It sounded like the traditional Welsh dish known as cawl; the recipe for which could be obtained from tea-towels sold at the tourist information shop. I didn’t tell him; I decided to hold that card close to my chest. It might be useful if Odessa ever showed up.
‘Where do you fit into all this?’ I asked.
‘I am here because of a promise I made to my dear mama on her deathbed: to find the two lovely sons she lost to Hoffmann. Two brothers, the like of whom the world will never see again. Little Ham, the youngest; we lost him to Hoffmann many years ago, somewhere – who knows where? – along the labyrinthine spoor left by this phantom. And Absalom, the man they found slain in the alley wearing the bright red robes of Christmas . . . For years he had been searching for Ham, and now alas he also has met his doom.’
‘But what’s all this got to do with Butch Cassidy?’ said Calamity and then slapped her hand to her mouth in horror. It was an unusual slip for her and I put it down to the excessive excitement generated by her Pinkerton mania. I felt sorry for her.
‘Shit,’ she said.
Elijah allowed a sly smile to animate his features. He paused for a beat or two, allowing the import of her words to be felt, and then said, ‘Oh dear, oh dear!’
Calamity looked at me, squirming.
I forced a laugh. ‘Forget it, kid. It was nothing.’
‘We all make mistakes,’ said Elijah in a voice that made me want to punch him. ‘But we can easily overlook it. All you have to do is give me the item you found in the alley. The one which rightfully belongs to my people, and which, I suspect, makes some reference to the celebrated outlaw Butch Cassidy.’
I picked up the index card. ‘No, I think instead we’ll just put your name on the board. That’s a much better idea.’
‘Then I am truly sorry.’ He stood up with exaggerated weariness, walked over and stood behind Calamity. He placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. Then took out a gun and held it to her temple. She froze. We all did.
‘There’s no need for that,’ I said in a cloyingly reasonable voice. ‘No need at all. We can work this out.’
‘Really? There’s been so much time to work things out but here we are with everything still unworked-out.’
‘Don’t give it to him,’ said Calamity.
‘Don’t be daft,’ I said. ‘Of course I’ll give it to him.’
I raised my hands and moved towards him. ‘Don’t do anything sudden, Elijah. I have to get past you to get the item you’re looking for.’
He caught my glance and I saw a sudden fear flash through the pools of his eyes. At least, I thought I did.
‘You’re scared of me? You think I will hurt your little girl? You don’t understand . . .’ He looked bewildered and puzzled. ‘My people have suffered so much. You could not begin to imagine it—No, don’t move!’
I was almost on him. Just another step and I would be there.
‘And yet you look at me with that fire of condemnation in your eyes, as if . . . as if . . . Don’t you see? It is we who were slaughtered. We’re not the wolves, we are just the lambs . . . Oh God. Oh God! Have we become no better than our oppressors?’ It was as if he was talking to an angel standing behind me in the room. Doubt clouded his gaze. He let the hand holding the gun fall to his side and began to sob. I made a grab for the gun; it slipped out of his hand and fell to the floor with a clatter. Maybe I should have noticed how ridiculously easy it was. Maybe I should have reflected on the fact that Mossad are not renowned for employing cry-babies. But I didn’t. I dropped to the floor and picked up the gun. Calamity jumped clear and I shoved Elijah, who was old and frail, and crying, and not very hard to shove, up against the wall and pressed the gun barrel into his eye. The lid closed round it, the faint grey lashes fluttering like butterflies. I gave the barrel a slight twist and he groaned.
There was a pause, the moment when I was supposed to tell him what a dirty low-down dog he was, that I would shoot without giving it a second’s thought. But that would have been a lie and we all knew it. Instead I was overcome by disgust. Nothing I could say would sound convincing; it would just sound like something on the TV. The moment had passed. I felt like Hamlet. I pulled the gun out of his eye and removed the magazine. I emptied out the cartridges and let them clink and dance on the table before gathering them up and putting them in my pocket. I slotted the magazine back in with a snap and returned the weapon. He took it without a sound and walked out, still sobbing. I felt sorry for him, sick in the pit of my stomach. But that was because I didn’t know his bitter tears were just a lousy act and what I should have done was reload the magazine, stick the barrel back in his eye and pull the trigger.
Chapter 12
IT WASN’T THE first time someone had pulled a gun in the office, but it was the first time someone had pulled a gun and then burst into tears. You never stop learning on this job. I spent five minutes reassuring Calamity about the Butch Cassidy slip; it was the sort of thing that could happen to anyone. We arranged to meet later at Sospan’s to review the Hoffmann case and discuss tactics for dealing with the Pieman. In the meantime I had an appointment with Police Commander Llunos. He’d asked to see me, in the strangest of places: St Michael’s Church.
He was sitting in the back pew, looking unhappy. He always looked glum, but this was different: not the usual world-weary existential disgust of the long-serving cop, the one that comes as standard issue along with the sarcasm and the stained raincoat; today he just looked unhappy.
I slid into the pew alongside him. ‘Come to take Him in for questioning, eh?’
‘Who?’
‘God.’
‘My mother’s sick,’ he said. ‘She’s had a minor stroke.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry.’
‘Yes. I’ve had to take some leave.’
‘I guess it’s pretty serious?’
‘They usually are, aren’t they?’ He considered with a puzzled look. ‘I don’t understand the human body. Normally it’s so tough, it never fails to surprise you what it can do. People who should be dead hang on for years purely out of guts or will power, you know. And yet a stroke, it’s just a vein popping in the brain, isn’t it? You’d think something like that could wait till after Christmas.’
We both said nothing for a while. When the silence got too oppressive I said, ‘I ran into your replacement at the Chinese. Nice fellow.’
Llunos made a slight upward jerk of his head in acknowledgement. ‘Yes, nice. He loves you.’
‘I noticed that.’
‘He’s not the sort of guy a smart guy makes a monkey of, so the first thing you do is make a monkey of him.’
‘Did I do that?’
‘And a monkey of me, too.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘Erw Watcyns,’ said Llunos. ‘He’s from the Cardiff Sweeney, which means he thinks everyone else, including me, is a bumbling, carrot-crunching amateur. He’s especially fond of private detectives, particularly smart ones like you.’
‘I didn’t say a dickey-bird to him. Isn’t this a strange conversation to be having in a church?’
‘This building is about the only place left where a conversation like this might do any good.’
I couldn’t think of anything to say to that.
‘You think us cops are really dumb, don’t you? You hide it well most of the time, but things like that have a way of revealing themselves.’
‘I’m sorry about your mum, but giving me a hard time won’t make her better.’
‘I told him you were OK, I tried to protect you, but you had to go and do it, didn’t you.’