Angel Confidential (10 page)

Worried sick, Mr Rudgard had suddenly had a piece of luck. Stella, as she now called herself, had registered for work with the temping agency Office Cavalry. Somebody from there had rung him just to check on Stella's National Insurance number. They wouldn't tell him where she was living or working, of course, but at least he had an address where she would be reporting for a job assignment sometime or other. So he had hired Block and Blugden to do the business and report back. He had left a photograph of Stella and instructions not to approach her or let her know she was being followed. That was all there was to it.

Except why Stella had given a real name, home address and phone number to the agency. That didn't sound to me like somebody running away, and I know about these things.

I have road cred.

 

The door of number 8 looked just like any other front door. Just the sort you would find in any substantial terraced house. Nothing unusual, even a milk bottle on the doorstep.

And then you noticed that the door was painted light blue, and that the letter box had been nailed shut; and if you looked closely, you could see that still showing through the light blue paint was the shape of a crucifix about three feet high, as if it had been painted on and then painted over.

Even so, nothing terribly suspicious. I had seen much worse – I'd lived in places where any sort of door was a luxury.

I walked on without stopping, conscious that this was a cul-de-sac and I couldn't loiter too long. There was a sign saying that a top-floor flat was for sale three doors away, so I pretended to be taking in the frontage and hoped I looked like a prospective buyer to the local nosy Neighbourhood Watch.

Actually, the Neighbourhood Watch were probably just the people I ought to be talking to about the inhabitants of number 8. But were they around when you needed them? Of course not. They come out only after dark, when you're getting back from the pub late and the streetlights jump out and attack you as you're trying to park the car. Can't move for them then.

I tried to think who a real private eye would approach.

The local milkman? Forget it. If you have one in London these days, they're up so early to beat the traffic they never see anything, and if you approach one, they assume you're going to mug them for their low-fat yoghurts. The postman? They wouldn't tell you anything; more than their job's worth. And face it, what sort of person is it who gets up so early in the morning and whistles a happy tune while delivering the bills from the credit card companies or the income tax? Sick people. They need help.

But so did I at this rate, with no sign of a resident dog-walker to gossip with; not even a passing tourist seeking directions; not even a cat. I began to stroll back, at least planning on getting a second look at the door of number 8, and then Rule of Life No. 1 (It's better to be lucky than good) kicked in and the door of the house opened and all I had to do was slow down a pace so I didn't actually trip over them.

There were three of them, all male and all wearing Cotton Traders turtleneck shirts, though in different shades, and jeans. So what had I expected? Saffron robes and bells?

The tallest, a slim dude about six foot tall with a lion's mane of red hair, was the head honcho, of that there was no doubt. All the body language pointed to him being the leader, the disciple or the teacher, or whatever title this particular cult adopted.

I had been in no doubt that it was some form of religious grouping right from when Veronica had tried to describe the place. I had dismissed the idea of squatters immediately. Not in this area, that would be asking for trouble, and anyway, most of the old-school semi-professional squatters were now running housing associations. Nobody squatted in a single flat anymore. You took over a high-rise office block and usually found some property company was glad that you did, because you were free and security guards cost money.

And there were no hippy communes anymore. Face it, most hippies were
old enough to be my father. Come to think of it, one of them had been.

Sure, there were crackhouses and derelict sites for the drunks and assorted druggies too zonked (or just unwilling) to find a place in one of the night shelters. But those weren't the sort of places from which a girl like Stella left for work every morning and returned every evening to be greeted with hugs and kisses by her house-mates.

From the way Veronica had described that – not to mention the cross painted on the door – I had guessed we were talking religion. It didn't surprise me. Who else would a runaway, love-lost girl turn to in the big city? After drugs, religious sects offering all the safety valves of a family without the hassle of relatives, were London's most successful growth industry.

The only question really was, what was their particular angle? What did they offer? What were their aims? How much did it cost to join, apart from a mail-order account with Cotton Traders?

That didn't take much detective work either. The smallest and youngest of the three, wearing the ‘buttermilk' shirt, handed me a printed sheet with a cheery greeting of: ‘Hello, neighbour.'

I wondered if he'd seen me looking at the For Sale sign, but then I realised that he probably said that to all complete strangers.

‘Thank you,' I said, taking the sheet from him. I half expected a sermon, or at least a come-on scam for money. Maybe I wasn't his type of likely cult material, as he smiled and turned to follow the other two shirts – one tangerine, the tall guy's an eggshell shade – down the street.

They didn't give me a second look, and I concentrated on the paper I had been given, so they could get ahead of me. And as I stood there outside number 8, I distinctly heard the sound of bolts being scraped home behind the door. At least four of them.

I glanced at the flyer I had been handed. It had been printed from a word-processor by someone trying to use all the available typefaces and then duplicated on bleached, unrecycled paper. Whoever these guys were, they were not eco-warriors. The key message came under the title:

 

The Church of the Shining Doorway

 

‘Give me your young people that I might

lead them to the shining doorway of

Jesus and all his understanding.'

 

Constantine

 

That was all it said, but below it was a hand-drawn logo of a door with a large cross as if painted on. I thought about the sound of the bolts being fastened behind the door of number 8, just a few feet away from me, and wondered why that particular doorway, shining or tarnished, needed so much security.

I folded the flyer carefully and put it in the inside pocket of my leather jacket. The three of them were at the end of the street now, the tall one half a pace in front of the other two, slipping on the linen jacket he had been carrying. Even from where I was, I could see it had all the creases in the right places.

I wondered whether to follow them or try my luck with whoever was in the house. I decided to keep to the street. I would need a good line in blag to get into the house, and for what? Stella should be at work, and I certainly didn't want Veronica coming looking for me if I did manage to get in.

As they turned the corner of the street I opted to tail them. It went like a dream. Dead easy, this tailing stuff. They never suspected they were being followed, and I stuck to them like glue all the way to where they were going. About a hundred yards round the corner into Sloane Square.

They stood and conferred for a moment outside the entrance to the underground station. Then the tall one in the linen jacket flapped a hand in dismissal and walked off, but only as far as a brasserie ten feet away. He took a seat in the window, and a waiter in a striped apron the size of a beach towel offered him a menu. He ordered without consulting it and, while waiting, produced a small, flip-up mobile phone and began dialling.

His two foot soldiers took up position straddling the entrance to the tube station and began to hand out flyers. I watched from across the square, noting that they targeted white Anglo-Saxons under the age of 20, occasionally getting a pull and a conversation developing. The one who had leafleted me made two contacts while I watched, in both cases taking out a pen and adding something – a phone number? – to the flyer.

Linen Jacket in the brasserie would check them with a glance every ten minutes, otherwise he concentrated on his phone calls and his coffee and what looked like a real brioche with apricot jam.

I remembered Veronica and wondered if she would be hanging around Armstrong waiting for me. Or maybe she had picked the wrong taxi in a different street. No such luck.

‘Did you find out anything?' she steamed, all excited.

‘I think I met some of her house-mates. Or perhaps I should say fellow churchgoers.' I produced the flyer and she read it like it contained the answers to the ‘How to pick up more men' quiz in her favourite magazine.

‘I don't get it,' she said, looking at me dead straight.

I bit my tongue. ‘The house, back there, it's the Church of the Shining Doorway. I admit it could do with another coat of gloss, but it's the best they can do at the moment.'

‘But what sort of people go to a church like that?'

‘I dunno, but I'll show you some.'

She followed me puppy-like back to the square, and she had to screw up her eyes and polish her glasses again to get a good look at the two disciples handing out flyers. I checked the window seat of the brasserie, but Linen Jacket had gone.

‘That one, on the left,' Veronica said, ‘he was waiting for Stella last night when she came home. There was another one, too, seemed very friendly indeed.'

‘Tall, red-haired? Handsome?'

‘Why, yes,' she said, open-mouthed.

‘You just missed him,' I said smugly. ‘Hang on, something's going down.'

‘Going down where?' she asked, but I ignored her.

Of all things, a real live vicar, dog collar and all, had emerged from the underground station and taken what appeared to be an instant dislike to the two Shining Doorway salesmen. He started on the one in the tangerine turtleneck, and then the one who had given me the flyer stepped over and joined in. We couldn't hear what was being said, but from the startled looks they were getting from innocent passers-by, they probably weren't comparing notes on the latest Church of England Synod.

The vicar character wasn't letting them off easy, wagging a finger to begin with, shaking a fist within a minute. The two disciples kept their cool, and when the scene began to attract an audience, and as if at a given signal between them, they backed off into the station, the vicar following them.

By this time, I had Veronica's arm and was leading her across the road. The vicar emerged into the square again, wiping the palms of his hands down his jacket as if to clean himself.

‘What are we doing?' gasped Veronica.

‘You wanted to know what sort of people go to a church like the Shining Doorway. Well, he seems to know. Let's ask him.' I nodded towards the vicar we were on collision course with.

‘What makes you think he'll talk to us?'

‘I've made a Leap of Faith, dear, a Leap of Faith.'

‘Is that from the Scriptures?'

‘No, it's a Springsteen track; and no, not that Springsteen. The one we call the Boss.'

 

 

 

 

 

His name was the Reverend Rickwell, his parish was in Catford and for the price of a cappuccino in a steamy sandwich bar just down the King's Road, he was willing to talk. For a doughnut he would probably have run through next Sunday's sermon for us.

‘I just can't help myself,' said the Rev (‘Call me Roger') Rickwell. ‘It's like a red rag to a bull with me as soon as I see them out on the street. They look as if they're hunting, if you know what I mean. And, yes, that is a most unchristian thought, I know.'

He put two sachets of brown sugar in his cappuccino and stirred it until the froth had disappeared. What a waste, but I didn't interrupt him.

‘Religious belief should be personal commitment not peer group pressure, and believe me, some of these cults – that's what they are, cults – really do know how to exert pressure. It's so easy in London. Young people living alone, away from home …'

‘Running away from home, perhaps?' Veronica chipped in.

‘That too. They are easy prey. They're offered all the security of a new family with none of the responsibilities, not even the need to think for themselves. Some of these groups have codes of discipline that make the Gestapo look like weak-kneed liberals. I ... I don't know. I just find it very hard to tolerate the intolerant. When I see them on the street, I just find myself arguing with them.'

‘You've had a run-in with this lot before?' I asked.

‘The Shining Doorway? Oh yes. And the Shining Fulcrum and the Furlong of Light and half a dozen others with equally meaningless names. But only when I find them out on the street acting like some moral press gang. And you saw this morning that it's impossible to argue with them. They just turn and walk away.'