Shooting in the Dark

uniform. Strange, because in my memory of him he wears uniform all the time. He arrives home from work at different times of the day and night and the first thing he does is come to see me. If it is daytime, he lifts me up from the floor or the chair and holds me high in the air so that I look down at him. If it is night, he comes to my room and gazes down at me. I may be half-awake, but I feign sleep. I know he is there and all is well with the world. I am held by his gaze, the centre of his universe, as he is the centre of mine.
    I retain these images but they are not accompanied by sound. They are silent films. I imagine my father coming into the house at the end of his day and shouting my name. Perhaps he began calling for me when he was in the street or on the garden path. And when he lifted me into the air it was not a soundless event. It was something joyful and there would have been accompanying laughter punctuated by his pet names for me and my own screams of delight.
    The sound-track has been eliminated. Somehow in the confusion of death and grief and time it has been lost or stolen.
    I used to think it was retrievable, that one day I would turn a corner of memory and discover it waiting for me. In my mind’s eye there was a parcel wrapped in brown paper, slightly dusty on the outside, but when I unwrapped it the contents were as clean and shiny as the first leaf of spring.
    Four reels of audiotape. The old kind, before cassettes were invented. You put the reel on to the machine and threaded it through the magnetic head, hooked it to an empty reel on the other side. I would be able to synchronize the silent pictures in my head with the sound on the tapes. And the result would be like real life. It would be almost the same as having him back again.
    But why four reels?
    I still don’t know. When that particular vision visited me there were always four reels of tape. I delved into the mystery of numerology, but never came up with a definitive answer. Symbolically the number four represents containment and regularity, as in the square.
    This is one of the reasons for my voice-activated recorder. I don’t want to lose the sound-track again. Another reason: when I transcribe an event I want to work from an accurate record.
    Miriam is not stimulated by speculations of this kind. She is young and excited by dreams of untold wealth and physical passion and pain.
    I have built a rack for us. It’s a rickety kind of thing but does the job. Miriam or myself can be strapped into it (with a little adjustment to take account of our different sizes) by means of leather cuffs with Velcro fastenings. It’s a strange and exciting sensation to be spread-eagled and at the mercy of another human being. Especially when you know she’s cruel and she loves you.
    Today I have been working on a simple mechanism that will enable me to administer electric shocks to my love’s labia.
    And on Thursday I have an appointment with the blind woman.
     

36
     
    The countryside was not Sam’s favourite place. His natural habitat was the city. He could take long desolate beaches, a coastline of any description. From time to time he’d found himself living in a smallish market town and that hadn’t been the end of the world. But open countryside and tiny villages made him think of incurable diseases.
    He was on the A64 when it started to snow. The steady stream of traffic kept the road clear but when he turned off on to the country lanes he had to slow down and think about getting a new set of tyres. People imagine running a detective agency is all profit, like there’s no overheads involved. But by the time the landlord’s had his slice and the insurance company’s had its, and you’ve paid out the wages and the accountant and the tax man and the various kinds of parasites that live off car ownership, you’re lucky if you can afford a chicken sandwich for lunch.
    Still, it was better than working. You worked for the man and most times the chicken sandwich problem disappeared, but so did your freedom and your soul and your integrity and your hope for the future and your faith in humanity and your balls shrivelled up and died. Take a tip from one who’s tried.
    The heavens tilted and tipped all the snow they had on to the North Riding of Yorkshire. There was powdery stuff mixed in with crystals, and the angels added hallucinations to the brew, so that huge glistening chandeliers threatened to crash through the windscreen. The