Junkyard Angel

by John Harvey

  And Anna. How did she fit into it all? If fit she did. Certainly she was mixed up with Blagden.

  Again.

  Mr Hugh Blagden and I would have to have a little talk.

  I was woken in the morning by someone banging insistently on the front door. I found my way to it by instinct and tried to pull it open. Nothing doing. Then I remembered the bolts. I pulled them free and opened the door.

  A youth was standing there with a telegram in one hand.

  ‘Mr Mitchell?’ he said.

  I said that I was.

  He handed me the dingy yellow envelope and I shut the door. This time I didn’t bolt it. After all, it was now broad daylight.

  I went into the living room and put the telegram down on the table. Then I left it there while I went through my morning routine of getting the fruit juice and coffee together. I thought I’d save eating until I’d seen what it said.

  After I had it was possible I wouldn’t have an appetite.

  I pushed my finger inside the flap and tore it open, then took out the piece of white paper. I read it quickly, then slowly … at least half a. dozen times. I was smiling.

  It read: THANKS. YOU MADE ME FEEL 25 AGAIN.

  10

  She was looking as tight and as brittle as she had last time, only there was something different about her. She wasn’t wearing her glasses. Without them she looked strange: a tortoise without its shell.

  I went in. I didn’t expect her to recognise me. Somehow I thought that without those glasses she would be fallible, unable to function.

  But she could. She made a cute little jumping movement in her chair and opened her mouth. Not far. Enough to let out a sound that was remarkably like, ‘Ooh!’

  I wondered if she had landed on a pin.

  ‘Hi,’ I said cheerily. ‘It’s a great morning.’

  The sky was grey like it was the only colour left in the world and if the wind had stopped biting it wasn’t above taking a quick snip at any carelessly exposed piece of flesh.

  She fumbled for her glasses. One of the doors to the right of her desk opened a fraction, then closed abruptly. I hadn’t been able to see behind it.

  ‘I thought I told you before,’ she was saying.

  I turned my attention back to her. That was better. Everything was in place and she was sounding much more her old self. An attractive combination of bouncer and brick wall. On a bad day getting past her would be like going round Brands Hatch the wrong way in the thirteenth lap.

  But this wasn’t a bad day. Not for me it wasn’t. Not the way I felt. Something had given me back some of the old bounce. If I wasn’t exactly feeling twenty-five again, then I was still a whole lot less weighed down than I had been.

  All I needed now was to get rid of the odd bruise and a few assorted sticking plasters and I’d be back in business with a vengeance.

  Which reminded me.

  ‘How’s business?’ I asked her pleasantly.

  You would have thought I’d asked her to drop her pants.

  She flashed me a steely look which ordinarily would have killed but she hadn’t noticed my protective vest.

  ‘You do run a business here?’ I said.

  ‘Of course we run a business.’

  ‘An estate agent’s.’

  ‘That’s what it says on the door.’

  ‘But you don’t have any flats?’

  ‘That was what I told you last time.’

  ‘And you don’t know anything about the firm’s concern with a block of expensive flats close to Earls Court where someone was found murdered. A girl, around your age. Someone had pounded one side of her face as though he was batting a slice of steak into shape ready for the grill. Then he stuck a needle in her arm. Only what was in the syringe wasn’t guaranteed to cure. Quite the opposite.’

  I could see that she wasn’t taking it too well. One hand was holding on to the edge of the desk like there would be no tomorrow and her face was looking decidedly strained. Someone should give the girl a holiday. Before it was too late.

  ‘That’s not on your list of desirable properties? Not even at the right price?’

  ‘It … no …’ She finished by simply shaking her head. I reckoned that it was the first time in her life she’d been lost for words—ever since the nurse gave her that first sudden slap.

  ‘Of course not. I was forgetting. And you don’t know any body called Blagden?’

  Her head moved slowly from side to side and something that might have been fear shifted along behind the frames of her glasses.

  ‘In fact, you’ve never heard the name, except from me.’

  ‘No, I …’

  ‘It isn’t the name of somebody who works here for instance?’

  ‘Uh …’

  ‘Somebody who works in that office over there.’

  I pointed towards the door that had opened and shut. Like the case I’d never been given to handle. She was looking that way too. Her bottom lip was beginning to droop. Only a little, but I liked it. I was beginning to wish she’d take off her glasses again.

  I said, ‘He is there isn’t he? Whatever the name on the door reads.’

  She didn’t answer. Didn’t look at me. Her right hand edged along to the far end of the desk. I reached over and stopped it before her fingers could press the button.

  When I shook my head from side to side there was a smile on it. She didn’t appreciate it, though. I thought she was close to tears. She wasn’t used to losing.

  I was gentle with her. Then. I said, ‘You don’t have to bother announcing me. I’ve an idea he already knows. He’s sitting in there with a cigar in his hand waiting for you to get rid of me. But this time it hasn’t worked. Don’t worry. He didn’t know it was one of my good days either. Sorry if it’s left you in a mess, sweetheart, but they don’t turn up so often that I can afford to neglect them.’

  She was looking at me now; looking and listening. There was only a desk between us and the way I was leaning over that didn’t account for much.

  I realised that my hand was still on top of hers. I didn’t do anything about it. I kind of liked it the way it was. I moved my other hand slowly up to her face. Fingers lifted the glasses clear and laid them down on the desk.

  Once I got started I was a regular terror with the women.

  She didn’t move. I said: ‘There’s only one thing I can give you and that’s a piece of advice. Once I’ve gone through that door, don’t get messed up with pressing any more buttons or making any phone calls. It isn’t worth putting your head on the line for. You do what I hoped you’d do last time. Walk over to the door, pull down the blind on the glass, turn the open sign round, so that it says closed, get on the other side of it and keep on going. What you do with the petty cash drawer is your business. Only don’t spend too long making up your mind.’

  She didn’t say thanks, but then she wasn’t that kind of woman. It didn’t matter. I hadn’t expected that. She still hadn’t moved away; her hand was still under mine. I knew that if I had leaned my head forwards a little further and kissed her she wouldn’t have minded.

  But I didn’t do it: knowing was enough.

  I left her at the desk and walked over to the office door. There didn’t seem to be much point in knocking, so I didn’t. Just opened it and went on in.

  Blagden was sitting behind his desk. But he wasn’t smoking a cigar. He was too busy for that. Even for an unlit one. There was a wastepaper bin on top of the desk and he was steadily filling it with assorted papers and receipts that he was taking from a bundle of files alongside his chair.

  ‘You might be a little late, Blagden.’

  He stood up and offered me his hand. I didn’t want it. I didn’t want to touch that skin; I didn’t think I liked whatever it was that wriggled beneath it.

  He pulled back his arm and
said, ‘This is a surprise, Mitchell.’

  ‘You’re a liar!’

  He raised one eyebrow fractionally.

  ‘You knew damn well I was outside. You were waiting until your hyper-efficient secretary gave me the old heave-ho. But this time I didn’t heave so easily.’

  He sat down, again and lifted the bin off the desk. I sat down as well and watched him while he lit a new cigar.

  ‘What do you want, Mitchell?’

  ‘Some straight talking from somebody for a change.’

  He opened his arms wide in a gesture that was probably meant to suggest that naturally he would do his best. But I didn’t think he could talk straight. Not naturally.

  ‘First, why did you get me poking around the flat in Earls Court?’

  ‘I told you, Mitchell. There was this complicated business with the lease and …’

  I let him carry on for a while and concentrated on the smooth urbanity of the accent, the tone of genteel persuasion that got up my nose even more than the other kind of persuasion he got others to apply on his behalf.

  When I had listened to it for long enough I stood up. I don’t think he was certain what I was about to do. I’m not too sure that I did either. But he was puffing at his cigar enough to actually keep it going.

  I walked round and sat on the corner of his desk with my foot resting on the edge of the wastepaper bin.

  ‘I’ll tell you, Blagden. You stop me if I get it wrong. This business doesn’t deal exclusively within this country. You’ve got offices abroad. You buy up properties in other parts of the world and sell or rent them over here to people who’ve got more money than they know what to do with. Or who want to get out with what they’ve got before the taxman gets more than they want to give. It’s a big operation. Not just the Continent. The West Indies. The Middle East …

  I stopped and leaned down far enough to lift a torn piece of paper out of the bin. It was a receipted hotel bill. I scanned it quickly, then opened my fingers. We both watched as it floated down and perched on the corner of the steel bin, wobbling precariously like some drunk and almost opaque butterfly.

  Then it toppled inside.

  ‘. . . and India. As I say, big, impressive. Enough bread to be made to satisfy anyone.’

  He was staring down at the blotter on his desk now. He was trying to give the impression that he wasn’t listening to what I was saying but I knew that he was.

  ‘Except that it gets to the stage when there isn’t an enough. Money’s like syphilis: you don’t know you’re riddled with it until it’s too late. When it gets too deep a hold it’s almost impossible to find a cure. So when the chance came along of making some more bread on the side, you couldn’t resist it.

  ‘Because we’re not talking about peanuts. What I’m guessing you’re into is big, big money. The other week the cops in Sweden or some place like that found a haul of thirty pounds of heroin. That, was reckoned as being worth around thirteen million pounds.’

  He stopped taking an interest in the blotter; shifted his chair harshly and stared over at the wall. I reached out for his arm and pulled him back towards me. The material of his suit slid under my grip like a loose second skin. But I didn’t let go. My fingers increased their pressure.

  ‘Do you realise what that means? It means that every junkie you supply has enough of that shit running round his blood stream to keep me in food and booze for the rest of my life.’

  He tried to loosen my grip but I wasn’t having any. He couldn’t even get his cigar to his mouth.

  He started to say, ‘You can’t say that I have anything to do with supplying …’

  That was as far as I let him get. My foot kicked the bin across the room and before it had clattered against the far wall I was standing up and the pressure on his arm was increasing second by second.

  He was a big enough man, strong enough—but he wasn’t used to having to show it.

  ‘Of course you don’t do the supplying. Not you. Not while there are lesser mortals to do that for you. All you’re concerned about is getting the stuff in and selling it in bulk. What happens after that isn’t your concern, isn’t that right? I bet you’ve even got a nice handy line in rationalisation all worked out in case you should ever need it. Something to do with the laws of supply and demand and how if you didn’t provide what was wanted then somebody else would. Does that ring any bells inside that thing you carry around on your shoulders under the pretence that it’s a real human head with a real human brain inside; a human brain with human concerns, human cares and human weaknesses.’

  I could sense my voice getting louder and I knew the pressure I was applying to his arm was increasing with it. He tried to prise my fingers away again but they weren’t shifting. Beads of sweat started to roll down his face and his eyes started to bulge in their sockets.

  Then there was a strange sound in the room and I realised that it was him, shouting.

  ‘What’s the matter, Blagden? Don’t like it, huh? You’re lucky it’s me and all I’m using is my own hand. If it were somebody else then it could be a nasty looking needle. You know about needles, don’t you, Blagden. Even if it isn’t you who pricks the skin and slots them into the vein.’

  He was getting paler every minute. I thought he might be going to pass out, so I released the pressure. He had a funny way of saying thank you. He tried to ram his knee up between my legs.

  Now I didn’t think that was very nice.

  I told him so. Then I thanked him … for giving me the opportunity I had been looking for. I looped a long left into his face and enjoyed watching his chair keel over in what was a passable imitation of slow motion. He didn’t go with it, not exactly. More slumped down to the floor where the chair had been.

  There was a dark line of blood issuing from his nose. He lifted an arm and wiped it away with the sleeve of his jacket. A few seconds later he was having to do the same again.

  I pulled him to his feet and told him to get his chair. Then I sat him down in it and watched the drips of blood falling on to the desk blotter where they spread in darkening circles.

  It was still one of my good days.

  ‘Right, Blagden. Two things. First, I want the Earls Court thing off my back. So you take a clean sheet of paper and make a statement to the effect that you hired me to watch the flat and find out who was in there, to the extent of making entry into a building over which you hold a controlling interest. State the retainer you paid me and then sign it. When you’ve done that you can dig into your wallet and give me the rest of my fee.’

  He wasn’t about to argue. He sat there like a real good boy and did as he was told. I got an envelope from the desk drawer and addressed it to Tom Gilmour at West End Central. Then I found a stamp and stuck it in the corner.

  ‘Okay,’ I told him, ‘that brings us to the second matter. Anna Vaughan.’

  He almost jumped. He didn’t quite but it was a matter of touch and go. The right hand side of his face twitched a little by way of compensation.

  ‘You’ve got your hooks into her. Again, I’m not absolutely sure how but if my guesses are as good as the earlier ones they won’t be far wrong. You’ve got her worried and frightened and I don’t like it. So lay off. Keep right away from her. If I see you messing her about again I’ll finish what I just now began. And if you send one of your bully boys round to find her, I’ll take him to pieces and send them back to you through the post. One at a time.’

  I thought that was about all for now. There were a few more things I could have asked but I didn’t figure it would do any good. Like, I could have asked where Anna was, but I figured that if she gave him an address it either wasn’t the right one or she would have split by now anyway. And to ask him meant letting him know that I didn’t have an idea where to pick her up—presuming she would be too worried by now to go back to work.

  I could have squeez
ed a lot of other things out of him, but they weren’t any of my business. Two things were: saving my own neck and trying to save the girl’s at the same time. Anything else could wait until those were settled. One way or another.

  While I’d been thinking, Blagden hadn’t exactly been overactive. He’d got as far as finding the cigar he’d started and had jammed it between the fingers of his left hand. He hadn’t bothered to light it.

  I had a sudden memory of a silent movie with a guy who’s got a face full of cigar and some other character comes along and slams his fist into the end of it. The cigar splits open and rams up against the first guy’s face.

  I had enjoyed it at the time. And sure as damn it seemed a good idea now.

  But then. … why be vindictive?

  Blagden wasn’t looking too good anyway: at least the way he was I couldn’t see anyone buying a used car from him.

  I stuck the stamped envelope in my pocket and moved over to the door. When I went out into the reception room it was empty of one receptionist.

  I was glad she had taken my advice—for her sake. I wondered what she had decided about the petty cash. If I bumped into her one day I thought I might ask her.

  Hell! The way I was feeling I believed she’d tell me.

  11

  I spent a lot of the remainder of the day trying to track Anna down. It wasn’t easy. The telegram gave no real clue and there wasn’t very much else to go on.

  I tried the air line office but I’d been right; she hadn’t showed up. I finally got an address out of the woman in charge, after using a mixture of bribery, threats and my own simple, good-natured charm. I needn’t have bothered.

  Ten minutes in the reference library close by Leicester Square showed me that the house didn’t even exist. Neither, the exchange, operator informed me, did the telephone number.

  When my feet were aching enough I got a cab to the office. I picked up the usual selection of circulars advertising three pence off everything and tore them in half without looking at them. There was a conveniently large bin close to the door in the outer office and I dropped the pieces into it and walked on through.