The Treatment
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Synopsis
'Simply the best British novel I've read this century' David Peace 'Will stay in my head forever...a fantastic book' The Tablet ' A maverick project that defies comparison' Metro An ArtsDesk Best Book of 2020 At a bus stop in south London, black teenager Eldine Matthews is murdered by a racist gang. Twenty years later, L Troop's top boys - models of vice, deviance and violence - are far beyond justice. There are some people the law will not touch. But Eldine's murder is not forgotten. His story is once again on everyone's lips and the streets of south London; a story of police corruption and the elimination of witnesses. A solicitor, a rent boy, a one-eyed comedian and his minder are raising ghosts; and Carl Hyatt, disgraced reporter, thinks he knows why. There's one man linking this crew of rambunctious dandies and enchanting thugs, and it's the man Carl promised never to challenge again: Mulhall, kingpin of London's rotten heart and defender of L Troop's racist killers. Carl must face up to the morality of retribution and the reality of violence knowing that he is the weak link in the chain; and that he has placed everyone he loves within Mulhall's reach. The Treatment is steeped in London's criminal past, its shadows of corruption and institutional racism. Like a seventeenth-century revenge tragedy, its characters reel from the streets, bars and brothels, hyperarticulate and propelled by wild justice.
Release date: March 5, 2020
Publisher: Quercus Publishing
Print pages: 448
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The Treatment
Michael Nath
Dramatis Personae
Carl Hyatt
a Chronicle journalist, and the teller of this tale
Karen Tynan
his second wife, and dark lady: a northern teacher
Lolly Morris
her friend and colleague
Goldie
Lolly’s cousin
Gina
the bohemian proprietor of the Tiresias club
Lord Larry
another bohemian
Cassie Evans
and another
Angie Pole
a dynamic friend of Karen’s
Mother Jago
a wise woman from Karen’s childhood
Víctor Hanley
a flash and fluent lawyer
Milly Hanley
his wan wife
Esme
their daughter
Donna Juan
(aka ‘DJ’)
a scholar and sex worker, major-domo at Lords
Pep and Albo
his fellow workers at Lords
Roadie and Atlas
two of their chums
John Fabian Morgan
(aka ‘The Cunctator’)
a one-eyed stand-up humorist
Turbo
his minder
Eddie Singh and Terry Ireland
old pals of Morgan’s
DI George Arnold
(aka ‘Big Ears’, ‘Scopic’ and ‘Geordie’)
an ex-copper
DS Charlie ‘Chas’ Bowler
his dark driver
Michael John Mulhall
a seasoned brigand and developer
Mandy Woods
his daunting sister
Van Spenser
a South African pimp
Raymond Vernon
an Anglican priest, and former landlord of The Bosun and Monkey
Bobby
his assistant
Sibyl Grove
a riddling woman
The Gonk
an elderly busker, and nark
Paulie Charalambous
a barber and whisky-man
Tyrus
his buff boss
Arsenal Cap
a tech guy
Gunther
a Nantucket-Red neighbour
John Waugh
a supplier of Olympic anoraks
Ellis
a fruit-and-flower stallholder and proxy journo
Andy Ravage
a rubicund newspaper editor, Carl’s boss on the Chronicle
Mandy Ravage
his wife
Fabiana
his right-hand woman and loyal lieutenant
Colin
a photographer
Mayor Montgomery
a Tory mayor
Sandy Clinch
a council officer
Steve Barnfield
a Labour councillor
Marcia Jones
his Kiwi girlfriend
Zac Cumberbatch
a slime-o councillor
Meredith Jhaliwal and Conor Gard
licensing inspectors
William Cook
a travelcard tout, and witness to a cover-up (deceased)
Beefburger Mike
his neurologically damaged friend
Frankie
his girlfriend
Scotch Al
(aka A-No. 1)
a compassionate fellow tout
Mad Max and Yardling
his further associates
Earl Holmes
a bully tout
Gunga Baines
a tout of Brixton
Laura
Carl’s absent first wife
Edward
his son by his first marriage
Nigel
his brother
Frankie Sly
an antiques man, and influence on Carl
Alison Sly
his alarming niece
Craig Norman
Carl’s former boss on The G*******
Justin Fox
a young intern
Saffron
his girlfriend
Alexander Brons
a boyish editor on The G*******
Camilla First
a posh and hearty lawyer
Ellis McMahon and John Dragonheart
former colleagues on The G*******
Eldine Matthews
a murdered youth
Carson Marshall
another murdered youth
Nate Nulty
a murdered accountant
Mick de Lacey
The leader of ‘L Troop’
Pete de Lacey
his brother and lieutenant
Vincent Drew and Alan Roche
the convicted murderers of Eldine Matthews
Danny Flowers
their craven associate
Julie Flowers
his wife
Robbie Woods
(aka the ‘Sixth Man’)
a well-connected psychopath
Jeffrey Gidney
the landlord of The White Cross
Andy Sargeant
The leader of the ‘Young SS’
Tony Cass
his lieutenant
Josh Rider
a wanker
Norah Field
a trainee WPC
Claire Sykes
her former colleague, a greenhorn undercover cop
Kim Perry
her contact
Marcus
Kim’s boyfriend
Gemma Cook
the owner of a hair salon
Sally Roberts
her employee, and pal
Julie Webb
their client, and Claire’s spitting image
Bobby Singh
Julie’s boyfriend
Lola
a Spanish restaurateur
Joe Pordio
an old Spanish bum
Magnus
a Norwegian widower
Rico Flores
a pargeter
Luna
his girlfriend
DS Chris Butler
a swearing copper
Dillinger Ismaél
a hopeless thief
Fatty Donovan
an Australian
Paloma Friendlikova
a litigious Russian
Sveta Sekshenko
a Ukrainian cleaner?
(all of them associates of Victor Hanley)
Instructor Alex
a Krav Maga trainer
Liam X. and Sammy Y.
two hypothetical Irishmen
Tony Friend and Noderick
two thoroughly useless criminals
Ady Beaumont and Deano
two separate childhood tormentors
Coroner McQuaid, Sir Horace Grinter, Jonas Kubb, and The Honourable Mr Justice Aubrey Clarke
various members of the legal profession
Chapter 1
So we went to Lola’s again and ordered al piedra. Lola brought the gear, and came back with the meat, watching as we laid it on the stones.
The stones hissed.
Lola’s hair was skillet black, outfit combat black; she wore a little apron where stains hid. ‘Tienes que vivir al límite!’
‘Ha ha!’
She said so again and walked away. My Spanish stunk. On Google Trans I looked up Lola’s words. ‘You have to live dangerously!’
Blood formed little runnels on the flesh; as the meat cooked, they darkened and went.
In the kitchen Lola cackled with her guys.
‘You should have tipped that sea-dog,’ Karen told me. Late afternoon at the long beach, we were looking for a short cut. Factor 50 on her mush, slap running, that was Karen, living dead from Manchester morgue. No way was she walking up the road. There was a path through the Parador but you needed the code, so we came under the cliff, past a hut where old boys were drinking. When I asked about steps to the town, one of them took us where the beach curved. A wave soaked his plimsolls, nearly put him on his arse. I told him muchas gracias, he kept with us. There were the steps. How d’you say You can go now, pal? We mounted together. Near the top, our fella dropped back. We’d reached a terrace. By a cannon of rotting bronze, a man tensed his throat, silver head shaking as we turned to say adios. Fifty yards out, there was a brown slick; a girl frothed for camera on a platform rock . . .
‘She wasn’t a bride. That was her communion dress.’
‘Ah.’
‘I never had one like that.’
‘You weren’t pure enough.’
‘Was till I met you – God, these are hot!’
Brown-aproned Lola flew past, down the step. On the terrace, she was dealing with someone. No shit. Back now grinning at favourites.
On the way to the apartment, we stopped at Charo’s. I ordered Karen a Bushwacker, reminding the camarera. Behind the jump, she told the bearded guy, who knew us and nodded. Charo’s was a snug, dark box. Could have settled there forever. You know how you miss a place already, like it harbours the spirit of the holiday? At the second taste, Karen closed her eyes, tiny pulse in the lids. Her right leg came into play. Tonight she wore a mauve-silk cheongsam. Locals and Irish were watching football: Lazio–Tottenham. They’d checked her when we entered. I told her she’d inflame ’em; we had some persiflage. She wanted another.
The barman stared at TV, shaking his head. Crowd trouble. I saw a banner: ‘FREE PALESTINE’. ‘Fascistas,’ said the barman. ‘Putos fascistas!’ Our camarera brought the cocktail, and a boot of lager for your pleb. Mussolini’s team were Lazio. Ultras. Irriducibili.
Sucking brown cream, Karen was telling me off about postcards, of which she’d sent a number, and I hadn’t. Spurs cop it time and again, this kind of treatment. Foul. We could go to the caves, couldn’t we? Which ones? Gas-chamber hiss when they visit West Ham. The caves Lolly recommended. She’d told me so many times! Really, really wanted to see them – so could we?
Sure.
We could take a picnic.
*
‘Maybe it was them cocktails, Carlo.’
Overnight she’d been throwing up, on the half-hour, two till five-thirty. Fucking awful. An argument against God, seeing someone like that. And hearing. In my view, the Bushwackers weren’t to blame. She had a fever. After a visit to the farmacia, we made it to Abril’s.
‘You can’t have slept either.’ She patted my hand. ‘Are you feeling all right?’
‘Yeah.’ I ordered iced aguas, coffee for myself.
‘Qué tal, amiga?’ The camarera was a stately young woman in black dress trousers, with a wide enchanting mouth. She could have come straight from opera, big-band rehearsal.
‘She was sick last night.’
‘Sick? Ay – devolver! There is a virus. Very bad.’
‘Here?’
‘Yes. Mucha gente –’ flowing gesture from the mouth – ‘por aquí. Mucha gente.’ She waved at someone, shook her head. ‘No omelette today?’
Give her a trumpet, let her blow, Daddio!
No omelette. Around us they were tucking in: train-wheel tortillas, saw-mill chip stacks, lager, bacon, long, complex salads. Karen swallowed. The camarera adjusted our parasol. I wouldn’t eat either.
‘I don’t think I’ll make the caves, Carl. I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t worry.’
‘But today was our last chance.’
Over there, a man tapped his phone.
‘We can come another time.’
By the cannon, wasn’t he, silver-haired.
‘Do you promise?’
The man tensed his throat. Today he wore a shirt of pink checks. A blonde expat came to ask about pargeters; he took his time, named a man in Calahonda; the expat went away. He tapped some more, drank of his beer; the camarera brought him olives. He took his time with them too; looked about like he was counting, caught my eye:
‘You should take the lady to the caves.’
‘We’d like to, but she’s not well.’
‘Where’d you eat last night?’
‘Lola’s. – I don’t think it was the food, though.’
‘Don’t you?’ Shaking head. ‘What do you think it was, then? Something in the water?’
‘The waitress said there was a virus going round.’
He sniffed. ‘Ain’t heard anything to that effect.’
‘Well, it feels like a virus!’ Karen said.
‘Where’s the evidence?’
‘I know what I’ve got, pal!’ Karen told him.
He watched her: ‘Just said it felt like a virus. Now you’re knowing.’
‘Well, I’ve decided!’ Karen told him. So stick that up your arse, cock! She’d row with anyone, all five-foot-two of her. Friend was giving me the hump as well, sitting there in Prada with his olives, and dry laughing way.
He tapped his phone. ‘Local newsfeed. Nothing about viruses.’
‘What have you got against Lola’s? It’s our favourite place.’
‘Never suggested I got anything against Lola’s. Eat there myself, once in a while.’ He tensed his throat. ‘Not my favourite, by any means. But I ain’t reviling it.’
‘I should think not!’
Under the table, I tried to find her foot.
‘You were swimming yesterday?’ said our friend.
‘Yes.’
‘Saw you coming up the steps with Joe Pordio.’
‘Who?’
‘The old boy you was with. – There’s an outfall just off the long beach. Water ain’t too clean.’
‘Ugh! How disgusting! They ought to tell people!’
‘Exactly,’ said our friend. ‘It won’t do. Which is why I was advising your husband here to take you to the caves. Pure air in there, very pure. Nice and cool, too. Just the job if you been down with the gastroenteritis.’
‘But the water’s so lovely, like stained-glass.’
‘Now that’s a choice way of putting it, that is,’ nodded our friend. ‘Are you a poet?’
‘Get on one! I’m a teacher.’
‘Very good. Teachers are a necessity, whereas poets are a luxury. I put my poetry books away after school, and to be honest, I never looked at them again.’
‘But poetry’s important.’
‘If you’ve got the time.’
‘You could always read a poem, instead of tapping on your phone.’
I wished Karen’d cool it.
‘Maybe I ain’t got the inclination.’ Tensing his throat.
‘Well I’ve heard the caves are poetic!’
‘Who d’you hear that from, you don’t mind me asking?’
‘My friend’s been here a few times.’
‘And she told you like?’
‘Yes. She loves them.’
‘What would her name be?’
‘Lolly Morris.’
Our friend hummed, said the name.
‘Well, you don’t know everyone, do you?’ laughed Karen.
‘Oh no! Course not, dear.’
‘Do you live here?’
‘I have got a place. Yes.’
‘Lolly says the caves are full of monsters – and weird shapes.’
‘The caves are OK, dear. All the monsters are out here in the sun. And your weird shapes.’
‘See! You could have been a poet!’ cried Karen.
‘I go by experience, babe.’ Nodding at me. ‘Don’t know nothing about poetry!’
‘We’d better be off now.’
‘You ain’t making the caves, then? You’ll be sorry!’
‘Next time.’ I looked for the camarera.
‘I’ll get that,’ said our friend. ‘On me. – No. Please. Hope I didn’t cause offence.’
As we stood, he said, ‘Try Bales. Town end of the Calle Carreta. You’ll like it there. – Hey, son! Careful! Your shoelace!’
He bent to pick up something as I tied it. We hadn’t introduced ourselves.
*
We spent the afternoon on the balcony. The flavour of cigs from below reminded Karen of her grampa, reading the Bury Times. A vigorous reader was Grampa Tynan. Better iron the evening paper when he was done, if you wanted a turn. The apartment under ours, a Norwegian called Magnus took on a long let, autumn to late spring. Magnus was a widower of ten years. I wished I’d never be one, moved the shade to keep the sun off her. It was coming as a reflex from a window opposite.
*
In a book I used to read my boy Edward, there was a road like the Calle Carreta.You could walk from a front door on to it, for the pavement was narrow; the road was narrow as well. Counting tiles upon the houses, their little infinite patterns, I went along . . . Say a jolly farmer on a tractor came down here, you’d be well fucked, son.
Why should I like Bales? Karen briefed me to expect a den of tarts, but it was a mixed crowd: locals, families, well-behaved kids, Brits who could speak decent Spanish, Brits taking photos of their plates; selected English papers on a table by the door; more Brits. The hanging ham whiffed like a changing room, so I went outside. Outside was too dark to read. When I came back, eyes were on me.
Déjà-vu headline, two mugshots: hazel-eyed man, Teutonic, hair receding; blue-eyed man, potato face, hair receding. Vincent Drew and Alan Roche, convicted of killing Eldine Matthews. Top left, repro box: ‘SUE US IF WE’RE WRONG!’ Christ, but that took bottle! Three to go. Sleeping easy now? Inside were twelve pages of reports and analysis. When we were kids at the barber’s, we devoured the men’s mags; so I read now, but my hot dreams were of libel . . . Karen texted: feeling lonely. Folding the paper, I drank up and left.
At the town end of the narrow road, she texted with a wish, so I hied me back to the ice-cream place, and bought her three bolas of yoghurt. Down the way, a taxi was idling.
There was a sound system in the apartment. I found her lolling creamily, in an emerald nightdress. She was listening to The Firebird. The last bit choked me up, which I didn’t let her see. I wondered if Magnus could hear. On the side, the yoghurt melted. The taxi wasn’t necessary.
Before we left for the airport, we went to the terrace. An old man was making nets. As if a god threw dust in handfuls, sun sparkled on the waves below.
‘Half close your eyes,’ Karen said, ‘then it looks like dancing stars. It’s so good when you’re feeling better. Worth being ill for. – Promise we’ll come back, Carl?’
Yeah. We took a selfie. The black-and-tan cannon was below me, out of sight. Mr and Mrs Hyatt and their Dog.
Chapter 2
London. After four, the rain paused. In the mews I had a word with Sibyl Grove; the cobbles shone like rows of liver. On the high street, someone called my name. By The Tavern, that was Hanley; how long since I’d seen Hanley?
‘Look like one of us, paisano!’
I told him we’d been in Narixa. Glinting, he suggested the pub. There was something he’d been waiting to tell me. Before we were through the door, he’d begun . . .
So his man’s pulled a Russian in the West End, taken her back. They’ve necked a bottle of Grey Goose, shared a fentanyl patch he had over from a rugby injury. His man’s crashed. Russian bird’s rummaging his DVDs. When he comes round, she’s cheering at Zulu, munching ham from the packet. Through the front door they hear another Slav. This being the cleaner. Who’s changed her day for a hospital appointment. Which he hasn’t remembered. Russian expresses desire to leave, scowling at his pinga like so. Problem. He hasn’t locked the door, since he hasn’t left for work, so the cleaner’s now locked the mortice trying to open it, and he’s overlocked it from the inside. Our cleaner’s howling one way through the letter box, his man’s arse naked howling back, Russian’s howling blue murder. It’s a howling bee.
Hanley began to roll cigarettes.
Our cleaner’s chagrin increases. She’s on lock-out for a Russian black-leg, while Paloma Friendlikova, her understanding is he’s invited a Ukrainian hooker round for a three-way shazam – and does she not like that! Gives his man the treatment, exits drainpipe left.
His man lets in our cleaner, she’s putting egg-white on his injury (folk remedy) when the police arrive. The magistrate, Sir Horace Grinter, is dubious about the welter of complaints (theft, assault, false imprisonment), especially given the state of his man’s left eye; the way Friendlikova sucks her teeth under cross-questioning; and the following facts: (1) a neighbour heard her shouting ‘Front rank, fire!’ with gusto at 6 a.m. – not a peep from his man; (2) her ‘stolen’ Louboutin pump’s been found in the moat by the janitor. Nonetheless, Horatio’s requested a postponement, pending evidence from a locksmith that reasonable attempts were made to open the door once Palomakova expressed the desire to leave.
‘Why’s she cooking this up, though? Why bother?’
‘The Russian? One of these turbulent people.’
‘Didn’t your cleaner testify?’
‘Keeping her for the postponement.’ Hanley glinted.
As I rose to get us another, he said something I didn’t hear. From the bar, I considered Hanley. Moustache, short beard, gold glasses; Hackett suit and good suede brogues. Life seemed a splendid fit for this gent. I knew him from the courts. And times I was hobnobbing with the Crime Squad, he’d be spieling, drinking Kronenbourg, in the snugs and back-bars of London Bridge. The cops called him Zipmouth, Groucho, puzzling why a fast-talking brown boy’s name was Hanley, not Mendes, Singh or Cruz, nor Patel, Kuldeep, Bobby Santos. Those were the days when such things counted. Someone used to call him Master Claypole.
‘You still at The G*******?’
‘No.’
He knew. In a fancy pewter case lay his new-born fags.
‘How d’you know?’
‘Someone was talking about it at Snaresbrook.’
With a full glass, I could hardly beat it. I asked him who was.
‘There’s a clerk over there called Jonas. He was telling me.’ With sad devilry, Hanley glanced about.
‘Jonas who?’
‘Jonas Kubb – K-U-double-B.’
‘Never heard of him.’
‘No reason you would, paisano. He was giving me the broad picture.’
‘What did he say?’
‘That Mulhall obtained a master’s injunction, and someone at The G******* breached it.’ Hanley sat there like a fixture in my gallery. This glinting busyness, had I really forgotten? So friendship makes its claim.
‘He said it was me?’ By now we’d come outside for a cig.
‘Someone like you. – By the way, you never made it to Milly’s birthday.’
Nice of him to change the subject, though this took me by surprise: I’d no memory of an invitation (none of Milly either).
‘Told her all about you, boysie. She wanted to meet.’
I apologized, Hanley was gracious, and desiring to smoke in unbroken rhythm led me round the corner from the high street, gazing upwards at an ornamental oddity on the roof of The Tavern, which I’d noticed often enough in my lazy way, without benefit of such explanation as he now furnished, like a bright schoolboy showing a visitor around – though it wasn’t me who was visiting.
So was he still living in the same place?
Hanley was, and of course didn’t name it, since I should have known already, then helped me, since he could see I didn’t. The place was World’s End.
We were neighbours then – in the metro sense. Though what he was up to down here drinking pale ale invited explanation. From the Magistrates’ Court he’d named to his home wasn’t that far, but it wasn’t this way either, unless you’d made a detour on purpose.
‘I like to walk home different ways.’ He saw what I’d been thinking. ‘Like Dickens.’
‘I’ve heard he was a walker.’
‘He’d walk to Kent and back, he had something on his mind, paisano!’
‘Why Kent?’
Hanley acted startled by my question: ‘Kent was his turf, wasn’t it!’
Oh yeah. I watched Hanley’s mouth. Should have been making for harbour. He seemed to be on to Dickens’s lawyers: Copperfield and Traddles, Carton, Jaggers, Tulkinghorn, Lightwood, Wrayburn . . .
‘Who’s Wrayburn?’
‘Eugene Wrayburn, Our Mutual Friend,’ Hanley advised me. ‘Another great walker. He spends hours sporting with a stalker.’
‘How does he do that?’
‘By walking stalker off his feet. Then he tricks him by popping from an alley and laughing in his face.’
‘Who laughs in whose face?’
‘Wrayburn laughs in stalker’s.’
‘Does he come out on top?’
‘Not immediately. Gets his head kicked in.’
While I considered this, Hanley waved with his cigarette. Where the road beside us forked, was a little cabin. ‘That’s changed!’
‘That was Van Spenser’s.’
‘You’re right, paisano! His sandwich joint. Ever sample his wares?’
‘No. You?’
‘Once. Once only. Years ago. Prawn-Peri-Peri-and-Pineapple submarine. Made me shit like a sandblaster. Had tickets for the theatre that night.’
‘To see what?’
‘To see nothing, boysie. Spent forty-eight lashed to the khazi, like a dungboat captain in a tropical storm.’
I wondered about Hanley’s interest in Van Spenser, who’d gone up in the world . . .
‘He ran hookers,’ remembered Hanley. ‘Had them in there making baps, travelling girls. If he caught them chucking food away, he lectured them about the townships. When they’d had enough of that and his groin pressure – you can see how narrow it is – he sorted them with kiosk cards and introductions. Which he called “promotion”.’
It had a jaunty seaside air, that cabin. Nowadays, it was occupied by a hefty-handed Arab in an Arsenal cap who unlocked phones. On the roof, a gull settled. I was making with departure phrases when Hanley pointed over the main road at the Tube: ‘That’s changed as well!’
I agreed.
‘The foyer, I mean,’ Hanley expatiated. ‘Twenty years ago, it was a scene, street people, drinkers, touts.’
The lurking places had been eliminated.
‘Fancy another?’
‘I have to get home.’ Text from Karen: Where the bloody hell . . .
‘Okey-doke.’ He looked away. ‘Oyster did for them.’
‘For who?’
‘The travelcard touts.You don’t remember William Cook?’
‘Can’t say I do.’ Following his gaze to the underground.
‘William Cook. Scotch Al was A-Number One, but William was some hombre. Craziest tout under the sun. Poor bastard. He was a saint, a prince!’ Hot-eyed, Hanley bowed his head.
I could have asked about William Cook, but here came a young man with hair in fierce braids, taking up a lot of pavement with his arms.
‘Hey, Turbo! Qué tal?’ called Hanley.
‘Smooth, boss,’ Turbo told him. ‘Is you wanting see J. Fabian?’
‘Not yet,’ Hanley told him.
‘Luxe,’ said Turbo. ‘No disrespect, but Mr Fabian, he said he got bum-ache tonight so he’s cancelling; you wants to go round, the man’ll make a special effort, VIP like.’
I took my chance and got out of there, leaving Hanley with Turbo on the kerb.
Chapter 3
Crossing the flyover, I spied the black-haired lad, waving steam from a potato in the hypermarket café. I got lunch for myself, Andy, Fabiana. At the customer-activated terminals, you had the future: loiterers, code-men, loblolly boys. To keep her employed, I paid the check-out woman. In mulberry leg-warmers, the black-haired lad went past. The check-out woman gave him evils. Outside, he said hi. It was raining again.
We stuck the curries in the office microwave, and Fabiana turned her iPod to communal. The microwave roared.
‘How about this?’
‘Fab, can you turn that down. Carlo’s got an idea.’
‘I’m trying to!’
‘Not the microwave oven! The music!’
‘Stop yelling!’
‘I’ve got a diesel in one ear, Lady Dovo in the other!’
‘It’s stuck!’
‘Here’s the idea. I hang about with a rent boy for the day.’
‘Carlo!’ laughed Andy. ‘You aren’t trying to tell us something?’
‘There’s a joint up the road. You must know it?’
‘Where?’
‘The mansions.’
‘He does know,’ Fabiana said. ‘He’s being coy. It’s that man one, isn’t it? The molly house at the top. Penthouse conversion.’
‘Molly house?’
‘Old word, Andy.’
‘That’s the one, Fab. It’s called “Lords”.’
‘Coo!’
Andy, our editor, chewed a while. ‘D’you know the rent boy?’
‘He always says hi.’
‘But what’s the story, the issue?’
‘Something edgy?’ Fabiana wore boots like the Chevalier de Recci and a gold-foil puggaree. She looked ready for anything, except work. Who could blame her? For once, she meant, by ‘edgy’. The nearest she got was editing Ellis’s ‘Shout-Out’. Ellis owned three fruit- and flower-stalls on the high street, prime spot, sponsored by Collingham, Clarke and Murrain, an estate agent near the unlocking booth that used to be Van Spenser’s bap shanty. Like tents at a medieval tourney, his stalls bore the CCM standard and flag. Once a week, Ellis sent a local entrepreneur’s opinions to the Chronicle, which Fabiana edited into a column, a task that required skilfully preserving Ellis’s ‘saltiness’, while minimizing the range of potential offence. For this, we received a donation from CCM; and when Fabiana or I passed the south stall, Ellis, leaning from his campstool in Chelsea-blue gilet and deerstalker, handed us a punnet. He said nothing; we didn’t either. On grounds of transparency, Andy refused to pass the stalls. He was editor. While he pinked for honour, and tried to explain why kickbacks were acceptable when soft fruit wasn’t, we chewed bumblebee peaches. Say he was caught on someone’s phone with a melon he hadn’t paid for . . .
‘It’s community interest.’
‘In what sense though?’
‘Come on, Andy! You know you want some kuff stuff,’ Fabiana told him. ‘It’s your mission.’
Like a kid saying no to sweets, Andy Ravage smiled. But he was a big lad now, and to that smile his size gave force, as it would to the day he cut loose (should that day come). He looked round where we sat. Where we sat was all we had. Rum premises (perched on a flyover). Before people started reading match reports on MSN and the Audit Bureau decided his circulation figures didn’t count anyway, he’d been a decent editor on a sports supplement in the Midlands. With his severance pay, he set up the Chronicle. He was told he’d never draw advertising, sponsors. In fact, he reeled in enough to pay the three of us properly. There was something about him people wanted to invest in. If ‘Big Society’ meant much, maybe it meant something like Andy Ravage, the way he took on life; giving his all, then giving more, with a face that challenged you to laugh in it. Worrying now about business people, local politicos, Collingham, Clarke and Murrain, their interests, sensitivities. Though never a word of a promise I’d made – too big for that.
*
Community interest was one thing. I had a hunch as well, and a grudge. Late afternoon, the black-haired lad passed me in wellingtons, sack on his shoulder. He didn’t say hi. I watched him enter Pom-Pom’s, hung about by The Khartoum. A German came to see the window menu. As the chef skimmed the mince, I heard a little talk and the two of them were off. Bitch! I’d been blind-sided.
From the window of The Tavern, I could keep an eye on Pom-Pom’s. He’d be back for the laundry. Rain on TV, people rowing over England. I fell to thinking of Mulhall. When you feel yourself doing that, Karen told me, you must breathe deeply, empty your mind, imagine nothing. That’s what you’ve got to do, love. Twice a week, her pupils had meditation time. She got them to imagine nothing as well, though that was a way of giving them a handle on cosmic microwaves. And Mulhall abhorred a vacuum. The TV showed England’s group for the Euro. If Gerrard didn’t smile, and Rooney stuck to a diet of radish, who knew how far we could go? Really was as open as that. The Spanish were tired of winning . . .
For Mulhall was a Kentish man,
And killeth one or three,
But when the intern came along
Mulhall did smile for glee . . .
It’s a top twenty entry . . .The lad with black hair still hadn’t come along for the laundry when Karen texted. Homebound, I passed two covered girls, discussing Mein Kampf.
*
In Karen’s ‘dedicated’ area was a decorated screen. Her pals at The Tiresias bought it for her wedding. They’d loved her; and though she never returned, painted with a shimmering woman ‘in the manner of Moreau’, the screen must have been a reminder. Maybe wished herself still there. Well, I’d promised to improve, and be truthful. Over the screen hung dresses, indigo, crimson,
Carl Hyatt
a Chronicle journalist, and the teller of this tale
Karen Tynan
his second wife, and dark lady: a northern teacher
Lolly Morris
her friend and colleague
Goldie
Lolly’s cousin
Gina
the bohemian proprietor of the Tiresias club
Lord Larry
another bohemian
Cassie Evans
and another
Angie Pole
a dynamic friend of Karen’s
Mother Jago
a wise woman from Karen’s childhood
Víctor Hanley
a flash and fluent lawyer
Milly Hanley
his wan wife
Esme
their daughter
Donna Juan
(aka ‘DJ’)
a scholar and sex worker, major-domo at Lords
Pep and Albo
his fellow workers at Lords
Roadie and Atlas
two of their chums
John Fabian Morgan
(aka ‘The Cunctator’)
a one-eyed stand-up humorist
Turbo
his minder
Eddie Singh and Terry Ireland
old pals of Morgan’s
DI George Arnold
(aka ‘Big Ears’, ‘Scopic’ and ‘Geordie’)
an ex-copper
DS Charlie ‘Chas’ Bowler
his dark driver
Michael John Mulhall
a seasoned brigand and developer
Mandy Woods
his daunting sister
Van Spenser
a South African pimp
Raymond Vernon
an Anglican priest, and former landlord of The Bosun and Monkey
Bobby
his assistant
Sibyl Grove
a riddling woman
The Gonk
an elderly busker, and nark
Paulie Charalambous
a barber and whisky-man
Tyrus
his buff boss
Arsenal Cap
a tech guy
Gunther
a Nantucket-Red neighbour
John Waugh
a supplier of Olympic anoraks
Ellis
a fruit-and-flower stallholder and proxy journo
Andy Ravage
a rubicund newspaper editor, Carl’s boss on the Chronicle
Mandy Ravage
his wife
Fabiana
his right-hand woman and loyal lieutenant
Colin
a photographer
Mayor Montgomery
a Tory mayor
Sandy Clinch
a council officer
Steve Barnfield
a Labour councillor
Marcia Jones
his Kiwi girlfriend
Zac Cumberbatch
a slime-o councillor
Meredith Jhaliwal and Conor Gard
licensing inspectors
William Cook
a travelcard tout, and witness to a cover-up (deceased)
Beefburger Mike
his neurologically damaged friend
Frankie
his girlfriend
Scotch Al
(aka A-No. 1)
a compassionate fellow tout
Mad Max and Yardling
his further associates
Earl Holmes
a bully tout
Gunga Baines
a tout of Brixton
Laura
Carl’s absent first wife
Edward
his son by his first marriage
Nigel
his brother
Frankie Sly
an antiques man, and influence on Carl
Alison Sly
his alarming niece
Craig Norman
Carl’s former boss on The G*******
Justin Fox
a young intern
Saffron
his girlfriend
Alexander Brons
a boyish editor on The G*******
Camilla First
a posh and hearty lawyer
Ellis McMahon and John Dragonheart
former colleagues on The G*******
Eldine Matthews
a murdered youth
Carson Marshall
another murdered youth
Nate Nulty
a murdered accountant
Mick de Lacey
The leader of ‘L Troop’
Pete de Lacey
his brother and lieutenant
Vincent Drew and Alan Roche
the convicted murderers of Eldine Matthews
Danny Flowers
their craven associate
Julie Flowers
his wife
Robbie Woods
(aka the ‘Sixth Man’)
a well-connected psychopath
Jeffrey Gidney
the landlord of The White Cross
Andy Sargeant
The leader of the ‘Young SS’
Tony Cass
his lieutenant
Josh Rider
a wanker
Norah Field
a trainee WPC
Claire Sykes
her former colleague, a greenhorn undercover cop
Kim Perry
her contact
Marcus
Kim’s boyfriend
Gemma Cook
the owner of a hair salon
Sally Roberts
her employee, and pal
Julie Webb
their client, and Claire’s spitting image
Bobby Singh
Julie’s boyfriend
Lola
a Spanish restaurateur
Joe Pordio
an old Spanish bum
Magnus
a Norwegian widower
Rico Flores
a pargeter
Luna
his girlfriend
DS Chris Butler
a swearing copper
Dillinger Ismaél
a hopeless thief
Fatty Donovan
an Australian
Paloma Friendlikova
a litigious Russian
Sveta Sekshenko
a Ukrainian cleaner?
(all of them associates of Victor Hanley)
Instructor Alex
a Krav Maga trainer
Liam X. and Sammy Y.
two hypothetical Irishmen
Tony Friend and Noderick
two thoroughly useless criminals
Ady Beaumont and Deano
two separate childhood tormentors
Coroner McQuaid, Sir Horace Grinter, Jonas Kubb, and The Honourable Mr Justice Aubrey Clarke
various members of the legal profession
Chapter 1
So we went to Lola’s again and ordered al piedra. Lola brought the gear, and came back with the meat, watching as we laid it on the stones.
The stones hissed.
Lola’s hair was skillet black, outfit combat black; she wore a little apron where stains hid. ‘Tienes que vivir al límite!’
‘Ha ha!’
She said so again and walked away. My Spanish stunk. On Google Trans I looked up Lola’s words. ‘You have to live dangerously!’
Blood formed little runnels on the flesh; as the meat cooked, they darkened and went.
In the kitchen Lola cackled with her guys.
‘You should have tipped that sea-dog,’ Karen told me. Late afternoon at the long beach, we were looking for a short cut. Factor 50 on her mush, slap running, that was Karen, living dead from Manchester morgue. No way was she walking up the road. There was a path through the Parador but you needed the code, so we came under the cliff, past a hut where old boys were drinking. When I asked about steps to the town, one of them took us where the beach curved. A wave soaked his plimsolls, nearly put him on his arse. I told him muchas gracias, he kept with us. There were the steps. How d’you say You can go now, pal? We mounted together. Near the top, our fella dropped back. We’d reached a terrace. By a cannon of rotting bronze, a man tensed his throat, silver head shaking as we turned to say adios. Fifty yards out, there was a brown slick; a girl frothed for camera on a platform rock . . .
‘She wasn’t a bride. That was her communion dress.’
‘Ah.’
‘I never had one like that.’
‘You weren’t pure enough.’
‘Was till I met you – God, these are hot!’
Brown-aproned Lola flew past, down the step. On the terrace, she was dealing with someone. No shit. Back now grinning at favourites.
On the way to the apartment, we stopped at Charo’s. I ordered Karen a Bushwacker, reminding the camarera. Behind the jump, she told the bearded guy, who knew us and nodded. Charo’s was a snug, dark box. Could have settled there forever. You know how you miss a place already, like it harbours the spirit of the holiday? At the second taste, Karen closed her eyes, tiny pulse in the lids. Her right leg came into play. Tonight she wore a mauve-silk cheongsam. Locals and Irish were watching football: Lazio–Tottenham. They’d checked her when we entered. I told her she’d inflame ’em; we had some persiflage. She wanted another.
The barman stared at TV, shaking his head. Crowd trouble. I saw a banner: ‘FREE PALESTINE’. ‘Fascistas,’ said the barman. ‘Putos fascistas!’ Our camarera brought the cocktail, and a boot of lager for your pleb. Mussolini’s team were Lazio. Ultras. Irriducibili.
Sucking brown cream, Karen was telling me off about postcards, of which she’d sent a number, and I hadn’t. Spurs cop it time and again, this kind of treatment. Foul. We could go to the caves, couldn’t we? Which ones? Gas-chamber hiss when they visit West Ham. The caves Lolly recommended. She’d told me so many times! Really, really wanted to see them – so could we?
Sure.
We could take a picnic.
*
‘Maybe it was them cocktails, Carlo.’
Overnight she’d been throwing up, on the half-hour, two till five-thirty. Fucking awful. An argument against God, seeing someone like that. And hearing. In my view, the Bushwackers weren’t to blame. She had a fever. After a visit to the farmacia, we made it to Abril’s.
‘You can’t have slept either.’ She patted my hand. ‘Are you feeling all right?’
‘Yeah.’ I ordered iced aguas, coffee for myself.
‘Qué tal, amiga?’ The camarera was a stately young woman in black dress trousers, with a wide enchanting mouth. She could have come straight from opera, big-band rehearsal.
‘She was sick last night.’
‘Sick? Ay – devolver! There is a virus. Very bad.’
‘Here?’
‘Yes. Mucha gente –’ flowing gesture from the mouth – ‘por aquí. Mucha gente.’ She waved at someone, shook her head. ‘No omelette today?’
Give her a trumpet, let her blow, Daddio!
No omelette. Around us they were tucking in: train-wheel tortillas, saw-mill chip stacks, lager, bacon, long, complex salads. Karen swallowed. The camarera adjusted our parasol. I wouldn’t eat either.
‘I don’t think I’ll make the caves, Carl. I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t worry.’
‘But today was our last chance.’
Over there, a man tapped his phone.
‘We can come another time.’
By the cannon, wasn’t he, silver-haired.
‘Do you promise?’
The man tensed his throat. Today he wore a shirt of pink checks. A blonde expat came to ask about pargeters; he took his time, named a man in Calahonda; the expat went away. He tapped some more, drank of his beer; the camarera brought him olives. He took his time with them too; looked about like he was counting, caught my eye:
‘You should take the lady to the caves.’
‘We’d like to, but she’s not well.’
‘Where’d you eat last night?’
‘Lola’s. – I don’t think it was the food, though.’
‘Don’t you?’ Shaking head. ‘What do you think it was, then? Something in the water?’
‘The waitress said there was a virus going round.’
He sniffed. ‘Ain’t heard anything to that effect.’
‘Well, it feels like a virus!’ Karen said.
‘Where’s the evidence?’
‘I know what I’ve got, pal!’ Karen told him.
He watched her: ‘Just said it felt like a virus. Now you’re knowing.’
‘Well, I’ve decided!’ Karen told him. So stick that up your arse, cock! She’d row with anyone, all five-foot-two of her. Friend was giving me the hump as well, sitting there in Prada with his olives, and dry laughing way.
He tapped his phone. ‘Local newsfeed. Nothing about viruses.’
‘What have you got against Lola’s? It’s our favourite place.’
‘Never suggested I got anything against Lola’s. Eat there myself, once in a while.’ He tensed his throat. ‘Not my favourite, by any means. But I ain’t reviling it.’
‘I should think not!’
Under the table, I tried to find her foot.
‘You were swimming yesterday?’ said our friend.
‘Yes.’
‘Saw you coming up the steps with Joe Pordio.’
‘Who?’
‘The old boy you was with. – There’s an outfall just off the long beach. Water ain’t too clean.’
‘Ugh! How disgusting! They ought to tell people!’
‘Exactly,’ said our friend. ‘It won’t do. Which is why I was advising your husband here to take you to the caves. Pure air in there, very pure. Nice and cool, too. Just the job if you been down with the gastroenteritis.’
‘But the water’s so lovely, like stained-glass.’
‘Now that’s a choice way of putting it, that is,’ nodded our friend. ‘Are you a poet?’
‘Get on one! I’m a teacher.’
‘Very good. Teachers are a necessity, whereas poets are a luxury. I put my poetry books away after school, and to be honest, I never looked at them again.’
‘But poetry’s important.’
‘If you’ve got the time.’
‘You could always read a poem, instead of tapping on your phone.’
I wished Karen’d cool it.
‘Maybe I ain’t got the inclination.’ Tensing his throat.
‘Well I’ve heard the caves are poetic!’
‘Who d’you hear that from, you don’t mind me asking?’
‘My friend’s been here a few times.’
‘And she told you like?’
‘Yes. She loves them.’
‘What would her name be?’
‘Lolly Morris.’
Our friend hummed, said the name.
‘Well, you don’t know everyone, do you?’ laughed Karen.
‘Oh no! Course not, dear.’
‘Do you live here?’
‘I have got a place. Yes.’
‘Lolly says the caves are full of monsters – and weird shapes.’
‘The caves are OK, dear. All the monsters are out here in the sun. And your weird shapes.’
‘See! You could have been a poet!’ cried Karen.
‘I go by experience, babe.’ Nodding at me. ‘Don’t know nothing about poetry!’
‘We’d better be off now.’
‘You ain’t making the caves, then? You’ll be sorry!’
‘Next time.’ I looked for the camarera.
‘I’ll get that,’ said our friend. ‘On me. – No. Please. Hope I didn’t cause offence.’
As we stood, he said, ‘Try Bales. Town end of the Calle Carreta. You’ll like it there. – Hey, son! Careful! Your shoelace!’
He bent to pick up something as I tied it. We hadn’t introduced ourselves.
*
We spent the afternoon on the balcony. The flavour of cigs from below reminded Karen of her grampa, reading the Bury Times. A vigorous reader was Grampa Tynan. Better iron the evening paper when he was done, if you wanted a turn. The apartment under ours, a Norwegian called Magnus took on a long let, autumn to late spring. Magnus was a widower of ten years. I wished I’d never be one, moved the shade to keep the sun off her. It was coming as a reflex from a window opposite.
*
In a book I used to read my boy Edward, there was a road like the Calle Carreta.You could walk from a front door on to it, for the pavement was narrow; the road was narrow as well. Counting tiles upon the houses, their little infinite patterns, I went along . . . Say a jolly farmer on a tractor came down here, you’d be well fucked, son.
Why should I like Bales? Karen briefed me to expect a den of tarts, but it was a mixed crowd: locals, families, well-behaved kids, Brits who could speak decent Spanish, Brits taking photos of their plates; selected English papers on a table by the door; more Brits. The hanging ham whiffed like a changing room, so I went outside. Outside was too dark to read. When I came back, eyes were on me.
Déjà-vu headline, two mugshots: hazel-eyed man, Teutonic, hair receding; blue-eyed man, potato face, hair receding. Vincent Drew and Alan Roche, convicted of killing Eldine Matthews. Top left, repro box: ‘SUE US IF WE’RE WRONG!’ Christ, but that took bottle! Three to go. Sleeping easy now? Inside were twelve pages of reports and analysis. When we were kids at the barber’s, we devoured the men’s mags; so I read now, but my hot dreams were of libel . . . Karen texted: feeling lonely. Folding the paper, I drank up and left.
At the town end of the narrow road, she texted with a wish, so I hied me back to the ice-cream place, and bought her three bolas of yoghurt. Down the way, a taxi was idling.
There was a sound system in the apartment. I found her lolling creamily, in an emerald nightdress. She was listening to The Firebird. The last bit choked me up, which I didn’t let her see. I wondered if Magnus could hear. On the side, the yoghurt melted. The taxi wasn’t necessary.
Before we left for the airport, we went to the terrace. An old man was making nets. As if a god threw dust in handfuls, sun sparkled on the waves below.
‘Half close your eyes,’ Karen said, ‘then it looks like dancing stars. It’s so good when you’re feeling better. Worth being ill for. – Promise we’ll come back, Carl?’
Yeah. We took a selfie. The black-and-tan cannon was below me, out of sight. Mr and Mrs Hyatt and their Dog.
Chapter 2
London. After four, the rain paused. In the mews I had a word with Sibyl Grove; the cobbles shone like rows of liver. On the high street, someone called my name. By The Tavern, that was Hanley; how long since I’d seen Hanley?
‘Look like one of us, paisano!’
I told him we’d been in Narixa. Glinting, he suggested the pub. There was something he’d been waiting to tell me. Before we were through the door, he’d begun . . .
So his man’s pulled a Russian in the West End, taken her back. They’ve necked a bottle of Grey Goose, shared a fentanyl patch he had over from a rugby injury. His man’s crashed. Russian bird’s rummaging his DVDs. When he comes round, she’s cheering at Zulu, munching ham from the packet. Through the front door they hear another Slav. This being the cleaner. Who’s changed her day for a hospital appointment. Which he hasn’t remembered. Russian expresses desire to leave, scowling at his pinga like so. Problem. He hasn’t locked the door, since he hasn’t left for work, so the cleaner’s now locked the mortice trying to open it, and he’s overlocked it from the inside. Our cleaner’s howling one way through the letter box, his man’s arse naked howling back, Russian’s howling blue murder. It’s a howling bee.
Hanley began to roll cigarettes.
Our cleaner’s chagrin increases. She’s on lock-out for a Russian black-leg, while Paloma Friendlikova, her understanding is he’s invited a Ukrainian hooker round for a three-way shazam – and does she not like that! Gives his man the treatment, exits drainpipe left.
His man lets in our cleaner, she’s putting egg-white on his injury (folk remedy) when the police arrive. The magistrate, Sir Horace Grinter, is dubious about the welter of complaints (theft, assault, false imprisonment), especially given the state of his man’s left eye; the way Friendlikova sucks her teeth under cross-questioning; and the following facts: (1) a neighbour heard her shouting ‘Front rank, fire!’ with gusto at 6 a.m. – not a peep from his man; (2) her ‘stolen’ Louboutin pump’s been found in the moat by the janitor. Nonetheless, Horatio’s requested a postponement, pending evidence from a locksmith that reasonable attempts were made to open the door once Palomakova expressed the desire to leave.
‘Why’s she cooking this up, though? Why bother?’
‘The Russian? One of these turbulent people.’
‘Didn’t your cleaner testify?’
‘Keeping her for the postponement.’ Hanley glinted.
As I rose to get us another, he said something I didn’t hear. From the bar, I considered Hanley. Moustache, short beard, gold glasses; Hackett suit and good suede brogues. Life seemed a splendid fit for this gent. I knew him from the courts. And times I was hobnobbing with the Crime Squad, he’d be spieling, drinking Kronenbourg, in the snugs and back-bars of London Bridge. The cops called him Zipmouth, Groucho, puzzling why a fast-talking brown boy’s name was Hanley, not Mendes, Singh or Cruz, nor Patel, Kuldeep, Bobby Santos. Those were the days when such things counted. Someone used to call him Master Claypole.
‘You still at The G*******?’
‘No.’
He knew. In a fancy pewter case lay his new-born fags.
‘How d’you know?’
‘Someone was talking about it at Snaresbrook.’
With a full glass, I could hardly beat it. I asked him who was.
‘There’s a clerk over there called Jonas. He was telling me.’ With sad devilry, Hanley glanced about.
‘Jonas who?’
‘Jonas Kubb – K-U-double-B.’
‘Never heard of him.’
‘No reason you would, paisano. He was giving me the broad picture.’
‘What did he say?’
‘That Mulhall obtained a master’s injunction, and someone at The G******* breached it.’ Hanley sat there like a fixture in my gallery. This glinting busyness, had I really forgotten? So friendship makes its claim.
‘He said it was me?’ By now we’d come outside for a cig.
‘Someone like you. – By the way, you never made it to Milly’s birthday.’
Nice of him to change the subject, though this took me by surprise: I’d no memory of an invitation (none of Milly either).
‘Told her all about you, boysie. She wanted to meet.’
I apologized, Hanley was gracious, and desiring to smoke in unbroken rhythm led me round the corner from the high street, gazing upwards at an ornamental oddity on the roof of The Tavern, which I’d noticed often enough in my lazy way, without benefit of such explanation as he now furnished, like a bright schoolboy showing a visitor around – though it wasn’t me who was visiting.
So was he still living in the same place?
Hanley was, and of course didn’t name it, since I should have known already, then helped me, since he could see I didn’t. The place was World’s End.
We were neighbours then – in the metro sense. Though what he was up to down here drinking pale ale invited explanation. From the Magistrates’ Court he’d named to his home wasn’t that far, but it wasn’t this way either, unless you’d made a detour on purpose.
‘I like to walk home different ways.’ He saw what I’d been thinking. ‘Like Dickens.’
‘I’ve heard he was a walker.’
‘He’d walk to Kent and back, he had something on his mind, paisano!’
‘Why Kent?’
Hanley acted startled by my question: ‘Kent was his turf, wasn’t it!’
Oh yeah. I watched Hanley’s mouth. Should have been making for harbour. He seemed to be on to Dickens’s lawyers: Copperfield and Traddles, Carton, Jaggers, Tulkinghorn, Lightwood, Wrayburn . . .
‘Who’s Wrayburn?’
‘Eugene Wrayburn, Our Mutual Friend,’ Hanley advised me. ‘Another great walker. He spends hours sporting with a stalker.’
‘How does he do that?’
‘By walking stalker off his feet. Then he tricks him by popping from an alley and laughing in his face.’
‘Who laughs in whose face?’
‘Wrayburn laughs in stalker’s.’
‘Does he come out on top?’
‘Not immediately. Gets his head kicked in.’
While I considered this, Hanley waved with his cigarette. Where the road beside us forked, was a little cabin. ‘That’s changed!’
‘That was Van Spenser’s.’
‘You’re right, paisano! His sandwich joint. Ever sample his wares?’
‘No. You?’
‘Once. Once only. Years ago. Prawn-Peri-Peri-and-Pineapple submarine. Made me shit like a sandblaster. Had tickets for the theatre that night.’
‘To see what?’
‘To see nothing, boysie. Spent forty-eight lashed to the khazi, like a dungboat captain in a tropical storm.’
I wondered about Hanley’s interest in Van Spenser, who’d gone up in the world . . .
‘He ran hookers,’ remembered Hanley. ‘Had them in there making baps, travelling girls. If he caught them chucking food away, he lectured them about the townships. When they’d had enough of that and his groin pressure – you can see how narrow it is – he sorted them with kiosk cards and introductions. Which he called “promotion”.’
It had a jaunty seaside air, that cabin. Nowadays, it was occupied by a hefty-handed Arab in an Arsenal cap who unlocked phones. On the roof, a gull settled. I was making with departure phrases when Hanley pointed over the main road at the Tube: ‘That’s changed as well!’
I agreed.
‘The foyer, I mean,’ Hanley expatiated. ‘Twenty years ago, it was a scene, street people, drinkers, touts.’
The lurking places had been eliminated.
‘Fancy another?’
‘I have to get home.’ Text from Karen: Where the bloody hell . . .
‘Okey-doke.’ He looked away. ‘Oyster did for them.’
‘For who?’
‘The travelcard touts.You don’t remember William Cook?’
‘Can’t say I do.’ Following his gaze to the underground.
‘William Cook. Scotch Al was A-Number One, but William was some hombre. Craziest tout under the sun. Poor bastard. He was a saint, a prince!’ Hot-eyed, Hanley bowed his head.
I could have asked about William Cook, but here came a young man with hair in fierce braids, taking up a lot of pavement with his arms.
‘Hey, Turbo! Qué tal?’ called Hanley.
‘Smooth, boss,’ Turbo told him. ‘Is you wanting see J. Fabian?’
‘Not yet,’ Hanley told him.
‘Luxe,’ said Turbo. ‘No disrespect, but Mr Fabian, he said he got bum-ache tonight so he’s cancelling; you wants to go round, the man’ll make a special effort, VIP like.’
I took my chance and got out of there, leaving Hanley with Turbo on the kerb.
Chapter 3
Crossing the flyover, I spied the black-haired lad, waving steam from a potato in the hypermarket café. I got lunch for myself, Andy, Fabiana. At the customer-activated terminals, you had the future: loiterers, code-men, loblolly boys. To keep her employed, I paid the check-out woman. In mulberry leg-warmers, the black-haired lad went past. The check-out woman gave him evils. Outside, he said hi. It was raining again.
We stuck the curries in the office microwave, and Fabiana turned her iPod to communal. The microwave roared.
‘How about this?’
‘Fab, can you turn that down. Carlo’s got an idea.’
‘I’m trying to!’
‘Not the microwave oven! The music!’
‘Stop yelling!’
‘I’ve got a diesel in one ear, Lady Dovo in the other!’
‘It’s stuck!’
‘Here’s the idea. I hang about with a rent boy for the day.’
‘Carlo!’ laughed Andy. ‘You aren’t trying to tell us something?’
‘There’s a joint up the road. You must know it?’
‘Where?’
‘The mansions.’
‘He does know,’ Fabiana said. ‘He’s being coy. It’s that man one, isn’t it? The molly house at the top. Penthouse conversion.’
‘Molly house?’
‘Old word, Andy.’
‘That’s the one, Fab. It’s called “Lords”.’
‘Coo!’
Andy, our editor, chewed a while. ‘D’you know the rent boy?’
‘He always says hi.’
‘But what’s the story, the issue?’
‘Something edgy?’ Fabiana wore boots like the Chevalier de Recci and a gold-foil puggaree. She looked ready for anything, except work. Who could blame her? For once, she meant, by ‘edgy’. The nearest she got was editing Ellis’s ‘Shout-Out’. Ellis owned three fruit- and flower-stalls on the high street, prime spot, sponsored by Collingham, Clarke and Murrain, an estate agent near the unlocking booth that used to be Van Spenser’s bap shanty. Like tents at a medieval tourney, his stalls bore the CCM standard and flag. Once a week, Ellis sent a local entrepreneur’s opinions to the Chronicle, which Fabiana edited into a column, a task that required skilfully preserving Ellis’s ‘saltiness’, while minimizing the range of potential offence. For this, we received a donation from CCM; and when Fabiana or I passed the south stall, Ellis, leaning from his campstool in Chelsea-blue gilet and deerstalker, handed us a punnet. He said nothing; we didn’t either. On grounds of transparency, Andy refused to pass the stalls. He was editor. While he pinked for honour, and tried to explain why kickbacks were acceptable when soft fruit wasn’t, we chewed bumblebee peaches. Say he was caught on someone’s phone with a melon he hadn’t paid for . . .
‘It’s community interest.’
‘In what sense though?’
‘Come on, Andy! You know you want some kuff stuff,’ Fabiana told him. ‘It’s your mission.’
Like a kid saying no to sweets, Andy Ravage smiled. But he was a big lad now, and to that smile his size gave force, as it would to the day he cut loose (should that day come). He looked round where we sat. Where we sat was all we had. Rum premises (perched on a flyover). Before people started reading match reports on MSN and the Audit Bureau decided his circulation figures didn’t count anyway, he’d been a decent editor on a sports supplement in the Midlands. With his severance pay, he set up the Chronicle. He was told he’d never draw advertising, sponsors. In fact, he reeled in enough to pay the three of us properly. There was something about him people wanted to invest in. If ‘Big Society’ meant much, maybe it meant something like Andy Ravage, the way he took on life; giving his all, then giving more, with a face that challenged you to laugh in it. Worrying now about business people, local politicos, Collingham, Clarke and Murrain, their interests, sensitivities. Though never a word of a promise I’d made – too big for that.
*
Community interest was one thing. I had a hunch as well, and a grudge. Late afternoon, the black-haired lad passed me in wellingtons, sack on his shoulder. He didn’t say hi. I watched him enter Pom-Pom’s, hung about by The Khartoum. A German came to see the window menu. As the chef skimmed the mince, I heard a little talk and the two of them were off. Bitch! I’d been blind-sided.
From the window of The Tavern, I could keep an eye on Pom-Pom’s. He’d be back for the laundry. Rain on TV, people rowing over England. I fell to thinking of Mulhall. When you feel yourself doing that, Karen told me, you must breathe deeply, empty your mind, imagine nothing. That’s what you’ve got to do, love. Twice a week, her pupils had meditation time. She got them to imagine nothing as well, though that was a way of giving them a handle on cosmic microwaves. And Mulhall abhorred a vacuum. The TV showed England’s group for the Euro. If Gerrard didn’t smile, and Rooney stuck to a diet of radish, who knew how far we could go? Really was as open as that. The Spanish were tired of winning . . .
For Mulhall was a Kentish man,
And killeth one or three,
But when the intern came along
Mulhall did smile for glee . . .
It’s a top twenty entry . . .The lad with black hair still hadn’t come along for the laundry when Karen texted. Homebound, I passed two covered girls, discussing Mein Kampf.
*
In Karen’s ‘dedicated’ area was a decorated screen. Her pals at The Tiresias bought it for her wedding. They’d loved her; and though she never returned, painted with a shimmering woman ‘in the manner of Moreau’, the screen must have been a reminder. Maybe wished herself still there. Well, I’d promised to improve, and be truthful. Over the screen hung dresses, indigo, crimson,
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