showing. It was shoulder-length and, even in the relative gloom, looked as though it could have been cleaner.
No trick of the light, however, could disguise her paleness, her thinness or her weariness. She had a frame for a fuller figure but she didn’t have the flesh for it. When she moved, her open gown parted further and, from across the room, Proctor could see her ribs corrugating her skin. Her face was made-up – peach cheeks, bloody lips and heavy eye-liner – but the rest of her body was utterly white, and when she smiled she only succeeded in looking tired. ‘My name’s Lisa. What’s yours?’
He ignored the question. ‘You don’t look like you do on the card.’
She shrugged. ‘I don’t want to be walking down the street seeing myself in every phone-box I pass. And I don’t want people pointing at me because they’ve recognized me from my picture, do I?’
‘I guess not.’
She kept her distance and put a hand on her hip, revealing a little more of herself. ‘So, what do you want?’
Proctor’s hand was in his coat pocket. He felt the torn yellow card. ‘I just want to talk.’
Her cheap smile faded. ‘I don’t charge less than thirty for anything. And for that, you get a massage and hand-relief.’
‘What’s your name?’
‘I told you. Lisa.’
‘Is that your real name?’
‘Maybe.’
‘Is that a yes or a no?’
‘What’s it to you?’
‘I’d just like to know, that’s all.’
She paused for a moment. ‘Tell you what, why don’t you tell me? Who do you think I am? Lisa, or someone else?’
‘I think you’re someone else.’
‘Really?’ She smiled again but it failed to soften the hardness in her gaze. ‘Who?’
‘I think your real name might be … Stephanie.’ Not even a flinch. Proctor was disappointed. ‘Are you Stephanie?’
‘That depends.’
‘On what?’
‘On your money. If I don’t see some, I’m nobody. If you just want to talk, that’s fine but it’ll still cost you thirty. I don’t do anything for free.’
Proctor reached for his wallet. ‘Thirty?’
She nodded. ‘Thirty. And for thirty, I’ll be Stephanie, or Lisa, or whoever you want.’
Proctor held three tens just out of her grasp. ‘Will you be yourself?’
She said nothing until he handed her the notes. And then, as she was folding them in half, she asked, ‘What are you doing here? What do you really want?’
‘The truth.’
‘I’m a prostitute, not a priest. There’s no truth here. Not from me, not from you.’ When Proctor frowned at this, she added: ‘When you get home this evening, are you going to tell your wife you went to see a hooker? That you paid her money?’
‘I’m not married.’
‘Your girlfriend, then. Anyone …’ Proctor didn’t need to say anything. ‘I thought not. So don’t come here and talk to me about the truth.’
Not only was her tone changing, so was her accent; south London was being displaced by something less readily identifiable. Just as her opening remarks had been laced with a dose of sleazy tease, now she was cold and direct.
Proctor was equally blunt. ‘I think your real name is Stephanie Patrick.’
This time, he knew he was right. The surname betrayed her and she froze, if only for a fraction of a second. He saw her try to shrug it off but he also saw that she knew he’d seen it.
‘I’m right, aren’t I?’
For the first time, she looked openly hostile. ‘Who are you?’
‘Your name is Stephanie Patrick, isn’t it?’
She looked down at the money in her fist and said, ‘Let me give this to the maid and then we’ll talk. Okay?’
It took Proctor a couple of seconds to realize that the ‘maid’ was the fat woman who had admitted him to the flat. ‘Okay.’
Lisa – for that was who she still seemed to be – turned away and left him alone in the room. When she returned, a couple of minutes later, she had transformed into a man who was six-foot-four and built like a weight-lifter. He had no neck, his huge shaven head merging with the grotesque bulges of his shoulder muscles. His white T-shirt was so tight it could have been body-paint.
He didn’t need to raise his voice when he pointed at Proctor and murmured, ‘You. Outside. Now.’
Proctor rolled over, vaguely aware of the soggy rubbish that was squashed beneath his body. The drizzle fell softly on to his stinging face. One eye was closing. Through the other, he saw two walls of blackened brick converging as they rose. He was in an alley of some sort and it stank.
The beating had been short, brutal and depressingly efficient; the administrator was clearly no novice. After a final kick to the ribs, he’d hissed a blunt warning: ‘If I ever see you here again, I’ll tear your fucking balls off. And that’s just for starters. Now piss off out of here.’
With that, a door had slammed shut and Proctor had been by himself, lying on a bed of rotting rubbish. For a while, he made no attempt to move. He lay on his back, his arms wrapped around his burning ribs. He tasted blood in his mouth.
He looked up and saw smudges of buttery light seeping from cracks in drawn curtains. And from a partially-opened window, he heard Bing Crosby crooning on a radio.
I’m dreaming of a White Christmas …
Proctor saw her before she saw him. He was standing in a restaurant doorway, trying to keep dry. The drizzle of the previous night had matured into real rain. When he glimpsed her, she was heading his way, so he retreated from view. Inside the restaurant, staff were preparing for lunch, placing tall wine glasses and small dishes of chilled butter on tables draped in starched white cloth.
He waited until she was close. ‘Lisa?’
She stopped but it took a moment for her to recognize him beneath his mask of bruises. Proctor raised his hands in surrender. ‘I don’t want any trouble. I just want to talk.’
She looked as though she would run. ‘Leave me alone,’ she hissed.
‘Please. It’s important.’
