The Run-Out Groove

by Andrew Cartmel

  “Why do you get to drive?” asked Clean Head sullenly.

  “Because I’m the one who’s immune to hallucinogenic drugs.” Tinkler twisted the key, gunned the engine, and we accelerated away into the night.

  18. LAMB

  The Colonel had a shopping bag from Harrods Food Hall tucked under his arm as he came through the door in a blast of cold air. He was wearing a duffel coat with a green and blue scarf at the neck and a black and white tweed cap. I didn’t blame him. The weather seemed to have skipped autumn and gone straight to winter in London this year.

  He took off his scarf and coat and hat, but kept hold of the bag until he set it down on the table and sank down in a chair opposite me.

  As soon as she spotted him, Fanny, who had wedged herself underneath one of the armchairs, scrabbled her way out and came trotting over. I could see the Colonel trying not to look at her as she approached, but as soon as she was within reach he leaned over and began to stroke her on the head, working all the way down the smooth fur to the tip of her tail.

  He looked at me as he stroked her and said, “So you weren’t able to get any kind of a lead on who these people are?”

  I shook my head. “The only person who knew we’d be in Canterbury that day, and who might conceivably have some reason to get rid of us, was Ambrose—”

  “That gold-toothed bastard,” said the Colonel. I could see he liked this hypothesis. “He wants Cessie all to himself. He feels threatened. I wouldn’t put it past him.”

  “But it couldn’t be him.”

  “Why not?”

  “Setting aside my doubts that he could organise something that elaborate, there’s the fact that this was an ambush carefully tailored for Nevada and myself.” I described the handbill with its enticing promise of vintage clothing and vinyl. “That was the work of someone who knew us.” Knew us disturbingly well.

  “Well, let’s go back to Canterbury and try to get to the bottom of this,” said the Colonel.

  “We did. We went back the next day—the day after next, rather. We actually spent the next day recovering from whatever drug it was they slipped us.”

  Indeed we had spent the day in bed. When Tinkler dropped us off on our return from Canterbury we had still been awesomely stoned. The night sky had looked like a cheap theatrical backcloth above the illuminated white shape of the Abbey, where a light in one of the upstairs rooms had glowed with a particular, singular intensity.

  I’d ‘known’ instantly this must be Stinky’s room and I could feel his eyes on us as we hurried to our front door, pursued by the endless clattering echo of our own footsteps, and by Tinkler. He saw us safely through our front door, said, “Remember, you’re not allowed to have psychedelic sex,” and then drove off to take Clean Head home.

  Unfortunately we let Tinkler down. Watched respectfully by the cats, whose eyes were four tiny, glowing, golden-green mirrors in the darkness, we had lain in bed making love slowly, endlessly and tenderly, spurred on by the certainty we had almost died. Finally as the dawn light was coming through the window, in slow solid blocks that pulsed as they arrived, we came to a halt. I lay exhausted on top of Nevada.

  She bit my neck gently and whispered something in my ear, so quietly I could hardly hear. But as I drifted off to sleep, the soft repeated syllables had slowly soaked into my brain:

  Love is this.

  Love is this.

  Love is this.

  The next day when Tinkler saw us he shook his head disgustedly and said, “You had psychedelic sex, didn’t you?”

  * * *

  “Anyway,” I said to the Colonel, “we didn’t get back to Canterbury until the following day.” Nevada was looking in anxiously from the kitchen where she had gone to start making coffee—she was under strict instructions to use the second-best beans—as soon as she’d seen the Colonel outside our gate. She was always concerned that I might get into a fistfight with the irascible old bastard, or something.

  There was certainly no danger of that at the moment. I couldn’t even get his attention, because Turk had just come clattering into the house and jumped up on the table in front of him. She was now prowling around on the table and sniffing at the Harrods bag. The Colonel was grinning at her.

  “This is Turk, isn’t it?” he said. “She’s got a lighter coat. And the nose is different.”

  “And she’s got a scar,” I said. “She’s a fighter.”

  “So is your friend. What’s his name? Tinker?”

  “Tinkler?” I said. “I don’t think I’d describe him as a fighter…”

  “Really?” snarled the Colonel. “Wouldn’t you? Well, it sounds to me like he did a terrific job of getting you out of a very nasty situation just in the nick of time.”

  “Trust me, nobody’s more surprised than he is.”

  Nevada came in with coffee, and while the Colonel was stroking both cats, one with each hand—I had to admire his coordination—I tried to update him about what we’d found when we went back to Canterbury. We had located the house again and met the woman who actually owned it. She’d been away on holiday in Sardinia and had just returned. She was quite eager to talk to us, not least because at first she thought we had been sent by the insurance company.

  “She was having quite a bit of trouble with the insurance company. It seems they only expect people to try and claim after they’ve successfully managed to burn their house down with cans of petrol, not to claim for a failed attempt.”

  “It’s totally baffled their system,” said Nevada.

  The Colonel nodded as if he was listening closely, which he might well have been, despite the fact that he now had both Fanny and Turk on the table in front of him, circling the Harrods bag in fascination, and he was still deftly stroking them both.

  “So after she found out we weren’t with the insurance people she was quite happy to have us there to complain about the insurance people to,” said Nevada.

  “She never did get around to asking us who we were,” I said.

  “She was very preoccupied with her claim for damages,” added Nevada.

  “What damages?” said the Colonel. “Nothing burned, did it?”

  “No, but they poured petrol all over everything. It soaked into the floor and furniture and ruined the rugs in the hallway, according to her.”

  “Yes,” said Nevada, “and yet what really got her upset was that they’d cut some of her roses.” This was true. But what had got her dander up even more was the fact of her missing Penguin paperbacks. Ironically, and presumably coincidentally, there had been a large collection of these in the house. It was the one instance where ‘Mrs Beatty’ had not been lying.

  “Someone cherry-picked all of the best titles,” the woman had said. Both Nevada and I had our suspicions about what had happened to these, but we kept our mouths firmly shut.

  I said, “She certainly had no idea who tried to kill us.”

  The Colonel looked up from the cats. “Did you report what happened to the police?”

  “She reported the break-in. And the petrol being poured everywhere.”

  “But you didn’t report the attempt on your life?”

  I shrugged. “What could we prove? If they took a sample of our blood now it might show a trace of the LSD—or whatever it was—or it might not. We don’t have a copy of any of the handbills. We asked the woman who owned the house and she hadn’t seen any trace of them. It seems the would-be arsonists were very scrupulous about removing those before they took off.” I looked at Nevada. “About all we could prove was that we were there, in the house that had been broken into.”

  “And you can see the problem with that,” she said, turning to the Colonel. “We might have ended up getting arrested ourselves.”

  He nodded. “And you don’t think she might have been in on it?” he said. “The woman who actually owned the house.”

  Nevada shook her head. “She was genuinely pissed off about those roses.”

  And the Penguins.
/>   “You should be paying us danger money,” said Nevada, smiling at the Colonel, “since we seem to be dealing with dangerous people.”

  “I will,” he said. “Consider your fee doubled as of now.” Then he grinned. “But you know what it means if you’re dealing with dangerous people?”

  “It means they’re trying to hide something,” said Nevada.

  “Which means there’s something to hide,” I said.

  He nodded. “And now you can find out what it is.”

  The bag from Harrods Food Hall turned out to contain diced lamb for the cats. While we were feeding it to them, the doorbell rang. Nevada went to answer it, and let Lucille Tegmark in. “Lucy,” she said.

  The Colonel’s face fell as he saw her. I suspected that one reason he’d come here to talk to us was to get the hell away from his unwanted companion. She glanced into the kitchen, then joined us in the living room. “Lamb,” she said. “I wondered what you’d bought.” She sat down at the table beside the Colonel, who pointedly moved his chair away. Lucy looked at him. “You do realise that some poor little lamb had to be taken bleating and screaming from its mother? A lamb to the slaughter.” She suddenly looked at me. “Isn’t that what they tried to make of you?” She looked at Nevada. “Lambs to the slaughter.”

  “Oh, Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” said the Colonel. He sighed and leaned back in his chair, looking at Lucy. “Have you worked out what happened to your documents yet?”

  “We know what happened to them,” she said.

  He turned to us. “Of all the print shops in London, she has to choose that one,” he said.

  Lucy’s face took on a ruddy tone and her eyes grew bright. “It didn’t matter which one I chose,” she said. “Obviously someone was watching and waiting and went in and stole our material.”

  The Colonel looked at us, shaking his head. “She chose the sort of place where that could happen.”

  Lucy looked at us. It seemed we were supposed to referee this. “I didn’t know anything was going to happen. How could I have known?”

  “Simple, basic precautions,” said the Colonel. “The kind anybody would take. Any sensible person.”

  Lucy stood up, turning away from him. She smiled at us, but it was clear his remarks had stung. “Well, if you’ll excuse me, I have to be going.”

  “Really, must you?” said Nevada. “You’ve only just got here.”

  “I have a lot of research to do. For the book. At the British Library.”

  Nevada showed her to the door. As soon as she was gone—while the door was still being closed behind her, in fact—the Colonel said, “She won’t even be able to find the British Library.” He was still staring angrily after her when Nevada came back into the room. Lucy’s visit seemed to have definitively soured his mood, not that it had ever needed much souring.

  Sensing the change, Nevada became determined to cheer him up. “Can we offer you a glass of wine, John? We’ve got rather a nice old vine Syrah on the go.” To my surprise, he accepted. I had him pegged as a man who was against all pleasure, especially his own. But maybe I’d got it wrong. He sniffed the wine when Nevada brought him a glass, and began to sip at it steadily, with reluctant satisfaction.

  Nevada put out cheese and figs and some bread and we picked away at it as we drank. We finished the bottle and I looked at Nevada and we decided silently to open another one. Turk climbed onto the coffee table to have a nap and Fanny fell asleep on the sofa. I served supper and we chatted in a desultory manner, mostly about how pissed off the Colonel was with Lucy.

  We were about halfway through the third bottle of wine when the Colonel suddenly said, “It’s her.”

  “I beg your pardon?” said Nevada.

  “I got the results of the DNA test. That thing in Canterbury living with the gold-toothed shyster. It is my sister.”

  “God, John,” said Nevada. When had she got on first name terms with him? He certainly didn’t seem to mind. “That must be quite a feeling. I mean, to know for certain. After all these years.”

  He grunted something.

  “Perhaps you feel a little… conflicted.”

  “Conflicted?” He snorted and took another sip of wine. “That human wreck is all I have left. That lobotomised mountain of dumb flesh. She’s all that remains of my family.” He looked up from his glass. “She’s the remains.” He chuckled coldly. “The human remains.” The fact that Cecilia had spoken to us on that day in Canterbury seemed not to have moved him at all. When we’d reported it to him he hadn’t even asked what she said.

  He was a man who knew his mind, and his mind was made up. At least where Cecilia was concerned. He drained his glass and set it down. “No,” he said. “My only hope is Valerian’s son. If that little boy survived, he’s a man now. And he’s the only hope I have. For the future. For my family.” For a moment his eyes glittered and I realised with a shock that the wine had brought him close to tears. Nevada gave me a look.

  I went and put some music on, to lighten the mood. I chose a Decca ten inch of Lita Roza. It was one of her few true jazz recordings. She was singing here with the Tony Kinsey quartet, including the mighty Joe Harriott on sax. The Colonel turned and listened for a minute and said, “Didn’t this girl sing ‘(How Much Is That) Doggie in the Window’?”

  “She did indeed,” I said. “But not on this record, thank god.”

  We finally called for a taxi—not Clean Head, who was taking a few well-earned days off—and put the slightly squiffy Colonel in it and sent him back to his hotel. When we got back inside the house, Nevada looked at me and said, “The poor bastard. All he’s got in this world is our cats.”

  “And he’s not having them.”

  “So we’ve got to try and find out what happened to his nephew.”

  “I’ve got an idea.” I picked up the phone.

  Nevada glanced at the clock. “It’s late. It’s one in the morning.”

  “That’s okay. He lives the rock and roll lifestyle.” I dialled Erik Make Loud’s number.

  He answered right away. “Hello?”

  “Hello.”

  “Yeah, hello.”

  I said, “Do you know who this is?”

  A pause. “Tinkler’s mate.” Now that he’d established who I was, he started to sound sleepy. He yawned loudly and said, “How is he, by the way? Old Tinkler?”

  “Great,” I said. “On fine form. In fact a few days ago he saved my life.”

  “Really?” said Erik. He sounded intrigued. “What happened?”

  “Someone tried to burn down a house with me in it.” Nevada was pointing at herself and mouthing silently, And me. “And Nevada,” I said.

  “Holy shit.” Suddenly Erik was wide awake. “Tell me all about it.”

  “Some other time,” I said. “It’s late.”

  “But Tinkler saved you, did he?” said Erik. He sounded impressed. I reassured him this was indeed the case, we said our goodbyes and I hung up. I’d had a cover story ready, but he hadn’t asked why I’d rung him. Perhaps as a rock star he expected random calls from adoring fans. Just to hear his voice.

  Nevada was looking at me sceptically. “What was all that about?”

  “Erik didn’t know anything about what happened to us in Canterbury. He was genuinely surprised.”

  “Either that or he’s a very good actor.”

  “He’s not that good an actor,” I said. “He’s not even that good a guitarist.”

  19. ICED BOTTLE

  My next step was to talk to Nic Vardy.

  This proved far from simple. He was impossible to reach on any of his many phone numbers, and text and Twitter proved equally ineffectual. Finally I resorted to email and eventually elicited a reply by this medium. It seemed the famous and suddenly very busy photographer was unable to schedule a phone conversation with us—no explanation why—but if we wanted to go to the trouble and inconvenience of travelling all the way out to Docklands again to see him, he was quite willing to grant us another inte
rview in his bijou flat overlooking the marina.

  I turned up five minutes early and watched the ducks, or rather the moorhens, until it was time for my appointment. I was on my own, having deliberately chosen a time when Nevada was busy. I didn’t like the way Vardy looked at her.

  As I approached the glass and steel flat I studied the windows. The pattern of them was randomised by the bright red, yellow and blue Mondrian blinds. The place looked deserted.

  I wondered glumly if Vardy had sensed my hostility, or perhaps just the absence of Nevada, and decided to be out when I called.

  When I rang the bell, however, I was instantly rewarded with the thumping of feet descending a staircase with emphatic, jaunty urgency. The door sprang open in a waft of warm air and expensive aftershave. It was Erik Make Loud.

  “Hello, sport. Didn’t bring Tinkler with you, then?”

  “Had I known you were going to be here…”

  He laughed and thumped me on the arm as I came in. “So what are you doing in Docklands?” I said.

  “I’ve been seeing a lot of old Vardy since he came to the Half Moon for the gig that night. You’re responsible for a bit of a reunion.”

  I took off my coat and we went up the minimalist wooden staircase—basically polished planks of wood set on iron bars jutting out of the wall. Vardy was waiting in the living room, sitting on a sofa. I entered the room and was instantly disoriented by a wave of déjà vu.

  I had been in this room before, yet I hadn’t. I remembered this place, yet I didn’t. It was so powerful that I wondered if it was some kind of hideous flashback aftermath of the LSD, blasting into my brain days later. What a cheering notion—that my mind might have been damaged permanently by the stuff.

  But then I realised what it was. I was standing in the same room, with the same view out the window of a pale afternoon reflected in the marina water. But the furniture in the room had been moved around—and some of it had actually changed. One of the armchairs, which had been a bit faded and worn last time, now looked paradoxically brand new. Maybe he’d had it refurbished in some way. Or maybe he’d upgraded to a better model and casually discarded the old one.