Death Trap (9 page)

‘Funny name,' Barnard said, as the teams jogged onto the pitch.

‘He's a West Indian, isn't he? You've got the Maltese and the Robertsons in Soho, we've got the West Indians down here. And Rachman for years and now Lazlo Roman, and no one seems very sure where he comes from. Another bloody foreigner, for sure.'

‘What's he into then, pornography? Should I be taking notice of him?' Barnard asked.

‘No, no, he's the latest property man. Rumour has it he bought up a lot of Peter Rachman's houses when he died, and is coining it by letting them out to the coons. Can't say I know much about him. He keeps his head down. There's not much in it for us, as it goes.'

‘Friend of mine lives in Argyll Gardens, up towards Notting Hill Gate. She said she came down to the nick to complain about some of the tenants being threatened but no one there was very interested.'

Lamb grinned knowingly. ‘Ah, yes, your pretty little bird from Liverpool. I met her all right. Tried to tell me I'd be helping you out if I rushed around and arrested some other big dog sniffing around her house.'

Barnard scowled. ‘There's nothing like that going on,' he said.

‘No, 'course not, Flash,' Lamb scoffed. ‘And pigs might fly. She's a bit of all right, though, isn't she? Though I'm not sure I could put up with that accent for very long. Grates a bit. All the little Liver birds are coming down here as well, are they, now their Liverpool bands are making it big? Anyway, I told her. We don't get involved in that sort of stuff, bloody landlords and bloody tenants. It sounded to me like a bloke called Stuttering Stan. He used to work for Rachman but it sounds as if he's found another boss. But it goes on all the time. If we bothered with it we'd be doing nothing else.'

‘Even if it comes down to GBH?'

‘Is that what she told you?' Lamb asked sceptically.

Barnard nodded.

‘Nah, no one ever gets seriously hurt,' Lamb said. ‘They'd rather move out when it comes to turds through the letter box. Know what I mean? And it's surprising how a big hairy dog can put the fear of God into people. Probably a bloody poodle at heart, just like you.' He laughed before a loud groan from the crowd around them turned their attention back to the pitch, where the opposition had nearly scored, though Barnard reckoned he had heard enough anyway. It was obvious Kate and her friends were going to get no help from the law in Notting Hill. The sooner they got out of the reach of landlords like the late Peter Rachman, the better.

K
ate gazed at her very limited wardrobe which was crammed into Tess and Marie's sparse hanging space and wondered what she should wear for a tour of the clubs and pubs of Notting Hill. Her one posh dress from Bon Marche that she had saved up for for months before she left home looked over the top for the neighbourhood, but if what Harry Barnard, ‘Flash' to his mates by all accounts, said was true her stock of more everyday clothes looked far too dull for the clubs which attracted the nobs and their girlfriends from the West End.

‘Tess,' she called plaintively. ‘Can I borrow this blouse of yours? I've got absolutely nothing to wear. I think it will fit me.'

An accommodation reached, and Kate reassured by her friends that she looked fabulous in her own knee-length black skirt, high heels and Tess's ivory silk blouse, she stood at the window looking down to the street until she saw Barnard's car pull in to the pavement. She sighed. She was still not convinced of the wisdom of this outing; it would, she was sure, give the importunate policeman all the wrong ideas, but for her own purposes she wanted to get to know this area of London. She had convinced herself that it would be a good scene to chase the sort of photographs she wanted to take in an area which was slightly chaotic, black and white, rich and poor cheek by jowl, and all the more colourful for that. She still regretted the death of
Picture Post
while she was at school, a world famous documentary magazine which she had dreamed of working for when she was little more than kid. That was where she had imagined herself a star when she had still been a skinny schoolgirl with a box Brownie begged from an uncle. But she still lived in hope that something similar might take its place. Surely television couldn't completely kill off the still picture, she told herself.

‘You look good,' Barnard said almost casually when she came down the steps to the red Capri, her coat over her arm. He held the passenger door open for her and glanced at his watch. ‘Come on,' he said. ‘We'll have a drink first. It's a bit early for the clubs to be in full swing, but we'll work our way round there. A year or so ago this area almost took over from Soho for crime and mayhem and a lot of people who should have known better came slumming round here for kicks. Peter Rachman was in the thick of it, with Mandy Rice-Davies in tow, and most of the rest of them who got mixed up in the Profumo scandal put in an appearance. That's all pretty well over now, but it's still not an area you should wander round on your own. There's enough still going down in Notting Dale to make it a dangerous place, particularly for girls as pretty as you.'

Kate acknowledged that with a faint smile as she got into the car and allowed Barnard to take her coat and fold it onto the back seat neatly before he got into the driving seat and pulled away. This was nice, Kate had to admit to herself. No previous boyfriend – if that's what Barnard was – had offered the luxury of a car. It had been the bus or shank's pony in Liverpool, she recalled ruefully, and that hadn't been much fun in stiletto heels. They drove along streets Kate recognised as far as Portobello Road where Barnard pulled into the kerb and parked before leading her into the lounge bar of the Sun in Splendour, settling her at a table and buying himself a pint and her a gin and tonic.

‘You can't go on drinking Babycham all your life,' he said with a grin. ‘With or without a cherry. Try that.'

She sipped the sparkling drink cautiously and then drank it slowly, getting used to the astringent taste. ‘So who's around this area then if high society's moved on?' she asked.

‘Well, there's the arty types. They still think it's smart to visit what's a bit of a ghetto really. Poets and such aren't averse to smoking marijuana, or even stronger drugs if they can get their hands on them. It's not that different from Soho really; all the crime and vice you can imagine alongside scruffy artists and writers looking for booze and drugs and sex. Only over here the gangsters tend to be black.'

Kate looked at her drink thoughtfully. She had met some of Soho's gangsters earlier in the year and would go a long way to avoid meeting any of them again. ‘Let's have a quick look,' she said. ‘You may be right. I'd be in over my head if I tried to take pictures.'

‘Unless King Devine fancies having his portrait done,' Barnard said. ‘He's vain enough from what I'm told.'

‘King Devine?'

‘I've never heard whether that was the name his mother called him or a title he's given himself. But apparently a king is what he is, effectively, around here. Not much happens in Notting Dale without his say-so.'

‘Let's have a look then,' Kate said, burying her doubts for the moment.

Barnard smiled. ‘You'll be OK with me,' he said. ‘This isn't my patch but I know a few people on the scene. We'll have a look at his club, see what's going down. Come on. We'll get another drink over there.'

They drove slowly down Portobello road and then turned right along Westbourne Grove into an area in which Kate could see West Indian groups predominated, although the women, gathered on street corners, and whom she guessed were prostitutes, were more mixed. And as they drove, further cafes and clubs began to crop up amongst the dilapidated housing. Barnard parked under a street lamp.

‘We'll leave the car here and walk the rest, I think,' he said.

Kate noticed that there were very few cars in the area and Barnard's red Capri coupe stood out like an exotic flower in the desert. The sergeant glanced around and spotted a group of teenaged boys loitering in the corner of the street.

‘There's half a crown for each of you if my motor's safe when I come back,' he said.

The gangly black youth who seemed to assume control grinned and pushed his jaunty trilby back. ‘You got a deal, man,' he said, and took up a dramatic posture by the bonnet.

‘Will they really take care of it?' Kate asked as they walked away.

‘Ten bob between them? It should be enough,' Barnard said. ‘It's all a question of supply and demand. And I'd be surprised if any of them actually knew how to drive.'

The two of them threaded their way through busy streets until eventually Barnard stopped outside a narrow door between a couple of shuttered shops. He knocked and it was opened by a tall, burly and distinctly unfriendly black man who looked the two of them up and down inquiringly.

‘We were recommended to come by  . . .' He beckoned the man closer and whispered something in his ear.

‘She don' come here any more,' the doorman said, looking unimpressed.

‘No, but the King isn't going to turn her friends away, is he? She might want to come back. And I'm told she was a very close friend once upon a time.'

‘You better go an' pay your respects,' the doorman said grudgingly, standing aside to let them through the door. ‘Don' forget now. The King like to know who in his place.'

Inside, the club was hot and smoky with a slightly fragrant overtone which Kate did not recognise. Barnard pushed his way to the bar with Kate close behind, through a noisy crowd of more or less equal numbers of black and white clients, and bought them both a drink. The tables close to the wall were all full but a few couples had found room to dance at the far side of the room to loud music with a rapid beat that was not quite like anything Kate had heard before. It had little in common with the Mersey beat, she thought, and she had no doubt which she preferred.

Barnard did a quick scan of the room and caught sight of a tall, slim black man in a very expensive suit, a silk tie and a trilby at a rakish angle above eyes which for a couple of seconds met his own with a look of interrogation. Barnard appreciated the ensemble, which he knew he could never afford, even with the help of his reluctant clients in Soho, but he also took on board the two equally tall, and not quite as well dressed and much more massive men who flanked the man he was sure was King Devine. He was not the least surprised when one of them barrelled his way through the crowd towards them, anyone who saw him coming moving smartly out of his way. He had no doubt that if the man in the corner was indeed Devine, he had been too slow in paying his respects. He had absolutely no reason to suppose that anyone here could identify him as a copper, but he whispered Kate a warning all the same.

‘I work with you, sweetie,' he said. ‘If anyone should ask.'

The heavyweight minder placed himself squarely in front of Barnard. But his message was not quite what Barnard had expected, and it filled him instantly with unease.

‘The King would like to meet your friend,' the minder said, leaving not the remotest possibility of dissent.

Kate glanced at Barnard quickly. She did not like this turn of events and she could see that Barnard was uneasy, but he shrugged and gave her a slightly strained but encouraging smile.

‘We'd better say good evening to the boss man,' he said, and they both followed Devine's minder through the crowd to the corner of the room where he waved an imperious hand to clear a table of the people sitting there and gestured them into the quickly vacated chairs before sprawling himself down opposite them.

‘You didn't introduce me to this pretty young thing,' he said to Barnard, his voice silky with quiet menace. ‘I like to meet all the pretty young things who come to my clubs.'

Barnard shrugged. ‘We were heading in this direction,' he said.

‘You told my doorman that you knew Mandy,' Devine went on. ‘How do you know her?'

‘Only through a friend of a friend,' Barnard said. ‘I just thought her name would get us in, to be honest. I knew she used to come here.'

‘Mandy used to come to a lot of places in Notting Hill,' Devine said. ‘So why are you really here? Is it for the cops?'

‘No, no, we wanted to ask you if we could take photographs in the club,' Barnard said. ‘We're both photographers  . . .'

‘Looking for famous people?' Devine laughed although there was not much humour in it.

‘Famous people, sexy people, all that sort of thing,' Barnard went on enthusiastically.

‘Or spying on them? People who don' want their pictures took?'

‘No,' Kate said quickly, pulling her camera out of her bag. ‘Look, I've got my camera with me. I could take a shot of you right now.'

Devine gazed at her precious Voigtlander as if he had never seen a camera before, and smiled faintly. ‘Well,' he said. ‘Maybe that would be nice.' He swung round in his chair to face his minders. ‘Could we entertain our pretty little photographer tomorrow, Charlie? What do you think?'

The minder grinned. ‘Sure, boss. Why not?'

‘Does that suit you, my dear? Meet me here tomorrow afternoon? About three? And I think we can do without your friend, don't you?' Devine smiled again, but it had all the reassurance in it of a crocodile eyeing up an unwary swimmer's leg.

Kate felt her mouth dry. She suddenly wanted to get out of this place, but there was one thing she wanted to ask Devine now she had got this far. ‘I met Nelson Mackintosh yesterday at his cafe,' she said. ‘And now I hear he's been arrested. I'm told you have a lot of influence round here. Could you help him get out of jail?'

Devine's face suddenly darkened and Barnard drew a sharp breath.

‘I think maybe you best take your little friend home now,' Devine snarled at Barnard. ‘She don' know what she is into with her picture takin'.'