'It's no good going to some back-street trader.'
There was a silence between them. Devlin broke the Luger down and wiped each piece carefully with a rag. 'Then who would I go to?'
Ryan said, 'There's a fella called Carver - Jack Carver. Has a brother called Eric.'
'What are they, black marketeers?'
'Much more than that. Jack Carver's probably the most powerful gangster in London these days. Anything, but anything that goes down, Carver gets a piece. Not just black market. Girls, gambling, protection. You name it.'
'I used to know a fella in Dublin in the same line of work,' Devlin said. 'He wasn't so bad.'
'Jack Carver's the original bastard and young Eric's a toad. Every girl on the pavement is terrified of him.'
'Do you tell me?' Devlin said. 'I'm surprised nobody's stepped in here before now.'
'It wasn't New York gangsters who invented cementing dead bodies into new roadways,' Ryan said. 'Jack Carver patented that idea. He's the one who supplied that active service unit with their guns and explosives back in thirty-six. If he had a grandmother he'd sell her to the Germans if he thought there was money in it.'
'I'm frightened to death,' Devlin said. 'Well, Carver is the kind of man who can lay his hands on anything, so if I want a radio..
'Exactly.'
'Fine. Where do I find him?'
'There's a dance hall a couple of miles from here in Limehouse. It's called the Astoria Ballroom. Carver owns it. Has a big apartment upstairs. He likes that. Convenient for his brother to pick up the girls.'
'And himself, I suppose?'
'You'd suppose wrong, Liam. Girls don't interest him in the slightest.'
Devlin nodded. 'I take your drift.'
His hands moved suddenly with incredible dexterity, putting the Luger together. He was finished in seconds and rammed a magazine up the butt.
'Jesus, you look like death himself when you do that,' Ryan said.
'It's just a knack, Michael.' Devlin wrapped up the oily newspapers and put them in the bin under thq, sink. 'And now, I think we'll take a little walk down by the river. I'd like your opinion on something.'
He went down the stairway to the boat and found Mary still reading. The rain dripped from the edge of the awning and there was a slight mist on the river. Devlin was wearing the military trenchcoat he'd stolen from the Army and Navy Club. He leaned against the rail, hands in his pockets.
'What are you reading?'
She held the book up. 'Our Mutual Friend.'
'I've started something.'
She stood up. 'We're going to have fog in the next few days. A real pea-souper.'
'How can you tell that?'
'I'm not sure, but I'm always right. It's the smell I recognize first.'
'And do you like that?'
'Oh yes. You're alone, enclosed in your own private world.'
'And isn't that what we're all looking for?' He took her arm. 'Your uncle Michael and I are taking a little walk in the rain by the river. Why don't you come with us? That's if you've got nothing better to do.'
They drove to St Mary's Priory in Ryan's cab. He parked at the side of the road and they sat looking at the entrance. There was a Morris saloon car parked outside painted olive green. It said 'Military Police' on the side. As they watched, Lieutenant Benson and a corporal came out of the entrance, got in the car and drove off.
'You're not going to get far through the front door,' Ryan said.
'More ways of skinning a cat than one,' Devlin said. 'Let's take a little walk.'
The strip of shingle he'd walked along earlier seemed wider and when he stopped to indicate the archway there was more headroom. 'It was almost under the surface this morning,' he said.
'The Thames is a tidal river, Liam, and the tide's going out. There'll be times when that thing's under the water entirely. Is it important?'
'Runs close to the foundations of the Priory. According to the plans there's a grill into the crypt under the Priory chapel. It could be a way in.'
'You'd need to take a look then.'
'Naturally, but not now. Later, when it's nice and dark.'
The rain increased to monsoon-like proportions and Ryan said, 'For Christ's sake, let's get in out of this,' and he started back to the steps.
Devlin took Mary's arm. 'Would you happen to have yourself a pretty frock tucked away somewhere? Because if you da, I'll take you dancing this evening.'
She paused, staring at him, and when she started walking again the limp seemed more pronounced. 'I don't dance, Mr Devlin. I can't.'
'Oh, yes you can, my love. You can do anything in the whole wide world if you put your mind to it.'
Chapter NINE
THE Astoria was a typical London dance hall of the period and very crowded. There was a band on each side of the room, one in blue tuxedos, the other in red, Devlin wore his dark clerical suit, but with a soft white shirt and black tie he'd borrowed from Ryan. He waited outside the cloakroom for Mary who'd gone in to leave her coat. When she came out he saw that she had on a neat cotton dress and brown stockings. She wore white plastic earrings, fashionable at the moment, and just a hint of lipstick.
'My compliments on the dress,' he said. 'A vast improvement.'
'I don't get a chance to dress up very often,' she told him.
'Well let's make the most of it.'
He took her hand and pulled her on to the floor before she could protest. One of the bands was playing a slow foxtrot. He started to hum the tune. 'You do that well,' she said.
'Ah, well, I have a small gift for music. I play the piano badly. You, on the other hand, dance rather well.'
'It's better out here in the middle of all these people. Nobody notices.'
She was obviously referring to her limp. Devlin said, 'Girl dear, nobody notices anyway.'
She tightened her grip, putting her cheek against his shoulder and they moved into the crowd, the glitterball revolving on the ceiling, its rays bathing everything with blue light. The number came to an end and the other band broke into a fast, upbeat quickstep.
'Oh, no,' she protested. 'I can't manage this.'
'All right,' Devlin said. 'Coffee it is then.'
They went up the stairs to the balcony. 'I'm just going to the cloakroom,' she said.
Til get the coffee and see you back here.'
She went round to the other side of the balcony, limping noticeably, passing two young men leaning on the rail. One of them wore a pin-striped double-breasted suit and hand-painted tie. The other was a few years older, in a leather jacket, with the flattened nose of a prize-fighter and scar tissue around the eyes.
'You fancy that, Mr Carver?' he asked as they watched Mary go into the cloakroom.
'I certainly do, George,' Eric Carver said. 'I haven't had a cripple before.'
Eric Carver was twenty-two years of age with thin, wolfish features and long blond hair swept back from the forehead. A tendency to asthma attacks had kept him out of the Army. At least that's what it had said on the medical certificate his brother's doctor had provided. His father had been a drunken bully who'd died under the wheels of a cart in the Mile End Road. Jack, already a criminal of some renown and fifteen years his senior, had looked after Eric and their mother until cancer had carried her off just before the war. Her death had brought them even closer. There was nothing Eric couldn't do, no girl he couldn't have because he was Jack Carver's brother and he never let anyone forget it.
Mary emerged from the cloakroom and limped past them and Eric said, 'I'll see you later, George.'
George smiled, turned and walked away and Eric moved round the balcony to where Mary leaned over the rail watching the dancers. He slipped his arm around her waist and then ran one hand up to cup her left breast. 'Now then, darling, and what's your name?'
'Please don't,' she said and started to struggle. 'Oh, I like it,' he said, his grip tightening.
Devlin arrived, a cup of coffee in each hand. He put them down on a nearby table. 'Excuse me,' he said.
As Eric turned, slackening his grip, Devlin stood on the right foot, bearing down with all his weight.
The young man snarled, trying to pull away, and Devlin picked up one of the cups of coffee and poured it down Eric's shirt front.
'Jesus, son, I'm sorry,' he said.
Eric looked down at his shirt, total amazement on his face. 'Why you little creep,' he said and swung a punch.
Devlin blocked it easily and kicked him on the shin. 'Now why don't you go and play nasty little boys elsewhere?'
There was rage on Eric's face. 'You bastard. I'll get you for this. You see if I don't.'
He hobbled away and Devlin sat Mary down and gave her the other cup of coffee. She" took a sip and looked up at him. 'That was awful.'
'A worm, girl dear, nothing to worry about. Will you be all right while I go and see this Carver fella? I shouldn't be long.'
She smiled. Til be fine, Mr Devlin,' and he turned and walked away.
The door at the other end of the balcony said 'Manager's Office', but when he opened it he found himself in a corridor. He went to the far end and opened another door on to a carpeted landing. Stairs went down to what was obviously a back entrance, but the sound of music drifted from above so up he went to the next landing where a door stood open. It was only a small room, with a desk and a chair on which the man George sat reading a newspaper while music sounded over the radio.
'Nice, that.' Devlin leaned on the doorway. 'Carroll Gibbons from the Savoy. He plays the grand piano, that man.'
George looked him over coldly. 'And what do you want?'
'A moment of Jack Carver's valuable time.'
'What's it about? Mr Carver don't see just anybody.'
Devlin took out a five-pound note and laid it on the table.
'That's what it's about my old son, that and another one hundred and ninety-nine like it.'
George put the newspaper down and picked up the banknote. 'All right. Wait here.'
He brushed past Devlin and knocked on the other door, then went in. After a while he opened it again and looked out. 'All right, he'll see you.'
Jack Carver sat behind a walnut Regency desk that looked genuine. He was a hard, dangerous-looking man, his face fleshy, the signs of decay setting in early. He wore an excellent suit in navy worsted tailored in Savile Row, a discreet tie. To judge by outward appearances he could have been a prosperous businessman, but the jagged scar that ran from the corner of the left eye into the dark hairline and the look in the cold eyes belied that.
George stayed by the door and Devlin glanced around the room which was furnished in surprisingly good taste. 'This is nice.'
'All right, so what's it about?' Carver said, holding up the fiver.
'Aren't they beautiful, those things?' Devlin said. 'A work of genuine art, the Bank of England five-pound note.'
Carver said, 'According to George, you said something about another hundred and ninety-nine. That came to a thousand quid when I went to school.'
'Ah, you remembered, George?' Devlin said.
At that moment, a door opened and Eric entered wearing a clean shirt and fastening his tie. He stopped dead, astonishment on his face that was quickly replaced by anger. 'Here, that's him, Jack, the little squirt who spilled coffee down me.'
'Oh, an accident surely,' Devlin told him.
Eric started towards him and Jack Carver snapped, 'Leave it out, Eric, this is business.' Eric stayed by the desk, rage in his eyes and Carver said, 'Now what would I have to do for a thousand quid? Kill somebody?'
'Come off it, Mr Carver, we both know you'd do that for fun,' Devlin said. 'No, what I need is an item of military equipment. I hear you're a man who can get anything. At least that's what the IRA seem to think. I wonder what Special Branch at Scotland Yard might make of that titbit?'
Carver smoothed the fiver between his fingers and looked up, his face blank. 'You're beginning to sound right out of order.'
'Me and my big mouth. I'll never learn,' Devlin said. 'And all I wanted was to buy a radio.'
'A radio?' For the first time Carver looked puzzled.
'Of the transmitting and receiving kind. There's a rather nice one the Army uses these days. It's called a twenty-eight set, Mark Four. God knows why. Fits in a wooden box with a carrying handle. Just like a suitcase. Very handy.' Devlin took a piece of paper from his pocket and put it on the desk. 'I've written the details down.'
