Killing Time

by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

  ‘Name?’

  ‘Paloma. Jay Paloma.’ Hollis gave an indescribable grimace. ‘I bet that’s not his real name, though. Una Paloma Blanca – what’s that song? D’you know him, guv?’

  Slider frowned a moment, and then placed him. ‘Not really. I know his flatmate, Busty Parnell.’ He sighed. ‘I suppose I’d better come.’

  Hollis followed him through the CID room. ‘He’s got some gear on him. Making a bit, one way or the other. Probably the other. Funny old world, en’t it, guv, when the Game makes more than the Job?’

  Slider paused at the door. ‘Every man makes his choice.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve no regrets,’ Hollis said, stroking his terrible moustache. ‘I’d bend over backwards to help my fellow man.’

  Slider trudged downstairs, feeling a little comforted. It was early days yet, but it looked as though Hollis was going to be an asset to the Department.

  Slider had become acquainted with Busty Parnell in his Central days. She described herself as a show dancer, and indeed she wasn’t a bad hoofer, but a small but insidious snow habit had led her into trouble, and she had slipped down the social scale to stripper and part-time prostitute. Slider had busted her once or twice and helped her out on other occasions, when a customer turned nasty or a boss was bothering her. Sometimes she had given him a spot of good information, and in return he had turned a blind eye to a spot of victimless crime on her part. And sometimes, in the lonely dogwatches which are so hard on the unmarried copper, he had taken a cup of tea with her at her flat and discussed business in general and the world in particular. She had made it plain that she would be glad to offer him more substantial comforts, but Slider had never been one to mix business with pleasure. Besides, he knew enough about Busty’s body and far too much about her past life to find her tempting.

  Her name was Valerie, but she had always been referred to as Busty in showbiz circles to distinguish her from the other Val Parnell, the impresario, for whom she had once auditioned. Slider had lost sight of her when he left Central, but she had turned up again a year or so ago on the White City Estate, sharing a flat with Jay Paloma. The last Slider had heard Busty had given up the stage and was working as a barmaid at a pub, The British Queen. Her flatmate was employed as an ‘artiste’ at the Pomona Club, a rather dubious night club whose advertised ‘cabaret’ consisted mainly of striptease and simulated sex acts, and which distributed more drugs than the all-night pharmacy in Shaftesbury Avenue.

  Jay Paloma was waiting for Slider in one of the interview rooms. He was beautifully, not to say androgynously, dressed in a white silk shirt with cossack sleeves, and loose beige flannel slacks tucked into chocolate-coloured suede ankle boots, with a matching beige jacket hanging casually over his shoulders. There was a heavy gold chain round his throat, a gold lapel pin in the shape of a treble clef on the jacket, and discreet gold studs in his ears. A handbag and nail polish would have tilted the ensemble irrevocably over the gender balance point; as it was, a casual glance suggested artistic rather than transvestite.

  Jay Paloma was tall and slenderly built, and sat with the disjointed grace of a dancer, his heels together and his knees fallen apart, his arms resting on his thighs and his hands dangling, loosely clasped, between them. The hands were well-kept, with short nails and no rings. His thick, streaked-blond hair was cut short, full and spiky like a model’s; his face was long and large-nosed, and given the dark eyeliner on the underlids and his way of tilting his face down and looking up under his eyebrows, he bore an uncanny resemblance to Princess Di, which Slider supposed was purely intentional.

  He was a very nervous, tremulous Princess Di today, quivering of lip and brimming of eye. He started to his feet as Slider came in, thought about shaking hands, fidgeted, looked this way and that; and obeyed Slider’s injunction to sit down again with a boneless, graceful collapse. He put a thumb to his mouth and gnawed the side of it – not the nail or even the cuticle but the loose flesh of the first joint. Probably he had been a nail-biter and had cured himself that way. Nails would be important to him; appearance important generally. Given that he shared an unglamorous flat with Busty and worked at the Pomona, his expensive outfit suggested that he exploited his body in a more lucrative way out of club hours.

  ‘So what can I do for you?’ Slider asked, pulling out a chair and sitting facing him. ‘Jay, isn’t it? Do I call you Jay?’

  ‘It’s my professional name,’ he said. He had a soft, husky voice with the expected slightly camp intonation. It was funny, Slider reflected from his experience, how many performers adopted it, even if they weren’t TWI. It was a great class-leveller. It was hard to guess his origins – or, indeed, his age. Slider would have put him at thirty-five, but he looked superficially much younger and could have been quite a bit older. He had makeup on, Slider saw: foundation, mascara and probably blusher, but discreetly done. It was only the angle of the light throwing into relief the fine stubble coming through the foundation that gave it away.

  ‘It’s nice of you to see me,’ Jay said, with the obligatory upward intonation at the end of the sentence; the phantom question mark which had haunted Estuary English ever since Australian soaps took over from the home-grown variety. It made it sound as though he wasn’t sure that it was nice, and gave Slider the spurious feeling of having a hidden agenda, of being persecutor to Jay’s victim.

  ‘Any friend of Busty’s is a friend of mine,’ he said. ‘How do you come to know her, by the way?’

  ‘Val and me go way back. We were in a show together – do you remember Hanging Out in the Jungle? That musical about the ENSA troupe?’

  ‘Yes, of course I do. It caused quite a stir at the time.’

  Slider remembered it very well. It had hit the headlines not only because it was high camp – still daring in those days – and full of suggestive jokes; not only because of the implication, offensive to some, that ENSA had been riddled with homosexuality; but because before Hanging Out, the star, Jeremy Haviland – who had also directed and part-written the show – had been a respected, heavyweight actor of Shakespearian gravitas. Seeing him frolicking so incongruously in satin frocks and outrageous makeup had been one of the main draws which kept packing them in through its short but momentous run. But the gradually-emerging realisation that Haviland had merely type-cast himself had caused secondary shock-waves which had destroyed his career. This was some years before homosexuality had become popular and acceptable. Six months after Hanging Out closed, Haviland committed suicide.

  ‘Val was in the chorus, singing and dancing, but I had a proper part,’ Jay went on. ‘It was a terrific break for me.’

  ‘Which were you?’

  ‘I played Lance Corporal Fender – the shy young lad who had to play all the young girls’ parts, and got all those parcels of knitted things from his mother?’

  ‘Yes, I remember. You did that song with Jeremy Haviland, the Beverley Sisters number, what was it?’

  ‘“Sisters, sisters, there were never such devoted sisters”,’ Jay Paloma sang obediently, in a sweet, husky voice. ‘It was Jeremy got me the part. I really could dance – I’d been to a stage-and-dance school and everything – but all I’d done before was a student review at UCL. I was sharing a flat at the time with the president of Dramsoc, and he wangled me into it, because frankly, none of the rest of them could sing or dance worth spit. Anyway, Jeremy saw me in it, liked me, and took a chance. He was so kind to me! I owed him everything. I got fave reviews for Hanging Out and everyone reckoned I was headed for stardom. But then all the fuss broke out over poor Jeremy, and the show folded, and we were all sort of dragged down with him. Tarnished with the same brush, you might say. It was hard for any of us to get work after that, and, well, Jeremy and I had been – you know—’

  ‘Close,’ Slider suggested.

  Jay seemed grateful for the tact. ‘He tried to help me, but everyone was avoiding him. And then he—’ He gulped and made a terminal gesture with both hands. ‘It was terrible. He wa
s such a kind, kind man.’

  ‘I didn’t know Busty was in that show. It must have been before I met her.’

  ‘She and I shared lodgings. She was like a big sister to me.’

  ‘She was at the Windmill when I first knew her.’

  ‘Yes, that’s where she went when Hanging Out closed. It was always easier for women dancers to get work. Well, we sort of lost sight of each other for a long time. And then about eighteen months ago we bumped into each other again in Earl’s Court.’

  By then both had drifted down out of the realms of legitimate theatre and into the shadowy fringe world where entertainment and sex were more or less synonymous. Busty was doing a bit of this and a bit of that – stripping, promotional work, topless waitressing. Jay was dancing when he could get it, filling in with drag routines, modelling, and working for a gay escort agency.

  ‘Val was doing the Motor Show – dressed in a flesh suit handing out leaflets about some new sports car. She was supposed to be Eve in the Garden of Eden, the leaflets were apple-shaped. The car was the New Temptation – d’you get it?’ He sniffed derisively. ‘She hated promo work – we all do. Being a Sunflower Girl or a Fiat Bunny or whatever. Humiliating. And the hours are shocking and the pay’s peanuts, unless you sleep with the agent, which you often have to to get the job at all. Well, you have to take what you can get. And we’re neither of us teenagers any more. There just isn’t the work for troupers like us. Everyone specialises, and the kids coming out of the dancing schools now can do things – well, they’re more like acrobats to my mind. It’s not what I’d call dancing.’

  ‘And what about you? What were you doing?’

  ‘I had a spot at a night club in Earl’s Court – a sort of striptease.’

  Slider had a fair idea which club. ‘Striptease?’

  Jay Paloma looked haughty. ‘It wasn’t what you think. In fact, it was my best gig after Hanging Out closed. I came on in this evening gown and white fur and diamonds and everything, and did this wonderful routine. Like Gypsy Rose Lee, you know – all I ever took off was the long gloves. Absolutely classical. It brought the house down! Well, anyway, Val and I bumped into each other in the street, and we were so glad to see each other, we decided to share again. We had this place in Warwick Road to start with, and then we moved out here.’

  Fascinating though this was, Slider had a lot to do. ‘So what did you want to talk to me about?’ he asked, with a suggestion of glancing at his wrist.

  Jay hesitated. ‘I say, look, d’you mind if I smoke?’

  ‘Go ahead.’ Paloma reached for the pocket of the jacket. The cigarettes were in their original packet, but the lighter looked expensive, a gold Dunhill, Slider thought. ‘It always amazes me,’ he added as he watched the lighting-up process, ‘how many of you dancers smoke. I’d have thought you’d need all your breath.’

  Jay Paloma looked up from under his brows and smiled in a fluttery, pleased way – because Slider had called him a dancer, perhaps. ‘It keeps the weight down. You don’t—?’

  ‘No, thanks.’ Slider pushed the ashtray across the table and prompted him again. ‘Well, now, what can I do for you?’

  ‘I’ve got a problem,’ Jay said. He puffed at his cigarette. ‘I think – well, I suppose you won’t believe me, but I think someone’s trying to kill me.’ The big blue eyes turned up appealingly at Slider. He was certainly nervous. He was sweating – Slider could smell it, even through what his daughter Kate would have called his anti-shave. Light and lemony: Eau Sauvage. Slider recognised it, because it was the one O’Flaherty favoured – though O’Flaherty, the patriot, pronounced it O’Savvidge.

  ‘What makes you think so?’ Slider asked encouragingly.

  The tense shoulders dropped a little. ‘Well, there’ve been, you know, funny phone calls.’

  ‘Heavy breathing?’

  ‘Not exactly. No. I mean, it rings and I pick it up, and there’s just silence. I know there’s someone there, but they won’t speak. And then, ten minutes or so, it rings again. Sometimes it goes on for hours. I take the phone off the hook, but as soon as I put it back on, it rings again. I can’t leave it off all the time because of work. I mean, you never know when someone might want to get hold of you.’

  ‘It could be kids.’

  ‘Kids wouldn’t go on and on like that, would they? I mean, they’d get bored and go off and do something else.’

  That was a point. This man had obviously thought about his predicament, which made Slider more inclined to believe him.

  ‘Has Busty picked up these calls too?’

  ‘No, that’s another thing. It never happens when she’s home. It’s as if,’ he shivered subconsciously, ‘as if he’s watching the house, and knows when I’m home alone.’

  ‘Have you seen anyone hanging around? Anyone suspicious?’

  He shook his head. ‘But it’s a block of flats. There are always people around, coming and going. And plenty of places to hide, if you wanted to watch someone.’

  ‘How long has this been going on?’

  ‘Oh, months now. Six months maybe – but I didn’t think much of it at first. I mean everyone gets those dead calls, don’t they? But about three months ago, the letters started coming.’

  ‘Letters?’

  Jay nodded, almost reluctantly, ‘At first they weren’t really letters, just empty envelopes. Like the phone calls. Sort of unnerving. You tear open an envelope and there’s a piece of blank paper in it. But then the messages started to appear.’

  ‘Written? Typed?’

  ‘Cut out of newspapers and stuck on, you know the sort of thing.’

  Slider knew. He sighed inwardly. It was so hackneyed. A hoax, he thought. A spiteful hoax by someone who had taken a dislike to Jay Paloma. A homophobe perhaps, or a purity-nut with a personal campaign to rid the world of sleazy entertainers.

  ‘And what did they say?’ he asked.

  ‘It started with one word – “You”. Then the next had two words – “You are.” By the end of the week it said “You are going to die.”’

  ‘A new letter each day for a week?’ This was unpleasant. It was beginning to sound obsessional. Poison pens could be obsessional, of course, without ever meaning to carry out their threats. But there was always the risk that they might convince themselves, steep themselves in their own culture to the point when the unthinkable last step became the inevitable next one.

  ‘Every week.’ The head drooped. ‘They got worse – about what he was going to do to me. Cut my throat. And – other things.’

  ‘I suppose you haven’t brought them to show me?’ Slider said, in the tone that expects the answer no.

  ‘I didn’t keep them. I destroyed them,’ Jay said, still looking at the floor.

  ‘That’s a pity,’ Slider said mildly.

  ‘I couldn’t bear to have them in the house. And I didn’t want Val to see them. I didn’t want to worry her.’

  ‘You didn’t notice the postcode, I suppose?’

  ‘All over the place,’ he said. ‘London postcodes, West End, Earl’s Court, Clapham – Heathrow once. All different.’

  ‘What sort of paper? What sort of envelopes?’

  ‘Just plain white notepaper. Basildon Bond or something. And white envelopes, the long sort, self-sealing. The name and address was printed – you know, like on a printer, on a label. And the words inside, like I said, cut out of newspaper and stuck on.’

  ‘Well, if you get another one,’ Slider said, ‘perhaps you’d keep it and bring it in to me.’

  ‘You don’t believe me,’ Paloma concluded flatly.

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘But you’re not going to do anything?’

  ‘It’s difficult to do anything without having an actual letter to work on.’ Paloma continued to look at him with a half-defiant, half-angry look – Princess Di at bay, badgered by a Sun reporter. ‘Look, I believe you’re frightened,’ Slider went on, ‘and that’s evidently what the letter merchant wants. It
doesn’t follow they’ll actually do what they threaten.’ Paloma said nothing. ‘You haven’t told me everything yet,’ Slider said after a moment. ‘Something else has happened to trigger your coming here.’ No answer. ‘I don’t think it was an easy step for you to take.’

  ‘You’re right,’ Paloma said, softening at this evidence of Slider’s percipience. ‘I don’t like police stations. I don’t like police – most of them anyway. But Val said – she said you were different. So I thought—’ Slider waited in insistent silence. Paloma swallowed and took the plunge. ‘A photograph. This morning. Cut out of a book or something. Of a dead body, all beaten up, with its throat cut.’ He reached out and stubbed out his cigarette with a violently trembling hand, and then quite suddenly turned corpse-white. Slider had been vomited over many times in the course of a long career. It taught you quick reactions. He shot out of his chair, grabbed the back of Jay’s neck and pushed his head down between his legs. Jay moaned and dry-retched a couple of times, but didn’t actually throw up.

  ‘Breathe deeply. In, and out. In, and out,’ Slider commanded.

  After a bit Jay sat up again, still pale but not quite so green.

  ‘D’you want some water, or a cup of tea?’ Slider asked.

  ‘No. No, I’m all right, thanks. Thanks,’ he added more particularly, eyeing Slider consideringly. He lit another cigarette, and Slider sat down again, keeping a wary eye on him.

  ‘I suppose,’ Slider said at last, ‘that you didn’t keep this latest mail-shot either?’

  Paloma shook his head. ‘I burned it. In the ashtray.’ He gestured tremblingly with his lighter. ‘I couldn’t bear it hanging around.’

  Slider sighed. ‘It would have helped if you’d brought it to me.’

  ‘I didn’t know I was going to come in,’ Paloma said. ‘I only decided at the last minute. And I felt – I don’t know – that if I didn’t get rid of it, it might, you know, happen.’

  Superstitious, Slider thought. Understandable, but not helpful. He said, ‘If anything else comes, any more of these letters, or anything you’re suspicious of, bring it to me unopened, will you?’ Paloma assented. ‘So, now, who do you think is doing this?’