Yeah right. He reminds me how that’s bollocks. Even an idiot like you could have told them apart. But he’s no longer calling the shots. He’s going to have to start trusting me a bit more.
Maybe, he says. Remember what happened the last time The Rebel called the shots.
The Banker may have only been a pretentious, junior management pen-pusher who liked people to think he was a big shot, but he knows how to bring me down. I manage to shut him up, only after he repeats something he said before: that I still don’t really know what I’m dealing with. It’s a fair point. But at the end of the day, I took the other package. It was an opportunity too good to miss.
Tossing coins into the automatic booth at the end of the toll bridge, I’m reminded how last night, as soon as I reached into my jacket for the heavier of the two envelopes, it was pretty bloody obvious I was holding a serious stack of bank notes. You’d think The Banker would have known this instinctively. But no. The closest I came to seeing, let alone handling a bundle of cash in my whole career was as a senior clerk, when I took my turn on the rota to seal the vault. Even then there was always another locked grille between me and the goodies.
No, he’s right again. Any fool would have known the feel of a meaningful pile of hard currency. Apart from the obvious size and shape of it, you’d recognise the way it curled around your hand, the tentative handshake of an old friend, bending and wedging like the pages of the phone book.
Well, that’s the first thing that came into my mind anyway – the phone book. They’ve become a lot thinner these days, whereas the business directory seems to keep getting fatter. That’s the reason I have a brown envelope locked in my glove compartment containing a neatly stacked two and a half inch block of yellow paper the size of £50 notes. Ignore the colour of its contents and I bet by holding that envelope you’d easily believe you just became twenty-five grand the richer. Anyway, I figure it might be a good idea to keep a decoy now the real stuff is safely hidden.
The lighter of the two packages is in my pocket, still with its original content. Mind you, it’s a different pocket in a different jacket to the one I wore last night. Call me paranoid, but each article of clothing has gone into a different plastic carrier bag, along with an anonymous sample of the contents of my dustbin, and each bag has been dumped into different street bins all the way to Lakeside. The last bag contained the gloves I wore last night; the ones I put back on this morning to examine the camera. I’m not sure what I was expecting to find. It’s a disposable, the sort you used to get in Woolworths for a couple of quid. Kids would buy them to leave lying around at parties so anyone could take a photo, and when they got them developed everyone would have a good laugh. There’d be the usual assortment of gurning faces, sneaky peeks up girls’ skirts and drunken lads’ lily-white arses. Until it’s been opened and the film processed it’s just another innocuous glitter-wrapped box with a lens. And that’s exactly what was in the envelope – nothing more, nothing less.
Right now, in the warming sunshine of a pleasant Kentish morning, the trauma of my recent criminal act, with its associated mysteries and consequent nightmares, has already started to fade, and I’m thinking about the money Herb promised me. I know I told him I didn’t need it, but with the job done, as far as I’m concerned, I’m eligible for the full remuneration package and keen to get my hands on another bundle of cash. Whilst a thousand quid is a poor relation to the stack I’ve hidden away, at least Herb’s money will be earned and I feel like I deserve it. I’ll decide what to do with the other windfall another time. All I’m focused on is handing the camera to Herb and walking away with the reward – no more questions asked. Debt repaid. Honour upheld.
For the second time in eight days, I’m also hoping to avoid detection by Mum’s neighbourhood watch, as I park in another side street and walk the last few hundred yards.
Unexpected Withdrawal
It’s still early as I walk up the front path. The curtains are already drawn back, not that I’m concerned about waking him. I’ve already grappled with that dilemma earlier this morning, only to then get no reply again when I rang his number. That’s what prompted my decision to just turn up. I’m not so sure of the rationale ten minutes later, when I’m still here ringing the doorbell and peering gingerly through the front window. No answer. No movement. Silence. By seven-thirty the street is coming to life; people are leaving their houses for work and I’m feeling increasingly conspicuous standing at the front door for so long. All I can do is walk back out of the gate and down the street back towards the car. Driving slowly past the house again, I think I see a silhouette move across the front window. I can’t be sure. I’m starting to doubt myself. Just lately, I’ve been seeing shadows everywhere.
I continue in the direction of Mum’s and try to come up with a credible reason for visiting again, unannounced and this early in the morning. At the same time I know she’ll never tire of being pleased to see me, and in no time I’m sitting in her kitchen, waiting for bacon and eggs.
‘There was a chance of some work down here,’ I say to her as she pours my fourth coffee of the morning. I hate deceiving her, but at least there’s some truth in it.
‘Oh, that would be good,’ she replies. ‘It would be nice to see more of you. I knew you’d find something soon.’
‘I wish I was so optimistic,’ I say, gesturing to the TV where the breakfast news programme is announcing more redundancies. ‘Things are looking pretty grim in the City. My old firm just let a dozen middle managers go.’
‘Isn’t that awful,’ she says with genuine concern. ‘All those poor bankers losing their jobs. Makes me think you got out in time.’
‘Maybe,’ I say without conviction. I can’t share her sympathy for guys my age walking away with six-figure packages. If only I could have kept my cool, I might have been considered an operational liability and been one of the lucky ones. I try to imagine how it would have felt, the short walk of shame from the MD’s office, followed by the long skip of joy out of the building.
‘It’s unlikely I’ll end up back down here though,’ I add, hastily backtracking so as to manage any expectations my recently regular visits are set to continue. ‘I might take on some temporary work closer to home.’
As I say it, I can’t ignore the irony of my recent foray into local casual labour, and get a flashback of myself legging it over a fence and down some back alley. Not exactly a placement through Office Angels.
‘Have you seen Herb Long lately, Mum?’ I ask, barely changing the subject.
‘Well, it’s funny you should ask,’ she says, her expression sharpening. ‘I saw him only yesterday coming out of the bank on Perry Street. It was really quite peculiar.’
‘What was?’ I say, steering a corner of buttered bread from yolk to ketchup to mouth in a single movement.
‘The way he completely ignored me. I know some say he’s a rogue, but he’s also a gentleman, holding doors open and raising his hat, smiling and saying “Good Morning”. Well you know me, I’ll always stop and say hello when people are civil, and no matter what they say, he’s always been very courteous to me.’ She pauses long enough to flip the last crispy rasher onto my plate and return the frying pan to the hob. ‘Then yesterday, it was as if he’d looked straight through me. He must have seen me because I walked right in front of him. He didn’t acknowledge me – no smile, not a word – just kept walking. I was so surprised, I was left standing there like a lemon. And rather than heading back towards Pelham Road to get the bus home, he got into a car that was waiting by the side of the road and it drove off in the opposite direction.’
I sit there trying to get my head around what she’s saying. It doesn’t seem so strange that Herb would get into a car after a visit to the bank, but I have to agree, it seems odd for him to blank her like that.
‘I just hope he’s alright,’ she goes on. ‘Whether he was a scoundrel in his day, I don’t know. Now he’s an old man. I’d pop along and knock on his door to check o
n him if I had the nerve. He’s always been such a private person. I don’t know anyone who’s ever been over the threshold into that house of his. Some say it’s a pigsty.’
‘Mum, you shouldn’t listen to all that gossip.’ I look up from wiping my plate with the last piece of crust. ‘He looked clean and tidy the last time I saw him,’ I add, unintentionally defending a man I supposedly haven’t seen for years, probably sounding a little too knowledgeable in the process.
‘Poor old soul,’ she says, seemingly without hearing me. ‘He always asks after you though. A couple of weeks ago he was very interested in how you were doing, especially when I told him you’d had some bad luck of late.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes. And besides, when was the last time you saw him, Michael?’
‘Oh… um… it’s been a while.’ I shrug and start clearing the table. As if that isn’t uncharacteristic enough, I grab the tea towel when she begins washing up.
If you’d done that more often, maybe Sam wouldn’t have given up on you. While she doesn’t say it, and I doubt she’s even thinking it, the words echo in my head regardless.
‘When you saw Herb a couple of weeks ago,’ I ask, keen to continue a real conversation, ‘did he say he wanted to speak to me?’
‘No, why would he have wanted to do that?’
‘Oh, it’s nothing really,’ I say, polishing an old fork like it’s sterling silver. ‘I got a garbled message on my mobile and couldn’t work out who it was. I thought it sounded like him, only I don’t know how he would have got my number.’
There’s no way Mum would have given it out and not asked me first. And given the opportunity to say if she did, she just shrugs.
After we’ve put everything away, I offer to take her into the town centre to get some shopping she says she needs. Nothing much, only a few bits I’m sure could have waited, but she never passes up the chance of the company and the possibility of seeing one of her friends and showing off her big-shot son. Ironically, when her chance comes to tell Iris or Rita or Joan how successful I am in the City, we’re surrounded by bog rolls. Mum doesn’t mention my recent change of fortune. I play along for the sake of her pride and try hard not to think too much about my latest career direction.
On the way back, she wants to call into one of the elderly ladies in the neighbourhood she keeps a charitable eye on. She takes the jumbo value pack of toilet tissues in with her and I stay in the car by mutual consent. It seems this is one old-timer not in the best state of domestic or personal hygiene.
The diversion means we pass Herb’s on the way home and I glance again at the front of the house. There’s still no sign of life. I help Mum unpack the shopping and decline her offer of lunch. Instead, she sends me off with a box full of emergency rations, in case I should starve before she sees me again.
Feeding Disorder
I’m back in the car, parked around the corner from Herb’s house, trying to decide what to do next. I unlock the glove compartment and take out the envelope with the camera. Maybe I should drop it through the letterbox. All my instincts tell me that would be a bad idea. First, if there is something dodgy on the film, I’d rather put the camera in his hands and not leave it lying around. Second, if what Mum saw the previous day is in any way connected, his house is probably the last place I should leave it. The thought strikes me like a hammer blow: the house may even be being watched. And there I was hanging around the front door for ages earlier. I might as well have had a big cardboard arrow pointing at my head. The third reason sits slightly uncomfortably on my conscience, but I don’t like the idea of giving up the goods without getting paid.
I decide to write a cryptic note I hope won’t incriminate me in the wrong hands. It reads: “Good match away from home last night. Apart from the changing rooms and a spectator too close to the Field! Caught offside but managed to evade the home defender. Thankfully no injury time or penalties. Guess who got the goal and lifted the trophy? Not bad for a fullback! Waiting for transfer news – MF”.
Approaching the front gate, I scan the street. It’s deserted, and I’m satisfied the little two-seater parked within sight of the house is empty. Walking up the path, everything is exactly as it was earlier. This time I only ring the bell once, wait a few seconds and without dwelling to look through any windows, put the note through the letter box and walk away.
Driving home, I can’t get the sense of anxiety to subside. I’m concerned there might only be two explanations for Herb’s absence. The first is that he’s been taken by whoever was trying to blackmail him with the photos. I imagine him, having handed over the cash he was forced to withdraw from the bank yesterday, suffering physical abuse at the hands of violent, ruthless thugs, as a direct consequence of me having taken the camera and their money last night. This is the malignant hypothesis that makes me feel sick to my stomach, not only at the thought of what Herb might then be going through. There’s also the realisation I’ll be their next target. At least I can console myself that there is nothing I could have done differently to help him. That’s where the problem arises, with the benign alternative that at first seems more reassuring. Having accepted it’s perhaps less fanciful to assume that Herb is sitting still and cold in his favourite chair, in a rear room of his house, with a book open on his chest, having expired peacefully from natural causes, I wrestle with the fact I’ve done absolutely nothing to raise the alarm, and here I am just driving away.
I consider calling the local police anonymously and telling them I’ve just witnessed a disturbance at Herb’s address, and that maybe they should go and check on the owner. Problem is, of course, if for whatever reason they had to break in, the first thing they’ll find is my note, which will soon start to look more that a bit odd if there are signs of foul-play. Even if everything’s fine and he seems to have just nipped into town for the day, they might have a rummage around anyway and find all that interesting stuff in the garage. Either way, I’ll have been responsible for tipping them off to my old friend’s lucrative trade in illegal merchandise. Reluctantly, I decide there’s nothing more I can do right now. If I haven’t heard from Herb by mid-afternoon tomorrow, I’ll drive back down again after dark and have a snoop around. For the second time in as many days, I find myself calmly and rationally contemplating breaking into someone’s house.
The further I drive beyond the river, the worse I feel, and once I’m off the motorway, I have to pull in and try phoning Herb again. There’s still no reply and I sit here, staring out of the windscreen for ages. That’s when I decide, enough is enough. I need to talk to someone about this predicament I’m in. I’ll ring Greg. I’ve known him for years. He lives near me, is a man of the world and, as a bookmaker, a good guy to have on-side in a crisis. I’m just hoping he’s free tonight.
‘GB Ra-cing,’ the receptionist sings at me down the line.
‘Hi, can I speak to Greg Bell, please? Tell him it’s Mickey Field.’
‘Put-ting you through,’ is followed by a few seconds of silence.
‘Field-o! How you doing mate?’
‘Yeah good, thanks Dinger. How’s business?’
‘Ticking over, mate, ticking over. You? Still enjoying your time off?’
‘Yeah, not bad. You know, just taking it easy for awhile.’
‘Nice one. Look, I’m up against it a bit mate, so what can I do for you?’
‘Sorry mate, I won’t keep you. I was just wondering if you fancy a beer tonight that was all.’
‘Great idea Mickey-boy. Definitely. Look, I’ll ring round the lads later and see who’s up for it, yeah?’
‘Yeah… that would be… I was just hoping we could…’
‘Yeah, brilliant idea… Hold on mate…’ his voice goes muffled and I realise he’s keeping two conversations going. ‘Yeah, no worries, Mickey. I’ll get the boys onboard and we can give it the full treatment. Can’t remember the last time we all got together.’
‘Yeah… sure. But what I…’
‘
And God knows you could probably do with a serious blow-out, me old mate.’
‘Yeah… but…’
‘And you don’t even have to get up for work tomorrow. Lucky bastard… Anyway, sorry mate. The three-thirty at Lingfield Park’s not looking good. Red-hot favourite’s gonna walk it. You heard it here first – go and put your house on it. Not good for us though. Need to lay off some of our risk. Gotta dash… King’s Head, right? Eight o’clock. Can’t wait. Laters.’
At that the phone goes dead and I sit back and shake my head. Rather than a quiet chat with a trusted mate, tonight’s now going to be a riot.
Assuming they are all up for it, along with Greg there’s Tom, who I’ve also known for years from when the three of us worked together at another firm. And then there are the two guys from my last place, Harvey and Jake, who were always more like friends than colleagues. The four of them know each other pretty well since I introduced them all, and we tend to get together a couple of times a year. It always ends up being a major piss-up and so I like to prepare well for the alcoholic binge.
Before getting home, I think about my usual lads’ night out speciality and wonder if I’ve got all the essential ingredients to make it when I get in. Four slices of bread, overhanging the plate, each with its own slice of ham, are covered in baked beans, topped with a generous layer of grated cheese and the whole thing is finished off for a minute under the grill. All chased down with a large glass of semi-skimmed. Manna! The plan is to load up to the point where I can absorb ten pints of beer; we usually get two rounds in each, and no one ever wants to shirk their turn as the evening wears on. Truth be told, most of us have usually had enough after six. The real art comes from leaving room in the tank for a quarter-pounder with cheese, salad and chilli sauce as we stagger home afterwards.
Mickey Take: When a debt goes bad... Page 5
