Disordered Minds

'You need the money.'

It was true... 'Not that badly.' Certainly not badly enough to have another book 'spiced up' by Andrew's editing. It had turned a thoughtful study on injustice into an unashamedly commercial book. 'You ruined the last one.'

'It wouldn't have sold if you'd done it your way. As it is, you made a nice little profit. You'll stand to make a bigger one if you mount a campaign for Howard. Look at Ludovic Kennedy's 10 Rillington Place. It was made into a film.' Andrew folded his fat little hands on his desk. 'You need the money, Jon. You can't buy Paul Smith suits and go to the opera every night on an academic's salary.'

Money. With it, a man could lock his resentments in a box and be the person he wanted to be. Without it, he was nobody. Jonathan checked his map, saw with relief that Friar Road was the next on the left and battled on, head down. He didn't notice the BMW that drew quietly into the curb behind him.

The Crown and Feathers was on the corner, a dark Victorian building with pebble-dashed walls and signs in the windows advertising live music on Saturdays and discounted meals for senior citizens on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Jonathan's misery deepened. He loathed cheap and cheerful. No doubt the pub was a pit stop for coachloads of old-age pensioners on day trips to the coast. Or, worse, a drop-in center for the ones who lived there. There would be piped Vera Lynn singing The White Cliffs of Dover' and 'We'll Meet Again,' the food would be inedible and the wine, if it was offered at all, would be vinegar. He should have stuck to his guns and insisted on a restaurant in town, but he might have had to foot the bill. With a sigh he shouldered open the door to the lounge bar and was surprised to find it almost deserted.

An elderly man sat on a bar stool, sipping beer and staring into space. A middle-aged couple were tucked away in a corner, heads together, sharing secrets. All three looked in Jonathan's direction when he entered, but the lack of response told him neither of the men was George Gardener. There was no one serving. He peered through a doorway marked 'saloon,' but it was empty except for a snooker table. The only food on offer appeared to be a list of sandwiches tacked to a wooden post; the only wine a couple of bottles beside the till with their corks pushed in. It was a place of cheap ale and no frills, and he wondered what sort of man would choose it for a meeting. Old Labor, Jonathan decided gloomily, and still fighting the class war.

Cold and wet, he shrugged off his raincoat and parked himself beside the bar. As an afterthought he took off his spectacles and tucked them into his breast pocket. Looking like an academic was the least of his problems. It was sporting the designer suit and shirt that was the mistake. He looked like a peacock in a chicken run, as out of place in the Crown and Feathers as the ancient beer drinker beside him would have been at Covent Garden. He felt the old man slide off his stool to move closer and studiously avoided his gaze. He was never in the mood for small talk- it was a talent he didn't possess-and especially not with a stranger who looked as if beer was his staple diet. The marbled hands were shaking so much that the decrepit Methuselah needed both of them to lift his glass.

'Don't get many of your sort in here.'

Jonathan ignored him. It didn't take any deep intellect to guess what he meant by 'your sort' and he wondered why it was always the elderly who came out with such statements.

A bony finger poked his arm. 'I'm talking to you.'

Jonathan lowered his leather briefcase to the floor and retrieved his cigarette pack from his raincoat pocket. 'What sort is that?' he asked, ducking his head to the lighter. 'Men who wear suits?' He shifted his glance to stare pointedly at the jabbing finger. 'Or men on very short fuses?' He made a fist of his right hand and rested it on the bar.

The old man, perhaps mistaking the signet ring for a knuckle-duster, put some space between them. 'Landlord's out back,' he said. 'Keep telling him he's losing customers, but he don't pay no heed. There's been a couple come and gone before you walked in.'

'Mm.'

'You should help yourself. Roy won't mind ... long as you pay, of course.'

'Mm.'

'Maybe you don't go for ale? Not used to it, eh?'

'Mm.'

'Don't say much, do you? Cat got your tongue?'

Jonathan made an effort. It wasn't the old man's fault he was overdressed for the occasion. He should have built in time to go home and change before a night with Verdi at the Royal Opera. 'I'm in no hurry. I'm meeting a man called George Gardener. Do you know him? He's a local councillor.'

The rheumy eyes gave a flicker of amusement, presumably anticipating that an Old Labor dinosaur and a peacock would make uneasy bedfellows. 'Maybe.'

'Is he a regular?'

'Comes in a couple of times a week. Sits over there to listen to the moaners.' He nodded toward a window table. 'Calls it a surgery or some such nonsense. Bloody waste of time I call it. How's a councillor going to increase benefits, eh? That's the government's job.' Jonathan gave a noncommittal nod. 'They should get off their arses and look for work,' the old man grumbled. 'No sense bellyaching to someone who can't do nothing.'

'No.'

'What you want with George, then? Looking for somewhere to live?'

'No.'

'Good thing, too. Them as can afford it buy off the council ... them like me what ain't got two farthings to rub together get down on bended knee and pray we don't get turned out.' He stared into his beer. 'It isn't right.'

'No.'

Belligerence sparked abruptly as if the repeated monosyllables annoyed him. Or perhaps it was the chill in the air-there didn't appear to be any heating in the room. 'What would you know about it?' he snapped. 'Where you from?'