London Noir

CHRISTMAS (BABY PLEASE COME HOME) by MARK TIMLIN

Soho – the capital’s centre of vice. Only minutes from the glittering lights of Piccadilly that shine like the jewels in the crown of Great Britain’s major city, lies this blot on our nation’s conscience.

Blimey, I thought. Where do Channel 4 dig up these funny old short movies to fill the time between the commercial break and The Oprah Winfrey Show? And as the pedantic tones of the narrator droned on, the grainy old black and white film switched from a view of Eros, to Compton Street, where half a dozen elegant-looking women in high heels, pencil skirts and short fur coats patrolled the deserted pavements. Then to the front of the old Windmill Theatre, and inside, where half a hundred geezers in long macs and trilby hats were watching a tableau of naked girls standing so still on stage that you could almost count the goose bumps on their upper arms.

Back here in the real world it was five p.m. four days before Christmas, and rods of almost solid, freezing, black rain beat down onto the window of my office from the dark mass of cloud that seemed to sit only inches above the roof of the boozer opposite, where the warm, golden light that seeped from the front door and the gaps in the curtains seemed to beckon me over.

So that was the deal. An hour of Oprah interviewing a woman who’d hired a killer to shoot her husband, and after the contract had gone sour, had spent four years in prison, and then returned, reconciled, to hubby’s loving arms. After that, an hour in the pub, then off home with a bag of fish and chips for another evening in front of the TV watching the rest of the world get ready for the annual festivities. Me, I wanted none of it. And intended to spend Christmas Day in bed with a good book, a micro-waveable spaghetti bolognaise and a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. No cards. No presents. No funny hats.

The narrator’s voice on the soundtrack of the film continued with the story of the Windmill, and just as I was sure he was going on to tell us how the place never closed, the door to my office opened to admit a man and a woman, water dripping from their umbrella, and I’d never know. I switched off the TV and looked up from the chair I was sitting in at my visitors.

‘Is your name Sharman?’ asked the man. He had a northern accent. He was well built with thick, short dark hair.

I nodded.

‘Thank goodness. We thought we’d never find you,’ said the woman. She was blonde and quite nice-looking, though her eyes looked tired. Her accent was northern too. And slightly stronger than the man’s.

‘I’m usually here,’ I said.

‘But this is such a big city and we didn’t have your proper address,’ she went on. She was wearing a red cloth coat, the skirts of which were dark with moisture. The man was dressed in a rich-looking leather jacket and jeans, with a scarf knotted at his throat and leather gloves. They both looked to be about forty.

‘What can I do for you?’ I asked.

‘Find our son,’ said the woman. ‘He’s disappeared.’

‘You’d better sit down,’ I said, and got up, pulled my two clients’ chairs in front of my desk and took her coat. It felt expensive and I noticed that the label was from Lewis’s in Manchester, as I hung it up to dry close to one of the two central heating radiators. Underneath she wore a simple dark blue dress and a cardigan.

‘My name’s Himes,’ said the man as I did it. ‘Douglas Himes. This is my wife, Mona.’

‘Pleased to meet you. Do you want some tea? Coffee?’ I said as they sat.

They both asked for coffee and I went out back and put the kettle on. Whilst it was boiling I spooned coffee powder into three mugs and took the sugar bowl and put it on the edge of my desk. ‘Milk?’ I asked. They both nodded, and I went out back again, splashed milk into the mugs and when the kettle boiled, filled them.

I passed round the drinks and sat back in my own seat and said, ‘Tell me about it.’

Douglas Himes started the story.

‘Jimmy, that’s our son’s name, left school last year. He was sixteen, and he’d been wasting his time there for years. He was never very academic. Not that I cared. Neither was I, and I did all right. I offered him a job in my business. I own a firm that wholesales motor spares around Manchester. Business isn’t bad. It wasn’t what it was a couple of years ago, but what business is? But at least we’re keeping our heads above water. There aren’t many other jobs to be had up there right now. None in fact. This damned recession. But Jimmy didn’t want to know.’

‘He just lay around the house all day. He couldn’t get the dole because he wouldn’t take a training scheme. So we gave him money,’ interrupted Mona Himes.

‘Then one day just after last Christmas, he told us he was going to London,’ Douglas Himes went on. ‘Just like that. We tried to stop him, but what could we do? You know what kids are like these days.’

I do as it happens, if only from a distance, and I nodded and took out my cigarettes. ‘Do you mind?’ I said to Mona. She shook her head and I offered the packet to the pair of them, and Douglas Himes took one. I pushed the ashtray in his direction and flicked my ash into the waste paper basket next to my chair.

When Himes’ cigarette was fired up to his satisfaction with a gold lighter he took from the pocket of his jacket, he continued his story.

‘We begged and pleaded with him not to go. He knew no one down here, but he wouldn’t listen. Eventually I gave him a couple of hundred pounds so that at least he could get somewhere decent to stay, and he left. I told him if he was short to let me know. I couldn’t see him down here with no funds. You read such terrible things.’

I nodded. ‘And you haven’t seen him since?’ I asked. You weren’t exactly in a rush to find him, I thought.

‘Oh yes,’ said Mona Himes. ‘He kept in touch. Regularly. He’d phone at least once a week. He even came home in the summer for a couple of weeks. He had money to burn then. But…’

‘But what.’ I asked.

‘He’d changed. He was always a very private boy, but when he came home he was worse. He wouldn’t let me into his room, and even though it was hot, he always wore a long-sleeved shirt. Then one day I walked in on him whilst he was having a wash in the bathroom. I was looking for dirty towels. He went mad. And his arms…’

She hesitated. ‘What about them?’ I asked, although I thought I could guess.

‘They were bruised. Badly. And worse than that they were covered in little bloody holes. It was horrible.’

Track marks. Just as I had thought.

‘Did he take drugs before he left home?’ I asked.

‘Not that we knew of,’ said Himes. ‘Though he might have.’

‘And you said he had a lot of money?’ I asked.

They both nodded. ‘Hundreds,’ said Himes. ‘He even tried to give us back the money we’d lent him, although we wouldn’t take it.’

‘He said he had a job in a restaurant as a waiter and got lots of tips,’ said his wife.

‘Any idea which restaurant?’ I asked.

‘No. He didn’t say.’

‘And why are you worried about him now?’

‘He said he’d come home for Christmas. He told us he’d come up last weekend. When we hadn’t heard from him by Monday we started to get worried. We’d never had a phone number for him. He always called us. We kept asking, but he told us he didn’t want us phoning him. He rang us last, last Thursday. Said he’d be up on Sunday at the very latest. That the restaurant was very busy.’

But not so busy that they’d let one of their staff have a protracted Christmas holiday. I thought not.

‘Did you have an address for him down here?’ I asked.

‘Yes,’ said Himes. ‘He said he had a room at a house in King’s Cross. At least he gave us his address. We went round there today but it was awful. Full of the strangest people having a party.’

‘A rave they called it,’ said Mona.

‘And he wasn’t there?’

‘We couldn’t get any sense out of any of them,’ said Himes. ‘They were all drugged up.’

‘It was a horrible place,’ said Mona. ‘Filthy. No curtains. No carpets. Nothing. Just a lot of children running wild.’

I nodded again.

‘Will you try and find him?’ said Mona. ‘We’ve read about you in the papers. They say you always do your best.’

My fame had obviously spread far and wide. ‘What about the police?’ I asked. ‘Have you been to them?’

‘They took down his name and that was about all. They suggested we tried the Salvation Army. No. I’m sorry. The police were no use at all.’

‘They’re busy people,’ I said. ‘Especially at this time of the year.’

‘But he’s our son,’ said Mona. ‘Please say you’ll help.’

I didn’t want the job. The last thing I wanted to do was schlepp around London during Christmas week looking for some seventeen-year-old junkie. Not with all the once-a-year drinkers out. The half pint and small sherry merchants in their dodgy suits pretending to be full of good cheer. Taking a break from the missus and trying to get some half-pissed secretary to give them a blow job in a back alley. Oh l’amour.

‘Please,’ she said again, and reached into her handbag for a tissue. I looked into her tear-filled eyes and relented. ‘I’ll try,’ I said. ‘Do you have a photograph of him?’

She reached into her handbag again and brought out one of those Kodak paper folders that bulged with photographs. She handled it as if it was a religious object. Maybe it was to her. I know that if my daughter went missing, photos of her would be to me. She opened it and passed me the top photograph.

‘That was taken on holiday in Ibiza two years ago when Jimmy was fifteen,’ she said. ‘It’s a very good likeness.’

I put the photo on the desk in front of me and looked at it closely.

It was a study of a boy from the waist upwards dressed in a green vest holding a can of Lucozade. He was handsome, tanned, had shaggy blonde hair and looked no more than twelve years old. The flash had reflected in his eyes and gave them a reddish tint.

‘Fifteen,’ I said. ‘He looks younger.’

‘He always has,’ said his father.

‘Can I look at the rest?’ I asked.

Mona Himes passed over the packet, somewhat reluctantly I thought.

I flipped through them. It was a microcosm of Jimmy Himes’ life from day one. It was one of the saddest things I’d ever seen, and I’ve seen some.

I pulled out another couple of more recent pictures and carefully returned the rest to the folder and passed it back.

‘I’d like to keep these,’ I said. ‘For now. I’ll make sure you get them back.’

Her sense of relief was almost palpable.

‘How much do you charge?’ asked Douglas Himes.

‘Two hundred a day plus expenses.’

It didn’t seem to worry him. The motor spares business must have been better than he’d let on. He pulled a cheque book and pen from inside his leather jacket. ‘I’ll give you a cheque for five hundred to be going on with,’ he said. ‘Is that OK?’

I nodded. ‘Are you staying in London?’ I asked as he wrote.

Mona Himes nodded. ‘At Selfridge’s Hotel.’

‘Have you got a car with you?’ It was just something to break the silence really.

She nodded again. ‘But we left it parked. We don’t know our way round London. We’ve been taking buses and cabs. ‘We walked around for hours looking for you. That’s why we got so wet.’

‘There’s a minicab firm next door,’ I told her. ‘They’re all right. They’ll get you back up West. How long do you plan on staying?’

‘Until you find Jimmy,’ said Douglas Himes as he tore the cheque out of the book.

‘I’ll do my best,’ I said. ‘Will you write down the address in King’s Cross?’ and I pushed a notepad in front of him. He scribbled down the information and pushed the notepad back.

That seemed to be about it for then. I helped Mona Himes back into her expensive coat and the pair of them went to get a taxi.

I passed on the pub and took a bottle of white plonk home to drink with my fish and chips. I watched TV for a bit then went to bed. I intended to be up early the next morning to begin my search for Jimmy Himes.

I reached King’s Cross at ten. If this place was a squat like I guessed, any earlier would have been a waste of time. Squatters aren’t exactly noted for early rising. I was dressed in my battered old leather jacket, jeans, artfully worn at the knees, and a pair of DMs with steel toe caps. Before I’d left home I’d stripped, cleaned and loaded my illegal.38 special Colt Cobra revolver and dropped it into one of my jacket pockets. You never know who you’re going to meet in that part of town. Especially if you’re asking questions that people don’t want to answer. And besides, not everyone in the rave culture was all loved up. Just the opposite as I’d discovered before.

In the other pocket I put the photos of Jimmy Himes in a white envelope. I didn’t want to crease them before I gave them back to his mother. And finally in the back pocket of my jeans I put two hundred and fifty quid in ten pound notes from a secret stash that I keep at home in case of emergencies. I figured that before the day was out I might have to grease some palms.

The previous night’s rain had stopped, but the clouds were still dark and angry and hung over London like they’d never let go.

I parked my E-type on a meter just round the corner from the address that Douglas Himes had given me and finished the journey on foot.

The house I was looking for was a tall, mid-terraced monstrosity round the back of the station. It had seen far better days, but then who hadn’t?

The bay window on the ground floor front was half boarded up, and the door that stood at the top of three filthy stone steps was no stranger to blunt instruments. I listened carefully and there was no sound from inside. Obviously yesterday’s rave had reached its logical conclusion. There was no bell push by the splintered frame, just two old bare wires that did nothing when I touched them together. I gave the door a hammer with my fist and felt it give almost an inch in the jamb. There was no answer, and I hammered again. Once again no one paid the slightest bit of attention, and I pulled my credit card case from my pocket and chose one of the cards that was out of date and loaded the door. It took less than ten seconds. I slowly eased the door open and peered into the dark and deserted hall. Inside all was serene and I slipped in and pulled the door closed behind me. The hall was freezing and smelt of cat’s piss. There was a door on the right. I tried it. The room with the bay window was empty except for about three hundred beer and soft drink cans, cigarette ends, roaches, and two big, battered hi-fi speakers in one corner.

I went further down the hall and came to another door. I tried that one too and it opened into a bedroom. Not the honeymoon suite at the Savoy, but a bedroom nevertheless.

The walls and window were hung with old tapestry curtains, in one corner was a battered chest of drawers that held an ancient black and white TV and a tray covered with loose cigarette papers, shreds of tobacco, stripped cigarettes, small lumps of dope, and minicab firms’ advertising cards, some whole, some torn. Beside the tray was a packet of clean hypodermic needles amongst a litter of used spikes, burnt spoons, night light candles, silver foil, and an empty glassine packet with just a trace of golden brown powder sticking to the sides. Against one wall was an old radiogram that looked as if it had come from a skip, next to a pile of records. Clothes were scattered everywhere. On a double mattress with no box springs, under a pile of dirty blankets and a stained duvet two people were asleep.

I went over and looked down at them. On the bare pillows I could just make out that one was male, the other female, although their hair was of equal length. I went to the window and pulled the curtain that covered it across the piece of string that held it up, then went back to the bed and kicked the edge of the mattress hard.

The female opened her eyes and looked up into mine. ‘Morning,’ I said. ‘Full English or continental?’

Her eyes were glazed and I might as well have not bothered. She focused on my face and looked around as if she wasn’t sure where she was.

‘Who are you?’ she said.

I ignored the question. What was the point? She was probably on re-entry from orbit and my name would mean nothing to her. Often it meant nothing to me.

‘I’m looking for Jimmy Himes,’ I said.

‘Who? What the fuck are you doing here?’

I told her again, and she shook the still form next to her until he grunted into life. ‘Matt,’ she said, ‘there’s someone here.’

I just knew this day was going to end in tears.

The man sat up, pulling the blankets off his girlfriend’s bare breasts. They were thin and long with puckered brown nipples and she didn’t try to cover them. I wished that she would. He was about twenty-five, skinny, with tracks on both arms.

‘I don’t want any trouble,’ I said. ‘I’m sorry to burst in, but the front door was open.’

A white lie. But forgivable under the circumstances, I thought. Although I might as well have saved my breath.

‘Are you the filth?’ demanded Matt, pushing his hair out of his eyes.

People are always asking me that. ‘No.’ I said.

‘Then what the fuck do you want?’ He said.

I repeated myself for the second time.

‘Never heard of him,’ he said. ‘Fuck off.’

I ignored him. He was probably used to it. ‘I’ve got some photos,’ I said, and took out the envelope, opened it and pulled out one. I hunkered down on my heels, and showed it to them.

‘Don’t know him,’ said Matt. ‘Now fuck off or…’

‘Don’t Matt,’ I said tiredly. ‘You’re out of your class.’ Which was probably the wrong thing to say in front of his inamorata.

‘I’ll…’ he said, beginning to push back the covers and get at me.

I didn’t want to see any more of his skinny body and shoved him back flat on the mattress. ‘I said don’t,’ I said.

He lay there and I could smell his breath. I’ve smelled more pleasant things, believe me. I held up the photo again and said. ‘Are you sure you haven’t seen this boy? His name’s Jimmy. Think about it.’

‘Maybe,’ said the woman.

‘That’s better,’ I said, and eased the pressure off Matt’s narrow chest. ‘Where? Here?’

‘He used to score sometimes.’

‘Where?’

‘Where we do.’

‘Jill,’ said Matt, and I increased the pressure on his chest again, until he shut up.

‘What does he supply?’

‘Everything. Dope. Smack. Coke. Uppers. Downers. Es. Speed. The lot.’

‘Where is he?’ I asked.

‘How much is it worth?’

Now we were getting there.

‘Jill,’ said Matt again. ‘You don’t know who this geezer is.’

‘What does it matter?’ said Jill. ‘That cunt’s always shorting us. Serves him right if this bloke does him. How much?’ to me again.

‘A tenner.’

‘Bollocks. Fifty.’

I wasn’t going to argue. If she was lying I could always come back. And do what? Shit. It wasn’t my money. If she was lying I’d just tell Himes and let him put a bit extra on the price of his spark plugs.

I stood up and took out my money. I wasn’t worried about letting them see it. I peeled off five tens and held them up. ‘Give.’ I said.

‘He lives upstairs. Handy like,’ said Jill. ‘First floor at the front. His name’s Derek. White bloke with dreads. He’s probably there now.’

‘Thanks Jill,’ I said, and dropped the money onto the bed where she grabbed it and stuffed it under her pillow.

‘Don’t tell him it was us told you,’ said Matt. ‘We’ve got to live here.’

‘Fair enough,’ I said, and turned to leave.

‘You can have this for another fifty,’ said Jill, and flipped the covers off her body. She was like something out of Belsen. Emaciated. With tracks up her arms and legs and even in her crotch.

Fifty what? I thought. Pence?

‘No thanks love,’ I said. ‘Another time maybe.’ And I left the room quickly. Closing the door behind me. I didn’t wait to hear her reply. I’ve discovered in my little life that saying no to a woman’s offer of sex is like asking for credit in a pub. A refusal often offends. I’d leave Matt to catch the flak. I’m sure he was used to that too.

I climbed the stairs to the first floor and found the door of the room at the front and knocked hard. There was no answer, so I tried again and heard a male voice call out, ‘Who is it?’

‘Jimmy sent me,’ I called back.

There was silence again and then from just the other side of the door the voice said, ‘Jimmy who?’

‘Jimmy Himes.’

‘Whaddya want?’

‘Guess.’

There was a further pause before I heard the sounds of locks disengaging, and the door opened six inches on a security chain and a white face half hidden by lank blond curls appeared in the gap. ‘Who are you?’ The face asked.

‘Nick. Are you Derek?’

‘Whaddya want?’ He said again.

‘Can I come in. It’s a bit public out here.’

‘Bollocks. Whaddya want?’

‘I’m looking for Jimmy.’

‘He ain’t here.’

‘Do you know where he is?’

‘You Old Bill?’ That question again.

‘No.’

‘Then fuck off.’ And the door began to close.

I lashed out with my right foot and the steel toe of my DM slammed into the door pushing it back to the full extent of the chain, and the face vanished. I slammed my left shoulder against the door, the chain snapped and I was inside. The owner of the voice was on the other side of the room. He turned and I saw he was holding a small baseball bat. A miniature version of a Louisville Slugger, but still plenty weapon enough to crush my skull if he got a good shot in.

I stood inside the doorway as he came at me. He was of medium height and build, but his arms were thick and muscular. He pulled back the bat to give me a good whack and I moved inside his arm and took the blow on my left shoulder, and let him have a good whack of my own with my clenched fist into his solar plexus. He let out his breath with a gasp, all the strength seemed to go out of his body, the baseball bat fell to the uncarpeted floorboards with a clatter and he doubled up. That sort of punch hurts and disorientates. I allowed him to drop to his knees, took hold of his left hand and bent the little finger back until I felt the ligaments at breaking-point and the boy screamed a high pitched scream. That hurts too. Much worse than a punch in the stomach. A bladder-emptying kind of hurt that fills your whole head with pain.

‘You going to be good?’ I hissed.

He nodded and looked at me through eyes dulled with agony and I eased the pressure, pulled him to his feet and propelled him across to an unmade bed. I threw him on top, rescued the Slugger and stood over him slapping it into my palm.

‘Are you Derek?’ I asked.

‘What of it?’

‘Jimmy Himes,’ I said,

‘What about him?’ I could tell it hurt him to speak.

‘You know him?’

A nod.

‘He scores off you?’

Another nod.

‘Seen him lately?’

A shake of the head.

‘How long ago?’

‘Last week.’

‘Where’s he stay?’

Silence.

I slapped my palm again with the bat. Harder.

‘Upstairs,’ said Derek. ‘With Wayne and Duane.’

‘Who?’

He repeated the names.

‘Where exactly?’

‘Top floor.’

‘Thanks,’ I said, put the bat carefully on the mantelpiece above the dead gas fire and left the room.

I went further upstairs. All the way, until I came to yet another door and I wondered what I’d find behind this one. I rapped on it with my knuckles and heard movement, and it was opened by a huge young guy dressed in a white singlet and blue and white checked trousers like the ones chefs wear. Around his head covered with long dark hair was tied a white bandanna. He had a lot of upper body development, and his skin gleamed with oil.

‘Wayne?’ I said ‘Duane?’

‘Duane. And who might you be?’ His voice was surprisingly high for one of his stature.

I got the picture.

‘Hi,’ I said. ‘My name’s Nick Sharman. I’m looking for Jimmy Himes.’

‘Who isn’t? Come right on in. Be my guest.’

He pulled the door right back and I went inside. There was a short hall interrupted by three doors, and he pointed me to the one at the end. Inside was another massive young bloke dressed in a white shirt and black trousers. ‘Well hello,’ he said in a deep, masculine voice. ‘Who have we here?’

‘Someone looking for Jimmy,’ trilled Duane. ‘This is Wayne by the way. Wayne, this is Nick.’

‘Welcome to our abode,’ said Wayne. ‘Be it ever so humble.’

I looked round. It was a living room cum gymnasium. One side was furnished with rugs on the floor, curtains at the window, two matching armchairs and a daybed covered with cushions to make a sofa. One wall was lined with shelves holding a TV, video, stereo, albums, cassettes and books. The other side was jammed with what looked like a full Nautilus rig and a whole lot of other weight lifting shit. Now I knew where Wayne and Duane’s muscles came from, and I pulled back my shoulders. The walls of the room that weren’t covered with shelves were adorned with posters of gay icons: James Dean in Giants Marlon Brando in The Wild Ones; Boy George in full drag; Jimmy Sommerville in nothing much. Par for the course.

‘And you’re looking for young James,’ said Wayne. ‘Or just a little romance?’

‘Nothing like that,’ I replied. ‘His mother and father have hired me to find him. I’m a private detective.’

‘A private dick,’ said Duane, with emphasis on the word ‘dick’, and flexed his biceps at me.

I smiled at him. ‘That’s right,’ I said.

‘What if he doesn’t want to be found?’

‘If I could see him and he tells me that…’ I shrugged and didn’t finish the sentence.

‘We’d like to see him too,’ said Wayne. ‘He owes us some rent.’

‘If you know where he is…’ I said.

‘Probably,’ said Duane. ‘But why should we tell you?’

‘To put his mother and father’s minds at rest that he’s all right. That’s all. I don’t intend him any harm.’

‘Sez you.’ Wayne this time. I was getting tired of the double act.

‘Anyway,’ said Duane ‘We can’t possibly talk now. We’re due at work soon.’

‘What do you do?’ I asked for something to say.

‘We work in a restaurant in Covent Garden. Duane cooks, I serve,’ said Wayne.

Jesus. The fucking salmonella sisters, I thought. Perfect.

‘So if you’d like to leave,’ he went on.

‘No.’ I said. ‘I’d like you to tell me where Jimmy Himes is.’

‘Duane,’ said Wayne, and Duane flexed his biceps at me again, and moved closer.

I was getting nothing but aggro at this house and I was getting sick of it, and what I did next was probably an over reaction, but I did it anyway.

I pulled the Colt out from my jacket pocket and stuck the two inch barrel into Duane’s face. On his forehead. Right where his third eye should be if you believe all that mystic bollocks. I cocked it with a loud click. Loud enough to scare the shit out of Duane anyway. ‘Relax Shirley,’ I said. ‘Don’t do anything stupid.’ Then to Wayne. ‘And as for you, Dorothy. Lie face down on the sofa there and spread your arms. You must be used to that.’

If they thought I was a homophobic fascist all the better. It wouldn’t be the first time. I used to wear a blue uniform, remember.

I didn’t want to pull the trigger and splatter Duane’s brains all over Marlon Brando, but I hoped he’d think that was exactly what I did want to do, and not get physical and try to be a hero. It worked. He stood stock still whilst Wayne made a high pitched sound at the back of his throat, turned, and fell forward onto the mattress of the daybed.

‘Right,’ I said. ‘Now we’ve got that sorted. How about telling me where Jimmy is. Duane?’

Duane squinted along the length of the gun I was holding, and swallowed. When he spoke his voice was even higher pitched than before. ‘He works the meat rack,’ he said.

‘Do what?’

‘The Dilly,’ said Wayne, his voice muffled by the mattress he was lying on. ‘Piccadilly, Coventry Street, Leicester Square. The cafes and arcades. He’s a rent boy. Didn’t you know?’

‘No,’ I said. “

‘It pays for his habit,’ Wayne went on. ‘He works there most evenings. We assumed he’d met a rich punter who took him away for a few days.’

‘So why didn’t you just tell me?’ I said disgustedly. ‘Instead of giving me the old queen act.’

‘We didn’t know who you were,’ piped Duane. ‘You won’t hurt me, will you?’

I shook my head. ‘No Duane. I won’t hurt you.’ and I put up my gun, and let the hammer down gently. ‘I’m off now,’ I said. ‘Thanks for the information. And next time don’t be so aggressive. You never know if it’s a pistol in my pocket or if I’m just glad to see you. Have a nice day, girls,’ and I backed out into the hall, through the door, down the stairs and outside, back to my car.

I didn’t see a soul as I went.

I took the photo of Jimmy and drove up to Piccadilly to try and find him.

I parked the Jaguar in the NCP at the back of Leicester Square and started my search. By two that afternoon I’d shown the photo round most of the cafes and arcades in the area, and I think I’d been told to fuck off in fifteen different languages. I went into Gerrard Street and found a pub full of Chinese and bought a pint of lager. At least in that boozer there were no happy Christmas revellers. I was sitting at a table, smoking my second cigarette when a kid sidled up to me. He was young and looked like he was auditioning for a place in The Jam. He was wearing a skinny two-piece suit of silver tonik mohair, black and white shoes, a pale blue button down shirt and a narrow black leather tie. He had blond hair cut into a pudding basin, and down his left cheek, from his eye to his chin he had a nasty looking thin scar.

‘I hear you’re looking for someone?’ he said.

I nodded. Any port in a storm.

‘Jimmy Himes?’

I nodded again.

‘I know where he is.’

‘Where?’

He grinned. ‘Buy us a drink first.’

I was probably being conned, but what the hell. ‘What do you want?’ I asked him.

‘Scotch and coke.’

I went up to the bar and bought what he asked for and another pint for myself. When I got back and he had downed half the drink, I said, ‘You know Jimmy?’

‘I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t,’ he retorted.

‘What’s your name?’

‘Rick. Slick Rick they call me.’

Sure they do, I thought. ‘And you know where Jimmy is?’

‘I know where he was.’

‘Where?’

‘It’ll cost ya?’

I wasn’t exactly amazed at that. ‘How much?’

‘A ton.’

‘How do I know you’re telling me the truth?’

‘I wouldn’t lie mister.’

‘You would say that.’

He looked injured at the thought. ‘He’s my mate,’ he said. ‘We work the Dilly together.’

‘You’re on the rent?’

He nodded and felt the scar.

‘A dangerous game,’ I said.

‘What, this? Not half as dangerous as HIV. You can’t get plastic surgery for that.’

I couldn’t argue with him on that score.

‘So where is he?’ I asked.

He held out his hand.

‘No son,’ I said. ‘You got a drink for your sauce. A hundred nicker and I want some proof.’

‘I can’t prove it. But it’s the truth.’

‘Tell me.’

So he did. According to him, Jimmy was with the same old queen who’d given Rick the stripe down his face. Rick would do a lot for money, but not everything, if the everything included grievous bodily harm, which was what the old queen wanted to inflict upon him.

‘Has the old queen got a name?’ I asked.

‘Daddy,’ said Rick. ‘When I wouldn’t do what he wanted, he did this.’ He felt the scar again. ‘The old cunt.’

‘Did you go to the police?’

Rick laughed fit to burst. ‘Are you fuckin’ joking?’ He said. ‘They’d bang me up if I did.’

He was probably right.

‘So where does Daddy hang out?’ I asked.

‘Shepherd’s Market. He’s got a place down there.’

‘Let’s go.’

‘Not now. It’s too early. He sleeps in. Tonight’s favourite.’

‘What time?’

‘Eight. Meet me outside the Shepherd’s pub. Know it?’

I nodded. ‘I’ll be in my car,’ I said. ‘A red Jaguar E-Type.’

‘It’s all right for some. I’ll show you his place, then split. OK?’

‘OK,’ I agreed.

‘And bring the dosh.’ And with that, Rick swallowed his drink and left.

I was parked where he said just before eight. The rain had started again and was slanting through the light of the street lamps, raising a mist of steam from the long bonnet of the car and obscuring my view through the windscreen like tears. The radio was playing Phil Spector’s Christmas album, and a couple of whores were eyeing up the car from the other side of the road.

I was still wearing my leather jacket and jeans, and I could feel the reassuring weight of the Colt in my right pocket. Rick ducked round the corner in front of me as the clock in the car said 8:05. He wasn’t wearing a coat and had the thin lapels of his jacket turned up against the weather. I leaned over, slipped the lock on the passenger door, he climbed in, and the whores walked off in disgust.

‘Excellent motor,’ he said, and he was just a boy again. Not a rent boy.

‘It’ll do.’

‘Take me for a drive one day?’

‘One day,’ I replied. ‘Now where does this bloke Daddy live?’

‘Just round the corner. Number seven. Over the pottery shop. There’s an entryphone by the door at the side. Got my dough?’

‘And he’s just going to let me in?’

I saw his face stiffen in the light from the dashboard. ‘You promised.’

‘Not exactly. You get me in and I find that Jimmy’s been there and you get your hundred.’

‘Fuck that.’

Take it or leave it. You could still be lying. Like I said. If I find Jimmy’s been there you get your money.’

‘He’ll kill me.’

‘I’ll make sure you’re all right.’

‘You don’t know him.’

‘I don’t even know that he exists.’

‘How do I know you’ll pay me?’

I took fifty nicker in tens, rolled up tightly out of my shirt pocket. ‘Half now. Half later. How about that?’

‘He was there,’ said Rick. ‘I promise you Jimmy went there.’

‘So you’ve got nothing to worry about.’

‘All right. But watch the fat bastard. You don’t know him.’ And he touched the scar on his face again.

We got out of the car and walked round the corner. Just as Rick had described it, there was a door next to the pottery shop, with an entryphone attached to the frame. I looked up. Dim light escaped from the edges of the curtains at the two windows above us.

Rick pushed the buzzer and waited. After half a minute a voice said, ‘Yes.’

Rick looked at me. ‘Is that Daddy?’ He asked. His voice was softer than the one he used to me, and he put on a slight lisp.

‘Yes.’

‘My name’s Steve. Ronnie sent me. He said I could stay.’

There was silence. Then the voice said. ‘Come on up Steve,’ and the entryphone’s buzzer sounded and the door clicked open half an inch.

Rick grabbed the roll of notes I was still holding and said. ‘See you back at the motor.’ And he turned and vanished into the thickening rain. I pushed open the door and was faced by a flight of stairs leading upwards, faintly lit from a bare bulb screwed into a fixture in the ceiling.

I walked slowly up the flight until it dog-legged and I could see an open door with a figure standing in the doorway.

The figure was huge. Bigger than huge. Humungous in fact. A great fat man in a white shirt and a pair of strides that would have made enough suits to dress a quartet. I stopped about four steps below him and looked up. I didn’t like being at a disadvantage, but I didn’t want to get close enough for him to aim a kick at my head with the big, black shoes he was wearing.

‘Daddy?’ I said.

He looked down at me in puzzlement. ‘It wasn’t you that buzzed though.’

‘No.’ I said. ‘It was someone I met who told me that Jimmy Himes had been here.’

I saw the fat man’s face pale and he licked his lips.

‘Who told you that?’ He asked.

‘It doesn’t matter. Is Jimmy here?’

‘Who are you?’

‘Nick Sharman. I’m a detective. Private. I was hired by Jimmy’s mum and dad to find him.’

‘I don’t know any Jimmy… What did you say his name was? Himes?’

‘That’s right. And I’ve been told different.’

‘Then you’ve been told wrong.’

‘Would you mind if I came in and had a look round?’

‘I certainly would. You could be anyone. A man alone in my condition…’

I wasn’t interested in a diagnosis. I took one of my cards from inside my jacket and climbed the last few stairs until I was on a level with him, and put it in his tiny, fat paw.

He glanced at it and said. ‘This means nothing.’

I pulled out the photo I’d been showing around all day. ‘This is Jimmy. Are you sure you don’t know him?’

Daddy’s eyes flicked to the photo, then away. ‘Never seen him before in my life.’

I shrugged. ‘Fair enough,’ I said. ‘How would it be if I came back with the police?’

His manner changed, and he gave me a smarmy grin, but I saw sweat break out on his forehead like tiny blisters of clear varnish.

‘I don’t think that will be necessary,’ he said.

‘Can I come in then?’

He moved his massive bulk backwards into the flat and admitted me. I pushed the door closed behind me. It was warm, and the hall was freshly decorated, with a thick blue carpet on the floor and a tiny table just inside, underneath the flat’s entryphone, with a glass vase of fresh flowers on it. Home sweet home. But the smell of the flowers didn’t disguise the sour smell coming from Daddy, and another smell from somewhere inside. Sweet but rank. Faint enough not to be noticeable unless you knew what it was.

I knew. And I was glad I’d bought my gun.

There were five doors leading off the hall. The flat was bigger than it looked from in the street. All the doors were closed.

Daddy threw open the first one on the left, reached in and switched on the light. It was the kitchen. It was spartanly neat and the appliances and utensils reflected like mirrors. It was empty.

Next door: Bathroom and toilet. Once again everything shone. Once again, it was empty.

End door: A bedroom, simply furnished with a single divan and a bedside table. The sweet smell was stronger there. The room was in darkness except for the light that entered from outside, between the undrawn curtains at the window that looked onto a bare brick wall opposite. Daddy stepped in and fumbled with the light switch. A dim bulb came on and I saw the door to a cupboard in the far wall. I pushed Daddy towards the divan and went over and yanked the cupboard door open. As I did so, the smell hit me like a muffled hammer. Human decay in its early to middling stages. Inside the cupboard, dressed in a puffa jacket and jeans was the body of Jimmy Himes. His face was bloodless, and his lips were drawn back over yellow teeth, but he was instantly recognizable from the photo I had shown Daddy. There was no visible sign of injury. Jimmy’s body was propped up against the back of the cupboard, whether by rigor, or because the collar of his jacket had been caught on a hook, I didn’t know, and didn’t stop to find out.

I looked at the fat man and he grimaced. ‘You fucker,’ I said.

‘There’s no need to get personal,’ he replied. ‘I’m sure we can come to some arrangement.’

‘No arrangement,’ I said, and drew the Colt from my pocket and pointed it at him.

‘And you won’t need that either.’

‘We’ll see. Where’s your phone?’

‘In the living room,’ he said. ‘The door opposite the kitchen.’

I backed out of the room, gestured with the revolver, and he followed me. ‘Why have you kept him here?’ I asked as we went.

‘I like him. He doesn’t talk back.’

I could have shot the bastard there and then for saying that. I should have. It was all going too easily. I walked backwards into the hallway, Daddy following me all the while, and when he reached the doorway, he looked over my shoulder along the length of the hall and said. ‘Sonny. Deal with him.’

‘Not that old one,’ I said. ‘You’ve been watching too much TV.’ And then I felt a slight displacement of air by my ear, before the doorway and Daddy exploded in a galaxy of white lights, and I tumbled down into a deep well of blackness where there was no light at all.

I came to for a moment as I was picked up by a pair of strong arms and carried back into the bedroom. I opened my eyes and saw that I was being held by a massive lump of meat in a pale blue, hooded sweatshirt. It had to be Sonny. ‘Yesterday my life was full of rain.’ I was so out of it, that I started to hum the tune, and he crashed my head against the door frame as we went, and the black hole opened again and I dropped into its embrace for a second time.

I came to once more lying on the divan bed with my arms and legs tied tightly and some kind of tape over my mouth. I was on my side, my hands were behind my back, and both they and my feet were numb and cramped, they were bound so tightly. The light had been switched off and the room was dark except for the reflected glow coming through my window, and someone was bending over me. For a second I didn’t know where the hell I was, until I was pulled roughly onto my back and I looked up into Rick’s face.

Then I remembered.

‘And you were going to make sure everything was all right,’ he whispered. ‘You’re fucking useless.’ He ripped the tape from my mouth, taking a few square centimetres of skin with it.

‘How did you get here?’ I said through dry lips, in a voice that I didn’t recognize as my own.

‘Up the fire escape and through the window. I thought you’d run out on me.’

I shook my head and nearly passed out again.

‘Did you find Jimmy?’ he asked.

I almost nodded, then thought better of it. ‘Yes, I did’.

‘Where is he?’

‘He’s dead. Murdered. In the cupboard over there.’

‘What?’ Rick looked at the cupboard door. ‘Christ. I wondered what that stink was.’

‘Can you unite me?’ I said. ‘We can talk about it later.’

‘Better than that,’ said Rick, and he reached into his jacket pocket and produced a flick-knife. He touched the button on the handle and a six-inch blade popped out, reflecting the dim light in the room.

As he slashed at the cords that bound my wrists we both heard movement in the hall outside the room.

‘Quick. It’s one of them,’ I said, urgently trying to rub some life back into my hands. ‘And they’ve got my gun.’

Rick stood up and went towards the door. ‘My legs,’ I said desperately, but before he could cut those ropes too, we both heard the movement get louder as someone approached the room. Rick ran across the carpet, opened the cupboard where Jimmy’s body was hidden, slid in, and pulled the door closed behind him. I lay on the bed, put my arms behind me as if they were still tied and squinted at the door through half closed eyes. It began to open and a shaft of light from the hall crept across the carpet before it was obscured by Daddy’s huge bulk. He stood in the doorway, the light behind him, my gun in his hand. I hoped he’d come close enough so’s I could grab him because my feet were useless, my hands weren’t much better, and I knew I’d only get one chance.

He entered the room slowly and I wondered what was on his mind, when there was a noise from the cupboard and I knew the game was up. Daddy switched on the light, looked at me, then turned in the direction of the cupboard door and raised the gun he was holding. The look on his face was half puzzlement, half fear. Slowly the cupboard door began to swing open and Daddy’s eyes widened in astonishment. I knew that with my legs tied the way they were I couldn’t reach him before he could shoot me, and I knew that Rick and I were done for.

The door opened further. Daddy was frozen to the spot and Jimmy’s body appeared in the opening.

Daddy screamed and fired twice at Jimmy. Rick who was holding the corpse as a shield let it drop and ran across the carpet, open flick knife in his hand, and his arm outstretched. Daddy stepped back and Rick plunged the blade upwards into his throat, and blood spouted like a fountain over his gun hand. Daddy fired once more, point blank into Rick’s stomach and the heavy bullet smeared a chunk of his back across the floor.

The fat man fell to his knees like a tower block being demolished, and with much the same racket, one hand clawing at the knife that protruded from his quadruple chins. I threw myself off the bed and crashed to the floor, cursing my useless legs, pulled myself up, using his fat as handholds, tore at the gun he was still clutching, and hitting at his face and neck with the side of my clenched left fist, hammered the knife further into his flesh. The Colt was sticky with both Rick’s and his blood, but I managed to tear it out of his grasp as the door at the far end of the hall opened and Sonny appeared, and ran towards us. I fell flat on the floor and fired upwards, emptying the gun into Sonny’s torso as he came. The pale blue of his shirt blossomed red, and he stumbled and fell, and his body slid along the carpet until his head rested in the doorway just a few feet from where I was lying. He opened his mouth and breathed his last with a rattle, and a gout of hot blood.

I looked at the carnage. At Sonny’s corpse, at Daddy bubbling his last around the amateur tracheotomy that Rick had performed on his throat, and at Rick himself, doubled up on the floor, still breathing but with a sound that was anything but healthy.

Fuck me, I thought. How am I going to explain all this?

I managed. Just about.

Rick was still alive, but bleeding badly from the.38 special exit wound in his back, and not so badly from the entrance from his belly. I dropped the Colt, ripped the ropes from around my ankles, took off my jacket, then my shirt, and ripped it in two. I wadded up one half and stuffed it in the hole in his back and covered the hole in his front with the other half. Then I stepped over Daddy’s and Sonny’s bodies and went to find the phone.

I needn’t have bothered. Some concerned citizen had heard the shots and called the police. As I picked up the receiver I heard the scream of a siren in the street outside, followed by the slamming of doors and a buzz from the entryphone. I went into the hall and buzzed back and met the coppers at the flat door with the gun dangling from my left forefinger by its trigger guard. The first copper took the empty Colt gingerly from me, and I told them to call an ambulance. They did.

The first copper went on into the flat whilst the second put me against the wall and searched me.

The ambulance arrived within minutes, which was a minor miracle, closely followed by a couple of detectives who took me down to West End Central to get my story.

I told it pretty well as it had happened. I just left out one part, and told only one lie.

I left out the part about going to King’s Cross that morning, and started my story with my tour of the Dilly where I met Rick. And I said that the gun belonged to Daddy and was at the flat when I arrived, and he’d pulled it on me. Like I said, I’d stripped and cleaned it that morning and I always wear a pair of cotton gloves when I do, so’s I leave no prints on the mechanism inside or on the cartridges. My fingerprints were on the outside, but so what? You’d expect them to be if I’d used the gun to shoot Daddy and Sonny, and there was so much blood on the weapon by the time we’d finished wrestling for it, that I doubt if forensics could get decent impressions anyway.

I reckoned the squatters at the house at the Cross wouldn’t be big on reading newspapers or watching TV news and only Wayne and Duane had seen me with it earlier. And if they did tell, it was just my word against theirs.

The police called up Douglas Himes at the hotel and he confirmed hiring me, and Rick lasted long enough in ICU to tell his part of the story, before he died the next day.

The police seemed to be quite happy about getting two chicken hawks off the streets. And as for Jimmy and Rick. There’s plenty more like them arriving every day at London’s mainline stations, for the cops to worry about them overmuch.

Well, I assume I explained everything. It’s over three months now since Christmas and everyone seems to have forgotten about the incident.

Almost everyone.

Mona Himes called me up a couple of weeks back to thank me for my help. She was crying before she’d said a dozen words.

Whilst I listened to her sobbing, someone put the phone back on the hook.

I don’t think it was her.