The Face (Harry Tyler Book 1) (13 page)

“I’ve fucking forgotten more about the law than you’ll ever know,” Dougie ranted. “Do you know who I am?”

“Not yet, sir, but I soon will.”

The two police cars disgorged their passengers. The Baker brothers and Harry Tyler gave the slow-moving rubber-neckers plenty of freebie entertainment as they had their pockets turned out at the back of the Ford. All three gave false names and addresses, then, leaving the hapless Dougie to the mercy of the uniforms, they strolled off to catch a mini-cab. None of them doubted that out of sight, free from Johnny’s restraining influence, the Dog would show his teeth. Dougie now had one more reason to hate East London, that and the three-year ban he was about to pick up and ignore.

The fun-loving criminals got back to the Ned where Slobberin’ Ron, already aware of the Dog’s misfortune, offered little conversation. Harry downed a pint almost in reverence, as if poor old Doug had died, then with a huge smile, he announced, “I’m off for a shag.”

Lesley looked great. “You look good enough to eat,” Harry told her.

“Fanny first,” Lesley replied, dropping her drawers and lifting her skirt. Even Harry was surprised by this speedy turn of events, but he wasted no time getting stuck in, tracing the alphabet letter by letter on her clitoris with his tongue. He had just reached K the second time around when the longing got too much and he started unbuckling his trousers.

“No, not here,” Lesley said. “Let’s go somewhere else. Let’s go to Southwark Park, or a lay-by, or a field. I fancy a bit of fresh air.”

“A fucking field? Where am I going to find a field in Rotherhithe?”

“I know a place, down by the docks.”

“And there was me thinking you were a virgin …”

Barmaids like Lesley Gore were two a penny in South London, but when it came to shagging she was top dollar. She was in to everything, uniforms, fantasy games, bondage – Les had this thing about being tied up and blindfolded. They had schoolgirl night, nurses night, Nazi night. Then there were the times she dressed as a nun, tied Harry to the bed and walked around him swinging one of those metal balls reeking of incense. Underneath the habit, Lesley wore a black basque, black stockings and suspenders. In her hands she carried a fat tallow candle and baby oil. Harry would be on the bed with a stonker, watching Lesley entertain Colin the candle … Happy days. No wonder that whenever he did manage to get home to Kara, Harry was content to sit in a garden chair with his feet up reading the
Sun
.

The day after Dougie was breathalysed, the Baker firm had even worse news. Young Steven Richards, the bright computer-literate nephew, was under arrest at Bexleyheath police station in Kent. Steven had been nicked at a public toilet in nearby Erith where he’d been caught giving a stranger a blowjob. The gents in question had been under surveillance, and Steven was one of 36 men to get lifted in the three-day operation. To Pyro Joe, his arrest was clearly a fit-up: this was the Filth extracting revenge on them for their screw-up when they’d raided the Ned.

According to the Police Inspector’s version of events, Steven had been caught two-up in the cubicle with another man, both had their trousers and underpants down. One officer had seen them over the top, a second cop had looked under the door and corroborated everything. The fellow on the receiving end was Samuel Taylor, a secondary school teacher from Crayford, who was keen to let the whole thing blow away as quickly as possible. The two men had not met previous to their gross encounter.

Johnny Too was lying in bed with Geraldine when he heard the news. Steven’s father, Trevor Richards, rang. He was beside himself with rage. Trevor had done enough bird to know about “boygirls”, he could even understand it, but the thought of his bright beloved son at it with some dirty nonce school teacher was too much to bear. Trevor was inconsolable. All Johnny Too could do was promise to put Maurice Bondman on the case asap. With Maurice in control, the family could already hear the “Not Guilty” verdict, but Steven walking away from the charge couldn’t begin to take the sour taste out of the Bakers’ mouths.

Johnny Too lay back in bed, hands behind his head, gazing at the ceiling. Geraldine hugged him.

“Fucking iron,” Johnny said. “How can Steve be an iron? He’s got it all, the looks, the clothes, the money. Birds love him.”

“John, it’s different these days,” said Geraldine. “If he’s gay, he’s gay. He’s got to be who he’s got to be. Talk to him. Don’t blow up. I know Trevor is upset. I know you’re upset, but talk to him.”

“Trev is going ballistic.”

“He’s bound to, but he’ll see sense. Steven is still his son. He’s still your nephew. He’s still the same bright boy he was this morning. Nothing has changed.”

The more they talked, the more Johnny saw the pieces coming together. Salih, yeah, Sally; the way Steve never had a steady girl … yes, of course. It hurt Johnny’s masculine pride and his family pride, but Geraldine was right. The writing had been on the wall.

Johnny got up and wandered into the shower on auto-pilot. He towelled himself down, dressed, kissed Geri goodbye and then walked to his car as if he were in a trance. By the time he reached the Ned, the clan had started to gather. Pyro Joe and Dougie The Dog were in the mood to firebomb Bexleyheath nick, but Johnny talked them round. His choice of words was not opportune. “Geri says”, “Geri thinks”, “Geri knows …” Pyro Joe was not the brightest of men, but he knew that family business should stay family and eventually he snapped.

“What the fuck’s it got to do with her?” he roared at Johnny. “She’s not fucking family. Your brain is in yer fucking dick where she’s concerned.”

And that was it. The brothers were going at each other like rampant stags. How long had it been since this had happened? Five years? Eight years? Ten? When they were teenagers they were clashing all the time, but onlookers were genuinely shocked to see the two South London crime lords at each other’s throats. Anyone who wasn’t in the Baker inner circle discreetly left the pub as close family and confidantes pulled the two raging fools apart. Rhino parked his 16-stone body between them and stopped the scrapping. But Joey was still seething. The TART had come between the brothers and nothing and no one should ever do that.

Word of the bloody brother bust-up soon spread amongst the womenfolk, and Joey’s wife, Barbara, the mother of his lunatic kids, felt it her duty to stick the poison in to Johnny’s wife, Sandra. Sibling jealousy was probably only 80 per cent of her motivation. Dark clouds were gathering behind Johnny Too’s back, but he was too pumped with vision and confidence to see them.

Peter Miller was one of the last to hear about Johnny and Joey’s fall-out. If truth be known, he was having enough trouble coping with being relegated from Harry Tyler’s premier league of pals. Even a dumb drunk like Miller realised that his former best mate with the cash-dispensing wallet was no longer sending the light ales across with the frequency to which he had become accustomed. Now H was trading with Slobberin’ Ron and the Brothers, Peter was starting to feel hurt. How was he to know that his usefulness had ended the day Harry had done his first bit of business in the Ned?

Keen – make that double keen – to redress the status quo, Miller had made it his business to find something, anything, to grab Harry’s attention. He had heard of a couple of nice tools being touted by Roger Davies, a drummer and a weasel of a man, who had given Her Majesty almost as much pleasure as HRH Stavros. So now Miller and Davies sat in Harry Tyler’s video car and Davies, on Miller’s recommendation, let his greedy mouth run away with him. He wanted £800 for a revolver and an automatic handgun with twenty lugs of ammo. Harry got on his mobile and had a two-minute conversation with an unnamed buyer: “Are you still in the market for a couple of those things? Yeah, with lugs, yeah.” And so Roger Davies became yet another yesterday man, taped, photographed, housed and waiting in line for a nicking … and two more pieces were off the street. Lovely job.

There was a danger Harry might get snowed under, buying every parcel up for grabs in the Ned. He was aware of it, and started to exercise discretion. The small fry were worth rounding up to a degree but nothing could be allowed to let him lose sight of the big target. And as days passed, it was easier for the Bushwhacker to knock back minor trades, although none of the lowlife jerks realised he was actually doing them a favour. Naturally all of Harry’s “No, not interesteds” filtered back to Johnny Too, demonstrating that the East Londoner wasn’t a greedy player.

Johnny Too liked Harry. His attitude was sound, he had a terrific sense of humour and an admirably free-wheeling love life. Clearly no woman could tie Tyler down. Johnny saw the way Harry would tell Lesley Gore to back off when he needed space, and had to be somewhere to trade. He also realised that half the time H disappeared he was obviously off shagging over Stratford way. Hey, everybody had to have a mystery. Where would he be without Geraldine?

Harry wasn’t one to talk about relationships and emotional shit, but he’d had Johnny Too in hysterics with his reports about his and Lesley’s sexual activities. The best story had to be the time Les was giving H a gobble in a private road on a huge building site in Wapping. He was just reaching his vinegar when a huge Irish security guard had come lumbering towards them shaking his fist. Harry alerted Lesley who stopped what she was doing and flung the car into reverse. Unfortunately, H was too far gone and as Les sped off, her brand new Schott top was splattered with Harry’s semen – or Harry’s Harry, his Harry Monk – as Johnny called it when he passed the story on with relish and embellishments to the hounds at his favourite poker game. In Johnny’s version Harry had also been tied to the steering wheel with a skipping rope, leaving Lesley, dressed in full St Trinian’s kit, to lean over him to change gear and get all that hot fish yoghurt in her hair. “And I bet she pulled a fair old pint and all,” Johnny would laugh. They were very much alike, him and Harry, Johnny decided. Both loved to tell a story, both were born to be at it, and both were natural comical bastards. Two peas in a knocked-off pod.

When DCI Susan Long ordered Harry to have a few days back home, he was actually disappointed. But it had to be done. Because of the round-the-clock surveillance, research, exhibits, telephone taps and covert equipment, the backload of work was piling up and Long needed breathing space.

Harry went home for five days’ leave in a good frame of mind. He had told Lesley he had to go back to the Dam to sort out a bit of business, and wouldn’t be answering the mobile. But as soon as he got home, everything went pear-shaped. He hated being there, the atmosphere was claustrophobic. Time itself seemed to slow, as if the tick of the clock had been replaced by a dull, distant thud. He felt trapped. He resented being forced back to this half-life that was his real world. Unable to get the operation off his mind, Harry barely spoke to Kara at all that first day. His wife put two and two together and made 69. He was having an affair, she knew it, and she screamed accusation after accusation at him: you FUCKING BASTARD! Harry fielded her rage with lie after lie – he’d been in Paris, he couldn’t get to a phone … he ducked, he dived. But after the first hour it no longer mattered if she believed him or not. He stormed off to his local, enjoyed a lock-in, rolled home about 2.30 am and kipped on the couch.

The next day, the atmosphere was fraught. Kara tried to make amends, but her heart wasn’t in it. Deep down she knew Harry wasn’t over the side, but somehow that made it worse. If her only competition was his job, she knew she had already lost. Some people worked to live. With Harry it was the other way round. Nothing mattered more than the job. On day three they made love. The session was brief, mechanical almost. They did it because they thought they better had or else … or else what? Kara didn’t want to lose her husband, on the contrary she wanted to rediscover him, but Harry would have to find himself first. And Harry? When he came he was seeing Lesley Gore’s face.

The night before he went back to his undercover work, he made her the same old promise: “After this job, I’ll go back to being a copper.” Kara knew it meant as much as the times he’d told her, “After last night I’ll never drink again.”

Back on the job, Harry felt liberated. It was almost as though he meant something in this other life that he had ceased to mean at home. Harry felt himself watching Pyro Joe, and hating him more each day. He resented the man – not for being Johnny’s brother, how daft would that be? But for being a bully and for being thick. If Johnny Too was a brighter Grant Mitchell, Pyro Joe was a beefier Mr Bean, holding him back. Maybe Joe was the reason Johnny turned bad. Maybe Johnny Too could be saved. It was 11.15 am when Harry Tyler sauntered back into the Ned. Johnny Too sat at the deserted bar chatting with Joe and Slobberin’ Ron.

When he saw Harry he shot off his stool and greeted him like a prodigal son.

“Wanna a beer, H?’ asked Ron.

“Bit early, innit?”

“Early for a pint?” said Johnny.

“No,” Harry replied. “For fucking silly questions.”

All four men laughed out loud. “Nice one,” said Ron.

“Fancy a livener,” Johnny Too asked his brother. Pyro Joe nodded. John emptied half a gram of cocaine out on the serving hatch and chopped it finely with an American Express gold card – he felt it tasted better chopped with a gold card, the same way that some blokes prefer their beer in a straight glass rather than a jug.

Johnny rolled up a five pound note and snorted three fat lines. Joe took another three.

“Best way to start the day,” the big man chuckled. “You want some, H?” asked Johnny Too.

“No, ta, mate. I knocked it on the head eighteen months ago. I kept it in the fridge and at night it used to call out to me.”

“What did it say?”

“It used to say: ‘If you eat me all up tonight, you won’t have to buy any more ever again. I’ll be your last bit.’”