Flashpoint

by Michael Gilbert

  Barming had levered himself off the edge of the table and was advancing on Jonas.

  “–for seeing that justice is done,” concluded Jonas defiantly.

  Sam Barming said, “You b-bastard. You f-f-fucking bastard.” He was beyond anger. He was at the boiling point of rage where words shot out, tripping over each other, bile and spittle mixed. “Coming here – asking me – me, Sam Barming, to help you. You – you’ve got a f-f-fucking nerve.”

  Jonas had got up too. He was not a coward, but there was something appalling about the bubbling fury of this wreck of what had once been a fine man.

  “You’re a lump – a lump of shit. You’ve never done a real day’s work in your life, have you? Have you? Go on. Tell me. The only time you get your hands dirty is when you wipe your arse. Talking to me about my duty – my mates. You make me sick. Get out. Get out.” He jabbed with his stick on the floor as Jonas backed away. “If I had that paper you want – if you offered me a million pounds for it, I’d burn it in front of your bloody eyes, mate.”

  Jonas was in the hall by now. Barming did not follow him. He started to laugh, and the laugh was more unnerving than the storm which had gone before.

  The front door was still open. As Jonas went out he noticed the men. There were a dozen of them, standing round his car.

  He walked slowly down the path, fumbling for the car keys in his pocket with a hand which he tried to keep from shaking. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Barming, standing at the window of the sitting-room, watching him. The men made no move. Like Barming, they seemed to be waiting on events.

  There was something wrong with the car. It took Jonas a few seconds to realize what it was. Then he saw that all the tyres were flat.

  Jonas stared at them. One of the men laughed. Jonas whirled round, and said, “Did you do this?”

  The man said, “Who, me?”

  “Don’t you pick on Herbert,” said a tall man with a broken nose. “He’s daft, anyway.”

  “That’s right,” said Herbert. “I’m not responsible for my actions. So watch it.”

  “You’ll have to pump those flats up, won’t you,” said the tall man. “Always supposing you brought a pump with you, that is.”

  Jonas walked round in silence to the back of the car. He unlocked the boot and found the hand pump. No one tried to stop him. No one said anything. He could feel their hatred. It was not hot, like Sam Barming. It was controlled and cold.

  As he stooped to fix the pump to the first of the tyres there was a slight shuffle of sound behind him. The kick, delivered with a heavy boot, landed just below the base of his spine, and pitched him forward against the body of the car.

  The pain and the shock waves which followed it nearly blacked him out. He had one thought in his head. The men were going to kill him. In a blind instinct of self-preservation he rolled up against the wheel of the car. He had no idea how long he lay there. It might have been seconds, it might have been whole minutes. All he knew was that no one was touching him.

  He put up a hand to wipe away the blood which was running in a steady stream from the gash in his forehead.

  Someone was saying something, and he thought that it was a voice he recognized.

  He got his free hand on to the ground and pushed himself into a sitting position. No one was looking at him.

  A second car, a big dark blue saloon, coming in the other direction, had drawn up almost level with the bonnet of his car and the men were clustering round it, listening to the man who had climbed out. As his eyes started to focus again he saw that it was Will Dylan.

  He heard scraps of talk. “Won’t do me any good. Won’t do you any good. Get those tyres blown up, and put the car off the road. I’ll take him with me.”

  “Tell him not to come back, Will,” said a voice. “He might not be so lucky next time.”

  This brought a laugh. The men seemed suddenly remarkably good-tempered.

  The blue car pulled forward beside Jonas. A hand came down, caught him by the arm, and pulled him up. The movement caused a pain in his back that made him cry out.

  “He’s saying thank you,” said the voice that had spoken before. Jonas could locate the speaker now. It was the man with the broken nose. “Thank you for a Todmoor welcome.”

  As Dylan helped him into the front seat of the car, the men stared at him with no more hostility than children for a guy they have hoisted on to a bonfire.

  “You’d better use this towel to clean your face up,” said Dylan. He had climbed into the driver’s seat.

  “My car,” said Jonas. The words came out like a croak.

  “What about it?”

  “Not mine. I hired it. Phillips in Sheffield.”

  “That’s all right. There’s a garage in Hathersage. We’ll stop there and get them to pick it up. I thought so. Here it comes.”

  There was a smack of heavy raindrops on the roof of the car and the windscreen was suddenly veiled with water. Dylan switched on his windscreen wipers and his headlights and drove steadily into the downpour.

  The drumming of rain on the roof made all conversation impossible and for this small mercy Jonas was thankful.

  11

  On that Monday morning, at about the time that Jonas’ train was drawing into Sheffield Central Station, Mr Stukely arrived in Wimbledon. A man of leisure, one would have said, with a little business to attend to, but no urgency about it.

  He paid visits to both the banks, the London and Home Counties, and the Investors and Suburban, which had offices in or near Coalporter Street. He seemed to be expected, for in each of them he had a short talk with the manager. After that he refreshed himself with a cup of coffee and turned his steps to the Town Hall, where he had some enquiries to make. After which, opening time having arrived, he made his way to the Adam and Eve public house at the end of Coalporter Street and ordered a glass of beer. Here he fell into conversation with a young man who worked at Messrs Crompton and Maudling, Auctioneers and Estate Agents. Mr Stukely was an easy talker, and seemed to get along equally with waitresses, barmen, town hall officials and chance-met characters.

  At half past two he approached the offices of Jonas Killey. Young Willoughby had come back from his lunch ten minutes before, as Mr Stukely well knew, having watched him from the saloon bar of the Adam and Eve. He climbed the narrow linoleum-covered steps, rang the bell and went in.

  Mrs Warburton smiled kindly on him, regretted that Mr Killey was up North on business, and wondered whether he would like to have a word with Mr Willoughby. Mr Stukely said that he would indeed like to do so, and was ushered into Jonas’ room. It was three minutes before Willoughby appeared, and in that short time Mr Stukely, who knew a good deal about lawyers’ offices, had absorbed a quantity of useful information from the letters and papers which had been left lying about on Jonas’ desk. One communication from a firm of builders he found particularly interesting.

  When Willoughby arrived, Mr Stukely explained his business.

  He had been recommended to them, he said, by Edward Lambard of Sexton and Lambard, Solicitors of High Holborn. Mr Lambard was a personal friend, and would himself have handled his business had he not been engaged in the Restrictive Practices Court. He had mentioned Mr Pilley as an expert in trust work, and since he, Mr Stukely, had other business to transact in Wimbledon, this had fitted in very well. Meanwhile perhaps Mr Willoughby could take his instructions. Willoughby, impressed by the appearance and manner of his new client, selected a clean sheet of paper, and prepared to make notes.

  Mr Stukely desired to set up a trust for his three children. The eldest, a boy, lived in America. Would that complicate matters? Willoughby was not sure, but said he would find out. The other two lived with his wife – not their mother, his second wife – in Buckinghamshire. Willoughby’s pen scoured the paper.

  At the end of a busy and enjoyable half-hour, he said, “There’s only one thing, Mr Stukely. You haven’t told me how much you wish to settle.”

  �
��I had it in mind,” said Mr Stukely, “to make an immediate settlement – there will be more to add to it later, you understand – but an immediate settlement of £20,000. And since you really know nothing about me I thought it prudent to bring a bank draft for that amount. I obtained it this morning from the local branch of the London and Home Counties Bank.”

  “Oh, we keep our client account there.”

  “Your client account?”

  “The Law Society encourages solicitors to keep their office account – that is their own private money – and their client account, which handles their client’s money, in separate banks. It is not laid down as an absolute rule, but it is very much favoured. An additional precaution, you understand, against the two becoming mixed. So our office account is at the Investors and Suburban.”

  Mr Stukely nodded his head approvingly. He thought it was a very sensible precaution. He said, “I suppose you handle a lot of clients’ money.”

  “Quite a lot,” said Willoughby modestly. Most of their clients were tradesmen who wanted debts collected, and young couples who bought houses with building society mortgages. Even so there was a reasonable balance in the client account as a whole, and Willoughby could not help feeling thankful that it was the London and Home Counties Bank which this important new client had visited and not the Investors and Suburban, where the unpleasant Mr Grimwade kept a jaundiced eye on their overdrawn office balance.

  Mr Stukely said, “I mustn’t take up any more of your time. There’s no great hurry about the paperwork. I am flying over to America tomorrow to visit my son and I shall be away for about ten days. Perhaps we could fix up a second conference when I return. I should like to have a word with Mr Killey. Not that I haven’t every confidence in your expertise, Mr Willoughby. Wednesday or Thursday week. I can’t be more definite until I know about flight times. Suppose I give you a ring when I get back. Excellent.”

  Mrs Warburton showed Mr Stukely out. She actually quit her sanctum to open the door for him, and was rewarded with a smile.

  “Now that’s what I call a client,” she said to Deborah, the sixteen-year-old girl who did all the jobs in the office that Mrs Warburton was too busy or too dignified to put her hand to. Deborah agreed that Mr Stukely was a perfect gentleman. Distinguished, too. “Something in the City, I expect,” she said. It was encounters of this sort which added lustre to the job of working in a solicitor’s office and enabled her to upstage her friends who had much better paid jobs in supermarkets and sweet shops.

  That same afternoon, Patrick Mauger asked for a few minutes of his Editor’s time.

  John Charles was halfway through the long span of his editorship which changed the Watchman from a provincial daily into a national newspaper. He was a man of deceptively casual habits. The amount of leisure which he enjoyed derived from his ability to delegate; but everyone, from the latest joined messenger to the senior news editor, recognized that, in the last analysis, the integrity and repute of the paper depended on decisions that he alone had to make.

  He listened carefully to what Patrick had to say. He had a good opinion of his ability, enjoyed his enthusiasm and mistrusted his judgement.

  “Do you think there’s anything in it?” he said.

  “The story about Will Dylan, you mean. I’ve no idea. And I don’t think it’s the real point.”

  “All right,” said Charles patiently. “What is the point?”

  “I was in Court on Friday. My shorthand’s a bit rusty, but I managed to get down almost every word that was said. Particularly that last bit, where Lyon gave him an unnecessary kick in the crutch. And I was watching Pilley’s face. He’s not going to let this matter drop.”

  “What can he do?”

  “There must be some sort of appeal.”

  “I’ll ask our legal eagles about that. Suppose he does appeal, do you think he’s any chance of getting – whatever it is he wants?”

  “I shouldn’t think so. But I’m perfectly certain of one thing. He’s building up for some sort of showdown. Either he’s going to say something quite outrageous about Dylan, who’ll be forced to sue him for libel. Or else he’ll get the order he wants, and the thing will have to be thrashed out in a criminal court. Even then I don’t see him getting a conviction, but think of the publicity.”

  “What you’re saying is, that there’s a bandwagon going to roll. Do we want to book an early seat on it?”

  “I didn’t mean to put it quite as crudely as that.”

  “But that’s what you think?”

  “More or less.”

  “Your ears are twitching. You’ve got some plan in your head. What do you want to do?”

  “Almost every other paper has taken the obvious line. Killey’s a publicity seeker. Throwing dirt to see if any of it will stick. Got a black eye from the magistrate. Serve him right.”

  “So?”

  “So I’d like to write something a bit different. Not exactly suggesting that there might be something in it. That’d be going too far. But putting both sides of the case.”

  Charles thought about it. He was far too experienced to believe in the old tag about any publicity being good publicity. Newspapers had been run on such lines, had blossomed for a lush summer and been blown away by the cold winds of autumn. He had no intention of allowing the Watchman to go down that street. What this infatuated young man of his was suggesting was a ballon d’essai. A thing which a meteorologist looses into the air to find which way the wind is blowing. A child’s toy. He had himself launched many such balloons. Sometimes they had been helpful, often they had drifted away unobserved into the stratosphere. Once or twice they had burst in his face.

  He said, “You can write it, but I don’t promise we’ll publish it. I’ll make my mind up about that when I’ve read it myself.”

  As Patrick was going, he added, “Have your shorthand notes of the hearing typed out. I want to see those too.”

  Jonas caught an early train from Sheffield, breakfasted on it and got to Wimbledon by ten. The left-hand side of his face was bruised and swollen and a strip of pink sticking plaster covered a long cut running from under his left ear to the point of his chin.

  Mrs Warburton said, “Good gracious, Mr Killey, what have you been doing?”

  “Slight accident,” said Jonas. “Nothing serious. Have you got the Law List?”

  “I believe Mr Willoughby has it.”

  “Ask him to bring it in, would you? And do you think you could manage me a cup of coffee?”

  Mrs Warburton plugged in the electric kettle and went along to Willoughby’s room. She said, “He’s back, and he’s in a shocking state. Looks as if he’s been in a fight. And he wants the Law List.”

  “Maybe he wants to consult a good solicitor.”

  “You’d better hurry. I don’t think he’s in a mood for jokes.”

  Willoughby refrained from comment when he saw Jonas’ face although it was sufficiently startling. He said, “One or two things have been happening while you’ve been away. We’ve got a new client. Rather promising sort of business.”

  He told him about Mr Stukely. Jonas listened with half an ear and said, “Good. Good.” He had found the number he wanted, and said into the extension, “Get me 405 3666, Mrs Warburton, would you.”

  “Twenty thousand pounds down. A bank draft. I put it on deposit for the time being.”

  “Quite right.”

  “We’ve been having a bit of trouble with Poynters.”

  “Who?”

  “The people who did the conversion here.”

  “Oh yes. I believe they wrote to me. What do they want now?”

  “Money. Just under four hundred pounds. They’re getting a bit shirty about it.”

  “Pay them something on account.”

  “That’s the trouble. I don’t think old Grimwade is going to carry us much further.”

  “Nonsense,” said Jonas. “He’s got plenty of security. If he won’t accommodate us, we’ll move the account to a ba
nk that will. Yes?”

  “It’s your number, Mr Killey.”

  “Thank you. I’d like to speak to Mr Lambard. The name is Killey.”

  There was a fairly long pause, and then Edward Lambard’s voice, neutral and unsurprised. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’d like to come along and consult you. Professionally.”

  “Does dog eat dog? When would you like to come?”

  “I’d be happy to leave it to you to suggest a time. I imagine you’re busier than I am.”

  “I very much doubt it. Should we say tomorrow afternoon, at three o’clock?”

  “That will do very well.” Jonas added, with an effort, “It’s good of you.”

  On Wednesday afternoon Patrick produced a first draft of his article, and had it torn to pieces by John Charles’ own hands. “It leans far too heavily on Killey’s side,” he said. “Also it’s too long, and it’s got too many adverbs in it.” Adverbs were John Charles’ particular bête noire. Patrick spent Wednesday evening rewriting it and had it thrown back again. “Now you’ve made it sound like a pro-Establishment pamphlet.” The red-ink note concluded, “Also you have used the word ‘basic’ three times. On the first occasion you meant ‘real’, on the second ‘essential’ and on the third nothing in particular.”

  On Thursday Patrick sat down to write the article again. He was not disheartened. He realized that he was being paid a rare compliment.

  Jonas arrived at the offices of Sexton and Lambard in good time. He was not kept waiting. Edward Lambard rose from his chair when he was shown in, advanced the three steps to meet him which he accorded to every client, great or small, said, “Sit where you’ll be most comfortable,” and sat down himself.

  Jonas said, “You heard what happened when I made my application in the Magistrates’ Court. I’ve decided to apply to the High Court for an order of mandamus. It seems to be the only way of forcing him to treat my application properly. I can’t handle it myself. That’s why I’ve come to you.”