by Reginal Hill
Funny the way the Lord doled out his gifts, thought Joe Sixsmith a touch enviously.
But not enough for it to touch his tranquillity more than the moment it took to turn and start towards the car park, which, though he did not know he'd got it, was perhaps a greater gift than either menace or beauty.
Seven.
Back in the car, Whitey was still in a deep sulk, manifested by lying on his back on the passenger seat, breathing shallowly and twitching intermittently in the hope of persuading some bleeding-heart passer-by to ring the RSPCA. Joe's return signalled failure, so he opted for deep sleep. But when the car stopped and Joe got out, the cat leapt to full awake-ness, a single sniff telling him they were at Ram Ray's Garage, and Ram was always good for certain little Indian sweetmeats Whitey was very partial to.
"Good morning, Joe. Car still running well, I see. That engine sounds sweet as a temple bell. Make me a fair offer and it's yours for keeps."
Ram Ray was six foot tall, with silky black moustaches, melting brown eyes, and a sales patter which could sell veal-burgers to a vegan. Particularly a female vegan.
"Fair offer would be you giving me the car plus a monkey for the work I've done on it," said Joe.
"Always the merry quip," said Ram, leading the way into the office where Eloise, his nubile secretary, switched her radio off and the kettle on. Whitey, recognizing the source of good things, rubbed himself against her legs, purring like a Daimler. Not a bad life being a cat, thought Joe. Zak's bosom, Eloise's legs he'd be purring too. Or more likely, have a heart attack.
"So, Joe, what's new?" asked Ram. "Heard from Penthouse yet?"
"Yes, I've heard," said Joe. "That's why I'm here."
He'd been tempted to let the bad news keep till the New Year, but whatever he felt about the Magic Mini, letting him have it on extended rent-free loan had been an act of kindness which deserved honest dealing.
He showed Ram the letter.
"I'm going to fight," he said. "But it means no money for the Morris for a long time, maybe never."
"Don't let it worry you, Joe," said Ram. "You have a good lawyer, I hope? You need a specialist to deal with these bastards."
Joe thought of Peter Potter.
"It's in hand," he said. "So it's OK to hang on to the Mini?"
"My pleasure," said Ram.
"And what about a re spray ... ?"
"Please, Joe. Not again. It has a value over and above its trade price. Those are original stencils. It is a piece of genuine sixties memorabilia. One of the exhibitions they are planning for the new gallery at the Plezz is concerned with the psychedelic era and already I am getting some interested enquiries."
"I get interested enquiries all the time," said Joe. "Like where did I get such a big box of chocolates? Or can I have three iced lollies, please?"
"You see?" said Ram, pleased. "People notice. A Ram Ray loan car. Excellent for business."
This was the fatal flaw in Ram Ray's otherwise amiable character. If it was excellent for business, he would have tat toed his name on his own grandmother.
Joe didn't bother repeating his old plea that being the cynosure of attention in motion or at rest was far from excellent for his business, but turned to accept a cup of tea from Eloise, who, with a herald's instinct for precedence, had seen to Whitey's needs first.
Like the Mini, the tea was rather too flowery for Joe's taste and he was ready for an antidote mugful of basic Luton leaf by the time he got back to his office.
He hefted the kettle to make sure there was water in it then kick-started the skirting-board switch with his toe.
Next moment he found himself sitting against the wall at the far side of the room. He had no idea how he'd got there, though from the ache in his back it must have been at sufficient speed to cause a substantial collision. His right hand was still clutching the Bakelite handle of his electric kettle, though the kettle itself was no longer attached. Through the blanket ache covering his back, a small pinpoint of sharper more localized pain was shining which he finally traced to his little finger. With difficulty he opened his hand to release the handle and saw that the end of his little finger was burned.
"Oh shoot," said Joe.
Reassured by the sound, Whitey emerged, saucer-eyed, from the refuge of his drawer.
"Don't just stand there," said Joe. "Help me up."
After plunging his finger into cold water then plastering it with ointment from his biscuit-tin first-aid kit and devising a makeshift finger stall with some insulation tape, he opened a can of medicinal Guinness. Then he set to work. In the mechanical field his detective skills were excellent and it didn't take him long to track the trouble to the switch in the ruined kettle. The internal connections had worked loose so that when he switched the power on the whole of the kettle became live. If it hadn't had a Bakelite handle ... if more than the tip of his little finger had been touching the metal ... if he hadn't been wearing thick-soled trainers... If, if, if... word was only good for testing things that could happen, not frightening your mind with things that might have happened. He fixed the blown fuses, dumped the ruined kettle and made a note to buy himself another. A detective could get by without most things, but not the wherewithal to brew tea.
The phone rang.
He picked it up gingerly as though afraid it too might hurl him across the room.
"Sixsmith? Is that you? What the hell have you been doing?"
"Butcher, how was Cambridge? You get to stroke the college eight?"
It was a joke which had had to be explained to him when he first heard it in a speech made by the Labour candidate at the last election, as had the subsequent debate as to whether the fact that the Labour candidate was a woman and the Tory opponent she'd been mocking was a homophobic father of six made it politically correct.
"Shut up, Sixsmith. Is it true? I get back to hear that not only is Peter Potter dead, but Sandra lies too."
That's right," said Joe. "But it's nothing to do ..."
"Nothing ever is," she said with a hurtful sarcasm. "Look, you get yourself round here right away and bring me up to date with what's going on, OK?"
Joe glanced at his watch. He should be on his way to the Plezz to pick up Zak. He still felt a bit groggy, but a man couldn't let a little thing like near electrocution get between him and his only paying customer.
Besides, it was something of a pleasure to be able to say, "Sorry, can't fit you in just now, Butcher. Why don't I drop by later? Between six and seven, say?"
He put the phone down on her cry of outrage.
Traffic was heavy and he was a few minutes late getting to the Plezz. Zak was waiting for him impatiently.
"Come on, Joe. I say four, I mean four."
"Sorry," he said. "It's the sales..."
"Wish I had time to go shopping," she said. "Grab my bag. Might as well make it look good, huh?"
Joe picked up her sports bag and staggered. What the shoot did she have in here? Weights? He saw Starbright's tramline lips twitch in a saturnine smile but he had his revenge a moment later as they approached the Mini.
"If I'd known you were coming I'd've got a roof rack," said Joe.
But his tiny triumph was immediately subsumed in amazement as he heard Zak cry, "Joe, is this yours? This is just the most fabulous thing I ever saw. A real sixties icon."
"You like it?" he said.
"I love it!"
Perhaps Ram Ray had been right, he thought. Perhaps it's just us old Philistines who miss the beauty of clapped-out cars and piss-printed cat trays!
"Bit different from your limo," he said as they watched Starbright struggle into the back seat.
"What limo's that?" she said, surprised. "Mary drove us here in her Metro and Dad sometimes lets me borrow his Cavalier."
A bothersome girl. Just when you had her pinned down as spoilt princess she turned back to Luton lass.
He got in the car and drove her home.
Home turned out to be a pleasant detached house on a s
eventies development in Grandison, one of the smarter suburbs on the far side of town from Rasselas where Joe lived.
"Nice," said Joe as they pulled into the short driveway.
"Dad worked hard," she said a touch defensively.
"Hey, no one thinks the worse of you because you weren't deprived as well as being beautiful and talented," he said.
He got out of the car and looked up at the house. A bright yellow box under the eaves proclaimed it was alarmed and there was a heat-sensitive floodlight which had lit up as they arrived. He checked the front door as they went in. Solid with deadlocks. A quick glance as he entered the living room told him the windows here and presumably all over the house were double glazed with individual locks.
Zak's mother was smaller than Zak but with the same graceful carriage and fine bones. Joe, who was introduced as Joe who's helping us out, she greeted with a grave courtesy. Starbright she ignored.
The room was warm and friendly with big chunky armchairs, bright paintings (the brightest signed Zak} on the pale emulsioned walls, and a spangled Christmas tree in the deep bay.
"Lovely house you've got, Mrs. Oto," said Joe. He meant it, but Zak took it as a hint that he was keen to do his tour of inspection and said, "Let me show you around, Joe," and led him out.
"Nice lady, your ma," he said as they went into the kitchen. "You give her the poor-relative-of-an-old-friend story?"
"Sure. Why not? You do the disguise so good, I don't think she's going to see through it," she said, giving him a smile which took any sting out of the remark.
But the thought stayed in his mind that if Mrs. Oto in any way resembled his Auntie Mirabelle, who had a herald's knowledge of all his old friends and their family trees, it wasn't a story that would hold for long.
The door from the kitchen into the back garden was the same sturdy design as at the front. Window likewise. He stepped outside into the gloom and a security light lit up immediately showing him a stone-flagged patio, a square of level lawn bordered by neatly raked flowerbeds enclosed by a six-foot pine-slat fence. Joe walked slowly round the lawn. No sign that any of the flowerbeds had been trodden on recently.
Shoot, he thought. Why is it whenever I do all the proper detective things, I get nowhere. Maybe the secret lay in the later chapters of Not So Private Eye.
He went back into the kitchen and said, "Upstairs." That came out real LA laconic, he thought, pleased.
There were four bedrooms. Zak's, like an archaeological dig, showed a record of her history through all its layers. Nothing had been discarded. Dolls, teddy bears, children's books, games, puzzles, ornaments, all were crowded in here. On the walls you could trace both the progress of her taste in pop-group posters and her own artistic development, through junior-school finger paintings to the sketches, watercolours and acrylics of her teens. Every inch of space was covered, not excluding the ceiling which looked like a patchwork quilt. But nowhere was there any sign of her link with top-class athletics.
"You sleep with your window open?" asked Joe.
"Couple of inches, but I always screw the handle down."
Joe checked. Supple burglar might get his hand in and turn the screw. He opened the window wide and looked out. No handy drainpipe. They'd have needed a ladder up from the patio.
"Father got a ladder?" he asked.
"Sure. But it's in the garage, which is kept locked."
Mary's room was at the other end of the scale, completely tidy with the bed made up with hospital corners, and hardly a thing there to tell you this wasn't a hotel.
He checked the window.
Zak said, "Mary always closes it before she gets into bed. She reckons the night air is bad for her."
The master bedroom looked out on the front. As Joe stood there a car pulled into the drive and a man got out and looked up at him.
"It's Dad," said Zak, waving. "Best go down and say hello."
"Hang on. We're not done," said Joe sternly. "This one?"
That's Eddie's. My kid brother. Shouldn't bother about him, he's more or less retired from direct human contact. If it's not on the Internet, it's not worth messing with."
Joe opened the door. A boy of about eleven or twelve was sitting in front of a computer which had a screen so packed with data that even at this distance it made Joe's head whirl.
"Hi, Eddie, this is Joe," said Zak.
The boy didn't look round but ran his fingers over the keyboard. The screen blanked then filled with the word HELLO!
That's the most you'll get," said Zak, pulling Joe away. "Unless he decides you're electronically interesting. He hardly acknowledged me when I got back, then Christmas morning among my prezzies I found a print-out with details of my last drug test plus those of every other top-flight woman I was likely to come up against."
"Is that useful?" said Joe.
"No, but it's amazing," said Zak.
As they came down the stairs, Joe heard a man's voice saying, "So what's he doing in my bedroom?"
Zak ran lightly into the lounge and said, "Hi, Dad. My fault. I was showing Joe the house and we were just admiring the view."
"Of the houses opposite, you mean? Strange tastes you've got, girl."
Henry Oto was a tall athletically built man with a square determined face. Zak had got his height and her mother's looks. Her sister had got her mother's size and her father's looks. You never know how the genes are going to come at you, thought Joe.
He knew from the papers that Oto was a senior prison officer at the Stocks, Luton's main jail. Remember, no escape jokes.
He said, "Hi, Mr. Oto. I'm helping Zak out, fetching and carrying, you know."
Oto said, "Fetching and carrying what?"
Joe shrugged and looked to Zak for help. Clearly her father lacked her mother's courteous acceptance of the vagaries of her daughter's new lifestyle. That's what came of associating with criminals.
Zak said, "You don't want your finely tuned daughter straining her back picking up her holdall, do you?"
Oto said, "Can't see how you're going to break records if you can't carry your own gear." But he was smiling fondly as he said it and Joe guessed that Zak had always been able to twine him round her little finger.
To Joe he said, "Haven't I seen you before, Mr. er ... ?"
"Sixsmith," mumbled Joe. "But just call me Joe, Mr. Oto."
Joe had always tried to keep his face out of the papers, even on those few occasions when they wanted to put it in. Not much use in being a PI if everyone seeing you said, "Hey, ain't you that PI?" But a photo had appeared recently in connection with one of his cases and presumably Oto took a special interest in anything to do with his prospective customers.
Mrs. Oto said, "I'd better go and see to our meal. Mr. Sixsmith, if you'd like to stay ... ?"
"No, thank you kindly," said Joe. It was doubtless a token offer but the woman didn't make it sound token. He gave her a big smile then turned to Zak and said, That everything for now?"
That's right. I'll see you out."
She followed him into the hallway. Starbright was standing there. No one else in the house seemed to pay him the slightest attention so Joe didn't either.
"Has that been any help?" said Zak.
"I'm working on it," said Joe.
The front door burst open and Mary came in. She didn't speak but gave Joe a look of fury and ran up the stairs. There was no trace of a limp.
Zak said, "So what now?"
"Don't know," said Joe. "All I can do is keep prodding. You want me to go with it?"
Keep it simple, keep it honest. It wasn't so much a strategy as an inevitability.
She said, "Of course I do. You can contact me here or down the Plezz."
Starbright said, "You in for the night, Miss Oto?"
"Yes, I think so."
"You change your mind, you've got the number."
The two men went out through the door which Mary hadn't bothered to close.
"Give you a lift?" said Joe.
&nbs
p; "Once a day's enough. Anyway, I've got my own wheels, boyo. And they'll get me where I want a sight quicker than yours."
Joe thought this remark was merely auto-macho till he saw the Magic Mini. It was almost completely boxed in by Mary's Metro and Oto's Cavalier.
"Oh shoot," he said. He turned back to the house to get one of them to move but a noise made him look round.
Starbright had stooped in front of the Metro and was lifting its front wheels off the ground. He took two paces backwards and set the car down.
"Get yourself out of that now, can you?" he said.
"Yeah, sure. Thanks a lot."
"Can't have you hanging around, can we? Places to go, people to report to. Old friends to see."
How did he manage to make everything he said sound like a threat or an accusation? wondered Joe as he watched the Welshman roll away like a boulder down a hillside.
As he got into the car he glanced up at the house. Mary Oto was watching him out of an upstairs window.
He waved.
She didn't wave back.
Eight.
"Right, Sixsmith, just give me it straight," said Butcher.
Joe gave it straight. She listened intently, not interrupting. When the mood was on her she made a great listener.
Joe was very fond of Butcher, but there was nothing sexy in it. Not that she wasn't attractive in a cropped-hair-no-make-up kind of way, and she had the great advantage of being shorter than he was. But she didn't press his button. Maybe it was the cheroots that did it. Keeping company with someone who put out more smoke than Mount Etna wasn't his idea of a turn-on. But he admired her superior intelligence, delighted in her capacity to make him feel witty, valued her judgement, and was deeply moved by the way she cared for her clients.
She'd mock him mercilessly if he even hinted it, but when push came to shove, he'd go to the wall for Butcher.
She said, "Joe, you must be a great pain in the arse to the police and I must say I've got some sympathy with them."
Joe said, "Hang about. I didn't do these killings."
"No, you just keep finding the bodies."
"Anyway, why so het up, Butcher? Or do you reckon someone's taken Mr. Shakespeare's advice and you could be next?"
