Aunt Mirabelle had imprinted in Joe's heart a faith in a benevolent deity that it would have taken surgery to remove, but when it came to everyday practicalities, he paid as much attention to Sod's as God's Law.
All that stuff about the lilies of the field and taking no thought for the morrow was fine, but any fool knew that a man driving around with a flat in his boot was bound to have another blow-out pretty damn quick, so on his way back to town he pulled into Ram Ray's garage on the ring road. Ram wasn't around, and he had to deal with the head mechanic, Scrapyard Eddie, who'd got his nickname because it was said that if you fell out with him, that was where your vehicle was likely to end up. Joe had recently been foolish enough to second-guess Eddie on a fuel pump fault in the old Morris, and now the mechanic seemed disinclined to admit the possibility of fixing the spare before the weekend.
Fortunately Ram's highly efficient and very desirable secretary, Eloise, who had a soft spot for Joe, came out to say hello. When she heard his problem she said, "Do it, Eddie," in a tone that reduced the mechanic to fawning co-operation, and invited Joe into the office for a cool cola.
"Don't you just love this weather, Joe?" she asked, leaning back in her chair and crossing her legs, a maneuver that made Joe glad he already had an excuse for sweating.
"Yeah, it's got its attractions," he said. High among which was Eloise's abandonment of outerwear just this side of decency, or a long way that side if you were Aunt Mirabelle.
"So how's business?" she asked.
"So so. And how's George? Saw him demolish Ernie Jagger last month. He's on a real winning streak!"
George was Eloise's boyfriend. A rising star in the boxing world, he stood two meters high, about the same across the shoulders, with fists like bunches of petrified bananas. Known in the sporting columns as Jurassic, the image of George was a good thing to keep in mind when talking to Eloise.
"Not with me, he ain't," said Eloise. "All that training, he takes it so seriously. Me, I like a sporting guy, but not when it turns him into a monk. No, George is out. Got myself a new sport, only Chip don't let it interfere with his time off."
"Chip?" said Joe. "So what's his game?"
"Golf, among other things," laughed Eloise. "He's assistant pro out at the Royal Hoo."
Joe wasn't particularly surprised. Coincidences that would have had others running to the parapsycholo- gists he took in his stride. Butcher had once said to him, "Sixsmith, you're in a job you've got no particular talent for, and you go at it in a half-assed way, but you've got a strike rate Willie Woodbine would die for. Serendipity, that's what it's called. That's what you've got, Joe."
"Can I get treatment on the NHS?" he'd asked.
"Don't joke about it!" she'd retorted sternly. "It's probably the only thing keeping you alive!"
Joe had thought about it later, then he'd sent it to the Recycle Bin to join all the other stuff that looked likely to stretch the period between his head hitting the pillow and sleep hitting his head by more than five seconds.
"Chip Harvey," he said. "I've just been talking to him. Nice lad."
"You've been to the Royal Hoo?" said Eloise. She was too nice to make cracks about getting a job in the kitchen or sweeping up leaves from the course, but Joe's musical ear detected the harmonics of surprise in her tone.
It occurred to him he'd have done better to keep his mouth shut. But no point crying over spilt milk, said Mirabelle.
Anyway, as Whitey added, may be spilt milk to you, but it's manna from heaven to me.
"Yeah. I'm on a case. Working for a member called Porphyry. Look, he's told people he was showing me around with a view to applying for membership, so that's what Chip thinks. When you talk to him, make sure he keeps it to himself, OK?"
A lesser man might have tried to swear Eloise to secrecy, but Joe had had it drummed into him as a child, never ask for what you know you can't get!
The young woman didn't seem to have heard his plea.
"Christian Porphyry? You're working for Christian Porphyry?"
Here we go, thought Joe, recalling Beryl's reaction to the Young Fair God.
"That's right."
"I met him couple of days back," she said, dreamy eyed. "First time I went out with Chip. He took me back to his flat out at the Hoo. He was showing me round, shouldn't have been, really, but it was a dead quiet time, then we bumped into Mr. Porphyry. He was just so nice! Anyone else and Chip might have been in bother. He says some of the members there act around him like he was invisible, like a footman in one of those big old houses you see on the telly. But not Mr. Porphyry. What are you doing for him, Joe?"
"Sorry, can't tell you that, El," said Joe. "Mr. Porphyry wants it kept confidential. You'll make sure Chip understands that, won't you?"
This got through.
"Sure, Joe. Chip thinks he's great. If that's what Mr. Porphyry wants, you can rely on Chip."
Whereas if it's just what I want…
Joe pushed the unhelpful thought away and looked for upsides.
Some of them act around him like he was invisible…
He said, "Yeah, Mr. Porphyry's having a spot of trouble at the club. Chip knows all about it and, from what he said, he's very much on Mr. Porphyry's side. In fact, it might help Mr. Porphyry a lot if I could have a quiet word with Chip away from the club…"
Eloise knew a hint when she heard one.
"I'm meeting him down the Hole tonight, half seven, if you want to catch him before we go clubbing." "Might just do that," said Joe. "Sorry." His mobile was ringing. He didn't recognize the number in the display nor the voice that said, "May I speak to Mr. Sixsmith?" in response to his noncommittal, "Yo?" The voice was a woman's, young, confident, educated but not posh, and above all friendly rather than menacing. "That's me," he admitted. "Oh good. Tried your office number but just got your answer service. My name's Mimi, Mr. Sixsmith. I'm Mr. Ratcliffe King's PA. He would like to see you with a view to employing the services of your agency. Would it be possible to make an appointment?" Sam Spade might have growled, "Why not? I'll be in my office about four if he wants to drop round." But Joe was a pragmatist. He said, "Sure. What time would be convenient for Mr. King to see me?" "Three o'clock this afternoon?" He liked the question mark. It could have come out as a statement or even a command. He said, "That's fine." "You know where we are?" Mimi asked. Which, considering how ProtoVision House dominated the north end of the High Street, was like asking if he knew where the Queen lived in London. "I can always ask a policeman if I get lost," he replied, risking a joke. Mimi laughed a bubbly genuine kind of laugh. "See you at three then," she said. "Bye." "Bye," said Joe. He looked at Eloise, who was busy scrolling incomprehensible spreadsheets down her computer screen.
He said, "You know someone called Mimi, PA to Ratcliffe King?"
"Maggie Hardacre? Yeah, we went to school together. That her you were talking to?"
"Yeah. Her boss wants to hire me."
"King Rat? Get yourself a watertight contract then, Joe, and a couple of good witnesses to his signature."
"Why do you say that?"
"I've seen the kind of discount he gets from Ram."
Her boss, Ram Ray, was rated one of Luton's sharpest in a commercial deal.
"So this Mimi…"
"Maggie's OK," said Eloise. "Went off to secretarial college in London, turned herself into Mimi and a top-flight PA, but she hasn't lost herself, know what I mean? Never wanted to come back here, but King made her an offer she couldn't refuse, so they say, and every time she gets restless, he makes her a better one. That's one thing about King Rat; he's a bastard, but if he really wants you, he doesn't count the pennies."
"I'll remember that," said Joe.
The door opened and the head mechanic said, "Tire's done and back on your car, Mr. Sixsmith."
"Thanks," said Joe.
"I'll come out with you and make sure the job's been done up to Ram Ray standards," said Eloise.
They walked out to the car together. Across the road from the garage Joe noticed a Chrysler PT Cruiser. Leaning against its bonnet with a mobile in his hand was a skinny guy who either had a nervous twitch of the head or was being bothered by flies. Joe was sure he'd been there when he got out of the Morris. Maybe his car had broken down and he was trying to contact the AA rather than stroll over the road and pay Ram Ray's charges.
Not only was the repaired tire back on the Morris and the spare locked back in position, but the layer of dust and dead insects had been scraped off the windscreen.
"Nice one, Eddie," said Eloise, smiling at the mechanic. "Ram will be pleased you looked after Mr. Sixsmith so well."
She knows how to pour the oil after stirring up the water, thought Joe. Those women who went around moaning they didn't get a fair shake at power should spend more time in Luton.
He started pulling his billfold out of his back pocket.
"That's OK, Joe," said Eloise. "This one's on Ram."
"Tell him I'm grateful."
"You are? Well, this one's on me."
She leaned forward and gave him a kiss. It was deep and delicious and lingering and he might have encouraged it to linger even longer if he hadn't been so surprised.
"See you tonight then," she murmured.
"Look forward to it," said Joe rather hoarsely.
As he drove away he put the lid on the fantasies bubbling up in the wake of Eloise's kiss by pondering on the royal summons from King Ratcliffe. Could there possibly be a connection with his employment in the Porphyry affair? OK, the links were at best tenuous. He'd told Merv about it at the Supporters' Club last night. He'd seen Merv engaged in deep conversation with Monty Wright before he left. Monty Wright had been turned down by the Royal Hoo. And Sir Monty and Rat- cliffe King were closely allied…
Not much there, certainly nothing worth getting your thoughts in a tangle over. Maybe Merv and Sir Monty had been discussing City's prospects for next season. Or haggling over the taxi fare from the club to the millionaire's mansion at Whipsnade. The lucky discoveries that often moved his investigations along their meandering road to conclusion he took in his stride, but attempting to find shortcuts by studying some kind of mental map got the mist rising from the fields in about two minutes flat.
Anyway, a PI's place was out there where the action was. Deep thought was for professors, and master criminals, and lawyers.
He was on speaking terms with only one person in any of these categories. He drove to Bullpat Square, parked on a double yellow in the confident belief that no traffic warden who had any sense would be pounding the pavement in this heat, and went into Butcher's Law Centre.
The outer office which doubled as reception and waiting room was usually packed with Luton's indigent, eager to have their wounds healed, their enemies destroyed and their rights protected, but the weather seemed to have taken its toll here too and there was only one seat occupied.
"Hi, Joe," said the youth on reception, one of a whole bunch of law students who helped out at the Centre, usually, Butcher had once said to Joe in a bout of alcohol induced cynicism, so that in later life whenever the moral burden of charging a thousand quid an hour for their services got a little too heavy, they could ease it by remembering that time in their salad days when they worked for free.
Joe distinguished them only by gender, and he didn't always get that right, but they all seemed to know him. He sometimes fantasized turning up at the Court of Appeal and the judicial trio all giving him high fives and saying, "Hi Joe!" but he hadn't yet put it to the test.
He said, "Hi. Like a word with Butcher, if she can fit me in."
"Take a seat, you're next but one," said the young man, whose voice was deep enough and chin shadowy enough for Joe to be fairly confident he was a man.
He took a chair opposite the solitary client, a woman of middle age who sat with head bowed and eyes closed. There was something vaguely familiar about her, but what really bothered Joe was she was sitting so still, he began to worry she might just have come in here to die.
He was about to share his anxiety with the receptionist when Butcher's door opened to let out a young woman with a tiny infant suspended round her neck in a sling, another two crowded before her in a push-chair, and a trio of older kids, from four to seven perhaps, bringing up the rear. If they were all hers, Joe's heart ached to think of the age she must have been when she first gave birth.
But the mother seemed happy enough, calling a cheerful "Thank you" to Butcher, who appeared in the doorway behind her, and flashing Joe a brilliant smile as he leaped to the outer door and opened it.
The lawyer's gaze registered Joe without any sign of enthusiasm then moved on to the still figure in the chair.
"OK, Betty, you can come through now," said Butcher, and to Joe's relief the woman rose instantly and vanished into the office.
Joe sat down again, took out his mobile and speed-dialed Merv.
"Hi there. Merv's taxis. If you want to go fast, Go- lightly."
"It's me, Joe."
"Joe, my main man! That antique heap of yours broken down again and you want picking up?"
"No thanks. That vintage vehicle I drive will be cruising round Luton long after that paddy wagon you call a taxi is taking up valuable space in Pinkie's Scrapyard. Listen, Merv, something I need to know, no bull now; when I left the club last night you were sitting beating Sir Monty's ear like you were trying to sell him some of that dodgy booze of yours."
"Dodgy? Hey, Joe, I told you: bankrupt stock."
"Yeah yeah. Anyway, what I want to know is, what were you talking about?"
"With Monty, you mean?"
"Of course with Monty! Come on, Merv. Don't play for time 'cos there ain't enough time for you to think up a lie would fool me."
"That must mean you know what we were talking about already, so why're you asking?"
"You were talking about me, right? Come on, Merv, I'm not pissed, this is business."
"OK, if it's business, yeah, he'd heard some of the guys joking about you being put up for membership at the Royal Hoo and he wondered what that was all about, so I told him the tale. Hey, it wasn't a secret, was it? Everybody in the club knew."
"Only because you told them," grumbled Joe. "But never mind that. So you told him the story, and…?"
"Well, he wanted to know all the whys and whens and whatfors."
"Which you supplied, right? Even though what you really knew you could write on the point of a pin, which is about the size of your brain!"
"Hang about, Joe. You said this was business," said Merv indignantly. "Last time I try telling you the truth if all I'm going to get is abused for my openness."
"Only thing open about you is your mouth," declared Joe. "So what exactly did you say?"
"Nothing you could deny wasn't true."
"Try me," said Joe.
"I said this guy Porphyry had put you on a big retainer for the duration 'cos there was something dodgy going off down the Hoo and being the guy who pretty well owns the place he's determined to get to the bottom of it, no expenses spared. I said you'd been cagey about the details because of client confidentiality, all that shit, but it was definitely something that could really drop some big-name people in it."
"Yeah? And what part of what I told you gets within free-kick distance of making that true?" demanded Joe.
"Well, I may have done a bit of tweaking here and there, Joe. That's a fault of yours, ruining a good story by dwelling on the dull bits. And I thought that Sir Monty, after him getting the elbow there, would be bum-chuffed to hear something bad might be happening to the Hoo, 'specially as the word is it was your main man, Porphyry, who put the black spot on him."
"Blackball," said Joe. "And was Sir Monty chuffed?"
"Not so's you'd notice. In fact, all he did was ask questions about you. Whether you were any kop, that sort of stuff."
"So what did you do? Rubbish me?"
"Joe! How long we been friends? People ask you to recommend a taxi driver, do you say, 'Stay away from that Merv Golightly, he's death on wheels and will rip you off into the bargain'? Of course you don't! No, I said what I always say. That Joe Sixsmith may not be much to look at and I don't know how he does it, but when he gets his teeth into a case, the bad guy may as well put his hand up straight away because Joe won't let go till he's got him by the short and curlies. That's what I said and that's the God's honest truth, Joe."
"Yeah. Well, thanks Merv," said Joe, touched.
"Think nothing of it. We OK now, Joe?"
"Buy me a pint at the club and we're fine."
"You got it. Now I'm on my way to pick up a wealthy widow who likes a drive out into the country now and then so she can exercise her dog, only she don't have no dog, know what I mean? See you, Joe!"
He switched off. With perfect timing, the door opened and the moribund woman emerged. She looked more lively now and the increase in animation was matched by an increase in familiarity, but not to the point of recognition.
The lawyer shook hands with her client in the doorway then turned and disappeared back into her office without a glance at Joe. But she left the door wide open.
He went in. She was sitting behind her desk lighting a thin cheroot. On the scuffed and ink-stained leather of the desktop in a silver frame stood a notice that read You are in a smoking zone. If you don't like it, feel free to leave. If asked about the new smoking ban in public places, she would reply, "This is my private office, not a public place. I don't have staff because no one who works here gets paid. And I don't have customers because people who show up here give whatever they can afford, which in many cases is nothing, so any money that comes my way is a donation not a fee."
From a cloud of smoke she said, "This visit social or professional, Joe?"
"What's the difference?"
"If it's social, it's not convenient. I've a stack of work to get through. If it's professional and you're in work, I'll expect a contribution."
"OK." Joe pulled the YFG's roll out of his back pocket. It had to be his imagination but it still felt crisp and cool. He peeled off a fifty and dropped the note on to the desk.
Butcher looked at it then said, "How much time do you expect for that?"
"Well, it was yesterday afternoon I got the money, two hundred, let's call it a day's fee, and let's say a day is twelve working hours, so I reckon that's three hours' worth there."
"You work short hours," she said. "I'll give you till I finish this cheroot."
She took a long drag and said, "Better start talking, Sixsmith. And talking fast."