CHAPTER TEN
He waited in his vehicle outside the Bull and Bear in Streatham.
He had arrived around seven thirty, parked his car in the car park at the rear of the building, watched who went in and who came out and then at eight he walked in through the front door.
It was a spacious bar, larger than most because it used to be a church. Ironically the religion business in England was faring badly and had been for some years. Pews were often more empty than occupied and ministers preached to smaller and smaller congregations. Scandals had not helped. And the introduction of modern attitudes to try to spice it up was not working either. The Royal Family even was considered in some quarters to be partly responsible, with their broken marriages and infidelities. How could the ordinary mortal be expected to have unquestioned faith in the Church of England when the head of the Church himself had admitted sexual indiscretions and a breach of his vows? Nevertheless there might just be help on that front. The marriage of the young Prince Charming to his gracious young wife had huge appeal.
Just the same, a growing number of personalities had looked to the Papal belief, turning their backs on the traditional Anglican faith. So churches up and down the country faced closure or a new life in some other role. Even as pubs like the Bull and Bear.
It was refurbished so that the ground floor was open and airy, tables and chairs tucked away in corners and nooks and crevices with at one end the bar, a single long well-seasoned wooden bench that had come from a cruise ship long ago scrapped, behind which young men and women wearing Bull and Bear T-shirts pulled the pumps. Staircases climbed up to a second floor that was like a library balcony on either side. Indeed, shelves of books had been carefully set into the walls. Small tables looked down. There were no slot machines nor any music because the Bull and Bear was a drinking and talking pub, a popular location in Streatham for people of all ages to meet. Which was why he had chosen it. He had watched it for weeks, for the time when he would need to hunt again. Tonight he was hunting.
As he drank his pint of Green King he looked around the room. It was what one did, it was expected so nobody would take special notice of him. He was checking out the scene. His attire also would not draw exceptional appraisal though he was dressed well and was good looking in a seasoned tennis player sort of way. He had never found it that difficult to pick up women. He was, it seemed, what they liked. Until they got to know him better.
The Bull and Bear was around half full and there were about a dozen women, just three he could make out who were not attached to a man. They sat alone at a table on the balcony. Perhaps it was a girls’ night out. They might be waiting for other friends, boyfriends maybe, to join them later. Or perhaps they were looking for someone to pick them up.
It was thirty minutes before one of the women, a rather plain mousy haired women in her late twenties or very early thirties, glanced at him and gave a short half smile. He half smiled back and turned to the bar to have his glass refreshed. He would not look at the women for another five minutes. Then he would. She would be impatiently waiting for his attention. If she was, she was his.
He would try really hard this time.
Very patient, very careful.
*
As they drove away from the Bull and Bear an hour before closing time the man turned to the woman who had told him her name was Paula, and smiled broadly.
She smiled back. She had enjoyed the conversation in the pub and found him to be witty, polite. She preferred a bit more ruggedness if she was honest with herself but he was very attentive to her which was attractive to her.
He dropped his hand to his lap, and then gently reached over and rested it softly just above her knee. She looked down but did not remove it. Her leg quivered ever so slightly.
Aaahhhhhh.