Jack Ludlow - The Burning Sky

‘Talk to her, see what comes up.’

‘Jardine, I know what will come up, it is what I will do then that counts. Now, what are you up to?’

‘Who says I am up to anything?’

‘When God gave me this big hooter, Jardine,’ Monty said, grabbing his hooked nose, ‘he did it so I could smell my fellow humans telling fibs. You will be up to something or you would have asked me if there was some job needing doing.’

Jardine grinned and explained: not one to trust easily, he trusted Monty Redfern absolutely.

‘That is a good cause, those poor black people, even if they are misguided religious. There are many Jews in that land, but not that Haile Selassie. Lion of Judah, my arse. How can you be that and not be Jewish, eh? You know Bucharest?’

‘I don’t even know Rumania.’

‘There are good people there, but many bad ones, too, and it is not the easiest place to be Jewish. It’s hard to lay blame — forgive me saying this, but I know, ’cause deep down I am still Russian, the Bukovina Jews are dumb Hasidic bastards. But there are some good Ashkenazim and Sephardim in Bucharest.’

He went to the back of his desk and opened an address book, penning a quick name and address. ‘Call on this fellow, tell him I sent you. If you need anything he will help. Now, show in that delightful young lady and let me dream the dream I can look forward to repeating when I try to get to sleep tonight.’

Jardine’s next stop was in South London, at a gym down the Old Kent Road. He walked through the door to the smell of sweat and high-odour embrocation. The place needed a lick of paint, if not several, and the windows were missing several panes, with bits of cardboard where there should be glass, while the lights were bare bulbs hanging from the ceiling. Around the room lay the various things required to keep a boxer at his peak — hanging punchbags, weights, mats for floor exercises — while in the middle was a full-sized ring in which two young fellows were sparring.

Shouting at them from the ringside was Vince Castellano, a one-time soldier in Jardine’s regiment and a useful welterweight boxer. A tap on the shoulder made him turn round, which revealed a flattened nose and the scarred eyebrows of a fighter, as well as a couple of proper bruises. The voice had the slight slur of badly fitting false teeth.

‘Good God, guv, what are you doin’ ’ere?’

‘Come to see you, Vincenzo.’

‘Keep sparring, you two,’ Vince shouted, ‘my old CO has come to call.’

‘It’s a long time since I was that.’

‘Must be three years since I seen you last, Mr Jardine, when you’d just got back from South America.’

‘I’ve still got the hangover and the bruises.’

‘That was a right night out that was, eh? You should never have taken me to that posh club up west. Toffee-nosed gits.’

‘And you should not have tried to fight everybody in there including the coppers who came to arrest us.’

‘Shouldn’t drink, should I, guv? But you knew that, so I always blamed you for that barney. That’s why I let you pay the fines.’

‘How’s business?’

‘Dire and don’t it show? Fallin’ down, this gaff is. I only keep the place goin’ ’cause of the kids. If they wasn’t ’ere ’alf of them would be in choky.’

‘How’s your Italian?’

‘Bit rusty, I only really speak it wiv me mum. Took her home a couple of years back for a visit.’

‘I remember you telling me.’

‘Not a success, was it? Most of her family think the sun shines out of Mussolini’s arse when I think he’s a pot-bellied git.’

‘Passport still valid?’

‘Yeh.’

‘I am going to do a job where I need someone to trust to mind my back. It might have a place for an Italian speaker too, and it pays well.’

Vince looked around his dump of a gym. ‘I got to keep this place goin’, guv, bad as it looks.’

‘Could anyone take it over for six months?’

‘Only if I could pay ’em.’

‘That can be arranged, Vince, but let me say this before you think about it: the job could be dangerous.’

‘Everythin’ you do is dangerous, guv.’ Jardine made a pistol with his finger and thumb. ‘That dangerous?’

‘Yup, but there’s enough pay to keep this place open and you in beer for a year.’

‘When d’you need to know?’

Jardine penned a number and handed it over. ‘You been in the ring again, Vince?’

‘Naw, feet are too slow now.’

‘The bruises?’

Vince touched his upper cheek. ‘Got them fightin’ Mosley’s mob, blackshirt bastards.’

‘Politics, Vince?’

‘Can’t let them just walk about shouting abuse just ’cause someone’s a Jew, ain’t right.’

Jardine looked around the decrepit gym. ‘You’re probably doin’ good work here, Vince — what if you had a benefactor?’

‘He’d need deep pockets.’

‘And if I could get you one?’

‘When was the last time somebody kissed your arse?’

‘Pay. Twenty quid a week and whatever it takes to get someone to replace you here. You can ring me tomorrow.’

‘To hell with that, I’m in for twenty smackers a week. Lead on, Macduff.’

Jardine rang Monty Redfern that night to tell him about Vince’s gym and how he got the bruises. It was a near-certain bet that the Jewish millionaire would back that.

‘All I remember of Vince Castellano was that he was a bloody handful,’ Lanchester remarked. ‘Fine boxer, mind. Did the regiment proud.’

‘I don’t think he drinks anything like he used to, and who knows, those fists of his might come in handy.’

‘So where are you off to in best bib and tucker?’

Jardine pulled a face. ‘I’m taking Lizzie to dinner and dancing at the Cafe de Paris. Apparently “Hutch” is playing tonight, and no doubt there will be two idiots trying to convince us of some new dance craze that is going to sweep the universe.’

‘Ah, the lovely Lizzie Jardine.’

‘Don’t you start, Peter.’

‘You cut her too much slack, old boy.’

‘I think you have that the wrong way round.’

‘Would you divorce her if she agreed, Cal?’

‘I would if that was what she wanted but I would have to get an annulment from the bloody Pope.’

‘A gentleman to the last, but that’s not what I asked.’

‘Peter, it’s none of your business. Now, if all our arrangements are in place, Vince and I will meet you at Victoria tomorrow morning.’ Picking up his shiny top hat, Callum Jardine, dressed in white tie and tails, bowed Lanchester out through his door. The Humber he had ordered was purring gently outside and that took him to Connaught Square to pick up his wife, who was, as usual, not ready.

‘Fix yourself a drink, Cal, I shan’t be long.’

‘When have I heard that before?’

‘What?’

‘Nothing.’

Going into the drawing room he stared at the furniture with distaste; Lizzie had redecorated once more — it was a biannual event — and this time all the furniture was white, even the sideboard which had on it the bottles and glasses. He poured himself a malt whisky, pleased that his wife had left out a jug of water, a pinch of which was put in the glass to release the peat flavours. That he took to the long French windows overlooking the garden square.

How many times had he stood at these windows waiting? Too many, the record being an hour — that had led to a row about the time it took her to get made up and dressed, then to an even more furious altercation when she found out he had sent the taxi away on the very good grounds the poor bugger had to make a living, which he did not do idling outside their house. There was no point in being cross; in fact, if she took long enough they might give the table he had booked away. He would much rather go to the Bag O’ Nails anytime.