When it arrived he slathered the brimming plateful with generous rivulets of ketchup and tucked in. Jupiter sat patiently by the parking meter, looking like an old dosser in his tatty checked coat, licking his chops from time to time. Lorimer, guilty, took him out a sausage but he merely sniffed at it and looked disdainfully away. Lorimer placed it on the ground by his front paws but it was still there, untouched and cold, when he emerged twenty minutes later, swollen gut straining at his belt, feeling grotesquely full but with his hangover subdued, a definite fifty per cent better.
He saw Rintoul following him, or rather paralleling him across the street. Rintoul was walking abreast of him, wanting to be seen, and when their eyes met he made an aggressive jabbing, taxi-hailing salutation in his direction. Lorimer stopped, uneasy, reasoning that this was what the gesture demanded and looked about him: the street was quiet, a few early risers hurrying homeward with their newspapers and pints of milk, but surely Rintoul could do nothing violent or untoward here? It would be the height of recklessness – or desperation – and in any event he always had Jupiter to scare him off.
Rintoul strode purposefully across the street. He was wearing a thin leather coat that did not look warm enough for this chilly, frosty morning, and in the low-angled sunlight his face had a pinched, pale look to it. Lorimer said nothing – he assumed Rintoul had something to tell him.
‘I wanted you to be the first to know, Black,’ Rintoul said, sounding slightly out of breath, facing him, shifting to and fro, his feet making restless little shuffling movements. ‘We’re being sued for negligence and criminal damage by Gale-Harlequin.’
‘Their decision, Mr Rintoul, not ours.’
‘It gets better. They’re withholding all monies owed. Not paying us for past work. So our company’s going into receivership.’
Lorimer shrugged. ‘It’s something between Gale-Harlequin and you.’
‘Yeah, but you fucking told them.’
‘We made a report.’
‘How much did Gale-Harlequin settle for?’
‘Confidential, Mr Rintoul.’
‘We’re broke. We’re going bust. Do you know what that means, Black? The human cost? Deano’s a family man. Four young kids.’
‘This is what happens when you set fire to expensive buildings, I’m afraid.’
‘We never meant it to go so –’ Rintoul stopped, realizing it was too late, that in these circumstances half a confession is as good as a whole one. He licked his lips and looked at Lorimer with unequivocal hatred, then glanced up and down the street, as if searching for an escape route. Or a weapon, Lorimer thought, something to bludgeon me with. His wandering eyes finally settled on Jupiter sitting ever-patiently at Lorimer’s feet.
‘This your dog?’ Rintoul asked.
‘In a manner of speaking, yes.’
‘I’ve never seen a more clapped-out, pathetic-looking animal in my life. Why don’t you get yourself a proper dog?’
‘He’s called Jupiter.’
‘You’re going to fucking pay for this, Black. One way or another you – you, mate – are going to suffer for what you’ve done to us. I’m going to –’
One more threat, one more violent word and we will prosecute you in the courts,’ Lorimer said, deliberately raising his voice for any passer-by to hear, before launching into the standard G G H response to any public verbal menace, always to be couched in the first person plural. ‘You cannot threaten us in this way. We know everything about you, Mr Rintoul, and have you any idea how many lawyers we have working for us? If you so much as lay a finger on us, so much as threaten us once more, we will set them to work on you. You’ll be truly finished then, truly washed up. The law will get you, Mr Rintoul, not me, the law. Our law’
Lorimer saw tears in Rintoul’s eyes, tears of frustration and impotence, or perhaps just a response to the icy keenness of the wind that had started to blow. It had to be a finely judged process, this counter-threat-sometimes it had the opposite effect to the one desired, it pushed people too far, to uncontrollable extremes instead of pinioning them, freezing them on the edge of retaliation. But now Rintoul was immobilized, Lorimer saw, his revenge motor stalled, inert between these two competing forces – his own rage, his own urge to strike out, versus the perceived might of Lorimer’s awesome reply.
Rintoul turned and walked away, one shoulder oddly hunched, as if he had a cricked neck. Lorimer experienced a form of qualified sorrow for him – the