Harry Pevensey had never believed that the early bird got the worm. Late to bed and late to rise, that was an actor's life, and it had always suited him. He had his routines, everything just so, drapes drawn to keep out the morning's harsh intrusiveness, eye mask ditto, dressing gown to hand and kettle ready to boil, so that he could slip into the day as painlessly as his usual hangover would allow. And no less than eight hours' sleep-otherwise he'd look like hell, and no amount of makeup would make amends.
So Harry was affronted on Tuesday morning when, just as he was opening one eye and then the other, testing the intensity of the light compared to the sharpness of the knife tip between his eyes and contemplating the operation of verticality, someone began a bloody pounding on his door.
"What the hell," he muttered, sitting up with more force than necessary and wincing at the consequences. Whoever it was had bypassed the downstairs buzzer-had his wannabe rock-god neighbor, Andy Monahan, left the building's main door off the latch again? Or-Harry froze with his feet halfway into his worn slippers.
There was the wine merchant's bill he hadn't paid, and the shirt-maker's-couldn't go to auditions looking like something the cat dragged in, after all. And if they got a bit impatient, they were likely to employ less-than-civilized means of collecting their filthy lucre.
For a moment he considered putting his head back under the covers, but if they broke his door down, there would be hell to pay, and he'd have lost any chance of presenting a dignified front.
He'd got back into his slippers and donned his dressing gown when the pounding grew even louder and someone shouted, "Harry! I know you're in there. Open the fucking door!"
Recognizing the voice, Harry said, "Dom?" What was Dominic Scott doing here, and making such a racket? "Just shut up, would you?" he called out as he shuffled to the door, his head pounding like a jackhammer.
"Harry, let me-" Dom staggered in, fist raised, as Harry opened the door. He looked worse than Harry felt-unwashed hair, pasty faced, and his breath reeked of stale alcohol and cigarettes, which Harry despised.
Harry closed the door, then grimaced, backing off a step. "You smell like a pub ashtray. And what do you think you're doing knocking me up at this hour? Not to mention giving the neighbors something to gossip about for weeks."
"Since when have you ever minded giving anyone cause for gossip," retorted Dom, sinking into Harry's brocaded slipper chair, a bequest from his paternal grandmother.
"And you look like shit," Harry continued, undeterred. It was a shame the boy let himself go, Harry thought, as he had looks Harry would have envied in his day. He considered booting Dom out of his favorite chair, but couldn't decide where he'd rather have him sit. He settled for taking the other armchair himself, after he'd straightened the covers on the bed. "What do you want, Dom?"
Dom leaned forward, and Harry saw that his hands were shaking. "Have you got anything, Harry? Offer a mate a drink? I'm not feeling too well."
"No. Bar's closed," said Harry, thinking longingly of the bottle of gin tucked away in his kitchen cupboard. The hair of the dog would ease his headache, but he wanted Dom Scott out of his flat as soon as possible, and he certainly wasn't inclined to share his medicinal stash.
"Coffee, then? Or even tea?"
Harry glanced at his filled kettle, his favorite cup set out beside it, along with the tea caddy, and sighed. "All right. One cup. But then you'd better make it quick." Not that he had anywhere to go, but the young man's behavior was making him anxious. Dom Scott was used to demanding, not pleading, which made Harry suspect there was a serious spanner in the works.
He made the tea while Dom fidgeted in the chair like a fretful child, pulling at his shirt cuffs, tugging at his already disarrayed dark hair. Harry had seen the signs before, and they weren't good, nor did they bode well for their joint scheme.
While the tea brewed, he excused himself to the loo, running a brush through his hair and examining his face-definitely the worse for wear-in the fly-specked mirror. Visions floated through his mind. Unsuccessful auditions. Bad parts in unheated village theaters. Mothers' unions, God forbid. Bill collectors who wouldn't, couldn't, be put off.
No, he was not going to let go of the merry-go-round. Not now, boyo. He could deal with Dominic Scott, a spoiled little tosser who didn't have half his mother's bollocks.
Harry went back into the sitting room with a smile and a new and steely resolve. He poured Dom's tea into a china cup that he hated to trust to the boy's twitchy fingers, then poured his own and sat on the arm of a chair, ankles crossed, as if he hadn't a care in the world.
"All right, Dom. What seems to be the problem?"
Dom gulped his tea until his cup was empty, then stared at him as if he'd suddenly lost the power of speech. Then he swallowed visibly and said, "Harry, we have to take the brooch out of the sale."
"What? Take it out of the sale?" Harry had expected him to try cutting his percentage, but not this. "Are you mad?"
"No. Look, I'm telling you. It has to come out."
"Why on earth would you want to do that? We're talking about a more-than-six-figure profit, and you're the one needed-"
Dom was shaking his head. "The police have been round. They talked to Kristin. They're asking questions about the brooch. Some woman says it was stolen from her during the war."
"Stolen?" Harry thought swiftly. "What did Kristin tell them?"
"Nothing. But she could lose her job. I asked her to take the brooch out, but she says she can't. She says you're the only one who can withdraw it."
"I bought it at a car boot sale," Harry said with an offhand shrug. "So why should it matter to me what some woman says?"
Dom twisted the teacup until it fell from his fingers and bounced on the threadbare Axminster carpet. "Harry, you don't underst-"
"No. You don't understand." For the first time in his life, Harry Pevensey knew he had the advantage. "The brooch stays in the sale. And maybe, if you're a really good boy, I'll give you a percentage of the profit."
Gemma had always liked the Lucan Place Police Station. Like Notting Hill, it was one of the few prewar buildings still functioning as an active station, and like Notting Hill, it had a warmth and grace most of the newer stations lacked.
It was also just a few streets from the South Kensington tube station, not far from Harrowby's, another rather uncomfortable coincidence, it seemed to Gemma.
She identified herself at reception and asked to see the officer in charge of the hit-and-run accident investigation. While the duty officer gave her a curious look, she was told she could see Inspector Boatman, and was soon shown into an office not unlike her own.
The officer who stood to greet her was female, short, stocky, dark haired, and somewhere in her indeterminate thirties, Gemma guessed. She wore a serviceable suit and no makeup, but when she smiled and held out her hand to Gemma, any notion of her as unattractive vanished.
"You're Inspector James?" she asked. "I'm Kerry Boatman. Have a seat." Like Gemma's, her desk was cluttered with paperwork, but the visitors' chairs were clear and looked as though they had seen much use. Spaced among the files on Boatman's desk, however, were a half-dozen photos, showing, from the sideways angle Gemma could see, various poses of a balding man, two toothy little girls, and a large tabby cat. Gemma, on the other hand, displayed nothing personal in her office, feeling it was inappropriate to cross those professional boundaries, but she suddenly felt a little ache of envy under her breastbone.