Hotbed

by Bill James

  ‘Yes, we all think so,’ Rose said.

  ‘Definitely,’ Articulate said after a while.

  ‘These things can’t be rushed,’ Ember said.

  ‘But accelerated,’ Rose said.

  Ember stood. ‘I have to get to my chores now,’ he said. ‘I’ll leave the bottle. There’s still enough for toppers in it You chat on, by all means. It’s been bracing.’

  ‘We haven’t really got anywhere,’ Rose said.

  ‘I certainly would not say that,’ Ralph said. ‘I’ve filed away in my head the very promising suggestions you’ve given me tonight. In due course, or even sooner, I will bring the file out and consider it properly in context.’

  ‘What does that mean?’ Edna said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘“In context”,’ Edna said.

  ‘Yes, true, Edna. This has to be the way of it – in context,’ Ember replied. ‘Competing proposals to be weighed against one another. In a way, I’m fortunate to have such choice. It’s a responsibility, though.’

  ‘Well, part of the fucking context now, Ralph, is that we have the funds entirely available and entirely ready,’ Edna said.

  ‘You’re well placed, indeed,’ Ralph said.

  ‘Cash, as it happens,’ Edna said.

  ‘Oh, really?’ Ember said.

  ‘What does that mean?’ Mrs Misk said.

  ‘Such a large amount,’ Ralph said.

  ‘We like currency,’ Mrs Misk said.

  ‘There’s much in its favour,’ Ralph replied.

  ‘But this availability might not be so “in due course”,’ Edna said. Mockery there, the old schemer. ‘We wish to apply these legacies as an immediate priority, not “in due course”,’ she went on. ‘Lumps of cash about like this – unwise. There are other openings for investment. We chose to put you and the Monty first on our schedule, sort of favoured client – potential client. I hope you agree this is a natural preference: we’ve known you and the Monty a long time. However, if our offer does not attract an instant response, we might feel it right to turn elsewhere.’

  ‘That choice would certainly be yours,’ Ember said.

  ‘So?’ Edna said.

  ‘I’ve come to learn that in this kind of business a review of all options is vital.’ Ralph gave that finality. He left their table. He felt proud of how he’d managed the meeting with those three. At no point did he allow his rage at their gross cheek and clumsiness to show itself. Snarls had ganged up inside him ready for use, but these he suppressed. None of the trio, nor anyone watching and listening, could have guessed he meant to ban the Misks eternally from the new Monty. Diplomacy Ralph regarded as one of his chief strengths.

  He went to the bar and gave orders that, as soon as the choir paused, musak should be switched on to deter any more singing. Then he did an inspection of the snooker and pool tables to see there were no rips after so many people pressed around, perhaps putting pint mugs on the baize. He ran a hand carefully over the green playing surfaces to assure himself they were all right. This movement struck him as a picture in miniature of the whole Monty situation. He wanted perfection, smoothness, elegant suavity at the club, and yet these qualities were constantly and gravely menaced by the club’s murky membership. Rose and Edna had this correct, no question, the cruel derelicts. But why couldn’t they see that they, personally, plus Articulate, were a hopelessly ridiculous and unacceptable part of that murky membership?

  C.P. Brown came and stood near him. He waited politely while Ember finished his inspection. ‘I’d greatly value a one-to-one talk for a moment, Ralph,’ he said.

  Ember smiled to show he might approve. He had expected an approach by Brown. For one thing, Ralph thought there must be a kind of actorly link, because of his blatant, embarrassing resemblance to the young Charlton Heston. Ralph believed also that Brown would feel an obvious, natural comradeship with another ‘clubman’, Brown representing the Garrick, Ralph the Monty. But it would be the Monty as not simply the present Monty: no, the Monty with a clear capacity to become, in time, at least the equal of the Garrick or the Athenaeum. Brown would definitely appreciate this, even if someone like that provincial slob, Harpur, couldn’t see these grand prospects for the Monty, and resorted to cheap, destructive sarcasm. Ralph prized the word ‘clubman’. To him it spoke of fine, civilized, convivial, reliable, unflamboyant, British qualities, not entirely based on class, but implying a certain status and affluence.

  However, Ralph did realize he must be careful talking to Brown. It would be foolish to get over-relaxed merely on account of those undeniable links – Chuck Heston and the clubs. Brown was almost certain to have been to 15A Singer Road to deal with Joachim’s possessions. Those 15B neighbours might still be very alert and would hear him there, perhaps even see him arrive if they continued watching the road for strangers interested in 15A. They’d come nosying downstairs again. By then, of course, they’d have known of Joachim’s death, through the press or broadcast news, and would be even more tense than when Ember called. They’d be reassured when they found that Brown was Joachim’s brother and would probably give him a history of callers at the flat, and mention the apparent surveillance carried out by the man in the car using a mobile phone. Ralph must decide how much he should show he knew, or half knew. Life was so often like this, wasn’t it?

  Just the same, Ralph thought that a private conversation with Brown would have a good foundation to it, so different from the ludicrous exchange with the Misks – ludicrous mostly on their part, of course, but tainting him because they actually considered he would accept their crude, idiotic offer. Although he knew he would never agree to such a proposal, their assumption that he would, and at an eager gallop, was an unpardonable insult. Because the family had produced a successful fucking bank robber, they calculated this entitled them to talk to him, Ralph W. Ember, as a possible business partner. Some sodding logic! And the kind of job Articulate was trusted with in the bank robbery would most likely have been minor, piffling, marginal – though well paid, to keep him quiet. Ralph found it pathetic and infuriating that they could imagine this gave them parity with him, and especially infuriating because they raised the matter direct, unabashed, in his own club. The Misk lot lacked all notion of protocol and status. Understandable. They’d never been required to use protocol until now. And they entirely lacked status, except possibly sudden money status. Money status did not impress Ralph or any other true clubman, particularly not sudden money. You could win ten million on the Lottery and still fail to get elected to the Garrick.

  They were absurdly jumped up. Ralph had detested the way Mrs Misk sounded off with that word ‘enhance’. She obviously loved it – as if they had some high-minded mission to bring improvement, like school inspectors or landscape gardeners. God, the cheek! And the principal – the only – the principal object for their enhancing programme was the Monty. The condescension nauseated. These were people who big-mouth chanted ‘Mares Eat Oats and Does Eat Oats and Little Lambs Eat Ivy’ in a public arena and did not mind being seen at it. True, Edna said they only sang so as not to seem ‘aloof’. Oh, so sensitive, so damn democratic! If they had to make an effort so as not to seem ‘aloof’, it must be because they considered they were, and should be, ‘aloof’. But when Ralph booted them out of the new Monty it would not be on account of their ‘aloofness’ – disguised or plain – but because they had fuck all to be aloof about other than, maybe, a nice, lumpy bit of recent pilferage, thanks to Articulate.

  Ralph found a table for him and Brown on the opposite side of the room from the Misks, and near the framed, enlarged, black and white photograph of old sailing and steam vessels moored in the docks. Ralph liked to remind Monty members that they lived in what had once been a great seaport, and that the names of areas like Valencia Esplanade commemorated the busy trading then with Spain and other foreign cities. These days, much of the local drugs dealing took p
lace at ‘The Valencia’, as the district was often known now. Ralph’s people worked there, of course. But this did not mean the district’s good – even great – past should be forgotten, in Ember’s opinion. The Monty probably hadn’t existed so far back, but, if it had, the membership would almost certainly have been chandlers, well-to-do general merchants, master mariners between voyages, coal factors. Estimable, solid people. Ember felt envious. ‘So much I don’t understand, Ralph. Gossip, rumour, hints, that’s all I have,’ Brown said. ‘I seem to meet continual shut-off points.’

  ‘Gossip, rumour, hints are all anyone has, I think. Such information – if one can even call it that – is always unsatisfactory.’ Ralph thought Brown might at least have said something decent and appreciative about the club as a conversational start, instead of just plunging into his own damn problems. But Ralph acknowledged that the problems were great, from Brown’s point of view. Did he want to play private investigator here – another of his roles? Ember had time to study this theatrical ‘star’s’ face close-up now they talked. A disappointment. Ralph saw no true distinction there. It seemed an ordinary, two-a-penny sort of face, especially taking into account the rather dated spectacles.

  ‘I don’t feel as if I’m discovering anything about Joachim’s life, nor about his death,’ Brown said.

  ‘His death is a mystery,’ Ralph said. Nobody was ever going to tell Brown he looked like the young Charlton Heston, nor like any other Hollywood leading man. In Ralph’s opinion, Brown had a face entirely unsuitable for a star – theatre or cinema – but which might look all right behind a grille selling tickets for a theatre or cinema. Although Brown’s face was not exactly unpleasant, it lacked zing and authority. Maybe they gave him parts that actually needed a very ordinary face. Ralph wished he

  knew something about that character, Bosola, Iles had mentioned. ‘I went to Joachim’s flat to sort out his things,’ Brown said.

  ‘Singer Road.’

  ‘You’ve been there?’

  ‘I felt I should. I called one night when he’d been out of touch for a while.’

  ‘“Out of touch”? Were you, then, in touch with him individually through work? Did he have some special project for you?’

  ‘When he’d been missing for a while,’ Ember replied. ‘Many noticed it.’

  ‘But you took the trouble to call at his flat personally.’

  ‘He was a valuable member of the company.’

  ‘The people in 15B heard me and came down.’

  ‘Yes, I met them, too.’

  ‘They seemed nervous – said there’d been callers just before Joachim’s body was reported found. “On edge”, they described themselves as. They wondered if I knew what kind of work Joachim did. They seemed to think that might be relevant. I had to say no. Well, it’s true: I don’t really know, do I? It was as if they feared being dragged into an area of life they knew nothing about and felt scared by. They’d chosen a flat in respectable suburbia and then these links with an entirely different kind of milieu began to show themselves.’

  ‘I would have been one of those callers,’ Ember replied. He wanted Brown to see him not just as owner of a potentially brilliant club and chief of a fine business, but a leader who felt solid responsibility to each of his workforce, no matter how insignificant. Ralph would certainly not like to be thought of merely as a distinguished figurehead famed for his unforgettable features. Incidentally, he had seen that the woman from 15B was slightly mesmerized by his looks, despite the shadowiness around the door of 15A. Ralph had grown used to such reactions from women, of course.

  Occasionally, he might respond, but Sally from 15B hadn’t

  excited him, though not at all untidy.

  ‘And a young girl also called,’ Brown said.

  ‘Yes, they mentioned that to me.’ Ralph decided to admit this, so he could show doubt about its importance. He had to keep Venetia out of an increasingly grim mess. She was a girl he’d paid big euros to nuns in Poitiers and Bordeaux for, hoping they’d implant restraint and refinement. Besides, Ralph saw a danger that, if Venetia were identified as the visitor who shouted through the letter box at 15A and left a note, the suspicion might grow that he, Ralph, had done Turret Brown. People knew how much he fretted about Venetia and her strong, dodgy, romantic urges. By ‘people’ Ember meant Harpur and Iles. They, in their intrusive, disrespectful way, would understand why her father had sent Venetia off to France. And they would understand in their intrusive, disrespectful way – or think they understood – how Ralph might decide to deal with one of his crook underlings, twice her age or thereabouts, if it looked as though he meant to move in on Venetia, and vice versa. Very much vice versa: he could visualize his child yelling her plaintive calls into an unresponsive hallway of an empty flat through an indifferent letter box. Poor, avid Venetia. He longed for her happiness. How Ralph wished she could be content with Low Pastures and her ponies and the paddocks and gymkhana wins, and her good school. Of course he would occasionally talk over these anxieties about her with Margaret, his wife. Responsibility for keeping the child safe must be entirely his, though. He could not dodge that, would not try to dodge that. Ralph believed in fatherhood.

  Perhaps, in fact, he would really have considered doing something serious about Turret if he’d lived, and if Venetia continued to stalk him. But he hadn’t lived. Ralph thought he’d spotted Venetia with her bike in the funeral crowd having an immense, soul-sick, mouth-gape, oh-gone-fromme-love-of-my-life weep. He’d felt irritated by this stupid, toothy display, but her performance could lead to no catastrophes. She’d recover, as she always recovered, and Ralph would be on guard for the next one.

  But, at the moment, he had to deal with C.P. Brown. ‘I don’t know much about Joachim’s private life,’ Ember said.

  ‘A young girl – thirteen or fourteen.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The 15B couple said they’d noticed her before in Singer Road, apparently watching the flat.’

  ‘Yes,’ Ember said.

  ‘And did they tell you she seemed a quaint, grown-up sort of kid – spoke of having been sent by “an associate” with a message that “brooked no delay”. They remembered the strangely weighty words.’

  ‘Not always easy to get the age of some girls right. Fashions. She might have been several years older.’

  ‘They’ve told the police about her.’

  This Ember knew. ‘They’d have to,’ he said. Of course, as Turret’s employer, he’d been interviewed by detectives about his death. They wanted information on his life apart from the firm. Ember replied he knew nothing about Joachim’s life apart from the firm. More or less true. Did Turret like young girls, for instance, they asked. So, yes, they’d heard about the unidentified child caller. Or Ember assumed unidentified. Perhaps they knew more than they showed – a customary cop trick. Ralph had to play ignorance and hope it worked. He gave them an absolute blank and turned snooty: would he, for God’s sake, go poking into an employee’s sex life? he said. The main interviewing officer was Chief Inspector Francis Garland, who, apparently, had charge of the inquiry: another one, besides Harpur, reported to have been close, and very close, to Iles’s wife, though perhaps not quite simultaneously with Harpur. No wonder many of Garland’s questions focused on sex – his special study. ‘Ralph, neighbours gave us a description of someone who could be you – in fact, could only be you – calling at 15A,’ he’d said.

  ‘Certainly I went there. A colleague missing. I felt concerned. A visit to his home seemed the least I could do. There’d been no phone response.’

  ‘It struck us as unusual for the head of a firm to take that kind of trouble over someone minor,’ Garland had said.

  ‘On the contrary, any head of a firm meriting such a title would surely feel anxiety about a disappeared member of staff.’

  ‘Did he have any special duties for you – special duties tha
t made for an exceptionally powerful bond?’

  ‘He was a colleague.’

  ‘The woman from 15B said the male caller had a remarkable resemblance to the young Charlton Heston. Ben Hur vintage. She was impressed. We guessed it must be you, Ralph.’

  ‘Me, like Charlton Heston? Never heard that before,’ Ember had answered.

  ‘No? The woman’s husband/partner seemed a bit put out by her swoon at your looks, Ralph. But you’re probably used to that kind of thing.’ Yes, Ralph had noticed this. And, yes, he was used to that kind of jealousy in women’s husbands/partners. It could be a bore.

  Now, in the club, Brown went on: ‘And the 15B people told me the girl claimed to have seen a man watching 15A from a car and speaking into a mobile phone. Did you hear that?’

  ‘They did mention it.’ Ralph hoped this might take some of the interest away from the mysterious girl who had to stay mysterious.

  ‘Who are these people, Ralph? How are they connected to Joachim?’

  ‘No information so far.’

  ‘The 15B couple said the girl wrote a note to Joachim. They actually provided the paper and saw her post it. Yet when they looked later through the glass front door it couldn’t be seen.’

  ‘I was there when they tried to spot it. But a piece of paper, not in an envelope – it could drift, couldn’t it?’

  ‘I imagine the police have this now. The neighbours said detectives and uniformed officers came round to 15A in numbers once Joachim’s body was found.’

  ‘They’d need to search for anything in the flat that might explain his death.’

  ‘Someone in a car watching and talking into a mobile – it could actually be the police, couldn’t it?’

  ‘It could be anybody, anything, suppose the girl had it right in the first place.’

  Brown hesitated, sipped some armagnac. Then he said: ‘Look, Ralph, one story I hear is of a full-out rivalry between you and Shale. That’s why I spoke of a war. Is my brother’s death part of this? Forgive me for the frankness, but I must ask. You’ll understand, I’m sure.’ Suddenly, he had become intense, confidential, demanding. Perhaps the Bosola character was like that.