Jack Carter's Law Read Online Free
handkerchief. I stand there watching him for a minute or two before I say anything to him.
“And supposing I was Wally Coleman and six hundred of the fellows that walk behind him?” I ask Duggie. “What would that make you and Gerald and Les by now?”
“But you ain’t,” says Duggie, not looking up from the disemboweled sandwiches. “If you was you’d be headfirst down that lift shaft with a bullet up your arse, no trouble.”
I grin at him.
“All right,” I say. “Let them know who’s here.”
He wipes his hands again and picks a handset off the wall next to him.
“Jack’s here,” he says, and puts the handset back on its cradle.
The door opposite the lift slides open and as I go in I say to Duggie, “Incidentally, it’s on the news a gorilla got out of Regent’s Park Zoo this afternoon. Haven’t caught him yet. If I was you I’d stay at home tonight.”
The door slides to behind me. I’m in another hall, bigger than the last. This hall has furniture, Regency repro, and gold-framed pictures, but there still aren’t any windows. The hall is lit by a single light set dead centre in the ceiling. There is another door, a replica of the one that is the entrance to the club, painted the same colour. I press a button on the wall next to the door and a second or two later the door is opened by another mug called Tony Crawford, the only difference between him and Duggie being that Tony’s gear is ten years out of date and that he’d eat the ham and the bread and the doily and the plate.
“Right, piss off, Tony, this is a meeting now,” says Gerald.
Tony closes the door behind me.
The room I am in is all Swedish. It’s a big room, low-ceilinged, and when Gerald and Les had it built on top of the club they’d let a little poof called Kieron Beck have his way with the soft furnishings. Everything about the room is dead right. The slightly sunken bit in the middle lined with low white leather settees with backs reaching the normal floor level, the honey-coloured polished floor itself with its scattered furs, the office area over by the window which runs all the length of one wall, the plain white desk that is worth half an Aston Martin, the curtains that make a noise like paper money when you draw
them—everything is perfect. The only things that look out of place are Gerald and Les. So much so that they make the place look as if you could have picked all the stuff up at Maple’s closing-down sale.
Gerald is sitting in the sunken bit, making the leather look scruffy. He is wearing a very expensive three-piece suit, gray chalk stripe, but with it he is wearing a cheap nylon shirt and a tie that looks as though he’s nicked it off a rack in Woolworth’s. His shoes are black and unpolished and one of the shoelaces is undone. But even if the shirt had been tailor-made from Turnbull & Asser and the tie had come from Italy and the shoes had been handmade at Annello & David he would still look a mess. One of those people that make a difference to the clothes instead of it being the other way round. Les, on the other hand, is immaculate. He is perched with his arse on the edge of the white desk, smoking a Sobranie. He’s wearing one of his corduroy suits, the pale beige one, and with it he’s got on a lavender shirt and a carefully knotted brown silk tie, a pair of off-white suède slip-ons and socks that match the colour of his tie. What is left of his hair is beautifully barbered, just curling slightly over the collar of his shirt.
Audrey is there as well.
She’s over by the cocktail cabinet, getting the drinks together.
“So,” says Gerald, “we’re finally here at last, then.”
I sit down on an armless easy chair in the raised-up part of the room. I don’t say anything. There’s no point until Gerald and Les have run through today’s double act.
“I mean, we thought maybe Cross had nicked you or something.”
Gerald laughs at the others, encouraging them to
appreciate his
“And supposing I was Wally Coleman and six hundred of the fellows that walk behind him?” I ask Duggie. “What would that make you and Gerald and Les by now?”
“But you ain’t,” says Duggie, not looking up from the disemboweled sandwiches. “If you was you’d be headfirst down that lift shaft with a bullet up your arse, no trouble.”
I grin at him.
“All right,” I say. “Let them know who’s here.”
He wipes his hands again and picks a handset off the wall next to him.
“Jack’s here,” he says, and puts the handset back on its cradle.
The door opposite the lift slides open and as I go in I say to Duggie, “Incidentally, it’s on the news a gorilla got out of Regent’s Park Zoo this afternoon. Haven’t caught him yet. If I was you I’d stay at home tonight.”
The door slides to behind me. I’m in another hall, bigger than the last. This hall has furniture, Regency repro, and gold-framed pictures, but there still aren’t any windows. The hall is lit by a single light set dead centre in the ceiling. There is another door, a replica of the one that is the entrance to the club, painted the same colour. I press a button on the wall next to the door and a second or two later the door is opened by another mug called Tony Crawford, the only difference between him and Duggie being that Tony’s gear is ten years out of date and that he’d eat the ham and the bread and the doily and the plate.
“Right, piss off, Tony, this is a meeting now,” says Gerald.
Tony closes the door behind me.
The room I am in is all Swedish. It’s a big room, low-ceilinged, and when Gerald and Les had it built on top of the club they’d let a little poof called Kieron Beck have his way with the soft furnishings. Everything about the room is dead right. The slightly sunken bit in the middle lined with low white leather settees with backs reaching the normal floor level, the honey-coloured polished floor itself with its scattered furs, the office area over by the window which runs all the length of one wall, the plain white desk that is worth half an Aston Martin, the curtains that make a noise like paper money when you draw
them—everything is perfect. The only things that look out of place are Gerald and Les. So much so that they make the place look as if you could have picked all the stuff up at Maple’s closing-down sale.
Gerald is sitting in the sunken bit, making the leather look scruffy. He is wearing a very expensive three-piece suit, gray chalk stripe, but with it he is wearing a cheap nylon shirt and a tie that looks as though he’s nicked it off a rack in Woolworth’s. His shoes are black and unpolished and one of the shoelaces is undone. But even if the shirt had been tailor-made from Turnbull & Asser and the tie had come from Italy and the shoes had been handmade at Annello & David he would still look a mess. One of those people that make a difference to the clothes instead of it being the other way round. Les, on the other hand, is immaculate. He is perched with his arse on the edge of the white desk, smoking a Sobranie. He’s wearing one of his corduroy suits, the pale beige one, and with it he’s got on a lavender shirt and a carefully knotted brown silk tie, a pair of off-white suède slip-ons and socks that match the colour of his tie. What is left of his hair is beautifully barbered, just curling slightly over the collar of his shirt.
Audrey is there as well.
She’s over by the cocktail cabinet, getting the drinks together.
“So,” says Gerald, “we’re finally here at last, then.”
I sit down on an armless easy chair in the raised-up part of the room. I don’t say anything. There’s no point until Gerald and Les have run through today’s double act.
“I mean, we thought maybe Cross had nicked you or something.”
Gerald laughs at the others, encouraging them to
appreciate his
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