Femme Fatale

by Dominic Piper

  ‘Only with written permission from the Church.’

  He grins. ‘Good. When you hear what I’ve got to tell you, you’re going to need one. Maybe more than one.’

  He opens a filing cabinet, pulls out a big white cardboard folder, sticks it under his arm and we leave.

  19

  FIRST WARNING

  The One Anchor is a slick chain pub trying to look like a tourist’s idea of what a British pub looked like in a 1950s UK B-Movie. It’s almost surreal. It smells of furniture polish. I run my hand over a large horse brass on the wall. I can’t tell what it’s made from but it sure isn’t metal. There are early twentieth century wrestling posters behind the bar and a chalkboard menu. The wall to my left is covered in framed fox hunting prints, because that’s what we all do here in Shepherd’s Bush.

  ‘We’ll need to sit by a window,’ says Jamie, now a little more composed than he was ten minutes ago. ‘What would you like?’

  ‘I’ll have a double vodka and soda,’ I say.

  I take a seat by a window as instructed and watch him walk to the bar. People here know who he is and a couple of older guys punch the air with their fists as he goes past. I’m curious about this. He’s a big, tough guy and I managed to reduce him to tears in a matter of minutes. I get the feeling that there’s more than one thing wrong in his life.

  He returns with the drinks on a tray. He’s having what looks like a pint of bitter with a double whisky chaser. He takes the big white cardboard folder out from under his arm and leans it against his chair. I wonder what’s in it.

  ‘What do you think?’ he says, waving his hand at our surroundings.

  ‘It’s weird.’

  ‘Yeah. Used to be a normal pub until a year ago. It’s the oldsters I feel sorry for. Most of them have gone to other pubs or they just don’t bother anymore. The breweries don’t give a monkey’s, of course.’

  ‘Do you live around here?’

  ‘Me? No. I live in Wandsworth. What about you?’

  ‘Covent Garden.’

  ‘Really? I didn’t think people lived there. Do you get a lot of trouble from the street artists?’

  ‘They’re a bloody nuisance, especially the ones that pretend to be statues. They’re the worst.’

  He allows himself a terse chuckle at this. He looks straight at me. ‘I’m sorry about earlier, man. I thought you were someone else. I couldn’t work out why they wanted to get in touch with me again. It could have been anything. And I was always waiting for another visit in the back of my mind, you know?’

  He knocks the double whisky down in one and starts on his beer.

  ‘Start at the beginning,’ I say.

  ‘I started seeing Paige…’ He stops himself, swallows, recovers and continues. ‘I started seeing Paige McBride on the seventeenth of April. It was…’ He stops and looks upwards to the right. ‘...on the twenty-sixth that one of these bastards first approached me.’

  ‘You’re sure of that date?’

  ‘Yeah. It was my brother’s birthday. I’d just been on the phone to him in the morning. I can remember walking along and laughing at something he’d said when this guy approached.’

  ‘OK. What time and where?’

  ‘I’d been to The Cuban Boxing Academy. I was talking to the guy there about getting a couple of his fighters involved in a charity exhibition match that I was beginning to organise. It’s in Freston Road, off The Westway. I was on my way to Latimer Road tube station. Normally I’d have gone there on my bike, my motorbike, but it was in dock for a service. This would have been about three in the afternoon.’

  ‘So you’d been seeing Paige for almost ten days at this point.’

  ‘That’s right. Ten days. I was in the first flush, you know? You’ve seen her, haven’t you. She’s fuckin’ gorgeous. She…’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘This car pulled up ahead of me. Like twenty feet up the road.’

  ‘Type of car?’

  ‘Dark blue Mercedes S Class. New. Didn’t clock the registration. A guy got out of the passenger seat an’ started walking towards me. He was grinning. I thought it was like – you know when that happens? It must be someone you know and you just don’t recognise them? Or in my case it might have been just a fan?’

  ‘OK. I’m going to stop you there. I’m going to get something from the bar. D’you want another drink?’

  ‘Another pint, please, and another double whisky.’

  I grab the tray and head for the bar. While the barman gets the drinks I ask one of the barmaids if she has any sheets of paper she can give me. A4 would be good. She doesn’t, but she can give me a couple of yesterday’s menu cards. That’ll do. I haven’t had a description yet, but for some reason I found the image of that guy getting out of the car and grinning inexplicably sinister.

  I sit down again. Jamie looks baffled. He takes the whisky and drinks half of it then returns to his beer. I take my tactical pen out of my jacket, place the menu on the table with the blank side up and flatten it with my fingers.

  ‘Tell me what this guy looked like.’

  ‘Well, he had, like, a really friendly face. Like he was your favourite uncle.’

  ‘How old?’

  ‘I would say sixty? Maybe? Certainly no older than sixty-five. I don’t know, you know? Might have been older than that. I’m not that clever with folk’s ages.’

  ‘Height? Weight?’

  ‘About your height, six two, six three. Two hundred and fifty pounds at a guess.’

  ‘Face shape?’

  ‘Sort of square. Overweight. Jowls. Weak chin. But a big guy, you know? Like I said. Strong. Just running to fat a bit.’

  I make an outline on the back of the menu. I can see him watching me.

  ‘Hair?’

  ‘Greying. Salt and pepper. Short. Cut en brosse. Wasn’t receding or anything.’

  I fill the hair in and turn the sketch around so he can see it. ‘Getting there?’

  ‘Yeah. That’s about it. You’ve got the jaw right.’

  ‘Tell me about his eyes and eyebrows.’

  ‘Kind of sympathetic, friendly, round eyes with a crinkle at the edges. Smiling eyes. Big eyes. That’s why I said he had a friendly face. They were brown, I think. Eyebrows grey like the hair. Salt and pepper.’

  ‘Shape of the eyebrows?’

  ‘Well like an S-shape, I suppose. Quite wavy.’

  I show him the sketch again. ‘Like this? I couldn’t quite manage to get sympathetic into the eyes.’

  ‘Yeah. Yeah. Christ that’s really good. Eyebrows a bit thicker maybe. You’ve got him. You’ve nailed him, man.’

  ‘Nose and mouth next.’

  ‘A small nose, and a bit beaky, yeah? Mouth was really small. Thin. No lips, really, but he had one of those thin moustaches that’s just, like, above the upper lip. Moustache was grey like the hair and eyebrows. A downturn to the mouth, like he was unhappy about something.’

  I finish off and turn the sketch around so he can see it. ‘OK. I can’t spend all day on this, but is that him?’

  He picks it up and looks at it. His face becomes serious and his lip curls. ‘Yeah. Yeah, that’s it. That’s him. That’s the bastard. That was really quick. Were you an artist or something?’

  ‘Yes. I used to be Picasso.’

  ‘I thought I recognised you.’

  I get my mobile out and take a photograph of the sketch and another for luck.

  ‘What about his accent?’

  ‘Well, south of England somewhere. I can’t really be more precise about that. Not London, I don’t think. Not a cockney accent, you know?’

  ‘OK.’ I continue. ‘So he was walking towards you and smiling.’

  ‘Yeah. I thought he was maybe someone I’d forgotten about. I meet a lot of people, you know? He called me by my name and stretched his hand out to shake hands. He was all smiles.’

  ‘And then what?’

  ‘He said he was really pleased to meet me. He’d been
a big boxing buff and it was a great honour. I thought then that he had to be a fan, right? But then it turned weird. He asked me to get in the car. He said he wanted to have a serious chat with me about something. I said I wasn’t getting in the car with him. I started to think he might have been some sort of pervert or something, you know? No one was that smiley and friendly, right? I said that whatever it was he could tell me here, on the pavement. He didn’t like this. He gave me this look like I’d really inconvenienced him. Almost like I was stupid for not taking up this wonderful opportunity to get in the car with him.’

  I take a mouthful of my vodka and soda and swallow. ‘I’m assuming that at no time he said who he was or gave you his name or identified himself in any way.’

  ‘No. But then he started going on about Paige, right? I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe my ears. I could feel my heart beating, you know? It was really disorientatin’. It was like some fuckin’ stranger had a window into my personal life, and a creepy stranger at that. I was wondering who the hell he was, you know? His face didn’t change. He was still all smiling and friendly. I asked him, like, who he was and how he knew Paige. I was starting to get angry, but I kept it under control. I have to know how to do that, you know? He said that Paige had a great future ahead of her and that it would be for the best if I didn’t ever see her again.’

  God Almighty. I’m getting angry with this guy and I wasn’t even there. I feel drunk just watching Jamie plough through his scotch and beer.

  ‘Did he give any reasons for this?’

  ‘Yeah. He said that he knew all about me and that I was a bad lot. Some very important people didn’t want Paige’s career damaged by her associating with the likes of me. All stuff like that.’

  I actually spit some vodka down my shirt from laughing. ‘Some very important people? Did he say who?’

  ‘Didn’t say who, but he said they were people who could do a lot of damage to my career and to my business. It was all for the best. She was only a girl after all. There were plenty more fish in the sea. I could just walk away from this and her career could get back on track and mine could continue as if nothing had happened. He was still smiling while he said all this, but his eyes were sort of dead now, d’you know what I mean? Cold fish eyes. Intimidating eyes.’

  ‘When he said he knew all about you – what did that mean?’

  ‘I’ve no idea,’ says Jamie, but he doesn’t meet my gaze when he says it.

  ‘What did you say to him?’

  ‘I told him that I had no notion who he was or who these very important people were, but what I did with my personal life was no one’s business except mine and who the fuck did he think he was etc. etc. I can’t remember all I said, but it was getting quite heated. I got cocky. I said who the fuck are you to tell me who I can and can’t go out with?’

  ‘Did that work? What you said to him?’

  ‘He just smirked. He shook his head and said I was making a big mistake. I told him that he was the one who was making the big mistake and that if I ever saw him again, I’d break his fucking jaw for him, no matter what the consequences were for me. He just laughed. He said he’d be in touch and just strolled off and got back in his car as if nothing had happened.’

  ‘Did you see his driver?’

  ‘Smoked glass.’

  ‘So was this it?

  ‘No. Then there was the second encounter.’

  ‘What happened on the second encounter?’

  He reaches down and picks up the big white cardboard folder by the side of his seat. He turns it upside down and taps it against his hand. Two X-rays slide out. He hands them to me.

  ‘Don’t worry about touching them. They can’t really be damaged by the sweat on your fingers or whatever. I’ve got two of each, anyway.’ He grins. ‘This is why we’re sitting by the window.’

  I take the X-rays off him and hold the first one up to the light. It’s a forearm. Both bones have horrific-looking fractures about six inches down from the elbow. The radius looks worse and parts of it have been shattered into fragments.

  ‘Holy shit.’

  ‘Now take a look at the other one,’ he says. ‘It’s like before and after.’

  It’s the same forearm, but now the radius has been repaired with a six-inch-long metal plate which looks like it’s being held in place by half a dozen screws which go deep into the bone. The ulna has some sort of metal rod fixing both parts of the fractured bone together. This is about four inches long. Airport security’s going to be murder for this guy.

  I hand the X-rays back to him and finish off the rest of my drink. I can feel my forearm aching.

  ‘You were asking what happened on the second encounter, Mr Beckett.’ He quickly taps the X-rays with his forefinger three times. ‘That’s what happened on the second encounter.’

  20

  IRON BAR TREATMENT

  I get in another round of drinks. Mr Sheng will be paying, after all. Jamie is now on his third pint of bitter and his fifth Scotch. He isn’t slurring his speech; not yet, anyway. My theory about him being somehow involved in Rikki Tuan’s disappearance is starting to disintegrate. He’s agitated, sweating and is shaking a little. It may be that he’s drinking on an empty stomach.

  I take a closer look at his face. He’s a little gaunt: he has a barely noticeable nervous tic under his left eye and both eyes have dark shadows beneath them, as if he hasn’t been sleeping properly for quite a while. I’ve got to keep him on track. I have to get a logical sequence of events out of him. People who’ve suffered some sort of trauma have a tendency to leap back and forth in time with their story and unintentionally muddy the waters. I take a sip of my drink. They’ve put tonic in it instead of soda, but I’m not going to complain about it right now. I’ll put it writing when I get home.

  ‘When did this second encounter happen?’

  ‘About three weeks after the guy got out of the car.’

  ‘So we’re talking about May the sixteenth? Seventeenth? Eighteenth? Try and remember. Do you remember what day it was?’

  ‘It was a Thursday because I’d been teaching at the juniors’ club.’

  ‘Hold on.’ I take my mobile out and bring up a calendar. ‘It must have been the sixteenth. That was a Thursday.’

  ‘Yeah, OK. Whatever.’

  ‘Tell me what happened from the beginning.’

  ‘You’ve got to remember that apart from anything else, what I’m going to tell you is a bit embarrassing for me. You know – despite what I can do, I’m not switched on as much in real life as I am in the ring. No one could be. You’d be crazy to be like that all of the time.’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘OK. It was about two-thirty in the afternoon. I’d been on the computer catching up with some admin stuff. Paige had called, so I’d spoken to her for about fifteen minutes. She was working three nights in a row, so I wouldn’t be seeing her again until the Sunday, I guess it would have been. Yeah.’

  I don’t say anything. I just look at him.

  ‘So anyway, I live on the fourth floor of a modern block in Wandsworth. There’s a reception desk with usually one guy and one woman on duty.’

  ‘Twenty-four-hour cover?’

  ‘Yeah. So there’s a knock on the door. Thursday afternoon. Wasn’t expecting anyone and I’d only just spoken to Paige. Usually a caller would be stopped at reception, but I didn’t think of that at the time. You know – someone knocks on your door and you answer it.’

  ‘Sure. Do you have a spy hole in your door?’

  He looks sheepish. ‘Yeah, but you know…’

  A couple of attractive middle-aged women sit behind Jamie. One of them has a knockout figure and I realise that I can check them out at the same time as paying attention to what he’s saying.

  ‘So I open the door and there’s this really big guy standing outside with a big grin on his face. And I mean a really big guy. A real big bastard. Over six foot five. Three hundred pounds at least. I mean, I’m no
t short or slight or anything. I’m five foot ten. But I got an immediate feeling of physical intimidation from this bloke.

  ‘So he’s grinning and he goes “Yeeeaaahhh! Jamie Baldwin The Man!” Very deep voice. And then, like, just punches me. A real sucker punch. A really powerful uppercut. Actually lifted me off my feet. I saw flashing lights, the lot. I mean, you know, it wasn’t the first time I’d been on the receiving end of a punch like that, but it was the first time I’d copped one outside the ring, you know?

  ‘So I was lying on my back on the floor in my hall and this guy comes over and just drops down onto me with his knees on my chest. I heard all the air come out of my lungs. You can imagine what it was like with someone that heavy.

  ‘It took me a couple of seconds to realise what was happening and then I let out a couple of jabs at his face, as hard as I could. But I was unfocussed. He started holding my arms and slapping my fists down. He took my face in one of his hands and starting squeezing like he was trying to crush my jaw. Then the other guy came in.’

  ‘Friendly Face?’

  ‘Yeah. Friendly as fuckin’ usual. He, ah, he just kicked me in the head, like. Just the once. I couldn’t – I couldn’t seem to think straight. To do anything, I mean. To defend myself. I felt really fuckin’ angry, but that kick and the big bastard’s punch. I wasn’t expecting them. I wasn’t prepared. I felt like an idiot. I felt pathetic. It was the surprise. It was…’

  ‘Stop beating yourself up about it. Keep focussed on what happened.’

  I make eye contact with the woman with the knockout figure. She has long, light brown hair, freckles, green eyes and is wearing a wedding band. She smiles to herself, looks away and starts talking to her friend. I’d say she was mid- to late forties.

  ‘I’m not sure if I actually passed out for a few moments, but I must have done. Might have even been a few minutes. I remember thinking that I might have been concussed by that kick to the head by the friendly face guy. It sounds crazy but I was worried about getting a blood clot on the brain. Anyway…’