A Fairly Dangerous Thing

by Reginald Hill

  Joe was amused, but the explanation of the headline caused the smile to fade slowly from his face.

  Beneath the window the burglars had tried to force, and almost certainly dropped by them in their anxiety to escape, had been found a book. It was L. E. Othurst’s Averingerett, Four Centuries of Growth. The journalist essayed some rather heavy-handed humour on the subject of noble lords throwing open their houses to the general public, but Joe was in no mood to appreciate it. The dreadful suspicion had leapt ready formed into his mind that the book was his.

  Cess Carter! Eager for Mickey to go on the trip. To ‘case’ the place? Why not, if as he suspected the boy had already served a fairly successful apprenticeship in breaking-and-entering? Then to borrow the books! Check what was most worth taking. Have a look at the diagrams of the layout of the building. Not that that seemed to have done them much good! But the bloody, infuriating cheek of the man!

  Joe’s instinct was always to avoid trouble. And Cess Carter frightened him. But sometimes in sheer reaction against his own awareness of this inclination to discretion, he would rush into a course of action quite uncharacteristic.

  Like now.

  Grabbing his jacket he rushed from the flat and sent his Volkswagen roaring up the road like a Panzer division. His intention was simple—to have words with Cess Carter.

  ‘Listen Carter, you’ve gone too far this time. Don’t deny it, you ginger thug, or I’ll beat the yellow guts out of you. We’re going to have a talk with Sergeant Prince, you and me. And you’re going to be going away for a little holiday and perhaps while you’re away Mrs Carter and me can try to make something of that boy of yours, something you won’t recognize.’

  It was interesting to observe Maggie’s educational influence already at work. So much for honesty.

  The interview that took place was slightly different.

  Firstly, by the time he found the Carters’ house the initial outburst of indignation had shrunk to a dribble. The house itself was a surprise. For some reason he had decided on a corporation ‘semi’; instead he found himself outside a fairly imposing old terraced house, fallen somewhat from its original late-Victorian dignity perhaps, but solid, imposing still, and no shabbier than the town-hall, say, or the municipal baths. Skivvies had obviously skivvied here and perhaps even butlers buttled. It gave him pause.

  Secondly, it was Mrs Carter who answered his rap with the lion’s-head knocker. She was wearing an apron and had obviously just come from the kitchen. There was flour on one of her hands and a trace of it was transferred to her forehead as she brushed back a lock of hair which had strayed forward. Her eyes widened with surprise, then worry, at the sight of Joe.

  ‘Mr Askern!’ she said. ‘Why … there’s nothing happened to Michael, is there?’

  ‘No, no,’ he hurriedly reassured her, at the same time wondering why the boy hadn’t got back from school yet. ‘I just wanted to have a word with your husband if I could. Is he in?’

  ‘Yes, I think so. Come in, here’s me keeping you on doorstep.’ Her anxiety was obviously not yet quite assuaged. ‘Is it about Michael you want to see him?’

  Joe decided on part of the truth.

  ‘Yes, that’s right, Mrs Carter. It’s about a book I lent the boy. There were three actually, but he seems to have mislaid one. He probably mentioned it to you.’

  ‘Books?’ she said, puzzled (understandably perhaps) by the thought of Mickey and books being linked together. ‘No, he said nowt to me. I didn’t know he’d borrowed them even.’

  Joe’s suspicions hardened. Obviously the whole arrangement had been a private one between Mickey and his father.

  ‘Perhaps if I could just see Mr Carter,’ he said gently.

  ‘Aye,’ she said. ‘I’ll give him a shout.’

  She ushered him into what had been, and probably still was known as, the front parlour. He watched her go out, noting the worried lines on her brow, the slight bend of her well-built shoulders. She must have been a good-looking woman in her youth. She couldn’t be all that old now, forty-two, forty-three. But a life with Cess, and then fifteen years of Mickey (Joe was quite happy to believe in the boy’s instant criminality), had obviously left its mark.

  He began to feel guilty. He had no desire to make things worse for the poor woman. Also the springs of his indignation had been quite dried up by his encounter with her, and the menacing image of Carter began to loom large in his mind. Discretion as well as decency advised withdrawal. Perhaps Cess was out? He was certainly taking a long time to come.

  Gently he opened the door and stepped into the hallway. His hopes of escape were dashed by the sound of upraised voices, one clearly Cess’s, coming from the room opposite.

  ‘You’ve been at it again, haven’t you?’ cried Mrs Carter, outraged. ‘The minute I take my eyes off you. First the school, now this. I knew it, I knew it as soon as I read about it.’

  ‘It’s all right, Mother,’ said Cess placatingly. ‘Nothing to worry about. It’s all fixed. There’ll be no bother.’

  ‘No bother! You’re nothing but bother. There were conditions when I took you back, Cess. I warned you. Once more, I said. Just once more …’

  ‘It’s all right,’ repeated Cess. ‘I’ll fix it. There’ll be no bother. It won’t happen again, believe me.’

  If she’ll believe that, she’ll believe anything, thought Joe, his indignation reviving. He’ll fix it, will he? She’d be better off with him back in jail!

  He rapped on the door and flung it open. They turned to look at him, Cess looking conciliatory, his wife’s face set with anger.

  When they saw who it was, their expressions slowly changed faces.

  ‘Mr Askern, I’m sorry … I didn’t mean to keep you waiting …’ began Mrs Carter.

  ‘What the hell are you up to, barging in like this?’ demanded Cess furiously. ‘I was right about you first time. You’re a snooper!’

  Joe ignored him.

  ‘It’s all right, Mrs Carter. I haven’t come to make bother. Don’t get upset.’

  His sympathetic tone was too much for the woman. Tears started to her eyes.

  ‘Please don’t upset yourself,’ repeated Joe.

  ‘I try not to,’ she said, choking back a sob. ‘But it can be hard. I’ll just go and sit down, if you don’t mind. I’ll be all right. I’ll give my sister a ring, it’ll be good to talk with someone who understands. If I’d taken her advice, I’d never be in this bother. Thanks, Mr Askern.’

  With one last condemnatory glance at Cess, she went through the door which Joe held open for her.

  ‘You’re a swine, Carter,’ he said, feeling very noble. ‘She’s a good woman. You can’t go on treating her like dirt. She took you back when many another would have left you for good. Can’t you see how lucky you are, man?’

  Traditionally such a speech should have had strong men weeping in their beer. But Cess seemed remarkably unaffected.

  ‘You think so, Sir?’ he said with a sneer. ‘What’s it to you?’

  ‘It’s a lot to me,’ said Joe indignantly. ‘I know what you’ve been up to. That’s my bloody book they found at Averingerett, isn’t it? And you put your lad up to borrowing it. God, how low can you get, involving an innocent boy in all this?’

  That didn’t ring very true even to Joe’s ears. Mickey and innocence had long been strangers, he felt.

  ‘I don’t understand what you’re saying,’ said Cess. ‘I don’t think anyone else would either.’

  ‘Oh, wouldn’t they? You think I’ll keep quiet because I’m sorry for Mrs Carter, don’t you? Well, we’ll have to see about that.’

  Turning on his heel Joe strode out of the door and down the hallway. Mrs Carter looked up in alarm from the telephone as he marched past. He gave her a reassuring nod and opened the front door.

  The evening sunshine fell across him like a hero’s robe. It had really happened! He had been strong, stern, unbending. He had stood up to the bully. And he had survived.

 
If only he could re-phrase his parting words. They could have been a little nobler, he felt. Still, they had been spoken, that was the main thing.

  Exulting, he opened the door of the VW.

  He was halfway into the driving-seat before he realized the car was not empty.

  Lord Jim was squatting toad-like on the back seat. He acknowledged Joe’s presence with a nod like a sledge-hammer.

  Joe tried to get out again but a flat, spade-like hand rested on his arm, restraining him without effort.

  ‘Well, Joe,’ said Carter’s voice from the pavement. ‘Mind if I join you two? Let’s go somewhere and have a drink and see if we can’t clear up this little misunderstanding.’

  CHAPTER V

  ‘No,’ said Joe. ‘I don’t want another drink.’

  Without doing something absurdly dramatic like crashing the car, or screaming out for help, it had been difficult not to go with Carter and Lord Jim. It was daylight, the pub they had taken him to appeared fairly respectable. The few drinkers already present so early in the evening looked as if they had just dropped in for a quick one on their way home from work. It was difficult to feel menaced.

  But he kept a firm grip on the glass in front of him and refused to let it be replenished, even though the conversation was making another double more and more desirable.

  ‘Cards on the table, Joe,’ said Carter. ‘You were right. It was your book. And it was Lord Jim and me at Averingerett last night. We left in a bit of a hurry. Good job your book didn’t have your name in, eh?’

  He grinned broadly.

  ‘Why are you telling me this?’ asked Joe, realizing that while false suspicions just make a man look foolish, confirmed suspicions can terrify.

  ‘We need your help, Joe,’ said Carter earnestly, bringing his face close to Joe’s. ‘That’s why we’re telling you. No, wait a minute, listen. What you’ve got to understand is that Jim here and me, we’re in the business. Right? We’re thieves. Professionals.’

  Lord Jim nodded. Whenever he did this, Joe had the feeling it was not just acquiescence but a rehearsal for a deathblow.

  ‘Professionals!’ he tried to sneer. ‘There wasn’t very much professional about last night.’

  Carter looked sheepish.

  ‘No. Well, all we really went for was a look around. Just a probe. Just to confirm what we had known all along.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘That to get into the place and out again without attracting notice, we need you.’

  ‘Me! You must be—I’m leaving!’

  Jim’s hand on his knee changed his mind.

  ‘You see, Joe, it’s always been a dream of mine to do a place like this,’ said Cess. ‘All that loot, all sitting there, asking for it. But it’s not like popping down the road one night, ringing up Mr Money’s house to make sure he’s out, then forcing the kitchen window. No, a job like this needs expert planning. And it needs contacts.’

  He leaned on his elbows, nodding in agreement with himself.

  ‘That’s you, Joe. On both counts. You came along like a gift from heaven. You might say you gave us the idea, so you’re in on it already.’

  ‘Not me,’ said Joe. ‘You can’t involve me, Carter.’

  The enormity of what the man was saying continued to dawn on him.

  ‘You rotten bastard! So you sent your son along to look over the place and to borrow my books! You must be mad!’

  ‘Not to look over the place,’ corrected Cess. ‘To look over you. We were impressed by what he told us. Knows the place like the back of his hand does Jojo (that’s what they call you, I told him to watch his lip!), and what’s more, he’s in with all the stewards, takes his sandwiches along to the head steward’s room.’

  ‘Why, the young yobbo! Spying on me!’ said Joe indignantly.

  ‘Hush,’ said Cess reprovingly. ‘He’s a good lad. He can do you favours. I’ve told him to see you have a nice easy ride in that school. No pins on Sir’s seat, or scratches on his little kraut car. Haven’t you noticed?’

  Oh no, groaned Joe internally. I’m being protected by a fifteen-year-old delinquent!

  Out loud he tried to speak with calmness and conviction. There seemed to be two courses open. One was to agree and then go and tell the police as soon as possible. The other was to refuse, but pledge silence. To refuse and tell the police needed more courage than he had available at the moment.

  ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I can’t help you. I don’t want to, and even if I did, I know nothing about the place you can’t pick up yourself by reading a couple of guide-books. So you stick to your business, I’ll stick to mine. I’ll forget all about this conversation …’

  ‘Will you?’ said Cess childishly. ‘Honest? No, I doubt it, lad. Somehow I doubt it.’

  ‘Why not?’ said Joe eagerly. ‘Look, who’d believe me? And you haven’t done anything. Yet. I kept quiet about the clock … and …’

  ‘I was right about you, Joe,’ said Cess with satisfaction. ‘You’ve got a head on your shoulders. Drunk, and you still noticed that stuff. And had enough sense to say nowt. You’re one of us already, you know that?’

  ‘Hello Cess, hello Jim. Thought I’d find you here. Who’s getting me a drink?’

  It was Cynthia, tightly-sweatered, minimally-skirted, her heavy, red lips curved in a smile of greeting which faded as Carter hooked back with his foot the chair she was pulling out from under the table.

  ‘We’re busy, Cyn,’ he said coldly. ‘Shove off.’

  ‘What? Busy? Sitting here having a drink, that’s busy? I’d like to be kept busy like that!’ she answered indignantly.

  Cess half-rose.

  ‘Shove off, girl, when you’re told, and stop the gabber, or I’ll break your bloody jaw and stop it for you.’

  Cynthia visibly paled, opened her mouth as if to answer back, changed her mind and flounced off to the far end of the bar.

  She had the buttocks for a magnificent flounce, Joe was able to note before his previous emotions reasserted themselves.

  ‘All right, Joe,’ said Carter, any suspicion of a conciliatory, friendly note gone from his voice. ‘I’ve offered you a job, a chance to make a bit of spare cash. Purely in an advisory capacity. What’s your answer?’

  ‘Answer? I’m not—how can—I don’t know,’ said Joe helplessly. Answer? How can a man answer a question like that with a thug like Lord Jim holding his leg and a face like Carter’s two inches in front of him?

  ‘He wants time to think, I expect, Jim,’ said Carter finally. ‘We’ll give him time. Tonight. Let him sleep on it. We’ll see him in the morning. But remember, Joe, Lord Jim here is the youngest of seven and they’ll all be watching you. So just think on, don’t talk, eh? And make up your mind right. Otherwise I wouldn’t bother to waste time marking any homework this evening.’

  He stood up and left, followed closely by Jim. Cynthia turned on her bar stool as they passed but they ignored her and disappeared through the door.

  ‘Carter!’ Joe yelled after them. ‘Your breath smells, you know that? I’ve had time to think and the answer’s no. So go home and start packing, lad. And tell Quasimodo there to go and climb a bell-rope. If he comes near me again I’ll tread on him so hard, he’ll be able to reminisce afterwards about when he was big.’

  ‘Scotch. A double,’ Joe said. His weak legs had carried him to the bar in response to the urgent message his brain had been pumping out for the past ten minutes.

  ‘What about serving me first?’ demanded Cynthia angrily. ‘These bloody men think they own the earth.’

  The barman paused, undecided. Joe waved his hand.

  ‘Serve the lady, please. I’m sorry if I jumped the queue.’

  ‘That’s all right, love,’ said Cyn, somewhat mollified. She came down the bar towards him. ‘Here, it’s Sir, isn’t it? From the Bell?’

  ‘The name’s Joe,’ said Joe.

  ‘That’s right,’ she said. ‘I put you to bed. Took your trousers off. You’re all righ
t,’ she added enigmatically.

  ‘Well thanks,’ said Joe. ‘Here let me pay for that.’

  ‘If you like,’ the woman said indifferently. ‘Oh that bastard! I’d like to …’

  ‘Carter?’ said Joe, relieved to talk rather than think, even if it was about the cause of his troubles.

  She looked at him sharply.

  ‘You two friends? I thought you was a teacher or something?’

  ‘No. I don’t think we’re friends.’

  ‘Oh. That’s all right then. He can be nasty …’

  Joe drank most of his scotch with a shudder.

  ‘Did you see the way he treated me. I’ve a good mind to …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said hopelessly.

  ‘Have another drink,’ he said, finishing his.

  ‘I’ll pay for these,’ she said and when he protested, went on, ‘Look, love, you’re not picking me up or something, I’ll stand my round.’

  They took their drinks to a corner table.

  ‘How long have you known Carter?’ asked Joe with some notion of getting better acquainted with his enemy.

  ‘Too bloody long,’ she said gloomily. ‘Why’re you interested?’

  ‘Just making conversation.’

  ‘Well, make it about something else. And take a tip from me. Don’t get mixed up with Cess if you can help it. You’re not the type.’

  ‘Believe me, I won’t,’ he said fervently.

  His initial impression of Cynthia as a stupid sex-kitten in the Hollywood ‘gangster’s moll’ tradition proved to be unfounded. She talked readily and entertainingly in a rather earthy fashion of herself and her upbringing, always stopping short of her involvement with Carter. She described herself as a professional escort working for an ‘agency,’ which she indignantly insisted was legitimate when Joe permitted himself a knowing smile. It was up to her, she protested. She only went as far as personal inclination took her.

  ‘Well, usually,’ she added with gloomy honesty.

  They both bought another round and Joe’s mind was beginning to be able to face the future without the chilling sweat breaking out under his armpits.