The Swap by Antony Moore

here.' Mr Briscow was chuckling.
    'Oh dear, that's not funny,' said Mrs Briscow, chuckling also. 'This poor woman killed in her own bed . . .'
    'In bed?' Harvey, who was still contemplating his breakfast, roused himself for a moment.
    'Well, wherever she was.'
    'In the cellar.' Mr Briscow had the paper. 'He cut her throat in the cellar. Now that's plain evil, I don't know how you can say he shouldn't be put down for that, Harvey. Killed like an animal that's what should happen to him. It would stop this sort of thing from happening all the time. But oh no, the bleeding hearts want to give him counselling and let him out after twenty minutes so he can do it again. These people are evil, Harvey, and they should be put out of their misery.'
    'Oh Christ.' Harvey put an undercooked lamb's kidney in his mouth and tried to chew. It tasted simply of meat, he could feel the blood leaking onto his tongue. A grimace filled with exhaustion crossed his face. He hadn't realised how tired he was.
    'What's wrong with that, Harvey?' His mother was scandalised. 'That's lovely, healthy food that is. You should eat that up, it's what you need.'
    'Yes, none of this vegetarian rubbish you get up in London. Alfalfa sprouts and soya beans? They're not sprouts and they're not beans. Should be done under the trade descriptions act. Simple as that.'
    Harvey focused for a rare moment on what his parents were saying. He had sometimes tried to picture London as they viewed it: a place of constant violence where no one ate anything but tiny portions of vegetables, before going off to watch pornography and take drugs. It actually wasn't that far from his experience of it. He tried to smile and then grimaced again as it made his head hurt. He put a piece of black pudding in his mouth and then, realising too late that this was a more serious proposition than he had expected, he started to chew.
    'It says the son, Charles Odd (35) – why do they have to tell us how old people are all the time? What do we care how old he is? – went to Trehendricks . . . Well, Harvey, that would mean he was in your year.' Mr Briscow looked at his son with genuine interest for the first time Harvey could remember, and Mrs Briscow jumped up and whipped round to check the facts over his shoulder.
    'So it would. Charles Odd, Harvey, you must have known him. Now let me think, do we know a Charles . . . Was there a Charles in your football team? No, that was a Christopher, wasn't it? Charles? Charles? Do you know him, Harvey? You must!'
    Overwhelmed by the experience of the black pudding and troubled by his parents' enthusiasm, Harvey nodded. 'Yeah,' he managed, still struggling with stray pieces of skin between his teeth. 'I knew him but I never really hung round with him at all. But, yeah. I saw him at the reunion on Saturday . . .'
    'You saw him at the reunion!' Both parents pounced like hungry seagulls on this titbit of news. 'You saw him on Saturday and on Sunday his mother was killed,' Mrs Briscow said triumphantly. Harvey frowned.
    'So what?' he demanded. 'Everyone there saw him. It's no crime to have seen him.'
    'Don't get defensive, Harvey. You'll only cast further suspicion on yourself.'
    'Piss off, Dad.'
    'If you did it you may as well come clean.'
    'Look, you may find that funny—'
    'But, Harvey, perhaps the police will want to interview you.' Mrs Briscow's eyes were shining.
    'Why the fuck ... ?'
    'Harvey!'
    'Language, boy, you're not in London now.'
    'Why the fuck would the police want to interview me? I saw him briefly at the reunion. We hardly exchanged two words. Why the fuck . . . ?'
    'You spoke to him! Harvey, I thought you said you didn't know him. You spoke to him and the next day his mother is killed.'
    'Jesus Christ . . .' Harvey felt suddenly that this would never end. Why had he come to this awful reunion in this crappy little town to be with these ghastly people who asked him impossible questions at breakfast and fed him terrible meats that tasted of