Craig Russell - Dead men and broken hearts

‘Exactly what have you got for us on Frank Lang’s whereabouts?’ Connelly posed the question like it was a wages demand.

‘Exactly? Well, the best way of answering that would be to say I’ve got exactly nothing.’

‘Why am I not surprised?’ sneered Lynch. I really, really wanted to reach over the table and smack the sneer off his face, but instead I smiled.

‘Why are you not surprised? I don’t know… because I sure am. You see, given enough time to ask the right questions, I could write a book on just about anybody’s personal history. If you dig around for long enough, and deep enough, you can put together a pretty comprehensive picture of just about anyone. People exist on several levels. The first is existing in the way we all understand it:, simply being there. The second is the way we exist in the minds of others: family, friends, lovers, acquaintances, colleagues… even people who see us regularly on the street or the bus or the tram without knowing our names or the first thing about us. The third is our bureaucratic existence: birth, marriage and death certificates, national insurance numbers, drivers’ licences, rent books…’

‘What’s your point?’ asked Connelly.

‘You have assured me that Frank Lang exists. The problem is the only footprints he leaves come to a sudden end. There is no dimension, no depth to Frank Lang. Go back two jobs or one address and there’s nothing. Because he was a sailor, the people I want to speak to about him are scattered all over the world. I’ve only been able to find two seamen who confirm that the face in the picture you gave me really is Frank Lang. And as for his paper trail existence, even that is minimal.’

‘This all sounds like an excuse for you not being able to do the job we’re paying you for,’ said Lynch, his small eyes glittering in the dim, smoky light.

‘Does it? It sounds more to me like I’ve been chasing a ghost. A ghost that, so far, only you two gentlemen, his two ex-shipmates and his nearest neighbours can confirm actually having seen in the flesh.’

‘Are you telling us that you can’t help us any more?’ asked Connelly.

‘Well, that depends.’ I paused and took a cigarette from my case, tapped the tip against gold plate to get rid of the loose shards of tobacco, and lit it. ‘I’ll be honest. I don’t think you’re telling me everything I need to know about Mr Lang and his sudden disappearance.’

‘We’ve told you all we can at this stage, Lennox.’ Lynch didn’t look at me when he spoke, his head lowered as he rolled loose tobacco into a cigarette paper.

‘I see.’ I turned to the union boss. ‘What kind of car do you drive, Mr Connelly?

‘I don’t have a car. If I need to get about on union business, then I have an official car and driver.’

‘What make is it?’

‘Ford Zodiac.’

‘Colour?’

‘Two-tone. Grey on top and a sort of fawny-brown underneath.’

‘What about you, Mr Lynch?’

‘I have a Morris Minor Traveller. Green. Now what the hell has that got to do with anything?’ He had finished rolling his cigarette and sealed the paper by running the edge along the tip of his tongue.

‘The only thing I’ve been able to find out is that, two weeks ago, Frank Lang went off with a couple of men in a large, expensive car, either red or brown in colour. Whoever these men were, and wherever Lang went with them, that is the last sighting we have of him. He just dropped off the world after that.’

‘Are you suggesting it was us?’ said Lynch. ‘If we have spirited Lang away, then why would we hire you?’

‘I wasn’t suggesting anything. I just need to know who picked him up that night. But I do know you’re keeping something from me. Lang is turning into the man-who-never-was. So, gentlemen, why don’t you cut the bull and tell me the truth about him?’

‘Everything we’ve told you is the truth,’ said Connelly, unperturbed. ‘Why would we hire you and then deliberately mislead you?’

‘Maybe what I’m looking for isn’t important, but simply the act of looking.’

‘Is this the way you sound all the time?’ asked Lynch. ‘Or do you, every now and again, open your mouth and make some sense?’

‘Oh, I sometimes make sense all right. Even if it is only to me.’ Again I turned back to Connelly. ‘You see, I am a suspicious sort of cove by nature. And this suspicious streak is putting odd ideas in my head.’

‘Such as?’ asked Connelly.

‘Such as maybe you hired me to go through the motions so you have something to show the police when whatever it is you’re hiding comes to light. I don’t know what that missing ledger has in it, or if that money really has gone missing. All I do know is that Frank Lang is a ghost, and I don’t believe in ghosts. There’s something dodgy going on here, maybe even illegal, and, like I told you, I don’t get involved in anything illegal.’

‘Is that a fact?’ Lynch smiled in a way I didn’t like. ‘We know all about your past, Lennox. Your involvement with the so-called Three Kings.’

Picking up my Borsalino from the table, I stubbed out my cigarette in a cheap ashtray made of pressed tin, and stood up. ‘I think we’re through here, gentlemen. I’ll send you my bill.’

‘You just hold on a minute, Lennox…’ Lynch protested as he stood up. It gave me no end of pleasure to plant my hand squarely on his chest and shove him back, hard, into his chair. The force of it nearly toppled him backward.

‘Stand up to me again,’ I said in an even, quiet tone, ‘and I’ll break your jaw.’

Connelly held up his hand in an appeasing gesture. ‘Mr Lennox, there’s no need to get fired up. Please, sit down. We really do need your help.’

I stayed standing. Lynch’s small rat eyes burned up at me with resentment. But he wasn’t going to do anything about it any time soon.

‘You’re right,’ said Connelly. ‘We haven’t told you everything. But with good reason. Please, Mr Lennox. Sit down and listen to what I have to say. Then, if you still don’t want the job, we’ll settle your bill and you can forget all about us. But please, hear me out.’

I shrugged and sat down.

‘When we first met, I told you that we had carried out our own limited enquiries, such as they were.’

‘Yes,’ I said, dropping my hat back onto the table. ‘So limited you didn’t even speak to Lang’s neighbours.’

‘Union officials are not detectives, and they would be very conspicuous carrying out any kind of public investigation. But with the enquiries we did make, we found ourselves in exactly the position you’re in now. Frank Lang doesn’t have much of a history, and all the history he does have seems to have been just enough to get him involved with the union.’

‘Some kind of plant?’

‘We don’t know, and that’s the truth,’ said Lynch, still glowering. ‘There’s a history of it in the movement. MI5, Special Branch… we know they use informers and infiltrators to spy on the union. It’s all supposed to be chummy at Number Ten these days, but the police still have their little rats burrowing away in our organization.’

‘Normally they’re ordinary workers who they pay for information,’ said Connelly. ‘Class traitors. But maybe Lang wasn’t working for the police or the government and is just a skilled con man. A criminal. When we couldn’t pick up any kind of trail, we thought we would involve you. Because of your background, we thought we could trust you not to talk to the police. And, to be brutally frank, that you may have ways of getting information out of people that we can’t be seen to employ.’

I snorted. ‘I see… you think I’m some kind of thug for hire?’

‘Not that. Just someone who was more likely to get to the bottom of this matter than we are. And you know people connected to the underworld who may have a better chance of knowing who Frank Lang really is.’