The Kings of London

by William Shaw

She walked ahead, dodging a taxi which blared its horn.

  ‘Wish Bailey would let us put a radio on. It’s so bloody quiet in here,’ complained Marilyn. ‘It’s like a morgue.’

  ‘Minus prat in the cravat,’ muttered Tozer.

  ‘For God’s sake,’ said Breen.

  It was true. Breen had never known the office like this. There were two empty desks now. It wasn’t just Prosser. Sergeant Carmichael had gone to the Drug Squad in Scotland Yard too. Breen missed him. They had been school friends together; Breen had followed him into the police, then into CID. The Drug Squad was still recruiting. Carmichael wanted Breen to follow him into it. But they were a loud team, brash and confident. Always getting in the papers. Not only were they fighting a whole new type of criminal, but the ones they were arresting were usually far more glamorous than the usual CID fare. Breen felt more at home where he was.

  He unfolded a piece of paper and called the number on it. A young woman answered. ‘The Hemmings residence.’ A housemaid’s voice.

  When Mrs Hemmings came to the phone, Breen said, ‘Oliver Tarpey gave me your number.’

  ‘I’ve been expecting your call.’

  ‘Could I come and speak to you?’

  The woman lowered her voice, ‘Not here,’ she said. ‘It wouldn’t be… convenient.’ A deep voice. Public school. Posh. Not the sort for the son of a working-class Labour man to be hanging around with. They arranged to meet on Wednesday in Battersea Park.

  Jones crossed the office and put a list of all the known and convicted burglars in the NW8 area on Breen’s desk. The two of them sat, going through them.

  Jones said, ‘Thing is, we don’t really know if anything was stolen, even. If we knew that, we might be able to narrow it down a bit. What about other murders? Anything like this?’

  Two burnt men. Breen thought about the body in the fire: the man who had died the night his father went into hospital. But that was different. He had been drunk. The fire had killed him. This man was dead before someone had tried to obliterate the evidence.

  Breen looked up from the list and said, ‘Are you coming to Bailey’s drinks tomorrow?’

  ‘Do I have to?’ said Jones.

  ‘Give him a break. He’ll be retiring soon.’

  ‘Not soon enough,’ said Jones.

  ‘You’ll have a baby any sec,’ said Tozer. ‘Take the chance to live it up while you can.’

  Breen said, ‘When is it due, Jones?’

  Jones blushed. ‘May. So the wife tells me.’

  ‘So come on. You won’t be able to go out so much, after.’

  ‘Who said having a baby’s going to stop me?’ said Jones with a grin. ‘Never stopped my dad.’

  ‘Boozer, was he?’

  ‘Is,’ said Jones. ‘Bloody alky, more or less.’

  ‘Language,’ said Marilyn.

  ‘Gin. Cider. Anything. He’d spend his life in the boozer if they didn’t shut.’ And Breen noticed how he started methodically flicking his biro in the air when he started to talk about his father.

  Breen said, ‘You know we saw Prosser’s girl on Saturday. You’re friends with her, aren’t you?’

  ‘Shirley? Don’t see much of her since she ran out on Prosser.’

  ‘Do you have her address?’

  The biro went up a few more times before he asked, ‘What do you want that for?’

  Breen looked back down at the list. ‘I just thought I should see if she’s doing all right.’

  Jones said, ‘You didn’t even like Prosser.’

  ‘Just wanted to know she was OK, that’s all.’

  Jones paused, then said, ‘A flat above a record shop on Edgware Road. That’s where she went when she left him. Maybe I should come too?’

  ‘It’s all right,’ said Breen. ‘Any idea what it was called?’

  ‘Something daft. I don’t know.’

  ‘Jumbo Records,’ said Tozer.

  ‘That’s it,’ said Jones. ‘Sells a load of jigaboo music. Not real jazz or anything.’

  Tozer was looking at Breen with a puzzled expression, but she didn’t say anything.

  The next morning he took the picture off his wall, wrapped it, tucked it under his arm, and carried it on the bus back to the police station.

  It was Tuesday. The Bond Street art galleries would be open. With Tozer, he caught the bus to Piccadilly Circus and walked down Piccadilly, reassuringly plain in the drizzle. A street of shops selling Norfolk jackets, bowler hats and umbrellas. Grey stone facades and tea at Fortnum’s.

  ‘Are you going to Bailey’s drinks tonight?’ he asked her.

  ‘Suppose,’ she said. ‘You want me to?’

  ‘It’s not up to me,’ said Breen. ‘Is it?’

  The first couple of galleries they went into sold oil paintings of horses and pastoral landscapes. ‘Modern nonsense,’ a lady in pearls said after a single glance in the first one they visited. A man in a yellow waistcoat in the second gallery said, ‘Try that place in Mason’s Yard. Can’t remember its name. It’s more their kind of thing. If it’s still going.’

  ‘How can anyone afford this stuff?’ said Tozer. ‘Those prices are loopy.’

  Mason’s Yard was a couple of streets away. The gallery was called Indica, according to the big sign over the window, but it seemed empty. A young woman with dirty blonde hair came to the door and said, ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Is this an art gallery?’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘We’re police,’ he said.

  She smiled. ‘Is this a raid? Only there’s nothing left here any more. The gallery’s closed.’ She wore a suede miniskirt and large patent leather boots.

  ‘I’ve only come to ask about a picture.’ Breen took the print out of the brown paper he’d been carrying it in and held it up towards her.

  The young woman frowned. She looked from Tozer to Breen. ‘What about it?’

  ‘Do you recognise it?’

  ‘Bridget Riley, of course. Is it stolen?’

  He examined the small etched signature. He hadn’t been able to make the name out before, but she was right. He should have recognised it. She was famous for those black-and-white geometric paintings that made you dizzy to look at.

  ‘Who in their right mind would nick a Bridget Riley, anyway? Op Art is finished,’ she said. ‘It’s inarticulate.’

  ‘We just want to know who might have sold it,’ said Breen.

  ‘Ask Bob Fraser,’ she said. ‘He used to sell stuff like that. Not any more.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Robert Fraser Gallery. Only he doesn’t really like the police much.’

  ‘Why not?’

  She rolled her eyes. ‘Don’t you actually read the papers? Because a bunch of your lot busted him for drugs last year. There was a fuss.’

  ‘What sort of fuss?’

  ‘He went to jail. Clink. Loved it, apparently.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Tozer. ‘That Robert Fraser.’

  The Robert Fraser Gallery was just off Grosvenor Square, close by. They walked there, but it was empty as well; no art visible through the windows. Breen rang the bell for a few minutes, but nobody answered.

  Striding back up towards Piccadilly, Tozer said, ‘You fancied her, didn’t you?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘That girl who told you about the painting.’

  Breen said, ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

  ‘Posh girl. Nice hair. I saw you peeking at her legs. Not surprised really. She was very pretty.’

  ‘I was not looking at her legs,’ said Breen. ‘I was observing.’

  ‘Observing,’ said Tozer.

  ‘It’s my job. Why? You jealous?’

  ‘God sake,’ she said. ‘Why would I be jealous?’

  Breen put the collar up on his raincoat and walked faster.

  Back in the office, Breen was drawing on a large sheet he had made by sticking two pieces of typing paper together.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Jones.

  ‘It’s
a graph.’

  ‘A graph?’ He sniggered.

  ‘I hated maths,’ said Tozer, holding up a powder compact in one hand and a stick of lipstick in the other. ‘I was always rubbish at it at school.’

  ‘Me too,’ said Jones. He stared at Tozer trying to put lipstick on. ‘You don’t need maths anymore, anyway. They’re going to make calculators you can do it all on, so why bother?’ He turned back to Breen. ‘Why do girls always make faces when they’re putting on make-up?’

  ‘You try doing it without,’ said Tozer, holding the lipstick towards him.

  ‘Bog off,’ he said, recoiling. ‘You’re not supposed to wear lipstick on duty. ‘’Sides, I don’t think you should be allowed to do that in the CID room, anyway.’

  ‘You don’t have to look,’ said Tozer.

  Breen had bought a packet of ten coloured crayons from W.H. Smith’s and now he took the sheets of paper and placed them on the floor. With a ruler he started drawing lines, half an inch apart.

  ‘Did you know your tongue sticks out when you concentrate?’ asked Tozer.

  When he’d finished drawing the grid, Breen started plotting points on the big sheet of paper using the crayons.

  Jones said, ‘What’s it supposed to show?’

  Francis Pugh had banked at Lloyds in Holborn Circus. Breen had requested all Pugh’s bank statements, filling in the gaps. He had spent the afternoon looking at them, breaking the payments down into different categories. Now he was plotting his notes onto the graph.

  Tozer said, ‘Are you going to be long? Jonesy and I can see you in the pub if you like?’

  ‘Has Bailey gone already?’ said Jones. ‘Don’t want to miss the free round.’

  Breen didn’t answer. He was concentrating on joining the small green crosses he had drawn on the paper. The floor was old and uneven. The worn grain of the wood showed through in the unevenness of his lines.

  ‘Free round?’ said Tozer.

  ‘There’s always a free round if it’s someone’s birthday. Besides, how else is Bailey going to get anyone coming?’

  Breen stood up and looked at the line he’d made. Then picked up the red crayon and started joining the red crosses.

  ‘I don’t mind waiting, mind,’ said Jones. He was watching Breen’s careful hand. ‘Imagine what Prosser would have said if he’d seen you doing that.’

  When he’d finished the red line, Breen stood up. He stared at the graph.

  ‘What’s it mean?’ said Jones.

  Breen looked at the graph. ‘I’m not sure,’ he said.

  Tozer joined them now, make-up back in her bag.

  ‘What’s the green line?’ she asked.

  ‘All the sums of money he spent on clothes since March 1967.’

  ‘And the red one?’

  ‘Cheques made out to cash.’

  The green line started high and descended as time progressed. Over the few weeks before Pugh’s death it bumped along the bottom of the X-axis. The red line did the almost exact opposite. Starting low, it began to rise in around March of this year. In the last few weeks it had risen steeply upwards.

  ‘I don’t understand it,’ said Jones.

  ‘Maybe he was buying clothes with cash, instead of cheques,’ said Tozer.

  ‘Maybe,’ said Breen. The two lines crossed in mid-June. He stood there staring at the graph, sure that there was some meaning to it, but not able to figure out what it was.

  ‘I’m dying for a drink. Aren’t you?’ said Jones.

  TEN

  The Louise was for drinking and little else: lit too brightly, no jukebox, just stools and benches in the public bar. The floor was always thick with cigarette butts and wet from spilt beer. A police pub. There were only three women in the place, including Tozer and Marilyn.

  ‘Ah, Paddy. Wondered where you were. Let me get you a drink.’ Bailey greeted Breen a little too eagerly. ‘What are you having?’ Bailey’s wife had patched the sleeves of his tweed jacket with leather ovals.

  ‘Thank you sir. Lager.’

  Other officers smirked. ‘Oooh. Teacher’s pet,’ someone muttered.

  ‘Another one, Jones?’

  ‘Go on then, sir.’

  ‘I was hoping there would be a few more in,’ said Bailey. ‘But I suppose people are busy.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Breen had tried his best, but there weren’t many in the pub. Inspector Bailey had grown less popular. The Met was going to hell, as far as he was concerned. He didn’t trust the younger officers with their new ways of doing things, especially when it came to the way they bent the rules. He would be gone soon anyway.

  Breen took his drink and sat with his boss. Jones was on Bailey’s other side.

  ‘Any progress with the Pugh case?’ asked Bailey, offering around a packet of Senior Service. Old-man fags. No one took one.

  ‘I thought this was supposed to be a birthday drink, sir,’ said Jones. ‘No shop talk.’

  ‘I hear your wife is expecting, Constable Jones. Congratulations are in order.’

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ murmured Jones.

  ‘Best thing that happens to a man,’ said Bailey.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I should do this more often. Take you lot out for a drink.’

  Conversation dried.

  Until Breen said, ‘Are we recruiting new officers, sir? To make up for the shortfall?’

  Bailey said, ‘I thought this was supposed to be a birthday drink.’

  ‘Good one, sir.’ Though nobody laughed.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Bailey. ‘It seems as if we’re not the most popular department.’

  ‘I mean,’ somebody was saying, ‘I knew why Carmichael wanted to go to the Drug Squad, he was always a flashy git, but I thought Prosser would be carried out of here in a coffin.’

  ‘Mind if I join you, sir?’ Constable Tozer was standing there with a rum and blackcurrant.

  Breen shuffled down the bench to make space for her.

  ‘You bringing Mrs Bailey to the Christmas party, sir? They got Kenny Ball. Lovely stuff,’ said Jones.

  Bailey smiled politely, then turned to Tozer. ‘I hear you are leaving the police too, Miss Tozer?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Going back to Devon.’

  ‘She’s going back to the farm. We’re too fast for her up here,’ said someone. ‘Ain’t we, Helen?’

  ‘My father’s not well,’ said Tozer. She looked at Breen as she did so.

  They had never discussed it: looking after sick parents. He’d just finished that; she was about to begin. Not the kind of thing you talked about.

  ‘Acker Bilk, Chris Barber, Monty Sunshine. Proper music. None of this pop rubbish,’ Jones was saying.

  ‘Police life is not for everyone,’ Bailey said, sipping on his pint. ‘It’s better to discover that earlier rather than later.’

  ‘Shame you didn’t discover that earlier,’ someone muttered.

  Bailey didn’t seem to hear or pretended he hadn’t. Another drink, lads?’ he said.

  Officers smirked. ‘Lads’: sounded ridiculous, coming from Bailey.

  A voice said loudly, ‘Don’t mind if I do.’ Everybody looked round. Marilyn’s shortarse boyfriend Danny had arrived. Check shirt and rockabilly quiff.

  ‘He didn’t mean you, you prat,’ said Marilyn. He leaned over and gave her a kiss.

  ‘Of course I did,’ said Bailey. ‘Daniel, isn’t it?’

  ‘Lager and black then,’ said Danny with a smile.

  Jones gulped down the pint Bailey had just bought him and banged the empty glass on the table. ‘Go on, sir. I’ll have another.’

  The inspector stood, trying to get into the role, ‘Righto. Drinks all round,’ he said, leaving Breen, Tozer and Jones sitting together.

  ‘You like that Bob Dylan feller, don’t you, Tozer?’ Jones was saying. ‘That’s not singing, is it? It’s torture.’

  ‘He’s OK,’ said Tozer.

  ‘You wait,’ Jones was saying. ‘Couple of years and
nobody will remember any of that. It’s the classics they’re going to remember. Real music. I didn’t know your dad was sick, mind you.’

  Tozer nodded, sipped her rum.

  ‘Sorry to hear that,’ said Jones.

  Tozer nodded again. ‘Thanks,’ she said.

  ‘You get on with him?’

  Tozer nodded.

  ‘I hate my dad,’ said Jones.

  ‘Will you shut up about your bloody dad, Jonesy.’ Marilyn joined them on the bench. ‘That true, Helen? You don’t like police life?’

  Tozer said, ‘Just the company you have to keep, that’s all.’

  People laughed, thinking she was joking. Tozer said, ‘I heard Prosser had gone because someone had rumbled he was bent.’

  ‘Don’t talk bollocks,’ said Jones. ‘You don’t know anything.’

  Older coppers glared at her. Jones added, ‘Best copper we ever had on CID, Prosser.’

  ‘What about Paddy?’ said Marilyn, scooching up next to him.

  Jones didn’t answer.

  Bailey came back with a tray. ‘One for the road, eh, chums?’ he said, sitting down next to Breen. ‘Chin-chin.’

  Marilyn leaned round Breen and said to Bailey, ‘I think Paddy’s great, don’t you, sir? He’s lovely.’

  ‘He’s a good man,’ said Bailey uncomfortably.

  ‘I feel sorry for him, living on his own,’ continued Marilyn. ‘If you ever want me to come around and cook you a meal, Paddy. Do some laundry. Anything like that.’

  ‘Stupid woman,’ said Danny, standing across the table from them. ‘You’re drunk.’

  Breen stood and went to the toilet. Jones joined him at the urinal. The toilets in the Louise stank of piss. Fag ends blocked the drain.

  ‘Thing is,’ said Jones. ‘Sometimes I wish I could talk to women. Properly. Like you do.’

  Breen was doing up his flies. ‘Me? Are you having me on?’

  ‘Marilyn and Tozer. They talk to you.’

  Jones was splashing noisily against the porcelain.

  ‘Why do you want to talk to women anyway? You’re married.’

  ‘My wife is making me sleep on the sofa,’ Jones said, urine still splattering.

  Breen was about to go and wash his hands. Jones never talked like this. Not to him, anyway. Breen turned to him and asked, ‘Why?’

  ‘We row a bit. That’s all. They go a bit funny when they got a baby, I think. I don’t know how to talk to her. So I just go out. You know. Walking. Or to the pub. She don’t like pubs much.’