.

"You don't know where you're going, do you?" he said.

I ignored him and kept walking. I picked up pace. I wanted to get ahead of them. Their footsteps quickened behind me, their gun holsters creaking in time, so I slowed down again. I didn't want to make them suspicious.

When we were off the bridge I stopped and looked up the street that ran alongside the river. The dogs must have finished a song. All I could hear now was the sound of the city. There were tall buildings to my left and banked-up traffic going over the hill. Steps went down to the narrow riverside walkway. There was a toilet block nearby.

I grabbed at my crotch. "I need to go," I said.

"Can't you hold on?"

"I'm busting."

"Oh okay."

We walked to the toilet block. When we got there one of the constables waited outside while the other one came in. He pointed at the urinal.

"I need to take a crap," I said.

He made a face.

I went into the cubicle and closed the door and pushed the lock across. Then I looked up. The mens was separated from the ladies by a cinderblock wall. The wall didn't reach the roof, and there was a space up there – I think it's for ventilation or something, like if somebody really lets one go.

I climbed quietly up onto the rim of the toilet.

"Come on mate," the constable said suddenly from the other side of the door. His voice was so loud and sudden that I almost slipped off the toilet. "How long's it take?"

I ducked down and said, "It won't come out."

"Christ, I don't need details."

He moved away from the door. A tap came on and I heard him washing his hands. The tap went off again. I imagined him brushing water through his hair.

I pushed my bag up into the gap above my head. Then I grabbed the top of the cinderblock wall and pulled myself up.

"Whattaya doing in there?" the constable said as he came back to the toilet door. He must've heard something.

I didn't answer. If I spoke from up near the roof I was a goner. I squeezed through the gap and eased myself down into the cubicle on the ladies side, pulling my bag down after me.

Someone screamed.

I'd landed in front of a little old lady. Her skirt was pooled around her ankles and her peach-coloured pantyhose was rolled down to her knees. Her thighs looked like pizza dough. She screamed again and started hitting me with her fists. She kicked out at me with a heavy black old-lady shoe and my shin exploded with pain. I turned around and fumbled the door open.

Then I ran.

I tore out of the toilet block and crashed through the bushes, tripping over them and tumbling over and somehow finding my feet again; then I was leaping down the steps three at a time as the constables shouted out behind me. I reached the walkway at the bottom and chanced a look backwards. The first constable had reached the top of the steps.

"Come back NOW!" he shouted.

"FUCK YOU!" I screamed insanely, and tore away upriver.

The dogs had started singing again in the distance. They sounded impossibly far away. The two pairs of shoes hitting the pavement behind me grew louder in my ears. The cops were catching up fast. I heard one of them fall – his body hit the pavement like a bag of cement. I laughed crazily and ran harder. My feet flew over the pavement, my lungs burned, the bushes and the river shot past me in a blur. But I could hear the other policeman gaining on me. I felt his hand claw at my shirt as I swerved past the Cripple and his dogs and threw myself into the Lane. I skidded on the slimy cobbles and went over, crashing into the wall, but scrabbled straight back up and sprinted up the Lane. It took me a while to realise that the only footsteps echoing in the Lane were my own.

I stopped and turned around.

The world outside the Lane's entrance shimmered. A confused-looking policeman stepped into the haze. He stared at me, then his eyes moved to my left and back to my right. I realised he couldn't see me. The other cop joined him. They looked like people trapped under an ice sheet.