Killing the Lawyer.
by Reginald Hill.
One.
Christmas. Season of d.i.y. divorce and marital mayhem. Meaning that while cop cars and meat wagons are ding donging merrily down Luton High, a PI can get festive and know he"s not missing much business. Especially a PI like Joe Sixsmith who doesn"t have much business to miss. December 28th, Joe called in at his office. Didn"t antic.i.p.ate a queue of clients but what were the alternatives? More force-feeding at Auntie Mirabelle"s, more unforced boozing down the Glit, or joining the other lost souls cruising the Palladian Shopping Mall in search of bargains they didn"t want in sales that had opened in Advent. There were no turtle doves or partridges waiting for him, only a single typewritten envelope and a sodden cat-litter tray. Whitey must"ve taken a valedictory leak as Joe waited for him on the landing on Christmas Eve. Perhaps it was memory of this peccadillo which had kept the cat firmly pinned in front of Mirabelle"s fire, but more likely it was just his insatiable appet.i.te for cold turkey. Thanks a bundle," said Joe as he emptied the clogged grit and damp tabloid into a plastic carrier and dumped it on the landing for later transfer to the bin below. Swilling the tray out in his tiny washroom, he noticed that the uric acid had produced a kind of stencil through the newspaper on to the beige plastic bottom. At various levels there must have been a colour photo of Prince Charles, a Page Three girl, and some guys firing guns in one of the world"s chronic wars. The resultant blurred image, framed in broken sentences, lay there like a drunk"s philosophy at closing time, and as difficult to get rid of. Cold water wouldn"t budge it.
"Shoot," said Joe. "Could get done for lese majeste, I suppose, but long as Whitey don"t mind, who else is going to notice?"
He gave the tray a good shake and balanced it to dry on the curtain rail over the window he"d opened to air the room.
Turning up his collar against the draught, he checked his answer machine. His own voice said, "h.e.l.lo, this is me talking to me. h.e.l.lo." He"d bought it off his taxi-driving friend Merv Golightly, who claimed to have accepted it in lieu of a fare. After a week of no messages Joe had got suspicious and rung himself. It made him feel both shamed and saddened that clearly the machine worked better than he did.
Now he turned to his mail. The single envelope had the t.i.tle PENTHOUSE a.s.sURANCE printed across the flap and he tore it open with crossed fingers, which wasn"t easy.
A cheque fell out.
Usually the sight of a cheque had Joe beaming like a toy-store Santa, but the figures on this one creased his good-natured face with disbelief. He turned to the accompanying letter.
Dear Mr. Sixsmith, Thank you for your communication of December 14th, the contents of which have been noted. There being no material alteration to the facts of the case, however, I have great pleasure in enclosing our cheque for one hundred and twenty-five pounds ( 125.00) in full and final settlement of your motor claim.
Yours sincerely, Imogen Airey (Mrs).
(Senior Inspector Claims Dept Penthouse a.s.surance).
"We"ll see about that!" said Joe.
Thrusting the letter into his donkey-jacket pocket, he headed out of the office.
Halfway down the stairs he heard his phone ringing. It rang four times before the answer machine clicked in. He hesitated. 28th was the Fourth Day of Christmas. (Or was it the Third? He never knew where to start counting.) Anyway, his superst.i.tious mind was telling him these could be the Four Golden Rings from the carol, heralding the case which was going to make him rich and famous. Or more likely it was Aunt Mirabelle telling him the table was set for tea, and where the shoot was he? Whoever, there was no time to go back. His business was urgent, it was coming up to five, and this time of year maybe even the Bullpat Square Law Centre kept conventional hours. As he resumed his descent he realized he was wheezing like a punctured steam organ. Even going downstairs knackers me, he thought. Sixsmith, you got to get yourself in shape! His car was parked out of sight round the corner. He tried to keep it out of sight as he approached but it wasn"t easy. It yelled to be looked at and three months" possession hadn"t dimmed the shock. It was a Magic Mini from the psychedelic sixties, still wearing its body paint of pink and purple poppies with weary pride. Clashing desperately with the floral colours was the legend in pillar-box red along both doors ANOTHER RAM RAY LOAN CAR.
At least after many hours of Sixsmith tender loving care, the engine now burst into instant life and the clutch no longer whined like a heavy-metal guitar. It was already dark and the bright lights of downtown Luton struck sparks off the slushy sidewalks, while high in the sky the Clint Eastwood inflatable over Dirty Harry"s bucked in the gusting wind, now aiming its fluorescent Magnum at the gla.s.sy heart of the civic tower, now drawing a bead on the swollen gut of a jumbo as it lumbered with its cargo of suntanned vacationists towards the line of festal light on Luton Airport. Even through his anger, Joe felt the familiar pang of affection and pride. This was his town. And he was going to leave it better than he found it. Just leaving it should do the trick, said a deflating voice. He glanced towards the pa.s.senger seat, but Whitey, who usually got blamed for such cynical telepathy, wasn"t there.
OK, so I"m talking to myself now. And I know better than to take myself too seriously. But there"s folk in this town got to learn to take me serious enough!
Armed with this thought, he parked his car on a double yellow in front of Bullpat Square Law Centre and strode into the building.
He saw at once he needn"t have worried about the time. Christmas might jerk the daily bread out of the mouths of gumshoes and hitmen. It did nothing to remove the bitter cup from the lips of the deprived and the depressed.
For a moment his resolution wavered and he might have headed for the comfort of the Glit if Butcher"s door hadn"t opened that second to let out a black woman with two small children.
Ignoring both the young man at the reception desk and the people crowding the wall benches, he walked straight in.
From behind a pile of files and beneath a miasma of smoke a small woman in her thirties glared at him and said, "Just when I thought things couldn"t get worse."
"Butcher, I need a lawyer. Read this."
He handed her the letter. She read it, at the same time lighting another thin black cheroot from the b.u.t.t end of the one she"d just finished.
"Don"t you ever think of your unborn children?" he asked, wafting the smoke away.
"When would I have time for unborn children?" she asked. This looks fine to me. Generous almost. That heap of yours couldn"t have been worth more."
"That heap was a 1962 Morris Oxford which I had restored to a better than pristine condition. Also it was part of my livelihood. I need a car."
"You"ve got a car. I"ve seen it."
"Then you know what I mean. I"m a PI. I follow people. I sit outside their houses and keep watch. In that thing, I might as well be beating a drum and shouting, Hey there, folks, you"re being tailed by Joe Sixsmith!"
"At least it"s free," she said. "It"s a Ram Ray loan car, isn"t it?"
"Yeah, sure. The work I"ve done on it to make it fit to drive would have cost you four figures if one of Ram"s ham-handed mechanics had done it. And besides, only reason he made the loan is he"s antic.i.p.ating I"m going to get enough money to pay him to repair the Oxford or replace it with one of them Indian jobs he"s importing. Now what happened was..."
"OK, OK, Sixsmith," she said, waving her cheroot impatiently. "I don"t want details. I just want to know why you imagine I can help you?"
"I need a lawyer," he said. "And you"re my lawyer."
"Now that"s where you"re making your mistake," she said. "Way back, when Robco Engineering made you redundant and tried to stiff you for your severance money, then I was your lawyer. And OK, from time to time, as your persistence in maintaining this pretence that you"re a PI has dropped you in the mire, I"ve given a helping hand. But that was out of, G.o.d help me, mere charity and pity for a dumb creature. Now, all those folk out there who have come to me with serious life-threatening problems which I should be dealing with this very moment, I am their lawyer. But I am not your lawyer, Sixsmith. And even if I was, I don"t do motor insurance!"
She thrust the letter back at him. He took it and let his eyes drift up to a poster on the wall behind her. It read: SHAKESPEARE SAID.
"Kill All The Lawyers".
Except, of course, us.
We"re here for your protection, not our profit.
IF YOU KNOW YOU"RE RIGHT, WE KNOW YOUR RIGHTS!.
Pointing, he said, "I don"t see where it says, excepting Joe Sixsmith."
"OK, OK," said Butcher. "Don"t go wee pie on me. Look, I"m really no good for you, what you need is a specialist. There"s this guy I know he owes me a sort of favour ..."
She smiled rather grimly. Joe guessed that in lawyer-speak, a sort of favour meant you knew something to put the black on a guy.
"You mind stepping outside a moment, Joe. I don"t like witnesses to extortion."
He went out. Expectant eyes focused on him. He smiled guiltily. The door opened and he slipped back in.
"Heard of Poll-Pott?" she said.
"Butcher, I"m not going to Cambodia."
"Ho ho. Pollinger, Potter, Naysmith, Montaigne and lies," she said.
"That Poll-Pott," he said. "With those posh offices in Old-maid Row?"
That"s them, except when they charge like they do, they don"t have offices, they have chambers."
"Sort of chamber poll-pot," said Joe, who was often stimulated to wit by Butcher"s presence.
"Jesus Anyway, Peter Potter and I used to be sort of buddies way back, before he became too rich to afford me. He specializes in insurance cases."
"And he"ll look into mine?"
"Not so much look into as glance at. He"ll give you five minutes to tell your tale of woe then he"ll spare five seconds to tell you whether you"ve got a hope in h.e.l.l. You want more, you"ll have to make an appointment and start paying by the pa.r.s.ec for his professional services. Sorry, that"s the best I can do, and even that has cost me dear."
"It"s great," Joe a.s.sured her. "When do I see him?"
"In the next half hour. After that, don"t bother."
"What"s he doing?" said Joe, looking at his watch which said quarter past five. "Jetting off to Bermuda for his hols?"
"Don"t kick a gift horse in the teeth, Sixsmith. Pete Potter may be self-seeking, hedonistic, and fascist, but he makes the big insurance companies reach for their bulletproof vests. You can be round there in five minutes if you step smartly."
"No, I can"t," said Joe. "The policy"s back in my flat."
"Oh G.o.d. Why do I bother? And why are you still cluttering up my works.p.a.ce? Don"t step smartly, run like h.e.l.l!"
Joe ran like h.e.l.l.
Two.
Even running like h.e.l.l and driving like Jehu couldn"t get Joe back to his flat and out to Oldmaid Row much before a quarter to six.
Still, he thought, if the guy"s as good as Butcher cracks him up to be, couple of minutes should be plenty to confirm I"ve got a cast-iron case.
He rehea.r.s.ed it as he kerb-crawled the elegant Regency terrace looking for the chambers.
Back in the autumn, his car had nose-dived through a cattle grid and been bombed by rubble from a ruinous gate arch. Ram Ray had produced an estimate for repairs running into a couple of thousand. "No sweat," the Penthouse a.s.sessor had said. "Cause of accident, faulty cattle grid. The estate owner pays." But when it turned out that the ownership of the estate was in dispute and that the current occupier was about to start a long prison sentence, the tune changed. This was when Mrs. Airey, the senior claims inspector, appeared. She came to look at the remains of the car, sucked in her breath sharply, said it was clearly a write-off and if Joe cared to submit his own estimate of value with supporting doc.u.mentation, it would be taken into account. Joe made his submission. Penthouse made their offer, Joe thought it was a misprint. He pointed out that his car was close to vintage status. They suggested it missed by a good thirty years and pointed out that the same model was still being manufactured in India. In fact, if they took the price of a new one from Ram Ray and projected twenty-five years depreciation, the value came to something less than one hundred. So the argument swayed for a good three months till finally Penthouse ended it with their cheque and Joe was desperate enough to admit he needed a lawyer.
It wasn"t that he had anything against lawyers, except that they were slow, pompous, patronizing and extortionate. Nothing personal, just what everybody knew. And he saw nothing in Oldmaid Row to disabuse him. It was described in The Lost Traveller"s Guide, the best-selling series describing places you were unlikely to visit on purpose, with a rare lyricism.
"But now after a long trudge through a desert of architectural dysplasia, the traveller sees before him an oasis of style, proportion and elegance which he may at first take for mere mirage. Here behind a small but perfectly formed park, bosky with healthy limes, runs a Regency terrace so right in every degree that one wonders if some Golden Horde of Lutonian reivers has not rampaged westwards and returned dragging part of Bath amongst its booty. Rest here a while and rebuild your strength for the struggles still to come ..."
No one lived here any more, though royal-blue plaques alongside several doors signalled that some of Luton"s brightest and best had once dwelt within. Now it was the best and brightest of the town"s businesses that located here. The rentals were astronomical but the letterhead alone was worth a thirty per cent hype of any normal professional fee.
The firm of Poll-Pott occupied the last house on the left, which in olden times had nursed the muse of Simeon Littlehorn, Poet, The Luton Warbler". Though not much known beyond his native heath, his "Ode on the Death of Alderman Isengard Who Fell Out of a Hot Air Balloon on the 17th of July 1843" is the shibboleth of all claiming to be native-born Lutonians. As Joe looked at the plaque he could no more keep the opening lines out of his mind than an Englishman can refrain from saying, "Sorry," when asked to pa.s.s the salt.
Oh Isengard whose winged word, High borne aloft on fiery breath, E"er raised the hearts of all who heard, Can such as thou plunge down to death?
As he mused, a BMW pulled up behind the Mini. A woman got out, looked at the pop pied paintwork in horror, then advanced to the door and punched in a code which opened it.
As the door closed behind her, Joe jumped forward and blocked it with his foot.
"Excuse me," he said, though in fact he only got as far as "Exc ..." before the woman whirled round, jabbed her fingers in his throat, seized his right wrist in both hands, pulled him towards her, then stepped aside and swept his legs from beneath him so that his own momentum sent him crashing to the ground. A knee then rammed between his shoulder blades and his head was dragged back by the hair just high enough for her forearm to slide beneath his chin and crush up against his Adam"s apple.
Try to move and I snap your windpipe," she said.
Joe tried to croak his understanding, found nothing came out, so tried to tele path it instead.
"OK, let"s get the police," she said.
The hand holding his hair let go, then the arm beneath his chin moved away. He risked a glance round and saw it was no relenting on her part which had brought this relief but the need of both hands to use a mobile phone.
At sight of his head movement she stopped dialling and raised the instrument like a club.
"I told you, don"t move!" she yelled. "You want your head ripped off?"
She could do it too, Joe guessed. He"d recently started on a martial arts evening cla.s.s and if he"d learned nothing else after four lessons, he knew that Mr. Takeushi, his elderly j.a.panese instructor, could fillet him and lay him out to dry without breaking sweat. This woman was clearly Black Belt or beyond.
He tried the croak again, this time managed,"... Potter She"d resumed dialling. Now she paused once more.
Encouraged, he gasped, "... Mr. Potter ... appointment ..."
"You"re here to see Peter?" She didn"t sound persuaded. Balding black Pis wearing ex-Luton-works-department donkey jackets and driving antediluvian Minis clearly didn"t figure large among Potter"s clients.
"... Butcher sent ... Bullpat Square ..."
"Butcher? You"re one of Butcher"s?"
A look of distaste touched her face, but at least it was edging out the look of incredulity. Butcher might be to Luton legal circles what Cerberus was to Crufts, but you couldn"t ignore her.
Joe nodded vigorously. The movement eased the pain in his neck and he repeated it.
"Go on like that," she said, "and you"ll end up on the back sill of a car."
But at least she removed her knee from his spine. He pushed himself upright, trying to look as if only old-fashioned courtesy had prevented him from defending himself, but a certain weakness round the knees which sent him swaying for support from the reception counter undermined the act.
The woman, who was youngish, good-looking in a glossy-mag kind of way and wearing a short fur coat which he hoped was imitation but wouldn"t have bet on it, was regarding him a.s.sessingly rather than anxiously as she enquired, "Are you all right?"
"I think so," he said.
"Good. You could have caused a serious misunderstanding, forcing your way in like that. Perhaps next time you"ll ring the bell and wait till someone admits you."
She had to be a lawyer, thought Sixsmith, admiring the way she was already rehearsing her defence against a possible a.s.sault charge. He looked around for the file he"d been carrying. The woman spotted it first and scooped it up, allowing the cardboard cover to fall open and give her a glimpse of the contents. The sight of his motor policy seemed to convince her finally of his bona fides.
"Here," she said, handing it to him. "You"ll find Mr. Potter"s office on the second floor. You are sure he"s here, are you?"
"Yes. Butcher rang him," said Joe.
She frowned as if puzzled by her colleague"s presence, or maybe just his accessibility.