The Taming of Tango Harris

by Graham Ison

  Chapter Six

  Harris’s house was in a private road not far from Epping Forest. The large gardens were screened front and back by trees, and the entrance was guarded by a pair of tall iron gates … and a guard in a small cabin.

  Findlater had explained all this to Fox and had expressed concern that getting in without alerting Harris might be a problem.

  Fox, however, did not see it as a problem. Leaving his own car and the three others containing most of DI Jack Gilroy’s team parked down the road a little, he strode up to the gate and peered through the bars. ‘Oil’ he shouted.

  A uniformed guard from one of the lesser-known security firms peered out of the small hut. ‘What?’

  Fox pointed at the map he had in one hand and gestured to the guard. ‘Can you tell me … ?’ he began, and then appeared to study the map more closely.

  The guard strolled over to the locked gates. ‘What’s up, mate?’ he asked.

  ‘What is up, dear boy,’ said Fox, ‘is that I am Detective Chief Superintendent Thomas Fox … of the Flying Squad, and I have a warrant to search these premises. Now you have two options. You can either unlock these gates without alerting Mr Harris, thus earning the undying gratitude of the Metropolitan Police, or you can raise hell and qualify for several years in chokey for obstructing officers investigating a murder … or two. The choice is yours.’

  The security guard managed to look both doubtful and worried until Fox produced his warrant card. Then he held up his hands. ‘You’ll get no trouble from me, guv’nor,’ he said. ‘I’m only the relief anyway. Don’t even know the geezer who owns the drum.’

  ‘Splendid,’ said Fox. ‘I knew you’d see it my way. Now then, just unlock the gates and we’ll say no more about it.’

  Nervously fumbling in his haste, the security guard eventually managed to open one of the gates just enough to admit Fox.

  ‘There are a few more of us, I’m afraid,’ said Fox with an amiable smile as he signalled his motorcade to move up. ‘And I think it might be a good idea if you came with us.’ He opened the door of one of the cars and propelled the luckless security guard into the back seat.

  ‘But I—’ began the guard.

  ‘Just so that you won’t be tempted to make any telephone calls, or press any mysterious buttons,’ said Fox, and wandered back to his own car.

  The four cars crunched to a standstill on the wide expanse of gravel at the front of the house and Fox and his team alighted. The security guard remained, hunched miserably in the back seat where Fox had put him, and contemplated getting another job.

  ‘Tell me, friend,’ said Fox. ‘Where is Mr Harris — who you don’t even know — most likely to be at this time of the morning?’ Fox glanced at his watch. He had deliberately picked mid-morning for his raid, secure in the knowledge that villains always expected to be ‘spun’, as they called it, in the small hours.

  ‘Dunno,’ said the guard.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ Fox stuck his head through the open window of the car so that his face was close enough to the security guard’s to give him some cause for alarm.

  ‘Er, he’s usually in the pool. Round the back.’

  ‘Splendid,’ said Fox. ‘Jack.’ He turned to Gilroy. ‘We’ll go the back way. And you, Rosie. Less formal, if you see what I mean. And you … ’ He turned back to the guard. ‘You will arrange to admit my officers through the front door.’

  ‘But—’

  Fox shook his head. ‘No “buts”, dear boy,’ he said.

  Fox, Gilroy, and Rosie Webster walked round the house until they reached what looked like a large summer-house. Fox shielded his eyes and peered through the glass.

  On the far side of the swimming pool, a bare-footed Tango Harris was seated on a wheeled sun-lounger. Dressed in a terry bathrobe, he was sipping at an evil-looking concoction in a long glass. He was in his fifties and over the years his bushy grey hair had thinned quite dramatically on top, leaving him looking like a benevolent monk.

  Poised on the edge of the swimming pool, about to dive in, was a naked and curvaceous blonde who could not have been more than twenty-five.

  ‘I’ll bet you a pony, Jack,’ said Fox, ‘that she is not his daughter.’ He pushed aside the sliding door and stepped inside. ‘Tango,’ he bellowed. ‘Long time, no see.’ The blonde screamed and fell in.

  Harris made to stand up, but knocked over the drink he had just put down on the small shelf built into the side of his sun-lounger. Pieces of broken glass scattered everywhere. ‘Fox! What the bloody hell — ?’

  ‘Don’t move,’ said Fox sternly. Harris froze, expecting to see guns: he knew the Flying Squad of old. There’s glass everywhere, Tango. You’ll cut your dainty dancers to ribbons.’

  Harris picked up his spectacles and put them on. ‘What the bloody hell’s this all about?’

  ‘Well, you’ve just answered one question. You do wear glasses.’

  ‘What are you going on about, Fox?’

  By now the blonde had made her way to the edge of the pool and was crouching down in the vain hope that the water would cover her lack of costume. ‘Tango,’ she said plaintively. ‘I’ve got nothing on.’

  ‘I know,’ said Harris.

  ‘What shall I do?’

  ‘Get out and piss off,’ said Harris. ‘I’m talking business. Oh,’ he added, ‘and get on the blower to Oily.’

  ‘Stop!’ said Fox and turned to Rosie Webster. ‘Go with Mr Harris’s secretary … ’ He paused to give the word sarcastic emphasis. ‘And make sure she doesn’t use the phone. I’ll decide when Tango can call his mouthpiece.’

  ‘It says in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act that I’m entitled to speak privately to my solicitor,’ said Harris.

  ‘Oh, very good,’ said Fox. ‘But not if I think it’ll hinder my enquiries.’

  Harris leaned back in his sun-lounger. ‘That’s only if you’ve arrested me,’ he said.

  ‘I have. You’re nicked.’

  Harris leaped out of his chair and stood on a piece of broken glass. He yelled and promptly sat down again, examining the sole of his foot. ‘I’ve cut me bloody foot now,’ he said.

  ‘Pity you didn’t do that before I nicked you,’ said Fox mildly. ‘Now one of my officers will have to write a report about it.’

  ‘How the hell did you get in here anyway?’ asked Harris, dabbing at his cut foot with a handkerchief.

  ‘Through the front gate. How else? I did consider landing in the garden in a police helicopter, but the Commissioner wouldn’t authorize the expense … not for a tuppeny-ha’penny villain like you, Tango. And talking of front gates, my spies tell me that you’ve got into the habit of draping naked blondes on them.’

  Harris gave Fox a sour look. ‘Are you going to tell me what this is all about?’ he said.

  ‘Sure.’ Fox sat down on the sun-lounger opposite Harris. ‘Jack, get the lads going, will you.’

  ‘Here,’ said Harris. ‘What’s the game?’

  ‘We’re searching the premises, Tango.’

  ‘I hope you’ve got a warrant.’

  Fox withdrew a sheet of paper from his pocket and handed it to Harris. ‘There you are, Tango. Your very own copy. That’s in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, too.’

  ‘Talking of which—’ Harris began.

  Fox held up a hand. ‘I know, I know. You’ve got to be told what you’re arrested for. In very simple terms, Tango, for the murder of Gina West, a prostitute.’

  ‘Do what?’ Harris stopped nursing his foot and looked at Fox in amazement. ‘You must be bloody joking.’

  Fox shook his head slowly. ‘It’s no joke, Tango.’ He nodded towards the door. ‘Who’s the bird, incidentally?’

  ‘Melody.’

  ‘That’s nice. Melody who?’

  ‘Eager,’ said Harris.

  ‘And is she?’

  ‘That’s what she calls herself. Melody Eager. Don’t suppose it’s her real name. Don’t suppose Melody’s her real name,
either.’

  ‘No, I don’t suppose it is. On the game is she?’

  ‘She better hadn’t be. She’s employed as my companion.’

  ‘Is that a fact?’ said Fox. ‘Pity you don’t give her a clothes allowance then.’

  ‘What’s all this about a murder? Who did you say? Gina someone.’

  ‘Last Friday evening, at a hotel in the West End of London, a prostitute by the name of Gina West was found murdered. The murderer paid by credit card, Tango. And we have traced the holder of that credit card all the way here. To you, in fact.’

  Harris leaned forward and peered at his foot again. Then he looked up. ‘What d’you take me for?’ he asked. ‘Firstly I never pay for it, and secondly, if I did I certainly wouldn’t pay for it with a credit card that could be traced back to me.’

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ said Fox. ‘I put it down to your advancing years.’

  ‘It’s a bloody stitch-up, that’s what it is. A pound to a pinch it’s bloody Billie Crombie.’

  ‘Quite possibly. She was certainly working for him. But as someone topped him last night, he’s out of the race.’

  ‘Topped? Billie Crombie?’ Harris contrived to sound surprised.

  Fox laughed. ‘Oh, do leave off, Tango.’

  *

  ‘At what time did you start asking the prisoner questions, sir?’ The custody officer at West End Central police station was very conscious of the law.

  ‘Haven’t asked him anything yet,’ said Fox without pausing as he walked through the charge room. ‘Get Mr Brace down here, will you.’

  ‘Yes, sir. And Mr Harris’s solicitor’s here.’

  ‘I’ll bet he is,’ said Fox as he made his way into the interview room.

  Tango Harris was lolling in a chair, a half smirk on his face. ‘What have you been doing, Fox? Poking around for some evidence to fit me up with?’

  Harris’s solicitor placed a hand on his client’s arm and shook his head. Then he faced Fox. ‘Mr Harris knows absolutely nothing about Miss Gina West, or her murder,’ he said. ‘And I should like to register my protest at the way he is being demeaned and harassed when a simple question would have proved categorically that he had nothing to do with this alleged crime.’

  ‘What simple question is that?’ asked Fox, nodding to Gavin Brace as he slipped silently into the interview room.

  ‘Did you think to ask him where he was on the night in question?’

  ‘On the night in question.’ Fox savoured the phrase. ‘That’s nice. Sounds like pure Agatha Christie. All right then. Where were you on the night in question, Tango?’

  ‘Clubbing … up west,’ said Harris.

  The solicitor smiled benevolently. ‘And there are several people who can testify to that fact.’

  Fox looked severely at the solicitor. ‘You may go,’ he said.

  The solicitor opened his book and started to make copious notes. ‘If you are going to exclude me from the interview,’ he said as he wrote, ‘you’ll be required to give the reasons in writing.’

  ‘You can stay if you wish,’ said Fox, ‘but your client can go. And may I thank him on behalf of the Commissioner for his ready assistance in this matter.’

  The solicitor looked shocked. ‘You really mean Mr Harris may go?’ he asked, wanting to be absolutely clear on the point.

  ‘Of course. Why ever not?’

  ‘But you arrested him for murder.’

  ‘I wouldn’t go that far,’ said Fox. ‘He kindly offered to assist me in my enquiries. Mr Gilroy will show you out. Oh, and if you find that you’ve unfortunately collected a parking ticket, let me have it and I’ll get it cancelled.’

  At the door of the interview room, Harris paused. ‘What’s your bloody game, Fox?’ he asked. It seemed to be one of his favourite expressions.

  ‘Game? I’m not playing games, Tango. See you in court.’

  ‘Is that a threat, Chief Superintendent?’ asked the solicitor.

  ‘No,’ said Fox. ‘A promise.’

  *

  The long line of black limousines stretched all the way down Verdant Lane, Lewisham.

  ‘Looks like a Criminal Records Office outing,’ said Fox.

  ‘There’ll be a few old friends here, guv’nor, that’s for sure,’ said Gilroy.

  The hearse containing the mortal remains of Billie Crombie nosed its way into Hither Green cemetery. The coffin was almost completely hidden by colourful wreaths, the largest of which bore an elaborate floral design emblazoning the message: IN LOVING MEMORY OF MY DEAR BILLIE. NOT FORGOTTEN.

  ‘How tasteless,’ muttered Fox.

  The car immediately behind the hearse contained a blowsy redhead dressed all in black, her heavy veil failing to disguise the fact that not only had she had a hard life, but had undoubtedly kept a cosmetics firm in full-time employment. Her gloved hands clutched a single red rose to her ample bosom.

  ‘Who’s that, guv?’ asked Gilroy.

  ‘That,’ said Fox, ‘is Arlene Fogg, common-law wife of the dear departed Billie Crombie. And they don’t come much more common than she does. What’s more, I’ll lay seven-to-four on she chucks that rose on Billie’s box when he’s planted.’

  ‘How long’s she been with him then?’

  ‘Going on twenty-five years, I should think,’ said Fox. ‘Her father used to run a stall in Deptford market and moonlighted as a street bookie, but he moved on to better things. War surplus, second-hand cars, and the usual bit of blagging. I think he even got captured for having lead off a church roof in the fifties. Very enterprising in those days, the local villains.’

  Fox and Gilroy strolled into the cemetery and watched the procession, now on foot, re-forming itself into a huge human arena around the grave. The six pallbearers, clearly unused to anything approaching hard work, struggled with the coffin.

  ‘Gordon Bennett!’ Fox stopped beneath a tree and lit a cigarette. ‘Would you look at that collection of toe-rags.’ The pallbearers, clearly taking the broad view of what amounted to suitable attire for a funeral, wore suits that ranged from black to light green, with jackets that appeared to be about three sizes too big. Their multi-coloured ties had been slackened off to reveal unfastened collar buttons on the vilest shirts Fox had ever seen. With obvious relief, they placed the coffin on the wooden stretchers over the grave and stood up, easing muscles that manifestly took exception to such physical exertion.

  ‘Ah,’ said Fox, ‘now this ought to be interesting.’

  ‘What’s that, guv?’ asked Gilroy.

  ‘Arlene Fogg might have been Billie’s common-law, but that scrubber over there with the Sylvester Stallone hair-do, who goes by the unlikely name of Sharon Scrope,

  was his bit on the side.’ Fox pointed his cigarette at a girl of about twenty-seven with dyed blonde hair who was forcing her way through the assembled mourners. She wore a very tight, very short black skirt, and her ample breasts bulged out of a low-cut matching jacket that was nipped in severely at the waist.

  Suddenly Arlene Fogg leaped into action. Stepping in front of Sharon Scrope, she placed her hands on her hips. ‘And what’s a slag like you doing here?’ she demanded.

  ‘Come to pay my respects,’ said Sharon.

  ‘Well, you can piss off and pay ’em someplace else,’ said Arlene, and pushed Sharon violently in the chest.

  Sharon staggered back a yard or so, but recovered her balance and stepped forward again. ‘I done more for him than what you ever did,’ she shouted.

  ‘Yeah, and most of it on yer back an’ all. Well if you think there’s anything in his will for you, you’ve got another think coming, you saucy cow.’ And Arlene seized Sharon’s jacket and ripped it open.

  ‘This could get a bit tasty, guv,’ said Gilroy.

  ‘Quite likely, Jack, quite likely,’ said Fox. ‘However, as an experienced police officer, I do not, at this stage, perceive a breach of the peace … or even an apprehended breach of the peace. These things have a habit of sorting themselves out.
Apart from which,’ he continued, ‘there used to be a piece in the good book which said that police should not interfere with the innocent amusements of the working classes.’

  Sharon, her breasts now fully exposed to the obvious delight of at least the male mourners, leaped at Arlene and delivered a forearm smash that would have brought applause from those who regularly watched the wrestling at Lewisham Town Hall. Arlene, hat dislodged to a ludicrous angle, responded by belting Sharon across the side of the head with her heavy handbag.

  Sharon lurched backwards and fell on to the coffin, moving it enough to dislodge the supports, and she — and the coffin — fell into the grave.

  ‘Oh, the cow, the little cow,’ screamed Arlene. ‘Look what the disrespectful bitch has done.’

  A young man jumped forward and held on to Arlene. ‘Here, hold up, Ma,’ he said. ‘Leave it be.’

  ‘You get rid of that cow,’ Arlene shrieked.

  ‘All right, Ma, but leave it.’

  ‘Who’s the hero, guv?’ asked Gilroy.

  ‘That’s Gary Crombie, eldest son and heir apparent to the Crombie empire, Jack. And the other one — the tosser pulling Sharon out of the hole — is his younger brother Kenny.’

  Several of the mourners ushered Sharon Scrope away from the graveside and she limped towards the gate, holding the remains of her torn jacket together with one hand while clutching a shoe with a broken stiletto heel in the other. Pausing at a sufficiently safe distance, she delivered her parting sally. ‘I’ll have you, you shrivelled-up old bag,’ she screamed.

  ‘Piss off,’ bellowed Arlene, not to be outdone in the matter of last words. ‘I’m sorry about that, Vicar, but I was provoked,’ she said, turning back to the clergyman who, throughout Arlene’s exchange with Sharon, had waited patiently to complete the committal.

  At last, Billie Crombie’s ornate coffin, having been hoisted out and replaced on the stretchers, was lowered once more into the mud of Hither Green cemetery. The crowd, deferring to Arlene, stood back while she examined the long, double-banked row of floral tributes. Suddenly she stopped, causing Gary Crombie to cannon into her. ‘Oh my Gawd!’ she cried in a keening voice. ‘Look at that. Just look at that.’