When the shots of the Crescent Hotel were shown Charlie’s blood turned to ice. Marty Morris had been sent to Mrs Pattinson in Charlie’s place, and now he was dead.
‘That should have been me,’ Charlie muttered to himself.
He felt slightly sick. Charlie did not often consider the grim realities of his trade. He had it all worked out in his head. He never thought about the dangers, so many different sorts of dangers, which would be so obvious to almost anyone else. Prostitutes were more likely to be the victims of violent crime than any other sector of the community. But Charlie did not think of himself as a prostitute. He regarded himself as a professional, just like any other. And he was a man. He was fit and strong. He could handle himself. In almost ten years on the game now, Charlie had never been hurt once. There’d been that weirdo at the Portway Towers Hotel who’d been heavily into S and M. That wasn’t Charlie’s game. No way! When he’d found out what he was being required to indulge in he’d headed straight for the door. The mark had turned nasty. There’d been a struggle, but Charlie had coped easily. He wasn’t sure, but at the time he thought he’d broken the mark’s arm. No problem. Charlie had no crisis of conscience about that. It was however, the last time he’d been with a man. He was getting established by then, had a good clientele, didn’t need the gay trade any more. So he’d told Paolo there’d be no more of that for him.
Paolo. That was it. He must call Paolo, find out what was going on.
‘Don’t panic,’ said Paolo in his broad Bristol drawl. ‘Looks like we’ve got a nutter out there. But young Marty was never careful. It’ll all be sorted...’
Charlie’s brain, however, was starting to function again.
‘Paolo, Mrs Pattinson called you and she asked for me,’ he said as calmly as he could. ‘Not just any lad, and certainly not Marty.’
Chillingly it occurred to him that the murderer could actually have mistaken Marty for himself. After all, it should have been him walking through those gardens. And he knew what the grounds of that place were like after dark. The lighting was worse than useless. Marty was black and more or less the same size as Charlie.
‘I reckon the whole thing was a set-up,’ Charlie blurted out, his voice trembling a little.
‘Naw,’ said Paolo. ‘Just a coincidence, mate.’
Charlie could hear the tension as he spoke and knew exactly where Paolo was coming from. He was trying to cover his tracks. Paolo had a good thing going with Avon Escorts. Everybody got their cut, including the tax man, the police had never before been involved — Paolo had a partner who saw to that, Charlie had always been told — and the boys and girls earned good money without the risks and stigma of going on the street. They were also often able to maintain some kind of perfectly respectable front, if they wished, as Charlie had always done. Everybody had been happy. Paolo ran a happy ship. He was another professional. Charlie knew that Paolo would be just as dismayed to hear himself described as a pimp as Charlie would to be described as a male prostitute. But suddenly the facts of his way of life were beginning to penetrate the fragile veil of pretence which Charlie had created.
‘Oh yeah,’ he said. ‘I know those gardens, somebody must have been waiting there for Marty.’
‘What’s the matter with you, Charlie? Marty could have been followed. A nutter, like I told you.’
‘They said on the TV he was killed in the early evening. He must have been on his way to see Mrs Pattinson. Did she call to ask where “her Charlie” was?’
‘No,’ said Paolo.
‘Oh shit!’ said Charlie. ‘I don’t like this. It breaks a habit of a lifetime, but I reckon I should go to the filth.’
‘They’ll eat you alive,’ said Paolo.
‘As long as I am still alive, man!’
Charlie heard Paolo sigh at the other end of the phone. ‘Look they’ve been to see me already. In the middle of the fucking night, as it happens. They already knew who Marty was and that he was one of ours. I don’t know how.’
‘Oh shit!’ said Charlie again. ‘What did you tell ’em?’
‘As much as I had to, and no more.’
‘Did you tell them about Mrs P?’
‘Yep. More than anything else they wanted to know who Marty was going to see.’
‘Well, of course they damn well did. Mrs P’s got to be the number one suspect, hasn’t she? And if it was her, it was me she thought she was topping, not Marty Morris, that’s for certain.’
Charlie could feel rivulets of sweat running down his back. He was frightened and he was also confused. Why on earth would Mrs Pattinson want to harm him? It didn’t add up.
Paolo started to speak again. ‘Look, the filth’ll catch up with her in no time. I wouldn’t get in a state. It could still be a nutter. A one-off. If you go to the police now that’ll be the end of that wonderful double life of yours, mate. Finito. Think about it.’
Charlie knew that Paolo had his own reasons for wanting to keep everything as quiet as possible. When the word got out that one Avon boy had been topped and the Old Bill were running around all over the shop, that would be bad enough. The prospect of it being anything more than a random killing would be even worse. Nonetheless Paolo had come up with the most persuasive argument of all for Charlie to keep quiet.
Charlie thought about the wedding two days earlier and entertaining his family in his beautiful apartment. He could see his mother’s smiling face inside his head, her pride in her youngest son tangible enough to touch. He had to keep what he did a secret. He really did.
‘Oh shit!’ he said for a third time. ‘OK, I’ll stay stum, at least for now, hope it all gets sorted. But I’m taking a holiday, Paolo, starting this minute. I’m not bloody working again until we know what’s going on.’
After hanging up the telephone Charlie hurried to the only window in his flat which was on the street side of Spike Island Court and checked to see if anyone seemed to be watching. All was quiet. And he stepped back from the window feeling vaguely silly. Maybe Paolo was right. Maybe he was over-reacting. Maybe his imagination was running riot. He had always had plenty of imagination. However, Charlie could not help having really bad vibes about everything.
He decided to take no chances. He thought for a moment and then called his mother.
‘How’d you like me to come home to stay for a few days, ma?’ he asked.
‘Now why on earth would my rich son want to leave that fancy new apartment of his to slum it with his old ma?’
He knew his mother was pleased, but there was amusement in her voice too. Already he felt reassured by the familiar sound of her lilting West Indian accent.
Charlie had the lie ready. ‘Fancy it might be, but the whole block has got to be re-wired. There’s been a major cock-up. Building regulations job. They’re coming to do my place tomorrow. The builders have to re-decorate and all that, but it’s going to be mayhem.’
His mother’s lovely warm rolling laugh seemed to make the telephone receiver shake in Charlie’s hand.
‘So, no sooner have they finished building that fine apartment block than they have to knock half of it down and start again, is that what you’re telling me, boy?’
‘Kind of.’ Charlie supposed he’d asked for this. ‘So, if you don’t find the whole thing just too funny, have I got a bed for a few days or not?’
Miriam Collins stopped laughing. ‘Son, do you really have to ask me? As long as I’m living and there’s a roof over my head, it’s your roof too.’