Read by Andrew Baguley (second story in podcast, here)
How times have changed. The sine qua non of the enjoyable social occasion for many people used to be cocaine. However, now that cocaine is readily available in Asda with some health warning that no one reads along the lines of “serious risk of turning you into a twat”, it’s no longer fashionable. I suppose they needed tax revenue from somewhere to pay for all that borrowing during the early twenties.
And don’t get me started on the Animal Rights Act. I hesitate to use the hackneyed term “political correctness gone mad” but if it ever had any meaning that time is now. We are one step away from giving dolphins the vote and armadillos a passport. It is militant veganism gone mad. Every sentient thing has rights. The consequence being that, while nobody says it these days – we are all so keen not to offend - a dinner party is hardly worth going to.
And so those of us who still have carnivorous urges have to rely on the smugglers and black-marketeers known colloquially as the “meat pirates”. My own Blackbeard, if you will, operates, or rather, used to operate, from the Coach and Horses in Hastings, East Sussex. It is one of the few pubs in the town in which natives and Filth mix freely. Filth, of course, stands for Failed In London, Try Hastings. I am neither native nor filth. I was just down from law-abiding Lewes for the day, having been informed that this was a place where deals might be made and illicit flesh might be procured.
My Blackbeard does not have a black beard. She does not have an eye patch or a wooden leg, at least as far as I know. If she owns a parrot, she does not bring it into the public bar. Modern day pirates, meat pirates, anyway, practise discretion; their clients, fearful of the disapproval of the vegetarian consensus and the damage to reputation, demand it, and of course, they themselves are mindful of the risk of the custodial sentence that comes with conviction for distribution.
Decades of red meat consumption had taken their toll on me. I tended towards corpulence. I had a rubicund face. My fingers looked like sausages. And not in a good way. I am not accustomed to being approached in a pub on a Friday night by a wholly unknown and relatively attractive woman. I remember the first words she spoke to me:
“You look like a man who hasn’t had a nice piece of meat in a while.”
Caught off guard, I struggled to answer.
“No,” I said.
“You look like you could do with a steak,” she said, “Know what I mean?”
I did. The physiological response was immediate and profoundly felt. I salivated.
“It’s been a while,” I said, gradually relaxing in her presence. She seemed … kind.
There was a pause. I realised that I had to be the one to get to specifics, to commit to the deal in the way that an undercover police officer couldn’t for fear of accusations of entrapment.
“You sell meat!” I said, more loudly than was prudent, and I saw her flinch and raise her finger to her lips.
“Sorry,” I said, “Sorry. Sorry. Sorry, I’ve never done this before.”
“You’ve never talked about meat before?”
“Not in a pub with a pirate,” I said, “How does it work?”
She sighed and then spoke very quietly and deliberately. “We exchange numbers. You text me your address and what you want, I text back a price and bank details. If you’re happy you make the transfer and in the evening a lad from UberEats brings your order.”
“Bank details?”
“Yeah. I’m an out of work butcher with a mortgage to pay, not a teenage gangster. I really can’t be doing with cash. Is there a problem with that?”
“No,” I said. I thought hard. Then I thought of one. “How does it appear on the bank statement?”
“Personnel services,” she said.
“You are joking? Personal services?”
“No. Personnel services, like an employment agency. I am quite literally not fucking with you. Now, shall we do business?”
*
I tried her Lincolnshire sausages and her loin chops. Her ox cheeks were delicious. I ordered bavette steak and corn-fed chicken and maple-cured bacon. I enjoyed everything she gave me. According to my bank statement, I was soon spending a little over £300 a month on “Personnel Services”.
I didn’t see her for a year or so after that. Everything was done over the phone and that was just fine but I have to confess that I went down to Hastings a few times during that year and on each trip I paid a visit to the Coach and Horses where I drank a pint of Harveys and then took the train back home. And then last January I saw her and I said hello and offered her a drink and ordered her a gin and tonic and asked how business was.
She appeared to be pleased to see me, but I put that down to wishful thinking. I am not much of a conversationalist and it all went a bit quiet once her drink arrived and I had paid for it so I asked her what her favourite meat was. I thought it was a good question.
“Actually,” she said, “I never touch it. Health more than anything. Haven’t for years. Anyway, probably not a good idea to develop a liking for my own product, know what I mean?”
I knew what she meant. At the prices she was charging, she was much better off selling the meat and sticking to a strictly plant-based diet.
She looked around. “Listen,” she said, “Have you got a freezer? I could get you a whole lamb, butchered perfectly, rack, legs, shoulders, scrag end …”
“Breast,” I said.
“Everything,” she said. Could do you the lot for £500, keep you going for months. Maybe I could throw in a poussin and a kilo of chipolatas. What do you say?”
“What is it, a closing down sale?”
“Pretty much. Frankly John,” she said, “I need to get out of the game. Seems like half of London’s old drug dealers have retrained ready to move into the meat market. Probably more handy with a cleaver than I am. I figure I can sell them my client list and get out. Meanwhile, I’m having a big sale, get a bit of cash together and leave you with enough to tide you over till the new boys get their supply lines sorted. Sound good?”
“What about mutton?” I said. “Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.” Truth is, I was worried about running out of meat and I didn’t want to be dealing with some sweaty kid who would probably bulk out his chicken with injected water.
And then the door burst open. “Everybody stay where you are. This is a police raid!”
As the situation sank in, we looked at each other – those involved in clandestine activity instinctively suspect those around them – and then looked embarrassed at momentarily suspecting the other. There were only a few moments to talk before the police separated us.
“Don’t worry,” she said. As long as you haven’t got any meat on you, you’ll be OK. You haven’t, have you?”
“Not a sausage,” I said.
“You buy sex, OK?”
At this, I looked blank. Fortunately, I had a few seconds to work it out.
We were led into separate corners by uniformed constables. I was informed that I was being detained under section something of the Animal Rights Act and asked if I had anything I shouldn’t. When I said I didn’t I was asked if I consented to a search there and then or if I refused, in which case I would be held at a police station pending search with the right to a legal representative, if I had one, present.
There was a sudden flurry of activity a few metres away when the police officer found a small bag in a young man’s pocket. “What’s this, sonny?” he asked, holding the bag an inch away from the man’s face. He couldn’t have been more than nineteen.
“Pork scratchings,” he said, almost sobbing.
“All right, lad.” said the policeman, “You’ll be OK. Tell us where you got them and you’ll be on your way with a caution before you know it. Let’s go.” They went outside.
I was searched and found to be meat-free, and then asked what I had been doing there.
I said what I had been instructed to say. I am not an actor. It didn’t sound right.
“I buy sex,” I said, then I added “OK?” because I wasn’t sure if that should be included. It sounded more belligerent than I wanted it to.
The constable told me to turn my phone on and show him. He scrolled through the most recent messages in the sent folder.
“Whoah!” he said. What’s this? Last week, message to ‘B’, ‘rump’? Just ‘rump? How do you explain that?”
I tried again: “I buy sex.” I didn’t add the “OK” this time. “It’s code,” I said, “so no one finds out.” I felt that I now sounded like an authority on the matter.
He looked back at the phone, scrolled some more. “Ah!” he said, “Also to ‘B’, What’s this? ‘Tongue?’”
I tried to imbue the three words with as much raw sadness as I could muster. “I buy sex!”
He let me go after advising me to think up code words that were less suggestive of illegal activity. I was, in his eyes, a sad case, no doubt, but no law breaker.
*
I never saw Blackbeard again. I did receive a postcard, though. Turns out she’s living in Leon in the north of Spain, stuffing meat and paprika into intestines to make artisan chorizo. She is happy to have found lawful and fulfilling employment. For my part, I have moved on. I made my final bank transfer to Personnel Services and a young lad brought the constituent parts of a sheep around the next day. I eked out the pirate meat for a good six months and then swore off the flesh of sentient beings forever.
I have been on the meat wagon for two years now. I look younger than I did, and I weigh less, and what with the low price of cocaine in Asda, I’m hundreds of pounds a month richer, much more confident socially, and I don’t have to worry about breaking the law. Anyone fancy a line?
(c) Ken Towl, 2022
Ken Towl (left) attended City, University of London's short story course in 2019 and is a regular contributor to Inside Croydon, leavening its award-winning reportage of local government goings-on with whimsical articles on walks, art, pubs and pandemics. He teaches Law, Politics and History.
Andrew Baguley worked for the council in the 70s, acted in the 80s, was in business in the 90s and noughties, and is now back acting in the 2020s. He may return to the council later ... His most recent project was playing a security guard in Ted Lasso.
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