We all walk together to a bench near the middle of the park. The bench has been slapped hard by the pigeons from above, so it’s a pretty dodgy place to be sitting. Still, it’s safer than some of the others, which the birds seem to recognise as their own public toilets.

‘Check the state of this place,’ Perry smirks. He’s the kind of guy who likes to sit in a scummy park and talk business. ‘It’s disgraceful,’ though his smirk is now a full-blown smile. It’s a smile of diseased malice, friendliness and happiness all rolled into one devastating concoction. He wears a flanno, rough jeans, old boots, and of course, that vicious smile of his. He looks for a place on the table to put the suitcase but settles for the ground.

A pause of silence arrives.

An old man comes to us asking for change.

Perry gives him some, but first he asks the poor old bloke a question.

He says, ‘Mate, what’s the capital of Switzerland, do y’ know?’

‘Berne,’ the old man replies, after some thought.

‘Very good. However, my point is this.’ He smiles again. Damn that smile. ‘In that country, once, they gathered up all the gypsies, whores, and drunken bums such as yourself, and they threw ‘em over the border. They got rid of every dirty swine that graced their precious land.’

‘So?’

‘So you’re an incredibly lucky drunken bum now, aren’t you? You not only get to stay in our fine land, but you also earn a living out of kind-hearted people such as myself, and my colleagues here.’

‘They didn’t give me anything.’

(We blew our last cash at the dog track the other day.)

‘Certainly, but they didn’t throw you in the Pacific either now, did they?’ He grins, evil. ‘They didn’t chuck you out there and tell you to start swimming.’ He adds for good measure, ‘Like they should have.’

‘You’re crazy.’ The drunk begins to leave.

‘Of course I am,’ Perry calls after him. ‘I just gave you a dollar of my hard earned wages.’

Yeah, right, I think. It’s money he earns from fighters.

The old man is already on to the next people — a grungy black-dressed couple with purple hair. They’ve got earrings stapled across their faces, and Docs on their feet.

‘He oughta give them the buck now,’ Rube observes, and I laugh. He’s about right, and as the old man lingers around the couple, I watch him. He has turned his life into the pocket scraps of other people. It’s sad.

It’s sad, but Perry has forgotten all about the man. He’s had his pleasure and is now strictly on to business.