The Price of Butcher's Meat Read Online Free PDF Page A

out of it I’ve spent on this bloody bed,” I said. “So where’s the difference?”
    “Don’t exaggerate,” she said. “You’re on a carefully planned course of supervised physiotherapy. They say you’re doing well, but it will be ages before you can look after yourself.”
    “So I’ll get help from Social Services. That’s why I pay my bloody taxes, isn’t it?”
    “How long do you think that’ll last?” she asked.
    “Till I get fed up wi’ them? Couple of weeks mebbe. By then I should be fine.”
    “I meant, till they get fed up with you! Who’ll look after you then?”
    I said, “I’ve got friends.”
    “Arse-licking friends maybe,” she said. “But arse-wiping ones are a bit thinner on the ground.”
    Sometimes she takes my breath away! Mebbe I were taking too much credit for putting the steel into Pascoe’s backbone. Should have known that all them years the bugger were getting home tuition!
    “For you mebbe,” I said. “Treat folk right and they’ll treat you right, that’s my motto. There’ll be folk queuing up to give me a hand.”
    “Takes two to make a queue,” she said. “You’re talking about Cap, aren’t you?”
    Of course I were talking about Cap. Cap Marvell. My girlfriend . . .

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    partner . . . bint . . . tottie . . . none of them fits. Or all of them. Cap bloody marvelous in my book, ’cos that’s what she’s been.
    “So I mean Cap. She won’t let me down. She’ll be there when I need her.”
    I let it out a bit pathetic. Could see I were getting nowhere slogging it out punch for punch, but even the really hard ones are often suckers for a bit of pathos. Vulnerability they call it. Make ’em feel you need help. Stood me in good stead many a time back in my Jack- the-ladding days.
    Didn’t take long to realize it weren’t going to get me anywhere now.
    “Boohoo,” said Ellie. “You’ve been together a good few years now, you and Cap. But you never set up shop together, you’ve both kept your own places. Why’s that?”
    She knew bloody well why it was. We’ve got our own lives, our own interests, our own timetables. There’s stuff in my pack I don’t want her getting touched by. And there’s definitely stuff in hers I don’t want to know about. Every time there’s an animal rights raid, I find myself checking her alibi! But the real big thing is lots of little things, like the way we feel about muddy boots, setting tables, using cutlery, eating pickles straight out of the jar, watching rugby on the telly, playing music dead loud, what kind of music we want to play dead loud, and so bloody on.
    I said, “An emergency’s different.”
    “So this is an emergency now? Right. Whose place will you set up the emergency center at? Your house or Cap’s flat? And how long will you indenture Cap as your body servant before you set her free?”
    “Don’t go metaphysical on me, luv,” I said. “What’s that mean?”
    “You’re not thick, Andy, so don’t pretend to be,” she said. “Cap’s life has been on hold since you got blown up. You know she’s got a very full independent existence—that’s one of the reasons you’ve never shacked up together, right? She’s not one of those ground-you-walk-on worshippers who only live for their man.”
    “I know what she is a bloody sight better than thee, Ellie Pascoe!” I declared, getting angry. “And I know she’d be ready and willing to put in a bit of time taking care of me if that’s what I need!”

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    “Of course she would,” said Ellie with that smug look they get when they’ve made you lose your rag. “Question is, Andy, do you really want her to?”
    No answer to that, at least not one I wanted to give her the satisfaction of hearing. And I didn’t say much either when she started talking about the Cedars out at Filey, the convalescent home provided by our Welfare Association for old, mad, blind, and