Chapter Forty-Four
Forty-Four
Catherine stuck her hand up her blouse and fumbled around. The corridor was quiet.
“Geoffrey, can you give me a hand with my bra?”
“Catherine, I’ve…My penis. It’s really quite—”
“Not that!” she said. “Carol did something with hers. I need the wire.”
Catherine and Geoffrey were at the top of the small flight of stairs that led to the roof door.
Catherine undid her two top buttons, and Geoffrey, gentleman that he was, did his best to tamper with the bra without engaging with her breasts.
Despite their afternoon of carnality, there was still a degree of awkwardness around each other’s bodies.
“The fabric. It’s too tough. I can’t get the wire out.”
“Use your teeth.”
“Catherine. I…I’ve only ever been with my wife. Until the other…You’re obviously a lot more experienced. I’m really not accustomed to this kind of…”
Catherine smiled. She’d managed to get Geoffrey to admit to the one thing he wasn’t an expert in. She touched his shoulder. “I just want the wire. I’ve an idea. Why don’t you just take them out?”
He frowned. “Take what out?”
“Your teeth,” said Catherine.
And so he did. Geoffrey took out his dentures and clamped them onto Catherine’s bra.
A couple of tugs and they were able to tear the cotton enough to get at the wire.
Catherine fed it through. Realizing she’d emasculated Geoffrey, she offered him the chance to unlock the door with the wire, which he proudly did without much trouble.
“Impressive,” said Catherine.
“Let’s just say I still know a thing or two about crime.”
“Very good. Don’t forget to pop your teeth back in.”
The door opened outward, revealing the fading light from the gray London sky and leading them directly onto the roof.
The surface below their feet was black asphalt, with small puddles dotted around, still there from a morning shower.
A brick wall, no more than a couple of feet high, bordered the whole roof.
At the rear, to their left, was a large greenhouse, about twenty feet in length.
Catherine headed right and leaned over the wall.
Below her she could see the four brand-new paving stones, still clean.
“This is where Desmond fell,” she said.
“Where he was pushed,” Geoffrey corrected her. “He’d have to have been playing silly buggers to fall off here.”
For a moment they were quiet, contemplating the death of their friend. Catherine inspected the ground, the wall, the surface of the roof. What was she expecting to find up there? A signed confession from the killer? It was just a roof.
She looked at the greenhouse. It was dense with green plants, nothing else. Marijuana presumably. But they knew that already, didn’t they? What did it tell them?
Together, they paced toward it.
“That looks like rather a lot of marijuana, doesn’t it, Geoffrey?”
“I’ve never seen so much in one place. That must be worth…I’m just trying to think…”
“More than a hundred thousand?” asked Catherine.
“Easily.”
Something moved in the greenery.
“Wait,” Catherine whispered, stopping Geoffrey with her hand.
The back of a man’s head. Someone was watering the plants. The voice inside hummed an old standard.
“He’s wearing earphones,” said Catherine.
Geoffrey edged forward to get a closer look but stepped into a puddle. His slip-on loafer was no good and his foot was immediately drenched. Instinctively he shouted out, “Jesus bloody Jesus sodding bloody Christ!”
Catherine held his arm as the head in the greenhouse turned to face them.
Jim.
They stayed still, frozen, as Jim placed down the watering can and went for the greenhouse door.
In what felt like a second, he was headed straight toward Geoffrey.
No smile, no greeting. He was leaning forward, determined.
This was not Jim the friendly old crooner Catherine knew from the karaoke nights.
This was Jim the old villain she’d heard about. His footsteps grew louder and quicker.
Jim punched Geoffrey in the face. It was the jab of a man who’d hit people before.
“No!” screamed Catherine.
Geoffrey bent, holding his face. Jim stood over him. “I’m not letting you fuck me over again, Geoff.”
“I had to do it,” said Geoffrey.
Still bent over, Geoffrey rugby tackled Jim, pushing him back toward the greenhouse.
They moved slowly. Here were two men who still knew how to fight, but at a much gentler pace.
Eventually, Jim’s back hit the greenhouse.
Geoffrey pulled back his fist and lunged but Jim moved to the side, leaving Geoffrey to punch the glass, breaking it and cutting his hand.
With the panel broken, Geoffrey improvised, putting his arm inside the greenhouse, picking up a pair of secateurs and turning to face Jim.
“What are you gonna do, Geoff?” shouted Jim. “Prune me?”
Slowly pacing backward, Jim picked up a waist-high spade that was propped against the greenhouse. The two old men were in a standoff, each holding up his horticultural weapon of choice toward the other.
—
Carol and Margaret arrived at the entrance to the roof sweaty with adrenaline. The door was ajar, and the police cordon had been pulled aside. They looked at each other.
“Ready?” said Carol.
“Wait,” said Margaret, taking a makeup mirror out of her handbag and wiping ketchup that had been there for God knew how long from the side of her mouth.
“What are you doing?” said Carol.
“If I’m about to die, I want to look my best.”
“You look lovely.”
They opened the door and found the action already in progress. Carol and Margaret headed for Catherine and planted themselves beside her, watching the two men the whole time. Margaret offered Catherine a Percy Pig, which she silently refused.
“What’s going on?” said Margaret.
“We found Jim in the greenhouse watering some cannabis plants. When we saw each other, he punched Geoffrey. Now they’re in some kind of standoff,” Catherine whispered. “It feels like an old fight, like they have history.”
“They do,” said Carol, biting the ear off a Percy Pig.
“You ruined my life,” said Jim.
“You ruined your own life,” said Geoffrey.
“You could of helped me. I asked you for help, Geoff,” said Jim.
“Could have,” said Geoffrey. “Could have helped me. You see, people shorten ‘could have’ to ‘could’ve’ and then they think that ‘ ’ve’ is ‘of,’ but it is actually, as I say, ‘could have.’ ”
“Jesus Christ, you’re such an arsehole,” said Jim.
“Right,” said Catherine. “I’m completely lost. What are they talking about?”
“Grammar, I think,” said Carol.
“No, before that,” said Catherine.
The three women were standing in a row, watching the action. From behind, you might think they were waiting for a bus.
“Right. So. Jim was a police officer,” said Carol. Jim turned toward her. “Stop me if I go wrong at any point, boys. Jim was a police officer and he went undercover with the McConvilles, who were big around here back in the day.”
Catherine was conscious that Geoffrey was taking small, nervous steps forward, slowly moving the standoff toward the roof’s edge.
“I’m listening,” said Margaret, putting more sweets into her mouth.
“How did you find all this out?” asked Catherine.
“Margaret took me on a little trip to MI5. We had a look at Jim’s file,” said Carol.
Catherine was impressed. “Wow.”
“Oh, you wouldn’t believe it, Catherine,” said Carol. “They’ve got files on everyone. You should see the size of yours.”
Catherine turned to her in shock.
“Just a little joke,” said Carol.
Catherine hit Carol on the arm, then returned to the topic of the moment. “Okay, so Jim was undercover?”
“Yes,” said Carol. “But I’m guessing he was too good at it. Would that be fair to say, Jim?”
“You could say that, yeah.”
“Jim made a good fake criminal,” said Carol. “So good, in fact, that he made a very good real criminal. Did a murder or two.”
“Or three!” said Geoffrey, spitting from his bloodied mouth, but still holding up the secateurs. His eyes never left Jim. Catherine, to her surprise, had never found him more attractive.
“Now, once you’re in so deep that you start killing people for a crime gang,” said Carol, “are you even a police officer anymore? How can they let you back in? But, Jim, I’m guessing you still thought you were a copper.
You weren’t supposed to turn into an actual villain, you just did. I know how you feel.”
“We’re not the same!” shouted Jim. “I killed because I was ordered to.”
“Oh, don’t be so pedantic!” snapped Carol.
“Wait, wait, wait,” said Catherine. “Finish the story.”
“Pretty simple, I think,” said Carol. “Jim wanted his old life as a police officer back. I’m guessing you, Geoffrey, were one of the people who wouldn’t let him back in. So Jim stayed in the Mafia, got himself all the way to the top.”
Margaret finished the last of the Percy Pigs and put the packet into her handbag. “Was absolutely everybody in Sheldon Oaks an investigator at some point?”
“I wasn’t,” said Carol. “But I am now.”
“Hang on,” said Catherine.
The men were still circling each other with their weapons up, neither taking his eyes off the other. Something had to break.
Catherine continued, “Why didn’t the police just arrest Jim? If he was a criminal now, that is. Why would they just leave him to be a gangster?”
“Because of Desmond!” shouted Geoffrey.
“Desmond,” said Carol.
“Because Desmond was bent,” said Margaret, clocking on.
“In Jim, Desmond had a man at the center of a crime gang,” said Carol. “And in Desmond, Jim had the man at the top of the Met. Together, they ran North London. Two cheeks of the same arse.”
Carol felt a drop of rain. It was spitting, the kind of rain you get just before a heavy shower.
Then Geoffrey made the error that would change all their lives forever.
He looked up at the sky. Jim took the opportunity to whack the secateurs out of his hand with the spade.
Geoffrey was weaponless, but his body, under threat, remembered a move from fifty years ago, and did what must have been the slowest roundhouse kick in history.
“Ow! My hip! My bloody hip!” shouted Geoffrey.
But the kick had done its job and the spade went flying over the wall.
After a second, they heard a clang as it hit the ground below.
Geoffrey powered forward, applying his weight advantage, pushing Jim against the wall.
But Jim was tough. Muscle memory took over.
He’d been there before, fighting for his life.
He was, quite simply, the stronger man. The men grappled, Jim’s head hanging backward over the wall.
Jim turned his head, glancing at the ground many feet below.
The view served as a defibrillator, and he found another gear, forcing Geoffrey back and spinning him around.
Now Jim was on top with Geoffrey hanging over the wall.
Just one final push and Geoffrey would fall to his death.
Jim’s body had no doubt, no hesitation. He wanted Geoffrey dead and Carol could see it.
Carol was in the moment.
Carol was present.
Carol could not let her friend die.
She ran, surprising herself at how fast her aged body could go, and grabbed Geoffrey’s flailing arm.
She tugged him, by the wrist, out of Jim’s hold.
The unexpected nature of her move caused Jim to slip, smacking his chin against the edge of the small wall and landing face down on the asphalt.
Carol sank her knee into the back of his neck.
She heard a whimper, not from Jim but from Geoffrey, who was now sitting on the floor quivering, contemplating how close he’d come to death.
What now? It was four against one and Jim had no weapon. Carol was in the zone. She could ease the life out of him right here, snap his neck, strangle him. It would be nice to feel the old buzz. The moment when you take a man from one realm to another, when you flick the switch. The privilege.
Time slowed.
Just as she was about to begin the kill, something new arrived: hesitation. She looked up at Geoffrey, Catherine, and Margaret. Her friends. These people didn’t have that impulse. For perhaps the first time in her life, Carol had something to lose.
She didn’t need to kill Jim. They had the upper hand.
He wasn’t a threat anymore. The exertions of the last few minutes had taken their toll on him.
This was a man whose body couldn’t do what his mind wanted anymore, and Carol’s mind didn’t want to do what her body could.
To kill him now would be to do it for sport. No need to kill for killing’s sake.
As Carol took away her knee, she heard the footsteps coming…
And then watched the secateurs go into the back of Jim’s neck. Hard and deep. It happened in slow motion. Was this an out-of-body experience? Had her muscle memory taken over? It took her a full second to comprehend the new reality.
“Don’t hurt my man!” Catherine shouted.
Carol moved to the side and saw Catherine’s contorted face, red with rage, her teeth gritted, as she stabbed Jim three times.
Is that what I used to look like? Carol pondered.
—
Carol, Margaret, Geoffrey, and Catherine sat on the roof, their backs leaning against the small wall.
They were all breathless, so overwhelmed by the action that they hardly noticed the rain.
Catherine looked at the blood on her hand and dropped the secateurs.
Jim lay dead, his face resting in a puddle.
Margaret broke the silence. “At least we know who killed Desmond and Giles now.”
“It wasn’t Jim,” said Carol matter-of-factly.
“It wasn’t?” said Margaret.
“Nope.”
“The drugs…Sorry, Jim was watering them. Am I being thick?” said Catherine. “I’m really not sure what’s going on.”
“All will be revealed,” said Carol.
“When?” said Geoffrey. “I was hoping to watch Grand Designs at nine.”
“At the dénouement, of course,” said Carol.
“And when is that exactly?” said Margaret. “Did you send an invitation? Sorry, I haven’t had a chance to check my phone.”
“Now. Downstairs, in the hall.” She looked at Jim’s corpse. “Unfortunately, not everyone can make it, but I’m expecting a good turnout. It’s karaoke night! You can’t miss karaoke night!”
“And Jim’s body?” said Geoffrey.
Carol thought for a moment, looking at Catherine.
“Leave him here,” she said. “We can deal with all that later.”
“There’s only one problem,” said Margaret. They looked at her. “I’m really not sure I can get up.”