Human Conditioning (39 page)

“I’ll take you some day,”
Frankie continued as they turned right onto a remote single-lane road cutting
through a vast field of crops, which expanded across the whole of their eye
line and into the horizon. Frankie glanced at Aiden. “So, what do you think?”

“Sorry, what?”

“Italy... I’ll take you there
someday...”

“Yeah, yeah, why not. I think
Lily has already been...” he answered absent-mindedly. He hadn’t been listening
to a word Frankie had said for the past half an hour or so.

Frankie concentrated on the
road, and, to Aiden’s relief, the chatter ended there. A couple of minutes
later, Frankie steered to the left and cut off the engine. “We can’t drive in
any further. We’ll have to walk.”

Aiden stared out of the
windscreen. There was a narrow mud track ahead, which, he assumed, led to
Frankie’s factory. He turned to Frankie and announced, “I’m wearing Armani
boots!” He was not amused. In fact, he looked positively horror-stricken.

Frankie smirked, wound an arm behind
his seat, and pulled out two plastic shopping bags. “Here...”

Aiden stared down at the bags.
“You are fucking kidding me? You make millions a month, and you want me to put
fucking shopping bags on me feet?”

Rolling his eyes, Frankie threw
the bags on Aiden’s lap and got out of the van. Slamming the door shut, he
started heading up the track. Aiden pursed his lips and fought down his natural
desire to argue. He would get himself some of those Caterpillar boots Frankie
was wearing for his subsequent visits, and he’d have to start wearing jeans
again. The thought was an unsavoury one. He loved his suits.

He threw the bags on the
driver’s seat, got out of the van and followed Frankie up the lane, stepping
awkwardly over the pot holes and puddles. When he caught up with him, he saw
Frankie glance down at his feet and subtly smirk when he noticed there were no
bags attached to them.

Coming to the end of the short
track, they approached an iron gate and Aiden acknowledged that they were on a
farm. Before them stood an enormous shed of approximately 100 feet in length
and 30 feet in width, with a steel roof and wooden slats over all the windows.
A chicken shed. It was weather-beaten but stable, and had obviously been out of
use for legal trade for quite a while.

Frankie pushed open the gate
and finally they were on concrete ground. Heading up the pathway to the right
side of the building, Frankie halted at a wooden door at the far end. He
knocked twice and announced his presence. Within seconds the door was opened.

“Alright, Ewan? I’ve brought
along our new supplies manager.”

Ewan Grady was middle-aged,
small and stocky. He had round grey eyes, a shaved head and was casually
dressed in faded jeans and a David Bowie t-shirt. “Ewan, this is Aiden. Aiden,
this is our production manager, Ewan. You don’t need to worry too much about
what he does. Just make sure that what is produced here makes delivery and its
revenue makes it back to the safe houses.”

Ewan held out a large hand for
Aiden, which Aiden took and shook firmly. Ewan was surveying him with immediate
mistrust, but Aiden didn’t take offence. He would do the same to anyone walking
off the street into an operation as big as this. Frankie, however, was vexed by
his colleague’s aloofness, and turning to Aiden, he said, “Why don’t you step
inside and take a look around?”

Aiden understood this to be
his cue to leave the two alone, and he did just that. He glanced back to see
Frankie taking Ewan aside and it looked as though Ewan was receiving a piece of
Frankie’s mind.

Aiden stepped further into the
factory. The floor was made of cement, the walls wooden and no lighting, just
large lamps placed near the different pieces of machinery strewn around the
vast space of the shed. The smell of chemicals and dampness filled his nostrils.
Only four other men were present inside and, after a glance in his direction,
they got on with their work, unperturbed by his presence.

He walked all the way to the
far end of the factory. There was a small office in the left corner, and along
the wall to the right of the office was a long plastering table. Upon it sat
eight individual cellophane-wrapped blocks of cocaine – which he estimated to
be at least two kilos per package – along with numerous pairs of rubber gloves,
several small knives, a couple of mixing bowls and two sets of electronic scales.
As he walked aside the table, he noticed a large drum at the end filled with
what he assumed was more cocaine.

“Benzocaine,” a voice grumbled
from behind him. There was the twinge of an accent there – maybe Welsh – but a
single word was not enough for Aiden to be sure. He turned to see that it was
Ewan.

“I’ve heard of it. It’s a
painkiller, isn’t it?” Aiden replied.

Ewan stood to his side. “Yeah,
it’s mostly used as a dental anaesthetic. We call it ‘magic’.”

Aiden added, “It’s your
mixer...”                 

“Yeah... the cocaine comes to
us about 60% pure. Those in the chain before us reduce it down from its 90%
purity after import. When we’re done with it, it leaves here at about 2%...
Benzocaine’s cheap. We can get it for about £5 a kilo.” He paused then turned,
gesturing to a machine in the far corner. “This over here is a metal press.” He
walked over to the machine and Aiden followed. “We use this to compact the cut
coke into blocks ready for sale. Once that happens, it’s ready for you to hand over
for delivery. You’ll need to count the amounts and log it in here.” He pulled
out an A4-sized book from a drawer next to the machine and handed it to Aiden.
Aiden opened it. It contained a hand-drawn table on each page with columns for
a date, time, deliverer name, delivery location and amount in kilos and net
cost. Aiden closed the book and handed it back to Ewan.

“It seems pretty self-explanatory,”
he said.

Just then Frankie walked over,
a wide grin on his face, his dark, crow-like eyes twinkling with excitement.
Holding out his arms, he gestured around the building. “So, what do you think?”

“Well, I’ve only seen half of
it, but it looks pretty impressive,” Aiden replied. “So, where do you produce
the pills?”

Frankie and Aiden left the factory two hours after their
arrival. They had talked through the whats, whys, wheres and who's in Frankie’s
office, then Frankie had offered Aiden some of the cocaine that was yet to be
cut. Now, the journey home didn’t feel as odious as the journey there. The cocaine
was good – the best Aiden had ever had. Even Reggie would have agreed on that
front.

“Why did you hesitate... when
I offered you a line?” Frankie asked out of the silence.

Ironically, it seemed that cocaine
curbed Frankie’s obsession to fill every silent moment with a story of his
past. They had been in the car for thirty minutes and he’d hardly said a word
until now.

“The wife,” Aiden replied,
smiling wryly.

Frankie nodded. “She’d
object?”

“I’ve been trying to cut down
since we got married.”

“I see... how d’you keep it
all from her, your businesses and that? I could never hold down any
relationship myself.”

Aiden shrugged. “She thinks
I’m in investments. Why would she suspect anything else? She wouldn’t have the
first clue about anything illicit, which is iro
nic
considering both her parents are Old Bill...” Frankie shot him a look of concern.
“Don’t worry, Frankie. I’ve been in the game for a while. I know how to be
discreet...”

Aiden grinned and Frankie
cleared his throat. “What’s she like, your missus?”

“A beauty, pure and angelic to
the core,” Aiden replied unequivocally.

“A beauty, eh?”

“One hundred percent.”

Frankie nodded and the
conversation ended there.

After days of doggedly asking around the estates nearby
Aiden’s old flat about whether anyone knew where Gina Watson lived, Lily had
finally got her answer from a girl of about fifteen whose mother knew a girl
who claimed to be an acquaintance of Gina’s. The young girl hadn’t been very
forthcoming, but she had at least given Lily the address of a flat on the
Kingsland estate. The tower block where Gina’s flat was located looked like a
new build. The exterior, built in light orange brick, was quite welcoming
compared to the older grey-stone flats that surrounded the block.

Lily banged her fist against
the front door with such conviction that she thought it might not last much
longer on its hinges. “Gina, open this door!” she yelled, her free hand cupping
her swollen stomach. 

No one replied. She pounded again, then peered through
the front window. The inside was shielded by a net curtain that she would
associate with a granny flat, but through the netting she could discern the
outline of a cooker and a sink. She squinted to focus and saw that the sink was
filled with dirty crockery. She stepped away and pounded once more on the door.

An old lady had been watching
the commotion from the stairwell. She approached the heavily pregnant woman she
had been scrutinising and announced, “I doubt you’ll get her up at this time in
the morning, love. She’ll be sleeping off the night before...”

“Heavy night, was it?” Lily
murmured.

“Heavy night every night, if
you know what I mean...”

“No, I don’t know what you
mean...” she muttered, as if to herself. She was in no mood to make small talk
with strangers. Then with a change of mind she added on a bellow, as loudly as
her naturally soft voice would allow, as she looked up at the first-floor
window she hoped was Gina’s bedroom, “Unless you mean she’s an alcoholic
scumbag
with nothing better to do than to ruin my life
!”

Despite Lily’s disinclination
to talk, the old lady continued, “It’s somewhat of a nightmare having a bunch
of toms living opposite you. All those men in and out during the day and night.
It can get a little boisterous to say the least...”

Lily turned to the old lady
and stared at her blankly “What do you mean, men in and out?”

The lady absorbed the
perplexed expression on her face and gulped hard. “Oh... I’m sorry. Have I
spoken out of turn? I thought maybe you were visiting...” She made a gesture
that suggested that her use of the word ‘visiting’ had some hidden meaning.

Lily’s eyes glazed over as
they despondently searched the old lady’s face then she turned and silently
searched her surroundings; Gina’s door, her first floor window, then across the
balustrade to the landscape of high-rise flats that surrounded her, as if she
were attempting to find the answer to an unspoken question. Her attention was
captured by a young woman stepping out of a flat several doors down, dressed in
a black satin dressing gown. She lit up a cigarette then stepped aside as a
man, twice her age, stepped out beside her. He gave her a dispassionate peck on
the cheek and Lily watched with sinking realisation as the girl recoiled and
sucked on her cigarette with conviction as the man strode away from her,
tucking his shirt into his trousers as he took the stairs.

Lily turned back to the old
lady before her. She too had watched the encounter and she was now smiling at
her with sympathy as she realised she had only just grasped the truth of where
she had come. “Are you telling me that Gina is... a prostitute?” Lily
whispered. 

“If Gina is the poor soul who
lives in this flat, then, I’m sorry, but yes. I didn’t realise you didn’t
know,” the old lady added, her wrinkled cheeks blushing as she then stuttered,
“I thought maybe you were early, thought maybe she batted for the other side as
well, like...” Lily’s hand went to her mouth. “My God, how... how did this
happen?”

The old lady shook her head
slowly. “It can happen to the best of them, love, especially round here.” Her
voice suddenly dropped a few decibels, as if it had suddenly dawned on her that
someone might be listening in on their conversation. She went on in a husky
whisper, “They get fooled, you see, by the men who lure them in with their
charm, their promise of money, and usually drugs, I’m afraid. They get them
fast with the drugs. It only takes a few weeks to get a girl hooked before
they’re dependent on it. That’s what’s happened to my Vicky. That’s my
granddaughter. She’s been given a flat a few doors down. It’s got bad round
here. The
pimp
,” she whispered this word even quieter, as if frightened
the use of the word would trigger an ambush, “he’s using this block to house
the working girls. My granddaughter...”

The old lady tailed off as
tears began to fall down Lily’s cheeks. Lily didn’t want to hear any more. She
wanted to leave, get away from this place. It made her skin crawl. “Thank you,”
she said politely. She began to walk away, then turned back. “Um, have you seen
him?” she asked, calling on her natural ‘do-gooder’ instinct. If she got a
description of the man responsible for this appalling crime, she would tell her
parents.

The old lady shook her head.
“It’s difficult to distinguish between all the men that visit...” she replied,
anxiously peering around her. Then she added in a quieter voice still, licking
her wrinkled lips as though she was now enjoying the tittle-tattle, “At a
guess, I would say it was the suited man that turns up every couple of weeks,
Vicky won’t confirm my suspicion though...”

“And you’ve not thought to
report him?” Lily interrupted.

The old lady smiled briefly.
“Even if I knew for definite, it would be more than my granddaughter’s life’s
worth reporting someone like that, and I mean that literally. These people are
nasty pieces of work. People like me, who have someone to look after... well,
we just can’t get involved.”

Lily was outraged. She had
never heard anything like it in her life. How could anyone sit back and allow
such evil to go on right under their noses? Straightening her back, she
demanded, “What does he look like?”