by Bill James
Manse didn’t have nobody in the house with him for protection. Although he had taken Hubert V.L. Camborne on the funeral trip to London, that was what would be termed a one-off, a Hackney must, like a doctor putting a mask on at certain points. Manse did without a constant bodyguard these days. When someone as close to you as Denz had turned out false you worried if the next one might be the same. Would he talk about you to someone else, did he scheme with someone else? Manse did think of ringing Hubert now and telling him to get over here armed, maybe with a few others, but then he decided this would look nervy and feeble – not just to Egremont, but to Hubert. And Hubert might put the gossip around among staff. Something like, ‘Shale was shitting hisself because he had a caller from the smoke. I had to help the poor prick get back to normal.’ This would not be good for leadership. And, perhaps the word wouldn’t stay inside the firm but reach that smug ponce, Ralph Ember, who’d get a long, superior chortle from it, although he was known as Panicking Ralph, or Ralphy, because in rough situations he’d go yellow. Plus, sending for help was the wrong kind of behaviour in an ex-rectory: no dignity. This property had stood here for more than a hundred years, so solid and calm, which included right through the bombing in the Second War. Whoever lived here now ought to behave with some of that same quiet toughness and bravery.
So, Manse did not make a call but went to open the door and greet Egremont Lake head-on, no chickening. Manse almost totally believed it was impossible for the Lakes to of dug out anything new and awkward about the way Denz went. Manse would still argue that Denzil could of done himself with the twin shots, despite what some troublemakers said, truly the result of his famed thoroughness. Although Manse kept weapons in a wall-safe behind one of the Pre-Raphaelites, he certainly had nothing on him at present. In his view, it would of been deeply vulgar and out-of-proportion to wear a harness and pistol in his purchased-outright-for-cash home, with its churchy past. Some vicars and even rectors felt up altar boys and went further, yes, but Manse had never heard anything like that about the history of this property and room. It wasn’t the kind of thing you could ask an estate agent.
‘Mansel!’ Egremont Lake said, with very pleasant warmth and plenty of good cheer. ‘I’d bet a grand or ten that you’d prefer to have substantive talks in this very fine, old, three-storey hutch about overall prospects, instead of at the after-funeral do in London with a crowd all round, and some, like my creepy cousin, Lionel-Garth Field, trying to eavesdrop, then, afterwards, cornering you for an unwelcome and comically presumptuous ear-bending. Inevitably – though perhaps a little slowly, for which I do apologize – yes, inevitably I came to see it as a prime duty to travel here and discuss matters on your home ground, as it were, and to have an educational trip around the relevant business territory with you as guide and supreme mentor, so that I know what we’re talking about when we’re talking about it, seeking a brilliant forward sales plan acceptable to both. I’m very keen to see the streets and pubs and clubs we’ll be utilizing. I believe in familiarity. I believe in actual early contact with new locations. Denzil used to speak of the Valencia Esplanade area as a major dealing site, but that’s about as far as my geographical data goes, I fear.’
‘It’s a true surprise seeing you, Egremont, on, as you so rightly term it, my home ground,’ Shale replied in what he considered quite a mild tone.
‘You attract such a pilgrimage. You merit such a pilgrimage.’
‘Thank you, Egremont.’
‘You have so much taking place in your life yet you can find time to backburner these items and hobnob with someone like yours truly.’
Well, maybe. Manse did have a lot taking place in his life, or possibly about to, anyway. Such as, when he heard the Bentley, Manse had been wondering in his den-study whether it was nearly time for Naomi and him to get engaged. In fact, he’d examined this topic quite a lot these last weeks. Most likely they didn’t have to wait until the divorce was all wrapped up. Sitting in the den and wondering about vicars and even rectors with altar boys, Manse wanted to get to something normal. He knew many didn’t go in for engagements and that kind of thing now, just took a property together and became what was known as ‘partners’. Manse regarded this as unimpressive and slack, and he thought Naomi might, too.
He knew Percy Ardoyne, the jeweller in Nash Street, very well from the time when Perce had a big habit – big though more or less manageable. He was clean they said, lately, but he and Manse still kept a kind of acquaintanceship going, and Manse had seen some very possible rings on display in his shop window. Naturally, Manse didn’t care about cost, but he thought Percy would act favourable towards someone who had looked after him, and looked after him personal, in them so fondly remembered snort and soar-away days. Perce would hope to keep things good between them in case sometime he wanted to go back to it, and to know for definite what he bought was quality, not some cheating half-filler mix that could flay your inside-nose quicker than the genuine and, also, give only a drabbish, half-cock buzz.
Manse preferred a simple, single-diamond ring, although Joan Fenton’s double hadn’t seemed over-showy. He hated anything too fussy, too blingy. It clashed with his deep down taste. His mother often used to say, ‘Go to the heart of things, Mansel. Forget the fripperies.’ He believed he had been born with that kind of outlook, anyway, and his mother’s words just beefed it up. He thought Naomi would agree on this, too. But he’d definitely ask her about the kind of ring she’d like, and maybe even take her to Percy’s to choose. You had to recognize that women could have their own thoughts about jewellery. Because she bought production-line Pre-Raphaelite poster-prints it might be wrong to think she’d always go for tat. And, in fact, he thought them poster-prints framed looked all right on the wall in Ealing. If she wanted a ring that was more multiple and fripperied than Manse might of picked, he would go along and not in any way reveal disappointment. She was the one whose finger it would be on, after all, and some regarded bling as fine – sort of breezy and in-your-face and full of fun, what they called ‘life enhancing’. He could make sure he told people she had picked it herself, but he’d grin in a forgiving, loving way when explaining it, like ‘You know what women are for flaunting, even Naomi.’
Egremont Lake said: ‘D’you know, Mansel, I look at this grand and previously sacerdotal villa and recall that here, at the top, my brother lived and served your companies. It’s a massive, thought-provoking notion.’
‘Indeed, yes.’
‘I feel his presence even as we speak.’
‘Denzil carried with him what is known as an ambience,’ Manse said. ‘Maybe you’ve come across the term. Some have it, some don’t. Perhaps, yes, Denzil’s endures, as high grade ambiences sometimes will. Remember Elvis. Remember Mother Teresa. It’s a privilege to enjoy some part of such a legacy, although in posthumous circumstances, as, of course, is a condition of legacies.’
‘Many’s the mention Denz made of you and the rectory, never other than positive, believe me.’
‘I’ve let the flat stay empty as a kind of tribute – a modest tribute, Egremont, yet, yes, a tribute just the same. Although in due course I expect I’ll find some use for those rooms, at present to convert them to a rumpus and TV nook for Matilda, Laurent and their boisterous friends would seem disrespectful to the dear and cherished memory of Denzil. His individual chest of drawers containing garments is still there as well as much of his crockery, shampoos and travel brochures. I feel the time has not yet come for a complete clear-out and severance.’
‘This is in harmony with the impression of you I’d already formed in conversation after the funeral, Mansel. Sensitive.’
Manse would not dispute that term for his character. He believed in being considerate and extremely unbulldozing towards quite a few people. For instance, although Naomi already wore rings on the right hand, one an opal, one a violet amethyst, Manse did not mind much, and never referred to them or asked where the fuck they came from. They, also, like the Ealing bed, wa
s the past. When she got them rings she could not of had no idea she would be meeting Manse in a Pre-Raphaelite gallery, and leading on.
If she wanted to tell him about the rings he’d listen, of course. To ask could not be right or charming – or sensitive, to use Egremont’s word. Besides, she might of been given them by her mother and father or bought them herself only for a fashion purpose, which would most likely be necessary when often meeting celebrities certain to be togged right up, which Naomi would have to match. If there was a wedding eventually, Manse believed it would be a lovely and notable occasion, though he’d have to watch out in case Syb heard of it and drove from North Wales to bugger everything up by any of a large choice of methods, or a combination.*
Although she didn’t want to live with Manse and the children herself, he thought she’d grow evil if she found he’d fixed to marry someone else. Syb didn’t seem to think much of marriage when it meant married to him, Manse, but he had an idea she’d grow ratty if he got the divorce and then married Naomi. Syb had been all right about women such as Patricia, Lowri and Carmel spending time with him in the rectory on a here-today-gone-the-week-after-next basis, but a wedding would most likely give her a real hormonal niggle. It might seriously hurt Syb to know Manse was happy in a settled way. He did not want to upset her, but now and then he had to give hisself priority. In a strong and crazily violent way, Syb could be rather weak.
Manse said, ‘You see, Egremont, a certain period set apart for thought about Denzil as a man, colleague and friend seemed to me only decent in the circumstances.’
‘Not all in your kind of position would be so considerate, Mansel.’
‘It is only one human being’s quiet tribute towards another.’
‘Are you going to keep me out here on the fucking doorstep in this crummy porch stinking of cat’s piss then?’ Egremont replied.
‘Yes, I think I am.’
‘You’ve already fixed something with Lionel-Garth, have you, you two-timing, two-pistols, murderous turd?’
‘How is Lionel-Garth, and your family in general, Egremont?’
‘You’ve hatched a deal with him, have you?’
‘What sort of deal?’
* See Hotbed
‘Running the territory for you.’
‘I run the territory,’ Manse said.
‘He’s got in first, the sod, has he?’
‘If I need a chauffeur I’ll let you know,’ Manse said. ‘Denzil used the fire-escape to get to his flat. He didn’t need to come into the actual house. I felt it was better like that, he being how he was. If you like, I’ll take you up the escape for an in memoriam, brotherly look at the layout of his place, and after that you and your thug chaperone can shove off back to London. I wouldn’t like you to think your journey was a complete waste.’
‘You’ve got that fucking Hubert from the funeral and his armament up there, waiting, have you, you sly bastard? And maybe others. You’ve been expecting this call? Why? How? Where does your intelligence come from?’
‘My mother has quite a brain. Often she gives almost workable advice on life.’
‘I saw you watching my arrival through that window there. You looked full of hate and contempt.’
‘Rectors would probably use the window to check whether they should open the door to a caller from the congregation or pretend to be out. I’d guess some church members could be very boring when discussing their souls.’
‘You phoned up to Hubert and the rest in the flat to get ready did you? “Safety catches off, lads. I’ll lull him with sweet doorstep chat, then bring him for you.”’
‘Some see it as a bad sign that the church should have to sell this house to a trade figurehead and move their rectors into something smaller, meaner, single garage only,’ Mansel said. ‘They sense decline and the creep of materialism.’
‘I came here in good faith.’
‘As I say, there’s not so much of that about these days.’
‘You owe us,’ Egremont replied.
‘Who?’
‘You.’
‘I owe who?’
‘Us.’
‘Who?’
‘The family.’
‘Owe what?’
‘You know what.’
‘I’ll be glad to go up there with you to show Denzil’s pre-death accommodation. This could be a sort of keepsake experience.’
‘Deliver me to an ambush, separated from my trooper? Do you think I’m bloody mad?’
‘Well, you did buy that fucking jacket,’ Manse said.
Chapter Twenty-Three
2009
Harpur hadn’t realized it at once, of course, but Gary James Dodd’s wild, fond, probably deluded, gallop towards the charity shop, and then the talented squashing and straddling of him from behind by Iles, set things moving fast towards the end of the siege, and towards the messy disaster that came with it. Parts of this sequence, Harpur saw and heard for himself. The rest of it he had to put together later from statements of survivors in the shop, some of it garbled and contradictory because people were so scared and confused, their memory of events a jumble.
He felt a kind of sympathy for Rockmain, whose careful work was smashed. He had built a classic, subtle, balanced procedure for conduct of the operation, sticking to all tried and successful British and US siege advice. This crumbled totally, though, once Dodd began his run, and Iles began his. Appalled, Rockmain had yelled, ‘No, no,’ at Dodd, and then tried to stop Iles following. Rockmain was seated near the negotiator but stood quickly and bellowed the ban when Dodd suddenly pushed the van door open. Rockmain had a surprisingly deep and commanding voice for someone so weak-looking, as if he was mainly voice and not much else, but Dodd ignored it. He was powered by love. He obviously believed he must try to save Veronica Susan Cleaver, his cherished partner. So, this stupid, lumbering, dud sprint, most likely altogether undeserved by her in any case, supposing it was Veronica Susan Cleaver bundled in from the pavement, Veronica Susan Cleaver, who’d apparently been intending to spend secret time with Adrian Morrison Overdale, chartered surveyor, who lived in nearby Cortilda Square. She seemed to be a very lovable woman. Both men worried about her.
Once Dodd had gone, Rockmain seemed to sense Iles intended pursuit. Maybe from the moment he joined the siege, Rockmain feared a collapse of patience in Iles. Harpur had feared the same. Come to that, perhaps Rock-main had expected a failure of patience in Harpur himself, also. Harpur had certainly thought about a solo invasion of the shop, and Rockmain’s trained psychological asdic might have picked up the signs, so he’d be all-round alert. But now it was Iles – Iles very blatantly about to dog and, if possible, halt Dodd. Near to hysterics, Rockmain took a miniature step or two and grabbed at the Assistant Chief’s left arm.
One of the things about Iles was he never got uppity and princely because someone manhandled him, no matter with what violence. For instance, often at funerals of murder victims Harpur had to quell him. Iles would abruptly take over the service and give his own well-meant sermon, blaming the Home Secretary or the Meteorological Office or the Pope or the Prime Minister or the Archbishops of Canterbury and Westminster, or the European Union, or Masons or the Trinity, for letting the country and/or the world get into the sort of condition leading to this particular death. These outbursts sometimes got reported in the local media and on the whole were not helpful. Harpur might have to use quite a slice of force to shut the jabbering sod up, and occasionally drag him down steps from the pulpit so the priest or minister could resume control, as was patently their right. Most probably, they had not been instructed in training how to handle this kind of interruption. When Harpur took hold of him, Iles would fight back, yes, and fight back with all his filthy, cultivated skills and astonishing strength, careless of the setting, but he would not pull rank about it, though he’d be in his magnificent blue ACC uniform. He took the scrapping as entirely in the normal run of things. Iles considered that few funerals were complete without an episode of
this kind fairly soon after the coffin arrived. Iles rabidly envied all the attention given to the corpse. He hated sharing any spotlight. Also, Iles regarded funerals as ceremonies where emotions should run, and the Assistant Chief had emotions. In its inconvenient way, Harpur found this endearing, but applied the brutalities if timely, all the same.
Now, when Rockmain gripped the ACC’s uniformed arm, attempting to detain him in a sort of parody arrest, Iles escaped from this hold at once, naturally, but didn’t then pick up Rockmain and chuck him against the wall of the caravan, or kick his feet away and knee and gouge him on the floor. Iles seemed to recognize, as Harpur did, that Rockmain might be entitled to salvage the approved siege pattern he’d created, if he could – in fact, was duty-bound to try. His little soul lived and took its shape and health from those ruses. Although he detested Rockmain, Iles would see he had professional obligations and, to a degree, the ACC respected these. Now and then the Assistant Chief could become amazingly proportionate.
All he did today was take a handful of Rockmain’s shirt near the throat, lift him for only a moment in the air – without any hint of butting, although the two faces came damn close – and then slam him back into his seat near the negotiator, like throwing down an empty rucksack. It was swift. Iles did not speak or whoop or laugh. He knew he should not waste breath. He still had the time and pace to catch Dodd well before he reached the shop.
