by Mark Timlin
The barman exchanged the full ashtray for an empty one, nodded and left.
‘Did you have any trouble getting in?’
‘No, it was very efficient.’
‘Good.’
‘You have excellent security here.’
‘After what happened to Trash, I thought we needed some.’
‘Trash?’ I asked.
‘Danny. Danny Shapiro. We call him Trash. He used to collect garbage for the city in New York. Nearly everyone in the band and crew’s got a nickname. It’s a game we play. Anyway, after what happened I called up the firm that does our tour security in Europe. They rent out heavies by the yard.’
‘They’re very polite,’ I said.
‘They’re paid to be. But they have another side to them.’
‘I can imagine. Don’t the other guests object?’
Roger Lomax smiled. ‘There are no other guests. We’ve taken the entire hotel for two months.’
I can’t say I wasn’t impressed. ‘You like a little elbow room then?’
‘Not really. This is just a small place. There’s only thirty-six apartments in the hotel, and twenty-five are being used by us right now. We always like a few spare for emergencies. We carry a large entourage of camp followers. We always stay here when we’re in London. The management are very understanding and the staff discreet and obliging.’
As if to prove his point, the barman returned with two more huge glasses on a silver tray. He slid them in front of us and vanished without a word. ‘I see what you mean,’ I said.
‘That’s nothing, believe me.’ I did, but didn’t ask for details. ‘This is a rock ‘n’ roll hotel,’ he went on. ‘An upmarket one, it’s true, but rock ‘n’ roll through and through. It’s owned by someone who understands the business, used to be in it. The manager doesn’t have to justify his existence to a conglomerate. The people here are prepared to overlook a little high spirits, supply food and booze at all hours. The bars stay open until the last person leaves. They don’t mind a few extra people staying over some nights. There’s a tennis court, olympic-sized swimming pool, Nautilus gym, snooker and pool rooms in the basement. They’ll even go so far as to redecorate if someone objects to the colour scheme in their suite. At a price, of course. A very high price. Refuse to pay and you’ll never get a reservation again.’
‘Everything costs.’
‘This is true. So we can just come in here and pull up the drawbridge and party, you know what I mean?’
‘Not really.’
‘You will.’
‘If I want to take the job.’
‘Why shouldn’t you?’
‘Let me ask you a question first – what makes you think someone tried to murder your man? What exactly happened?’
‘This is confidential, right?’
‘Of course.’
‘He took some bad cocaine.’
‘Bad? How?’ I asked.
‘The worst way. It wasn’t coke at all. It was smack. He OD’d.’
‘Hmm.’
‘Now you see what I mean about murder?’
I nodded. ‘When did this all happen exactly?’
‘Last night. Well, this morning to be precise. Three a.m. We got the hotel doctor. He got Trash to the Cromwell Hospital. They cleaned him out. It was a close call. He’s still there, under guard. He’ll be out in a couple of days and back to work.’
‘Where did the stuff come from?’
‘He doesn’t know.’
‘How come?’
‘He’s a coke freak. To the max. He’s got Charlie stashed all over the shop. The guy would hide coke in his baby’s diapers, if he had a baby.’
‘Do you know who was here in the hotel when it happened?’ I asked.
‘I’ve got a guest and room list in here.’ He tapped the brown folder in front of him.
‘That’s not what I asked,’ I said. ‘Do you know exactly who was in the hotel this morning? Who Shapiro was with? What everyone’s movements were?’
‘It’s confused. There was a party going on.’
‘Someone must know who was there.’
‘People were coming and going. You know how it is.’
‘Yeah, I know how it is. But what the hell do you want me to do?’
‘Find out exactly what did happen.’
‘An accident maybe?’
‘Not the first.’
‘No?’
‘No. Some tapes got wiped in the studio. A lot of work went down the drain, and a lot of cash. And other things – small things, equipment going missing. Nothing much on its own but…’
‘It could be coincidence.’
‘It could be. Find out for me. Ask around.’
‘Have you considered that people here might not want to help me? I’ve got no authority. Get the police in, it’s not too late. They’ll probably smack your wrist for being tardy, but so what? I’m sure you’ve had worse. People tend to answer their questions.’
‘No police.’
‘You keep saying that. Why not?’
‘When I spoke to McBain about you, he said you weren’t stupid.’
‘I’m not.’
‘Then join the dots. The last thing I want is the police poking around in here. This is a great big money factory. The band earn a lot, a fuck of a lot. We have less than a month to finish the new album. It’s all scheduled. The record company reps have sold it into the shops. Ads have been booked in the trades. More importantly, the week it’s due out is a very quiet one for releases. It’s the optimum date for it to go to number one, worldwide, first week. Lots of editorial space has been earmarked for interviews. Christ, there’s a six-month copy date on some of the glossies. The interviews are in, and I don’t intend for them to come out and no new product in the stores. Two TV documentaries are scheduled for the week of release, one here, one in the States. The publicity machine has started to grind, and once started it’s hard to stop. If we miss the date it won’t be fatal, but we will lose maybe a couple of million unit sales worldwide. We don’t need those sales but we sure want them.
‘A month ago Keith Pandora’s mother gets ill, very ill, maybe terminal. She can’t be moved and he insisted on coming home. She’s the only mother he’s got and he wanted to be here, just in case. Now as it happens we’re playing five nights at Wembley Arena two months from now.’ He tapped the table top for emphasis. ‘That’s at the start of the World Tour that’ll keep them on the road for months. Up to, including and long past the album release date. So you see time is tight. What we do is cancel our studio time in LA, buy time in London, which won’t be easy at short notice, believe me, and book this place for two months. We’ve already got it reserved around the week we’re at Wembley. In fact, it would be cheaper to buy the fucking place at the rates we’re paying.’ He shuddered at the thought.
‘You have no idea what it’s costing us to suspend work on the album.’ He gave me a look of such pure sincerity as he spoke that he almost had me believing he gave a damn. Almost.
‘I’ve hired a sound stage at Shepperton for live rehearsal, and brought over key road crew. I’ll fly the rest over in time for the concerts and maybe pick up a few here. Representatives of the lawyers and accountants have come over with us and they’re working from suites on the third floor. So what we’ve done in essence is move Pandora’s Box’s base of operations from Los Angeles to London.
‘See, these people are different. I know them. I know their drinks and drugs of choice. Who they’ve fucked and who they’d like to fuck. I even know what make of tampons the girls favour. I should do, I’ve had to buy them enough times. This is our world. It’s a closed world and we look after our own business. Clean business and dirty business. We get away with a lot. The punters expect it. What I don’t need is a bunch of London cops tramping around in here. It upset
s the creative flow.’
‘So does murdering one of the band.’
‘Exactly,’ he said, without a trace of irony. ‘We need someone who knows a little bit about the business.’
‘I don’t.’
‘McBain says different. He says you’re cool. I’ve known him a long time, and what he says goes with me. So will you take the job?’
I didn’t answer. ‘Attempted murder is serious,’ I said.
‘Look, Nick, I can’t even be sure it was attempted murder. Maybe Trash did get things mixed up. It happens. But I swear to God I’ve never known him take horse. Maybe it was just someone’s idea of a joke that went wrong. I just want a clue without calling in the law. We may be able to get away with a lot, but we’re still vulnerable. Three of the band and most of the crew are American. I don’t want anyone busted and deported. That would bring the album to a halt and my career with it. Do me a favour, Nick, say you’ll help. Here’s that list of everyone booked into the hotel. I’ve spoken to them and they’re prepared to talk to you. Well, most are. They’re pretty spooked about Trash, all of them, whatever front they put on.’
‘He’s that important?’
‘At the moment, yes. You see there’s only one track on the album left to do and it’s written by him, sung by him, and all the guitar parts are his. The bass and drum tracks were laid down at the weekend. We need him for the lead guitar and vocal parts and time’s getting short. And we can’t go without him.’
‘You have a month.’
‘A month to finish one track is nothing for this lot. The album after Regrets took three years to record and that only had nine tracks on it. A month is fast work, believe me.’
He fell silent and so did I. I sipped my drink and lit a cigarette. ‘So where exactly do you fit in?’ I asked finally.
‘I was wondering when you’d ask. I’m the man. I look after the money factory. I procure things and smooth the way, and when things go wrong I grease the palms so that things go right again.’
‘Do they go wrong a lot? You seem to have all the bases covered.’
‘Are you kidding? Just look at the mess we’re in now. In this business, things always go wrong. It’s the only constant you can count on. I’ve been in the industry for twenty years. I started as a gofer for Jack Barry at The Marquee. I did a couple of Reading festivals, then joined Family as a backline roadie.’
‘What?’
‘I looked after the onstage amps and stacks. I went to the States with them twice, and stayed. I worked for Capitol Records as a plugger. What I was really doing was supplying cash and coke to the FM stations on the West Coast. Then I joined Atlantic, did the same. Then I got promoted to special projects.’
I looked at him.
‘Don’t ask,’ he said. ‘I did one tour with Zeppelin before Bonzo died, then tour-managed Elton John, and when he stopped touring in eighty-one I hitched up with The Box. I’ve been with them ever since.’
‘You come from London?’
‘Originally. East End through and through… at least, I was. I went back for the first time in years a couple of weeks ago. Shit, man, they’ve ruined that part of town. It was never all that great, but now …’
‘Times change,’ I said. ‘And governments. Anyway I thought you’d have been a Tory, with all this.’ I gestured round the bar.
‘American citizen now. Straight Democrat ticket. That’s another reason I don’t want any deportations. I might be first.’
‘It sounds like you have a good life.’
‘It is. I’m very well paid. Very. And I have an expense account that means I never have to touch my salary. I have absolute control over a bank account that contains enough funds to make your eyes water. I carry every major credit card, all the bills are covered, and I don’t have to supply receipts. I have an apartment in Beverly Hills and shop on Rodeo Drive. I have a very beautiful woman who lives in that apartment whom I haven’t seen for months and might not see again for another six, or maybe longer. She’s probably balling the world. I know I am. I have the choice of eighteen cars. I travel first class. Soon, I’m sure, my shit won’t stink. For a boy from Plaistow, who never lived in a house with an inside toilet until he was fifteen, I reckon that’s not bad.’
‘Not bad at all, so why are you so pissed off?’
‘Sorry, Nick. Sometimes I ramble. Too many of these.’ He tapped his glass.
‘Me too,’ I said. And it was true.
‘So listen, I’ve got a suite for you,’ he said. ‘It’s very pleasant, second floor, on the corner with a view of the square.’
‘Do you think I’ll approve of the colour scheme?’
‘I hope so. Does that mean you’ll take the job?’
‘I don’t know.’
Just then the door of the bar opened and a woman came into the room. She walked over to the bar and said something to the barmen. One reached down and touched a switch, and recessed lights in the ceiling and walls winked on. It wasn’t the Blackpool illuminations but at least you could see to count the fingers on your hand.
I looked over at Lomax. ‘Isn’t that Ninotchka?’
He nodded. ‘None other.’
I checked the woman out. She didn’t look much from a distance, but she was a bona fide, 22-carat rock star with a capital R and a capital S. Apart from the success she’d had with Pandora’s Box she’d released several solo albums which had charted, and had three top ten singles in her own right. She’d been in two movies, one Oscar-nominated, and had by all accounts fucked enough famous geezers to qualify for a double-page spread in the Guinness Book of Records.
The barman mixed her a drink, and when he passed her the glass she made towards us. She was wearing a chamois leather suit with a short jacket and a long, full skirt that revealed a hint of white petticoat at the hem. The jacket was unbuttoned over a silk camisole top with lots of lace detail, and by the way her nipples poked through the thin material, and jiggled as she walked like two tiny loaded pistols, nothing underneath. Her high-heeled, lace-up boots matched the colour of her suit to perfection. She was wearing a lot of tom. About fifty narrow silver bracelets on each wrist, silver rings on every finger including a twin of the one Roger Lomax wore. Around her neck was a silver and turquoise necklace and in one ear was an extravagant earring of silver and bright blue feathers, more than six inches long. Her hair was dusty blonde, and tied back so that just a few wisps hung around her ears. She was tanned golden, and the shade of lipstick she wore set off the tan to perfection.
‘Do you always have to sit in the dark, Roger?’ she asked. ‘I swear you were a vampire in a previous life.’ She had a real American accent and played it to the gallery, which was me.
‘Ninotchka, this is Nick Sharman,’ said Roger Lomax. ‘He’s an old friend of Mark McBain’s.’
‘Wow, how did you manage that? McBain’s as hard to tie down as smoke,’ she said, generating about ten thousand watts of pure California girlism.
‘I managed,’ I said, and offered her my hand.
Her jewellery rattled as she took it. Her grip was strong and dry.
‘Nick Sharman, this is Ninotchka,’ Roger Lomax finished the introduction.
What do you say? I’ve seen your tits in Playboy. I’ve seen you all sweated up, frolicking with some butch geezer in your last video. I saw your arse in the movie when you were supposed to be screwing Jack Nicholson. I said none of those things. ‘How do you do?’ was all I said.
‘You Englishmen are so polite,’ she said back. ‘At first.’ And gave Roger a dirty look. I sensed there was unfinished business there, and I didn’t want to know about it.
Up close, and even in the half-light of the bar, Ninotchka was showing signs of wear and tear around the edges. Hard boozing wear and tear, hard living wear and tear. But on her it looked good. Besides, she looked as if she could care less.
She sat down and helped herself to one of Lomax’s cigarettes. ‘What do you do, Nick?’ she asked.
‘He’s a private cop,’ Lomax answered for me. ‘I’ve asked him to find out who spiked Trash.’
‘You don’t look much like Dick Tracy.’
‘I’m not,’ I said modestly.
‘You going to ask me some questions?’
‘Maybe. I haven’t made up my mind whether to take the job or not.’ But I was beginning to.
‘Wanna take me to dinner tonight?’ she asked.
That sort of offer you don’t get from that sort of woman twice in a lifetime. ‘Yeah, sure,’ I said, almost tripping over my tongue.
‘I’m in the Mayfair Suite. Corny but true. Pick me up at seven. I get too hungry for dinner at eight.’ And she started half singing, half humming The Lady is a Tramp as she finished her drink, stood up and left us.
I looked at Lomax and he looked back at me and I don’t think he liked what he saw. ‘Seems like you’ve taken the job then?’
‘Seems like it.’
‘I’d be very careful there if I were you, Nick. You’re just her type, I know it. I’ll tell you exactly what’s going to happen. She’ll give you her full attention, ignore everyone else. She’ll only speak through you. She’ll ask your advice on everything, and take it. You’ll choose her clothes and her next single. She’ll buy you the complete Gaultier summer collection. You’ll be walking around three feet off the ground. Then she’ll cut you off at the knees, brother. She’ll chop off your dick, spread it with mustard, put it in a roll and gobble it up. You’ll be castrated, and you’ll probably hand her the scalpel, you’ll love her so much.’
‘Sounds like the voice of experience.’
‘You’d better believe it! I told you, I know what tampons she prefers. I’m giving you the good word, Nick. Just like I wish someone had done to me.’
‘I’ll bear it in mind.’
‘No, you won’t.’
He was wrong. I would. I was too old and ugly to fall into that kind of trap, or so I thought. ‘If I’m going to stay here I’ll need to go back and get some things,’ I said, ignoring his comment.
