Nick's Blues Read online

  “Got to what?”

  “Nothing.”

  “So come in.”

  As she walked hesitantly past him and into the kitchen, Nick wondered what on earth he was doing.

  Melanie stopped by the kitchen table and glanced around.

  “It’s just like ours. Except for, you know, the stuff.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I suppose they all are.”

  Nick nodded.

  “Your mum at work?” Melanie said.

  “Yeah.”

  “Mine, too.”

  “You’re not at school?” Nick said.

  Melanie shook her head. “How long will you be off?” she asked.

  “I dunno. Maybe next week. I’ve got to go back to the hospital first.”

  “Have the stitches out.”

  “Yes.”

  “How many did you have?”

  Nick touched them with his fingertips. “Fifteen.”

  He shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

  “Do they hurt?”

  “Not really, no. Itch sometimes.”

  “I had stitches once. I was always pulling at them, ’cause of that, you know. Itching. I pulled some out before it was time. Didn’t mean to. Blood everywhere. My mum, she went spare.”

  As much for something to do as anything, Nick went to the side and picked up the kettle. “Fancy a cup of tea?”

  “No, it’s all right.”

  “Coffee, then?”

  “No, I…”

  “There might be a Coke still in the fridge.”

  “I shouldn’t.”

  “Water? We do a very nice line in water.”

  There was a vestige of a smile around Melanie’s eyes. “Tea, then. As long as you’re making it, tea’d be fine.”

  Nick filled the kettle and set it to boil.

  “When I was waiting outside,” Melanie said. “After I’d knocked the first time, I thought I heard someone singing.”

  “Just an old tape,” Nick said, and then, because she continued to look at him. “It was my dad.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Not really?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I didn’t know your dad was a singer.”

  “No, well, nor did I. I mean, I did, but not really. I’m just finding out.”

  “Your dad’s… your dad’s dead, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “I wish mine was.”

  The kettle started to boil.

  Nick stared at her for several moments before speaking. “You’re not serious. I mean you’re joking, right?”

  Her look was unwavering, her eyes grey-green. “Dead serious.”

  Nick released a breath. “How come?”

  “The kettle’s boiling,” Melanie said.

  “How come you feel that way? About your dad?”

  “The kettle,” Melanie said. She got up and moved towards it, banging her hip against the table corner on the way. “Where’s the tea?” she asked, a tremble in her voice.

  Nick pointed to where the tea bags were on the shelf.

  “What shall I make it in?” Melanie said.

  Nick lifted down two mugs. Tears were running across the contours of Melanie’s face. He dropped in the tea bags and she poured the water with a less than steady hand.

  “He doesn’t hit you, does he?” Nick asked. “Or anything?”

  He didn’t want to go too far into what ‘anything’ might be.

  “No,” Melanie said. “He used to. Hit me, I mean. Now he won’t… he won’t even touch me. He just… he’s just on at me all the time, calling me names. Fat bitch. Fat cow. Fat useless cunt.”

  “I’m sorry,” Nick said and touched her arm.

  Melanie sobbed and turned aside, her body starting to shake.

  Nick swallowed hard, got the milk from the fridge and finished making the tea.

  “Sugar?” he said.

  She nodded and mumbled something he took to be “Two.”

  “Here,” he said a few moments later, holding the mug out towards her.

  Melanie slowly turned and as she did so, she suddenly winced and doubled over as if she’d been kicked.

  The mug shook in his hand and tea slopped to the floor.

  “Here,” he said. “Here, sit down.” But Melanie was shaking her head. “The bathroom,” she said. “I need to go to the bathroom.”

  Nick nodded. “You know where it is. Same as in your place, right?”

  While she was gone he stood staring out of the window at the tops of cars moving fast between the lean branches of the trees. Buds slow to appear. His mouth felt strangely dry, any discomfort of his own forgotten.

  After a while, he heard the toilet flush, the bathroom door open and close.

  “I’m sorry,” Melanie said.

  “Don’t be silly,” Nick said.

  Melanie gave him a smile and reached for her tea.

  “That’ll be cold,” Nick said.

  “Doesn’t matter.”

  “I don’t know if there’s any biscuits,” Nick said.

  Melanie sat on one of the stools. “Tell me about your dad,” she said. “If you want to, that is.”

  Before Nick could respond there was a knock at the door.

  “I don’t believe it,” he said. “Oxford Circus round here all of a sudden.”

  When he opened the door there was Ellen, snug black top, black jeans, her hair teased out.

  “Oh,” Nick said.

  Behind him, Ellen could see through the small hall and into the kitchen, Melanie sitting there, mug of tea cradled in both hands.

  “Sorry,” Ellen said. “I didn’t want to disturb anything.”

  “What? No, no. It’s nothing. Come in.”

  Ellen looked at him with narrowed eyes. “I don’t think so, Nick, do you?” And before he could stop her, she had closed the door. When he pulled it back open it was only to hear her feet, fast on the stairs.

  “Shit!” he said, not quite to himself. “Bloody shit!” And turned back to where Melanie was now standing, face doughy and pale. Distraught.

  “I’ll go,” she said.

  Nick nodded and looked away.

  thirteen

  The pub was almost empty when Nick walked in. A couple of blokes sitting at a table to the far right, nursing their pints. Someone in a suit close by the window, newspaper folded open in front of him, occasionally looking out. Stripped wooden tables and a bare wood floor. A shamrock over the bar.

  He waited, patient, as the barman shelved a case of Becks with unwonted care.

  When the man straightened and turned, he looked at the stitches neat along Nick’s forehead but made no remark.

  “There used to be some kind of acoustic club upstairs,” Nick said. “Folk and blues. I don’t think it happens any more.”

  “You’re right there.”

  “Whoever used to run it, you’ve no idea how I might get hold of them?”

  The barman leaned closer. “A singer, then, is that what you are? Not country and western, I dare say?” Throwing his head back, he sang the opening lines of ‘Blue Moon of Kentucky’ in a strangled tone. “Bill Monroe, now, there’s your man.”

  “Have you any idea,” Nick said, “who it was, ran the club? How I might get in touch?”

  “Dave Brunner,” the barman said, aiming his voice at the two men in the corner, “have either of you seen him around at all?”

  “Didn’t he used to use the Grenadier?” one said.

  “I believe you’re right,” said the other.

  “The Grenadier,” Nick said. “Where’s that?”

  “Gaisford Street,” said the first man. “Last time I looked.”

  “Dave Brunner,” Nick said to the barman. “That’s his name?”

  “The same.”

  “Thanks,” Nick said and turned towards the door.

  “Blue Moon of Kentucky, keep on shining,” warbled the barman. “Shine on the one who’s gone and
said goodbye.”

  ***

  Kentish Town Road was the usual mixture of slow-moving traffic and impatient pedestrians, beggars sitting hopefully alongside cash machines, young women pushing buggies and prams. Nick had taken a couple of painkillers earlier but still walked slowly, short of breath, not wanting to jar his ribs any more than was necessary. He was crossing the junction with Holmes Road when he heard someone call his name.

  “Nick? Nick Harman, isn’t it?”

  She was standing back from the pavement edge, neatly dressed, hair in place, leather briefcase in her hand.

  “Detective Inspector Ferris, remember?”

  Of course he remembered. He wanted to brush past, carry on walking, but didn’t quite feel able.

  “No school?”

  Nick shook his head.

  She was looking at the stitches etched across his forehead.

  “You come off your bike, something like that?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What? You came off your bike, that’s how it happened?”

  “If you say so.”

  “If I say so?”

  “Look,” Nick said, taking a step round her. “I’ve got to go.”

  “You’re not in any kind of trouble, Nick, are you?”

  “Why should I be in trouble?”

  “You tell me.”

  An ambulance, siren wailing, was trying to force it’s way through the middle of the traffic, cars and lorries pulling over to let it pass. People bunched on the corner where they were standing, scarcely bothering to look.

  “That’s a nasty cut,” the inspector said.

  Nick shrugged, not answering.

  “How many stitches, Nick?”

  Nick shrugged again.

  “You weren’t in some kind of a fight, were you?”

  “I told you, I came off my bike.”

  “Of course.” The inspector smiled. “Do you even have a bike?”

  “All kids have bikes, don’t they?”

  She raised a hand towards his face. “Whoever did that, I don’t suppose you’d care to tell me who it was?”

  “I’ve got to go.”

  “You don’t always have to fight your own battles, Nick, fight your own corner.”

  “No?”

  The inspector shook her head. “Not on your own. Sometimes it’s okay to ask for help.”

  “I don’t need any help.”

  He had half an idea she might try to stop him, but when he glanced back at the next crossing, she was no longer there. As he reached the far side of the road, someone hurrying cannoned into him, and he gasped and caught his breath as the pain fired across his chest, leaning for several moments against a shop window before continuing.

  The Grenadier was at the far end of Gaisford Street, a small, low pub he’d never noticed before, squeezed between a builder’s yard and a terrace of ageing flat-fronted houses late-flowering with skips and scaffolding.

  It took him less than a few minutes to learn this was indeed Dave Brunner’s local and that Brunner showed up most nights a little after ten, having switched off his set at the start of the news.

  By the time Nick had walked back home, he was aching so much he swallowed two Paracetamol with a glass of water and lay on the bed.

  ***

  The first time Nick had seen Christopher’s house he’d been eaten up with envy. All of his life in one cramped flat or another and here was Christopher with more rooms than you could easily count. And stairs. More than anything, Nick was jealous of the stairs. However old he was then — eleven, twelve — the idea of stairs, stairs you could chase up and down, even lay practically full-length along, was somehow thrilling.

  And at the top of the stairs, in a loft space let into the attic and going right across the house, was Christopher’s room, shelves and cupboards overflowing with books and toys, a remote control train set in one corner, his own stereo, his own computer, his own small TV.

  The first time Nick had been allowed to sleep over, he swore he would never go home again.

  Of course, after that, as he got older, it became clear that all was not as perfect as it seemed. Voices raised in anger, slamming doors. Sometimes Christopher would sit cross-legged on his bed for hours, still wearing his outdoor clothes, hands clamped over his ears.

  When Nick came round one day in the summer holidays, there was a van outside, two men loading boxes and small items of furniture, clothes wrapped in plastic. Christopher’s younger sister, Kirsten, sat on the step outside crying. His mother, grim-faced, directed operations, anxious to leave, her new Range Rover parked a short distance up the hill.

  They had been in Oxford less than a month, Christopher’s mother and sister, when Christopher’s old baby sitter, Anna, a Bulgarian blonde with a student visa, moved in. It was longer than that before Christopher would as much as speak to her, never mind use her name. He still referred to her dismissively as ‘the baby-sitter’, though that didn’t stop him watching hopefully as she padded to the bathroom in the mornings, her dressing gown loose but never quite loose enough.

  This particular evening, Christopher’s dad was out at the theatre and Anna was stretched out on the settee with a bottle of wine, watching a DVD of Indecent Proposal.

  “Tell me again why we’re going to this pub?” Christopher asked.

  Hungry, he was making a search of the fridge, one of those huge American jobs with metallic fronts and half the contents of Waitrose inside.

  “See this bloke,” Nick said.

  “About this woman, used to sing with your old man.”

  “Yeah.”

  Christopher finished making a sandwich with ham and cheese, cut it across and offered half to Nick, who shook his head.

  “Come on,” Christopher said, “if we’re going, let’s go. I can eat this on the way.”

  ***

  The interior of the pub was a broad L-shape, with two pool tables at the far end. A few heads turned towards Nick and Christopher as they entered, but mostly they were paid scant attention. The woman behind the bar, middle-aged, served them two bottles of Carlsberg without question. There was a television fixed by an angle bracket to the wall, the sound turned low, and through speakers high on the far side of the room, just audible, slow deep soul.

  “James Carr,” said Christopher, who liked to know such things. “‘Dark End of the Street’. My old man’s got the album.”

  Nick nodded and took a swig at his beer. Christopher’s dad had enough old vinyl to start a retro store.

  “Excuse me,” he said to the woman behind the bar, “but can you tell us if Dave Brunner’s here?”

  “Dave? Yes, see that bloke over there, bald, glasses. That’s Dave.”

  Nick thanked her and nudged Christopher’s arm. Together they walked over to where Brunner was talking to a couple who might have been father and son, the conversation, what they picked up, about how Spurs had thrown it away again in the last ten minutes. Nick was surprised they’d held out that long. A quick image of Ellen slipped into his mind and was as quickly gone.

  “Mr Brunner,” he said. “Sorry to interrupt you…”

  Brunner turned his head. “Good news or bad?”

  “Neither really.”

  “Then you must be collecting for something.”

  Nick shook his head. “I just wanted to ask you…”

  “Yes?”

  “You used to run that club, right? In the high street?”

  “Spit it out, son.”

  “Charlene Bell…”

  “What about her?”

  “I was wondering, if you knew how I could get it touch with her?”

  Dave Brunner chuckled. “Bit old for you, son,” he said, winking at the couple across the table.

  Tosser, Nick thought. “She was a friend of my dad’s.”

  “And he’s sent you to look for her, has he? What’s he think I am, Friends bloody Reunited?”

  “My dad’s dead,” Nick said.

  The grin disappeared
from Brunner’s face. “I’m sorry,” he said, and then, “What was his name?”

  “Les Harman.”

  Brunner leaned back and looked at Nick as if for the first time. “Sit down,” he said. “The pair of you. Let me get you another beer.”

  fourteen

  Charlene Bell lived in a large four-storey house in Camberwell, south London. Miles. Euston, Kingsway, Waterloo, the Elephant: Nick thought the bus was never going to arrive.

  The house was at the middle of a terrace that had formed one side of a Georgian square, now partly demolished, largely in need of repair. Charlene had bought it with the proceeds of a freak hit some dozen years before; a television commercial had used an old recording she’d made of ‘Walking the Dog’ and for a couple of weeks it had hovered in the lower reaches of the Top Twenty.

  Her record company, having ignored her for years, hastily reissued the album from which the song came and of course nobody bought it. Charlene appeared on daytime TV and Greater London Radio, as it was then, chatting with Robert Elms. Bizarrely, she was added to an Oldies tour which featured the Tremeloes, Billie Davis and the Four Pennies. Aberystwyth, Truro, Derby Assembly Rooms.