My first thought was that it was from home. I had an idea that my stepdad would call at some point and tell me that mum was sick or would find some other way to pressure me into coming home. I picked up the receiver and pressed the earpiece to my ear.

'All right, son?'

'Oh! h.e.l.lo, Colin.' Of course, Colin would know my exact moves. He would know exactly what time I would pa.s.s by the offices on the way to the morning briefing. This was all surveillance.

'Anything I should know, son?'

'No, I don't think so.' One of the secretaries was eavesdropping, so I moved away as far as I could and turned my back.'

'What does that mean? You don't think so.'

'It means nothing to report.'

'Right. You all right for everything?'

With Colin it was like speaking in code. 'What do you mean?'

'Are you short for a few quid? I'll get it to you if you're short.'

'No, no, I'm fine.'

'Good lad.'

'Where are you right now?'

'I'm around. I ain't allowed on the camp.'

'Colin.'

'What?'

'If I see her out, am I to buy her a coffee or whatever?'

There was a long pause. 'You can buy her a coffee. But not a drink.'

'Okay. I've got to go to work now, Colin.'

'Right.'

I put the receiver back on its cradle. The secretary looked at me and compressed her lips.

When I got to the theatre, Pinky and Tony were hastily revising the programme.

'What's it like out there?' Pinky asked.

'You couldn't cut it with a knife,' I told them.

We were scheduled to organise a Swimming Gala around the pool. 'Can't do it in this,' Tony said with finality. 'Right let's get 'em all in the ballroom. We'll have another f.u.c.kin' magic show.'

'Right.' Pinky said. 'Another f.u.c.kin' magic show.'

'We need,' Tony said, 'someone to jog up to the pool to see if there's anyone hanging about. Bring 'em all down to the ballroom.'

'I'm not going out there!' n.o.bby shouted. 'Have you seen out there? It's like a biblical f.u.c.kin' epidemic out there is what it is. A f.u.c.kin' biblical f.u.c.kin' plague I mean. Cecil B. DeMille, without the toads. Four hors.e.m.e.n of the f.u.c.kin' ladybirds. That's right. Apopolypse. No, what is it? Apocalypse. I open my mouth to speak and ten ladybirds fly in.'

'What a shame you have to shut your mouth,' said Sammy the elder Greencoat, adjusting his wig.

'Hey!' went n.o.bby. 'Hey! That's not nice!'

While all this was going on, Tony leaned over to me. 'Will you go, David? Someone has to.'

'Yeah, I'll do it.'

Pinky opened his office and reappeared with a battery-powered megaphone. 'Use this, if you like. You'll need to hang around up there for half an hour collecting the stragglers and latecomers. Good lad.'

Off I went with my megaphone, into the ladybird storm.

I didn't jog. I made my way pretty smartly up to the deserted swimming pool area and switched on the thing. The airborne insects were pinging into the metal funnel as I mouthed a few words about everyone going down to the ballroom to have a great time. The trouble was there was no one there to hear me. Hardly anyone was actually outside in the ladybird storm. I let the megaphone fall at my side. 'There's a magic show waiting for you,' I said to no one, or maybe just to the flying bugs.

The ladybirds seemed attracted to my blazer. Maybe the green stripes had them confused into thinking they were settling on a lush leaf. Thankfully they didn't seem attracted to my white trousers in the same way, but I wiped about two or three dozen ladybirds off my blazer sleeve alone. Tony had told me to stick around for half an hour but what with the insects targeting me I didn't feel like standing still so I went about the chalet blocks, trying to be inventive with what I gabbled into my megaphone. Something unfunny about emergency anti-ladybird legislation. Occasionally a door would open and a bemused family would peer at me trying to fathom what I was saying.

Ladybirds were crawling inside my collar and in my ear and I'd had enough. I walked past block D mouthing about an all-star magic show with Abdul-Shazam! and all the gang when one of the chalet doors opened. It was Terri. She'd been cleaning one of the refurbished chalets. I went over to her.

'Look at you,' she gasped. 'Come inside.'

She pulled me in and slammed the door on the cloud of insects.

'Look at you!' she said again, this time pointing at me.

I looked down. The ladybirds had swarmed over my blazer. There was barely a patch of cloth to be seen under them. They were live but motionless, anch.o.r.ed to the coloured threads. My blazer was a live garment, like something from a dream.

I was shocked.

'Let's get it off you,' she said. Very gently she reached a finger under each lapel and eased the blazer off my shoulders, like she was determined to lift the thing off me without killing a single ladybird. I felt the thrill of her fingers stroke my collarbone. She stepped in closer to me and delicately slipped the blazer down the length of my sleeves. I could smell the shampoo in her hair. I could smell something like sunshine on her skin. She was close enough for me to feel her breath on my neck. When she'd lowered the blazer sleeves free of my arms she stepped to one side, holding the blazer in one hand, and then she gently hung it over the back of a chair before stepping back. I don't think she lost a single ladybird in the process.

For a long time, we were motionless, staring at the ladybird-sheathed coat. Then she turned and stepped over to me, and pressed her mouth on mine. We were still kissing as she popped the b.u.t.tons on my shirt and tore it from my back. The shirt cuffs wouldn't go over my wrists as she tugged the shirt behind me. There was a new, uncovered mattress on the bed and we fell on it. I was still manacled by my shirt as she worked my trousers down. I remember gasping, and looking up, and seeing the live ladybird blazer on the back of the chair, and then closing my eyes.

The magic show was. .h.i.tting its stride by the time I got to the ballroom. Tony had some kids on the stage, fumbling for coloured handkerchiefs in a soft blue velvet bag. When they pulled out white handkerchiefs instead of coloured ones he pretended to be annoyed. Nikki was up there with him in her fetching costume of sequins and fishnet tights. I avoided eye-contact with her.

'Thought we'd lost you,' Pinky said dryly, eyebrows aloft.

'I swallowed a bug and it stuck in my throat,' I said. 'I had to go and get a drink from somewhere.'

'Ha,' said Pinky. He flicked imaginary ash from his unlit cigar. 'Haha.'

Tony or should I say Abdul-Shazam! wrapped up that part of his conjuring act and I saw n.o.bby and Sammy wheeling the large sword casket on stage, carefully settling it between two chairs. Tony went serious for a moment and changed his microphone style. He asked for quiet because, he said, the next trick was genuinely dangerous and the swords he would be using were sharp. He invited someone to come up and check the swords. He held a piece of ribbon at arm's length as one of the campers cut through the ribbon with a whisper. He warned us that they had tried to get insurance against any mishaps but no insurance company in the land would offer a premium. And with that, Nikki climbed into the casket.

Tony perspired visibly. I thought he looked anxious. I glanced at Pinky but he was poker-faced. n.o.bby and Sammy looked pretty serious too. A hush descended over the audience, broken only by the clink of gla.s.ses or the sound of the till opening at the bar. I knew the trick would be perfectly safe, even though I didn't know how it worked. I just had an awful feeling in my stomach that something was going to go wrong.

At that moment I felt an astonishing surge of protectiveness towards Nikki. I had to grip the sides of my chair to stop myself getting up and interfering with the show The casket was closed and locked with Nikki in it. There were five swords in all, and after a little bit of strutting on stage, as if he was pumping himself up, Tony forced the first sword through the cabinet with rather shocking violence. There was a gasp from the audience as the second and third swords were thumped in swiftly and without ceremony. The last two swords were inserted from the top Of course, no one was really surprised when the swords were taken out again, the casket unlocked and Nikki stepped out prettily in her sequins and fishnets. It seemed to me not that Tony had performed a fabulous illusion; but that that the audience had given their permission for the illusion to work on them. There was wild applause and more gags from Tony, who pretended to be rather relieved that the trick had worked.

Tony announced that the morning's entertainment would be concluded with a yard-of-ale compet.i.tion. n.o.bby and Sammy were dispatched to the bar to collect the yard gla.s.ses while I was asked to clear away the magic props. I started by wheeling the sword casket from the ballroom back to the props cupboard behind the adjacent theatre. When I got there I found Nikki backstage behind the scenery flats, wriggling out of her sequined outfit.

'That seemed to go well,' I said. I still hadn't recovered from my explosive and unexpected s.e.xual encounter with Terri just a couple of hours earlier and I was trying to sound casual.

She beamed at me. Then she frowned and patted the side of her face with her forefinger.

'What?' I asked.

She found a tissue and stepped across to me. She was wearing bra, pants, fishnet tights and stiletto heels, and her tawny skin had on it a bloom of perspiration. She wet the tissue with her mouth and rubbed something from the side of my mouth, near my lip.

'What is it?'

'Lipstick.'

'Really?'

'Yes, really. It's gone. You're clean.'

I didn't feel clean. 'Must have been one of the campers. You know how they grab you.'

She didn't blink. She ran her tongue across her top lip and said, 'Wow! You smell like a wh.o.r.e's handbag. Did she throw perfume all over you?'

Tony breezed in, wiping sweat from his brow with a white handkerchief. 'Funny!' he said loudly. 'Funny how I keep catching you two backstage. Put her down, David, and let me explain how all this packs away.'

I could barely pay attention as Tony explained how to stow all the props and demonstrated how to collapse the sword casket. He went to great lengths to show me how the casket worked: there was a frame inside the box in which Nikki had rotated her body into a very precise position with her ankles tucked back. The swords ran in fixed trammels between the backs of both knees; under her armpits; behind her neck and so on. It was completely safe since the frame moulded her body in an inflexible position, and the invading swords were tracked along smooth rails. The sharp demonstrator sword, identical to all the others except for a single identifying bead in the pommel, wasn't used.

I pretended to be well focused on all of this. All through it I was acutely aware of Nikki watching me watching Tony.

'I'm showing you things,' Tony said seriously, 'that would get me kicked out of the Magic Circle.'

11.

A fine casket built for st.u.r.dy illusion not service I missed lunch. Terri was still working on the refurbished chalets and I returned to her, as I'd said I would. On my way I walked past the palmist's white caravan. Madame Rosa had the door shut firmly against the bug swarm. She was looking out of the window, directly at me. I averted my eyes. The ladybird storm had subsided a little but it was still unpleasant to be outside. Dead ladybirds crunched underfoot; they lay in piles where they had hit a wall or a window and had fallen back.

She'd left the door ajar for me. When I stepped inside, the door clicked behind me and she was already unb.u.t.toning her thin nylon overall. She was completely naked underneath and it slipped to the floor with a hiss. 'What kept you?'

She didn't give me a moment to answer because she leapt on to my hips, folding her arms behind my neck and clinging to me with her legs, kissing me. The scent of her mixed with the perfume Nikki had got wind of had me dizzy. Any doubts I had about Terri were dispelled the moment she wrapped herself around me. With her still clinging to my neck I walked her across the room and collapsed onto the bed.

'Wait,' she said. 'Not like that.'

She got up and moved across to the table. She shifted a chair aside and bent across the table, spreading her legs and pushing her bottom into the air.

'Spank me.'

I laughed. Wrong.

'Spank me,' she said again.

'What?'

'Do it.'

I moved towards her. It wasn't something that would ever naturally occur to me. The request seemed more comical than erotic. I lifted my hand and let it fall across her b.u.t.tock, but without conviction.

'Harder for Chrissake.'

But I was already losing my erection. I felt ridiculous.

Perhaps she sensed it wasn't going to happen. 'Oh just f.u.c.k me, you prat.'

I had to clear my head. I managed to slip away from that chalet with some free time before my next duty. I stepped out of the camp with the idea of recovering on the beach for half an hour, but the ladybirds were still swarming, pinging at my face and settling on my clothes. As I turned away from the camp gates I sensed a car cruising alongside me. I knew it was the same car in which I'd been chauffeured to the National Front meeting. It was Colin's green-and-cream Hillman Minx.

My guts squeezed as my instincts kicked in and I pretended to be deep in thought. I kept walking. The two-tone Hillman purred alongside, keeping pace. Then the horn sounded.

I had no choice but to turn. The car came to a halt. I faked a startled look, then processed a smile on recognising Colin at the wheel. His face was expressionless, staring back at me.

I froze as he leaned across the seat to open the pa.s.senger door. Everything about his demeanour said to me that he knew. I thought if I got in that car I was finished.

'Get in then, you f.u.c.king drip,' he called softly.

In a flash it occurred to me that if he didn't know, then my hesitation would make him suspicious. I had no choice. I climbed in. The car smelled of leather upholstery and something like gun metal. He reeked of smoky, fresh sweat as if he'd just been exercising.

Colin put his wipers on to sweep the ladybirds away. 'f.u.c.kin' things. Everywhere.' He released the clutch and we drove off. 'What's a matter wiv you then?'

I looked back over my shoulder as if we were being followed. 'I think they were watching from the gate.'

'Watching for what?'

'Well, they know you're banned, don't they?'

'Oh,' he said, threading the big steering wheel through his rough hands as he turned the corner. 'They don't give a monkey's. Neither do I.' He didn't go very far, pulling up at a nearby modern brick-and-gla.s.s pub called The Dunes. Before we got out of the car he pushed a fiver into my hands. 'Get 'em in; I need a slash.'

While he went to the toilet I went up the bar and ordered two pints of bitter. I was glad he wasn't there because when I went to carry the pints to a table my hands shook so badly I slopped some of the beer on the carpet. I sat down and took a deep breath. I took a sip of beer and as I lifted the gla.s.s to my mouth my fingers reeked of Terri's s.e.x.

Colin came out of the toilet, sat down opposite me and lit up a cigarette. Players No. 6. He took a deep drag, exhaled and sat back. His change from the fiver lay on the table. 'Well?'

'Good as gold.'

'Yeah?' He looked out of the window and then took a deep gulp from his pint. His Adam's apple bobbed aggressively as he drank.

'As far as I can tell.'