Mervyn Night stared at me with the black eyes of a bad-but-friendly man. After a few seconds, he remembered the style expected of a London underworld figure and turned on the Irish charm.
“Don’t mind Paddy and Liam,” he chuckled. “They’re jus’ me Meeters and Greeters. They hate everyone.”
The two paddies let me go, smoothed my jacket for me, and retired to the end of the bar.
The urbane Mervyn seemed to fill the room as he strolled over to shake my hand.
“Tis providence ‘as sent you, Mr Judd. In our darkest hour, you’ve come ridin’ on wings of serendipitous steel to deliver us from a cruel and implacable foe. Or at least ter help us find the bastards,” he said, accepting a mineral water and a dry sherry from the barman and guided me towards a large round table at the back of the room.
Once again he looked me over and shook his head.
“So like our Danny. Hear yer’ve had a tough time.”
“Yeah, I seem to have stumbled into someone else’s adventure. And I wouldn’t mind getting out just quietly.”
Once again, I repeated the story of my troubles, but the more I spoke the more worried he seemed to get.
“The Blue focken Fury,” muttered Mervyn to himself. “‘Ad me suspicions, so I ‘ave. Looks like they’s puttin’ their cards on the table. Well, at least now we know.”
He sat silently for a moment, twisting the stem of his small sherry glass.
“So, do you reckon you can help me?” I asked.
“Help you?”
“That’s why I’m here, mate,” I said, pulling my keys from my pocket. “I wanna get this key back to the Blue Fury before they kill someone. That’s why they did over Danny. Tryin’ to get this key back.”
“Ahrrr … the key, yes,” said Mervyn. “Show us.”
Despite vaguely feeling like Frodo must have felt being confronted by Boromir at Amon Hen, I handed over the keys, and saw the beginnings of a plan glinting in the eyes of Mervyn Night.
“Looks like a locker key, so it does. A locker holdin’ somethin’ dey want … but which lockers?”
The same thing had occurred to me.
“I was given the key on a flight to Heathrow. Are there lockers at Heathrow?”
“Course there are,” agreed Mervyn. “Dat’s where we’ll look first.”
“Look?”
“Aye. If’n you’re doin’ business wi’ the likes o’ the Blue Fury, it’s best to go in with a strong bargainin’ position.”
“But I don’t want to do business with the fuckers. I just wanna get ‘em off my back.”
The steel in Mervyn’s eyes warned me that he was not a man to be lightly dissuaded from a course of action.
“Well I am doin’ business wi’ the fockers, much as I would have it otherwise. Dat means we do dis my way, okay?”
I knew better than to labour the point, but as he removed the key from my key ring Mervyn seemed to appreciate that he owed me something.
“Loik yer said Mr Judd, yer’ve stombled into someone else’s adventure. The adventure’s mine, strange as dat may seem from your vantage.”
I wasn’t really minded to argue. After all, I really did just want out of all the trouble. And, assuming possession of the key was uncontested, Mervyn slipped it into his waistcoat pocket. Frodo would’ve had a fit.
“It took guts to come back an’ explain it all Mr Judd … Eric,” said Mervyn. “Yer’ve saved the family a heap of bother. So tell me, is there anyt’ing I can do fer you? What are yer plans?”
“Well, back to Australia I guess.”
“What, right away?”
“I s’pose. Nothin’ to keep me here.”
Mervyn tapped his teeth considering.
“Truth be telt, I’d rather you was close by for the next little while, till t’ings is played out. D’ya need a job?”
“A job?”
They’d told me at the airport that I wasn’t allowed to work in the UK, but it occurred to me that such a prohibition would mean little to Mervyn.
“Not official on the books like,” he smiled, obviously reading my mind.
Fuck it, I’d come this far. Why not stay a while to experience the Old Dart? I still had £14,000 (the best part of $35,000 AUS ) but if I was to face Shona, it was best I arrived home with most of that intact. Also, I liked Danny - and Mervyn - and even Paddy and Liam in a funny sort of way.
“Be a shame to leave so soon. And yer’d be doin’ me a favour if’n yer stayed,” prompted Mervyn as my eyes trailed over some of the sporting pictures. Most of them black and white and yellow with age, but a large picture just to my right was colour and starkly fresh. A football team in red and gold were lined up for their annual portrait - and there in a suit at the end of the front row was a widely grinning Mervyn. The photograph was captioned: Bentham United - Southern Conference. And as I took in a little more of the room, I realised that numerous other photographs, banners and scarves adorning the walls also bore legends regarding Bentham United.
I drew a deep breath and said, “What sort of work have you got?”
Mervyn sat back in his chair and appraised me with the eye of a first class thoroughbred trainer.
“Yer look fit,” said Mervyn. “I know just the t’ing for ya.”
THE LONDON ARRANGEMENT
The van stopped outside my new digs just before dawn and immediately my back began to ache. I’d come 10,000 miles to do fucking removals work.
The driver’s window rolled down and a wiry-looking ginger looked out and said, “Eric?”
I nodded and the window rolled back up as I walked the long way round the truck to the passenger door. I climbed into a cabin reeking of cigarette smoke, with a floor littered with empty fag packets and old, take-away wrappers. Between the passenger and driver’s seats was a pile of old paperwork that would have taken a team of accountants a year to unravel, which said a great deal about how Mervyn ran his removals business.
The wiry ginger took off into the North London traffic, fumbled a fag into his mouth and lit it - one eye on the end of the fag and one on the road. Immediately the cabin was filled with acrid, choking smoke and I rolled the window down to breathe.
“Put that fahkin’ window up!” snapped the driver, but I just stared at him - giving him the old warning look I’d used my entire life to defuse inflammatory situations. He stopped at a traffic light, turned to berate me. And then caught my eye.
After a few seconds, the anger on his face turned into a grin.
“Awright, you can ‘ave it ‘alf open,” he said, but I continued to stare at a point on his chin. The grin grew broader.
“Ah, bollocks,” he said, winding down his own window. “It’s too nice a day ter fahkin’ argue.”
It was a nice day. Autumnal London had turned on a cracker - pale blue sky streaked with pink and gold fingers as the sun crept above the Hampstead horizon.
“Jaffa,” said the driver as the lights turned, and the truck lurched onwards.
“Eh?”
“Jaffa. That’s me name, mate.”
“Right. So where are we goin’,