Philip Kerr - A Philosophical Investigation

‘You see everything in a dump like this,’ said the girl and climbed into her pants.

‘That’s not what I meant.’

‘No? What did you mean?’

‘The dead man: ever see him before?’

‘I said hello to him as he came down the stairs and sat down.’

‘Would you recognise him again?’

She nodded and pulled up her skirt.

‘So why did you tell my inspector that you didn’t see anything? You know, you almost certainly saw the man who did it.’

Clare shrugged. ‘I dunno. Scared, I guess. In this business, you can get into trouble if you talk to the police. People don’t like people who talk to the law. You know.’

‘Meaning Mr Grubb.’

‘Yes. He can get a bit violent sometimes.’

‘He hits you?’

‘Sometimes, yeah. Never on the face, mind. And it’s not just that. If he found out that I was telling you things now, he might assume I’d tell you something else another time. I might lose my job. Grubb says that there are plenty of Chinese who would do what I do, for half the money.’

‘If I promise to sort it out with Grubb, will you take a look at some ComputaFit pictures and see if you can’t help to improve them?’

Clare nodded again and pulled on a none too clean sweater.

‘You promise you’ll make it so that he won’t take it out on me?’

‘I promise. I’ll have one of my men drive you down to the Yard.’

On her way back upstairs, Jake stopped for a moment and took a deep, unsteady breath. It made Jake angry to think of the men who came to this filthy cellar to see a girl, formulated, sprawling on a stage, pinned and wriggling on a floor. It made her angry to think of a girl like that making a commodity of herself for the profit of the man in the office upstairs. She felt her brow lower with distaste.

Jake searched in her shoulder bag for the set of electronic tungsten knuckles she kept there. The rubber grip meant that the user could hold them quite safely, but when the metal came into contact with the human body, they emitted an electric shock, thus enabling most female police officers to hit every bit as hard, if not harder, than their male colleagues. Good job too, thought Jake, with all the thugs they had to deal with, most of whom were prepared to belt a policewoman every bit as hard as they would a male officer.

Jake found Mr Grubb in his office with Detective Inspector Stanley seated on the corner of his desk. She disliked him almost instinctively. He was large and fat, but despite his expensive suit, his gold watch and his cigar, you could still see the grubby little schoolboy underneath the man. He was well-named.

‘You the Chief Inspector?’ snarled Grubb.

Jake kept the hand with the knuckles hidden for the time being.

‘That’s right,’ she said breezily.

‘Then tell your bit of prick to get off my back. It’s no good him threatenin’ me with fire and safety officers. I didn’t see nuthin’, all right?’

Jake looked at Stanley. ‘Leave us alone for a minute,’ she told him.

Stanley nodded uncertainly, and then stepped out of the room.

‘I’m sorry, but what did you say you saw?’

Grubb grimaced at her. ‘What are you? Deaf or something? I said, I didn’t see nuthin’.’ He laughed at her and set about re-lighting his cigar.

‘If you did not see nothing,’ Jake said, ‘that means that you did see something.’

‘Eh? What you talkin’ about?’

‘Don’t you see? The two negatives cancel each other out. You know I’m glad you’re going to help us because if you had said that you didn’t see anything, I’d be worried that something might happen to you.’

‘You threatenin’ me, darlin’?’ He spoke without even looking at her, as if in contempt of her.

‘Yes,’ said Jake flatly.

‘I’ve done nuthin’. You can’t scare me, luv.’

‘No? I bet I could scare you, Mr Grubb. I bet I could have you begging for mercy.’

Grubb smiled. ‘There’s only one way that a girl like you could have me beggin’ for mercy,’ he said suggestively.

‘Oh? And what’s that?’

He laughed. ‘Use your imagination, sweetheart.’ Then he shook his head and, getting up from his desk, advanced towards Jake. ‘You know, I do believe you’re tryin’ to get hard with me: is that right?’ There was quiet menace in his voice.

Jake held her ground and nodded.

Grubb pushed his fat schoolboy’s face closer to Jake’s until she could smell the tobacco on his breath.

‘Don’t make me laugh. You don’t—’

Jake thumbed the bezel on the grip of the knuckles and brought her fist up through a short arc. The knuckles emitted a low electronic hum as they accelerated through the air, but this was abruptly lost in Grubb’s howl of pain and surprise as, with a small blue spark, her fist connected with his stomach. He doubled over, almost collapsing on top of her, but still finding himself able to flail at her with one fist. Jake neatly sidestepped the clumsy blow, and pulling the punch just a fraction, she caught Grubb on the side of the jaw. He collapsed onto the ground.

Jake stood over him, and grabbing him by the tie, she pulled his head clear of the floor and then let it drop a couple of times.

‘How’s your memory now?’ she asked. ‘Anything yet?’

‘All right, all right,’ Grubb moaned, rubbing his jaw. ‘I did see him. No need to get violent.’

‘Good,’ said Jake. ‘I’m glad you’ve decided to cooperate.’ She twisted his tie tighter. ‘I don’t much like your business and I don’t much like the crumbs like you who run it. It’s lucky for you that I’m busy today, otherwise I’d ask some of the girls who work here about you. And if I found that you were the type who slaps them around, well that would really make me angry. Let’s hope for your sake that I never have to come back here, eh?’

Jake yelled out for Stanley. He returned to the room and smiled when he saw Grubb lying on the floor at Jake’s feet.

‘Take this man down to the Yard, Stanley,’ she said. ‘Seems like he’s remembered something after all. And the girl too.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’ Stanley helped a stunned-looking Grubb off the floor. ‘What’s the matter with you, then? Fall over, did you, sir? Come on, up you get.’ Stanley nodded almost appreciatively at Jake and then led Grubb out of the office to the car.

Jake switched off the knuckles and dropped them back into her bag. Her high police rank sometimes left her on the slippery ice of intellectual detective work, constructing elaborate aetiological theories, with little or no friction underfoot. She enjoyed the almost academic conditions of her work. But it felt good to be back on rough ground again.

It was dark by the time Jake parked her BMW in the small car-park surrounding her apartment building. Before she got out of the door she put her head through the strap of her bag and adjusted it across her chest. Then she unzipped the bag and put her left hand inside, so that she had hold of the Beretta’s neoprene grip even before she had pulled the door-handle. Now that he had her address she was more careful about her security. Was it possible that she might have even met Wittgenstein in her own building?

With this one thought in her mind Jake crossed the car-park and gained the front door without incident. The doorman glanced up from his evening paper. There was lipstick on his cheek.

‘Evening, miss,’ he said.

Jake released the big gun and zipped her bag.

‘Good evening, Phil,’ she said. Now she saw the headline on the paper. Another man found murdered.

‘This serial killer, miss: what makes someone do it?’ said Phil. ‘The wife says he must be gay or something, but none of these men who’ve been killed have been touched, right?’