Local Legend

by Trembling, Paul;

  “It doesn’t make any difference,” he said in his distinctive voice. “We can always find him if we want to.”

  I didn’t like hearing that. I hoped Sam had taken note.

  “Hello,” I said to him. “We’ve met, but I don’t think we were ever introduced?”

  He shrugged. “Well, do forgive my manners, Mr Deeson. Ignacio D’Razzo.” He indicated the seat in front of the desk. “Make yourself comfortable, why don’t you?”

  “Thanks.” I sat down. D’Razzo stayed where he was, which meant that he was behind me and out of my line of vision. Which made me uncomfortable, but I didn’t want to start an argument over seating arrangements. The big guy, Carlo, was standing off to the left, near the door, and just within my peripheral vision – which was also uncomfortable. There was no sign of the possible third man, which I didn’t much like either. In fact, the whole situation was decidedly unpleasant.

  “So how do you and Ignacio know each other?” I asked Adi. “Only, it seems a bit strange that the last time we met, you sent me over to his place with a bomb.”

  “The bomb was for Lonza,” Adi said with a touch of asperity. “I didn’t know that Mr D’Razzo was going to be there.”

  “You can call me Ignacio,” said D’Razzo from behind me. “Since we’re all being so friendly.”

  I got the impression that he was enjoying the situation. I wasn’t, and Adi didn’t look that pleased either.

  “Ignacio is in the same line of business as Handy Jack. The late Handy Jack, that is. Only, whereas Jack was Second Division at best, Ignacio is more Premier League level. He works for a very important man in the States, and I’m very pleased that he came over here in person to help deal with this situation.”

  “This situation? I suppose by that you mean Lonza trying to steal the sports centre?”

  “Yes, but there’s a bit more to it than that. You remember I mentioned how, when I figured out what Lonza was up to, I took some precautions?”

  “You got Casey in to watch your back.”

  “That was one of the precautions. But you know me, Graham. Never all my eggs in one basket, eh? I had a few other things going on. For example, I reached out to Ignacio’s boss. Who is – or was! – also Lonza’s boss, as it happened. I let him know what Lonza was really up to, and how we could cut him out to our mutual benefit. I thought that if I couldn’t talk Lonza round to my point of view after the Madrid game, then we’d just manage without him altogether.”

  “So you went over his head.”

  “That was the idea. Only it didn’t play out quite as I’d hoped, what with Lonza hiding me out in the desert after the game. But once Casey had rescued me, I got in touch again. Passed on what I’d heard from Lonza and renewed my offer – basically, ‘Get Lonza off my back and help me launch California Strike properly, and you can take all the profit directly.’ Legitimate profit, so it wouldn’t need Lonza to launder it.

  “I still hadn’t got an answer, though, when we came over here. Which was disappointing. I’d hoped things would move faster.”

  “My boss likes to consider things carefully before he makes a decision,” said Ignacio. “And we were taking a closer look at all of Lonza’s deals. Turns out he’d been skimming off more than we’d realized. So I needed to come and have a conversation with him about that.”

  “Lonza knew that Ignacio was coming for him,” Adi continued. “That’s why he was pushing so hard to get the sports centre. It was his best chance to buy himself out of trouble. He was running out of time. But so was I. I couldn’t let him get his hands on it. So Casey suggested some extreme measures.”

  “The bomb.”

  “Yes. Of course, I didn’t know that Ignacio had already caught up with Lonza.” He shrugged apologetically in that direction. “That was unfortunate. A breakdown in communications, I suppose you’d call it.”

  “Yeah, you could call it that,” Ignacio agreed. “Crazy thing is that if you hadn’t called when you did, Deeson, Lonza would already have been dead. We were kinda close to finishing our negotiations, you might say, and Rocco, he wasn’t looking to come out of it too good.” He chuckled. “You threw him a lifeline. A short one… He did his best to drive a bargain, but the truth is he’d have gone with any deal if he thought it was gonna buy him some time. I thought we’d go along with it, see if I could get a little extra out of it, cover expenses.”

  I remembered the way Lonza and Handy Jack had deferred to D’Razzo; the way his “suggestions” had guided the discussion. Well, that was explained, anyway. If I hadn’t been so wound up myself, I would probably have felt the tension in the room. “So the whole thing was a waste of time? What a mess.” An image flashed across my mind – Handy Jack after the explosion. I was glad I hadn’t been able to see Lonza. “And the bomb was Casey’s idea?”

  “He had the expertise to do it,” Adi confirmed. “And the materials.”

  “But you hadn’t told him about your other little arrangement with Ignacio and his boss?”

  “Need-to-know basis, Graham. Just like managing a team, really. You tell people what’s necessary to get the best performance out of them. Anything else just gets in the way.”

  I rubbed my forehead wearily. “Managing a team, Adi – what’s the worst that happens? You lose a game, you have a bad season, you get relegated? This is a bit more serious. People have died. Lonza, Jack… that actor who was pretending to be you… and now Casey. It’s not football, it’s not a game.”

  “How did you know about Casey?” Adi said sharply, shooting a glance past me at Ignacio.

  “We found your house, Adi. We went there. We saw him. His body, that is.”

  Behind me, Ignacio muttered something. It sounded like an obscenity. He wasn’t enjoying himself so much now.

  “That’s a pity, Graham. I don’t know how you found the place, but I’d rather you hadn’t.”

  “Is that all you can say about it, Adi? Your friend’s dead and you just wish I didn’t know about it?”

  Adi laughed. “You think Casey was a friend?”

  “He rescued you from Lonza, didn’t he?”

  “Yes. But that wasn’t for friendship. Casey was a mercenary, Graham. He was helping me because I promised him money. A lot of money, actually. Fifty per cent of what I could get from the sports centre, and a regular cut from the CSS income after that!” He shrugged. “Of course, that wasn’t in the deal I’d made with Ignacio’s boss. So I’m afraid Casey was in the way.”

  “And I was kinda upset about the bomb,” added Ignacio. “Not that I’m weeping for Lonza or Jack, but I was in the room as well! Can’t have it going round that someone took a shot at me and got away with it. I’ve got my reputation, you understand. Besides, I was planning my own thing for Lonza.”

  A lot of information was swirling around in my head. I grasped at something, trying to get things in order.

  “So – let me get this straight, Adi. You did a deal with Ignacio, told him where Lonza was and where you were. But you didn’t know he was there, so you sent the bomb to get rid of Lonza. After it went off, Ignacio knows right away that it must have been you who sent it, so he gets some of his lads…”

  “Carlo and Donnie,” put in Ignacio. Which confirmed that there was a third man. Somewhere. “They were already over at Adi’s house, keeping an eye on things. After you and your son had left us so quickly, I told them to take out Casey and bring Adi to join me in town. I figured with things blowing up like that your police would be round pretty soon, so we had to move in a hurry.”

  “You went to Declan’s, got the keys, and came here…” I stopped. I was missing something. I ran through what had been said. “But what did you mean about paying Casey fifty per cent of what you got for the sports centre?”

  “Yes, I know; it was pretty steep. But what could I do? When he got me out of the desert he wanted to know how I was going to pay for his services, and that was the only thing I had to offer. I didn’t have a good bargaining position, so when
he asked for fifty per cent, I had to agree.”

  “Yes, but…” I felt unsteady, even though I was sitting down. As if something I’d thought was rock solid had started to move. “Adi, the whole point of stopping Lonza was to keep the sports centre going… wasn’t it?”

  Adi gave me a baffled look, then suddenly laughed. “Heck, Graham, did you think that this was what this was all about? Saving the sports centre? You really haven’t got a clue, have you?”

  “But – this place – it’s your legacy. Your gift to the town, to the people, to all the fans…”

  Adi rolled his eyes. “Graham, I don’t give a rat’s backside for the town, the fans, or the sodding sports centre! I need this place sold off. I need the money to get CSS back up and running! Didn’t you get that? It wasn’t Lonza’s plan in the first place. I was always planning to sell it off. He just hijacked the idea from me.”

  CHAPTER 14

  “Keep your eye on the ball. That’s all there is to it.”

  Adi Varney, at a press conference, when asked, “What’s the most important rule in football?”

  I stared at him, aghast. “You can’t mean that. I – OK, I understand you wanted to go and try something new in California. But this place – it’s done so much good for so many people, so many kids…”

  Adi shrugged. Baffled by his indifference, I glanced round, searching for inspiration, and my eye fell on an especially old and yellowed newspaper cutting in a worn wooden frame.

  “Look,” I said, pointing it out, and he glanced in that direction. “Do you remember that day, Adi? Of course you do.” In the faded picture you could just about make out a younger Adi and younger Graham, flanking an elderly man in a clerical dog collar who was holding a large pair of scissors over a length of ribbon. “The opening of the Sports Hall – this building, Adi! That’s Reverend Allen. The minister who did the funeral for Davy. He talked about that, about how you were rescued, and how your life and career were all a demonstration of giving back to the community…”

  Adi snorted, and I realized I was going the wrong way with this. But nothing better occurred to me, so I ploughed on.

  “He prayed for you, remember? He thanked God for you, Adi, and for your vision, and your skill, and –”

  “Enough!” He slammed his stick down on the desk, breaking my flow. “Enough of that!” He leaned forward across the desk, indifference replaced by fury. “That was always one of the things I hated most about you: the way you were always trying to shove your religion down my throat! Always so damned holier-than-thou and righteous, always telling me where I was going wrong, like you were my conscience or something!”

  I recoiled, physically moved back in my chair, in the face of his anger. I was shocked by it – even more by the words he used. Especially by one word. Hate.

  “No,” I said. “It wasn’t like that at all, Adi. We talked about things, yes, and I gave you my opinion – but I didn’t try to force anything on you…”

  “Oh no? How many times did I hear, ‘Adi, you can’t do that, you shouldn’t, you mustn’t – you’ve got a position to uphold, you set an example, you should think of the team, you should think of Karen, you should think of your kids? Always telling me what I should be like, who I was supposed to be, and I was only there at all because of you and your little brother!” He spat the words at me.

  “My brother who died, you mean?” I said, as calmly as I could. “My…”

  “Your little pest of a brother, always following us around and hanging about and getting in the way and who shouldn’t have even been there on the canal that day! But he had to come with us, and he had to get himself killed, and I’ve wasted my life trying to make up for that, because I thought you chose me over him and I owed you for it!”

  I tried to speak, but Adi was in full flow now and shouted over me. “And I put up with it, with being stuck in this little hole of a place, with having you preach at me and tell me how I should be living, with all these community projects and charities that you pushed me into, and all the time watching you build your comfortable, boring little life on the back of my skill, my success, all the while knowing that I should be out there doing bigger things, better things, greater things, but I couldn’t because of your stupid brother…”

  He paused to draw breath, and I tried again to get a word in but he carried on.

  “And it was all a lie, wasn’t it, Graham? All a lie because you never meant to save me anyway. That was just an accident. So I’ve wasted my time, wasted myself – and now I’ve got one last chance to show the world what I can do and you want me to give it up for this poxy little charity that I only ever started in the first place because you wanted me to! Well, forget it!” He slammed his stick down on the desk again. “Forget it! This place, this town – and you – you’ve all had as much of me as you’re getting! Now I’m taking something back, and neither you nor your religion nor your little brother is going to stop me!”

  He finally ran out of words. But he was still glaring, panting with the force of his anger, and gripping his stick so tightly that it looked as though he was going to snap it between his fingers.

  He wasn’t the only angry one, though. What he’d said had hurt. The injustice of it, the cruelty of it – the stupidity and arrogance of it. I could feel my own temper rising.

  “Do you know why I became a Christian, Adi? Did you ever understand that?” I was still keeping my voice calm, but I was shaking. “It was after Davy died. After that day down at the canal. We were never very religious before then, our family. But when we were grieving, when we were broken, the church was there for us. Reverend Allen” – I pointed at the newspaper cutting – “he was there for us. He spent time sharing our grief, sharing our tears. A lot of the church did. That’s why we started going, because they were there for us when we needed them. But where were you, Adi? Where were you when I was ripping myself apart with grief – and with guilt, because I’d let my brother die and saved my friend? You were off playing football, Adi. That’s where you were. The church people we hardly knew were there for us and my best friend whom I’d pulled out of the water was away playing games!”

  “Now just…” he began, but I wasn’t finished.

  “Yes, I know, it was your big chance. And you took it, didn’t you? Scored a hat-trick! Because you were always good with a ball, you were brilliant.” I leaned towards him, stared him straight in the eye. “But that was the day after he died, wasn’t it? Davy lying stone cold in the mortuary, me still in shock and nearly broken with grief, but you were out being brilliant. Because that’s all you were any good at. Being brilliant at football. You were no good at being a friend. You were rubbish at caring about people. Left to yourself, you just used them and dropped them, failed them, let them down. Couldn’t be bothered with anyone who wasn’t helping your game, or listening to you talk about your game.”

  “Graham!” he snarled. But I wasn’t about to stop now.

  “You think I’ve held you back these past thirty-plus years? Well, I have, Adi. I held you back from alienating nearly everyone you knew with your single-minded, self-centred obsession with your own greatness. All those times I was being your conscience – I was helping you treat people with respect, with consideration, with dignity. You found it hard enough to get on with people anyway, but you never realized how much worse it would have been if I hadn’t been there! Without me around, your marriage would have failed in the first year, because I had to tell you how to treat your wife properly. Without me you would never have made it as a manager, you wouldn’t be the big name in this town, you wouldn’t be the legend you are now. Because it’s not just about football, Adi. That’s what you never understood. I had to be there to show you how to be a decent human being, not just a good footballer.

  “I believed in you, Adi. I believed you could be a better person, that you were a better person, really, and that I just needed to help that part of you come out. I had to believe it, for…” I broke off, took a breath, forced
myself to resume, “… for Davy’s sake.”

  I looked at Adi, looked him straight in the eye. “I was wrong, wasn’t I? This is the real Adi Varney. It’s all there ever was.”

  He met my gaze. And all I saw was indifference.

  I sat back again. I was feeling very tired. There was so much more I wanted to say, but I didn’t have the energy.

  “So go on then, Adi. Sell this place off, take the money, go and live your dream. See how well you do without me. But just have a think about how you’ve got on since you left. How well that worked out for you. Because you may be brilliant at football, but you’re useless at just about anything else, and when I’m not there to –”

  Adi was still fast. Not on his feet, of course, but with his hands. I didn’t even see him move before his stick smacked into my skull, sending me sprawling out of the chair, pain exploding through my head.

  Then he got out of the chair, and came round to stand over me. I squinted up at him, barely able to focus through the throbbing pain.

  “You did it again,” I muttered.

  “Yeah, well, you wouldn’t shut up, would you? Never did know when to keep your mouth closed. Idiot. You should have been thinking instead of talking. Why do you suppose I wanted you here? Just to catch up on old times?”

  I certainly wasn’t thinking now. “I – don’t know…”

  He shook his head. Prodded me with the end of his stick. “All that stuff you know about, Graham. About Lonza and the bomb. It’s a loose end, you see.”

  He leaned back against the desk and stared down at me. “Of course, the best thing would have been if that bomb had taken you out as well. I wanted Casey to make it more powerful, to be sure of that. But he said that was the biggest bang he could put into a package that size. And of course, we couldn’t have you delivering anything too big. Lonza or Jack would have got suspicious.”

  “You wanted to kill me?” I was having trouble with the idea, and not just because of the blow to my head.

  “Oh, so many times.” The thought of doing so had gone a long way to restoring Adi’s temper. Or perhaps it had been hitting me. Either way, he was smiling brightly. “Casey thought that if the bomb didn’t get you, Lonza’s guys would probably finish you off. Didn’t think you’d get out of there so fast, but then we hadn’t planned on Sam getting involved. Bit of a complication.”