by Mike Ripley
I pulled out a chair for Lisabeth and then the other for myself. Lisabeth was opposite him, but he seemed more intent on me.
‘So what have you heard? And from whom?’
The voice was deep and slow, maybe Midwest, and softer than I had expected. Maybe I had been expecting a Deep South evangelist. Maybe someone who passed around snakes in a bag. What was a Messiah supposed to sound like in the 1990s?
‘Lots of people,’ I said. ‘Carrick Lee for one.’
He didn’t move a muscle except the ones he was chewing with.
‘Don’t know anyone by that name,’ he said. ‘Hope they said kind things about me.’
‘It was more about your work,’ I tried.
‘My work is helping people. I hope I was of help.’
He flicked a crumb from the lapel of his linen jacket. Underneath it he was wearing a plain white T-shirt. He had long, tapering fingers and the nails were long and shaped at the ends. A guitar player when he wasn’t converting followers, I guessed.
‘Carrick Lee came to you via Simon Buck, about two months ago,’ I said, then broke off as the waiter placed a large, steaming cappuccino in front of me, then one in front of Lisabeth. She hadn’t twitched since we’d sat down.
‘Go on,’ Connie said after the waiter had disappeared. ‘Does this get to a point?’
‘Buck sent Carrick to work with you on one of his little property scams. How’s that for a guess?’
‘It’s a guess, that’s all.’
I put my hands on the table and reached for my coffee. The cup was so hot it burned my fingertips and I left it where it was rather than let him see my hands shake.
‘Carrick came looking for you when you were at the house in Islington. He hasn’t been seen since.’
‘Sorry, means nothing to me.’
He stuffed the last of the croissant into his mouth and chewed.
‘I’ve been to the house in Lennard Street,’ I said, looking hard for a reaction.
‘I haven’t,’ he said, swallowing. ‘At least, not for a while.’
He switched his stare to Lisabeth as he reached for another croissant from the basket.
I didn’t know what else to say. If I mentioned Stella, it might make life difficult for her, depending on what had happened in the house. And we still didn’t know if Veronica and Fenella had actually got inside. And Lisabeth was being no help, just sitting there nursing her coffee but not drinking it.
‘This has not been as interesting as I thought it would be,’ Connie said coolly. ‘You’re Angel, aren’t you.’
It wasn’t a question and he wasn’t looking at me. He and Lisabeth were eyeballing each other.
He selected a croissant and delicately held it over Lisabeth’s cup.
‘I’m on a caffeine-free day today,’ he said conversationally, then dipped the end of the pastry into her coffee. ‘But just a taste, huh?’
He held it up above his face, his eyes on Lisabeth all the time, then he stuck out his tongue and let a drop of coffee fall from the sodden end. Then he brought it closer and licked it twice, using his tongue like the lead singer of a Heavy Metal band performing to an audience of pimply youths.
‘You must be Angel from all I’ve heard,’ he said in my direction rather than to me. ‘Your two dykey girlfriends told me all about you, after a little persuasion, that is.’
He looked at me when he said that, and smiled. Two mistakes in one, stranger.
Lisabeth moved like a blur. She scooped up cup and saucer and flung them at his chest. He howled and flapped with his hands, either from the sting of the hot coffee or over the mess it made of his T-shirt and jacket.
I didn’t get a chance to ask which it was, because Lisabeth was on her feet, reaching for the lapels of his linen jacket. She pulled him up and off his seat and bent forward herself, smashing her forehead into the bridge of his nose. He sank back, almost as stunned as I was, and emitted a low moan of pain, his hands over his face.
I stared at Lisabeth as she sat down again and placed her hands on the table, linking her fingers.
‘Did that hurt?’ I asked.
‘I think I’ve broken his nose,’ she said, not even breathing hard.
‘Not him, you pudding. You.’
She just shrugged her shoulders.
I took some paper napkins from the metal dispenser on the table and laid them in front of Connie.
‘There was one other thing, Connie,’ I said confidently. ‘We did rather want to see our friends this morning. Just to make sure they’re all right.’
He looked at me over a noseful of paper napkins. The blood was starting to show through them.
‘Dey ... dey’re in de house,’ he stammered, then shook his head as if to clear it, but he stopped doing that when he realised it hurt too much.
‘Are they all right?’ Lisabeth growled.
Connie reacted like she’d hit him again, his chair scraping the floor as he tried to back off.
‘Is everything okay?’ came a voice. The waiter, from behind the coffee machine.
I didn’t know whether he’d seen anything or not. Outside, in the square, two young girls in school uniform were looking through the window in open-mouthed amazement. I decided to get Lisabeth out of there before they formed a fan club.
‘Slight accident. Our friend here was told to avoid caffeine and now he’s gone and got a nose bleed. How much do we owe you?’
‘One continental breakfast, two cappuccinos, that’ll be ten quid,’ he said, but he stayed behind his bar.
‘That’s outrageous,’ whispered Lisabeth.
‘Leave the money on the table, Connie,’ I told him. ‘Then get up slowly. You’re taking us to church, okay? And we’d better find our friends in one piece. Do I make myself clear?’
He nodded, then grabbed for some more napkins as droplets of blood splashed on his T-shirt. He reached into his jeans pocket and produced a £10 note, throwing it onto the table.
Lisabeth picked up her shoulder bag. ‘Let’s go,’ she said to me.
‘But I haven’t finished my coffee,’ I said, aggrieved. Her expression told me not to push it. ‘Okay, okay. Grab his phone.’
She snapped it up and plopped it into her bag, where it clanked against something heavy.
‘Now let’s walk out of here slowly and together.’
I went through the door first, blocking it so that Connie had to stay real close. If I had been him, that was where I would have done a runner, so I worked on the principle that while Lisabeth probably frightened him more, I stood a better chance of catching him.
But he didn’t even try to run. We walked him into John Brome Street, me on his right, Lisabeth on his left. To the passers-by, we were two good friends helping another after an accident. That was the scenario had anyone said anything to us. But this was London. No-one said anything to us.
‘Hey, I was bullshitting back there,’ Connie said to me through a wad of bloody paper. It came out as ‘dullshitting’. ‘Your girls, they’re all right really. It was just some of the women, they roughed them up a little. Nothing serious.’
‘Sure,’ I said, not trusting him as far as Lisabeth could throw him. ‘Let them tell it. How do we get in?’
We were almost at the blue door.
‘There’s a knock. I have to do it.’
He tried to ease in front of us, but gently, like he was trying to help.
‘Watch him,’ I said to Lisabeth. ‘Who’s in there with them?’
‘Just Julian,’ he said.
I looked the door over. It was solid enough but there was no lock, something I should have noticed before.
‘Keys? What do you do for keys?’
‘No keys, man,’ he sniffed, looking at a handful of red napkins. His nose looked awful. ‘Bolts. Only opens from inside. Got to have
someone here all the time. Only opens on the secret knock.’
I moved in close to him, so he was almost up against the door, and motioned Lisabeth to stand next to me.
‘Go ahead.’
He put the napkins to his nose with his left hand and rapped with his right; three long, four short, two long knocks.
I heard a bolt draw back, then another and then the door swung open. The other disciple I had seen handing out tracts at the tube station was standing there. He was wearing a vest top and jogging pants.
‘Julian’ – Connie gasped, swaying to one side into the doorway – ‘I need protecting. Beat the crap out of him.’
Julian reacted before I could. He stepped forward, nudging Connie inside with his right elbow, while making fists of his hands.
I grabbed Lisabeth and took a pace backwards. I had it in mind to take more than one, for Julian looked like he knew what he was about. He put up his fists, but not like an amateur would, apeing a 19th Century prize-fighter pose. His fists were close and at an angle in front of his jaw. He flexed his shoulders and I saw more muscles than I wanted to. He was positioned as if about to perform a demonstration left-right-left combination on a punch bag. As none of us had a punch bag, the next thing in reach – exactly his reach – was me.
‘What have they done to you, Connie?’ he said out of the corner of his mouth, not taking his eyes off me and moving his feet for better balance.
‘They’ve hurt me, Julian. Now you hurt them. Do it.’
For a second, his expression to me said ‘Sorry, nothing personal’, but it didn’t distract him from the business in hand.
I took another step back, tugging Lisabeth with me. She was fumbling in her shoulder bag. Going for the phone to call the cops, I thought. By the time she’d worked out how to use it, she might as well make it an ambulance. And, if I was lucky enough to live, an orthodontist. Again.
‘Now, hold on, Julian,’ I said. I didn’t put my hands up. Most professionally-trained boxers don’t go for undefended targets. It tends to throw them. Obviously Julian had been to the wrong sort of boxing gym. He just took another step and tensed himself.
It was all happening very fast, but then fights do.
Suddenly, Lisabeth seemed to be leaning into me, and as I still had a good grip on her with my left hand, I pulled so she was in between me and Julian. Surely, he wouldn’t hit a woman?
He didn’t get the option.
Lisabeth finally stopped fumbling in her bag and produced something that she swung at Julian’s head. I saw it glint in the morning light, which was more than he did.
Whatever it was thwacked into the side of his head and his eyes glazed and his knees buckled and he just sort of deflated in front of us. Lisabeth’s arm was still extended as he fell, and I could see it was some sort of bottle she was holding.
Julian didn’t stop on his knees. He kept going, face-first on to the pavement.
I reacted just as Connie did. I was pushing Lisabeth out of the way and stepping on and then over Julian to get to him as he tried to swing the door shut. I put my shoulder down and jumped the last three feet, cannoning into the door and smashing it and him back into the house. I stayed on my feet and pushed hard to keep the door fully open. Connie was howling again. I had trapped his right hand between the door and the hallway wall.
I eased off and he fell away, still yelling, his right hand tucked in his left armpit, his left hand to his still-bloody nose. I reckoned he’d had a bad enough start to his day to remove any further resistance.
‘What about this one?’ Lisabeth said from the doorstep. She was still holding her weapon, and though I looked hard, she still hadn’t broken sweat.
‘Is he out cold?’
‘Yes, I think so.’
‘Then I’ll take care of him. You keep an eye on the live one. You’re much better at this than me.’
She came into the house and I eased by her, then grabbed Julian by his ankles and dragged him, face-down, back into the house.
As I did so, I wondered who was going to tell him that he’d been laid out by a half-litre bottle of Virgin Olive Oil. Extra Fine quality, of course.
The Contemplation Room where the girls had been imprisoned was a windowless pantry smaller than a Victorian jail cell, off the kitchen. There was no cellar in this house.
To make it lightproof, somebody had fitted black foam rubber around the inside of the door, masking even the door frame just to increase the sense of isolation. Bastards.
Connie stood against the wall in the kitchen where we’d pushed him and just motioned with his head. Lisabeth drew the bolts and opened the door which, like the cellar door in Lennard Street, had a cross crudely painted on it.
‘Binky?’ she said, and for the first time, there was a tremor in her voice.
Three female voices responded, all frightened.
‘You can come out of there,’ she said. ‘It’s safe now. You’ve been rescued.’
And who were they to argue?
Veronica came out first, blinking, then taking her glasses off and rubbing her eyes. Stella followed, her hair matted, one shoe missing, and dirtier than Veronica. Finally, Fenella, rumpled and falling into Lisabeth’s arms.
Veronica came over to me where I was standing guarding Connie, though Connie was going nowhere.
‘I think I’m glad to see you for once,’ she said, pulling at her clothes as if to straighten her dignity. ‘If you did this to him.’ She pointed a grimy finger towards Connie’s face.
‘Not me, I’m afraid,’ I said, not wanting to take the credit in case charges were laid at a later date. ‘It was Lisabeth.’
‘Right on, sister,’ said Stella, turning on the taps in the kitchen sink and splashing water on her face.
Lisabeth pulled her head from Fenella’s shoulder and smiled sheepishly.
‘Are you all right, Ronnie?’
‘I’m fine,’ said Veronica, glaring at Connie. ‘It was Fenella who put up the fight.’
Lisabeth’s brow creased. Then she put her hands to the sides of Fenella’s face and tilted it gently. Fenella was sporting a three-tone black eye. Lisabeth began to move her carefully to one side.
‘No, Lisabeth,’ Veronica said forcefully. ‘You’ve done enough.’
Veronica was still looking straight at Connie, but he wasn’t meeting her eyes, he was trying to nurse his nose and his hand at the same time.
Veronica shook her head slightly, then took off her glasses again and held them out so I could hold them. Then she stomped as hard as she could on Connie’s left foot. He screamed and doubled up, and as he did so. Veronica ducked in under him and brought the top of her head up into his face.
His head jerked back and hit the wall, and there was a spray of blood from his nose this time. Then he yelled again and, in mid-yell, fainted, slumping to the floor.
‘Way to go,’ breathed Stella softly.
‘Thank you. Ronnie,’ said Lisabeth and Fenella together.
‘How about I make a nice pot of tea?’ I volunteered.
We dragged Julian into the Contemplation Room and bolted the door.
‘Is he all right?’ Fenella asked, ever the worrier.
‘He’s breathing,’ said Lisabeth in a voice designed to close the subject.
Connie we manhandled into the downstairs room Stella described as ‘The Chapel’. It had no furniture, just scatter cushions covering the floor. Connie, who had been out for only about a minute, seemed grateful for the lie down.
‘Time to talk,’ I said, and he groaned. ‘Or shall I leave you to the ladies?’
‘It was Buck, man, it was Buck.’ He spoke through a broken nose, and a split lip from where Veronica had butted him. His face was a mess, but he seemed keen to chat.
‘Buck set you up in properties, didn’t he? So you could – what? – bring down th
e value, frighten tenants off? Which was it?’
‘Either/or, man. Sometimes both. He’s done it before using what he called gyppos, even hobos; you known, man, winos, drunks off the street. That man is into property in a big way and that’s not clever, man, not these days.’
He was right. The property market had slumped. People had paid big prices two years earlier and now found themselves owing the bank more than the bricks and mortar were worth.
‘And Carrick Lee? What was he?’
‘Nothing, man, nothing to me.’ Connie waved a hand weakly. ‘You gotta believe me on this one. He worked for Buck, just delivered orders, money … Shit, I only met the guy twice. Whatever there was between those two was between those two, not me, man.’
‘What do you mean, between those two?’
‘Buck and this guy Lee. There was something there, but I don’t know what. Hey, look, it had something to do with her old man, that’s all I know.’
‘My father?’ shouted Stella. ‘I knew it.’
‘What did it have to do with Stella’s father?’ I had seen the way he had flinched at Stella’s voice.
‘It was something ... I don’t know …’ He shook his head. It still hurt. ‘… But it wasn’t the property thing, man. Believe me. He knew all about that.’
‘What?’ from Stella, louder.
‘Shit, your old man owns this place and the fucking house next door, and that’s got sitting tenants. He knows, I tell you. But this thing with Lee was something else. Buck wanted him out of the way.’
‘So, what happened at the house in Islington, Connie?’ I asked quietly. ‘And remember, I’ve been there.’
‘What ...?’ Veronica started, but I signalled quiet.
Connie tried to lick a swollen lip and failed.
‘Buck told us we were moving again, quick, like that night. To this place here. He told us he was having trouble with Lee and we had to get him into the Contemplation Room, and leave him there. Hey, look, I don’t know what happened. We packed up and moved here.’
‘But you can guess, can’t you?’ I said softly.
‘There’s nothing to connect me, man. No physical evidence, whatever happened.’ He lowered his voice so the women would have trouble hearing. ‘I travel light, man. You won’t find anything.’