Dark Briggate Blues

by Chris Nickson

  ‘Sit down, Mrs Hart,’ he said as he showed her in. He’d expected another telephone call, not a visit.

  ‘I had to come into town and take care of some things,’ she explained as she lit a cigarette.

  ‘Did Carter ring again?’

  She nodded. ‘This morning.’

  ‘What did you tell him?’

  ‘The same as before, that he’ll have to wait. That the police haven’t even released Freddie’s body yet.’

  Her grief sounded convincing. He wondered how real it could be when they’d both spent their time in bed with other people.

  ‘How did he react?’

  ‘He’s very smooth,’ she said, and there was a hint of admiration in her voice. ‘He builds up the pressure so one hardly notices. He’s not someone who likes to wait, is he?’

  ‘No,’ Markham agreed. ‘He isn’t.’ He decided to change the subject a little. ‘Have the police told you when you can have your husband’s body?’

  ‘Monday. The undertaker is collecting it.’ She paused for a moment of reflection. ‘The funeral’s on Wednesday in Richmond. That’s where he grew up.’

  ‘And what then?’

  ‘If Carter offers a fair price, I’ll sell to him.’ She stubbed out the cigarette. ‘After all, I need to live.’

  ‘He won’t. He likes to deal on his own terms.’

  ‘Then he won’t get his hands on Hart Ford, Mr Markham. It’s a simple as that.’ She smirked. ‘I have another offer, anyway.’

  ‘What? You didn’t mention that.’

  ‘It’s not really an offer,’ she corrected herself. ‘Just someone who might be interested.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Will Dawson.’

  He breathed evenly.

  ‘Do you know who he works for?’

  ‘Himself. He owns the club.’

  ‘No, Mrs Hart. He’s the manager of the Kit Kat. Carter owns it.

  ‘What?’ She was full of outrage and disappointment. ‘He never told me that.’

  ‘It’s true.’

  ‘Damn him.’ Joanna Hart set her mouth firmly then loyalty won out over anger. ‘But Will’s family has money. So does Celia’s. He could afford it.’

  ‘Maybe he can. But Carter will be behind any offer he makes. I’d bet on that.’

  ‘I know Will,’ she protested. ‘He’s an honourable man.’

  Markham sighed. He wasn’t sure that honour had any place in the world these days.

  ‘I’m sure he is.’ He’d allow her that. ‘I don’t understand you. I’ve just told you that Dawson’s working for the man who wants your business and you shrug it off. I don’t know what you want from me.’

  ‘Support, advice. And to stand up to Carter.’ She eyed him. ‘You seem to be doing a good job of that.’ She opened her black handbag, took out a purse and produced a ten-pound note. ‘Will that keep your services for a little while?’

  ‘Yes,’ he told her. He had hardly any money in the world but didn’t reach for the note.

  ‘Daddy lent me a little.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘You’re a strange man yourself.’

  ‘Am I? I feel like a confused one right now.’

  ‘Aren’t we all?’ She stood by the door.

  ‘Perhaps we are.’ He paused. ‘Next Thursday.’

  ‘Thursday?’ She turned her head.

  ‘You said the funeral’s on Wednesday. Carter will ring you on Thursday.’ He nodded at the money on the table. ‘You can guarantee it.’

  ***

  He knew exactly where he’d find Carla – in her studio at the Art College. It was where she spent every spare minute. He strode through the corridors, feeling so old next to the earnest students. The room was on the top floor, nothing inspiring about it, just another room behind a door, but inside it was her kingdom. She was standing back, absorbed in studying the painting on the easel, and didn’t even hear him enter.

  The figure was a woman. He felt certain of that, although he couldn’t say why. The long hair, probably, and the slim fingers of the praying hands. But everything else had been stripped away. The flesh of the face was almost down to the bone, the eyes sightless, the clothes just rags covered in mud.

  ‘God, that’s good,’ he said.

  She turned with a smile.

  ‘Thank Donatello, then,’ she told him.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Italian sculptor. Renaissance. This is inspired by a statue of Mary Magdalen that he did.’

  ‘It’s …’ he began.

  ‘For God’s sake don’t say beautiful, Dan.’ She delved under her smock for cigarettes and matches. ‘Please. I don’t want any beauty in there. I want pain, suffering, redemption.’

  ‘You’ve got that.’ He was impressed. It was completely different to anything else she’d done. In spite of what she said, there was beauty in the honesty of anguish.

  She kept her eyes on the painting.

  ‘Not yet. Who knows, maybe I’ll manage it.’ She shrugged off the mood. ‘What do you want to do this evening?’

  ‘I don’t know. A meal? The pictures?’

  She pouted.

  ‘There’s nothing on I want to see. Some friends of mine are having a party later. We could always go there.’

  ‘We could.’ He’d met some of her friends. They had little in common.

  ‘Or we could go out to eat then back to your flat and shag our brains out.’

  ‘That sounds a much better idea,’ he replied with a grin.

  ‘Give me ten minutes to change and do my face.’

  ***

  They went to Donmar. He had enough left to afford it. She’d brightened at the suggestion, but once the meal arrived her enthusiasm dimmed.

  ‘What’s wrong? I thought you liked it here.’

  ‘I do.’ She pushed the pasta around with a fork. ‘It’s just after Italy, the real thing, it’s just not the same.’

  ‘It’s still good. You always enjoyed it before.’

  ‘I know,’ she apologised. ‘It … it just doesn’t taste Italian to me now.’

  ‘We can leave if you want.’

  ‘No. You eat. I’ll just have the wine and a coffee.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  She nodded but he knew all the magic of the evening had already evaporated. Nothing would seem right, the mood had shattered. They could go through the motions but neither of them would be happy.

  He ate in silence until his plate was clean while she sipped her wine and smoked. The waiter brought their small cups of dark, hot coffee.

  ‘Would you rather just go home?’ he asked.

  ‘Would you think I was really terrible if I said yes?’ she asked glumly. ‘I’m sorry, Dan. I hadn’t thought this would make me feel like this.’ She shook her head and gave a weak laugh. ‘It’s all rather silly, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s fine,’ he told her.

  ‘I can just take the bus …’

  He shook his head.

  ‘I’ll take you home.’ He lifted a hand for the waiter. ‘Can I get the bill, please?’

  ***

  He drove. During the few minutes to Headingley they barely exchanged a word. Carla fretted with her handbag and stared out of the window. When he parked she turned to him.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she repeated. ‘I really am. It’s such a stupid little thing. I know that.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  She gave him a peck on the cheek.

  ‘I didn’t mean to ruin everything.’

  Studio 20 was almost empty, the musicians still setting up, piano, drums, bass, trumpet and saxophone. A few people sat around, everyone in his own little world. Did he want to wait and hear jamming that would probably be uninspired? No, he decided, and turned on his heel.

  ‘Dan.’ Bob Barclay’s voice called him back.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Do you remember that young tenor player from last weekend?’ Of course he did. The boy felt the music in his fingers and his
soul. A rarity for British jazz. Rare enough even in America. ‘He sent me a letter. He got the job with Dankworth.’

  ‘I’m glad.’

  ‘There’s talk of Big Bill Broonzy touring over here again. Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, too.’

  He’d heard them on record. Blues on acoustic guitars and harmonica. Good stuff but it didn’t touch his heart like jazz.

  ‘Let me know if they’re coming to Leeds.’

  ‘Not staying?’

  ‘Not tonight.’

  ***

  At home he looked through his records. Not so many of them, really. Finally he selected some Coleman Hawkins, ballads that moved languorously, suiting his mood. By the time the needle clicked in the final groove he’d smoked his way through three cigarettes, not thinking of anything in particular, just letting the sense of regret and loss weigh down on his mind.

  ***

  The grey morning suited him. It was Saturday. He didn’t need to go to the office. Instead he took the list of properties that Carter owned and spent the day driving from one to another, walking each neighbourhood. They had nothing in common, other than the fact they’d becomes his for next to nothing. But it wasn’t wasted time; now he could place them all if he needed.

  ***

  Markham put a shilling in the gas meter and heated up a tin of tomato soup. A concert played quietly on the Home Service, Rachmaninov’s ‘First Piano Concerto’. A book, an evening of the radio and an early night. But he hadn’t even finished ten pages before there was a timid knock on the door. He opened it, wondering who’d want to visit, and saw Carla standing there, biting her lip and looking bashful.

  ‘I’m sorry about last night,’ she said. ‘I must have seemed like a shit.’

  ‘I didn’t know what to think.’ He’d wondered if her final words the night before had meant it was all over.

  ‘Can I come in?’ she asked and held up a bottle of the Chianti she’d brought back from Italy. ‘Peace offering.’

  ‘What would you have done if I’d been out?’ he asked later. They were sitting on the floor, only the light through the window illuminating the room.

  ‘Camped out on your doorstep until you came home,’ she answered. He couldn’t make out her eyes. ‘I mean it, I would. And if you’d brought some floozy with you I’d have told her to get lost.’ She sighed. ‘I don’t know. I was fine until we went into the restaurant. I know they want to make it seem like Italy, but as soon as I walked in it just seemed so, I don’t know, false. It made me wish I was back there and I started feeling sad. I took it out on you, I’m afraid.’

  ‘But you’re here now.’

  ‘I had a little cry last night.’ She gave a wan little smile. ‘Well, a lot of a cry, actually. And this morning I told myself not to be so stupid. I like it here, really. If I moved to Italy I’d have to learn the lingo. It’s cheap there but it’s not as if I have pots of money to support myself.’

  ‘And you have me,’ he ventured.

  ‘If you still want a silly cow.’

  ‘I do.’

  Carla put down her glass.

  ‘So yesterday we were talking about shagging. Do you still fancy it?’

  ***

  He woke feeling chilly and realised she’d pulled the sheet and blankets around herself, cocooned and blissful as she slept on. Typical, Markham thought. He washed and dressed, watching her face, then slipped out to buy the Sunday papers.

  They were sitting by the window, drinking tea and reading the weekly scandal and titillation when Carla stretched and said, ‘I should go. I want to do more on that painting.’

  ‘You don’t have to.’

  She leant across and kissed him.

  ‘I do,’ she insisted. ‘I don’t suppose you’d like to give me a lift to the college?’

  ***

  He left her on Woodhouse Lane, striding away purposefully. So close to the city centre that he might as well go to the office and see if there’d been any interesting post the day before. The streets were empty, the shops were shut; even the pubs in the middle of town didn’t open on the Sabbath.

  Bills – rent, rates, another form from the Inland Revenue – nothing he wanted to think about today. He tossed them on the desk and left, feeling happy. They’d had a good night, a very good night that made him smile.

  He turned the corner on to Briggate and paused for a moment. He knew the man leaning against his car, drawing on a cigarette and then studying the glowing tip. Detective Sergeant Ronnie Graham. Someone had pointed him out once. A hard man with hungry pockets and fists that saw more use than his brain.

  Graham was in his early thirties, as bulky and muscled as a boxer, hair so short it seemed to barely colour his scalp. But the dark mackintosh and big, booted feet gave him away as a copper.

  ‘Can I help you, Sergeant?’

  The policeman stared at him as if he wanted to memorise every feature of Markham’s face, the look slowly turning to contempt.

  ‘I think it’s you who needs help, lad, not me.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘A little bird told me what happened to those fingers of yours.’

  ‘You must know some very talkative birds,’ Markham said.

  ‘It also told me what you were supposed to do. Seems like you haven’t been doing it.’

  ‘So it sent down a crooked copper?’

  Graham made one hand into a meaty fist.

  ‘You’d better be careful.’

  Markham had been enjoying Sunday. He felt at peace with the world after time with Carla. He didn’t want this. And he didn’t have to prolong it. He unlocked the car door.

  ‘Was there anything else?’

  ‘I don’t waste the time of day on people like you for no reason. Two things. A reminder to do what you’re told.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘What do you know about a raid on the Kit Kat Club last night? Seems it was ordered by the licensing committee.’

  ‘Maybe someone tipped them off.’ He started the engine. ‘Good day, Sergeant.’

  ‘We’ll be meeting again.’

  He glanced in the mirror as he drove away. Graham was standing, hands on hips, looking at the vehicle.

  Carter was bound to have a copper or two on his payroll. It was inevitable that he and Graham should find each other. The policeman lived with his hand out. He beat confessions from people. He planted items on searches.

  Still, he’d learned something. The licensing committee had already taken action. Twenty quid of Ted Smith’s money well spent. And over the next week it would become more interesting when the inspectors from the planning department visited Carter’s other businesses and found faults.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  ‘I hear you saw Sergeant Graham yesterday.’

  Baker stood by the table in the Kardomah, his face flushed after hauling his bulk up the stairs.

  ‘For a minute or two.’ Markham waved at a seat. The letter from the bank had arrived that morning. No apologies, just excuses. A mix-up in accounting. But he had money again. He was flush.

  ‘Don’t mind if I do.’ The man put his hat on the crisp white cloth and mopped his face with a handkerchief. Joyce the waitress appeared, her steps silent on the thick carpet.

  ‘Cup of tea, luv,’ Baker said, ‘and a slice of cake.’

  ‘We’ve a nice sponge today,’ she told him.

  ‘Aye, that’ll be grand. Just put it all on this young man’s bill.’

  ‘It’ll be a pleasure,’ Markham said wryly.

  ‘What did you do to annoy Graham? He’s not often about on a Sunday.’

  ‘He seemed to think I’d done something that I hadn’t.’

  Baker eyed him sharply.

  ‘There seems to be a lot of that about lately. I think you might have shot someone but you haven’t. Now Graham thinks you’ve done summat else and you’ve not. You’re innocent as a newborn bloody lamb, aren’t you?’

  ‘Not my fault people make mistakes.’ He finis
hed the last of his soup and roll.

  ‘Maybe not. But there’s something going on. Why don’t you tell me what and get it off your chest. You’ll feel better. If Graham’s involved it must have a stink to it.’

  ‘No love lost between you two?’

  ‘He’s a disgrace to the bloody force.’ Baker’s voice was serious and flinty. ‘And if you ever claim I said that, I’ll deny it and break two more of your fingers. Got that?’

  ‘Perfectly.’

  ‘Good lad.’ He stopped talking as Joyce returned, then gave his attention to the food.

  Markham stirred his coffee and lit a cigarette, letting the smoke drift up towards the ceiling.

  ‘Why are you so interested in Graham?’ he asked.

  ‘I told you why,’ Baker answered finally as he slurped the tea. ‘A little fix here and there when you know in your bones that someone’s guilty but you can’t prove it. That’s fair enough, that’s justice is all. But what he does is wrong and it makes us all look bad. If you have something going with him, I’ll see you go down, too.’

  ‘Yesterday was the first time I’d met him.’

  Baker gave a small nod.

  ‘Then make sure it’s the last. If he wants something from you, walk away. Consider that a warning.’

  ‘I don’t want anything to do with him.’

  ‘Then he wants something from you.’ The policeman sat back and lit his pipe. ‘What is it?’

  For a moment Markham considered telling him about David Carter. But he didn’t know how far the man’s influence reached. Not to Baker, that was certain. But those higher up, where everything could become lost? He was safer keeping it all to himself.

  ‘I didn’t give him the chance to tell me.’

  ‘I don’t believe you,’ Baker said flatly. ‘I don’t like you, but you’re not a bloody fool. Don’t get mixed up with him.’

  ‘I’m not going to.’

  ‘And when you’re ready, come and tell me what’s going on.’ He paused for the length of a heartbeat. ‘If you don’t, I’m going to take you in again and question you properly. You know things you’re not telling me.’

  ‘I promise.’

  Baker nodded again and rose, gathering his mac around his body and placing the hat on his head before lumbering away.

  ‘Is that everything?’ Joyce’s voice took him away from his thoughts.