Jack Carter's Law (25 page)

“Hang on a minute, Jack,” Peter says from behind me. “Don’t you think we ought to have a chat before we do anything we can’t go back on?”

I turn round and look at Peter. He’s still lounging in the chair by the door but now he’s got his shooter resting in his lap. He’s holding it, and although he’s extremely careful that it shouldn’t be pointing directly in my direction, it wouldn’t take much if the situation made that eventuality necessary.

“I mean,” Peter says, “it bears thinking about, doesn’t it?”

“Oh yes?” I say.

“Well, look at it this way,” he says. “What’s the point in plowing on against all the odds? If what Eddie says is right, Hume has got it all sewn up. There’s no going back. Gerald and Les are finished.”

I don’t say anything.

From behind me Eddie says, “That’s right. They’re finished. They can’t come back now.”

I turn to face Eddie. He’s standing there with his face all lit up, thinking he can see a way out of his situation.

“Get your coat, Eddie,” I tell him.

Eddie looks at Peter and I follow his glance.

Peter says, “We could do a deal with Hume. We could tell him where to get at Gerald and Les and make the takeover nice and smooth in return for being left out of it and carrying on as we are.”

“That’s right,” Eddie says. “Wally’s always wanted you on the firm, Jack. It’d work out perfect.”

“And you could still get the finance for your tickle,” I say to Peter.

“Spot on,” he says. “You got it in one.”

“Except that if we were to do what you’ve just said we’d both be on twenty-fives whatever this chancer’s trying to tell us.”

“You wouldn’t,” Eddie says. “I guarantee it. I can phone Hume and do a deal right now.”

“Do you believe what Eddie says?” I ask Peter. Peter shrugs.

“What’s the alternative?” he says. “We’re on a definite loser the other way.”

“And what if I say I’m going to play this the way I set out to play it?”

Peter looks me in the face and is quite motionless. This is where he has to decide what to do and until he’s done that he is very careful not to do anything which will cause me to react. He looks beyond me at Eddie and then back to me and he’s just about to speak when there is a slight movement behind me and I whirl round just in time to see Eddie disappearing round the corner of the L-shaped room, the part that leads to the kitchenette. I rush after him but there is a lot of furniture in the way and before I’m at the corner of the L the kitchenette door has slammed. Peter is already on his feet and I shout at him to open the door behind the chair he was sitting in and get into the hall. I make it to the kitchenette door and yank it open but of course Eddie is no longer in the kitchenette because through its other door, the one that leads into the hall, I can see Eddie scrambling at the lock handle of the outside door. I hurry across the kitchenette but I’m never going to make it because now Eddie has got the outside door open and the only thing that’s going to stop him is Peter but the outside door slams as Peter appears in the hall. I get into the hall a second after Peter and already he’s twisting the lock handle. He’s gripping his shooter in his free hand.

“Whatever you do, you cunt, don’t shoot,” I tell him as I follow him through the door. We turn left but there’s no sign of Eddie; he’s already legging it down the stairs. We rush along the landing and Peter calls Eddie’s name as we go, as if that’s going to make him stop for a moment’s reflection. I make it to the top of the stairs first and start going down them two at a time but when I get to the second landing I’m still no closer to Eddie because he’s already out of sight and on the second flight of stairs but when I get to the top of them I stop short when I see what’s on the third step down: one of Eddie’s tartan slippers is lying there, sole upwards, and I look beyond the slipper to the foot of the stone staircase and see the still figure of Eddie lying there, arms outstretched, face down, his head at a completely wrong angle to the rest of his body. He’d tripped and broken his neck.

Peter pulls up sharp too and we both stand there at the top of the stairs looking down at Eddie’s body. Then I turn to Peter and take hold of him by his neck and with all the angry force in my body I push him backwards until the balcony wall stops us going any farther. The shooter slips out of Peter’s fingers and with both hands he tries to loosen my grip on his neck but there’s no way he’s going to be able to manage that. I keep pressing until he’s leaning out over the empty courtyard and with my free hand I hit him several times across the face.

“I should let you drop,” I tell him. “I should let you drop right now.”

I hit him again and step back and then I pick up his shooter and point it at him.

“Or shall I shoot your fucking kneecaps off? Shall I do that instead?”

Peter pushes himself away from the balcony wall and looks at me the way Eddie had looked at me when I’d first walked into his living room.

“Jack . . . ” he says.

“Shut it,” I tell him. “Another word and I’ll do it.”

Then I put his shooter in my pocket and turn away from him and begin to walk down the stairs, picking up Eddie’s slipper on the way. When I get to Eddie, I bend over him and turn him face upwards but there are no miracles for Eddie this Christmas. His dead eyes reflect the naked light bulb in the stairwell’s ceiling.

Peter makes his way down to the bottom of the steps and leans against the wall, supporting himself on the handrail. I look up at him.

“All right, you fucking egg,” I tell him. “Get hold of the legs.”

I put the slipper back on Eddie’s foot and then I take hold of him underneath his armpits and look up at Peter again and he moves and gets hold of the legs and as we lift, some change slips out of Eddie’s trouser pocket and the coins make a tinkling sound as they hit the stone floor.

We get Eddie to the bottom of the stairs that open into the courtyard. The snow is still falling and the courtyard is still empty. We carry Eddie away from the light on the staircase and into the shadow of the balcony above and then we put Eddie down.

“Right,” I say to Peter. “Now you go and fetch the car and back it in the courtyard entrance and open up the boot. I know you’re going to do exactly that because you don’t want to wake up every night for the rest of your life wondering if tonight’s the night I’m going to appear at the end of your bedstead. Do you?”

I hand him the car keys. He doesn’t answer. He looks at me for a moment and turns away and hurries across to the courtyard entrance and disappears round the corner. Then I take hold of Eddie again and under cover of the balcony I drag him round to the arch and wait for Peter. I look at my watch and decide to give him two minutes. If he’s not back by then the only thing I can do is leave Eddie where he is and take one of the few remaining chances I have left.

But within the allowed time there is the sound of the car backing into the archway. I grab Eddie again and start pulling him through the snow and I hear Peter get out of the car and unlock the boot and by that time I have got Eddie to the rear of the car. Peter takes Eddie’s legs again and we lift Eddie into the boot and close the lid. Then I tell Peter to drive the car back to where it was before and wait and I go back up to Eddie’s flat and put the furniture back the way it was and get rid of the cigarette ends and then I pick up the address book that Eddie had been writing in and slip it in my pocket. After I’ve done that I put the flat black case on the settee and flip the catches and open the lid and my eyes are greeted with the beautifully symmetrical pattern of ranks of wads of nice crisp notes. At a quick guess I would say there is twenty thousand worth at least. I look into the case for a moment or two and then I get up and find Eddie’s bedroom and slide open one of the doors on the built-in wardrobe. I take out one of Eddie’s overcoats and a pair of his shoes and as I’m doing that I notice that on the top shelf there is a stack of brightly wrapped Christmas presents out of sight and of reach, all ready for Eddie to deliver to wherever his wife and kids are spending Christmas.

I shut up the wardrobe and then I switch out all the lights and close all the doors and go out of the flat.

When I get back to where Peter is I throw the coat and the shoes in the back seat and tell him to drive to a place I know beyond Liverpool Street. Peter does as he’s told and sets off without saying anything. His face looks even pastier under the sodium streetlighting and his mouth is set in a light thin line and it’s not because he’s been affected by Eddie’s death because normally he’d be making the most of the funny side of it. I sit there in silence myself and let him sweat for a while.

The place I’m thinking of is about half a mile off Liverpool Street itself. This place used to be a block of insurance offices and for the last few weeks it’s been in the process of being demolished. I passed by it a few days ago and its cellars and their interlocking passages are now wide open to the weather. It takes us about quarter of an hour to get there and when we arrive I tell Peter to drive down a side street that would have been boundaried by one of the walls of the demolished building. We park at the far corner of the site away from any lights, and I tell Peter to wait in the car while I go and take a look around. I walk onto the site and over to the edge of one of the sunken corridors and drop down into it. Now I’m out of sight and I take out my key ring and play the small torch along the corridor until I come to a pile of plastic rubble sacks lying on the floor next to a narrow cupboard set in a tiled wall. I climb out of the corridor and go back to the car and tell Peter to get out and open up the boot and we carry Eddie back to the corridor and I get down in it and Peter lowers Eddie down onto my shoulders and I carry him to where the cupboard is and tug one of the plastic sacks over his feet and legs and one over his head and his torso and prop him up in the cupboard and close the door on him. Unless they decide to take out the cupboard in the morning he’ll be safe there till after Christmas.

I climb out of the corridor. Peter is still standing on the edge and he waits for me to walk past him and falls into step behind me.

When we get back to the car I get in the driving seat and Peter gets in the other side and when he’s closed the door I say to him, “The only reason you’re not propped up next to Eddie is because I couldn’t carry the two of you on my own.” He takes out one of his cheroots and tries to find his lighter.

“So you know what you’re doing for Christmas, don’t you?” I say to him.

He manages to light his cheroot but it takes him two or three goes. He blows the smoke out. “I was right,” he says. “You know I was only talking sense back there.”

“Yes and look where your sense got us.”

He’s quiet for a while.

“So what now?” he says at last.

“You’re the one with all the bright ideas,” I tell him. “I was hoping you’d tell me.”

--

Mallory

B
ACK AT
L
ESLEY’S FLAT
. Con stands there open-mouthed while I tell him what happened when we went to see Eddie. When I’ve finished he looks at Peter.

“What’s he doing still standing up?” he says. “Or have you saved him as your Christmas present from you to me?”

“That depends. I might decide to keep him myself. You know how it is with Christmas presents.”

Con is still looking at Peter and Peter is avoiding that look by standing at the dresser and making himself a drink.

“So what the fuck do we do now?” Con says. “Go and ask Hume where Jimmy is? Seeing as it’s Christmas, like. Because that’s the only fucker left.”

I take Eddie’s address book out of my pocket and look through the addresses but nothing tells me anything I don’t already know so finally I open it at the page headed A
PPOINTMENTS
. Nice and neat, Eddie was, I think to myself, as I look down the entries written in small, boyish best-book handwriting. Must have got good marks from his teacher. But nothing could have warmed the cockles of his teacher’s heart more than the last entry in the right-hand column. All it says is M
.
W
ATERLOO
. And as I look at the initial and the word I remember the book open on the windowsill and some of the things that Eddie said while we were waiting for him to come off the phone, and in particular that yes, he’d be there at seven-thirty, no trouble, and yes, he’d bring it along. I close the book and think of the initial M. and look at the shiny black case lying like a square black
diamond on top of the glass table. Then I get up and pour myself a drink and look at the case again.