Moon Over Soho

by Ben Aaronovitch

  I could feel them, layers of vestigia etched into the walls of the Café de Paris, flashes of laughter, the smell of tea, snatches of music, a sudden sharp taste of blood on my tongue. It was like an old church far too entangled in too many lives and events to be able to pick out any one thread. Certainly nothing recent. A vestigium isn’t laid down like a groove in a record, it’s not like a tape recording. It’s more like the memory of a dream, and the harder you grasp at it the faster it melts away.

  Another flash, brick dust and a ringing silence. I remembered: The Café de Paris had been hit during the Blitz, killing most of the musicians including the legendary bandleader Ken Johnson. That might explain the silence. Polidori, cheerful bugger that he was, once described a plague pit he investigated as being an abyss of solitude.

  “You promised me a dance,” said Simone.

  Actually I hadn’t, but I took her in my arms and she pressed in closer. She started to hum as we artlessly swayed in a small circle. I didn’t recognize the tune. Her grip on my waist tightened and I grew hard against her. “You can do better than that,” she said.

  I put some grind into the sway and for a moment I was back at the Brixton Academy with Lisa Pascal who lived on the Stockwell Park Estate and seemed determined to be my first ever, although actually she ended up being violently sick on Astoria Park Walk and I slept on the sofa in her mum’s front room.

  Then I heard it, Johnny Green’s opening bars but with a swing beat and a voice singing far away: My heart is sad and lonely / For you I sigh, for you, dear, only. Simone was short enough to rest her cheek against my chest and it was only when I noticed that she was copying me that I realized I was humming the tune. Her perfume mingled with the vestigia of dust and silence and the words were clear enough for me to sing them softly. Why haven’t you seen it? / I’m all for you, body and soul.

  I felt Simone shudder and put her arm around my neck and pull me down until she could whisper in my ear, “Take me home.”

  WE WERE practically running by the time we got to Berwick Street and Simone had her keys out and ready for a front door that opened straight onto a steep staircase with dirty communal carpeting, forty-watt bulbs, and those pop-out timer switches that never last long enough for you to get all the way to the top. Simone led me up a third flight of stairs that doglegged around some bizarre retrofit put in back in the 1950s when this was a flat for French maids and “Ring top bell for models.” It was a steep climb and I was beginning to flag, but the sway of her hips dragged me up the fourth and final flight and we burst out onto the roof. I managed to get brief impressions of iron railings, bushy green potted plants, a bar table with a furled white-and-blue sunshade, and then we were kissing, her hands pushing down the back of my jeans, yanking me forward. And we went down onto a mattress.

  Let’s be honest here, there’s no way to get out of a pair of tight jeans with any dignity, especially if a beautiful woman has one hand in your boxers and an arm wrapped around your waist. You always end up frantically kicking your legs in an effort to get the damn things past your ankles. I was a gentleman, though, and helped her off with her leggings—everything else we were wearing had to wait because Simone wasn’t looking for a slow buildup. She pulled me between her thighs and having lined me up to her satisfaction pulled me the rest of the way in. We went at it for ages but finally I looked up to find her rearing above me with the waning moon watching us over her shoulder, her waist bucking under my palms. She threw her head back and bellowed and with that we came together.

  She flopped down on top of me, her skin feverish and sweaty, her face buried in my shoulder.

  “Fuck me,” I said.

  “What, again?” she asked. “There’s no stopping you, is there?”

  I was instantly hard again, because nothing gets a man going like a bit of flattery. Yes, when it comes to sex we really are that shallow. It was chilly and I shivered as I rolled her over onto her back. She opened her arms wide but I ignored them and let my lips trace a line down to her belly button. Her hands grabbed my head—urging me lower, but I stretched it out. Treat ’em mean, keep ’em keen, that’s my motto. I put my mouth where the money was and I didn’t let up until her legs were pointing straight up in the air and her knees were locked. Then I climbed my slippery way back up and introduced myself once more. Simone’s ankles locked behind my backside and her arms snaked around my shoulders and for quite a long period coherent thought was something that happened to other people.

  We came apart with a sticky pop and for a moment we just lay there and steamed in the night air. Simone kissed me open-mouthed, hungry, for a long moment and then levered herself off the mattress.

  “I’ll be back in a minute,” she said.

  I watched the heavy sway of her pale buttocks as she padded across the roof and slipped in through the door. There was still enough moon and street light to see that the top of the terrace had been converted into a roof garden and a good professional conversion it was too, with solid flags underfoot and waist-high iron railings. Wooden tubs stood at the four corners, each planted with something that was either a really big plant or a very small tree. The mattress I was lying on was actually a proper outdoor seating cushion with a water-resistant PVC covering. It was cooling off under my naked buttocks and so was I.

  From below came the muttering, shouting party noise of another Soho evening. I became very conscious of the fact that I was lying stark bollock naked on top of a roof in Central London. I really hoped the guys at air support weren’t called into a patrol, otherwise I could end up on YouTube as that naked dickhead on the roof ROFL.

  I was seriously considering looking for my clothes when Simone arrived back with a duvet and an old-fashioned picnic hamper with F&M stenciled on the side. She dropped the basket by the mattress and flung herself and the duvet around me.

  “You’re freezing,” she said.

  “You left me on the roof,” I said. “I nearly froze to death. They were scrambling the air–sea rescue helicopters and everything.”

  She warmed me up for a bit, and then we investigated the hamper. It was a real Fortnum & Mason picnic hamper complete with stainless-steel flask of hot chocolate, a bottle of Hine cognac, and a whole Battenberg cake wrapped in grease-proof paper. No wonder it took her so long to come back.

  “You just had this lying about?” I asked.

  “I like to be prepared,” she said.

  “Did you know Casanova used to live around here when he was in London?” I said. “When he went out for an assignation he used to carry a little valise with eggs, plates, and a spirit stove in it.” I slipped my hand around the warm heavy curve of her breast. “That way wherever he ended up he could still have a fried egg for breakfast.” I kissed her—she tasted of chocolate.

  “I never knew Casanova was a Boy Scout,” she said.

  We sat under the duvet and watched the moon setting behind the roofs of Soho, we ate Battenberg cake and listened to the police sirens whoop up and down Charing Cross Road and Oxford Street. When we were suitably refreshed we had mad sex until what passes for the dawn chorus in Soho was welcoming the first blush of the new day.

  I like to think old Giacomo would have approved.

  SIR ROBERT Mark was commissioner of the Metropolitan Police from 1972 to 1977 and is famous for two things—the Goodyear tire adverts where he said the words “I believe this to be a major contribution to road safety,” and “Operation Countryman,” an investigation into corruption within his own force. Back in what the Daily Mail calls the good old days a conscientious copper could triple his income just by sticking his hand out at the right moment, and an armed blagger could walk away from a collar for just a modest consideration. Though to be fair they always tried to make sure that someone was charged with the offense so at least justice was seen to be done and that’s the main thing. Commissioner Mark, who took a dim view of this, initiated the most sweeping anticorruption drive the Met had ever seen, which is why he’s the figure that police
parents use to keep their little baby police officers in line. Behave or nasty Sir Robert Mark will come around and boot you off the force. This is probably why the current commissioner had a portrait of Mark hanging in the atrium of his office strategically placed so that he faced the row of uncomfortable fake green leather seats that Nightingale and I were forced to wait on.

  When you’re a lowly constable nothing good can come of getting this close to the big man himself. Last time I’d been there I’d been sworn in as an apprentice wizard. This time I suspected it was going to be mostly swearing. Next to me Nightingale seemed relaxed enough, reading the Telegraph in a tan lightweight Davies & Son suit that was either brand-new or, more likely, coming back into style from some earlier epoch. I was in my uniform because when confronted with authority a uniform is a constable’s friend, especially when it has been ironed to razor-sharpness by Molly, who apparently regarded a trouser crease as a conveniently located offensive weapon.

  A secretary opened the door for us. “The commissioner will see you now,” she said and we stood up and trooped off to face the music.

  The commissioner’s office is not that impressive, and while the carpet isn’t that budget-conscious no amount of wood paneling could disguise the dull gray mid-1960s concrete bones of the New Scotland Yard building. But the Metropolitan Police has over fifty thousand personnel and a working budget of four and a half billion quid and is responsible for everything from antisocial behavior in Kingston to antiterrorism in Whitehall, so the commissioner’s office doesn’t really need to try that hard.

  The commissioner sat waiting for us. He was wearing his uniform cap and that was when I truly knew we were in deep shit. We stopped in front of the desk and Nightingale actually twitched as if suppressing the impulse to salute. The commissioner stayed in his chair. No handshakes were offered and we were not invited to sit.

  “Chief Inspector Nightingale,” he said. “I trust you’ve had a chance to acquaint yourself with the reports pertaining to the events of last Monday night.”

  “Yes sir,” said Nightingale.

  “You are aware of the accusations levied by members of London Ambulance Service and the preliminary report by the DPS?”

  “Yes sir,” said Nightingale.

  I flinched. The DPS is the Directorate of Professional Standards, fiends in human form that walk among us to keep the rank and file in fear and despondency. Should you feel the cold damp breath of the DPS on your collar, as I did then, the next thing you need to know is which bit is doing the breathing. I didn’t think it would be the ACC, the Anti-Corruption Command, or the IIC, the Internal Investigations Command, because hijacking an ambulance would best be categorized as criminally stupid rather than stupidly criminal. Or at least I was hoping that’s the way they would see it, and that I’d be done by the MCAV, the Misconduct Civil Actions and Vetting Command, whose job it was to deal with those officers who have laid the Met open to being sued in the courts—by traumatized paramedics for example.

  “Do you stand by your assessment of Constable Grant’s actions that night?”

  “Yes sir,” said Nightingale. “I believe that Constable Grant, faced with difficult circumstances, evaluated the situation correctly and took swift and decisive action to prevent the death of the individual known as Ash Thames. Had he not removed the cold iron from the wound or, having removed it, not transported Ash to the river, I have no doubt that the victim would have died—from loss of blood at the very least.”

  The commissioner looked directly at me and I actually found myself holding my breath until he looked back at Nightingale.

  “You were left in a supervisory position despite your medical condition because I was assured that you remain the only officer qualified to handle ‘special’ cases,” he said. “Was this a mistake on my part?”

  “No sir,” said Nightingale. “Until such time as Constable Grant is fully trained I remain the only suitably qualified officer currently serving in the Metropolitan Police. Believe me, sir, I am as alarmed at this prospect as you are.”

  The commissioner nodded. “Since it appears that Grant had no choice but to act as he did, I am willing to chalk this up to a failure of supervision on your part. This will be considered a verbal reprimand and a note will be entered into your record.” He turned to me, and I kept my eye on a nice safe patch of the wall an inch to the left of his head.

  “While I accept that you are inexperienced and being forced to use your own judgment in circumstances that lie—” The commissioner paused to choose his words. “—outside of conventional police work, I would like to remind you that you swore an oath both as a constable and as an apprentice. And you were warned when you did so that extraordinary things were expected of you. At this point no disciplinary action will be taken and no note will be appended to your record. However, in the future I wish to see you exercise more tact, more discretion, and to try to keep the property damage to a bare minimum. Do you understand?”

  “Yes sir,” I said.

  “The property damage,” said the commissioner, turning back to Nightingale, “including that to the ambulance, will be paid for out of the Folly’s budget, not the Met’s general contingency fund. As will any legal costs and damages that arise out of civil litigation taken against the Metropolitan Police. Is that understood?”

  We both said yes sir.

  I was sweating with relief. The only reason that I wasn’t facing a serious disciplinary hearing was because the commissioner probably didn’t want to explain to the Metropolitan Police Authority why a lowly constable was currently de facto head of an Operational Command Unit. Any advocate I called in from the Police Federation would have had a field day with my lack of effective supervision by a senior officer—Nightingale being on sick leave, remember. Not to mention the health and safety implications of being forced to jump into the Thames in the middle of the night.

  I thought it was all over but it wasn’t. The commissioner touched his intercom. “You can send them in now, please.”

  I recognized the guests. The first was a short, rangy middle-aged white man looking surprisingly dapper in an M&S ready-to-wear blue pin-striped suit. No tie, I noticed, and his hair was as resolutely comb-resistant as a hedgerow. Oxley Thames, wisest of the sons of Father Thames, his chief counselor, media guru, and hatchet man. He gave me a wry look as he took the seat offered by the commissioner to the right of his desk. The second was a handsome fair-skinned woman with a sharp nose and slanted eyes. She wore a black Chanel skirt suit that, had it been a car, would have done zero to sixty in less than 3.8 seconds. Lady Ty, Mama Thames’s favorite daughter, Oxford graduate and ambitious fixer, she seemed pleased to see me—which didn’t bode well. As she joined Oxley I realized that the bollocking wasn’t over, and this was to be The Bollocking 2: This Time It’s Personal.

  “I believe you know Oxley and Lady Tyburn,” said the commissioner. “They’ve been asked by their ‘principals’ to clarify their position with regard to Ash Thames.” He turned to Oxley and Ty and asked who wanted to go first.

  Ty turned to the commissioner. “I have a question for Constable Grant. If I may?” she asked.

  The commissioner made a gesture that suggested that I was all hers.

  “At any point,” she said, “did it cross your mind what would have happened to my sister had Ash been killed?”

  “No ma’am,” I said.

  “Which is an interesting admission given that you helped negotiate that agreement,” she said. “Were you unaware of the exact nature of an exchange of hostages perhaps? Or did you just forget that should death befall Ash while he was in our care, my sister’s life would have been forfeit? You do know what the word forfeit means?”

  I went cold, because I hadn’t given it a thought, not when recruiting Ash for the surveillance job or even when I was sailing down the Thames with him. If he’d been killed then, Beverley Brook, Lady Ty’s sister, would have faced the ultimate forfeit. Which meant I’d nearly killed two people that
night.

  I glanced at Nightingale, who frowned and nodded for me to reply.

  “I do know what the word forfeit means,” I said. “And in my defense, I’d like to say that I never expected Ash to put himself in harm’s way. I considered him a sober reliable figure, like all his brothers.”

  Oxley snorted, which earned him a glare from Lady Ty.

  “I hadn’t counted on him being quite so brave or quick-witted,” I said and got a look from Oxley that conveyed the notion that there’s such a thing as laying the blarney on too thick. It didn’t matter, because the reason you don’t fight with Lady Ty is she just waits for you to finish dancing about and then gives you a smack.

  “While I’m of course aware of the role played by Inspector Nightingale and Constable Grant in facilitating a conciliation framework,” said Lady Ty, “I think it would be better, in light of recent events, if they took a less proactive stance with regard to matters relating to riverine diplomacy.”

  I was moved almost to applause. The commissioner nodded, which just proved that the fix was in—probably with the Greater London Police Authority and the Mayor’s Office. He probably felt he had enough on his plate without us dishing out any more. He turned to Oxley and asked whether he had anything to add.

  “Ash is a young man,” said Oxley. “And it’s well known that boys will be boys. Still, I don’t think it would hurt if Constable Grant were to exercise a hair more responsibility when dealing with him.”

  We waited a moment for more but Oxley just looked bland. Lady Ty didn’t look happy so maybe the fix wasn’t as firmly in place as she would like. I gave her my secretive little boy smirk, the one that I’ve been using to drive my mum berserk since I was eight. Her lips thinned, but she was obviously made of sterner stuff than my mum.

  “That seems reasonable,” said Nightingale. “As long as all parties stay within the agreement and the law, I’m sure we can agree to a hands-off approach.”