In spite of the drizzle I stuck at the work long enough to wash the number plates, clean dead gnats off the windscreen and polish the headlamps. I was about to go back inside when I heard a car turn into the drive. Lanthorn went down the steps to meet it. He had obviously been waiting, and I was curious, so unfolded the leather and began wiping the side windows.
The Mini-van, recognisable at once by its coat of arms, came to a halt. The wipers stopped, and Eric Alport got out.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ Lanthorn called. ‘You should have got here last night.’
Alport began filing his nails. ‘The ship was late.’
‘Like hell it was. You got caught up in some pansy boozer by the docks. I’m flaming well fed up with it!’
I’d never seen such contempt on a man’s face as came across Alport’s. He would have stayed silent all day, rain or not, if Lanthorn hadn’t asked: ‘Did you get it, then?’
He took his time, while picking a crow out of his nose. ‘It’s in the back — you pratt.’
Lanthorn’s face was only saved from bursting by shouting: ‘I’ll fucking nail you one day, lad.’
‘If you do, it’ll be your coffin lid that’s going down.’
Lanthorn pulled at the handles as if he’d break them off. ‘Where are the keys?’
They flew through the air. He missed. Alport went on at his filing. It was a wonder he had any nails left. They must have been the pride of whatever club he belonged to. Lanthorn picked up the keys with eyes glittering, and opened the back of the Mini. He put his hands in and touched lovingly whatever was there. ‘Matthew!’ he shouted. ‘Cullen! Come and give a hand.’
I walked around the Rolls a couple of times before getting there. Matthew carried what looked like a five-pound box of tea, a neat wooden package, well battened on all sides. I took one, and so did Lanthorn, but Alport didn’t deign to work. He asked if there was any breakfast in that house of iniquity, because he was starving. I said there probably was, at which he put his nail file into its little leather sheath, buttoned his Carnaby Street Mao-style sugarbag jacket that must have cost every bit of fifty pounds, and went inside.
The Mini-van was stacked to the gunwales with boxes which I supposed they had wheeled off the ship on a fork-lift truck. When this lot got loose on the streets of Britain everybody would be flying till the end of the century. They were flying already, but this would take the lid off their heads as well. In my time as a criminal we had smuggled gold, which seemed so harmless it was impossible to feel guilty, but now it seemed the gold was of a different sort and much more valuable, weight for weight. Instead of getting at the government’s pocket, it got at the people’s minds by rotting them through and through, which would only end by making it easier for the Moggerhangers of the world to gain more and more power.
I didn’t fancy making a career in that kind of trade and considered giving notice at the earliest opportunity, though I realised that the best way to do it — so stupidly had I fallen into it up to my neck — would be to send a telegram of resignation from a remote island in the South Pacific. Even then there would be no guarantee that the long arm of Moggerhanger or Lanthorn wouldn’t reach me. Strolling out of my palm-thatched hut to smoke an early morning cigar, a giant coconut would fall from a tree and squash me flat. The only way I could get free of such a job was by bringing the whole organisation crumbling down, and in that respect at least I knew that Matthew Coppice was right.
Sixteen
When I got back to Town I called on Blaskin, and found to my amazement that he was playing chess with Bill Straw. Dismal snapped at my collar and tie with affection. ‘I’d forgotten you could play chess.’
Blaskin poured us all a glass of wine. ‘He’s damned good at it. He beat me twice yesterday.’
Bill grinned. ‘I learned when I was in jail.’
‘He’s a boon,’ Blaskin said. ‘And I’m in despair, so it takes my mind off things.’
‘I thought you never got depressed.’
He made a move. ‘Don’t be insulting. My commitments are numerous and onerous. I have to show Moggerhanger a first draft of his life story in three months. I’ve also promised to deliver a Sidney Blood story to Pulp Books in a month’s time.’
I spluttered into my wine. ‘You’re Sidney Blood?’
A troubled grin exposed his long yellow teeth. ‘What an idiot you are. There must be twenty writers churning out a Pulp Book by Sidney Blood now and again. It pays my club subscriptions for one thing. It’s a bit of a challenge, for another. And then, I enjoy rattling off all that violence and obscenity. What’s more, to continue my litany of woe, I’ve also promised my ordinary publisher a new novel in a fortnight that he can bring out in the autumn, and apart from the fact that I want to give it to a publisher who’s promised me twice as much money, I tore up the first page this morning because it was no good, so don’t have anything to give anybody. I also have to write a lecture on the future of the modern novel before tomorrow. With so much work to do I can’t lift a finger.’
Bill gave his usual hee-haw laugh and made another move on the chessboard. ‘You’re up the creek with a hole in the boat and no paddle, and a three-hundred foot waterfall in the offing.’
Blaskin clutched the kind of head that should never have been without a hat. He was obviously not feeling well. Ever since the revelation that he was my father it had been hard to think of him as such. At twenty-five years of age, when the news broke, I no longer needed a father. Before then, he’d have been a bloody pest. Maybe if he and my mother had managed to live a normal life when they finally got married our connection would have been more convincing, but the last thing we knew she had gone on a bus to join a lesbian commune in Turkey. At least Blaskin said, and if so, who could blame her — the way he had treated her after the first weeks of their reunion had worn off? Not that she had given him much peace, either.
Blaskin resembled a mad uncle more than anything, meaning he was more likable than if he had been my father, because whereas a father might have cast me off when I got into trouble with the police, Blaskin had generously stood by and given some help.
‘If you listen to me,’ I said, ‘your troubles are over, the present ones, anyway. I’ll spill what I know about Moggerhanger onto a tape recorder, so that all you’ve got to do is get it typed. That’ll give you a nice wad to show him, and he won’t mind as long as you hand something over.’
‘He’s already had a fat packet of stuff from me,’ Bill said.
‘That’s good, then. And as for the novel by Sidney Blood, you can write that, Billy. Read a couple, and you’ll soon spew it out. The typist can correct your bad grammar.’
Bill poured more drinks. ‘I’ve read scores already. They’re on every airport bookstall I’ve been through, as well as in pirated editions all over India. I’m game for having a go at writing one. It’ll pay Major Blaskin back for his wonderful hospitality.’
Gilbert threaded his fingers together and smiled. ‘Acting Major, please.’
I stood up. ‘And so Gilbert can get on with his lecture, which he can finish by tonight.’
‘You mean I have to get to work right away?’ he wailed.
That was all the thanks and appreciation I got for my ingenuity. ‘I read in last week’s Guardian that the best medicine for a difficult menopause is work. In any case, if you don’t want to give your new novel to the present publisher — a novel that you haven’t yet written, I might add — why don’t you write a shit novel in a week and let them have that one to turn down? Then you’re free, and you can write a proper one for your new publisher.’