September Song (27 page)

‘I've had enough of you. I'm going to shoot your bollocks off,' he said.

‘I don't think so, Ricky,' I said. ‘I really don't think so.'

Guns are interesting things. There's something about them – an aura, I suppose you'd call it. It's as if they magically confer power on those who hold them, and in a way, of course, they do. But, when it comes down to it, they're only tools. Admittedly, they're tools that do a very ugly thing, but, like other tools, they're only as good or useful as the person wielding them. Ricky didn't impress me as a master craftsman. Perhaps if he'd done his National Service instead of time, and had actually handled a gun before, he'd have been more formidable, but even then I don't think I'd have been as impressed as he would have liked because I did have an advantage in assessing this particular situation.

I knew the sawn-off wasn't loaded.

The look of surprise on his face when I stepped closer to him was something to behold. The thin, tight smile widened into something resembling a circle as his mouth dropped open and the eyes stared in disbelief. I put my hand on the top of the barrel and forced it down until it was pointing at the ground while he struggled with the triggers, with no apparent understanding of how the thing worked or why it wasn't responding in the expected manner. Then I twisted it out of his grasp, and he stepped back in some confusion. He looked so pathetic that I couldn't be bothered to hit him.

Behind me, Dave Mountjoy groaned. I risked a quick glance at him. His false teeth had fallen out and were lying, like a strange pink and white crustacean, a few feet from him. He looked like an old, old man.

‘George was right,' I said. ‘You ought to make sure your dad's all right. That was a nasty fall.'

The boy looked uncertainly at George, who gave him an encouraging nod. After a few seconds of hesitation, Ricky moved slowly around me, going sideways like a crab, always with his eye on the gun, and knelt down by Dave.

‘It might not be a bad idea to get him looked at,' I said. ‘Bangs on the head can be quite unpleasant.' I looked at George. The quizzical expression on his face and the way he half-smiled at me suggested he had guessed that the sawn-off wasn't loaded. Or he thought that I was insanely brave. The smile, though, said that he wasn't sure either way and that he wasn't about to risk anything. All the same, I was aware of a slight tremble in my hands that I tried to disguise by moving them a bit. And there was a cold, uncomfortable trickle of sweat dribbling from my armpits. ‘As far as I'm concerned this is all over.' I waved the gun in Ricky's direction. ‘I'd advise you to make sure he knows that.'

George nodded, and I turned to go.

‘Oh, there really are some blokes who want a word with him. About his “business dealings” up West. I don't know where they've gone now, but they will find him, you know.'

George nodded again. ‘I'll keep an eye open,' he said.

I sauntered off, trying for a nonchalance I certainly didn't feel.

I joined Viv Laurence at the gate. ‘Phew,' I said, ‘you all right?'

‘More or less,' she said. ‘Blimey, you make a habit of this?'

‘What?' I said.

‘Rescuing damsels in distress.'

‘Only in the silly season,' I said.

I gazed along Temple Mills Lane, but there was no sign of a maroon Ford Zephyr.

A long shrill whistle sounded as a locomotive screamed past in the distance, and a gust of wind slapped some cold rain into my face. This had once, a long time ago, been a bleak marshland, offering pasture for a few skinny cattle, and now, criss-crossed by railway lines, littered with featureless warehouses, vast engine sheds and scrap-metal yards, it was just as depressing and desolate.
Plus ça change, la plus c'est la même chose
.

The rain slapped me in the face again.

I looked back at the little group huddled by the car, around the prone figure of Dave Mountjoy. It didn't look as if any of them, even Ricky, had any appetite for following me. A damaged Dave and a deflated tyre seemed to have taken the sting out of them for the time being.

‘Sorry,' I said to Viv, ‘my taxi didn't wait. Are you up to a short walk to the bus stop?'

She looked down at her less-than-sensible high-heeled shoes and giggled rather charmingly, but then she looked back warily at the group of Mountjoys and I realized that she was frightened and nervous.

‘Do you think they'll let us on a bus?' she said.

It was my turn to laugh. We were unlikely to pass as respectable citizens out for a quiet Sunday stroll down Leyton High Road. My shirt, shoes, suit, face and hands were stained with mud from the scrapyard. Her blouse was very badly torn, and a certain amount of flesh and bright-red underwear was on display. I tried not to notice that she really did have impressive thruppenies.

I took off my jacket and draped it around her shoulders.

And then, of course, I remembered that there was the small matter of a sawn-off shotgun. The banks (and pretty much everywhere else for that matter) may have been closed, so an armed robbery might not have been very likely, and I'd never heard of anyone using a bus as a getaway vehicle, but I still couldn't see the conductor being too happy about letting me on with that shoved down my trousers. On the other hand, he'd have to be a brave man to tell me to get off.

I decided to disable the damned thing as best I could by jumping on it or something and then dumping it in the disused warehouse we had to pass. I started walking along the road with Viv tick-tocking along next to me.

The rain had stopped, but it was too late for me. My shirt was soaked.

As we came up to the warehouse, a maroon Ford poked its bonnet out from beyond the far wall and then slowly lumbered over the weeds and broken paving stones, through the puddles and the mud, bounced heavily off the kerb on to the road and then rolled to a halt next to us. The passenger window was wound down slowly, and Nelson looked out at me. He pointed at Viv Laurence. ‘Don' look much like Ricky Mountjoy,' he said.

‘No,' I said, ‘he's still in the scrapyard. You can catch him there.'

He stared through the windscreen. ‘I remember you sayin' you was goin' to bring him out,' he said.

‘I did,' I said, ‘but you weren't there to greet him.'

‘It was rainin',' he said. ‘We decided to wait in the motor. You can go and get him now.'

‘No,' I said. ‘I've done my bit, and I've got what I came for. You want him, you go get him.'

The windscreen continued to fascinate him. ‘That wasn't the deal,' he said.

I shrugged.

‘OK,' he said, ‘but I'll remember this. And I'll remember we owe you for Clive's toot' and Victor's headache.' I assumed he meant the bloke Charlie had biffed. ‘And that's Clive's gun you got there. You gonna give it back or what?'

‘Sure,' I said and dropped the sawn-off on his lap.

‘Hey,' he said, ‘be careful. You coulda hurt my marriage prospects.'

He hefted the gun and then pointed it out of the window, straight at me.

I leaned in towards him and pushed the barrel of the gun to one side. ‘A word of advice,' I said. ‘Be very careful who you point that thing at.'

‘Why?' he said.

‘It's a dangerous weapon,' I said. ‘You point it at the wrong person and you'll find out just how dangerous. Oh, and you don't owe me a thing. We're straight.'

He didn't reply, and I stepped away from the car. He slowly wound the window back up. The light fell on its slightly convex surface in such a way that it was opaque. All I could see reflected in it was a dark, lowering sky.

Clive slipped the car into gear, and it pulled slowly away. I watched it roll up to the gate of the scrapyard. It paused there for a few seconds. I could hear the engine idling noisily, and I don't imagine it went unnoticed by George and the others. That was probably what Nelson had in mind. Make them aware of him. Give them something to think about.

They soon drove on past.

I shuffled over to a thoughtful-looking Viv Laurence, who had retreated a few feet. She took my arm, and we walked quickly off towards Leyton High Road, away from the Mountjoy boys and in the opposite direction to that taken by Clive and Nelson.

I did listen carefully for the powerful purr of a prowling Ford motor all the way to the bus stop and all the while we waited for a number fifty-eight.

But all I could hear was that strange, pounding sound in your head generated by the stress of unfinished business.

SEVENTEEN

J
erry was just a bit bemused.

In all the time that I've rented the flat from him, I've only ever brought one woman back there, and now, having, it seemed, only just waved farewell to one after serving her breakfast, here was another, gasping for a cuppa and desperate for a custard cream.

Unsurprisingly, Viv had been very quiet after we'd plonked ourselves down in the warm fug of the empty top deck of the bus. We'd done nothing more than steam gently and stare gloomily out of the front window after the conductor had taken my coppers and punched our tickets. He'd looked at us suspiciously but said nothing.

I suspected that I had started to smell riper and more pungent than a piece of Big Luc's favourite Livarot cheese by the time the bus stopped outside the Gaumont and we stepped out into the cool, grey afternoon. To be fair to Big Luc and to Livarot, the cheese does taste a lot better than it smells, which is not something that I ever expect anyone to say about me.

Jerry was back from the Antelope and full of beer and
bonhomie
. He'd heard me open the door and had insisted we join him.

I'd been more than happy to do that. He had a very decent two-bar electric fire that could singe the hairs on your arm if you sat too close, and he didn't mind stuffing the meter with sixpences to keep it going. He would also play jazz all afternoon on his mellow-toned radiogram. What's more, he'd share his last tin of sardines with you. All in all, Jerry's a pretty good landlord to have.

I don't know that he's all that familiar with working girls, but I think that even he sussed pretty quickly that Viv probably didn't have gainful employment at the Matchbox Toy factory or at the Caribonum. But he didn't say anything or so much as raise an eyebrow. He likes to think he's something of a bohemian and very open-minded. There may be some truth in that, but the real reason he didn't say anything is because he's a complete gentleman where ladies are concerned and just an all-round nice guy.

He was still on a Bunk Johnson binge, and Bunk and the boys were still, as they had been that morning, wishing they could shimmy like someone's sister Kate when we dropped thankfully on to Jerry's chaise longue. It wasn't very comfortable, but it was, he'd always maintained, an antique, a bequest from his paternal grandfather, so I certainly understood his affection for the old thing. I felt the same way about Grand-père's chair.

Jerry busied himself brewing tea while I went upstairs to wash and change my clothes. When I came downstairs, cleaned up, a little, in a fresh shirt and my only other suit, they were sipping tea and engaged in polite conversation about the record business. Viv was telling him how much she liked Teresa Brewer, Rosemary Clooney and, of course, Dickie Valentine. Jerry was nodding thoughtfully, as if this was important information.

I asked Jerry if he had anything to eat, and Viv looked at him appealingly with big eyes. She hadn't even managed any breakfast before the Mountjoys had paid her a call.

Jerry glided off to his scullery, and we heard him rummaging in the larder. ‘There's a tin of corned beef or a tin of pilchards,' he yelled.

So it was to be corned beef and Branston pickle sandwiches.

I took Viv up to my flat and found a clean shirt for her and showed her where she could wash. I was about to leave her to it when she put her hand on my arm.

‘I'm really grateful to you,' she said, ‘but this isn't finished.'

‘I know,' I said.

‘No,' she said, ‘I don't think you do.'

I held my hands out, open-palmed, encouraging her to go on.

She coughed. ‘The thing is,' she said, ‘and I haven't told anyone this, but I think I know who killed those two kids.'

‘Call the police,' I said.

‘You're joking,' she said.

‘No,' I said.

‘Well, you should be. If I said anything, I'd have to go into hiding. Leave London. I couldn't be a witness or nothing. Anyway, all the cops I know are taking backhanders. They wouldn't be interested. Except to shop me to Mr Fitz. I couldn't risk it.'

‘Fitz?' I said. ‘James Fitzgerald? He did it?'

‘Who else?' she said. ‘Not him personally, of course. But it was his blokes, I'm pretty sure. And he set it all up.' She paused and ran her hands through her hair. ‘The thing is, I was walking past the Frighted Horse, on me rounds, you know? And I saw some blokes leaving that alley where the kids were found. I don't think they saw me. They were black, like the guy you were talking to this afternoon. I don't know if he was there. Anyway, they weren't acting like they'd killed anyone. They were laughing, and one of them went back into the alley and he said something like, “That's a warning. Pass it on. Next time it's serious.” When they'd gone, I poked me head round the corner and saw it was the nasty little oiks who'd been beating on your mate, the pianist. They were both struggling to their feet, so they were alive then. I didn't hang about and walked past, and about five minutes later I saw four of Mr Fitz's men heading that way.'

I was puzzled. I thought back to my first encounter with James Fitzgerald when he'd implied that I might know something about the missing drugs. And then Malcolm Booth had expressed his worries that some of his words might have been misconstrued.