SuperJack

by Adam Baron

  ‘So, I want to tell you not to meddle with me. That’s why I got you here. Little dog, chasing my coat tails. I killed Alison Footballer-Fucker? Prove it. And you better do it quick because if the newspapers start saying it, you be careful. If I can kill her, are you so special?’ His fingernails were digging into my arm. He didn’t seem to realize. I looked up to see his two friends, staring back at us. Beyond them Willie stepped up. The lad had wanted to take it but had been told to stand aside. Willie sent it low, to his left. The keeper got a hand to it but the ball crossed the line. The place erupted and almost immediately the halftime whistle blew.

  Korai put his lips right up to my face and raised his voice.

  ‘You won’t destroy all this for me. As you say, I have resources, Mr Rucker.’

  Two of them were looking at me.

  ‘I have many, many resources. You hear me?’

  ‘I hear you,’ I said.

  Korai nodded his head then stood. His friends stood too. I saw a skinny little boy on the ground, school-books scattered, fifteen holers going in, hard. I watched him walk down to the touchline. He didn’t look back at me. While his minders held an umbrella over his head the little boy with the broken glasses marched all the way round the pitch, waving at the supporters, a bright white grin splitting his old, cracked face wide. There was no sign of the anger, the bitterness. He shook hands with some of the fans and threw his scarf to them. He held his arms in the air and danced a foolish jig to the tinny sound of the club song, blaring out of the tannoy. A sea of blue danced with him, whipped up by strange winds. By the time he got to the tunnel the whole of the crowd was standing.

  They loved it. They ate it up.

  Part Four

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Jack Draper must have found a new hiding place because when I got up next morning the slightly too dramatic girl on London Live was still reporting his absence and the police spokesman was beginning to sound like he really, really hated his job. The newsreader also mentioned that Draper’s team, Leyton Orient, had only managed a one-one draw last night, making me glad I’d gone home immediately after Korai had left me. Orient were now fourth in the table, dropping down from second due to results elsewhere.

  Early that morning I called the mobile number Draper had given me but there was no reply from it. I gave it one last try before leaving my flat and this time it was answered.

  ‘Hello. Hello.’

  The voice belonged to an old Glaswegian.

  ‘Hello,’ I said. ‘Is Jack there?’

  ‘Jack, I don’t know any Jack. Well, I did once but he’s been dead ten years. And who would you be?’

  It was then that I realized the man was very, very drunk. I asked him where he’d got his phone from.

  ‘Oh,’ he said. ‘A young fella give it me. He didn’t have any change but he said I could have this. Last night it was. Said I could have it. Not that I’ve anyone to call, mind. But it’s been fine talking to you.’

  ‘And where are you, exactly?’

  ‘Where? I’m right here, you daft bastard.’

  The phone went dead and when I tried the number again it just rang.

  The rest of that morning I spent in Westbourne Park, being as obvious as I could be about asking some very blunt questions no one wanted to answer, making sure a lot of people got a good look at me. I’d given up on Nicky’s staff. I thought I knew who had taken his money. I took the roll of film I’d shot in Westbourne Park down to Carl to develop. All the while I had a nice bruise just above my left temple that made my head look like a leaking battery. It stopped me getting in the ring but Sal told me that it was a good chance to work on my speed so I was back on the rope, getting my footwork better than Gene Kelly’s. We didn’t talk about the only thing there was to talk about. Taking quite a few more painkillers than the side of the pack suggested got me through the day.

  I had lunch with DS Coombes. In the afternoon I took an express train to Leicester, telling Nicky that I wanted to go through some security arrangements with his mother and father. I didn’t spend long there. I hadn’t been back in my flat for more than an hour when Louise Draper called. She wanted to know what was happening. She had heard about McKenna and was now certain her husband was guilty. I didn’t tell her that DS Coombes had called me to say that the thumbprint on the shard of glass I’d spotted definitely did come from Draper. Louise wanted me to go round and give her an update, and I did go. I also had another look round her house, and did see there what I’d thought I remembered. Louise’s sister was with her, as was her neighbour, the doctor, being there for her, but they both left when Louise told them that we needed to speak. And we did speak, though not about her husband. She said things to me and I said things to her, and sometimes we said them at the same time, to each other.

  I spent Saturday with Shulpa. She called to say that though her boss wanted her to go into the office she was blowing him off. He’d got mad but so what? I remembered what Nicky had told me even before Shulpa had moved to London. She never stayed in a job very long, before getting bored. It seemed like the pattern was beginning to repeat itself. Still, legal secretaries were in demand and she could always temp, which would probably suit her more anyway. Or else her boss was so cracked on her she could just do whatever she liked and not have to worry. That wouldn’t have surprised me either and I admired Shulpa for not being a pushover.

  Shulpa complained that we never actually spent any time just being together, talking. I said I was free until late afternoon and asked if she wanted me to come over to her small flat in West London. I wasn’t surprised when she said why don’t we meet in town? We grabbed lunch in a cafe by Holborn Station. Shulpa was astonished at the still-vivid state of my forehead, asking me how it had happened. I didn’t tell her that the man she’d practically grown up with had done it. I said I’d slipped in the gym and she tutted.

  ‘The things you get up to when I’m not there,’ Shulpa said.

  Shulpa and I talked about nothing as we ate, until she fell silent.

  ‘Are you okay?’ she said, eventually.

  ‘Apart from a headache, sure.’

  ‘You seem a bit withdrawn.’

  ‘Do I?’

  ‘You’re not your usual, adoring self. You do adore me still, don’t you?’

  ‘I do. I absolutely do adore you. I adore you too much as a matter of fact. It’s creating problems for me. I seem to spend all my time thinking about you. It’s as if a mist has fallen over my eyes, created by your beauty.’

  ‘Yeah, right.’

  ‘It’s true. You mist me, you get me very misted.’

  We were quiet again and then Shulpa tentatively mentioned Draper. Shulpa asked me various questions about the police, whether or not I thought Jack had killed the people he was supposed to have. I shrugged.

  ‘Ask Nicky,’ I said. ‘He knows him far better than me. You probably know him better than I do actually.’

  ‘But you’ve been working for him, haven’t you?’

  ‘Uh huh.’

  ‘Why didn’t you say? Nicky told me,’ she added.

  ‘I didn’t think. I have a lot of cases, I didn’t realize. Sorry.’

  ‘It’s okay. So, is he guilty? Of killing that girl? And his agent? It’s pretty amazing.’

  I shook my head. ‘I don’t know for sure. I did actually find him but he legged it before I could speak to him. I’m not sure I’m working for him any more to be honest. I think he thinks I ratted on him.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘By telling some people where he was staying.’

  ‘And you didn’t?’

  ‘Of course not. Though I would if I was certain he did kill Alison and his agent. Anyway, you knew him pretty well when you were younger, didn’t you? Do you think he could kill anyone?’

  ‘It was a long time ago.’

  ‘I know, but even so, if you had to guess?’

  Shulpa frowned as she thought about it. Nicky had been positive that Jack didn’t
have it in him to kill anyone. I looked deep into Shulpa’s dark eyes. ‘Yes,’ she said after a second or two, her voice very even. ‘Yes, I actually think he would be capable of that. Do the police have a lot on him?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘They’ve got enough to want to talk to him pretty badly but I don’t know if it’s enough to send him down.’

  Over coffee I brought up the subject of Nicky. Shulpa hadn’t asked me about him – probably wanting to have an afternoon free of worry, or else we’d done a good enough job convincing her that we’d got it sorted. When I told her he was on the mend Shulpa wanted to know what was going on about the money he’d lost. I told her I was working on it. Then she wanted to know if Nicky had got his mortgage sorted.

  I hesitated. I seemed to spend all my time lying to this girl. I decided I should tell her the truth. It was only fair to warn her.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘He can’t get a mortgage.’

  ‘What?’ Her fork stopped outside her mouth and her eyes opened.

  ‘He can’t get one. He doesn’t officially own the Ludensian.’

  ‘So…’ Shulpa took it in quickly. ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘Find the money he’s lost.’

  ‘What…what if you can’t?’

  I looked at her, hard. ‘I’ll have to ask the Maltese guys he was dealing with not to kill him.’

  Shulpa looked back at me. Then she gave a dismissing, metallic laugh. ‘They won’t do that. They won’t really kill him, will they?’ I didn’t say anything. ‘Billy? I mean, what good would it do, it wouldn’t get them the money, would it? And it would end all chances of getting it, no?’

  Shulpa was trying to convince herself, not me. I remembered the look on her face when Nicky and I had been making elephant man jokes – the fear, the concern.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t make sense. Of course they’ll threaten him but they’re businessmen, they’ll just keep demanding money. They won’t kill him.’

  I looked at Shulpa, the way she was avoiding my eye, diving back into her meal, the way she’d brushed the idea of them killing Nicky aside so quickly. I didn’t tell her she was wrong, that the Maltese most certainly would kill her brother if they didn’t get what they wanted.

  After I’d paid, Shulpa said she didn’t mind what we did, as long as we didn’t have to talk about anything horrible. I thought for a second then took her to one of my favourite places, to Sir John Soane’s house, which was only round the corner. I told Shulpa where we were going and she said great, asking me what we’d find there. I told her that John Soane had gone all over the world collecting artefacts. His former house on Lincoln’s Inn Fields, just behind Holborn, is a mini British Museum, literally stuffed with Greek marbles, Roman statuary and countless other rare antiquities. They are all squashed into an elegant Edwardian terrace alongside some beautiful, classic English furniture. The impression you get is bizarre and surreal, as if Charles Dickens had gone on Changing Rooms with Pliny.

  When we got there the museum was surprisingly quiet. Shulpa seemed suitably wowed by it all, especially when one of the trustees explained the various political figures thinly disguised in a set of Hogarth cartoons, hidden behind some panelling. She was even more impressed when he told her what the paintings were worth. I’d been to the house a few times, though I still found things to interest me. It wasn’t until we walked down to the basement, however, with its strange light and flagstone floor, where most of the bigger pieces are, that anything really struck me. And did it strike me. I turned a corner and came face to face with my ex-girlfriend, Sharon. The girl my brother had been engaged to when he had the accident that had left him in a coma. The girl who, were he ever to come round, he would think was about to marry him. The girl I’d taken from him even as he lay there, who I’d thought would be the last girl I’d ever want to be with.

  Sharon was standing beneath a small arch, looking upwards at the ceiling. She wasn’t moving. My face flushed instantly and I stopped in my tracks. I couldn’t help gaping at her and I could hardly speak. Shulpa stopped at my side.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  Sharon was naked. It was then that I remembered going there with her, how we’d come down to the basement and I’d had exactly that response. How I’d teased her. I hadn’t seen Sharon’s body in more than six months and there it was. An exact replica in smooth, polished, two thousand-year-old marble. Exact, breathtakingly exact, so exact I could feel my body responding to it the way it responded to Sharon. Sharon had laughed. I don’t look like that! You do! My God! I’d tried to get Sharon to take her clothes off to prove the point and we’d both ended up laughing so much as I tried to strip her that we’d been asked to be quiet, or leave.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘It’s nothing. Really.’ It wasn’t nothing. Something inside of me had responded in a way that was immediate and visceral. Images of Sharon flashed into me. I told myself that I should have applied my restaurant rule to museums too.

  ‘Are you sure? It doesn’t look like nothing. What is it?’

  I tried to explain to Shulpa and she gave me a measured, hard look. I sighed. ‘It can be difficult having exes,’ I said. Shulpa looked off to the side. ‘I didn’t mean to see this. Did I? You never know when the past is going to hit you.’

  ‘I know,’ Shulpa said. ‘Don’t think I don’t know that.’

  ‘I mean, you’ve had other relationships, do you ever think about them?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So you must know what I mean.’

  ‘Yes. I do. But you don’t have to spell it out, Billy.’

  We were both very quiet for a while, looking at an Egyptian sarcophagus, both studying the myriad tiny figures carved into the granite. Shulpa wouldn’t meet my gaze.

  ‘You never talk about them,’ I said. ‘Maybe you should.’

  Shulpa put a hand on her hip. ‘I’ve had a lot of boyfriends. You want a list?’

  ‘No, but if there was someone really special…’

  ‘What about you? You’ve told me about her.’ Shulpa turned and waved her hand dismissively at the statue of Pallas Athene. ‘But there must have been others. And you only told me about your Big Love Affair with her as a way of warning me off. And don’t tell me I’m wrong, I’m not stupid, Billy. You like me, we have great sex, but take it any deeper? You don’t want that, do you? The word rebound could have been coined for the way you are with me. This is the first time that we’ve ever even just gone somewhere.’

  ‘Shulpa…’

  ‘So, sorry I didn’t tell you about the ones before you, I just didn’t think to. But let me see. There was Michael, a trader, who I met when I was twenty. I was only young then and even though he was kind of a nerd he impressed me with his Porsche. After him, let me see, a one-night stand with some guy whose name escapes me and another with the bass player in an indie band that was going to be big, he said. Then I was fucking this bouncer who was a bit thick but he got me in wherever I wanted and always had a lot of coke around as well as having an absolutely enormous cock…’

  I held my hands up. ‘Okay, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. It doesn’t matter…’

  ‘No, let’s get on with it. I’ve got plenty more, believe me. But you have a go first. Anyone else you want to tell me about? Let’s get it all out in the open. I want every last snog since you were twelve. Or did you start earlier than that? Don’t miss anyone out, I’m very jealous, Billy.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I am,’ I said again. ‘Really. Come on.’

  Shulpa stood in front of me, both hands on her hips now like the urn behind her. She’d got really fired up, in seconds. An old American woman was cringing in the corner, trying not to listen. Shulpa glared as she shuffled out, leaving us alone in the small basement. Then Shulpa glared at me, her eyes burning. I just stared back. I thought she was going to go off again but suddenly her eyes lost their focus.

  ‘Oh, I don’t mind you being jealous,’ she said. ‘It’s a complimen
t, actually. And we should talk about our pasts.’

  I nodded, slowly. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘But I’m sorry. As for Sharon, you could be right, about why I told you about her. I’d never really thought…’

  ‘Her?’ Shulpa turned round and sauntered back over to where Sharon’s double was positioned beneath the arch. She walked round and studied it, nodding.

  ‘Not bad. But I’ve got better tits than that and you know it.’

  She struck the same pose as the statue, and I laughed.

  ‘Or do you? Shall we take the Pepsi challenge? Shall I prove it to you?’ We’d left our coats upstairs and Shulpa’s hands went to the bottom of her cashmere roll neck.

  ‘Shulpa…’

  ‘I think you need to be sure, Billy. You need to be absolutely certain.’

  This time I was asked to leave the Soane Museum. We both were. We were, apparently, lucky that the curator didn’t call the police. Shulpa and I were told never, ever to go there again.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  I called DS Coombes on her mobile from Holborn Station after seeing Shulpa onto the tube. We’d spoken yesterday and after finally managing to persuade her that my way of handling it was the right one, we’d agreed what to do.

  ‘Are you there?’ I asked her.

  Coombes’ voice was tight as a ten-pound line pulling a twenty-pound pike. ‘I am. With fifteen other officers in support, all on my say so, with nothing to back me up but this idea you’ve had. Are you sure he’s in there?’

  ‘He has to be. You’ve seen no movement, no one coming in or out, who even vaguely could have been him?’

  ‘No one.’

  ‘Which means he’s inside.’

  ‘Or I’m going to make your life a real misery. But if he is there I still think we should just go up and grab him…’

  ‘Trust me. You can always jump on him if he goes anywhere. You sure the place is covered?’

  ‘If he’s in there and he tries to leave, we’ll know about it.’