“That was the night I quit the watch business.”
“Yes.”
“Well, the week after that my partner and I went to Paris and we spent almost every penny we had buying gold. We bought 1,280 ounces for forty-five thousand dollars U.S. A good price then. And we brought it back here with no trouble. No trouble at all. Then I went on a diet and lost two stone. It took me two months and I damn near starved, but I lost it. Then we had it all set. These two cunts and I would fly to Goa.”
“With the gold,” I said.
“That’s right. With the gold. You know how much gold was bringing in Goa then?”
“No.”
“Ninety-four dollars an ounce. Christ, it’s more than that now, but do you know how much our profit would have been? Seventy thousand dollars. Net. For a plane trip.”
“What happened?”
“My partner and I got greedy. We decided that since I’d lost so much weight, we could rig a special girdle so that I could carry fifty pounds with no problem. Originally I was going to carry forty pounds and the two cunts were to carry twenty each. But with me carrying fifty pounds, we only needed one cunt. She could carry thirty and look a little bit preggy, you know. It was what is known as an economy move. You want another drink?”
“You’ve watered the Scotch,” I said.
“What did you expect?”
“Watered Scotch. I’ll take another.”
He fixed me another drink. “That’ll be a pound,” he said. I paid him.
“So what happened?” I said. “The girl you left behind blow the whistle on you?”
He nodded glumly. “She blew it all right. We barely stepped foot in Heathrow before they were swarming all over us. You asked what happened to me. Well, prison is what happened to me. Two years of it. Have you ever been in prison?”
“No,” I said. “Not really.”
“I couldn’t stand it. I went crackers. I lost even more weight until I was nothing but skin and bones — just as I am now.” He held out a thin arm for me to inspect. “My hair fell out. I developed ulcers. My teeth went. And when I got out after two years I looked just about as I do now and who would buy a gold watch from somebody who looked like me?”
“Nobody,” I said.
“You’re right. Nobody. So now I’m into brothel-keeping — on a small scale, of course. I push a few drugs, because if I didn’t, I couldn’t keep the cunts. I run an after-hours boozer with watered-down spirits and I sometimes peddle information for a fair price and what is it that you’re after?”
“That partner of yours.”
“Him!”
“You’re still in touch?”
“Oh, yes, we’re still in touch. After all, he’s a fine Christian gentleman, he is. I went to prison and he did buggerall. But every Christmas he comes around to see me with a big basket of treats.”
“He faked those watches for you, didn’t he? Could he fake anything else?”
“Him? He could fake the crown jewels if he put his hand to it. He’s a bloody artist. What d’you have in mind?”
“Maybe a sword. Could he do an old sword?”
“No problem. He’d have to pray over it for a while, but he could do it. He takes his religion seriously. As I said, he’s a proper Christian. After all, when I got out of the nick, didn’t he set me up in this wonderful business I’m in? That’s true Christian charity, isn’t it?”
“You’re bitter, Tick-Tock.”
“You damned right I am.”
“How much for his name and address?”
The dead cunning in his eyes moved over to let the greed in. “How’d you find me?”
“Manny Kaplan.”
“Oh, him. What have you got on, St. Ives?”
“I don’t know.”
“Come off it. If you be needing an old Indian gentleman,” he said with a quaver, “I could play me old granddad now instead of me.”
“I don’t think so, Tick-Tock.”
“Just the name and address, right?”
“Right.”
“Fifty pounds.”
“Jesus.”
“My ex-partner will be glad to introduce you to him.” He pointed to the print of Christ on the wall. “He brought that around last Christmas. The cunts like it. Fifty pounds, please.”
I counted him out fifty pounds. “His name’s Billy Curnutt with a C and two t’s and he lives over his shop at fourteen Beauclerc just off Hammersmith Grove.”
“What kind of a shop?” I said.
“He’s a locksmith when he’s not down on his knees praying.”
I rose. “Okay, Tick-Tock. Thank you very much.”
“One more thing,” he said.
“What?”
“He might be in low spirits.”
“Why?”
“His wife left him this past Christmas Eve. I hear he’s not over it yet.”
“That’s too bad.”
“It’s also something else.”
“What?”
“It was the only good news I got last year.”
Chapter Eighteen
The Christmas tree tipped me off that something was wrong, which only demonstrates just how quick I am. If someone still has the Christmas tree up in the middle of May, fully decorated, although a bit brown, with the presents still lying beneath it, I tend to view it as unusual, even odd, although I had once kept mine up until the fifteenth of March.
I had had trouble finding a taxi and I hadn’t arrived at the shop of William Curnutt, locksmith, at 14 Beauclerc Street until a quarter to six. Curnutt’s shop had a big plate-glass window and behind the window was a drawn tan shade that had large white letters on it that spelled CLOSED. The locksmith’s shop was nearly in the center of the block of small shops. Above the shops was a layer of flats. In the center of the block was a flight of stairs that seemed to lead up to the flats.
I went up the stairs and down a hall until I came to 14-B. I knocked, but nobody answered. I tried the door, more out of curiosity than anything else, since it was a locksmith’s door, but it opened, so I went in.
The Christmas tree, a Scotch pine, I decided, was near a window. It was a big, fat tree, reaching nearly to the ceiling. Although the base of its trunk rested in a pail of water, there was a thick ring of brown needles on the mauve carpet and on the still unwrapped packages.
The furniture in the sitting room was neither good nor bad, just serviceable, sturdy stuff of no particular style that had been bought to last a long time and still had five or ten years to go. The lemon curtains were drawn, but two floor lamps were lit. On the walls were old mezzotints of Biblical scenes. David was about to do Goliath in with a slingshot. Adam and Eve were being driven out of the Garden of Eden by the stern forefinger of an old man with a long white beard who looked mad as hell. Some Roman soldiers rolled dice near a cross to which Christ was nailed. There were several others, all hardnosed, fundamentalist stuff, that seemed to hold out faint hope of there ever being a happy ending for the human race.
I went through the rest of the flat. There were two bedrooms, one of which must have been that of a child, a bath, a small dining room, and a kitchen. The beds were made, the bathroom looked scrubbed, and in the kitchen, which was almost fussily kept, things were laid out for tea.
The entire flat, except for the desiccated Christmas tree, which I took to be a sort of shrine, was almost too neat, as if it had just been cleaned by an overly conscientious daily, or as if its occupant couldn’t abide a speck of disorder. There were no overflowing ashtrays; in fact, there were no ashtrays at all. No empty glasses or teacups. No ring around the bath. No bits of shaved beard in the basin. No unwashed dishes in the sink.
A flight of stairs led down from the kitchen, presumably to the shop beneath. I went down them and came out into a workshop that seemed to be even more tidy than the flat above. There was a place for everything and everything was in its place. Tools of all description were carefully set into wall clamps and brackets. Rows of nails, bolts, and screws were meticulously sorted and stored in capped, labeled jars. A long, sturdy workbench with two big vises dominated one wall. Against another was a small industrial oven. There was also a gas-fed forge, some key-making machines, and several banks of blank keys.