The Honey Trap Read Online Free PDF Page B

dreadfully drunk on Monday, was sick as a dog, and it was just hideous,’ I blurted.
    ‘What was hideous?’
    ‘The hangover. I was panicking like a headless chicken, dealing with Max, and then I had to get the coat back and then, well, see, I made a mistake.’
    ‘What type of mistake?’
    ‘A repercussive one.’
    ‘What? You mean you keep making the same mistake over and over again.’
    ‘No, that’s like behavioural patterns. I’m talking about a mistake that could cost me my job.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘I broke the rule.’
    ‘You’ve lost me.’
    ‘And the finger.’
    Before going to the police station, I’d spent much of the morning retracing my steps of the fateful night. I’d called the Phoenix. The landlord of the pub plainly
thought I was a crank, or someone from a TV show, calling in to make a fool out of him. Public humiliation in the name of entertainment. Is humiliation a virtue? I just don’t get it. Video
clips sent in by people who force their kids, partners and pets to fall or trip, or bang their heads in the most obvious of set-ups, and all for a measly fifty quid. Three in a boat and guess what?
They fall into the water. Wow, couldn’t see that coming! Ooops, the hose has gone awry and near drowned the baby, or Dad looks like he’s doing a massive piss . . . hilarious. Clumsy me,
tossing pancakes, and wait for it . . . plop, it fell on my head! Hey, watch out! There’s a glass door in front of you . . . oh too late!
    I called the minicab company. Unbelievably, the driver in question had ceased to exist. I guess they must have assumed I was some sort of Customs official checking out his status. I called the
bus company, was kept on hold for twenty minutes, and then a recorded message informed me I should write in, assuring me that eighty-five per cent of complaints are answered within three to four
weeks.
    ‘Look.’ I leant in close to the policeman, a young guy, and I was struck hard by the fact I was no longer a young woman. For so long the feared and dreaded law had
always been older than me. How things change: before you know it, you’re looking middle-age right in the face, and the face is worn-out, eyes heavy, and there is no hint of laughter behind
those windows to the soul. The glow of youth has long since been extinguished, and you take to wearing make-up and looking at old photos thinking, Christ, what have I become?
    ‘Look, young man,’ snapped I, to the police boy, attempting to be assertive, though I have joined the ranks of the crippled. Yes, I believe motherhood is a state of near crippledom.
One’s pace is slowed down and one gets special seats on buses.
    ‘Look, I found a finger, and that’s odd. I mean, someone is going round with a missing finger. I think it should be investigated.’
    ‘But you see, Mrs . . .’
    ‘Ms,’ I correct him.
    ‘Ms . . . sorry, what is your surname?’
    ‘Brodsky, Isabel Brodsky.’
A QUICK PERSONAL HISTORY
    Isabel Brodsky. Born in the last century, a child of the seventies. Irish mother, a lapsed Catholic, Swiss father, a lapsed Jew, and together they made two secular babies. Me
and my older brother, Freddie. My mother, a feminist hippy, found herself with two small kids, and an idealistic husband, forced to embrace capitalist ideology and set up a successful marketing
business. Pretty soon after that they split, though to be fair to them, it wasn’t acrimonious.
    I had an easy childhood, stable, loving, and spending time with Dad meant we got to go on loads of holidays. My mum now lives in New Mexico. My father remarried, and lives in Switzerland with
his second wife and two kids.
    But back to me – at the age of twenty-seven, having missed three periods, I decided to take a test. Lo and behold it proved positive. The donor – for alas, that is all I can call him
– I’d met at a music festival and haven’t seen since. Two days of joviality, of drugs and wild abandon. Has to be said he was a great lay. Anyhow, we