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Charlton’s territory, and he didn’t want to interfere. Once, he tried half-heartedly to steer Charlton towards the bar, but Charlton resisted and, grinning, turned and introduced him to the girl. Annabel. Or it could have been Charlotte. All Barker could remember afterwards were her pupils, which were tiny, like punctuation, and her white-blonde hair, which looked as if it had been polished.
    It was a fight with fists and bottles. Barker caught somebody in the solar plexus with an uppercut. His father had taught him the punch when he was six: one brutal arc, nine inches start to finish. The man dropped to his knees and vomited what looked like a half-chewed McDonald’s Quarter Pounder with Cheese on to the tarmac. Out of the corner of his eye Barker saw Charlton shove somebody else’s face into a wall. The crunch of skin and bone on pebbledash. In the end, though, they had to run for it. Down an alley, back across the vacant lot. Charlton slammed the Sierra into first gear and raced it over weeds and potholes. The suspension floundered, winced. It sounded more like a bed with people fucking on it than a car.
    â€˜That bloke,’ Charlton said. ‘He ought to bite his food up.’
    He grinned into the rear-view mirror, his face pale and greasy, his left cheek-bone grazed, already swelling.
    â€˜There’s one of them won’t be doing that for a while.’Barker propped his right knee against the dashboard. He could still hear the neat snap as someone’s front teeth broke. The impact had ripped a hole in Barker’s trouser-leg and torn the skin beneath.
    â€˜You better get yourself a rabies shot,’ Charlton said.
    They stopped on Mile End Road and bought fish and chips, which they ate in the parked car. Though Barker was angry with Charlton for involving him in something so futile, so unnecessary, he could at least console himself with the thought that he had come to Charlton’s aid. His stock had risen, as Charlton would probably have said.
    Barker stared through the windscreen, his bag of chips warm and damp on his lap. Wind scoured the streets. The scuttle of litter.
    â€˜We could’ve done with Ray tonight,’ he said.
    He turned and looked at Charlton, who bent his head sideways and bit savagely into a crispy orange slab of cod.
    â€˜Sod it,’ Charlton said. ‘We did all right.’ He spoke through splintered flakes of fish.
    â€˜Grasp Sparrow By The Tail,’ Barker said.
    Charlton grinned. ‘Drive Away Monkey.’

Last Thing I Remember
    One morning in early spring the door of the barber’s shop opened, the bell tingling, and Charlton walked in. Sighing loudly, he eased down on to the red plastic bench, picked up a magazine. Barker had a regular in his chair, a long-distance lorry-driver who came in every three weeks for a trim. As Barker’s scissors chattered up the left side of the lorry-driver’s head, he glanced at Charlton in the mirror. Charlton was wearing a camel coat over a dark-grey suit, and a pair of brogues that somebody had cleaned for him.
    â€˜Got yourself a new woman?’ Barker said.
    Charlton passed one hand gently over his cropped black hair, then turned and spoke to Higgs. ‘You the boss?’
    Higgs nodded.
    â€˜How much are you paying him?’
    â€˜About two f-fifty an –’
    â€˜Good,’ Charlton said. ‘Because that’s all he’s worth.’
    Barker smiled as he reached for the clippers and began to shave the hairs at the base of the lorry-driver’s neck. Higgs was bewildered, though. Blinking rapidly, he folded a towel and draped it over a chair.
    â€˜Does he get a lunch-break?’ Charlton asked.
    â€˜One-thirty,’ Higgs said without looking up.
    Barker glanced at the clock above the mirror. Quarter-past.
    Charlton spoke to Barker for the first time since he’d walkedin. ‘There’s a café down the street, the something Grill. I’ll