by Colin Murray
He nodded to Charlie, who rapped on the door. The door shivered.
We heard someone shuffling about inside and then a muffled and wary, ‘Who is it?’
‘It’s Mr Jackson, Mr Graham,’ Charlie said.
There was a long silence.
‘Why don’t we just huff and puff and blow the door down?’ I said, hoping that Les wouldn’t take the comment personally. ‘It’s what the bad boys would do, if that’s who he thinks we are.’
Les shook his head irritably. ‘Just open up, Phil,’ he said. ‘I’ve brought Tony to see you.’
The door shook a bit more and then swung to and there was Philip Graham.
Unshaven, in grubby vest and pants and with his hair awry and rubbing at sleep-encrusted eyes, he didn’t much look like a matinee idol, more like a scrofulous and unpleasant young man, thin, pale and malicious. Which is, I suppose, what I’d always thought he was.
He stepped back and beckoned us inside. Then he looked quickly out on to the landing and firmly pushed the frail door to when we were in. I don’t know who he thought that was going to keep from getting at him, if that’s what he was afraid of. He was certainly afraid of something.
We stepped straight into the living room. There was the usual stale, young-man smell about the place – feet, sweat, unwashed clothes and bodies – and it was dark and untidy in there.
Home, not-so-sweet home.
It reminded me of the war. And, I was sadly forced to admit, it was just a little bit like my own flat, above the record shop.
‘So,’ I said, keen not to stay in that fetid atmosphere any longer than was necessary, ‘what’s up?’
In the half-light and shadows of the room, the venom in the look he flashed me shone brightly. I thought it was uncalled for.
‘You telling me you don’t know?’ he said.
‘Er, yes,’ I said, ‘I’m telling you that I don’t know. If I knew, I wouldn’t have to ask, would I?’
‘Can we have a light on? Or draw the curtains?’ Les said. ‘This place is like a bloody tomb. And an open window wouldn’t hurt. It smells like something died in here, weeks ago.’
Charlie pulled the curtains to one side and forced the sash window up.
The light didn’t improve noticeably, but some cool, sooty air sneaked in and disturbed the ambiance a little.
I looked out of the window at the higgledy-piggledy rooftops of west London while I waited for Philip Graham to talk. There were a few gaps in the roofline here, but not as many as in the East End. The light was the colour of a dirty net curtain. I thought of the blue sky of Paris and felt a brief but overwhelming spasm of regret. I wasn’t sure what for.
I turned away from the gloom of a London morning, back to the gloom of a seedy flat in west London.
Les had lit a cigar. It wasn’t quite of Churchillian stature, but it was heading in that direction. Charlie was lighting a Woodbine for Philip Graham. Graham was looking worried and furtive. I glared at him unsympathetically.
‘Well?’ I said. ‘What’s the story?’
He drew nervously on the cigarette, then blew smoke out through his nose. ‘Last night,’ he said and then stopped.
I sighed. ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘last night . . .’
And then it all came out in a breathless rush.
The gist of it was that he’d gone slumming again and had visited the Frighted Horse way after hours. It was the usual lock-in scenario, and he’d met up with Del, one of his ‘friends’ from Thursday night, and then Ricky and Billy had turned up. Billy had seen Lee (‘that piano-playing bloke we had the run-in with’), and Del and Billy had decided on a pre-emptive strike. They were only gone about five minutes and came back, grinning and full of it. Apparently, Lee’d pulled a blade on them, but Billy had wielded his little cosh and they’d given him a bit of a seeing-to and he’d collapsed like a soggy newspaper. They’d left him in a crummy alley round the back of the pub. Then Ricky had handed them some envelopes and sent them off to make their deliveries. And they hadn’t come back.
I shrugged. ‘So what?’ I said. ‘They probably went to a club.’
‘No,’ he said grimly. ‘They were supposed to come back. But they couldn’t. When Ricky and me went out, we found them. Lying in the alley they’d left your mate, the pianist, in. They’d both been knifed.’
‘Dead?’ I said.
‘Don’t know,’ he said. ‘Ricky and me ran for it. But I suppose so.’ He paused. ‘They didn’t look well.’
Neither did he, but I didn’t say anything. As for the other two, I didn’t feel anything much tugging at my heart strings. A lot of good, decent young men died in the war. These may well have been stupid, pointless deaths, but, somehow, I couldn’t think of Del and Billy – short though my acquaintance with them had been – as good or decent. But I was worried for Lee. Well, if I was honest, I was worried for Miss Summers.
‘And you think . . .?’ I said.
He looked at me like I was an idiot. ‘I think that your mate Lee did for them and you know all about it,’ he said.
I shrugged again. ‘Why would you think that?’ I said as mildly as I could manage.
Judging by the look that crossed his face, either I’d been a lot more aggressive than I’d intended or he really was a shrinking violet.
‘He was there,’ he said. ‘Waving this bloody great knife. Why do you think we ran?’
‘Are you sure it was him?’ I said. ‘They’d dealt with him a couple of times before without much difficulty. What would have been different this time?’
He looked at me warily, not saying anything. The accusation was in the look.
‘For the record,’ I said, turning to Les and Charlie, ‘I wasn’t there. And knives are not my style.’ But I was thinking back to what Lee had said to me the night before. It had sounded suspiciously like knives might be his style.
‘No one’s accusing you of anything, Tony,’ Les said.
‘I rather think they are,’ I said.
It wasn’t just Philip Graham. The Mountjoys obviously thought I was involved too. And they, equally obviously, thought that I was connected, and that a corrective punishment was therefore not advisable. My thoughts strayed to Big Malc and his boss. I wondered who that might be.
‘What are you involved in, Philip?’ I said.
‘Nothing,’ he said.
‘Oh, come on. Why didn’t you call the police?’
‘Ricky didn’t think it was a good idea,’ he said, looking past me.
‘And why do you think that was?’ I said. ‘What do you think was in those envelopes that Ricky Mountjoy was doling out? Fairy dust?’
He blushed and stared down at the floor. He looked like an overgrown schoolboy caught out in a lie.
‘What’s this, Tony? What are you saying? What’s he mixed up in?’ Les looked genuinely perplexed and more than a bit angry.
‘I didn’t know, Mr Jackson.’ Young Philip was still staring guiltily at the floor, and he was mumbling. ‘Not really. Ricky had some contacts, but he didn’t have any cash. He said he’d double my money in a week. It was a business opportunity.’
‘Give me strength,’ Les said. ‘Tony, can you sort it?’
‘It’s what you pay me for, Les,’ I said. I nodded at Philip Graham. ‘He ought to take a holiday. Somewhere bracing, perhaps.’
‘He’s got a film to finish,’ Les said.
‘All right. A strict curfew, and put him in a quiet hotel. Get him a minder. Charlie could do it. For a week. I’ll see what I can do.’
Charlie didn’t look too thrilled, and neither did Philip Graham.
‘What?’ Philip Graham looked up pugnaciously. ‘What’s this all about? All you’ve got to do is warn your mate off and everything’s fine.’
We ignored that. Though there was an outside chance he was right.
‘Get washed, shaved and dressed,’ Les said to him, ‘and where’s your phone?’
He shook his head. ‘There’s a phone box on the corner.�
��
‘Charlie,’ Les said, ‘phone the office. Tell whoever’s there to sort out a hotel room for this one.’
‘I don’t think I can mind him, Mr Jackson,’ Charlie said.
‘It’s all right, Charlie,’ Les said, ‘he won’t need minding.’
Charlie nodded and left.
Philip Graham slouched off to his bedroom and Les wearily rubbed at his eyes.
‘What is with youngsters these days, Tony?’ He shook his head sadly. ‘Remember the cosh boys a few years back? In the big smog?’
I remembered a cosh boy from a few hours back. The bump on my head throbbed at the memory. ‘Wasn’t that a newspaper thing, Les?’ I said. ‘I didn’t bump into any.’
He shook his head again. ‘Nor did I, but there were a lot of reports, Tony. And now there are all these Teddy boys.’
‘I’m sure I’d have been in just as much trouble. If I hadn’t had a war to fight.’
‘That’s the thing. We had a war to fight. Put ’em in the army, I say.’
‘We do, Les,’ I said. I left it at that. Reminding him that he hadn’t actually done any fighting seemed a little harsh.
He stared moodily out of the window, chewing listlessly on his cigar, listening to the muffled sounds of Philip Graham splashing water about and rummaging in drawers for clothes. Graham coughed a lot for a young man.
Les had a lot on his mind, and most of it had nothing to do with his young star. He would be content if I could keep Philip Graham and Hoxton Films out of the papers. That could probably be managed if the little toerag stayed out of harm’s way. And if the old bill didn’t sniff him out and decide to feel his collar. But I couldn’t see Ricky grassing him up. Unless he used him as an alibi. Of course, a lot was hanging on whether Graham had told me the truth about what had happened. I supposed that he might have done.
As we waited for the young heart-throb to emerge, I found myself remembering something someone had once said: ‘No, no, no: game is hung; men are hanged.’
EIGHT
It was close to ten when Charlie stopped the Rolls in Frith Street. I nodded to Les and told him I’d be in touch, and then I thanked Charlie for the ride and slid along the seat and stepped out into a cool, overcast September morning in a seedy and hung-over Soho. I didn’t have anything to say to a sheepish Philip Graham.
I waited until the big car had swished away before looking for another cup of coffee. I didn’t want Les thinking that I was swinging the lead.
As it chanced, Charlie had dropped me outside the Moka.
The dumpy, middle-aged waitress looked up, reluctantly abandoned her cigarette and the Daily Mirror she was flicking her way through, and clumped over to me. She had a number of things in common with Enzo: a nationality, a similarly gracious manner and a shiny, gurgling coffee machine. The Moka claimed that their machine was the first in the country, and they had certainly flown Gina Lollobrigida in to declare it open a few years before. They probably had a photograph of the momentous event on the wall somewhere, but I couldn’t see it.
Enzo didn’t openly dispute anything, just sniffed dismissively if anyone mentioned the Moka in his presence.
The coffee was better than Enzo’s, and I sipped it gratefully. A late night and a very early morning awakening had left me feeling decidedly dozy. I yawned mightily.
‘Someone needs his beauty sleep,’ a soft, low voice I recognized whispered out of the deep shadows at the back of the coffee bar.
I stood up. ‘It’s a while since beauty sleep could do anything for me, Miss Summers,’ I said.
‘Join me? Please,’ she said. ‘And it’s Jeannie.’ She looked at me thoughtfully as I sat down opposite her. ‘I don’t think that’s true,’ she said and smiled a little enigmatically. ‘Everyone needs their beauty sleep.’ She paused, and her lips quivered into that little smile again. ‘Though you probably need it less than most.’
‘Because it can’t do anything for me?’ I said.
She shook her head. ‘No, that’s not what I meant.’
I wasn’t sure if she was teasing me or not. She certainly wasn’t flirting with me.
She looked tired, which probably explained her concerns about beauty sleep and her decision to sit away from the light – such as it was – of the windows.
I sipped some coffee. ‘Where’s Lee?’ I said.
The large, black handbag lay on the bench next to her, and she reached down and fussed with it, eventually taking out a cigarette case and a box of matches. She lit a cigarette and puffed on it, then carefully put everything back in the bag and replaced the bag. Then she looked at me bleakly.
‘I wish I knew,’ she said. ‘But I don’t.’ She put the cigarette into the ashtray and watched it smoulder away. She really wasn’t a smoker. ‘He’s been even more unpredictable ever since we got to London. He told me he was just going out for a breath of air after that fiasco of a set. He knew we hadn’t been good, and he didn’t want to talk about it.’ She looked at the thin, greyish smoke curling up from the cigarette towards the ceiling. ‘So I waited for him. I slept in the dressing room. But he didn’t come back.’ She sat up straight and looked at me fiercely. ‘I’m really worried about him.’ She paused before adding, ‘Tony.’
‘Did he say anything, before he went out?’ I said.
She gave a little shake of her head. Her hair waved gently in a faint echo of the gesture. It wasn’t firmly lacquered in place. ‘Just that he needed a breath of air.’
‘Did he pick anything up to take with him? I said.
‘Like what?’ she said.
I shook my head. ‘I don’t know,’ I said airily. ‘Just anything.’
She looked at me suspiciously. ‘Do you know something?’ she said.
I didn’t want to lie to her, but I didn’t want to tell her what I knew either, so I shrugged and shook my head in a dismissive, non-committal sort of way. ‘He may be back at your digs,’ I said. ‘Perhaps you should go back and wait there.’
‘We’re supposed to be going to Glasgow tomorrow,’ she said and laughed. ‘He pronounces it to rhyme with glass cow. It always makes me laugh.’
She picked the cigarette up from the ashtray. It was half burnt down, and a long line of ash drooped from its end and fell on to the table. She angrily mashed the cigarette out and swept the ash to the floor. Then she looked directly at me again, and I saw tears in her eyes.
‘I’m lost without him,’ she said.
‘I could get you a cab,’ I said, ‘to take you back to your digs. And I could ask around . . . I can’t promise anything . . .’
She fumbled in her bag again, and this time she took out a little handkerchief. She dabbed at her eyes. ‘I’ll take you up on the cab,’ she said, ‘but I can’t possibly ask you to spend your Saturday chasing after Lee.’
‘It’s not a problem,’ I said. ‘I’ve things to do around here anyway.’
She reached across the table and put her hand on mine. ‘That’s very kind of you,’ she said. Again there was a little pause before she added, ‘Tony.’
After settling Jeannie Summers in a taxi and sending it on its rumbling way to her digs, I strolled past Pete’s Place. Well, I walked past the Acropolis restaurant and peered down the greasy steps at the dark and decidedly smelly basement that housed the club.
A louche figure in a crumpled brown suit was hunched over a cigarette at the foot of the steps. He looked up at me, took one last drag on the fag cupped in his hand and then tossed it aside. It glowed weakly on the gloomy paving stones for a few seconds.
Peter Baxter’s tired face was nearly as crumpled as his suit. He nodded at me and wearily climbed the steps.
‘You don’t look like you got to bed,’ I said.
‘Just thinking about it,’ he said. ‘I’ll manage a few hours before tonight’s show.’ He paused. ‘Have to find a replacement act first though. That junkie piano player is a liability. But she won’t perform without him. And he’s disappeared again.’
I no
dded but said nothing.
‘Still, there’s always someone who needs a spot. Not that they’re anywhere near as good as her . . .’
I nodded again.
‘She’s pissing her career away on that no-hoper,’ he said.
I shrugged. ‘She loves him, I suppose,’ I said.
‘Love, schmove,’ he said and took a step back down before turning to me again. ‘By the way, watch yourself round the corner. There’s a swarm of rozzers about. Something’s up, but I don’t know what.’
‘Thanks,’ I said, ‘I’ll avoid them, if I can.’
He nodded and trod carefully down the steps.
He was right. The police were out in force by the Frighted Horse. Most of them were just standing around, stopping honest citizens like myself from going about their business, but three or four in plain clothes were rummaging around in an alleyway thirty yards or so from the pub. I recognized one of them, and unfortunately, before I could turn and bolt, he recognized me.
Inspector Rose was wearing a very becoming lime-green bow-tie that went well with his brown Harris Tweed jacket, natty brown trilby and fawn twill trousers. He was, in short, as dapper as ever. He clutched the bowl of his old pipe in his right hand. He pointed at me with the chewed stem. ‘Tony,’ he said, strolling over to me, past the uniforms, ‘fancy seeing you here.’
‘Just passing, Inspector,’ I said.
‘Really?’ he said.
‘Really,’ I said.
‘So you can’t tell me anything about what happened here last night, then?’ he said.
Rather than openly lie, I just shook my head.
‘Come on, Tony,’ he said, ‘let’s have a cup of tea and you can tell me all you know.’ He put a hand on my shoulder and steered me back towards Frith Street. ‘You do have an uncanny knack for turning up at murder scenes, don’t you?’
