The Lively Dead

by Peter Dickinson

“A what!”

  “A frightener. His job is to frighten people. M-mostly it’s to make them leave their homes, so that his mob can t-take them over, but sometimes he frightens minor p-pimps and such, and takes their girls off them.”

  Procne, thought Lydia, shrinking into herself. They done him proper—he’s in Morocco, last I heard. She was scared but not terrified. This was the moment which all her life she’d known might leap out at her, the point when she’d have to fight, as a soldier does. Her mind flashed to the weak places in her defences—Dickie, lying on his belly on the pavement lost in a ludicrous strip about a phantom tank; Richard—how much to tell him? When? After yesterday …

  “Who are you?” she said suddenly.

  “Me? My n-name’s Tony Bland.”

  “Oh … you write for Get Notted?”

  “That’s me.”

  “In that case … hell, you’d better come home, if you’ve got time. I’ll give you some lunch. Come on, darling, bacon and crisps. Have you been reading the balloons?”

  “Sometimes,” drawled Dickie, still drowning in the dream. As he crawled to his feet Lydia saw that he’d been lying across a patch of dried dog-piss. It didn’t seem to matter just now.

  Tony Bland’s stammer turned out to be mostly shyness, but partly (Lydia began to suspect) a protective device, a demonstration of harmlessness and ineffectualness, which might even be quite useful for a young man whose purpose was to seize capitalism by the ankles, stand it on its head and shake the money out of its pockets.

  “What do you think of G-get Notted?” he asked as Lydia was turning the bacon on the grill.

  “I nearly always buy it, but I don’t always agree with it. I like what it stands for in principle, but quite often I get angry about the way it sets about things. Last year I was involved in an effort to get a decent nursery school in this area. Your lot quite rightly wanted it further north—in fact I resigned from our committee about that very thing …”

  “I know. That’s why I c-came to you. You see …”

  “Let me finish. You did several stories on it, and they nearly always got something badly wrong.”

  “We’ve g-got a very small staff,” he said.

  “Yes, but that wasn’t the trouble. The real problem was that you couldn’t distinguish between truth and propaganda.”

  He cut a dainty square of bacon, piled a little mashed potato onto it and decorated it with three peas, so that it looked like a cocktail canapé. He put the load prissily into his small mouth, and didn’t answer until he had chewed and swallowed it.

  “In most cases there isn’t any d-difference,” he said.

  “I know that argument, and I dislike it. But even if you allow it this wasn’t one of those cases. I think it might just have been possible to get a school going, in the right place, with enough money behind it, if that’s what we’d all been working for. But you didn’t seem to mind whether there was a school or not, provided you could throw enough muck in the Council’s face. The Council stinks, and perhaps we wouldn’t have got the school anyway, but it wasn’t up to you to decide that.”

  She waited for him to answer, but he simply went through his bacon-cutting ritual and nodded as though he’d heard all this before and had learnt to be patient about it.

  “So you see,” she said, “I’m going to be cagey about what you say about Mr Ambrose. That’s all.”

  Dickie, eating his lunch in his cardboard hide-out, made a curious wheezing explosion. Tony jumped, but Lydia knew the sound well.

  “It’s all right,” she said. “He’s just seen a joke with his mouth full of crisps. Don’t worry—he’ll sweep up. He’s very fussy about his own territory, like a badger. Look, if what you say is true, why did Mr Ambrose take such trouble to provide me with a gardener?”

  “How did it happen?”

  She explained the absurd half-fantasy about the spy.

  “That t-ties in,” he said. “There was an old woman died here, wasn’t there—Procne Newbury’s mother? And now there’s this business about bodies being switched. And I hear s-something about missing money—that’s not got into the nationals yet.”

  “Yes, but …”

  “Procne w-worked for Jones’s mob. The old woman died from natural causes?”

  “She fell off a table when she was drunk. It all came out at the inquest.”

  “Yes … I wonder if you could f-fake that. Never mind. The mob had a reason for being interested in this house, you see. That b-body-switching business doesn’t sound their style—too fancy. But perhaps they heard about it, perhaps they knew about the money, perhaps they s-simply wanted to check up, on principle. But whatever it was, they’d enough reason to send a bloke to do a preliminary scout round. You b-bumped into this bloke, and talked to him about gardening. That g-gave them an opening for their usual operation—Jones came round to check, and you offered him just what he w-wanted—a job for one of his men in half a dozen houses.”

  “It wasn’t the same bloke! I knew it wasn’t! They found an ex-con who knew about gardening and sent him along! But … you mean he was supposed to find out which houses were worth burgling?

  “They might try that, as a side-line, but their main interest is housing. They w-work it like this. They find a street which suits them and they put somebody into it for a couple of months …”

  “What do you mean, into it?”

  “It varies. One c-case I heard about, they twisted the milkman’s arm—showed him a fiddle, trapped him into working it and then threatened to show him up. They p-paid him a bit of cash, too. Sometimes they take a room. It doesn’t really matter, provided they can get a toe-hold. You see, their theory is that there’s always a few weak points in any community, and if you can find them out you can exploit them. That’s w-where the frightener comes in. The sickening thing is how mean they are. They’re rich, but they’d rather scare an old couple out of their home than b-buy them out. Usually it’s a bit of both. And once they’ve g-got their men into a couple of houses they can d-do what they like. Up in G-golborne ward they emptied one street in ten months, f-flat.”

  “It wouldn’t be like that here. Quite a lot of these houses are owned by—it sounds awful to say this—people who’d know how to fight that sort of thing. You know, people with money and education, people the police would listen to.”

  “I d-don’t know. They’ve got big ideas. But they might play it differently here. They might g-go almost legal. You’re right on the edge of the p-posh area in Devon Crescent. If they c-could find a few places which owners were thinking of selling, and then just b-bring down the tone of the Crescent a bit, so that it became p-part of the p-poor area, they c-could start to buy up below the market price, and then there might be a bit of a panic, and perhaps they’d pick up some more houses. Then they c-could take their heavies out, and smarten it all up, and sell off, or l-let off, at a big profit. One of the things I’d like to p-prove is that they’ve g-got a working agreement with Dice and Dottridge.”

  “The estate agents?”

  “Right. I’m p-pretty certain they have, but if I could prove it that would really shake things up.”

  He paused, looking almost wistful at the thought of dragging into the open this juicy big slug of a scandal. Dickie came crawling out of his hide-out, still somehow managing to gaze at his comic with one hand and shuffle his plate along the floor with the other. He rose to his feet and moved like a sleep-walker to the sink.

  “Honestly, darling,” said Lydia. “I think you’ve been looking at that long enough for now.”

  “No, I haven’t.”

  “Please, darling. If you stop now and read it again after tea, you’ll enjoy it much more then.”

  “Can I have an apple?”

  “Of course.”

  “All right. I’ll go and practise my code.”

  He let go of the comic s
o slowly that there might have been half-set glue on it, still running in sticky strands out to his fingers after he’d let go. But he didn’t seem to sulk at all. Lydia felt a rush of enormous affection as she watched his round rump wriggle into his hide-out. When she turned back to Tony she found he’d picked up the comic and was reading it with serious absorption.

  “Hey!” she said.

  “G-great stuff,” he said, looking up. “My parents wouldn’t let me b-buy them.”

  “Quite right,” said Lydia. “I don’t usually. They’re mental pollution.”

  “They’re an alternative universe.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.”

  “All right, I’ll think about it. But stop reading it now, damn you. I want to know what to do about Mr Ambrose. Do you mind that noise?”

  -… - .- beeped the buzzer as Dickie began to work at random round the letters. Sometimes he kept it up for an hour at a time. Lydia found it restful, like the song of a metal bird.

  “N-no,” said Tony. “That’s fine. D-did your g-gardener ask you questions all the time?”

  “No. As a matter of fact he was a remarkably silent bloke.”

  “Oh. That’s not so good.”

  “On the other hand, Mrs Tevell told me that he was a tremendous gossip. She never stops talking herself, so I thought she just meant that he was a good listener. But perhaps …”

  “That’s b-better. I know the t-type. Just what he’d want. Look interested, egg her on a bit with the odd question, and she’d t-tell him everything she knew.”

  “So he didn’t need to ask me anything?”

  Tony frowned.

  “I d-don’t think that’s it. I think it’s more likely he’d b-been told to keep his mouth shut here. What did Jones w-want?”

  “I don’t know. He said he wanted to talk to me. He said I was in trouble. But he raced off when he saw you.”

  “I w-wish he h-hadn’t seen me. The ch-chap who was on the job before me g-got a very nasty beating up. And the p-police don’t want to know, because we’ve made quite a bit of t-trouble for them since we started.”

  “Yes, I read about that. You were right all along the line there, I thought.”

  “G-good.”

  “What do you think I’d better do now?”

  “I d-don’t know what you’d better do. I know what I’d l-like you to do.”

  “What?”

  “I think he’ll c-come back. N-not while the police are here, l-later. I’d like to get a t-tape-recording of what he says.”

  “Why should he come here? I have to go out sometimes. And I haven’t got a tape-recorder.”

  “He’ll c-come here, because he likes to g-get at people in their own homes. It m-makes them feel they aren’t safe anywhere. If he t-tackles them outside, they feel they’ve still got somewhere to run to. We’ll lend you a recorder. Do you know how they work? I’ve got a friend who can fix it all up for you. You’ve got to be able to set it going without him seeing.”

  “Hell,” said Lydia. “Let me think.”

  Dickie’s nonsense message to nowhere filled the room still. Tony cut up and ate the chilly remains of his lunch, apparently without noticing how unpalatable it had become. His neatness and sensual apathy depressed Lydia. These people, she thought, my natural allies—do I want them in power if that’s how they are? Suppose Mr Ambrose were an official in some left-wing group, a frightener for urban guerrillas, would Tony turn one wispy hair? No. But he’s not, and he’s got to be fought, at some point, by someone. She realised that it was unlikely that anyone would ever be better placed to fight him than she was, herself, now. His earlier victims had been unprepared, without influence, without allies. She was none of these things.

  “How did you hear this rumour about money?” she said. “I don’t think it’s true, but how did you hear it?”

  Tony shook his head, knowing but not revealing, just like Austen.

  “You’ve got a friend in the police, haven’t you?” she said.

  He shrugged.

  “Oh, for God’s sake!” she said. “I’m not going to get him into trouble. The point is that the Superintendent in charge of this body-swapping business has got it into his head that something serious is going on. I think he’s nuts, but if he’s right then I think Mr Ambrose must be the bloke he’s looking for, so really I ought to tell him about him …”

  “I’d much rather you d-didn’t. He’ll ju-just fade away and I’ll have to start again.”

  He sounded quite plaintive about it. No question of his seeing any problems but his own.

  “Well, I’ve got to reserve the right to tell him if I need to. In fact it goes against the grain to tell him one bloody thing. But what I can’t afford is for him to find out that I knew who Mr Ambrose really is, without my having told him, and I was afraid your friend in the police …”

  “N-no, that’s OK. What does he mean, serious?”

  “I wish I knew.”

  Tony masticated a last, slow, mouthful.

  “Well?” he said.

  “OK,” said Lydia slowly. “I don’t think there’s much chance of it coming off, but I suppose I’ve got to give it a try.”

  Chapter 23

  They spent the afternoon in Holland Park, Dickie ceaselessly gunning down his mates under the salad-coloured leaves of the adventure playground while Lydia sat on a bench and tried to read her new Autocar. There was one dark-haired little Roscius who died a thousand deaths, all spectacular, crumpling into a bullet-riddled heap at one moment and at the next picked off by a sniper as he teetered along a wooden walk-way six feet from the ground. Two pig-tailed girls banged and died with the best of them, but it was noticeable that only the kinder-hearted boys bothered to gun them down. So even at that age men were almost as prejudiced as Father about the feminine role. Lydia made a deliberate effort and dragged her mind away from Mrs Newbury, and Aaku, and Austen, and Mr Ambrose. She took out a pencil and on a blank bit of an advertisement for sparking-plugs wrote “Resolutions: If it’s a girl.” But the list wouldn’t materialise. The dark, cloudy bulk of Mr Ambrose edged continually between her and her imaginary daughter; the ghost of Mrs Newbury gibbered its ancient admonitions, and Superintendent Austen coughed a warning dry cough. That was real. He was walking along the path by the bamboos and when he saw that she had noticed him he raised his hat and walked on. Lydia scribbled out the words she had written. The daughter would have to wait.

  When they got home the telephone was ringing.

  “Liz?” said Lalage’s voice, urgent.

  “Yes, darling.”

  “How are you?”

  “Fine. I spent the morning paper-hanging and arguing with the fuzz, and this afternoon I’ve been watching Dickie shoot his friends. What’s up?”

  “Oh … I just wanted to check … I mean, I didn’t want to spring this on you if you were feeling …”

  “Do get on with it. I’m OK.”

  “Well … do you remember I told you Dad had some gen for you about the corpse?”

  “That’s right. I want to know about that.”

  “Wait. He’s just rung up in an absolute fury.”

  “Why on earth?”

  “Well, he can’t see it’s not your fault.”

  “What isn’t, for God’s sake? Lal!”

  “Sorry. I’d forgotten he could get like that. I mean, it’s been years. Last time was when Richard left the army …”

  “I know that. Do pull yourself together, darling. Or else tell him to ring me.”

  “He can’t. He’s operating on someone’s bum. I hope his hand’s not quivering still. He wouldn’t anyway.”

  “I can’t stand this. I’m going to ring off.”

  “No. Wait. You asked him to find out whether there was anything odd about the autopsy on Mrs Newbury. Right?
He did that. He was waiting to tell you yesterday. Answer, rather huffily, of course not, all above board. Brain haemorrhage caused by fall when drunk. But now they’ve come round and hauled him out of the theatre and asked why he wanted to know. Tremendous kerfuffle. High horses everywhere. The point is that it wasn’t all above board. Got it? They’d missed something.”

  Lydia felt her body gasp, almost as though that were what politeness demanded, while her mind accepted the news. Procne had foretold it, had been right where the world was wrong. It would have been, Lydia now vaguely felt, disloyal to her to be surprised.

  “What?” she said.

  “They did find something.”

  “I meant what did they find?”

  “Dad said something about a kaffir trick. He was almost incoherent.”

  “Why didn’t he ring me?”

  “Can’t you see, darling? He wants to keep his hands clean. You’ve made him … oh, I expect they’ll hush it up, anyway. But he’s lost face, and he probably lied to them, and now …”

  “Does he think that I …”

  “I don’t know what he thinks. When he’s calmed down a bit … Is it serious, Liz? Really?”

  “It might be.”

  “But who on earth?”

  “The trouble with this house is that anyone can go in and out.”

  “Mrs Newbury sounds like a born blackmailer, too.”

  “Yes.”

  “At least you’re in the clear. And Richard. They can’t … Liz! They can’t, can they?”

  “Father seems to think they might, doesn’t he? You might remind him that I only wanted to know about the autopsy so as to be able to guess how long Mrs N had been on the bottle.”

  “Oh. Yes. He got that, before this other thing. No time at all is the answer. The bloke who did the job decided that that was why all the alcohol had been absorbed into her blood-stream, and why she got so drunk and fell off the table.”

  “Only now it looks as if she didn’t.”

  “Oh, God! What did he mean by a kaffir trick, Liz? It rings a faint bell.”

  “Don’t you remember—it was one of his favourite toughen-em-up no-nightmare stories, about witch doctors creeping into huts in the dark and sliding a fine spike into the spinal column? No blood, no wound.”