Divide and Rule

by Solomon Carter

  Before another ten minutes was up and he had skimmed through the trash news that filled the local paper, he ordered his second pint. The first Kronenbourg was already comfortably kneading the edges of his frayed nerves. He was breathing easier and feeling a little more at peace with every passing moment. Got to get my head to together, thought Dan, as the worst of it passed. They have to see I’m still at the race, or I’m done… absolutely finished. Dan caught himself, and tried to push the negative self-talk aside. But there was no way he could do it. This wasn’t imaginary worry. This was pure and simple fact. But if he couldn’t avert them these dreaded new emotions - and the sweats and the freezing fear they brought upon him - then he would have to quit before they noticed. Dan could not endure the shame of knowing he was beaten. Worse, he could never endure the pain of knowing Eva had seen him being... weak. No way. When the time came, if he couldn’t hack it anymore, he would quit.

  Dan downed half of the second pint in three gulps, his tension loosening enough to let out a thin smile. Eva would be home soon. The thought cheered him and he tipped the pint towards his mouth again. He noticed a newcomer standing at the bar beside him. His presence felt strange. Dan hesitated, but felt compelled to turn around and look. He was scared to look. No, he was being weak again. Dan took a short, sharp breath and turned around. It was like discovering he was still inside a very bad dream. Peter Serge stood beside him, all calm and serene with his hands on the bar top. He was waiting for a drink as if it were mere coincidence that he was in the same pub as Dan, right there next to him. Beside Serge was a big man with a roll of fat hanging over the back of his shirt collar. The big man was supposed to be intimidating of course, but Dan saw all the areas of fat along with the gristle in the man’s body. Even at two pints down, Dan knew he would have beaten the man inside twenty seconds. Serge was the only one changing the atmosphere, and changing Dan. All of a sudden, those two pints didn’t seem like half enough to do the job. Dan stiffened up and fought to manage his breathing like it was a feat which needed his complete attention. The barman came up to Peter Serge. “Yes please, gents, what can I get you?”

  “I’ll have a pint of bitter. Jeff?”

  “Lager. Any will do.”

  “Right you are. And you, Mr Bradley? Another Kronenbourg?”

  Peter Serge turned. There was mischief all over his face. Dan couldn’t quite place where the mischief came from, but it was there, like a watermark. Dan stayed still, but looked at the man with determined effort, like it hurt him to do it.

  “No more, thanks, Mr Serge.”

  “Call me, Peter.”

  “I’d rather not,” said Dan.

  “See, Jeff. I like a man who knows his place. You work in the service industry, don’t you, Mr Bradley.”

  The bartender was pouring pints and half listening at the same time.

  “You hired us. I work for clients. You’re a client. That’s a service, I suppose. What’s your point, Mr Serge?”

  “My point is that I like to ensure good customer service.”

  “Read the papers and then check our work record. We don’t need to grovel or beg for work, Mr Serge. It usually comes knocking for us.”

  The drinks arrived and Serge paid with a twenty long ways.

  “The thing is, I did read the papers, Mr Bradley. And I know all about your year behind bars, perjury and fraud, as I recall. And I know all about your history as a pugilist. Pugilist means Boxer, Jeff. Did you know?”

  Jeff nodded eagerly and put his beer to his fat lips. Jeff didn’t mind being patronised.

  “I know you spent a year bumming around after prison, walking around with slum dogs and prostitutes before that mad Russian bastard locked you up and cut your face to shreds. I know it all, see.”

  “It’s not hard to find out, Mr Serge. It’s mostly on the public record.”

  “Yes, indeed it is.”

  Dan felt his mouth going dry, his pulse quickening so fast, he could feel its beat in his neck. He wanted this over, and the sick little man’s black eyes gone out of his life.

  “Look. What do you want, councillor?”

  “I want to say I know you’re a pissing-empty-headed idealist, Bradley. Which makes you a liability. Your previous history proves it. But you’re also the action, the muscle in this silly little private detective outfit you work with. The skirt gives out the instructions, but as far as I can see you make this tick… So I just wanted to remind you that you work for us. You have a responsibility to get this work done, and done well. And… if the opportunity presents itself for you to sort out whoever did this, I want you to do it. Do you know what I mean?”

  “That sorting out part. On a scale of 1 to 5, 1 meaning a telling off and 5 meaning..?”

  “No holds barred.”

  “That’s how you do things, is it? No holds barred?”

  “No, you prat. I’m a local Councillor. I’m an upstanding citizen who cares about the people I represent. I care about the potholes in the roads, and the awful noise made by anti-social neighbours. But Jeff here and a few of my other friends… they love a bit of no-holds-barred. Don’t you Jeff?”

  “Oh, yeah,” said Jeff, not seeming worried he was being used as a threat.

  Dan forced himself to look into the filthy dark eyes of the sharp suited Councillor. It hurt. Dan strained to keep up his gaze.

  “What makes you think I would ever do anything like that?”

  “Because you’re a man of principle. We’re paying you to find a scumbag who nearly killed young Jerry Burton and tried to ruin our election campaign. That’s war, Mr Bradley. And the silly bastards who started this war should have read our history too, eh, Jeff? Because when we go to war, Mr Bradley, we win. And now you work for us I expect nothing less than the same from you.”

  “Maybe your standards are too high, Mr Serge.”

  “Maybe. Or maybe you’re the kind of tart who thinks he can earn money from us and turn us over at the same time. Do you think you want to make some kind of moral point against us? Because I sense it on you more than the girl. The skirt is a pragmatist. She needs the money, but I’m not so sure you care about money. Which bothers me.”

  “I’m no hero, Mr Serge. I’m a proletarian. I work for my dough and I go home at night. I just like to be able to sleep when I need to. I have a conscience.”

  “Oh no. A conscience. Maybe someone will do you a favour and knock that out of you one day.”

  “I got knocked down once or twice in the ring. But I never got knocked out. Not ever. And my conscience is right where it was then.”

  “That’s the spirit, Bradley. Put your back into this case, find the bastard that did it, use your skills to fix this, and everyone’s a winner.”

  “Councillor?”

  Dan just about managed to match his gaze.

  “Yes?”

  “How do I know it wasn’t you that did it?”

  Jeff turned around, and looked shocked enough to spit his beer.

  “Don’t be a total prat, Bradley. We’re a team. We’re on a mission. And we’re going to take this country by storm. I wouldn’t ever do anything to jeopardise that mission. Now, you be a good employee, and do your bit, and then the rest of our campaign will all go swimmingly. Do you understand? We don’t need any violent enemies or loose cannons out there. You people came recommended. So live up to your billing. Do your job.”

  “You wasted your time in coming to put the frighteners on me, Mr Serge.”

  “Oh. How come?”

  “Doing our job is what we do best.”

  Dan turned down his pint, thudded the glass onto the bar and turned away. His heart was hammering against his rib cage. His senses were screaming. He wanted to run, to get away, and to breathe some fresh air. Dan forced himself to control his stiff legs, to keep them from wobbling but he dreaded that he looked stiff with fear that he was walking like a robot. It took him an age to walk to the door. He heard the snickering behind him, and felt his face flush a deep red.
He would get over this. He’d gotten over every challenge he’d ever faced and he’d faced a queue every day of his life. This was another one, an internal one, but it was just another opponent, nothing more. As soon as he got outside Dan looked up and breathed a deep lungful of air, and then another. He wiped his forehead of sweat. These new feelings were unbearable, and it was Serge who triggered them. Reading the mixed signals of mischief on Serge’s evil face, Dan was sure Serge somehow knew what he was doing to him. But Dan was an overcomer. One day soon, the fear would be gone. And then he’d put Serge and all his skinhead bums on their backs. But until that day, he had to suck it up and handle it. He had to stay in the game…

  It was plain to see that Dan was not himself and he didn’t even mention the reason for the sweet stench of beer on his breath. He walked into Eva’s office tentatively, quietly even, just after 6pm, a good half hour after Jess had gone home. Dan’s presence in the office and his manner – was troubling. He reminded Eva of a criminal whose conscience is plaguing them. He sat at the spare desk looking at an open screen. These days he did not have a nemesis to google, so she knew he now started his day scanning the sports pages of the BBC website. But now he sat there, struggling with something she couldn’t see. For a while Eva ploughed on making notes about her experiences at the hospital, her thoughts about Burton and the possible directions the case could take. She plotted the names of the interviews she’d need to do to make any progress. Jerry’s friends. His mother. His college. So far everything was wide open. As she typed the tension mounted alongside Dan’s silence. She had intended to wait for Dan to get it all off his chest. But his breaking point never came. Eventually, Eva exhausted her thoughts and questions and looked over at Dan. He met her eyes, but his were semi-distant and glazed with thought.

  “What the hell is the matter, Dan?”

  She watched him struggle with what he was going to say next. His mouth opened, but no words came. He shuffled upright in his chair and smiled, but it was not convincing. Among the rugged charm of Dan’s good looks she could make out the lines of the scars on his face where the butchers in Shad Thames had brutalised him.

  “Peter Serge. What do you make of him?” Dan asked.

  “A very nasty piece of work. A self-centred bigot with a tendency to overuse menacing glares. I think he believes he can freeze people with those horrible eyes of his. And so far, I can’t rule him out as a suspect in the attack on Jerry Burton.”

  “Same here,” said Dan, nodding with a wry smile on his face.

  “What about you Dan? What do you make of him?”

  Eva watched Dan’s face flicker. He blinked before he replied.

  “I think he just might be pure evil.”

  “What do you mean, Dan?”

  “Exactly what I said, Eva. I don’t know if he attacked Jerry Burton or not, but the bastard is evil.”

  Eva felt an unwelcome chill come over her. Not since Victor Marka had she heard Dan talk like this.

  Eva tried to lighten the mood. She smiled. “You came back here to tell me that?”

  “No. I came back for some company, Eva. But you’re busy, and I don’t think anyone wants my company tonight.”

  Eva made a sympathetic face. “I’m busy, Dan, and tired.”

  “It’s fine. I understand.”

  Dan stood and walked to the door. “Eva?”

  She kept her eyes on him the whole way. She nodded when he looked back.

  “I never meant to make things hard for you. Not back then. And not now, either.”

  “I know, Dan. It’s okay.”

  “Lock the door when I’m gone,” Dan walked out into the night, and Eva stared at her notes. They told her nothing which she didn’t already know. But the space created when Dan left felt sorrowful. Something was up. She supposed it was ridiculous that she had ever thought he was fine after all he’d been through in Shad Thames, yet up to now he had been okay. But whatever was going on, he wasn’t okay anymore. Eva walked up to the door, and put the snib on the door lock. Then she bolted the door. Eva had avoided the office the whole day so as she wouldn’t have to deal with the Jess/Dan factor and all their histrionics. But it wasn’t to be. Because in just five minutes of conversation, Dan had her well and truly spooked. Dan the unflappable, the ridiculous, the stupid, the courageous. Eva was spooked most of all because Dan was acting so strange. One way or another, Eva had to get past Dan and Jess to get this done. She needed a clear head and no diversions, no messes to clean up. But sooner or later, Dan was going to need help.

  Seven

  Eva was in a large coffee shop on the edge of town. It was a new looking place, all brown like a Starbucks or Costa, but far too empty. It was the kind of coffee shop in the wrong area which would be closed down in six months. Sitting in front of Eva was a big man who looked like a boy. He was a boy. His name was Gary Mertz and Eva knew Gary Mertz was lying. It didn’t matter why right now – Eva wasn’t sure which part exactly he was lying about – but Eva guessed it could be important later. But getting the truth from someone who was lying wasn’t easy right there in the moment with the liar in front of you, unless you were interrogating them in a police interview room with the right uncomfortable conditions. But Private Investigators didn’t have those kinds of privileges, so Eva had to call on her inner resources. She banked the fact young Gary Mertz was lying about the last time he had seen Jerry Burton, and moved on. Gary Mertz was Jerry’s college pal, one of a few who hung around and drank too much in the cheapest and dirtiest of the local pubs on a Friday. Mertz was a smart student, bright and heading for promising things much as Jerry Burton had been, provided he didn’t go too far off the rails in the meantime. But like Jerry, Mertz was a big lad, and looked like he’d been in a fight himself all too recently. Mertz was sporting a black and had a swollen jaw.

  “So you can’t remember when you last saw Jerry? Surely you’ve got some idea. Was it an hour before Jerry was taken into hospital? Or a day? Or a week?”

  Eva gave him a long look. Sometimes, she knew, her pale green eyes would help her with a witness or a client. She wasn’t in favour of using her looks to hurt people, but Eva didn’t mind letting a young man get caught up in her eyes if it meant he might blurt out the truth in his fluster.

  Mertz got caught up in those pale eyes for a nanosecond, but she saw the boy shake himself out of it just in time. “I don’t know. It could have been a day or a week. I wasn’t counting.” The quiz show buzzer sounded in Eva’s head. Mertz was lying again.

  “So what about the shiner and that pop-eye jaw? Do you remember when they happened? Or are you fuzzy on that part as well?”

  “This? Oh, that’s nothing.”

  “Of course it’s nothing. Tough guys like you don’t even notice when they get smashed around the face.”

  “It wasn’t like that. This all happened during a football match. I’m a centre-half. I’m a hard player, you know. I like to mix it a bit. Sometimes I come up against players who like rough and tumble, like me. It’s just part and parcel of the game.”

  “So the guy must have got a red card?”

  “Um, no. It was an informal kick about. Not a real match.”

  “Those bruises are bad, Gary. I think if someone did that to you, you would have fought back, wouldn’t you, Gary?”

  “What goes around comes around. Yeah.”

  “So what’s his name and where can I find him?”

  “Why? What’s it to you?”

  “Maybe Jerry Burton was at this match and you forgot about it. This other guy might be able to tell me. Or maybe there are other people at that match you’d know better. You could give me their names.”

  “No way. It was just a football match. A kick about.”

  “You said that, Gary. But you do remember some of the people who were there, don’t you?”

  “Jerry wasn’t there.”

  “Is that because it happened after Jerry went into hospital? Or is it because the football match, like half of ev
erything else you’ve told me, never happened at all.”

  “You what?”

  The boy looked shocked, disconcerted. Like a smart villain who had been found out and was now totally undone. There was a glimmer of tears in his eyes. Eva stared him out.

  “I’m NOT lying. If you don’t want my answers, you can take a running jump. Leave me alone. I never wanted any of this to happen to Jerry, did I?”

  “Any of what?”

  “What happened to him, like?”

  “So what did happen to him?”

  The young man shifted in his chair and looked out of the wide window of the coffee shop. A stream of traffic flowed past the window, obscured by the intense wash of water from the autumn rain. Eva checked the direction of his gaze. Mertz noticed it, and a hand made it up to his mouth. He began to bite on his nails.

  “He almost got killed, didn’t he?”

  “That’s right, Gary. He did. Do you think he’s in danger still? Do you think anyone else could be in danger? I mean, there are only what, three days until Jerry’s dad faces the by-election now. That’s three days of danger. Three days of protection for Jerry. Anything could happen, couldn’t it?”

  “That’s life, man. Anything can happen, right?”

  “But some things are more likely than others, right?”