One Fight at a Time (6 page)

One of Roly Bevan’s best builds obviously.

Grover turned the door handle and pushed. The door refused to open. He knew it was not locked. It was hanging out of true and jammed into the door frame space. He leaned his right shoulder against the door and pushed harder. The door opened and swung into the room. A squarish space, fifteen by fifteen, the living area immediately in front of him, at the far end, the tiny kitchen. Grover assumed that the door to the right of the kitchen, led to the bathroom. There were half a dozen pieces of furniture in the room. A single bed, small cabinets on either side of it, one of them with a lamp standing on it. A small dining table and a couple of chairs sat in front of the dormer window. In the centre of the room, a sofa was separated from the bed by a cheap, Formica covered, coffee table.

That was all Grover took in. There was a man asleep on the sofa, lying on his back. Grover stepped closer. The man was not as he imagined the twenty-one year old Harry to be. And he was not asleep. He was dead. His throat cut.

Grover moved closer, careful not to touch, or step on, anything which might record his presence in the room and stared down at the sofa. The man’s hands appeared to be tied behind his back. The wound in his neck was long and gaping open. His blood had leaked all over the place, obviously for some minutes. The cushion his head was resting on, was stained dark red. Bits of skin, forced away from the wound by arterial blood pressure, had stuck to the fabric.

There were few people more experienced in dead bodies then Ed Grover. He stared at the young man for a long time. Then surveyed the room, taking everything in forensically. There was no telephone in the flat. He left the room and went down a floor.

Rachel – the brunette with the glasses – called the police from the coin box phone by the front door and extended temporary hospitality to Grover. The conversation had not gone much beyond names and ‘what was an American was doing in Bristol?’ when a black Wolseley 6/80 pulled into the curb outside Blenheim Villas.

The constable driving the car, PC Walker, stayed behind the wheel.

Detective Chief Inspector Robert Bridge climbed out on to the pavement and inspected the facade of number 5. Had he voiced an opinion, it would have been close to Grover’s assessment. Detective Sergeant Tom Goole, got out of the other side of the Wolseley and claimed the moment.

“Christ... Bevan got this patch-up scheme past the planning people did he?”

He walked around the back of the car and joined his boss on the pavement. Goole was light on his feet and a couple of inches shorter than Bridge. Slim, fair haired, with blue eyes, solid cheek bones and a square jaw. He had been on Bridge’s Serious Crimes Team, since his promotion from DC three years earlier. The SCT was an elite squad, based in the Bridewell at the western end of Broadmead. It was the only historic building still standing in that part of Bristol; somehow the Luftwaffe had missed it.

“Roly Bevan has influence,” Bridge muttered. He opened the gate and walked towards the front door.

Approaching his mid-50s, Bridge was an experienced, hard-nosed copper with a direct approach to the job of catching criminals. And he did so, with some of the best officers culled from the Bristol, Bath, Somerset and Gloucester Constabularies. All of them hand-picked and as tough as they could be moulded. He led them, with an understanding of human nature that had been absorbed through years on Bristol streets. Consequently he never spent a great deal of time puzzling and pondering. On most occasions and in most cases, he simply knew what to do and got on with doing it. And this rubbed off on the whole Serious Crimes Team. Which was just as well, because he expected no less from his subordinates than the one hundred per cent he put in. In return, he allowed this platoon of quick witted coppers to operate with as much freedom as they needed. It had worked well, so far. Bristol was developing a reputation for not having to call in detectives from Scotland Yard to deal with crimes like murder. Although the ACC was always prepared to remind Bridge that his ‘bunch of commandoes’ was constantly under review.

Bridge stood straight and tall. Wider in the shoulders than Goole, with dark hair and dark eyes. He had a scar across the bridge of his nose and over his right eyebrow; the legacy of an encounter with a razor gang when he was young beat bobby, back in the 30s.

Grover answered the doorbell, introduced himself and led the detectives up to the top floor. They paused outside the door to the flat.

“It wasn’t locked,” Grover explained.

“Does it lock?” asked Goole. “It doesn’t fit the frame.”

“It seems Roly Bevan doesn’t spend money, if he can get away without doing so,” Grover said.

Bridge looked at him.

“What do you know about Roly Bevan?”

“Only what I’ve heard.” He looked at his wrist watch. “I’ve been in the city less than two hours.”

“Long enough, it seems, to stumble across a dead body.”

Grover looked into Bridge’s eyes. If the detective only knew how many stumbles there had been.

Bridge led the way into the flat, moved to the sofa and looked down at the man lying on it.

“Who is he?”

“I’ve no idea,” Grover said.

Bridge turned back to him. “So what are you doing here?”

Grover had no desire to get Harry and the Morrisons involved, but the explanation for his presence in the flat had to be the truth. So he gave the two detectives an account of his day since he left Fairford. Ended by saying that his host’s son Harry was a friend of Nick, the tenant of this flat, and he had come to see if Harry was here.

Goole pointed to the dead man.

“Is this him. Nick?”

Grover shrugged.

“Could be. I never met him.”

“And of course, we can check all his with Mrs...” Goole flicked back a couple of pages of his notebook.

Grover helped him out. “Mrs Morrison, yes.”

“How do you know her?” Goole asked.

“I met her on Good Friday 1941. The day of the big raid. A friend of mine staying in Bedminster was killed.”

“What were you doing in England in ’41?”

“I was in the US Eagle Squadron. You can check all of that too.”

Suddenly Goole was embarrassed. The Eagle Squadron had been special. The American soldier they were looking at, had been over here, helping out long before the rest of his countrymen. He stopped asking questions.

Bridge took time to scan the room. He circumnavigated the sofa, all the while, staring down at the carpet. Goole moved across to the door right of the kitchen and found the bathroom. Bridge arrived back where he had started. He asked Grover how long he was planning to be in Bristol.

“I’m on a three day pass. I’ll be here until Wednesday evening.”

There was the thumping tread of feet on the stairs. Bridge told Grover he could go. Grover met the forensics team on the landing. He stepped to one side as the photographer, medical examiner, fingerprints man and two uniformed officers moved past him into the flat.

He walked down the stairs, knocked on Rachel’s door, said goodbye to her when she appeared, then continued down to the front door. Outside, he crossed the street, turned, and looked back at number 5. One question in his head.

What the hell was he getting in to?

Chapter Seven

Roly Bevan had just finished reading the sports section of the
Sunday
Express
. He shuffled the broadsheet pages back together neatly – even after reading, he hated his newspaper to be untidy – folded it and placed it on top of his desk as though it were still on the newsagents display stand. He looked down again at the front page headline.

SENIOR
CIVIL
SERVANT
IN
BLACK
MARKET
SCANDAL

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance had accepted a case of whisky from Reg Dalton, a black marketeer and very small-time, aspiring gang leader. In return for what, it was not yet clear, but His Majesty’s employee was in the process of being publicly humiliated at the enquiry set up by Board of Trade boss Harold Wilson. The government’s success rate in the fight against black market operations was low, but here was an opportunity to demonstrate the solemn integrity in which it rejoiced.

Bevan smiled, reached across his enormous leather topped desk, flipped open the lid of a gilt cigar box and picked up a corona. The best that only black market money could buy. He lit the cigar with a fat, gold desk lighter, sat back in his swivel chair and blew smoke rings at the ceiling.

His office was on the floor above the bar of the
Mighty
Albion
in Barton Street, at the western end of St Philips. A quietly run down suburb that had succeeded in being anonymous and neglected since before the outbreak of war. The sort of place from which an experienced chancer like Bevan could operate smoothly and un-noticed. Not that the interior of his office was low profile. The room was nineteen feet square. Roly had re-laid the office floor and sound-proofed it, to ensure that the noise of carousing did not reach him from the bar and saloon below. And he had filled the space with big bits of furniture. Faux Hollywood art deco. The chandelier, the sofa and the big, heavy, dark oak dresser, looked like they had been transplanted from the set of
The
Magnificent
Ambersons
. An oasis of knocked-off class in a desert of bomb craters, dirty streets and grimy pubs. Not that Roly would be seen dead living around here. His home was a regency house in Clifton. He kept his 1939 Mark V Bentley in the garage in the lane behind his house and drove to his place of business every day in a dark green 1945 Austin 10.

All in all, allowing for a little irritation here and there, times were fine for Roly Bevan. He paid good money for his Neville Reed suits, his Oxford shirts, Burlington Arcade ties and two tone shoes – he had seen George Raft wearing a pair of Florsheims in
Each
Dawn
I
Die
. He dressed to make an impression. No fifty bob tailor was coming anywhere near him with a tape measure.

But the sweet contentment of his morning was about to go down the pan. There was a knock on the door, Bevan called out “Come in” and Patsy Halloran did so. Now in his late 50s, bald except for a fringe of close cropped grey hair ringing his head like a collar, he carried too many extra pounds for his five feet eight frame. Once a promising flyweight, too many parties while on the rise and too many drinks on the way down had left their mark. He had run up the stairs and he was out of breath.

“Problem Boss,” he said and took in some more air, “McAllister wants to fight Langley.”

Bevan stared at his gym manager, who took another deep breath.

“Langley will murder him,” he said.

“Mac says not.”

“That’s because he’s over-optimistic.”

“Boss...”

“Langley beat Jimmy Wilson in the south west area welterweight final I know, but Wilson is too told, out of condition and way past his best.”

“That’s right. That’s why Mac thinks he can take Langley.”

“That’s what he thinks is it? He’s a dear boy, but he should leave whatever thinking capacity he has for the ring. Langley won’t take the fight unless it’s top of the bill. The best that Mac will get is a bout on the under card. Where he might scrape a win on points. But the purse will be tiny. He’ll be lucky if he gets twenty-five quid.”

Halloran opened his mouth to reply. Bevan held up his hand.

“Out of the question Pat. In the meantime, work the boy harder.”

Halloran dropped his head, sighed and lifted it again.

“I thought you’d say all that. So, can you come down and explain it to Mac?”

“Oh for fuck’s sake...” His morning good mood thoroughly dissipated, Bevan got to his feet. “I’ll be there in couple of a minutes.”

Halloran left the office. Bevan stood up, crossed the room, took his jacket from the bentwood coat stand, shrugged himself into it, stood in front of the full length mirror hanging on the office door and smiled at the image looking back at him. Five feet ten and a half inches tall – the half was important – slim, lean and square shouldered. Proud of his long dark hair, he had a Denis Compton cut, immaculately Brylcream’d. The suit was his second best work day outfit; a light grey, wool, pin striped ensemble, which comprised a wide shouldered jacket, matching waistcoat and loose legged trousers with inch and a half turn-ups. He adjusted the collar of his pale blue shirt and straightened his pale yellow tie. Pulled his shirt cuffs gently from his jacket sleeves and inspected the gold cuff links inscribed with his initials. Then twisted the cuffs so that the gold studs were directly in line with his fourth fingers. He shot his jacket sleeves forwards and pulled his waistcoat down towards his hips; smiled at his reflection once again and left the office.

The
Mighty
Albion
gym was a converted car workshop behind the pub. It had been there since the twenties; a back street, unlicensed fights venue, where local hard men could earn themselves a week’s drinking money, providing they won the bout. Bevan had taken over the place when the previous owner retired to live with his son-in-law in Newport. He had invested some money in it, put in a seventeen foot ring, secured permission from the city council to operate and a licence from the British Boxing Board of Control to promote fights.

One corner of the gym worked as the weight management centre, with a string of weight pulls and scales and press benches. In the space running left towards the next corner, there were three heavy bags and a couple of speed balls, hanging from an iron ceiling bar. A series of wooden cupboards containing head guards, hand wraps, gloves, medicine balls, chest exercisers and first aid kits, stood ranged along the opposite wall. And there was a glass fronted cabinet, which housed the trophies won by members of the gym, past and present.

The ring was in the centre of the floor.

Robbie McAllister, was inside the ring with his sparring partner – a black Jamaican would-be welterweight, Leroy Winston. McAllister looked the part, but he was prone to doing too much dancing and not enough punch throwing. He had a weak left lead and if not a glass jaw, one that was too soft for even a regional championship contender. The Jamaican was actually a much better prospect. In his late twenties, a docker and short of ring training, but a natural southpaw. He had come to England in June 1948, one of the passengers on the
Empire
Windrush
. In east London, he had fallen into bad company and spent a night or two in a Bow Street police cell. So he followed a friend down to the west country, got himself a job in Parsons Timber Yard in the Floating Harbour and a room in a house in Southville which did not have a sign on the door saying
No
Dogs
,
no
Irish
and
no
Blacks
.

Roly Bevan liked him. Whatever else he was, Roly was no racist.

He called a halt to the exercise in the ring. McAllister took off his head guard, Halloran gave him a towel and Bevan shepherded him into Halloran’s office.

McAllister listened to what Bevan had to say. He made a couple of half-arsed attempts to defend his corner. To no avail. He threw the towel across the office, wrenched open the door and slammed it behind him. Halloran and Winston watched him cross the gym and go into the changing room. From whence, a moment or two later, came the sound of banging tin locker doors. Bevan came out of Halloran’s office.

“Pat,” he said. “See if you can calm him down, will you?” He smiled at Winston. “You look in good shape.”

Winston gave his towel to Halloran.

“I’ll talk to him,” he said.

Bevan watched Winston cross the gym floor, waited until he disappeared from sight, then he turned back to Halloran.

“I’ve got to go out,” he said. “Things to do.”

*

PC Walker reversed the Wolseley into the only remaining parking space in front of Roly Bevan’s three storey regency house on Sion Hill. He shifted the gear stick into neutral and switched off the ignition. From the back, Bridge opened the nearside passenger door and climbed out onto the pavement. Goole did a reprise of his Blenheim Villas car exit and stepped out into the road. He looked across the roof of the Wolseley, towards the beautifully glossed green door of number 23.

“Just a bit grander than the accommodation he offers his tenants. Not short of a bob or two is he?”

Bridge grunted. “He had a good war.”

He closed his car door. Tipped back the rim of his dark grey trilby and stared at Roly Bevan’s piece of up-market real estate.

“We’ll get the bastard one day,” he said. “Meanwhile, let’s see if he’ll put the kettle on.”

Bevan was not there to put the kettle on. In fact, he arrived as Goole was ringing his doorbell. He knew the two men on his doorstep were detectives. The trilbies and the cheap suits were a dead giveaway. He smiled. He was getting tapped up again. He slowed the Austin, stopped in the middle of the road, parallel to the Wolseley and wound down his window.

“What is it this time gents?”

Bridge turned and looked at him.

Bevan’s smiled slipped a little, then dissolved. He knew DCI Bridge. And all about him.

“We’ve just popped round for tea and scones,” Bridge said.

Bevan stayed as cool as he could manage.

“I’ll park this round the back and I’ll let you in.”

Bridge and Goole, waited patiently in front of the green door. A couple of minutes later it opened. Bevan inclined his head and waved the detectives into the hall.

“This must be your first visit Chief Inspector,” Bevan said.

Bridge stared at him.

“I know who you are,” Bevan said. “Everybody does.”

Bridge ignored the testimonial.

“This is Detective Sergeant Goole,” he said.

Bevan nodded to Goole.

“Sergeant...”

Bevan closed the front door and bade the policemen follow him upstairs to the first floor.

The house had a dress circle view of Brunel’s sensational suspension bridge. To take advantage of this, Bevan had paid huge sums to have the interior re-designed. The basement, actually hewn out of the cliff-side rock under the house, was divided into two rooms. One of them a substantial wine cellar, monitored by a thermostat and kept at a constant fifty degrees Fahrenheit; the other a twelve seat home cinema, graced by armchairs with red crushed velvet upholstery, a 16mm film projector and a screen which was, effectively, the fourth wall of the room. There were three guest bedrooms on the ground floor. The first floor was a kind of
grande
salle
. A laundry and kitchen, accessed directly from the stairwell, flowed into a dining area, which seamlessly dissolved into a living area. Dominated by two Eames aluminium framed chesterfield sofas, looking at each other across a matching coffee table. There were floor to ceiling bookshelves along one wall, stacked with books Roly had not read and was never likely too, but the collection looked impressive. His own bedroom and en-suite bathroom boasted the best views and along with his dressing room and office, completed the top floor facilities.

The whole house was neat and reverentially tidy. There was nothing out of place. As if the designer had established the mise en scene as a lasting interior statement and nothing had been moved since.

Bevan pointed the detectives in the direction of the sofas and moved into the kitchen.

“Scones I can’t do,” he said. “But we do have some fairy cakes. Mrs Maltravers bakes twice a week. Small luxuries, I know. But in times of austerity...”

Goole looked at Bridge, then opened his mouth to enquire where Mrs Maltravers got enough eggs and flour to bake twice a week. Bridge raised his right hand to stop him.

“Tea and cakes... Thank you,” he said.

Bevan picked up a brand new, chrome electric kettle, filled it from the tap and plugged it into a point on one of the expensively tiled walls.

“Indian, Ceylon, China?” he asked. “Earl Grey perhaps? Or just plain ordinary grocer’s tea?”

Goole was all for strangling the slimy bastard. Bridge shot him a severe look of restraint.

“Sergeant Goole would like Earl Grey tea,” he said.