by Bill James
‘If you meet him, don’t call him Ralphy. He thinks it makes him sound like somebody’s moronic cousin, not allowed out alone, “Our Ralphy”. Make it “Ralph” or “Ember”. He’s there, by the bar, talking to friends.’
‘What kind of work?’ ‘Various roles,’ Harpur said. ‘Joachim had versatility. Many noted that.’
Brown looked across at the singers and then at the crowd generally: ‘God, though, some club.’ The singers began, She was only a bird in a gilded cage, a beautiful sight to see. Alec Maximilian Misk’s mother and great aunt, if that’s who they were, joined in, swaying on their chairs to the rhythm. This spread would irritate Ralph more. He’d visualize the whole club at the crummy tunes soon, like a soccer crowd.
‘It’s a good turn-out, isn’t it?’ Harpur remarked. ‘Someone truly remarked just now that the community had taken your brother to its heart.’
‘Which?’
‘Which what?’
‘Which community?’ Brown said.
‘This one.’
‘But what kind of community is it?’
‘The Monty draws folk of many careers,’ Harpur said.
‘Occasionally, my parents would get a call. Then, nothing for months,’ Brown said, ‘no idea where he might be, how he might be living – even whether there was a girlfriend or that kind of thing.’
‘A bad shock.’
‘I looked around a bit in the funeral for a woman on her own, perhaps, and especially stricken. But too big a crowd. And why should I imagine she would be on her own? She’d have pals, probably. Would someone like that come on here, to this sort of party? It’s hard to associate it with grief and a death.’
‘This is the living,’ Harpur said. ‘Think of those New Orleans funerals – solemn music en route to the graveyard, then “When the Saints Go Marching In” – swinging and cheery – for the return.’
‘Is there a woman?’
Harpur had nothing on that – nothing beyond Venetia Ember’s fascination, which might mean . . . nothing. He said: ‘Apparently, he –’
‘Look, the fact is, I need to talk to anybody who knew a bit about him lately,’ Brown said.
‘Well, I –’
‘You seemed the right sort of person.’
‘Well, I –’
‘Had Joachim turned crook?’
‘We’re at only an early stage in the investigation.’
‘Drugs?’
‘We have some leads,’ Harpur said.
‘It sounded like a gang execution. The sudden disappearance. Then discovery of the body, probably at a spot very distant from where the death took place. One reads about such things – London, Manchester. And the torture. Those murderous families. You have people like that here?
This place – the club – it’s ... it’s ... I don’t know ... it reeks of villainy. A hotbed.’
‘A very early stage,’ Harpur explained.
‘But there will be a proper, thorough investigation?’
‘That goes without saying, Mr Brown.’
‘I think in a way I’d prefer it to be said. I’d like to hear the promise, the commitment.’
‘You’re big on the spoken word? Well, you would be. Some are dubious about what words can actually do.’
‘It’s strange to see senior police at a place like this,’ Brown replied. He nodded towards the singers and then pointed upwards. They were standing under The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.
‘The Monty’s an institution,’ Harpur said. ‘Ralph would tell you it’s in flux.’
Pause. Then Brown said: ‘You see . . . excuse me . . . but I heard . . . this is slightly ticklish . . . I heard there might be some kind of . . . some kind of, well, arrangement between the people my brother seemed to work among and the police.’
Yes, that was ticklish. ‘Arrangement?’ Harpur said.
‘Yes, a sort of . . . a sort of, well, arrangement. An accommodation.’
‘Heard where?’ Harpur said.
‘A local press girl collared me for information about Joachim post funeral. She seemed to know the scene.’
‘Oh, press. They pretend to be in on so much.’
‘She said you’d probably be here despite . . . It’s confusing. I’m uneasy. Did Joachim have enemies? . . . But isn’t that absurd? Forgive! Of course he had enemies or he wouldn’t be dead and gouged. Enemies why, though? Did the man he was working for have enemies? Ember? Is he a baron? Was it a gang thing? Joachim – he started and stopped in a lot of jobs. Did he try to pile up money too fast?’
Iles joined them. Harpur made the introductions. Iles carried out some very thrilled staring. ‘C.P.?’ he said.
‘Clement Porter Brown, the actor? Played Bosola in the
West End not long ago?’
‘Well, yes,’ Brown said.
‘Initials would fool Harpur, of course. Did you ever get round to Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi, Col? It’s a play. Bosola! A character. Not so much immoral as amoral. Some performance that.’
‘Mr Brown is worried there might not be a really committed investigation,’ Harpur said. ‘He’s picked up hints of a supposed police understanding with Ralphy and Manse. Would you know anything about that, sir? I think Mr Brown feels we shouldn’t be here at the club.’
‘I’m a sucker for all the Jacobean plays,’ Iles replied, hearty fandom in his face and voice. ‘The fun they have with evil. A sort of mischievous exuberance. Congratulations on the way you played it! Oh, yes. But I’ve always been in love with the Duchess, so devilishly treated by Bosola. I’m awed by him and at the same time hate him. You really got those divided reactions going in me. Thank you.’
‘The family had lost contact with Joachim,’ Harpur said.
‘Perhaps he felt left behind,’ Iles said. ‘Brother a stage star, after all. Parents?’
‘Docs,’ Harpur said.
‘Well, there you are – those farcically fat salaries handed out by the Government to GPs,’ Iles said. ‘Joachim had to do catch-up. Competition is a terrible foreman. Why we’re all here today.’
‘I don’t follow that,’ Brown said.
‘Das Kapital,’ Harpur replied, ‘or something else.’
‘You’re doing Hirst in Harold Pinter’s No Man’s Land next, I gather,’ Iles said. ‘I’ve seen Ralph Richardson and Pinter himself take the part, also Gambon. But you’ll transcend! Sure of it. Sarah, my wife, and I will get to that, believe me. We can leave the baby with her mother overnight. Sarah’s into drama, modern and Jacobean. In some ways we are very much on the same wavelength.’
Now, Iles’s voice became high and agonized. ‘Listen, Brown, that’s a fact – Sarah and I have a hell of a lot to bind us together. I don’t know what you may have heard about my wife and Harpur when talking to people in a place like this but –’
‘Yes, which other people will you want to meet, Mr Brown?’ Harpur said.
‘Some called Joachim “Turret”, I gather,’ Brown said. ‘This sets up uncomfortable thoughts about . . . about, well, a gun-happy lout.’
‘Bang, bang, bang. He had to make a show,’ Iles explained. ‘He couldn’t let you take all the spotlight, could he? Brothers try to race each other.’
‘One of Mr Iles’s interests is competition,’ Harpur said. ‘And then, also, the back of vans, of course.’
Chapter Eight
Unhinged Humphrey eased his way with delicate politeness through the crowd to talk to Naomi, Manse and Ralph near the bar. Always when Ralph drew up in his head a list of people who’d get their Monty membership forever ashed once the transformation began, Unhinged appeared at sixth or equal seventh with Dean Knighton, who was also somewhere around the club now, getting down to a degree of post-mourning.
Ember reckoned Humphrey’s personality had three ways of expressing itself, and only three: (a) Extre
me violence, (b) Violence, (c) Mingled courtesy and tearfulness. Today, Ralph guessed Humph would try to get in line with the occasion and go for (c), though you could not be certain this would last, and at any time he might tumble suddenly into (a) or (b), particularly during afternoons or evenings. People said that before midday he quite often had hours of total, safe, near-normality. It was afternoon now. He wore a formal morning suit – black jacket, black, silver-striped trousers, black shoes – and a black tie plus stiff white collar. When Humph attended funerals he always came in perfect turn-out. Off and on, propriety could be quite a thing with Unhinged. He reminded Ralph of Iles: both dressed with splendid care, both possessed hellishly seesaw, hacksaw, chainsaw minds. But Ember never pointed out this resemblance to Iles.
Although Ralph hadn’t checked on the Monty computer, he thought Humphrey should have been still locked up on a menaces or bodily harm sentence for seventeen more days yet. Lately, however, jail overcrowding meant some people got early release. It surprised Ralph that Humph with his known tendencies should qualify, but Home Office policy produced weird decisions. Ralph regarded accuracy on dates as vital because, under a remarkably civilized clause in Monty rules, anyone jailed had his/her membership put on hold, giving him/her a holiday from subscriptions until he/she returned to the club. He doubted whether the Athenaeum had any such humane regulation.
Because he was so often the way he was, nobody would work with Unhinged, and he did solo freelance protection, occasional racecourse and stables spying, and debt collecting on a percentage. His business cards, which had some sort of silver, yellow and puce armorial escutcheon at the top, said: ‘Humphrey Maidment-Fane, Confidential Security and Recovery Services, established 1997.’ During some of the years since then he had not been available to give security and recovery to clients, though. Now, Ember saw that, yes, Unhinged was weeping and mannerly, his big, bulbous face slack, moist, pitiable, chaotically pained. ‘Here’s a loss, Ralph,’ he said. A tremor about his lips made talk dodgy for the moment. The double ‘s’ was stretched, like tyre deflation. Unhinged had no drink with him, and Ralph considered it wisest not to offer.
‘A loss indeed, Humphrey,’ he said.
‘I don’t know when I felt a loss more,’ Maidment-Fane said.
‘Such a loss,’ Shale said.
Ember introduced Naomi and Humph. ‘You were at the funeral, so you’ll know we’ve undergone a loss,’ Maidment-Fane said, giving her a wonderfully respectful, small, slow, mournful bow: Ember saw that, on account of the suit, this had true, pallbearer quality. Unhinged wiped around his eyes with a handkerchief, and almost at once had to repeat the movement. ‘As if a part of myself gone.
You’ll recall those words, Naomi, “Never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”’
‘Ridiculous, really,’ Naomi said. ‘If it was tolling for thee, thou wouldn’t hear it and couldn’t send to know for whom it was tolling.’
Ember wished Naomi knew Unhinged better. She might be more careful about pissing on his quotes then.
‘The vicar did it just right: “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.” Crucial, to know your purpose under the heaven,’ Maidment-Fane said. ‘I try to keep my aim on that at all times. Turret was always sure of his purpose under the heaven. You could feel it. People like Turret are so rare.’
‘They don’t grow on trees,’ Naomi said. ‘Why was he called Turret?’
‘I wanted you to realize you have my full condolences, Ralph,’ Maidment-Fane said. ‘He used to operate for you, didn’t he?’
Ralph said: ‘Thank you, Humphrey. Yes, it was my firm’s privilege to have Joachim as –’
Maidment-Fane twitched along his body-length. Ember remembered making a note on Humphrey’s club data profile about this twitch type as a warning symptom in Unhinged. ‘I couldn’t be sure because I’ve been away and pre that, of course, you’d never give me a steady position in your fucking fine outfit, would you, Ralphy?’ Maidment-Fane replied. But then, magnificently, deftly, unreliably, he got himself back to politesse. ‘However, I admit the closeness would make his death, and such a death, all the more painful for you.’ He wiped his face again.
‘Thank you,’ Ember said. He decided he’d let the ‘Ralphy’ go for now. The situation was dangerously balanced. It would not take much to push Unhinged into bad, really unhinged unhingedness. In fact, Unhinged could reach a state where ‘unhinged’ ceased to be adequate as a description. At these times it was as if he had totally lost touch with everything sane and solid so that, even if his hinges had been OK, there existed nothing for him to be hinged to.
‘And you, also, Manse – no matter what they say, and keep on saying, I know you’ll regard Joachim’s passing with almost unbearable sorrow,’ Maidment-Fane remarked. ‘Definitely almost unbearable. Sensitivity is one of your main outgoings, famous for it among the firms on a nationwide basis.’
‘What do they say and keep on saying?’ Naomi asked. ‘Which “they”?’
‘A tragedy,’ Shale said. ‘Such a future beckoned for Joachim and yet he finishes like that. Again I remark, don’t tell me there wouldn’t be no foxes and stoats up that hill nosing at him in their totally wild, busy way. To them, he would be a strange item, lying there, and they can’t be blamed for interest and nuzzling. It’s their nature. But this was someone whose mother and father obviously regarded as special, so they give him the unusual foreign name, most likely German, although Joachim wasn’t. The point about “Brown” as a name is it’s common or garden. But if you stick “Joachim” in front of it this is all the difference, especially if it was not shortened to Joe. And then he’s found by a dog in nettles. That got to seem untoward to anyone right-thinking.’
‘I’d guess from the tributes I hear he was through and through a team man,’ Naomi said. ‘Did people in general love him? I expect he could take his place with aplomb in any group. Such a strength.’
Ralph wished she had not said this, either. Remarks like Naomi’s might unsettle Unhinged. Ember saw now not just the body-twitch, but a serious tightening of MaidmentFane’s features. Then a frown started and quickly dominated. Humph did not like teams, because he never got into one. ‘Joachim could act damned arrogant and stand-offish,’ he said. ‘That stupid fucking kraut name gave him swagger. They got it from some big Nazi. “Joachim”, for God’s sake! Where’s the fucking jackboots? I offered a share in quite a tidy little job needing a duo once, takings assured, next to no outright gunfire peril from their security or police armed response cars, as long as we were quick – flak jacket only a formal precaution. But would he look at the project? “Thank you kindly, Humphrey, but not exactly my line, you know.” What I’d call a fucking put-down, wouldn’t you? That’s the sort he was.’
Then, for a moment – and to his credit, in Ralph’s opinion – Unhinged softened and seemed determined once more to repel anger and truth today in the RIP circumstances, no matter how much she provoked him. The raving sod tried to get his bulging, malevolent, balloon face back to intolerable sadness. Ember would admit the struggle had its own low-level poignancy: in fits and starts Humph wished to seem human. ‘But still a loss. Oh, yes, beyond description this loss.’
‘What sort of tidy little job?’ Naomi said.
And his tone kept its edge. Maybe he felt hounded by her, serial questioned. ‘All Turret thought about was staying this side of the wall,’ Maidment-Fane said. ‘Cautious. Jittery.’
‘Most people want to stay this side of that wall, don’t they?’ Naomi said.
‘Timid. And then, for instance, look at those two,’ Humph replied.
‘“For instance” meaning what?’ Naomi said.
‘Which two, Humphrey?’ Ember said.
‘Harpur and Iles,’ Maidment-Fane said, and Ember saw he’d fully and hopelessly reverted now to universal hate, his default mode. Sometimes Humphrey’s
fury took in everyone and everything: there was himself and there were his enemies, and this made the entire world picture. His resentments blasted a huge target arc. Transform and backdate his rage into depth charges and he could have won the Battle of the Atlantic solo.
‘Oh, they’ll often turn up at our functions, Humph, especially after funerals,’ Ember replied.’It’s nothing much. They like to crow when it’s one of our people dead from violence. After all, they’re police. Standard behaviour. Iles got the Queen’s Police Medal for gloating.’
‘They talk,’ Maidment-Fane said.
‘Well, people do talk in clubs,’ Naomi said. ‘Conviviality. I’m sure there’s a great deal of that at the Monty.’
‘Unquestionably,’ Ember said. ‘Its very purpose, and a worthwhile one, I contend. Interaction. Civilized. A social duty, indeed.’
‘Those two, rabbiting to someone I don’t know at all. Do you like that sort of thing, then, Ralph?’ Maidment-Fane said.
‘Which sort of thing, Humphrey?’ Naomi said.
‘Confidential,’ Maidment-Fane said.
‘How can you tell it’s confidential?’ Naomi said.
‘Look at them, for God’s sake,’ Humphrey said. ‘They’re not on about the weather.’
‘Just a harmless chinwag,’ Ember replied.
‘There’s whispers come out of this club, Ralph,’ Maidment-Fane said.
‘What sort of whispers?’ Naomi asked.
‘Those three, talking like that non-stop,’ Maidment-Fane said. ‘You could fucking weigh the whispers.’
‘Whispers?’ Ember asked. He took the bottle of Kressmann armagnac from off the bar as if to do some top-ups, gripping it hard around the neck and keeping it against his right leg at arm’s length.
‘Oh, fair enough, fair enough, we’re here for a tribute to Turret and I wouldn’t say a thing against that,’ Maidment-Fane admitted. But his voice stayed hard and vindictive. ‘I’d say he was definitely . . . definitely . . . well, a loss. That’s the word I find I come up with finally. But there’s other matters.’
