Jack Nightingale 03 - Nightmare

by Stephen Leather

  Nightingale shrugged. ‘To be honest, Perry, I’ve never seen the attraction of shooting people for fun.’

  ‘It’s a game, man.’ He picked up a joint from an ashtray next to the video game console and lit it.

  ‘I guess,’ said Nightingale. ‘But you do it enough in a game and maybe the lines get blurred and people start to think that killing’s fun and that you always get a new life. And we both know that you don’t. You get killed and that’s that. There’s no reset button.’ He gestured at the girls. ‘I need to ask you something. Are you okay for them to be here?’

  ‘Off you go, girls,’ said Smith, patting the girls on the legs. ‘Wait for me in the bedroom. If I’m not up in ten minutes, start without me.’

  One of the girls whispered in his ear and he grinned. He waved T-Bone over. ‘Give them a couple of wraps,’ he said.

  The girls uncurled themselves from around Smith and left the room with T-Bone. In the hallway he gave them two wraps of crack cocaine and they went upstairs, giggling.

  ‘Fit, huh?’ said Smith.

  ‘Yeah, they say gentlemen prefer blondes. What are they? Russians?’

  ‘Latvians. And they’ll do anything for crack. Now, to what do I owe the pleasure, Nightingale? I thought you and I were old news.’

  ‘You sorted out the Reggie thing?’

  Smith grinned. ‘Reggie who?’ He looked over at T-Bone. ‘You know anyone called Reggie?’

  T-Bone shook his head. ‘Name don’t ring a bell.’

  Smith stretched his arms out along the back of the sofa. ‘Looks like the Reggie thing, whatever it was, got sorted,’ he said. ‘So what do you want?’

  ‘Bit of business, actually,’ said Nightingale.

  Smith blew a cloud of sweet-smelling smoke at him. ‘Not sure I wanna do business with a former cop,’ said Smith. T-Bone stood behind the sofa, his arms folded across his massive chest.

  Nightingale reached inside his raincoat and pulled out a manila envelope. He tossed it onto the table in front of Smith. Smith leaned forward and picked it up, the joint clamped between his teeth. He opened the envelope and rifled through a thick wad of fifty-pound notes. He nodded and sat back, looking expectantly at Nightingale.

  ‘I need a gun,’ said Nightingale.

  Smith grinned. ‘A gun?’

  ‘Yeah. A bloody big one.’

  ‘What’s your game, Nightingale?’

  ‘No game. I want to buy a gun.’

  Smith’s nostrils flared as if he’d smelled something bad in the room.

  ‘My money’s good,’ said Nightingale. ‘I left the stuff I printed back at home.’

  ‘Do I need to get you to strip down again, Nightingale?’ His eyes hardened.

  ‘What, you think I’d wear a wire to get you on a gun charge?’

  ‘Last time I checked having a gun gets you a ten stretch.’

  Nightingale sighed, opened his raincoat and began to unbutton his shirt. Smith took his joint out of his mouth and waved for him to stop.

  ‘I don’t want to see your raggedy arse again,’ he growled. He scratched his chin and then nodded. ‘Okay, this is how it’s going to work. You pick up that money and put it back in your pocket.’ He gestured with his joint at the heavy standing by the door. ‘T-Bone there is going to take you for a ride and show you what we’ve got. You’re going to give him the money and all’s well that ends well.’

  ‘Cool,’ said Nightingale, reaching for the envelope.

  Smith lashed out with his foot and slammed his shoe down on the envelope, missing Nightingale’s hand by a fraction of an inch. ‘Just so we’re clear,’ said Smith. ‘If anything happens to T-Bone, if he so much as gets a parking ticket today, then I’ll come looking for you again and this time I won’t miss. Clear?’

  ‘Like glass,’ said Nightingale.

  Smith moved his foot. Nightingale took the envelope and put it in his pocket. ‘Thanks,’ he said.

  ‘This ain’t nothing to do with me. This is between you and T-Bone.’ He grinned. ‘But you’re welcome.’

  61

  Nightingale followed T-Bone out of the house and along the road. The heavy was now wearing a Puffa jacket over his tracksuit, and black leather gloves.

  ‘Where you parked?’ growled the heavy. Nightingale pointed at the MGB. ‘That works?’ said T-Bone. ‘What is it, clockwork?’

  ‘It’s a classic,’ said Nightingale.

  ‘That’s rust around the wheel arch, innit?’

  ‘A bit. When you’re that age you’ll probably be a little rusty around the edges.’

  T-Bone chuckled. ‘You’re a funny man, Nightingale.’

  ‘I have my moments,’ said Nightingale. He took out his cigarettes and offered the pack to T-Bone, who shook his head. Nightingale lit a cigarette and blew smoke up at the sky, careful to keep it away from the other man. ‘So how did you get a nickname like T-Bone?’ he asked. ‘You got a bit of an appetite?’

  T-Bone shook his head. ‘Nearly killed a guy with a stake once.’

  ‘What? A piece of meat?’

  ‘Broken bit of wood. Like doing a vampire. He had a machete; I had a stake.’

  ‘And how do you get from impaling to T-Bone?’

  ‘It’s ironic, innit?’ he said. ‘You never have a nickname?’ He grinned, showing two gold front teeth.

  ‘They called me Birdy at school.’

  ‘Nice,’ said T-Bone. He nodded at the MGB. ‘You get in your toy car and follow me. We’re going to a lock-up in Streatham.’

  ‘Streatham? That’s not far; why don’t we go in the same car?’

  ‘Because I’m not riding in your piece of shit and you’re as sure as hell not riding in my motor. If we get stopped I want deniability.’

  ‘We won’t get stopped.’

  ‘You don’t know that. Black man in an expensive car, he’s got a target on his back. So you follow me.’ He jerked a thumb at the MGB. ‘How fast will that thing go?’

  ‘I’ll keep up with you. I’ll pedal real fast.’

  T-Bone laughed and clapped Nightingale on the back. ‘I like you,’ he said. The smile vanished and he gripped Nightingale’s shoulder. ‘What Perry said back there is only half the story,’ he said. ‘Anything happens to me you’d better hope I don’t get bail because I’ll personally be tearing off your balls and shoving them down your throat. Hear?’

  Nightingale nodded. ‘I just want a gun,’ he said.

  ‘I know. A big one. Don’t worry about that; we’ve got big guns coming out of our arses.’

  ‘Nice image,’ said Nightingale. He blew smoke. ‘Let’s go. I’ve got things to do, rivers to cross, mountains to climb.’

  ‘What?’

  Nightingale grinned. ‘My clock’s ticking.’ He dropped the cigarette onto the pavement and stamped it out.

  T-Bone went over to a black Porsche SUV and climbed in. He waited until Nightingale was in the MGB and then pulled away from the kerb and headed south. Nightingale kept close behind. T-Bone slowed down when they reached Streatham and after they’d driven along the High Road he made a right turn and then a left and then drove down an alley between two rows of houses. They came to a block of six brick-built lock-up garages with metal doors and corrugated iron roofs. There was a black Lexus there, its engine running. T-Bone parked facing it. Nightingale pulled in behind the Porsche and parked. As he climbed out, T-Bone was hugging two big black men who had got out of the Lexus. Nightingale recognised one of them from the photographs that Dan Evans had shown him by the Serpentine.

  T-Bone said something and they all laughed, then T-Bone pulled out a set of keys, unlocked the door of one of the lock-ups and pushed it up. The other two went back and leaned against the bonnet of their Lexus, their hands deep in the pockets of their overcoats. As Nightingale walked over to the lock-up, one of the men pulled something black and metallic from his pocket. Nightingale’s heart began to race but then he realised it was a Magnalite torch. The man chuckled as he switched on the torch as if he knew
what Nightingale had been thinking.

  T-Bone waved for Nightingale to join him and disappeared inside the lock-up. The man with the torch pushed himself off the Lexus and followed T-Bone. There was an old Jaguar there, its boot facing outwards. T-Bone pulled the door down behind them. ‘Don’t want anybody looking in,’ he explained. He used another key to open the boot, then stood to the side to allow Nightingale to see into it. The other man used his torch to illuminate a dozen or so sackcloth-wrapped packages.

  Nightingale picked up one of the packages and unwrapped it. It was a Glock, similar to the one he’d used when he was with CO19. He rewrapped it and put it back in the boot.

  ‘Too small?’ said T-Bone. A larger package contained a sawn-off shotgun with a stubby single barrel and a pistol-grip butt. ‘Takes five shells,’ said T-Bone. ‘Untraceable. It’ll blow off everything above the waist from six feet away. Bang!’

  ‘Maybe not quite as big as that,’ said Nightingale. ‘You know what I’d really like? An MP5.’

  T-Bone sneered as he rewrapped the shotgun. ‘Nine mills don’t do no damage,’ he said. ‘Like the Glock. Nice gun, but most guys I know could take a couple of nine-mill slugs and keep on walking. You get shot in the face with this and you ain’t going nowhere.’ He put the package back in the boot. ‘Are you going to fire it?’

  ‘Am I what?’

  ‘The gun. You gonna fire it or just wave it around? Horses for courses, innit?’

  ‘I’m going to be playing it by ear.’

  ‘Here’s the thing. If you don’t fire it you can sell it back to us at fifty pence in the pound. You buy for five hundred and we’ll take it back for two-fifty. But if it’s been fired it’s on you because then it’s traceable.’

  ‘Unless it’s the sawn-off ?’

  ‘You can fire that all day long and it’ll never be traced,’ said T-Bone. ‘But if you’re gonna be letting rip then you don’t want the Glock or the MP5 or the MAC-10 because you’re gonna be spitting out shells all over the place.’

  ‘Yeah, well, when Perry came after me I seem to remember the tinkle of casings hitting the pavement.’

  T-Bone chuckled. ‘That was Reggie’s idea,’ he said. ‘He wasn’t concerned about getting his money back. They were brand new and he was planning to sell them on to a gang north of the river so that they’d take the heat for your hit.’

  ‘Nice,’ said Nightingale.

  ‘He was clever like that, all right,’ said T-Bone. ‘Too clever for his own good as it turned out. But if you’re planning to let fly you’d be better off with a revolver. Keep your casings.’

  ‘Fewer shots, though.’

  ‘See, you being a cop and all I’d be thinking you’d make every shot count,’ said T-Bone.

  Nightingale smiled at the irony of a former member of a Metropolitan Police armed response unit being given firearms advice by a south London gangster, but everything that T-Bone said was right. Nightingale didn’t know how the evening was going to play out but if he did have to fire the weapon he didn’t want to be leaving evidence around. ‘So what do you have in the way of revolvers?’

  ‘I can do you a nice Smith & Wesson,’ said T-Bone, reaching for a second parcel.

  Inside were two stainless-steel guns with black rubberised handgrips that looked very similar but Nightingale recognised one as the Model 627, a .357 Magnum that took eight rounds while the other was a Model 629, a .44 Magnum that held six rounds. The 627 had a four-inch barrel and the 629’s was more than an inch shorter.

  ‘Nice,’ said Nightingale, reaching for the 627. He checked the action and nodded approvingly.

  ‘You wouldn’t want to be firing at any distance,’ said T-Bone. ‘But with eight in the cylinder you’ve got more of a margin for error.’

  ‘How much?’ said Nightingale.

  ‘Twelve hundred quid.’

  ‘What? I only want the one.’

  ‘List price in the States for them both is about a thousand dollars. And we have to get them over here.’

  ‘Do I have “idiot” written on my forehead?’

  ‘I can’t see in this light,’ said T-Bone. ‘Maybe. But for a new gun that’s the price, innit?’ He took the 627 off Nightingale and wrapped it up. ‘How close do you think you’re getting to the target?’

  ‘Not sure,’ said Nightingale. ‘Why?’

  ‘The Smith & Wessons have both got short barrels. I’ve got something a bit longer.’ He rooted among the packages and pulled out the one that he was looking for. ‘It’s a Taurus 627,’ he said, handing the gun to Nightingale. ‘The barrel’s eight and a half inches so you can be accurate up to fifty feet without too much trouble, seventy-five feet if you’re lucky. Holds seven rounds, not too much of a kick, but again you know what you’re doing so that shouldn’t be a problem.’

  Nightingale nodded, then looked along the barrel.

  ‘It’s a bit front-heavy so two hands are better than one,’ said T-Bone. ‘The grip’s a bit small but you’re not a big man.’

  ‘I’ve had no complaints,’ said Nightingale.

  T-Bone wagged a gloved finger at him. ‘Funny man,’ he said.

  ‘How much?’ asked Nightingale.

  ‘It goes for about five hundred bucks in the States so you can have it for seven hundred and fifty.’

  ‘Dollars?’

  ‘You should do stand-up, Birdman,’ said T-Bone. ‘Quid. But I’ll throw in a box of rounds.’

  Nightingale took out the envelope of cash, then turned his back on T-Bone while he counted out the notes. He heard T-Bone chuckling behind him but he ignored him. He turned round again and gave him the money.

  T-Bone shoved it into his coat pocket without counting it, handed Nightingale the gun and then pulled a box of cartridges from the boot. He gave them to Nightingale. ‘Pleasure doing business with you,’ he said. He raised the door and daylight flooded in. ‘Like I said, return it unfired and I’ll give you half the cash back.’

  ‘That’s not going to happen,’ said Nightingale. ‘Whatever happens, I’ll dispose of it.’

  ‘Pity,’ said T-Bone. ‘It’s a nice bit of kit.’ He pulled the door down and locked it. As he straightened up he stopped smiling and looked at Nightingale with dead eyes. ‘If anything happens to this stash any time soon, your life won’t be worth living. You know that, right?’

  ‘I hear you,’ said Nightingale.

  T-Bone took a step closer and glowered down at him. ‘Don’t let my pleasant disposition lull you into a false sense of security,’ he said. ‘Just because you were a cop doesn’t mean you can’t be hurt. And hurt bad. And if you fuck with us, I’ll be the one doing the hurting. Clear?’

  ‘Crystal,’ said Nightingale. He winked. ‘Be lucky, T-Bone.’

  ‘Yeah. You too, Birdman.’

  Nightingale shoved the gun into his pocket as he walked back to the MGB.

  62

  Nightingale called Morris on his mobile when he was a few miles away from Fairchild’s house. ‘Are you ready, Eddie?’

  ‘I’m in the pub, about half a mile past the house,’ said Morris.

  ‘You’re not drinking, are you?’

  ‘You’re not my mother, Nightingale. And I’m the one doing the favour here.’

  ‘For a monkey. Let’s not forget the five hundred quid in my pocket. See you in a bit.’

  Nightingale ended the call. He slowed the car once he got near the house, getting a good look at it as he drove past. It was a stone barn conversion with a steep roof that looked brand new and a dovecote at one end. There was a sweeping driveway leading from the main road and a two-car garage running at a right angle to the main house. Nightingale had phoned Fairchild’s Mayfair office and confirmed that the lawyer was in London, and a check of the electoral roll had shown that he lived alone in the house.

  Nightingale parked at the side of the pub and found Morris at the bar drinking a bitter lemon. Nightingale ordered a coffee from the landlord. ‘I’m pretty sure the house is empty,’ he said.
‘There’s an alarm box on the side wall. That means there’s probably not a link to the cops, right?’

  ‘Sometimes they have both,’ said Morris. ‘But the nearest cop shop with twenty-four hour cover is thirty miles away so there’s not much point in a phone link. But I’ll be able to deal with it no matter what the system.’

  ‘It’s that easy, is it?’

  Morris tapped the side of his nose. ‘It is if you know what you’re doing. I used to install them, and nine times out of ten the factory setting is still there. Even if it’s not . . .’ He shrugged.

  Nightingale’s coffee arrived.

  ‘By the way, have you got my cash?’ asked Morris.

  Nightingale sighed, took out his envelope of cash and counted out ten fifty-pound notes.

  ‘Petrol?’ said Morris.

  Shaking his head, Nightingale sighed again and then handed over another fifty-pound note.

  Morris grinned and pocketed the money. ‘You’re a prince among men,’ he said. ‘Right, how are we going to do this?’

  ‘I’ll leave my car here,’ said Nightingale. ‘We take your car to the house, you get me in, then you shove off back to London.’

  ‘You’re staying?’

  ‘That’s the plan. And when I’m done I’ll come back here and pick up my car.’

  ‘What are you up to, Jack?’

  ‘It’s complicated,’ said Nightingale.

  ‘You’re not robbing the place, I hope.’

  ‘If anything it’s the opposite. He’s stolen from me.’

  ‘So we’re on the side of law and order?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ said Nightingale. He finished his coffee and patted Morris on the back. ‘Let’s go.’

  Morris had parked his Saab behind the pub. ‘I need to get something from my car,’ said Nightingale. He went around to the MGB and retrieved the Taurus and the box of ammunition from the glove compartment. He put the gun in his right coat pocket and the cartridges in the left. They were so heavy that they pulled the coat down, so he took it off, rolled it up and carried it. He figured that Morris wouldn’t be as amenable if he knew that Nightingale was carrying a gun.