by John Harvey
Tom Gilmour sat in the back with me and he kept the journey pretty functional. We were going to take them in and get them booked and then he and I were going to go back to his office and have a nice little talk. Maybe. Or maybe we wouldn’t be in his office. It could be the blank, anonymous room downstairs which they kept for questioning their prime suspects. Far enough away from the enquiry desk to ensure that old ladies who came in to enquire about their missing tabbies didn’t lose all their respect for our wonderful British police.
I didn’t know and looking across at Gilmour’s face sure didn’t help any. Mostly it was stony, impassive—except when it was creased by a heavy scowl. But that was okay.
If you had seen what his face had seen then you would be stony too.
He spent seven hours on a ledge in Upper Brooklyn. The ledge was twelve storeys up and no more than a foot wide. All Tom had to hold on to was the sill of an open window and a few remaining hopes. The girl had no window and no hopes. She stood jammed back against the brickwork of the building, arms spread out wide as though she were waiting to be crucified. It was early evening; it was gathering dark and it was raining. A dull, insistent rain which beat down and down and down. Not that the rain mattered. It wouldn’t have altered things if there had been a heat-wave.
Tom Gilmour squatted on that ledge until he had lost all feeling in his legs; until the arm which held fast to the wood of the ledge was an unmoving thing which he had long forgotten as a part of his body. And all this while he talked and tried to get the girl to talk. Most of the time it was just his voice and the beat of the rain, against the wall and up from the ledge.
Occasionally she would say something: and it wasn’t very nice. It was not very encouraging. She swore at her father, whoever and wherever the bastard was; she swore at her mother, for having opened her legs on that fatal occasion and for opening them at every opportunity ever since; she swore at the son-of-a-bitch who had got her pregnant then gone off and left her, too late to have an abortion, with a life inside that she neither wanted nor needed.
Tom had said what about the child, the child who is alive inside you. And she had said it is for the sake of the child that I am doing this. And she had pushed back with her hands against the wetness of the wall and had simply dived out into the greying air.
She hadn’t waited for them to come for her with the nails.
Tom watched the first fluent movement outwards, then turned his head away before the fall turned into a tumble, a vain flapping; he covered his ears from the scream, pushing his head down against the arm which held his own life fast. Even through the muffle of hand and shoulder he could hear the sickening thump.
That was just one thing: one event in the year Tom Gilmour had spent with the police force in New York. He learned a whole lot and he saw a whole lot. He came home a different man: something was missing from the centre of his body and its place had been taken by something new inside his brain. Something shining, efficient and metallic. Deadly. Maybe in a way Gilmour himself had died out on those streets.
Now he was a faster cop, a harder cop, a cop who carried his gun whenever he could squeeze the authority and who loved to feel the strength of its handle between his two hands. He had seen in New York what a city could become and now he saw in London what a city was becoming. And he didn’t like it. Now he was a better cop.
A stony one. As stony as a dirty, rain-streaked ledge a foot wide and twelve storeys up.
The car pulled in outside West End Central Station and we went inside.
Gilmour took me up the stairs to his office and shut the door behind me. He went over and pulled down the blinds. Then he offered me a seat and when I sat down he kicked it away from under me. I hit the floor with a thump that must have told the guys in the office downstairs to put the earplugs in again. But Tom just stood there looking at me with an expression that was a mixture of contempt and pity.
‘Christ! Mitchell, you are one hell of a creep! When are you going to realise that there isn’t always going to be someone like me around who is going to leap around in the early hours of every goddamn morning bailing you out of the shitty messes you keep falling arse over end straight into?’
He spat into the wastepaper bin. He missed and he rubbed his shoe over the offending phlegm.
Then turned back to me: ‘You see that yellow mess that just coughed out of my gut? Well, that’s you. And you see what I did to that mess? Well, that’s what I’m just liable to do to you.’
I was on the point of asking him what for, but I stopped myself. I thought that given time he would tell me anyway. He did and he didn’t need much time.
‘All the way along you’ve been withholding enough evidence to fill a paper sack and then some. You said that you had no idea who that little creep was whose head was bashed in on your stairs. Well, you knew, Mitchell. You knew and as sure as all hell you went round to his house and you found out what you could—and you got hold of his little red book into the bargain.’
I must have looked surprised for he sat hard on the front of his desk and eased the toe of his shoe into my shoulder. It sure wasn’t comfortable on the floor but I wasn’t about to try to get up and get pushed down by a foot in my face. That wasn’t my kind of luxury.
‘You’re thinking how do I know. I know, Mitchell, because although it had obviously escaped your notice there is a whole goddamn police force in this city and there are more of them than there are of you. So when the police woman was talking to the little girl, after she had gained her confidence with a few sweets and a good heart-to-heart about girlish matters, she found out about the visit. The visit some man had made when she was cleaning her daddy’s car the day her daddy didn’t come home. And when she started to remember, boy, did she remember you good. She could describe you as well as if she’d been your own kid, not that of some dead jerk lying in the mortuary with his head staved in.
‘So that’s how we know for one. For two, we found this in the desk in your office.’
This time I did get up—or try to. Why didn’t I listen to my own warnings just one time? The flat underside of a size ten struck along the side of my face and I hit the filing cabinet hard. Hands dragged me up and when I moved my arm so as to rub my back, one of them hit me across the cheek so that it stung, then went numb.
I was always getting hit, and this day had started off worse than most. First two heavies break into my quiet little residence and try to take me to the cemetery. Then along comes the big bold copper to the rescue and proceeds to take over where they left off. One of these fine days I was going to start hitting back and when I did …
‘Stop feeling sorry for yourself, Mitchell.’
I rubbed my face, trying to encourage a little feeling back into it.
‘Did you have a little thing like a warrant to go looking round my office for little red books?’
‘Don’t crap around with me, Mitchell, and don’t waste my time belly-aching about your legal rights because you forfeited those a long time ago. You forfeited those the first time you put one tiny toe outside the law yourself.’
He looked at me and something rose up in his throat again and this time he hit the bin. It was getting later and he was getting more control over his faculties. I hoped like hell that he didn’t feel impelled to hit me again.
But instead he turned round and went behind his desk. He sat down and took out a half-bottle of scotch and a couple of glasses. Carefully, he poured two small measures: it was still early.
He passed one over to me. I pulled the chair up from the floor and sat down. I took the scotch and it felt good and warm as it went down. He reached over with the bottle and poured me another. That felt good too.
He shrugged: ‘Besides, your office lock was still busted. We just went in and looked around.’
He put the bottle back in the drawer and took out the red notebook. He turned to the page with Howard�
��s name on it and reversed it; he pushed it across the desk so that I could see it. I sensed I was supposed to say something but I didn’t. So he did.
‘We knew already, I guess. When you went up to Nottingham and saw Leake and told him you were off to see Candi Carter’s manager.’ He paused and sipped at his own drink. ‘Funny man, that Leake. Seems he took a liking to you, said you seemed all right. Liked the fact that you went and told him what you were going to do.’
He stared at me over the desk.
‘Of course, that’s what you’re supposed to do anyway. You might try doing it with me a bit more often.’
I nodded and asked, ‘Did Leake say any more?’
Gilmour shook his head, ‘Not much that was of any use. They’re checking out all known acquaintances of Candi Carter’s and hoping for a lead that way. The flat brought them nothing at all: whoever went through that and cleaned it up would make a good housewife. Spring cleaning wasn’t in it! But he didn’t go much on you in that role.’
I asked, ‘What about Howard?’
‘They busted a couple of musicians on the night you went there first. There was a guy in plain clothes watching you watching Howard.’
I said that I had known that.
‘After that it seems that Howard had another visit and Leake guesses it was from you. Whoever it was scared the shit out of him. I guess it was you, too. What did he tell you?’
I hesitated but the numbness in my cheek was only now disappearing and besides I preferred Gilmour when he was handing out scotch rather than punishment. Not that Howard had told me very much that was positive. Just eliminated a few possibilities.
‘Howard didn’t help much, except he convinced me that it wasn’t him that finished Candi. He was fed up with the way she had been using him all right, but he wouldn’t kill her. I got the impression that he was stuck on her.’
Gilmour asked, ‘Did he have any idea who had done it?’
I didn’t want to tell him about John until later that morning: I hoped I would be able to see that person first myself. My questions were more urgent. Then Tom could have him. So I told him part of the truth—which is all most people ever get anyway.
‘She was into drugs pretty heavily and …’
He interrupted: ‘We knew that from the autopsy. Boy, she was so high inside that the doctor nearly went on a trip from just sniffing the samples.’
‘Amphetamines?’
He nodded again. ‘Mostly. How did you know?’
I put it down to intelligent guesswork and went on.
‘Howard said she owed and owed big. He wasn’t prepared to cover for her any more. If you talk again to her recording manager at Dragon he’ll tell you the same story. All the fall guys she had been leaning on and putting the bite into were moving out of the way and letting her do her own falling. And she didn’t like it: she was used to softer landings. She grew to think that was all other people were for: catching her when she fell.’
Neither of us spoke for several minutes. In the smallness of that office we were both left with our own thoughts of girls falling.
Then Tom said: ‘You knew her pretty well.’
I looked back at him and he understood the look. I carried on with my story.
‘Howard reckoned that whoever had sold her the stuff was moving in to take payment. Or else to snuff her out as a warning.’
‘He wasn’t supplying her himself, then?’
I shook my head: it still hurt. ‘Not by the end.’ She wanted more stuff than he could get. Besides …’ I couldn’t stop myself breaking into a yawn. I had forgotten that it was still early and I hadn’t exactly had a restful night’s sleep. I tried again. ‘Besides, he was being edged out of the market.’
Gilmour looked more interested.
‘You told me before about a guy called Jupp who you thought was trying to pull the dope market together and get the really heavy, expensive stuff into the business. Do you think it might have been from one of his contacts that Candi was buying?’
He thought about it but not for very long.
‘Yes, that’s very possible.’
‘Would Leake have had this information, about Jupp and what he was up to?’
Gilmour wasn’t sure and he said so.
I said: ‘Then you might pass it on to him with my compliments. Tell him that it may be that if he finds out who Candi was buying from then he might find a murderer.’
Personally I wasn’t too certain about that, but it sounded convincing. At least Tom said he would pass on the information. But his face didn’t show how convinced he was either.
He said: ‘You’d better go out and get something to eat. You don’t look any too good.’
I didn’t feel it: but the thought of food made me feel a lot worse. But there were things I wanted to do and it was time to do them now. And quickly, before I was beaten to it.
I stood up and thanked Tom for the help and the drink.
As I was on my way through the door he called me back.
‘Scott, I said before that if you can get anything on Jupp or any of his boys we’ll be grateful. But don’t let us know when it’s too late: or it may be too late for you too. You best remember you won’t be playing with punks when you tackle them. That Winston, for instance. He sure is one big black mother!’
I thanked him for the advice and shut the door behind me, I guessed that now he would let up the blinds and let in the light of day.
When I got on to the street the light of day didn’t look too appealing to me. There were places I would rather be than walking the streets at this hour. I would rather be in the warm, in the dark.
I found myself thinking about Jane.
I found myself thinking about Sandy.
I found myself thinking about Vonnie.
I found myself thinking about Candi.
It wasn’t any use: my thoughts were getting colder all the time.
I went home and started my daily round of coffee. When I thought it was a respectable hour for making calls and I guessed that the kidneys would be warming on their silver tray, I phoned Thurley.
I told him I had definite information about his daughter’s whereabouts. There was a long silence in which he must have thought I was speaking from the grave. Then I asked if he had the three hundred there and ready. He said no but he would send John to the bank for it.
His voice was still emptier than usual: he was losing a little of his command, a little of his cool.
‘Are … are you sure you have seen Buffy?’
‘Sure I’m sure.’
‘But where? Is she all right? Can’t you tell me over the phone? Then I can send John round to fetch her.’
Yes, I bet you could, I thought.
I said: ‘Never mind where for now. I’ll tell you all of that when I get there. But take it from me, when I saw her she looked to be in pretty fine shape. And mixing with some very friendly people: very loving.’
I could sense that Thurley didn’t understand what the hell I was rambling on about. Which was just fine. I wanted him to stay as confused as he could. And I wanted him to think that I knew a lot more that he didn’t feel safe about my knowing.
But I thought I had better suggest I wasn’t the only one in the know. I didn’t want to arrive at the Thurley residence and find a repetition of the earlier attempt to gun me down.
So I said, ‘You remember Tom Gilmour at West End Central? Well, I’ve just been taking an early breakfast with him. I told him I was on the way round to see you. He said to be sure to pass on his regards.’
I hung up and got over there as fast as I could.
When I got there the door was open and there was no John to usher me in. Maybe he was still at the bank. Maybe. I found his master out on the terrace.
Thurley was wearing a hacking jacket and a pair of jodphurs. I
didn’t know if he had been riding or was about to. Perhaps he rode into town as shotgun when John fetched the money from the bank. Or perhaps he liked the image. I didn’t like his image: I thought his image stank.
It stank of privilege and hunting foxes so that your dogs could tear their bellies open with their bare teeth—dogs you had kept starved so that the lust for meat drove them to any lengths for their kill. Well, Thurley had a pretty pack of hounds and I thought I had just dealt with two. And dear John, hovering behind the coffee pot, was a third.
But what Thurley really killed with was something much less obvious and more appealing than men with guns. It came in the shape of cylindrical or spheroid pills, or it came as pure white powder. It killed through the mouth or through the vein. And every time it began to kill it brought in money. And if the money stopped coming before the kill had happened then John or someone like him would go round with their gun bulging inside their jacket.
For Thurley did none of this. He never touched the stuff, never even saw it. He just arranged that such and such a shipment be made, met and paid for. Then he sent it to someone like Jupp who sold it on the ready-made market. Except for a small amount that was kept back for special customers. Customers almost as special as Thurley himself. And someone with rather more style took that to its destination. Possibly someone presentable like John. Or more possibly someone respectable like Martin, someone with the ability to move without suspicion.
‘You seem strangely preoccupied this morning, Mr Mitchell.’ Thurley was standing in front of me, offering me a cup of coffee.
I took it and nodded.
‘But you have found Buffy?’
I nodded again, ‘Yes, I’ve seen her. I can tell you where. Do you have the three hundred?’
‘Really, Mr Mitchell, you do seem rather unnaturally concerned about your fee. I thought such matters were normally settled up at the conclusion of a case. In retrospect as it were.’
I looked at him and still didn’t like what I saw; not one inch of fatted flesh, a laundered and scrubbed surface.
‘We’re at the conclusion of the case, all right, Mr Thurley. Don’t you worry about that.’
