Supping with the Devil Read online

  ‘Nasty thing, an upset stomach,’ said a voice to her left, and turning, she saw Edward Bell examining her pile of vomit.

  ‘I … I’m sorry,’ she gasped.

  ‘You don’t have to apologize for catching a bug,’ Bell said easily. ‘And it won’t take one of the staff more than a minute to clear it up.’ He looked her up and down. ‘You’re very pale. Would you like me to show you where your room is, so you can lie down for a while?’

  Paniatowski’s legs had turned to water, and her head was swimming.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said weakly. ‘I’d appreciate that.’

  The row of Jaguars, lined up and awaiting valet parking, made Jeff Hill, sitting behind the wheel of his own XJ6, frown with displeasure.

  There had been a time when driving a Jag had meant something, he thought, but now every little jumped-up market trader and sports socks manufacturer seemed to be able to afford one – which meant that it was time for him to get shut of his Jag, and buy a Lamborghini or a top-of-the-range Mercedes.

  ‘But if you do that, Bloody Mona will automatically assume you’ve done it to impress women,’ he said aloud.

  As if a sporting hero like him needed a big car to talk a bit of loose into his bed!

  One of the garage staff – a lad of around eighteen – tapped on his window, and Hill opened the door with such speed that the boy had to jump back to avoid being hit by it.

  ‘Does that window look like a door knocker to you, you bloody idiot?’ Hill demanded.

  ‘No, sir, but …’

  ‘Then don’t bloody knock on it. I’m the customer here, in case you hadn’t noticed, and if you want to speak to me, you stand where I can see you, and wait until I’m ready.’

  ‘Sorry, sir,’ the boy said. ‘I only came to tell you I’m ready to park your car now.’

  ‘And not before bloody time,’ Hill growled, climbing out of the Jag and holding out his car keys.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ the boy said, taking the keys. ‘Aren’t you Jeff Hill?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘My dad took me to see the ’68 Cup Final. Watching you slam that second goal in was the best moment of my life.’

  Hill had been inclined to dislike the boy at first, but now he was warming to him.

  ‘Sorry I snapped at you just then, son,’ he said, ‘but it’s been a very long day.’

  The youth grinned. ‘Don’t worry about it – it’s an honour to be bawled out by you, Mr Hill,’ he said.

  Well, of course it was, Hill agreed silently.

  He reached into his pocket, pulled out his billfold and peeled off a five pound note.

  ‘Look after my car properly,’ he said.

  ‘I don’t want your money, Mr Hill,’ the boy said.

  ‘Take it,’ Hill said, stuffing the note into the boy’s top pocket with one hand, and ruffling his hair with the other.

  Feeling better about himself – and about the world in general – he walked around the car, and entered the hotel through the main door.

  A large sign, stretched across the top of the reception desk, said: ‘The Royal Victoria Hotel welcomes the British Sports Manufacturers Association.’

  He looked around, and saw Baby Doll – looking as luscious as ever – sitting near the entrance to the bar, drinking a gin and tonic. Once he had established that she was there, he looked straight through her, which was no mean feat, given that, the moment she’d spotted him, she’d rapidly adjusted her position to show him a generous length of thigh.

  The mistake that most men made with their bits of stuff on the side was to pretend that the two of them were just friends or close acquaintances, he thought, as he walked up to the reception desk. And the reason it was a mistake was that once they’d established that connection, other people paid them extra attention, just to see if there was more to it than that.

  That was why a clever man – and he considered himself, looking at the matter objectively, a very clever man – maintained a much greater distance from whoever he happened to be poking at the time.

  Certainly, he’d spoken to Baby Doll in public – they were in the same business, so there was no use pretending he had no idea who she was – but no one had ever seen them doing any more than exchange passing pleasantries.

  If they were drinking in the same bar, they sat at opposite ends of the room. If they were in the same restaurant, they made sure they were facing in different directions.

  And that distance helped make the whole affair even better, because by the time they did get together – late at night, in one of their rooms – they’d been waiting for so long to touch each other that the sex was red hot.

  It was a perfect system, and if Mona was hoping to catch him at it again – and thus take an arm and a leg off him in the divorce court – then she was due for a big disappointment.

  ‘George Baxter speaking,’ said the voice at the other end of the line.

  ‘It appears you intend me to stay at the Hall for the whole of the festival,’ Paniatowski said.

  ‘Yes, I thought I’d already made that plain,’ Baxter replied.

  Like hell he had!

  ‘There’s no point in me being here all the time,’ she said. ‘They’re taking care of their own internal security – and, the way things stand, I have absolutely no authority to do anything.’

  ‘Not even moral authority?’ Baxter taunted. ‘Most police officers – most good police officers, I should say – consider moral authority to be one of the strongest weapons in their armoury.’

  ‘Listen—’ Paniatowski began.

  ‘No, you listen, Detective Chief Inspector Paniatowski,’ Baxter interrupted her. ‘The earl will allow me to have only one officer within the grounds, and you are the officer that I have selected. I want you there, for the whole period, in case anything goes wrong, because if something does go wrong, I’ll need a credible witness – by which I mean a fairly high-ranking officer – to testify that, given the restrictions imposed on me by the earl, there was simply nothing I could have done about it.’

  It sounded plausible – but it wasn’t true. What Baxter really wanted, if anything went wrong, was someone to take the fall.

  She could almost hear him addressing the disciplinary board – ‘I posted DCI Paniatowski to Stamford Hall because she had an excellent record. We now know that she was no longer up to the job. I accept responsibility for failing to notice that, though I feel I must add, in my own defence, that rather than coming to me and expressing her doubts about her ability to handle the situation, she chose instead to carry on as normal.’

  He wanted something to go wrong, she suddenly realized – he was praying for something to go wrong.

  ‘Listen to me, George,’ she said. ‘Please listen to me. It wasn’t my fault that Jo died. I had nothing to do with it.’

  There was a sudden loud thud at the other end – as if Baxter had slammed his fist down hard on the desk, or perhaps thrown something against the wall – and then the line went dead.

  If the Devil’s Disciples’ camp were to be viewed from the air, it would look like a random scattering of tents, Spike thought, but there was nothing random about the way that Badger set up camp.

  He would always start by selecting a clearing which would be the centre – the heart – of the camp. It would be at this central point that all the communal activities – the gang-bangs, the drinking sessions, the arm-wrestling competitions – took place. It would be, in other words, a sort of peripatetic clubhouse, which both proclaimed the Devil’s Disciples’ identity and reaffirmed it.

  The tents would fan out from this clearing, with roughly a quarter of them going in each direction. No one tent would be that close to any other tent, not because the Devil’s Disciples cherished their privacy – a Disciple had no privacy, everything he was and everything he owned was no more than part of the large, dangerous beast which was the gang. No, it was done purely on strategic grounds, because, with no focal point for an attack, an enem
y – and the Devil’s Disciples had plenty – could not deliver a quick knockout blow.

  Even here at Stamford Hall, surrounded as they were by high walls, Badger took the same precautions he always did, Spike noted. Even here, he had not neglected to post a couple of sentries at the edge of the woods. And this caution of his was just as admirable, in some ways, as his obvious bravery in battle.

  Once the tents were all pegged down, Badger called the gang to the clearing. The other Devil’s Disciples sat down on the ground, but Badger remained standing, with his two lieutenants flanking him – a clear indication that this meeting was about ‘official’ business, and therefore carried with it the force of law.

  ‘This isn’t the first time we’ve worked security,’ Badger told the other Disciples. ‘Most of you will remember how we “kept order” at the crappy old house in Derbyshire.’

  Oh yes, I remember it, Spike thought.

  The ‘crappy old house’ had been a rather fine – though somewhat dilapidated – Georgian mansion. It could have been truly beautiful if it had been lovingly restored, but the owners, a property development firm, were not in the least bit interested in restoration.

  The meeting takes place in an out-of-the-way pub called the King’s Head, which is run by an old woman who is both deaf and has a pronounced limp. It is a cold, unwelcoming place, and there are very few other customers, which is probably why this particular venue was selected.

  There are three Devil’s Disciples at the meeting – Badger, Chainsaw and Spike. Spike knows why he is there – Badger is assessing him to see whether or not he has the potential, at some time in the future, to become a lieutenant – and he is bursting with both pride and apprehension.

  The other two men at the table both have hard, uncaring eyes, and are wearing flashy – though obviously expensive – Italian suits. When they reach for their drinks, Spike notes that while the older one is wearing heavy gold cuff-links, the younger has opted for little links with diamonds in them.

  It is the older of the two who makes the running.

  ‘It was a sweet deal we’d got going for us,’ he says. ‘We were going to knock the building down, throw up half a dozen executive-style houses which look pretty good on the surface, and then sell them on before the roofs started leaking and the doors began to warp.’

  He’s not bothering to lie to us, Spike thinks. With most people he’d at least make some pretence of being an honest business man, but we’re not even worth that small effort.

  And then he thinks, but why should he lie to us? We’re the Devil’s Disciples – and we don’t play by normal rules. Isn’t it really a compliment that he’s being so frank with us?

  ‘Things were going beautifully,’ the second man – Diamond Cufflinks – says. ‘We spread a bit of money round in the town council planning committee, and we got their permission to knock the place down.’

  ‘But then the local conservation society stuck its oar in,’ Gold Cufflinks continues. ‘They claimed it’s a listed building.’

  ‘And is it?’ Spike asks, before he can stop himself.

  Both suits glare at him.

  ‘What’s that got to do with anything?’ Gold Cufflinks asks.

  ‘Nothing,’ Spike mumbles, aware that Badger’s eyes are on him, and that the look in them is not one of approval.

  ‘Anyway, they file an appeal, and in the meantime they take out an injunction to stop us demolishing the place. Now normally, we’d have ignored that. Once the building’s gone, it’s gone, and by the time they get around to fining the company for knocking it down without permission, that company doesn’t exist any more – we’ve already filed for bankruptcy, and we’re off running some other business entirely,’ Diamond Cufflinks says.

  ‘But this conservation group’s smarter than most,’ Gold Cufflinks says. ‘It’s organized a human chain to stand around the building – and that chain’s there twenty-four hours a day.’

  ‘They’d soon shift themselves if they saw the bulldozers coming at them,’ Badger says.

  ‘Maybe they would,’ Gold Cufflinks agrees. ‘Or maybe they’d decide to call our bluff. And we can’t risk one of them getting killed, because that would really sink the deal.’

  ‘On the other hand,’ Diamond Cufflinks says, ‘we’ve got no objection to a few of them getting hurt.’

  It is late afternoon. A dozen Devil’s Disciples are sitting on their machines at the crest of a small hill, on the road which descends to the old mansion. The wall around the mansion has already gone – knocked down before the conservationists really realized what was happening – but it has been replaced by a human chain which is keeping the bulldozers at bay.

  The chain is made up of all kinds of people. There are old ladies in Burberry overcoats and green Wellington boots. There are middle-aged men smoking pipes and reading newspapers (probably the Guardian, Spike thinks) and middle-aged women who have learned how to knit while standing up.

  But it is the line of around fifty young people – the boys mostly long-haired, the girls all dressed in smart casuals – that attracts Badger’s attention.

  ‘Students!’ he says.

  And the word comes from deep in his throat, like the growl of a dangerous dog.

  He really hates students, Spike realizes. They represent everything he isn’t, and he takes even their presence there as a personal insult.

  ‘Leave the old bags alone,’ Badger says, as he pulls his bandanna up to cover his mouth and nose. ‘It’s them hippy bastards we’ll go for. And no knives, no razors – just fists.’

  The Devil’s Disciples go down the hill at full throttle, heading towards the students. Even from a distance, Spike can sense the panic among the young people, and it is no surprise at all that the line breaks up to allow the Devil’s Disciples through.

  The bikes are going at some speed when they reach the bottom of the hill, and Spike is forced to slam on his brakes to avoid smashing into the side of the house. He goes into a back-wheel skid, but he had expected this, and so is ready to ride with it.

  The bike stops moving, and Spike stamps his left foot down hard on the ground, to hold it. Around him, he can see half a dozen other Devil’s Disciples doing the same.

  The whole thing has been much easier than he had thought it would be, and no one has got hurt. He feels a great sense of relief – and then he looks over his shoulder, and sees that the students have regrouped.

  Badger has already dismounted from his machine, and is walking towards the line, screaming obscenities at the top of his voice. He sounds angry, but Spike doesn’t think he is. All he is really doing is hyping himself up for battle – and he is glad the line has chosen to resist.

  As Badger gets closer to the line, several of the male students adopt a fighting stance. Perhaps some of them really do know how to fight – perhaps some have even boxed for their college – but it won’t do them any good.

  They should attack him now, while they still have the advantage of numbers on their side, Spike thinks. But the students just stand there, waiting for Badger to make the first move.

  Badger raises his fist, as if he is about to lash out at the student directly in front of him, then twists to the side, and kicks one of the other boys on the kneecap. The boy howls in pain, and goes down, but before he hits the ground, Badger has kicked him again, this time in the face.

  There are perhaps four or five seconds when the students surrounding the fallen boy gape at him in stunned silence. And when they do start to move – to help their wounded colleague or perhaps defend him from further harm – it is already too late.

  The rest of the Devil’s Disciples attack the same part of the line – gouging, kicking, punching. More of the students drop to the ground.

  Further down the line there is confusion, and the chain splinters and young men and women turn to look at the violence which is being enacted a few yards from them – a violence which is nothing like the violence they have seen in the movies, but involves cracked
bones, broken teeth and real blood.

  It only takes a few of the students to retreat for the retreat to become a stampede.

  In the background, the bulldozers roar angrily into life, and start to edge forward.

  The Devil’s Disciples step back, and allow waiting building workers to carry away the injured, leaving a clear path for the heavy machines.

  By the time the bulldozers reach the old house, there is no longer a protective chain, merely a mass of dazed individuals, well away from the action, who still can’t believe what they’ve just seen.

  The first bulldozer reaches the house. Its blade smashes into the wall, and two hundred and fifty years of history is turned to dust.

  Later, when the Devil’s Disciples are back at their camp, celebrating with the beer the property developers’ money has bought for them, Spike finds a quiet corner of the woods in which to do some thinking.

  What had happened that afternoon was a very different thing to the pitched battles the Devil’s Disciples had with other gangs, he thinks. It was somehow less honourable.

  But there were more of them than us, he argues. They outnumbered us ten to one.

  Yes, but you could put ten novices on one side of a chess board and a grand master on the other, and that still wouldn’t make it a fair fight.

  He wonders if he should leave the Devil’s Disciples. But he has never stuck with anything – seen it through – in his entire life, and this may be his last chance. Besides, he does not want to disappoint Badger, who is grooming him.

  The students could have fought back and they could have run away right at the start, he tells himself, but they did neither, so what happened to them was entirely their fault.

  The crisis of conscience he has been experiencing is banished for the present – but it will return.