Eastern Standard Tribe – Day 8 of 64

8.

Linda didn’t like to argue—fight: yes, argue: no. That was going to be a problem, Art knew, but when you’re falling in love, you’re able to rationalize all kinds of things.

The yobs who cornered them on the way out of a bloody supper of contraband, antisocial animal flesh were young, large and bristling with testosterone. They wore killsport armor with strategic transparent panels that revealed their steroid-curdled muscles, visible through the likewise transparent insets they’d had grafted in place of the skin that covered their abs and quads. There were three of them, grinning and flexing, and they boxed in Art and Linda in the tiny, shuttered entrance of a Boots Pharmacy.

“Evening, sir, evening, miss,” one said.

“Hey,” Art muttered and looked over the yob’s shoulder, trying to spot a secam or a cop. Neither was in sight.

“I wonder if we could beg a favor of you?” another said.

“Sure,” Art said.

“You’re American, aren’t you?” the third said.

“Canadian, actually.”

“Marvelous. Bloody marvelous. I hear that Canada’s a lovely place. How are you enjoying England?”

“I live here, actually. I like it a lot.”

“Glad to hear that, sir. And you, Miss?”

Linda was wide-eyed, halfway behind Art. “It’s fine.”

“Good to hear,” the first one said, grinning even more broadly. “Now, as to that favor. My friends and I, we’ve got a problem. We’ve grown bored of our wallets. They are dull and uninteresting.”

“And empty,” the third one interjected, with a little, stoned giggle.

“Oh yes, and empty. We thought, well, perhaps you visitors from abroad would find them suitable souvenirs of England. We thought perhaps you’d like to trade, like?”

Art smiled in spite of himself. He hadn’t been mugged in London, but he’d heard of this. Ever since a pair of Manchester toughs had been acquitted based on the claim that their robbery and menacing of a Pakistani couple had been a simple cross-cultural misunderstanding, crafty British yobs had been taking off increasingly baroque scores from tourists.

Art felt the familiar buzz that meant he was about to get into an argument, and before he knew it, he was talking: “Do you really think that’d hold up in court? I think that even the dimmest judge would be able to tell that the idea of a Canadian being mistaken about trading two wallets full of cash for three empty ones was in no way an error in cross-cultural communication. Really now. If you’re going to mug us—”

“Mug you, sir? Dear oh dear, who’s mugging you?” the first one said.

“Well, in that case, you won’t mind if we say no, right?”

“Well, it would be rather rude,” the first said. “After all, we’re offering you a souvenir in the spirit of transatlantic solidarity. Genuine English leather, mine is. Belonged to my grandfather.”

“Let me see it,” Art said.

“Beg pardon?”

“I want to see it. If we’re going to trade, I should be able to examine the goods first, right?”

“All right, sir, all right, here you are.”

The wallet was tattered and leather, and it was indeed made in England, as the frayed tag sewn into the billfold attested. Art turned it over in his hands, then, still smiling, emptied the card slot and started paging through the ID. “Lester?”

Lester swore under his breath. “Les, actually. Hand those over, please—they don’t come with the wallet.”

“They don’t? But surely a real British wallet is hardly complete without real British identification. Maybe I could keep the NHS card, something to show around to Americans. They think socialized medicine is a fairy tale, you know.”

“I really must insist, sir.”

“Fuck it, Les,” the second one said, reaching into his pocket. “This is stupid. Get the money, and let’s push off.”

“It’s not that easy any more, is it?” the third one said. “Fellow’s got your name, Les. ’Sbad.”

“Well, yes, of course I do,” Art said. “But so what? You three are hardly nondescript. You think it’d be hard to pick your faces out of a rogues gallery? Oh, and wait a minute! Isn’t this a trade? What happened to the spirit of transatlantic solidarity?”

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