The First Novels: Pay Off, the Fireman (39 page)

Another drink appeared in front of me and the waiter half turned and pointed to Frankenstein’s little helpers who grinned and gave Howard and me an exaggerated thumbs up. I winked and Howard said ‘Cheers’ and we drank. The tonic was flat but what the hell, you can’t have everything you want in life, can you? But when I put the glass down I saw that the guy in the russet waistcoat was watching me as he polished a wine glass and I knew that he knew that I knew so I was damned if I was going to let him get away with it.

I pushed the half-full glass towards him and told him quietly that I wanted to feel little bubbles bursting against the back of my throat, that I’d like a fresh tonic water and not one from a bottle that had been opened twenty minutes ago, that I’d like it fairly quickly and that if it didn’t appear PDQ I’d ram the glass up his arse. I’m not sure how good his English was but I think he got the message because he stopped cleaning the glass and changed my drink, watching me all the time through unblinking brown eyes.

Howard had gone decidedly frosty and I suppose he was starting to regret having brought me to his precious club so I gave him a winning smile and put my hand on his shoulder. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said. I was grinning but inside I really didn’t give a toss whether or not he was unhappy, other than that I needed his help. He’d give me that anyway, because he wasn’t doing it for me he was doing it for the paper, but he’d try harder for a friend. They always do.

‘Howard, I insist you let me buy the next round.’

‘Members only,’ he reminded me.

‘In that case old lad, I insist that you buy me a drink,’ I said, and he did. And another. And before long we were both laughing and joking, but while he was relaxed and open I was weighing up the man, trying to calculate how best I could use him. I knew how to get people to talk, how to get information without them even realizing they were being tapped, I knew what questions to ask but the one thing I didn’t know was who to ask, and for that I needed Howard and if it meant sitting in a bar with a bunch of no-hopers and the sounds of tinkling chandeliers and rugby club bellows then what the hell, I’d got drunk in worse places.

The Sloanes and their providers left after an hour and they were replaced by a group of five young men in jeans and fake Lacoste T-shirts. Sports subs from the
Post
, said Howard, just finished their shift. As they studied the menu chalked onto a large blackboard on the wall, they were joined by a tall, anorexic-looking Indian in a grey suit that was too short in the sleeves and too wide around the chest, a grubby white shirt with a frayed collar and what looked like a Guards’ tie but obviously wasn’t. The body was a gangling collection of limbs that belonged to an adolescent, and the rash of pimples on his forehead below a greasy mop of hair marked him as a teenager, but even under the subdued lighting of the bar you could see the lines etched into the corners of his eyes and the furrows that ran from the side of his nose down either side of his mouth that gave his age as being thirty-five plus. There was a cigarette burning in his right hand and when he moved it up to his face to inhale I saw that half of his index finger was missing, and what was left was yellowed with nicotine. The man was constantly moving, shifting his weight from his left leg to his right, scratching his head, shrugging his shoulders, tapping his foot, all the time reading the menu and talking to the subs. An intravenous shot of Valium would probably have done him the world of good.

I realized I was staring when Howard leant across and whispered in my ear, ‘John Healy, news editor at the
Post
.’

‘Under a lot of stress is he?’ I asked, only half joking.

‘He’s been like that as long as I’ve known him,’ he said. ‘Overactive thyroid or underactive pituitary or something.’

‘It looks like he’s on something.’

‘Only adrenaline. You know what it’s like being a news editor.’

Too right – caught between the devil and the deep blue sea, above him an editor with his eye on the budget and a knighthood and the opposition and below him chancers and freeloaders perpetually trying to stab him in the back. Living on a knife-edge isn’t half of it, it’s a balancing act that causes more ulcers and heart-attacks than alimony and high blood pressure combined. And it’s a road to nowhere because the only way up the hierarchy of modern newspapers is through production, the nuts and bolts manufacturing of the product, selecting the stories, editing them, choosing the pictures and making the headlines fit. The down table subs graduate to the back bench and if they’re good, and lucky, and brown-nose their way into the boss’s good books then they get an office of their own and a title and maybe one day a shot at the editor’s job. Maybe. But at least they’re in with a shot. The subs can get to the top, news editors either die or are pensioned off. Healy looked closer to death than to a monthly retirement cheque.

‘How did an Indian get a name like Healy?’ I asked.

‘English father – a major out here on attachment with the Gurkhas. Mother is the daughter of one of the wealthiest merchants in Hong Kong.’

‘They marry?’

‘I think she was quite keen but his wife and kids weren’t too happy with the idea.’

‘And she still had the baby?’ Try as I might I couldn’t picture the gangling, hyperactive Indian as a child in a pram.

Howard shrugged. ‘She loved him. Like they do. Her father was all for having him floating face down in the harbour but she stuck to her guns and insisted that she be allowed to keep the baby. Her father disowned her, threw her out of the family home and she brought John up on her own. She died a couple of years back.’

‘Sad story.’

‘It happens, laddie.’

‘I guess he’s what you’d call a major problem,’ I said and we giggled like a couple of schoolboys.

‘He’d know what Sally was working on?’ I asked. I was rapidly realizing how everybody in this town seemed to know everybody else’s business. Small town mentality, I guess.

‘Aye. I suppose you’ll be wanting an introduction?’ I drained the glass and said yes and when Howard ordered another round he called over to Healy and asked him what he wanted.

‘San Miguel,’ he answered, but the barman already had a can in his hand. He ripped off the ring pull and handed the lager to him without a glass. My gin came with a fresh tonic and another surly look. I was starting to like this bar.

‘First today,’ said Healy and drank from the can, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down furiously.

‘Same,’ I said, but I’d already lost count of the number of gins I’d had.

Howard introduced us and we shook hands. I could feel the stub of his index finger pressing into my palm and I shuddered. He didn’t seem to notice, or maybe he was just used to it. Or maybe he did it on purpose.

‘I’m sorry about Sally,’ he said. Sorry didn’t sound right, but what else could he have said? Sorry implied pity, I’m sorry to hear that your dog was run over, sorry about the mess, sorry I broke your pencil. Sorry wasn’t a word you could use to describe a fifteen-storey plunge out of a hotel window, not when it was your sister. I didn’t feel sorry. I felt angry. I wanted to know why and I wanted to know who.

‘Can I help at all?’ he said, fingering his collar with his left hand and swirling the can with the other.

‘Sure,’ I said. ‘I need to know what she was working on.’

‘No problem,’ he said, and now he was adjusting his tie and his right foot had started tapping to a tune that only he could hear. He flicked his head to one side to clear the greasy hair from his eyes. ‘Come round to the office tomorrow.’

‘Cheers,’ I said, and then added I’d better go because I was still jet lagged.

‘I’ll see you tomorrow,’ I said to John, who had slid into one of the bucket seats and was bouncing his knees up and down as if bumping a toddler while scratching his chin. He waved farewell with his can of lager.

Howard walked me to the door. On the way out we passed the club’s office where a young girl with shoulder length hair held back in a pony tail with a red ribbon was typing a letter. Behind her on the wall was a display of FCC souvenirs.

‘I want to have a tie,’ I told him.

‘You what?’

‘I want to buy a tie. An FCC tie. Or are they for members only, too?’

‘OK, I’ll buy you a tie,’ he said patiently. ‘Red or blue?’

‘Blue, it’ll go with my eyes.’

Howard bought the tie for me, dark blue with a yellow crest and yellow stripes. I took mine off and clumsily tied the new one around my neck as I leant against the wall for balance. I ceremoniously handed my old tie, black with blue dots on it, to Howard. He took it and sighed. I think he was humouring me.

‘I’ll help you get a cab,’ he said.

‘Howard old lad, I’m quite capable of calling myself a taxi,’ I told him.

‘Aye, that’s as may be,’ he said. ‘But you might not be able to tell him where you want to go.’

‘There can’t be that many Excelsior Hotels in town,’ I replied.

‘Just the one, but the Chinese call it . . .’ and I missed the rest because it sounded something like a George Michael chorus played backwards.

‘Point taken, Howard. Call me a cab.’

‘You’re a cab,’ he said and we both laughed out of all proportion to the bad joke. A taxi with its roof light on screeched to a halt and Howard opened the rear door for me. He chattered to the driver who grunted and nodded.

‘John’s a good lad,’ he said to me as I climbed in the back. ‘Go easy on him.’

I closed the door and wound down the window. ‘I will do,’ I said. ‘But I’ve never trusted Indians. Not after what they did to Custer.’ Then the taxi screeched away from the kerb and I fell back into the seat chuckling. He wasn’t the only one with a sense of humour. Shit, I was pissed again.

It was Sally, but not the cold, dead Sally I’d seen lying on the steel tray in the mortuary with a brown label tied to her big toe. This Sally was warm, and smiling and tossing her head. ‘Wake up,’ she whispered, and nuzzled my ear with her nose. ‘I’m back.’

I blinked and rubbed my sleep-filled eyes, then sat up as I realized it was her.

‘I thought you were dead,’ I gasped.

‘Don’t be silly, do I look as if I’m dead?’ She put her hand on my forehead. ‘You look terrible. Were you out on the razzle last night?’ She sat on the bed next to me.

‘Yeah, I was in the FCC with Howard. It’s a terrible place.’

‘Did he lead you astray?’

‘I’m not sure who was leading and who was following.’

‘You drink too much.’

‘I’m better than I was.’

‘It’s still too much.’

‘I can handle it. Where have you been, Sally?’ The phone started ringing.

‘I’ll tell you when you’ve answered the phone.’

‘Tell me now. I have to know where you’ve been.’

‘Answer the phone first.’ She bent her head down and kissed me lightly on the cheek. I woke up. The phone was still ringing but she wasn’t there anymore. The ‘I’m back’ dreams had started.

It was Howard, ringing to see if I was OK.

‘I’m fine, Howard.’

‘Do you need me this morning?’ he asked.

‘No thanks, John will look after me.’

‘OK. Look, leave this afternoon free.’

‘For what?’

‘A junk trip. Courtesy of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank. Lots of booze and great food. But more importantly, there’ll be a lot of VIPs there, people you should meet. This place is a village, everybody knows everybody else’s business. We might find out something.’

‘You’ve sold me the idea, Howard. What time and where?’

‘The junk leaves Queen’s Pier at 4 pm, but I’ll meet you under the Hong Kong Bank building at 3.30.’

‘All right, I’ll see you there.’

I replaced the receiver and lay on my back, left arm across my eyes to shield them from the bright morning sunlight that shafted in through the window and across the double bed. I was still dog tired, partly because of the previous night’s drinking session but I told myself the jet lag wasn’t helping, my mind accepted the fact that it was ten o’clock in the morning and I was in Hong Kong, but my body still thought it was 2 am and that I should be asleep. I rolled onto my side, flopped my legs onto the floor and wrapped myself in a hotel robe. My tongue was thick with fur and I wiped it on the towelling belt. God I hate mornings. I could just about manage to look out of the window without heaving, but I had to squint to do it. Something was missing, and it took me a while to realize what it was before it hit me with a jolt – the bag containing Sally’s belongings had gone, the window seat was bare. I checked behind the chairs and under the bed and then I opened the dressing table drawer. Her watch lay there, with the money clip and the purse, next to a hardback New English Bible and a sewing kit in a white cardboard folder. Of course, the room had been tidied and I’d been too drunk to notice the night before.

I found the bag, the dress and the shoes in the wardrobe. I slipped the dress off its hanger and held it up in front of me, imagining her wearing it, standing in front of me, looking up with laughter in her eyes. I held the blue material scrunched up against my face and breathed deeply, filling my nose and my throat and my lungs with the smell of her. The dress was cool and soft and felt like silk and I rubbed it gently up and down my cheeks. ‘Sally,’ I said out loud and then it suddenly hit me how perverse I must look, standing there kissing my dead sister’s dress. I screwed it up and threw it in the wastebin, along with her shoes, the money clip and the bag. The purse contained a couple of Hong Kong Bank credit cards and several hundred dollars. The money I left on the dressing table but the cards I tore in half and threw on top of the dress. The watch I’d have to think about. I didn’t want her things, I didn’t want my nose rubbed in her death, to know that all I’d ever have of Sally would be the objects she’d touched. Maybe I’d keep the watch for our mother. Or maybe I’d wear it. I dropped it into the inside pocket of my jacket in the wardrobe, remembering as I did that I still had to phone Mother. I’d been in no fit state last night, but now it was too late, she’d be asleep. Tomorrow.