59 Minutes

by Gordon Brown

  The second goon was trying to get to his feet. Rachel ran back and, with a kick that Bruce Lee would have been proud to call his own, she landed her heel on the first goon’s head. He screamed and let go of my foot. I pulled myself through the door and Rachel followed me. She slammed the door shut and turned the key that she had left in the lock. The sound of the second goon hitting the door reverberated around the close and we ran.

  Outside Rachel hit the remote on the car key ring and we leapt in. She fired up the car and we were history.

  ‘Now where?’ she said.

  ‘ London.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘ London. I need to sort this and the only place I can do that is London.’

  ‘I can’t go to London. I’ve got a job.’

  ‘And it won’t be much use if you’re a new addition to Linn Crematorium. London it has to be.’

  ‘Fuck.’

  It’s hard to think that you could spend six hours in a car with someone and say so little but Rachel was the type of girl that could do that and some.

  We hit the outskirts of London just after rush hour and I directed her to Fulham. I had someone I needed to see and I could only hope they were still in their old house.

  As we passed by the Albert Hall I had a change of mind and told Rachel we should check into a hotel for the night. I needed to do a little leg work before I took the next step.

  We booked into one of the myriad of hotels that circle the Albert Hall. It took me back to that first night in London. This time I wasn’t sharing. Separate rooms of course.

  Another day another dollar.

  Chapter 59

  Wednesday August 13 th 2008

  I’ve made a shed load of phone calls and I’m certain my name is now around town. But I had no choice. If there was one person that might know where Dupree was it was Giles — and the last time I had talked to Giles he had screamed at me down the phone for my little jaunt into Silvertown. Stepping on his toes had got him fired. But I knew he hadn’t vanished.

  While in prison I met a small time con called Casper Turner. Casper was a toe rag and had been caught robbing an old folks home. Normally I would have ignored his type but I recognised the name from London and I knew he had been tied up with Giles in some way. I caught up with him in the exercise yard and he told me that Giles had retired back to his house in Fulham.

  When Giles got the bullet he was in his late fifties and I knew he had more than enough cash to get by. I thought he might be dead by now but the phone calls had revealed that he was very much alive, and still living in Fulham. I had an address and it was time to pay a visit.

  Rachel was still in silent mode and when I asked to borrow her car it was like asking a kidney patient to lend their dialysis machine. But she agreed.

  London was the usual — busy and a pain in the arse. I wound my way towards Giles’s address. Harrods slipped by and then Stamford Bridge. There was a football game on tonight and the police cones were already going out to limit parking.

  I turned into the North End Rd. The daily market was running, the stalls lining the full length of the road on my right. I had no sat nav and no A to Z but I knew Fulham well enough to get to Giles’s street.

  Parking was a different game and even mid morning it took me twenty minutes to find a space. Rachel’s car was two inches longer than the gap but a bit of bumper to bumper action and I was in. I’d explain the scratches if she noticed them.

  Giles lives in a row of terraced houses. In the mid eighties they had provided a surprisingly cheap accommodation option given their proximity to the city centre. Chelsea, just up the road, was already awash with million pound plus homes while you could still get a two bed flat for thirty five grand not half a mile away.

  I walked past Giles’s house and glanced at the building. The curtains were open but it was hard to tell if there was anyone home. I reached the bottom of the street and did a u-turn and gave one more fly by. I u-turned again and this time walked up to the door.

  It was a jet black affair with a large brass knocker in the shape of a horse’s head. I tried to remember if Giles had been a horse person, but there were no bells ringing. I pulled back the knocker and let it drop. I repeated the exercise and waited.

  I was about to knock again when I heard a noise from behind the door. There was a spy-hole just above the horse’s head and I saw it darken as someone looked out. Bolts were thrown and the door cracked open. A head appeared.

  ‘Fuck.’

  I seemed to have this effect on people at the moment.

  ‘You can piss off.’

  I smiled.

  ‘What the hell do you want?’ said Giles.

  ‘To chat.’

  ‘What the fuck do we have to chat about?’

  ‘Amongst other things, the price of bread would seem a good topic.’

  The door closed, a bolt was thrown and the door re-opened. Giles was dressed in a pair of battered chinos topped off by the granddaddy of oversized cardigans. The sort that has no buttons and relies on a cloth belt to keep it closed. He stepped back and gestured for me to come in. I took a quick look up and down the street but it was clear. I wasn’t expecting anyone but then again I had thought Rachel’s a safe bet.

  ‘Expecting company?’ said Giles.

  I shook my head. ‘Not unless you are?’

  He closed the door, led me through a short hall and into the room on the right.

  It was like stepping back in time. The furniture was Victoriana, as were the carpet and fittings. Two walls were floor to ceiling with books and the third wall had a stunning landscape of a ship in the midst of a hell of a storm.

  ‘Take a seat. Tea?’ he asked.

  ‘Thanks,’ I replied.

  With that he left me and I wondered why there was no butler. I didn’t sit down, choosing to browse the book-shelves instead.

  I was no great reader but then again this was not Waterstone’s top ten land. Most of the books sounded like medical texts from an era long since gone.

  ‘The Establishment of the Causes and Effects of Excessive Bile and other Digestive Juices on the Well Being of the Elder Man’, ‘Vibratory and Motion Maladies’, ‘Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners.’ and so on. Rivetting. I moved to the second wall and it was more of the same. As I waited on Giles to return I hunted for a non-medical book but, if it there was one, I didn’t find it before tea and biscuits appeared.

  Giles placed a silver tray on the walnut coffee table that sat in front of two over stuffed armchairs. The tea was in a silver pot, the sugar in a silver bowl, the milk in a silver jug and the spoons were silver. The tea cups were delicate bone china. It could have all been cheap tack but, to my untrained eye, it all looked genuine antique.

  Giles sat down and looked at me. I took the chair next to him but he made no attempt to pour the tea.

  ‘Good tea needs to infuse for a full five minutes. My apologies for my brusque language at the door. I was caught a little unawares.’

  The change of attitude was a bit too Jekyll and Hyde for my liking.

  ‘So what can I do for you?’

  ‘No small chat?’

  ‘Do you want to?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then what can I do for you?’

  ‘Do you know a French man called Carl Dupree.’

  ‘Dupree. Wasn’t he the one responsible for your little residency in prison?’

  ‘That’s him.’

  ‘I can’t say I know much. When you so kindly replaced me I decided to put all that behind me. I’ve heard of the man. A player as I recall. Big time down here. Other than that not a lot. Why?’

  ‘I’m trying to find him?’

  ‘For a social call?’

  ‘You could say that.’

  ‘And what makes you think I can help?’

  ‘You were always well connected. Far better than me.’

  ‘It didn’t do me much good.’

  ‘I mean well connected across the board.
I never mixed in some of the circles you did. I was hoping that some of your old connections might be able to put me in touch.’

  Giles leaned forward and gave the tea a stir. Clearly the five minutes were not yet up.

  ‘Surely he can’t be that hard to find? I mean he is hardly a low profile type of person.’

  ‘No but my old network is long gone. I’ve probably exposed myself just getting your address. By the time I find him he will have found me. I thought you might be able to shorten the process.’

  ‘If I could help why would I want to? After all you rolled me over big time. I don’t owe you a thing.’

  ‘Bygones are bygones?’

  He laughed and stirred the tea again.

  ‘Let’s risk it.’

  With this he poured milk into my cup and filled it with tea. He did the same for himself. I picked up the cup and took a sip.

  ‘Well?’ he said.

  ‘Well what?’

  ‘The tea. Was it worth the little wait?’

  ‘Very nice.’ And it was.

  ‘I tell you what,’ he said. ‘I might be able to help but I want something in return.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘When I left, you took on my office. I never had the chance to clear it out.’

  I remembered the office well. It wasn’t quite in the same league as this room but you could see that he was on his way to a full blown life that revolved around Queen Victoria and her subjects.

  ‘There was a globe of the world that sat next to the window. Do you remember it?’

  I did. It was a huge beast.

  ‘Do you know where it is?’

  It was my turn to laugh. Of all the bizarre things to ask, I actually knew where the damn thing was.

  I had stared at it for months after moving in and hated it. It was one of those globes that showed the world as they thought it looked in the late sixteenth century — missing chunks of land, odd shaped versions of countries, extra islands at the foot of the world — you know the sort of thing. Only it wasn’t that old. Spencer used to say it was late Woolworths.

  In time I had decided to clean out the office to put my own stamp on my space and the globe went. I was all for throwing it out but Martin decided he wanted it. I had no idea he even liked the thing so I said yes and he took it.

  ‘Martin Sketchmore took it.’

  Giles couldn’t have known Martin that well but his face changed markedly when I mentioned his name.

  ‘You remember Martin?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well I can give you a number but he’s gone a bit A.W.O.L. at the moment. It’s the best I can do.’

  ‘Maybe later,’ he said and that seemed to close the conversation on the globe.

  ‘So will you help?’

  Giles poured another tea and offered me the same but I refused.

  ‘There used to be a Sainsbury’s at the end of my road. Did you know that?’ he said.

  ‘No’ — a bit leftfield again.

  ‘A small one. It closed. You don’t hear of many supermarkets closing. It sat right at one end of the North End Rd market. It had a fruit and veg section but with the market outside the front door it never did well. It also had a hostel for Sainsbury employees above it. Young kids starting out were put up there until they got on their feet. All gone now. Funny how things move on isn’t it?’

  I didn’t know what to say.

  ‘You think you’ve got a handle on the world,’ he continued. ‘And then it sneaks behind your back and shoves you flat on your face. I loved that little Sainsbury’s. I don’t know why but when I found out it had the hostel I always thought of it as a nursery. Lost souls in London being watched over. It had a nice ring to it.’

  More tea was drunk and I waited for the trip down memory lane to resolve itself into a relevant story or vanish.

  ‘Mid eighties it would have been,’ he said. ‘Mid eighties and I was walking home. I’d dropped the car in town after I had drunk too much and taken the tube to Fulham Broadway. The place was alive with football supporters. Chelsea were playing Millwall in the cup — at least that’s the way I remember it.’

  He sipped at his cup before continuing.

  ‘The police had thrown a line of horses down the centre of the North End Rd keeping Chelsea fans to one side and Millwall to the other. It didn’t really work — there was too much distance between the horses to make an effective barrier. A fan, I can’t remember if it was Chelsea or a Millwall fan, thought it was funny to light up a newspaper, run up to one of the horses and try to set light to its tail. The policeman was off the horse in a shot and a scuffle broke out. A few more policemen on horses rode in and the fan was lifted. As I arrived at my road I looked up at the hostel above the supermarket. The lights were on and by now it was late. I saw a face at the window, looking down on the scene below, and I remember thinking that they don’t really know what is going on down here. It’s funny but some people can stare at a situation for years and never really get it. Strange that, isn’t it?’

  Leftfield. Definitely leftfield.

  Giles finished his tea.

  ‘I don’t know where Dupree is but I can find out. It will take me a day or so. Give me a number and I’ll let you know.’

  ‘Can I call you instead?’

  He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Sure tomorrow night about seven should be fine. Where are you staying?’

  ‘East end of the city,’ I lied.

  He gave me his number and the conversation was over. A few minutes later and I was back on the pavement.

  I’d always thought Giles was a bit off the wall and old age hadn’t really changed him for the better.

  Back at the hotel I told Rachel we were here until at least tomorrow night and she kept up the silent treatment.

  With nothing better to do I wandered up to the Natural History Museum and then across to the V amp; A and blew a few hours. I ate in a Pizza Hut. I don’t know where Rachel ate. I had one drink in the bar and then called it quits for the night.

  Chapter 60

  Thursday August 14 th 2008

  I woke up early but had nothing to do and all day to do it. I borrowed fifty quid from Rachel and decided to do the tourist bit. I waited until the rush hour had gone and picked up a Zone card that would give me travel all day.

  I had no plan so I drifted through the centre of London seeing much but taking in little. My head played around the upcoming encounter with Dupree but the event seemed distant and unreal. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do when I caught up with him, but doing anything was better than this nothing.

  I walked up the stairs at Bank tube station and went for a wander around the financial city. You could almost feel the money in the buildings around me but you could also feel the tension. There was change in the wind. A few days ago the French bank BNP Paribas had signalled some serious financial problems and the issues over the summer with the US markets didn’t bode well.

  I wound my way up to Holborn and then walked along to Tottenham Court Rd. I cut through Leicester Square and took my time crossing Trafalgar Square before I made for Hyde Park and some green.

  I found a bench and watched the lunch time people become the mid afternoon people. I got bored and stiff before deciding to go back to the hotel.

  I grabbed a sandwich from a corner store. I wasn’t hungry but I forced myself to eat it. God alone knows what might happen tonight and the last thing I needed was to be low on energy.

  I lay on the hotel bed until six thirty and then headed back out. I found a phone box and, at bang on seven, I phoned Giles’s number. It rang half a dozen times and then the answer machine kicked in. I was about to hang up when he picked up and apologised.

  ‘I was in the toilet. Your French man has an office on Lloyds Avenue in the city. He operates his business under the company name King to Ace Ltd. I don’t know the number on Lloyds Avenue but it isn’t that long a road. I don’t expect to hear from you again.’

  Before I could say th
anks he hung up on me. I didn’t know Lloyds Avenue but there was a Food and Wine across the road from me and, after a quick transaction, I owned a shiny new A to Z.

  The book told me that Lloyds Avenue was not a spit from where I had been earlier in the day. It backed onto Fenchurch St station and was a short walk from the Tower of London.

  I went back to the hotel to find that Rachel was out. I scribbled a note and pushed it under the door. I didn’t know whether Dupree would be at his office and I suspected a phone call at this time of night would prove fruitless.

  I tried to look up the company in the hotel phone book but there was no entry under King to Ace. I borrowed the reception phone and tried directory enquiries but the people with the answer didn’t have an answer. My best bet was to pay a visit and suss out the lay of the land.

  I took the tube across town — still busy with late workers and night shoppers — before exiting at Bank. This afternoon I had turned left at the top of the exit — this time I turned right. The light was fading and the streets were quiet. Office lights were on all around me and the bulk of the city work force had split for the day.

  I found Lloyds Avenue. It was short and unobtrusive. Not off the beaten path but certainly near the verge. I walked down the right hand side and scanned the few doors that there were. I completed the trip and repeated the walk, scanning the other side. I came up blank. I started again but this time I walked up to each door regardless of what the wall plaque, or sign outside, read.

  About half way down there was a double door entrance. The reception area beyond was small and functional but the building had the feel of quality. The sign outside read ‘Cranchester Aggregates plc’.

  At the back of the reception, unmanned, was a list of the divisions and which floor they occupied. Most were a variation on Cranchester — Cranchester Equipment, Cranchester Haulage and so on. Right at the top, the style of sign writing changed.

  All the bottom floors were written in simple capital letters — each in the same typeface. The top one differed in two ways. Firstly there was no letters and secondly there was a picture of the King of Hearts and the Ace of Clubs.