Free Money: A Suicide Note by Martin Amis Page B

colourless, moistureless face.
    'Same again?' he said.
    'Yeah,' I said. 'Hey, and — Fat Paul. Give us a scotch and all.'
    'Big one?'
    'Nah, just a double'll do.'
    Fat Paul placed the drinks on the bar. He folded his arms and leaned forward. He nodded pensively. 'There's a new stripper on today,' he offered. 'Veronica. Jesus. Beautiful.'
    'I'll stick around.'
    'Here, that — Selina. Still giving her one, are you?'
    'Don't ask me, pal.'
    We heard the sounds of chains shaking. We turned: a small shadow bided its time behind the locked glass doors.
    'Fuck off out of it!' said Fat Paul, in his youthful way.
    'No, it's all right,' I said. 'This must be my writer.' ——————
    Five days of London time, and still no fix on Selina.
    Twenty-four hours ago I ran Alec Llewellyn to ground, but then the trail went cold. Alec, that liar. He was holed up in a service-flat block off Marble Arch — a high-priced dosshouse for middle-management loners and transients, with the strict feel of the ward or the lab: fifty units of downward mobility, observable under controlled conditions. Alec sees himself as one of life's deep divers. Crime, debt, dope — these are the fathoms through which he swims. The pinch of his long fingers over bookmatch and cigarette packet corresponds to the lines of his handsome, nervous, nutcracker face. Yes, he's nervous. He is much weaker than he was a year ago. He could do it all then. He is not sure he can do it all now.
    'Where's Selina?'
    'I don't know,' said Alec. 'Lying in a pile of cocks somewhere. Wiggling her bum in some penthouse. Take your pick.'
    'Who's she fucking?'
    'How should I know?'
    'You told me it was someone I knew well. Who is it. Who.'
    'Doesn't matter who. Think about it, man. I can't believe I've got to sit here telling you this. She's a gold-digger pushing thirty, right? In other words, an exhausted sack artist with shrinking assets. She can't stop digging, she has to keep digging until she strikes. There's nothing else she can do. Okay, marry her. Or try another kind of girl: freckles and A-levels, career woman, divorcee with two kids, fat nurse —'
    'Oh you're such a liar. You just don't care what you say. What's it like, being a liar?'
    'Not too bad. What's it like being a moron? Where do you think she is. Summer school? Walking in the Lake District?'
    I looked round the room, at the churned bed, the hairbrush, at the splayed, eviscerated suitcase. Lean Alec, at thirty-six, a father of two, with his education, his privilege — what's he doing in this hired coop? We were drinking pernod, or paranoid, from a litre bottle with Heathrow tab.
    'You know,' I said, 'what you told me at the airport, it fucked up my whole trip. Thanks. You really gave me a bad time.'
    'That was just a precaution.'
    'Uh?'
    'She wants all your money.'
    This really got me going. 'So what?' I said. 'God damn it, what's that got to do with you?'
    '...I want all your money.' He laughed, but the laugh had a lot of wince in it. 'Look, John, this is serious. I hate to ask you this.'
    'And I hate to hear it. How much?'
    He named the figure — a consternating sum. I said, 'You already owe me money. What's it for? A drug deal? Gambling debt?'
    'Alimony! She's got the law batting for her now. We have a disagreement, I get a squad car full of rozzers coming round here to put her side of it.'
    'Wait a minute. You told me you were still fucking her.'
    'I am. Between you and me, it's never been better.'
    'I don't get it.'
    'It's like this. The pigs say I owe her all this money. If I didn't have the money there'd be no problem. But there it is, in the bank. Now I need that money to close a deal. I'm in with some bad guys on this and if I don't come across I'm going to get really worked over. They told me what they were going to do to me.'
    I said, with interest, 'What, exactly?'
    'No blows to the back of the head. In other words my face comes off. The pigs, they mean business too. Either I cough up on Friday, or it's