A Good Year for the Roses (1988) (4 page)

I spent the rest of the morning browsing around the shops. I even bought some books and magazines, nothing special.

By twelve I was in the pub opposite Mayles’ studio. I blagged a table close to the door and made myself comfortable.

The pub started to fill up around twelve-thirty. It was no spit and sawdust establishment. The clientele was heavily mobile in an unpward direction. Lots of stylish whistles and suede jackets. And not the kind of suede you picked up down the lane for £39.99 either.

At one o'clock precisely Howard pushed through the front door. He wasn't alone. He had one of the models who'd been receiving the make-up treatment at his studio earlier in tow.

She was tall, taller than Howard and she was dressed in a leather biker's jacket over a denim miniskirt. Her hair was as wild as a lioness’ mane and the colour of honey. I wondered if she was there for my benefit. I wondered if I should pretend to be gay. That'd fool them.

I stood up as they looked round the bar. Howard spotted me and headed in my direction, the girl tagged along behind. Howard introduced us. Her name was Matilda. She looked up at me. ‘My, but you're tall,’ she said.

I thought about the Chandler line and used it. Why not, someone has to now and then. ‘I try to be,’ I said.

She giggled. Howard looked at me disgustedly. He'd obviously read
The Big Sleep.
He went off to get some drinks from the bar. I opted for a pint of lager. Matilda chose Perrier. Howard went for scotch, a double, straight up, no ice, no mix. A real man's drink.

I found an extra chair for Matilda. When she sat and crossed her bare legs I got a flash of white cotton panties. Yeah, I know, I shouldn't have been looking. But when you've been through what I'd been through, and you've been out of circulation for as long as I had, when that much naked thigh is thrust under your nose, believe me brother, you look.

When we were all sitting comfortably, I began.

‘Howard,’ I said. ‘You don't mind me calling you Howard, do you?’

He shook his head. ‘Patsy Bright has vanished. She left home two months ago for an evening out and hasn't been seen since.’ I placed the photo on the table in front of him. ‘Now, from what I can gather from her father, which isn't much, you took some photos of her a while back. Now I'm not suggesting for a minute that you know anything about her disappearance, but you must know something about her. So tell me.’

‘Like what?’ He asked.

‘Firstly, do you know where she is?’ There's nothing like getting down to the nitty gritty.

‘No,’ he replied.

‘OK, but tell me, did she have a chance of making it as a model?’

He shrugged. ‘Who knows? If I could tell you that, I'd have opened my own agency years ago and long since retired to the sun. She might, she might not.’

‘What kind of model?’ I asked.

‘Not page three,’ he said. ‘Not enough up top, and I don't mean in the brain department. No tits you see. But maybe advertising or catwalk.’

‘Nothing else?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Glamour, porn, I'm no expert.’

He looked tired all of a sudden. ‘No, Mr Sharman. I don't do that kind of thing, I don't need it.’

‘How come you took these shots?’

‘She pestered me into it,’ he said.

‘Do you usually do, what do you call them? Audition shots, is it?’

‘Well everyone needs a portfolio to show around,’ he replied as if talking to a simpleton.

‘But from what I saw this morning, someone of your calibre wouldn't normally do a session like that.’

He loved the flattery. Matilda nearly cracked up. I liked that.

‘Did she pay you?’ I went on.

‘I did it as a favour at the end of another session,’ he replied.

‘Because she pestered you?’ I asked sceptically.

‘Yes, in a word.’

‘Where did you meet her?’

‘At a club. Legends I think it was.’

‘What happened?’

‘She walked up to me and said she wanted to be a model and asked for my help.’

‘Just like that?’

‘Just like that.’

‘Do you always help aspiring models who buttonhole you in nightclubs?’ I asked with even more sarcasm.

‘No.’

‘Then why Patsy?’

‘She had a way about her, a freshness, an appeal.’ I left it at that.

‘What did you get out of it?’ I asked.

‘Nothing.’

‘Nothing?’

‘No.’

‘Did she, how can I put it, offer you any favours?’

He laughed, so did Matilda. ‘I wouldn't take them if she did. I don't swing that way.’

Jesus, just as well I hadn't put on a limp-wristed act. I might have got more than I bargained for. I think I blushed.

‘Sorry,’ I said

‘Don't be,’ he replied.

‘So that's it.’ I said. ‘One session for her book?’

‘Exactly.’

‘When did you last see her?’

‘I bumped into her, maybe three months ago.’

‘How was her modelling career going?’

‘Not good.’

‘Even with photos by you?’

He smiled and didn't take my bait. ‘No dedication,’ he said. ‘Rich daddy, too many late nights, that was her problem. She wasn't hungry enough. Not like Matilda here. Perrier water, a strict vegetarian diet, lots of exercise and early to bed. Right Matilda?’

‘Right,’ said Matilda. I wouldn't have minded being in on the last two of the four.

‘Did she take drugs?’ I asked as innocently as possible.

‘No, I don't think so, that's my poison as you guessed earlier. She was too young for that sort of thing.’

‘I know she smoked dope,’ I said.

‘That's not drugs,’ he replied. ‘It's almost legal isn't it?’

I wondered if they'd changed the drug laws since I'd been in the boozer, but said nothing. ‘OK,’ I said, ‘and thanks. I'm sorry about, you know, what happened earlier. It's just that I wanted to get to you quickly.’

‘And you did.’

‘No hard feelings?’

‘None, as long as you keep schtumm about the other.’

‘Absolutely,’ I promised.

I bought them a drink. Howard was OK. He didn't bear a grudge. Matilda was OK too. I even got her ‘phone number before they left, but I doubted if I'd use it, but who knows?

For some reason I felt well depressed after I came out of the pub. I lost myself in The West End and didn't do anything more about Patsy Bright that day. I visited some drinking clubs I know round the back of Tottenham Court Road. I met a few people I knew and a few I didn't. I quit around eight and rescued the car from the garage. I was too drunk to drive home, but I did anyway.

I undressed and hung my suit up neatly. I took a pill to make me sleep and drank two bottles of Moosehead to make me sleep better.

I went into the office late the next morning. I drank too many cups of tea, leaning against the cold oven in the kitchen, putting off going.

I walked down from home and bought a paper on the way. It was full of bad news and I tossed it into the trash. I unlocked the front door, and as I opened it, Cat ran from under a parked car, slid through the narrow gap between the door frame and my legs and sat down in front of his empty bowl. ‘You're getting to rely on me.’ I said to him. ‘You'd better watch out or it'll end in tears. Eventually I'll let you down. It always happens.’ Cat looked at me reproachfully and I went and checked the larder. It was empty. ‘I told you so,’ I said. Cat said nothing. I picked him up and tossed him back into the street. ‘Go and ponce off somebody else,’ I said. Cat spat playfully and took a strip of skin over two inches long off the back of my left hand with his claws as I let him go. I swore and sucked at the tiny beads of blood that sprang from the scratch. Cat stretched and slunk back under the car ‘Nine lives,’ I said, ‘but don't push your luck son.’

I went back into the office and sat down behind the desk. I sucked at the back of my hand again as I stared through the window.

I suppose I sat there for twenty minutes just doing nothing. Eventually I pulled my address book from out of the top drawer. I opened it at ‘S’ and ran my finger down the page until I found the neatly printed entry for SOUTHALL, TERRY. Another old friend, another face from the past, from the clutter that filled my head.

I wondered if he, too, was still around. As I dialled the number I thought back over my friendship with the man I was telephoning. Terry was ten years older than me, give or take. That would put him at about forty five now. But he looked older and acted younger.

He was born in Hackney or Stepney or Plaistow, or somewhere like that in the East End where good South Londoners never go unless they're lost or have their cab fare home carefully folded and hidden in their shoe. He'd escaped early. Away from the back-to-backs and the bomb sites, up West, where the living was easy. First in the rag trade and then into photography. Now, as I said, I don't much like photographers as a rule, but Terry was different. He'd been an original London mod, a face who'd gravitated into the working class mafia of popstars, designers and advertising people who'd temporarily taken over from the real aristocracy in the sixties.

He'd been a real speed freak in those days he'd told me, living on a diet of purple hearts and french blues washed down with scotch and coke, and his heightened senses demanded excitement that even swinging London couldn't supply. So he'd taken his cameras and gone to the States. Over there he'd fallen with an even faster New York crowd which for a while had satisfied his needs. Then one day whilst watching TV, he'd seen a news report about the war in Vietnam. The story had captured his imagination and he'd conned Time Magazine into sending him over to do a photo report from an Englishman's point of view.

Once there he was hooked. Hooked on the Orient, hooked on the excitement of war, hooked on the easily available drugs and women, and finally, I think, from the way he told it, hooked on the whole macho army bullshit which he'd never experienced in mundane old England. He'd lived a charmed life in South-East Asia, at least for the first couple of years he'd been there. His work had been acclaimed, initially in the USA and then in Europe. He'd lived with the GFs amidst the mud and bullets. Sleeping in their bivouacs and taking part in both overt and covert missions on and behind enemy lines. He'd shared their rations and their joints, chased the dragon and caught VD with his beloved grunts. Then late in ‘68 it all caught up with him. He was syphilitic, living in a bottle and attached to a Ranger outfit somewhere on the An Hoa Basin. The Rangers had gone in to hit a Viet Cong command post. Terry had gone with them. He'd strapped himself to the outside of a Huey helicopter, festooned with cameras and as the chopper engaged the enemy, shot reel after reel of film. The Huey had come under fire. An incendiary grenade fired from a Russian rocket launcher had exploded inside the aircraft. All the occupants were killed. Terry had been neatly flipped out of his tightly laced combat boots and thrown over fifty feet down into the river they were following. He'd been shaken, but unhurt. The worst was yet to come. Another gunship had crashed nearby. The crew had survived and been captured. The VC dragged Terry from the river and punched and kicked him over to join the other prisoners. Reinforcements of marines had been drafted in. Over twenty choppers came in fast out of the sunrise, their shadows like giant scarabs as they sliced the top branches from the trees with bullets from the Gatling guns mounted on their sides. The Cong had fired their own automatic weapons into the small group of POW's. Terry had been lucky, he was at the centre of the bunch. The bodies of the other men had protected him from the worst of the sporadic fire. One bullet had smashed into the camera that was still hanging round his neck. He also received arm and leg wounds, but he was alive. The other half a dozen men didn't make it. The marine force landed and body-bagged the dead out. Terry ended up in a military hospital. The doctors patched up his wounds and cured his social diseases. Within a month he was declared fit and discharged.

He felt fine, except that every time he picked up a camera he began to tremble. His career was finished. A year later he'd made it back to England. By then he was clean of booze and drugs.

Broke and disheartened he'd become a drug rehabilitation counsellor. Unfortunately he couldn't relate to a team environment, so, funded by the GLC he'd set up a one-man drug clinic in Stockwell in the mid-seventies, which is where I'd met him.

Whilst he was with the forces in Vietnam he'd developed a strange cockney and western accent, littered with army slang and French and Vietnamese bastardisations. He'd never lost it. Personally I thought it was a load of old bollocks. But I'd never been there, so what did I know.

The ‘phone rang at the other end and I recognised his voice as he answered. ‘TS,’ he said. That was another thing about him I remembered. He loved initials.

‘Hello Terry,’ I said. ‘It's Nick Sharman.’

‘Goddamn,’ he said in reply, stretching the second syllable to breaking point. ‘Nick, my friend, long time no see.’

‘Hi Tel, I wondered if you'd still be around.’

‘Around and around as always. But where the fuck have you been? I mean, how long is it? Two years?’

‘About that,’ I agreed. ‘What are you doing with yourself?’

‘You got me at the old number. Nothing's changed. Still trying to clean up other people's messes. Same as usual.’ That's what I'd hoped.

‘But listen, man,’ he went on. ‘Where the hell are you? And what are you doing?’

‘You might not believe it,’ I said, ‘but I'm a private detective.’

‘Oh, but I do,’ he interrupted. ‘Nick Sharman, PI. Prime time schlock if ever I heard it. It's perfect.’

“I'm glad you're amused,’ I said. ‘But this is serious. I've been employed to try and locate a young girl who's missing. She seems to be into drugs. That's why I've called you up. With the clinic and all I hoped you might be able to give some information. She's local,’ I added.

‘Not the only reason I hope,’ he said. ‘And besides, the last time we met, you were the expert on consciousness expanding substances.’

‘Not you and all Terry,’ I said. ‘Listen, I'm finished with all that. And even if I wasn't, I've been away too long. I need to talk to someone who's up to date with what's happening. I've got some photos of the girl I'm looking for, you might even know where she is. Can I see you?’

‘Sure, when?’

‘How about today?’

‘Why not?’

I looked at my watch, it was eleven thirty. ‘How about a pint at lunchtime?’

‘Sure.’

‘I'll pick you up about one then.’

‘Look forward to it,’ said Terry.

We made our farewells and hung up.

I hung around the office for a bit and then decided to take a trip down memory lane.

I drove to Stockwell via Brixton. As I cruised through the familiar streets, I could almost feel the oppression and discontent rising through the cracks in the pavements. It had been a long time since I had ventured there. I'd avoided the place since I'd been back, but now I welcomed the journey. I purposely went down Railton Road, the old front line, to check out the changes. There were a lot. Whole rows of houses had been demolished. Cafes and shops that I had been familiar with had changed hands or were standing empty. A good deal of cosmetic work had been done. New yellow brick maisonettes had been built to cover the sites where petrol bombs had exploded. Some brave attempts to promote local pride had been made, but somehow it didn't seem to have worked. I could still sense a heavy tension in the air. As I drove, I could almost see old momma despair flitting from house to house, peeping through the dirty windows at me and twitching the curtains back as I passed.

The sun shone down on the locals hanging out in the streets. Rastafarians sat on the front steps of the houses, chatting and smoking together. Small groups of smartly dressed youth moved gracefully amongst the pedestrians, boogying along to the sounds coming from the giant tape-players hoisted on their shoulders. The market was as busy as ever. I stopped the car for a few minutes and strolled amongst the stalls. I saw a lot of faces I knew, but made no attempt to talk to anyone, even though I noticed a few looks of recognition as I walked by.

I remembered huddling for shelter, one hot summer's night, just a few years previously, not far from where I now stood, as my uniformed colleagues had been the targets for bricks and Molotov cocktails. I shuddered at the memory and picked my way through the rubbish and back to the car.

I could tell that all was not well on the streets. Life was normal enough on the surface, but I knew the area well enough to guess that trouble was throbbing beneath the surface like an ulcer about to burst and flood the bloodstream with poison. All my instincts told me that one day soon, violence would return to the streets and Brixton would burn again.

I motored on down the main shopping street, past Brixton Police Station where I'd spent so much of my working life and turned left into The Stockwell Road.

I found a parking meter in a quiet back street and left the car. I walked through an estate of old LCC flats towards the clinic which was housed in a shop front close to the clock tower.

I pushed open the glass door and stepped into the clinic. It had been partitioned with plywood into two offices. The front section where I stood was decorated with posters for concerts, unemployment benefits and the Labour Party. An old table was jammed into one corner and groaned with leaflets for various drug programmes and social security schemes. By the door stood an old tin desk, behind which sat a girl, her head bowed over the papers before her. I coughed politely. She ignored me.

‘Excuse me,’ I said. She slowly lifted her head and looked at me. Her eyes were exactly the shade of lavender blossom. She stared at me but said nothing

‘Is Terry in?’ I asked, though I was perfectly sure he was. She continued to look at me with those beautiful eyes. Then she looked away. ‘In there,’ she said, with a sigh that almost broke my heart, and pointed to a door set in the wooden partition. I felt as if I was missing something. ‘Just go in,’ she went on. I sidled over to the door, knocked and opened it. I looked back at her, but once more her head was bowed over the desk. I stepped into a tiny cubicle and found Terry sitting behind the twin of the desk in the front office, his feet propped up on the top.

He looked the same as I remembered him, only in worse shape. But I suppose none of us are getting any better. Terry was very tall, six foot three or four. His black hair was shot with grey, and hung long and greasy to his shoulders. There was a round, bald spot on the crown. He seemed to have lost weight in the time since I'd seen him and could ill afford to. His angular body was dressed in a battered camouflage suit, topped by an old leather flyer's jacket. On his feet were black, low heeled cowboy boots with silver trimmings on the toes and heels.

He looked up at me as I entered. ‘Nick,’ he said. ‘You're a sight for sore eyes.’

‘Hi Terry,’ I said. ‘Not disturbing you, am I?’

‘I'm just meditating my man,’ he said in reply. ‘Looking into my inner being, on the quest for truth.’

‘I've tried it,’ I said. ‘And discovered you'll find as much truth looking into the inner workings of a chicken sandwich.’

‘Quite the cynic Nick. Lighten up a bit. You always were too uptight.’

‘Roger and out, Terry. I'll try my best. What's happening?’

‘Same old scam. Different players, is all,’ he replied. ‘The rehab business is not what it was. Once I was treated like Saint Peter laying hands on the junkies and performing miracles. Now you can get crabs by just looking at the little bastards.’

‘Is that how you got that?’ I asked referring to a large cold sore on Terry's top lip.

‘Fucking herpes,’ he said with a pained smile. ‘I got it from mouth to vagina resuscitation.’

‘Your life style is obviously as attractive as ever,’ I said. ‘Aren't you ever going to grow up?’

‘Grow up?’ he echoed. ‘Look who's talking. Private eye indeed. I can almost see the credits rolling.’ He dropped even further into an American accent. ‘The city is a bitch,’ he intoned.

‘Too funny for words,’ I said drily. ‘I've come to you for help. Are you going to come through or not?’

‘With what?’ he asked innocently. ‘Not drugs surely. As I said before, you used to be the expert on all that shit.’

‘Let's get a few things straight,’ I said. ‘The past is past, I'm clean now. This business I'm involved in is a one-off. I didn't want to take the case, if that's not too fancy a word for it. I'm helping someone who cried on my shoulder a couple of days ago. It's a coincidence that drugs are involved. I need some information. I'm a freelance now, just like you, and I can do with all the friends I can get. But it's a two way street. You help me now, and maybe in the future I can help you. Is that a deal?’