The Conduct of Major Maxim

by Gavin Lyall

  The gymnasium door opened and the chunky man jerked his head at Maxim "O'right, Major, you can'ave yerword. "

  It was a high room, clean and busy and very bright, with big windows around two walls It had nothing to do with the boxing gyms of the movies, or with the tired, almost empty pub downstairs. There were over a dozen men in the room, but with two whole generations missing The boxers were all young, barely twenty, wearing vivid coloured tights and tee-shirts, thick leather head-guards and big groin protectors. The next age up was at least fifty, and a handful sitting on hard chairs beneath the windows and sharing the sports pages of the Standard were obviously old-age pensioners.

  Billy Dannwas about fifty-five, tall, very solid, with a square calm face and longish white hair He wore a clothjacket like a hospital porter's, with big pockets, and was leaning on the ropes of a boxing ring that filled one corner of the room.

  Two boys, one white and one black, were sparring in the ring, their feet going hiss-hiss-hiss as they slid flat-footed across the canvas.

  The chunky man said " 'Ere's the officer, Mr Billy."

  Maxim said: "Major Harry Maxim." Billy Danngave him one quick glance and a nod and went back to watching the boxers. His eyes were a pale, cold blue.

  "You've been asking about Ron. Why?"

  "He's AWOL. I saw him in the country, last weekend. He told me about it. Then he vanished. I want to talk to him. "

  "You want to take him back. Are you his CO?"

  "No, and I've no power to go around arresting people I just want to talk to him. "

  "Suppose he goes back – what'll happen?"

  "It depends on his story. He'll get a few daysmcells, probably, and lose his stripes for a while. But he'll live it down."

  "It could take a long time "Danntook a stopwatch from his pocket and called: "Last ten," and the boxers speeded up to a flurry of blows. After ten seconds Dannsaid: "Time. " The boxers stopped and took sips from a communal water bottle. Dannwent and talked to each separately, demonstrating with a dropped shoulder, a jabbing hand, a weaving head.

  "Looks pretty busy," Maxim commented. Other boxers were pounding at the heavy bags, skipping, one was dancing poncily in front of a full-length mirror and another lying down doing sit-ups with a trainer standing on his feet.

  "Busy?" the chunky man snorted "You should see it five o'clock of an evening in the fights season." He indicated the black boy, who was listening carefully to Dann, nodding his head at each point made "You know 'im? That's Ranee Reynolds. He's a contender."

  "What weight?"

  "Welter. You ever fight?"

  "Not boxing."

  "Karate, I suppose."

  "Something like that. "

  Danncame back and called: " 'Way yer go," then glanced at his stopwatch. His whole life was chopped into sections of three and one minutes, and looking at the watch was merely a gesture by now. The fighters movedm oneach other, hiss-hiss hiss-hiss.

  "What's Ron to you?"Dannasked.

  "A useful soldier. An investment, if you like."

  Dannwatched the fighters for a while. "He came here when he was just fourteen. I couldn't take him in properly, but I had a word with the Council-you know about his background, of course? – and they said they'd rather he spent his evenings here than on the street. He'd started fighting in his youth club and he'd beaten everybody there twice over and they didn't much want him back. He was looking for something bigger, and it could've been sailors with a month's paymtheir pockets coming out at closing time. He was good enough to sort them out sober, let alone half cut. At fourteen. But he didn't really need the money, not if he hadn't got the time to spend it. Keep kids busy and they don't need money. You got any kids?"

  "One But I just want to know -"

  "So I let him come here any time I was open. He swept up, he washed bandages, posted my letters. I taught him the exercises and let him get in the ring with some of the bigger lads."

  "Bigger?"

  "The little ones would've chopped him up, just to show who's boss."

  "'E was a cocky little bugger," the chunky man said, smiling.

  The hiss-hiss from the ring suddenly became sharp howls as the white boy lost his temper and both boxers started throwing real punches from a solid footing. Reynolds snaked out three right jabs, each tearing through the other's guard and snapping his head back sharply.

  "Now, now, now,"Danncalled.

  The white boy backed off, head hunched down and angry. Reynolds moved smoothly after him, the hunting cat who knows it's only a game – until he wants it to be something different.

  Danncaught something in Maxim's look and smiled briefly, for the first time. "You can't have him, Major. He could have a big future, that boy. The other one, he's a street fighter. Ron Blagg was a street fighter, to start with. He learned; he learned a lot, then he jomed the Army. "

  Maxim said: "It's kind of you, but I don't really need all the background. I just want to get a word to him."

  "I'm telling you something about him. Before you knew him. I could only get him for, maybe it was two hours a day. He wanted more than that. He wanted a family. A fighter ought to have a family. I don't mean married. I don't want any married fighters Give me a kid from a big family, a poor one, but solid. I couldn't be Ron's family Maybe the Army was I hoped it would be Now, I don't know. "

  "He was doing pretty well."

  "Yes – he used to drop in here when he was on leave. I dunno…" He looked at the watch, called: "Last ten, " and watched the fighters speed up for the finish The white boy came out of the ring, Dannhad a few words with him, and called over another to take his place '"E stopped boxing," the chunky man said "'E said he'd stopped, Ron did. Couple of years ago, that was. Said 'e wouldn't getinthe ring, 'e was afraid he might hurt somebody. Well…"

  Maxim felt vaguely relieved that Blagg, freshly trained in the SAS's version of unarmed combat, had known himself well enough to stay out of the formal boxing ring. Perhaps the Hereford course was really what he'd been looking for all along. It was lucky that Her Majesty had more jobs open for street fighters than true boxers.

  Dannsaid: " 'Way yer go," and the new round started. "So what do you want with Ron, then? Try to make him go back'"

  Maxim took a calming breath. "That has to be part of it. Every day he stays away makes it worse. But I want to talk to him first."

  "You could write him a letter. "

  "This isn't something I want to put on paper It's all a bit unofficial."

  The door to the corridor opened and another fiftyish man with a broken nose came in and up to Dannand said: "All okay, Mr Billy. It's all right." He went away again, passing within two feet of Maxim and not even glancing at him. In fact, being careful not to see him at all.

  Maxim felt a retch of sick anger. "Youarseholes. He washere, wasn't he? – when I came in. And you kept me gabbing away while you smuggled him out the back or something. And you think you've been so bloody clever and all you've done is screw the boy's life up a bit further, but you're all right, Jack. No dirt on your hands."

  Danngazed at him with cold, mild eyes.

  "D'you want to know what happens to a deserter? " Maxim demanded. "He becomes a non-person. He can't get a National Insurance card so he can't get a real job. He can't sign his name to a cheque or a lease or hire purchase deal. He daren't even go to a doctor because he's got no medical records. Had you thought of anyofthat? He's got to move away from here to some place he doesn't know, and to live he'll probably have to go crooked, even if he doesn't want to. And since he's no good at it he'll get nicked and then he'll have a criminal recordand be dismissed from the Army because of it. You've just given Blagg a great start in life, Mr Dann, and without even it costing you one penny!"

  He had suddenly become the main event of the afternoon. The boxers in the ring had stopped and even the pensioners by the windows were staring at him. And everybody had the same expression of Nobody-talks-to-Billy-Dann-like-that-and-least-of-all-in-here. The Fight Game
had abruptly become a seminar of shocked spinsters.

  Maxim scribbled his home number on an Army calling card. "Get Blagg to call me at that number. Don't have any more bright ideas of your own, just get him to callme "

  One of the boxers drifted over from the punch-bags, wearing only the protective bandages on his fists. "D'you want me to see'imout, Mr Billy?"

  Maxim ignored him. "And don't send any of your Palais-de-Dansers after me unless you want him back in a hamburger bun!"

  He brushed past the boxer and slammed out of the door. Danngazed after him, his face still mild. He took the stopwatch out and looked at it. Beside him, the chunky man was turning purple and spluttering at the room: "Did you'ear? Did you'ear'im?"

  Maximwalked a fast quarter of a mile, breathing quickly. Oh, but that had been clever, that was really cool. You sneak out to make a few discreet enquiries under an alias and you end up being so discreet that they'll probably rename the bloody street after you. Your real name, too.

  All right, then. Now we really will be cool. As a penance we will now do everythingexactly right. Pretend we're back on the Ashford course and been sent up to town to check a dead letterbox, make a brush exchange, all the tradecraft and with the experts watching and eager to make a banquet out of your mistakes. We'll go by the book, we'll go by the book down to the full stop at the end of The End.

  For the next twenty minutes he was Harry Maxim, Super Secret Agent. When he crossed a road he looked both ways -but not for too long, and crossing only when he needed to. He walked against the flow of a one-way street, to shake off any tailing vehicle, but only because it led in the right direction. He found a telephone box on a corner and called Number 10to check for messages, giving himself a chance to gaze innocently around and spot anybody who might be loitering. He crossed an open park, forcing a foot tail well back – but again only because it was a short cut. And he used the reflections in shop windows to check the other side of the street, but only with shops that Harry Maxim (non-Super Secret Agent) would logically look into.

  At the endofthattime, according to the Ashford book, he should have lost – seemingly by chance – most of any team following him. More important, he should have established whether or not he really was being followed.

  And he was.

  One thing was certain: it wasn't anybody from the Lord Howe gym. These people were real contenders, and that needed some thinking about. But first of all, he had to reassure them, certainly not lose any more of them. So he caught a bus up to London Bridge station; it was impossible to lose a man travelling at the glacier speed of a London bus.

  The real question was whether they knew who he himself was. Were they following him to find out where Harry Maximwent, or had they picked him up in Rotherhithe and were following to find out who he was? If they didn't know, he didn't want to tell them, but if they did then he mustn't do anything blatantly un-Harry Maxim that would show he'd spotted them.

  Damn. He should have started playing spies a little earlier. Or rather, he should have remembered the Ashford instructors who had told him often enough – no, obviously not often enough – that this wasn't a game, something to be stopped and started. It was a way of life, till death did you depart.

  With the Underground map in his diary, he worked out a-route that involved two changes of train and landed him at Finchley Road station – near enough to home that he might have detoured to visit the big shops there. At Ashford they'd told him to assume that any fan club would be working by radio – in their cars, on their motorbikes, in their pockets. But going underground through central London would shed all the wheels, and radio doesn't work down there. In theory, every time he changed trains somebody should flake off and go up to the open to broadcast his new direction. The final trick was to make sure you shed the last of your fans as fast as possible when you came up for air yourself, before the vehicles could be homed in on you again.

  But you can never be sure it's really worked.

  Chapter 8

  Maxim settled down for a gloomy evening. He daren't yet tell George – or anybody – that he was being followed. It was an Unmentionable Disease, and he'd caught it because he'd been to an Unmentionable Place and so it served him right, but that didn't make it any less sore. If they were still with him at the end of tomorrow, he could complain, but not until then.

  There was nothing he wanted to see at any of the nearby cinemas, he'd be irritable company in the local pub where he was a contender in a small bar-billiards school, so there was nothing for it but to spend the time watching television with the other sinners.

  The phone rang at just after seven. A youngish, roughish voice asked: "Is that Mr Maxim?"

  "It is."

  "Me name's Dave. Dave Tanner. Er- I heard you was looking for Ron. You know – Ron. Er- am I right?" He sounded nervous, but it could just have been his telephone manner.

  "Yes. Are you the chap that has his bike?"

  "Er, yes, that's right. He had me Yam."

  "Thanks for calling. Can you get him to call me?-or meet me?"

  "Er. Yeah. No, I mean – could you come up here? I mean we could have a talk. "

  "Of course. You mean to Rotherhithe?"

  "Yeah. Er- you know a pub, the Golden Hind?"

  "I can find it. It shouldn't take me much more than half an hour. How will I know you?"

  A pause…"Er- I'll be in the Public. I got on mejeans and DMs and me leather."

  Blackleather jacket, fat Doc Marten boots and jeans. As distinctive as ninety per cent of Rotherhithe's young men, and a fair number of its girls, most likely.

  "I'll ask for you at the bar," Maxim said. "Half an hour -okay?"

  In practice, it was a bit more. He took the car and the warm evening seemed to have brought out hordes of motorists who Were just strolling, and he chose a zigzag route to throw off any fan club.

  The Golden Hind was smaller and a lot more cheerful than the Lord Howe, a busy little place with an obvious hard core of regulars wedged into their favourite corners. Maxim stopped just inside the door to the public bar and looked around. As he'd expected, there were four young men dressed as Dave Tanner, but only one of them was interested in who might be coming in. Maxim stared at him, in a friendly way, until he slid off the bar stool and came over.

  "Dave Tanner?"

  "Yes. Er- it's Major Maxim, innit?"

  "Harry. Can I get you a refill?"

  "Er, yes."

  They moved to the bar. Tanner was drinking lager, and Maxim wanted one as well, after the warm sticky cross-town journey, but he didn't want a long, bulky drink in his stomach. Dave Tanner was a bit too nervous for a man on his own territory. Well, all right, technically he was concealing information about a deserter – although nothing like the scale on which Major Maxim was doing it – but civilians don't take desertion seriously. If you can afford to walk out of your job, walk out, why not?

  He ordered a single vodka with ice, no tonic.

  "Were you at school with Ronnie Blagg?"

  "Er, yes, that's right."

  "Did you box as well?"

  "Me? – never. " Tanner seemed amused. He had a long pale face, fashionably spiky fair hair and a pleasant smile. He was probably Blagg's own age – twenty-five – and he had a gold signet ring on a hand that was already worn and scarred bywork at some machinery. "I was never into boxing, but Ron, he always wanted to be fighting something. No, we just sort of hung about together. He stayed with us, sometimes, when he come on leave. He was having it off with me sister at one time. You know – just when they hadn't got nothing better going."

  "Can you put me in touch with him now?"

  "Er… I mean look, what I can do…" Tanner seemed even more nervous, taking a sudden gulp at his lager. Maxim took a casual look around. They werejammed in a pack at the bar, having to talk loudly at eight inches' range. They certainly couldn't be overheard, but in that crowd anybody could be watching them. "What I'll do," Tanner said again, then asked: "You haven't got no idea
of where he is yourself?"

  "Of course I haven't. I thought you knew."

  "Yes… look, there's somebody wants to talk to you, right?"

  "Somebody who knows where he is?"

  "Er, could be. He just wants to talk. "

  "All right. " Maxim finished his vodka and sat waiting. He was fairly certain now that he was walking into a trap, and wished he'd come armed. That way, nobody need get hurt. Now there's confidence for you, assuming that if anybody gets hurt it won't be you. No, it wasn't really that: it was being trained to get hurt, knowing he could stand it.

  Tanner quickly swallowed the last of his lager and led the way. Outside, the sky was still a brilliant clear blue, but the side streets were full of long shadows. Maybe there was half an hour of daylight left.

  They turned away from the main street, towards the river and the closed docks. The road was a narrow canyon turning between high walls that protected the now-derelict warehouses, and by its nature must be a dead end. Tanner walked at a hurried, unnatural pace.

  "I thought you didn't go to the bike shop except on Saturday?" Maxim asked pleasantly.

  "The bike shop? No, I don't. What d'you mean, the bike shop?"

  "Where you got my name and phone number."

  "The bike shop? Oh yeah, thebike shop. " Tanner pretended to remember. So wherehad he got the number? Maxim took off his silk scarf, wiped his brow and put the scarf in his pocket. In a fight, it could become a noose.

  They passed an elderly Cortina II parked half on the pavement. There were people in it. He was several paces past when he heard the car doors open and realised just how outnumbered he was.

  He hit Tanner in the stomach, a short punch to wind him, then snapped him around in a half-nelson and throat-hold. There were five others, four whites and a black, and he thought he recognised a face from the Lord Howe gym. They were the right age, anyway, and they moved like athletes.

  "The first thing I do is break his arm," he announced.