The New Eastgate Swing

by Chris Nickson

  ‘Anything?’ he asked.

  ‘Someone was here recently.’ He lifted up a newspaper. ‘Yesterday’s edition. Can’t tell who it was, though. Could have been your friend or it could have been Harker.’ He thought for a second. ‘It would be a good place to hide out. No one would think of looking here. Could have been his bolthole.’

  ‘If it was, he has another one now.’

  Even the pale November light seemed bright after the War Room. He blinked a few times. Another dead end. And they still had no idea where to find Peel or Harker.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  ‘Is this Mr Markham?’ A woman’s voice, speaking loudly, as if she wasn’t used to the phone. He’d heard the coins fall; she was calling from a telephone box.

  ‘It is.’

  ‘This is Mrs Peel, luv.’

  ‘Has Trevor come home?’ he asked, hopes rising.

  ‘No. Not even a message.’ She was trying to press down the fear; he could hear it under her words. ‘Have you found him?’ It came out like an accusation.

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘I’m going to the police,’ she told him firmly. ‘This isn’t like him.’

  ‘It’s probably the best idea,’ Markham agreed. ‘They can do more than me.’

  ‘All right.’ She seemed surprised, taken aback at his honesty.

  ‘And I hope he shows up very soon.’ He daren’t tell her what he believed.

  ‘So do I, luv,’ Mrs Peel said bleakly. ‘I didn’t sleep a wink last night. I just hope to God nowt’s happened to him.’

  ***

  ‘What now?’ Markham asked.

  ‘I’m thinking.’ Baker had rung a friend on the force and given the number plate of the motorbike. It belonged to Trevor Peel. ‘Fair to say that Harker has him.’

  ‘Yes.’ He thought about the lad’s mother and what she must be going through. ‘But how do we find him?’

  ‘I don’t know, Dan,’ Baker said quietly. ‘I don’t bloody know. Harker’s the one calling the shots on this. I’d keep that gun close, though. I’ve feeling we’re going to need it before all this is over.’

  ***

  Markham sat upstairs at the Kardomah, taking his time over a cup of coffee and looking blankly down at Briggate.

  Nothing. They had absolutely nothing. No way to find Harker. Nowhere to even begin.

  The man was in charge; they were trotting along behind and hoping.

  He’d ground out the cigarette when a movement below caught his eye. Hurriedly, constantly glancing out of the window, he counted out change before dashing out of the cafe.

  The figure was about seventy yards ahead, strolling and taking his time, as if he didn’t have a care in the world, carrying a small brown-paper parcel under his arm. Markham stayed back, just close enough to keep him in view, exactly the way he’d been taught in the service. He ducked his head, taking off the hat and crushing it into his pocket. A quick change of appearance in case the man was watching in shop windows.

  There were plenty of pedestrians around. And up ahead, in the middle of the throng, was Simon Harker, moving carelessly along Briggate towards the Headrow. Across from the Odeon he turned, heading down the hill. Markham hurried up to the corner, holding his breath that the man was still in sight.

  Harker was walking faster now, weaving through the people, and there were fewer of them around. If he tried to keep up, he’d stand out. Markham quickened his pace a hair, not too much, straining his neck to keep his quarry in sight.

  At Vicar Lane Harker had to wait for the traffic lights to change, gazing around. Markham stayed behind a knot of women out shopping together. He took out the hat and placed it back on his head. Anything that might mean the man didn’t spot him.

  Then Harker crossed Eastgate through a gap in the traffic and disappeared down the steps by the Gas Board showroom. Markham waited for an opening and darted across the road. At the bottom of the stairs he paused. They were a short cut through to Lady Lane and the West Yorkshire bus station.

  He counted to five then pushed his head around the corner of the building. Harker was already far down the street. No other pedestrians; he daren’t follow. All Markham could do was watch as the man turned left on to Bridge Street, then try to cover the distance to the corner rapidly and quietly.

  Harker had vanished.

  It couldn’t have taken more than twenty seconds. But he was nowhere in sight. Bridge Street stretched out ahead. There were buildings, other roads that ran off it. He must have taken one of those.

  Cautiously, Markham walked, his hand around the butt of the Walther in his pocket. Harker could have spotted him and be waiting, ready to pounce. He walked two hundred yards, through the tunnel under the bridge, engines roaring above him, glancing up the side streets as he passed, then coming back again to Lady Lane.

  Nothing.

  So bloody close and he’d come away empty-handed. As he stood and lit a cigarette he could feel his heart pounding, all the fire roaring through his body.

  Christ.

  He strode back to the office. They had an area to search now. A start. But it was a place filled with small businesses and the last remains of slum housing. Too many possibilities.

  ‘You took your time,’ Baker said when he walked in. ‘I thought you’d hopped on a charabanc to Scarborough or something.’

  ‘I saw Harker,’ Markham said.

  ‘Where?’

  He went through it all from the moment he’d run out of the Kardomah. When he finished, Baker said, ‘Let me get something from the car.’ He returned within a minute, unfolding a map of Leeds on the card table and pointing with a stubby finger.

  ‘You lost him on Bridge Street. But he only had a thirty-second start, is that right?’

  ‘Less.’

  ‘And no sign of him at all when you walked along?’

  ‘Nothing at all.’

  ‘We know he couldn’t have gone too far in that time.’ He traced a small circle on the paper. ‘Nothing beyond that.’ He smiled, a feral grin showing tobacco-stained teeth. ‘We might just be closing in on him.’

  ‘There’s still plenty to go through. And he might have known I was behind him. He could have led me down there and ducked off somewhere else.’

  ‘Do you think he did? In your gut?’

  ‘No,’ Markham told him. He felt certain of it. ‘I’m sure he never saw me.’

  ‘That’s good enough for me.’ He rubbed his hands together. ‘Let’s make a start.’

  ***

  There were more businesses and doorways than he’d imagined. They’d split up; it was the only way to cover the ground.

  ‘It’s like when I was a detective constable and we did house-to-house questioning,’ Baker said. ‘It’s boring, but it can work. Just give them a very quick description and ask if they’ve seen anyone like that in the last day or so.’

  ***

  By five o’clock his knuckles felt raw from knocking on doors and his voice was hoarse from saying the same words over and over. Two people thought they might have seen Harker, but neither remembered exactly where; he was no more than a faint impression.

  The day had turned colder. At five he gave up. All the small business had closed for the day and the streets were empty. There was still plenty left for tomorrow. His feet ached as he walked back to the office on Albion Place.

  Markham felt a hard knot of frustration. He should have just run and confronted Harker, taken his chances. Instead he’d tried to be clever and ended up losing him.

  He sat at his desk, smoking and trying to warm up. The chill hadn’t left his bones before Baker arrived, raising his eyebrows in a question. Markham shook his head.

  ‘Never mind. We’ll see the rest of them in the morning. Someone down there will know him.’

  ‘If we’re lucky.’

  ‘Then hope that we are.’ He adjusted his hat. ‘I’m off for the night.’

  ***

  He listened to the six o’clock news. Productivity was
up, wages were rising. But there was always something going on somewhere to leave the world an unsafe place. The faint shadow of nuclear war always on the horizon. Markham switched off the wireless and selected a Basie LP. It was full of life and joy. The kind of music to dispel gloom. Just what he needed right now.

  ***

  ‘Back to it,’ Baker said. ‘We’ll find something today, don’t you worry.’

  They marched over to Bridge Street side by side.

  ‘When I started out on the beat, all the Leylands round here were still full of people. They’ve knocked most of the houses down now. Good job, too, if you ask me. You wouldn’t have wished them on a cat.’

  ‘Bad?’

  ‘They were packed inside. No indoor plumbing, outside privies down the block. You can say what you like about the past, but it wasn’t pretty. All this renewal, it’s the best thing. Give people somewhere decent to live like Quarry Hill Flats.’ He gestured to the huge estate on the other side of Regent Street. It looked grey, forbidding, secretive, the main archway like a gate into some dark place. ‘We were not long wed and moved in there in ’38, when it opened. Everything new and modern. It was like paradise. You thought you’d walked into another world.’

  He was just filling time, and they both knew it. A distraction before the grim work.

  ‘We’ll meet back at the office at twelve,’ Markham said.

  ***

  After an hour a thin drizzle began to fall and then passed. The sky lowered as more clouds rolled in. By afternoon they’d probably have another fog. Not good weather for hunting someone.

  Trevor Peel was still missing. He’d heard nothing more from the boy’s mother. He’d half-expected the police to come calling with questions, but there’d been no word from them. Maybe she hadn’t reported it, after all. Like so many people, the family probably kept their distance from the law. From some, the avoidance was natural, drummed into them over generations. Ringing the coppers would be a desperate resort.

  More knocking on doors, more going into offices, small warehouses and factories. He kept at it doggedly until quarter to twelve. Not even a hint of Harker. Finally he gave up and strolled back to Albion Place.

  Already there were the first wisps of mist in the air and he could hear people starting to cough, walking with scarves held over their noses and mouths.

  Baker was scribbling a note.

  ‘You just missed a telephone call,’ he said. ‘Someone wants you to ring them back sharpish.’ He handed Markham the scrap of paper with a number.

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘Said his name was Turnbull.’

  The man who’d rung from MI5. Ted Smith’s favour.

  ‘Did you find anything?’

  ‘Not a sausage. How about you?’

  ‘The same.’

  He settled at his desk and began to dial the number. What did the man want? Maybe they’d found Harker. Maybe it was all over. Maybe.

  He was shuffled through two layers of secretaries before Turnbull picked up the phone.

  ‘I’m glad you rang me back.’ That confident, patrician accent.

  ‘What can I do for you, Mr Turnbull?’

  ‘There’s something you ought to know. It won’t be in the newspapers or on the news. You mentioned a chap called Tim Hill when we talked.’

  ‘That’s right.’ The secret service’s contact at Cokely’s. The one who’d turned the Germans into double agents.

  ‘Did you know him at all?’

  ‘I never met him. My partner talked to him.’

  ‘Then perhaps you can remember him in your prayers.’

  Dead? Hill was dead?

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ Markham said. He turned the scrap of paper over, scrawled Hill’s dead on the back and pushed it over to Baker. The man read it and raised his eyes in alarm. ‘How did it happen?’ Markham continued.

  Turnbull was slow to answer.

  ‘It wasn’t natural causes. My people are looking into it.’

  MI5 had taken over the murder investigation from the police. That was what he meant.

  ‘I see.’

  ‘That other chap you mentioned. Our Deutscher friend.’

  ‘Harker.’

  ‘We’re very eager to talk to him,’ Turnbull said.

  ‘So are we,’ Markham told him.

  ‘Ah.’ A long pause and then, reluctantly, ‘Perhaps we should join forces.’

  ‘What did you have in mind?’

  ‘We have two people on their way. They should be in Leeds by three. I’ve instructed them to come to your office.’

  Not a request for help. A command.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘I already have Warner there. He’s looking into the matter with Mr Hill.’ So bloody circumspect. He knew it came from years of caution, but no one was going to be tapping this line.

  ‘We’ve met.’

  ‘Very good. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that the country would be grateful for you doing your duty.’

  ‘We’ll talk to your men,’ Markham said.

  ‘Very good. Expect Mr Davidson and Mr Molloy.’ Turnbull put down the receiver. Not even a thank you.

  ‘It seems we’re assisting MI5.’

  ‘From what I’ve seen of them in the past, someone needs to,’ Baker said. ‘If we’re going to have to put up with them later, we’d better get some dinner now.’

  ***

  Davidson and Molloy looked more like clerks. The same as Warner, Markham thought. Bowler hats, dark suits and overcoats, eyes slightly glazed from the long train journey, mouths pursed in disdain at being sent north.

  They asked their questions, not bothering to take notes. But Markham expected that. They were recruited for their minds. They might look bored, but they’d be thinking. He hoped so, anyway.

  ‘We’re going to need local knowledge,’ Davidson said. He was a lanky man in his forties with jowls already developing. ‘We’ll co-ordinate with our chap who’s here already and find out the state of play.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘You say you can’t find Harker but you know where you lost him.’ He made it sound like Markham’s failure.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘We’ll start with that in the morning,’ Davidson said briskly as he picked up his briefcase. He stood, his companion following quickly. ‘Nine o’clock?’

  ‘They make me feel like one of those native guides you see in the pictures,’ Baker said after the footsteps faded on the stairs.

  ‘Not very friendly, are they?’ They’d been supercilious, acting as if everything would be fine now that the professionals had arrived. And he didn’t believe a word of it. They were just two more blunderers in the dark. ‘I saw some like that in West Germany.’

  ‘How good were they?’

  ‘A few did well,’ Markham answered after a little thought. ‘Most of them were a waste of time.’

  ‘Well, I don’t want to play second fiddle to a pair of spies. No “yes sir, no sir, three bags full” whilst they balls it all up.’ He curled his hand into a fist. ‘We know what we’re doing, don’t we?’

  ‘As much as they do.’

  ‘Then let’s handle it ourselves. The way we were before their bloke Hill got himself killed.’

  ‘And what do we do if we find Harker?’ he asked soberly.

  ‘We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.’ But Markham knew what it meant. No mercy, no hauling him off to stand trial.

  ***

  An evening of singers. Ella, Sarah, Billie. He loved the way they twisted themselves into the words, the way that Holiday could show the depth of emotion simply by slurring a word. There was beauty in it all, and it swung like the devil.

  But always the sense of time passing. Running out. A clock relentlessly ticking.

  He had strange dreams, Harker breaking into the flat and destroying his record collection, taking pleasure in smashing the records one by one. Even while it was happening he knew it wasn’t real, but he was unable to move or stop it ha
ppening. All he could do was sit and watch it, the tears streaming down his cheeks.

  Markham woke with a start, gulping for breath. The tendrils of the dream clung to him. He had to get up and smoke a cigarette before his mind cleared. The records were still there, neatly filed in alphabetical order.

  He’d never expected to feel so much for music, that it could move him. But he’d grown up on the sound of the radio. The polite, reserved dance bands and the classical music of the Home Service. Music that seemed to peer down from a height.

  Jazz invited him in. It spoke to him. There was freedom in it, that sense of exploration. It didn’t have limits or boundaries. Markham ran his hand over the top of the LP covers, finished the cigarette and went back to sleep.

  ***

  In the morning he felt the broken night. It took him a little while to wake up. His toast tasted like cardboard. Only after a second cup of tea was he ready to face the world.

  Davidson and Molloy were waiting outside the office door, dressed in exactly the same manner as the day before. No small talk, they just sat and waited in silence for Baker to arrive. But he didn’t. Nine o’clock. Half past and his seat was still empty.

  ‘Perhaps he’s poorly,’ Markham said.

  ‘Then why doesn’t he ring?’ Molloy sniffed. ‘We have work to do and he knows that.’

  But this was his protest. Markham understood that. Quietly and firmly withdrawing his labour. He knew exactly where the man would be.

  Molloy and Davidson stayed until quarter to ten. They finally asked a few questions and Markham answered them honestly. He even explained about the house to house and saw them glancing at each other with contempt. But he doubted they could come up with anything better.

  Finally they’d had enough.

  ‘We’ll note your unwillingness to help in the file,’ Davidson said stiffly.

  ‘I’ve told you what we know.’

  ‘We expect active help, Mr Markham, not just words.’

  Once they’d gone he hurried over to Bridge Street. He didn’t bother to look over his shoulder. If they wanted to follow, that was fine; it wasn’t a secret. But men like that would get short shrift around here. The superior attitudes would only get peoples’ back up.