Later he felt sufficiently recovered to venture out in search of something to eat. Despite his growing optimism that some solution to his problems would turn up, he found himself acting like a man on the run, looking up and down the street half a dozen times before stepping out from behind the front door, and glancing frequently into his driving-mirror as he drove into the shopping centre.
After a light meal, which was all his stomach was still fit for, he did his weekend shopping and afterwards went to the early performance at the local cinema. He wasn’t particularly interested in the picture, but he had no other plans, having half-assumed he would be seeing something more of Maggie over the weekend.
He left before the end of the film, drawing a disapproving cluck from an old dear next to him.
‘Paul Newman’s a double agent,’ he whispered confidentially, and felt immediately ashamed.
I’m a big man when it comes to putting down old women, he thought. But Cess and Lord Jim have just got to look at me to make me sweat.
Damn them both! he thought angrily as he spiralled down from the multi-storey car-park. Why should I let a couple of small-time crooks bother me?
I’ll put on the pressure for a change, he told himself as he drove home through the empty streets of the early evening. I’ve got as least as much to threaten them with as they have me. I’ve broken no law, I can’t be sent to gaol.
He slammed the garage door shut with a force which mirrored his new resolution and strode manfully across the garage forecourt. The small block of rental garages contrasted oddly in style and material with the backs of the terraced houses in one of which his flat was situated. These terraces hadn’t been built to look at from behind, he thought as he pushed open the rickety wooden door which led to the back yard and garden.
Still, it’s home.
His arm was grasped at the elbow. With a certainty usually reserved only for lovers, he knew the touch.
‘Cess wants a word,’ said Lord Jim.
Cess was standing against the yard wall manicuring his fingernails with a knife, like a man who has seen too many pre-war Warner Brothers gangster films.
‘You’ve got a visitor, Joe,’ he said flatly.
‘Oh?’ Absurdly his mind began to tick off the friends and relatives who might possibly visit him.
‘Don’t you want to know who? Or perhaps he does know who already. What do you think, Jim?’
Jim was invisible behind him, but Joe felt his presence, dark and menacing.
‘Jim’s not sure. Which is lucky for you. If Jim was sure, I wouldn’t know any way to stop him marking you.’
It suddenly seemed the best idea in the world to stop Jim from becoming sure.
‘Who?’ asked Joe drily. ‘Who is it?’
Cess didn’t answer immediately but studied his fingernails speculatively. The knife looked old and stained.
‘Prince,’ he said finally. ‘Sergeant bloody Prince. What’s he want, Joe?’
‘How the hell should I know?’
Suddenly they were both very close, not speaking, not touching, but unbearably, threateningly close. He could not see the knife but his feverish imagination placed it an inch away from his rib-cage.
‘I don’t know,’ he cried. ‘I hardly know the man. Perhaps he’s worried about the company I keep!’
Fear had made him unintentionally ironic, but it seemed to break the tension. Cess stepped back, smiling. The knife had disappeared.
‘You could be right, Joe. You probably are. As long as you didn’t send for him, eh? But I can see you didn’t. I told you we could rely on him, Jim! But you’ll be careful, won’t you? Be like a good citizen. Only remember, the only good citizen is a live citizen.’
‘We’ll be around,’ growled Lord Jim.
‘That’s right. So watch how you go, Joe.’
Silently they slid out through the wooden door. Joe waited a good five minutes in the yard before he felt able to go into the house.
Perhaps, he thought hopefully, Prince will have tired of waiting and gone away.
At first he thought his hope had been realized. There was no sign of the sergeant either in the hall or on the first-floor landing. But his sigh of relief was interrupted by the opening of a door below and Alice’s voice.
‘That you, Joe?’
‘Yes.’
‘Visitor.’
‘Thank you very much, Miss-er-Fletcher. Very kind of you. Good night.’ It was Prince’s voice. Followed by Prince’s tread up the stairs.
‘Mr Askern? Can you spare a moment?’
‘Of course,’ said Jim. ‘Come in.’
Prince refused a drink saying he had just had a coffee with Alice in her flat. He stressed the word coffee.
‘Very hospitable neighbour you have,’ he said. ‘Very generous girl. If she hadn’t asked me in, I’d have probably gone away and missed you.’
Damn the woman! groaned Joe inwardly. Why did she have to be so desperate for men?
‘What can I do for you, Sergeant?’ he asked.
‘Have you known Cess Carter long?’ said Prince.
Hot and cold waves ran the length of Joe’s body so violently that he felt their progress must be clearly visible.
‘Carter?’ he croaked. ‘Oh, you mean Mickey’s father?’
‘That’s right. You were playing golf with him last Sunday.’
‘No. No. Not really. I mean yes, I was playing with him, but we just happened to meet. That’s all. I met him for the first time at a PTA meeting a few days before. I teach his son.’
‘I’d like to think so,’ said Prince with a smile.
‘Why do you ask?’ said Joe.
‘What do you know about Carter?’ asked Prince, ignoring Joe’s question.
‘Nothing. Nothing much.’
‘Well, you must choose your own friends, Mr Askern. But a man in your position has got to be circumspect. Carter’s got a criminal record, you know that?’
‘Yes, well. I had heard something.’
‘He’s a professional criminal, Mr Askern. A violent man. He’s kept his nose clean for two or three years now, ever since his wife took him back.’
‘You mean, she left him?’
‘That’s right. Last time he got sent down. Just a couple of years. Small stuff, he stole half a church roof. Anyway his wife told him she’d had enough. I was there. I nicked him. She said if he was going to be a bloody fool all his life, at least he wasn’t going to involve her and her son any more. True enough, when he came out, the door was locked in his face. She kept it up for six months, then she gave him another chance. It seemed to work for a while, but we’ve started hearing things lately. So we’re keeping an eye on Cess and his associates, just in case they get any ideas above their station. Just routine.’
Routine like hell! thought Joe. That’s what they always say till they can send you down.
‘Am I an associate then?’ he asked, trying for a lightly surprised tone.
‘No. No, of course not,’ said Prince, suddenly conciliatory. ‘It was just that seeing you together last Sunday, I got to wondering if he’d said anything interesting … to us, I mean.’
‘I’m not a whatsitsname … nark. Not a nark!’ protested Joe.
Prince looked puzzled.
‘Of course not,’ he said. ‘But you’d tell the police if you knew a crime was being planned, wouldn’t you?’
‘Certainly. Certainly,’ said Joe in his good citizen voice.
‘Well then. I’m sorry to have troubled you.’
‘Not at all,’ said Joe, feeling very relieved. It had hardly been worth Prince’s while coming to see him just for this. Strangely the thought did not comfort him.
‘By the way,’ said the sergeant at the door. ‘I was round at the school this morning. Checking the new locks they had fitted after the break-in.’
‘Really? Anything new on that?’ asked Joe casually.
‘We’ve got a couple of ideas. Is your car OK now, by the way?’
&n
bsp; The question baffled him. He examined it so closely for concealed pitfalls that Prince had to cough gently to remind him of the need for an answer.
‘I don’t follow …’ was the best he could manage.
‘Broke down that night, didn’t it? One of the beat men noticed it standing outside the Bell all night.’
‘Yes. That is, no. I had a couple of drinks and thought I’d better catch a bus. Safer.’
‘Very wise,’ said Prince. ‘It’s best to be safe. I met one of your colleagues at school this morning. Cohen, is it? Miss Cohen? She’s not married?’
What’s he trying to do to me? groaned Joe.
‘No,’ he said. ‘She’s not married.’
‘Nice girl. Very nice girl. We’ve nothing like that down at the station. You’re a lucky man!’ Prince laughed. ‘Well, must be off. Thanks for talking with me, Mr Askern. Good night!’
Joe watched him go down the stairs and listened till he heard the front door close. Then he raced to the window over-looking the street to ensure that Prince had really left the house. The unmistakable mop of white hair was being carried purposefully across the road. Parked almost opposite the house was a car, a blue Cortina, whose driver was visible behind the wheel, reading a newspaper. Prince went by without the slightest pause in his stride, but Joe’s gaze stayed on the car. He was sure he had seen it parked there once or twice recently. It made him feel uneasy. But this could just be an overflow from the great flood of unease released by Prince’s visit. Could it just be coincidence that he had touched upon nearly every cause of concern in Joe’s mind at the moment?
‘Miaou!’ said Vardon, rising from his eavesdropping position behind the record player.
It was time for food or Garland. Or both. Somewhere over the rainbow seemed a good place to be. But as he hacked open the tin of pilchards he and Vardon were going to share for supper, he had the feeling that it was already too late.
CHAPTER VII
‘Nice weekend, Joe?’
The next bastard to ask me if I had a nice weekend gets a swift hack on the shin.
‘Morning, Askern. Nice weekend?’
Except Solly. Headmasters should not be kicked except by winners of football pools.
In any case, no answer seemed to be required as Solstice went on, ‘I was out for a run in the car yesterday. Did you know there’s a diversion on the A515 because of roadworks?’
‘Did I know? No. Or yes, now you come to mention it, I think I did notice something on our Averingerett trip last weekend.’
‘I wondered about that,’ said Solly sadly, as though some awful suspicion had been confirmed. ‘You might have mentioned it, Askern.’
He tottered off to his study to plant a red flag on his wall-map.
It must be marvellous, thought Joe, for your only worry to be keeping an up-to-date account of local road conditions.
‘Morning, Joe,’ said Vernon coming into the staff-room with his Monday-morning Celtic twilight look. ‘Looked for you yesterday. I went round in a hundred and seven. I needed the sight of somebody worse.’
‘I stayed at home,’ said Joe. ‘A bit under the weather.’
‘Oh? Nothing serious?’
For a moment Joe thought of confiding his troubles to Vernon, but the sound of the assembly bell interrupted his thoughts. In any case, his woes required either a desert to shout them in, or a quiet corner and a confidential whisper.
As he made for the hall he caught a glimpse of Maggie’s car pulling into the staff car-park. He increased his pace. He didn’t feel able to meet her yet.
His story was fully prepared, of course. A visit to some friends in Sheffield, prior to calling on Maggie. A sudden attack of some unspecified illness—symptoms of nausea, fainting and so on. He wasn’t too far from the truth. A visit from the doctor; unfit to drive; couldn’t get through on the telephone, in any case semi-delirious.
It wasn’t a great story, but it was fairly watertight and it established him away from the flat on Friday evening in case she’d tried to phone.
They met in the corridor as he returned from assembly. One look at her face told him things were going to be difficult. For the second time in twenty minutes, he thought of confessing all. But not here, not in a corridor with all the reluctant activity of an educational Monday morning about them.
He launched himself into his tale, looking for signs of softening as he described his illness. There were none. If anything the unwelcome signs flashed brighter. He sucked in his cheeks a little more, coughed gently, and essayed a little stagger. Still no effect. Quickly as he could, he got to the end of his story and paused.
She considered him for a moment, coldly and impersonally it seemed. It felt most unpleasant.
‘So you were sick?’
‘Yes.’
‘In Sheffield?’
‘Yes.’
‘Where you spent the night’
‘Yes.’
She smiled now, but grimly. If anything, he’d preferred the impersonal scrutiny.
‘Then I think you should see the police.’
Oh Jesus! What does she know?
‘Because, being concerned when you didn’t turn up and I couldn’t get you on the phone, I drove round to your flat on Friday night.’
Oh God. Such things shouldn’t happen.
‘I was just in time to see a man and a woman going in. I saw them quite clearly. They were moving slowly as there seemed to be some confusion whether or not they should keep their clothes on till they got inside.’
No more. Please God, no more.
‘Shortly afterwards your light went on. Obviously as you were in Sheffield, they were using your flat illegally. Don’t you think you should report it?’
He spread his arms out in a hopeless gesture and avoided her eyes.
‘I’m sorry, Maggie. Really sorry. I can explain …’
‘Again? I heard you the first time, Joe. I won’t bother with the repeat.’
She pushed past him and strode away down the corridor.
‘Maggie,’ he said turning after her. Mickey Carter stood a couple of yards away, grinning broadly.
‘Morning, sir,’ he said. ‘How’s it going?’
His head nearly came off as Joe caught him an open-handed round-armer behind the ear.
The rest of the day was black dark for Joe, relieved temporarily only by the news that Miss Onions had indeed been selected for service on the jury trying Chubb.
She’ll put him away for ever! thought Joe gleefully, remembering the part the little pornographer’s photography played in his present plight. But the rift in his relationship with Maggie had caused him too much pain for any lasting pleasure in anything. In fact, just as a broken leg takes one’s mind off toothache, so the loss of Maggie almost made him forget Cess Carter and Lord Jim.
But only almost.
By four o’clock, things had changed insomuch as the processes of self-justification and self-pity had almost completed their cycles. And when Maggie ignored Joe’s fifth attempt to speak to her as she went towards her car, he drove away furiously, picturing her painful remorse when, too late, she found out the truth. How nobly forgiving he would be!
Meanwhile he was resolved to go home and give Alice what she’d been begging for for months. If Maggie was going to nominate him lecherous bastard of the month, he might as well start acting the part.
Only the fact that Alice did not arrive home till five-thirty prevented him from putting his plan into immediate operation. At five twenty-five he was standing at his window looking along the street, eagerly awaiting her appearance.
At five-thirty the blue Cortina drove slowly past the house and came to a halt about twenty yards down the road. He felt extremely uneasy at the sight. Who the hell could it be?
But now his mind was diverted from the problem by the appearance of Alice, moving with easy grace, elegantly dressed, her slimness a definite asset in this area. He felt his blood begin to stir within him. Perhaps here he could finally
shake off his obsession with big breasts. Could Alice be slotted into the Maisie poem? Who cared? He could always turn to a lesser poet to find the apt phrase for his present feelings.
‘I begin to feel some rousing motions in me,’ he quoted softly, ‘Which dispose to something extraordinary my thoughts.’
She looked up and saw him, waved hesitantly. He opened the window and leaned out. She stopped.
‘Hello,’ she said. ‘How are you?’
‘Much better,’ he said. ‘Care to share a poor bachelor’s crust? I’ve got a huge pizza in the fridge just longing to be thrust into a red-hot oven for twenty minutes.’
‘Oh,’ she said, surprised at either his hospitality or his imagery.
‘That would be nice. Lovely. Yes, please. Now?’
‘This very instant,’ he said. ‘Come as you are.’
He withdrew from the window feeling very Caliph-ish and rubbed his hands as he glanced around the room, making sure all was in order.
Hurry up, love, he thought. For you, Christmas has come a little early this year.
He glanced at himself in the mirror and undid another button on his shirt.
There was a gentle tap at the door.
‘Come in,’ he called. ‘It’s open house.’
Slowly the door swung open. Joe went towards it, a smile on his lips.
Lord Jim stepped solidly into the room.
‘Oh no,’ said Joe.
‘He wants to see you,’ said Jim.
‘Not again. I can’t come. Not now.’
‘Now,’ said Jim.
‘It’s early. It’s only half past five.’
‘He’s got other things to do later,’ said Jim.
‘Hello!’ said Alice from the doorway, her face faintly flushed, perhaps from running up the stairs. ‘Do you mind, I brought an apple pie and some cream.’
She stopped as she caught sight of Lord Jim.
‘Oh, sorry.’
She smiled at him. Her smile died as he turned his slatey eyes on her and slowly looked her up and down.
‘We’d better be off,’ he said.
Alice tore her fascinated gaze from him and looked in surprise at Joe. It seemed to be her look-of-the-night.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. It wasn’t worth even a token protest he thought wearily. ‘I have to go out.’
A Fairly Dangerous Thing Page 7
