Rat Poison (20 page)

Anyone who aims kicks at Patrick usually ends up by having that particular foot caught, guided to impossible heights and ending up either flat on their back or airborne. It immediately became apparent that there was no danger of Micky getting really hurt – only his pride, that is. After thumping down on to his own Axminster three times he got in a kick that landed, earning a couple of lightning and sickening smacks around the head that bafflingly got through his guard. Then, having proved to his opponent that kick-boxing was not a lot of use against someone trained in the back streets of God knows where, Patrick got him in a less-than-comfortable headlock.

I shuddered. Like this, exactly like this, with little perceptible effort, I had indeed once seen him break a man's neck, the sound akin to snapping a stick of seaside rock between gloved hands. I still have nightmares about it. If he really lost his temper  . . .

‘So we talk?' Patrick asked, a little breathlessly.

There was an almost inaudible acquiescence.

A pair of lavishly dripping figures squelched down the stairs but stopped when they saw the gun that was now in my hand. They looked at their employer for guidance but received none; Micky, having been released, busy manoeuvring his head into a more conventional position on his shoulders, panting with rage and lack of air.

‘I could get them to shoot you dead!' he yelled when he had found enough oxygen.

‘My wife would drop all three of you before you'd even opened your mouth,' his visitor calmly told him.

Best described as short, dark and good-looking in a slightly lopsided way, this having nothing to do with what Patrick had just done to him, Micky had not previously noticed the gun but did now and performed a nervous shimmy. ‘No! No! Forget that! The cops'll be right here if there's gunfire.'

‘We
are
the cops,' Patrick said. ‘Or didn't Cookson bother to tell you that bit?'

‘He said someone from the Serious Organized Crime Agency, or something like that, was coming after me, personally. I didn't believe him after he'd laughed. Cookson never laughs.' He glared at the two large puddles on his plum-coloured carpet. ‘Oh, get out! You're fired! You're like a couple of bloody
girls
!'

My gaze went across to the two women and the other man who I noticed Patrick had endeavoured not to turn his back on. I had an idea he was armed, and also clever.

‘I need a drink,' Micky announced, waving his hands in slightly girly fashion and making a move over towards the side of the room. For some reason his mannerisms suddenly reminded me of Johnny Depp in his role as Captain Jack Sparrow.

‘Be careful,' said the clever-looking man with a chuckle. ‘That lady is itching to pull the trigger if she thinks you're about to do anything stupid.'

‘
I'll
fix you a drink,' Patrick offered. ‘And you are?' he queried of the speaker.

‘I am the captain of this ship. Call me Enrico.'

‘Which part of Italy do you come from?'

‘Perugia.'

‘I think you own this vessel and rent it out to rich criminals at weekends. And do the driving as it saves it from being heavily pranged on the nearest jetty.'

The man smiled broadly. ‘Not just hard men. Anyone with  . . . the correct funds.'

Micky glowered at the man and said, ‘I'm sure there's something you ought to be greasing right now.'

The Italian did not stop smiling. ‘But my crew  . . .' he said with phoney regret, gesturing to the contents of the sofa and bean bag.

‘I'll send them along when they've recovered. And take those damned women with you.'

‘I'm not a parcel, you know!' shrieked one of the girls.

‘You're like screwing one!' Micky bawled back.

The three went.

Patrick found the drinks cabinet, fixed a large whisky and handed it over.

‘You don't want one?' Micky said, seating himself.

‘No, thanks.'

I had already replaced the Smith and Wesson in my pocket and sat down where I could watch everyone. The man in the bean bag had been conscious for at least a minute and would suffer nothing worse than a slightly bruised neck; his friend, too, was stirring. They both thought it best to literally lay low.

‘I'd just eaten,' Micky mumbled after taking a big swig of his drink. ‘Not a good time to fight.' He saw that no one was remotely impressed with this excuse and yelled, ‘Well? What the hell do you
really
want?'

‘As I said, Uncle,' Patrick said. ‘His head, on a plate, lightly boiled.'

‘I've no influence with that bastard.'

‘Clearly. How did he trick you into going into Bath that night?'

‘Tricked? I wasn't tricked. No one tricks Micky.'

Patrick took a deep breath. ‘Why do conversations with crooks always resemble the soundtrack for a thirties gangster movie? I know why. It's because you watch thirties gangster movies. Now listen: it is the twenty-first century and things have moved on. There
is
something called the Serious Organized Crime Agency and I work for it. I served in special operations in the army before joining MI5 and then SOCA and can assure you that on the one-to-ten scale of crime barons you come in at approximately minus fifty. I'm not interested in you and your shitty little empire – Cookson can mop that up at his leisure when he has enough evidence. I want Uncle. He sent one of his hit men after me. And I'm getting impatient so if you don't tell me everything that's inside that flea-sized brain of yours we can continue where we left off just now.'

The man stared at him and then stuttered, ‘C–c–cops aren't allowed to do things like that.'

‘My boss is around a hundred miles away,' Patrick said nastily.

I reckoned we had progressed to a soundtrack from an eighties gangster movie.

Micky took another large mouthful of whisky, belched and then said, ‘And you'll go away when I've told you what I know?'

‘Yes, let's get rid of those two.'

The men took one each, shoving them out and shutting the door.

‘OK,' Micky continued when he had been reunited with his drink. ‘Charlie Gill and me was chums once. Used to knock around together, play darts and stuff like that.'

‘But he originally came down from London.'

‘Right. When he was in his late teens, yonks ago. We talked of setting up in business together but he didn't like Bristol. Thought there was more money to be made in Bath, more wealthy punters, better cars to steal. So we went our own ways. Then, recently, I got a message from him.'

‘And?'

‘He said there was a city geezer wanting to take over his patch as it was getting too hot at home. He'd somehow found out about Charlie and offered him a partnership but Charlie didn't trust him an inch. He'd gone along with him to get as much info as he could about the bloke, who kept bragging about what he'd got, what he'd done, how loaded he was. Would I muster with a few lads to show a bit of muscle with his own boys so he got the message and scarpered? He said he'd pay if I had to take people on.'

‘Instead of which  . . .'

‘Yeah. It was us who was really for the chop.'

‘Why Bath? What does this man want with a provincial city?'

Mick shrugged. ‘Well, the punters are still loaded, I suppose. Quite a few of the big boys are moving out of town as you cops make life too uncomfortable for them.'

‘And you didn't have enough in the way of lads for that night so you recruited a few illegal immigrants.'

‘They was desperate for money. Starving. Came in on a lorry hoping to get jobs picking fruit and veg and but couldn't find nothing. A couple of them was killed.'

‘Sliced to ribbons by all accounts.'

‘It was murder. They was little more than boys.'

‘Don't try to pretend that you actually care!' Patrick bellowed, making Micky jump.

‘Yes, I do care!' he shouted back. ‘They didn't know English, perhaps just a few words, and one of them cried when I got him to understand that I'd give him a hundred quid if he mustered with a few other blokes and did one night's work for me.'

‘You armed them, though.'

‘Well, I had to, didn't I?'

‘Did they know how to fire them?'

‘We did try to explain,' Mick muttered after a short silence.

‘Gill's dead,' Patrick said.

‘I know. He was a bloody fool. After the turf war he rang me and said  . . .'

‘Go on.'

‘He said he hoped I hadn't been hurt and he hadn't known it would be like that, a shoot-out with people killed.'

‘Did you believe him?'

‘I did at the time. Not now. Then he said that Uncle – that's a bloke called Brad Northwood in case you didn't know – was going to make him his right-hand man plus a share of his London takings. It was an offer too good to pass by.'

‘If Gill used to be a chum of yours how come he sold you down the river?'

‘You've said it: money. Charlie could never resist the stuff. He didn't have to brag about it to me though, did he?'

‘It was certainly Uncle who had him killed. Do you know anything about a woman called Joy Murphy?'

‘Only that she's Northwood's minder and will kill anything for a laugh. God, if only I'd known  . . .'

‘He probably won't give up until he's removed all the opposition from the vicinity of Bath. That'll include you.' In offhand fashion Patrick added, ‘Of course, it'll tidy things up wonderfully for us cops.'

‘I don't see what I can do about it.'

‘There's something you could do.'

‘What?'

‘Put it about as widely as you can that you've been forced into selling your outfit: your boys, loot, where you keep it and anything else important, to a guy who's returning to this country from where he's served a long prison sentence abroad and wants to find his roots. His great-grandad was a big noise in Bristol and Bath a long time ago and he wants to carry on where the old man left off at an early age, mostly because he was hanged for several murders.'

‘And who's this guy going to be?'

‘Me.'

‘You!'

‘I'm pretty convincing as a mobster.'

‘I think I believe you. What do I get out of it?'

‘Not a lot. Revenge for the humiliation and loss of funds that Uncle caused you that night, perhaps. I can't promise you freedom from prosecution for crimes you've already committed and my boss would never sanction the transfer of a large sum of money. I'll think of something. But you'll have to trust me and ask Captain Enrico to take you on a cruise. Just disappear for a while.'

‘And if I refuse?'

‘I'll just carry on breaking your neck. Slowly.'

‘He might have agreed but then do nothing,' I said later.

‘He'll do it,' Patrick replied. ‘It involves nothing more than having a few words in people's ears in pubs and some phone calls. He's keeping his head right down at the moment crime-wise anyway so it might guarantee that he goes off the map for a bit longer.'

‘I'm not too sure of Cookson either. I mean, you'd told him you had no intention of going to see Micky undercover but you could have changed your mind.'

‘I don't think he's bent.'

‘No, I wasn't suggesting he is. But if he
did
happen to be getting backhanders from Micky and Micky tells him what you're doing  . . .'

‘It probably wouldn't matter a lot. I can't believe Cookson has a hotline to Uncle. No, I think he was seriously concerned about my welfare.'

Wishful thinking?

THIRTEEN

J
ames Carrick seemed glad to be back at work but there was something about his eyes that hinted of less sleep than was good for him. Patrick gave him a file containing an account of our activities while he had been away, which he read carefully, occasionally glancing up at the pair of us as though in disbelief and uttering the odd muttered Gaelic expletive.

‘Bloody hell,' he said, having finished the last page.

Patrick said, ‘I asked Ingrid to leave off the latest development as I want to talk to you before I do anything further with it. I've been to see Mick the Kick and asked him to spread the word that he's been forced into selling his business to another mobster. Me – under another name, obviously.'

‘Right,' Carrick said, drawing out the word for just about as long as possible.

‘And I'd like to stage some kind of large crime here to make Uncle believe I'm taking over Bath as well,' Patrick carried on blithely.

‘Patrick  . . .'

‘I've said nothing to Greenway yet.'

The Scot wagged a finger at him. ‘Through Murphy Uncle knows what you look like.'

‘By the time he finds out who he's up against it'll be too late.'

‘How the hell did you persuade Micky Fellows to do this?'

‘Just promised to kill him there and then if he didn't.'

Carrick looked a bit shocked. ‘He might have called your bluff.'

‘I wasn't bluffing.'

‘Bloody hell,' Carrick said again.

‘But I knew he'd agree. He might turn Queen's evidence too – if there's something in it for him.'

Carrick pondered. ‘We have plenty of evidence to connect Charlie Gill to the case and now you've spoken to Billy Jessop, Murphy and Northwood are well in the frame. Billy was shown some mugshots yesterday and has positively identified both of them as the people in the big car driven down the pedestrian precinct that night, the woman having recruited him and his brother in the first place. He'd only seen Northwood once before. There is actually sufficient evidence to arrest these people without any theatricals at this end.'

‘Good, I'm happy to abandon that idea, but it never hurts to stir the brew a bit.'