by John Lawton
He had one of those pinpoint torch things in his hands now and was shining it first into Troy’s eyes and then into his ears.
‘But you’re not normal, are you, Mr Troy? You’re odd. You’re the clever dick who thinks the rules were made for someone else. Shirt off.’
Middleton tapped on Troy’s naked chest. Listened through the cold end of his stethoscope. Fingered an old scar on his ribcage. ‘Potato peeler, wasn’t it?’ The bastard was smiling now. ‘Or did you think there were secrets at Scotland Yard?’
Troy was definitely going to thump this sod.
‘Drop your trousers.’
‘Is this really necessary?’
‘Drop ’em, Mr Troy. And when I say cough try your best to oblige me.’
When it was all over and Middleton had exacted a pound of flesh in ritual humiliation, Troy was tying his tie, and Middleton was jotting notes into a file and talking without looking at him.
‘There’s good news and bad news.’
‘And?’
‘Well, the good is that I can pass you back to active service without having to tell the commissioner that it’s against my better judgement and advice. You’re fit, Mr Troy. Surprisingly fit.’
‘So what’s the bad news?’
Middleton looked up. The cat that had got at the cream. ‘You’ve been that way for a while. I’d estimate you’ve been a1 for at least a couple of weeks. If you’d come to see me then instead of wasting your time with Dr Death, you’d have been back on the force a while ago.’
‘But . . . I haven’t felt well.’
‘Purely psychological, Mr Troy. All you needed was the prospect of work to make your mind shape up as your body has done. That, after all, is the trouble with the dead – they have bodies, they no longer have minds.’
Middleton slid his glasses way down his nose and looked at Troy over the top. He held out a stamped form. ‘Just let the commissioner have this. Good day to you, Mr Troy.’
§ 75
On automatic pilot, the following morning, Troy slipped his glasses into his top pocket and was reaching for the walking-stick by the hallstand when it hit him – perfect balance, 20/20 vision, a steady hand that stretched out for the walking-stick without so much as a hint of a tremor. Middleton had been right. All he’d needed was to be told. Anna had been right. If she ever listened to him again, he’d tell her as much.
Swift Eddie Clark and Mary McDiarmuid were waiting for him when he got into work. A cup of hot black coffee and a smile.
‘Lose the uniform,’ Troy said to Mary.
‘What?’
‘You’re a detective. Civvies from now on. No point in looking as though you’re on crossing duty.’
Troy stood behind his desk. Looked around. There was blank white paper on his blotting pad, ink in his inkwell, a neat array of ballpoint pens, a glass ashtray full of paperclips, an empty out-tray, a single hand written note in the in-tray: ‘I’ve sent a copy of my report to your GP. Good luck, Mr Troy – Ronald Middleton.’
Troy decided to take it in the spirit in which it had surely been intended. It was congratulation and warning in a single sentence. The old man’s way of saying, ‘Don’t overdo it.’ Normal service had been resumed. It was as close to bliss as man ever came.
He sat down, lord of most of what he surveyed, palms flat on the worn leather of his desktop. They were staring at him. Standing like Harbottle and Albert.
‘Well?’
Mary McDiarmuid and Eddie exchanged glances.
Mary McDiarmuid said, ‘Orders, boss?’
Orders? He’d almost forgotten how to give orders. ‘What are you working on?’
‘Mr Wildeve has me cross-referencing missing persons with the files on those two cut-up boys. Do you want to see it?’
‘Not yet. What I want is everything on the Ryans, the Feluccis and Joey Rork.’
‘I’ve got those,’ said Swift Eddie. ‘Mr Wildeve sent them over last night.’ Less than a minute later he dumped a pile of brown folders on Troy’s desk.
‘I’m still working on the commissioner’s manpower review.’
‘How long? I need you now. In fact, I need you to put on your old mac and do some footwork.’
‘Me mac? In this weather?’
‘It was a metaphor.’
‘Footwork?’
Given his preferences not only would Swift Eddie never leave his desk, he’d have a camp-bed, a Primus stove and sleep in his office.
‘A nice stroll around Stepney.’
Eddie looked deeply disappointed with his lot. Assumed an air of oppression and misery. It was his front, his way of getting people to make demands on others instead of on him. Troy had seen it a thousand times. He stared Eddie down in a matter of seconds.
‘I’ll be shut of it tomorrow.’
‘OK. Just tell me when.’
Troy began to sift through the pile. There was so little, he thought, so little of any substance. It was a poor showing after weeks of investigation. There was almost nothing in any of the files he didn’t know already. But for the last item in Rork’s file.
Troy picked up a blue page. The note clipped to it read ‘Brought in by F. Jones prop. Cromarty Hotel 4th August.’ That was more than a fortnight after Gumshoe had died. It was an aerogramme, an innocent-looking – Troy thought it had been chosen for just this effect – missive. A large sheet of sky-blue paper, almost tissue-thin, folded over five times and gummed along the three outer edges. It was postmarked Washington DC, 15 July, and it had neither a date nor a return address on the letterhead. It looked to have been typed on a portable by a man not accustomed to typing or Tippex.
Dear Joe,
It may be a while before you get this. I’m not epredd expressing it or anything conspicuous and, needless to say, if you ever get anyone asking you how you came by it you’re on your own. Sorry kid. That’s just the way it is.
This is what I could find out and pretty much how things roll out. The lovely Kate is rummaging around in the top drawer yet again. But – she would wouldn’t she?
First – Tom Driberg. He’s a member of their parliament, but I guess you know that. An MP since the war. Typical Engilsm Englishman. Public school. Oxford – all the right moves in all the right places. In short we have nothing you couldn’t have learnt from Who’s Who. A maverick pain in the ass is all we know. All the right moves, but not all the right noises. Not favoured by the present leaderhsi leadership. And not the likely lover for Katie – for ‘typical Englishman’ read querr.
Daniel Ryan. Nothing. There isn’ta file of any kind.
Frederick Troy. Nothing per se . . . but there’s a closed file on his old man that reads like Dashiel Hammet meets Buldog Drummond.
Alexei Troy, born Troitsky, in Russia in God knows-when, died 1943. They – and remme remember this pre-dates the CIA by yard and a half so it’s mostly what Hoover and the Feds thought was worth passing on – had all the suspcions and none of the proof. Red or White or candy-stripe like a goddam barber pole? Whatever. The guy left Russia in 1905, got to England in 1910, built up a newspaper and publishing empire – sizeable interersts here too – second only to Beaverbrook. Only time the file showed a glimmer was in 1941 when he broke the story of the German inavs invasion of Russia before it actualy happened. Took some reading between the lines but it’s clear that he knew. No conclsuion drawn, you didn’t have to be a stargazer to see that one coming. His other son is a top man in the opposition. Looks to be in the next cabinet the way things are going – war hero (worked with Ike in 1944 and is still friendly), champion of the poor, all that stuff. The guy you ask about is a copper right? He’s just noted as ‘and son’ on a visit to NY in the twenties. But if he’s a Lodn London bobby he’s got to be straight, right? Right. But . . . I was in London during the Berlin Crisis in ’48. And I kind of think this guy is the same Frederick Troy who busted Johnnie Baumgarner. In which case that we don’t have file with his name on it is kind of remrakble. The way I heard it, and every ot
her agent in Lodn London for that matter, was that this Troy pointed a gun at Johnnie’s head and dared him to reach for his. Like he’d have killed Johnnie without a second thought? Quien sabe? Whatever – just watch your step.
Lord Edward Steele. Take a drink, Joe. Sit yourself down. You’ll be here a while. The file was half an inch thick. Born (we think) Erdrich Strelnitz, Strelnik(c otional)z or Strelnikov in either Czech Bohemia or Hungary circa 1908/1910. Could be Jewish, but he’s denied that often enough. Nothing more known before 1946 when he arrived in England from France, speaking perfrect perfect English and toting enough money to start his own business. The Brits give him a passport at once, no questions asked, from which Langley deduces that he was working for them throuhghout the war. The sort of thing tha could easily be checked, but nobody has. Would also explain the money – some sort of scam appropriating Resistance funds supplied by the Brits, maybe a bit of judiscu judicious looting – who knows? Starts cheap restaurants, like soup kitchens, moves into catering as a whole and insofar as the British have any food faster than fish and chips (you tried that yet?) he was the king of fast food by 1950. Givn the state of their food rations in those days, a smart move. Fortune estimated at several million, and that’s pounds not dollars. Now he’s into everything, construction, investmnt, you name it. MP for Nottingham (as in Sherriff of) 1951–55 (yyou have t ask yiuself did he get bored?). Knighted 1955, a lordship or whatever they call it New Year’s honours last year. Now – he was the choice of the Labour Party. Unlike the Driberg guy he really is in favour.
So far, so god. But here’s the stingeroo. He’s on our payroll. Has been since ’48. No real idea what he does but he does it. Anyway your guess will be the same as mine – he finks on the Brits. After all sombody has to, they tell us sweet fuck all at the best of times. Langley think he’son the take from the Israelis as well, and seem not much bothered by this even though they may not be the only ones keeping Lord Ed in the manner to which. He is very well connected. He visited Ike at the White House in ’53, and got introduced to the Veep too. That one seems to have blossomed. He and Dick Nixon have met half a dozen times since ’53. He has stayed with Pat and Dick and the fucking spaniel in Florida and Pat and Dick (not the spaniel) have stayed with Lord Ed at his stately type home in England. I doubt that Dicky knows the connection to Langley – it would be unlike Ike to tell his Veep so much as a sukk syllable more than he has to – but that hardly matters. Thing is, Nixon is a creep, has a finger in every pie, he has more angles than a romb rhomboid (or do I mean a trapezoid? fuck me i spelled that right!) and is paid off by more crooks and mobsters than you could cram into Joliet with a team of meatpackers. By the company hekeeps. . .?
If the lovely Kate Cormack is getting herself mixed up with Steele and guys like Steels then I can see the Deeks crapping themselves. Jesus, Joey, that woman is . . . what do the Brits say? . . . a wagonload of monkeys. Two racoons in a burlap sack if you see what I mean. Personally I have every intention of voting for Senator Cormack (anyone’s better than Dicky), but we could end up with a First Lady who is a major embara embarrasm . . . fukit!!! – embarrassment. ‘First Lady Fucks Brit Spook’– not a headline you’d want to read. Bring back Dolly Madison.
Watch yourself old buddy . . . whoever this Limey pal of yours is who said Lord Ed was a ‘total twat’ is wrong, dead wrong . . . now burn this.
‘Your Old Pal Pete’
Troy knew the reference. There was a Ring Lardner story in which a man spread mischief and slander by writing to total strangers and signing off ‘Your Old Pal Pete’. Or was it Al? Maybe it wasn’t Lardner, maybe it was Twain corrupting Hadleyburg? Either way it was obvious Pete was not his real name and it was pointless even to try and find out – he wouldn’t know where to begin. All that mattered was that Gumshoe had had a friend in Washington who could dish the dirt. He did not know whether to be flattered or surprised that Rork had included him in the enquiry. There’d been no mention of Angus. Perhaps Angus was so obviously, so crankily harmless.
Troy yelled for Swift Eddie.
‘Why wasn’t I shown this?’
Eddie sat down opposite Troy, took the sheet of paper from his hand, read it in a single take and passed it back.
‘I thought we had a deal, Eddie?’
‘Indeed, sir. But Mr Wildeve was concerned not to bother you with things that lead nowhere.’
‘Lead nowhere?’
‘His exact words, sir.’
‘Really?’
‘Do you think it leads anywhere?’ said Eddie, in a tone that implied he knew damn well it didn’t.
Troy said nothing.
‘Mr Wildeve also said, sir, that it was your wont to go ferreting around in spook stuff into which he and I would eventually get dragged and he was, and I quote, “on me tod”, he decided to let you find out in your own time.’
‘Dragged in?’
‘We all kid ourselves about one thing or another, sir.’
‘It’s not that it doesn’t lead anywhere, Eddie, of course it doesn’t. But it’s another card in the hand, isn’t it? Having the dope on Lord Spoon might come in rather handy.’
‘Mr Wildeve said that too, sir. I think it’s what bothered him most. What do you intend to do with the info now, if you don’t mind me asking, sir?’
‘I’ll think of something.’
He folded the aerogramme back into its compact form and shoved it in a pocket. It was too precious to leave in a desk drawer. It wasn’t so much a card in the hand as an ace in the hole.
§ 76
Predictably Onions had every nagging phone call redirected to Troy’s office. Every half-hour or so Mary McDiarmuid would ring him with the Mail or the Standard – for whom Troy had a standard line. The press did not dictate the investigations of the Metropolitan Police Force. If they had evidence they should bring it forward now or risk a charge of obstructing the course of justice. If they did not have evidence and wished to publish items on the Ryan twins, then that was between them, the Ryans and the laws of libel. This shut no one up, occasionally produced laughter, and, from a reporter on his family’s Evening Herald, produced a knowing snigger.
But there were also the politicians. The bigwigs had had their say to Onions. It was the also-sat, the back-bench green-leather arse-polishers who now phoned Troy. Most East London MPs sought some form of reassurance, banging on about ‘descent of the area into lawlessness’, ‘mob rule’, ‘the bobby on the beat’ and so on. Troy resorted to the meaningless brush-off as practised by the royals, ‘Something will be done.’ Then a Conservative M P, Sir Albert Stokes: Marylebone South, telephoned. Troy was thinking that he’d seen enough knights lately to last a lifetime and was wondering what this might have to do with Sir Albert when it dawned on him. The Empress club was in his constituency. He heard Troy’s platitudes with good grace and, just when Troy thought he was about to ring off, said, ‘You’re not related to the other Troy, are you?’
‘What other Troy?’ said Troy.
Then Les Gidney called. Les was the Labour MP for Stepney. Watney Street, the Ryans’ home and garage were all in his constituency. He was, de facto, the MP to whom the Ryans should complain if their boast to Onions had meant anything. Troy wasn’t at all sure they had – not that that meant they wouldn’t. Troy knew Les slightly. Another 1945 man, elected straight from khaki. A plain, working-class bloke, not at all easy with the likes of Rod and Gaitskell and their public-school socialism, but, Troy thought, one of the good guys.
‘I’ll get them, Les.’
‘I don’t doubt it. But it is baffling.’
‘What is?’
‘It’s a sort of circle game. Wheels within wheels, that sort of thing. It’s only a few weeks back that Mo White was wanting me to meet them to talk about what he called “development opportunities around Watney Market”. And then just a few days ago Rod suggested I come to a meeting with him and Mo and Ted Steele. I said no to both.’
‘The Ryans’ reputation preceded them?’
‘No, Freddie. Not all. Truth to tell I’d never even heard of them. That alone is worrying. And, needless to say, I’ve heard from them rather too much lately. If it were left to them I’d spend the rest of my time in Parliament writing outraged letters to the commissioner. But, no, I turned down both meetings because I know Mo White, known him all my life. And I trust him about as far as I could chuck him.’
‘Les, Stepney has a new detective inspector.’
‘I heard. Has this anything to do with anything? I knew Paddy Milligan. I thought he was all right.’
‘He is. Family troubles. He wanted a transfer back to Lancashire. The new chap’s called Ray Godbehere. Why don’t you introduce yourself? See he meets the people a new DDI should meet?’
When Mary McDiarmuid announced a Dick Goldblatt, Troy called a halt to it. ‘Isn’t he the Tory for Golders Green?’
‘I think it’s Neasden, boss. And I rather think that’s Goldfarb. This chap said Goldblatt.’
‘What’s the difference? Get a number and tell him I’ll call him back.’
‘Will you?’
‘No.’
§ 77
He liked the feeling. An old feeling rendered anew. Made fresh. To get home after a day’s work. To find the evening still light, to have a cup of tea whilst listening to the news on the Home Service, and then to sit in the yard with a glass of wine and the evening paper and watch dusk creep over London. He could do this any day and, indeed, had done so most days this summer, but without the solid sense of a day’s work behind him it wasn’t the same. He liked the feeling that he might have earned it.
Troy was ready. He had heard enough of the day’s news – once Parliament no longer sat, the press, wireless and television were held to be in what was called the ‘silly season’. Licensed trivia. Lots of statistics about cricket and the weather. It seemed to begin just after Wimbledon fortnight and the term struck Troy as arsy-versy. Politics was a very long, very silly season. He had the folding chair tucked under one arm, a glass of Chaˆteau Bouvard-Pecuchet ’46 in one hand and the other outstretched to the latch, when someone knocked at the door. Bugger.