Playing with Fire

by Patricia Hall

  ‘I’ve been following up some incidents that look like somebody’s trying to get a protection racket going again,’ he said. ‘Could be part of the same thing and Stevenson made the mistake of resisting. He fancies himself as a bit of a peacemaker if there’s trouble in here. There are a few people who reckon they can have a bit of fun at the customer’s expense occasionally. Stevenson’s a big lad and knows how to handle himself. Intruders don’t generally hang around long. But he could have picked the wrong people this time. Whoever’s behind the protection racket drove a car into an Italian cafe yesterday morning because the owner didn’t want to pay “insurance”. And nobody’s talking about it. In fact, nobody’s talking about anything much, as it goes. Everybody’s very edgy.’

  DI Watson looked at Barnard for a long moment and then nodded reluctantly. ‘Maybe you can make yourself useful then,’ he said. ‘Get out among your contacts, your poofs and your toms, and find out exactly what’s going on. If whoever half killed the barman is involved in anything else I want statements, descriptions of anyone who’s been making threats, every last detail. Don’t take no for an answer from anybody, male, female or any other beggar – or bugger – in between. I’ll see you back at the nick about four and we’ll see what you’ve got. It looks as if these shirt-lifters are going to be made legal before we know where we are, so we’d better show willing at least.’

  ‘Guv,’ Barnard said and spun away from him on his heel to conceal the anger in his eyes. His younger brother had killed himself as a teenager long before any change in the law had been dreamed of and he had regretted almost every day since then that he had never guessed what his secret was and never helped him. It was not something he had ever talked about at work and never would, but Kate knew and, to his surprise, she understood.

  He did not have far to go to start his inquiries. As he pushed his way through the watching bystanders outside the pub – officially the Grenadier but generally known simply as the queer pub or quite often by much less acceptable names – his arm was seized and he found himself pulled into an alleyway on the other side of the road.

  ‘I thought you might not be far away, Vincent,’ he said to Vince Beaufort, who did not look as though he had been to bed the previous night. His eyes were sunken, his make-up smeared and his clothes rumpled. ‘Late night, was it?’

  ‘None of your business,’ Beaufort said. ‘So what happened here? Your bobbies won’t tell me anything.’

  ‘I don’t suppose they will,’ Barnard said. ‘DI Watson’s in charge. The only place he wants to see you is behind bars, along with all your friends and acquaintances, so watch out. So far, he has this down as a lovers’ tiff that went too far. Does that make any sort of sense to you?’

  Beaufort shook his head. ‘If it’s Len you’re talking about, the barman? No, he’s got a long-term partner,’ he said. ‘I know all you straight men think we sleep with someone new every night, but that’s not always true. Not everyone plays the field and he didn’t.’

  ‘So someone has to help me follow up the other possibility,’ Barnard said.

  ‘Which is?’ Beaufort said.

  ‘It’s down to whoever is behind the thugs who are trying to get a protection racket going again.’

  Vincent shuddered histrionically and said nothing.

  ‘Someone must know,’ Barnard said. ‘My boss thinks it must be Ray Robertson, which is not that unlikely, I suppose. Before he got into his flamboyant phase with the boxing charities he wasn’t averse to milking the local pubs and clubs.’

  ‘Most people think Mr Robertson’s abroad somewhere. You hardly ever hear his name mentioned these days. There are new people around now, more violent people, and no one seems to know who they are or where they came from.’

  ‘Cockneys, are they? Or Italians from round Clerkenwell branching out? They’re a vicious lot if they’re not running your local shop. Or the Maltese trying to expand into Ray Robertson’s old territory?’

  Beaufort shrugged again. ‘Any one of those,’ he said. ‘Could be. But rougher and tougher than when the Maltese and Mr Robertson’s lot carved it up between them. This lot look like they enjoy the violence. They do it for fun. People are scared, Flash, really scared.’

  ‘Keep your eyes open for me, Vince,’ Barnard said quietly.

  Beaufort glanced around the still-watching crowd before turning his back on them and dropping his voice to a whisper. ‘I told you, there’s one bloke who hangs about, dark fellow, quite a dish to look at, a bit Spanish looking. I’ve no idea who he is but he’s definitely on the scene quite often, not doing a lot, just watching. I could fancy him but he has a chilly look in his eyes and he definitely isn’t one of us.’

  ‘You haven’t got any idea of a name?’

  ‘’Fraid not, and I’m not going to try to find out either,’ Beaufort said. ‘This feller’s not one you’d want to cross. There’s something bad going on, you can be sure of that, and I’d put money on him being at the heart of it.’

  ‘OK,’ Barnard said. ‘Keep in touch, yes?’

  ‘All right,’ Vince said, and he tried to sidle unobtrusively away down the alley behind them, breaking into a trot before he had gone more than a couple of hundred yards and disappearing round a corner as if he had never been there at all.

  Kate O’Donnell ordered a sandwich and a cappuccino at the Blue Lagoon, which was where she often met Harry Barnard for lunch, but today the sergeant had cried off, claiming he was too busy to take a lunch break. She was trying to work out the best time to phone Dave Donovan in Liverpool to pass on what had happened to Marie Collins with her agent, although she knew that what she had learned would not please Dave much or help him track her down. The fact that Jack Mansfield claimed to have passed her songs to a record company might encourage her boyfriend slightly but the fact that they had not wanted to produce them would be a blow, and the fact that Marie had not come back to talk to Mansfield at all would only pile the pressure on. She pulled the list of possible addresses she had checked against the A–Z from her bag and decided that she was thrown back on that as the only strand of information she could follow up and that Harry was undoubtedly right when he said it would be like looking for the proverbial needle. Even knowing Marie’s new stage name, which she might be using, it was likely to be a thankless task. And if she was really trying to dump Dave she might have simply made the address up.

  She sighed, took another bite of her chicken sandwich and was aware that someone was hovering above her with a loaded plate in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other and an inquiring expression on his face.

  ‘D’you mind if I sit here?’ a man asked with an uncertain smile. ‘It’s a bit full now.’

  ‘Feel free,’ she said, glancing around the cafe’s bustling lunchtime crowds. ‘I’ll be going in a minute.’

  ‘Can I get you another coffee?’ he asked. ‘If you’ve got time, that is?’

  Kate focused on the man hesitating above her and decided that the tall, dark stranger with hair a few inches longer than many bosses would find acceptable might be a welcome distraction from her slightly desiccated lunch and the absence of Harry, who had seemed unusually worried that morning, answering an early phone call and gulping down no more than a strong coffee for breakfast.

  ‘A quick one,’ she said. ‘Cappuccino. Why not?’ Leaving his own lunch on her table, the man went back to the counter to join the queue again.

  ‘You look a bit glum,’ he said as he put the coffee in front of her and slid into the chair opposite. ‘Do you always have lunch by yourself?’

  ‘Not often,’ Kate said. ‘My boyfriend’s busy today.’ She thought it was worth putting down a marker in case he thought she was available for more than a casual chat.

  ‘Ah,’ the man said. ‘That’s a shame. I’m Bob by the way.’

  ‘Kate,’ she said, feeling exposed and trying hard to sound neutral.

  ‘And with that accent you’re not from these parts, are you? So where’s home?’
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  ‘Liverpool,’ she said defensively.

  ‘Ah,’ he said again, not hiding his scepticism. ‘Of course. I thought it might be Glasgow. But I suppose you lived next door to John Lennon, did you, when you were a little girl?’

  ‘I went to the same college as he did, actually,’ Kate said firmly. ‘It’s my one claim to fame.’

  ‘You’re kidding?’ Bob came back, looking slightly stunned.

  ‘No, I’m not. He wasn’t my best mate or anything, but I knew him and Cynthia, his wife, when we were all students.’

  ‘So are you a musician too?’ Bob asked, still looking sceptical.

  Kate shook her head. ‘No, it was the college of art and I was doing photography. I can’t remember what he was supposed to be doing: you could say he wasn’t a very studious student but he could draw. Funny pictures too. He was well known for it. But after that the band went off to Germany and played in clubs in Hamburg. I didn’t see him again for years, until he came back in a group to play in the Cavern Club and make their name.’

  ‘Well, well, that’s amazing. They certainly put Liverpool on the map, didn’t they? No one in London had a clue what was going on up there until they burst on the scene and the girls went crazy.’

  ‘It had been going on in Liverpool for years,’ she said.

  ‘No way?’

  Kate finished her sandwich and the coffee he had bought her and pulled her jacket over her shoulders. ‘I must get back to work,’ she said.

  ‘So did you get a job as a photographer?’ Bob asked quickly, and it was clear that he wanted to prolong the conversation. ‘That’s quite unusual for a girl, isn’t it?’

  ‘Not unheard of these days,’ she said sharply. ‘This is the sixties, not the thirties.’

  ‘Oops, sorry,’ he said. ‘I suppose you specialize, do you? Lots of babies and small children maybe, little dogs and cats for birthday cards? That sort of thing.’

  ‘Not exactly,’ she said, not hiding her irritation. ‘I work for an agency for magazines and newspapers.’

  ‘Saving the babies and small children for when you get married then, are you? When you give up work?’

  Kate looked at him stonily, wondering if he was deliberately trying to provoke. She stood up and pushed her chair hard underneath the table, destabilizing his coffee so that it filled its saucer.

  ‘There was some sort of happening going on in a pub round the corner this morning, lots of police around,’ he said quickly. ‘Is that the sort of thing you take pictures of then?’

  ‘I don’t know what was going on there,’ Kate said. ‘I didn’t notice anything unusual and I don’t usually do news pictures. But why do you think I’d want to give up work anyway? I enjoy what I do. I worked hard to qualify for it.’

  ‘Sorry, sorry, I’m sure you did,’ he said. ‘I can see why Liverpool’s got the reputation it’s got, what with you and Cilla Black both. A bit spiky. I just hope your boyfriend can handle it. What does he do?’

  On the point of answering as casually as the question had been asked, she suddenly felt very cold and shivered slightly. ‘This and that, you know what Soho’s like,’ she said and pushed through the tables, heading for the door as quickly as she could. What had seemed like a chance encounter suddenly did not seem quite like that any more. She made her way slowly back towards the Ken Fellows Agency and was not too surprised to see Harry Barnard himself waiting for her by the door, leaning against the doorpost with his hat pushed back and a cigarette in hand. She was surprised at how pleased she was to see him and offered her cheek for a quick kiss.

  ‘Sorry I couldn’t make it for lunch,’ he said. ‘There’s been an attack on the barman at the queer pub and this one is definitely not an accident – it’s attempted murder by the look of it and the pub’s been trashed. It’s all getting very heavy, so there’s a major panic on. I’m just heading to Casualty to see if he’s come round yet. He was unconscious when he was taken in. I’ll probably be late back tonight. DI Fred Watson’s in charge and he doesn’t like me much. He’ll pick my brains, keep me pinned down as long as he can and take the credit, I expect.’

  Kate hesitated for a moment and then told herself that Harry would not thank her for presenting him with more anxiety just now. ‘I may go and check one or two more of those addresses for Dave tonight and then see if I can get him by phone, tell him what’s going on,’ she said. ‘And see if I can track down the bass player he thought might help. Kevin Dunne, he’s called. Dave and his girlfriend both knew him before he came down here to join the Rainmen.’

  ‘Jason Destry’s group?’

  ‘That’s right. They’re doing very well at the moment,’ Kate said. ‘Not quite the Beatles but I’m sure that’s where they’d like to go. I don’t think I ever met Kevin Dunne back home, though, but he might have some idea where Dave’s Marie is. It’s a small world, the music business, especially around Liverpool. Everyone knows everyone else up there and a lot of them stick together when they come to London.’

  ‘There’s so much going on at the moment. What I need is just a hint that it wasn’t an accident. You can ask your bass player if he was at the club too, but it would be a bit of a long shot. I still reckon you’re wasting your time trying to find Marie,’ he said. ‘Anyway, good luck. I’ll see you later, Katie. Take care.’

  She watched him push through the lunchtime crowds towards Oxford Street and the Middlesex Hospital and wondered if she had been imagining an unusual interest in Harry Barnard from Bob, the casual customer looking for an empty seat who had chatted her up in the Blue Lagoon. Wasn’t it much more likely that the good-looking, dark-haired man had sat at her table because he fancied her, not from any more ulterior motive? Perhaps she shouldn’t underestimate her own charms, she thought wryly. But she was sure that she was not being completely paranoid to think that once she and Barnard had crossed the path of the secret state they might try to forget but they would probably never be forgotten. She shivered again before pushing open the office door and climbing the narrow wooden stairs to the photographers’ room on the first floor and dropping into her chair, still feeling a worm of anxiety in her own stomach. She thought she had made a new life well away from Liverpool, but more and more the waters of the Mersey seemed to be seeping back to lap around her ankles in unpredictable and slightly threatening ways.

  SIX

  Realizing by now that groups had managers and even if musicians were not always available at the end of a phone line their manager almost certainly would be, Kate called Jack Mansfield that afternoon and asked him if he knew who the Rainbirds’ manager was.

  ‘What do you want to know that for?’ he asked aggressively.

  ‘Someone I knew in Liverpool has just gone to work with them,’ she said, stretching the truth only a little.

  ‘I heard they’d taken on another Scouser,’ Mansfield said, sounding as if he was describing some particularly unpleasant infectious disease. ‘A bass player. You haven’t tracked down Ellie Fox, have you? I got a flicker of interest in her reel in the end.’

  ‘No, her boyfriend’s coming to London, though. You might find him on your doorstep in the next couple of days. He seems to think you’re to blame for the girl dumping him.’

  ‘I can do without that sort of hassle,’ Mansfield said. ‘I tell all my boys and girls I’m not in charge of their love lives or their other tastes in leisure activities.’

  ‘So where can I contact the Rainbirds?’ Kate asked. ‘They’re not shacked up in some country mansion miles from anywhere, are they? Are they that successful already?’

  ‘They’ve certainly shot up the charts lately,’ Mansfield said, a fact which clearly irritated him. ‘I did read somewhere that Jason was looking for a house out of town. That’s what all the lads who’ve done well seem to be doing.’ He riffled through the address file which was almost buried on his desk and repeated the details of their manager down the phone to her.

  His offices seemed to be located on the north side of Oxfo
rd Street in an area devoted more to restaurants than the music business, although Kate was not sure whether that was a sign of higher status than Denmark Street or lower. When she walked through the shopping crowds into Charlotte Street the building did not look much different from the one where Mansfield had his agency, although when she presented herself at the reception desk it struck her as a more efficient operation, cleaner, tidier and better cared for.

  ‘Well, I can’t go handing out band members’ addresses and phone numbers to just anyone who walks in off the street,’ the girl behind the desk said officiously. ‘Their last single did really well and they’re hoping the new one will do even better. If that happens we’ll soon be getting hysterical young girls chasing round after Jason with their knickers in a twist. Maybe not for Kevin, though, as he’s not been in the band long. I don’t think many of the fans have cottoned on to him yet, though he’s quite dishy, isn’t he?’

  ‘I knew him in Liverpool,’ Kate said quickly. ‘I’ve known him for years …’ she said, pushing the truth to its outer limits.

  ‘Yes, I can tell that from your accent,’ the receptionist said, unimpressed. ‘I thought you must be foreign or something.’

  Kate had to take a deep breath before she could speak again. ‘Do you think you could pass a message to Kevin for me? If I give you a phone number? Then it’s up to him if he wants to contact me.’

  ‘I suppose that would be all right,’ she said without any enthusiasm. ‘Give me the details and I’ll pass them on next time I see the band. Though I don’t know when that will be. They’ve been working all hours on the new recordings. And Jason’s bought himself a new house somewhere in the country so I guess they’ll be going down there for the weekend. It’s got a swimming pool …’ She stopped, realizing that she had perhaps gone over the top. ‘Well, I don’t know if it’s heated. It’s getting a bit chilly for it now if not.’

  By the middle of the afternoon, Sergeant Barnard felt as if he had worn the leather off the soles of his shoes without much result. He had trawled the shops and bars, cafes and restaurants, bookshops from legitimate – very few, to very dodgy – very many, trying to measure the extent of the harassment which, eyes turning away and lips pursed told him clearly enough what was going on but about which no one would utter a word. Neither cajoling nor bullying nor even modest bribery opened mouths today, as they usually did, though apart from the trashing of the Grenadier and the assault on the barman, there was no sign of overt violence on anyone else’s premises today or on the street. But the mood was sullen, as if the whole of Soho was holding its breath waiting for something else to happen. DI Fred Watson was not impressed by the lack of progress, and when Barnard reported back to the nick he sent him straight back out on to the streets again to keep on asking questions they both knew by now he was not likely to get answers to.