Death Trap Page 4

  ‘So who are these main men?’ Barnard asked. ‘Are they into Rachman’s property rackets?’

  ‘Lazlo Roman certainly is,’ Robertson said. ‘He worked with Rachman as I understand it, for a while anyway, but increasingly on his own account. He’s not short of a bob. He’s bought some of Rachman’s property portfolio, though where he got the cash from I don’t know. And I don’t suppose his methods are much different.’

  ‘It’s an odd name. Where’s he from?’

  ‘Poland maybe. Somewhere like that. Behind the Iron Curtain anyway. He keeps himself very close. When I tried to talk to him he more or less told me to piss off.’

  ‘And the other main man?’ Barnard pressed.

  ‘I don’t want you messing around with King Devine, Harry,’ Robertson warned. ‘I’m in some delicate negotiations with him.’

  ‘What did you say he was called?’ Harry asked incredulously.

  ‘He’s from Jamaica, black as night, and big enough to win the world title if he didn’t spend all his time knocking back champagne and smoking pot in the night spots he runs. I don’t think he’s been here that long but he’s doing very well for himself and he could do even better with me on board, something I think he’s coming to see.’

  ‘I didn’t think you liked black men,’ Harry said, recalling some encounters between the Robertson brothers when they were boys and a few Lascar seamen who were rash enough to venture too far from the docks.

  ‘There’s black men and black men,’ Robertson said expansively. ‘This one’s a king by name and a king by nature, seriously loaded in fact. A man I can certainly do business with.’

  ‘But not into rental property, as far as you know?’

  ‘I doubt it,’ Robertson said.

  ‘So where can I find this man Roman? Does he live in Notting Hill?’

  ‘Nah,’ Robertson said dismissively. ‘He lives in one of those mansion blocks of flats near Lord’s Cricket Ground. Very nice. Rumour has it he’s bought two on the top floor and knocked them together. What do they call it? A penthouse? He didn’t invite me in, mind. We met for a drink at the Ritz. But he wasn’t interested in doing business. Didn’t want an invite to my next gala do. In fact, didn’t want anything I could offer him, as far as I could see. I began to wonder if he was related to Rachman, another Jew, and had inherited the lot. You never know.’

  ‘Thanks Ray,’ Barnard said. ‘At least that gives me a lead. I can take it from there.’

  ‘So who do you know living in a slum house in Notting Hill, Harry boy? It wouldn’t be that cheeky little photographer from Liverpool, would it?’

  Barnard got to his feet with a grin. ‘Whatever gives you that impression?’ he asked. ‘No, I’m just doing a favour for a friend, that’s all. You know me. All heart.’

  ‘And some,’ Robertson said. ‘I’ll send you a pair of tickets for the next do. Be interested to see who you turn up with.’ Barnard left him laughing as he dialled another number.

  Tess Farrell switched off the small black and white television irritably and flung herself back onto the lumpy sofa. She and Kate had shared their first attempt at a spaghetti Bolognese and decided that Italian cooking was maybe beyond their meagre skills. The meal lacked the allure the dish had had when they had shared it at an Italian restaurant near Notting Hill Gate. And now their mood was made even darker by the failure of the BBC to come up with anything they wanted to watch.

  ‘Let’s go out for a drink,’ Kate suggested. ‘It is Friday night. We shouldn’t be stuck in like this.’ Tess sighed.

  ‘I really ought to do some preparation for next week’s lessons,’ she said. ‘My head of department’s a bit fierce.’

  ‘How’s the new job going?’ Kate asked. ‘You haven’t said much about it?’

  ‘It’s a bit overwhelming, to be honest,’ she said. ‘You’ve no idea how big that school is, all these huge new buildings, dead modern, two thousand pupils, acres of sports fields, swimming pool, they’ve got the lot. Puts the crumbling old Victorian ruin we went to in the shade. I’ve barely learned to find my way round yet let alone got to grips with the teaching. At least I’ve only got a part timetable for the first year, which is supposed to let me find my feet as a new teacher, but I wonder if that’s enough.’

  ‘And what’s this comprehensive thing then? What does that mean?’

  ‘They don’t do the Eleven Plus. They all move up from juniors to secondary, all together, instead of going to grammars and secondaries. You get classes with all sorts of kids in, and they do technical and commercial subjects as well as O Levels. Different abilities, different nationalities, different colours. It’s amazing.’

  ‘Well, you sound as though you need a drink,’ Kate said.

  ‘Yes, maybe. Just the one.’

  They grabbed their coats and made their way downstairs only to pull up in surprise on the first-floor landing where Elsie was standing by her front door watching Geoff and another man manoeuvre a sofa out of the flat. The group stopped what they were doing when they saw the two young women coming down the stairs and Elsie burst into tears.

  ‘Whatever’s going on?’ Kate asked in alarm.

  ‘We have to get out, dear,’ Elsie said through her sobs. ‘Geoff was attacked on the way home from work last night. Look at the state of him. And they said that it would be me next.’

  Geoff turned towards them and the friends took in his battered face and a half-closed black eye in horror.

  ‘Have you been to the police?’ Kate asked but was not very surprised when both Elsie and Geoff shook their heads vehemently.

  ‘They said not to do that,’ Geoff mumbled through swollen lips.

  ‘Let me take a picture,’ Kate said, pulling her beloved Voigtlander out of her bag and attaching the flash. ‘You might change your minds later when you’ve got away from here.’

  Geoff shrugged but stood for a moment with his arm around his wife and let her shoot a couple of shots.

  ‘We’ve got to go,’ Elsie said, looking utterly defeated. ‘We’re never going to win, are we? This is our friend Don.’ She gestured towards the burly man at the other end of the sofa who seemed disinclined to say anything at all. ‘We’re going to stay with him for a bit while we look for somewhere else, and he says we can put most of our stuff in his garage. He’s got a nice semi out in Greenford.’

  ‘Oh Elsie, I wish there was something we could do to help,’ Kate said. ‘I hate to see those scallies getting away with bullying you like this.’

  ‘You want to watch out, girl,’ Geoff mumbled. ‘It may be you next. I reckon they want to empty the house. Probably get that posh old bird out of the basement too. I’ve never rightly known what she’s doing down there. Someone’s gaga old lady been dumped out of the way, I reckon. Anyway, we must get a move on. Don’t you worry about us, girl. Worse things happened in the war, didn’t they, and we came through that all right in the end.’

  Subdued, Kate and Tess made their way out into the street and watched as the sofa was heaved into a van parked outside where most of the rest of the Wilsons’ possessions seemed to be already stacked. On the other side of the road they saw the same two heavily built men they had seen threatening the Wilsons the previous day, a large Alsatian sitting peaceably enough beside them at the end of his chain. Kate still had her camera in her hand and, half concealed by the van, took a shot of them for good measure.

  ‘That is so unfair,’ Kate said angrily as they turned away. They walked slowly west towards Ladbroke Grove, their enthusiasm draining away as they absorbed what Geoff had said. There was no doubt in Kate’s mind that she and her friends might be next on the list for a visit. ‘Do you know where Portobello Road is?’ she asked Tess suddenly.

  ‘Yes, there’s an antique market down there, and other stuff. We’ve been there sometimes, me and Marie. Picked up some second-hand stuff for the flat. There was hardly any kitchen gear in there when we moved in. Why do you want to know?’

  ‘Mrs Beauchamp in the bas
ement – who’s not as gaga as all that, by the way – wants me to take a message to someone with a stall down there tomorrow morning.’

  ‘How on earth do you come to be running errands for that old bird?’ Tess asked.

  ‘Oh, we got talking,’ Kate said airily. ‘I think she’s lonely. Anyway you can show me the way so I don’t get lost tomorrow.’

  ‘You’ll have to get an A to Z or you’re going to get lost eventually,’ Tess said. ‘Especially flat hunting. No one ever knows where anything is in London and they look at you as though you’re daft if you ask for directions. You need a map.’

  ‘Yes, I’ll get one. There’s one in the office I borrow when I go out on a job, but I keep meaning to buy my own.’

  ‘Anyway, we can go that way if you like, along Portobello. There’s some pubs down there that look interesting,’ Tess said, assuming the air of a long-time resident in the neighbourhood.

  ‘Fantastic,’ Kate said, although she still felt depressed. ‘Will we find another flat, do you think?’ she asked. ‘Preferably before those scallies with the dog come knocking on our door.’

  ‘’Course we will,’ Tess said. ‘Though we may have to move further out. The great thing about living here is it’s so close to the West End. That suits Marie while she’s working in Soho, though with a bit of luck she’ll get some acting work soon. With Z Cars and all the bands it’s getting quite fashionable to be a northerner. And I’m only a short walk from school. It’s perfect, that’s why we took the flat in the first place.’

  ‘This tube line suits me too, specially now I’ve got the job permanently,’ Kate said, whose agency was just a couple of streets from where Marie Best worked her shifts at the coffee bar.

  ‘Yes, that’s two of us settled at last. But I do worry about Marie. She’s not getting a hint of acting work.’

  ‘I know. I think she’s getting quite fed up,’ Kate said. ‘Is it the Liverpool accent, do you think?’

  ‘Oh I think she can talk proper when she has to,’ Tess said, laughing. ‘I remember she said they had speech coaching at drama school. What she says is that there’s just not enough parts for women in most plays. And it’s right, isn’t it? You think of Shakespeare and all those kings and dukes maundering on and fighting battles. Even on TV it’s all men. Think of all the dishy blokes in Z Cars, and with northern accents. But where’s the girls?’

  They plodded in discouraged silence, making their way through streets where most of the passers-by were West Indian and the strains of unfamiliar music drifted out of open windows, until finally they reached a long road where one or two market stalls were still being packed away.

  ‘This is it?’ Kate asked.

  ‘This is it.’ Tess said. ‘Do you think you can find your way by yourself tomorrow?’

  ‘Have you got an A to Z yourself?’ Kate asked.

  ‘I can lend you mine. But you really need one of your own.’

  ‘I’m sure I do,’ Kate said. ‘I don’t think I can take the office one out all the time. The lads in the office don’t tell me anything much about what I can and can’t do. They really don’t like me there, you know? Not a suitable job for a girl, they say. They’re always muttering in corners about it. Making snide remarks. They make a point of not asking me to go out for lunch with them.’

  ‘It doesn’t sound much of a place to work,’ Tess said tentatively.

  ‘It’s fine. I’ll show them. I know I’m good at this photography lark.’

  They carried on down Portobello Road looking for a pub they would feel comfortable going into on their own, pushing through rowdy groups of young men, some black, some white, only to find themselves confronted on the next street corner by a tall black man in a multicoloured woollen hat, a dark suit which made him look like a vicar and a smile of recognition on his face directed at Tess.

  ‘Don’t I know you?’ he asked in a broad Jamaican accent. ‘Isn’t you Miss Farrell who teachin’ my son English at Holland Park School? He in the fourth form. Fourteen now.’

  Tess stared in astonishment for a moment and then smiled slightly nervously. ‘Mr Mackintosh?’ she said. ‘You came in to see me and the head of English on the first day of term? I do remember.’

  ‘Is he settlin’ down better now?’ Mackintosh asked. I tol’ him to concentrate on his work. I don’ want any more reports of him wasting time in class, you know? No more reports like that. There’s so many bad things goin’ on with the youth now. I worry for Ben.’

  ‘I think he is doing better,’ Tess said, slightly doubtfully. ‘We’re reading A Midsummer Night’s Dream and they all seem to be enjoying that. We act it out in class and Ben has been reading Bottom the Weaver. He seems to enjoy that. He’s very funny, a good actor.’

  Mackintosh looked anxious again. ‘Funny?’ he said. ‘If he play about in class don’t hesitate to wop him. He try too hard to be funny sometimes.’

  ‘I’ll remember that,’ Tess said faintly.

  ‘So what you doing down here, ladies?’ Mackintosh went on. ‘It’s maybe not the best place to be after dark on your own. ’Specially not jus’ now. Some white girl was attacked in Ladbroke Grove the other day.’

  ‘We live round here,’ Tess said. ‘Up towards Bayswater. We were just looking for somewhere to have a drink.’

  Mackintosh smiled widely. ‘Well, I can show you the way back to Holland Park Avenue, if its alcohol you want, in a better class of pub, or I can give you a soft drink in my cafe over here.’ He waved vaguely down a side road where lights in red and gold and green lit up a shop front decorated with exotic painted trees and flowers. ‘I don’t serve anything harder. There’s no one likely to give me a license for that.’ He laughed. ‘You know I told you I thought my Benjamin has a rare talent for story tellin’ that I wanted to tell you about. He gets that from me, you know? But my education was interrupted because I was a foolish boy who thought he should go off and help fight a war for the mother country, you know? So I never finished my schoolin’ and have to make my livin’ as and where I can. And now I find the mother country doesn’t actually like me very much. I want Benjamin to do better than I have. I want Benjamin to do well whatever the colour of his skin. I suppose all fathers want that.’ His laughter this time had an edge to it. ‘Let me treat you to a coffee and I’ll set you on your way home.’

  Kate and Tess glanced at each other and then Kate nodded, aware that a group of white teenagers on the corner of the street was looking at their encounter with some hostility. ‘That would be very kind of you, Mr Mackintosh,’ she said, sounding more confident than she felt.

  ‘Nelson, please,’ he said and strode ahead of them to the brightly lit cafe they had seen from a distance.

  ‘Why Poor Man’s Corner?’ Kate asked, glancing at the name over the windows.

  ‘It’s a place in Jamaica, where I was born,’ Mackintosh said. ‘Not far from Kingston. Seemed like a good name round here. There plenty of poor men.’

  Inside the cafe was hot and steamy and he settled them at a table close to the window, sat down at the table himself and waved to one of the young black men behind the counter who began to hover as soon as their boss walked through the door.

  ‘Is it coffee, or would you like to try some Jamaican soft drinks? Spiced carrot juice, or mango . . .’

  ‘Coffee, thanks,’ Tess said firmly.

  ‘And me,’ Kate said, feeling slightly ashamed of their caution. But she barely knew what a mango was and spices were a foreign country. She glanced round the crowded tables crammed together in the smoky, low-ceilinged room, and realised she and Tess were the only white faces there. Most people were drinking what looked like fruit-based drinks and a few elderly men in a corner were playing dominoes.

  Mackintosh ordered in a patois they did not fully understand, and then slipped easily back into more standard English. ‘Won’t be long,’ he said.

  ‘I take photographs,’ she said. ‘I’d really like to come back here and take some pictures. I don’t think man
y people realise places like this exist in London.’

  ‘And those that do wish they didn’t,’ Mackintosh said without rancour. ‘Still, at least they’re not blowing up little girls in church like they are in Alabama. Not yet anyway.’

  ‘That was terrible,’ Kate said.

  ‘That was pure evil,’ Nelson came back sharply, as if suddenly unable to control an anger he usually kept hidden. He handed them their coffee and took a gulp of his own. ‘About your pictures. I’ll talk to my customers, maybe. Give me a call in a day or two and I’ll let you know.’

  They drank their coffee, increasingly the object of curious glances, while Mackintosh told them how he had decided to remain in England when he was discharged from the RAF and had been one of the first to settle in West London.

  ‘I still get homesick,’ he confessed. ‘And my wife more so. She came over later when your government said it wanted West Indians to come here to work. She’s a nurse. There’ve been some bad times round here for us, but I was determined to stay. There’s nothing but poverty in Jamaica. And Benjamin was born here. He’s a clever boy when he concentrates his mind on his work and I want him to do well. It is possible, you know. I have a friend, like me he stayed after the war, and now he is a lawyer. I’d like that for Ben.’