A Crooked Sixpence Read online

  ‘Ricky, this is Mr. O’Toole, from the Sun, a good friend of ours,’ said Mary Lou.

  ‘Hi,’ said Ricky, offering a plump hand.

  ‘Glad to know you,’ lied O’Toole briskly.

  ‘I’ve prepared you a summary of the facts about Ricky,’ said Mary Lou. I’m afraid we can’t give you his life story just at the moment. We’ve...promised.’ She handed O’Toole a duplicated handout headed ‘His Deep Purple Voice Plucked a Million Heartstrings’. O’Toole skimmed through it. He had read it a few minutes before, in a clipping from the Sun library.

  ‘I just want a few background details,’ said O’Toole.

  ‘My favourite food is steak,’ said Ricky.

  ‘Well, that’s interesting,’ said O’Toole. ‘You were a bellhop before you took up crooning, weren’t you, Mr. Rogers?’

  ‘I never done a regular job like,’ said Ricky.

  ‘Please don’t use the word “crooner”, it’s terribly out of date,’ said Mary Lou to O’Toole. ‘I don’t think you should say bell-hop, either, that’s not the sort of publicity we want, is it, Ricky?’

  ‘You know best,’ said Ricky.

  ‘How about head waiter?’ suggested O’Toole.

  ‘Let’s say he worked in the catering industry?’ said Mary Lou.

  ‘Did you dream of being a big star as a boy, Mr. Rogers?’ asked O’Toole.

  ‘I wanted to run me own barrow,’ said Ricky. ‘Couldn’t do it, though, with me bad ankles.’

  ‘That’s just our little joke,’ explained Mary Lou. ‘You used to save your pennies to buy Bing Crosby’s records, didn’t you, Ricky?’

  Ricky nodded.

  ‘Did your parents encourage you?’ asked O’Toole.

  ‘Of course they did,’ said Mary Lou. ‘Your mother was your inspiration during the years of struggle, wasn’t she, Ricky?’

  ‘Mum used to say she didn’t mind what I did as long as I kept out of trouble,’ said Ricky. ‘Me Dad didn’t really get interested until I landed me first big job. Fifty nicker a week. He’s me manager now.’

  ‘You’ve shot right to the top,’ said O’Toole.

  ‘I’m knocking out a thousand a week now,’ said Ricky. Of course, there’s a few people get a cut out of that.’

  ‘That’s not very nice publicity, is it?’ asked Mary Lou. ‘Tell Mr. O’Toole how loyal your fans are.’

  ‘Yes, I’d be nowhere without them,’ said Ricky. ‘They’re entitled to me very best and they’ll always get it, so help me. I’m spending twenty-five nicker a week just on stamps and photos but I don’t grudge a penny of it.’

  ‘Ricky’s terribly generous,’ said Mary Lou. ‘Terribly loyal to his fans.’

  ‘They worship the ground I walk on, like,’ said Ricky. ‘But I’m the first to admit I owe everything I am today to them.’

  ‘It says here your favourite colour is blue,’ said O’Toole, consulting the handout.

  ‘Yes, and me favourite classical music is Tchaikovsky. The fans love those little personal details.’

  ‘Do you expect to stay right on top forever?’ asked O’Toole.

  ‘Why not?’ said Ricky, I’m not just a singer, I’m an entertainer, see? That’s where the others fall down. They’ve just got one gimmick, like a guitar or a hearing aid. I’m an all-round entertainer, and I’m ready to give of me best all the time. So why should I worry?’

  ‘Why, indeed?’ said O’Toole. ‘These facts will just about do me. I’ll take the handout along and write the story from that.’

  ‘Sorry we couldn’t give you Ricky’s full life-story,’ said Mary Lou. it’s grand stuff, I can tell you. But perhaps some other time.’

  ‘If you’ve promised, you’ve promised,’ said O’Toole. ‘But I think I’ve got all I need.’

  ‘Any time, I’m always glad to meet the reporters,’ said Ricky.

  O’Toole nerved himself for another handshake but none was offered.

  ‘Ricky is no mental ball of fire, Mr. Barr,’ said O’Toole, handing over his copy. ‘He told me his fans loved him and he loved them.’

  ‘Was the agent any help?’ asked Barr.

  ‘She’s a hard, sly piece of work, I should judge,’ said O’Toole. ‘She’s brighter than poor old Ricky, of course, but she seemed to swallow the story about the big series of singing stars all right.’

  Barr frowned as he read the crooner’s life-story. O’Toole detected a hint of reprimand for himself, probably because he had too loosely implied that he and Barr were in the relationship of fellow-conspirators. ‘The series sounds a good idea, by the way,’ O’Toole added.

  ‘We’ll see,’ said Barr. ‘What’s this crapology about working in the catering industry? What did the lout actually do?’

  ‘Bell-hop,’ said O’Toole.

  ‘That’s more like it,’ said Barr, altering the copy with a pencil. He read on to the end. ‘Seems okay,’ he said. ‘It’s not what you’d call a thrilling read, but in the circumstances it’s good tactics. Norman Knight tells me he’s dug up a tasty little procuress.’

  ‘A real monster,’ said O’Toole.

  ‘Sounds first-class,’ said Barr. ‘I’d like you to learn as much as you can from Norman, we can always use a second string to him. I think he wants to see you, by the way. And try and improve that time-keeping, there’s a good lad.’

  ‘I’ll watch it,’ said O’Toole.

  As he left Barr’s office he spotted Knight with a big, bright, fair-haired man holding a camera.

  ‘This is Sam Jensen, our photographer. Digger,’ said Knight.

  ‘Any pal of Norman’s is a pal of mine, Aussie,’ said the giant, holding out a massive hypo-tanned paw. O’Toole liked the look of him.

  ‘Same here,’ he said, shaking the lump of muscle.

  ‘How would you like to see Eileen, the love of your life, in daylight?’ asked Knight.

  ‘Not a bit,’ said O’Toole. ‘Must we?’

  ‘We’re moving in for the kill,’ said Knight. ‘Sam is going to take her portrait and we’re going to tell her what’s going on. After all, we didn’t actually pay her anything. We need her admissions to clinch the story. Barr always wants me to confront the clients and reveal my identity, mainly to keep on the right side of the Press Council. It makes sense, too, I’ve got to give him that. Generally speaking, he’s got a cautious streak. If it ever came to a court case, we’ve heard what she has to say together and we’ve given her a chance to put her side of the case, if she has one.’

  ‘Very right and proper,’ said O’Toole.

  O’Toole enjoyed the ride down Piccadilly to Eileen’s place with his two hefty and congenial colleagues. The trip had the flavour of a fishing expedition in good company. Knight explained the assignment to the photographer as they went.

  ‘I’ll knock on the door, Sam,’ he said. O’Toole will be right behind me and that will just about block you from sight until she gets the door open. Then I’ll step aside and you’ve got your shot. You’d better leave then, just in case she’s got company. Go and sit in the car. We won’t be long.’

  ‘I’ve heard that before,’ said the photographer. ‘But I’ll wait.’

  The front door of the building stood ajar. They climbed past the door marked ‘Private’ to Eileen’s apartment, and Knight knocked. A chain clattered out of the way and Eileen, tousled, looked out, frowning as she recognised Knight and O’Toole.

  ‘You can’t do this to me, boys, running out and then coming back in the middle of the day,’ she said, running a hand through her hair. ‘Please go away.’

  ‘We’re just here for a cuppa, m’darling,’ said Knight.

  Eileen opened the door some more. Oh well, perhaps...’ she said. In the middle of her sentence Knight stepped aside and O’Toole followed suit. There was a harsh, dry blink of electronic flash and the click of a shutter. Jensen was turned and clumping down the stairs before Eileen quite knew what had happened. ‘What on earth...’ she said, cringing back. Knight was over the doorstep
into the room before she had recovered her balance. O’Toole followed close behind, nodding an unsmiling greeting.

  ‘You won’t want the neighbours to hear this,’ said Knight. ‘I am Norman Knight of the Sunday Sun and this is my colleague, O’Toole.’

  ‘My picture,’ Eileen gasped. ‘What...’ O’Toole noticed she was wearing the same floral housegown.

  We have discovered that these premises are being used for immoral purposes,’ said Knight. ‘We are going to put your name and this address in the paper.’

  ‘And my picture?’ asked Eileen, ashen. Knight nodded.

  ‘But why, why?’ asked Eileen. ‘Is it a crime to have a bit of fun?’

  ‘How old was the girl who was here yesterday?’ asked Knight.

  The woman flinched.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. Ί didn’t...ask her.’

  ‘She’s fifteen,’ said Knight.

  ‘You’re not going...going to say I brought her into this, are you?’ ‘Yes. You did.’

  ‘But please, please. I didn’t know how old she was. She might be lying, trying to get your sympathy or something.’

  ‘She’s not.’

  ‘I swear I didn’t know. I swear it, I...’

  “You should have known,’ said Knight, if you bring young girls up here for prostitution you ought to find out how old they are.’

  ‘But she wanted to come,’ pleaded Eileen. ‘All I said was she could meet some nice people, and perhaps make a few pounds, and she wanted to come. I swear I was going to give her half. After all...’

  ‘That’s not the point,’ said Knight. ‘You procured her for immorality for the purpose of gain and I’m going to put your name and address in the paper.’ Knight sounded like a magistrate, rolling off the pompous legal phrases.

  O’Toole noticed that the woman looked older in daylight, forty, perhaps, or forty-five. The geisha’s professional veneer she had worn the night before had gone, and Eileen was a sagging middle-aged terrified housewife on the point of tears. Then her face twisted and she sobbed desperately.

  ‘Norman, Norman, you just can’t do this to me,’ she choked out. it doesn’t matter about me so much, but think of my poor husband. All his friends know this address. You’ll ruin him. You’ll kill him. I know I’ve done wrong but it didn’t seem so bad at the time, I swear it didn’t. I’ll stop. I’ll get a job, I’ll take in washing, I’ll do anything. Please, Norman, you look a kind man, please, please...’ and then sobbing stopped her.

  ‘You should have thought of that before,’ said Knight, I’ll quote you in the story saying you didn’t know how old the girl was, if that’s any comfort. I’ll tell my editor about your husband. The decision is up to him.’

  ‘Oh please, Norman, please,’ the woman moaned. ‘And that picture,’ she said, to herself.

  ‘Come on, Digger, let’s go,’ said Knight. ‘We’ve got all we want.’

  Eileen’s face was buried in her hands as they left. Her uncombed black hair showed streaks of grey.

  Knight and O’Toole went down the stairs and got into the car in silence. ‘Sticky time?’ asked the photographer.

  ‘You know, I feel sorry for the poor bitch,’ said Knight, staring straight ahead.

  ‘So do I,’ said O’Toole, softly.

  ‘She should have thought of this before she took to whoring,’ said Knight.

  ‘And we wanted to be Fleet Street men,’ said O’Toole. ‘Don’t take that the wrong way, Norman.’

  ‘I know what you mean,’ said Knight. ‘There are parts of this job I don’t like, either, Digger.’

  The office was deserted when they got back. O’Toole didn’t feel much like lunch so he got on with the mill-girl’s confession. He had reached the part where the Marquis plied her with champagne and she escaped from his penthouse in the nick of time.

  Not very enthusiastically, he wrote:

  ‘My head was swimming from his expensive wine, but when he whispered a disgusting suggestion, I saw through his SLY TRICKS.

  ‘“You may be a Lord, but you’re no gentleman,” I said, and he flinched when he saw my Yorkshire determination.

  ‘He flinched even more when I said: “Let me go this minute or I’ll dial 999.”

  ‘I could see he wasn’t used to girls who stood up to him, who weren’t a bit impressed by his money and his title and his smarmy hand-kissing manners.

  ‘He knew when he was beaten. He touched a bell, and a silver-haired butler came in with a soft tread that made my flesh creep. Yes, he had plenty of servants and important connections, but what he didn’t have was...‘

  At this point O’Toole stalled. What on earth didn’t he have? If this boy wasn’t nicely fixed, no one was. He didn’t have a bluff Yorkshire manner with accent to match, but hardly any of the aristocracy have, if you can believe the Evening Standard. O’Toole was getting bored with the mill-girl’s struggle to preserve her virtue, especially as he knew she would. Her imaginary personality was getting tangled up with Kathleen’s, who had just had a much more real escape from disaster at the hands of the Sun. Unable to recover his sincere interest in the story for the moment, O’Toole phoned Elizabeth and arranged to meet her that evening. But that didn’t seem a very thrilling prospect, either.

  O’Toole walked up the crooked length of Fleet Street, the detour by St. Clement Danes and the depressing straight cut of the Strand, with its fake railway lost property shops, rubber goods stores and shop-fitter’s Minoan style hotels on the way to his date. By Aldwych Tube a newspaper poster

  PROMINENT ACTRESS CRITICAL

  trapped him for an unwary tuppence ha’penny. It wasn’t Jenny, of course, but some museum-piece who had wowed them in the nineties and who now made her last newspaper appearance, thanks to a malignant carcinoma and the unaccountable failure of Khrushchev to do anything newsworthy in time for the six o’clock West End Final editions. The poor old duck rated two paragraphs in eight point low down on the front page, which they’d probably held open hoping for better things. The dirty, confidence-tricking, bad-apple-polishing bastards, thought O’Toole. If I fall for it, what chance have the public got?

  Wondering how long misleading posters about obscure show business people would continue to stab him at unexpected moments, O’Toole slid into a dangerous nostalgia for the flat overlooking the harbour, the bulging balloon sails of the eighteen-footers, the green gelatinous heave of the water behind the ferries, Sydney rock oysters for two and the bright, clean world of no problems. It was only a few months ago, cut off forever by the armoured glass shutter which separates us from the past.

  Elizabeth was waiting, dimpled, real and present, in a coffee-house in Leicester Square. Her voice really was quite like Eileen’s. They talked about nothing special, and went to a movie which took a long time to end. O’Toole didn’t ask her back to South Kensington, and she didn’t suggest it, and for the first time there was no real contact between them at all.

  XVII

  ‘LATE AGAIN, Old Tool, you brothel of a boy,’ greeted Jacobs. He had rehearsed it somewhere. ‘You’ll miss half the fun if you’re not here early on Saturdays.’

  The newsroom was jammed with the Saturday crowd of unknown faces, noisy with the rattle of typewriters, lively with the flicker of telephone lights.

  ‘It’s hysterical, Tom,’ said O’Toole. ‘I don’t really want to be here at all. I want to be punished. What’s on, anyway?’

  ‘Knight and a client are waiting to see you. They’re in the waiting-room. Some sort of trouble over one of your whorehouses.’

  O’Toole found Knight and a thin-nosed little man with horn-rimmed spectacles glaring at one another. The little man was clutching a seedy briefcase.

  ‘Hello, James,’ said Knight. ‘This is Mr. Ifor Morgan, a solicitor. He tells me he represents Eileen, the lady we saw yesterday. This is my colleague, Mr. O’Toole.’

  ‘Are you an Australian of some sort?’ asked the lawyer fiercely. O’Toole nodded.

  ‘I believe you go
by the alias of McNaughton. You are a party to the conspiracy against my client.’

  ‘Am I?’ asked O’Toole.

  ‘Just a moment, Mr. Morgan,’ said Knight. ‘Let’s get to the point. What do you want, exactly?’

  ‘Certainly. I am here to give you a solemn warning.’

  Oh, yes,’ said Knight. ‘What about?’

  The lawyer cleared his throat. ‘I have reason to believe that you intend to publish a criminal libel on my client,’ he said. ‘I don’t suppose you have more than a layman’s acquaintance with the law, Mr. Knight, so let me inform you of the punishment for criminal libel. Imprisonment, Mr. Knight. A severe term of imprisonment. Your colleague will naturally join you in Wormwood Scrubs.’

  ‘Indeed,’ said Knight. ‘Do you happen to know what this libel is that we intend to publish?’

  ‘I do,’ said the lawyer. ‘I am instructed that you intend to brand my client as a woman of loose morals. That is clearly a criminal libel of the gravest sort, you can take my authority for that.’

  ‘But it’s true,’ said Knight.

  ‘You are aggravating your offence, Mr. Knight. All this will go to the question of damages. An impudent perseveration in the libel.’

  ‘Did she tell you what we were doing in her flat?’ asked Knight.

  ‘I believe she was ill-advised enough to admit you into her home,’ said the lawyer. ‘You claimed to be close friends of her husband’s.’

  ‘She told you that?’

  ‘Those are the facts, Mr. Knight. I will not be called a liar to my face by your type of person.’

  ‘Why were we there for more than an hour?’ asked Knight. ‘We have ample evidence of the time we spent on the premises.’

  ‘I am afraid that my client was taken in by your glib talk,’ said Mr. Morgan. ‘She allowed you to stay a few minutes. A grave mistake on her part, clearly, but no basis for a foul defamation.’

  ‘Why did she disrobe, then?’