Raucous (20 page)

CHAPTER FIFTY TWO

“It hardly seems fair,” Rollin said.

He was carrying a 12-gauge shotgun, the barrel broken over his right arm.  To his right Chamberlain walked in the same pose with an identical shotgun.  They were a matching pair as far as Rollin could tell.  The metal plate was intricately engraved and the wood matched in colour and shape.  He was no experts on these types of guns, but Chamberlain had called them Holland-and-Holland, side-by-side.  They were lighter than he imagined, but as expensive as they looked. 

Rollin liked the chances of the pheasants they were hunting on Chamberlain’s land.  Chamberlain had described the usual routine, beaters sending up birds and posh men in costumes from the 19
th
century taking pot shots with 12-gauge pellet guns.  Rollin had asked for a private walk.  Chamberlain insisted on the guns.  Rollin agreed.  He figured it would make him at ease and confident.  Rollin needed Chamberlain to open up. 

They walked through heath, wrapped up warm.  Chamberlain wore a Green jumper, green jacket, and brown woollen trousers.  Rollin hoped he had something smoother underneath because that looked like pure itch on every inch of skin.  Rollin wore new, a red waterproof wind-breaker over a hiking under-shirt and thermal jumper.  He wore dark brown cargo trousers and hiking boots.  They walked, birds flew, they kept their expensive guns hanging over their inner elbows as Chamberlain’s two sheepdogs bounded back and forth begging for something to fetch.

They walked in silence, broken by occasional calls to Chamberlain’s dogs.  They walked until the house was a mile behind them; they turned right and walked toward a raised, barren moor.

“How has his death affected your inner circle?”  Rollin asked.

Chamberlain was confused, he opened his mouth but Rollin spoke.

“The DJ.  The nation’s monster.  The new personification of pure evil.  How has it affected your circle of acquaintances?”

Chamberlain, head down, walked on.  Rollin paused but followed.

“It is, in a certain sense, a shame he died when he did,” Chamberlain said.

“He wasn’t going to live forever now, was he?”  Rollin said. “Nasty little bastard that he was.  Never could figure his influence.  A man who never married, lived with his mum, kept her clothes when she died.  I’m no head doctor, but that’s firing up signals immediately.”

Chamberlain didn’t break stride.  He whistled as the older of his dogs was drawn to a hedgerow.  The dog listened to his owner and bounded back toward Chamberlain.

“He was a clever man,” he said.

“Only so far,” Rollin said.  “Clever enough to tie-in people with influence.  Hell, he had royal approval.  A man with the regal friends.  Politicians too.  You guys.  What happens at your boarding schools to make you that way?  I’m just an armchair psychologist, but a boy who is abused has a higher chance of growing up to be an abuser, right?  That big fat bastard, politician, one of your boys.  Everyone knew, the police, the head of his party.  The locals.  They all knew, but they voted him in and kept him out of trouble.  Now you, you were different.  I don’t remember you ever socializing with the DJ.”

Chamberlain stopped now.  His dogs sensed feelings and started to circle closer.  The eldest lay down at Chamberlain’s feet.

“I never did.  He was a repulsive man,” Chamberlain said. “Dangerous when young.  A man of violence.”

“Same when he was older,” Rollin said. “Everyone in the business knew.  Journalists, the whole media world knew the guy was the way he was.  A lot of the public had their suspicions too.  But he lived to a real good old age.  Now why is that?”

“He was clever manipulator.”

Rollin accepted the idea with a single exaggerated nod.

“A man who recognized influence,” he said. “Recognized it when he was young.  Identified people with strange tastes in powerful positions and supplied then blackmailed.  That sound like someone we know?  Bring him down and they bring themselves down.  And he’s gone, and now the police, the new generation, are going to take everyone down.  Just a sniff of shit on you from what the world now says is evil and you have the end of any type of career.”

Chamberlain locked his gun in place, the barrels clicked into a well machined mechanism.  He held the butt in his right hand, and let the barrel point downward, its tip close to the floor.

“The world has a strange sense of morality,” Chamberlain said.  “Jerry Lewis marries a thirteen year old cousin and he’s just some weird musical genius.  Chuck Berry had his legal problems.  That utter joke of a man from the 70’s, the DJ’s friend.  The man with the wig.  The singer.  He married kids too.  But it was OK, the church gave its blessing.”

Rollin stared, unhappy with the answer.

“I don’t know if that is an argument, or even intelligible,” Rollin said.  “And without going into details, I know about your operation.  I’m not the only one.  Word spreads, suspicion sinks in.  Hell, there are those that think you are one of them.  You never remarried.  Twenty-five years a bachelor.  You are never seen with women.  You must hear the rumors."

Chamberlain smiled to hide his anger.

“And you know very well that they are not true,” he said.

“Not really, but I am always willing to believe a friend, always have.”

“If there is something in it for you.”

The dogs started to growl.  They sat up, one either side of Chamberlain.  Rollin looked at them in turn with contempt.  He hated dogs.

“Friends help each other,” Rollin said, his eyes still on the dogs. “But the point I’m making is that we are entwined.  The shit that sticks to you, and they are coming for you.  You will be spoken to.  And I don’t care how much you believe in the solidarity of your little perverts club, because the choice between giving up your name or spending years in an institution where they become prey, the little boy that the big men want to abuse is easy.”

“I can ride it out," Chamberlain said.  "The worst has already happened.  The biggest talker I silenced.  Raucous did me the favor, and now I have him.”

“Maybe, But I don’t think so, and I honestly don’t think you truly believe that either. The DJ died twelve months ago and the story runs in the papers and more have been arrested. But the problem occurs by the shit sticking.  You’ll be investigated, deeply.  If they can’t get you on your operation, they’ll get you on something else.  And I’m concerned that something else will be me.  More specifically our business dealings. As much as you wrote it up and hid the details within the small print of the small print of documents no one will see till we are long dead, they have been illegal.  I don’t really have the desire to be broken down into pieces and told to start again.  This, my friend is the problem.  Your fondness for power and leverage over men with deviancies is directly related to my own economic well-being.”

Chamberlain felt confident.  His two dogs were ready to attack, his gun was cocked and ready.  Rollin was essentially unarmed, in a weaker position.

“Then cash out and get out,” Chamberlain said.

Rollin understood why his arrogance was flowing.  Rollin knew he was at a disadvantage in the moment.  But he hadn’t come to cause physical harm.  He knew his temper could occasionally explode.  But not as much or as extreme as when he was young.  But he was here, in Chamberlain’s place because extra barriers to making excessive decisions were an extra comfort.  He wouldn’t, and couldn’t cause Chamberlain harm.

“A lovely thought,” Rollin said.  His voice calm. “But it can’t be done quickly.  I’m a millionaire in property.  Assets.  All objects the police and government will take, or block.  My cash assets are not sufficient to cover me for a year.  Most would go on legal costs to keep me out of jail. And then a new start with no money.  I’m too old and too accustomed to my way of life for that to happen.  You see where I’m going?

Chamberlain looked around at his land, at his large house in the distance. 

“You don’t want me to get caught,” he said.

“You are already caught.  The word is out there.  They just need to be sure, to have proof, to come after a man of your influence.”

Chamberlain tightened his grip on the stock of his shotgun.  He raised thee barrel slightly, heading toward horizontal.

“You want me dead?” he asked.

Rollin took a step forward and rested his left hand on the top of Chamberlain’s gun and gently pushed it down.  The two dogs snarled, baring teeth.  Rollin’s face was twenty centimetres from Chamberlain’s.

“If it happened natural, yeah, that would ease my worries.  But killed, bumped off by foul means?  What would that achieve?  It’ll be investigated the same and the conclusions won’t change.  My business, my property, my buildings and my accounts all closed down. Alive or dead, it is the same.  I guess I could get the satisfaction of your death, but I would honestly rather see you alive and inside.  I’m all for a tooth for a tooth and all that other biblical claptrap.  But I think the greatest pain I can cause you is by letting you be caught and seeing you try and survive inside.  I know you’ll get a cushy number, a free prison, gardening and all that, but at a certain point, the media are not going to be happy with your easy life, and then you’ll be moved to a real prison, the ones you used to legislate.  I can’t see you being happy.  So, no, you have no fear I’ll kill you.  But cause you pain if you fall into this investigation?  Yeah, I can guarantee you that.”

CHAPTER FIFTY THREE

“Are you trying to seduce me?” Charlotte asked.

She looked tired, a little weary.  There was no humor in her voice although she tried to inject some.

Mitch was sat on the park bench.  He was sure he had lost Jobs.  The walk through Paddington station, the crowds, the six single tickets he had bought to gain him access and exit to two underground areas but never taking a train after the first he used to arrive.  A myriad of people, half knowing through routine and experience where to go and how to avoid the other fifty percent of lost souls and amazed tourists.  Mitch had walked from the tower block, he saw Jobs follow the same distance behind, not too far and not too close.  Mitch nearly lost him once on a large escalator at the first underground stop.  This was not his plan.  He needed Jobs to be moving away not waiting at an exit or blocking a staircase.  There were a series of tunnels that led into what seemed a maze of platforms and corridors but was one single area.  It would make the perfect paint-ball zone.  A million places to hide, an infinite number of routes, a confusing sequence of signs, but essentially a unique area divided by one way systems not everyone followed.  Mitch darted onto a platform as a train arrived, luck more than timing, Jobs followed, Mitch jumped into a group of people waiting for passengers to leave the carriage.  Jobs had no reason to believe Mitch was escaping.  Mitch turned as the wave of passengers stepped from the carriage.  He had ducked and drifted away with those who left.  He didn’t dare to look around or poke his head above the masses.  He followed the crowd, walked over a bridge inside the station, one seemingly built in a more artistic architectural century and waited.  He stayed still, hidden in a corner of white tiles.  He watched people walk and push and jog and stand still. He heard the guitar music of a busker, and the continual, non-stop clatter of feet on concrete floors.  He stayed for thirty minutes, watching the seconds climb to sixty and crash back to zero on his Casio watch.  He removed his jacket, letting it drop to the floor.  He placed a cap on his head and joined the crowd.  Jobs was lost and Mitch made slow overground progress on ever-stopping red double-decker buses back into the heart of the city.

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Mitch waited until he saw Charlotte exit the hospital.  She pushed through the basement door and walked, looking left and right as if expecting to be greeted with a mad mass of paparazzi cameras.  She moved quickly.  And Mitch followed.

Charlotte used public transport.  Jumping onto buses and leaving them before they stopped, and quickly jumping onto the next.  She was fast and confident, and knew the routes, and occasionally a driver.  Mitch followed with difficulty.  She was trying to shake a tail, and doing well.  She never looked round.  Her gaze was ahead, or through a side window.  She could not know Mitch was behind her.  She never paused bar the moments a bus she rode was left idling in traffic.

Charlotte stepped from the latest bus as it pulled up to its stop. Mitch waited and followed but she was gone.  Mitch panicked.  His heart-rate rose, he felt the sudden fluctuation in beat in his chest.  He spun around, people stared at him as he bumped a few passers-by.  She was gone.  He took two steps forward, craning his neck but she was not there.  He paced to the side, and then back.  Charlotte had vanished.

Mitch stood still as people of all race and style walked around him.  He looked across the road.  He knew the place, had heard the name.  Green Park.  He walked to the crossing, waited with a hundred people for the illuminated man to turn green.  A man, a face cracked by sun, booze and nicotine, with thinning dreadlocks and heavy hemp clothes, walked across the road early.  A car sounded his horn and the man swore.  The lights changed, a rhythmic beat sounded, and a mass of people crossed in unison.  Mitch entered the park, the temperature was below twelve degrees, the sky cloudy and dark, a light breeze blew across the grass, and people leaned forward, or were pushed away.  Four plastic bags twirled, dipped, and circled as trees rustled.  Mitch saw an empty wooden bench.  The plaque spoke of a man who had died ten years before but had loved the park.  Mitch sat down and watched the path that ran next to the hidden stream.  People walked at pace, unsteady, like actors feigning to be pirate seamen newly onshore.  He didn’t see which way the person arrived, he was too busy looking at people rushing through, but he heard and felt the person sit down to his left.  He waited twenty seconds; he counted them in his head, and then glanced left.  Charlotte was looking back.

She asked her question.  It was out of context, a nod to a novel, or film from the 60s.  Seduce her?  That would be the reverse order.  She seemed to find the association funny, amused to watch a reaction of recognition.

“The graduate?”  Mitch asked.  “Our ages aren’t different.”

Charlotte licked her lower lip, “A memory you don’t know.”

Mitch squinted, looking directly into Charlotte’s wide eyes.  “I’ve read the book,” he said.

Charlotte moved forward, her face two inches from that of Mitch.  Mitch could not see her mouth.  “When?”  Charlotte asked.

“I don’t remember.”

Charlotte snorted, unbelieving. 

“Any reason to be following me?” She asked, leaning away.

Mitch stayed silent, looking into her eyes. 

Charlotte gritted her teeth “You’re at Rollin’s penthouse.  Nice if you can get it.  How’s the bonding going?”  Real father-son love fest.”

Mitch clasped his hand in front of him.  He did not want more anger.  “We don’t see each other so much.  A slow process.”

“How do you feel about that?”

Mitch looked up, confused.  “I feel about us,” he said.  “What we did.”

Charlotte looked up to the sky and blew out air.  She looked back to Mitch.  “It was a mistake, a shot at a past I never had.  Sorry, if it means anything to you, I feel as bad as you do.”

“You know about me,” Mitch said.

“I know about who you were,” Charlotte said.  Her voice louder now, the words punching out.  “But not about what you are.”

They sat on the bench in silence.

“I have a dream,” Mitch said.

“Like Martin Luther King?”

“It’s me, on a balcony.  A door smashes open and then black.  Always had it, don’t know why.” 

Charlotte pulled back and stood.  She did this quickly as if preparing to run.  “Stand up,” she said.  She reached out her hand, grabbed Mitch’s arm and eased him to his feet.  She grabbed his hand in hers, not romantic, similar to a tired and stressed mother pulling her son away from a display of toys.  “Come with me,” she said.

They walked for ten minutes; the rows of bed and breakfasts slowly gave way to small shops, and then pubs and then bars.  Many years ago the street was an upper-class area with maid's quarters and butlers.  Now the easy money had gone and properties were for business and entertainment.  Charlotte stopped; she still held Mitch’s hand.  Charlotte looked up.  Mitch followed her gaze.  The edifice was unusual in comparison to those around it.  The flat, but decorated faces of the buildings either side, looked as though they had been built without imagination.  It was a large building, the entrance set back from the street, an overhanging balcony held up on seven white circular columns.  The place was a new trendy bar.  It would be this way, fresh and cool, for one season then lull, fade, lower prices, and accept clientele for which it was not designed and fold.

The front had been opened up.  The whole front, shaded under the large balcony, was a large open space.  Inside the tables were dark wood, large and heavy with matching chairs.  The bar was a long rectangle open on three sides to customers at it jetted across the room.  Mitch saw that it was a converted cinema, one of the old types.  To the left and right of the ground floor room, were swinging doors, a circular pane of glass in each of the four panels that were protected by worn brass plates.  Raucous could imagine the spiral staircases behind them that led up to the first floor. 

Charlotte was speaking to the barman.  Their ease indicated they knew each other well or that the barman was the most experienced flirt in London.  They looked at Mitch, the barman shaking his head.  Charlotte said thanks and walked to Mitch. 

Let’s go, she said, pushing open the swinging door to the left.

The spiral staircase curled up, opening up onto a large space that had once been the ticket office and foyer.  Now the place was a dining area.  Seventeen tables, evenly spaced, four occupied by families, each with a child, each with a pushchair.  They spoke little and ate cod and chips, hot-pots and salads.  A large double door filled the middle of the far wall.  Mitch stared at it as if it held a secret.

Charlotte saw him and said, “They say the theatre is still out back, that big bowl, snap down seats, curtain covered screen,”

“The left for the smokers, the right had it banned,” Mitch said. 

Charlotte nodded slowly.  “You like the cinema,” she said.

“Liked.”

“I worked here, you came.”

Mitch stared at the door.  Charlotte pulled him to the opposite side of the room, she pushed a door and they walked out onto a balcony.  This area was busier.  Smokers pulled on cigarettes, Middle-aged, ruddy faced men with large stomachs spoke loudly and laughed as they made fun of each other with jokes and insults they had used a thousand times before.  They gathered around large heaters shaped like tall mushrooms, the women sat in outdoor chairs of brown plastic, molded to vaguely resemble a basket weave.  Smoke drifted, capillaries expanded and cheeks flushed, as hand gestures made long wisps of smoke twirl and break. 

Charlotte walked Mitch to the edge of the balcony where there was a free table and low chairs with off-white cushions.  Mitch sat down, pinched his shirt away from his chest and realized he was sweating.  He looked around the balcony and saw his dream.

The door that bashed open was now made of glass, frosted in stripes, not the red emergency door of old.  The empty space was filled with people and tables and chairs and fire and smoke.  But the dream was set here, years before, before the bar, before the change, when multiplexes hadn’t destroyed simple screens, when Christian lived. 

Charlotte waited, watching Mitch understand where he was.  His face was set in confusion; he couldn’t comprehend where he was.

“It’s not a dream,” Charlotte said.  “Nor a nightmare.  It’s memory.  This is where we died.”