Dead Beat

25

The smell of sweat was the first thing that hit me as I walked into the club. Not stale sweat, but the honest smell of hard-working bodies. Various voices greeted me as I walked over to the ringside where two teenage girls were engaged in kicking shit out of each other in as technically perfect a way as possible. For once, I hadn't come to fight myself, though just watching made my body yearn for release.

The man I'd come to see was standing in a line-backer's crouch, his face distorted by yells of encouragement. 'Go for it, Christine,' he was screaming. And we think we've come a long way from the primeval ooze, I thought, as I tapped my friend Dennis the burglar on the shoulder. He whipped round and I took a nervous step backwards.

When he saw me, he straightened up and grinned. 'Hiya, Kate. Just give me a minute. Our Christine'll be through to the semifinals in a couple of minutes.' Then he spun back to face the ring and resumed his passionate cheerleading. Nothing comes before Dennis's family.

The bell sounded for the end of the round, and after a moment's conferring with the judges, the referee held Christine's gloved hand up in victory. Let's face it, with Dennis's reputation, there wasn't a judge in the place who wouldn't have given any benefit of the doubt to Christine. Not that she ever needed that, I had to admit.

Christine emerged from the ring to a bear hug from her father. Even her body protector wasn't enough to stop her wincing at the force of his embrace. She gave me a wry grin and said, 'I'll soon be good enough to lick you, Kate.'

'On that showing, you could do it now,' I told her. I wasn't joking either. I turned to Dennis. 'She's really got it.'

'You're not wrong. She could go all the way, that kid. She's well sound. Now, what can I do for you, Kate?'

'I need your brains and your body, Dennis.'

He faked a wicked leer. 'I always said you'd never be able to resist my animal magnetism. Did you finally ditch the wimp, then?'

I didn't take offence. He affectionately calls Richard 'the wimp' to his face. Richard returns the compliment by calling Dennis Neanderthal Man, and Dennis pretends not to understand what it means. They're all big kids, men. And just like kids, they're ruled by their appetites. Like Jett with Tamar.

'Sorry to disappoint you, Dennis, but it's just your muscle I'm after.'

He pretended to be devastated by the news, clapping his hand to his forehead and saying, 'How can I face tomorrow, Kate?' Then he became serious. 'Is this going to take a while?'

'Couple of hours at the most.'

'Let me take Christine home, and I'll meet you in half an hour at your place. OK?'

Dennis was true to his word. Exactly half an hour later, my doorbell rang. I had the kettle boiled in readiness. He likes to stay in shape, does Dennis. He seldom drinks alcohol, never touches drugs, and runs six miles every morning, rain or shine. His only vice, apart from burglary and GBH, is cigarettes. I greeted him with a cup of sweet milky coffee, placed an ashtray by his feet and settled down with my vodka and grapefruit.

'Schneids,' I announced.

'I told you all I could about the Smarts,' he said, wagging a finger at me. He was right. He'd given me a head start in my inquiries. He's a great source, is Dennis, as long as the people I'm after have no connection to his friends or family. Well, those of his extended family that he's on speaking terms with at any given time. And sometimes, he spontaneously brings me little gems if he owes someone a bad turn. His moral code is stricter than that of a Jesuit priest, and not a lot easier to figure out.

'It's not the Smarts I'm interested in right now, I don't think. It's a guy in Bradford called Fat Freddy. Mean anything to you?'

Dennis frowned. 'I think I've heard the name, but I can't put a face to it. He's not connected locally.'

'He's in the schneid merchandising area – t-shirts, pirate cassettes. Anyway, there's a tie-in to another case I'm working. What I'm trying to get at is why someone who's legitimately involved in the merchandising business would have anything to do with a schneid merchant.'

Dennis lit a cigarette and flicked a trace of ash off his shell suit bottoms. 'S'easy, Kate. Say I'm licensed to produce the straight gear for a top band like Dead Babies, and I'm a bit bent myself. I find out who's doing the schneids and I offer them a deal. I won't shop them if they cut me in on their scam. I mean, a couple of years ago, shopping someone was no big deal. They just got raided and their gear confiscated. But now they've changed the law, you can go down for these trademark jobs. So it's a real threat. Also, if I was double bent, I'd offer my schneid merchant advance copies of the designs I was going to put out next, so he'd have a head start against the competition.' He sat back and blew smoke rings, well pleased with himself. It made a lot of sense.

'I like it. Thanks, Dennis. That was the brain bit. Now the muscle bit. You know a dealer called Paki Paulie?'

Dennis scowled. He hates dealers more than he hates bent coppers. I think it's something to do with having two young kids. He once broke the legs of a pusher who was hanging round the local school gates, after the local police had failed to arrest the guy. There were a dozen mums who saw Dennis go berserk with a baseball bat, but not one of them ID'd Dennis when the cops arrived. They're used to rough justice round there. 'Yeah,' he growled. 'I know that scumbag.'

'I need to know if he sold any heroin to one of the people involved in this case I'm on. I've got a funny feeling he's not going to roll over for me. That's why I need a bit of muscle. You game?'

'When do we start?' Dennis asked. He drained his coffee mug and leaned forward expectantly.

We found Paki Paulie an hour later in a seedy bar in Cheetham Hill. The front bar looked like any other run down pub, its clientele mainly middle-aged, poor and defeated. But the back bar was like walking into another world. In the dim light, a handful of guys in expensive suits held court at the tables lining the walls, accompanied by their muscle. Scruffy kids meandered in and out, pausing by one table or another for muttered conversation. Sometimes cash was passed over fairly discreetly in exchange for dope. More often, the dealer got up and accompanied his punter out of the bar's back door into the car park.

On my own, I'd have been scared I'd be taken for a cop. But with Dennis by my side, there was no danger of that. He nodded towards one of the corner tables while we waited for our drinks.

'That him?' I asked, trying to keep my glance casual. Dennis nodded.

Paki Paulie wore a shimmering silver grey double-breasted suit over an open-necked cobalt blue shirt. The clothes were obviously expensive but he looked cheap as a bag of sherbet lemons. He was leaning back in his chair, gazing at a point on the ceiling as if his only worry in the world was what to drink next. Next to him, a hard-looking white youth stared gloomily into an almost-empty pint pot.

Dennis picked up his glass and strolled over to the table, with me in his wake. 'All right, Paulie?' he said.

'Dennis,' Paulie acknowledged with a regal nod.

'How's business?'

'Not good. It's the interest rates, you know?' Paulie replied, twitching his mouth into a smile. That was all I needed. A smack dealer with a smart mouth.

'A word, Paulie,' Dennis said softly.

'Dennis, you can have as many words as you want.' Paulie's urbanity was firing on all four cylinders now, but it wasn't polished enough to cover the quick flicker of concern in his eyes.

'You heard about Jack the Smack?' Dennis asked innocently. Paulie's eyebrows rose. He clearly knew all about Dennis's little vigilante action. 'Bad time for accidents in your line of business,' Dennis went on conversationally. 'State of the health service these days, nobody in their right mind'd want to end up in hospital.'

Paulie's protection seemed to gather himself together and shifted forward in his seat. 'You want to…' was all he got out before Paulie snapped, 'Shut it.' He turned back to Dennis and said, “I hear what you're saying, Dennis.'

Dennis gestured towards me with his glass. 'This is a friend of mine. She's looking for some information. She's not the law, and if you're straight with her, there's no comeback.'

Paulie looked directly at me. 'How do I know I can trust you?'

'The company I keep,' I answered.

Dennis put his glass down and cracked his knuckles dramatically. Paulie's eyes flicked from me to Dennis and back again. I took a photograph of Tamar out of my bag. It was one I'd clipped from the papers that morning, with Jett cut out of it. 'Has this woman ever bought anything from you?'

He barely glanced at it and shrugged. 'Maybe. How do I know? I serve a lot of punters.'

'I can't believe you've got a lot of punters like this, Paulie. Natural blonde, doesn't dress out of a catalogue, accent like Princess Di? Come on, you can do better than that.'

Paulie picked up the picture and studied it. 'I seen her down the Hassy,' he finally conceded.

'How much did you sell her, then?' Dennis butted in, thrusting his face forwards till it was only inches from the dealer's.

'Who said I sold her anything? Shit, man, what is this? You joined the drugs squad?'

Dennis's head snapped back, like a cobra ready to strike. Before he could complete the manoeuvre that would spread Paulie's nose over his face, the dealer shouted, 'Wait!' Dennis paused. The sound level in the room had dropped to an ominous level. A sheen of sweat had appeared above Paulie's top lip. His hand fluttered at his bodyguard who was straining at an invisible leash. 'It's OK,' he said loudly.

Gradually, the noise picked up. Paulie wiped his face with a paisley silk handkerchief. 'OK,' he sighed. 'About a month ago, this tart came up to me in the Hassy saying she wanted some smack. She didn't seem to know what she wanted or how much. She told me she wanted it for a coming home present for a friend, enough for a dozen hits. I thought she was full of shit, but what the hell? I don't give a monkey's what they do with it. So I sold her ten grammes. I never saw her again. And that's the truth.'

I believed him. It wasn't so much the threat of Dennis breaking his nose that had changed his mind. It was the thought of what would happen to him if the O'Brien brothers came looking for him. Even bodyguards have to sleep.

The thing that bothered me was that Dennis's methods hadn't bothered me. Maybe I'd been reading the wrong books. Perhaps tonight I should tuck myself up with an Agatha Christie and a few balls of pink wool.