Daggers Drawn

Fedora John Harvey

When they had first met, amused by his occupation, Kate had sent him copies of Hammett and Chandler, two neat piles of paperbacks, bubble-wrapped, courier-delivered. A note: If you’re going to do, do it right. Fedora follows. He hadn’t been certain exactly what a fedora was.

Jack Kiley, private investigator. Security work of all kinds undertaken. Ex-Metropolitan Police.

Most of his assignments came from bigger security firms, PR agencies with clients in need of baby sitting, steering clear of trouble; solicitors after witness confirmation, a little dirt. If it didn’t make him rich, most months it paid the rent: a second-floor flat above a charity shop in north London, Tufnell Park. He still didn’t have a hat.

Till now.

One of the volunteers in the shop had taken it in. ‘An admirer, Jack, is that what it is?’

There was a card attached to the outside of the box: Chris Ruocco of London, Bespoke Tailoring. It hadn’t come far. A quarter mile, at most. Kiley had paused often enough outside the shop, coveting suits in the window he could ill afford.

But this was a broad-brimmed felt hat, not quite black. Midnight blue? He tried it on for size. More or less a perfect fit.

There was a note sticking up from the band: on one side, a quote from Chandler; on the other a message: Ozone, tomorrow. 11am? Both in Kate Keenan’s hand.

He took the hat back off and placed it on the table alongside his mobile phone. Had half a mind to call her and decline. Thanks, but no thanks. Make some excuse. Drop the fedora back at Ruocco’s next time he caught the overground from Kentish Town.

It had been six months now since he and Kate had last met, the premiere of a new Turkish — Albanian film to which she’d been invited, Kiley leaving halfway through and consoling himself with several large whiskies in the cinema bar. When Kate had finally emerged, preoccupied by the piece she was going to write for her column in the Independent, something praising the film’s mysterious grandeur, its uncompromising pessimism — the phrases already forming inside her head — Kiley’s sarcastic ‘Got better, did it?’ precipitated a row which ended on the street outside with her calling him a hopeless philistine and Kiley suggesting she take whatever pretentious arty crap she was going to write for her bloody newspaper and shove it.

Since then, silence.

Now what was this? A peace offering? Something more?

Kiley shook his head. Was he really going to put himself through all that again? Kate’s companion. Cramped evenings in some tiny theatre upstairs, less room for his knees than the North End at Leyton Orient; standing for what seemed like hours, watching others genuflect before the banality of some Turner Prize winner; another mind-numbing lecture at the British Library; brilliant meals at Moro or the River Café on Kate’s expense account; great sex.

Well, thought Kiley, nothing was perfect.

Ozone, or to give it its proper title, Ozone Coffee Roasters, was on a side street close by Old Street station. In full view in the basement, industrial-size roasting machines had their way with carefully harvested beans from the best single-estate coffee farms in the world — Kiley had Googled the place before leaving — while upstairs smart young people sat either side of a long counter or at heavy wooden tables, most of them busy at their laptops as their flat whites or espressos grew cold around them. Not that Kiley had anything against a good flat white — twenty-first century man, or so he sometimes liked to think, he could navigate his way round the coffee houses in London with the best of them.

Chalked on a slate at the front of one of the tables was Kate Keenan’s name and a time, 11.00, but no Kate to be seen.

Just time to reassess, change his mind.

Kiley slid along the bench seat and gave his order to a waitress who seemed to be wearing mostly tattoos. Five minutes later, Kate arrived.

She was wearing a long, loose crepe coat that swayed around her as she walked; black trousers, a white shirt, soft leather bag slung over one shoulder. Her dark hair was cut short, shorter than he remembered, taking an extra shine from the lighting overhead. As she approached the table her face broke into a smile. She looked Kiley thought, allowing himself the odd ageist indiscretion, lovelier that any forty-four year old woman had the right.

“Jack, you could at least have worn the hat.”

“Saving it for a special occasion.”

“You mean this isn’t one?”

“We’ll see.”

She kissed him on the mouth.

“I’m famished,” she said. “You going to eat?”

“I don’t know.”

“The food’s good. Very good.”

There was an omelette on the menu, the cost, Kiley reckoned, of a meal at McDonald’s or Subway for a family of five. When it came it was fat and delicious, stuffed with spinach, shallots and red pepper and bright with the taste of fresh chillis. Kate had poached eggs on sourdough toast with portobello mushrooms. She’d scarcely punctured the first egg when she got down to it.

“Jack, a favour.”

He paused with his fork half-way to his mouth.

“Graeme Fisher, mean anything to you?”

“Vaguely.” He didn’t know how or in what connection.

“Photographer, big in the sixties. Bailey, Duffy, Fisher. The big three, according to some. Fashion, that was his thing. Everyone’s thing. Biba. Vogue. You couldn’t open a magazine, look at a hoarding without one of his pictures staring back at you.” She took a sip from her espresso. “He disappeared for a while in the eighties — early seventies, eighties. Australia, maybe, I’m not sure. Resurfaced with a show at Victoria Miro, new work, quite a bit different. Cooler, more detached: buildings, interiors, mostly empty. Very few people.”

Skip the art history, Kiley thought, this is leading where?

“I did a profile of him for the Independent on Sunday,” Kate said. “Liked him. Self-deprecating, almost humble. Genuine.”

“What’s he done?” Kiley asked.

“Nothing.”

“But he is in some kind of trouble?”

“Maybe.”

“Shenanigans.”

“Sorry?”

“Someone else’s wife; someone else’s son, daughter. What used to be called indiscretions. Now it’s something more serious.”

Following the high-profile arrests of several prominent media personalities, accused of a variety of sexual offences dating back up to forty years, reports to the police of historic rape and serious sexual abuse had increased four-fold. Men — it was mostly men — who had enjoyed both the spotlight and the supposed sexual liberation of the sixties and later were contacting their lawyers, setting up damage limitation exercises, quaking in their shoes.

“You’ve still got contacts in the Met, haven’t you, Jack?”

“A few.”

“I thought if there was anyone you knew — Operation Yewtree, is that what it’s called? — I thought you might be able to have a word on the quiet, find out if Fisher was one of the people they were taking an interest in.”

“Should they be?”

“No. No.”

“Because if they’re not, the minute I mention his name, they’re going to be all over him like flies.”

Kate cut away a small piece of toast, added mushroom, a smidgeon of egg. “Maybe there’s another way.”

Kiley said nothing.

As if forgetting she’d changed the style, Kate smoothed a hand across her forehead to brush away a strand of hair. “When he was what? Twenty-nine? Thirty? He had this relationship with a girl, a model.”

Kiley nodded, sensing where this was going.

“She was young,” Kate said. “Fifteen. Fifteen when it started.”

“Fifteen,” Kiley said quietly.

“It wasn’t aggressive, wasn’t in any sense against her will, it was... like I say, it was a relationship, a proper relationship. It wasn’t even secret. People knew.”

“People?”

“In the business. Friends. They were an item.”

“And that made it okay? An item?”

“Jack...”

“What?”

“Don’t prejudge. And stop repeating everything I say.”

Kiley chased a last mouthful of spinach around his plate. The waitress with the tattoos stopped by their table to ask if there was anything else they wanted and Kate sent her on her way.

“He’s afraid of her,” Kate said. “Afraid she’ll go to the police herself.”

“Why now?”

“It’s in the air, Jack. You read the papers, watch the news. Cleaning out the Augean stables doesn’t come into it.”

Kiley was tempted to look at his watch: ten minutes without Kate making a reference he failed to understand. Maybe fifteen. “A proper relationship, isn’t that what you said?”

“It ended badly. She didn’t want to accept things had run their course. Made it difficult. When it became clear he wasn’t going to change his mind, she attempted suicide.”

“Pills?”

Kate nodded. “It was all hushed up at the time. Back then, that was still possible.”

“And now he’s terrified it’ll all come out...”

“Go and talk to him, Jack. Do that at least. I think you’ll like him.”

Liking him, Kiley knew, would be neither here nor there, a hindrance at best.

There was a bookshop specialising in fashion and photography on Charing Cross Road. Claire de Rouen. Kiley had walked past there a hundred times without ever going in. Two narrow flights of stairs and then an interior slightly larger than the average bathroom. Books floor to ceiling, wall to wall. There was a catalogue from Fisher’s show at Victoria Miro, alongside a fat retrospective, several inches thick. Most of the photographs, the early ones, were in glossy black and white. Beautiful young women slumming in fashionable clothes: standing, arms aloft, in a bomb site, dripping with costume jewellery and furs; laughing outside Tubby Isaac’s Jellied Eel Stall at Spitalfields; stretched out along a coster’s barrow, legs kicking high in the air. One picture that Kiley kept flicking back to, a thin-hipped, almost waif-like girl standing, marooned, in an empty swimming pool, naked save for a pair of skimpy pants and gold bangles snaking up both arms, a gold necklace hanging down between her breasts. Lisa Arnold. Kate had told him her name. Lisa. He wondered if this were her.

The house was between Ladbroke Grove and Notting Hill, not so far from the Portobello Road. Flat fronted, once grand, paint beginning to flake away round the windows on the upper floors. Slabs of York Stone leading, uneven, to the front door. Three bells. Graeme Fisher lived on the ground floor.

He took his time responding.

White hair fell in wisps around his ears; several days since he’d shaved. Corduroy trousers, collarless shirt, cardigan wrongly buttoned, slippers on his feet.

“You’ll be Kate’s friend.”

Kiley nodded and held out his hand.

The grip was firm enough, though when he walked it was slow, more of a shuffle, with a pronounced tilt to one side.

“Better come through here.”

Here was a large room towards the back of the house, now dining room and kitchen combined. A short line of servants’ bells, polished brass, was still attached to the wall close by the door.

Fisher sat at the scrubbed oak table and waited for Kiley to do the same.

“Bought this place for a song in sixty-four. All divided up since then, rented out. Investment banker and his lady friend on the top floor — when they’re not down at his place in Dorset. Bloke above us, something in the social media.” He said it as if it were a particularly nasty disease. “Keeps the bailiffs from the sodding door.”

There were photographs, framed, on the far wall. A street scene, deserted, muted colours, late afternoon light. An open-top truck, its sides bright red, driving away up a dusty road, fields to either side. Café tables in bright sunshine, crowded, lively, in the corner of a square; then the same tables, towards evening, empty save for an old man, head down, sleeping. Set a little to one side, two near-abstracts, sharp angles, flat planes.

“Costa Rica,” Fisher said, “seventy-two. On assignment. Never bloody used. Too fucking arty by half.”

He made tea, brought it to the table in plain white mugs, added two sugars to his own and then, after a moment’s thought, a third.

“Tell me about Lisa,” Kiley said.

Fisher laughed, no shred of humour. “You don’t have the time.”

“It ended badly, Kate said.”

“It always ends fucking badly.” He coughed, a rasp low in the throat, turning his head aside.

“And you think she might be harbouring a grudge?”

“Harbouring? Who knows? Life of her own. Kids. Grandkids by now, most like. Doubt she gives me a second thought, one year’s end to the next.”

“Then why...?”

“This woman a couple of days back, right? Lisa’s age. There she is on TV, evening news. Some bloke, some third-rate comedian, French-kissed her in the back of a taxi when she was fifteen, copped a feel. Now she’s reckoning sexual assault. Poor bastard’s picture all over the papers. Paedophile. That’s not a fucking paedophile.” He shook his head. “I’d sooner bloody die.”

Kiley cushioned his mug in both hands. “Why don’t you talk to her? Make sure?”

Fisher smiled. “A while back, round the time I met Kate, I was going to have this show, Victoria Miro, first one in ages, and I thought, Lisa, I’ll give her a bell. See if she might, you know, come along. Last minute, I couldn’t, couldn’t do it. I sent her a note instead, invitation to the private view. Never replied, never came.”

He wiped a hand across his mouth, finished his tea.

“You’ll go see her? Kate said you would. Just help me rest easy.” He laughed. “Too much tension, not good for the heart.”

Google Maps said the London Borough of Haringey, estate agents called it Muswell Hill. A street of Arts and Crafts houses, nestled together, white louvred shutters at the windows, prettily painted doors. She was tall, taller than Kiley had expected, hair pulled back off her face, little make-up; tunic top, skinny jeans. He could still see the girl who’d stood in the empty pool through the lines that ran from the corners of her mouth and eyes.

“Lisa Arnold?”

“Not for thirty years.”

“Jack Kiley.” He held out a hand. “An old friend of yours asked me to stop by.”

“An old friend?”

“Yes.”

“Then he should have told you it’s Collins. Lisa Collins.” She still didn’t take his hand and Kiley let it fall back by his side.

“This old friend, he have a name?” But, of course, she knew. “You better come in,” she said. “Just mind the mess in the hall.”

Kiley stepped around a miniature pram, various dolls, a wooden puzzle, skittles, soft toys.

“Grandkids,” she explained, “two of them, Tuesdays and Thursday mornings, Wednesday afternoons. Run me ragged.”

Two small rooms had been knocked through to give a view of the garden: flowering shrubs, a small fruit tree, more toys on the lawn.

Lisa Collins sat in a wing-backed chair, motioning Kiley to the settee. There were paintings on the wall, watercolours; no photographs other than a cluster of family pictures above the fireplace. Two narrow bookcases; rugs on polished boards; dried flowers. It was difficult to believe she was over sixty years old.

“How is Graeme?”

Kiley shrugged. “He seemed okay. Not brilliant, maybe, but okay.”

“You’re not really a friend, are you?”

“No?”

“Graeme doesn’t do friends.”

“Maybe he’s changed.”

She looked beyond Kiley towards the window, distracted by the shadow of someone passing along the street outside.

“You don’t smoke, I suppose?”

“Afraid not.”

“No. Well, in that case, you’ll have to join me in a glass of wine. And don’t say no.”

“I wasn’t about to.”

“White okay?”

“White’s fine.”

She left the room and he heard the fridge door open and close; the glasses were tissue-thin, tinged with green; the wine grassy, cold.

“All this hoo-hah going on,” she said. “People digging up the past, I’d been half-expecting someone doorstepping me on the way to Budgens.” She gave a little laugh. “Me and my shopping trolley. Some reporter or other. Expecting me to dig up the dirt, spill the beans.”

Kiley said nothing.

“That’s what he’s worried about, isn’t it? After all this time, the big exposé, shit hitting the fan.”

“Yes.”

“That invitation he sent me, the private view. I should have gone.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“I was afraid.”

“What of?”

“Seeing him again. After all this time. Afraid what it would do to all this.” She gestured round the room, the two rooms. “Afraid it could blow it all apart.”

“It could do that?”

“Oh, yes.” She drank some wine and set the glass carefully back down. “People said it was just a phase. Too young, you know, like in the song? Too young to know. You’ll snap out of it, they said, the other girls. Get away, move on, get a life of your own. Cradle snatcher, they’d say to Graeme, and laugh.”

Shaking her head, she smiled.

“Four years we were together. Four years. Say it like that, it doesn’t seem so long.” She shook her head again. “A lifetime, that’s what it was. When it started I was just a kid and then...”

She was seeing something Kiley couldn’t see; as if, for a moment, he were no longer there.

“I knew — I wasn’t stupid — I knew it wasn’t going to last forever, I even forced it a bit myself, looking back, but then, when it happened, I don’t know, I suppose I sort of fell apart.”

She reached for her glass.

“What’s that they say? Whatever doesn’t kill you, makes you strong. Having your stomach pumped out, that helps, too. Didn’t want to do that again in a hurry, I can tell you. And thanks to Graeme, I had contacts, a portfolio, I could work. David Bailey, round knocking at the door. Brian bloody Duffy. Harper’s Bazaar. I had a life. A good one. Still have.”

Still holding the wine glass, she got to her feet.

“You can tell Graeme, I don’t regret a thing. Tell him I love him, the old bastard. But now...” A glance at her watch. “... Mr Collins — that’s that I call him — Mr Collins will be home soon. Golf widow, that’s me. Stops him getting under my feet, I suppose.”

She walked Kiley to the door.

“There was someone sniffing round. Oh, a good month ago now. More. Some journalist or other. That piece by Kate Moss had just been in the news. How when she was getting started she used to feel awkward, posing, you know, half-naked. Nude. Not feeling able to say no. Wanted to know, the reporter, had I ever felt exploited? Back then. Fifteen, she said, it’s very young after all. I told her I’d felt fine. Asked her to leave, hello and goodbye. Might have been the Telegraph, I’m not sure.”

She shook Kiley’s hand.

When he was crossing the street she called after him. “Don’t forget, give Graeme my love.”

The article appeared a week later, eight pages stripped across the Sunday magazine, accompanied by a hefty news item in the main paper. Art or Exploitation? Ballet dancers and fashion models, a few gymnasts and tennis players thrown in for good measure. Unhealthy relationships between fathers and daughters, young girls and their coaches or mentors. The swimming pool shot of Lisa was there, along with several others. Snatched from somewhere, a recent picture of Graeme Fisher, looking old, startled.

“The bastards,” Kate said, vehemently. “The bastards.”

Your profession, Kiley thought, biting back the words.

They were on their way to Amsterdam, Kate there to cover the reopening of the Stedelijk Museum after nine years of renovations, Kiley invited along as his reward for services rendered. “Three days in Amsterdam, Jack. What’s not to like?”

At her insistence, he’d worn the hat.

They were staying at a small but smart hotel on the Prinsengracht Canal, theirs one of the quiet rooms at the back, looking out onto a small square. For old times sake, she insisted on taking him for breakfast, the first morning, to the art deco Café Americain in the Amsterdam American Hotel.

“First time I ever came here, Jack, to Amsterdam, this is where we stayed.”

He didn’t ask.

The news from England, a bright 12 point on her iPad, erased the smile from her face: as a result of recent revelations in the media, officers from Operation Yewtree yesterday made two arrests; others were expected.

“Fisher?” Kiley asked.

She shook her head. “Not yet.” When she tried to reach him on her mobile, there was no reply.

“Maybe he’ll be okay,” Kiley said.

“Let’s hope,” Kate said, and pushed back her chair, signalling it was time to go. Whatever was happening back in England, there was nothing they could do.

From the outside, Kiley thought, the new extension to the Stedelijk looked like a giant bathtub on stilts; inside didn’t get much better. Kate seemed to be enthralled.

Kiley found the café, pulled out the copy of The Glass Key he’d taken the precaution of stuffing into his pocket, and read. Instead of getting better, as the story progressed things went from bad to worse, the hero chasing round in ever-widening circles, only pausing, every now and then, to get punched in the face.

“Fantastic!” Kate said, a good couple of hours later. “Just amazing.”

There was a restaurant some friends had suggested they try for dinner, Le Hollandais; Kate wanted to go back to the hotel first, write up her notes, rest a little, change.

In the room, she switched on the TV to catch the news. Over her shoulder, Kiley thought he recognised the street in Ladbroke Grove. Officers from the Metropolitan Police arriving at the residence of former photographer, Graeme Fisher, wishing to question him with regard to allegations of historic sexual abuse, found Fisher hanging from a light flex at the rear of the house. Despite efforts by paramedics and ambulance staff to revive him, he was pronounced dead at the scene.

A sound, somewhere between a gasp and a sob, broke from Kate’s throat and when Kiley went across to comfort her, she shrugged him off.

There would be no dinner, Le Hollandais or elsewhere.

When she came out of the bathroom, Kate used her laptop to book the next available flight, ordered a taxi, rang down to reception to explain.

Kiley walked to the window and stood there, looking out across the square. Already the light was starting to change. Two runners loped by in breathless conversation, then an elderly woman walking her dog, then no one. The tables outside the café at right angles to the hotel were empty, save for an old man, head down, sleeping. Behind him, Kate moved, business-like, around the room, readying their departure, her reflection picked out, ghost-like, in the glass. When Kiley looked back towards the tables, the old man had gone.