our little outfits, our shirts and striped ties. I couldn’t find shorts to fit me so I had to make do with rolling my trousers up above my knees. Actually, it was a look that Jasper almost pulled off, even if he did resemble the kind of kid who always came top of the class in mental arithmetic. I just looked ridiculous.
We left Barnaby in the car, engrossed in
“I might have a sniff around in a bit,” he said, glancing up from his book. “See if there’s any sign of the enemy.”
I wish now that I’d said something to him. Thanked him, perhaps, for giving us a lift. Shaken his hand or something. Told him to let the bitterness go and enjoy what little was left of his life. But how could I have guessed? How could I have known that I was never going to see him again?
We strode over to the club. There was a ridiculously weedy bouncer at the door, sporting a little spiv’s moustache like no one had bothered to tell him that the Blitz was over and we didn’t have rationing anymore. He smirked at Barbara as she walked past and nodded brusquely at me, but just as Jasper was about to strut through, he held out his arm to stop him.
“Sorry, sir. Couples only.”
Jasper looked at him in astonishment. “What did you say?”
“Couples only. That’s the rules. Makes it a level playing field, you see.”
“Just let me through,” Jasper said, and tried to push his way past. All I can say about the struggle that ensued is that the bouncer must have been very much more forceful than he appeared.
“OK.” Jasper stood back, put his hand in his pocket and produced a twenty-pound note. “Would this help change your mind?”
“Rules is rules,” the bouncer said sententiously.
“Fine.” Jasper dragged out another twenty-pound note. “How about this?”
The mustachioed man just shook his head.
“Brilliant,” Jasper snapped. “London’s only honest bouncer. Listen here,” he said, and I could see he was on the cusp of losing his temper. “Right now, inside your club, there are a couple of creatures who’d think nothing of making every woman in this city a widow just because they’re bored. Now, for God’s sake, let me pass.”
“No offense, sir. And I don’t mean to be rude. But would you mind awfully buggering off?”
I’d been watching this performance with no small amount of amusement, but when I turned to look at Barbara there was nothing but stern professionalism on her face.
“Mr. Jasper,” she said. “We can’t afford to waste time to here. See if you can gain access with another party. Henry and I must go inside.”
Jasper whined, “You could disable this man with a twitch of your wrist.”
“I don’t want to draw attention to us,” she said.
“You can’t leave me out here.” He contemplated his pale, almost hairless legs and shivered. “Not like this.”
Barbara gave him a look of sardonic dismissal, turned her back and vanished into the club. As I followed, she spoke quickly into her earpiece. “We’re at the club, sir. Near the targets. We’re going dark.”
Dedlock’s voice in both our ears. “Understood. And good luck.”
At the door, we both paid ten pounds to a woman who sat slouched on a stool chewing gum, who then grudgingly invited us inside.
Diabolism turned out the be a large concrete space packed with several hundred people swelling and roiling in an ocean of sweaty desperation. There seemed to be a vaguely festive theme, and I recognized the song which was making the floor thump and quiver as a dance remix of Earth, Wind and Fire’s “Boogie Wonderland,” which had climbed alarmingly close to the top of the chart that year. There were firemen’s poles fixed around the room, about which the uninhibited could cavort. It was the kind of place that served Bacardi Breezer by the pint, and I’m afraid I hated it on sight.
Every single person was dressed the same. They were literally in uniform. Tiny skirts, ties draped suggestively around bare necks, scarves knotted round heads like bandanas. The club insisted the minimum age of entry was eighteen and I can confirm that everyone present appeared very comfortably over that limit. A good many, in fact, looked as though they had not seen eighteen for several decades, a fact unflatteringly revealed at intervals when the strobe lighting illuminated their faces, accentuating every crease and wrinkle, each pockmark and pimple. The floor sucked at my feet and for the first time in years I felt again the bilious fear of adolescence, the hideous terror of being expected to dance.
As Earth, Wind and Fire segued into Europop, Barbara took me by the hand and hoiked me through the crowd toward the bar, where she fetched me a drink in a plastic cup. When we spoke we had to shout in order to be heard.
“Eee shred shred tout!”
“What?” I yelled.
She leant close to my left ear and shouted: “We should spread out!”
I nodded in response and, clutching my drink, walked away from her, slaloming between gyrating couples.
It turned out to be easier than I could have hoped. A few minutes later I saw them, recognizing them at once from the backs of their heads, two men sipping cocktails at the bar, one burly and ginger-headed, the other slim and dark. I looked around for Barbara but she had already disappeared into the crowd, and I knew that if I were to go for back-up now I could lose the Domino Men all over again and we’d have to start from scratch. So (I think not unheroically) I did the only other thing I could. I walked up behind Boon, intending to administer a brisk tap on his shoulder, but as I was almost upon him a tubby redhead dressed for hockey practice blundered my way and I tripped forward, slapping the Prefect hard on the back of his head.
When the little man turned to face me I saw immediately that he was not Boon. Nor was his companion — a tall pugilistic-looking man with an interesting scar on his left cheek — Hawker. Both appeared incensed.
I tried a weak smile and mouthed a “sorry” but neither of these improbable clubbers seemed swayed by my contrition. The smaller one grabbed my shirt and yanked me close enough to smell the beer on his breath.
“Sorry!” I shouted again. “Thought you were someone else.”
The ginger-haired man pinched my nose between his forefinger and thumb and forced me up on tiptoe. I squeezed shut my eyes in expectation of a thorough pummeling when my nose was suddenly released and I was able to place both feet flat on the ground. The men were pointing at me and laughing. I couldn’t quite hear what they were saying but I could guess.
Don’t blame me… Blame Grandpa!
Not for the first time, I felt a warm surge of gratitude for
Somebody else seized my hand and I was dragged away from my admirers. Barbara’s face was close to mine and she was shouting. “Henry! Stop clowning about!”
She gave me a look which, if not actually outright contemptuous, at least bedded down somewhere in the lower reaches of derision. She strode back into the crowd and I was about to do the same when I felt an angry buzzing in my left pocket. I pulled out my phone and tried to answer, but conversation proved hopeless and I was forced in the end to retreat to a stall in the gents’, where the music at least subsided to a tectonic rumble.
“Hello?” I said for what must have been the sixth or seventh time in a row.”
“It’s Abbey.” She sounded infuriated.
“Sorry. Couldn’t hear you out there.”
“Henry, your friend’s turning the flat upside down. She’s been in our bedrooms. She’s chucked half the fridge out onto the floor. She’s in the corridor right now, tapping on the walls to see if they’re hollow. What the hell’s going on?”
I swallowed hard. “I know it must seem strange. But, please, let Miss Morning do whatever she needs. I’ll make it up to you. I promise.”
Abbey still sounded profoundly irritated but I thought I could detect at least the beginnings of a thaw. “Listen, about our conversation earlier. About Joe. I want you to know that I don’t have any feelings for him anymore.” It was obvious that this wasn’t easy for her to say. “I’m not on the rebound.”
