Killing Time Read online

  ‘Yes,’ said Slider. ‘I know.’

  ‘And I’ll tell you another thing,’ she said, flame-eyed with tears and outrage now. ‘Just Sunday, he was talking about chucking the whole thing up. He said he was fed up of it, the whole set-up, the club, show-business, working all night and sleeping in the day, being treated like dirt, being slobbered over by drunks. And he said to me Sunday, he said, “Val,” he said, “let’s chuck it up and get out of London while we’ve still got a bit of life in front of us.” Well, he’d got this plan, you see, for us to retire and get a place in the country, in Ireland, and do bed and breakfast for holiday-makers. He’d been saving up ages to buy a little place. It was his dream, but now he said, “Val, let’s really do it.”’ The animation faded. ‘He meant it an’ all. It’s not fair. He deserved a bit of luck, poor Maurice.’

  He’d had his bit of luck, Slider reflected. It’s just that it wasn’t good.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Fissure of Men

  Busty’s next-door neighbour was torn between the obligatory reluctance to ‘get involved’, and the temptation of being a star, for if she became a witness for the police, she might get herself on the telly. She havered and wavered, but finally the glamour of potential fame overcame her to the point of inviting Hart in for a cup of tea – a courtesy Hart would have dispensed with. The flat smelled of urine, babies and chip fat. Why didn’t humans have those useful nostrils that closed flat, Hart wondered. When her hostess left the room to put on the kettle, Hart sneaked her Amarige out of her handbag and dabbed a bit on her upper lip for protection.

  Charmian, was the woman’s name, God only knew why. Charmian Hogg. She sat on the sofa opposite Hart, a pasty female, spots at the corners of her mouth and a crop of blackheads on her cheeks like an aerial view of black cattle grazing across a parched plain. Her hair was dirty, her teeshirt much stained, her short skirt straining into corrugated creases across her belly, her bare legs blotched red and mauve, her feet in broken-down slippers. She pulled a pack of cigarettes out from behind the sofa-cushion and lit one, and a dirty child of about three, in sagging, nappy-bulging shorts, wandered in and climbed up next to her, clutching her arm and staring at Hart as if she were Sigourney Weaver. In another room a baby cried monotonously. In a corner of this one, in a playpen, another child of about eighteen months picked listlessly at the tacky bits of trodden-in food on the carpet, and stared out through the bars with its mouth open.

  ‘Them next door,’ said Mrs Hogg, ‘I never had nothing to do with ’em. I told the Council, I don’t want the likes of them living next door to me. Disgusting. Well, I don’t mind blacks,’ she said generously, for Hart’s sake, ‘but that lot—! And him! Filthy, I call it. I mean, I suppose some of ’em can’t help being that way, which you don’t mind when they’re nice, like that actor, what’s his name, he’s very funny, you know the one I mean, the big fat one. But to do it like him next door – just selling himself for money. Just like animals. Not but what he wasn’t polite, always looked smart, and said hello nice as you like when I met him on the stairs or anything. Offered to help me up the stairs with the pushchair once, but I wouldn’t let him anywhere near my Jason – would I, Jase?’ she addressed the odoriferous child beside her, which was now absently exploring its nose with a forefinger, never taking its eyes from Hart’s alien face. ‘You never know what you might catch off someone like that. Riddled with diseases they are – AIDS and that – and I wouldn’t have him touching none of my kids.’

  Hart moved further towards the edge of the armchair she was sitting on, which she had a horrible suspicion was damp. ‘So you didn’t know ’em very well?’

  ‘I never even knew his name until you told me.’

  ‘What about your husband?’

  ‘He ain’t here. He’s got his own flat over Fulham. He don’t come here much now. He’s got this girlfriend. Right little slapper she is!’

  ‘All right, tell me what you heard last night,’ Hart said, anxious to get her to the point.

  ‘Last night?’

  ‘You said you heard something?’

  ‘Oh. Yeah. Well, there was a noise. Like someone was having a barney. It woke my Jade up, so I wasn’t best pleased, I can tell you.’

  ‘Woke your what?’

  ‘Jade. Over there.’ She indicated the child in the playpen. ‘My little girl.’

  Blimey, thought Hart. ‘What time was that?’

  ‘Oh, middle of the night. I dunno exactly.’

  ‘After midnight?’

  ‘Well, maybe not. I didn’t notice.’

  ‘Were you in bed?’

  ‘No, I was in here, watching telly. I might of just dropped off, though,’ she admitted reluctantly.

  ‘What exactly did you hear?’

  ‘I heard this crash, like the door was being kicked in, and then a load of shoutin’ an’ crashin’ about, like someone was havin’ a real barney.’ She waxed enthusiastic. ‘All furnicher bein’ knocked over and glass broken and that. And then someone shouted, “I’m going to kill you, you dirty bastard.” And then there was a kind of thud, like a body falling over. And then it all went quiet.’ She shuddered. ‘’Orrible it was!’

  In your dreams, Hart thought, making notes with an inward sigh. ‘What direction did these noises come from?’

  ‘Are you taking the piss?’ Mrs Hogg asked with a derisive look. ‘Them next door, o’ course. That’s what you was asking about, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yeah, right. But you see, there’s no sign of anyone having a fight in there, no furniture turned over or broken glass. So I thought it might be some other barney you heard.’

  Mrs Hogg grew sulky. ‘I know what I heard. You callin’ me a liar?’

  ‘I just want you to think carefully about what you really heard. It’s not going to help us if you exaggerate.’

  ‘I did hear the door bein’ kicked in,’ she said defiantly. ‘And I heard some furnicher crashin’.’ A pause. ‘Maybe that was all,’ she added reluctantly.

  ‘What about the shouting?’

  ‘Well, maybe, maybe not. I can’t say for sure.’

  ‘And can you help me some more about the time?’

  ‘Like I say, I must of dropped off in front of the telly,’ she said, eyeing Hart as though she saw her chance of stardom dissolving.

  ‘And it was the noise that woke you up? Do you remember what was on the telly then?’

  Further probing brought the admission that Mrs Hogg had been hitting the Cinzano earlier in the evening, which had caused her to drop off, and the noise next door had only partly woken her. She had dozed again, and it was only when Jade’s howling had started off baby Pearse that the combined racket had penetrated her cobwebs. By then all was quiet next door. It was then ten past midnight, so the door-kicking-in could have happened at any time before that.

  The neighbours on the other side were harder to coax out, and less forthcoming, but probably more reliable. The elderly couple glared at Hart suspiciously round the chain on the door, and would only open it when she had got PC Baker to come and flash his uniform, and both sets of ID had been carefully scrutinised.

  ‘Can’t be too careful,’ the oldster grunted begrudgingly as he opened the door a little wider. He wore a very sporty home-knitted cardigan of grey wool with a white reindeer-motif border, whose pockets sagged hopelessly under the burden of handkerchiefs, tobacco tin and matches.

  ‘Only you see stuff on the telly all the time,’ the oldstress added over his shoulder. She was inclined to be apologetic, and would have asked them in, had her husband not blocked the way as robustly as his trembling frame could manage. Hart was quite happy to interview them on the doorstep. Over their diminutive shoulders she could smell the house aroma of liniment, cold roll-ups and dirty bodies, and had no wish to pitch her Amarige against this new Everest.

  The old man said their name was Mr and Mrs Maplesyrup, but the old lady, whose teeth fitted better, corrected this to Maplesthorp as Hart wrote it down. They had hea
rd the door being kicked in all right. It was just before half past eleven, because the film was just finishing, which was Assassination with Charles Bronson, very loud and lots of banging, guns and that, and Mr Maplesyrup had thought at first the noise was just part of the film, but Mrs Maplesyrup had said turn the sound down a minute, Charlie, I think it was next door. So he had done, because it was just the whajjercallums, the titles by then, and they’d listened, and they’d heard a sort of bang next door, or it might have been a thud, maybe, like something heavy being dropped or knocked over. And then nothing, just quiet, so Mr Fudgefrosting had turned the sound back up because there was that advert he liked, the supermarket one with the little boy and the shopping, he was a laugh that kid, and Mrs Hotjamsundae had gone to put the kettle on for their cuppa, which they always had before they went to bed. And while she was in the kitchen it was all quiet next door, and no-one had come along the communal balcony past her window. And this morning when she went out to go down for the paper she had just looked next door, just a quick peek, and she’d seen that the door wasn’t closed properly and a big footmark on it and sort of splintery-looking at the edge where the Yale was, so she’d known they hadn’t imagined it after all.

  ‘I suppose you didn’t think of calling the police?’ Hart said. Mr Maplesthorp looked witheringly at her, and said they couldn’t go phoning the police every time they heard a thump or a raised voice, or they’d never be off the phone. And the police wouldn’t thank them neither, they never did nothing if you did phone them. Anyway, you didn’t stick your nose in on this estate, you left well alone as long as you were left alone. It wasn’t like it used to be in the old days, when you could leave your front door open all day and no bother, and neighbours were neighbours. They were only waiting to be rehoused, but they’d been on the waiting list five years now, so unless they won the lottery—

  Mrs Maplesthorp interrupted to add apologetically that they hadn’t thought anything about it really, the noise next door, though they’d always been quiet people, no trouble, and not usually given to fights or kicking doors in, but you didn’t get thanked for interfering between man and wife, she’d learnt that lesson the hard way when she’d tried to make peace between her brother and his wife, and got an earful from both of them, and they’d never spoken since, except at family funerals and things, though they always sent a Christmas card, which was a bit hypocritical when you thought of it …

  Satisfactory, Hart thought when she finally made her escape. Three witnesses giving a similar story – you couldn’t ask for more than that in an imperfect world.

  ‘Has there been any trouble at the Pomona recently?’ Slider asked Sergeant O’Flaherty on his way out to the yard. Fergus was one of his oldest friends, a man of sharp, sidelong wit and vast experience, who lurked, like a birdwatcher in a hide, behind the persona of a joke Irishman, a pantomime Thick Mick. Sometimes Slider suspected that he had slipped so far into self-parody that he had started to believe it.

  ‘Not more than usual,’ O’Flaherty said. He was on his break and eating a sausage sandwich, washing it down with gulps of tea. ‘There was a bit of a frackarse Saturday night, but it didn’t amount to much – more of a comedy turn in the end. Some animal rights nutters tried to storm the place, but the doormen dusted ’em off.’

  ‘Animal rights?’ Slider was puzzled. ‘What were they protesting about?’

  ‘One o’ the cabaret acts. Simulated sex with a sheep,’ Fergus explained with a curled lip.

  Slider frowned. ‘But that’s—’

  ‘Asherjaysus, it wasn’t a real sheep, it was paper mashy an’ a bit o’ woolly stuff stuck on; but the animal libbers didn’t work that one out until they got in and chucked some paint at the performers. It missed them and hit the sheep, at which point the truth dawned. They was so gobsmacked it give the doormen a chance to grab. They gave ’em no resistance and the doormen chucked ’em out with just a bunch o’ bruises. They thought about suing, but when I pointed out what the headlines’d be, sense prevailed and they thought they’d better keep quiet about it, for the sake o’ pride.’ He finished his tea. ‘D’you know what the Pomona called the act, anyway?’ Slider shook his head. ‘A Pair o’ Sheepskin Slippers.’ He gave a snort of mixed disgust and amusement.

  ‘So how come it wasn’t all over the papers?’

  ‘The Pomona’s owned by Billy Yates, and he didn’t want the publicity any more than the animal libbers.’

  ‘Ah, of course,’ said Slider, understanding. Billy Yates was a local businessman with his fingers in almost every pie, and an inordinate influence in the local community.

  ‘He squashed the locals, and they didn’t dare syndicate. There was a paragraph in Monday’s Evening Standard, but it didn’t have the interesting details, so nobody else picked it up. Yates was fed up, mind you, having to take off the act, but he couldn’t have his artistes shagging a green sheep, now could he? O’ carse, he’d a’ had to take it off anyway, One o’ the slippers in question was your man Jay Paloma.’

  ‘Was it indeed?’

  ‘Didn’t you know that? I thought that was why you was asking.’ He looked at Slider keenly. ‘You think it was some nutter on a clean-up campaign?’

  ‘I’m not sure. Paloma was some bigwig’s rent boy, according to his flatmate. He could have been wiped for security reasons.’

  ‘Or jealousy. You know what these types are like – incontinent as the moon.’ Fergus screwed up his greasy bag and potted it neatly in the bin. ‘How’s Little Boy Blue gettin’ on?’ This was his nickname for Atherton. It was not unaffectionate.

  ‘I rang yesterday. They said the usual things.’ He tried to be positive. ‘It’s bound to be a long job. It was a massive wound.’

  ‘It shouldn’t a happened to a bloke like him,’ Fergus said. ‘But then, I never thought he should be a copper. Restaurant critic, maybe. It’s like seein’ a raceharse pull a coal cart.’

  ‘He’s a good detective,’ Slider objected. ‘You’re a Catholic, Fergus. Do you believe prayers are answered?’

  ‘Always,’ Fergus said firmly. He eyed his friend with large sympathy. ‘Sometimes the answer’s “no”.’

  ‘You’re such a comfort,’ Slider complained, and headed for the door.

  Fergus called after him. ‘D’you know what’s headin’ the bill at the Pomona in place o’ Sheepskin Slippers? It’s that big fat Vera doin’ a strip, all dragged up in Egyptian like Elizabeth Taylor. Two Ton Carmen they call it. It’s the last bastion o’ good taste, that place.’

  ‘Oh, you are awake,’ Slider said. ‘The nurses warned me not to disturb you if you were resting.’

  ‘I can rest all day,’ Atherton said.

  ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘Excremental.’

  Slider studied him from the doorway. ‘You look like the Pompidou Centre.’

  ‘And Honeyman sent a basket of fruit,’ said Atherton, looking at the thing which lurked horribly in a corner, covered in brittle polythene and topped with one of those vast pale mauve bows beloved of florists.

  ‘Honeyman’s an idiot,’ Slider said, fetching a chair to the bedside. ‘Can’t you give it to the nurses?’

  ‘They won’t take it. They keep saying I’ll want it later, when the tubes come out. I keep telling them by then it’ll be pure penicillin.’

  ‘Maybe that’s what they mean. Can I get you anything before I sit down?’

  ‘Yeah. Wet my lips, please.’ There was a container of saline solution and a crock of baby buds for the purpose. Slider performed the task neatly. ‘You’d make someone a great wife,’ Atherton said, to cover for the variety of emotions it made him feel.

  Slider sat and made himself as comfortable as possible, wondering who they used as a model for these moulded chairs.

  ‘How’s Jo?’ Atherton asked.

  ‘Fine. Busy.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘Ditto. We had a shout. That’s why I didn’t get in to see you yesterday.’

  ‘You d
on’t have to come in every day.’

  ‘I do,’ Slider said shortly. Atherton hadn’t the energy to argue with him. He knew Slider blamed himself for the knife wound, because he hadn’t let Atherton in on his thought processes, and therefore laid him open (ouch, change metaphor) left him vulnerable to the momentary mistaken identification which had let Gilbert get his blow in. Atherton had even, in his worst moments of despair, blamed Slider himself; but the truth was that it had all happened so quickly, even if he had found himself faced with a complete stranger when the door opened he wouldn’t have seen the knife coming. But Slider felt responsible, and visiting every day was one small way of making it up. And Atherton liked to have him visit. It broke up the day a bit.

  ‘Nicholls came yesterday,’ Atherton said.

  ‘He knew I wasn’t going to make it. Did he tell you they’ve started getting the bill together for Mr Wetherspoon’s charity concert for Children in Need? Nutty’s going on in a fright wig and sequins singing “Hey Big Spender”. He’s billed as Burly Chassis.’

  Atherton smiled painfully. ‘Don’t. It hurts to laugh.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘When’s that coming off?’

  ‘The concert? September some time.’

  ‘Maybe I’ll be out for it, then.’ Atherton sounded so doubtful that it seemed better to both of them for the subject to be changed. ‘Tell me about the shout.’

  ‘The shout?’ Slider’s mind was elsewhere and he sounded vague. ‘Isn’t it that painting by Munch?’

  ‘Give the man a coconut,’ Atherton said, secretly rather impressed by Slider’s knowledge. ‘Not The Scream – the shout. Your shout.’

  ‘Oh! Oh, it was a corpus. In a flat on the White City Estate.’