The Madeiran Double Cross

by Sally Spencer

  FIVE

  Elsie looked out of the window at Hyde Park. It was only the beginning of November, but the stark, bare trees, shaking in a howling gale, made it seem like mid-winter. She was sick of England and its bloody weather, she yearned for a kinder climate, like the one in Madeira.

  The thought of the Portuguese island took her mind back to her problem, and she frowned. Frank was acting very strangely these days. Sometimes he seemed elated; on other occasions he would be gloomy, as if weighed down by a heavy burden. But always, whatever his mood, there was the sense of purpose about him which she had first noticed in Madeira.

  It wasn’t a new woman – he was still knocking off that slag Linda. So, reluctant as she was to admit it, it was just possible that he was planning a job. It would fail, of course. It would be the most bungling amateurish raid in the whole history of bank robbery.

  And maybe that wouldn’t be a bad thing. With Frank out of the way for the next twenty years, her dad would have to keep her. And as long as she was discreet about it, she could have lots of other fellers on the side – younger fellers with a bit of class.

  No, as attractive as the prospect might seem at first, her pride simply wouldn’t let her just stand by and watch it happen – because even though the robbery would fail, the very fact that it had happened at all, without her knowledge, would mean that Frank had pulled one over on her. And she was not about to give him that satisfaction.

  She heard him moving around in the hallway. and by the time she got there he was already halfway into his camelhair coat.

  “Bloody awful day to be going out,” she said.

  Mason shrugged the shoulders of his coat into position. “Just fancied a drink.”

  “I fancy one myself,” Elsie said. “Mind if I come along?”

  “If you like.”

  The pause between her question and his answer had been almost imperceptible, but Elsie, who knew him so well, noticed had still it.

  “On second thoughts,” she said, patting her curls, “the wind’ll ruin my hair-do. Frank, do you know how much money we've got left?”

  “Not exactly.”

  The liar!

  “About two hundred quid in the house, six thousand three hundred in the safety deposit box, and whatever you’ve got in your wallet.”

  And that was another thing. She’d never kept too close a track on money – when they ran out Frank could always rob another bank – but she was sure there should have been more than that. Frank might have been buying expensive presents for Linda, but that wouldn’t account for it all. Whereas, if he was planning a job …

  “As little as that,” Mason said.

  But he didn’t seem worried.

  “It takes a while for me to set up a job, you know that,” Elsie said. “And once it’s fixed, we need seed money. It’s about time I started thinking about the next one.”

  Early in their marriage, the mention of a new job had always excited him, but over the last couple of years it had instantly induced a depression, and for days he had walked round like a condemned man. Now, she watched as – apparently unconcerned – he slid on his gloves.

  “You’re right,” he said, opening the door. “Put your mind to it.” He stepped into the corridor. “And I’ll keep a look-out for any likely prospects myself.”

  The door closed, and he was gone. Elsie stood still for almost a minute, scowling at herself in the mirror, then returned to the lounge.

  The sky outside the window was hung with heavy grey clouds. It looked as if it might snow. Elsie picked up the phone and dialled a seven-digit number she knew off by heart.

  “Hello? Yes, it’s me,” Her voice had lost its edge, and gained instead a syrupy, little-girlish quality. “No, I know I haven’t … You know how it is, I’ve been busy … No, just things. But I have been missing you, Daddy, honestly I have.” The syrup ran so thickly that to anyone other than a doting parent, it would have been cloying. “Next week definitely … Listen, Daddy, there’s something I want you to do for me …”

  *

  The gloves had been the easiest; as long as they were leather, that was all that mattered, and he’d bought the first pair that fitted him in Harrods. There hadn’t been much difficulty with the white suit either; he’d had it specially made and paid for it with the sweetener Mason had given him. It was when he had come to the shirts and ties that he’d run into problems – the shops simply didn’t sell that sort of coordinated stuff anymore. Still, he’d persevered, and it had paid off; the white shirt with discreet brown stripes and white tie with brown rectangular motif looked really sharp. Arnie felt as comfortable in the clothes as he did in the role model he had adopted to fit his position in the gang – Michael Caine in The Italian Job.

  Not that it was an easy part to play, he told himself, as he sat on the dinky pink chair in the bed-sit. Not with the supporting cast he’d been given.

  “You’ve done well, Arnie,” Mason was saying. “A bloody good team.”

  A bloody good team. That was just what Arnie meant about the supporting cast – Noel Coward’s Mr Bridger, in The Italian Job, had been much more erudite.

  “There’s just one missing,’ Mason continued.

  The married man who’d recently done bird.

  Arnie raised one gloved hand, the index finger pointing towards Mason, the others curled back into the palm. He’d been practising the gesture in front of the mirror, and knew it looked good.

  “It’s difficult, Mr Bri … Frank,” he said. “I’ve only come up with one name, and he’s not really suitable.”

  “Who?” Mason asked.

  “Harry Snell.”

  “Solid feller, grey hair, got a wart on his nose?”

  “That’s him.”

  “How tall would you say he was?”

  “About six foot,” Arnie said, puzzled.

  How big did you need to be to wield a shotgun?

  Mason smiled with satisfaction. “He’ll do.”

  There’d been no weak link in The Italian Job – all the team had been real pros. Time for Michael Caine to step in and save the operation.

  “You haven’t seen him, Frank,” Arnie argued. “He’s just served eight of twelve and his nerve’s gone. Even when he’s talking to you, he can’t sit still. He jumps every time a car backfires. Get him in a bank with a shooter in his hands, and Christ knows what will happen.”

  “Don’t worry,” Mason said, “he’s just the sort of bloke I’m looking for.” He turned to his lieutenant. “Right, Tony?”

  “Right,” Horton agreed.

  *

  The cameras were neatly laid out on the coffee table, and, one by one, Nigel was lovingly cleaning them. He never brought them out when Linda was at home because it always provoked an argument.

  “You don’t need all them,” she’d say, “not for the kind of work you do. If you kept one and hocked the rest, we might have a bit of money for a change.”

  He gave into her on nearly everything, but he would never pawn his cameras. Now that he could no longer afford to sail, his skill as a photographer was the only thing he had left to take pride in.

  He was in the middle of cleaning a lens when the doorbell rang.

  Jehovah’s Witnesses or a debt collector! Nobody else ever called.

  Nigel ignored it, and carried on with his task. The bell rang gain, more insistently this time. Nigel didn’t even look up. Whoever it was would get bored eventually and go away.

  The caller abandoned politeness and began hammering with his fist. Nigel laid the lens gently back on the table, then took his temper out on the door by flinging it open to reveal – Frank Mason. He backed away immediately.

  “Hello, Nigel, old son,” Mason said, smiling. “You took your time. You deaf or something?”

  “I … no … I was …”

  “Mind if I come in?” Mason asked, but he had already stepped over the threshold.

  Nigel had never been this close to Mason before. He realised for the first
time that it was not the man’s size that made him intimidating – he could give him an inch, certainly no more – it was his aura of hardness. He was sure that even if it were possible to sneak behind Mason and hit him with a sledge-hammer, the bastard would not go down – because he didn’t want to.

  Nigel looked wildly around the living room and saw it through Mason’s eyes: the furniture, good when his father bought it, now outdated and battered; the carpet, visibly worn; the walls, with their faded, browning paper.

  “Could do with a few quid spending on it,” Mason said.

  Nigel had to get away, if only for a minute. Had to have time to pull himself together without the overawing presence of Mason to distract him.

  “Drinks,” he said. “I’ll get us some drinks,” and fled to the kitchen.

  He picked up two glasses to put on the tray, and they clinked in his trembling hands. He opened the door of the cupboard where he kept the booze – his father had had a private pub built in the cellar of his house – and surveyed the pitiful collection of bottles. A cheap supermarket gin, a British sherry, some Bulgarian wine.

  He uncapped the gin bottle and took a long swig. It was oily and unpleasantly fiery, but it gave him the courage to return to the living room.

  Mason was sitting on the sofa, one of the precious cameras in his paw. Nigel wanted to kill him for even touching it, but instead he said, “We’ve got gin, Mr Mason, but we’ve just run out of tonic.”

  The seated man aimed the camera at him and clicked the shutter. Nigel felt a stab of pain in his chest.

  “Doesn’t matter about the drink, Nigel, old mate,” Mason said. “I didn’t come here for that.”

  He was holding out the camera in front of him. Nigel willed himself to step forward and take it from him, but his legs would not obey the command.

  “Very nice equipment, this,’ Mason commented. “Good with it, are you?”

  “One of the best,” Nigel said – and for once there was no wobble in his voice.

  “That’s what I’d heard,” Mason told him.

  He put the camera down on the battered coffee table, then reached over and patted the seat of the easy chair.

  “Sit yourself down,” he said.

  As if this was his flat, and I was only a guest, Nigel thought – but he did as he’d been told.

  “Linda mentioned that I’ve got a bit of work I might be able to put your way, didn’t she?” Mason asked.

  There was something about the way he said ‘Linda’ that told Nigel that this was her secret lover. He was burning with rage – but at the same time he was chilled with fear.

  “She’s told me,” he said.

  “Well, it’s more than a bit of work,” Mason explained, “it’s a major part of the operation, and one that calls for your particular talents.” He pointed a finger menacingly. “You tell Linda any of this, and I’ll break every bone in your body.”

  “You can trust me,” Nigel said.

  And he thought to himself: You really can trust me, because I'm shit-scared of you.

  Mason looked around the room again. “You don’t want to go on living like this, Nigel,” he said. “And you don’t have to. You do this job for me, and I’ll see you get the same cut as everybody else. It might even be enough to retire on.”

  If Mason had offered him a couple of hundred quid, or even a couple of thousand, he wouldn’t have been worried.

  He knew his own worth.

  But Frank was offering serious money – for Nigel’s particular talents – and that scared him almost as much as the thought of what Mason would do if he turned him down.

  “What’s the job?” he asked.

  Mason told him, quietly, confidently – but firmly. Then he left.

  The moment the door clicked behind him, Nigel rushed to the bathroom. He knelt over the toilet bowl, alternately gagging and puking. The bathroom tiles swirled before his eyes, but that was less disturbing than the thoughts that were swirling round his head.

  The first thought was Mason had offered him a job, a job which was both criminal and crazy – perhaps even criminally crazy – and he had agreed to take it.

  The second was that even before Mason had left, he had come up with a scheme of his own to pay the other man back for taking Linda off him.

  There was no question about which of the two was more frightening. Working for Mason meant – at worst – a long time in prison. Working against him could mean ending up dead.

  He knew his own plan was fraught with danger, but knew, too, that he was going to go through with it anyway – and as a fresh batch of vomit rose in his gorge, he wished to God he’d never had the idea.

  *

  Mason stood at the bar of The Duke of Argyle and wondered why it was that so many pubs were named after dukes.

  No, he didn’t, he corrected himself – not really. What he was actually wondering was if he’d got the timing of the job right.

  Start things moving too early and word would get around; too late and the operation would fall irredeemably behind schedule. He’d had to recruit Portuguese Pedro when he did, just to make sure the silly little bugger stayed out of jail until Christmas. And he’d had to tell Nigel now, because Nigel would need to make arrangements. But he’d been taking a chance both times.

  He considered the plan as a whole.

  It was a thing of beauty, a delicate balance of forces.

  It was a hare-brained scheme full of ‘What ifs?’

  There were days when he felt sure he could pull it off.

  And there were days like this when all he wanted to do was run back to Elsie, with his tail between his legs, begging her to go over The Plan to find its flaws – or, if she didn’t like it at all, to come up with another one.

  And why not? She had a few lines around her eyes, but her hair was still glowing blonde, and she had kept her figure —it was almost as good as Linda’s. He didn't love her, that was true, but then he didn’t really love Linda either. He wondered, if he really tried, whether he could to make his marriage work.

  He saw the two heavies in the mirror behind the bar, the second they came through the door.

  They were both twenty-six or twenty-seven. One was about his height; the other was shorter, but made up for it with the breadth of his shoulders. They were hard; not like the kids in Spooner’s Snooker Hall thought they were – but really hard.

  They walked up to the bar, and stood one each side of him. The barman came across and the taller one shook his head in a way that made him scuttle rapidly to the other side of the pub.

  “There’s a bloke wants to see you,” the shorter one said.

  “Is there?” Mason replied, sipping at his drink.

  The shorter one grabbed his arm in an iron grip.

  “Now!” he insisted.

  Mason put his glass down on the counter.

  “I should think you two could take me in the end,” he said, “but I wouldn’t half make a mess of you first.”

  “Let go of him,” the taller one ordered. “Mr Sims doesn’t want no trouble.”

  Mason had known all along who had sent them. These two would not have dared treat him like this unless they had really heavy backing. Still, he clicked his fingers, feigning surprise.

  “Mr Sims? Of course, it’s Son-in-law’s Day. Has he got me a present? There was a lovely fluffy panda in the newsagent’s window and …”

  “Let’s go,” the taller one said.

  No sense of humour, these fellers.

  *

  Mason looked around Sims’ ‘study’. It had changed for the better over the years; Persian carpets, Regency furniture and an antique mahogany desk (at which Sims probably perused his daily copy of the Sun).

  Ted had become very rich since the day he moved into drugs and prostitution – which was also the day that Frank had decided to leave the firm and set upon his own.

  A crucifix with a three-foot high Christ dominated the room. Mason marvelled at the anatomical accuracy of it; he
could count all the ribs, even the veins in the feet were visible. The artist had caught the hanging man in a moment of exquisite agony, as he was twisting his body in a futile attempt to relieve the pain.

  Sims had had people nailed up, Mason heard. He wondered if he’d used the crucifix as a model.

  The oak-panelled door opened, and Sims entered the room. He was dressed in a three-piece tweed suit, and looked like a jovial country gentleman up in town for the day – at least, he looked like that until you saw his cold hard eyes.

  “If you needed to talk to me, I’m in the phone book.” Mason said. “I don’t like having nursemaids sent after me, Ted.”

  Sims laughed. “Don’t take it to heart, Frank-boy. I just wanted to see you in a hurry. The lads may have been a bit over-keen, that’s all. It’s hard to get good help these days. Drink?”

  “Whisky,” Mason said. “I didn’t have time to finish my last one.”

  Sims walked over to the bookcase filled from top to bottom with weighty tomes bound in Moroccan leather. He pressed Plato's Republic and the middle section slid up to reveal a cocktail bar. He mixed the drinks, and handed Mason his.

  “I hear you’re planning a new job,” he said.

  “Yeah?” Mason replied, noncommittally. “Where’d you hear that?”

  Elsie! Bloody Elsie!

  “Let’s just say there’s a whisper,” Sims told him.

  “It’s news to me,” Frank said. “Unless Elsie’s got something up her sleeve.”

  Sims walked over to his desk, and sat on the edge.

  “The way I heard it,” he said, “you were planning a job without Elsie. Cutting her out! And we all know what the next step is, don’t we? I believe in the sanctity of the marriage vows, Frank. ‘Till death us do part’ – if you get my meaning.”

  “What’s the going rate for rubbing out son-in-laws?” Mason asked. “Ten grand?”