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a bed. She was so good looking I did the sort of double take you normally only see in cartoons. Her skirt was hitched up above her knees which were above her thighs as the bed was low. She was wearing a pair of black high heels which showed off her calves. Her legs were just perfect. She had long brown hair and a hard, intelligent face. She was talking to a gigantic black guy. As I walked in they both looked up at me and kept talking as if they wouldn’t mind if I pissed off. I got the message and walked back into a small kitchen. There was another spade sitting at a Formica topped table. He had a lot of cans of Long Life in front of him like chessmen on a board. He addressed me in a Jamaican patois.
    “Hey Man. You had a slice of de cake?”
    “What’s that?”
    “Upstairs man.” He nodded to a flight of stairs just outside the kitchen door. I hadn’t noticed that the flat was on two levels. I went up the stairs; at the top was a hall with a front door that opened up three steps above street level. A wire light bulb frame covered with a pair of black women’s nylon panties set the tone of sophistication. A fat slob, very vulgar, lots of big rings, stupid frilly dress shirt, was having a suppressed argument with a white girl who looked like she was a classy scrubber. I pushed open a door. Inside was a double bed with a mattress and a blanket. No sheet, no pillows. There wasn’t much else. A hard chair in the corner, a chest of drawers. A man and woman were making it on the bed. They looked up.
    “Fuck off. Come back in ten minutes.” The girl screamed at me.
    “Plenty of time for everyone,” said the man without rancour. I closed the door on them and wandered back downstairs to get a Long Life. The Jamaican wasn’t so struck on the idea of me having one but he let me off with a cautionary warning. “Cool it on the juice eh!” He was a big bastard with a smile that made you nervous. I felt my arm being squeezed gently and looked up to see Christopher standing by my side. His limbo partner eased past me and struck up a lively conversation/argument with the drinks quartermaster. “Enjoying it?” whispered Chris.
    “It’s great. So different, kind of zany.” In truth I would have liked to put three blocks between me and every character I’d met there so far, except perhaps the dark haired girl in the back room. He motioned me conspiratorially to follow him to the sofa which the tarts had just vacated but fearing his intentions I told him I was going to look for another drink. He let me go with a lingering squeeze of the hand and a look that signified that we had just undergone a blood brother ritual. Back in the kitchen the couple we had left had progressed from talking to shouting and were just contemplating screaming. I moved out quickly into the bedroom and found myself in the lone company of the girl who had been talking to the spade. She was still sitting on the bed, giving an eyeful of leg and I took it in at my leisure. “You with Christopher?”
    “Yuh.”
    “You a fairy?” I shrugged.
    “You look like one.” I moved right into the room and sat down next to her.
    “Then you’ve got nothing to fear from me, have you?” I said and placed my hand softly on her knee.
    “I wouldn’t let Winston see you do that. He’ll saw your head off with a butcher’s knife and chuck it out the window.”
    “Where is Winston?” I asked, not without interest, at the same time withdrawing my hand.
    “Just gone to look for a drink. He’ll be back in a minute.”
    “Good,” I said in a sincere tone. A silence grew in which she looked at me as she might have looked at a television programme that was boring her.
    “D’you know Christopher?” I said.
    “Do I know Christopher?” She seemed to find it amusing.
    “....Everybody knows Christopher, darling.” The door opened and the gigantic spade came back into the room with a bottle of Jamaican white rum, at least I assumed that’s what it was. It had no