by Mathew Carr
12
Until that evening Lawton had been out in Barcelona only during the day. Even when he went out for supper, he never went further than the Plaza Reial or the Café Suizo, and he was usually back in his hotel room before it was fully dark. Even then the gas lamps were usually on. Now he found himself in a maze of dark narrow streets without streetlamps, where the only light came from the apartments, taverns, and brothels on either side of him. It was difficult to make out the sailor as he followed him through the darkness. All around him men were chatting to the whores who stood outside open doorways or leaned over balconies in corsets, dressing gowns, and negligees.
If his father was in Barcelona then it was only natural to find him in a neighborhood like this. In his more vicious moments the old man liked to torment and humiliate his mother with tales of whorehouses from Port Suez, Mombasa, Buenos Aires, and other cities, and he had never cared whether his children heard him. Even if the red-haired sailor was the father he had not seen for fifteen years, Lawton was not sure what he would say to him. He might curse him or hit him. He might tell him all the things he had never had the chance to tell him when he was younger, but he needed to know whether the sailor was indeed his father or whether his brain was playing tricks on him again.
Already his head felt fit to burst and the faces of the people in the street seemed to drift past in the murky light like grotesque disembodied masks floating down a dirty stream. All around him he heard a babel of languages, some of which seemed to be calling to him. He heard lewd and raucous laughter and smelled the same combination of wine, cheap perfume, tobacco, and opium that he remembered from his Limehouse days. Finally he caught up with the sailor and laid his right hand on his shoulder. As soon as he turned around, Lawton saw that he had been mistaken. The sailor looked nothing like his father, and Lawton looked at the Kaiserliche Marine eagle and the red felt center on his black cap and wondered how he could have been such an idiot.
“Was willst du?” the sailor said angrily.
Lawton mumbled an apology and the sailor walked away, shaking his head and cursing under his breath. Lawton felt angry with himself as he watched him go, and he also felt afraid. In that moment he wished that he could take his head off his shoulders and shake out all the fancies and delusions that swarmed inside his overheated brain like spiders in a jar. Just then he heard the strumming of a guitar from a nearby tavern, and he caught the familiar sweet licorice smell. Even as he walked toward the open doorway he saw Dr. Morris shaking his head and telling him to go back to his hotel, and then he stepped into the crowded room and even as the smell of sweat, sawdust, smoke, and wine wafted over him, he knew it was too late.
The tavern reminded him of many similar holes-in-the-wall in the East End, with its rows of dusty bottles behind the bar, its domino and card players, and its general air of unrepentant vice. Some of the customers were sailors. Others had the slack, distorted features of men and women who had abandoned themselves to the night a long time ago. In one corner a seated guitarist was accompanying two couples who were performing a dance he had never seen before. The music was jerky, staccato, and compelling, and even though the dancers pressed their breasts and cheeks together they seemed to look past each other as they moved back and forth in the cramped space as if they had been forced together by accident.
Lawton walked over to the counter, where a gnomelike little man in a filthy apron was wiping glasses with an equally dirty cloth. He ordered a shot of absinthe and felt a sharp, physical craving that was almost like lust as the tavernkeeper poured the green syrupy liquid into a grimy glass. Lawton swallowed it down in a single gulp and shook his head like a dog shaking water as the hot bittersweet taste washed through his mouth and throat. Already the world seemed sweeter and more benign and the pain in his head gave way to a rush of giddy bonhomie.
“Now that is a fine drop!” he exclaimed. “And I’ll take another, thank you. Even though my doctor says I mustn’t drink. You know what I think? If a man can’t have a drink or two then what in the name of sweet Jesus on the cross is the point, eh?”
The tavernkeeper seemed unperturbed by the profanity as he poured another glass and pushed it toward him. With his hanging jowls and baggy brown eyes he reminded Lawton of a weary bloodhound, and his face bore the look of resignation and disinterest of a man who had seen everything and cared about nothing. Whether it was the absinthe or the knowledge that nothing he said in this place would ever be noted or remembered, or simply the fact that he was speaking in Spanish, Lawton felt suddenly loquacious.
“I believe my father would’ve enjoyed your establishment, Señor,” he said. “Though whiskey not absinthe was his tipple. Hopefully it will have killed the fucker by now. Either that or the clap. The strongest man in the world! Hah! I, on the other hand, have always drunk in moderation. And have no transmitted diseases.” Lawton laughed and drank the glass down. “And yet now I am the one who must watch out for my health!” He spat the word out and reached for his cigarettes. “What kind of justice is that?”
Lawton held out the glass and once again the tavernkeeper filled it. “I used to box, you know. Working the fairs and doing well enough. So one day this gentleman comes up to me—fine clothes, waistcoat, and cane. You look good, he says, and I want to make you an offer. I want you to take part in a bareknuckle fight in London. A special fight. No Queensbury Rules. No rules at all. I don’t even have to win. All I have to do is fight Black Jack Owen—a coal miner from Merthyr Tydfil. You know where Wales is? Never mind. Take my word. He was a big man and a hard man, too. With a reputation. Just fight him, the gentleman says, and even if I lose, I get twenty percent of the takings. Naturally I accepted.”
For the first time the tavernkeeper looked almost interested, and some of the other customers had gathered round to listen. Lawton felt himself warming to his tale now and he called for another drink, and proceeded to describe the epic fight that had taken place in the warehouse near Shadwell Docks in 1896. Fifty-two rounds spread over three hours, with no referee and no ring, only the circle of spectators yelling and howling and crowding around the two fighters as they battered each other till they were barely able to stand. It was not easy to find the words in Spanish to describe the intensity and ferocity of the encounter, and he took up his stance and demonstrated some of the moves and punches, right down to the final round when Owen caught him on the temple with a rabbit punch and followed up with a jab to the jaw. That punch should have finished it, he said, and he had felt himself going, and then the Welshman became overeager and dropped his guard, just long enough for him to deliver the right hook that finally knocked him down.
“The most beautiful punch I ever laid on anyone!” said Lawton nostalgically. He did not tell them how he had thought of his father in the moment that Black Jack Owen came toward him to finish him off with his fists by his sides; how the rage had enabled him to rally one last time. “The crowd couldn’t believe it and nor could I,” he said. “They carried me on their shoulders round and round the warehouse and gave me so much rum that I passed out. And when I wake up I find I’ve made a month’s pay in one fight. Sixty percent of the takings. You see my gentleman friend had been betting against me! Never mind a broken nose, two broken ribs, and a headache that wouldn’t go away for a week. Like a metal spike in my head. And sometimes I don’t think it ever came out.” Lawton felt suddenly deflated. He did not want to talk about his illness or even think about it. Nor did he want to tell them that he had never fought that well again. “Another glass please, Señor!” he turned to the guitarist. “Hombre, let’s have a song! Do you know ‘The Last Rose of Summer’?”
The guitarist shook his head.
“It’s easy!” Lawton began to sing: “’Tis the last rose of summeeeer/Left bloomiiing alooone/All her lovely compaaanions/Are faded and gooone.”
The guitarist and the customers looked unimpressed by this rendition, and Lawton shrugged and turned back to the bar, as the guitarist began to strum a tune th
at sounded vaguely oriental. Already the euphoria was fading and he felt the morbs returning. Now he felt only terror and disgust at the thought that his mind had tricked him into believing that his father was in the city. That was how his mother had begun, seeing people no one else could see and even talking to them, and now he was condemned to follow the same downhill path. He did not know how many glasses he had drunk by the time he staggered back into the street to make his way back to the hotel. He had not gone far when he heard a smooching kiss, and he looked up to see a woman standing on the balcony in a dressing gown.
“You want to fuck me, Mister?”
She slipped the dressing gown over her shoulders and cupped one of her breasts in one hand and beckoned to him with the other. For a brief moment Lawton was tempted to go upstairs, then the nausea rose up inside him and he leaned forward and vomited. The woman cursed as he lurched off through the darkened street, holding the wall like a blind man. A few minutes later he saw Weygrand’s bulging eyes staring from one of the posters outside the Edén Concert, and he stumbled on toward the Plaza Reial.
There was no traffic on the Ramblas now, and the pedestrian thoroughfare was deserted except for a few sailors and prostitutes moving around in the gas lights. The morbs held him fast now, and he felt only disappointment, disgust, and anger at the world that had taunted him with possibilities that a man from his background had no right to expect, only to snatch them away from him. Perhaps the old man had felt like that when he staggered or crawled back from the pub to terrorize his wife and family. But his father could never have dreamed of becoming a detective—or becoming anything at all.
And yet there had been a time—many years ago—when he really believed the old man was the strongest man in the world; when he listened to the stories of monsters, mermaids, and Indians that he brought back with him from the sea and imagined that he was just like Ulysses or Captain Cook—a hero, a navigator, and an explorer. But in the end his father had turned out to be a whoremongering drunk who drove his poor wife mad. How many times had the old man told him he would never amount to anything in this world? And now the world had proved him right; the man who had laid out Black Jack Owen was sliding down toward the workhouse or the asylum.
He was still trying to remember where his hotel was when he saw the three men walking slowly toward him. All of them were wearing bowler hats and overcoats, and as they came closer he saw that two of them had shotguns hanging from their shoulders. The other man was slightly shorter than his companions and he looked at Lawton with a disapproving, imperious expression that immediately annoyed him.
“Where you going, friend?” he asked. “Bit late for whoring.”
Lawton straightened up. He was more than a foot taller than any of them, and even though a voice in his head told him to be respectful, he felt suddenly belligerent. “What’s it to do with you?”
“That’s not how you talk to the Somaten.”
“I’ll talk whatever shite I fancy, little man. So fuck off now.”
“You need to wash your mouth out,” the little man said.
“Do I now? And who will make me do that?”
“You’re coming with us.”
“The fuck I will. I shall be speaking to His Majesty King Edward about—”
The sentence went unfinished as one of the Somaten jabbed the butt of his shotgun into his stomach, winding him. Even as he bent over the other shotgun hit him hard in his lower back, pitching him face forward onto the cobblestones. He tried to roll away, but now the three militiamen were all kicking him and beating him with their guns as he tried to curl up and protect himself. High above the canopy of trees he could see the tiny glints of stars and he thought of all the good souls the priests had told him about, sitting at the right hand of the Lord and stretching back in their millions toward infinity. Millions and millions of souls, Father McGuire had told him, of all the good people who had ever been alive since Adam and Eve, burning like tiny candles for all eternity.
Lawton knew he was in hell, and there was no escape from it. Everything conspired to keep him there, from his poor, weak brain to the buildings and plane trees and the wrought iron balconies, and the three devils who seemed intent on kicking him to death. He thought he might be sick again, and then he felt the world slipping away from him, and the stars receded too, and he fell down into the pit of darkness that seemed to have been always waiting for him.
* * *
He woke up to find himself lying on a cold stone floor and stared up at the vaulted roof above his head. At first he thought he was in a church, then he smelled vomit and alcohol and saw the dusty stream of light descending at an angle from the high barred window. He sat up and looked around at the men sitting or lying all around him. Most of them were sleeping, and some appeared to be unconscious or dead. He felt for his wallet and pocket watch, and he was relieved to find that they were still there. He ached all over, and he knew that he had been beaten, but he could not remember anything beyond the point when he had set off in pursuit of the red-haired sailor. He stumbled over to the barred grille with a growing feeling of panic. On the other side of the room a uniformed policeman was sitting at a desk, doing some paperwork by the glow of a paraffin lamp.
“Excuse me officer. Can you tell me where I am?”
The policeman looked at him. “You’re in Atarazanas District Police Station, Section 2,” he said. “Awaiting deportation.”
“Deportation?” Lawton rubbed the back of his head. “What for?”
“Drunk and disorderly behavior. Brawling with the Somaten.”
“They attacked me!”
The policeman shrugged. “That’s not what they said. And as soon as we find out where you came from, we’re going to send you back there.”
“I can tell you where I’m from, but I’d like to speak to the station chief.”
“Inspector Bravo Portillo is too busy to deal with drunks.”
Lawton tried to muster some semblance of dignity. “Look, my name is Harry Lawton. I’m a private investigator and I have a job to do in Barcelona.”
“Is that what you were doing last night? Your job?”
Lawton was not in the mood to be mocked by jumped-up little policemen, but after last night’s encounter there was not much he could do about it. He considered asking for Smither at the consulate, but there was no guarantee that His Majesty’s Government would be any more sympathetic to a predicament that he had brought entirely on himself. The policeman was about to walk away when it occurred to Lawton that there was another possibility.
“Please ask the inspector to contact Charles Arrow at the Office of Criminal Investigation,” he said. “Tell him Chief Inspector Maitland’s Irish friend needs to see him.”
The policeman seemed to know who Arrow was, and he agreed to give the inspector the message. Lawton wrote down Maitland’s name for him, and the officer left the room and came back a few minutes later to say that he had passed on his request. He was followed shortly afterward by another officer, who began calling out some of the names in the cell. Over the next two hours the bodies began to thin out, until Lawton was able to sit on a bench. Finally the second officer called out his name. The desk officer opened the cell and Lawton followed his colleague up a flight of stairs and then up another floor, where the policeman ushered him into an office. Behind a desk a dapper little Spaniard with pointed, elf-like ears and a slick of black hair plastered to one side of his mostly bald head was sitting smoking a cigarette.
In front of the desk a tall, broad-shouldered foreigner in a smart two-piece suit was sitting with his hat on his lap. He looked in his late-forties, but his hair and moustache already showed streaks of gray, and he looked at Lawton with disapproval.
“Señor Lawton,” said the man behind the desk. “I am Inspector Bravo Portillo. Inspector Arrow here has asked me to release you.”
Lawton nodded gratefully. “I’m glad to hear it.”
Arrow’s stony expression did not change. “If Chief Ins
pector Maitland is prepared to vouch for you I assume there must be a reason,” he said in English. “Though I suspect he might feel differently if he was aware of your behavior last night.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”
“I will defer to the inspector in this instance,” said Bravo Portillo. “But if you ever do anything like this again, you will be sent back to England on the first available ship.”
Lawton thanked him once again and followed Arrow out into the corridor. He was surprised to find that the police station was in the same street as the Edén Concert theater, and as they walked back toward the Ramblas he saw Weygrand’s face staring at him once again.
“Sorry about the bother,” he said.
“ ‘Bother’ doesn’t quite describe it, does it?” Arrow replied. “I don’t normally pull drunken Micks out of the clink, believe me. Yet Chief Inspector Maitland said you used to be a detective.”
“I was.”
“Was this why you left the force? Drunkenness?”
“No sir. I left because of ill health.”
“And yet James sent you here.” Arrow looked at him curiously. “He says you’re working for Randolph Foulkes’s widow?”
“I am.”