Kiss Me Quick (6 page)

‘I’m still going to talk to him.’

Machin frowned. ‘You don’t think we already have?’

Not wanting to seemingly undermine him, Vince threw him an acquiescent smile. ‘I don’t doubt it for a second, mate. Just to reacquaint myself, for old times’ sake.’

‘Be my guest. We’ve done everyone on Jack’s payroll and,
surprise
, surprise, not a dicky bird. All shtum and alibi-ed up to their orchestra stalls.’

A fresh thought spiked in Vince’s mind. ‘How about those not on his payroll?’

Machin shot him a blank look.

‘He never married, did he?’ Vince continued.

Machin laughed. ‘Jack? Wife, kids and all that stuff? He’s not the marrying kind.’ He refilled his mug. ‘How about you, son?’

‘Married? Not yet, no.’

‘Got someone in mind?’

‘Not yet, no.’

‘Good-looking fella like you, all the birds fancied you.’ Machin stared out the window contemplatively. ‘It’s not all it’s cracked up to be, son.’ He pointed to a framed photo resting on the windowsill, gathering dust in the fading sunlight. It was a family portrait: one wife, two kids. Say cheese. ‘There’s my ball and chain over there.’

Vince glanced over at the photograph. ‘Nice,’ was all he could come up with for the fat smiling faces in the frame.

‘Jack had a bird he was keen on. A right eyeful, as it happens – not bad at all. A real looker, if you like that type of thing.’

Vince glanced around at Machin. ‘What type of thing?’

‘Slim ones, not a lot of meat on ’em, like a Jean Shrimpton or a Cathy McGowan.’ Machin shook his head in mild disgust at the prospect of having his way with either the international model or the
Zeitgeist
pop-show presenter and self-styled Queen of Carnaby Street. ‘No, son, give me a Mansfield, a Russell or even a Dors any day of the week.’ Machin cupped and jiggled both his hands in front of him, as if weighing up some imaginary breasts he’d just sprouted. ‘Real birds, I mean. Something you can hang your hat on.’

Vince smiled, knowing that Shirley the barmaid, with her tits spilling out of her blouse, was more the ideal ticket than Jayne Mansfield, Jane Russell or even Diana Dors.

‘What’s her story, then?’ asked Vince.

‘She runs one of Jack’s clubs in Oriental Place,’ Machin said. ‘Place called the Blue Orchid. We had her followed for a couple of weeks, but nothing came of it.’

‘What’s her name?’

‘Bobbie LaVita.’

‘Bobbie …
LaVita
?’

Machin gave a bemused shrug. ‘You know this town. Here everyone’s a character.’

Vince repeated the name under his breath, pondering it.
‘LaVita. La … vita. The … life.’

‘The what?’

‘LaVita is Italian for “The Life”.’

Just then, the door swung open, and Ginge swung in along with it.

‘Don’t you ever bleedin’ knock?’ Machin asked him sharply. He didn’t like getting caught having a snifter at only four in the afternoon.

‘Sorry, guv,’ said Ginge. He then turned to Vince. ‘You’ve got a call from a Mr Ray Dryden.’

‘Thanks.’ Vince stood up.

‘You can take it in here,’ offered Machin.

‘It’s OK. You’re busy so I’ll leave you to it,’ he replied, wanting privacy for this particular call.

‘I’ll sort you out a desk later,’ said Machin.

Vince gave him an appreciative nod and followed Ginge out the door.

Machin cleared up the evidence of booze by simply knocking it back. He then slumped into the chair that Vince had vacated, gazed at the family portrait and smiled. Then he wondered if he’d get to charver Shirley again tonight.

Ray Dryden had joined the Met along with Vince as part of the new fast-track graduate intake, and they soon became close friends. Ray read Modern Languages at university, but got caught up in detective novels and decided that was the life for him. He was smart, though not really up to the physical side of things. To make up, he had tons of enthusiasm and knew his way around research libraries, halls of records and drawers of press clippings. He was good with names, dates, paper trails, piecing data together and thumb-tacking it on to a cork board and, to his credit, getting results. A year ago, Ray had joined the small team that ran the London bureau of Interpol.

Vince’s hunch, like everyone else’s, was that Jack was
somewhere
out of the country. Jack Regent’s Corsican connection was too strong to ignore, therefore Interpol had been put on alert. Vince had put in a call to Ray as soon as he was thrown the case.

‘What do you say, Ray?’

‘Why the sudden air of secrecy? You don’t trust our Brighton brethren?’

‘London, Brighton – all the same to me.’

‘The Eddie Tobin situation?’

‘It’s still a bad beef.’

‘Don’t let it get you down, Vince. It’ll blow over, you’ll see.’

‘I don’t want it to blow over, Ray. I saw a girl getting killed up on that screen.’

‘Girls get killed on the screen all the time, Vince. They call them actresses.’

‘This wasn’t acting. This was for real, and I’m going to prove it.’

‘Did you actually see her get killed? Did you see any blood?’

‘No,’ said Vince, almost wishing that he had, just so the
vagueness
of the crime would crystallize. ‘And I know what you’re going to say next, but I’m sure if I’d have stayed on my feet long enough, I would have.’

The silence on the phone swelled into an uncomfortable tumour of doubt and uncertainty.

‘Do you believe me, Ray?’

‘If you say it’s so, Vince, then I’m with you – you know that. But that’s another case, yeah?’

‘What have you got for me?’

‘What do you know about the Unione Corse?’

‘Nothing.’

‘They’re the French equivalent of the Mafia,’ said Ray Dryden. ‘Corsicans but operating mainly out of Marseilles. Involved in all the usual rackets, but big in smuggling. Heroin, hash, cigarettes, gold, any other contraband they can get hold of and turn a profit on.’

‘Brighton’s just had three junkies turn up dead on heroin.’

‘Shit! When did this happen?’

‘We found them today. The stuff that killed them was so pure, it looked like it had just come off the boat.’

Ray exhaled a whistle of astonishment that acknowledged not only the tragedy but the synchronicity of the events. ‘Vince, you’re going to be very interested in what I’ve just found out. Sitting comfortably?’

Vince, knowing him like he did, knew Dryden was going to come up with the goods. Because when Ray Dryden got stuck into something, he stayed stuck in. Notepad and pen out, Vince made himself as comfortable as he could get, considering he was perched on the corner of a desk in the incident room. ‘I’m all ears.’

‘French cops first discovered a heroin-processing lab near Marseilles in 1937,’ Ray began. ‘It was a huge operation,
manufacturing
tons of raw opium into opium paste, then into morphine, then heroin. Some of the raw opium was brought in from Turkey, where farmers are licensed to grow opium for legal pharmaceutical drugs. The rest came in from Indochina, via the French colony out there. It’s refined in Marseilles then shipped out – to the States mainly. In the thirties and forties, there was a big heroin epidemic in Harlem, New York. All the gear coming in at the time was thought to be supplied by the Unione Corse, along their opium routes, then distributed internally by the Mafia. In 1947, the Yanks discovered the first big import: seven pounds of the stuff was seized from Corsican sailors in the Brooklyn docks. Purest brand they’d seen. Anyway … You still there?’

Vince had let out an audible sigh at this history lesson of French villainy. He wished Ray would sharpen it up and put a point on it. But he realized that Ray was on a roll, and that he’d have to listen to the full fruits of his labour before they got to what he needed to hear.

‘Ray, I’m enthralled. Pray continue.’

‘The whole operation was run by the Unione Corse boss, one Paul Carbone.’

Vince jotted the name down. ‘Sounds Italian?’

‘Corsica’s got a very mixed history and heritage. It’s French, but it’s an island stuck out in the Med, with the Italians, Sicilians, Greeks and Turks passing through. Lots of invasions. A real
melting
pot.’

‘Carry on, Mr Chips.’

‘Anyway, here’s the thing. The French coppers uncovered a
processing
plant by accident. But it had already been up and running for about five years, because Carbone had protection.’

‘Gangsters getting protection? There’s a novel twist.’

‘Yeah, and it came from way up top. During the war, the Unione Corse worked with the French Resistance. Doing what they were good at, getting in and out of places they shouldn’t be and killing people. Assassinations of Gestapo officers,
high-ranking
collaborators, spies. They did a good job, apparently, even had medals pinned on them. Then after the war, they were used by the American CIA and the French SDESE.’

‘Snappy name.’

‘It’s the French Intelligence service. They used the Corsicans to stop the French communists taking control of the harbour of Marseilles, which is the busiest port in the Med. Lots and lots of money involved, so the Unione Corse has big connections with the French government. I reckon they see them as the muscle, get them to do the dirty work that they can’t be seen doing themselves. The pay-off, you ask? They let them get on with what they do, turn a blind eye. As long as not too much dope turns up in Paris, and most of it ends up safely in the States, they’re happy.’

‘Do you think Jack Regent’s got anything to do with these people?’

‘Do you?’

Vince weighed it up: Marseilles, Corsica, New York. It all sounded a little exotic, but why not? And anyway, there was nothing else to go on. And, like with Ray, it was the kind of intrigue that fired Vince’s imagination. It was why he became a cop – seeking the bigger picture, the bigger story.

He eventually replied, ‘He’s Corsican, he’s a criminal and three junkies have just OD’d on heroin. In my book, that’s a
connection
. What else should I know about this Unione Corse?’

‘Its members always carry the emblem of the Corsican flag with them, wearing it engraved on a piece of jewellery, like a ring or a medallion. The higher echelon members also have a tattoo. But they always have it on them somewhere. It’s a badge of honour to them to never be without it.’

‘What does the Corsican flag look like when it’s at home?’

‘It’s a Moor’s head. You know, the Moors?’

‘Yeah, plays left back for West Ham.’

‘Er, a coloured fella’s head … North African or Arabic.’

Vince laughed. ‘Yeah, thanks, Ray, I know what a Moor is. How’s the glamorous world of Interpol treating you?’

‘Our international police force, Vince? I haven’t left my office once since I got here! The only time I see foreign climes is in the Greek or Italian place at lunchtime. Listen, I think this is good stuff. If we can build a case with—’

‘
We?
’ asked Vince.

‘Yeah, you putting in the heavy footwork, and me the brains behind the operation. Who knows, if we put enough of a case together, we could both be out in the Mediterranean sunning ourselves.’ Vince laughed, but Ray continued. ‘Ah, Vincenzo, I know a wonderful restaurant in St-Tropez. And the women, the fiery temperaments, the exotic looks …’

‘How’s this for exotic? Bobbie LaVita?’

‘Who’s he?’ asked Ray Dryden.

‘He’s a she.’

‘Mmm, sounds promising. A date?’

‘Hardly. But she’s quite an eyeful apparently. She was Jack Regent’s paramour.’

‘Gangster molls are not my type.’

‘Me neither, but I’m curious. Might be the closest I’ll get …’

Bobbie LaVita, Bobbie LaVita, Bobbie LaVita, Bobbie LaVita, Bobbie LalalalalalalaVita
…

The name kept running through Vince’s head mambo-style as he stepped out of the station into Edward Street. It was a sunny day, not too hot, just lit up. The sun hung low in the sky,
throwing
a vivid light over everything.

‘Detective Treadwell?’

Vince turned around sharply, and there he was.

Giving him the benefit of the doubt, he was about five foot seven inches, maybe less. Podgy with sandy hair, he looked as if he’d be bald by the time he hit forty. But that day looked at least twenty years off.

‘I’m Terence. Terence Greene-John, reporter for the
Evening Argus
.’

Vince gave the cub reporter a thorough once-over: noting a brown Harris-tweed hacking jacket; burgundy V-neck jumper, probably with holes in the elbows but he couldn’t see; Tattersall check shirt; green tie with small blue mallards flying all over it, and tightly knotted like a noose; faded bottle-green baggy
corduroy
trousers worn high with braces, exposing red socks and battered brown brogues. In fact, everything about the fellow’s garb looked battered, baggy, well worn and handed down. He looked like a ruddy-faced young farmer from good stock.

‘If it’s about the three in Kemp Town, I don’t know any more than Detective Machin already told you people.’

Terence dismissed this with a vigorous shake of his head. ‘No, no, no, Mr Treadwell—’

‘Detective Treadwell.’

‘Yes, yes, yes, sorry sorry—’

‘It’s OK. What can I do for you, Mr Green …?’

‘Green-John,’ he corrected, reaching into his jacket pocket and handing Vince his card. ‘Jack Regent is the story I’m covering.’

Vince inspected the card which, on closer inspection, was not a card at all but a piece of thick, scissor-cut paper. It just had his name and a number on it in plain typewriter font. Vince inspected Terence, noting the reporter had the inky fingers of multiple
ribbon
changes. But the card was wrong, because he’d obviously knocked it up himself. Vince raised a doubtful eyebrow. ‘You really work for the paper?’

Terence couldn’t meet his gaze, instead his eyes darted
downwards
. Vince noticed he had exceptionally long eyelashes, like a girl’s.

‘To be honest, sir—’