He decided to sit on the fence.
"Hi there, how're you doing?" he said.
"That could depend on you, Joe. I was ringing to tell you that I've pushed a possible client your way. Christian Porphyry. You heard of him?"
"Didn't I see his picture in the paper recently?" said Joe. "Got arrested or something?"
He didn't see the need to tell Woodbine Porphyry had been and gone. Might be some chance of getting a bit of info from the horse's mouth.
"Got engaged, Joe. Not the same thing. Though, come to think of it, maybe you're right."
He chuckled. His voice was quite friendly. Looked like this might be a Willie day, which probably meant he wanted something. Woodbine was the kind of ambitious cop whose gaze was fixed on the high ground. He only glanced down in search of small change that someone else had dropped. In his mind, professional and social upward mobility marched hand in hand and he'd married accordingly. But popular judgment was that he'd need to become Lord High Executioner before his wife would reckon she'd been compensated for her noble condescension.
He stopped chuckling and went on, "The thing is, Joe, I've given you a good write-up, and I just wanted to make sure you won't let me down."
"Wouldn't dream of it, Willie, no sir, you can rely on good old Joe."
He'd over-hammed it. Woodbine said sharply, "This is serious, Joe. I hope you're going to take it seriously."
"Of course I am," said Joe in his serious voice. "Might help, though, if you gave me a hint what it is I'm being serious about?"
"It's nothing, storm in a teacup, really. Mr. Porphyry, Christian, has got himself a bit of bother at the golf club. He mentioned it to me, asked my advice. I gave it some thought, and I told him, 'Sorry, Chris, but this doesn't get close to being a police matter.' You know me, Joe, always willing to stretch things a bit for a friend, but in this case I really couldn't see how anything in the official machinery could be of any use. But I hate to let a chum down. And it struck me, what he really needed was someone so unofficial, you'd pay him no heed. Someone so unlikely, no one would worry about him. Someone you'd not lay good money on to know his arse from his elbow. Someone like you, Joe."
It wasn't exactly a glowing testimonial. But Joe knew that he probably only survived in Luton because Willie Woodbine felt able to give it.
Very few cops like private eyes. Most view them with grave suspicion. And a few hate their guts and would love to put them out of business.
Not that Joe had looked like he needed much help in that line when he started. But somehow again and again after stumbling around like a shortsighted man in a close-planted pine forest on a dark night, he had emerged blinking with mild surprise into bright light and open country with everything lying clearly before him.
On more than one occasion Willie Woodbine had been nicely placed to take most of the credit. But the cop was clear-sighted enough to recognize it was Joe's success, not his own, and from time to time he reached out a protective hand, not so much to pay a debt as to protect an asset.
Reaching out the hand of patronage was something new.
"That what you told Mr. Porphyry about me, Willie?"
"No." Woodbine sighed. "I told him that in something like this, despite appearances, if anyone could get the job done, it was likely to be you. So don't you go letting me down, Joe. Or else…"
"Yeah yeah," said Joe, to whom a veiled threat was like a veiled exotic dancer. While you didn't know the exact proportions of what you were going to see when the veil came off, you knew you were unlikely to see anything you hadn't seen before. "But just what is the job, Willie?"
There was another voice in the background now, saying something Joe couldn't make out, but the tone was urgent.
"Joe, got to go. Keep me posted, OK?"
The phone went dead.
"Shoot," said Joe, draining his can of Guinness.
He hadn't got much further forward. What could a bit of bother at a golf club amount to? Taking a leak in a bunker, maybe. Or wearing shorts with parrots on.
There was mystery here, and maybe trouble. At least he had the consolation of knowing beneath the parrots he had two hundred quid of the YFG's money thawing in his pocket.
He looked at his watch. Just after three, but he might as well go home. He didn't anticipate getting any more business today.
He tossed the can toward the waste bin, missed, rose wearily and went out to brave the heat of the Luton dog days.
4
Blackball
As Joe drove the Morris through Bullpat Square, he saw a familiar figure coming out of the wide-open door of the Law Centre. Tiny enough for even a vertically challenged PI to loom over, from behind she could have been taken for a twelve-year-old, but that wasn't an error anyone persisted in once they'd looked into those steely eyes and even less after they'd listened to the words issuing out of that wide, determined mouth, usually borne on a jet of noxious smoke from a thin cheroot. This was Cheryl Butcher, founder and leading lawyer of the Centre, which offered a pay-what-you-can-afford legal service to the disadvantaged of the city. Joe slowed to walking pace and pulled into the kerb. "Hey, Butcher," he called. "You looking for action?" She didn't even glance his way. "What the hell would you know about action, Six- smith?"
"Enough to know you walk too far in this heat, you're going to melt away. Like a lift?"
Wise-cracking was an area of traditional gumshoe activity Joe didn't usually bother with. It required from-the-hip rapid-fire responses and he was honest enough to recognize himself as an old-fashioned muzzle-loader. But his relationship with Butcher somehow seemed to stimulate him to make the effort. Maybe it was the certainty that in their mutual mockery there was a lot of respect.
"You heading to Rasselas?"
The Rasselas Estate was a collection of sixties high-rise blocks that would probably have been demolished years ago if a determined Residents' Committee, led by Major Sholto Tweedie, ably assisted by such powerful personalities as Joe's Aunt Mirabelle, hadn't succeeded in making it a place fit for humans to live in.
"I surely am."
"Then you can drop me at Hermsprong," said Butcher, opening the car door and stepping in, which you could do with the old Morris Oxford if you were only as big as the lawyer.
Architecturally, Hermsprong was a mirror image of Rasselas built on the other side of the canal. And, like a mirror image, it showed everything back to front.
Unlike reconstructed Rasselas, every cliche of depressed urban high-rise living could be found on Hermsprong. Crack-houses, corner dealers, lifts that were moving urinals when they moved at all, underpasses that were rats' alleys where you could lose more than your bones, the highest break-in rate, the lowest clear-up rate, more hoodies than a monastery, and so on, and so on. If ever a place should have been razed to the ground, Hermsprong was it. But paradoxically it survived because of Rasselas's success. How could you say an experiment had failed when you could produce evidence only a mile away that it could succeed? Or to put it another way, why should you demolish Hermsprong and relocate its inmates to the lovely new small well-planned developments the council was building to the east when the inhabitants of Rasselas were so much more deserving?
These were the arguments the sophists of the City Council produced in order to postpone a decision that was going to put an intolerable strain on their already overstretched budget.
Joe knew that to ask why Butcher was heading for Hermsprong would be like asking a bank robber why he robbed banks. 'Cos that's where my clients are, stupid.
Instead he said, "You're not going to light that thing in my car, are you?"
Referring to the cheroot that Butcher had inserted between her lips.
"Jesus, Sixsmith, you should watch more old movies. You can't be a proper PI unless you chain smoke!"
"Like you can't be a proper lawyer 'less you wear a wig and charge five hundred pounds a minute?"
"Don't insult me. I'm worth more than that."
But she put the
cheroot away then asked, "So, business is so bad you've shut up shop and decided to spend the rest of the day watching mucky videos?"
"Wrong, as usual. Matter of fact, I'm going home to do some research on the very important client I'll be lunching with at his club tomorrow."
"Oh yes? And I'm going to meet the Lord Chancellor to talk about becoming a High Court judge!"
This provoked Joe to telling her all about his encounter with the YFG.
She listened with interest. He tried to conceal his ignorance of what the case was all about by claiming client confidentiality but she saw through that straight away.
"You mean you haven't got the faintest idea, don't you? How many times do I have to tell you, Sixsmith? Always find out what you're getting into before you get into it. Interesting though that the sun doesn't shine all the time, not even on Golden Boy."
"You know Porphyry?"
"Not personally, but professionally I had occasion to do some research on the family three, four years back in connection with a compensation case."
"Shoot. And that was against Porphyry?" said Joe, feeling illogically dismayed.
"Against the Porphyry Estate, which makes it the same thing. One of their employees died. Coroner said accident, no one to blame, but that's what they appoint coroners for, isn't it? To make sure the Porphyrys of this world never get blamed. There was a widow and a son. I reckoned they deserved better."
"And did they get it?"
"Unhappily the mother didn't survive her husband long enough for things to run their course. If there is a God, he's a member at Royal Hoo and looks after His own."
"I thought Chris was OK," Joe protested.
"And you've got O-levels for character judgment, right? I'm sure he's a very likeable guy. In the class war, the ones that make you like them are the worst, Joe. He might seem to be trailing clouds of glory, but he's also trailing a couple of centuries of unearned privilege. And if you get to thinking he's different from the rest, remind yourself he's just got engaged to a fluff-head whose father runs some of the most fascist imprints of our mainly fascist press." To Joe this sounded a bit unfair on the Bugle, but political debate with Butcher was a waste of time. "All I know is the guy's got some kind of trouble," he said weakly. "Yes, and that is good news," said Butcher. "But what's really puzzling is why he's looking for help from you of all people." Indignantly he retorted, " 'Cos I was recommended, that's why?" "Recommended?" she said incredulously. "Who by? The Samaritans?" "By Willie Woodbine, no less." Which meant he had to tell her all that part of the story too. To his surprise she nodded as if it all made perfect sense. "Poor Willie," she said. "Must be in a real tizz. And you're his last resort." "What's that mean?" "You don't know anything, do you, Joe?" she said. He knew she was going to be really patronizing when she called him Joe, but he didn't mind. Folk could rarely be patronizing without telling you stuff you didn't know just to show how much more they knew than you did. She said, "Willie Woodbine's dad used to buttle for the Porphyrys-" "Battle?" interrupted Joe. "You mean, like he was a minder or something?" "He was their butler, for God's sake. Willie must be three or four years older than Chris, just the age gap for a bit of hero worship, young master being shown the ropes by the butler's worldly-wise son. Boot on the other foot when they grew up, of course, but there's a relationship there that begins to assume at least the appearance of equality when Willie joins the police force and starts his rapid climb up the ladder. If he gets to be chief constable, he might even get invited round to dinner."
"Miaow," said Joe, who might have observed, had he been given to self-, social-, psycho-, or indeed any kind of analysis, how interesting it was that folk from nice bourgeois backgrounds like Butcher were much more inclined to get hot under the collar about the inequalities of class than natural-born plebs like himself.
She ignored him and went on, "So it's not surprising that Willie, with his eyes on the top, should want to do the young master a service, particularly in this area."
"You're losing me," said Joe.
"It's finding you that's the problem." She sighed. "The golf club. The Royal Hoo. Getting into the Hoo is the ultimate accolade in Luton high society. If your face doesn't fit, you've more chance of getting into the Royal Enclosure at Ascot wearing shorts like yours!"
Now Joe did feel hurt. Class didn't bother him but snipes at his fashion sense did, 'less they came from a rich client or a gorgeous in-out girlfriend. He refused to let himself be diverted, however, and asked, "So you don't just go along and pay your admission fee?"
"No! They need to look you over, check your family and friends then move on to your bank balance, your tailor and your table manners. After that if you've got someone to propose you, second you and probably third and fourth you, they take a vote-"
"Who's this they?"
"Some committee," she said dismissively. "And it just takes one blackball and you've had it."
"Black ball?" said Joe. "Don't like the sound of that."
"Don't go vulgar on me, Joe," she said.
"Sorry. So Chris is putting Willie up for membership, is that what you're saying?"
"So I'd guess. And of course if you want to get into the Hoo, then getting yourself proposed by Christian Porphyry is just about the closest thing you can get to a guarantee of success."
"Because everybody likes him, you mean?" said Joe, who didn't find this hard to believe. One of the many perks of being a YFG had to be that everybody liked you.
"Don't be silly. What's liking got to do with it? Because the Royal Hoo more or less belongs to the Porphyry family, of course."
"That more or less?" asked Joe.
"I don't know the precise details," said Butcher. "Just what I picked up when researching the family background. Know your enemy, Joe. You never can tell when some little detail might come in useful in court."
Joe shuddered at the thought of finding himself on the wrong end of Butcher in a courtroom. Not even Young Fair Gods were safe.
He said, "OK, give me the history lesson, long as you're not charging."
"I'll put it on your slate," she said. "Back in the twenties, one of the Porphyrys was so hooked on golf he built a course on an outlying stretch of the family estate known as the Royal Hoo because, according to tradition, King Charles had been hidden there in a peasant's hut during the Civil War."
"And he was anonymous, so they called it Hoo?"
"Funny. I hope. No, it's called Hoo because that's what hoo means: a spur of land. At first it was for private use only, by invitation from the family. Then the war came and the course got plowed up. When peace broke out, and the UK was once more a land fit for golfers, the old gang of chums and hangers-on started pestering Porphyry to have the course refurbished. Only this was a new Porphyry, your boy's grandfather, I'd guess, and he was commercially a lot sharper and didn't see why he should pick up all the tabs. He insisted a proper company be formed and the Royal Hoo Golf Club as we know it-everyone, that is, except you-came into being."
"With the Porphyrys still in control?"
"Don't know the contractual details, but I'd guess they kept a controlling interest. People like them don't give their land away, free gratis and for nothing," she said grimly.
"So, with Christian's backing, Willie looks like a cert for membership? Good for him, if that's what he wants."
"And good for you too, Joe. Maybe. I'd guess whatever trouble Porphyry's got, he did what the ruling classes always do and turned to his old butler for help. That's OK if you've got a Crichton or a Jeeves, but all he had was Woodbine, who felt he couldn't help officially but tried to keep his nose up master's bum by recommending you as a last resort."
Joe tried not to show he was hurt but he wasn't very good at dissimulation, and Butcher, who was very fond of him, said placatingly, "Look, I don't mean you don't get results. For God's sake, I've recommended you myself, haven't I?" This was true, and the memory eased the smart a little. "All I meant was, I mean, Jesus, what can you do in a set-up like
the Hoo? You'll stick out like a…" She seemed lost for a simile. "Like a black ball," completed Joe. This time she didn't reprove his vulgarity. "Something like that. When Porphyry met you, didn't he say anything?" "Like, hey man, no one mentioned you were a short black balding no-hoper with parrots on his shorts? No, I don't recollect hearing anything like that. Unless giving me four fifties and saying come and have lunch with me at the club is posh shorthand for I'd be crazy to hire a slob like you." "Joe, don't go sensitive on me. It doesn't suit you." He consulted his feelings. She was right. And in any case, it was too much of an effort in this weather to keep it up. "Apology accepted," he said. "Apology? You going deaf too?" That was better. Now they were back on their proper footing. They chatted about other things till Butcher told Joe to drop her in an area on the fringe of Hermsprong that even in the full brightness of a midsummer day had an aura of dark menace. "You want I should come with you?" offered Joe, glancing uneasily at a group of young men who looked like they were planning to blow up Parliament. "To do what?" she asked. Then, relenting, she added, "No, I'll be OK, Joe, but thanks for the thought. It's you who needs protection. I'm just going among the poor and the disadvantaged. Tomorrow you'll be mixing with the rich and successful. That's where the saber-toothed tigers roam. Take care of yourself there, Joe."
She got out of the car, lit her cheroot, and set off along the pavement, pausing by the terrorists to say something that made them laugh and exchanging high fives with them before she moved on.
Sixsmith watched her vanish behind the graffti'd wall of a walkway, tracking her progress for a little while by the spoor of tobacco smoke which hung almost without motion in the lifeless air. She'd be OK, he guessed. She was worth more to these people alive than dead. This was her chosen world. People like Porphyry and the other members of the Royal Hoo were the enemy, which was why she knew so much about them, presumably.
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