Gone Tomorrow

by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

  He tried a wide shot. ‘What was Lenny doing in the park that night?’

  ‘He used to do some business there,’ Boston said. ‘He used to sell shit an’ poppers – maybe white, I dunno – and that was where ’is customers met ’im, right?’

  ‘How did he get in?’

  Boston shrugged. ‘Froo the gate, man, how should I know? But everyone know that’s where ’e is certain times.’

  ‘Was he selling drugs for this same boss?’

  ‘Nah. I don’t fink so. He never done the serious stuff, just bhang an’ amyl, y’know? I fink it was just like a sideline. I dunno where he got the gear. Lenny, ’e was mixed up in a lot of stuff. He liked to freelance. Maybe that’s why he got in trouble.’

  Slider felt a certain weariness coming over him. If Lenny Baxter was selling cannabis and amyl nitrate poppers it opened up a whole new cast of potential murderers. Eddie Cranston had a lump of cannabis in his flat. Maybe he had been one of Lenny’s customers and knew him, therefore, a little better than he had let on. And if he was a customer, he’d have known where to find Lenny to kill him. The trouble was, so would everyone else.

  He struck out again, hoping for shallower water.

  ‘How was Sonny Collins mixed up in it?’

  Everet Boston looked surprised, and suddenly frightened. ‘How d’you know about Sonny?’ Slider got his own back and merely shrugged. ‘I don’t know what Sonny’s into,’ Boston said. ‘He does some biz for the—’ He stopped himself, and went on, ‘for the Man. I dunno what, though. Lenny run messages sometimes. We all do. Sonny passed ’em on.’ He stopped again. His eyes flickered nervously. ‘I don’t know nuffink about what Sonny does. The Man keep everything very private. We don’t ask an’ he don’ tell. That way he stay ahead an’ we stay alive. You don’t wanna get on the wrong side of ’im, I tell you.’ He slugged back the rest of the rum and said, ‘Look, man, I gotta go. It’s dangerous talkin’ to you.’

  ‘You think the Man might be watching you?’

  ‘He watches everybody,’ Boston said.

  ‘Tell me who he is.’

  ‘You fink I’m mad? I shoon’t be here.’

  ‘Yes, why are you here?’ Slider asked. ‘I’m very grateful, but what made you do it?’

  The supercool pose altered subtly as a different Everet peeped through the tightly drawn curtains of street attitude. ‘There’s this bird Lenny lived with.’

  ‘Tina,’ Slider supplied. ‘You know her?’

  ‘I knew her before.’ Everet looked suddenly ferocious. ‘Lenny was a bastard! He was a total ratfuck bastard an’ he got what was comin’ to ’im. I’d a killed ’im myself if I could a got away wiv it.’

  ‘I suppose you didn’t kill him, did you?’

  ‘I jus’ told you. Wojer fink, I’m comin’ here givin’ myself away? You fink I got shit for brains? I come here to help you, and no way you goin’ to stick this on me, you bastard copper! I’m gettin’ out of here.’ He half stood, and glared at Billy. ‘Last time I do anyfink for you.’

  Slider spread his hands. ‘Calm down. Of course I don’t think you did it. But it would help if you could tell me where you were that evening, just so we can cross you off the list. Between eleven Monday night and eight Tuesday morning.’

  ‘I was down the Snookerama all night, from about ten till they shut, about one o’clock,’ Everet said, head back in a defiant pose. ‘Then I went home. If I’d’ve knew what was goin’ down I’d’ve been there in the park givin’ ’em the Mexican Wave while they done it, all right? But I never.’

  ‘I believe you,’ Slider said. ‘Do you know who did kill him?’

  Boston hesitated. ‘Lenny, he trouble. He don’ play by the rules, right? I reckon he had it comin’. And nobody won’t shed no tears for him. Not Tina, that’s for sure.’

  ‘Do you know where Tina is now?’

  The innocent question seemed to shock Everet. He stared at Slider, his eyes widening. ‘I fought she was at ’ome.’

  ‘She’s not, and her clothes are gone. Where is she?’

  Everet’s lips parted, and for a moment Slider thought he was going to get something, but he only licked them and then, as if coming to a sudden decision, got up with a violent movement and said, ‘I gotta go.’

  ‘If you want to tell me any more,’ Slider said desperately, ‘you know where to get me. If you give me names, I can protect you.’

  ‘No-one coon’t protec’ me against the Man,’ he said bleakly, and with a sidling speed, like a threatened snake, he headed for the door. At the last minute, he turned to say, ‘That night Lenny got done – it wasn’t ’is night for dealin’ shit.’ And then he was gone.

  Slider would have liked a moment’s silence with his thoughts, but One-Eyed Billy wanted notice and recognition.

  ‘He’s brill, innee? Ol’ Ev was always a right one. He was always in trouble at school. I got you the goods, didn’t I, Mr Slider? You’ll tell Dad I helped you like he said I had to?’

  ‘What puzzles me,’ Slider said, to Billy since he had to, ‘is if he’s so scared of his boss finding out he’s been talking to me, why meet here in broad daylight?’

  Billy looked pleased. ‘He told me that. He said anyone can go in a pub, and in daylight you can see people coming. He said if you meet down an alley after dark they know you’re up to something.’

  ‘That’s very interesting,’ Slider said. Stupid, possibly, but interesting. No, to be fair, it was probably true. Maybe Everet Boston really was as cool as he tried to appear. ‘What was this Tina to him?’ he asked. An old girlfriend?’

  ‘I dunno,’ Billy said. ‘He never mentioned her to me.’

  But he obviously cared strongly about her, Slider thought, and he was obviously alarmed that she was missing. He thought of the two heavies outside Lenny’s house. Had she been abducted? Or was she fleeing this tiresome Mr Big Everet wouldn’t name? At all events, Boston’s moment of humanity warmed Slider to him just a degree, while poor old Unlucky Lenny, the victim, was becoming less lovable the more was discovered about him.

  As Slider approached his room his nostrils began to twitch, but he was so deep in thought and speculation that he didn’t realise what it was he was smelling until he turned in at his open doorway and saw Joanna sitting on his desk swinging her legs. It was her scent, of course. Her face lit up like a pinball machine awarding two thousand bonus points and an extra game, and he was across the room in a Cartlandesque single bound.

  When they paused for breath, Atherton said, Ahem. Cough cough.’ He was standing by the door into the office, and on the Everet Boston principle had been masked from Slider’s view by the open door onto the corridor.

  With large portions of Joanna still pressed against him, Slider could afford to be lenient. ‘What are you doing here? Come to ask about that career move to the stolen cars unit?’

  ‘I was keeping her entertained until you got back.’

  ‘Well, you can go away now.’ He turned back to Joanna. ‘It’s so good to see you. You look well.’

  ‘She looks more than well,’ Atherton said. ‘She looks glowing.’

  ‘Are you still there?’

  ‘Apparently,’ Atherton said blandly. ‘How did your interview with One-Eyed Billy go?’

  Slider moaned. ‘At a time like this, he wants me to think of work.’

  ‘Shall I go?’ Joanna offered helpfully.

  ‘No, no, stay. I don’t have any secrets from you.’

  ‘We could go and get some lunch while we talk,’ Atherton suggested. ‘Joanna’s hungry.’

  ‘Of course, you must be. It’ll have to be the canteen, though.’

  ‘Okay by me,’ Joanna said.

  ‘Has Porson come in?’

  ‘No, he’s not coming,’ Atherton said as they headed out of the office. ‘He phoned in to say he’ll be out for a couple of days. I hope it’s nothing serious.’

  ‘So do I. He’s a funny old duck, but I like him.’

  As it was Monday, the ca
nteen had bubble and squeak on.

  ‘They like to keep up these little traditions,’ Atherton said, handing Joanna a tray.

  ‘It’s quite good,’ Slider said. ‘It goes with the cold roast pork.’

  ‘And wiz zat, madame,’ Atherton hammed, ‘Ah recommend ze rock ’ard carrots and ze soggy cauliflowair.’

  ‘Oh brave new world, that has such menus in it,’ Joanna said. ‘I’ll have the cottage pie, please. What?’ she protested, catching Atherton’s expression. ‘I’ve been living on horse and chips and Wiener schnitzel for weeks.’

  ‘Same for me,’ Slider said to the server.

  ‘Chips an’ gravy, love?’ she offered Joanna. And to Slider, ‘No gravy for you, isn’t it, sir? Would you like some of the bubble on yours?’

  Atherton took a salad. ‘I don’t know how he does it,’ he said as they sought a table. ‘One look from his sad-puppy eyes and he has ’em eating out of his hand.’

  Joanna batted her eyelashes at Slider. ‘I’d eat anything out of your hand. Even cottage pie. Do you know,’ she added in a normal voice, ‘the worst thing in the world to watch someone eat?’

  ‘McLaren’s fried egg sandwiches?’

  ‘Worse than that.’

  ‘With tomato ketchup?’

  ‘Worse than that. It’s what Brian Harrop – second trumpet in the Phil – used to have at the Clarendon Arms after concerts. A cottage pie sandwich. It’s true. A great big wodge of cottage pie, with gravy, between two slices of white Wonderbread. It’s something you never forget. Like doing the nose job with porridge.’

  ‘Thank you for sharing that with us,’ Atherton said, sliding into a corner seat. ‘So, dear old guv o’ mine, what about this new lead from One-Eyed Billy? Tell us, Entellus.’

  ‘One-eyed—?’ Joanna began, but Atherton stopped her with a quick gesture.

  ‘Not important. Who’s the informant?’

  ‘It was a dude called Everet Boston,’ Slider said, unloading his tray.

  ‘A dude?’ they chorused in protest.

  ‘No other word for it,’ Slider said. A slick, smart, streetwise, slinky-shouldered black with a Willesden accent you could slice and bottle. He was as painfully hip as a hospital waiting list.’

  ‘I’m getting the picture,’ Atherton said in disparaging tones.

  ‘Yes,’ Slider said, ‘but for all his attitude, he wasn’t standing behind the door with One-Eyed Billy when they were passing out the brains.’

  ‘Please,’ Joanna begged, ‘stop with all this one-eyed stuff. It sounds like a black-and-white B film from the fifties.’

  ‘Billy Cheeseman,’ Slider elucidated. ‘His dad owned a pie and eel shop down the Goldhawk Road.’

  Joanna put her head in her hands and whimpered. ‘No more! I’m coming over all Jack Warner.’

  ‘I’ll talk to Atherton,’ Slider said kindly, and between forkfuls, told what he had heard that morning, adding a swift blocking in of the rest of the case for Joanna’s benefit.

  ‘And you didn’t bring him in?’ Atherton asked when he had finished.

  ‘I’d have needed at least eight wild horses,’ Slider said. ‘But Billy obviously knows him, and where he lives. If need be we can go and fetch him, but I’d rather not at this stage. He was genuinely scared, and if we want him later in court we’d better cherish him now.’

  ‘You believed all this bollocks about a Moriarty lurking in the shadows?’

  ‘He believed he was in danger,’ Slider said. ‘I said from the beginning it looked more like a gang killing to me.’

  ‘You did,’ Atherton allowed.

  ‘If the boss, whoever he was, ordered Lenny’s killing for some unspecified crime against the organisation, the same could happen to Everet.’

  ‘So you think it was an execution?’ Atherton said.

  ‘How many times do I have to tell you—’

  ‘He doesn’t speculate ahead of his data,’ Joanna finished for him. ‘He likes to keep an open mind. Don’t you, beloved?’

  ‘What she said,’ Slider nodded.

  ‘The thing that strikes me, as an outsider, as significant,’ Joanna said, ‘was saying Monday wasn’t Lenny’s usual night for selling drugs. Which suggests he must have been meeting someone there by arrangement, who, presumably, killed him. So doesn’t that rather rule out this other bloke, Eddie Whatsit?’

  ‘Unless he followed him,’ Slider said. ‘He might have been out looking for him, spotted him on his way to the park and followed.’

  ‘On that basis, it might have been anyone,’ Atherton said.

  ‘Quite. But there’s also the possibility that Eddie was also working for the boss, whoever he was. We know he’s stupid, but he might be useful as a blunt instrument, if he takes orders well.’

  ‘Maybe that’s why he stayed indoors for two days. Maybe he was told to lie low,’ Joanna said. ‘The stuff about being too vain to go out with a black eye sounds a bit thin to me.’

  ‘You’ve not met him,’ Atherton said. ‘He’s more vain than a blood donor clinic. I can’t believe anyone would use him, even as a blunt instrument, if they had any choice. Well,’ he concluded, spearing the last quarter tomato, ‘it’s obvious that Sonny Collins is the man to lean on.’

  ‘I thought you’d had two goes at him,’ Joanna said.

  ‘Yes, but now it’s time to take the gloves off,’ Atherton said. He noted her expression. ‘I can spout worse clichés than that in a good cause.’

  ‘You’re right,’ Slider said. ‘We’ll get him in again, and this time he stays in until he comes across.’

  ‘I suppose that means you want me to scarper,’ Joanna said with barely a sigh. She knew the score.

  ‘I’ll try not to be late tonight,’ Slider said, ‘but you know—’

  ‘I know. Don’t worry about me. I’ll ring you later and see how you’re getting on.’

  ‘What will you do?’

  ‘I’ll go and see Sue. Is she at her place or yours?’ she asked Atherton.

  ‘Mine, as far as I know,’ he said.

  ‘Oh good. I’m longing to see your cats.’ She kissed Slider goodbye with her eyes, respecting his dignity. ‘Go get ’em, tiger! See you later.’

  CHAPTER TEN

  Chicken Ticker

  This time Sonny Collins came in accompanied by his brief, none other than the famous David Stevens, who represented all the worst villains in west London. Stevens was a small man with a well-lunched figure, smooth hair and a smooth face. He had merry twinkling eyes, the unfailing cheerfulness of one of life’s higher earners, and suits so expensive and beautiful they would make a boulevardier faint.

  Slider’s heart always sank when he saw Stevens turn up with someone he wanted to question. They had crossed swords many times, and Stevens usually came off better. Behind his bonhomie he had a mind like the labyrinth of Knossos, and any argument he put up had more clauses than Santa’s family tree; but Slider couldn’t help liking the man. He beckoned, and Stevens turned aside willingly to chat with him.

  ‘How can Collins afford your fees?’ Slider asked, after they had exchanged the amenities. Stevens only beamed at him. ‘Don’t tell me the brewery’s paying his bills?’

  ‘A famous brewing firm would naturally want to protect its reputation,’ Stevens said.

  ‘So it is them?’

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘I can’t believe they’d lash out that much on a bloke who runs the Phoenix. Have you seen the Phoenix?’

  ‘No. But I can’t believe it either.’

  ‘More likely they’d just sack him if they wanted to keep their hands clean.’

  ‘Much more likely.’

  Slider whimpered. ‘Five minutes talking to you and I feel like a dog trying to bite its own tail.’

  ‘But where can you get one at this time of day?’ Stevens said genially.

  ‘So you aren’t going to tell me who’s paying you?’

  ‘Not in these trousers.’

  ‘You know we’re
investigating a very serious crime?’

  ‘Of course. And if my client is suspected of committing a very serious crime I’m sure he would like to hear your evidence.’

  ‘I just want to ask him some questions,’ Slider said. ‘Why does he feel the need for a high-powered brief? Has he got a guilty conscience?’

  ‘My client has already co-operated with you on two occasions. Taking him from his legitimate business for a third inquisition almost amounts to harassment, and he felt he needed a friend at his side to guide him.’

  ‘I love the way you talk,’ Slider marvelled through his frustration. ‘I suppose what that means with the peel off is that he’s not going to tell me anything?’

  ‘That depends on what you ask him,’ Stevens said, obviously enjoying himself hugely.

  ‘I’m glad someone’s having fun,’ said Slider. ‘All right, let’s get this over. I wish you’d remember sometimes,’ he added as they headed for the interview room, ‘that we’re supposed to be on the same side.’

  ‘Not we,’ Stevens said. ‘Only you.’ He patted Slider on the shoulder. ‘You need a holiday, old son. Cruise in the Caribbean, maybe. I’ve just come back from one and it’s lovely there this time of year.’

  Sonny Collins sat almost bursting out of his jacket with subdued power and emotions, but – interestingly to Slider –seemed less at ease with David Stevens beside him than he had seemed without. At every question he looked at the solicitor for instructions on how to answer, which seemed to inhibit him, especially as for the most part the sublimely relaxed Stevens merely twinkled at him.

  It was as Slider expected: Collins would tell him nothing.

  ‘Mr Collins,’ Slider said patiently, ‘we know that you knew Lenny Baxter, so why do you keep denying it?’

  ‘Never seen him before in my life,’ Collins repeated.

  ‘You called him by name in the presence of Eddie Cranston.’

  ‘Eddie told you that? He’s a lying toe-rag.’

  ‘I agree with you,’ Slider said. ‘Eddie’s scum, but in this case he’s telling the truth. You and Lenny Baxter did business together.’