Dusty Death

by J M Gregson

  He had taken the coke an hour ago, as his cover demanded that he should. Normally it gave him a lift, made him for a time more confident and optimistic, even though he knew in his heart that this well-being was an illusion. Tonight he found as he slunk along the almost deserted streets of Moss Side that the high had not lasted, that he felt less rather than more secure.

  Would his reactions be slowed, would he be unable to act and react to events as swiftly as he surely must if he was to survive?

  He told himself that he would have the backing of the firm. Tonight, for the first time in months, he would have the benefit of police support, of colleagues who were anxious to secure his safety. That thought gave him no comfort. He struggled indeed even to comprehend the idea. He had immersed himself for so long in the culture of the underworld which he had made his natural habitat for the last four months that he could not regard the network which was supposed to extricate him from this as anything other than an alien force.

  Mike Allen had ceased to think like a policeman.

  The building loomed ahead of him, massive and black as a setting for a horror movie. But it was worse than that: his fevered brain, so full of unwelcome thoughts, told him that. This multi-storey car park, tall as an office block, black as Satan’s palace, was worse than any Psycho motel. It was bigger, blacker, more threatening in its massive anonymity, than any cinema mock-up could ever be.

  To see so large a building so dimly lit was the worst thing of all. Some of the university buildings were only half a mile away, their size making them seem even closer through the darkness. Some of them were much higher than this one. But they were brightly lit, teeming with a life that was innocent and ongoing. Mike put up the collar of his anorak against the straggling hair at the back of his neck and turned away from them.

  The man, whoever he might be, would not be there yet. That was the way it operated. He forced himself to move beneath the big concrete arch of the entrance and into the cave of darkness.

  The basement smelt of rotting wood, of urine, of a host of other dank smells he did not care to identify. There was a tiny scratching at the far end of it, thirty or forty yards away from him. Rats? Mike was a Winston Smith when it came to rats; he feared that he would run screaming from the place if anything ran over his foot. But the sound was not repeated. Mike Allen forced a long breath of the damp and icy air into his coke-narrowed lungs, then put his shoulders and his back against the damp concrete of the wall. This wait would be the worst time of all. You had to try to close your mind against the possibilities of the next half hour.

  The minutes stretched like hours, the sounds of the city outside sounding muted and distant, as if reminding him that he was isolated here, that he was alone with the evil forces which would dictate his destiny. He thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his grubby anorak, trying not to register the tremors which began to run through his limbs as the effects of the cocaine wore off and the damp cold of this place began to take its toll on his thin body.

  He should have been glad to hear the car, to know that his vigil was coming to an end. Instead he felt only fear. Fear of himself, as well as what was coming. Fear that his body would be so rigid with terror that his limbs would be unable to move, his brain unable to act out the part it had played so successfully for months. Fear that in this climax of his ordeal, his nerve would fail him and he would collapse in suicidal confession at the feet of the man he was supposed to trap.

  The Jaguar purred softly into the car park and down to the basement, fixing him like a rabbit in its headlights, threatening as it eased silently towards a stop to pin him against the dripping wall. Mike Allen’s knees were shuddering against the front bumper when the long vehicle stopped and the illumination switched abruptly to side lights. Mike had thrown up the back of his arm in front of his eyes, blinded by the fierce white light after the darkness of his waiting.

  He was conscious of a heavy man easing out of the passenger seat and standing over his crouching form. The driver and another figure from the back of the car got out and stood slightly behind their leader, one on each side, the heavies providing the protection he would never need from Mike.

  ‘Good evening, Mr Smith,’ said Mike obsequiously. He was glad that his voice at least was working. You called them all Smith; no one in the hierarchy revealed his name, and the less you knew the safer it was for you.

  The man did not reply. He studied the form in front of him for a few moments, then reached out a toe to Mike’s leg and turned him from a sideways cower to a position facing him directly. ‘So, Michael Allen, you want to work for us. You want to deal.’

  ‘I do, Mr Smith.’ Mike had caught a touch of Irish in the voice. It was irrelevant, now: he wasn’t a detective, not in this situation. He was bait, dead as a dodo within minutes, if the men who might not even be there did not intervene to save him. Yet he was glad he had picked up the bit of brogue: it showed that his brain was working, when he had most need of it. He whined, ‘I need to deal, see. It’s the only way I can get my supplies, innit?’

  It was the way most people became dealers at the bottom of the chain, the way the barons were assured of their loyalty. Once you became an addict, you were no longer employable in legitimate work in the world outside. You needed your coke or your heroin in ever larger doses, but you no longer had the money to buy. You had to deal, to get your supplies.

  ‘Cokehead, are you?’

  Mike could hear the contempt in the voice. He thought for a moment that the man who had come to vet him was going to touch him again with his toe, to give him a kick perhaps, just for the pleasure of it. Instead, he stood motionless, studying the abject figure in front of him: Mike could hear the sound of his breathing, smell stale cigar smoke on his camel coat. He pleaded, ‘I’m not an addict, Mr Smith. I’m in control still. I’m a user, not an addict. I won’t let you down, when I deal.’

  ‘If you deal.’ The check came promptly, as if he had touched a nerve. This man enjoyed the power he wielded; it wasn’t just the wealth which interested him. ‘Can you shift horse?’

  ‘Horse and coke. LSD as well, if you’ve got it.’

  ‘And E?’

  Mike could hear the voice ticking off the list of the most lucrative drugs for the suppliers. ‘Yes. I can shift Ecstasy, plenty of it. The middle classes want that! And speed. And as much rohypnol as you can supply!’

  The laugh came back at him harshly through the dimness. ‘Everybody wants the date-rape drug! Everyone can shift that! Symptom of our decadent society that is, Michael Allen.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Smith.’ He stood with head bowed, feeling the weakness now in his knees, wondering where this was taking him, how long he could keep up his part if no one intervened to save him.

  ‘We’ll be looking to you to turn over a thousand quid a week initially. Two thousand a week, once you get going. Think you can do that?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, I’m sure I can, Mr Smith. So long as you can make sure that I get what I need for myself.’

  ‘You’ll get that, Michael Allen. And perhaps commission for yourself, when you begin to shift the right amount. There’s money in this, you know, for those who keep their mouths sealed and get on with shifting the stuff.’

  That was the nearest he would come to a pep talk. Most of these pathetic instruments did not survive more than a year before their own addiction caught up with them. That did not matter to the Smiths of the industry, so long as those who failed knew nothing about the men above them.

  ‘I’ll shift them all, Mr Smith. I know I can do it. I’ll be one of your best operatives, once I get going.’

  Smith’s laugh rang loud in that quiet, echoing place. He had heard it all before, knew that these contemptible creatures really believed what they were so desperately telling him. ‘I like that word: “operative”. Comes from a different world, that does. I like it. Well, Michael Allen, you’ll be delighted to know we’re going to give you a trial.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Smith. I won’t l
et—’

  ‘A couple of weeks to start with. You’ll get your own intake, which you’re not to exceed, and quantities to shift. We’ll be watching you, mind. If we find you satisfactory, you’ll be given more dope and an extended period.’

  ‘Right. I’ll make sure you—’

  ‘You won’t see me again, Michael Allen. I don’t deal with the likes of you.’

  ‘No. No, I wouldn’t expect to—’

  ‘But I’ll be watching you. Don’t you worry about that. So don’t you step out of line.’

  He had never taken his eyes off the submissive figure against the dripping wall in front of him. He did not do so now as he nodded to the man behind his right shoulder. The man opened the boot of the Jaguar and bent to lift the box from inside it. The boot light gleamed unnaturally bright in the darkness around it, throwing the man’s features into a goblin profile as he stooped and straightened again. He waited for another nod from Smith before he came forward and held out the box to the man with his back to the wall.

  It was at that moment that hell broke loose.

  Arc lamps flashed bright and blinding, throwing up the group by the Jaguar as if they were on a stage, freezing the cameo into stillness as the police sirens blared and the vehicles screamed in to block off the exit for the Jaguar.

  There was a confusion of yelling voices, telling the men caught in the lights not to move, that armed police had their weapons trained upon them, that they should keep perfectly still. Seconds later, the three men who had so terrified Mike Allen were against the side of the Jaguar with their hands above their heads and their feet splayed, as expert hands ran up and down their bodies in search of weapons.

  Mike slumped against the wall, scarcely realizing that salvation had come, scarcely hearing the torrent of oaths and obscenities pouring over him from Smith as he realized he had been betrayed.

  The officer yelled into the man’s ear that he was being arrested for attempting to supply illegal Class A drugs, that he did not need to say anything now, but that it might prejudice his defence if he failed to reveal evidence which he might later rely on for his defence in court.

  All Mike was interested in was the strong police arms which held Smith in check as he tried to launch an attack on the exhausted figure in front of him.

  It was only when the big frame was being arrested and flung into the back of the police Rover that Mike heard that his real name was Walter Swift.

  Nineteen

  February the twenty-ninth. A day of great significance, in the minds of some people.

  Frivolous people, Lucy Blake told herself firmly. Forget all about the date and enjoy the evening, that was the best approach. It’s not every day that Percy Peach takes you to a posh restaurant. She’d offered to go Dutch, but he’d rejected the suggestion, with a lordly wave and an expression wholly inappropriate for the delicate ears of a young lady. As Lucy had decided that at twenty-eight she was now no longer either young or a lady, she did not make even the attempt to blush.

  She wondered whether to pretend that she had eaten duck à l’orange of this quality on many previous occasions, then rejected that idea also. Percy Peach had a disconcerting habit of seeing straight through any pretensions of that sort. More importantly, she was pleased to find that she no longer wanted to deceive him, that they had gone beyond the point where they played silly games of that sort with each other.

  The silly games they did play with each other were much more enjoyable.

  Percy seemed to be having to search much harder than usual for words. Perhaps the immaculate linen on the tables and the gleaming cut glass inhibited him. Or perhaps he was inhibited by the fact that at the beginning of the evening he had forbidden any shop talk, any observations on the baffling case of the murder of Sunita Akhtar.

  Percy was at his most trenchant and most amusing when he spoke off the record about the suspects involved in a case. It was his involvement in his work which was one of the things which had attracted her to him, in the first place. Try finding that in the ten most important factors in a relationship, as listed by Cosmopolitan.

  He kept filling up her glass with the Shiraz. It was a good one, and he even threatened to order another bottle. When she refused, he insisted on ordering brandies at the end of the meal. She shuddered to think what the evening was costing him. He can afford it, as a single man on a chief inspector’s salary, she told herself firmly.

  Peach lingered uncharacteristically at the end of the meal. He was usually far too impatient to spend more time than was strictly necessary over anything. Well, almost anything. You couldn’t count sex: all men were prepared to spend inordinate amounts of time on that. But certainly food was not normally one of Percy Peach’s major concerns. And this lingering, this running of his finger thoughtfully round the top of his glass, this series of soulful glances into her eyes over the latter stages of the meal, was quite untypical. Unnerving, in fact.

  He said suddenly, ‘You’ve got very beautiful eyes, you know. Blue or green, according to the light. Or something between the two, a shade which can turn strong men’s knees to water.’

  ‘Ultramarine,’ she said dryly.

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘You told me all about my eyes the first time we went out. Ultramarine, you called them then.’

  ‘Did I really? I congratulate myself on that. I had great discernment, in those days.’ He shook his head sadly, as if they were thirty rather than three years behind them. He’d be going in for the full nostalgia trip next, recalling their first, tentative advances to each other as if they had been Romeo and Juliet. It was all quite perplexing, especially when you hadn’t much of a head for alcohol.

  Lucy realized that weakness when the cold night air hit her outside the restaurant. Percy asked her, ‘Your place or mine?’ as the taxi drew up. That was disconcerting, too. He normally had it all worked out, was looking forward with relish to the romp ahead of him, whether in her warm bedroom or in his freezing one.

  Lucy looked up at the thin moon, caught the frost on the grass, and said firmly, ‘My place, I think!’

  ‘Much the best idea,’ Percy agreed. ‘I like a woman who can take important decisions!’

  He made it sound heavy with import, and it was so far from his normal attitude that she wanted to take issue with him. But he darted his mobile right hand straight to her thigh in the darkness of the back seat of the taxi, and she was soon giggling her way through much more familiar battles. Normal service had apparently been resumed.

  Yet he was not as anxious as usual to get her into the bedroom. He accepted the offer of another coffee and sat in the big armchair looking through her CDs, making desultory conversation. He seemed to be at a loss until she mentioned the England cricket team, whereupon he enlarged at great length and with great expertise on the length of the England tail and the inconsistency of their bowling. Her mother would have loved it.

  Lucy Blake wondered whether Percy was beginning to go off her.

  That awful idea was quickly dispelled when they made their tardy retirement for the night. Percy held her at arm’s length and looked soulfully into her eyes before they left the sitting room, an uncharacteristic delay at this particular moment. But once she began to undress, all was busy activity. She was reassured, even as she employed the nimble side-step which was a necessary skill during this part of the evening.

  Percy seemed as usual to have at least two pairs of hands, both of them highly active. ‘You’re a fetishist!’ she told him breathlessly. ‘I’ve never seen anyone turned on so immediately by the sight of a pair of pants.’

  ‘I’ve always been into knickers,’ Percy agreed happily. ‘Even more so since I got into yours!’ Suiting the action to the word, he fell upon her with a warrior’s whoop and deployed his four hands at the back and the front of the blue silk garment. ‘Now that’s what I call a backside!’ he said with a long sigh of pleasure. ‘I warmed my hands specially for this.’

  ‘You were always one to bowl a gir
l over with your consideration,’ said Lucy, deciding that the line of least resistance was the only possible one here and making for the double bed she knew would soon be in disarray.

  It was some time before Percy Peach said anything else. When he did, it was the mystic but simple ‘Bloody’ell, Norah!’ which was his usual seal of approval on their carnal exchanges. It was warm and muffled, from somewhere beneath the bedclothes.

  They had eaten and drunk too well and exercised too strenuously. At two thirty in the morning, Lucy Blake found herself staring at the ceiling and reviewing the curious events of the earlier part of the evening. Indigestion. She must be getting old: she needed a tablet.

  It was a mistake. It was whilst she was stretching for her handbag beneath the bed that the man she had thought deeply asleep beside her fell upon the ample backside he had so admired and ravished her anew. For certain, his ardour was not diminishing.

  She sank happily back upon her pillows. ‘Bloody’ell, Norman!’ she murmured admiringly.

  It was over the stark simplicity of the breakfast bar in her small modern kitchen that she puzzled herself again about the events in the restaurant on the previous evening. ‘You weren’t your usual self, my man,’ she said, as lightly as she could. ‘You were polite, even romantic. It’s not your style.’

  ‘I’m a romantic at heart.’ Percy stared bleakly at his muesli and imagined a full fry-up. ‘And I’m ten years older than you. I’m not allowed to presume.’ On that gnomic utterance, he delved his spoon resolutely into his healthy cereal and ate.

  ‘Nearly ten years,’ she corrected him. ‘And I didn’t notice any decline in energy during the rest of the night.’

  Percy smiled in spite of himself, looking rather like a schoolboy who has just received praise for getting his sums right. ‘Nevertheless, I am a modest man, Lucy Blake. I do not presume.’ He sighed rather theatrically. ‘I’m disappointed, but not surprised. It’s a pity, because I’m very fond of your mum – she talks a far better cricket game than you ever will. But there it is.’ He sighed again and resumed his meditational munching of muesli.