They left Stephen lying in the shit. It seemed appropriate. Or at least entertaining. He wasn’t unconscious, but his nose was most probably broken. He lay half on the floor, his upper half on a pile of ledgers, moaning and holding his face. For good measure, Liz had stomped on the back of his head.
They knew they had to get out fast, but Sandra stopped Liz before they ran out the door.
“We can’t leave that guy here Liz”, she said as she gestured to the body of the manager. “This has got nothing to do with him. I don’t want his family being told he’s dead and all festy from sewage that we set loose.”
“We’re not taking him with us.”
“We can at least move him.”
The rose-stained water had yet to flow to his body thanks to be blocked by Stephen’s legs, so they stepped around and with no small effort lifted his torso up. He was soaked through with blood, and they very ungently laid him on the top of the desk, and swung his legs up as well.
“Isn’t this tampering with evidence or something”, Liz said, trying to wipe the blood off her hands and onto his jacket. Sandra, who was doing the same, just shrugged.
“It’s not like we haven’t done that already.”
They headed for the door, ignoring Stephen’s moans. Liz stopped, turned back, and kicked him again. They left the office.
The corridor outside smelt unpleasant, and the floor squelched with each step they took. The stairs were, quite literally, a shit waterfall. Daniel had done his job with perhaps a little too much success. He was definitely thorough. Fortunately it was a blend of water flowing off the street as well, so there was a slightly diluted consistency. But the smell, particularly in the enclosed corridor, was nauseating.
Sandra felt it burn through her nostrils, and she covered her face with her sleeve only to be swamped with the rich iron odour of blood. She grabbed Liz by the arm who had also been working up the courage to tackle the stairs.
“If we don’t go now it’ll be up to our ankles.”
She nodded, and they squelched up the carpet stairs, treading carefully so as to not slip, but also to avoid as much splashing on the pants. Sandra was exceptionally glad that both her and Liz were wearing thick soled sneakers, but wondered about the collection of canvas shoes upstairs. Poor bastards. We did that.
When they reached the top they found themselves in a huge empty room. Some chairs had been tipped over in the rush to leave, but otherwise there was no one to be seen. The stairs had become a drain, and as this particular section of the bar was a step down from the rest, it had become a stream. They squelched across, trying to not look down but finding they couldn’t avoid looking down until they reached the other side, where the main bar sat. It too, was empty. Fortunately the floor was also clean, and the smell less painful. They could hear the sounds of people out on the streets. And rummaging from behind the bar.
“Hello?” Liz called, and Daniel emerged from the back of the bar.
“Oh hi. Just seeing what it was they kept back there. Not nicking anything. I swear. Beer?”
“Uh. Yeah, actually”, Sandra pulled up a stool. Liz did the same. Daniel went to the fridge, opened three beers and handed them out.
“Oddly enough, for an artist, I’ve never worked behind a bar. Always thought about it, but never took that step.”
“Why’s that?” Sandra asked.
“I always liked drinking too much”, he replied, and knocked back his beer. Liz reached into her pocket and pulled out a crumpled packet of cigarettes. She offered them around, and they each took one.
“Has anyone called the cops?” Sandra asked.
“Staff did, ages ago”, Daniel replied. Liz looked around before she lit her cigarette. “I wouldn’t worry about the staff here”, he continued. “They’ve got no loyalty to this bar. The pay is shit, the hours are long, the break room is a closet. There was a dude who works here still in the room when I grabbed my first beer.”
Sandra blinked as she lit her cigarette.
“First beer?”
“Uh, yeah. First beer. The second one I drank on my own.”
Sandra took two drags of her cigarette, purely for the pleasure of smoking inside a pub, something she’d not done since the laws had changed and she’d quit. She then dropped the almost full cigarette into a nearby glass.
“If you didn’t want it –“ Liz began.
“Oh I did. I really did. I was enjoying it too. That’s why I had to put it out.” She remembered her bag on her shoulder, and started going through its contents.
“Hey, you got your bag back”, Daniel cried out. “Go you. Does it have what you want?”
She stopped, thought for a second, then looked up at him.
“Daniel, this is really important. I want you to remember the night we met. Remember?”
“Well, yeah. I’ll never forget it. Not because we met, no offence, obviously.”
“Fine. Whatever, look, you and Richard walked in the door, walked across the room, I was coming the other way and you bumped into me, yeah?”
“Yeah that’s right.”
“Ok, concentrate on this – where did you bump into me?”
“Where? I dunno, somewhere over there.” He gestured, vaguely, to where the front bar connected to the sceptic bar.
“No no no, not good enough. I need you to tell me exactly. Where was it.”
“What are you thinking?” Liz asked, luxuriously enjoying her cigarette for the very reasons Sandra had put hers out. “Are you thinking what I think you’re thinking? Cause this place would be cleaned San. That’d be one sticky floor it’d get thoroughly cleaned.”
“Bullshit it’d be thorough”, she replied. “I reckon this place would get maybe one, proper thorough clean, once a week maybe. But not every night, there’s no time. And I’m guessing it’d be on Monday morning, after the weekend madness has passed and it needs it most. So, Daniel – you and Richard walked in here.”
“Yeah”, he said, cigarette hanging on his lip, beer in his hand. He walked out of the bar to the door, and began to re-enact their entrance. “We were here, walked some foxy ladies here, then around the retarded queue swamping the bar, dodge this table, oh yeah, there was some dickhead here incapable of telling a story without waving his arms around, and I had to turn around to avoid his hand and smack – right here. I bumped into you right here.”
“And the bag?”
He looked around the floor, trying to remember.
“The bag… flew down there”, and he gestured to a bare part of the floor.
“Shit. I was sure”, she said, “I was so fucking sure.”
“Hang on”, he interrupted, “remember, there were legs everywhere. People everywhere. Me and Richard got down on the floor, you were down on the floor, picking up bits, but it really went everywhere, I found uh.. a box of tampons, actually..”
“Yes, women bleed from the vagina Daniel, it happens, we’re aware of it, deal with it, move on. Where did you find the fucking box of tampons?”
“Right by that chair” he said, and gestured. There, resting against the wall, was a chaise lounge, frayed carpet: a million places to lose something. They ran over, and without discussion hurled the chair across the room. Their flat hands scanned the carpet, the corners of the carpet, the cracks in the wall. Daniel checked the couch. Sandra searched the wall edge for a duct, a chamber, something. Liz almost tore up the frayed edge of the carpet. But they didn’t find anything.
Liz and Daniel were still searching, when Sandra got up from the floor, and sat on her knees. She sighed. Whatever that data was on, it was gone. There was nothing in the phones, nothing in the bag, nothing on the floor. She was about to go back to the bar when she stopped rushing to find the answer and thought for a second.
No, really?
She slowly reached into the bag, not allowing herself to get her hopes up. This was the last possibility. She pulled out the box of tampons, and flicked it open. There, nestled comfortably in a corner of the box, was a small red USB stick. That son of a bitch Clark really wanted to hide that data. She smiled, despite the fact that the septic smell seemed to be getting stronger.
She was about to tell the others when she saw Daniel get his head yanked backwards by the hair, and a knife pressed against his throat so close that it cut the skin ever so slightly, but enough for a small amount of blood to flow, and enough to make him freeze deathly still.
Sandra looked into the mangled face of Stephen Pohler. He’d gone beyond this world. He was in a dark place, a place of total desperation. His eyes were cold. Solid. And he was ever so close to cutting Daniel’s throat. Sandra dropped the box back into her bag. Liz stayed on the floor, also frozen.
“Throw it over here. Just throw the whole damn bag.”
She obliged, and threw it at his feet.
“Pass it up to me”, he said to Daniel, who picked it up and also obliged. Stephen kept the knife at Daniel’s throat and let go of his hair to take the bag. He held it tightly in his hand.
“There’s no point”, Sandra said. “You can’t come out clean from all of this. You can’t win.”
“I don’t want to win”, he said. “I just want him to lose”.
He looked towards the door, saw the way was clear there. He looked at the girls, and saw the tension in both of them. He decided, and ran the knife across Daniel’s throat. Daniel’s eyes widened in surprise and his hands reached up to stem the blood, as Stephen ran across the room to the door. Liz and Sandra leapt across to Daniel, who fell on the floor. Liz grabbed hold of his throat, Sandra took a quick look at the situation, but saw nowhere to put her hands, decided she couldn’t help, and ran for the door.
The crowd outside was still thick, and the rain had stopped. Sandra wondered where all the tall people were when they weren’t in pubs, and stood on her toes to see where Stephen had gone, but it wasn’t hard to tell – he was busy forcing his way through the crowd, she could see people being shoved aside only five metres away. But she’d have to do the same, and she’d never catch him. Instead, she jumped up and down and shouted:
“Stop him! That bastard stole my bag!”
In an instant, six guys jumped him and tackled him to the ground. She smiled, and caught out of the corner of her the flashing blue light of an approaching police car. They were going to be for a bit of a shock. She was sure they were called out for vandalism.
But they were about to get a hell of a lot more.
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