Hitmen I Have Known

by Bill James

  The paint shop seemed to be popular. At first Harpur could see nothing unusual about the steady flow of customers in and out. Some would be householders, others tradesmen needing supplies. Nobody looked to Harpur like a pusher or a baron. Then, though, he focused on a man in dungarees and navy bobble hat apparently making for the shop. There seemed to be a sort of mad bonhomie about him. On his left shoulder the man carried a short, metal, extendable ladder. He might have been a decorator about to pick up some essentials for a job. Yes, he might have been, but probably wasn’t.

  Iles? Harpur couldn’t be certain at once, but got out of the car and went to look up the road directly over the barrier, closer by the length of the Volvo’s bonnet. Harpur thought the ACC might be whistling, though the distance even now was too great to be sure his lips were pursed. He walked briskly, holding the ladder with one hand, swinging the other with fine jauntiness. Someone gloriously happy in his career as a decorator and eager to get on with freshening up a room or stairwell today would probably walk like this.

  And so did Iles, walk like it in crafty imitation. ‘Whistle while you work’ – was that the assistant chief’s aggressively cheery warble now? Anyone seeing this man for the first time would unquestionably believe he was good with wallpaper, never mismatching patterns. Taking obvious care not to clock anyone with the ladder, he went into the shop. Normally, Iles wouldn’t have minded hitting people with a ladder or with anything else that could assert superiority but avoid the tedium of words. He was into theatricals now, though, and his chosen role demanded a sweet show of caring and harmlessness. When he came out ten minutes later he was carrying in his free hand what Harpur could see was a pot of paint. Iles’s left still held the ladder.

  Had he done the same analysis of the situation as Harpur’s own? Did the ACC see similar risky likelihoods of additional, unwanted drugs business on his ground? Iles had created an unspoken but binding arrangement with Ralph and Mansel Shale that provided toleration of their businesses in exchange for guaranteed peace on the streets. A London invader could disrupt and possibly destroy that neat, civilized treaty. And so, like Harpur, Iles would want to know what Ralph Ember was doing with a possible big, big-city drugs syndicate.

  When he left the shop, Iles turned towards the multi-storey. This surprised Harpur. He would have expected the ACC to take the ladder and pot of paint back to wherever he had parked. Unextended, the ladder would fit into the cabin of a saloon car. Naturally, if he was a genuine decorator, the shop might have been on his way to the job and he could call in en route for the pot of paint required. But he wasn’t a decorator; he was Assistant Chief Constable (Operations) Desmond Iles.

  In a little while, Harpur saw why he’d been wrong to assume the ACC would go back the way he had just come. He looked up at the enormous frontage of the multi-storey and focused instantly on Harpur standing at the barrier. Iles gave a kind of imperfect wave with the pot-of-paint hand. There could be no finger flexibility in the wave because the assistant chief’s fingers had to clasp the pot. In fact, the wave didn’t really look like a wave, more like someone shaking a lemonade bottle to get the bubbles gallivanting. Iles’s left still held the ladder in a steadying grip on his shoulder.

  Harpur waved back. It seemed the decent thing to do. Obviously, he found it a pain that Iles picked him out like that from such a huge background, but the ACC couldn’t help being so fucking smart. Harpur recognized that he should have grown used to the assistant chief’s blazing all-round talents by now. Occasionally, Iles would speak about his mother, and made her sound effortlessly malign and vindictive. Perhaps this had made Iles brilliantly clever to crush her.

  Harpur got back into his car. After a few minutes, Iles opened the passenger door and joined him. Because of the ladder he’d been forced to use the stairs not the lift. He leant the ladder against the barrier with the paint pot underneath. He took off the bobble hat and put it into the pocket of his dungarees.

  ‘My own view, do you want it, Col?’ the ACC said.

  ‘Why not, sir?’ Harpur replied.

  ‘First, that the two people running the shop don’t know they’re being watched; and second, that they would be capable of all sorts, on top of the commodities game.’

  ‘Which all sorts?’

  ‘All sorts. They’d take on anything.’

  Harpur wondered whether he was seeing the difference between himself and the ACC. If Iles wanted to know something about a shop and its people and its customers, he’d go in and try to find it, whereas Harpur hung back, alert but passive behind a barrier, hoping that something significant would happen and that he would spot it. Iles behaved as if the world was in debt to him, and he’d collect whenever he wanted to.

  ‘There’s a kind of exuberant devilishness about Jo and Mil,’ Iles said.

  ‘You think they have form?’

  ‘Possibly they’ve got away with it so far,’ Iles said.

  ‘Did you pick up a tail after the shop?’ Harpur replied.

  ‘Tail?’

  ‘As possibly being more than what you seem.’

  ‘My whole life is like that, Harpur. It’s a kind of economizing. I try to lease out only segments of myself. I’m no spendthrift with my selfhood. I keep reserves. I might need them.’

  ‘Quite a few would be intrigued to hear this,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Which?’

  ‘Which what, sir?’

  ‘Which few?’

  ‘Quite a few.’

  ‘You?’

  ‘Shall I give you a lift with the gear to where you’re parked?’ Harpur asked.

  ‘The Jo element of that business, or those businesses, is a very comely piece,’ Iles said.

  ‘Does she go for artisans?’

  THIRTY-TWO

  Although there were certainly times when Harpur regretted having his name, address and phone number in the directories, on the whole he regarded it as not only a useful thing to do but a proper thing to do. If people needed help, they ought to know where and how they could get it. Of course, some would argue that anyone needing help should dial the 999 emergency number and get police or fire brigade or ambulance or all of them. But not everybody wanted that kind of official public aid. Iles’s wife, Sarah, for instance, would not like to turn to any of these services, but she hadn’t minded calling the other day at Harpur’s house with her worries.

  And now there was Melanie Younger: small, pretty, slight, agitated, plaintive; the one-time girlfriend, possible fiancée, of Raymond Street. It was early evening. As often happened if someone came without pre-arrangement, Harpur was at work, and for a while his daughters had to do the hosting. When he arrived today, Hazel, Jill and the guest were in the sitting room with cups of tea and biscuits.

  Harpur sat down on the chesterfield. Hazel poured him some tea. ‘We’ve had a good talk, Dad,’ she said.

  Oh, God.

  ‘This is in some ways a very sad visit, but in another way it’s lovely, Dad,’ Jill said. ‘If you ask “Why sad?”, Dad, I would reply, “Because it is to do with a death.” If you ask, “Why lovely?” I would answer, “Because Melanie is to be wed.”’

  ‘Yes? Oh, many congratulations, Melanie,’ Harpur said.

  ‘The man she loved first is dead,’ Jill said. ‘He is that death I mentioned. But it doesn’t mean because he is dead she can’t later on love someone else and want to marry him. It would be such a waste to be in love only with someone who’s dead.’

  ‘Yes,’ Harpur replied.

  ‘That would make death a winner, and turn mourning into a career,’ Jill said. ‘Bad, bad, bad.’

  ‘Right,’ Harpur said.

  ‘There’s a poem we did at school that says death shouldn’t be proud because it’s not so mighty and dreadful as it thinks,’ Hazel said, ‘and all the best people do it – die.’

  ‘For instance, you loved Mum, Dad, but now she’s dead and you’ve got Denise instead,’ Jill said.

  ‘Right,’ Harpur said.

  ‘
Although she’s only twenty that doesn’t matter,’ Jill said.

  ‘No,’ Harpur said.

  ‘She smokes a lot but one day she might give it up,’ Jill said. ‘If she gets a cough she would know she’d better stop, owing to her undoubted lungs.’

  ‘Yes,’ Harpur said.

  ‘You can still love her,’ Jill said.

  ‘Yes,’ Harpur said.

  ‘And she’s brainy, knowing French et cetera, so being only twenty doesn’t really come into it.’

  ‘No,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Think of that composer, Mozart,’ Jill said.

  ‘Right,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Mozart was only a kid when he wrote some great symphonies.’

  ‘Yes,’ Harpur replied.

  ‘But it’s not exactly the same with Melanie,’ Jill said.

  ‘Not the same as Mozart?’ Harpur said.

  ‘Not quite. Melanie needs a bridge,’ Jill said.

  ‘A bridge?’ Harpur said.

  ‘Kind of,’ Jill said.

  ‘Between what and where?’ Hazel asked.

  ‘Plus what are known as plaques come into it. This is why I said about a bridge,’ Jill replied.

  ‘Right,’ Harpur said.

  ‘You’ve met Melanie before, haven’t you, Dad, at the time of the death,’ Jill said.

  ‘Yes,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Those were terrible times, Mr Harpur,’ Melanie said. She had on a navy tracksuit and red and white training shoes. Her hair was pulled back into a bun on the back of her neck.

  ‘Yes, terrible,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Melanie is scared in case there is a return to them days,’ Jill said.

  ‘“Those”,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Those what?’ Jill said.

  ‘“Those days”,’ Harpur said. ‘Not “them”.’

  ‘That’s what I said – not them days again,’ Jill said.

  ‘OK,’ Harpur said.

  ‘She used to snort,’ Jill said.

  ‘Yes,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Stress,’ Jill replied.

  ‘Yes,’ Harpur said. He thought there might have been a short time when Melanie went on the game to finance her snorts. No need to mention that now.

  ‘The plaque is to do with them days,’ Jill said. ‘That’s the thing with plaques – they are about the past. They are in the present because they are fixed on a wall where people can see them now, but they are not about now but about the past. They are to remind people what happened in a previous time. Hazel spoke about a poet. If a poet, years back, lived in a certain house, they would put a plaque on it to say this had been his place. That would be a really nice plaque and helpful if a scholar wanted to know where the poet lived and wrote his or her poems with a big feather sharpened at one end so it became a pen. If the scholar asked for directions, someone might answer, “You can’t miss it because there’s a plaque.” If the poet could come back from the dead and see the plaque on his or her house, it would give him or her a true joy and make all the poems he or she had done seem worthwhile. He or she would go off if he or she was a ghost and write another poem about it all. There are plenty of rhymes for “plaque”.’

  ‘Right,’ Harpur said.

  ‘But some plaques are about really awful things. This is why I said sad,’ Jill replied.

  ‘So when’s the happy date, Melanie?’ Harpur asked.

  ‘She doesn’t want anything to sort of mess things up,’ Jill said. ‘Such as to do with a plaque.’

  ‘Melanie has heard rumours, strong rumours,’ Hazel said. ‘Well, I suppose we all have.’

  ‘Trouble,’ Jill said.

  ‘Possible trouble – fresh trouble,’ Hazel said, ‘like that roughhouse at The Monty, and maybe worse.’

  ‘I’ll try to explain it for you,’ Jill said.

  ‘Oh, thanks,’ Hazel said.

  ‘No need to be snotty-sarky,’ Jill said.

  ‘Isn’t there?’ Hazel said.

  ‘Haze doesn’t want to get deep about it all, Melanie, because there was something very special going on between her and Desy Iles.’

  ‘That’s enough, Dandruff Queen,’ Hazel said.

  ‘It’s over now, but she’s still a bit touchy about it,’ Jill replied. ‘The bridge – she wouldn’t want to talk about the bridge. But the bridge is what Melanie needs, isn’t it, Melanie? You’d like a bridge to Des Iles, wouldn’t you? Dad, I think Melanie hopes you’ll speak to him for her, you being so close to him at work. That’s why she’s here.’

  ‘It’s the Ray Street plaque at police headquarters,’ Melanie said.

  ‘There’s a plaque about him because he was murdered when he was undercover,’ Jill said.

  ‘Dad knows this, you idiot,’ Hazel said.

  ‘That plaque could get some hates going,’ Jill said. ‘Melanie doesn’t want big aggro around about one boyfriend when she’s going to marry another one. This could really upset the new fiancé. He could get quite jealous of the dead one and the plaque can bring out all sorts of stuff about the past which might not be good for a marriage.’

  ‘I’d like Mr Iles to stop the halo parade anniversary event for Ray this year,’ Melanie said. ‘Some people think too much fuss is made about Ray and not enough about the other two deaths.’

  ‘And so there’s envy and anger,’ Hazel said.

  Jill said: ‘Some believe Des Iles doesn’t want the two murders case solved because he—’

  ‘Shut it, bitch,’ Hazel replied.

  ‘There’s such a thing as vengeance,’ Jill said. ‘Someone is dead, such as Raymond Street, and the court couldn’t find who did it. So someone else might decide to take over and double it.’

  ‘Illegal,’ Hazel said.

  ‘Of course,’ Jill replied.

  THIRTY-THREE

  The death of Waistcoat in that terrible fashion came as a bit of a shock to Ralph. OK, admittedly he’d contracted Mil Parvin for the hit, and had already paid half a respectable fee to juice things nicely along, but Ralph lately began to wonder whether it might be an over-extreme measure, and was wondering about further discussion. He’d often heard or seen that phrase, ‘further discussions’, on TV news or in the press when some major political row was under way, and he liked the impression it gave of decent orderliness and patience. This, surely, was a worthwhile objective.

  Second thoughts like this did sometimes take hold of Ralph. He knew that some would call it indecisiveness, even jitteriness. No, not at all, but a sign of disciplined thinking or re-thinking, free from the pressures of that earlier, possibly hasty, decision. Only fools never changed their minds.

  He could still see the logic that had made him feel Naunton (Waistcoat) Favard must be removed, and soon. It was entirely reasonable to fear that Waistcoat would go on making dangerous trouble unless he was stopped, and the only way he could be finally and permanently stopped was to have him seen off. Ralph had handed over totally honest instalment money to have that done, and he would cough up the rest when unquestionably due.

  But he had come to wonder whether something less could work with Waistcoat. For instance, he might be given a blunt, unencrypted warning. Or he could get very thoroughly beaten up but just not to the point of death, and breakages confined to the limbs, nothing extravagant. Someone left in that state would most likely not invite more of it by rudely bellyaching again about the Paul Favard and You-know-who deaths. After a suitable period of recovery Waistcoat, given that kind of corrective, should be able to get back to almost a normal life with pain well under control.

  Obviously, Mil would no longer be entitled to the full Rest In Peace fee if one of these changes to the original commission was picked. He’d already received half and Ralph would not have attempted to get any of it back if the situation had been perfectly and sweetly resolved by a good and very serious chin-wagging and/or hammering.

  Ralph accepted that if he took part in this kind of operation he might have to put up with some sizeable losses. That’s what business wa
s about: risk, chancing, possible reversal, a start again elsewhere. But, plainly, if the killing had been called off, Ralph would not have paid the remaining half of the original agreed fee, but that could be dealt with in civilized, sensible talks that took account of radically altered circumstances. Ralph might have agreed to a small, goodwill, token amount, instead of the full second contribution.

  Now, though, there had been total completion of the Waistcoat project and the stated remainder of the payment would definitely be due. Ralph’s uneasiness about it all did continue for a while, but he wholeheartedly accepted that a contract was a contract, whether written or only spoken, and its terms had to be followed, or what would happen to standard commercial life? That standard did not come automatically. It had to be actively preserved. Appalling chaos threatened otherwise. Ralph never stopped worrying about chaos.

  The news of the death was not official yet. Ralph heard of it in two separate, but more or less identical versions, from members of The Monty. Ralph would have been sceptical about the tip-off if there were only one. But the fact that the information came from two people, and with details that were consistent, more or less convinced Ralph of their truth. Ralph did recognize that, although the information had two sources, what those two sources delivered might have reached them from only one source. Ralph doubted that, though.

  And, of course, in a way the news was only to be expected, and consequently more credible. There had been an agreement between Ralph and Mil Parvin to finish Waistcoat, and it appeared now that he had been eliminated. Rest In Perpetuity. Ralph remembered from school that if you solved a problem in maths you could write at the end, ‘QED’, Latin for ‘Which was to be demonstrated.’ Ralph thought that with a couple of slight changes this could be applied here about Waistcoat: who was to be destroyed. But perhaps that was a flippant way of looking at the situation. Ralph certainly did not feel flippant. He felt burdened, weighed down by the need to pay up for something he wasn’t sure he believed in any longer. ‘Irrelevant, Ralph; footling, Ralph,’ he told himself. ‘There was a binding commitment. It’s still binding, only more so, because the purpose of the commitment has been committed.’