going to ask my questions with a high degree of politeness and patience. It was in keeping with the image I wanted to project to her: that of a man who was essentially on the side of the good guys, but who wasn't afraid of trying on the tough stuff. I thought she'd like that because it would mean I was more likely to come up with some answers, which would help with her story.
'And,' I continued, taking a gulp of my beer, 'I want you to look into Mr Pope's background. Find out anything you can about him. Clients he's had, associates he's got, any controversy he's been involved in. Same with Khan.'
She looked at me in the way an old girlfriend of mine used to do when she thought I was taking the piss. Put-out, but in a playful sort of way. 'You don't want much, do you?'
'It'll help with your own investigation.' I pulled a piece of paper from the pocket of my new jacket and put it on the table in front of her. There were five phone numbers on it, taken from the records section of Slippery Billy's mobile. I didn't know if they'd elicit any information, but it was worth a try. 'Do you know anyone who could trace these numbers, and find out whose names they're registered in?'
She asked me whose phone I'd got them from and I told her that it belonged to Les Pope. 'And they're calls that he recently made and received.'
'How did you get hold of his phone?' she asked, taking the piece of paper.
I flashed her my most businesslike expression. 'One of his phones. I believe he's got several. Let's just say, by stealth.'
'Does he know it's gone?'
'It's back with him now.'
'I'll see what I can do. I can't promise anything.'
'If you use any of your police contacts, be very careful. Don't, whatever you do, mention Pope, and don't use the same source for all the numbers.'
She gave me a puzzled look, followed by a suspicious one. 'You've got a very unorthodox way of operating.'
'In a land of conformity, it's always best to be a little different. It boosts business.'
'I bet it does.' She looked at her watch again. 'I'm sorry, I've got to make a dash. But I'll see what I can do with this. I also need a number for you.'
She keyed my number into her mobile, then put everything in her handbag and stood up, stubbing out her cigarette. She put out a hand, but she was no longer smiling. She was more wary of me now. 'It was nice to meet you,' she said as we shook, 'and thanks for the drink. Let me know how you get on with Pope.'
I told her I would, said it was nice to meet her too, and watched as she walked out of the pub. It was, I thought, one of the terrible injustices of life that as a man grows older he still experiences the same sort of desire for attractive young women that he's always had, and yet, at the same time, age makes him become steadily less attractive to them. I'm not a bad-looking bloke, but I look my age, and in ten years' time, if I'm still here, I'm going to look fifty. Eventually, I'm going to get to the point where no one wants me. Already I was too old for Miss Emma Neilson. I could see it in the way she looked at her watch. She was interested in me because I might have some information relevant to her story, but that was all. When she'd heard what I had to say, she'd wanted to get away to see her friends. Even her boyfriend, maybe.
I thought about getting another drink, but decided that this place wasn't for me. It was beginning to fill up now as the evening's revellers arrived in force — mainly a twenties crowd, with a few thirty-somethings sprinkled in — their faces rosy from the cold outside, their laughter echoing through the bar. If I had to drink alone, then at least I was going to do it somewhere where I felt comfortable.
I drained my pint and left.
16
Out on Oxford Street, row upon row of Christmas lights were strung across the road in a riot of festive colour. Shops were still open and the pavements remained dense with the last of the hardened shoppers and the now far more numerous gaggles of boisterous and drunk youths, the girls among them looking worryingly underdressed for the weather conditions. No one caught my eye as they passed, no one took the least bit of notice of me. Given my situation, this should have been something that pleased me, but tonight it didn't. It made me feel even more like an outsider. Someone who'd long ago ceased to belong.
I was at the wrong end of Oxford Street for my hotel, so I started walking in the direction of Oxford Circus, and managed to grab a cab with a driver who thankfully wasn't interested in talking, and who took me back to Paddington without saying a word.
I got him to drop me off in Praed Street, and wandered along it for a few minutes, enjoying the relative quiet, until I found a pub that looked about right. A song by Oasis — I couldn't remember which one — drifted out of a gap in one of the stained-glass windows, accompanied by the buzz of conversation and clinking of glasses that I'll always associate with a proper London boozer, and which up until that moment was a sound I'd forgotten how much I missed.
I stopped at the door and stepped inside, immediately breathing in a lungful of warm, smoky air.
It was a nice place, recently decorated, with the emphasis on wood-panelling. The room itself was long and narrow with a bar running three-quarters of its length. Several irregular rows of round tables took up the rest of the available space, and tonight they were filled with a loose collection of drinkers, exclusively white and almost exclusively male, and varying in age from twenties to seventies. Most of them seemed to be facing roughly in the direction of a raised platform in the far corner of the room, which I took to be some sort of stage. At the moment it stood empty. About half the stools lining the bar were in use, but there was a cluster of three spare at the end furthest from the stage, and I took the middle one of these. A couple of punters looked round as I passed, but their expressions registered no interest as I ordered my second pint of Pride of the evening from a barman with a sagging head and a prehensile lower jaw who bore more than just a passing resemblance to a well-built Barbary ape. Not someone you'd want to pick trouble with.
No longer having to worry about impressing attractive female company, I took a huge gulp from the pint this time and sunk about a quarter of it down in one. Now, finally, it was tasting like nectar, but as I drank again, I realized that a vital ingredient was still missing, and I knew immediately what it was.
Two seats down, an old geezer in a grey raincoat and cloth cap, who must have been knocking on the door of his eightieth year, puffed thoughtfully on a Lambert amp; Butler while staring at his reflection in the mirror on the other side of the bar. I watched him for a few moments, following the cigarette out of the corner of my eye as he dipped the tip in his mouth and noisily sucked in smoke, then slowly withdrew it and, with bony soft-veined fingers, tapped the end against the side of the Heineken ashtray, before repeating the process all over again.
It had been three years since I'd last had a cigarette, and for most of that time I hadn't missed having one, but then for most of that time I hadn't been in a smoky London pub drinking Pride. It was, I had to admit, difficult to do one without the other.
I drank some more of the beer, trying to supplant the urge by wondering what Emma Neilson was up to now and whether her efforts would turn up anything of use. But it was no good. The seeds of doubt had been planted. Three years might have gone by, but that was irrelevant. I needed a smoke, and, worse still, I'd already subconsciously made the decision to have one. I could see that, unlike a lot of pubs, the landlord here sold them behind the bar. They were stacked in four separate rows on a shelf beneath the spirit optics — Marlboro, Marlboro Light, Bensons and Silk Cut — like whores beckoning a happily married man. I couldn't take my eyes off them.
I finished my pint, motioned Apeman over and ordered another one, along with a pack of Bensons and a box of matches. It felt like a momentous, life-changing decision, and I hesitated before I removed the cellophane wrapping. People who start smoking again usually justify their decision by saying they're only going to have the one, or that they're only going to do it when they're out socially, or whatever, but this was different. I knew straight away that if I had this one then that was it, I was back on thirty a day. Which represented supremely bad timing, since they cost twenty-five times more per pack here than they did back in the Philippines.
Still, the line had been crossed, and it was a testimony to smoking's long-standing hold on me that as soon as I'd taken the first sip of the new pint, I was ripping off the wrapping and pulling one out. I lit it without further
