September Song (20 page)

His expression as he fell back against the cushioned wall behind him was all innocent surprise. He looked at the men around the table, who suddenly had a somewhat sheepish appearance.

‘Is this true?' he said. He turned to the man who had followed me only six or seven hours earlier. ‘What do you know of this “unpleasantness”, Stanley?'

Stanley said nothing, just stared at the tablecloth.

‘You could also,' I said, pointing at Stanley, ‘tell him to stop following me. Apart from anything else, he's not very good at it.'

Mr Fitz shook his head sadly, like a man disappointed in those around him. ‘Tony,' he said, ‘what can I say? I knew nothing of any of this. You and I have broken bread together. We have shared our wartime experiences. Why, we are practically comrades-in-arms. You have my assurance that nothing like this will occur again, if I can possibly stop it.' He sighed and spread his hands. ‘Of course, even the most experienced and in-touch officers can't make absolute promises  . . .'

I know when I'm being lied to, and I know when I'm being patronized. But I also know when there's no point in taking umbrage. I've been lied to and patronized by much better men than James Fitzgerald.

‘That's most reassuring  . . . James,' I said.

He smiled smugly and picked up his brandy glass again. He swirled the dark spirit around, twitched his nostrils over the rim and then drank deeply, emptying the glass.

‘I think,' I said, ‘I know some of what's been going on, but it doesn't make much sense.'

He suddenly looked a bit more interested and alert. ‘Oh?' he said. ‘Do go on.' He handed his glass to Stanley, who stood up and walked to the little bar that ran along one wall of the restaurant. I watched him pour a stiff measure from a squat bottle on the counter.

I suddenly realized that there was no one else in the place: no adulterous couples furtively holding hands, lingering over an exotic candlelit dinner; no waiters picking their teeth, waiting to make their weary way home to Turnpike Lane; no proprietor adding up bills. I could hear some clattering coming from the kitchen, but that was it. Apart from me, Mr Fitz and his boys. I started to feel even more uncomfortable. Ah, well, in for a penny and all that.

‘I think it's about the ganja market,' I said.

Fitzgerald widened his little eyes a fraction. ‘Drugs?' he said. ‘Gosh! What makes you think that?'

I again thought it wiser not to rise to the tone. I can live with someone being sarcastic at my expense. ‘I'm afraid it probably is about drugs, James. Drugs, and an ambitious young man.' I paused and took a deep breath. ‘I should explain that my only interest is in protecting my client's interests. He has an asset who has become mixed up in all this. I'd like to be able to reassure him that his asset is safe. If that reassurance is forthcoming, then I'm out of this and you and your –' I spread my hands to encompass everyone around the table – ‘colleagues won't see me again.'

Mr Fitz looked slightly puzzled, and I wondered if this could be genuine. He shook his head. ‘I'm afraid,' he said, ‘that you will have to elucidate.'

‘Philip Graham,' I said, ‘a young actor contracted to Hoxton Films, has inadvertently got involved. My boss would like him out of it.' I paused. ‘It's that simple.'

Mr Fitz nodded slowly. ‘I'm more than happy,' he said, ‘to assure you, and the estimable Mr Jackson of Hoxton Films, that I have no quarrel at all with that particular rising star of the silver screen.'

I made to stand, but Harold put big meaty hands on my shoulders and I remained seated. ‘In that case,' I said, ‘I need take up no more of your valuable time.'

There was what felt like a long silence before Fitzgerald nodded to Harold and spoke. ‘Just one proviso,' he said. ‘Convince that young man that dabbling in things he wots not of is hardly conducive to a long and peaceful life.'

‘Understood,' I said and stood up after Harold removed his mitts and moved a foot or two back from my chair.

I stepped away from the table and peered through the gloom at the front door to the restaurant.

‘I think,' Fitzgerald said, ‘that you may have to leave via the kitchen, Tony.' His small, pale hand indicated the double doors. ‘And just one other thing, before you go.'

I stood still and looked down at him.

‘The other gentleman,' he said, ‘the musical one. What's your interest there?'

‘None,' I said. I wasn't washing my hands of him, or throwing him to the wolves. Smugly, I assumed that Lee was already on his way to Scotland Yard. Or was about to be. And then he'd be off to bonny Scotland, safely out of the way. ‘None at all.'

Mr Fitz sucked in his cheeks and then flicked the tip of his pink tongue around his lips. There was something dismayingly obscene about the sight. ‘I'm delighted to hear that, Tony,' he said. ‘Have a pleasant journey home. To Leyton, isn't that right?'

‘Yes,' I said, wondering how he knew and if it mattered, ‘that's right.'

He nodded and smiled sweetly. It was, of course, a warning.
I know where you live
.

I smiled back and pushed my way through the swing doors into the kitchen. The bright light was blinding after the shadowed gloom of the dining room. Two tired-looking middle-aged men in grubby white jackets stopped smoking and stared at me. I nodded at them as I passed and strode out on to the staircase.

It had been a very long day. I stood on the top step for a moment and looked down at the dingy, cluttered little alley. Something large squirmed past an overflowing bin. The ripe smell of rotting vegetables drifted up on the gritty bitter air. The authentic smell of London: coal smoke and rubbish. A few vehicles rumbled past in the distance, and I could just hear the band downstairs working up a real sweat with ‘Way Down Yonder In New Orleans'. Jerry has a record of the immortal Bix Beiderbecke playing it. I thought of that lovely mellow sound.

Then I ambled slowly down the stairs, my footsteps ringing out in the night air. I got down to the yard and yawned mightily. I was really looking forward to tumbling into my pit.

Then an arm reached out from the shadows under the staircase, grabbed my arm and dragged me back there. I just had time to think about Fitzgerald and perfidious Albion before something hit me very hard on the side of the head. I fell to my knees, took another couple of punches and a kick or two before collapsing completely into semi-consciousness. Thankfully, the two of them (there were definitely two of them) stopped thumping me at that point and moved on. So it wasn't a punitive beating they were administering. They just wanted me out of the way. Well, for the moment, I was happy to oblige. I stretched out on the cold, damp ground. The ugly black cat – the one that had been rummaging in the bins – swayed cockily past, tail erect. I was so much of a threat it couldn't even be bothered to hiss at me.

I heard some muffled yelling in the distance and tried to sit up, but my head didn't feel quite right about that and I slumped back down just as people emerged from the back entrance to Pete's Place.

Two men were dragging another, and a woman – Jeannie Summers – was pulling at them in a vain attempt to stop them. As they came to the foot of the stairs in front of me, one of the men – Ricky Mountjoy – turned and viciously backhanded her. Then he punched her in the stomach. She went down as heavily as I had done and started sobbing.

I struggled to get up, but this time it was my legs that weren't having any of it. I did, though, manage to reach out from under the stairs and grab Ricky Mountjoy's ankle. He completely lost his footing and crashed and slithered back down the four or five steps he had climbed and lay in a heap at the bottom.

Lee the piano player took his chance. He pulled away from the man holding him, jumped down the stairs, hared off to the back of the yard, clambered up on to a bin, leapt over the wall and was away. I couldn't help noticing that he was pretty good at this running away stuff. I assumed he'd had a lot of practice.

Malcolm Booth limped down the stairs and hobbled off in pursuit. I don't suppose that, even at his best, he was anything like as nimble, and with one ankle out of use it was a bit like watching a tubby, crocked right-back trying to catch Tom Finney.

Ricky Mountjoy was altogether sprightlier, and after one vicious glance at me and a quick rub of his barked shins he dashed to the rear of the yard. There was the clatter of a falling bin, and he was over the wall. I hoped that Lee had enough of a start.

As I slid over to Jeannie Summers, Malcolm Booth, favouring his left leg, came back from the rear wall. The look on his face suggested he'd been sucking on a bag of lemons.

I was feeling a bit better after pulling Ricky Mountjoy back to earth, and I stood up, fists at the ready. When Malcolm was about five feet away I put up my guard. ‘All right, stop there,' I said. ‘Another step and I will really hurt you.'

He stopped, but he didn't speak. The voice came from behind and above me.

‘No you won't.'

I didn't look away from Malcolm. I knew who it was. I recognized the voice.

‘No,' I said, ‘I won't. Not if he stays where he is. But I have to tell you, Stanley—'

‘It's Stan,' he snapped out. ‘Only Mr Fitz calls me Stanley.'

‘Fine,' I said. ‘I have to tell you,
Stanley
, I am not a happy man. I don't like being ambushed after
James
and I came to an agreement. I am very browned off with Malcolm here. And I do assure you,
Stanley
, that I will break his arm or his leg – I haven't decided which yet – before you or anyone else can fall down those stairs.'

Applause chuckled out from Pete's Place, and Jeannie Summers sobbed a little more.

‘Now,' I said, ‘there's an injured woman here, and I am going to take her inside the club. If anyone follows me in, he is going to regret it for a good month or two. I really am that browned off.' There was no response. ‘Do you understand me?'

Stanley coughed. ‘Yeah, I understand,' he said. ‘No one's coming after you. Take her in. Mr Fitz has no interest in you or her.'

‘Thank you,' I said. ‘All the same, I think I'll wait until Malcolm is safely upstairs before I move.'

Malcolm Booth looked at me like I was a smelly mess his cat had just vomited up as he passed me and made his slow, halting way up the stairs. Although I thought I detected a touch of regret in his eyes as well. Regret that we were no longer the firm friends he thought we could have become. But then I'm an old sentimentalist. He was probably just sorry he hadn't fractured my skull.

What with all my bumps and bruises, I'd thought I would be relieved when the taxi drew up opposite the Gaumont. But I wasn't.

It was very late, and the cinema was dark and had been for many hours. I looked across to Jerry's shop for any sign of light as I handed the cabbie my last pound note. He counted out my change in that slow, careful way cabbies have. I'm sure it's so that you have time to do the mental arithmetic and come up with the tip.

There wasn't even a glimmer leaking from Jerry's place, so Jerry was asleep. Since Jerry didn't go to bed much before Monday on a Saturday, that meant it was very late indeed. I handed back some of the silver the cabbie gave me, said goodnight and, picking up her suitcase, led Jeannie Summers across the road.

We'd sat in Peter Baxter's office for a while, swallowing Aspro and brandy, holding cold-water-soaked flannels to our faces, and she'd expressed a desire to be anywhere but in her digs waiting for her feckless husband to show. She said she'd had it, with him, with her life with him, even with singing. Peter had looked helpless and murmured something about the missus not being the understanding sort, so I'd felt I had to offer my 'umble abode. I'd told her not to expect much, that it was shabby and dirty, had an outside loo and no running hot water. She'd just said that she'd spent most of her life in places like that and, as long as it didn't contain her worthless husband, it would do fine. It was then that I'd stopped looking forward to falling into my bed. I'd be on my grandfather's old chair, sleeping in my office for the few hours before dawn broke. Not that it was likely to be a glorious sunrise. The occasional spatter of rain as we crossed Church Road suggested that this Sunday would not be one of cloudless skies and bright sunshine.

I apologized to her again for the state of the flat as I waggled my key around. The new lock was still a bit stiff and took some turning.

The dank little corridor that ran alongside the shop smelt damper than usual, and the stairs that led to my couple of rooms creaked and groaned louder than ever. The dim, unshaded light bulb threw weak shadows on the brown, scuffed walls and mice scurried noisily under the floorboards.

Jeannie Summers didn't seem to notice. Or she was too polite to comment.

She stood in the middle of my living room, which is also my bedroom, looking a little
distrait
.

The livid mark on her left cheekbone, where Ricky Mountjoy's wedding ring had struck her, showed no sign of fading yet and emphasized her pallor and the greenish tinge to the bags under her eyes.

‘I think I'd like to go to bed now,' she said, turning a weary smile on me.

‘Of course,' I said, putting her case down. ‘I'll just find some clean sheets.'

She sighed. ‘Oh, I'm too tired to worry about fresh bedding,' she said.

‘It won't take a minute,' I said.

She yawned hugely. ‘All the same,' she said.

I shrugged and pointed to the sad-looking heap of sheets and blankets that hid the narrow cot I slept on. Fortunately, and unusually, Jerry's monster of a cat, Fluffy, was nowhere to be seen. I wondered where he was. He wouldn't be mousing. Mice offered him no challenge. He'd never been known to stir for anything less than a foot-long rat.