Piece Of My Heart

“But you’d let me know if you did?”

“Of course I would, Mr. Chadwick.”

“We think the Newton gang might be behind it, and you know how interested I am in putting them away.”

Skelgate cringed at the words, even though they referred to someone else. “The Newtons, you say. Nasty lot, them.”

“They may be planning other raids. If you happen to hear anything, we could come to the usual arrangement.”

“I’ll keep my ears open, Mr. Chadwick, that I will.” Skelgate looked around with his ferrety eyes. Paranoia was another trait of his; he always thought someone was watching or listening in. “Is that all, Mr. Chadwick? Can I go now? Only, I don’t want us to be seen together. Those Newtons are a violent bunch. Think nothing of putting a man in hospital for a month, they wouldn’t.”

“Just keep your eyes and ears open.” Chadwick paused, tensing as he realized he was reaching the point of no return. For weeks he had been moving among people who despised everything he valued, and somewhere in the midst of it all, he had become unglued. He knew this, and he also knew there was no going back. All he wanted was for Yvonne to come home and McGarrity to go to jail for the murder of Linda Lofthouse. Then, he hoped, perhaps he might find some peace. But deep down, he also knew that there was every chance peace would elude him forever. His strict religious upbringing told him he would be damning himself to eternal hellfire for what he was about to do. But so be it.

He felt a sudden heaviness in his chest. Not a sharp pain or anything, just a heaviness, the way he always thought the sort of heartbreak that torch singers describe would feel. He had felt it just once before, when he ran out of the landing craft on the morning of the sixth of June, 1944, but that day he had soon forgotten it in the noise and smoke, in dodging the mortar and machine-gun fire. “There is one more thing I’d like you to do for me,” he said.

Skelgate clearly didn’t like the sound of that. He was practically bobbing up and down on the balls of his feet. “What?” he said. “You know I do what I can for you.”

“I want a flick-knife.” There, he’d said it.

“A flick-knife?”

“Yes. With a tortoiseshell handle.”

“But why do you want a flick-knife?”

Chadwick gave him a hard look. “Can you get me one?”

“Of course,” said Skelgate. “Nothing could be easier.”

“When?”

“When do you want it?”

“Soon.”

“Same place, same time, tomorrow?”

“That’ll do fine,” said Chadwick. “Be here.”

“Don’t worry, I will,” Skelgate said, then glanced around, saw nothing to worry about, and scurried down the towpath. Chadwick stood watching him go and wondered just what it was that had brought him to this godforsaken place on this ungodly mission. Then he turned in the other direction and walked back in the rain to his car.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank Sheila Halladay and Dominick Abel for reading and commenting on early versions of the manuscript, and my editors Dinah Forbes, Carolyn Marino and Carolyn Mays for doing such a wonderful job on the final version. The copyeditors certainly had their work cut out, too, and came through with flying colors.

They say that if you remember the sixties you weren’t there. I was, so I could hardly rely entirely on memory for the sections of this book that take place in 1969. Jill Bullock, Communications Coordinator of the Alumni and Development Team at the University of Leeds, proved to be a mine of useful information. Kenneth Lee and Paul Mercs, who were both also there, shared some interesting stories with me, some of which could be repeated in the book. Among the many books I read and DVDs I watched, I would like to single out Jonathon Green’s account of the period, All Dressed Up, and Murray Lerner’s documentary on the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival, Message to Love.

A special thanks to Andrew Male, Deputy Editor of MOJO, for interesting conversations and information about some of the more obscure elements of late-sixties music, and for letting me be a fly on the wall in the office. Thanks also, as ever, to Philip Gormley and Claire Stevens.

I also have special thank-yous for Dr. Sue, of the Calgary Wordfest volunteers, for the doctors, staff and paramedics of Mineral Springs Hospital, Banff, and for Drs. Michael Connelly and Michael Curtis, along with the nurses and staff of the cardiac unit of Foothills Hospital, Calgary, without whom Piece of My Heart might have taken on a whole new meaning altogether! Also, thanks for Janet, Randy, Matthew, Jonathan and Megan for a home away from home.

About the Author

PETER ROBINSON’s award-winning novels have been named a Best-Book-of-the-Year by Publishers Weekly, a Notable Book by the New York Times, and a Page-Turner-of-the-Week by People magazine. Robinson was born and brought up in Yorkshire, England, but has lived in North America for nearly twenty-five years.

www.peterrobinsonbooks.com

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