Dead Flowers Read online

  ‘Right.’ I touched her hand, smiled at the girls and went inside.

  41

  I hate funerals.

  And I’ve been to some, let me tell you.

  Too many.

  I hate chapels of rest and coffins and wreaths and all the other paraphernalia. Every time I go into a church and see a box containing someone I knew up on the dais in front of the altar I get a terrible feeling in my gut, and today was no exception.

  There was a lone figure in a navy blue suit standing in the middle of the aisle, facing the front. I walked up to him and he turned as he heard my footsteps. It was Charlie’s brother. ‘Hello, Tel,’ I said.

  ‘Hello, Nick,’ he replied, taking my hand. ‘Long time.’

  ‘If we had to meet under these circumstances it could’ve been a lot longer,’ I said.

  ‘You’re right,’ and he sniffed hard.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said.

  ‘I know. You and him went back a long way.’

  ‘Not as long as you two.’

  ‘No. He was a little sod when we were kids. He drove me mad.’

  ‘That what little brothers are for.’

  ‘Course. You were one, weren’t you?’

  ‘That’s right. At least he had you longer than I had my big brother.’

  ‘Sorry, Nick.’

  ‘No. Ancient history, Tel. We’re here for you today, and Ginny and the girls, not me.’

  ‘Right. Ginny wants it short and sweet. I’m going to say a bit, then you. Then we go out to the grave. Sod this rain.’

  ‘It’s a good day for a funeral,’ I remarked. ‘Miserable as buggery.’

  ‘You’re right. As we leave with the coffin they’ll be playing some music.’

  ‘Don’t tell me. Rod Stewart,’ I said. Charlie had always been a big fan.

  Tel grinned. ‘Had to be, didn’t it? “Sailing” and “Mandolin Wind”.’

  As people started filing in, I propped my dripping umbrella in a corner and sat on the front pew at the side. Ginny and the girls and Charlie’s widowed mother joined me. Charlie’s mum sat next to me; she held my hand tight and I kissed her.

  When we were all seated and the doors were closed against the weather, Tel stood at the lectern and said, ‘We are here today to say goodbye to my brother and my good friend, Charlie Martin. We’re not here to mourn his death as much as to celebrate his life and what he meant to our mum, his wife and his three lovely daughters. And of course to me, his big brother. We used to fight all the time when we were small.’ He smiled. ‘Hardly a day went by when Mum didn’t have to separate us, and send one of us up to his room. I’ll admit it was usually Charlie, because I was a better liar, and Mum would believe me when I said he started it.’ Charlie’s mum squeezed my hand as she suppressed a sob and I squeezed hers back. ‘But after we lost Dad,’ Terry continued, ‘somehow none of that mattered any more, and the two of us promised that we’d never fight again, and we never did.’

  I tuned out Terry’s voice and wondered what they’d all say if they’d been sitting in that bar in Brixton earlier in the year and heard what Charlie had told me about what his life had brought him.

  I came back as Terry finished. ‘Charlie always looked on Nick Sharman as someone he could count on, and Nick’s here today to say a few words.’

  Terry stepped off the lectern and I got up and took his place.

  I looked at the sea of faces that filled the chapel; some I knew, some were strangers, and everything I’d thought of saying went out of my head.

  ‘I don’t know about you,’ I said after a moment, ‘but I had other plans for this afternoon.’

  There was dead silence.

  ‘And all I can think of is that this is the first time I’ve seen all of Charlie’s friends together without a glass in their hands.’

  A ripple of laughter ran across the room and I knew it was going to be all right. ‘But I think we’ll remedy that a bit later.’

  Another ripple.

  ‘What do you say about someone like Charlie?’ I said. ‘There’s not enough words in the language. He was a husband, a father, a son, a brother. But to me, most of all, he was a friend. A friend for twenty years, who stood by me when a lot of others walked away.’ Just like I’d walked away from him, I thought. ‘He was always there. Twenty-four hours a day, though he moaned and groaned about it. But I always knew I could count on him. I could count on him for money. I could count on him for a sympathetic ear, and I could count on him to come out in the middle of the night with a tow truck and get me home when one of the motors he’d lumbered me with gave up the ghost.’ A louder ripple of laughter, and even Ginny smiled at that one, because it was usually her who answered the phone. ‘But it wasn’t only Charlie,’ I went on, looking at the front row of the pews where Terry had rejoined the family. ‘It was Ginny and the girls too. And before them Charlie’s mum and dad and Terry. I’ve known the Martins for longer than I like to remember, and I’ve never had anything but a warm welcome from any of them, even though I was often being a nuisance, and if they’d had any sense they’d’ve shut the door in my face. I’ve had some bad times over the years and Charlie was always the first to rally round and the last to leave. Sadly, he’s left us now, far too soon, and I’m going to miss him. But I know I won’t be the only one. I look at your faces and I can see that as long as we all shall live, so will Charlie. And I can’t think of any finer memorial than that.’

  I stood down then and walked back to my seat and Tel must’ve made some sort of signal because the doors of the chapel opened, the undertaker’s men came in, and everyone stood as the sound of Rod Stewart’s voice filled the building and the service was all over.

  42

  We stood in the rain as they lowered Charlie’s body into the ground, and his mum held one of my arms and Carol held the other; Tel had his arm round Ginny and the other two girls. The rain blew under my umbrella and I was glad as the raindrops on my face disguised my tears.

  When the JCB with the shovel attachment moved in to fill the hole, the congregation slogged back up the hill through the grey curtain of rain to the cars and we drove in convoy to the Meadowlark in Dulwich Village.

  I hate wakes as well, and I’ve been to some of those too, but at least you get to have a drink.

  Upstairs at the Meadowlark was exactly as you’d imagine a south London boozer to be. A high, embossed ceiling, red flock wallpaper, chairs round the walls, a few scattered tables, a small bar in one corner and a tiny stage opposite. It was cold and damp inside and our wet clothes soon steamed up the windows.

  Ginny and Tel and Tel’s mum and the girls sat at one table, and the guests circled round them, passing on their commiserations one by one. I made straight for the bar and ordered a large brandy. The family had put a few hundred quid behind the bar but I insisted on paying. When I’d got my drink I found a spare chair, rubbed condensation off the window pane next to it, lit a Silk Cut, and stared down at the street below.

  ‘Penny for ’em,’ said a man’s voice when I was about halfway through the cigarette and the drink.

  I looked up. It was a bloke called Malcolm something-or-other who used to wholesale cars to Charlie. Mostly reps’ cars, nearly new but high mileage. I’d never been keen on him, but I’d bumped into him a few times with Charlie in various pubs round about.

  ‘Hello, Malcolm,’ I said.

  ‘Bad do,’ he remarked. ‘Charlie was a good customer.’

  ‘You’ll survive.’

  ‘Ginny’s packing the business in. There’s a bargain there waiting for someone.’

  ‘Why not make an offer?’ I said.

  ‘Not me, Nick. I like to move around. Can’t be tied down. Nice things you said about him.’

  ‘And true,’ I said.

  ‘That’s bloody right, Nick,’ another voice interrupted. ‘Bloody right.’ This time I smiled. The owner was someone I’d known nearly as long as Charlie himself. Paul Betteridge. A one-time petty thief who’d disc
overed a talent for art in the shovel, and now made a fair living flogging canvases to debutantes and trustafarians who thought it was too, too cool to be seen buying from a convicted felon, even if he hadn’t done time since the seventies. ‘How’s the boy?’ he asked in an accent that was several classes more up-market than when I’d first met him.

  ‘Good,’ I said. ‘Apart from all this. How are you?’

  ‘Can’t complain.’ And indeed it appeared that he couldn’t, judging by the expensive look of the fabric of the black suit he was wearing.

  ‘I can see that,’ I said. ‘You hanging round Groucho’s again?’

  ‘No. Groucho’s is a wee bit passé. Soho House now.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ I said.

  ‘Well, you south Londoners never had any style.’

  ‘And you’d know.’

  ‘Terrible thing about Charlie,’ he said, taking a seat next to me. ‘He was one of the best.’

  ‘I know,’ I said.

  In time we were joined by one or two other mutual friends and the booze kept on coming and the room warmed up and we all dried off.

  ‘He thought the world of you, Nick,’ said Big John Fowler, a pro wrestler turned greengrocer, who came over with a tray loaded down with bottles of lager.

  ‘The feeling was mutual,’ I replied, taking one and juggling my brandy with the other hand. ‘I just wish I’d paid him the money I owed him.’

  ‘He loved all that,’ interjected Bobby Lander, who ran a wholesale tyre business just down the road from Charlie’s lot.

  ‘Yes,’ said Paul. ‘It was the frisson of danger you added to his mundane life.’

  ‘He thought you were the boy,’ said Big John. ‘Always full of stories about what you’d been up to.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t the boy. I was the prat. Charlie was the one who kept a business and his family together. Look at the mess I’ve made of my marriages. He was the boy if anyone was.’

  ‘Maybe he fancied you,’ said Malcolm, now halfway pissed and getting a bit too loud.

  ‘Shut up,’ said Big John, and he flexed his massive shoulders. ‘This ain’t no time for your stupid jokes.’ And Malcolm did as he was told.

  And then it struck me. Maybe Charlie had fancied me. And that was the worst thought I’d had of all.

  43

  The wake went on till closing time.

  I got a cab home and collapsed into bed where I slept until noon the next day. I got shaved, showered and dressed and took a walk through to Dulwich to collect my car. At seven that evening I drove to Albany Road, found the Druid’s Rest pub and parked round the corner.

  I walked in at seven-thirty exactly and the pub was everything I’d thought it would be. The windows were covered with thick drapes and there was a small stage in one corner with mirrors at the back at ground level, set at an angle so’s the punters could get a good look at the strippers’ twats from every direction. There was a twin deck set up next to the stage, with huge speakers either side. The whole place was painted black and the carpet was filthy and dotted with lumps of dried chewing gum. The lighting was dim and the place stank of stale beer, and I’d bet the glasses were dirty. All in all, a regular south-London gin palace catering to the demimonde big style.

  It was too early for the clientele to have roused itself; there was only one solitary drinker at the bar, and a huge barman in a black waistcoat and red bow-tie behind it, catering to his every need.

  I went and ordered a bottle of Beck’s and declined his offer of a glass. After a swallow, I said, ‘Chris Grant?’

  ‘In the office.’ He poked his finger towards the back of the pub where I could dimly see a sign that read OFFICE, which saved me the bother of asking for further directions.

  I left my beer on the sticky counter and headed for the sign, but before I could reach it a behemoth of a bloke in evening dress, with cropped hair except for one cowlick at the front, stood up from the chair he’d been sitting in, his back towards me, so I hadn’t noticed his presence, and shouted, ‘Oi! What’s your fucking game?’

  That just about done it for me. I’d been fucked around, threatened, lied to, had half a ton of scaffolding dropped on my head and shot at. Now this cunt was shouting at me, and I’d had enough.

  ‘Do what?’ I said as he came towards me, his knuckles almost dragging on the floor.

  ‘You can’t go in there, you cunt.’

  ‘Don’t call me that,’ I said as mildly as possible, and put my right hand behind my back on to my gun butt.

  ‘I’ll call you what I fucking like, you cunt,’ he said, and I grabbed him by the front of his greasy dinner jacket with my left hand, drew my gun with the other and stuck the pistol in his face.

  ‘Don’t disrespect me, you fucking piece of shit,’ I yelled. ‘Who the fuck do you think you are, you fuck?’

  He looked wide-eyed at the gun as I turned him again and shoved him face forward against the bar and kicked at his feet. ‘Spread ’em, you fuck,’ I said. ‘Wider.’ I grabbed him by his cowlick and slammed his head on to the wood, and my bottle spun across the top showering foam.

  The barman reached down and picked up a sawn-off Louisville Slugger from its hiding place behind the bar. I grinned, screwed the barrel of the Colt into the bouncer’s ear and cocked the hammer. ‘Drop it, you cunt,’ I shouted at the barman, ‘or I’ll blow this fucker’s head off and he’ll die in his own shit, then I’ll shoot you. You want that? Do you? I’ve done it before, believe me.’

  He obviously did because he dropped the baseball bat on to the floor. I leant forward and said into the bouncer’s ear, ‘Chris Grant. Where is he?’

  ‘I’m right here,’ said a voice from the shadows at the rear of the pub. ‘You want to talk to me?’

  44

  Grant was exactly as Melanie had described him. Tall, dark, slimy, and I bet he was a wow with the ladies. At least ladies of a certain type.

  ‘I assume your name’s Nick Sharman,’ he said, standing there all casual and elegant in fawn linen with a pink button-down shirt and a colourful tie.

  ‘You assume right,’ I replied.

  ‘You don’t listen, do you? I thought you’d been told to keep your nose out of my business. Still, now you’re here you’d better come on in, and leave George in one piece, if you don’t mind.’

  I imagined George was the bouncer, so I let go his hair, hammered him in the kidneys with the butt of my pistol and stood back. ‘Can’t get the staff,’ I said.

  ‘It is a problem,’ said Grant; then to his two employees, and the one customer who had watched the whole performance like it was an extension of the in-house entertainment, ‘Just relax, everything’s fine.’ Then back to me. ‘Come on through, Mr Sharman. Would you like a drink?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Mine got spilled. I’ll have another Beck’s. By the neck.’

  ‘A Beck’s and a brandy, Eugene,’ he said to the barman. ‘The good stuff.’

  ‘Eugene,’ I echoed. ‘Nice name.’

  Eugene gave me a glare that said if I’d’ve asked for something in a glass he would’ve spat in it. Which was exactly why I hadn’t.

  Grant led the way through past the ‘office’ sign and I followed, still carrying the Colt, and found myself in a long corridor that sloped gently upwards towards the rear of the pub.

  We went into a comfortably furnished room that was as neat and clean as the bar was grubby. Grant took a seat behind a large, empty desk with three video monitors on a shelf behind it, two showing views of the bar area, which is how come he knew I’d been outside raising a riot, and the third of what looked like the outside of the back of the pub shot from a high angle. He pointed me towards a leather swivel chair in front of the desk, exhibiting a flashy, gold Rolex on his right wrist as he did so. ‘You can put that away now,’ he said, indicating the gun.

  ‘I’ll just hold on to it, if you don’t mind,’ I replied. ‘Eugene might get ugly. Or more ugly.’

  ‘That would be difficult,’ s
aid Grant drily. ‘But please yourself.’

  I sat where he’d pointed, and a moment later Eugene came in with the drinks, set them on the desk and left. Grant picked up his glass and toasted me and I did the same with the beer bottle in the hand that wasn’t holding the gun, letting my sleeve ride up to show him the Rolex I was wearing. He noticed.

  ‘So what can I do for you, Mr Sharman?’ he asked.

  ‘I think you know.’

  ‘Refresh my memory.’

  ‘I’m looking for this woman,’ I said, putting down my beer and taking Sharon’s picture out of my pocket. ‘Sharon Miller. I believe you’re acquainted.’

  He shrugged non-committally. ‘Why?’

  ‘Her husband wants her back.’

  ‘Does he now?’

  I nodded.

  Grant took another sip from his glass. ‘Why does he want that?’

  ‘He’s got a kid. Kid needs Mommy. That’s nature.’

  ‘He couldn’t keep her before.’

  ‘Maybe things have changed.’

  ‘How?’

  I wasn’t about to tell him about the lottery win. Twelve million was rich even by this bloke’s blood, so I just shrugged.

  ‘You see,’ he went on, ‘Sharon has expensive tastes.’

  ‘I’ve heard about her tastes,’ I said. ‘And how you pander to them, and how she pays you for what you supply.’

  ‘And how would that be?’

  ‘On her back mostly, I imagine.’

  ‘You have a very poor opinion of me, Mr Sharman. Sharon got into certain bad habits. I was appalled. Subsequently we parted company.’

  ‘So where is she now?’ I asked.

  It was his turn to shrug. ‘I told you we parted company. She moved on. She went with the four winds.’

  ‘Where?’

  Another shrug. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Months ago. I have a fast turnover of women.’

  I imagined he did.

  ‘Tell me,’ he asked after a minute’s silence. ‘How did you find me?’

  I didn’t answer and he smiled. ‘Wally. I should never have trusted him.’