Riptide

by John Lawton

  ‘Does it hurt, smartyarse?’

  ‘Of course it hurts.’

  ‘Good. So it should-it is practically through to the rib, and a little pain will make you wary next time.’

  Over Kolankiewicz’s shoulder Troy saw the door open. Kitty Stilton entered, took her key from the latch and came up behind Kolankiewicz, hands sunk deep in her coat pockets. He did not care for the look on her face. White, tight and red about the eyes. It was too late in the day, he was in pain, he was bleeding. He did not need whatever bee it was that buzzed in Kitty’s auburn bonnet.

  Kolankiewicz did not even turn.

  ‘If you are staying, angel from hell, then you must make yourself useful. Hold the edges of the wound while I stitch.’

  Kitty did not bat an eyelid. She slipped between the two of them and gripped the wound between thumb and forefinger. It hurt all the more.

  ‘Bastard,’ she whispered.

  ‘Aaagh,’ said Troy, as Kolankiewicz sank in the needle. ‘I thought you said you’d localise it?’

  ‘I was lying,’ said Kolankiewicz. ‘Now, pretty woman, hold tight, because the bugger will squirm.’

  Kitty gripped him as though she had pliers in her hands.

  ‘I was hoping for a word,’ she hissed.

  ‘Well, I can hardly not listen, can I?’ Troy hissed back.

  She pinched him harder.

  ‘In fact I was hoping to make you squirm.’

  Troy squirmed.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘Why didn’t I tell you what?’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me my dad was dead?’

  ‘I thought the American would tell you.’

  ‘He was in chokey. How the bleedin’ ‘ell could ‘e?’

  ‘I didn’t know that. I only found out today.’

  ‘Troy, you should have told me. You should have come round to Jubilee Street and told me and me mum yourself. Can’t you see that? I shouldn’t have found out from a routine visit by a gobshite like Nailer. You should have told me. After wot we been to each other you should have told me. No excuse. I don’t care where you were, what you were doing, you should have told me.’

  It seemed to Troy that the two of them had combined their efforts to torture him, that Kolankiewicz was punctuating Kitty’s sentences with every puncture of his flesh. When she finished, he finished, knotted the thread and snapped it off.

  ‘OK. We done. You got one more medal on your chest, copper.’

  Troy looked down at the wound. It was a mess, a ragged line made to look like a zip fastener with its row of regular, coarse black stitches. With a gesture like a conjurer about to manifest a pigeon, Kitty produced a handkerchief from her pocket-one of his, with his initial in the corner, the one she had helped herself to just the other night-and wiped his blood off her fingers.

  ‘What we’ve been to each other?’ Troy said. ‘Good God, Kitty, what do you think we’ve been to each other?’

  ‘Vodka still under the sink?’ Kolankiewicz asked.

  Troy ignored him. He disappeared into the kitchen.

  ‘Kitty, why are you here?’

  Kitty sat down on the armchair, stuck her hands back in her pockets and stared at him. Troy swung his legs to the floor and realised he’d be foolish in the extreme to try and stand.

  ‘Kitty, I’m very sorry your father’s dead. But taking it out on me isn’t going to bring him back.’

  ‘I’m here because.’

  This construction had always baffled him. Russian had nothing like this. The incomplete ending implying that he should know how the sentence ended-that it was a moral issue to know, and a moral dereliction to have to ask.

  ‘What is it you think I can do for you?’

  ‘You can help Calvin catch the bloke who killed my dad.’

  Troy sank back. He should have guessed – it was typical of Kitty to want the moon.

  ‘Jesus Christ.’

  ‘You can do this, Troy. Calvin can’t do a thing on his own. The Yard’ll run circles round him. He’ll wander round London like a dog at a fair.’

  ‘What you mean is that I should go up against Nailer for you.’

  ‘Nailer ain’t gonna catch him, now is he?’

  ‘Probably not.’

  ‘And you don’t have to go up against Nailer. You just have to sort of go round him.’

  Troy said nothing. He hoped that if he said nothing for long enough Kitty might just give up and bugger off.

  ‘There’s no on else can do it,’ she went on, undeterred. ‘You owe me this, Troy. You do this for me. And if that don’t mean nothin’ to you, then do it for my mum.’

  Troy sighed silently, began to work it out. He could not think that he owed Kitty anything, and her mum was not a viable instrument of emotional blackmail; she was simply a pleasant old woman in Stepney who’d invited the two of them to tea a couple of times last year, eyed him up and down as a potential husband and pronounced him ‘too posh’ as in ‘too posh, stick to your own kind Kitty’, but-he could backtrack, get Kolankiewicz to sign him off sick, make his apologies to Stan, take ten days while the wound healed, talk to this American, and if-what an if-he had a lead, follow it. He and the American might run circles round Nailer. It had that hint of satisfaction to it.

  Kitty appeared over him, put a hand to his forehead.

  ‘You’re hot,’ she said.

  ‘I feel cold.’

  She went upstairs, came back with a blanket and spread it over him.

  ‘Tomorrow,’ she said. ‘I can send him round tomorrow.’

  ‘You do that,’ he said. ‘Tonight’s not a good idea. Tomorrow. Not too early. Not before noon. Not before four. I’ll listen to his story. See what I can do.’

  Kitty kissed him on the forehead, thought better of it and kissed him on the lips.

  ‘Oh, and not a word about you-know-what.’

  And she did not even ask what had happened to him.

  When she’d gone Kolankiewicz emerged from the kitchen, clutching a vodka bottle and a glass.

  ‘Good,’ said Troy. ‘I could do with a shot.’

  ‘Tough titty. Is for me. The idea that alcohol is good for the sick is a myth. It opens the blood vessels and hence lowers the body temperature, and with the blood you just lost that would not be good idea.’

  ‘But I feel hot.’

  ‘And two minutes ago you felt cold. QED. Now, you want to know what I think?’

  ‘Does it matter? You’re going to tell me anyway.’

  ‘I tell you what I tried to tell you this afternoon. If you going to stick nose into old Stinker’s death you should hear me out.’

  ‘I think I’m what you’d call a captive audience.’

  ‘You going to help the luscious Kitty, am I right?’

  ‘I don’t seem to have a choice.’

  ‘To find her father’s killer?’ ‘

  Troy tried to shrug. It hurt too much so he said nothing.

  ‘Okey dokey. You will appreciate, death is my business. I see death every day.’

  ‘I’m not unfamiliar with the grim reaper myself. So could we get past the egg-sucking stage?’

  ‘When do you think I last saw two such deaths as these?’

  ‘Such deaths as what?’

  ‘The Dutchman, and then old Stinker.’

  Troy craned his neck to get a better look at Kolankiewicz. It hurt too, but this was getting complicated. The look on Kolankiewicz’s face might just help.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Never in my years in the death business have I had two deaths quite so close together which you, in the force, are keen to ascribe to professional murder-let us say assassination.’

  ‘I’m really not following you. It may be blood loss, but you’ve lost me.’

  ‘Do you really think there are two such men on the loose? Two such assassins, even in wartime?’

  ‘I haven’t thought about it at all yet. But since you ask-what makes you think Walter was the victim of a professi
onal hit?’

  ‘You heard Bob Churchill-a professional’s weapon, he said.’

  ‘A professional’s weapon but not necessarily a professional. As I recall, he made no comment on that possibility.’

  ‘I say again, Troy, do you really think there are two killers?’

  ‘I don’t know. But someone got the drop on the Dutchman. Sneaked up behind him and snapped his neck like a twig. Do you agree?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘No one got the drop on Walter. He was shot from the side. I’d even say he was turning to look at his attacker when the gun was fired. As though he was expecting someone. Whoever it was came up the alley was not the man he was expecting, but by the time he knew that it was too late. The man was within range and fired.’

  ‘You sure? That’s an awful lot of deduction.’

  ‘I had five minutes to look at the body before Nailer stormed in. I could draw you a picture.’

  ‘I never got to see old Stinker’s body. But if you going to chase this wild dog, I think you should consider the possibilities.’

  Troy did not need to hear any more. It had been explicit in everything he’d heard while the American was under arrest, in everything Peter Dixon had told him, that the American and Stilton had been pursuing a man Cormack could not or would not name. Was he still in pursuit, had he abandoned his mysterious man-a German?-to find Walter’s killer? Or was he looking for two people now-whoever it was he was chasing and a murderer? Had it dawned on him that they might conceivably be one and the same person? Good God, what had Kitty let him in for? What had he let himself in for?

  ‘Did you see the report?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Totally different MOs, of course. A world of difference between a hands-on killing and a shooting. Neither are for the squeamish, but I’ve always thought the former required nerves of steel and emotions scraped back to the bone. I could do with a look at Spilsbury’s report. Just to be certain I’m not wrong and that the shooting wasn’t to finish off a botched attempt. Can you nick me a copy?’

  Kolankiewicz shrugged. ‘Easy peasy,’ he said. ‘Now, can I give you a hand up the stairs?’

  § 73

  ‘I’ve nothing to wear.’

  ‘You sound just like my sisters every time we get ready for a dance up West.’

  ‘No-I mean. My suit’s a write-off.’

  Cal held up the sad sack that had once been his fifty-shilling suit.

  ‘Should have called laundry the minute you got in.’

  ‘The minute I got in all I wanted was a bath. And then you got in.’

  ‘Awright. Don’t get shirty.’

  ‘My shirt’s ruined too!’

  ‘Couldn’t you go out in your uniform?’

  ‘No, Kitty, that’s the last thing I can do.’

  Kitty picked up the phone and asked for Stepney 315.

  ‘Vera. It’s me. I need you to do something, (pause) No-I’m at Claridge’s. (pause) No, I don’t see that that matters a toss. I’m not calling for an argy-bargy. I need something and I need it now. (pause) Of course I know you’re up to your… (pause) Yes, I’ll be back, (pause) Vera-for Christ’s sake, will you just bloody listen! Calvin has to see the police about Dad. He’s nothing to wear, (pause) No-don’t ask, it’d take too long. Just do it. Get that plain blue suit of Kev’s out of his wardrobe and bring it over, (pause) Well he’s not going to need it now is he? (pause) A clean white shirt an’ all. (pause) Then send Tel! I don’t care as long as somebody does it!’

  ‘I’ll swing for that silly tart one of these days. I swear I will.’

  She turned to him.

  ‘Tel’ll be over in about half an hour.’

  Tel arrived, a cigarette stuck to his bottom lip, a new swagger in his walk. The assumed posture of instant adulthood. The man of the family. He handed the suit to Cal, leant against the tallboy and flicked ash vaguely in the direction of an ashtray.

  ‘Wotcher sis.’

  ‘Wot do you think you’re playing at?’

  Cal left them to it. Ducked into the bathroom and slipped on the suit. It was a far, far better cut than his old one. It could have been made for him. It had been made for Kevin Stilton. The label over the inside pocket was that of a Savile Row bespoke tailor. Kev and Trev had, literally, spent like sailors. He sat on the edge of the bath, slipped on his shoes and surveyed himself in the looking glass. The suit was perfection. The shoes were clean and buffed-Kitty had had the foresight to stick them outside the door before they turned in for the night. They’d come back gleaming. Gleaming but regulation US Army brown, and about as fitting for this suit as his last. Blue and brown, it would have to do.

  When he emerged Tel was no longer smoking, and his left cheek bore the red imprint of Kitty’s hand. The veneer of manhood wiped from his face, a spotty, gawky seventeen-year-old once more.

  ‘You sure you know where you’re going?’ Kitty asked.

  ‘Sure. Cab to that pub you and I met in, cross the road and down the alley.’

  ‘I could come with you.’

  ‘I’m better on my own.’

  She kissed him softly.

  ‘Good luck.’

  Did he need luck? The prospect, the necessity of luck had not occurred to him.

  The cab dropped him by the Salisbury in St Martin’s Lane. There were, he thought, no two things more guaranteed to make you glad to be alive than the proximity of sudden death and the dazzling light of a sunny afternoon. He found his way down Goodwin’s Court, an alleyway little wider than a path, to Troy’s front door. He hesitated a moment, wondering what his first words to Troy might be, and then reached for the knocker-rat-tat-tat.

  § 74

  Troy regretted that he had not accepted Kolankiewicz’s offer of a helping hand up to his bedroom on the first floor.

  ‘No thanks,’ he had said. ‘I think I’ll just lie here for a while. Things to think about.’

  Hours later he had awoken, stiff and sore, and mounted the stairs. Searing pain had shot through his side, he had sunk to his knees and felt one of Kolankiewicz’s carefully sewn sutures burst apart. In the morning he awoke to blood on the sheets again. It looked to be about a cupful. So what, he had thought, he lost that much shaving every week. By late afternoon he had changed his shirt twice, slapped on every inch of Elastoplast he could find and staunched the bleeding. All the same he felt weak, and dearly wished he’d put the American off for another day. He was just fiddling hopelessly with the cufflinks on his third shirt when the rat-tat-tat came at the door.

  ‘I guess it’s time we introduced ourselves,’ the American said. ‘Calvin Cormack, Captain, United States Army.’

  He stuck out his hand, a disarming smile upon his face that Troy could not but think was genuine. He did not know why it should surprise him-the openness, the friendliness of most Americans-but it always did.

  ‘Frederick Troy,’ said Troy. ‘Detective Sergeant, Scotland Yard.’

  His cuff flapped as he shook.

  ‘You having a problem with that?’

  Troy did not want to have to explain.

  ‘Arm’s a bit stiff,’ he said simply-and before he could stop him Cormack reached out and deftly threaded the cufflink, like a father teaching a twelve-year-old boy how to wear his first grown-up clothes.

  The yard was flooded in May’s sunshine. Troy beckoned him inside, propped the door open to let some of the light bounce off the wall and into the sitting room. Cormack looked around with what seemed to Troy to be a mixture of bafflement and curiosity-he looked too big for the room, as though his hair would dust the paint from the ceiling, his feet catch every obstacle and those long, long legs never prove capable of bending themselves to sit in any of the chairs. Along with their openness and friendliness went their inordinate size. Cormack plonked himself down in the chair Kitty had sat in only last night, contracted to a human size, pushed his glasses that bit further up his nose and smiled nervously. Human once more, almost Troy-sized.

  ‘C
an I get you a cup of tea?’ Troy asked inevitably.

  ‘Sure.’

  Troy stuck the kettle on. Its whistling would give him an excuse to get up and move when the talk lulled. He could not say why, but he had the feeling that this man and he would find little in common but their common cause and Kitty. And Kitty was you-know-what.

  ‘Cute,’ Cormack said as Troy sat down. ‘Always loved these little houses.’

  Troy found himself staring at Cormack, seeking the man Kitty had described to him: tall, six foot two or thereabouts, skinny, speccy, already losing his hair.at the temples, full in the mouth, wide, fleshy lips-not the handsomest man alive… but comforting. An easy man to be with, a shy, gentle man, restrained, good-mannered and not particularly good between the sheets. An inexperienced lover.

  ‘And don’t you get so damn cocky. A bit of the other ain’t everything, you know.’

  Troy had said nothing. She said she felt safe with this man-enveloped, cared for, snuggled-all words she had used.

  ‘But do you love him, Kitty?’ he had asked.

  ‘Wot’s love got to do with it?’

  ‘So you don’t.’

  ‘Did I say that? God, you’re nosy when you want to be!’

  Troy had said nothing, assumed the conversation was over. Then she said, ‘But I could.’ Then, ‘Stop lookin’ at me!’ Then she threw something at him.

  ‘Kitty seems to think we have a lot in common.’

  Cormack was speaking to him. Troy was miles away. Recollecting in tranquillity.

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘I was saying, Kitty seems to think we have a lot in common.’

  Kitty had talked about him? To the American? Told him what? That they shared the you-know-what?

  ‘We do?’

  ‘Fathers,’ Cormack said simply, and Troy began to get the message.

  ‘Ah, I see. You’re the son of that chap who makes all the fuss about isolationism.’

  ‘And you’re the son of the guy who makes all the fuss, period.’

  Troy had to smile at this. It was undeniable. His dad had dedicated his life to stirring up trouble.