by John Lawton
§ 53
The cast was slow to assemble. Mary McDiarmuid insisted on driving Troy home and stayed to eat dinner with him. He could find no way to tell her to go. He desperately wanted to phone Tosca. He couldn’t do that with Mary there. He could go upstairs and phone on the bedroom extension, but he’d still be conscious of Mary. Instead he cooked for her: a vaguely Italian chicken and mushroom in white wine sauce that caused her to raise an eyebrow. ‘If you’re this good a cook, boss, I’m surprised you’re still single.’
‘I’m married,’ he said bluntly. ‘Don’t ask.’
Eddie turned up alone. Troy was uncertain whether his being there at all was his own idea or Jack’s, but Jack arrived ten minutes later and seemed not in the slightest surprised to find Eddie sipping tea on a straight-back chair in the corner, as ever trying to look like part of the furniture. And lastly, came Shrimp Robertson and George Bonham.
It had turned into an evening of warm summer drizzle, moisture simply hanging rather than falling to coat everything in soft focus. The droplets glistened on the Shrimp’s uniform, clinging to the blue-black tunic, shining like diamond on his silver buttons. He took off his helmet and clutched it, not in the way coppers do, who have long since given up wondering what to do with it, but clutching it with pride. The Shrimp wore his whole uniform with pride, even down to the boots, so shiny you could see your face in them – but that was often true of former National Servicemen. If little else they knew how to shine shoes. Troy could not remember that pride. He had fought his father to be allowed to become a copper in the first place, and the old man had quickly resigned himself to it as a comic novelty. But Troy doubted he had ever felt the pride Robertson felt. He had hated being in uniform, and going ‘plain’ had come as a relief. Whatever happened now, he hoped it did not take the shine off the boy’s pride in the job.
‘I ’ope you don’t mind, Mr Wildeve, sir, but Mr Bonham and me we go back a long way. In fact I’ve known Mr Bonham all me life. Mr Bonham can speak for me.’
‘You’re not on trial, Mr Robertson, but George is welcome all the same. This isn’t about anything you’ve done . . . It’s about . . . local knowledge. You’re the one with the local knowledge and before you it was George.’
It was, Troy thought, a surprisingly tactful speech. All the same, George and the Shrimp sat on the edges of their chairs, looking completely unsure of the situation. Jack stood, Mary McDiarmuid sat on a stool by the fireplace, and Troy found himself with the chaise-longue to himself. All in all the room felt too full, too many people crammed in, as though the inevitability would be some sort of rupture.
‘The Ryans?’ Jack began simply. ‘Tell us all about the Ryans.’
Shrimp looked at George; George looked at Jack. ‘If you want the lot, the kit an’ caboodle, you’d better let me start,’ he said.
‘Fine.’
‘I knew their father, old Mickey Ryan. I say old, he was younger’n me. But that’s the way he was. He came back from the war in 1918 old – just worn out, old and half bonkers. He’d two kids, both born just before the war, Danny and Mickey junior. But Mickey junior and the wife got took in that bad ’flu epidemic in ’17. Mickey came back to Blighty to find Danny being looked after by his grandparents. He took Danny home with him, went back to his job at Billingsgate. Hated it, as far as I could see. Hated life. Sometime in the twenties he remarried. There were four kids. Martin in about ’24, Alice in about’29, she died before she was one, and then the twins in ’35, Patrick and Lorcan. The followin’ year his second wife dies, and the same year, that summer of 1936, Mickey takes a trip out to Walton-on-the-Naze, takes off all his clothes and walks out into the North Sea. No one ever saw hide nor hair of ’im again. That leaves just Danny. He’d be in his early twenties by then, I s’pose, and he takes the twins. Danny’s a bloke with a heart of gold, and he’s the nearest thing those twins ever got to a dad. But he volunteers in 1940. And Martin, their other brother, dies on the beach at Normandy. So when the war’s over Danny comes back to find a pair of scallywags who’ve been passed from one aunt to another for the best part of six years.’
‘That’s where I come in,’ said the Shrimp. ‘I known the Ryans all me life. Born in the same hospital, grew up in the same streets. They’re only eleven months older than me. It’s just like Mr Bonham says, we were all little sods – war on, half the dads away fightin’ . . . bound to happen. Often as not we just skived off school and gave all the lip we could to the grown-ups. We’d skived off school the day Mr Troy met us in ’44. But we could be worse than that. We nicked things. What kid didn’t? My dad thrashed me for that. We smashed things. What kid didn’t? My dad thrashed me for that too. But Paddy and Lorc went further than any of us. They could be cruel. I mean vicious. They thought it was hilarious to bait some poor dog, catch and skin it. I saw ’em carve up a Jack Russell once. Belonged to some poor old woman down Jubilee Street. Only thing she had in the world, but they caught the little blighter and they butchered him. It made us all just a bit wary of ’em. You couldn’t predict what they’d do next. Mind – they weren’t stupid. One or two of my old mates would do things so daft they were askin’ to get caught. And they did time in Borstal for it. Not the Ryans. They knew not to get nicked, and they knew how to put the blame on somebody else. I say me dad thrashed me a few times – sometimes it was for things they’d done. That sort of drove a wedge between us. By the time I left school I wasn’t havin’ much to do with ’em. When it came time for National Service I was prayin’ not to get sent to the same camp as them. But I did. I went through basic with them. And you know what? They kept their noses clean. They was model soldiers up front, “Yes, sir, no, sir, three bags full, sir.” And behind the scenes they was nickin’ everythin’ that wasn’t nailed down. They peddled NAAFI stuff all over West Germany.’
Troy looked at Eddie to see if this struck a chord. Clark had run a nice little business in NAAFI coffee beans in Berlin just after the war. Eddie looked blank, not a flicker of identification. Jack stood with his back to the fireplace, saying not a word. George picked up the thread.
‘After the war Danny went into boxing. He’d been Light-Heavyweight champion in the army. You know the rest. Pretty soon he was managing anyone who was anyone. He tried to get the twins to take an interest, thought it might just sort of level ’em off. But they didn’t want to know.’
‘And when they finished in the army,’ the Shrimp picked up, ‘Danny sets ’em up in that garage under the railway arches in Shadwell and tells ’em that’s it. They make a go of it, or they don’t, but they needn’t bother comin’ runnin’ to ’im for ’andouts cos there weren’t going to be any. Last two or three years that’s wot they done. They run a garage, they traded cars and it looked like they was keepin’ their noses clean all over again. But they weren’t. Least, I reckon they weren’t.’
‘How can you be sure?’ Jack speaking was like a ripple running through the air. He oozed scepticism.
‘I know the Ryans, sir. But I s’pose what you mean is what do I know that they actually did? First whiff I got of it was earlier this year. I was still out at Hendon. There’s a chippie in the Mile End Road called Foster’s. It’s common knowledge that half the businesses in the Mile End Road paid protection to Alf Marx’s mob. Everybody knows it but nobody squeals. Then, February I think it was, when old Alf was still on remand, pre-trial like, my sister tells me this story of two young blokes that try to muscle in. They went round Foster’s and told old Joe he should pay them from now on. So, as you’d expect, Joe Foster gives ’em grief, tells ’em how he pays money to Alf Marx to keep toerags like them away from his shop. You know what they did? Joe had this old ginger tom, been there for years it had. They picked the poor bugger up and flung ’im in the deep-fat fryer. That’s when Joe caved in and that’s when I knew it was the Ryans. Cos that’s just the sort of stunt they’d have pulled when I was a kid. But there’s more. You remember last March some poor sod was found out in Eppin’ Forest nailed to a tre
e like Jesus on the cross?’
Troy and Jack looked at each other. They’d never solved that one.
‘They did that too. I know cos I saw ’em do that to a Labrador when I was about twelve. Foster’s chippie, that bloke in the forest . . . that’s when I think the Ryans started their takeover. Cos while Alf Marx ran things nobody would have dared.’
‘Let me get this straight,’ Jack said. ‘You’re saying these Ryans, who are what, twenty-four or twenty-five, have taken over Alf Marx’s rackets?’
The Shrimp stopped, looked at Jack and then at Troy, aware for the first time of the import of what he had said. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I suppose I am saying that.’
‘And you’ve been how long at Stepney?’
‘Just a couple of weeks, sir. But that’s not the point. Point is, I know the Ryans. I know what they’re capable of.’
‘And you didn’t think to tell us until now?’
The Shrimp stopped again, he and Troy looking straight at each other.
‘Would any of us have believed Mr Robertson?’ Troy said. ‘I’d’ve asked him where his hard evidence was. I might even have been dismissive of his childhood assessment of the Ryans. And there is, as we know, the matter of loyalties and loyalties compromised. It would have been easy for Mr Robertson not to come back to Stepney. He could have gone to any nick in the country. He need not have set foot on his own patch. But since he did, and since he knows what he knows . . . why should a young copper risk his career for what was no more than gossip?’
‘Was?’ said Jack. ‘You mean it isn’t now? Freddie, there’s enough sleight-of-hand in your last statement to baffle Houdini. It’s local knowledge, it’s gossip, it’s not to be repeated and then it is? And if it’s true, why haven’t we spotted them? We’re the good guys. Not only that we’re meant to have an efficient, if ad hoc, system for gathering information. How can two Irish yobbos knock an entire Jewish gang off the map and we don’t know about it until now?’
‘Jack, who in any nick is responsible for keeping an ear to the streets?’
Troy turned to the Shrimp. ‘Remind me, Mr Robertson, who’s your detective sergeant?’
‘Mazzer, sir. Al Mazzer.’
‘What’s that?’ said Jack. ‘Italian?’
‘No,’ said Troy. ‘I rather think it’s Jewish.’
‘That’s right, sir. I reckon Mr Mazzer is Jewish.’
‘Jewish,’ George chipped in, ‘and bent.’
The Shrimp was quick to protest, ‘I never said that, Mr Bonham.’
‘He’s gotta be, hasn’t he? Stuff like this going down and the DS doesn’t bloody know? When I ran that nick we’d’ve known. We’d have had all the tittle-tattle off the street and we’d have known what was bollocks and what wasn’t. We’d’ve known. If this Mazzer’s not bent . . .’
Jack said, ‘You know him, George?’
‘I’ve seen him about. Flash bastard. Brought in from Leytonstone two or three years back.’
‘And?’
‘And what?’
‘Do you know for a fact that he’s bent?’
‘No – but I’ll lay you a penny to a quid.’
Robertson looked at Troy desperate for a way in.
Troy said, ‘Let’s hear from Mr Robertson. He works with Mazzer after all.’
‘Well?’ said Jack.
‘Mr Bonham’s right, sir. Al Mazzer is a bit flash. And the talk in the nick is . . . well, y’ know.’
Troy thought Jack would explode. A slow ascent, but a steady one. He’d known Jack too long ever to be surprised by him completely. But knowing just when Jack would decide to go by the book and when he would leap in where only fools and Troys would ordinarily tread was impossible. He’d known Jack bend and break the law to back him up, and he’d known him rat him out to Onions when time and circumstance dictated.
‘That’s it? That’s all the two of you have to point the finger at a fellow officer? He’s a bit flash? He’s a bit bloody flash? Well, it’s not good enough. I can’t go to the commissioner with what amounts to no more than the gut feelings of a wet-behind-the-ears recruit and, forgive this, George, a man who’s been retired for five years. He’ll blast me off the bloody mountain. Now, there is something amiss in the borough of Stepney. That much is obvious. But you cannot expect me to take what the two of you are saying seriously when it amounts to no more than gossip. And I’ll say now that I’m appalled by all three of you. Where, where for Christ’s sake, is your judgement? Freddie – you’ve been ill. Can’t blame you for that, but has it rotted your brain? I cannot waste time listening to your crackpot theories. We do not go around pointing the finger at our fellow officers without the slightest shred of evidence. And if we took heed of every daft rumour we heard, you and I would both have been drummed out of the force years ago. What we have is a system, a system that the three of you now seem to be trying to circumvent. There ought to be a sign on the desk of every divisional detective inspector saying, “The buck stops here.” If there’s anyone to blame it’s got to be the man in charge. Now, when is Inspector Milligan due back?’
‘Tomorrow,’ said the Shrimp.
Jack’s voice soared. Eddie and Mary McDiarmuid looked blank and baffled. The Shrimp had turned white; Bonham was red with embarrassment or restrained rage.
‘Tomorrow I shall fry Milligan’s ears in chip fat. If the Ryans have muscled in on the Marxes, he’s the one who should have known, and he’d better have a bloody good explanation! I’ve got bodies piling up like the St Valentine’s Day massacre and I want answers! In the meantime, I want nothing of what was said here leaked. If so much as a word of this gets out I shall come down on the lot of you like a ton of bricks!’
Jack left without another word.
Troy took advantage of the chaise-longue, and quietly stretched out: Jack had worn him out. He’d seen dozens of Jack’s rages over the years, but this one had the unique quality, if that was the word, of coming when he, not Troy, was running the show.
A few moments passed in silence. Then Bonham got up with a quiet ‘I’ll be off then,’ and opened the front door.
The Shrimp looked blasted, muttered his ‘goodnight,’ and they left together.
Mary McDiarmuid moved to a position from which she could look clearly at Troy and said, ‘I’m the new girl here. Would you mind telling me what all that was about?’
Troy sighed at the effort, but the words were ready and able. ‘Jack feels cornered.’
‘Cornered?’
‘I’ve presented him with a fait accompli and he doesn’t like it. But he’ll come round, maybe not tomorrow or the day after, but he’ll come round.’
It was Eddie’s turn to express bewilderment.
‘What fait accompli?’
Troy thought about this. Clark was the most trustworthy man he had ever known. Not that he was honest, straight as a die et cetera –far from it. But he was bent in all the ways Troy himself was bent. For much of the time so was Jack, but when he wasn’t he wasn’t.
‘Who do you think blew up Brock? Who do you think put me in hospital? Who do you think snatched Bernie Champion? We’ve been looking at Brock’s murder from the wrong angle from the start. We assumed it was vengeance. That Brock had been blown up as tit-for-tat for sending Alf Marx down. Nothing of the sort. The Ryans hit Brock just to show Alf ’s gang they could. To scare the living daylights out of them. And they took Bernie to get control of the territory. What we just heard from George and young Robertson is the first thing I’ve heard in weeks that explains what happened to me.’
‘And Joey Rork?’
‘Rork just blundered into it. He followed the Ryans thinking he would learn something about Danny. They killed him. Rork wasn’t a complete fool either. He spotted them for what they were. Two tearaways on the up. He didn’t think they were just ringing cars. He thought they were making serious money.’
‘They’re not much more than kids. How could they just take over? Us not knowing about it till now is one thin
g, but how?’
‘How many of Alf ’s mob went down with him?’
‘Six or seven?’ said Eddie.
‘Eight,’ said Troy. ‘The gang was left in tatters.’
Eddie thought about this. When Eddie thought about things, Troy knew, he was, often as not, faking to give the appearance of due consideration to what had been on the tip of his tongue anyway. ‘Do you remember, sir, what you said at Mr Brocklehurst’s party when Alf Marx went down?’
‘No.’
‘I was standing next to you, sir, you were talking to Mr Wildeve but I heard you all the same. You said, “Nature abhors a vacuum.” ’
‘I did?’
‘Yes, sir. Let’s hope Mr Wildeve remembers too.’
§ 54
Troy reached for the telephone and called Claridge’s. Only when Reception answered did he realise he didn’t know what name to ask for. ‘Miss Tosca?’ But there was no Miss Tosca staying there. ‘Mrs Troy?’ It seemed so unlikely. Mrs Troy it was, but she had checked out half an hour ago.
He lay back on the chaise-longue, the phone sitting on his chest like an obelisk. It might ring. He’d wait. He might by force of will be able to conjure her up like a will-o’-the-wisp.
About ten minutes later he heard the door open. He hadn’t bothered to lock it after he’d finally ushered Eddie out with ‘It’s ten o’clock. Bugger off home.’ All the same, the strength of his will was a surprise.
He saw a pair of spiky heels step into the arc lit by the reading lamp behind his head, tilted a little and saw the hem of a rain-spattered trenchcoat. The trenchcoat pooled around her ankles, he looked all the way up and saw . . . Kitty, a vision of a creamy-white summer dress, so translucent he could see through it . . . a collage of light and shade, curve and hollow. She flicked the hem at him, brushing it gently across his face. ‘If you say you haven’t got the energy, you ’re dogmeat.’
She plucked the phone off his chest, and lay down in its place, nose to his nose, lips to his lips . . . lips to his ear.
