Waterloo Sunset Read online

  What’s it all about?

  Good question. Harry wished he knew the answer.

  ‘All right?’ Wayne asked as he returned with the drinks. ‘You were panting like a pensioner.’

  ‘Out of condition, that’s all.’

  ‘Nothing to do with the skinny guy dressed in black, then? Or that piece of paper you picked off the grass and stuffed in your pocket.’

  ‘Ah,’ Harry said. ‘You noticed.’

  ‘And the bloke who was about to kick your head in? Hard to miss.’

  ‘He used to be a client.’

  Wayne winced. ‘You overcharged?’

  ‘It’s a long story.’

  ‘No offence, Harry, but with you, it always is.’ A gleam lit Wayne’s eye. ‘Risky to challenge him, if there’s bad blood between you. So what was so special about the scrap of paper you rescued?’

  ‘Nothing.’ Harry wasn’t in the mood to confide in a man with a mouth like the Mersey Tunnel. ‘I got my wires crossed, that’s all. The man in black is Tom Gunter. Last year I defended him on a charge of murder.’

  ‘And he’s walking the streets already? Is the early release scheme even more generous than we’ve been told?’

  Harry tasted the coffee. ‘You might remember hearing about the case on the regional news. A woman who lived two doors away from Tom was stabbed to death. Her body was found in an alleyway. Three years earlier, Tom was convicted of breaking an ex-girlfriend’s jaw. This time, the police reckoned he’d propositioned his neighbour and took it badly when she turned him down. He and I argued about his defence and he instructed someone else.’

  Wayne leant his elbows on the table and bent closer. His aftershave had a spicy tang. It probably cost more than Harry earned in a week.

  ‘Who got him off?’

  ‘A witness who placed Tom at the crime scene changed her mind. A week later she jetted to Disneyland with her kids, all expenses paid. Very nice for a single mum on benefit. Tom waltzed off without a stain on his character. If you don’t count his previous convictions, that is.’

  ‘So justice was cheated?’ Wayne shook his head. ‘You know something, Harry? That’s why I decided I couldn’t stomach the law any longer. It has nothing to do with justice.’

  ‘Unlike management consultancy?’

  ‘Trust me, you’re wasting your time with criminal law.’

  ‘I like a challenge. Defending habitual drunks on the basis they suffer habitual thirst.’

  ‘I’m not joking. I’ve taken a long, hard look at your business model. The practice needs to change.’

  Wayne had come back into Harry’s life when he rang to offer a fortnight’s consultancy funded by a government grant. Jim Crusoe reckoned they had nothing to lose, but Harry wasn’t so sure. Wayne never missed a chance to remind them that quitting the law was the best career move he could have made.

  ‘Defending criminals is what I do.’

  ‘You could do something else.’

  ‘I handle divorce work too, don’t forget. County court cases. Accident claims.’

  ‘I mean something more ambitious than demanding compensation for people who trip over pavements. Don’t you ever yearn to do something fresh?’ Wayne gestured expansively and nearly knocked over Harry’s mug. ‘Your life can change in a moment.’

  Harry pictured Tom Gunter, stroking the knife’s blade. ‘Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of.’

  ‘You know what they say, Harry? Feel the fear and do it anyway.’

  ‘Moving office was bad enough. What if I want my life to stay the same?’

  ‘You’re kidding.’

  Harry frowned. ‘It’s not so terrible.’

  ‘We all want something more. Come on, admit it. Where’s the fun in defending dyed-in-the-wool rogues and trying to persuade the judge that a fourth generation burglar is one of God’s lost children?’

  ‘None of my clients deserves to be stigmatised as guilty. It’s needlessly discriminatory. I like to think of them as…differently innocent.’

  Wayne tutted. ‘A sense of humour is all very well, but it doesn’t bring down the overdraft.’

  ‘All right, if you want the truth. No two days are alike in this job, that’s the appeal. Tomorrow I’m before the city coroner. Representing the son of the deceased at an inquest.’

  ‘What hourly rate will you charge? Please tell me you didn’t quote a fixed fee.’

  ‘Aled Borth reckons he was duped out of what little money he was expecting to inherit. He may work in the movie business…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘…but we’re not talking Steven Spielberg or Martin Scorsese. Aled plays the Mighty Wurlitzer at the Waterloo Alhambra. The cinema dates back to the age of silent movies, but these days it’s run by a charity.’

  Wayne shook his head. ‘Crusoe and Devlin aren’t a charity, Harry. You need to apply your mind to profit and loss, debtor days and cash flow.’

  ‘In the small hours of the morning, I think of little else.’ Harry wiped his mouth and got to his feet. ‘Thanks for the coffee. Catch you another time.’

  Lou the concierge was still in conference with his wrinkled chum as Harry waited to take the lift back upstairs. Pan pipes fluted from concealed speakers, the bland music spreading across the foyer like mayonnaise. Facing the welcome desk was a huge plasma screen television. A DVD played in a never-ending loop, featuring exquisitely groomed young architects with public school accents who conjured up virtual images of a futuristic Liverpool. Harry doubted if they’d ever set foot north of Watford. When they extolled his home town, he scarcely recognised the warts-and-all city he loved.

  ‘Vibrant sustainability…construction initiatives…catalyst for economic growth…’

  He hurried up to the office, keen to talk to Kay and find out what she’d meant to say to him. Maybe she knew who had dropped off the note about Midsummer’s Eve. But she was nowhere to be seen.

  In reception, he spoke to Sylvia, Jim Crusoe’s secretary, who doubled as their office manager.

  ‘Is Kay around?’

  Sylvia was a softly spoken woman in her late forties who had worked for Harry and Jim Crusoe since they’d first set up the firm together. No crisis ever bruised her calm good humour and Harry sometimes puzzled over what they’d done to deserve such loyalty. It certainly wasn’t down to how much they paid her.

  ‘Taking an interest in plant care, all of a sudden?’

  ‘Are you questioning my green credentials?’

  ‘Of course. You’re a serial killer of spider plants and mother-in-law’s tongue. Kay said goodbye ten minutes ago. She’d finished here and was off to her next job.’

  ‘Did she leave any message?’

  Sylvia raised her eyebrows and he guessed she thought he’d taken a shine to Kay. She was a would-be matchmaker, determined to pair Harry off with a woman more reliable than those he’d been mixed up with in the past. The snag was, reliability didn’t turn him on.

  ‘What message did you expect?’

  ‘She said she wanted to have a word. Maybe about Tom Gunter, I don’t know.’

  ‘Tom Gunter?’ Sylvia’s grimace made clear what she thought about Kay’s boyfriend. ‘Sorry, she didn’t say anything to me. How about you, Suzanne?’

  The receptionist shook her head. ‘By the way, I meant to tell you. That Aled Borth rang. He was due here at four o’clock, but he’s cancelled the meeting.’

  ‘Did he speak to Grace?’

  ‘No need,’ the girl snapped. She detested Harry’s new secretary and never communicated with her if she could avoid it.

  ‘But the inquest into his mother’s death is tomorrow. We were going to discuss the evidence.’

  ‘He said he didn’t want to see you, after all.’

  She made it sound like a good decision. Harry had meant to talk Aled Borth through the witness statements taken by the coroner’s officer. He was desperate to persuade his client not to turn the inquest into a fiasco by accusing an innocent man of murder.

>   ‘Surely…’

  ‘He’s coming in tomorrow at nine sharp before you both set off for court, so what’s the problem? I said it was fine if he wanted to cancel. No point in running up costs if there’s no need. Client care, you know?’

  She beamed in triumph. At least she was cheap, and on a good day, her Scouse wit was sharper than anything on the telly. For Harry and his partner, employing Suzanne had become a bad habit, like drinking more than was good for you or supporting a football team that never repaid your devotion. She’d long ago become part of the furniture at Crusoe and Devlin – and now she’d outlasted the furniture. The old desks and chairs would never pass muster in slickly refurbished John Newton House. A fortnight ago, they’d been sold for firewood.

  Back in his room, he propped his feet on the brand new desk. John Newton House was named after an eighteenth-century slaveship master who saw the light after being appointed tidal surveyor for the Port of Liverpool. He became a clergyman and writer of hymns, including the one which gave Amazing Grace her nickname. The building dated back to the age of King and Kaiser, when Liverpool was second city of the Empire and gateway to the New World. Once the headquarters of a long-sunk shipping company, it remained for decades a soot-blackened relic of past glories. The wind whistled through broken windows and rain seeped in through holes in the roof. It was supposed to be a listed building, but the list probably consisted of blots on the waterfront.

  But that was then. Once Liverpool was named European Capital of Culture – eat your hearts out, Milan and Barcelona – investment flooded in. John Newton House had become a landmark in a mini-Manhattan skyline, at least according to the agent’s brochure. A developer ripped out its guts to create office and retail space, coupled with luxury apartments on the top floors.

  Harry knew he should be grateful for his corner office, with its panoramic views of river and town, but it felt as homely as a hotel lobby. Crusoe and Devlin had moved from a block resembling the Leaning Tower of Pisa minus the charm. Last week a demolition crew had reduced it to rubble. It would be foolish to say he preferred its cramped and cobwebbed ambience. Jim Crusoe would never forgive him. And yet…

  As he closed his eyes for a moment, the door swung open and his partner marched in. Jim was a broad-shouldered man whose confident stride never became a self-important swagger. He considered Harry’s indolent pose and unleashed a theatrical sigh.

  ‘Taking a well-earned break?’

  ‘Power-napping,’ Harry said. ‘Two or three naps a day increase production, well-being and longevity. It must be true, I read it in a self-help book Wayne Saxelby lent to me.’

  ‘You were asleep.’

  ‘Blue-sky thinking. Trying to see the big picture. You were right, these management consultants know a thing or two.’

  Jim’s eyes swept over the jumble of files and papers scattered over desk and floor and came to rest on a tottering pile of back issues of The Law Society’s Gazette, still in their virgin, shrink-wrapped state.

  ‘We agreed a clear desk policy. Touch each piece of paper only once?’

  ‘It’s not a mess, just an eclectic design scheme.’

  ‘Shouldn’t you catch up on your reading? Keep up to date with what’s happening in the profession?’

  ‘True.’ Harry gazed sadly at the magazines. ‘Trouble is, the Gazette isn’t quite the gripping read it used to be.’

  ‘We need to talk about practice development. Wayne says we should give up on legal aid. You can reinvent yourself as a specialist in civil liberties. Harry the human rights lawyer: it has a ring to it.’

  Harry groaned. He’d understood business consultants to be people who spent endless time and money writing down what you told them and then regurgitating it in jargon-ridden reports to be filed in the waste paper basket. Any hope of relying on Wayne to preserve the status quo was misplaced. Since he’d blipped off Crusoe and Devlin’s radar, Wayne had metamorphosed from clueless solicitor into a dynamic evangelist for change. He fizzed with energy and ideas; every time he consulted his laptop, he came up with something new. Clear desk policies were only the start. Soon management-speak and documented processes would encroach on every aspect of Harry’s working life like Japanese knotweed, smothering him with bureaucracy.

  ‘Bloody Wayne. When I heard about his new career and glamorous girlfriend, I thought he must be suffering from delusions. Now it looks like pure unvarnished grandeur.’

  ‘Don’t be negative. He was at pains to assure me he isn’t a seagull consultant.’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘Someone who flies in, craps over everything and then flies out again.’

  ‘I’m not reassured. Let’s talk another time.’

  ‘All right. I’ll schedule a meeting.’

  Harry rolled his eyes. Another shortcoming of their upgraded computer system. Anyone could trespass into your diary or your email inbox. The tyranny of technology. Your life wasn’t your own any more.

  ‘If we must.’

  ‘What’s the matter with you?’

  ‘Somebody wants me dead.’

  Jim was as inscrutable as a warrior from First Emperor Qin’s Terracotta Army.

  ‘So what’s new?’

  He was right, that was the scary thing. While Jim scrutinised the black-edged message, as though trying to decipher the Enigma Code, Harry mulled over the people who might bear him a grudge. In this line of work, you couldn’t help treading on toes. Nothing personal, he assured himself. But then again.

  Jim tossed the slip of paper back on to the desk.

  ‘You may be looking peaky, but I still say the report of your demise is exaggerated.’

  ‘You’re all heart. Who could have sent it?’

  Once upon a time, Jim had grown his hair long and shaggy, and every time he shook his head, the locks fell to mask his eyes. Now he had much less hair, and not simply due to the passage of time. His new barber was as ruthless and expensive as a high class hit man.

  ‘Face it, Harry. The list must be endless.’

  ‘Actually, I liked you better when you were unsuccessful.’ Harry cast his eyes around the bare white walls. One of these days he’d pin up his framed posters of Casablanca and North by North West. ‘Before you hit the big time.’

  ‘If I’m that successful, why am I still in partnership with you?’

  ‘You don’t have long to wait to be rid of me.’ Harry pointed to the sheet. ‘Midsummer’s Eve.’

  ‘Doesn’t say which year.’

  ‘Always look on the bright side, huh?’

  ‘Listen, someone’s winding you up. Don’t lose sleep over an out-of-season April fool. Just make sure you’ve paid your insurance premiums and written your will.’

  Harry ran his hand through his hair. At least he still had plenty of it, though lately he’d discovered several strands of grey. Soon he’d have to stop kidding himself it was simply due to the stress of defending the indefensible. The cracking of his knees when he ran upstairs wasn’t simply caused by a touch of damp in the air. He was getting older, though he wasn’t confident he’d truly grown up.

  ‘The envelope must have been delivered by someone close by. But Suzanne didn’t notice anyone.’

  ‘Maybe it came from someone who works for us.’

  Harry shook his head. ‘Can’t see that.’

  ‘You haven’t upset Amazing Grace?’

  ‘She wouldn’t do something like this.’

  As soon as he said it, he wondered why he was so sure. The secretary was their newest recruit. He hardly knew her.

  ‘Have you asked Lou if he spotted anyone suspicious?’

  ‘Old Hawkeye, are you serious?’

  ‘Not really.’

  Jim loosened his tie. It was made of silk and discreetly patterned; long gone the days when he favoured psychedelic designs and polyester. His dress sense had transformed since his wife’s death after a short and terrible battle with kidney cancer. After six months of numb denial, he’d moved in with a woman young en
ough to be his daughter. He’d lost weight, and his suits these days were tailor-made. Not like the shabby tweeds he’d favoured when a stone and a half heavier.

  ‘So what’s special about Midsummer’s Eve?’

  Spreading his arms, Harry said, ‘Your guess is as good as mine.’

  Aled Borth might have cancelled their meeting, but Harry supposed he ought to look at the papers before the inquest opened in the morning. The Liverpool coroner, Ceri Hussain, was legendary for her efficiency and she expected lawyers appearing in her court to be fully prepared. Besides, he wanted to give a good impression. One evening a few weeks earlier, he’d fallen into conversation with her at a lawyers’ networking event and they’d finished up having a drink together. She was recently widowed and, he guessed, as lonely as he had been after the death of his wife Liz. They hadn’t met up again. But you never knew.

  He picked up the phone. ‘Grace, any idea where the Borth file might be?’

  ‘Oh, sorry! I meant to put it back in the cabinet last night and… I’ll bring it in right away.’

  She’d put down the phone before he could say there was no rush and within a minute she was in the room, thrusting the buff folder into his hand with stammered apologies.

  ‘No problem, don’t worry.’

  She gave him a hesitant smile. A slim woman in her thirties, with dark waist-length hair, high cheekbones and anxious eyes. Her skin was pale, and the slits in her sleeveless black cotton dress revealed glimpses of white legs. The magenta lipstick matched her nails.

  ‘Would there be anything else?’

  ‘Thanks, that’s fine.’

  The door closed behind her, shutting out the muskiness of her perfume. Grace had been with him for three weeks and he still couldn’t make her out. She didn’t wear a wedding ring and dropped no hints about her private life. At lunchtime she would be hunched over The Road Less Travelled rather than a word puzzle in the Daily Mirror or a sex-and-shopping blockbuster. You couldn’t imagine her joining the girls who sunbathed out in the church gardens. She seemed to have nothing in common with the other secretaries, whose conversation – in the bosses’ hearing – revolved around the shortcomings of the men in their lives, and their next holiday in Spain.