London Noir

SCOUTING FOR BOYS by CHAZ BRENCHLEY

The kid in the alley has been dead two days.

I know, I checked her myself last night after watching all day from my window, never seeing her move.

It’s a good window for watching. Not too high, not too far above the street. No radical views, no panorama; but who needs panorama? I’ve got life.

And death, of course, death too. Death’s a fine substitute for panorama.

It was last week she turned up, Wednesday morning. I was tilting my chair, talking numbers down the phone, eyes on the street as ever and here she came: crop-haired and dirty, wrapped in coats, all she had and all she knew clutched in her arms. Two carriers and a sleeping-bag, home sweet home.

At first sight I wasn’t honestly sure which she was, boy or girl. No clues in her clothes, and she was young enough that she could have been either, her body not declaring itself one way or the other. That was a teaser, a constant tickle in my mind; you expect to know, first glance, it throws you if you don’t.

Throws me, at least.

So I watched more carefully than I might have otherwise, gave her more attention than she deserved.

Sexed her in the end by the way she moved, something feminine about it even in these circumstances, even in extremis, as she slumped in a doorway and spread her bags about her.

And lost interest straight away, what little interest I’d had. Turned my mind back to work, back to making money; and when I tired of that I turned to the other thing, the morning’s papers on my desk, news bulletins I’d caught at home, flyers I’d seen shrieking in the streets.

Headlines, headlines.

Someone is killing the rent boys of London, the leader said in The Guardian. A fine, resonant sentence, and utterly untrue. That made it sound universal, as though renting were the only qualification, extinction the ultimate goal.

Not so. Surely, not so. Yes, three lads had died -three out of five best mates, a pack who ran together, worked together, lived and ate and for all I knew slept together. They’d died individually, died alone; but I wouldn’t light a candle for coincidence. Nothing random here, no casual series for this killer. Those lads were sighted, beaded, blown away.

Alfred Kirk was number three, was that morning’s catch, hauled out of the river at low tide by one of the lower bridges. Pale under his skin of mud he must have been, no blood left to colour him lively. A frenzied attack, the papers said. Multiple stab wounds or slashed to rags, depending on your preference. Me, I prefer a choice, I like the rounded picture.

I liked the next bit, too. All the reports came together for once, even the tabloids’ prurience turning oblique now, all quoting the same source: clear signs of repeated sexual abuse, they all said.

Abuse, they called it.

With Alfie, I’d have called it nothing more than right and proper use; but perhaps you had to know him.

Or perhaps not. Flesh is flesh, and it’s a market economy. What you’ve got, you sell. Alfie did, they all do. That’s not abuse, it’s exploiting a resource.

Alfie Kirk. Dark, stocky, willing little Alfie. Take the boy out of the valleys, and you can sure as hell kick the valleys out of the boy.

Fresh meat he’d been when I met him, newly run from the Rhondda. Alfie ‘I’m sixteen’ Kirk, at least two years ahead of himself there; but he was hungry, he learned quick. Joined the Crew, sharpened up and settled in.

Now he was sliced meat, someone had been sharpening their blade on his bones. The Crew was disbanding fast, was being dissected.

Three down, two to go.

And I knew where to find them.

Or thought I did.

At half six I left the office, heading for the tube. Passed the girl in her doorway, heard her inevitable croak, ‘Spare some change, please?’

Didn’t check, didn’t even turn to smile at her, to say no. I do that sometimes, tease them with a little humanity, remind them of just how far they’ve gone.

Today, not. Today I was buzzing, my mind was crowded, I was almost in a hurry; I couldn’t make the space for a sideshow.

There was a milling crowd at the entrance to the tube station, mobbing a man in a peaked cap, going nowhere. Over their heads I glimpsed steel grilles pulled half shut, empty passageways beyond.

The man was gesturing, trying to speak; stress lifted his voice an octave so that I could hear something above the crowd’s murmur. No words, nothing useful – just the harassed tone of it, the swearing he could barely manage to suppress.

I didn’t stay to find out what had happened, didn’t join the crush. No point. There weren’t any trains, that was all I needed to know. A bomb, a strike, a suicide – who cared?

Piccadilly was maybe twenty minutes’ walk from where I worked. Head down and moving fast, I might even have done it in fifteen that day; but only because of the chill in the wind, no other reason. I was keen, yes, but I wasn’t urgent. Two lads, they weren’t worth that much. They weren’t actually going to make me hurry.

Walking, I wondered if the police had made any connections yet, whether anyone had told them they were dealing with a single unit here. If not, they’d be lucky to work it out for themselves. The Crew had been a rare bunch, almost a phenomenon.

If the police weren’t on to that yet, it left me still one step ahead.

I could hope, at least. I wasn’t going to hurry, but I allowed a little hope.

No sign of the boys down the Dilly, but I wasn’t expecting that. They had to be pretty sussed or they wouldn’t have it this good, they wouldn’t have me out looking for them. They’d be keeping off the streets for sure, keeping their heads well down.

I’d only come this way to hear what the word was, how many understood what was happening; and I read my answer in the silence, and on the faces of frustrated punters. No one was working tonight. Universally, it seemed, heads were being kept down this hunting season.

No major surprise, with a crazy on the loose. I was a little disappointed, perhaps, some lads at least should have worked out that they weren’t in any danger – Christ, a child of six could have worked that out, counting on the fingers of one hand – but better safe than sorry, that was always the rule. Low profiles and don’t take risks. Touting for trade with a knifeman out and about definitely counted as risk, as sticking your head above the parapet. Even if you knew the Crew, seemingly. Maybe five won’t be enough for him, maybe he’s got them already and he’s hungry for more…

I could do that no trouble, I could think their thoughts for them, these lads. Transparent as glass, even in their absence.

Him, too. The crazy, the killer. He was bright like a target in my head. I could make him dance when I wanted, whenever I chose.

What I wanted now was food. I might be going on to Mickey’s but I wouldn’t pay Mickey’s prices and he wouldn’t feed me at cost, never mind the amount of trade I put his way; so I ate at Burger King, reading whatever book it was I had in my jacket pocket that day. Spent a while longer in a pub, washing the taste of what I’d eaten out of my teeth; and then up to Oxford Street and just a little further.

Mickey’s is in the basement, and where the hell else would you expect to find it? Low, low life.

Hard to find it at all, mind, if you don’t know where to look. No neon signs to light this club, no flashing arrows pointing. Just go down the area steps into purpose-built sinister shadows, knock and smile nicely at the peephole.

Or don’t bother with the smile, it won’t help. Strictly members only, at Mickey’s. If they don’t know you, you don’t get in. They won’t even open the door, they’ll just leave you standing. Knocking till your knuckles bleed.

Do them a courtesy, wipe the blood off the door before you go.

I took the steps three at a time, pounded the door with my fist, shuffle-danced impatiently on the spot until Gordy opened up. Not in a hurry, of course; only to get out of the cold.

‘Jonty. Hi, how’ve you been?’

‘Busy. The man in, is he?’

‘Sure.’

Nothing more certain, actually. If the club was open, the man was in.

Matter of fact, the man was in his corner already, though the night was too young yet for his clientele. Coming through into the complex nest that was Mickey’s – half a dozen small rooms with doorways knocked through, whole walls knocked out to link them into a single multi-cornered, many-pillared space – I glanced down to the bar at the end and saw him slumped on his stool, hands folded across his belly. The faintest movement of his head acknowledged me; if there’d been anyone else in, or anyone that counted, they might have envied me so much recognition.

The place wasn’t exactly empty, but it might as well have been. A few unfamiliar faces, sitting quietly in twos and threes, talking in whispers: I checked them off as I passed, decided none was worth even being curious about.

There was a new lad serving, didn’t know me; I had to ask for a Dos Equis, instead of it being already opened and waiting for me when I reached the bar. I even had to tell him not to bother with a glass.

A polite tilt of the bottle towards Mickey, and then the cold bite of beer in my throat, welcome even in this coldest of weather. Half the bottle, chug-a-lug, and I stopped purely for its own sake, because I could.

And hitched myself onto a stool at the bar and beckoned the boy over, told him what I wanted. A saucer of salt, here; quarters of lime, here. A shot-glass of the good tequila, refilled when I tapped; and the Dos Equis replaced whenever it was empty. And all of it down on my tab, of course, no tedious fumbling for cash.

The boy looked for Mickey’s nod, and got it. Of course, he got it. Mickey and I, we’re like that. Go back too far, know each other too well.

It’s what you need when you’re young, when you’re starting: someone older, someone who’s been around. Someone to drop a word in season, lend a bit of knowledge here, a bit of money there, take it back with interest later. And after a while you don’t need them any more but they’re still there, they’re embedded, you can’t shift them.

In my life, that’s Mickey. Other people have their own, but not like Mickey. There isn’t anyone like Mickey.

Every night he sits in his club, in his corner, squat and heavy on his stood, his flesh overflowing. Doesn’t stir, unless there’s trouble. He’ll be charming if he needs to be, or else he’ll be offensive; but mostly he’s neither, mostly he just sits. And drinks tonic water, and Lord only knows where he gets his weight from, I’ve never seen him eat.

Never known him sleep, either. Daytime, if you want him, he’s upstairs. In his charity shop, looking after his boys.

I was there for a reason that night; but no hurry. I sat at the bar till the bar got busy, and for a while after that. Testing the service, see if I still got the lad’s quick attention even with half a dozen queuing. Letting Mickey see. He’d want to see me looked after.

Eventually, though, I pushed myself to my feet and walked around the bar.

Peeled a twenty from my back pocket, handed in it to Mickey. No special favours, that was how we ran it; and entrance fees never went on the tab.

He took the note, held it up to the light, pursed his lips; for a second I thought he might run it through the machine he keeps by the till, to check for bad paper. But he nodded, tucked it away, tilted his head in permission. I went through the door he sits beside.

It’s a heavy door, with a safety light glowing dimly above and ‘EMERGENCY EXIT’ in big letters; but it’s not an exit, except in an emergency. It’s just a way upstairs.

His charity shop, he calls it. Police, social services, everyone else calls it a hostel for runaway boys. Bed, meals, no questions asked; and no one ever asks Mickey any questions.

Actually, he runs it straight. If a lad wants to doss, if he wants to use the bed and eat the meals and nothing more, that’s fine. No pressure. Mickey’s not losing out, he gets funding from all over.

If a lad wants to work, that’s fine too. Mickey doesn’t even take a cut, the entrance fee is his percentage.

This was the Crew’s home base, the roof they always came back to. And this was crisis time; I expected to find them here.

What was left of them.

Up the stairs, cold and dimly-lit, just a fire exit, officer, no one uses it; through the door at the top, and into a different world. The club is soft shadows and carpet, alcohol and smoke, all the fringe activities of sex. The hostel has lino underfoot and fluorescent tubes overhead, the music’s cheap and loud and confrontational and so are the kids. No fringe activities, no skirting, no seduction.

No conversation, either. You come up from the club, you mean business. So do they.

In the common room that night, as every night, there was a group of lads clustered around the pool table. Others perched on the radiators. Some were talking, some were very much alone; but I walked in and they all looked round, looked interested.

Ready to trade, they were. They might not be working the Dilly just now, but here they were under Mickey’s eye. In the common room, that time of night, anything I saw would be for sale.

If I’d been wanting to buy. The boys knew me, though, most of them. They looked, nodded recognition, turned away. Pool balls clicked, voices rose against the thudding beat from a ghetto-blaster on the window-sill.

The faces I was looking for weren’t there, the Crew not on duty tonight. No surprise. I thought they’d be up in the attics, sharing a room, sharing a bed perhaps for comfort and security, and the door wedged shut. No locks on the boys’ rooms, but they’d improvise, they’d shut the world out somehow.

Shut out the world, maybe, but they’d open up for me.

I made my way over to the pool table, and goosed a lad just as he was bending to take a shot. He jerked, screwed the shot, glared furiously over his shoulder as his audience giggled – and blinked, and smoothed the glare into an effortful smile, swallowed what he’d been going to say. Said, ‘Skip, hi. Want me?’

Hiding his surprise, playing it cool for the sake of the other lads watching, listening in. See how easy I turn a trick? he was saying. Even Skip, that you’re all scared of. No worries, he was saying. I’m a class act, me.

They call me Skip sometimes, picked it up from Mickey. They don’t know what it means, but they like it.

‘No,’ I said, ruining his evening for him, wrecking him for the night. ‘I’m looking for Dex and Tony. They in, are they?’

He shook his head, ‘Not seen’em, Skip, not for a couple of days,’ but I was ready for that. They’d be primed, they’d be ready for the question, and even these kids had a kind of pack loyalty. With a knifeman out in the world, they were going to need it.

I wouldn’t want them overdoing it, though. Not to the point of misleading me. So I knuckled that young blood’s skull for him, made him yelp, really hurt his credibility; and said, ‘Try again. Which room?’

‘Straight up, Jonty,’ he whined, squirming against the grip I had on his elbow. ‘They’re not here, ask anyone. Ask Mickey.’

This time I believed him, let him go. He rubbed his arm, aggrieved; I tipped him a crisp new fiver and said, ‘Where else would they be, then?’

‘Word is, someone’s after them,’ a breathy voice from behind me. Everyone was watching now, tuned in to this.

‘I know that. Where would they go?’ Where would they feel safer than here? It was a question I couldn’t answer; and neither could the kids, apparently. At any rate, none of them did.

Then a man came in, a customer. I didn’t know him, nor did they; but no danger, if he’d got past Mickey. The lads lost interest in me and the pool both, offered him a beer, turned on a vulnerable, electric charm.

They’re good, Mickey’s boys. Two minutes later I was still killing balls on the abandoned table when the newcomer left with a boy leading him, taking him out the other way. Deal concluded, trick duly turned. The boy would come back in an hour, perhaps, or else in the morning; in the man’s car, or else in a taxi. That was one of Mickey’s rules, that they always got a lift back. It made the boys feel good, it let everyone know they were safe; and, of course, it meant they were back in the shop, back on the shelf for another customer. The lads came and went as they pleased, or thought they did, but Mickey had the system well rigged.

I slammed the black off three cushions and into a middle pocket, heard someone whistle and applaud at my back, walked out without looking round.

On my way back down I heard sounds that weren’t music, from behind a closed door. Remembered the television room, and put my head inside.

There were a couple of youngsters slumped on separate sofas: newcomers, nervous, flushing under my gaze, their eyes jumping between me and the TV screen. I didn’t think they were that interested in a news bulletin. Waiting for what came next, perhaps; or more likely just watching telly because they were numb and scared and at least it was something familiar, something they knew how to do.

I was on my way out again when I caught something, Alfie’s name mentioned.

Suddenly there was at least one interested viewer in that room, there was me coming right inside now, pushing the door to behind me and never mind the way those kids jumped, never mind what they thought.

News conference on the screen: long table, microphones, policemen and women and one nervous civilian between them. Alfie’s older brother, they said, and a lot older too, he looked thirty at least. And short and dark and very Welsh, twisting his hands together and making the usual useless appeals. ‘Whoever did this, for God’s sake give yourself up, isn’t three dead boys enough?’

To which the answer was obviously no, and I didn’t know why he was wasting his breath. Five had to be a minimum here, there was no getting away with anything less.

The brother was going on, pleading for information now, for any information. ‘You don’t have to go to the police. You can come to me, I’ll be an intermediary. I came to London to find my brother; I’ll stay as long as I have to, to find his killer. I’m staying at the Prince Consort Hotel on Church Street, contact me there if there’s anything you can tell us, anything at all…’

Nothing I could tell him; nothing Mickey could tell me either, or nothing he admitted to. No, he didn’t know where Dex and Tony had buggered off to; he didn’t know they’d gone till just that morning, when he checked their rooms. And no, they’d left nothing behind, obviously nothing with him for safe-keeping. Usually they did that, so probably they’d gone for a while, wherever it was they’d gone. Out of the city, even, maybe…?

But I didn’t believe that, and neither did he. You don’t do that; you don’t leave London so easily, a snap of the fingers, one fright and you’re gone.

No, the city grips tighter than that. They were still around, those boys. And I’d find them.

If there were luck or justice in this world, I’d find them first.

Shaved and showered, smartly dressed, I was into work before eight next morning. The girl in the doorway was awake too, only her eyes showing between sleeping-bag and woolly hat. Thin, tight eyes, weary and distrustful.

Wise girl.

After a couple of hours’ intensive working, I glanced out of the window and saw a policeman. Saw him stop, question the girl for a minute or two, finally nod and move away.

That didn’t impress me at all.

So I phoned downstairs to the security guard. He’d been on duty since seven, he’d be getting bored by now, he’d be into a change of routine,

‘Tell her to move, Carl. The law can’t shift her, maybe, but we can. Tell her that.’

And he did, he told her. I watched from my window, saw her gesture stiffly, saw her spit. No trouble guessing what she was saying down there, the message she was sending. They get vicious on the streets, these kids do. Not hard, not as hard as they like to think, but vicious for sure.

Vicious isn’t always wise, though, it isn’t always protective. Carl came back, and we had another little chat on the phone while I sat in my chair and watched the street, thinking how cold it was out there. How cold she must be already, cold all the time, despite the sleeping-bag and so many layers of clothing…

So I talked to Carl, and heard him laugh; and watched him carry a bucket over the road, watched him tip a gallon of cold, cold water over the girl.

Even through the double glazing, I could hear her shriek.

Hear her swear, too, see her come scrambling out of the sodden bag in a fighting fury; but Carl was already half-way back, strolling contemptuously across the street with a big grin on his face, not even looking. She snatched up a handful of frozen dog-shit, hurled it at him, missed. Cast around for a stone, a can, anything else; but the services are good around here, the streets are swept. She was all the trash there was.

And she was wet and freezing cold, and he was twice her size. She didn’t come after him, just slumped back into her doorway. Rummaged desultorily in a carrier bag, pulled a few clothes out, dropped them again; wrapped her arms around her knees, rocked to and fro, head down and shoulders shaking.

When I left the office an hour later, she was back in the bag. I wasn’t sure that was such a good idea, better to keep dry, I would have thought; but I didn’t stop to say so. She was curled up small, back to the street, no begging now. And Carl had his game-plan all worked out.

From the look of her she wasn’t going anywhere; but if she didn’t move, twice more today she was going to get a wetting.

It was going to be a hard cold day for the kid and a harder colder night to follow, with wet bedding and a sharp frost forecast even here, even in the heart of the city.

It’s a tough life, when you’re not welcome in other people’s doorways.

The tube was on again, so I took the Northern line out to a small hotel at a frugal distance, and asked at reception for Mr Kirk.

The girl behind the counter nodded over my shoulder; I turned, saw him in a corner, watching me. Watching everyone that came in, I guessed, and probably praying, good Chapel background that he had. Probably praying even now, that I should prove an answer to his prayer.

Maybe I was, at that.

I asked the girl to bring us a pot of coffee, two cups. She said he drank tea. One of each, then, I said. No hurry, I said. When you’ve got the time.

She nodded, promised. I made my way between chairs; he stood up as I reached him, met my extended hand with his, ready presumably to shake with any stranger in his need.

‘Mr Kirk, I’m glad to catch you. I saw you on the news last night, and I thought perhaps we ought to talk. Oh, I’m sorry, my name’s Jonathan, my friends call me Jonty…’ And some people called me Skip, but he didn’t need to know that, it wouldn’t mean a thing.

‘David,’ he said, reciprocating, politely not asking for a surname. More sussed than he seemed, perhaps; or else just learning fast. He’d have to be, if he’d been hunting for Alfie in any of the right places. ‘Please, sit down, I’ll order some tea…’

‘No need, I’ve done that.’

‘Well, then.’ He sat down himself, fidgeted his clothes into neatness, and got straight to the point. ‘How is it that you can help me, then, ah, Jonty?’

‘Only that I knew Alfie quite well, I know the people he mixed with, some of the places he hung out. These kids, they wouldn’t talk to the police, they might not talk to you – but they’ll talk to me. Specifically,’ laying plenty of cards on the table, honest as they come, ‘there are two boys we need to find, because they’re next on the hit-list, they’ve got to be. I don’t know if you’ve realized this, I don’t know if the police are aware, even; but Alfie was one of a team, five good friends,’ really working on that Chapel mentality here: all good buddies together, all looking out for each other and don’t mention what they did for cash. ‘Three of them are dead now, and it’s too much for coincidence. Whoever this madman is, he’s not killing at random…’

And so I talked, and drank coffee, and painted what picture I liked of Alfie’s life, what picture I thought David ought to see. He sipped at his insipid milky tea, and nodded, and tried to understand.

I was still talking when the girl interrupted me, beckoning David over to the desk to take a phone call.

I sat back and watched him, trying to read lips at this distance and failing but feeling lucky regardless, guessing who the call was from as David scribbled frantically on a message-pad.

Guessing right, because he came back to me wide-eyed, almost trembling with excitement.

‘That was, that was this Tony you were just telling me about,’ he said, stammering over it. ‘Alfie’s friend Tony, he said he was. And they’ve been hiding out, see, him and the other boy Dex, because they know someone’s after them. They wouldn’t go to the police, well, obvious reasons, really; but he says he’ll talk to me. He says he’d like to meet me, he’s given me an address, meet him there this evening, he says…’

That was Tony, all right. That was more or less what I’d expected, why I was here. Tony was a TV freak, and you couldn’t tell him, he wouldn’t listen. Anything he saw on TV had to be right. If he’d seen the news last night, I knew, he’d have to be in touch.

‘Do you know where this is, then, do you?’ David asked, thrusting the address at me, already assuming a partnership signed and sealed. ‘I’ve got an A-Z, I could find it, but I don’t know London, see, I don’t know how to get about…’

‘Sure,’ I said easily, one glance at the street name and a big smile for David. ‘I can get you there, no trouble.’

‘Oh, that’s good. That’s wonderful. Only, he did say I was to come alone, see, I don’t know what’s best to do about that, he might think you were police, and not come out…’

Well, no. That much I could guarantee: Tony wouldn’t think I was the police.

He might not come out if he saw me, that much was true, but he’d have very different reasons.

‘No problem,’ I said, still easy, still utterly laid back. ‘I’ll wait outside, you can go in alone. Don’t want to scare the boy. What is it, anyway, what sort of place, did he say? Not a house, I guess, not down there.’

‘No, it’s a car-park,’ David said. ‘A multi-storey car-park.’

Of course, a car-park. What else? And he’d be waiting at the very top, no doubt, and only wishing he had a car to wait in. If he hadn’t pinched one, just for the occasion. Too, too television…

So I collected David that evening, and we caught a bus. He wasn’t happy on the tube, he said, so far underground, so tight and dark in the tunnels. A farming family, he said, not mining.

Rural Wales, where sheep are sheep and men are careful.

Alfie hadn’t been like that. Alfie didn’t know careful from common sense, and had no truck with either. He’d learned to love the night and the crowds and the rush of London – but then, he’d had good teachers. Mickey and me and the Crew – between us, we’d made Alfie what he was.

What he was now, of course, was dead. Tony might know who or he might know why, might even have answers to both; and Tony was coming out of hiding, to talk to David.

I was curious, I was very curious to know what he wanted to say.

Eight o’clock and long since dark, the car-park long since emptied. This was dead ground any time after six, the gates locked and the workers gone, only the guard dogs restless behind wire.

David went in alone, as instructed. He walked slowly up and out of my sight, preferring the broad ramps and the open decks to the stinking and constricted stairway. He’d brought a torch, cautious man that he was: ‘It’ll be lit, I know that, but it’ll not be lit well, now, will it?’

And he was right, it wasn’t lit well. He shone the beam into every shadowed corner before he walked inside, sent it ahead of him up the ramp like a herald of his coming, almost like a weapon. Staying obediently on the pavement, pacing to keep myself warm this savage night, I saw sudden flashes and occasional fingers of light thrust out above me to mark how far he’d climbed.

After he’d reached the top deck, the light died; or else David was simply looking the other way now, his back turned to the street. Had found what he was looking for, perhaps was looking at Tony.

I waited, patient as the night to see what the night would bring. A train rattled on its tracks, somewhere between me and the invisible river; a fox barked, high and sharp and sudden, setting off the dogs. No one passed me, on foot or in a car.

And then there was David running down, the torch not shining now: uncareful David, careering down the ramp, running almost full-tilt into a concrete pillar, caroming off with a gasp and stumbling towards me.

‘Easy, man,’ I said, catching him. Holding him still, feeling how he trembled. ‘What, then, what is it, what’s up?’

He shook his head, far past talking; for a minute there he could only breathe, and shake. But then he straightened slowly, slowly took control. At last he pulled away, lifted his head to meet me eye to eye, and said, ‘Come. You come and see…

He didn’t take me very far, only into the carpark and straight past the ramp, over to the other side. A low wall ran between the massive pillars supporting the decks above; beyond was rough ground, crumbled tarmac and weeds.

And a body, a boy, face down and too obviously broken.

David played his torch up and down the lad’s length, held the beam still on bleached-blond hair and the glint of gold in his ear.

‘Will that be Tony, then, will it?’

Unquestionably, that would be Tony; and so I told him.

‘No mistake, you don’t need to see his face?’

‘No.’ Didn’t need to, certainly didn’t want to. I looked up instead, counted six separate decks. From the top, it would have been a long way to fall. Time enough to know that you were falling; maybe even time enough to think about it, briefly.

‘There’s no one here,’ David said needlessly, ‘no one else. He’s gone, that did this. What should we do, should we call the police, would you think?’

‘No,’ I said again. ‘We should get you back to your hotel, is what we should do. Forget about Tony, he’s gone too; no harm if he has to lie there till morning. We just get the hell out of here, nice and quiet and don’t get involved.’ I saw him back to the Prince Consort. Saw him settled with the aid of a couple of large brandies and an hour’s soft talking; and finally went home by tube and train, thinking that a farmer should be tougher than this, a farmer should be old friends with death.

Perhaps it’s different when people die, perhaps it cuts more deeply.

I wouldn’t know.

Friday morning: and the girl not in her doorway, only the glaze of ice on the pavement to remember her by, where Carl’s water had flowed and frozen before it even reached the gutters.

He’d be satisfied, he’d be pleased with that. I saw no need to tell him where she was, that I could find her from my window. She hadn’t moved far at all, only twenty yards into an alley; but she was out of sight of the street there, hidden behind piled bags of rubbish.

Huddled in her bag, not even her head showing now, she moved as little as she had to; but sometimes she did, she had to. Sometimes her whole body jerked and spasmed under cover, sometimes for minutes on end. And sometimes afterwards her face would appear, and she’d spit a mouthful of phlegm as far as she had strength to send it.

Not far, not far at all.

The weekend I spent at home, watching telly mostly, only filling in time: sure that the phone would ring soon, that someone would have something to tell me. I didn’t try to second-guess what that would be, it was only the call I was sure of. Someone and something, useful information.

It came at last on the Sunday evening, almost too late to count, I’d almost been wrong there.

Almost.

‘Jonty, this is Alan Tadman…’

Alan. Good to hear from you.’ My neighbour on the water, he had the mooring next to mine; and already I was way ahead of him, I knew what he was going to say, I could have written his script.

‘Well, I hope so,’ he said. ‘But there may be trouble, this may not be good news…’

‘Tell me anyway and let’s see, shall we?’ I thought it was good news. I thought it was the best.

‘It’s just, there’s been someone on your boat the last couple of days. At least that long. We came down on Friday, and I thought I saw a light; but it wasn’t much, and your car wasn’t there, I assumed I’d imagined it. Just a reflection on the window, something like that. But then I saw her shifting yesterday, as if someone was moving around inside. I knocked, but there wasn’t an answer. I would have phoned then, only I didn’t want to sound neurotic; so I watched her today, and I’m sure there’s someone aboard. Maybe they’re friends of yours; but they don’t answer my knocking, so I thought someone should tell you. Not the police, I didn’t want to tell the police without checking first…’

‘No,’ I said kindly, ‘you wouldn’t want to trouble the police. Thanks, Alan, I know who that’ll be. I’ll come down and have a chat with him.’

‘OK, fine.’ His voice huffed with relief; he’d done the right thing. ‘You don’t want me to stay around till you get here, do you? Only we’ve both got work in the morning, and the wife’s keen to get off…’

‘No, you go. Don’t worry about it. And thanks again, I’m very grateful.’

Being the man he was, Alan would probably still hang around for another hour or so, expecting me to dash down, wanting to be there when I did.

So I waited, I gave Linda an hour and a half to drag him away; and even then I didn’t go directly to the canal. I drove into the city first, to pick up David.

‘I’ve found Dex,’ I told him. ‘Come on, I’ll take you there.’

You pay through the nose, for a permanent mooring in London; but it’s worth it, to me. I wouldn’t be without my boat.

She’s a proper narrowboat, sixty-eight foot of steel hull and wooden upperworks. I bought her from a broke commodities broker, paying cash strictly under the counter, no comebacks. She wasn’t called the Screw Archimedes then, but she is now.

Every couple of months I take off for a week or two, but I was only a fortnight back from the last trip. I wouldn’t normally have been near the Screw this weekend.

Maybe I should have thought of checking it over, just in case; this wasn’t the first time Dex had lain low for a while on my boat. He’d always asked permission before, though. Presumably he’d had a spare set of keys cut on the quiet, and decided this was the time to use them.

Not bad, for a kid in a panic. Not the world’s greatest idea, maybe, but not bad. He couldn’t have reckoned on a nosy neighbour watching how the boat rocked at her moorings.

I parked behind the pub as always, then led David a hundred yards along the cinder towpath. Here was the Screw, tied bow and stern to mooring-rings; fifty yards further on were the black gates of the lock, with the river flowing darkly beyond.

And yes, there was a light aboard my boat. Thin and flickering, a torch with its battery dying, perhaps, just bright enough to show around the curtain’s edge.

‘That’ll be him,’ I murmured. ‘You wait here, David, leave this with me.’

‘I want to see him,’ David said, unaccustomedly forceful.

‘You will. I promise. Just let me speak to him first, OK? He’ll be nervous enough as it is, he’s hiding here, you’ve got to remember that; it’ll be worse if two of us bust in on him at once. Especially with you being a stranger.

He nodded, stood back, let me go. I stepped lightly aboard, slipped my key into the Yale on the door and ducked inside.

Down the steps, past the rear bunks, past the head, through the kitchen – and there was Dex in the lounge, stretched on a banquette and barely reacting, barely lifting his head.

The reason for that was on the table between us. The light came from a spirit lamp, its pale flame turned low; and scattered around it were all the makings, spoon and syringe and a length of inner tube, and his sweet sweet smack in a cellophane pack. And yes, Dex really was running away this time, running everywhere he knew to hide. Two years since I’d kicked this habit out of him, kicked him clean.

I wasn’t going to do that again.

He knew it, too. Looked at me and knew it, even in the state he was in; and tried to smile even so, tried to be easy. As he would, as anyone would.

‘Skip. Hi…’

Sure, he called me Skip. They all did that, all five of them. What else would a crew call their captain?

‘You owe me money, Dex.’ Large amounts of money; and I had an idea I was looking at a lot of it, right there on the table, what was left of my money.

I’d made that money, and the Crew had spent it. I wasn’t happy at all.

They’d been a loyal and obedient band, my Crew, my little group of workers. It was a clever gig, too, a sweet project. I ran the money off, fives and tens and twenties; they spend it around their clients. Half a dozen ways they had, to persuade a man to change his notes for mine. And of course no comebacks, even if he found out they were dud. The kids might lose a customer, but no more than that, no worse. Certainly no police.

So I trusted them, I gave them a thousand at a time and only took eight hundred back. Easy money for them, easy for me.

But then they blew it, they didn’t keep up the payments. Someone started picking them off, and they ran for cover. With my money in their pockets.

‘Christ, be fair, Skip,’ Dex stammered, as I’d known that he would. ‘We had to, some bugger’s after us…’

‘That’s right,’ I agreed calmly. ‘I’m after you.’ His dealer too, by now, if he’d been paid with my clever money; but that was no concern of mine.

‘They’re dead, Skip. They’re all dead…’

‘That’s right,’ again. I fetched water, busied myself with the makings on the table, fixing up a good strong jolt: not so much a trip, more a retirement. Using all he had in that little packet, enough to give a horse a hefty kick.

‘Skip…?’

‘Let’s put it this way,’ I said, tapping the syringe lightly, expertly, watching the bubbles rise. ‘You spend my money on smack, I want to see you get a proper high out of it. Don’t I? I want to see you get your money’s worth. I made that money, I wouldn’t want to see it wasted.’

‘That’ll, that’ll kill me…’ No resistance, but I hadn’t expected any. If I wanted to do this, he’d just lie back and let me. Even if he’d been fit and well fed, he’d let me do it. That’s how I’d trained him. I was skipper, he was only crew.

‘Yes, I expect so. Two choices, Dex,’ still smiling, still sweet and reasonable. ‘Either I put you down with a needleful of dreams, or you get up off your pretty arse, go outside and talk to Alfie’s brother. He’s waiting for you.

‘Alfie’s…?’ Oh, he was slow tonight, he was well detached. He frowned, almost had to think who Alfie was before he got onto the notion of a brother. Finally, ‘That’s where Tony went. To talk to Alfie’s brother.’

‘I know.’

‘He never come back, didn’t Tony.’

‘I know. He died.’

‘Yeah…’

He looked at me, crew looked at skipper. Skipper tapped needle.

Crew departed.

He shuffled slowly aft, banged his head on the hatchway getting out. I emptied the needle into the sink and gathered all the makings together in a bag, for ditching later.

Briefly, I heard David’s distant voice; then nothing.

When I went outside to look for them, I found David pretty much where I’d left him, in the shadow of a warehouse wall, Dex at his feet not even bleeding any more.

David’s knife was still in his hand but unconsciously so now, only loosely held, no threat in the world.

‘They fouled my brother,’ he said, ‘these foul boys. And Alfie fouled us all, he fouled the family…’

I shrugged vaguely, not interested in his justifications. I had a lock key in my hand; I gave that to David and explained how to flush Dex out through the system, how to send him away down the river.

Then I locked up and left David to it, drove away.

Next morning, when I phoned the hotel and asked for Mr Kirk, they said he’d checked out already. Given up hope of helping, they said, gone home: gone back to his happy valleys and his sudden hills.

I need a new network, new distribution; but that’s not a problem. There are always boys, and boys are always hungry.

And the word will get around, will do me good. The Crew fucked with Skip, the boys will tell each other, and they’re all dead now, the Crew, all fucked over…

That’ll keep them sweet, my new crew, when I sign them up.

Meantime the girl over the way has coughed herself to bones and nothing, she’s dead in the alley there, stiff and gone.

Wonder how long it’ll be, before they find her?