Reap the Whirlwind

2

2

Summertime Blues-Eddie Cochran/T-Rex/The Who

The sun was at its peak when I got back outside, and the street was whited-out like a negative photo. After the air con in Stowe-Hartley’s office, it was almost unbearable, and I took off my jacket, and rolled up my shirt sleeves. Now I knew how that fried egg outside the newspaper office felt. I crossed the road heading back towards High Holborn, and I noticed a man standing on the pavement opposite looking like he was lost. He was about my size and looked like he went to Bertie Wooster’s tailor. He was wearing a three piece tan summer suit, a long collared pink shirt with what looked like a tabbed collar, which I immediately fancied, and a matching paisley tie and handkerchief, flopping out of the breast pocket of his jacket, with two tone brown and white brogues. He even had a carnation in his button hole. Like him, it hadn’t wilted in the sunshine. How he managed the waistcoat in the heat I couldn’t imagine. He was holding a silver topped walking cane. I only looked for a second but there was something about him. Elegance I think, and he made me feel like a badly tied bag wash.

I turned left at the corner of Highcross Street and as I strolled along, I heard a voice from close behind me. I hadn’t heard him following. I must be getting old. ‘Mr Sharman,’ said the voice. ‘Nick Sharman.’

I turned, it was the bloke in the tan suit. ‘What?’ I said. Not original, but there you go. He seemed perfectly affable close up. No obvious weapons apart from the cane. He reached into the inside of his jacket. If he was armed and about to shoot me, then I was a goner, with nothing on me more lethal than a Mont Blanc ballpoint pen. Instead of a pistol he pulled out a leather case, flipped it open and showed me a Metropolitan Police ID. ‘Detective Inspector Douglas Spencer,’ he said. ‘Can we have a word?’

Of course now I know he probably had a leather case in every pocket, under different names, and different identification for every security and police force in the country, but I didn’t know that then. And I didn’t ever know his real name as far as I knew. Not ever. But, I’m getting ahead of myself.

‘About what?’ I said. ‘Hold on, have you been following me? What’s going on?’

‘No. I haven’t followed you. I just knew where you were going to be this morning. Fancy a drink?’

I was confused. Not for the first time in my life as it happens. But I was also intrigued and wondered what previous misdemeanour was about to jump up and bite me on my arse. ‘Alright,’ I said. ‘Why not? It’s a hot day, and a cold drink sounds just fine.’

‘There’s a pleasant pub, just around the corner,’ he said, and led the way. I followed like a lamb to the s*******r. The boozer did indeed look alright. The woodwork was painted shiny black with hanging baskets leaking water from a recent soaking, which I could cheerfully have stood under to cool myself down. Inside it was polished floors, a polished bar, and polished bottles reflecting the low lights. Orange and red. The barman was behind the jump, polishing a glass. There was a CD of Motown greatest hits playing quietly. Air con there too. Happy days.

‘What do you fancy? asked Spencer.

‘Bottle of Becks,’ I replied. Then spotting fresh limes on a shelf behind the bar, I added. ‘With a squeeze of lime juice.’

He went to the bar and ordered. I sat on a padded banquette and waited for my drink. Spencer came back with two glasses of beer. Mine had a lime juice top just like I’d asked.

‘Told you,’ he said. ‘Not a bad place.’

I agreed out of politeness as Marvin Gaye segued into Gladys Knight. ‘So,’ I said. ‘What’s this all about?’

‘I’ll come to that. You see there’s just one thing we don’t know about you, Mr Sharman. We don’t know if you’re on the side of the angels, or the dark side.’

‘We?’ I said.

‘The security forces. The forces for good.’

‘I didn’t know I was so popular.’

‘I wouldn’t go that far,’ he replied after taking a drink. ‘But you’re definitely on our radar.’

‘Nice to know.’

‘Which is why you’re here. We… I recognise you’re a shrewd operator. And you were a b****y good copper until you turned to grand larceny.’

Obviously he didn’t believe in gilding the lily. He was right, of course, but that’s another story.

‘So you see, we… I need your opinion on something.’

Just then the penny dropped and I recognised his voice. ‘Hold on,’ I said. ‘It’s you. On the telephone. You’re the bloke who called me.’

He didn’t even have the goodness to blush. Instead he shrugged and said, ‘Guilty as charged.’

‘And you weren’t in France.’ He shook his head.

‘So there is no deceased old lady.’

‘Oh there is. An old dear died in an old folks home. No reason. No sign of foul play, and indeed no sign of fair. Poof.’ He threw open one hand. ‘And she was gone. According to the postmortem her heart just stopped. Her grandson was most distraught. He approached us and so began my little deception the other day.’

‘And my opinion?’

‘On the fellow you met today. Leonard Stowe-Hartley .

‘The lawyer?’

‘The very same. A slippery cove.’

He saw my frown.

‘Do you read, Mr Sharman?’

‘Sometimes.’

‘I do. It’s my way of relaxing. Crime fiction mostly. Christie, Wallace. The golden age of British crime writing, and sometimes I slip into the argot.’

‘I have a friend who shares your interest,’ I said. ‘My favourite is Lee Child.’ It was his turn to frown.

‘I believe he’s quite popular.’

‘Why do you want to know what I thought of Stowe-Hartley?’

‘Going back to the old lady. The home she died in is part-owned by him. And coincidentally he’s her lawyer. Or was. Hence the delivery you did today.’

‘I see,’ I said, though I didn’t. ‘As a matter of fact I didn’t like him.’

‘Why was that, pray tell?’

We were back in the thirties.

‘Dunno, to tell you the truth. Just didn’t like him…’

‘Good. I hoped you’d say that. You see, as well as being a slippery cove, our Lenny is rich. There is no Gyre and Gimble, it’s all his. Plus he’s clever, he’s duplicitous, he’s ruthless, and he’s b****y elusive. And Stowe-Hartley isn’t his birth name.’

‘Which is?’

‘Sidney Hartley. Stowe was his father. So you see, he’s a bastard by name and nature.’

‘So what exactly does he do?’ I asked.

‘He’s a fixer. An architect. He plans jobs. Criminal jobs, and takes a cut. A large cut we hear.’

‘So why not nick him?’

‘Because he is as clean as clean can be. When these jobs go off he’s in Scotland playing golf, on the beach in Barbados, or on his yacht moored on the South of France. And he’s a hail fellow well met. The life and soul of the party as everyone else will testify. Alibied to the hilt. Simple!’

‘But that still doesn’t tell me where I fit in.’

‘Fit, precisely,’ he said. ‘You are the perfect fit. What we’re looking for is someone to put a spanner in his works. A cat amongst the pigeons. And you would be perfect.’

Suddenly, the room seemed colder than the air conditioning warranted. ‘Let’s get one thing straight from the get go,’ I said. ‘No matter what you might have dug up about me, I don’t kill people for money, or for any other reason.’

He managed to raise one eyebrow like a low rent Roger Moore. ‘No no, Mr Sharman. That’s not what we want. Heaven forfend. Just a little sand in his shoes. Besides, it’s been tried. Twice, as a matter of fact. And both would-be assassins ended up dead. No, just a little abrasion in his life. Come on, with your pedigree it would be easy.’

‘Well,’ I replied. ‘You can forget about that. I don’t do dangerous things any more, and that sounds dangerous to me. My life is chasing debts, finding missing persons and delivering writs. That’s it. I just want a quiet life.’

‘Don’t we all?’ he said. ‘Well, if that’s your last word, I suppose I’d better leave you to finish your drink and enjoy your quiet life.’ He consulted the expensive-looking watch on his wrist. ‘Time I was going. Thanks for yours. Time that is. Oh I nearly forgot.’ He reached into his jacket again and pulled out an envelope and slid it across the table to me. ‘Another two hundred pounds for your trouble. And don’t mention this meeting to anyone, there’s a good chap.’

It’s been a long time since anyone called me that. ‘Fine,’ I said, and pocketed the dough.

‘I’ll take that,’ he said, nodding towards the envelope with the receipt inside. ‘I’ll make sure it gets delivered.’

I passed it over. He picked it up, rose, leaving his beer, and with a good-natured ‘Cheerio for now’, he left me to finish mine. Which I did. Then I headed for the Japanese restaurant where, as I ate my Japanese sliced steak, my Japanese crunchy noodles and my Japanese hot sauce, and drank my Japanese cold beer, and where the air conditioning was on high too, I figured that I hadn’t been fed such a bunch of bullshit for a long time. But I didn’t let it spoil my appetite. After all, I thought, as I sat on the bus home, what could he do to me? I didn’t have to wait long to find out.