Fatal Quest

by Sally Spencer

  But he was talking to a dead line.

  The plane tree stood directly behind the park bench. Its solid trunk seemed impervious to the cold, but its smaller branches suddenly began to shiver, as if, so it seemed to Woodend, they had only recently discovered their own winter nakedness.

  ‘Own winter nakedness!’ he repeated, this time aloud – and with mild self-disgust. ‘Leave poetry to them what’s got the trainin’ an’ aptitude for it, Charlie. You just concentrate on catchin’ villains.’

  But the fact that the stark image had come to him, unsought, merely showed that the feeling of bleakness – which had enveloped him while talking to Tom Townshend on the phone – was still with him.

  The sight of Townshend himself – even from a distance – did nothing to help dispel the mood. He was sitting on the bench with the collar of his overcoat turned up around his ears, and his hat pulled down so tightly that it almost covered his eyes. He seemed to be a much smaller man than the one who Woodend had talked to so recently in the Conway Club.

  While Woodend was standing there, watching and worrying, the cigarette in his right hand burned so far down he could feel the heat of it on his fingers. He performed the impressive trick of taking a fresh Capstan from its packet one-handed, then lit the new cigarette from the old one, threw the stub away, and began to walk towards the bench.

  On the phone Townshend had seemed desperate to have a meeting, but now, when he heard Woodend’s approaching footsteps, he did not look up – and even when the sergeant stopped directly in front of him, he kept his eyes fixed firmly to the ground.

  ‘Whatever’s happened to you, I never meant it to,’ Woodend said. ‘I had no idea at all that you’d be runnin’ any risk. I give you my word on that, as an old comrade.’

  Townshend did finally raise his head – just enough for Woodend to see some of the bruising on his face.

  ‘Why is it, Charlie, that when you’re a young man, with so much to live for – so much to look forward to – you throw yourself into the heat of battle without even a second’s hesitation?’ he asked.

  He didn’t sound angry, as he had done earlier – and as Woodend had expected him to now. Instead, his voice was filled with deep sadness, almost as if he were in mourning.

  ‘And why is it that later in life,’ Townshend continued, ‘when so many of the good times are already far behind you – when you know it’s all downhill from now on – that the fear finally comes?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Woodend admitted. ‘Maybe it’s because the less you have left, the more you learn to cherish it.’ He took a deep drag of his cigarette, then said, ‘Tell me what happened, Tom.’

  ‘I can’t help you any more,’ Townshend said. ‘From now on, Charlie, you’ll have to fight the battle on your own.’

  ‘If that’s all you needed to say to me, you could have done it over the phone,’ Woodend pointed out.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So what was the point of draggin’ us both all the way out to the park, on a shitty day like this?’

  ‘It was just the way it had to be.’

  Woodend quickly scanned the area around the bench. A woman, warmly wrapped up, was pushing her brand-new baby in a brand-new pram. A tramp, swathed in even more layers of clothing than the woman, was picking up the cigarette end that the sergeant had recently discarded. And standing in a clump of trees, a hundred yards away, was a man in a green duffel coat holding his hands up to his eyes.

  No! Woodend thought. Not holding his hands up to his eyes – holding something in his hands up to his eyes.

  Binoculars!

  ‘We’re bein’ watched by the feller who’s standin’ in that clump of trees,’ he told Tom Townshend.

  ‘Yes, we are,’ Townshend agreed.

  ‘How long has he been there?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘All right, then, let me put it another way – how long is it since you first noticed him there?’

  ‘I didn’t notice him at all. I had no idea where he’d be – but I knew he’d have to be somewhere.’

  ‘Why is he here?’

  ‘Can’t you work that out for yourself?’

  Yes, Woodend thought, he probably could.

  ‘He’s here because somebody decided that it wasn’t enough for you to just tell me you weren’t goin’ to help me any more – you had to be seen to be tellin’ me?’ he guessed.

  ‘Yes, that’s exactly why he’s here,’ Townshend agreed.

  ‘Well, since he is watchin’ us, we might as well give him somethin’ interestin’ to watch,’ Woodend said.

  He threw his cigarette on the ground, grabbed Townshend by the lapels of his overcoat, and jerked the journalist roughly to his feet.

  ‘For God’s sake, what are you doing, Charlie?’ Townshend gasped. ‘Are you trying to scare me? Because if you are, you’re wasting your time. I couldn’t be more terrified than I am already.’

  ‘I can see that for myself,’ Woodend said softly. ‘An’ believe me, that’s not my intention, Tom. All I’m tryin’ to do is put on a good show for your mate over there.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Townshend said.

  ‘If I just walk away, he’ll never know what you’ve actually said to me. But if I rough you up a bit – an’ then storm off in a temper – it’ll be obvious that you’ve delivered just the message you were supposed to deliver.’

  He released his grip on the other man’s lapels, and pushed Townshend roughly back onto the bench.

  ‘Jesus Christ, that hurt,’ the journalist groaned.

  ‘It was meant to hurt,’ Woodend told him. ‘We’re bein’ observed by a professional, an’ if I’d tried to fake it, he’d have known it was faked.’ He lit up another cigarette. ‘Who did this to you, Tom?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Are you sayin’ you didn’t recognize them?’ Woodend asked, waving his hands angrily in the air for the benefit of the man with the binoculars.

  ‘That’s right, I didn’t recognize them,’ Townshend agreed.

  ‘You’re lyin’,’ Woodend told him. ‘You know the face of every major villain in London. That’s your job.’

  ‘The … the reason I didn’t recognize them was because they were wearing masks,’ Townshend stuttered.

  Woodend shook his head. ‘No, they weren’t.’

  ‘I swear to you …’

  ‘An’ the reason they weren’t wearin’ masks was because they wanted you to know who they were – an’, more importantly, they wanted you to know who it was that had sent them.’

  ‘You’re right, of course,’ Townshend agreed weakly. ‘I do know who sent them. But I daren’t tell you.’

  ‘Then what can you tell me?’

  ‘Nothing! I can’t tell you a bloody thing!’

  ‘What did they say to you?’ Woodend persisted.

  ‘They told me it was about time I started minding my own business.’

  ‘An’ what did they mean by that?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘You’re lyin’ again.’

  ‘They … they told me to stop trying to find out who was behind the Meadows Educational Trust.’

  ‘Have you found any more about the trust than you knew the last time we talked?’

  ‘No. And that’s the truth, Charlie! But even if I had found out more, I wouldn’t tell you now.’

  ‘Under the circumstances, I can’t say I blame you,’ Woodend said. ‘Is the watcher still there?’

  ‘He’s still there,’ Townshend confirmed.

  ‘I’ll leave in a minute,’ Woodend told him. ‘But before I do, I’m goin’ to have to hurt you again, so you’d better brace yourself.’

  ‘Do you have to?’ Townshend groaned.

  ‘You know I do. It’s for your own protection.’

  ‘Then make it quick.’

  Woodend lashed out with his right hand. Townshend never saw the blow coming, but when it struck his cheek, his head rocked.

  ‘Well
, that should certainly convince the watcher,’ Townshend said, with what passed, on his battered face, for a grin.

  ‘I’m sorry I got you into this, Tom,’ Woodend said, looking down at him. ‘If I’d known how deep it ran, I’d never have asked you to help.’

  Then he turned, and stormed away like an angry man who had been frustrated at every turn – which, given the circumstances, wasn’t a hard show to put on.

  Nineteen

  As he’d left Tom Townshend and Green Park behind him, Woodend hadn’t even stopped for a moment to wonder where he would go next – because he’d already known he would be heading for Balaclava Street. The place seemed to have a hold on him. It exerted a magnetic – or perhaps even magical – pull that was hard to resist. Now, back in Canning Town and standing on the sordid street where hopes and dreams died before they had even begun to come into bud, he asked himself why he had bothered.

  He didn’t know what he expected to find there. He didn’t really know if he expected to find anything at all. But since DCI Bentley’s official investigation clearly wasn’t going anywhere – and Tom Townshend’s enquiries had been brought to a sudden, terrified halt – he had to do something himself.

  Or to put it another way, he thought despondently, he had come back to Balaclava Street because he had no idea where else to go.

  He walked slowly from one end of the street to the other; past the door of Victoria Jones’s looted house; past the window behind which Lene sat watching her own narrow world go by; up to the pub where – contrary to what the DCI had claimed – Victoria Jones had not spent her days drinking, and where her daughter, Pearl, had never rung her to say that she all right.

  He supposed that what he’d secretly been hoping for (so secretly that he’d even been keeping it from himself) was that someone would approach him and provide him with the lead which would get the investigation rolling again: a neighbour, who had written down the registration number of the big black car which had, early one morning, spirited Victoria away; a friend of hers from church (another darkie Christian, as her neighbours might say), who would be able to tell him where she got her money from; a snotty-nosed kid, a talking dog – anybody, or anything, which could give him the break he needed.

  When he was finally approached, it wasn’t by any of these. Instead, it was by three hard-looking men, who walked towards him with a firmness of purpose which left no doubt in his mind that he was their intended target.

  He waited until they were a few feet from him, then raised his hand and said, ‘Stop right there.’

  ‘Or what?’ one of them asked – but they had stopped anyway.

  ‘Or I’ll breathe all over you.’

  ‘Come again?’ the man said, as if he suspected he’d misheard.

  ‘I’m just gettin’ over a very bad case of the flu,’ Woodend warned. ‘An’ let me tell you now, you wouldn’t want my germs.’

  And he was thinking, These aren’t local lads at all. They’ve been brought in from outside.

  Which was not good news – because London gangsters generally cleaned up their own mess, and it was only when they had a particularly nasty job they needed doing that they brought in outsiders.

  ‘Did you hear dat?’ said the man who was clearly the leader of the trio. ‘He just threatened to breathe all over us! What we’ve got here, lads, is a bobby who can do a comic turn! I like dat.’ He turned to the man on his left. ‘Don’t you like dat, Paulie?’

  ‘Oh, I do, Eddie,’ the other man agreed obediently. ‘I enjoy a good laugh, me.’

  ‘How about you, Jack?’ Eddie asked the third man.

  ‘I tink the bobby’s a regular riot.’

  They were Liverpudlians, Woodend realized.

  And that was more bad news – because there no harder gangs in the whole country than the ones based in Liverpool.

  ‘But ja know what’s an even funnier joke?’ the man called Eddie asked Woodend. ‘I’ve gorra a pistol in my pocket, an’ if you don’t do exactly what I tell you, I’m gonna blow your bloody head off.’

  Eddie didn’t want to shoot him – Woodend was sure of that – because the Liverpudlian knew that once he’d killed a copper, he was a marked man.

  No one would protect him. No one would hide him. The moment he pulled that trigger, he was putting a rope around his own neck.

  So Eddie didn’t want to shoot him – but if things didn’t turn out how he’d planned them to, if he lost his nerve for a moment – then he just well might!

  ‘Let’s hear your patter, then,’ Woodend suggested.

  ‘My patter?’

  ‘The little speech that you’ve got worked out in your head.’

  ‘Oh, dat patter,’ Eddie replied, with a grin. ‘Well, it’s like dis, Sergeant. We’ve come all de way down to the big city to teach you a lesson you won’t forget in a long time. Now if you make us do it here, where there’s witnesses, it’s gonna be a very rough lesson. But if you let us take you into a back alley – if you cooperate with us, like – we might go a bit easier on you. So which is it to be?’

  Eddie was lying, Woodend thought. The beating would be just as harsh wherever it was administered. But the longer it was postponed, the more chance there was that the three thugs would drop their guard for a moment.

  ‘I’ll cooperate,’ he said.

  ‘A wise choice,’ Eddie told him. ‘I tink you’d berra turn round now, Sergeant. And do it slowly.’

  Woodend performed a slow turn, and the moment he was facing the other way he felt strong hands grip his arms tightly.

  Anyone who was watching would know exactly what was going on, he told himself.

  But would they care?

  Would they call the police station?

  No chance!

  In the eyes of most of the occupants of Balaclava Street, beating up a copper was almost a public service.

  With Eddie behind them – and his pistol no doubt pointing at the sergeant’s head – Woodend and the two other Liverpudlians walked a few yards down the street, and then turned into a narrow alley.

  ‘Shall we do it here?’ Paulie asked.

  ‘No,’ Eddie replied. ‘Let’s take him round to der back street. It’ll be wider, so we’ll have more room to do de business.’

  As they wheeled around the corner, Woodend saw that Eddie had been right. The back street was much wider than the alley, wide enough to accommodate what the council called ‘the sanitary engineers’ vehicle’ and everybody else – well aware that its sole purpose was to collect the large pails (often swilling over with faeces) from the street’s outside toilets – referred to as the ‘shit cart’.

  But while there was more space for Eddie’s crew, there was also more space for him, Woodend thought. Because though he accepted the fact that he was going to take a beating – and probably a very bad one – he was not going to go down without a fight.

  ‘Dis’ll do as well as anywhere,’ Eddie said, when they had walked a few yards up the street.

  Paulie and Jack stopped, did a half-turn, and – without relinquishing their grip on his arms even a little – flung their prisoner against the wall.

  Woodend gasped as he felt the breath forced out of him. But no real damage had been done. Not yet!

  Eddie marched up and down in front of the other three men, like an officer inspecting his troops.

  ‘Before we do what we’re here for, I’ve been told by the feller who sent me to ask you a few questions,’ he said.

  ‘An’ who is “the feller” who sent you?’ Woodend wondered.

  ‘We don’t want to go into names. Let’s just call him “a concerned friend”, shall we?’ Eddie suggested. ‘Can I ger on wid de questionin’ now?’

  If Woodend could have shrugged, he would have done, but he was still held in a vice-like a grip which made such a gesture impossible, so he simply said, ‘If that’s the way you want to play it.’

  ‘It is de way I want to play it,’ Eddie told him.

  ‘Then ask away.’
/>
  ‘What your “friend” wants to know is why, when he went to all de trouble of phoning you up to warn you off de darkie girl’s case, you didn’t listen.’

  ‘I must have had the phone held up to my left ear, an’ that’s the one that I’m deaf in,’ Woodend said.

  ‘Still de comedian,’ Eddie said. ‘I wonder if you’ll still find it funny when you’re crawlin’ around on the ground, looking for dat left ear of yours.’

  ‘What else did my “friend” say?’ Woodend asked.

  ‘De other ting that he wanted me to ask you was if you was really as stupid as you seem to be.’

  ‘An’ why would my friend think that I was stupid? Just because I wouldn’t listen to him?’

  ‘No – because you wouldn’t listen to anybody. He says dat even an idiot like you should have worked out by now that nobody wants the case solved – and dat includes your bosses in the big cop-shop on de river.’

  It was time to make his move, Woodend decided.

  He let his body go limp – as if he were almost on the point of collapse – and said, ‘Listen, Eddie, you don’t have to do this, you know.’

  ‘Did I say you could call me “Eddie”?’ the other man demanded.

  ‘No, but …’

  ‘Then call me sir.’

  Woodend gulped. ‘You don’t have to do this, sir.’

  ‘But I do have to do it,’ said Eddie, who was still parading up and down in front of him. ‘I’ve already been paid to do it.’

  ‘But … but if you went back to the man who sent you …’

  ‘Your concerned friend?’

  ‘Yes, if you went back to him, an’ you told him that you thought I’d already learned my lesson …’

  ‘Not quite so full of yourself now, are you?’ Eddie asked. ‘Face it, Charlie, you’re going to take a hammering,’ he grinned again, ‘so you might as well just sit back and enjoy it.’

  ‘Please …!’ Woodend begged.

  And then he tensed his body – and lashed out with his right foot.

  He would have liked to have kicked Eddie in the groin, but the angles were all wrong for that, so instead he aimed at his left kneecap.

  Woodend felt his boot connect, and heard Eddie scream out in agony. A heavy thud followed almost immediately, which was probably the sound of the Liverpudlian hitting the ground, but he didn’t see Eddie fall, because he’d already turned his attention to Paulie and Jack, and was attempting to swing them round so that their heads banged together.