home, I was climbing into the passenger seat of Richard's hot pink Beetle convertible. I wriggled uncomfortably, then pulled out a handful of scrunched up papers from under me and tossed them on to the rest of the detritus in the back seat.
This car's a health hazard,' I grumbled as I kicked Diet Coke cans, old newspapers and cigarette packets aside in a bid to find some floor space for my feet.
'It's my office,' he replied, as if that was some kind of reason for driving round in a dustbin.
'You leave it sitting around with the top down, and somebody's going to come along and mistake it for a skip. You'll come out one morning to find a mattress and a pile of builder's rubble in it,' I teased him, only half- joking.
Luckily for my eardrums, Richard was having a night off, so we avoided anywhere with live music. We ended up dancing the night away at one of the city's more intimate clubs. Afterwards, we went for a late Chinese, so it was after three when we finally crawled into bed, hungry for one thing only. And I don't mean sex.
11
I woke around noon to the electronic music of a computer game, and found Richard sitting naked in front of the screen playing Tetris. It's a game that sounds simple, but isn't. The object is to build a solid wall out of a random succession of differently shaped coloured bricks. Sounds boring, but the game has outsold every other computer game ever invented. Richard, like half the high-powered traders in the City, is addicted to it. Unlike the City superstars, however, Tetris is about Richard's limit when it comes to computers.
I pried him away from the screen not with the temptations of my body but with the offer of a pub lunch. He got up eagerly and went off to his house to have a shower, a shave and a change of clothes. What I had omitted to mention was that this was to be a working lunch. A couple of weeks ago, I had followed one of Billy Smart's customers to a pub on the outskirts of Manchester. I wanted to take a look and see what was going on there. But a woman on her own would be both conspicuous and a target for the kind of assholes who think that a woman alone is desperate for their company. What better camouflage in a trendy young people's fun pub than Richard?
We took my car, partly on environmental health grounds and partly so that Richard could have a drink. It took about twenty minutes to drive out to the pub in Worsley, a large 1950s tavern with a bowling green and a beer garden that ran down to the canal. The car park told me all I needed to know. Every car had its string of poser's initials – GTI, XR3i, Turbo. I felt like a second-class citizen with a mere SR. Inside was no better. The interior had been completely revamped according to the chapter of the brewery bible headed 'fun pub'. My first impression as we walked through the door was of pink neon and chrome. It looked like a tacky version of every New York bar featured in the teen movies of the last decade. I half-expected to find Tom Cruise throwing bottles around behind the bar.
I was out of luck. The barman who shimmied up to serve us looked more like a cruiserweight. While Richard ordered the drinks, I took a good look around. The pub was busy for a lunchtime. 'Plenty of Traceys,' Richard commented as he glanced round.
He wasn't wrong. The women looked as if collectively they might just scrape together enough neurons for a synapse. The men looked as if they desperately wanted to be taken for readers of
Richard handed me my orange juice and soda and I steered him over to a crowded corner of the lounge where I'd spotted my man. I'd briefed Richard on the way so he was happy to oblige. We sat down a few yards away at a table that gave me a good view of what my target was up to. He was sitting at a table with a bunch of eager young men and women around him. There was nothing particularly discreet about his operation. For a start, he was wearing a bright green Sergio Tacchini shell suit. In front of him on the table were half a dozen watches. I could identify the fake Rolexes and Guccis from that distance. Within minutes, all of them had been bought. He appeared to be charging fifty pounds a time, and getting it without a quibble. But he didn't seem to be passing them off as the real thing. Realistically, though, anyone trying that routine would have to be a lot more discreet, dealing one on one to make it look like an exclusive.
Another half dozen watches appeared from Billy's contact's pockets, and most of them vanished as quickly as the others. He shuffled the remaining two back into his jacket then burrowed under the table. He surfaced with three cellophane packets containing shell suits. Surprise surprise. The suit he was wearing was a schneid.
'Sometimes this job is a pain in the arse,' I muttered to Richard.
He looked surprised. 'Did I hear right?' he asked in tones of wonderment. 'Did I hear you say you were less than one hundred per cent thrilled with your life in crime?'
'Piss off,' I quipped wittily. 'Just look at those shell suits! They're the business. If this wasn't a surveillance operation, I'd be over there right now buying those suits. Take a look at the colours!' I couldn't take my eyes off two of the suits, one gold, one teal blue. I just knew I'd look wonderful in those colours.
Richard got to his feet. 'Poor old Brannigan,' he teased. 'But I'm not working.' He moved towards the neighbouring table.
'Richard!' I wailed. A couple of heads turned and I lowered my voice to a piercing whisper. 'Don't you dare!'
He shrugged. 'Who's to know? Anybody asks you, I bought them for you as a present. You didn't have to know they were copies, did you?'
'That's not the point,' I hissed. 'I
Richard reluctantly did as I asked him. His face had sulk written all over it. “I
'Of course I do. I also want a Carrier tank watch, but I can't afford the real thing. I dare say if Dennis had offered me a copy before I got involved in this assignment, I'd have bought it. But this job changes things. I'm sorry, Richard, I know you were trying to please me. And if you want one for yourself, I won't mind.'
Richard shook his head. 'You and your bloody morals,' he commented darkly.
'Oh, come on! Who was it who read me a lecture a couple of months ago about how immoral it is to make tapes of my albums for my friends when it means taking the bread out uf the mouths of poor, starving rock stars like Jett?' I reminded him.
He grinned. 'OK, Brannigan, you win. Now, have you seen enough, or do I have to spend the whole day in this dump?'
I glanced over at the next table. The man had got to his feet, empty-handed, and was heading over towards the door, followed by most of his audience. I guessed the rest of his stock was in his car outside. 'I'm nearly done,' I told him. 'Let's just tag along with the kids and see what he's got hiding in his boot.'
We trailed behind at a discreet distance, and I managed to get a good look as we passed. The boot was full of shell suits in a wide choice of colours, but there were no rolls of watches that I could see. Nevertheless, it had been worth the trip, I pointed out as I drove Richard home. And there was a bonus too. If we pulled off the watches job, we might well be able to interest Sergio Tacchini in doing something similar for them. I'd been surprised to see the suits. I knew that schneid designer clothing was big business, but it was the first time I'd come across it connected, however tangentially, to the Smarts' business. I said as much to Richard.
'There's a lot of it about,' he said, to my surprise. 'I've seen all sorts of stuff on sale at gigs in the clubs. Anyway, I'm glad it worked out. Always happy to oblige the Sam Spade of Chorlton-on-Medlock.'
Poor sod, I thought. In reality, we live in Ardwick, one of those addresses that makes insurance companies blench. But Richard still believes the propaganda that the property developers came up with to convince us that we were moving somewhere select. 'Ardwick,' I corrected him absently. He ignored me and asked what my plans were for the afternoon. 'Work, I'm afraid. And this evening too, probably. Why?'
'Just wondered,' he said, too innocently for my liking.
'Tell, Barclay. Or else I'll tidy your study,' I threatened.
'Oh no, not that!' he pleaded. 'It's just that I've got the chance of a ticket for this afternoon's match at Old
