Della is the only person I still listen to. I hear the views of others, weigh the significance of their opinions; but Della is wise, Della is good. Sometimes, I think she’s one step removed from everyone else.
She once told me that you can distinguish between truth and lies by the way the speaker tilts their head: slightly to the side, truth; forwards, a lie. It’s not effective for everyone, of course. There are professional liars out there who know how to control such noticeable mannerisms, and there are people like Della, who spend their time marking these liars. They are the most accomplished deceivers of all. I am sure now that Della spun me more than a few mild deceits in the time I knew her.
There is a pile of bodies heaped against the harbour wall as I step from the gangway and onto the mole. Two or three deep, a hundred metres long, with seagulls darting their heads here and there to lift out moist morsels in their red-tainted beaks. I’d always wondered where that red mark came from, ever since I was a child. Della told me it was tomato sauce from all the chips the gulls used to steal, and I believed her for a while. Then she told me they were natural markings. Now, I know the truth.
“Where do they come from?” I ask the policeman who stands at the bottom of the gangway. He glances over his shoulder at the bodies, as if surprised that I even deigned mention them.
“No worries,” he grins through black and missing teeth. “Dead trouble, rioters. Normal, all is normal.” He grabs my arm and helps me onto the mole, nodding and never, for one instant, relinquishing eye contact until I tip him.
“Rioters, eh?”
The little man forces a mock expression of disgust, and I actually believe he wants me to smile at his display. “Rioters, wasters, trouble. No more worries.” He performs an exaggerated salute, then turns and makes sure my tip is safe in his pocket before helping down the passenger behind me.
I stroll quickly along the dock, sweat already tickling my sides and plastering my wispy hair to my forehead. I try not to look at the pile of corpses, but as I approach the gulls let out a raucous cry and take flight in one frantic cloud. Three young boys run to the corpses and begin levering at them with broom handles, lifting limbs so that they can scour the fingers and wrists of those beneath for signs of jewellery. Evidently they have already been picked clean, because by the time I reach the harbour and hurry by with my breath held, the kids have fled, and the gulls are settling once more.