by Tom Graham
‘I think you might be spot on there, DI whatever-your-name-is,’ said Sargood, picking up his trilby and beating a retreat back along the corridor. ‘It seems that right now isn’t an opportune moment for taking statements. And I think I’m just about to do a lot of toilet in myself.’ But then, from a safe distance, he called back: ‘I will not be intimidated by you, Mr Hunt! You cannot silence the voice of the free press! The pen is the sword of truth, or something like that. And truth shall always … it will always … oh dear.’
He started gingerly checking his trousers for untoward dampness. Furiously, Gene made to lunge at him. It was enough to send Sargood skittering away, barely keeping his balance as he crashed through a set of swing doors and vanished from sight.
‘I can see you and him have a colourful past,’ said Sam.
‘He’s stuck so many knives in my back you’d think I was a ruddy voodoo doll,’ growled Gene. ‘I nearly once got the sack coz of what he writ.’
‘It’s wrote actually, Guv.’
‘Don’t you start an’ all, Tyler.’
Sam held up his hands in a conciliatory gesture. They headed off together along the corridor, each wrapped in his own thoughts. But just as they reached the exit, Sam turned to Gene.
‘I’ve just got to ask, Guv. Where did you learn about the fall of Constantinople?’
‘Sleepless nights in front of the Open University,’ Gene replied, arrogantly sparking up a cigarette. ‘If you’re gonna sit up all night, might as well improve your mind. Besides, there ain’t nowt else on at four in the morning.’ He fixed Sam with a mean look. ‘But I can guess how you spend your sleepless nights, eh, five-tissue Tyler.’
CHAPTER TEN: WESTWORLD
Back at CID, Gene ordered his team to assemble. Annie sat behind her desk, with Sam standing next to her. Chris stood eagerly to attention, awaiting his captain’s commands. Ray lounged, smoking and chewing gum at the same time.
‘I’m convening a meeting,’ Gene announced gravely. ‘A council. A council of the utmost confidentiality. I want everyone in my office. Everyone except Bristols.’
Annie looked up angrily from her desk. Gene glowered implacably back at her and said, ‘And before you pipe up in her defence, Tyler, she’s unreliable.’
‘She’s one of the team, Guv,’ Sam declared.
‘Is that right?’ Gene said, raising his eyebrows. ‘Is that why she conducts “private investigations” behind her DCI’s back? Is that why she goes running round town talking to ex-coppers who then get bumped off? Is that why she gives me a heap of backchat and don’t tell me nowt I need to know coz it’s “personal” and sits in my ruddy motor tooting my ruddy horn?! Cartwright – you’re on light duties. Kettle, tea bags, fresh bottle of milk, and that floor could do with a sweep.’
Before Sam could jump to her defence, Annie slammed her hands down on her desk, got to her feet, and stormed out.
‘Leave her, Tyler!’ Gene barked. ‘Chris, Ray, get your arses in there.’
‘Aye, Guv,’ they said in unison, and disappeared into Gene’s office.
But Sam remained where he was, torn between obeying his DCI and going after Annie. Gene strode up and loomed over him.
‘I said leave her, Sam,’ he said, but his voice was lower this time, less harsh, less commanding. ‘I said it before – there’s no room for personal, not in this place.’
Sam made a move to go after Annie, but Gene caught his arm.
‘Fellas are dying,’ he hissed. ‘And I need coppers.’
Sam hesitated. Then, at last, he nodded.
‘Yes, Guv,’ he sighed.
He followed Gene into his office and positioned himself next to Chris and Ray, while Gene himself fished out a packet of fags from the heaps of junk on his desk and lit up. He drew deep, exhaled a slow cloud of smoke, and then cast his eyes over his assembled squad.
‘A sleeping dog has woken up,’ he said, ‘a sleeping dog I’d hoped would stay happily snoozing until I was retired off and drinking away me pension. A big dog, gentleman. A big, horrible bastard of a dog called Clive Gould. Ring any bells, Ray?’
Ray thought, shrugged, and shook his head.
‘Don’t ring no bells for me neither,’ piped up Chris.
‘A little before your time, young Christopher,’ Gene said. He drew on his cigarette again, and then went on: ‘Clive Gould was a villain, back in the sixties. He was well known in CID. He was very well known. He made his money in the motor trade – buying, selling, importing, all of it hooky. A lot of the lads working here made use of him, getting cars they’d never be able to afford otherwise. Harmless stuff. And Gould did well out of it, started expanding his business interests into clubs and casinos all round the city. Plenty of free drinks and birds on the lap for the boys from CID, and in return them boys turned a blind eye when he dabbled in a spot of naughtiness here and there.’
‘Naughtiness?!’ put in Sam, incredulous. ‘Guv, “naughty” is not the word for that murdering, psychopathic –’
Gene raised his hand to silence him.
‘These things always start small,’ the Guv said. ‘Favours, back-handers, a little ducking and diving that profits everyone and don’t hurt no one. You know how the world works.’
‘Yeah,’ said Chris, pulling what he thought was his wisest face. ‘I do.’
‘But Gould was ambitious,’ Gene went on in a low voice. ‘Ambitious and ruthless. You’re right, Tyler, when you call him a psycho. He set himself up against some of the hardest bastards running the rackets in this city. And he broke ’em. He broke damn near all of ’em. There was fellas shot, fellas drowned, fellas found on the wrong end of a rope, fellas turning up with half their brains hanging out.’
Dredging up some old recollection from his dusty memory banks, Ray said, ‘Hang about, yeah, this is starting to sound familiar. Weren’t some bloke found nailed to a tree one time?’
Gene nodded: ‘Ruddy great six-inchers, one through his throat, one through his bollocks. And he were upside down an’ all. Just imagine that. I think Chris certainly is.’
Sam and Ray glanced across at Chris, who had gone pale green.
‘Gould had half this city sewn up,’ Gene went on. ‘And all them little favours and back-handers he was exchanging with CID had grown and grown. He was paying off dozens of coppers round here – and not just plod, but top brass too – DI’s, DCI’s, whatever it took to keep the law off his back. The pay-offs were massive. Gould was pouring money into this place – and naturally, there was no shortage of takers for it.’
‘But what’s all this got to do with us, Guv?’ asked Ray. ‘This Gould slag, he’s not around now, is he?’
‘He got too big for his boots,’ Gene said. ‘He made too many enemies. And one of them enemies caught up with him. I don’t recall the details – I’m not sure anyone does, it was all confusing – but it seems somebody got to him, some old villain he’d run out of business, most like. And that was that. Gould got zapped, the pay-offs stopped, his empire fell apart, and Manchester turned into the paradise on earth that well all know and love today.’
‘Aye,’ shrugged Ray, ‘but like I say, Guv, why are you telling us all this?’
Gene turned to Sam. ‘I’ll let you inform him, Tyler.’
Sam cleared his throat and said quietly: ‘I don’t believe Clive Gould is dead. I think he’s … he’s been away, and now he’s back. Pat Walsh and Mickey Carroll were both coppers on his payroll back in the sixties. I think Gould killed Walsh and he was trying to do the same to Carroll.’
‘Why would he kill ’em after these years?’ asked Ray.
For a moment, Sam was at a loss how to answer that. He couldn’t say the truth as he knew it: that Gould was draining them, cannibalizing them, to build himself up; that he wanted to destroy Sam and drag Annie away with him. How the hell could he say that?
But Nelson had told him that whatever cosmic events caught Sam in their orbits, they appeared here in 1973 as cases for CID. Everything found a reflection, a symb
olic manifestation, in their police work – and the return of Clive Gould would be no exception.
‘I think,’ said Sam, weighing his words carefully, ‘I think that there is evidence hidden in the files here that could not only expose Gould’s death as faked, but could be used to put him away for the rest of his life. I think he’s afraid that certain coppers who used to be on his payroll are prepared to blow the gaff on him – and in turn, he’s prepared to risk everything to silence them.’
Yes, thought Sam. That’s how it will appear here. That’s how it will seem to the CID of 1973.
‘If Tyler’s right,’ Gene growled, ‘then there’s more to it that just that. Annie Cartwright, our dopey girl detective, is the one who’s been digging up all this old stuff in the files. She’s been digging and she’s been talking – to Carroll, to Walsh, to them ex-coppers who were on the take. And word’s evidently gotten back to Clive Gould that his past is not as dead and buried as he thought it was.’
‘So it’s bloody Cartwright who’s stirred all this up?’ said Ray, and he shot an angry look at Sam. ‘Why don’t you keep her on a tighter leash, Boss?’
Sam squared up to him: ‘She’s a copper and she’s acting like one.’
‘She’s acting like a kid!’ Ray came back at him. ‘The past is the past, you leave it where it is, you don’t go back to it when there’s no need.’
‘Sometimes there is a need to go back to the past,’ Sam said. ‘Sometimes, there’s every need to go back.’
‘Oh, yeah, right Boss, and two blokes winding up dead is a price worth paying, is it?’ Ray turned back to Gene. ‘That Cartwright, Guv, she’s a liability. This is big league stuff; she had no right to be going behind all our backs.’
Gene nodded, but Sam put his foot down: ‘This department was riddled with corruption back then. It was like a cancer. Guv, you should be the first one to applaud one of your officers rooting out what’s rotten.’
‘Sleeping dogs,’ Gene said dourly.
‘Time to wake ’em up, then!’ Sam said angrily. ‘Annie had the balls to do that. Can the same be said for any of you lot?’
Ray rolled his eyes, unimpressed. Chris was still queasy with visions of the man with the six inch nail run through his bollocks.
After a long pause, Gene said: ‘Well. It seems to me we ain’t got no choice in this. Cartwright’s popped the cork on something, and that’s that, there’s no going back. What we got to do is play this right. If Tyler’s on the nose about this, if Gould’s back in town and blagging old coppers, then nailing him would be a big gold star for this department and an even bigger gold star for me. And boy, do I ever need a gold star.’
‘What’s the plan then, Guv?’ Ray asked.
‘First up, let’s make sure we’re pointing our guns in the right direction,’ said Gene. ‘Chris, if you’re going to puke up, bugger off and do it in the bogs.’
‘I’m steady, Guv …’
‘I don’t want you chucking your porridge in my waste bin.’
‘I’m … controlling it, Guv.’
‘Good. Keep controlling it and do something useful at the same time. Dig up what you can about Clive Gould’s death. I want everything – coroner’s report, death certificate, what suit he had on when they stuck him in the casket. If there’s discrepancies in there, if there’s anything to suggest that Gould ain’t as dead as he’s supposed to be, I want them found, you hearing me, Chris?’
Still looking on the verge of spewing, Chris gingerly made his way out.
‘Raymond,’ Gene went on, ‘it looks like the police files are full of more bullshit and bollocks than Tyler’s LP collection, so let’s leave ’em be. Instead, see what you can dig up about old acquaintances and employees of Gould, fellas who worked for him, heavies, croupiers, mechanics, dollybirds if you can find ’em. Let’s get a list of contacts on the roll so we’re not fannying about in the dark. I want to start speaking to people who might know what’s going on.’
‘Wilco, Guv,’ said Ray and turned to go. But then he paused and fixed Sam with a look, and said, ‘You know she don’t belong, Boss.’
Sam looked straight back at him and said: ‘You’ve got your orders, DS Carling.’
‘Don’t think with your dick, Boss, not in this job.’
There was a tense, silent moment, and then Ray pushed his way past Sam and headed off.
‘He’s right, Tyler,’ Gene said.
‘Annie Cartwright, the department scapegoat,’ said Sam bitterly. ‘Where the hell’s the esprit de corps round here?’
‘The what? Hang on a sec, Samuel, while I look that phrase up in my Beginner’s Guide to Talking Utter Cock.’ He scowled across at Sam. ‘Cartwright’s been a dollop. And deep down you know it. Going behind my back, going behind everyone’s back, that’s not how it’s done, Tyler.’
But Sam had heard Annie run down and abused more than enough for one day. He turned his back on Gene, threw open the door, and walked out without a word.
He found a cup of cold tea which she hadn’t so much as sipped. Sam came over and sat beside her. She didn’t look up.
‘I’m proud of you,’ he said.
‘Don’t patronize me, Sam.’
‘I understand how you’re feeling. Confused, frightened … God, I’ve had my share of that.’
‘Nothing makes any sense anymore,’ she said, almost inaudibly. ‘Nothing feels real. Or it feels too real. Or …’
She looked for the right words, failed to find them, and threw up her hands in despair.
‘I hate seeing you this miserable,’ Sam said. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘I’m not expecting you to do anything,’ Annie said.
‘No, but I’m still offering. Let me take you out somewhere tonight.’
‘I dunno, Sam.’
‘A meal. Somewhere quiet. With candles.’
Annie shook her head.
‘Well, there’s always the stock car rally,’ Sam teased her. ‘I’ve seen the posters. Lots of noisy bumping – just your scene, yeah?’
She didn’t react. But Sam kept pushing for a smile, however fleeting.
‘Not tempted? Really? You surprise me. Okay then …. what about the pictures? Come on – two hours of escapism. Leave the world and all its worries behind for a bit. Lose yourself.’
‘Lose myself …’ she muttered.
‘In a good way,’ Sam added.
Annie shrugged.
‘I’ll get you a lolly,’ Sam said, and then leaning closer, he added enticingly: ‘A red one. Mmm? Ah, I’m getting through to you now, yes, I can see it in your eyes.’
The hint of a smile appeared on Annie face. It warmed Sam’s heart to see it.
‘You’re resistance is crumbling …’
‘Okay, Romeo,’ Annie said, giving in to him with a sigh. ‘What’s showing?’
‘The Guv’s bête-noir,’ grinned Sam.
‘Never heard of it. Who’s in it?’
‘No, that’s not the name of the film, what I meant was … Don’t matter. Westworld, that’s what’s showing. The one with Yul Brynner.’
‘Who else?’
‘Don’t know. Some blokes.’
Annie thought it over, looked Sam in the eye, tilted her head to one side and said: ‘I’ll pass on the lolly. But I quite like Yul Brynner.’
The moment they arrived at the Roxy, Sam regretted it. It was here, outside the cinema, that the shadowy form of Clive Gould had stepped out suddenly and confronted him. He looked at the poster on display – Yul Brynner in full cowboy costume, looming up, gun in hand, his face falling away to reveal circuits and wires beneath. He thought how Gould’s transparent apparition had stood directly in front of it. The memory disgusted him. Why the hell had he come back to this place that had such horrible associations? And why had he brought Annie?
But Annie herself was oblivious. She hung tightly to Sam’s arm, reassured by his presence, desperate for some scrap of normality in a life that was becoming increasingly undermined.
Normality, Sam thought as the queue began working its way into the cinema foyer. I think we could both do with a great big helping of dull, boring, workaday normality.
Two for the stalls set Sam back a grand total of ninety pence. Together, they made their way into the auditorium and settled into the faded red plush of their seats. The place filled up – Brynner was a big draw – and, as the lights went down, Sam found Annie’s hand and gently squeezed it. Her fingers tightened around his, hard.
The curtains pulled back, and up on the screen, trippy geometric shapes came hurtling out of a hazy void, accompanied by jaunty, jazzy music. It was time for Pearl & Dean.
Pa-pah, pa-pah, pa-pah, pa-pah, pa-pa-pah!
Pa-pah, pa-pah, pa-pah, pa-paaaAAAH – PAH!
There was a bad splice and a crunch of crackle. Then wobbly, catlike music howled shakily from the speakers, and a man’s voice intoned over a sequence of shoddy Polaroids:
‘For the real taste of Old Peking, why not visit the Golden Gong. Enter a world of luxury and wonder, relax in one of our hygienic, wipe-clean dining booths, sample Macclesfield’s finest oriental cuisine, choose between authentic wooden chopsticks or a proper knife and fork, and let the magic of the Far East transport you on an unforgettably culinary adventure. The Golden Gong Chinese restaurant – only five minutes from this cinema.’
‘Five minutes by jet pack!’ Sam whispered. ‘It’s miles away, right over by –’
But he was drowned out by the next advert. The screen was filled with square-jawed men who seemed to have walked straight out of a mail-order catalogue. They laughed and joshed to a funky soundtrack, attracting the attentions of women who all looked like Agnetha from Abba. In the pub, in the park, in the night club, these guys had it made – it was all friends and fun and quality birds for them. Their secret? They rolled their fags with Rizla. Sam duly took note.
A jump-cut to crudely animated peanuts hopping about as excited voices sang: Hey! Crusader! Have you any nuts?
It got the same filthy laugh from the audience that Sam remembered from his childhood.
Normality, San thought again, and he found that he was relaxing. He hoped Annie was too. They deserved it, just one evening away from cosmic stress and trauma.
