Intermission

by Graham Hurley

  ‘But you’ve talked to him?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And?’

  I don’t answer. In the background, at Dessie’s end, I think I’m hearing seagulls. Then he’s back on the phone again.

  ‘It’s probably best if we do this face to face,’ he says.

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter. Except I’m about to do you a big, big favour. I’m parked on the seafront. Just where I picked you up last night. Sooner rather than later, eh?’

  He ends the call without a further word of explanation, and I’m left staring at the phone. Favour? Seafront? I shake my head, aware that after this brief moment of solace at Tim’s, events have once again taken charge.

  I’m getting to know Southsea by now and I take a slight detour that would suggest I’m coming from the direction of Tony Morse’s flat. Dessie leans across and opens the front passenger door as I approach. He’s listening to a concert on Radio Three, and I recognize the second movement of Beethoven’s Eroica symphony. There are crumbs on his lap and when he notices my interest, he offers me the untouched half of his egg and cress sandwich.

  ‘Lunch,’ he says. ‘Compliments of Londis.’

  I nod absently, taking the sandwich, absorbed by the music. It was Berndt who introduced me to this symphony, the one gift of his that came without strings of any kind, and even after all the wounds we inflicted on each other I still, in my heart, thank him for it.

  Dessie reaches for the volume control but I tell him to leave it alone. There’s a passage for the brass midway through the second movement, taken up by the strings, and it never fails to touch me. Dessie’s sitting back now, his big hands clasped over his belly, his eyes closed. Once the movement has flickered and died, I let him have his way with the volume control.

  ‘Well?’ he says.

  ‘Sublime,’ I tell him. ‘And it’s his year, too. Two hundred and fiftieth anniversary. I could listen to music like that for the rest of my life and die a happy woman. In fact, I nearly did just that.’

  I tell him briefly about my tussle with the Grim Reaper. After the operation, when chemo took me to places I never want to revisit, it was music like this that kept me going.

  ‘Shit,’ he says quietly. ‘I didn’t know.’

  ‘Why should you? It’s a detail. Cancer is ugly. The virus is ugly. Our bodies let us down. The world belongs to the microbes. They’re the ones who’ll survive. Not us.’ I look at him, forcing a smile. ‘How many clichés in all that? Are you counting? Should you be? I mean it. In the end, nothing much matters.’

  ‘You’re kidding.’

  ‘Am I? How do you know, Mr Jenny Wren? How can you ever be sure?’

  I’m gazing at him now, offering him the time and space to frame some kind of answer, but unless I’ve got this little scene completely wrong, he genuinely doesn’t know what to say.

  ‘You mentioned a favour,’ I remind him. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Fuck the favour. You’re a very unusual woman. And that’s a compliment.’

  ‘Thank you.’ I do my best to force a smile. ‘And the favour?’

  He stares at me a moment, still wrong-footed, and then shakes his head as if to get all the bits inside back in working order. I recognize this gesture, this little tic, because I do it myself, especially when I’ve drunk too much. For now, though, I couldn’t be more sober.

  ‘That money you brought to my place,’ he says. ‘I’m guessing there’s more.’

  ‘You guess right.’

  ‘How much more?’

  ‘A lot. You never embarrass a lady by asking for specific figures, but a lot.’

  ‘Six figures?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And where is it?’

  ‘Why do you ask?’

  ‘Because you need to get out of this car, and make a call to whoever’s looking after it, and tell them to put it somewhere very safe.’

  I blink. After Beethoven and half an egg sandwich, this man has my full attention.

  ‘You’re telling me this person, these people, are under threat?’

  ‘The money. The money is under threat. Make the call now.’ He nods towards the pavement. ‘I promise you won’t regret it.’

  ‘We’re talking the bad guys here?’

  ‘We’re talking however much H has got squirrelled away. Just do it. Please. I’ll wait.’

  ‘You mean there’s more?’

  ‘I’m afraid so.’

  ‘We haven’t finished? We’re not through?’

  ‘Far from it.’

  Bloody hell. I get out of the car and find Jessie’s number on my directory. She’s down at Flixcombe and she answers at once. When I mention H’s rainy-day fund, she assumes I need another instalment to pay the nursing agency. I tell her she’s wrong.

  ‘He’s getting better, Jess. My guess is we’ll probably need another fifty grand but fingers crossed we might not want the rest.’

  ‘So, what do you want me to do?’

  ‘Hide it.’

  ‘Hide it? What is this?’

  ‘To be honest, Jess, I’m not at all sure, but a man I think I trust insists you make it very hard to find. Take it to the woods and bury it. Ask Andy, he’ll have some ideas. Just as long as it’s away from the house.’

  ‘Jesus, Enora. You’re starting to frighten me.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I don’t mean to. This is for H, really.’

  ‘And Malo? What does he think?’

  ‘Malo’s another story. I’ll phone you later. Byeee …’

  I end the call and return to the car. Dessie half mutes the Beethoven again.

  ‘Done?’ he asks.

  I nod, glad he wants no more details.

  ‘Next?’ My smile this time is unforced. ‘How can I help you, Mr Wren?’

  ‘Wesley Kane.’

  ‘What about him?’

  ‘He has two phones, at least.’

  ‘You want me to steal them? Destroy them? Clone the SIM card? Pop them in a Jiffy bag and send them to Cowplain? Just name it, Mr Wren.’

  Watching his face, I know I’m on a roll. For the second time, he’s not quite sure how to handle this.

  ‘You can get to see him?’ he asks at last.

  ‘Any time I like. He very badly wants to get into my knickers. As long as it’s daylight, and somewhere public, I stand a fighting chance. Otherwise I’m afraid it’s rideaux.’

  ‘It’s what?’

  ‘Curtains. With a little flurry at the end when I take a bow.’

  ‘This might not be so funny,’ Dessie murmurs. ‘There are photos on one of those phones we need. We’re not asking you to steal it. Just give us a clue where he might keep it.’

  ‘So you can seize it?’

  ‘One way or another, yes. It needn’t be obvious. It needn’t be in his face. There are other ways. Here …’

  ‘What’s that?’

  Dessie has produced a cube wrapped in silver foil. He slips it into a plastic sachet and hands it across.

  ‘It’s a little present for Mr Kane. The man has a nose for good skunk and this is the best.’

  ‘You’re serious?’ I open the sachet and sniff inside.

  ‘We are, yes. We’ve done the biz on Mr Kane a number of times over the years and got nowhere. You have collateral.’

  ‘You mean something he wants? Needs? Nicely put.’

  ‘Not at all. My pleasure. I’ve just saved you at least a hundred grand, so I’m guessing you might return the favour.’

  ‘By meeting Wesley?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And afterwards?’

  ‘Afterwards?’ He nods down at my mobile. ‘Phone your friend again about the money. Do it tomorrow afternoon. By then, she should have news for you. Tomorrow evening, if restaurants were open, I’d treat you to something lovely. As it is, it might be home cooking again. You’re going back to that shitty flat?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then phone me when you need picking up.’ He
holds my gaze. ‘Deal?’

  I say nothing. The pronoun he’s been using is starting to bother me.

  ‘We?’ I ask.

  ‘We.’ He confirms.

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘My little gang.’ He nods at the radio. ‘The final movement nails it.’ A thin smile. ‘Stay tuned, eh?’

  TWENTY-SIX

  Wesley Kane isn’t hard to get hold of. I phone him mid-afternoon, and he insists I come over at once. Daytime television is driving him insane. Banged up with this shit all day, he tells me, does weird things to your head. He sounds friendly, even warm, and after our previous exchanges this comes as a surprise.

  I’ve never been to Wesley’s place, never had the pleasure, but he’s given me the address. Fratton is just one of the many jigsaws of terraced Victorian properties that make up this city, and I’ve noticed that estate agents are doing their best to rebadge it as a little urban village, but you’d need more than clever marketing and a fancy label to brighten these streets. The parking is impossible, and some of the houses look beyond redemption. Despite lockdown, and the rain, kids are kicking a ball around in the street while ageing faces, many of them Asian, tut-tut behind falls of grimy net curtain. It’s a world scored for satellite dishes and dripping gutters. Fratton, I think, could do with a Doorstep Disco.

  Wesley’s front door is painted a deep purple. I’ve heard H telling stories about this house of his, chiefly on those evenings when half a dozen of the tribe made the trek down to Flixcombe for an evening of Stella and gentle reminiscence. H claims to have bought it for Wesley years ago when trade was booming and he needed an enforcer to keep the competition in their place. Wesley, so H would have us believe, had a special room in the house for the application of serious pain, and by and large it worked a treat. At the time, I dismissed most of this as boys’ talk, but since then, knowing Wesley a little better, I’ve realized how much he enjoys violence. Which, given the way he’s decorated the place, is truly remarkable.

  Everything is pink: the narrow hall, the tiny cave of the front room, the diner at the back. He’s laid deep-pile carpet everywhere, a cheesy white to offset the pinkness of everything else, and when Wesley takes me through to the kitchen, I find myself looking at a Barbie wall calendar. Wesley’s April, like everyone else’s, is near-empty but that’s not the point. If I was a psychologist, this entire house would be Exhibit One. Wesley’s either taking the piss or he has a big problem.

  ‘What do you think?’ It’s a serious question.

  ‘Have you got daughters upstairs?’ I ask him. ‘Are there any other secrets I should know about?’

  ‘Pink’s good for the blood pressure,’ he says. ‘It’s very calming. The inner me loves it.’

  ‘The inner you, Wes? I didn’t know you had one.’

  This kind of banter goes down very well with Wes. I sensed we could be friends from the moment I met him, and he’s always looked after my best interests. From the start I realized there was something slightly childlike about him, a winning naivety at odds with his fearsome reputation, and this little house of his seems to prove it. He wants us, above all, to be mates. For real, if at all possible, but otherwise just buddies.

  I watch him uncorking a bottle of Côtes du Rhône he must have bought specially. In return, I present him with the little cube wrapped in silver foil. The gesture, which I try to make as artless as possible, feels like the grossest treachery. What links me and H is Malo, nothing else. But that alone, Pompey flesh and blood, is enough to make me one of the tribe.

  ‘Where did you get that?’ Wesley has unwrapped the cube and is sniffing it. Then he applies a wetted forefinger and gives it a lick. ‘Nice. Very nice.’

  ‘Good. I got it from an actor friend. He didn’t want any money but I gave him a tenner in the end. Too generous, do you think?’

  ‘Fuck, no. A tenner? For this?’

  The resin is the deepest black. Wesley fetches a pouch of loose tobacco and some papers and begins to skin up. His hands, I notice, have developed the faintest shake. He crumbles the resin over the spliff and seals it with another lick before finding a match. He holds the first lungful for a long moment before expelling a long blue plume of smoke. Then he nods towards the front room.

  ‘This deserves a bit of a sit-down,’ he says.

  I follow him through with the bottle and a glass. Over the mantelpiece is a framed print of what looks like a gazelle in some forest glade. As an image, it belongs on the birthday card you’d give your granny, the winsome creature’s innocence caught in a haze of golden sunshine, and it reminds me of a railway journey Wesley and I shared a while back. The train went through edges of the New Forest, and Wesley couldn’t tear himself away from the scruffy little ponies grazing beside the track. He thought they were sweet, and that was his word, not mine.

  ‘You like it here?’ I gesture towards the window.

  ‘It’s seriously crap. The area, the fucking neighbours, the low-life who keeps trying to nick my bike round the back, but – yeah – I love it. They’ve brought a speed limit in now. Twenty miles per hour. The kids won’t get run over any more and we’ll all die of disappointment.’ He shoots me an inane grin. ‘How does that sound? I’m blaming the weed. You want a toke? Help yourself.’

  He offers me the spliff, but I shake my head. This is a small room, airless with the windows closed, and the smell of weed is overpowering. At this rate, we’ll both end up stoned.

  ‘Don’t you want to know about H?’ I ask him. ‘I think he might be getting better.’

  ‘I know. That’s what he said.’

  ‘He’s been in touch?’ This comes as a surprise.

  ‘Yeah. He phoned me half an hour ago, banging on about that boy of yours. He’s hurt. Have I got that right?’

  I nod, and tell him about finding Malo on the seafront.

  ‘He took a slap or two?’

  ‘More than that. They set about him, Wes. What happened put him in hospital. That’s why I’m here. I want to know why, and how, and who bloody did it. I told H it was an accident but he wouldn’t have it.’

  ‘Of course he wouldn’t. He knows this city. They weren’t having a go at Malo, they were getting at H.’

  ‘That’s the other thing.’ I tell Wesley about the meter cupboards at the flats, and about some stranger breaking in to turn off the supply.

  ‘Just your flat?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘That’s seriously bad shit.’

  ‘Exactly. H was dying at the time. Without oxygen, without the pump, it would have been over. Someone wants to kill him, Wes. And you’re right. If they can’t get at him, Malo will be more than acceptable. H can look after himself. Malo can’t. For me, that’s where it begins and ends. I’m serious, Wes. This has to stop.’

  ‘Yeah, that’s exactly what H said. Word for fucking word. Me? I’m a tough old bastard. The boy? There for the taking. You’re right. This is out of order. Next, they’ll be up the hospital to finish the job.’ He stares at me for a moment, and then suddenly leans forward, his hand on my knee. ‘Pompey joke, love. No offence.’

  It doesn’t feel like a joke, far from it. A glass of Côtes du Rhône and a lungful of Dessie’s skunk are beginning to do very bad things to me.

  ‘So, who’d want to kill H, Wes? Who’d want to go to all that trouble?’

  ‘You want a list?’ He throws his head back, seemingly delighted, but there’s not a shred of warmth in his bark of laughter. ‘That man pissed off everyone, and I mean everyone. Not me. Not Johnny In-Yer-Face Mr Hurt-You. But lots of others. People have long memories here. No one ever forgets. And when the chance comes, you know what? They fucking take it.’

  That man, it occurs to me, is H. This is a new Wesley – a Wesley I’ve never heard before. He sounds aggrieved, even resentful, and I’m starting to wonder exactly what Dessie might have added to his little cube of skunk. I’m still feeling guilty about being here at all, but if this is the truth I want to know more.

  �
��You’ve got names?’

  ‘Of course I’ve got names. Faces from back in the day? Blokes he stitched up? Tossers who thought he’d got far too big for his fucking boots? H’s problem was success. Lay your hands on that kind of money, and half the fucking world’s gonna come after you. That’s why he needed someone like me. That’s why he still needs someone like me. And you think I really get off on that kind of gig? You don’t think it becomes a pain in the arse in the end? Having to dig H or his fucking boy out of some hole or other? You want the truth? I’m getting past it, love. Some things I can still handle, that would be a real pleasure, not just for me but for you, too, and that’s a fucking promise, but the rest of it …?’ He falls silent for a moment, staring at the spliff. ‘The problem in this city is way simpler than I ever thought. No one gets away. Ever. Not me. Not Fat Dave. Not even H. You think you do, but you don’t. And you know why? Because it becomes a state of mind. When you’re young it doesn’t matter, nothing fucking matters, and that’s because everything’s a laugh. Now’s different. We’re all sick, and that’s got nothing to do with the fucking virus. It eats away at you, this place, and in the end there’s fuck all left.’ He nods, suddenly grave. ‘You’re a lovely woman. You’re a lovely gal. H doesn’t deserve you. No way. Ever.’

  ‘H hasn’t got me,’ I point out. ‘All we have is Malo.’

  ‘That’s not what he thinks. You know it’s not. I’ve watched the pair of you sometimes. H thinks he’s clever, and he is, but I can read him like a fucking book. In that evil little head of his, he’s all over you. He thinks you belong to him, he thinks he has sole rights, and one day he figures that you’ll get it, that you’ll say yes.’

  ‘To what?’

  ‘Every fucking thing. Eight times a night. Upside down. Whatever.’

  ‘You’re stoned, Wes. You’re talking nonsense.’

  ‘Stoned? Yes. Nonsense? Never. You have to be around people like H to understand him, and I was, and I do. Back in the day I’d put out for him, and he knew it. I worshipped the man. Not the money, the man. Why? Because he’d got it all so sorted. Because he was so clever, so evil, so fucking brave. There was no one in this city he was frightened of. There was no stroke he wouldn’t pull, and some of them were genius, everyone said so. Get alongside a bloke like that, my love, and you were doomed. He pulled the strings, all of them, and you didn’t have a fucking prayer.’