The Wolves of London (10 page)

‘It’s not about the money,’ I said. ‘It’s about whether I’d be able to face myself in the mirror the next morning.’

She stared at me in bewilderment. ‘Are you serious?’

‘I’m afraid so. Look, I know you must think I’m soft in the head, but I can’t take the risk – and I don’t want to.’ I shrugged. ‘I know you and Benny must have had a conversation about me while I was on my way here.’

Again she looked surprised, almost guilty, in fact. ‘How would you know that?’

‘You said that Benny had told you I was perceptive – and he certainly never told you that when he called you. I heard everything he said.’

‘Touché,’ she said wryly.

I smiled. ‘So did Benny tell you what I was inside for?’

‘Armed robbery, wasn’t it?’

‘That’s right. But it’s not as impressive as it sounds. I was young and stupid and under too much pressure. I did it because… well basically, because I was more or less living on the bread line despite working all the hours God sends, and I needed the money. And it was well worked out. It seemed like… if not exactly the perfect crime, then a pretty safe bet.’

‘So what happened?’ Clover asked. ‘How did you get caught?’

‘There was a weak link, a bloke called Dennis Jasper. He was a crackhead who thought he was an anarchist. After the heist we divided up what we’d nicked, and the guy who’d organised it, an old school friend of ours called Ray Duffy, told us to keep a low profile and not to splash the cash. Dennis managed to keep quiet for about two days, and then he got hammered down the local pub and started shooting his mouth off about how he’d fucked the system.

‘Next thing I knew, I was woken at five in the morning by a crash that made me think an oil tanker had ploughed into the side of the house. Then the police flooded into my bedroom, dragged me out of bed and punched me in the guts so hard I pissed myself. Before I knew what was happening, I was thrown into a Black Maria and driven to the local nick.’

Clover was half-smiling, like she didn’t know whether to look sympathetic or amused.

‘And that’s pretty much it. I got sentenced to nine years and served six years and two months of that.’

‘And what happened to Dennis Jasper?’

‘I’ve no idea. I never saw him again. I heard on the grapevine that he’d got a shorter sentence than the rest of us for dropping us in it. Some say he buggered off up north when he got out, but others reckon he’s buried in a farmer’s field somewhere.’

‘And meanwhile you went straight?’ Clover said.

‘Yes. I became an upstanding member of society. I still am.’

Clover’s expression had changed, but I couldn’t quite read it. It might have been pity or admiration or something else entirely. I shrugged. ‘Sorry to disappoint you.’

She shook her head. ‘It’s not that. I respect your integrity. No, it’s… Would it change your mind if I were to tell you that McCallum is alone in the house at night, that he sleeps soundly, that his security system – despite what I told my associates – is non-existent, and that I can provide you with a key for the French windows that lead directly into the drawing room? I know it’s easy for me to sit here and say this, Alex, but the opportunity I’m offering you will be marginally less difficult than taking candy from a baby. In fact, it’ll be the easiest twenty-five grand you’ll ever make in your life.’

I regarded her for a moment. ‘Can I ask you a question?’

‘Ask away.’

‘If this job’s so easy, why do you even need a middle man? Why not do it yourself?’

She smiled but looked away, her cheeks flushing red. ‘You really want to know?’

‘Yeah, course.’

‘It’s because, despite my association with Benny, I’m not a natural criminal. And frankly I’d be shit-scared. Bloody terrified, in fact. Creeping through that garden at night, letting myself into that pitch-black house… just the thought of it gives me palpitations.’

‘You don’t
look
the nervous type.’

‘I’m not – when I’m in my comfort zone. But out there…’ she shuddered. ‘No thanks.’

I was silent for a moment. I couldn’t decide whether to believe her or not. ‘So you’re prepared to give up twenty-five grand just to save yourself from being spooked for half an hour?’

‘Definitely. Because I don’t see it as giving up twenty-five grand. I see it as
earning
two hundred and twenty-five by doing sod all. All
I’d
have to do is sit tight here drinking tea and eating biscuits while you do all the leg-work.’

‘Plus it would give you an alibi if anything went wrong,’ I said.

‘Nothing
will
go wrong, but… yes, there is that.’ She tilted her head, her smile widening. ‘I can see you’re tempted.’

‘Good try,’ I said, ‘but I’m afraid the answer’s still no. It’s not that I don’t appreciate the opportunity, and it’s not like I couldn’t do with the money, but like I said earlier, it’s a crime. You’re asking me to enter someone’s premises illegally, to steal their property—’

‘Property which they obtained illegally in the first place,’ she reminded me.

‘That’s as may be. But two wrongs don’t make a right.’ I spread my hands. ‘Sorry, but… there you go.’

Clover sat back, looking disappointed. ‘Pity,’ she said. ‘I really thought you and I had the makings of a good partnership.’

I wasn’t sure what she meant by that. Was she trying to flatter me? Even flirt with me? Trying to make light of it, I said, ‘Well, if you’ve got any jobs which
don’t
involve breaking the law…’

‘I’ll be sure to let you know,’ she promised.

She held my gaze for a long moment. I stood up and stuck out my hand.

‘Well, great to meet you,’ I said, feeling suddenly awkward. ‘No hard feelings?’

‘No hard feelings,’ she confirmed, and shook my hand with what seemed to be genuine warmth. She held on to it for a bit longer than she needed to and I looked at her quizzically.

‘Maybe our paths will cross again,’ she said.

I couldn’t think how they might, but I tried to sound encouraging. ‘Who knows?’ I said. ‘Maybe they will.’

B
y the time I got home I was shattered. I’d been on tenterhooks all day, and the emotional toll that that had taken combined with the wine I’d drunk in The Hair of the Dog had pretty much wiped me out. I staggered into the darkened flat, slapping lights on as I went, and straight into the kitchen. With tiredness gnawing at me, I pinballed from cupboard to drawer to fridge, dragging out crockery and cutlery, coffee, milk, bread, ham, margarine and mustard. Moving like an automaton I made myself a coffee and a sandwich and then stumbled back into the front room, leaving the kitchen debris behind me. I put my mug down on top of Kate’s
Toy Story
colouring book on the toy chest which doubled as a coffee table and then sank on to the settee with a rusty groan to match the creaking of the springs.

It was only as I tipped my head back and closed my eyes that I became aware of the silence. Not that it was ever completely silent in London, of course, but compared to the clamour I’d been surrounded by all day it seemed, temporarily at least, as hushed as I had ever known it. Then, little by little, sounds filtered through – the humming of the fridge, the rumbling whoosh of distant traffic, the faint but constant white noise of the city. Hadn’t I read somewhere that the infinitesimal background hiss we hear in even the quietest of environments is the ceaseless, ever-expanding echo of the big bang rolling on into infinity? Was that a scientific theory or just an old wives’ tale? With my eyes closed I lifted my sandwich to my mouth and took a bite. Chewing the bread and meat slowly into a pulp and gulping it down was a bigger effort than I’d been expecting.

Next thing I knew I was jerking awake, shocked and disorientated, as if from a nightmare. Salmon-pink light streaked with purple bruises was seeping in through the French windows. I gaped blearily at the still-f mug on the colouring book, the coffee now scummy and cold. I clearly hadn’t moved because the plate containing my ham sandwich, the bread now a little curled and dry at the edges, was still on my lap. I shifted and groaned. My back was aching like a bastard and my hands were numb with cold.

What time was it?

I pushed the plate aside and stretched out my legs so I could extricate my phone from my jeans pocket. Even after trying to massage some life into my hands, my fingers were like dead meat, and I was reminded of those three-pronged claws in amusement arcades which you have to manipulate with levers to pluck a prize from a glass booth. At last, however, I managed to prise out my phone and gaped at the display screen. It was 6.25 a.m. I’d slept for over seven hours.

In thirty-five minutes it would be time to get Kate up and ready for school. Great. But at least, unlike yesterday, I had half an hour’s grace before the whirlwind hit. Last night, once I’d realised I was going to be back too late to put my daughter to bed, I’d rung Paula and arranged for Kate to stay the night over there.

Moving like an old man I pushed myself to my feet and shuffled through to the bathroom. I didn’t have a hangover this morning – or not much of one at any rate – but my sleeping position and the chill that had seeped into my limbs during the night made me feel almost as wretched. I cranked up the temperature in the shower and luxuriated in the sensation of hot water battering my skin, unknotting my clenched and aching muscles. As I soaped my body and washed my hair, I thought about my meeting with Benny, and Clover’s offer, and wondered whether I’d made the right decision, and how the hell I was going to help Candice.

She’d be wanting answers and I didn’t have any. Not yet anyway. Having closed the door of opportunity that had been opened for me made it doubly imperative that I come up with a solution to Candice’s problem. Maybe the thing to do was to bring Michelle and Glenn in on this, get everything out in the open, work as a family to clear up the mess. Candice would hate it, of course, but perhaps if we all pooled together we’d raise enough to pay off this Mitch guy. There’d be repercussions, bitterness, accusations – I could see Glenn using the incident to insist that Candice get a job to pay off her debt, for a start – but we could deal with all that once the bigger threat was out of the way.

Or maybe we
should
just tell the police and have done with it. Despite the threats that Mitch had made, it wasn’t
really
in his interests to inflict physical damage on his accusers, was it? Not over what to him must be a paltry sum; and not when it would mean the finger of suspicion being firmly pointed in his direction.

By the time I stepped out of the shower my flesh was tingling and I felt… if not exactly raring to go, then at least reasonably human again. From where I was standing, towelling myself dry, I could see my reflection staring back at me from the mirror screwed to the wall above the sink. It looked pissed off, accusatory, its short, dark hair sticking up in damp spikes. Its face was thin, maybe a bit
too
thin, the cheekbones high, the skin pulled tight around the jaw line. Its nose was long, bony – I think the polite term is
aquiline
– and its eyes, though I say so myself, were a fairly startling blue (before she went loopy Kate’s mum, Lyn, used to describe them as ‘Paul Newman blue’).

Though a fair number of women seem to have taken a liking to my face over the years, I’ve always thought it a bit shifty. I know I’ve got a tendency to frown a lot, narrow my eyes and not smile much, because people have remarked on it.

‘Don’t look so mean,’ Lyn used to say when we were out together.

‘I’m not,’ I’d reply.

‘Yes you are. You always scowl at everybody. You look at people like you want to rip their heads off.’

Her words always surprised me, and for a while I’d make an effort to smile more. But eventually my face would slip back into its default expression of ‘moody git’. I must admit, it’s got me into a few of those ‘What you looking at?’ situations over the years. On the other hand it was a boon in my younger days. If you looked anything but mean on the estate where I grew up the jackals would quickly close in.

I got dressed and made myself coffee and toast, then carried it through to the front room. I watched the news while I waited for the hammering on the door that would herald Kate’s pyjama-clad, tousle-haired arrival.

By 7.10 she still hadn’t turned up, though, and I wondered whether she’d insisted on breakfast with Hamish before heading home to get washed and dressed. I had a quick smoke out on the balcony, then brushed my teeth and crossed the landing to knock on the Sherwoods’ door. I half-expected to hear the shrieking of excited children from within, the rapid thump of elephant-like feet, Paula’s voice raised in encouragement bordering on exasperation.

But all was oddly silent, and no one responded to my knock. I put my ear to the door and knocked again, louder.

‘Hello?’ I called. ‘Anyone there? It’s me, Alex.’

The silence was eerie. I felt discomfited by it – not exactly worried yet, but baffled all the same.

I took out my phone, dialled the Sherwoods’ number. After a moment I heard a strange double-ring, the phone in the flat and the same one in my earpiece. The phone rang five times and then Paula’s voice broke in, its tinnier echo, coming from my phone, telling me to leave a message. Instead of doing so I cut the connection and dialled Paula’s mobile number. This time, when her voicemail cut in, I
did
leave a message, trying to keep my tone light, as if that alone would make everything okay.

‘Hi Paula, it’s Alex here. Just wondered where you were. It’s twenty past seven. I’ve just popped round to get Kate, but there’s no answer.’ I hesitated, toying with the idea of speculating aloud where she might be, but then I said, ‘Call me when you get this message, just to let me know everything’s okay. I’m sure it is. Bye.’

I put my phone away and hovered for a moment on the landing. I felt out of sorts, wondering what to do next. I couldn’t go to work not knowing where Kate was. As I wandered back into my flat I was already formulating theories and explanations.

Maybe one of the Sherwoods’ parents had been taken ill and they had been called away unexpectedly. But if that was the case would they have taken the children with them? Wouldn’t one of them have gone and one of them stayed at home? Well, maybe it was Adam who had been taken ill then? Or Paula? Or maybe Adam was working away from home – he did that sometimes – and Paula had had no choice but to rouse the kids and take them with her? But in that circumstance, wouldn’t she have called me and left a message? It was the silence that was odd. Paula was usually so efficient, so reliable. Although if she’d had a shock – if one of her parents had had a heart attack, say, or if they’d been involved in an accident – then it would be perfectly understandable if she’d simply forgotten because her mind was elsewhere.