To Die For Read online

  ‘That nigger is of especial interest to me. So leave her alone.’

  It was an effort not to shove his nose back into his head. Instead, I got up and walked away, leaving half my drink.

  I decided to walk home and try to clear my head with fresh air, if that’s what you could call it in London. If I walked down St Paul’s Road, I could cut across to Green Lanes and follow that up to the Seven Sisters Road. It was only a couple of miles. I left the warm fuggy air of the Sportsman and hit a crisp, cold January night. It helped to clear my head, freshen me up a bit.

  I’d gone a few dozen yards when I saw her, standing in a doorway, trying to light her cigarette. She was wearing a short black jacket. The collar was up. Her shoulders were hunched against the cold. I walked past.

  ‘Hey,’ she called after me.

  I slowed and stopped. I didn’t turn around. I heard her trotting on high heels. When she reached me, she stood a moment. Her unlit cigarette was between her fingers. She moved from one foot to the other to keep warm. A jacket like that was useless in this weather, plain daft.

  I thought that if I just gave her a few quid she’d leave me alone. I was waiting for the pitch, thinking she’d charge fifty quid tops for a quick one, figuring I’d give her a score and be off. Instead, she said, ‘That hurt, you know.’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘What you said in there.’

  I didn’t know what she was talking about. I waited for her to say something else. She managed to light her cigarette, took a deep drag and blew out a cloud of smoke and breath.

  ‘I wasn’t trying to solicit you, you know.’

  ‘Weren’t you?’

  ‘I’m off duty.’

  She smiled then. I wondered why. She looked nice when she smiled. She didn’t look all washed-up and wasted. She looked as if she could still think life was fun, like a kid.

  She had a slim body and she was tall, lanky really. In her heels she came up to my chin and not many women can do that. Her skirt rode high up on her thighs, and her blouse was thin. She stood shivering and her knees were together and she looked about as awkward as a woman can look. Her face became serious again. She frowned and there was something in there, something she couldn’t hide.

  ‘He a friend of yours?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘That man, Paget.’

  ‘No.’

  Her frown lifted. ‘Didn’t think so.’

  ‘What do you want?’ I said.

  She looked down at the ground and pulled her jacket tighter about her. When she looked up, her eyes were wide, her eyebrows raised.

  ‘I wouldn’t mind a cup of tea,’ she said.

  I looked at my watch.

  ‘Nothing open round here.’

  That was a lie. We both knew it.

  ‘We could go to my place,’ she said softly.

  I was about to give up on her and go when she said quickly, ‘Just for tea.’

  I sighed. ‘Yeah. Sure.’

  We walked off, me striding like a walking wall, she tottering to keep up, smoking as she went.

  It took us a while to walk to her place and all that time I was wondering what the hell I was doing. She’d say something now and then, making small talk, telling me about what a bloody awful day she’d had and how she just wanted to sit down with a cup of tea and all that kind of thing. I might have muttered something or other, but it was an effort.

  She lived in a high-rise off the Caledonian Road. We passed a group of kids as we went in. They stared at us. I stopped at the lift and one of the kids laughed.

  ‘It’s not working,’ Brenda said. ‘Hasn’t ever worked as far as I know. I think they put it there for show.’

  So we climbed the stairs. The building was a sixties thing, falling apart at the seams, cracked cement, damp in the stairwell. They should’ve pulled it down ten minutes after they’d put it up. Some of these buildings are getting tarted up these days, sold to City types for a bomb. This one hadn’t had that treatment, and if it ever did Brenda and all the others would have to go find some other piece of shit to live in.

  ‘Fancy a cuppa?’ she said, as she disappeared into the kitchen.

  It was a one-bedroom flat, basic, but she’d done what she could with it. There were a few ornaments around and an Indian-style cotton throw on the settee. There was flowery wallpaper, but it was discoloured and peeling in the corner where the damp was coming through. It was warm, though. She used a blanket as a draught excluder for the front door.

  In the lounge, there were pot plants all over by the window and a large plant in one corner. She was trying to bring life into the place.

  I was looking at a print on the wall when she came in with the teas.

  ‘Sorry I took so long.’ She handed a mug to me. ‘Bloody kettle packed up. I have to boil water on the stove.’

  She waited for me to drink some of my tea before drinking her own.

  ‘I saw that in a shop in Camden,’ she said, pointing to the picture I’d been looking at. ‘It’s called The Fighting Temeraire, by J. M. W. Turner.’

  ‘I’ve heard of it.’

  ‘The Temeraire was a famous ship, can’t remember why. But, thing is, here it’s being taken in to be broken up.’ She held her tea. When she spoke again, her eyes glistened.

  ‘It’s one of the saddest pictures I ever saw. That beautiful ship and it’s being dragged in to be pulled apart. Its time is up.’

  We both looked at the picture for a while. The once-glorious fighter, now ghostly, was being pulled to its end by a squat black tug while Turner lit a funeral pyre in his sky. I’d never bothered with art, but as I looked at the picture, I saw she was right, it was sad. And yet, glorious also. I didn’t know why, I just felt it.

  ‘She fought at the Battle of Trafalgar,’ I told her. ‘She helped save Victory. At one point, she was locked between two French battleships and managed to outfight them both.’

  Brenda looked at me for a moment.

  ‘You really know a lot.’

  ‘I know bits and pieces,’ I said.

  ‘And them holes, they’re for the guns?’

  ‘Yeah. She was a ninety-eight gun ship of the line.’

  ‘That’s a lot of guns.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Frightening.’

  ‘They were killing machines, those ships.’

  ‘Killing machines?’ she said. ‘Killing machines.’

  She looked at the picture again, tilting her head to one side.

  ‘Why did they have to break it up, Joe? Why kill it?’

  ‘Like you said, its time was up.’

  ‘Yeah,’ she said, looking back at me. ‘I suppose so.’

  She took her tea over to the settee. I took mine to a small table on the far side of the room. I sat on a wooden chair at the table, turning it slightly to face her. She moved across the settee so that she was closer to me. She smiled and I clenched my jaw. I was still waiting for the pitch. The silence stretched. Brenda fidgeted. I drank my tea. It was good tea.

  ‘Where are you from, Joe?’ she said, finally.

  ‘Tottenham.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  She looked like she was trying to say something about Tottenham, but she didn’t seem able to come up with anything. Most people know it for the football club and the riots. She said, ‘I’m from Leeds. You ever been there?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You ever been to Yorkshire?’

  ‘One time.’

  ‘Where’d you go?’

  ‘Sheffield.’

  ‘Yeah, well, Sheffield’s nice, but Leeds is, like, nicer.’

  ‘Maybe I’ll retire there.’

  She laughed nervously. She was trying and I suppose I wasn’t making it easy for her.

  There was another lull in the conversation. It was more lull than conversation.

  ‘I remember the riots in Tottenham,’ she said, having finally thought of something to say about the place. ‘I remember, I was going to go to a club there w
ith my friend and I told her at the last minute that I didn’t really feel like it and then on the news they had about all them riots.’

  ‘The riots were in ’85.’

  ‘Oh. Must’ve been some other riots then.’

  I was still waiting for the pitch. She waited for me to say something. She might as well have waited to be young again.

  ‘It’s funny, you know?’ she said. ‘The way things happen sometimes. You believe in God?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No. Neither do I. You believe in fate?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You believe in anything?’

  I looked at her.

  ‘What for?’

  Maybe I spoke harder than I’d meant to. There was a slow throbbing in my head and I was still riled about that encounter with Paget. I could’ve taken him apart in two seconds flat, but that would’ve meant trouble for me. I could’ve at least told him to fuck off, but that would’ve soured me with the casino. Once, I wouldn’t have given a fuck about that. What bothered me now, sitting in this damp flat, drinking tea, my head aching, was that I was losing my bottle, getting fearful of where I was, where I would be in five, ten years. I was getting old and my future was lousy and I damned well knew it, and someone like Paget could see it too and knew he could slap me down without any comebacks.

  Brenda shifted in her seat, looked up, looked down. She put her mug on the ground, got up, went to a white, vinyl-covered cabinet and pulled out a bottle of gin and a glass. She filled the glass with gin and held the bottle up to me. I shook my head. She put the bottle down.

  ‘Mind if I smoke?’ she said.

  ‘It’s your place.’

  ‘Actually, it’s not. I rent it. Frank owns it. He owns lots of places and rents them out to his tarts. Sometimes he comes here to film stuff.’

  She lit a cigarette and, while the smoke was still in her lungs, downed her drink. She poured another.

  ‘What do you want from me?’ I said.

  ‘Nothing. I mean... Oh, Christ, I don’t know.’

  ‘Everyone wants something.’

  ‘Do they?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She stood slowly and brought her drink over to the table and put it down. She stood and watched me for a moment before sitting next to her drink, pulling it towards her, looking at it like it was her child.

  ‘I just wanted someone to talk to,’ she said to the drink. ‘That’s all right, isn’t it?’

  ‘I’m not the talking type.’

  ‘I know. We established that.’

  ‘So, why me?’

  ‘Bloody hell,’ she said, looking up sharply. ‘Are you always so suspicious?’

  I was about to tell her that I wasn’t being suspicious, but I stopped. There I was, looking for her angle. That was suspicion, wasn’t it?

  ‘Why?’ I said.

  ‘Why what?’

  ‘Why do you want to talk to me?’

  ‘I dunno.’

  ‘You’ve got to have a reason.’

  ‘Have I?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She thought about that for a moment.

  ‘I think,’ she said, ‘I think because I thought you were like me. I thought that you wanted someone to talk to, you know? I thought you were, well, lonely.’

  I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t feel lonely. I didn’t feel anything. I wondered if not feeling anything was what feeling lonely was like. I wasn’t sure. I couldn’t remember anyone ever just wanting to talk to me. Maybe that was loneliness.

  ‘I think you are like me,’ she said. ‘A bit, anyway. I think you do want to talk.’

  ‘Why would you think that?’

  She smiled a small, sad, uncertain smile.

  ‘Well, you’re still here, aren’t you?’

  She was right. I was still there.

  I went to see her a few days later. I gave her a new kettle and a book about the Battle of Trafalgar. She smiled then, one of her wide smiles.

  8

  There were lights on, but nobody answered, and I couldn’t see any movement inside the house. I banged on the door again. After a while, I could see a small figure through the frosted glass. The figure hesitated and then moved quickly forwards and snatched the door open. I found myself looking down at a woman. Her face was pale; her eyeliner had streaked from crying. She was scared, but she looked straight into my eyes and held my gaze. She was a good-looking woman, slight in frame, with large brown eyes that had a cat-like slant to them. In her hand, pointed at me, was a kitchen knife.

  ‘I’ve called the police,’ she said.

  I wondered if Bowker had called ahead and tipped them off. The woman didn’t seem to know how to react to my calmness. She kept edging backwards and then forwards again. She was lost, caught between anger and fear and bewilderment and a bloody great kitchen knife.

  ‘Go away,’ she said at last.

  She tried to slam the door, but I held out a hand and caught it. She fought me for a moment, trying to push the door shut. She gave in and the door flew back against the wall. She held the point of the knife a foot from my stomach.

  ‘I’m looking for a Ray Martin,’ I said.

  I didn’t force my way into the house, and that seemed to confuse her more and for a few seconds she forgot how to talk. When she remembered, she said, ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Nobody he knows. I need to talk to him.’

  ‘Haven’t you people done enough?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Bastards.’

  She spat the word, then started sniffling. She reached her hand up to wipe her eyes, forgetting that the knife was in it. I could’ve slapped her down easily enough, but smacking sobbing women and smashing down doors leaves a trail. She remembered the knife and brought it back to aim it at me.

  ‘Others were here?’ I said.

  There was doubt now in her eyes.

  ‘You’re with them.’

  ‘I’m not with anyone. I don’t know who the hell “they” are.’

  I took the gun slowly from my jacket pocket. When she saw it, she gave no sign of fear except to grip the knife more firmly. I held the gun out to her.

  ‘I only want to talk to him.’

  I put the gun on the floor, took a step forwards into the hallway. She didn’t stop me. She was scared, but she wasn’t panicky, and she had the determination of a she-cat protecting its young. She moved backwards so that she was lit by the ceiling light. I pushed the door closed.

  With the light of the hallway now on her face, I could see that she was older than I’d first thought. Lines had been scratched into her face. You could see a history of hardship. Martin had done a long stretch, King had told me. Had she waited years for him to come back? She was probably in her middle forties, but still attractive. I moved forwards slowly and she moved backwards, equally slowly, keeping the knife pointing up at me, keeping her fierce eyes on mine. It was a dance, of sorts – two-step with blade. I could have taken the knife from her anytime. I don’t know why I didn’t.

  She crumbled then. The knife wavered in her hand and then fell and landed on the carpet. Her face creased.

  ‘I can’t lift him,’ she said.

  ‘Where is he?’

  She pointed to a room at the back of the house.

  ‘He won’t let me call anyone.’

  I eased past her. She caught her sobs and followed.

  The room was small and dark, but it was comfortable. There were flowered curtains and quilted cushions and those small bowls of dead, dried petals that smelled. It was a woman’s place, a cluttered refuge full of books and easy furniture and warmth. On a mantelpiece over the fireplace were framed photographs of a smiling couple. There was no money on show, but there was security. The room didn’t fit with my profession. There couldn’t be anything here that would link with Beckett and Cole and a missing pile of cash.

  And then I saw the man.

  He was on the floor with his back against the wall. He’d dragged himself over. The
re was blood spattered on the carpet in the middle of the room. He looked like he was in his fifties, but it could have been that he was a damaged forty-something. He’d done some fighting once. His nose had been broken long ago, and there was scar tissue around his eyes. His hands were broad and gnarly, but they’d gone soft. He’d been big once, but he’d thinned so that the skin around his face was loose.

  He was a mess. His brown hair was matted with dried blood, his right eye swollen and livid, his lips split and bloody. I lifted him from the floor and put him in one of the two comfortable chairs. He looked up woozily and made a weak attempt to push me away and stand up. I eased him back and he gave up trying.

  ‘Martin?’

  He didn’t try to answer and when he looked at me he had trouble focusing. I sent the woman off to get water, ice and a cloth. When she came back, I wiped the blood from the man’s face, put ice in the cloth and pressed it to the swollen eye. I held the glass of water to his lips. He swallowed a little, then winced and pushed the glass away. He took the ice-press from me and held it to the left side of his face. He wasn’t making a fuss about it. He shook his head and looked up, noticing me for the first time.

  ‘Who are you?’ he said.

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘You’re Martin.’

  ‘Yeah, sure.’

  ‘Who did this to you?’

  ‘Two men. Dunno who. Have an idea.’

  ‘Describe them.’

  ‘Both white. One thin, tall, blond, and a shorter one, heavy, with red hair, shaved short.’

  ‘What did they want?’

  ‘Same as you, I expect. Wanted to know where Beckett is. Told them I don’t know.’ He gestured to his face. ‘They didn’t believe me.’

  ‘I’m calling an ambulance,’ the woman said.

  ‘No,’ Martin said.

  ‘Look at you. Look at your face,’ she said.

  ‘I’ve had worse. Don’t get hysterical.’

  ‘I’m not getting hysterical. I’m going to call an ambulance, that’s all. What’s so fucking hysterical about that?’

  ‘Call them and they’ll report it to the police,’ I said. ‘Get the law here and this’ll be peanuts to what’ll happen next.’

  ‘He’s right,’ Martin said.

  I held Martin’s face in my hands and probed it. I knew what I was doing and he knew that I knew. I suppose we each took one look at the other and knew we’d both been there before. He jerked back once in pain, but said nothing. I lowered my hands.