Jim Cogan - The Dirty City

“Dr Masters.”

“Mr Jerome - apologies, I’ve been meaning to call your office – I can’t tell you how grateful myself and Helena are to you, you saved our little girls life.”

“All in a days work, Dr Masters. Can I ask, is Michelle conscious, might I be permitted to speak to her?”

“Of course, Mr Jerome, I’ll take you in – but just one thing,” he paused at the door. He looked like a man dealing with massive internal conflict, as if all the things he’d previously been assured about were being called into question, “Helena – she doesn’t know the exact details of the circumstances that Michelle found herself in. I’ve only been told what the doctors here can ascertain from examining her, and frankly that is something no father should ever have to hear.”

“I understand, Doc, you can count on my discretion.”

Poor bastard. Daddy’s little girl wasn’t a little girl no more.

The room was dimly lit with a single bedside lamp. Michelle Masters was lying in a hospital bed with all manner of tubes and other medical paraphernalia sticking out of her. She looked like she was sleeping.

At her bedside, holding her hand, sat Mrs Helena Masters. She was a classy, immaculately groomed lady in her early forties. Like any concerned parent would, she was showing the signs of the strain, but nowhere near to the extent of her husband. I wondered if she’d ever find out the full story, but a big part of me agreed with the Doc, what she didn’t know couldn’t hurt her. I got the impression that a revelation like that would destroy the woman.

As I approached, she turned to look at me, her expression adjusting with acknowledgment.

“Mr Jerome, I don’t know how to thank you, you got our little girl back. Michelle. Michelle, honey, this is Mr Jerome – the man I was telling you about.”

Michelle didn’t move or even open her eyes.

“You’ll have to excuse her, Mr Jerome, she’s still really tired after her ordeal.”

“It’s okay, Mrs Jameson. I just dropped by to see she how she was doing. But I was wondering…” I paused, trying to make my request as gently as I could, “I’m working on a new case, another missing person, similar circumstances. I’ve reason to believe Michelle might be able to help.”

“Well, you can ask her, she hasn’t really spoken much since – well, you know?”

“I appreciate this is a bit unorthodox, but,” again, I left a subtle pause, “I’d really like to talk to her alone, if possible. I need to speak to her about someone called Anton.”

“Mr Jerome, I’d have to insist that you don’t-.”

“Mom. It’s okay. I’ll speak to him,” everyone rapidly glanced around to Michelle, her eyes now wide open. I’d had a feeling that might get her attention.

“Michelle, honey, you’re still recovering.”

“It’s alright, Mom, this is important, I need to do this, please .” Michelle gave her mother the little girl eyes and smiled – she was some piece of work, she knew just how to play her.

Reluctantly, Helen Masters agreed and the Doc ushered his wife outside. I sensed that she had her reservations but the fact that Michelle was talking again seemed to act as source of comfort to her, so she didn’t protest too much.

“Thank you, Michelle.”

“Who told you about me and Anton?” Her expression had shifted, she had dropped the sick little girl in hospital act very quickly indeed.

“Newt.”

“That son of a bitch. You know what he did to me?”

“I only know what he told me.”

“And you’re looking for Anton?”

“Yes, his father-.”

“Is a self-obsessed, controlling son of a bitch.”

“Well, he’s a lawyer, so I guess that’s a fair description.”

“He hired you to find him, didn’t he?”

“He did.”

“Anton doesn’t want to be found.”

“I know that too. But someone has found him.”

“What do you mean?”

“He was at Newt’s place last night, when I came to get you out of there. Have to say, he was not in a good way. However, turns out that was the least of his problems - Newt reckons some hoods turned up and took him away. Mob guys. I need to know what he was into, and how deep. His life could depend on it, and you’re one of the few people he might have spoken to about it.”

“Oh God!” For the first time since we began talking her expression softened.

“I know this is hard. I know this is painful, but you’ve got to tell me all you know about Anton, I think he’s in way over his head. I need your help,” the good old fashioned guilt trip, it rarely failed.

She sighed, “Okay, Mr Jerome.”

“Good girl, start at the beginning.”

“We met at Newt’s place. I’d known Newt for a few months, a friend put me onto him, she told me he sold the best dope in the city. That was true at least, it was good shit. I started buying more of it, then when things went crazy at home Newt let me stay at his place, rent free. I thought he was being nice, I should have seen it coming.”

“He’s a creep, that’s what he does. Go on.”

“I’d been staying there a few nights when one evening Anton showed up. He was a new customer as well. We got talking, we got really stoned together, and you know, one thing led to another. For a few days things were great. Anton and I were inseparable; he had all these crazy plans, about getting out the city, going somewhere new and starting over. Looking back, it seems so naive.”

“It’s okay, sweetheart. This happiness . It didn’t last?”

“Anton ran out on his father, taking a load of money with him. He was living off that, it was all he had.”

“Where was he staying?”

“At first in some cheap, shitty motel, but they started getting suspicious of him. So he started sleeping rough, he told me he’d fallen in with some of the crowd near the Old Portland Bridge by the old dockside.”

“Sounds like a dangerous place for a kid like that to be?”

“That’s what I told him, whenever I could I convinced to stay with me at Newt’s place. Funny, that’s where the problems began.”

“Newt took exception to having another lodger?”

“Not at first. Anton had money, he was paying his dues. He was buying a lot of dope from Newt. But then money started to run a bit short, that’s when Newt did the one thing that ensured we couldn’t run out on him.”

“What happened?”

“One night, we didn’t have enough money to pay for dope, Newt said it was fine, that he didn’t mind – he liked having us both around. Then he offered us something new, something we’d never done before.”

“Heroin?”

“We didn’t really know what it was at the time. We smoked it, Newt helped us – he said this stuff could be dangerous if you did it wrong. It was very different to dope.”

“How long was Newt giving you the stuff for free?”

“About a week. And then…” I could see tears bubbling up in her eyes. “And then he had us. Both of us, we needed it. That first day Newt told me it wasn’t free no more, I tried to go without. My God, it was like my life was going to end. Anton was worse, he’d been able to smoke a lot more of it than me.”

“So what did you and Anton do?”

“Anton promised me he could fix this, he went out, I don’t know what he did but he got money. I asked where it came from and he lied about it. I could tell, he’d been so honest and open with me up until that point. He claimed it was money he was owed by a friend, but he couldn’t look me in the eye. I never found out where it came from, I assumed he stole it. I didn’t want to think about it – for all I knew he could have been robbing people in the street. But he had money, and we were able to get what we needed from Newt, and for a day or two, it was alright again. And so it carried on, I stopped asking where Anton was getting the money, I didn’t want to know anymore, I was just relieved that he was able to get it.”