GUILT TRIPPER by Geoff Small Read Free Book Online Page B

prostitutes and have oddballs like Herman and Dickens tagging along. It
makes me feel superior, like I’m supposed to be.”
     “You…you were right
too.”
     “Sorry?”
     “What you just said
about me being a victim of my mother and using Ingrid as a captive audience so
I could enjoy the sound of my own voice.”
     “Well, we’re all
victims of nurture, Danny. So what do you intend doing then? Are you going to
the police?”
     “That’s entirely up
to you.”
     “No it’s not at all!
The balls are all stacked in your court. So what’s it gonna be?”
     “I’ll keep quiet on condition
that you sign all the Squeaky Kirk royalties earned since you were arrested
over to me, before lunchtime tomorrow. Seven hundred and sixty grand should do
the trick.”
     Judith shook her
tearful head in disgust. In the space of a minute, a man who’d spent a lifetime
masquerading as a socialist had exposed himself as a phoney and a blackmailer,
willing to profit from the attempted murder of a prostitute.
     “You’re friggin’
joking aren’t you?” Bob laughed exaggeratedly, through a combination of
disbelief and nerves.
     “No. I mean, let’s
face it, it’s only what you people should be paying in taxes anyway.”
     “According to you
people who have nothing to lose and everything to gain maybe.”
     “Whatever. But
what’s a hundred per cent worth in prison when you could be enjoying half of it
in the fresh air?”
     “How do I know you
won’t hand me in anyway, after I’ve paid up?”
     “Because I’d be incriminating
myself wouldn’t I? With half your royalties in my bank it would be obvious
there’d been blackmail and I’d be looked upon as badly as you. You know I’m a
man of my word.”
     “I did, yes. But how
can you trust a man who, it’s just turned out, has been lying to himself for
forty years. You do know you’re renouncing everything you professed to believe
in?” There was another brief pause before Bob started talking into his phone. “Fergus?...Bob
Fitzgerald…Fitzgerald! Fergus, I need a face to face…I know that but…I wouldn’t
be bothering you unless it was an emergency…Half an hour…I really, really
appreciate thi…hello?”
     Light filled the
hallway. Judith just about managed to conceal herself in the darkened bathroom before
Bob marched out of Danny’s bedroom towards the front door, talking manically.
     “It’ll be worth it
to see you finally coveting cash and stripped of your self-righteousness. We’ll
be morally indistinguishable and I won’t have moved an inch either way. You
know what this means don’t you?” He turned to face Danny, who was now wearing
an old white dressing gown, with pink streaks where it had been washed with
coloured clothes. “It means I’ve won. I was right and you were wrong. We are
all instinctively loners…self-interested individuals.” He rubbed his hands in
glee. “Do thank the old lady downstairs for letting me past her as she came
through the main entrance door.”

 
     
     
    CHAPTER: 8
     

     
     Danny turned from
shutting the door to find a deeply hurt Judith standing in front of him.
     “You used me,” she
complained plaintively.
     Ashamed, Danny looked
down at the floor. “Yes, I did…and I’m truly, truly sorry.” Then he walked
away, unable to look at her. As he entered the lounge, he passed Fin on his way
out, but neither so much as acknowledged the other’s presence. The latter told
Judith he was going to give her and Danny some time alone together, before
retiring to his own bedroom.
     Having taken time to
recompose herself, Judith went into the lounge, where Danny was stood on the
balcony in his dressing gown, looking up at the stars. She slumped down on the couch
and stared at the faded area on the knees of her jeans, arms crossed, kneading
her pink, lamb’s wool V-neck jumper with her fingers. After a couple of minutes,
Danny started talking, but remained with his back to her.
     “The