Ken Bruen - Rilke on Black

Indeed.

Put the house on the market. Told the estate agent I was going abroad and would take a low, low price for rapid sale. I met him at Clapham, showed him over and gave him a spare set of keys. If I could just hold it together, I might make a clean sweep.

The doorbell went. I was wearing the blue suit to blind the estate agent. Opened the door to a near identical one, except the body language shouted COP. He was in his fifties, what they called grizzled. Tufts of steel brillo hair, hard grey eyes. About six foot, he was running to fat but not there yet. Flashed the card.

“Good morning Sir, I’m Detective Brant from the Met, might I have a word?”

“Sure, care to step in.”

He did and gave the house a more thorough scan than the property guy.

“Tea, coffee?”

“Coffee — I shouldn’t but, my gut is hell and gone anyway. Black with two sugars please.”

I got the coffee and motioned him to sit. He glanced round again, said, “Comfortable! And they say Clapham’s on the way back.”

I often wondered where those areas went in the mean-time. The same place as Brant’s gut, presumably. Kept these observations mute and waited.

“You are familiar with one Dexter Cole and, lemme check my notebook here — Elizabeth Reed and, yes, Bonny Mellor.”

“Did I know them you mean — yes, of course I did. Dex is my neighbour — right opposite in fact, Lisa was his girlfriend and Bonny was my friend.”

He gave the procedural puzzled look. I didn’t help.

“See, that’s my dilemma. Both Cole and Reed have disappeared. Ms Mellor alas was killed in a tragic fire. Your friend you said — but you didn’t go to her funeral?”

“I couldn’t — too stressful.”

“Yes, yes, it would be. In fact, we thought you’d vanished yourself. Bit of a holiday perhaps?”

“Not exactly. I stayed with a friend — a lady.”

“And she is? — her address, just for my records you understand. I was led to believe you and the Reed woman were close.”

“Naw, she was Dex’s piece of skirt. Me, I’m not into black — know wot I mean?”

“I see.”

He pondered, then held up his cup. “Might I?”

I was boiling the water when I heard him behind me. Gave me a turn — shades of Dex — but I looked down. He said, “I’m going to level with you Nick.”

As no name had been given by me, I was to shake in my boots here. Police psychology one.

“I shouldn’t really be divulging this but, perhaps you can help me.”

“I’ll try.”

“A black businessman was kidnapped and we have reason to believe a ransom of over two million has been paid.”

The bitch! Upping the ante for the insurance. She’d be lucky.

I gave a low whistle. He said, “Yes, quite a tidy figure, but the man hasn’t been released. Our inquiries lead us to believe Cole and Reed might be implicated.”

Now I adopted the pondering face, then said, “Might this businessman not have staged it — you know, fake kidnap?”

“Mmm, a possibility, yes — maybe.”

“But you don’t think so.”

He drained the coffee. I was feeling that drained too. He made to leave and said, “If you hear anything about either of those two individuals, please call me. Here’s my card. We’ve reason to believe this Dex character is volatile and unpredictable.”

Not any more!

I took the card, made noises of agreement. At the door he thanked me for my co-operation then, looking at my suit, asked, “You’re not currently employed Nick, are you?”

Up close our suits were twins. I said, “If I were, would I be wearing this rubbish?”

Next morning I rented a safe deposit box. Not an easy thing to do but persisted. Plonked most of the cash in that and paid for one more week at the hotel. I was getting accustomed to it. Then I got hold of a motor trade magazine and arranged to sell the van. Short of myself, I had near everything up for sale. Whether I’d get to collect any or all of it was the toss of the black dice. Sure beat horse racing though. A whole new slant on the gamblers old cry of — “to make a killing”.

Friday was D-Day The initial could be Danny or worse. Then the last act. I booked a flight to New York for Sunday — ready to rock and roll.

All day Wednesday I willed myself to relax. Ate three solid meals, exercised, and tried not to project. A huge surge of adrenaline was building and I kept rein on it. Restrain and temper the flow till the hour of confrontation.

On a whim I stopped at a coffee shop and found an empty table. Ordered cappuccino and eased back. The coffee came, frothy and hopping but alas, with company. A couple in their twenties. She asked politely if they could share the table. The guy, in mandatory pigtail, gave me a look. “Not today pal,” I thought, “it’s my armistice for London time. No way can you piss on my parade.”

The guy began a torrent of abuse to his partner. Foul, ferocious, and relentless. I said, “Hey fella, you wanna give it a rest for a bit.”

He sneered, something to witness. He was built to maybe burst a balloon — all of the fashionable one-thirty pounds. He said, “This any of your business? You think your bulk intimidates me?”

The girl gave me the pleading stare, the “please don’t rile him further” number. So I leant over the table, clamped my hand on his wrist, said, “You want to know what I think? OK — I think you should be very fuckin’ intimidated. Now — if you answer me, I’m going to make you eat the ponytail, elastic band and all. See, it is my business ’cos you sat at my table. So, not a word — shush!”

I drank my coffee and after a few minutes he hepped up and stamped away. She said, “He doesn’t mean it.”

“But he does — he most certainly does. What I do know is you’ll follow him and I dearly wish you wouldn’t.”

She did.

A new tenant would have been pleased with the bag beneath the bed. They used to say, if you wanted to find a hooker’s number, look inside the provided Gideon Bible. Provided you had one. I didn’t. Lay on the bed, put on the headphones and let Neil Young sooth me.

 I was wondering what to do,

 and the closer they got, the more those feelings

 grew.

 Daddy’s rifle in my hands felt reassuring,

 he told me RED means RUN son, numbers

 add up to nothing.

 But when that first shot hit the door,

 I saw it coming,

 raised the rifle to my eye, never stopped

 to wonder why.

 Then I saw BLACK and my face flash in the sky.

Hard to figure old Neil had been opening my mail.

As I’d put Lisa into the bin liner, she’d opened her eyes and grabbed my wrist. That terrible rattle was coming from her throat. I’d broken her grip and pounded her down into the bag, a stream of terror pouring from me. Somehow I’d tied the bag but still there was movement. I’d used a shovel to beat down and begged — “for pity’s sake, die you bitch” — and came awake.

Drenched in sweat, the headphones still on and ripped them off. It took me a few moments to realise I was whimpering. Crawled from the bed and tore off my clothes, they were sodden with perspiration. Naked, I found the half bottle of gin and gulped at it — my hands could hardly hold the bottle. Even the room was shaking, the death rattle loud in my head. The gin calmed me, it sickened me but my heart slowed down. As did the room. Staggered to the shower and tried to soak away the heebie-jeebies. Said aloud — “thing like that, put a man off sleeping.”

Going round to Bill’s, I’d

3 Videos of Alf

An Alf doll

Alf T-Shirts

Alf Cutlery

Alf Posters.

Should do it!

To my bitter disappointment, the little girl was out with her mum. I couldn’t believe how let down I was. I said, “Ah well, next time.”