Fiddle City

by Dan Kavanagh

  But that was obviously not going to happen today, thought Duffy. Just get on with your job and keep looking around, those were the rules. He had been allotted his dunce’s corner, and he was expected to sit there until they wanted him. There wasn’t anything special about the corner, he realised, except that he could be watched easily, especially by Mrs Boseley in her little glass hut. Duffy trundled his trolley when asked, and found that his day consisted of the usual mix of short, back-breaking bursts of work interspersed with tedious periods of inactivity. Except that there was always something else to do. With a casual eye and a little bit of bored wandering about, he managed to work out the security system of the place. The alarm, and then on top of it the hidden trigger alarm which goes off if anyone tries to tamper with the main one: not bad, a middle-price item from about five years ago. And somewhere there’d probably be a buzzer to alert the terminal people.

  At one point he wandered over to Mrs Boseley’s eyrie when he noticed she wasn’t there. He half-opened the door, and pretended to look inside; well, she might be under the desk or something. Then he stood politely outside the door, though the glass meant that he could see most of what he wanted to.

  ‘Yes, what are you doing up here?’ Mrs Boseley had suddenly reappeared.

  ‘Oh, Miss, er, Mrs, I wondered if there was any work. I haven’t had anything to do for a bit.’

  ‘I don’t give you work. Mr Gleeson gives you work.’ You needed gloves to talk to her.

  ‘Sorry, sorry. Only trying to be helpful.’ And he walked cravenly back to his corner. But he’d checked the door lock, and worked out where he thought the alarm buzzer would probably be.

  When the dinner whistle went, he tagged along with Casey to the canteen. It was a bit early to call it a friendship: it was more that Casey didn’t actually punch Duffy’s head in for following him about. They sat opposite one another while Casey consumed twice as much food as Duffy. Why didn’t he get fat? Maybe he took a lot of exercise; maybe it was nothing to do with how much you ate, anyway. Duffy feared getting fat, so he didn’t eat much and he took as much exercise as he could handle; he even ran up stairs sometimes – well, if he was in a hurry. Mostly, though, he just worried, and worrying about getting fat seemed to keep him thin. For the time being, anyway.

  Duffy stared at Casey’s long, sallow face, the thin moustache inspired by some old Charles Bronson film, the rocker-revival hairdo. Was anything going on under that hairdo, he wondered. Casey never addressed him – not that Duffy minded – but as a token of incipient toleration he deigned to answer questions, as long as they weren’t asked while he was eating. As he laid down his knife and fork, swabbed at the baked-bean juice on his moustache and exhaled loudly, Duffy asked him,

  ‘You hit many people?’ He indicated Casey’s right hand with a deferential gesture, to fill out the inadequacy of his words. Casey looked at his hand, and as he looked it formed itself into a fist, seemingly without the authority of its owner.

  ‘Only when I ’ave to,’ he replied.

  ‘You got any more tattoos?’ Duffy asked this quickly, sensing Casey’s impatience at the protractedness of their conversation.

  This was one Casey could answer without words. He reached to the neck of his shirt, and pulled open the top two jeans poppers. A line of dashes ran round his throat, interspersed with letters. Duffy read:

  - - - - C - U - T - - - - - H - E - R - E - - - - -

  Casey’s Adam’s apple formed a chunky punctuation mark in this complex instruction, whose implications he allowed Duffy to take on board while he went off and fetched himself two sweets. Duffy watched him demolish them and tried to keep his mind off the idea of getting fat. He imagined a balding, middle-aged version of himself turning up to offer security assistance and being laughed away. ‘We don’t want a fat security man,’ they shouted at him; ‘whoever heard of a fat security man?’

  At the end of the sweets Duffy knew he was allowed to speak again. He adopted a tone of one decidedly less brave than Casey but trying hard to put on a stiff upper lip.

  ‘Is there – is there much violence around here?’

  Casey almost smiled; that’s to say, he seemed to strain a smile through his face, and the sieved remnants of it came out the other side.

  ‘’ad a mate,’ Casey replied, ‘Big nose. Big nose.’ Casey tapped the side of his own conk to help Duffy out. ‘Fahnd ’im in one of them big fridges. In wif the toolips.’

  Casey fell silent, looked almost reflective; then just when Duffy was about to offer his condolences, he went on loudly, with a rolling laugh:

  ‘Didn’t need to send that sod no flahs.’ And he kicked Duffy hard under the table by way of emphasis.

  On his way back to the shed Duffy stopped off at the telephone box and made three calls to breakers’ yards in the area. Two didn’t answer; they must have been out to dinner. To the third Duffy described McKay’s car, and explained that his hospitalised friend had left something in it.

  ‘Nothing like that here, mate.’

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘Sure I’m sure. Look, I might not be able to recognise a tiger in yer tank, but I can tell one when it’s all over the cowing car, can’t I?’

  ‘Sure. Sorry, mate.’

  ‘Any time.’

  He’d have to come back to that later. Another afternoon, and then it would be Friday. Maybe he should do it this weekend – break in. He could be here for days before he picked up how the shed operated; or before he even knew the full range of stuff they transported. All he’d need was a couple of quiet hours; it wasn’t as if he was going to smash anything.

  But of course, he didn’t need to break in. He could get Hendrick to give him the key. Assuming that Hendrick himself was on the level. Duffy never forgot about the client’s angle. But if Hendrick was on the fiddle, why call in Duffy at all? Maybe there were two fiddles, one Hendrick’s and one somebody else’s? It’s Fiddle City, Duffy, Willett’s voice repeated in his head. Yes, but even so, Hendrick wouldn’t call him in if he were on the fiddle himself, would he? Would he? Anyway, what did it matter – if he asked Hendrick for the key, and Hendrick refused, then he threw in the job; if he asked, got it, and then something happened which made Duffy think there was more to Hendrick than he’d been told, he’d throw in the job even quicker. And then he’d take Carol out on the fifty used oncers.

  Friday’s work was like Thursday’s, and Wednesday’s and Tuesday’s. When the dinner whistle blew he hopped it to the telephone box. He told Hendrick’s secretary that he was still worried about the papaws. He hoped the job didn’t last beyond the end of the papaw season, otherwise he’d be in trouble. She put him through.

  ‘Mr Hendrick, it’s about those papaws.’ (It was always useful to remind the clients of their own pathetic security ploys; they liked that.) ‘I think I might need the key.’

  ‘The key to the papaws? Oh, you just cut them open with a knife.’

  ‘Very amusing, Mr Hendrick.’ (Very wasteful on my 10p, Mr Hendrick.) ‘I’m not finding things out quick enough. I think I’d better take a look round this weekend. Can you let me have the key?’

  ‘Er, yes, I don’t see why not. But you’ll have to come and collect it from my home.’

  ‘No trouble, Mr Hendrick, it all goes on the account.’ (It was also useful to remind the client of your expenses.)

  Hendrick gave him an address in Fulham and asked him to call on the Saturday morning. Duffy then rang the other two breakers’ yards; one of them was still out to lunch from the day before, the other, at Yiewsley, thought it might have seen the car, but couldn’t remember where it was. Maybe Duffy would like to call round sometime? Yes, they were open Saturdays: until four.

  So far, so good. Duffy walked quickly to the canteen where he found, to his surprise, that Casey had kept him a chair. Not that the gesture appeared to mean he was going to unbend in any other way. The same silence continued while the serious business of eating was undertaken. Except that when Casey finally thu
ndered his sweet spoon back into his bowl, he actually addressed Duffy, for only the second time in their now burgeoning relationship.

  ‘Where j’ get the ring, then?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Where j’ get the ring, then, if yer not a wrong ’un?’

  Ah, that; so that was what had been preying on Casey’s mind all this time: the stud.

  ‘Girl I’m courting gave it me.’

  Casey in reply gave his delayed exhalation.

  ‘Only I fort you was a wrong ’un.’

  Perhaps I’ve made a friend, Duffy thought.

  Friday afternoon was pay-day. They lined up, all six of them, at four o’clock precisely, outside Mrs Boseley’s office, and went in one by one. Duffy, as the most recent recruit, was last in the queue.

  ‘I hope my work has been satisfactory, Mrs Boseley,’ he said, in a manner which he hoped might seem not too openly ingratiating. Mrs Boseley gave him one of her specially refrigerated glances, and went back to counting his wages. As she handed them over, she said,

  ‘I wouldn’t know, I haven’t been watching.’

  Which was only partly true, because occasionally in the last four days Duffy had looked up from his dunce’s corner of the shed and noticed her blonde semi-beehive pointed in his direction. She certainly made Duffy feel watched, whether he was or not.

  He went and sat on a packing case in his corner. He gazed back at the glass cubicle. Where did a woman like Mrs Boseley come from? Did she have a Christian name, for instance? Did she have a past? Did she have parents, or did she simply drop in through the roof of Hendrick’s shed one day, trim and fortyish and avid to run things? She can’t always have been an office manager; and she clearly didn’t work her way up in Hendrick’s. What could she have done before? Duffy thought of her scraped-back hair, her neat but to him unappealing figure, her bland, well-boned good looks; then he took ten, fifteen years off it, put her into a uniform (without watching while she undressed), and there she was: a stewardess. Or, as they called them then, an air hostess. That was it, that made sense. She was an ex-stewardess; they always retired them at – what was the age, he didn’t know; but it was like Playboy bunnies. Rather unfair, Duffy thought; one day you’re worth the free trips and the businessmen’s glances, and the next it’s sorry, no one wants to look at you any more, no there’s nothing wrong, but isn’t the skin round your jaw a little looser than it used to be, perhaps, and, anyway here’s a nice little ground job which doesn’t involve any travelling except to the loo and the canteen.

  What did old stewardesses do? What did old anything do? Old golfers never die, they only lose their balls. Where had he read that? And what about old security men? What about Duffy when he got fat and old and stopped being smart anymore? Would he become a nightwatchman and sit in a hut roasting chestnuts over his fire, waiting to be peed on by punks who called him Grandad? And would he perhaps be shuffling one midnight along the corridor of some factory, not because he was suspicious or anything but because he was bored and his legs needed the exercise, when some over-enthusiastic cowboy decided to take him out with the wooden end of a shotgun? It was always happening.

  ‘Car keys.’

  Duffy gave a start. Gleeson was standing next to him, chewing slightly, and making his mutton-chops shift softly up and down. Gleeson was one of those chubby people who look as if they are naturally friendly; in his case looks were deceptive.

  ‘Your car’s parked in the wrong place, can I have the keys?’

  ‘Sorry, I’ll move it.’

  Duffy had his hand in his pocket and was making off when Gleeson intercepted his arm.

  ‘Your car’s parked in the wrong place.’

  ‘Yuh, I heard.’

  They stared at each other for a few seconds. Duffy found himself wondering why they’d taken all day to ask him to move it; and, surely it couldn’t be …

  ‘Your car’s parked in the wrong place.’

  God he was stupid. Christ he was stupid. He wordlessly dug out his keys and handed them over. He might have hoisted it in more quickly if he hadn’t been mooning over his old age, but even so … He felt almost ashamed of himself. You take the fifty, you wait for the connection, and then when it comes, you don’t recognise it. Maybe you are getting fat, Duffy.

  In a couple of minutes Gleeson returned. Duffy half expected him to say something, though he didn’t quite know what; something, perhaps, like, ‘Meet you behind the third frigo-container on the right.’ But instead, Gleeson merely tossed the keys to Duffy from a distance of four yards and turned his back. As he caught them, Duffy looked down the shed towards Mrs Boseley’s office. Did he catch a flash of blonde as a head looked away?

  Well, at least something was happening. Better something than nothing, even if you don’t understand it. Duffy couldn’t wait for 5.30, to see why they’d wanted to move his car.

  However, when the whistle blew, he loitered a bit. He changed slowly, and didn’t hurry on his way to the shed door. Anyone who wanted to fall in casually beside him was more than welcome as far as Duffy was concerned. But no one did. Outside, in the small forecourt, his van was in exactly the same position as he had left it in the morning. This didn’t surprise him in the least. He walked slowly across to it, waiting perhaps to be hailed by Casey, who was climbing into his Capri. But nothing happened. So Duffy eased himself into the van. Nothing on the seat. He flicked open the glove compartment: nothing there either. Nothing on the windscreen shelf. He looked over his shoulder into the back, but that all looked the same as ever. Maybe they’ve sawn through something in the engine, thought Duffy; but dismissed the idea as paranoid. Then, as he was backing out of his parking space, he slipped his hand into the driver’s door pocket. Polythene. Ah-hah. He lifted a package on to his crotch and didn’t look at it until he was in second gear. Then he shifted his glance downwards. Calculators. Six pocket calculators; still in their boxes; still in their polythene bag.

  How very kind, Duffy thought. Fifty oncers on the Wednesday, six pocket calculators on the Friday. That thought contented him for not more than half a second, then he changed up a gear into third and slowed the van until it deliberately stalled. He pulled into the side of the road, quarter of a mile from Hendrick’s and half-way to the gate. Then, just in case anyone was watching, he put the van in first and turned the ignition. It fired, the van heaved forwards, and stalled again. He repeated this twice, then climbed out with a not-this-again expression, and threw up the bonnet.

  He fiddled a bit with the plugs as he worked out quite why he felt unconvinced. He didn’t know how these things were done, but he felt sure that they weren’t done like this. You got the fifty quid, and then you got the connection; or you got the calculators and then the connection; you didn’t get both and then nothing. It couldn’t work like that; you had to do something to earn something. What’s more, the calculators were still in their original packaging; the polythene had a couple of stickers on; even a police cadet would be able to work out where they came from.

  Duffy slammed down the bonnet and climbed back into the driving seat. He took a duster and a pair of driving gloves out of the glove compartment. He pulled on the gloves, and with the duster rubbed very hard all over the polythene packing; it would be nice to leave Gleeson’s dabs on it, but there was no way. Then he wrapped the package in the duster, took off the gloves, started the car, looked lengthily in the rear-view mirror, then drove off quickly. He turned sharp left, left again, right, and braked sharply in front of the Gents as if he didn’t know whether or not he could hold it any longer. He ran up the path to the Gents, dived into a crapper, climbed on to the seat and tucked the calculators behind the cistern. One of these days, he thought, public crappers will go over to low cisterns like we have at home, and then where will we all be?

  He smiled to himself as he drove slowly back towards the gate. He didn’t mind at all being picked out at random by a security man and flagged into a special lane where a policeman was waiting. Of course he und
erstood it was all routine. Sure, there’s a lot of it about. Search away. Glove compartment, under the seats, don’t miss the driver’s door pocket. Brief body search, this way please, no problem, might even enjoy it he said to himself. The policeman patted him all over, and as he worked his way up the insides of his legs Duffy said to himself, Don’t get too cocky. The policeman was very friendly as they went back outside to the van, where the security guard had just finished his work; he was also nice to Duffy. Duffy was nice back. He quite understood, didn’t mind at all, any time, feel free, see you again soon.

  As he drove off, Duffy remembered Willett and said to himself: random nose, or scientific nose? Or a bit of help?

  Hendrick opened the door to Duffy with a preoccupied expression. He walked him silently down the hall and into the kitchen, scattering before him a pair of small daughters whom he instructed to go and play outside. As the back door banged, Hendrick fretted over whether he ought after all to let Duffy have the key to the freight shed. Duffy knew the situation well: first you employ someone to help you on the security side, and you tell him all your troubles, and then you start wishing you hadn’t. It was a familiar psychological pattern. And there was an equally familiar way round it. You didn’t stand on your dignity and get petulant and thrust your credentials down the client’s throat; you just went quiet for a moment to show him you weren’t as put out as he expected you to be, and then you tickled the businessman in him.

  ‘Just as you wish, Mr Hendrick, I mean, it’s really up to you. I can’t swear to you I’ll find anything of use if you lend me the key. It’s just that, given the sort of job this is, it’ll definitely cut down the bill if I can get round the shed when there’s no one there. But it’s entirely up to you, of course.’