Shooting in the Dark

the house, OK. I’ll look around for something else.’
    Sam got to his feet and took a couple of steps over to where Ralph was sitting. ‘You’d better find that something else fairly soon,’ he said. ‘I don’t like you, Ralph, and I’m prepared to make your life miserable. You’re sponging off Geordie and Janet at the moment, looking around for a way to make your life easier, but that’s gonna end quick. Either get a job and pay them for your keep or move out.’
    ‘You can’t tell me what to do. What happens between me and Geordie’s private.’
    ‘You’ve got a couple of days,’ Sam told him. ‘Then I tell Geordie everything I know about you.’
    Ralph walked to the door, a grin on his face. ‘You’re bluffing,’ he said. ‘You know if it comes to a showdown, Geordie’ll stick to family. If he has to make a decision between you and me, he’ll tell you to go fuck yourself.’
    ‘You just remember this,’ Sam told him. ‘You’re the kind of guy can get both feet in your mouth at the same time. That’s OK, just makes you look stupid. But imagine what it’d be like to have both of my feet in there as well.’
     

42
     
    Janet sometimes wondered if she’d got it wrong. In the beginning she’d had a couple of cats, mainly for company. Not that they’d been much good at it. Venus was never there anyway, except for food; and Orchid was always in the house but not at all sociable. They were icons of independence.
    Then Geordie came along. He was kind, it was true, and fun to be with. A real love in fact, but he took some looking after. Plus he brought Barney along, a dog into a house full of cats. Life got fuller, but it also got more complicated. All the time she used to have to herself faded away.
    By the time Echo was born there weren’t enough hours on the clock to get through the day. The first couple of months had been a walking nightmare and Janet had felt her world imploding. Constant fatigue, the need to give more of herself than she possessed, and the numbing suspicion that she was alone with it all toyed with the fragile perimeter of her sanity.
    Ralph was almost the last straw. If he had been the perfect house guest it would have been bad enough, but he was a slimeball who was forever sniffing around, making lewd suggestions, dragging Geordie out on afternoon drinking sessions and eating them out of house and home.
    Some people might capitulate to the kind of pressure and stress which had entered her life, turn to migraine, or
    the bottle, or Agatha Christie. But tension and adversity had a galvanizing effect on Janet’s consciousness. She was energized, inspired to rise above it, and whereas before Ralph’s arrival she had been tired and listless, she was now fired with the passion of a mission.
    ‘Cook us some eggs, darlin’,’ Ralph said when he came down. He brought a strong odour of stale sweat with him. It was mid-morning and Geordie and Echo were sleeping, trying to catch up on the hours they’d missed in the night.
    ‘Cook ’em yourself,’ she said. ‘I’m not here to wait on you.’
    ‘OK. I can cook. What about a little kiss, then?’
    ‘Fuck off.’
    ‘Oh, mucky language over the breakfast pots. Trying to make Ralph randy?’ He licked his lips, made a face with staring eyes. His long curly hair was so short of vitality it clung to the side of his face for support.
    ‘You’re disgusting,’ she told him.
    ‘That’s what they like,’ he said. ‘Women.’
    She snorted. ‘And you’re the man to give it to us? Jesus, Ralph, I’m so thrilled. How long’ve you had this effect on women?’
    ‘Sarky, but you’re more interested than you let on. Geordie’s always tired these days. He walks round like a zombie all day.’
    ‘Leave Geordie out of it.’
    ‘Yeah, OK, darlin’, if that’s how you want it. I won’t mention him if you don’t. Not while we’re together.’
    ‘How much longer are you gonna be here?’ she asked.
    ‘Come and sit on my knee and I’ll whisper it in your ear.’
    ‘You know, Ralph, getting splashed with shit while you’re minding your own business is kind of unfortunate.
    But there’s a real insanity about jumping in the septic tank.’
    He thought about that for a moment, his brow clouded over, as if he’d been hit with a full row of big words. Then he shook his head and smiled his toothy grin. ‘There you go, again,’ he said. ‘Talking dirty words.’
    Janet said, ‘Ralph, if I opened my legs for you,