“Really? Congratulations. When’s it due?”
“Oh, early days. Another five months to go.”
“That’s great news. Do congratulate your wife too, won’t you?”
“Course I will.”
“And how long have you got to go now?” Mrs Pargeter posed the question with delicate tact.
“Done seven years. Five more outstanding. Reckon I could be out in eighteen months, though – with good behaviour.”
“And that… won’t be a problem?” This question was floated even more sensitively than the previous one.
Keyhole Crabbe looked at her with reproach. “Mrs Pargeter, surprised you have to ask. Model prisoner, I am.”
“Yes. Yes, of course,” said Mrs Pargeter. “Sorry.” Hastily, she moved the conversation on. “By the way, did you hear that Fossilface O’Donahue was out?”
“Yeah, I heard.” Keyhole Crabbe shook his head ruefully. “Also heard something about he was a reformed character.”
“Given up his evil ways, yes.”
“Heaven preserve us. If he’s as unsuccessful at being a goodie as he was at being a villain, we’ve all got problems.”
“He is actually planning to repay his debt to all the people he reckons he’s done wrong to. ‘Make restitooshun’ is how he puts it.”
“Oh, blimey,” Keyhole groaned.
“And he’s intending on each occasion to do it in some way that demonstrates his sense of humour.”
“His what? Fossilface O’Donahue’s sense of humour? That’s a contradiction in terms.”
“Well, he’s apparently undergone a major transformation while he was inside. Now he claims he’s got a real sense of humour.”
“I don’t know whether I dare ask how it manifests itself…”
“I think he’s actually got a bit of work to do on the fine tuning.” And Mrs Pargeter outlined to Keyhole Crabbe Fossilface’s amusing attempt to repay the ‘monkey’ that he owed her late husband.
At the end of her narration, Keyhole groaned again. “Oh God. And you say he actually mentioned me by name?”
“Fraid so. What does he need to make ‘restitooshun’ to you for?”
The prisoner grimaced. “He done the dirty on me few years back when we was doing a bank job. Locked me in one of the vaults when the rest of the gang scarpered. So I was waiting there when the police arrived. Dead embarrassing for me of all people, as you can imagine.”
“Why particularly for you?”
“Well, I’m supposed to be this ace escape merchant, aren’t I? But Fossilface had nicked all my picklocks and other gear, so I couldn’t do nothing.”
“But could you have got out of a bank vault even if you had got your equipment with you?”
Keyhole Crabbe shrugged lightly.
“Course I could.”
“So he certainly owes you something.”
“Oh yes. ‘Restitooshun’. Dear God, I hate to think what form it’ll take.”
“Maybe he’ll just pay you some compensation money…” Mrs Pargeter suggested. “Maybe he’ll give up these elaborate ways of paying people back.”
“I’d like to believe you,” said Keyhole Crabbe gloomily, “but once an idea gets lodged in old Fossilface O’Donahue’s head, it takes a bloody road-drill to dislodge it.”
“Oh dear.”
He sighed. “Well, I’ll just have to wait and see what happens. I’ll be on my guard, though. Who else is on Robin-bloody-Hood’s hit-list?”
“Truffler, Hedgeclipper, Concrete and Gary certainly.”
“You and all?” said Keyhole to the chauffeur.
“Yes,” Gary confirmed with foreboding.
“What wrong did he do you then?”
“Sabotaged a getaway car I was driving. Could’ve been bloody nasty. I was lucky to escape in one piece.”
“So what kind of humorous ‘restitooshun’ do you reckon he’s going to make you for that?”
Gary shook his shoulders, as if suddenly cold. “I shudder to think.”
“Come on,” Mrs Pargeter urged comfortingly. “No point in worrying about things till they happen, is there?”
“Where Fossilface O’Donahue’s concerned,” said a doom-laden Keyhole Crabbe, “I’m rather afraid there is.”
“It’ll be fine,” Mrs Pargeter said blithely. She looked at her watch. “Should be in London in a couple of hours. Don’t envisage any problems that end, do you, Keyhole?”
“Nah,” he replied. “Done Wandsworth lots of times, haven’t I? This time of night screws’ll be asleep, anyway. Think everyone’s banged up, don’t they?” And, his worries about Fossilface O’Donahue temporarily allayed, Keyhole Crabbe chuckled fruitily.
♦
In a cell in Wandsworth Prison, Concrete Jacket lay wakeful and troubled on his bunk. Beneath him his cell-mate snored deeply.
There was a scraping noise at the cell door. Concrete tensed. As the sound continued, he eased himself off down to the floor, and picked up an enamel jug from the table. He raised it to defend himself as the door opened.
The outline of a man appeared in the doorway. Concrete Jacket moved forward aggressively and hissed, “Ere, what the hell do you think you’re –”
“Concrete, it’s me – Keyhole.”
The jug was halted in mid-descent towards the intruder’s head. “Keyhole Crabbe?”
“Right.”
Concrete Jacket looked bewildered in the half-light as Keyhole gently closed the door behind him. “What you doing here then? Got transferred down from Bedford, have you?”
“Nah,” Keyhole replied easily. “Just needed to see you.”
A suspicious light came into Concrete’s eye. “Ere, this isn’t an escape, is it?”
His visitor was appalled by the suggestion. “Good heavens, no. Very risky business, escape.”
“Too right,” the builder agreed. “Makes you a marked man, that does.”
Keyhole nodded. “Oh yeah. Wouldn’t catch me doing it. Serve your time like a good boy, no fuss, get your remission for good behaviour – that’s my philosophy.”
“Yeah.”
“It’s all right to nip out for kids’ birthdays, wedding anniversaries, that kind of number – otherwise, you just got to knuckle down and do your bird.”
“Right.” Concrete Jacket nodded his endorsement of these Victorian values. He gestured to a chair and the two prisoners sat down. “So what is it then, Keyhole? Great to see you, by the way.”
“You too, my son.” Keyhole gestured to the sleeping cell-mate, the rhythm of whose snores had not changed at all. “All right to talk with, er…?”
“Oh yeah,” Concrete replied. “That one’d sleep through the Third World War.”
Keyhole Crabbe nodded with satisfaction and drew a half-bottle of whisky out of his coat pocket. His friend’s eyes lit up. Two enamel mugs were quickly found and charged. They were clinked and gratefully sampled.
“Now,” said Keyhole Crabbe, “it’s about this Willie Cass business, Concrete…”
∨ Mrs Pargeter’s Plot ∧
Thirteen
The first streaks of dawn were lightening the sky as Gary’s limousine drew up outside the main gates of Bedford Prison. The back door opened and Keyhole Crabbe emerged.
“Sure you’ll be OK?” asked Mrs Pargeter.
“No problem,” the prisoner replied with a grin. “Dozy lot in here.”
“I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done.”
Keyhole grimaced wryly. “Just sorry I couldn’t get you more. Afraid Concrete really clammed up on me.”
“Well, I’m very grateful for what you did get.”
He dismissed this with a flip of the hand. “Quite honestly, Mrs P., when I think of all the things your husband sorted for me, it’s the least I can do.”
Mrs Pargeter smiled. “He’d be very grateful to you, and all.”