Love Story, With Murders

by Harry Bingham

  I nuzzle Buzz’s shoulder with my head. He kisses and releases me, gently freeing himself from my hand.

  We go inside.

  Dad doesn’t notice us straight away. The grand opening is in three days’ time and the place is still a blizzard of sawdust and power tools. There are five workmen still on site. The place looks a long way from ready, but these last stages happen fast.

  We stand and watch. The place is smaller than I’d realised. His pole-dancing clubs, the two of them I’ve seen, are big. Black, shiny, ugly things. Moneymaking machines. Turning girls into profit. Not prostitution, but it feels almost the same.

  This place is classier, smaller, more intimate. It doesn’t repel me.

  Dad sees us and breaks into a huge smile. He comes over and has to introduce us to everyone.

  ‘Kevin, you know David Brydon, do you? Detective Sergeant Brydon, no less. Make sure he doesn’t see your bloody electrical work in that corner or you’ll be doing time for attempted murder, eh? Murder by electrocution.’

  He shouts, he introduces, he charms. He makes sure everyone knows that Buzz is a police officer, not, presumably, because anyone here is doing anything illegal but because Dad has never kicked his old habits. Disciplines of an earlier time.

  We spend forty minutes admiring the bar. The place looks a mess but, seeing it through Dad’s excited eyes, you can see how nice it’ll become.

  We end up in a room upstairs, furnished like an ordinary office, drinking Labatt’s from the bottle. Or rather, Buzz and Dad do. I just fool around with my bottle and sip tiny bits of foam from the head.

  ‘Keeping busy? That Mary Langton business, no further ahead on that, are you? Not that you can tell me, but what a horrible business, eh? Imagine that, if it was your daughter, imagine how you’d feel.’

  I tell them both about going to see Langton’s parents. I’ve told Buzz before, of course, but differently. I say how the mother cried. The father too.

  ‘You know, I’ve always thought it was funny how we never came across the girl. I mean, a girl like that in South Wales, you’d think she’d have shown up at our club once or twice.’

  Buzz throws me a sharp look but I keep my face flat. He says, carefully, ‘We interviewed your managers at the time. Inspected payroll records and so on.’

  Dad says, ‘Payroll! Trouble is, when you’re the boss, you want everything to be done just so. Every box ticked. So you tell everyone you want it done right, but then, you know how it is, the minute your back is turned. A girl doesn’t turn up when she’s meant to. Someone has the flu. The night manager is short handed. What’s he going to do? Probably make a few calls and pay someone under the table. I said all that to Emrys, in fact. Told him to ask around. They’ll tell him stuff they’d never tell me.’

  A thought strikes him.

  ‘In fact, sod that, I’ll call Em now. Think of that poor girl in someone’s bloody freezer!’

  He pulls out his phone and stomps off, incapable of making a phone call while sitting still. It must have been torture for him, the days before mobiles.

  I smile at Buzz. He doesn’t know how to read this. Is my dad genuine? Or is this all prearranged? He tries to get a clue from my expression, but my face is a smooth, clear wall of nothing.

  After a few moments, Dad comes back in. ‘Do you have photos? Of the girl? Mary?’

  We say yes. Not on us, but we can call them up from anywhere with Internet access. Dad leaves again. Buzz and I talk about the bar downstairs for a couple of minutes, until he comes back. ‘Let’s go,’ is all he says.

  Downstairs and outside to the Range Rover.

  Buzz in the front alongside Dad. Me in the back. Dad starts talking to Buzz about the Wales–Australia rugby match. We lost it apparently. There’s another match against South Africa in a couple of days. Dad thinks we’ll win. Buzz thinks we’ll lose.

  Dad and Buzz are both tall, big men. I am five foot two and hardly big. There’s something about the scale of the car, the size of the two men in the front, and me all alone in the back which makes me feel about eight years old. Like I’m swinging my heels on the way to the beach while the grown-ups talk about grown-up things.

  The city moves past the windows.

  The rain has returned, but not much. Speckles on the windscreen. Buzz and Dad are talking about a rugby player called Jones. I listen in for a while, but there seem to be at least four different Joneses in question, which seems excessive, even by Welsh standards.

  We leave town, or sort of leave town. Arrive in Saint Fagan’s, a village which just about remains that rather than a mere suburb. Dad turns aggressively onto the Crofft-y-Genau Road, then right again when we get into the village. Buzz has stopped talking about rugby. Dad too.

  He parks outside one of the houses. White stucco. Modern. Decent-sized garden. Garage.

  ‘Rhys Jordan, one of my managers,’ Dad tells us.

  We all get out.

  The rain softens the air. I feel it on my face and, for a moment, have no self-consciousness about it. I’m just someone feeling rain on my face and I like it.

  Dad bangs on the door, rings the doorbell and shouts, ‘Hello, Rhys?’ He starts telling us that Jordan probably isn’t in, although there are lights on inside and only a matter of seconds have passed since he started banging, ringing, and shouting. Then there’s a shape behind the glass, and the door opens. Mid-forties. Black hair thinning on top. Dishevelled, but in a way that inclines toward handsome rather than repellent. Rhys Jordan seems sleepy, but I suspect that’s all part of the look.

  He sees Dad and says, ‘Oh, Tom, okay, do you want to –’ but Dad doesn’t need to be invited into places, he just needs an open door. We’re already inside. The hall, then the living room. The living room is larger than I expect and looks all early seventies. A big, curvy orange sofa. A fake zebra skin. A gas fire. A couple of lava lamps. The look is so carefully retro, I imagine it’s achingly hip. There’s even a record player and a stack of vinyl by one of the lava lamps.

  There’s a woman on the sofa. Pale skin. Long black hair. Immaculately smooth, the way Welsh hair gets only with straighteners. Black sweater over black jeans. Jewellery and red nails.

  ‘Corinne, isn’t it?’ says Dad, who never gets a name wrong. ‘How are you, love? Rhys behaving himself, is he? You’ll tell me if he doesn’t. These two ruffians are police officers, would you believe? Detective Sergeant David Brydon, this one. That’s Fiona, my daughter. You’ve met before, have you? You must have. No? That’s terrible, Corinne, we must have you over. Look, sweetheart, be a dear, will you, and give us a few minutes? No problem, we just need to talk to Rhys.’

  Corinne sways gracefully up from the sofa. She’s going to go upstairs but a quick conference with hubby in the hall sends her out into the night. We see her vanishing down the garden path in a long coat, her hair wound up inside a woollen hat.

  Dad looks at Jordan, who looks at Buzz first, then Dad. I don’t exist, not in this duel of glances.

  Dad says, ‘Emrys has spoken to you, has he?’

  Jordan: ‘Yes.’

  Then Dad, explosively: ‘Fuck it, man! Why the bloody hell didn’t you come clean? Years back. There’s a dead girl involved here.’

  ‘Look, Tom, we gave the police –’

  ‘Don’t give me crap. I never take crap.’ Dad’s eyes are blazing. He is either genuinely angry or giving a master class in how to act it. I can’t tell. But Jordan is scared. Not pretending, the real thing. ‘Fi girl, be a love, would you, and –’

  But I’m already on the case. There was a laptop closed up beside the sofa. I’m booting it up, waiting for a Wi-Fi connection.

  The computer processes slowly. Buzz watches the scene silently.

  Then we get a connection. Jordan gives us the password. I log myself into the police portal and bring up photos of Mary Langton. Not the ones of her dead: the leg, the head, the other bits and pieces. I like those photos, the head shot especially, but my tastes aren’t widely shared. I
bring up the others.

  Langton playing hockey. Langton at graduation. A family photo. The one of her at the party wearing her Shoes of Death. A couple of her swivelling around a pole.

  Jordan nods.

  ‘Yes,’ he says. His voice is husky on his first attempt, then he clears his throat and repeats the word.

  Buzz says, ‘Are you able to identify this girl as a dancer at your club?’

  ‘Yes. Or no, I’m not sure. Waitress probably.’

  Dad nods, a micro-nod not intended for general consumption. I suspect he thinks Langton didn’t have the physique required for a dancer in one of his clubs. Her plump hips would have been fine in a spangly miniskirt, her breasts would have nestled nicely in their cutaway bikini top. But that uniform was for the waitresses and bar staff. The dancers wore less and earned more.

  Buzz goes back to his question. ‘Can you confirm that you employed this girl, Mary Jane Langton, in some capacity – either waitress or dancer – at your club?’

  ‘Yes. She wasn’t employed, exactly. She was never on the payroll. But she was on our list of phone numbers to call if we were shorthanded. And . . .’

  And?

  Buzz runs through the inevitable follow-up questions. I take notes as he does so.

  How often would Langton have been employed on that basis? A couple of times a month, probably. She had a reputation for being a steady worker. Under pressure from Buzz, Jordan’s ‘a couple of times a month’ changes to ‘pretty often, I suppose.’

  How was she paid? In cash, from the till. Payments weren’t large, because waitresses could make up to £120 an evening in tips. On busy evenings, waitresses would be expected to work for tips alone.

  Why was this information not disclosed to the police at the time of the original investigation? Because the payments were under the table. Jordan was worried about the taxman. Dad had to interject at this point, ‘Fuck’s sake, Rhys. A dead girl. A dead girl and you’re worried about a stupid little tax thing.’ An exchange of glances follows, which I can’t read.

  Back to Buzz. Over what period of time was Langton employed? Jordan offers us one answer – a few months – then corrects that to more like six – then says he doesn’t know.

  Dad asks him how he can find out. Jordan says he’s not sure, then says there’ll probably be a cashbook somewhere, so they can reconcile till takings to the electronic cash register. Then he says he’s not sure if a book would still be around from so many years back. Dad gets antsy again and makes Jordan phone someone called Colin at the club. The person called Colin says he’ll get straight back to us.

  The room goes quiet.

  Dad is still fuming. Buzz lets him fume. Outside, I see Corinne coming back, a dark shape gliding up to her own front door. I go to intercept her and we stand outside together.

  ‘Is there a problem?’ she asks.

  ‘Not really. Rhys withheld some information from a murder investigation and we may want to give him a bollocking, but that’s about the limit of it.’

  She smiles. White teeth, red lips.

  I ask her if she has a cigarette. She does. We stand there on her own front doorstep, smoking. I don’t usually smoke tobacco, but it feels nice, this.

  I ask her what she does. She says, ‘Music production.’ I don’t know what that means, not really.

  The phone rings inside the house. There’s a conversation.

  Corinne and I talk about what we’re doing for Christmas. She and Rhys are going to her family in Merthyr. I say, ‘Same here,’ then have to explain my family isn’t in Merthyr, but in Cardiff.

  There’s a crashing sound behind us. Dad yelling. Corinne and I are suddenly keenly aware that my father is furious at, what – her partner? her husband? – in the house behind us. An awkward silence. Corinne says, ‘They say it’s going to get a lot colder soon. Freezing, apparently.’ I say, ‘Really?’

  They’re finished inside. Rhys comes to the door, lets us in.

  Dad is rolling his shoulders, eyes smouldering. Buzz stands aside, watching everything. We say goodbye.

  Dad, Buzz, and I get into the Range Rover, head back into town.

  ‘Where can I drop you?’ says Dad. The first words since we left.

  Buzz and I exchange looks. The three main choices: Buzz’s flat, Cathays, or Dad’s club. But it’s no choice really.

  ‘We’d better go to the Unicorn, interview people there. Sorry, Dad.’

  ‘No, no. No sorries. You two have got a job to do.’ He drives on in silence. The rain is back again, but more heavy now. Welsh weather. ‘Listen, I’m sorry I shouted.’

  ‘That’s okay,’ says Buzz. ‘You had every right.’

  ‘Bloody traffic.’ Dad mutters a little later, but before long we’re at the Unicorn. The Virgin and Unicorn. A neon sign. The word Virgin in simpering pink, the word Unicorn in deep flesh red.

  Buzz and I get out, say goodbye to Dad. He apologises again and drives off with a fierce sprayback from his rear tyres. My face can’t feel or not feel the rain. It’s already inside the club, with its girls, its cashbooks, and its secrets.

  18

  Later. Ten thirty in the evening. The rain gone and skies clearing.

  Buzz and I leave the club. Only now is it starting to get busy. On the stage behind us, the first breasts and thighs are starting to appear, like stars emerging overhead.

  It feels weird being here with Buzz. Knowing that he’s a bloke. That his hormones are tugging him backwards into the bar behind us. I haven’t looked down, but for all I know he’s aroused. Why wouldn’t he be? Why shouldn’t he be? We walk out into the night, feeling weird.

  Watkins is there waiting. Her silver-grey BMW, sleekly parked, sidelights on. The Ice Queen’s face expresses no sign of her having seen us, but the car purrs into life and the sidelights switch to headlights.

  Buzz gets in the front. I get the back again. The child’s seat. Swinging my feet and thinking about ice cream.

  We drive to Cathays.

  Not much conversation. We’ve already briefed Watkins by phone. We’ll have a proper debrief in her office. As we drive, she asks us to get Susan Konchesky to join us. It’s an order, obviously, but first I do nothing, somehow assuming that Buzz will call her. But that’s not the police way of things. I’m the junior officer in the car and anything boring is my job, anything interesting is someone else’s. Buzz moves uncomfortably in his seat. His way of reminding me to stick to the party line: We don’t keep our relationship a secret, exactly, but nor do we do anything to advertise it. Him making the call instead of me would be an advertisement, albeit not a very big one.

  So I jump to it. Find my phone, make the call. Tell Susan Konchesky that if she’d had any idea of having a nice evening, she could pretty much forget it. I don’t put it quite like that, but I put it enough like that that Watkins’s habitual air of grim annoyance thickens into something soupier.

  Susan says, ‘Okay, if I have to. Where are you now?’

  I say, ‘In a car, with DI Watkins.’

  She says, ‘You’re joking,’ but she can tell I’m not.

  When we get to Cathays, Buzz, being a man, has to go and pee. Konchesky hasn’t yet arrived. I find myself going to the kitchenette with Watkins to make coffee. While we’re waiting for the kettle to boil, I put my hand out to feel the fabric of Watkins’s suit sleeve.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘Do you mind? It’s lovely.’

  If she does mind, it’s too late. But she doesn’t, or doesn’t say she does. The kettle boils. Three coffees for everyone else, peppermint tea for me.

  There’s a stupid moment of awkwardness at the door as we’re sorting out who picks up which mug and how we get out of the door without pouring boiling fluids over each other. Which is good. I’ve made Watkins the Badge nervous. A stupid triumph, but sometimes I enjoy stupid things.

  To Watkins’s office, with mugs. Buzz arrives, bladder nicely empty. Konchesky too, nervous, clutching paperwork.

  All the lights are on.
Ceiling tiles and that unblinking fluorescent glare. It feels wrong. Unsettling.

  Watkins to Buzz: ‘Okay, from the beginning.’

  Buzz reports everything that happened. Or rather, he takes a series of life events and translates them into police-ese. ‘The witness confirmed his identity as Rhys Jordan and that he has been employed as manager at the Virgin and Unicorn for a total of nine years.’ He doesn’t normally talk like a training manual, but everyone behaves weirdly in front of Watkins.

  ‘When we got to the club, we spoke to Colin Jones, who produced the relevant cashbooks. We have them with us now. In the eight months before her death, Mary Langton received cash payments from the Unicorn on fifteen different occasions. Amounts ranging from twenty to eighty pounds.’

  ‘Dates?’

  I have a list of the dates in my notebook and pass them over.

  ‘Susan?’

  Konchesky has been doing a lot of the gruntwork on Khalifi. She’s been back through his bank records for a full nine years. He was no saint. Numerous card transactions place him in clubs and bars. He’s been more abstemious in recent years, but further back he appeared to have been out on the town most Friday and Saturday nights. She has the dates in front of her. Dates when Khalifi used his card in the Unicorn. None of those dates match the Langton ones.

  Khalifi also used plenty of cash. He used to withdraw four hundred pounds at a time and spend it fairly rapidly. So perhaps he was in the Unicorn on one of those Langton nights, but spending cash. No suggestion that he was trying to keep himself invisible, just that he liked to use cash.

  Watkins, Brydon, and Konchesky bend over the various lists and printouts trying to find a match. I lean away, wondering if it would be okay to turn off the overhead lights and just rely on the desk lamp. I don’t like the brightness. The other three mutter to each other as they compare lists.

  I say, ‘Cash payments to Langton all fell on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. The Thursday payments tended to be lower.’

  Everyone looks at me.

  I say, ‘According to Jordan, the girls make most of their money from tips. I imagine waitresses worked for tips only on Fridays or Saturdays.’