Shadowplay

by Norman Hartley

  I grinned. ‘This is my world, Jim. Don’t worry about it.’

  I took my jacket off and left it in the car, rolled my sleeves up to mid-forearm, and loosened my tie. At a coffee shop opposite the building, I bought a coffee, specifying triple cream. The girl sniffed and made me pay extra for the cream and I put a lid on the plastic cup and carried it across the street. At the entrance, I nodded to the security guard and walked straight to the elevator. He barely gave me a glance and I rode straight up to the fourth floor. On the landing, I checked the directory for Wint’s room, took the lid off the coffee, and knocked on his door.

  When Wint opened it, I gave him the coffee straight in the face. The triple cream had been my concession to gentlemanly conduct. The coffee wasn’t hot enough to scald, but it disoriented Wint as effectively as any stun grenade. While he was still coughing and spluttering, I kicked him in the groin, and as he doubled up, I waited until his head was low enough, then I put him into a neck lock and spun him around and onto his knees. I’d known so many men like Wint—dangerous, deadly fighters because they were instinctively brutal and had a high tolerance for pain. But Jim Pike had had a motto for that too: ‘If you’re dealing with someone who has a high tolerance for pain, mister, the best way is to give him a lot of pain to tolerate.’

  For that, there is nothing like the ‘bow.’ I’d had it used on me during a session of barrack-room brutality and the memory of the pain was still imprinted almost twenty years later. I held Wint’s face against the edge of the desk to muffle the screaming, then applied the hold. Left foot at the back of the calf to keep him locked in the kneeling position; leg in the small of his back, choke hold on the Adam’s apple, and arm across the shoulder to provide the leverage, when the twist on the spine was applied.

  I did it only once and very briefly. Then I let Wint go and let him slide to the floor cursing and sweating from the pain.

  ‘Where’s the list?’

  Wint was almost crying with the pain. I moved as if I were going to reapply the hold and he shouted, ‘No. Jesus. Don’t.’ He unlocked the top drawer and handed me an envelope.

  ‘Who gave it to you?’

  Wint’s eyes looked frightened. ‘It came in the mail. Everything did, with a phone call first. I never knew who it was.’

  It was what I expected. I didn’t argue.

  ‘Wint,’ I said, ‘you’re a lucky man. You’re going on an assignment. In an hour’s time, you can go to the Renway Freelance Syndication office in High Holborn. You’ll be given a one-way ticket to Australia and one hundred pounds’ expenses for a story on the family life of wallabies. You’ll get the return ticket, one day, maybe, when Shaun Renway, who’s a very good friend of mine, is satisfied that your story is acceptable. If you go to the police or contact any papers, I’ll find you again and break your back. That’s a promise. It’ll be an accidental injury incurred when the middle-aged, gentlemanly president of World News was desperately trying to defend himself against a known sadist and street fighter. Get the picture? Goodbye, Mr. Wint. Enjoy the wallabies.’

  When I got back to the car, I winked at Pike. ‘I think he’d have liked a battle of the giants,’ I said. ‘Unfortunately, there wasn’t time to oblige him.’

  I opened the envelope and examined the list. I didn’t know most of the people and there were only a couple I’d remembered seeing at the party.

  ‘I’ll deal with this later,’ I said. ‘Right now, I’m going to have a word with Geoffrey Haycroft and then we’ll see about the good Lord Branston, my fair-weather friend.’

  I spent two hours with Haycroft and mapped out a strategy to deal with the union crisis. Haycroft had wanted to tell Billingsly confidentially that I’d been tricked by Sellinger, but I wouldn’t hear of it.

  Instead I told him to call Los Angeles and talk to the president of Datavol, Jake Hyman. ‘The order for the X-13S would be worth over two million dollars if it was genuine. Tell Hyman I’ll make it genuine on two conditions. I want a letter specifying that I asked for a delivery date specified not less than a year from now, and an escape clause after three months if union negotiations were not completed satisfactorily. Tell Billingsly that I had to place the order or lose my turn in the line. Say I was gambling on his good sense and on his understanding of the future needs of the company. Then start negotiations.’

  Haycroft grinned. ‘You’re taking a risk.’

  ‘I’m in that kind of mood,’ I said. ‘But you’re sure you’re fit? You won’t have a heart attack on me in the middle of the negotiations?’

  Haycroft laughed. ‘No. I really hated being at home, you know. I suppose it’s become a kind of drug. Negotiating is my life.’ He grinned. ‘And this one’s going to be fun.’

  After that, I refused all calls and rested for an hour, then had Pike drive me with Cox to the Fox and Grapes.

  Ronald Simon was already there, looking prosperous and stylish but very uneasy. He was dressed in a rich-looking blue suit with a soft sheen to it and a monogrammed pink silk shirt under a bold St. Laurent tie.

  As soon as I walked in, I commented on the suit, ordered a round of drinks, and introduced Cox and Pike.

  ‘When I first knew Simon,’ I said, ‘he was wearing transparent shirts open to the navel and gold medallions on his hairy chest.’ I smiled. ‘And sunglasses. You should have seen those shades. Beautiful. You should try the gear out on your clients. It’d make quite a hit.’

  Simon winced. He had never seen me in this brash, false-hearty mood and he knew it could only mean serious trouble. He was head of one of the most prosperous advertising agencies in London and one of the most respected members of his profession. Very few people knew, as I did, that he had once called himself Rinaldo Simoni and had been one of the most unscrupulous and unprincipled of the paparazzi—the street photographers who work the Rome nightclub circuit for gossip and scandal about the jet set.

  Far worse, from Simon’s point of view, he believed, wrongly, that I had evidence of embezzlement that could have put him in jail. In fact, I had no such evidence. Simon had been involved in shady dealings with a television news syndicate associated with World News, and I had helped the WN Rome Bureau chief to extricate himself from guilt by association. Simon had gotten out too, and he’d believed that my silence had helped. I was too contemptuous of him to bother telling him otherwise and I’d never had any intention of using the hold I had over him. But as the French say, great ills need desperate remedies, and I probably had less than a day to deal with Lord Branston.

  I could see Simon was terrified. The Italians also have a saying: ‘If a man does you a favor, make sure you know his price.’ Simon knew I was there to rake up the past, and I had one of the best-known ex-policemen in London with me. He had no idea what I wanted and I let him sweat a little, as we chatted in a quiet alcove of the pub.

  Finally I put him out of his misery.

  ‘Jim,’ I said, ‘a long time ago I was able to do a small favor for Ronald and now he’s very kindly agreed to pay me back.’ I turned to Simon. ‘Ronald, you know Lord Branston, I’m sure.’

  Simon nodded nervously.

  ‘Well, Howard is being very awkward about some photographs he has. They’re photographs of me. Rather tasty ones actually, except they’re faked. Now the problem is that Branston is claiming that you can’t fake photographs.’ I grinned at Pike. ‘I’d love to hear Howard Branston tell that to Ronald here. Do you know what Ronald once did? He was hanging around outside the Piper Club in Rome one night when Richard Burton and Liz Taylor were the hottest tabloid story in the world. They just came out onto the street. Side by side. Not drunk. Just standing there. Very disappointing, no story there at all. So you know what Ronald did? He paid a little kid to race down the pavement and stamp on Liz Taylor’s foot. Liz screamed with pain, and grabbed hold of Burton’s lapels to stop herself losing her balance. Simon snapped the shot and sold it around the world with the caption ‘I’m leaving you, screamed Liz.’ It was a terrific photo. Liz�
�s face all contorted, Burton looking upset. Ronald’s a real genius.’

  Simon swallowed hard.

  ‘What do you want me to do?’

  ‘Nothing very serious,’ I said. ‘A joke, really. Howard Branston is trying to maintain that you can’t fake photos. I want you to show him that you can. Only I want more than photos. I want a little dossier put together on Branston’s private life.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Tonight.’

  ‘Christ.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘I know it’s a bit rushed. But Branston’s around the corner having dinner at the Braganza. You could start right away.’

  ‘I don’t have a camera.’

  Cox tapped the bag at his feet. ‘Nikon. Motor wind. All the trimmings. No problem.’

  Pike nodded. ‘We’ll give you a hand,’ he said gruffly, ‘seeing as how it’s just for a joke. One of my boys has been keeping an eye on his lordship. Let’s go and take a look.’

  We finished our drinks and I led Simon out to Pike’s Rover. We cruised slowly around the block and picked up Terry Mitchell, who had been assigned to Branston.

  ‘What’s the score, Terry?’ Pike asked. ‘This is Mr. Simon. Put him in the picture.’

  ‘Not much to report, Jim,’ Mitchell said. ‘Branston often comes to the Braganza because it’s near where he lives. Usually walks home. On his way he calls in to see his mother who has a flat in Soho Square, then he continues over to Headcorn Street.’

  Soho Square, despite its name, was completely respectable. It was on the fringe of the area of strip clubs and porn houses which made up most of Soho, but the square itself contained a private hospital, several smart apartment buildings, and a few business premises, mostly connected with the film industry.

  ‘Not very promising,’ I said, ‘but that never worried Ronald.’ I laughed. ‘You know what he used to do in Rome? On his way to work, he’d stop outside a cinema where they were showing blue films. In his car, he used to keep a movie camera and he’d slap an RAI State Television News sticker on the side and start filming the line. There was no film in it, of course, but the men in the line didn’t know that. They thought they were going to end up on the eleven o’clock news lining up to see Lust on Two Wheels or whatever. So they’d all get the hell out of there and the theater manager would try to chase Ronald off. But he’s a very persistent fellow, our Ronald, and he’d end up getting a few thousand lire lunch money to go play in the next street. Genius. Absolute genius.’

  Simon was looking really sick by now and he knew that I had enough stories about him to pass away a whole evening.

  ‘Where’s this apartment building,’ he said.

  ‘Right in Soho Square.’

  ‘That’s nearly next to the Braganza. He won’t walk through Soho at all.’

  ‘No, that’s right.’

  He turned to me. ‘You want the fakes to be embarrassing?’

  ‘As embarrassing as possible,’ I said.

  I pointed through the car window. ‘Something along those lines would do fine.’

  We were passing The Fetish House, which advertised ‘Films, videocassettes, and magazines for all kinds of specialist interests.’

  ‘Pictures and what else?’

  ‘Anything you like,’ I said. ‘I’ll leave it to your imagination.’

  Simon turned to Pike.

  ‘We’re in West End Central’s police district, aren’t we?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘What would happen if someone, an ordinary citizen, filed a complaint about a flat or an apartment building, claiming it was being used for immoral purposes?’

  ‘It would be investigated.’

  ‘How long would the investigation take?’

  ‘Depends how busy the station was. Could be right away. Could be a week or more.’

  ‘If there was such a complaint made tonight, could you arrange for West End Central not to bother with it for a while?’

  Pike nodded. ‘Yes, I know the guvnor down there very well. Yeah. We could fix that.’

  ‘There you go, Ronald,’ I said, half pushing him out of the car. ‘Once you set your mind to it, I know you’ll come up with something beautiful.’

  Simon hesitated as he stepped out of the car.

  ‘After this, are we quits? And no stories about me around the street?’

  ‘Not a whisper, Rinaldo,’ I said. ‘You have the word of an English gentleman.’

  22

  The package from Simon arrived just in time. It came at nine-thirty the following morning, ten minutes after I’d received a message from Paul Sellinger peremptorily ‘inviting’ me down to Samman’s for a meeting with Howard Branston. When I’d examined Simon’s handiwork, I called Sellinger to accept.

  ‘I wanted to spare you the embarrassment of a full board meeting,’ Sellinger said. ‘I think Howard will convince you there’s no point in trying to hang on.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said coldly, ‘a meeting is a good idea. We have a lot to say to each other, you and L’

  As I put down the phone, I wondered how soon Paul would hear what was happening in New York. Jopling had arrived and had already had two meetings with Robert Sellinger. The story had ‘shaken the poor bastard to the core,’ Jopling said, and now a meeting with Jacob was scheduled for nine o’clock, New York time.

  That was two o’clock London time, so I agreed to come to Samman’s at four. With a bit of luck and some careful management, it would all come together nicely.

  Next, I called Branston and suggested that we have lunch together on the way down to Samman’s. At first, he refused, as I’d expected. But I knew how to tempt him. ‘Howard, it’s not just for my sake,’ I said. ‘The woman in the photo wants to meet you. She has something to say about all this. I’m sure you feel that’s fair.’ I was sure that would do it. Branston would never refuse such a meeting. When he accepted, I wondered what he was imagining. A desperate, tearful appeal? An offer of her body even? Whatever he fantasized, it was sure to be a situation which put him in a position of power, and that was a temptation Branston could never resist.

  We arranged to meet at a country pub called the Red Lion in a village in Kent about ten miles from Samman’s. I’d known it well in the old days and there was a very cozy, private back room that was ideal for the meeting.

  I called and booked it, then spoke to Seagull. I’d slept the night in the office, partly because I wanted to catch up on a week of missed work and partly, I admit, from caution. Seagull had said she didn’t mind about my resumed relations with Nancy, but I didn’t know how Nancy would feel about Seagull and I decided it was safer to place a moratorium on my sex life until the Starburst affair was over.

  I hadn’t fooled Seagull, though, and she teased me mercilessly for several minutes before listening to what I wanted her to do.

  Then she really laughed. ‘Now that is worth coming out of hiding for,’ she said. ‘Send the package over, to give me a bit of time to rehearse.’

  For the hell of it, I decided to take the Rolls to drive down to Samman’s. If the schedule held, I’d be able to dispose of Branston over lunch, just in time for a telephone call from Nick in New York to tell me that the Family was ready to put the screws on. And I would be there first, to add a little retribution of my own.

  Ryder was also poised. The director of the CIA had been briefed and he had agreed to hold back his report to the President just long enough to be sure of Jacob’s reaction.

  Everything was set, but at the last moment I almost didn’t make it down to the Red Lion. We began the journey in almost skittish high spirits, with Walker driving the Rolls and Mitchell riding shotgun, and Pike and Paddy following in the Rover.

  The heat wave had returned and the Kent countryside was looking almost tropical in the baking sun.

  With the air conditioning of the Rolls on full, the landscape seemed completely unreal, as though it were being back-projected onto our personal television. Then, without warning, the peaceful image wa
s transformed and an antinuclear march erupted in front of us.

  It was the Rolls which provoked them. They had been trudging along the dusty lane, keeping close into the hedgerow to use what shade there was, when suddenly we had turned the corner and the sight, of Seagull and me kissing in the luxurious air-conditioned comfort of the Rolls was too much. We learned later that they were already in an angry mood. They had been heading for Colemarsh Camp, which was being used as an assembly point for the troop movements to the Continent. The marchers had wanted to disrupt a territorial column which was making for Dover, but they had been turned back by police and dispersed into the countryside.

  With Pike’s help, we managed to maneuver our way out without getting the car damaged, and found a long detour free of any further pockets of straggling protesters. The incident was a useful reminder, though: Starburst was still what this whole business was about. As usual, in my obsession with Paul Sellinger, I’d been close to forgetting that.

  Despite the detour, we arrived at the Red Lion on time and I immediately spotted Howard Branston standing beside the small ornamental lake. Walker parked the Rolls and I introduced Jennifer. As we walked into the pub, I noticed Branston’s eyes covering every inch of her figure, with an extra lingering glance at the line of thigh that was showing through the slit in her carefully chosen, skimpy mauve dress.

  The Red Lion, like Samman’s and most of the buildings in the area, was a sixteenth-century structure with low, timbered beams. George, the landlord, came through to greet us and led us toward the special back room. In the main bar there was a group of very loud, noisy men in too-new country clothes, with several women who looked as though they would be more at home in the Hunter’s Den. Through the window I could see two Range Rovers—one of them with leopard-skin seat covers— which obviously belonged to them.

  ‘Croydon car dealers gone horsey,’ George whispered as we walked through. ‘Don’t worry, Mr. Railton, they won’t disturb you.’

  We settled in the back room, which was cozily furnished with high-backed oak settles with good thick cushions around an unpolished table.