by Dan Kavanagh
‘All right.’
‘You should have told me, I’d have changed.’
Duffy looked embarrassed. Carol thought this was because he felt guilty about how long it had been since he’d last taken her out. But he went on looking embarrassed.
‘Duffy,’ she said sternly, ‘what’s the catch?’
‘Nnn?’
‘What’s the catch, Duffy?’
‘Eh? No catch.’ But she could tell there was. ‘I’ve got to see a man on the way, that’s all.’
‘Duffy, you are a bugger.’ He gave her a wary grin.
‘I know.’
At 8.30 they left and drove slowly into town. When Carol saw the direction in which they were going, she turned to him and said, ‘You’re not taking me to work, are you, Duffy? I mean, I don’t need to clock in till tomorrow morning.’ That made him look even more embarrassed.
They drove much closer to Dude’s this time, and parked about thirty yards short of it.
‘That’s where I’m going,’ he said, pointing down the street. ‘Shan’t be long.’
‘You are a dirty bugger, Duffy. If I see one of my mates tootling past, I’ll send them in just to see you aren’t up to any monkey business.’ But she didn’t really mean it. If Duffy wanted to spend his money in posh massage parlours, then that was up to him. She couldn’t disapprove. And at least it was with women.
There was a different hat-check girl tonight. Blonde, and with breasts … no, Duffy didn’t really want to look at them. There was something about this place that made you feel a lot dirtier, and at the same time a lot less interested. Fifteen pairs of breasts ought to be fifteen times more exciting than one pair; but it didn’t work like that. Even in the booth with the girl he hadn’t really felt much interest in her breasts, because they didn’t seem to be hers: they seemed to be part of the club’s fixtures and fittings. Clipped on, and then put back on the shelf at two in the morning when the last puffing punter was given his hat and eased out into the street.
‘Do you charge?’ he said to the girl, suddenly curious.
‘Twenty pounds, sir … ’
‘No – no, I mean for leaving your hat.’
‘Your hat? Not many gentlemen have them nowadays,’ she said.
‘Or your coat. Does the cloakroom charge, is all I’m saying.’
‘Oh no sir, certainly not.’ She seemed quite offended. ‘Though of course, you can always tip us,’ she added. Of course. Always. The pound change from the price of a single whisky – that would be about right. He felt irritated.
‘Appointment with Mr Dalby,’ he said, rather curtly.
‘Oh, well, sir, I’ll have to see if he’s free.’
‘The name’s Marcus.’
‘Marcus what?’
‘Mister Marcus.’ Duffy realised he had picked himself a pseudonym made out of two Christian names. Like Eric Leonard. A name that wasn’t serious.
‘Oh, of course.’ The girl seemed abashed. Duffy felt like a bully. That was probably just as well; he had to get into the right mood for bluffing Dalby.
He rather hoped he wouldn’t be recognised by the girl with the northern accent and the breasts which were located in the middle of the graph. Still, how long did a punter stay in their minds – ten minutes? And besides, he looked different now; instead of Fifties revival and tincture of mothballs, he was all velved up. Blue jacket, blue trousers – a close enough match in this light to pass for a suit – boots, and a mauve shirt open at the neck. Did he look like Lord Brown’s assistant? Did he look like a dealer? Well, it was up to him to turn those equations round: he didn’t have to look like either of them if he made both of them look like him.
He gave a hooded glance at the girl-strewn bar as he was led towards the stairs. The same smell of joss-sticks. Just as dark downstairs. The booths with their slatted half-doors; the hands clamped to the breasts as if with superglue; the wet bottles; the fresh flowers; the artificial tones of hostess conversation; the balding husbands with good suits and bad consciences.
‘Mr Marcus, a pleasure.’ Dalby had come out of his office to greet him, and paused briefly to inspect the scene below. You couldn’t actually hear the peeling-off of ten pound notes; but you could imagine it well enough from here, Duffy thought.
At first Dalby’s office seemed floodlit, but it was only the contrast. Duffy sat in a high-backed tapestry-work chair across the desk from the club owner. He took his time, and looked around the office for a few seconds as if he were thinking of buying it. He took in the standard lamp, the sofa, the small bookcase, the series of large prints round the walls. They looked like early woodcuts which, for modern reproduction, had been enlarged about twenty times; they showed pastoral scenes. The one behind Dalby’s head depicted a large tethered horse, a cow, a sheep, and a couple of thatched cottages. Centuries, and worlds away from Dude’s. Unless, of course, the tethered horse belonged to Ye Olde Opium Dealer who had called in at one of the cottages to make a connection.
Dalby coughed, and Duffy permitted his eye to return slowly to the cougher. Dalby was watching him rather damply from behind his little round gold spectacles. Duffy decided that he momentarily had the initiative; and this was the way it was going to stay. If you bluff, bluff big, he thought, and bluff aggressive. Also, as a sign of confidence, leave out the shifty, ambiguous half-language of the trade. Dalby looked the sort of dealer who lived by circumlocution and might fret at straight talk.
‘The room’s clean,’ said Duffy sharply, in his unstreet voice. It was an affirmation rather than a question.
‘Oh yes.’
Duffy looked across at the open door past Dalby’s left shoulder, which led, presumably, to his bedroom, and the bathroom with the post-coital tub. He let his held glance act as his second question.
‘We’re quite alone,’ Dalby assured him.
Duffy then talked quickly and confidently, as befitted Lord Brown’s assistant.
‘I’ve got two hundredweight of grass coming in fairly soon, though from what I hear of you you won’t be very interested in that. Can’t say I blame you, it’s such a long-winded drug, isn’t it; and personally I find cigarettes a disgusting habit, though I cast no aspersions. I’ve got a moderate amount of coke coming in next week or so. And I’ve just had some excellent Chinese Number Three which is being cut at the moment. That’s my shopping list. Why you? Because I need money now for my next import, which is quite substantial. I wouldn’t go outside otherwise. I hear you’re reliable and honest – that’s what I hear, anyway – and if you don’t mind my saying so, you’re British, which makes a nice change. Of course, if you aren’t – I don’t mean British, I mean the other things – I don’t advise you to deal with me.’
Duffy gazed at Dalby impassively while awaiting his reply.
‘Er … um … um … ’ He seemed thrown by such directness. Thrown enough, Duffy hoped, not to go into the question of who the invented ‘Christopher’ might be.
‘ … er … price?’ he said eventually, as if forcing himself to use a dirty word.
‘The coke or the smack?’
‘The er … former.’ (Which meant that he was interested only in the former; or that he had his own supplies of the latter on the way?)
‘Sliding scale, depends on purity. I’ll have to wait and see when it arrives. My rates are middle-of-the-market. Twenty to thirty a gram. You want some?’
‘Er … yeees.’
‘Good, fine,’ said Duffy, as if he had another few calls to make that evening. He got up and extended his palm.
‘It’s all on the handshake,’ he said. Dalby took it as if it were an honour. ‘Oh, by the way, I seemed to disturb some of your customers on the way in. Is there another way out?’
‘Oh yes, this way.’ He took Duffy out of the office, along a corridor away from the booths, down a passage and out through a back door. No alarm system, simple door: Duffy was laughing. Dalby held the door open; Duffy nodded, but without looking at him, and strode out into the dar
k. That had been a strain.
‘Did they do wonderful things to you?’ Carol asked as he slid into the van. It was a half-serious tease. It was also near a dangerous subject.
‘Wonderful,’ replied Duffy in a dreamy voice. ‘Only costs fifty-four pounds.’
‘Will you take me some time?’ she asked. But Duffy only chuckled to himself.
Later, as they sat over kebabs and tried to make themselves heard above the Zorba music, he said, ‘I might let you go on your own.’
‘Where?’
‘That place – Dude’s.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, I was just wondering who you might be having dinner with tonight.’ Carol looked puzzled. Duffy winked.
‘I’ll pay, of course, but if you take the bill, then you can charge it, can’t you, if it works out?’
She leaned over and tapped her knuckles on the top of his head, as if to restore order in there.
‘I mean, it’s a way of repaying you really, isn’t it?’
Sometimes, she didn’t understand him at all, even when she looked back on it later.
‘Your kebab’s getting cold.’ Why was he smiling at her like that?
He drove her back to Acton, since her car was there already, and as it was late she decided to stay the night. They went into the flat and Duffy turned all the lights on, even though they were going straight to bed. He always liked to have a last look round. It made him feel more secure about going to sleep.
‘Duffy,’ she said to him as she cuddled into his back.
‘Mnnn.’ He was almost asleep.
‘I like that velvet suit.’
‘Mnnn.’
‘Pity it doesn’t match.’
8
THE NEXT DAY, WHEN he arrived for work, Duffy was again greeted by a punch on the bicep from Casey, and a chortle of ‘Cun’’. This flutter of affection from the Tattooed Man touched Duffy, and he began to wonder if he could unfix Casey. If he didn’t have to fix him, if he could leave all the thieving with McKay where it truly belonged, then that would square him with Hendrick. And if he unfixed Casey, then that would also be another promise broken towards Mrs Boseley, and that couldn’t be bad. It might be just worth a try, as long as it didn’t put him out too much.
At lunchtime he telephoned the hifi villains. If they had any sense, they wouldn’t have rushed straight round to their nearest middleman with the stuff; they’d wait a few days just to see if there wasn’t going to be any follow-up. He got the driver who liked the oil patches. Duffy’s voice was tuned to its streetiest.
‘It’s Duffy ’ere, from ’endrick, ’eafrow. ’Bout that case of sparks I frew in by mistake the uvver day. O.K. if I come rahnd this evening?’
‘What, mate?’
‘Case of sparks you got wiv yer hifi. I loaded for yer. Frew ’em in by mistake.’
‘Sparks?’
‘Ligh’ers, you know, snout ligh’ers. Frew in a case. Gotta ge’hem back or get the cowing sack.’
‘Can’t say I remember any, mate.’
‘Awri’, well, you prob’ly didn’ unload them. Prob’ly still sittin’ wivver hifi. But we go’hem booked aht t’ya, see?’
‘I’ll just go and check, old cock.’
‘Awri’.’
He was away several minutes, and Duffy was afraid of running out of 10p pieces before he returned. He sounded displeased.
‘We found them, mate, they were in with some tape-decks.’
‘Fanks, oh fanks a lot, you saved my skin.’
‘Well, I’m afraid one or two of them are missing. Someone seems to have been helping himself round here.’ The hifi villain’s pound of flesh, Duffy thought.
‘Lock ’em up till I get rahnd, willya? And fanks. You saved my skin.’
‘Any time.’
He didn’t sound as if he meant it.
It was going to be a busy evening, he could see that, so he decided to start early. Skipping off work at half four would irritate Mrs Boseley a great deal, which was of course an end in itself, but it would also enable him to get to the hifi villains in Ealing before they closed.
He picked up 140 of the original gross of lighters which he had switched, and drove home. Then he went to the nurses’ hostel and collected a small item from Christine. Home again, he packed a holdall with everything he thought he’d need and set off for Geoff’s flat. As he rang the bell, he pulled down his zip, and let his trousers gape. He did this every time he called on Bell.
‘Do your flies up, Duffy,’ said the entryphone. Duffy smiled. He’d never been able to spot the camera. Most people liked to let you know you were being spied on, through the fish-eye lens in the door, or the not-so-hidden camera; it gave them a sense of power as well as of security. Bell got his pleasure from knowing that you didn’t know you were being examined.
‘Armpit, groin or back?’ was his greeting. Duffy groaned to himself. It was always like this. He tried to show as much interest as possible in Bell’s techniques, but the fellow did exaggerate. There were fifteen miniature tape recorders laid out for inspection on the work bench. Duffy imagined the arguments about their respective merits that would doubtless ensue: arguments not between Duffy and Bell, but between Bell and Bell.
‘Does it matter?’
‘Of course it matters. It’s the first question. Where do you want the mike, where do you want the recorder?’
‘I don’t know. Are there any factors that make any difference?’
‘Course there are, Duffy. Who are you taping? And where? I don’t want to be told, of course, I just want to be told enough. How long do you want to record for? How far away will your friend be? Will you both be stationary? Is there going to be any background noise? Will you be able to slip away and change the tape?’
‘I see,’ said Duffy, but Bell had only paused for breath.
‘Will you want to change your clothes? Is it as important to record you as it is your friend? Will there be any third parties? And then, of course, there are the physical matters.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Is anyone likely to try and kick you in the balls? Or punch you in the back? Will you want to hit anyone while you’re recording? Or before you’re recording? Will you want a stop on the recorder so that you can pause the tape, hit someone, and then go back to recording?’
‘You don’t think I’m very nice, do you, Geoff?’
‘What? What do you mean?’ Bell, Duffy realised from his surprised expression, had been talking from a purely technical angle. Hitting someone, as far as he was concerned, was merely a factor which might interfere with sound quality.
Duffy began to outline what he needed. He’d estimated that the visit might take forty minutes; in the event it took two hours. He emerged feeling as if he’d just had all his ribs bandaged at Uxbridge Hospital. A recorder the size of a crispbread was plastered into the small of his back; wires ran into each of the pockets of his blouson: switch in the right pocket to start, switch in the left pocket to pause. He’d better remember that.
It was dark now as he drove along the M4. All that survived of the mad, self-destructive jumbos were a few twitching lights in the sky; red, green, white. It was their fault if they crashed now, Duffy reflected: going out in the dark like that. It shouldn’t be allowed.
At the shed he unloaded the cigarette lighters and dumped them close to his dunce’s corner. He’d think up a story for Hendrick later. First, though, he had to get through Plan B. He flicked the top of his left ear and made it throb. That made him feel better about Plan B. He picked his way across to Mrs Boseley’s glass office, dumped his holdall beside the desk, sat in her chair, steered his foot well away from the security buzzer, took a deep breath and picked up the phone.
Come on, come on, answer it, you’ve been in every time I’ve watched you, don’t go out tonight, maybe you’re polishing that big Granada of yours in the drive, come on, ah –
‘Gleeson, it’s Duffy. Yes, Duffy from work, that’s right.’<
br />
‘What the fuck do you want?’
The main thing was, to get it in the right order, not give him anything which would make him ring off before he saw he had no choice but to pick the course of action Duffy was leading him towards.
‘I called Mrs Boseley, but her husband said she’d gone to stay with a friend for the night.’ Get that into his skull for a start.
‘Where did you get my number from? Why are you calling?’
‘I got your number from a big book which is sitting in front of me called E–K. All right?’
‘Why are you calling me?’
‘I found some heroin today at the shed.’
‘You what? Duffy, where are you?’
Duffy let that pass. He paused. He rather felt he had Gleeson’s attention for a while.
‘At least I thought it might be. So I took a bit of it – you may have noticed I left early – and I showed it to a friend, who said he thought it probably was, and we’d better hand it in or something. I said I’d better ring the people at Hendrick Freight, so I got out the phone book … ’ He enjoyed spinning it out.
‘Where on earth did you find it?’
‘ … and I rang Mr Hendrick.’ Pause at that.
‘What did he say?’ Gleeson didn’t sound too secure.
‘Oh, he wasn’t there, he’s out for the evening. Then I rang Mrs Boseley as I said, and she’s out for the night, so I thought maybe you’d know what to do.’
‘Quite right, Duffy. Let me think.’
Duffy gave him about four seconds space and then said, ‘Shall I call the police?’
‘Let’s not rush anything, Duffy. Let me think. I mean, we don’t want it to look bad for Hendrick Freight.’ That set it up nicely.
‘I don’t care the fuck how bad it looks for Hendrick Freight. What do I owe Hendrick Freight? How much is Hendrick Freight giving me for my fucking ear? I’m going to ring the fucking police.’ He let his voice climb towards the hysterical.
‘Don’t, Duffy,’ said Gleeson. ‘Stop, let’s think it out. No, of course you don’t care about the company, why should you? But I don’t want to be hasty.’