Read A Spoonful of Luger Online
Authors: Roger Ormerod
A Spoonful of Luger
© Roger Ormerod 1975
Roger Ormerod has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
First published in 1975 by Robert Hale Ltd.
This edition published in 2014 by Endeavour Press Ltd.
Extract from
Parting Shot
by Roger Ormerod
I HAD
sworn
I
would
never
go
near
the
place
again,
yet
there
I
was,
fumbling
off
a
37
bus
and
heading
into
a
case
I
hated
even
to
think
about.
But
these
days
the
important
clients
don’t
go
for
experience,
especially
when
the
packaging
is
old
and
battered
and
the
contents
disguised
by
its
bulk.
They
look
for
the
sprightly
young
men,
leaping
from
the
gleaming
cars
they’ve
left
on
double
yellow
lines.
I’d
left
mine
at
the
breaker’s
yard,
and
the
£10
was
my
working
capital.
I
had
reached
a
point
in
my
career
where
I
was
closer
to
begging
than
to
choosing.
It
was
this
case,
or
starve.
They
hadn’t
moved
the
terminus
any
closer
to
the
town
centre.
I
trudged
up
the
hill,
the
hold-all
getting
heavier
every
moment.
It
was
a
cold
Saturday
afternoon
in
early
January,
but
my shirt
was
clinging
to
my
back
before
I
made
it.
Fortunately,
the
decision
wasn’t
heavy.
The
Bedford
was
the
only
hotel
they
had.
From
the
room
they
gave
me
the
square
was
a
ragged
patchwork
of
market
awnings,
with
surging
humanity
in
between.
But
nothing
had
changed
very
much
in
ten
years.
Lloyds
had
a
new
glassy
front
and
Woolworths
had
absorbed
two
adjacent
shops.
But
the
war
memorial
still
presided
over
the
central
island
and
pointed
a
dipped
flag
at
the
public
toilets.
God,
I
loathed
the
place.
I
didn’t
remember
Elm
Lane,
but
they
gave
me
directions
at
the
desk.
There
was
a
bus
you
could
take
out
to
the
new
ring
road,
then
you
changed
to
a
circular ... and
probably
froze
while
you
waited
for
it.
I
decided
to
walk.
There
was
a
lot
of
spare
flesh
to
walk
off.
It
was
a
mistake.
I’m
not
the
walker
I
used
to
be,
and
it
was
about
two
miles
out.
Not
a
pleasant
route,
either, past
the
dead
railway
sidings
and
the
canal,
past
the
gasworks ...
it
could
have
been
any
Midlands
town.
But
it
improved,
and
Elm
Lane
might
well
have
been
a
lane
at
some
time,
and
still
kept
its
trees.
It
was
part
of
the
ring
road
now
and
the
roadway
had
been
widened.
It
was
dusk
when
I
got
there.
They
had
a
bus
stop
right
outside
the
house,
but
I
hadn’t
seen
any
buses.
Randall
let
me
in
cautiously.
We’d
fixed
it
up
by
phone,
but
he
didn’t
ask
who
I
was,
so
I
suppose
it’s
obvious.
The
wife,
he
said,
was
in
the
lounge.
As
he
pointedly
took
me
into
the
kitchen,
I
gathered
we
weren’t
going
to
discuss
it
with
his
wife,
but
I
had
my
own
ideas
about
that.
It
was
a
big
old
house
and
felt
empty,
like
a
concert
hall
with
no
music.
I
found
myself
walking
softly.
The
hall
was
in
patterned
quarries,
its
area
roughly
the
same
as
the
whole
of
my
bed-sitter.
There
was
a
wide
staircase
off
at
the
rear.
They
had
modernised
the
kitchen,
with
matching units
everywhere
and
a
coke
boiler
in
the
corner.
Randall
didn’t
ask
if
I’d
like
to
see
the
child’s
room.
I’d
have
declined,
anyway.
He
was
trying
desperately
to
be
normal,
though
I
could
tell
he
was
sizing
me
up.
Too
old,
perhaps?
Too
flabby?
There
were
all
the
formal
politenesses.
Had
I
eaten,
would
I
care
for
coffee,
and
smoke
if
I
liked.
But
his
grey
eyes
had
that
haunted
look
of
somebody
trying
not
to
think.
He
would
have
been
about
forty,
slim,
not
clumsy
but
certainly
not
graceful.
Maybe
his
face
had
been
fuller
the
week
before,
and
those
lines
round
his
mouth
could
have
been
new.
He
had
difficulty
in
speaking.
Every
word
had
to
be
dredged
from
somewhere
way
back
and
forced
forward
into
the
light.
His
finger
nails
were
dirty.