Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite! Read Online Free Page A

with a hot towel and had strawberry cheesecake and a cup of coffee, and I'd watched The Hobbit and thought of Brin and Baggins, and I'd looked over the script, and I'd folded the bed out and tried to get to sleep but I hadn't really been tired, I'd just been folding the bed out because I could and I'd wanted to see what it was like, and I'd tried reading Hunter Davies but hadn't been able to concentrate and I'd listened to the Beatles and I'd finally found a song – Baby You're A Rich Man – that I'd almost, but not quite, forgotten and which took me a little by surprise, and eventually I'd slept with the seat upright. I'd done all of those things, on the plane. I knew I had.
    I'd given a lot of thought to how I came to be on the plane before it crashed but not on it afterwards, but I was no nearer an explanation. And I wasn't even going to start trying. It was so absurd, so far-fetched, so utterly out of the ordinary, that the very idea of it subverted all kinds of notion of time.
    'I was on the plane,' I said. My voice sounded weak, despite all my efforts to be strong. Would I even believe myself? Did I really believe that I was on the plane?
    'What's your name?' asked the woman.
    'James Kite,' I said. I'd already answered that question a hundred times.
    'Who were your parents?'
    'I said. Mr and Mrs Kite. My dad was William, William Kite.'
    'Funny,' she said. 'We can't find any trace of your parents.'
    'They're both dead,' I said. 'I said...'
    'Buddy, Hitler's dead, doesn't mean you can't find traces of the guy,' said the moustache, finding the first glib remark of the day. 'Your parents, on the other hand... vamoose.' He leaned forward. I could smell him. I want to say he smelled of cheap aftershave, but maybe it wasn't cheap. I wouldn't know.
    'You want a lawyer?' asked the woman.
    I nodded. My first thought was, how expensive is that going to be? I'm never going to be able to afford a lawyer. Nevertheless, I nodded.
    'You know how many people know you're here?' she asked.
    I shook my head. I looked at the mirror and she followed my gaze.
    'Two,' she said, turning back to me. 'Just me and Agent Crosskill here. There isn't even anyone behind the glass. No one else knows. We can do whatever we like to you, and no one will ever know.'
    Agent Crosskill?
    She paused. Her eyes did not leave me. I withered beneath her stare. I hated that they made me feel like that. I wanted to stand up to her. I wanted to be blasé, I wanted to be like some guy in a film. I don't know, Bruce Willis maybe. Bruce Willis never wilts beneath anyone's stare.
    'You're not getting a lawyer,' she said. 'Ever. Chances are, in fact, that you're never walking out of this room. Start telling us the truth and maybe we'll let you go to the bathroom.'
    Her words crawled into my head. She hadn't shared her partner's increase in tone and tempo. She had spoken slowly, casually almost, like she was a public servant telling me that I needed to renew my driving licence, or that I'd underpaid my council tax by three pounds. And her words crept inside me and wormed their way down into my stomach, and suddenly the nerves and fear that gripped my insides were a transfixing, physical torment.
    I wasn't getting out. I wasn't going to see Brin and Baggins. That was all that mattered. I'd been waiting so long for that.
    'You have to let me speak to my family,' I said. I had to cough just to get the words out.
    'We have to?' she said. 'Did you give the same consideration to all those people on the plane that crashed?'
    'What plane?'
    She never took her eyes off me. Neither did the guy with the moustache. They did not exchange a glance. They were attached to me, as if they had fired a taser into my head.
    'What plane?' I said again. Although, of course, I knew what plane they meant. Of course I knew. I'd been on the plane.
    'You were checked in to travel on a plane that, twelve hours ago, crashed into the side of a mountain, killing everyone on board.' She paused, although