by Ray Connolly
‘He’s American,’ said Barbara as though that explained every possible gaucherie. ‘Now what about you?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Come on. What’s bothering you? What did you do to lose Asid?’
Kate stared at her hands. She couldn’t tell Barbara about Charlie. She wanted to, but she knew it would be pointless. Barbara would never understand. She tried to put it in a more oblique way.
‘Don’t you ever wonder about what we’re doing?’ she asked.
Barbara’s blue eyes opened wide: ‘No, never,’ she said. ‘There’s nothing I’d rather do.’
‘Nothing?’
‘Nothing.’ Barbara was quite firm about that. She meant it all right. She liked sex, she liked having a good time, she liked being admired and she loved money. ‘I think,’ she went on, ‘that I chose the perfect vocation.’
Kate changed the subject, ‘When will you tell Sarah?’
Barbara smiled: ‘About Harrigan? When I’m sure.’
‘What will you do if she gets difficult?’
Barbara smiled: ‘What will she do?’
‘There’s Daley … and the others.’
Barbara smiled: ‘All menace and threats. If it came to it he’d run away like a frightened rabbit. He’d never dare take on Harrigan.’
Kate remembered Charlie’s face. He said he’d had his face and arms smashed. That was Daley’s work, and Charlie wasn’t anything like so important to them as Barbara. Would fear of Harrigan be a big enough deterrent to Daley? Kate couldn’t be sure.
‘I think you’re wrong,’ she said, suddenly rather loudly. ‘I know someone who was badly beaten up …’ She stopped. Barbara was again looking at the man with the beard, hardly listening. ‘Barbara … you must listen …’
‘I heard you … but they can’t hurt me. I know too much about the way they work … all the little assignations they arrange for us, all the rendezvous, all the names of our friends from the Gulf and Saudi and the oil companies. Even without Harrigan’s backing I’d be safe. One threat from Sarah and I could give the vice squad enough work for ten years.’
‘Sarah will think you know too much.’
‘Which is why she won’t dare do anything. With Harrigan I’ll be untouchable. Think about it, Kate. But, remember, I trust you to keep quiet.’
Kate nodded.
Barbara looked again at her new conquest. He was smiling again. ‘Do you think,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘that our friend with the beard would like to take me off to Sardinia for a few days? … He doesn’t look very busy, does he?’
‘Take care, Barbara,’ said Kate.
Barbara ignored her: ‘I’d settle for a couple of days in Cannes actually,’ she said and widened her smile at the smirking romantic across the dining-room.
Chapter Thirteen
‘Waits at the window, wearing a face that she keeps in ajar by the door, who is it for?’ Charlie’s fingers skipped pizzicato style across the keys, his lips unconsciously mouthing the story of Eleanor Rigby. He opened his eyes and surveyed the long narrow cocktail bar. Not without reason was it called the Mystery Train. It was seven in the evening and trade was brisk. A few minutes earlier a refugee from the sixties had wandered across. and, shoving a crumpled pound note into the glass jar which was kept on top of the piano for such benefactors, had insisted that Charlie play everything Beatle he knew. Charlie knew everything Beatle, but a pound was only a pound, so he resolved that having worked through most of the Revolver and Rubber Soul albums he would move on to a little Fats Waller or even dive into some Sting ragtime as soon as Father McKenzie had ‘walked from the grave’.
This was his first night in the Mystery Train. It was certainly a step forward from the Starlight Rooms where Marty the Zee had told him they had now replaced the girl with the hair and guitar with a Muzac machine. At the Starlight no one listened. Drink was too important. Here at the Mystery Train, three converted railway carriages stretched and widened and parked in a yard around the back of Covent Garden, the clientele was younger and musically more aware. The tips would be smaller, obviously, but it would be a relief to get away from playing the theme from Love Story and A Man And A Woman every night of the week.
He looked up and around the bar at the mixture of publishers’ secretaries, journalists and stiffer-necked young men he assumed to be in some sort of financial or legal professions. There was just as much chatting-up as at the Starlight and probably with a more assured success ratio, he figured, but the scales were more evenly balanced between the sexes. There were no expense account macho males and no dollified little scrubbers. Here was something approaching an equality of purpose, and not a hooker in sight. The thought had crossed his mind before he had thought of Kate. The reminder dug a bruising knuckle under his ribs. He stopped playing and leaving McCartney behind headed after some Brubeck, a left-over from his days at the Starlight. A low murmuring of dissent at his choice of music murmured in the club. Satisfied that he was at least being noticed he relented and moved on to Sergeant Pepper. ‘What wouldyou think if I sang out of tune, would you stand up and walk out on me?’ he sang. And thought about Kate.
Chapter Fourteen
Kate’s holiday away from the attentions of Sarah ended after two weeks. The telephone was ringing as she returned to her flat from a walk in the park.
It was Daley: ‘Sarah wants to see you,’ he said with the charm of an adder. ‘It’s important … Trader Vic’s at seven. Okay?’ His voice was hard and peevish.
Kate guessed that he was still angry for the dousing with vodka she had given him. She knew better than to ask for any further explanation: ‘All right,’ she said. ‘Tell her I’ll be there.’
‘She said you mustn’t be late,’ said Daley.
‘I never am,’ replied Kate and put down the phone.
The Hawaiian-styled bar known as Trader Vic’s in the lower ground floor of the London Hilton was busy in the middle of the evening cocktail hour as Kate made her way down the steps from the hotel lobby and into the plastic gloom of the Americana South Seas. As usual, when she made an entrance, heads looked up, busy little accountant-type heads on shiny well-suited businessmen. She moved through the tables to the far corner where, quietly watching a motionless parakeet in a cage, sat a small, dark woman of about forty. This was Sarah: a neat, trim woman with black, straight hair cut and layered so that it fell in a parting down one side around a small and finely featured face. She was the ultimate in chic: sitting there so placidly, she might have been a senior partner in a fashion house, or the wife of a rich banker.
‘What would you like to drink?’ Sarah indicated the cocktail list for which Trader Vic’s was famous. She was wearing a sober well-cut navy blue suit and white shirt with a floral scarf tied casually yet extremely carefully about her neck.
Kate chose something that was a concoction of pineapple juice and vodka. Sarah raised a perfectly curved eyebrow and immediately a small absurdly-attired girl, looking like an extra from South Pacific, appeared before them. Kate did not like Sarah, but it was difficult not to be aware of the power of her presence. The girl took the order and disappeared into the gloom among the mock palms, bamboos and staring men.
‘How are you, my dear?’ Sarah always began her conversations with the gushing politeness of an old and loyal friend. ‘It’s been so long since we had a chance to talk. You’re looking perfectly ravishing. Marvellous … Do you know, I’ve been so busy recently …’ She sighed. It was all part of her build up.
Kate was not taken in by this smattering of bonhomie. She had been ordered to appear, and appear she had. ‘You wanted to see me,’ she said.
‘Just a little chat,’ said Sarah. Kate knew that it was something else. Sarah was never interested in little chats.
‘A little chat about what?’
At that moment the drink appeared, and the two women fell silent until the hula-hula girl had left them.
‘I really can’t think what possesses those poor girls
to think they’re sexy in those ridiculous outfits,’ said Sarah shaking her head as she watched the young waitress sashay away.
Kate didn’t answer this time. Sarah would come to the point in her own good time. There would, she was sure, be no mention of Asid.
Sarah was a hard woman, but with the prettiest and most disarming of faces. Kate had known her for five years. At first they had come together on a friendly basis, when Kate had joined the small and extremely successful modelling agency which Sarah owned. It was only later that Kate had realized that the modelling agency was little more than a recruitment centre for a larger and vastly more profitable organization. Sarah stage-managed a world in which beauty and power were brought together and bonded by a centralization of wealth unknown in any other age. For the super-rich London was both office and playground; a playground in which Sarah provided most of the best toys.
In another culture Sarah might have been described as a broker. Indeed she no doubt saw herself as a dealer in one particular kind of commodity in a brokerage which covered a multitude of activities and interests. Behind every good man lies a good woman, they used to say. In the tradition of history Sarah and her partners had simply adapted that maxim to a city that had become uniquely a centre for world finance, diplomacy and most recently and most importantly, gambling. In places such as this were men who had wealth and power, and who were frequently alone. In London behind every good man was a choice of beautiful women, which was where Sarah’s girls scored over the opposition. Sarah produced courtesans, multilingual, intelligent, well-educated sophisticates – women a man would never be ashamed to be seen with. Kate was her very best.
The question of the identity of Sarah’s partners had long teased Kate, as it did most of Sarah’s girls, and from time to time she and Barbara had amused themselves by trying to guess who they might be. But guessing was as far as they ever got. Sarah never gave them the remotest clue, and the partners themselves kept their tracks perfectly covered.
For nearly thirty minutes Sarah kept up a polite although seemingly pointless conversation about the vagaries of being a businesswoman in these uncertain times. At first Kate was puzzled. Only when Sarah sneaked a glance at her watch did Kate realize why she was there. They were obviously going to meet someone else.
‘Who is it?’ she asked.
‘Nothing very grand I’m afraid, darling,’ said Sarah. ‘Very much a short term thing, I’m afraid.’
‘How short?’
‘Tonight.’
‘One night?’ Kate was surprised. Sarah had never suggested a one night stand before. Her organization prided itself on providing something rather more special than that. London was packed with escort agencies and massage parlours for the quickie specialists.
‘There isn’t much else available at the moment,’ said Sarah. ‘Midsummer is a bad time for us, you know that.’
‘Why me?’ Kate knew exactly what she was worth.
‘This wouldn’t have been necessary if you hadn’t upset Asid,’ said Sarah.
So that was it. She was being chastised, reprimanded for fouling up a relationship with the most lucrative client in London. She knew now that her mystery client was in all probability going to be verging on the obnoxious. This was Sarah’s way of reminding her girls that business depended upon their total commitment.
At that moment any further conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a rather portly, fair-to-thinning-haired man in a loud check lightweight jacket, and pale blue cotton trousers, which didn’t quite reach his black highly-polished shoes. He had, Kate observed, a rather large nose, pink tired eyes. and judging from the way his lips hardly moved when he smiled, probably a poor selection of teeth. His stomach bulged heavily over a snake-skin belt. He was, she thought, medium revolting.
On seeing him Sarah was at once back to her laughing, gay self. ‘Kate,’ she said, enjoying every second of the humiliation, ‘this is Mr Brent … He’s Australian.’
Brent bent down and shook Kate’s hand vigorously: ‘Pleased to meet you …’
‘How are you, Mr Brent?’ she replied.
‘That’s okay, Katey. No need to be formal. You can call me Wide.’
‘Wide?’
‘Wide Brint…’
Kate caught Sarah’s eyes. They were mocking. Along with everything else Sarah was a snob, and the Australian dialect was not one which she would find socially acceptable. Poor Mr Wade Brent was merely being used as a tool in her humiliation of Kate – although, had he known, he might not necessarily have complained.
Wade Brent smiled broadly at the two women: ‘Dunno much about how you go about this kind of business in London … don’t suppose you take credit cards, do you?’ And with that he burst into laughter.
Kate stared at her hands. Jokes must take an awful long time to reach Australia, she thought. But clearly, discretion took even longer.
Wade Brent was a stranger to London. A stranger with a lot of money to spend quickly in whatever direction Kate so directed. He wasn’t fussy what he did, he told her, after Sarah had left them, so long as he had a good time … ‘know what I mean, Katey’.
Kate thought she knew very well what he meant.
She took him first to dinner at the Meridiana in Fulham Road and then on to a casino in Curzon Street where Sarah had left their names.
To Wade Brent this was high living, and in between telling her all kinds of fascinating things about how he apparently owned just about half of Queensland and the odd cobalt plant here and there, he also gave her to understand that, despite the deal he had made earlier in the evening with Sarah, there would be a nice little present for her later if she behaved herself. Wade Brent liked to come to the point.
Despite attempts to keep him interested at the tables Brent suggested somewhat forcibly around midnight that it was time they retired to his suite back at the Hilton.
They were in his room by ten past twelve, in bed by quarter past, and the act of love making – including the particular speciality that he claimed he had asked and paid for – was completed by twelve twenty-five.
‘Katey,’ said the bloated middle-aged Australian, lying panting happily on his back like a pink seal, ‘I want to tell you that on the Wide Brint scale you score nine point nine. Top marks I ever gave anyone.’
Kate didn’t answer at once. The experience had left her completely cold. She had not enjoyed it: she hadn’t hated it. She had just done her job reasonably well. She wasn’t used to getting marks for it. Sarah had certainly known how to humiliate her.
‘I’m very flattered, Mr Brent,’ she said after a moment. ‘I never usually get past the first round heats.’
Whether or not Wade Brent realized that he was being sent up she had no way of knowing, because suddenly he had lost interest.
‘Christ, Katey … I’m jiggered … bloody jet lag …’ he mused.
He closed his eyes. Kate stared out of the window. In his haste to get into bed Wade Brent had not drawn the curtains.
‘Katey … look I’m beat…’ His eyes were flickering trying to stay open. ‘Why don’t you give me your phone number and we’ll get together tomorrow when I can get back on my feet. I’m all in for tonight now.’
‘I’m sorry. Sarah doesn’t allow home telephone numbers,’ said Kate, which was true. All business had to go through her.
‘OK … look … why don’t you run along now … it’s been nice, but … I’ve got some meetings tomorrow … We’ll get together again before I go back … You’re a great girl, Katey
Kate needed no further invitation to leave. Within two minutes she was dressed and heading for the door. Wade Brent was already virtually asleep. She thought about reminding him about the little present he had promised, but she didn’t. True, she had earned it, but she had a feeling it would be easier to forget all about it than to try to raise the sleeping Australian from his stupor.
Never mind, she thought. Win some, lose some. With Harrigan this was how it would always have been.
Chapter Fifteen
The postcards were Marty’s idea, although at first they embarrassed Charlie to death. It came to Marty when he paid his first visit to the Mystery Train to see how his client was progressing, and was totally astonished to discover that his client had actually established a following.
‘You didn’t tell us you had groupies here,’ said Colin, who had accompanied Marty, and was virtually slavering with envy as he realized the attention Charlie was receiving. ‘I suppose you sing, too.’
‘Yes,’ said Charlie, sitting back on his stool and resting, ‘I even do some of our songs sometimes.’
‘I thought you were supposed to be a cocktail bar pianist who nobody listened to and everybody complained about,’ insisted Colin, as a young girl smiled hopefully towards Charlie.
‘It’s this place. It does for the Elton John-Billy Joel types what the Hope and Anchor does for punks,’ said Charlie.
‘What?’ said Marty. The conversation was going too fast for him. He had booked Charlie as a replacement pianist. It had never really occurred to him that Charlie might become a draw.
Charlie explained: ‘They wanted me to sing. So I did. Now they keep asking me where they can buy my records … don’t laugh. I’m a star.’
‘A little star,’ corrected Colin. ‘More of a twinkle really.’
Marty looked at Charlie: ‘You’re not trying to tell me that all these years I’ve been poor you’ve been hiding your talents in that girls’ school, are you?’
Charlie shrugged: ‘I don’t know. But the manager here tells me I can stay as long as I want.’
‘I want to renegotiate,’ said Marty and hurried away to seek out the manager.
‘What happened?’ asked Colin.
‘I’m an overnight sensation at thirty-five,’ smiled Charlie. ‘All of a sudden all these people began asking me to play things I’d written myself, and the one night I got a bit drunk, so I sang a couple of our songs … things like Wild Strawberries and Touch Me In The Morning … and there you are, there’s a constant stack of requests, the jam jar is stacked with money, and people are listening while I’m singing.’