by Paul Harris
She apologised and her smile lost some of its erstwhile warmth. “You just seemed a little lost that’s all.” She began to move away from me but I held my hand out to her in supplication.
“I’m so sorry,” I told her, “I was miles away. My friend got killed here and I just wanted to come and… I don’t know what, really. See for myself?”
She didn’t seem to know how to respond but her smile had melted away altogether now.
“You might remember. It wasn’t too long ago. He got stabbed right here somewhere. By a mugger.”
She shook her head glumly. “I remember,” she said slowly. “The police shut the station. We had a day off. It was very sad.”
“Did you see who did it? The police never caught him. I don’t suppose you did. Perhaps you did. You may have seen something.”
She shook her head again and looked as if she were about to cry. “No, I was down on the platforms when it happened.”
“Your colleagues must have seen something?”
Her head was continuously shaking from right to left now like a dog in a car window. “The police interviewed everybody. All of us. If anyone saw something they would have said.”
“The cameras? CCTV?”
“The police checked everything. I believe they were very thorough. They never arrested anyone.” She seemed to be growing a little exasperated. “Speak to them in the café next door, they may be able to tell you more.”
She looked me square in the face and tried to muster a parting smile. “It was horrible,” she muttered and disappeared through a wooden door marked “Private”.
Café Metro was right next door. It was open but barely trading. A man sat at one of the tables outside reading a copy of the newspaper that I had left on the train. I wondered what his thoughts were on the issue of Guantanamo Bay. He peered over the rim of his glasses at me as I passed his table. I forced a smile and he returned to his paper. He was wearing a beige suit and had a straw boater on his head. He’d have looked more at home at Henley than on the Holloway Road. He sniffed as if he could smell me.
I walked into the empty café and climbed onto one of the bar stools, scrutinising the cake and cookies and samosas behind the glass fronted counter. A fly buzzed frenetically against the glass, gave up, and settled on a rock cake. I thought that I observed him rubbing his hairy front legs together before taking a slight stab at a piece of dried fruit. He knew that I was watching him but didn’t seem to care. He continued to groom himself before taking off and attacking the glass panel again.
A man of South European appearance entered from the rear of the premises and seemed surprised to see me. He wiped his hands on his apron. “Sorry to keep you. What can I get for you?”
I pushed the boat out and asked for a mocha and the man duly obliged. He placed the steaming cup and saucer in front of me and I paid him. “I wondered if you might be able to help me.” He said nothing but had the courtesy to appear attentive. “A friend of mine got stabbed to death in the station.” I nodded towards the wall. “I wondered if anyone saw anything.”
He looked concerned and I thought that I could just make out a tear forming in the corner of his eye. He stood erect, sighed, and wiped his face. “It was a terrible thing. Terrible. The young man was covered with blood. Blood everywhere. I’m sorry for you if he was your friend.”
I stirred my coffee. “You saw?”
“I will never forget.” He bit his lip and offered me a napkin. I took it from him even though I didn’t want it.
“Where did it happen?”
“Near to the entrance. Just here.” He pointed to the wall behind him. “It was terrible.”
“Did you see his attacker?” I pursued.
He shrugged uncertainly. “Maybe. I told the police that I saw someone. You know, someone suspicious. I’ve seen him many times but not since then. He used to hang around just out here.” He gestured towards the chairs and tables that were clustered outside. The man in the beige suit had folded his newspaper, removed his glasses, and was now staring through the window at us. “He used to pester my customers, you know? Begging for money.”
“What did he look like?”
“I gave the police a description. Did a photofit. White, average height, average build, fair hair, nothing to set him apart.” He said it as if they were well rehearsed lines. “Except maybe a strange look in his eyes.”
“What look?”
“Vacant and wandering but at the same time also intense and frustrated.”
“If he was around so much, he must have been caught on the cameras. There are cameras everywhere out there.”
He shrugged. “You would think.” He raised his hands in the air. “But they find no one.”
Convinced that there must have been CCTV footage of Bangla’s assailant, I finished my coffee and headed out back onto the street. The man in the beige suit had gone, leaving a plate covered in crumbs and currants on his table. Outside the station was a local street map on the wall and high above it was the distinctive black glass bowl of a closed circuit television camera. I located the nearest police station on the map which, as it turned out was at Holloway, and determined to make my way there.
But, as I waited for the lights to change at the pedestrian crossing, I wondered what kind of welcome I’d get at the police station and what they would make of any suggestion that I could find Bangla’s murderer even though the Metropolitan Police with all their resources at hand could not. I wanted to see the CCTV footage. I wanted to see the photofit that my friend from the café had provided but there was no reason for them to open up their archives to me or even allow me through the front door. My relationship with the police force had always been a stormy affair. I eyed the Red Lion on the opposite corner and a sinking feeling began to grow in the pit of my stomach.
As the lights changed, I heard a commotion behind me and turning around I saw the café owner running towards me. He had a piece of paper in his hand which turned out to be a newspaper cutting. He thrust it at me. “I found the picture. The photofit that they printed in the paper.” I took it and thanked him and he darted back off to his glass counter to shoe the flies off his cakes.
As I ambled across the road, I opened the piece of paper and studied the image that it contained. There was something familiar about the face on it but as I’d already been told, there was not much to distinguish this face from any other. The eyes were, perhaps, a little unsettling but apart from that, he could have been anybody. I took one last look before folding the paper and putting it into my pocket. I knew that I could have seen this photo on the television news any number of times and that’s why it had a curious hint of familiarity. I pushed the door open and walked into the Red Lion.
Chapter Twelve
A Truck Load of Records on a Baking Hot Day
When I got back South of the river, there was a police car parked outside the Volunteer. Uniformed officers were walking the street talking to passers-by. There was an air of doom abroad. Across the lights on the approach to the bridge there was some blue and white barrier tape blocking off the northbound carriageway and the footpath. Another police car was parked inside the tape and a policeman appeared to be standing guard outside the tattoo shop. Two more police cars came across the bridge and turned into the High Street.
“What happened?” I asked one of the smokers who were loitering outside the Volunteer.
“Someone got shot,” he replied ruefully. I pulled my hood over my head as if it made me invisible and marched off just as a first few spots of rain began to fall.
Inside the Pig and Whistle, the regulars were out in force. There was an excitable buzz around the bar. Sky television had been dumped in favour of the BBC in anticipation of some local news bulletins. Absolutely everybody was keeping an eye on the screen as it flickered through a feature about Hilary Clinton.
“I would!” remarked Buffalo, cutting through the confused hum of restrained conversation.
For once, the sound of th
e broadcast had been turned up, and for once, Buffalo was listening instead of talking. Lola seemed to be holding court so I sidled towards him to see if I could pick up on what he was saying.
“Blowed to bits!” I heard him say, and then he repeated it. “Blowed to bits, he was!”
Spider had been found in one of his upstairs rooms by his sister who’d let herself in with a spare key that he’d given to her only a week earlier. She’d been searching the premises for the non-stick muffin tray that she had previously lent him and which Spider had failed to return promptly enough. Upon discovering the body, she called the police who responded by immediately dispatching a car to the tattoo parlour, where it arrived two and a half hours later.
After finishing his bacon sandwich and wiping a dollop of tomato ketchup from his lips, Constable Fairbrother was able to confirm the presence of a fatal shotgun wound in Spider’s chest and several litres of dried blood on Spider’s bed sheets; circumstances that had already been clearly related to the telephone operator by Spider’s sister almost three hours earlier. The alarm was immediately raised. His duty dispatched, Constable Fairbrother found the door to Spider’s backyard and slipped out for a cigarette while he awaited further instructions.
The murder weapon had not yet been retrieved nor indeed had Spider’s sister’s muffin tray. Although it was understood locally that there was a suspect who was currently helping the police with their ongoing enquiries regarding the murder, he was, as yet, under no suspicion whatever for the disappearance of the muffin tray.
As the Hilary Clinton story dragged on beyond the Whitehouse and the oval office and Monica Lewinski’s cigar shenanigans, attention began to wane. Timmy was looking more bored than most but still had a glint of expectation in his eye as he said to me, “Me and Lola are going to be on the telly.”
“Why?” I asked him.
“We was there at the murder.”
“At the murder itself or at the murder scene afterwards?”
“We seen them find his body, innit.”
“Who they nicked for it? You know?”
Timmy shrugged. “But nothing like this ever happens around here.”
“Nothing?” I queried, “Not ever?”
Timmy thought for a moment. “No, not since the old Pax Romana.”
I screwed up my eyes and glared at him, and then took a sip of my beer. “What! Tim, what do you know about Pax Romana?”
“Loads, man!” He looked a little offended by the blatant tone of doubt in my voice.
“Like what then?”
“You know, the secret pact,” he breathed as though it were still a secret.
“What secret pact?”
“The peace deal that the Romans and the Vikings signed after the battle of Sleepy Hollow. It brought forth two centuries of peace. That’s why we can walk down the street unmolested these days still. Unless you go up Tinder Lane late at night.” He took a self-satisfied gulp of beer. “See?” he beamed, “I know that I’m no Trevor McDonald but I’m a lot smarter than people think I am. I just hide it under a bush.”
“Who tells you this shit?”
“I read it in the paper. I like to keep up with play, you know.”
“What paper do you read?”
“I don’t know what it’s called, do I.”
“You sure it’s a newspaper and not Viz or something like that?”
He sighed and shook his head at me as if he pitied my lack of knowledge. “Just look it up, Rod. If you want to know stuff, just look it up.”
Our attention was drawn to a flashing blue light that flickered on the fusty net curtains as it passed slowly along the road outside. One or two anxious looks passed from face to face and the steady hum of chatter momentarily abated. All that could be heard was Buffalo ordering a packet of pork scratchings. Lola smiled nervously at Timmy. A clatter of dominoes broke the tension and conversations were resumed.
Timmy took a pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket and offered me one. “Shall we?”
“You just want to watch the police cars going past.” I took a cigarette and put it in my mouth without lighting it.
“Knowledge is power,” he said mysteriously and probably quite accurately as we pushed our way through the crowd at the bar to the outside door.
The evening was relatively mild but there was an unsettled breeze gusting around the streetlights and parked cars. In the distance, two figures appeared from the kebab shop and staggered towards us as they rammed chips and lamb donor into their mouths. As they approached, one of them veered towards us with a look of intent in his eyes. I took a drag on my cigarette and blew the smoke upwards into the darkening night sky. The man with the chilli sauce around his lips was three metres away from where we were standing on the step outside the entrance to the pub. He was still staring, giving it large.
“Dickhead!” said Timmy. The man stopped and wiped his mouth. His friend turned around and grabbed his arm but he resisted. He was gazing at Timmy, his lip curled as if he was going to cry. I stepped down beside him and rummaged around in his polystyrene takeaway tray. I selected a chip with the appropriate amount of chilli sauce on it, held it up in the air, and then popped it into my mouth. Timmy stood beside me. The man threw his meal down at our feet. “Finish ‘em!” he snarled and the two of them walked off into a glare of headlights.
“You had any more weird dreams lately?” asked Timmy out of the blue as we watched them go on their way.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re always having weird dreams. You had any more?”
“What’s your angle, Tim? What’re you implying?”
“Nothing. Just wondered.”
“That I’m weird or something?”
“No!”
Another police car drove by but this time without any lights flashing. The driver peered over at us as if he was checking us out. The car pulled over to the side of the road and we could see its two occupants talking to one another before the female officer in the passenger seat began speaking into the radio. I looked at Timmy and he looked at me and said, “Don’t worry, we ain’t done nothing.”
I flicked some kebab meat off one of my trainers. The car performed a U-turn and drove slowly past us scanning for any suggestion of guilt but it kept going and went off in the same direction as the two drunks. I sighed with relief.
“Funnily enough,” I said, “now you come to mention it, I dreamt that I was out having a meal with Louis Saha and Glen Matlock the other night.”
“What the hell?” spluttered Tim. “Who’s Lewis Shar?”
“He used to play for Fulham. Apparently he was quite good.”
“What night was this?”
“What night was the dream or what night did we go out for the meal?”
Timmy shrugged and lit another cigarette. He seemed genuinely interested. “Either.”
“I don’t know…either of them.”
“So, where did you go for this meal then?”
“We went for a curry. I don’t know where. I think I had a jalfrezi but I can’t be sure.”
“What did you talk about? What did you say to them?”
I had to think for a moment. Even on those rare occasions when you can remember your dreams, it’s seldom possible to recall the finer details. “I think I asked Matlock to pass the popadoms.”
“And did he?”
“Did he hell! He ate the lot!”
“A bit greedy then? Who is he? Is he fat?”
“I don’t suppose it matters really, since it didn’t really happen.”
“But how do you know it didn’t happen?”
“Because it was a dream, Tim.” And now it was turning into one of those conversations that are better left alone.
“Yeah,but…”
“No, Tim! It was just a dream.”
“But how do you know that the things you think that you dream didn’t really happen?”
“What would I be doing going for a curry with Saha and Matlock?”<
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A car sped past and sounded its horn. Timmy raised his hand by way of a greeting. “Who’s that?” I asked him.
“Don’t know. Someone, I suppose. You never know though, Rod. I had a weird dream the other night.”
“Oh yeah?” I started picking some loose mortar out of the brickwork next to the door. “What about?”
“I was falling. Everything was chocolate brown. Everything was spinning.”
My head was beginning to spin too. “Anyway, Tim, I need a piss.”
“Don’t you want to know what happened?”
“Well, what happened?”
“I disappeared into a black hole and span around forever.”
“Well that proves that dreams are only dreams, don’t it? You’re standing right in front of me now and you’re not even spinning.”
“But am I, Rod? Am I? Are you sure that you’re not dreaming that I’m standing here in front of you and really I’m spinning around in some kind of chocolate brown vortex?”
I considered this hypothesis for an exceptionally brief moment of time. “You know what, Tim? You might have a point there because I ain’t half hungry. I’m going to the toilet and then I’m getting some crisps. You don’t think its because Matlock ate all my popadoms, do you?”
“Could be,” mused Timmy as I unshackled myself from his wistful pondering and drifted towards the door. “Were they plain or spicy? Do you know?”
“Spicy of course.”
When I came back from the toilet, Timmy was standing at the bar with Lola and Buffalo. Everybody’s attention was now fully committed to the television screen. I joined them and, after ordering a packet of cream cheese and chives flavoured crisps, turned my attention to the big screen that hung above a make-shift stage that was never used.
“What did I miss?” I whispered.
“Shshh!”
“Some local news at last?”
Another collective “Shshh!”
The pictures on the screen were of Tattoo Palace and the police tape. A policeman was still standing guard in the shop doorway. The camera wheeled around to show a view of the bridge approach. It looked almost picturesque with the bridge lit up in the background. In the foreground stood a reporter with a microphone in her hand. She wore a big coat and had gloves on her hands.