Hotbed

  ‘True.’

  ‘It thrilled Naomi,’ Shale said.

  ‘She’s a fine girl.’

  ‘Now and then she gets her doubts about me, Ralph.’

  ‘Doubts? About you?’ Only someone mad wouldn’t have doubts about Shale.

  ‘I can tell. These doubts might be natural.’

  ‘You’re very forgiving, Manse.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be right to blame her too much, seeing the sort of life she’ve come from.’

  ‘Which?’

  ‘She got to adjust. All right, every couple got to do that. But for her it’s a really big item. Not so easy, maybe. This is a woman with her own mind. In a way, I admire her for that. It can be a fucking plague.’

  ‘What kind of doubts, Manse?’ as if Ralph didn’t know.

  ‘She don’t like some of the . . . well, she thinks there might be untoward things she haven’t been told about, like not quite as things seem, and this worries her. Women goes in for all sorts of worries, as you know.’

  ‘Untoward?’

  ‘Like this Turret Brown.’

  ‘In what sense, Manse?’

  ‘She wonders who killed him. They can be like that, women. Somebody gets killed and cut about, so they’ll start with questions. They see that as natural. It’s their way. Silence? They never fucking heard of it. They haven’t got a lot to do, and so they’re always on the lookout for topics.’

  ‘Whom does she think killed him?’ Obviously, Ralph knew the answer to that one, but it would be best for Manse to tell him, not for him to tell Manse. He said ‘whom’ because it was correct and he did not want to patronize Manse by going down to his fucking grammatical level.

  ‘This nosiness can make things dodgy, Ralph.’

  ‘Everyone wonders who killed Brown, including the police.’

  ‘Yes, we all do, I know. It’s an absolute mystery.’

  ‘Does she want to name someone?’

  ‘She thinks she picks up pointers – such as from Unhinged. Very sickening hints.’

  ‘What sort of hints?’

  ‘It can make things tense, Ralph.’

  ‘You tell her what Unhinged is like, don’t you?’

  ‘That his mouth takes over? Yes. It takes over until something else takes over, such as the throttling.’

  ‘Pointers from Unhinged mean nothing. Well, she ought to be able to see what he’s like. Half crazy. Naomi’s an intelligent woman.’

  ‘Yes, I think she does see it. And because of what you done on Unhinged and the way we acted so harmonious together, flattening him – I think that affected her in a truly helpful style. I don’t say she’s forgot the doubts – not totally, that will take time – but I believe it’s going to be all right – the wedding and so on. I got to say moments used to come when I couldn’t be sure. This is a major church all lined up and willing to do it, and I still worried she’d back out because this Brown gets hisself killed in very worrying conditions – I mean, it was more than worrying for him hisself, clearly, but worrying for others, as a result. A poor situation, Ralph.’

  ‘Hard on you.’

  ‘Yes.’ Shale did some mourning. Then he bucked up suddenly. ‘But what I wanted to explain, Ralph, is how I – I mean I myself, in person – how I learned so much from that little carry-on with Unhinged. You might not know it, Ralph, but there are some who say businessmen like us are bound to fight each other, because we all want to be top dog with no other dogs around at all. It’s what known as a theory. You heard of “dog eat dog”? It’s like that. Of importance. Some thinker come up with it as an idea, I heard. They can be like that, thinkers – famed for theories. They’ll look at certain conditions and they’ll decide, Ah, these need a theory. You and me, Ralph, when we think of something it’s just ordinary thinking. But when one of these real thinkers thinks most likely they’ll come up with a theory. Famed for it.’

  ‘They’re always at something.’

  ‘Anyway, I don’t believe it. Never did, and less now. What I’d say, especially after that Unhinged trouble, is we’re friends, you and me, Ralph, and eternal friends. No theory from no thinker can upset that. Them thinkers can go fuck theirselves. If they think thinking’s so grand, why don’t they think about something useful, not just theories? We’ll act like we always did, two firms, but two firms who give each other total respect and understanding.’

  ‘Right, Manse,’ Ember said.

  ‘We don’t usually talk about such matters, I know. We don’t need to talk about such matters because they are there, like natural. But now and then it’s good to talk about such matters. They deserve it, because very few others got

  anything like it, or none at all.’

  ‘True.’

  ‘This is not one of them theories, this is just how it is, and OK to discuss.’

  ‘Highlights things.’

  ‘Spot on.’ Shale stood suddenly. ‘Look, Naomi is here, with the children. I’d like to call them all in so they can see us together, companions for ever, in total trade harmony. This they should witness, and share the joy.’

  ‘Right, Manse,’ Ember said.

  Shale went and opened the den-room door. He called out to Naomi and the children, in an excited, fulfilled voice. After a moment, the three appeared and sat down on the leather chairs and settee, Naomi, Laurent and Matilda. The boy and girl were still in their private school uniform, blue, trimmed with black. They looked refined, despite Mansel. ‘Here’s Ralph,’ Shale said, with terrific affection. ‘He didn’t want to go until he saw you all. It’s the way he is. Of course, he’ll see you again at the wedding, but that’s still days away.’

  ‘We’re all looking forward to it, I’m sure,’ Ralph said.

  ‘So much,’ Naomi said.

  And Ralph thought she might mean it now, although she seemed to have learned fast how to use conversation to hide things as well as say them. Perhaps that very personal interview with him at the club helped her. He guessed she had not told Manse about the visit. Their meeting, plus the Unhinged incident, could have worked on her, together convinced Naomi that Shale might just about justify the risk, marriage being such a risk, anyway. Many women would gamble. Also, she knew art, and had decided that at least some of Manse’s stuff was genuine and valuable. Plus, there had been so much talk about this wedding that she probably thought she couldn’t get out of it now – big church, very helpful clergyman, lots of invitations sent. Ralph believed he might be able to give her some consolation later on in the marriage. She’d probably expect this from him. But not immediately. He would regard that as gross, and probably she would, too.

  ‘Naomi’s not our mother, of course,’ Matilda said, ‘in the biological meaning, but she’s going to be our new mother, anyway.’

  ‘Yes,’ Laurent said. ‘Our real mother’s quite good at it when she wants to be, but she’s not here lately.’

  ‘No,’ Naomi said.

  ‘Isn’t it great?’ Shale said. ‘How things sort theirselves out.’

  ‘Great,’ Naomi said.

  Ember left soon after this. He’d certainly thought about getting Manse on his own to let Shale know that Articulate meant to kill him as part of a deal with Ralph, but then decided Manse could probably protect himself. Perhaps, in any case, the sod deserved whatever came. After all, he’d done, or he’d had done, Joachim Brown, someone very carefully selected and approved of by Ralph, and by his daughter. It was difficult to forgive that, despite all the endless brotherly windbagging and buddy-mush just now.

  Yet, Ember didn’t want to be entirely negative and harsh. Maturity, in his opinion, brought an ability to compromise, and he thought of one way he could respond to Mansel’s thoroughly inspired show. Ralph decided he’d tell a couple of his people to watch out for Sybil on the wedding day, assuming Manse lived that long, and, if she looked likely to turn rough and loud
, cart her off somewhere secure and soundproof until the ceremony ended, though with no more than necessary violence, and definitely nothing sexual. Ralph knew he, personally, would hate a disturbance in this top quality church as much as Manse.

  Ember was at the Monty late again a day or two later and did a routine tour of the club yard to satisfy himself no mysterious packages had been left against outer doors. He must not get unvigilant. It could be a mistake to think any attack from Shale would be against him, Ralph, physically. Instead, the tactics might be shaped to reduce him, break him, gradually. So, for instance, knock off Turret, a valued, favoured, honoured, member of Ralph’s firm. And then? Do the Monty, and with it, many of Ralph’s golden hopes. Destruction of the Monty could mean destruction of Ember’s mind and selfhood and will to fight.

  An unmarked Volvo drove into the yard and parked. Iles and Colin Harpur left the car and walked towards him, Iles looking what Ember thought of as deeply unwinsome. These two would sometimes arrive at the Monty after midnight, on the face of it to see all licensing conditions were observed, but actually, in Ralph’s view, to terrorize the clientele and enjoy a few free drinks. ‘Hunting firebombs, Ralph, dear?’ Iles said. ‘Isn’t it a gross world, though?’

  Ember took them to the bar and set the pair up with their usuals, then poured himself a Kressmann’s. Twenty or so members remained in the club, mostly at the bar or playing snooker and pool. Iles did his usual arrogant glare about, as if he couldn’t believe how some of these people were out of clink, or any of them. Ralph felt this sort of attitude would be utterly improper once the Monty had been relaunched. Perhaps it should be regarded as improper now, though Ralph would admit that some members who got Iles’s disbelieving stare tonight might have been locked up except for very talented QCs and/or the overcrowded jails.

  They sat at a corner table. Harpur said: ‘I gather Articulate was here alone recently for quite a dialogue. Had he suddenly turned really articulate? He’d emerged somehow?’

  ‘I see such one-to-one conversations with long-time members as a very worthwhile and, indeed, pleasurable experience,’ Ralph replied, ‘and an essential factor in one’s job as host.’

  ‘How true,’ Iles replied.

  ‘One to one?’ Harpur said.

  ‘Articulate’s a valued “Montyist”, as I term our regulars,’ Ember replied. Had this sod, Harpur, seen Articulate turn up alone, on a return visit the other night? But how could that have happened? Articulate arrived very late. Had Harpur been watching the Monty? Why? Or had someone in the club at the time given Harpur or Iles a whisper? It always badly hurt Ralph to think the Monty housed members who watched things here and straight off reported to the police, for some contemptible fee. He might be able to trace the guilty voice this time, if that was how Harpur knew. There’d been very few other people in the club. Ralph believed he could remember who.

  ‘And then Articulate and his mother and great aunt Edna in earlier that evening,’ Harpur said. ‘We saw them, of course. A previous conference.’ It wasn’t a question, but he gazed at Ralph, as if expecting an answer. Harpur always looked slabby, harsh, aggressive – yes, some said, like Marciano, though fair-haired. Alongside him, Iles appeared dainty, but to Ralph’s knowledge, lacked all daintiness. ‘This sounds like real activity,’ Harpur said.

  ‘What does?’ Ember said.

  ‘These visits,’ Harpur said.

  ‘This is a club. It has a social aim. People drop in,’ Ember replied. ‘You drop in yourselves, don’t you, Mr Harpur?’

  ‘We wondered, Mr Iles and I, whether you could recall the gist of your talk with Articulate, or even with Articulate and his mother and great aunt Edna.’

  ‘As a matter of fact, I didn’t know of the later tête-à-tête with Articulate,’ Iles said, ‘but Harpur mentioned it to me. He’d found out about that in some way. We won’t inquire how, Ralph, shall we? We’d get no fucking answer. Occasionally, Harpur does mention things to me, if it suits him, but edited.’

  ‘I talk to many members over any twenty-four hours, you know,’ Ralph said. ‘I see it as my function – a necessary and pleasurable one.’

  ‘They’re lucky to have you,’ Iles said. ‘Everyone realizes that. But, look, don’t piss Col and me about, Ralph, there’s a chum. Just give us what Articulate said, what you said, what the women said, would you? Something agreed at the first meeting and then Articulate comes in late to confirm? Or cancel? OK?’

  ‘Casual conviviality, that’s all. You make it all sound very purposeful and businesslike, Mr Iles,’ Ralph said, ‘whereas –’

  ‘Yes, purposeful and businesslike,’ Iles said. ‘That’s our reading of things.’

  ‘It could be wrong – with respect,’ Ralph said.

  ‘It’s the later conversation – just you and him – that really interests us,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Generalities, I should think,’ Ember said. Ralph produced a frown to show he meant to try seriously to help them and recollect. ‘Weather. Holidays. Cricket. The usual small talk. We try to avoid politics – too controversial. Most of them support David Cameron and the new Conservatives, of course, because of Eton and Oxford. I don’t mean any of them actually went to either place, but they’d like to be noticed backing classiness. They think it will persuade me to accept their membership when the Monty changes. I bump into so many people here and have a few unimportant yet, I trust, comradely words. These little exchanges seem to merge into one pleasant and not very significant encounter. I don’t know whether Alec would recall things better than I. It might be in your interests to talk to him, if you feel something significant might have come up.’ Obviously, Articulate would tell them nothing. He wasn’t going to chirrup: Oh, yes, Mr Iles, Mr Harpur, I went into the Monty to arrange a bit of reciprocity – I’d do Manse for him if he’d promise not to let my mother and great aunt put any of my money from the Holborn bank expedition into the Monty black hole. ‘I’d not object to your asking him. Why would I? Nothing controversial or private. You can tell him, if you wish, that it’s OK with me for him to go over

  what was said.’

  ‘The thing about Articulate is he’s dead,’ Iles replied.

  ‘My God,’ Ralph said. The shock was real.

  ‘Which is why what he talked about with you might be to the point,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Is this certain – confirmed?’ Ralph said.

  ‘I confirm it,’ Iles said. ‘You can’t get anyone deader than that.’

  ‘Generalities,’ Ralph said. ‘We talked generalities.’

  ‘Done by multiple shots,’ Harpur replied.

  ‘Oh,’ Ralph said.

  ‘It looks as though he meant to bop Mansel Shale, but got bopped himself,’ Harpur said.

  ‘As most of us would have forecast,’ Iles said. ‘Alec as executioner? I mean, sure to cock it up.’ He sniffed boisterously for a while and did an imitation weep for Articulate. ‘These things tend to sort themselves out nicely, don’t they, with next to no interference from us? A bit of neat domestic tidying. Brown, dead, Articulate dead – both wholly inpenetrable cases, I’m afraid.’

  ‘The whisper’s around, isn’t it, that he was in on the ICDS robbery with some sort of stooge function,’ Harpur said, ‘but nicely paid to keep his gob shut? Did that make him feel suddenly big and mature and competent – and free up his voicebox, at least for chats with you?’

  ‘Poor deluded prat,’ Iles said. ‘He gave himself a kill mission on your behalf? Has Mansel seemed a threat lately, Ralph? That’s how we read the scene. I expect you know the theories about monopoly, the commercial imperative, that eternal, grisly capitalistic struggle for dominance.’

  ‘Interlocking factors,’ Harpur said. ‘You’ll remember that Mr Iles is quite a dazzler at charting these. So: Joachim Brown, Karl Marx, Naomi, monopoly, Unhinged, Manse Shale, Articulate, the lady Misks – Rose and Edna.’

  ‘An
d, of course, yourself, Ralph,’ Iles said.

  Yourself. Ember wondered, did these two want to nick him as accessory? Were they saying he commissioned Articulate to remove Mansel Shale? Perhaps in a way he had. Articulate and he shook hands on the plan. Articulate had offered, Ralph accepted, though regarding it as fantasy. That might be criminal. Must be. Luckily, however, it was deeply, blessedly unprovable. Possibly, Harpur saw Articulate come late to the Monty, but he couldn’t have heard the conversation, and no stooly club member had been near enough to eavesdrop. Harpur and Iles pressed him to tell them what was said, but must realize they’d get only horse shit. They hadn’t put him under caution. Iles considered this and the Brown case ‘impenetrable’. They’d never charge anyone with either. So, how could Ember be an accessory? Accessories had to have somebody to be an accessory with.

  ‘Mansel, a threat?’ Ember replied. ‘In which way?’

  ‘Thrilled by his new gangster gloss, did Alec offer to knock Shale over for you?’ Iles said. ‘Suddenly the retard thinks he’s one of Nature’s hit men? Were you and he talking some kind of deal? You’ll see why we’re concerned about his appearances here, Ralph, especially the second one, without his minders, the crones. He needed confidentiality? I wonder if he wanted to say something to you they shouldn’t hear?’

  ‘Deal?’ Ember said.

  ‘Quid pro quoism of some sort,’ the ACC said.

  Ember saw Iles needed to show he had guessed the arrangement between Articulate and Ralph. As ever, this fucking know-all craved credit for being a know-all. That was probably enough for him. There could be no arrests. ‘Yes, generalities,’ Ralph replied. ‘We spoke generalities.’ He replenished their drinks and took more armagnac himself. ‘I think about his mother and great aunt Edna,’ he said.

  ‘Those two are provided for, we believe,’ Iles said.