Essex Poison

‘Really?’ Delaney gave a sinister little laugh. ‘Well, if I had known you were simply going to pay me back then there’d have been no need for this long discussion, would there? This rig-marole.’ He rolled the ‘r’ of the rigmarole. ‘A cheque is acceptable, but I would prefer cash. You might be so kind as to visit my cashier downstairs on the way out. I’m assuming you have the money with you now?’

‘I was wondering actually if we could arrange some sort of … payment plan?’

‘A payment plan?’

‘A schedule of repayments,’ I said.

Gleason and MacDonald sniggered again.

‘Well, I suppose it’s not an unreasonable request,’ said Delaney. Gleason and MacDonald immediately stopped sniggering. ‘How about if I give you to the end of the month to pay me in full?’

‘I was hoping actually that you might be able to extend the period of repayment a little longer,’ I said. The end of the month gave me about two weeks. I was thinking more like two years – maybe until 1939. Or 1940. By then things might have calmed down. I might have straightened myself out.

‘Longer?’ said Delaney. ‘You want longer?’ Delaney examined the tip of his cigar. ‘Oh dear. I am disappointed, Mr Sefton. You see, that just shows a lack of … ambition, don’t you think?

‘I—’

‘Also I don’t know if you’re familiar with traditional banking practices, but I’m afraid it’s really not common practice for the borrower to determine the terms of repayment. It is the lender, rather, who holds all the cards, as it were.’

‘Of course,’ I said.

‘Good. So we’re agreed then that you’ll be paying me back at the end of the month, payment in full, in cash. Plus the small matter of compensation for the stolen goods, of course; shall we say we’ll double the amount and round it up to, what, one hundred pounds?’

‘One hundred pounds?’

For me, and indeed for almost anyone except for the very wealthy and the very lucky, one hundred pounds in 1937 was an unimaginable amount. For me, working for Morley, it was almost a year’s wages.

‘That’s a deal then,’ said Delaney. ‘Gentlemen, would you show Mr Sefton the door?’

Gleason and MacDonald hauled me out of my chair and began to escort me – drag me, rather – to the door.

‘Oh, Mr Sefton, just before you go.’

Gleason and MacDonald paused and turned me around just as we had reached the top of the stairs. I could see Delaney smiling, framed in the doorway like a painting of some all-powerful potentate: hand-grained features, black-enamelled hair, ivory teeth, the very image of the inscrutable and implacable.

‘I wonder,’ he said, ‘I’d be interested to know: have you perhaps heard rumours about my methods for calling in debts? In those very very rare cases where people are not able or unwilling to make their payments?’

‘Yes, I have,’ I said.

‘Well’ – he chuckled – ‘the rumours, you will be delighted to hear, Mr Sefton, are not entirely true. Isn’t that right, boys?’ Gleason and MacDonald wholeheartedly agreed that not all the rumours were entirely true. ‘Not at all. Not at all at all at all. Just be careful going down the stairs now.’

The Windmill Theatre sign winked red at me, I stepped forward, Mickey Gleason pushed, and I began to fall.

CHAPTER 4 (#ulink_6357c16d-b880-57e1-8357-8ef57d1f4f19)

THE MUSIC WRITERS’ MUTUAL PUBLISHING CO. (#ulink_6357c16d-b880-57e1-8357-8ef57d1f4f19)

NOTHING WAS BROKEN. That was the main thing. I was sure nothing was broken. I had managed to put out a hand to prevent myself from going head first but I had rolled and skidded and smashed my way down and was at the bottom of the stairs when I heard my Brigader friends rushing towards me. I’d curled into a foetal position to protect myself from the inevitable beating. I pressed myself into the cracked linoleum and waited for the first blow. Instead I felt a hand reach down to pull me up.

‘Sorry about this, mate, no hard feelings, eh?’ said Gleason.

‘Sure,’ I said, relieved, beginning to stand.

Which is when MacDonald took a well-aimed kick that knocked me back against the door.

‘Just pay up, you swine,’ said MacDonald, or words to that effect, with his characteristic Glaswegian charm. The rest of what he said, and exactly what he said is, alas, unrepeatable. Suffice it to say, I was left in no doubt that it would be in my best interests to pay my debt to Delaney without delay or hesitation.

When they finally pushed me out the door back onto Windmill Street – ‘See you in two weeks with your hundred pounds!’ called MacDonald with one final thump, as I staggered back – I noticed a tiny brass plaque indicating the name of Delaney’s offices, which I had never noticed before. The Rendezvous. Indeed it was.

I was breathing hard – panic and pain, a bad combination. I checked my ribs. I needed somewhere to rest. Somewhere to gather my thoughts and tend my wounds. Somewhere safe.

Some of the places I stayed in London in between assignments with Morley during our time together: Berwick Street, Dean Street, Greek Street, Wardour Street, in ‘hotels’, basements, flophouses and grand apartments, in mews, rows, streets, yards, courts, drives, circuses, both inside and out in the cold. There is nowhere, however, that I can particularly recommend: there is nowhere that remains the same. Time and money, tourism and sheer merchant greed have swallowed up the Soho that I knew and loved.

My most reliable stopover during those years, the place I dragged myself to when all seemed lost and there was nowhere else to go, was the offices of the Music Writers’ Mutual Publishing Company, on the fourth floor of 14 Denmark Street – long since disappeared but fondly remembered.

During my time at college – when I wasn’t drinking or suffering the after-effects of drinking – I had somehow become involved with the college Music Society. I was in a Gilbert and Sullivan and a couple of end-of-term concerts, and was a stalwart of the – often rather rowdy – revues, which is where I first met Ronald ‘Easy’ Pease, of the Pease family brewers of Batley. Ronald was studying music. He was a multi-instrumentalist who played the violin, the viola, the oboe, the flute, the French horn, the organ, the piano and – most proficiently and competently of all – the fool. Ron was a prankster, the sort of person who liked to enter a room and immediately set about causing mischief. He even looked like a puppy, with masses of dark unruly curls and big soulful eyes. He also had charm and money, which meant that he managed to escape rustication on a number of occasions for various incidents of drunkenness, vandalism, nudity and – after one memorable night out – for ‘fouling’ on the doorstep of the Master’s Lodge. (It probably helped that Ron’s father and grandfather had both attended the college before him and that the generously endowed Pease Building was an important addition to the college estate.)

After college, Ron had attempted for a while to pursue a conventional career as an orchestral musician, but because he was an independent-minded sort of a fellow, and because he was of considerable independent means, conventions could pretty much be disregarded and after a couple of years of professional musicianship, and a couple more of entirely reckless behaviour, he eventually settled into the unlikely profession of musical arranger and lyricist, a profession that guaranteed only an irregular income but which he supplemented by happily working as an agent for the old pawnbroker on Denmark Street who specialised in musical instruments. This brought him into contact with exactly the kind of people he most liked and admired: artists, jazz musicians, reprobates and thieves. Ron’s ‘career’ was indeed almost as precarious and unpredictable as my own, the only difference being that he could afford for a career to be precarious and unpredictable, since he was one day destined to inherit a fine house in Chelsea, a place in the country, an estate in Scotland and at least one-third of a brewery. He was utterly unreliable, incapable of taking anything even half seriously, and a very good friend, but most importantly, he was the sole proprietor of the Music Writers’ Mutual Publishing Company, and had kindly provided me with a key to his office on the fourth floor of 14 Denmark Street, which meant I had a place in Soho where I could occasionally sleep when necessity demanded.

Necessity now most definitely demanded.

It was fast approaching dawn. Denmark Street was deserted. I let myself into the building and went through the lobby towards the stairs. Ron’s lease prohibited using the office for anything but commercial purposes but if you paid your rent and didn’t cause too much trouble you could get away with almost anything. There were plenty of people in the building who were getting away with almost anything. You’d often find musicians sleeping in the lobby, and pimps, and the sort of people who come out at night and then mysteriously disappear during the day, or when their bills are due. The first floor was always the busiest: on the first floor there were a couple of rooms used by prostitutes, so there’d be people in and out – as it were – at all times. Ron used to go mad because the prostitutes would hang their underwear in the shared bathroom and make a terrible mess. (I was there in fact the night that Ron decided enough was enough and started throwing their underwear down into the street, tossing silk panties and brassieres onto passing pedestrians: you scored points if you managed to land a pair of knickers on an unsuspecting bowler. I was also there the night that Ron decided his office was too small, and since the office next door was empty we just broke right through, making a big hole in the wall: for a while we called ourselves the Hole in the Wall Gang, until we realised it wasn’t funny. The building was falling apart, even without our jolly japes. We were young, carefree and hellbent on destruction.)

The lobby was empty. Not even the girls were working. I was glad no one was around. I wasn’t in the mood for conversation. Many years later, during the course of our travels, Morley, Miriam and I had to contend with the sad case of a sweet-shop owner who had apparently fallen down her stairs and broken her neck. I had been lucky in my single-flight fall from Delaney’s office – at worst I had maybe sprained an ankle – but I was bruised all over from my little chat with MacDonald and felt like I’d been mauled by whatever creature it is who is the most proficient at mauling: some lean, mean-featured pitiless Scots sort of creature, no doubt. I dragged myself up the stairs, let myself into Ron’s office and wearily settled myself into an armchair, clearing away piles of unanswered post and musical scores. Sleep came instantly.

CHAPTER 5 (#ulink_fe1dce52-d72b-53ea-8d36-b613555f75ae)

A TOPOGRAPHICAL CREMESCHNITTE (#ulink_fe1dce52-d72b-53ea-8d36-b613555f75ae)

I WAS WOKEN what seemed like only moments later by the sound of a piano playing and the unmistakable smoky-sweet stench of Russian tea. I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming or if Ron had arrived early at the office. Knowing Ron, this seemed highly unlikely; and sure enough, when I half opened my eyes I saw that it was in fact Morley, Morley with his moustache and his grin, Morley seated at Ron’s piano, singing and strumming a song in a minor key.

Once I built a railroad, I made it run

Made it race against time

Once I built a railroad, now it’s done.

Brother, can you spare a dime?

Once I built a tower up to the sun

Brick and rivet and lime

Once I built a tower, now it’s done

Brother, can you spare a dime?

‘Ah, Sefton, good morning!’ He raised his cup of tea towards me in greeting.