Trixie moved in first, played it perfectly. Said: “Where’s Gee Street?” So the poor bastard got his phone out, pulled his maps app up. Max could see he was susceptible. 

She collared him, stepping out the lift at the top of the concourse. She played dumb, got him to really spell it all out to her. Subtlety, I tell them: she’s got that in abundance. 

The man had his kid in a pram with a tube coming out of his nose, a massive scar across the kid’s brow to below his ear. He’s laden too, Max sees this: that’s the full-blown whistle.

The pram rolled to just about midway between the lift and barriers, nice and slow. It’s like Trixie was rolling the damn thing, total control. She had Max in her sights, and she moved on to “Gee Street.”

Then Max moved in with all the scars across his own face, all cockney: “blah blah blah.” He goes eye to eye with the man, really tried hypnotizing him with these crazy eyes he has. 

He’s going: “You’re a dad, fam; me too. We got that in common.” No, no, no, I’m screaming.

How many times am I telling this kid? I say: “Subtlety, Max. Just take it easy, why don’t you.”

I cannot fault Trixie, though. She got the man with the pram and about a million bags: he’d be prime in anyone’s eye. She clocked the Rolex too.

You’re a regular horologist, aren’t you. Trix, I said once, and I felt the weight of her at my temple. All she’s hearing is whore and bang. That was when she was fresh from Bristol.  

She says Seamonster for Seamaster, but that’s just her. Still, she knows them at 20 paces, by the tick. Seamonster, she says. You smell the Weston-Super-Mare on her, little pirate. 

Not many have the scent for that hospital, neither: Trixie sure as hell does. So when the guy smelled a rat, it’s all on Max. You’d have to be bastard blind not to. 

Aye, Max will say he had to be stalling; will say he had to make a damn spectacle on the concourse, which got them rumbled. 

He looked a damn fool there, flapping, saying: “I’m homeless, but I don’t need no home fam.” And there in the middle of the concourse, everyone sees him for what he is.

He’ll say, if Dave made his spot on time, they’d have the damn Rolex. But that’s not what happened. 

Dave can slip a watch like Houdini, but the kid is dumb as pig shit; that’s why we say it: Never let Dave talk.

I thought I loved Trixie once. She was touching this fat cat’s whiskers while she does the reach around and pulls the wallet right out of his pocket. 

She held herself right to me then, slipped the watch right on me, all sleight of hand: a bleeding Seamonster, she says. But then I smell her, and she stinks as bad as everyone of us.