The Last Card (18 page)

A
de eased his racing-green Range Rover into the line of traffic at the top of Frith Street. As the car edged its way down the crowded Soho street, past the trendy coffee shops, bars and
restaurants
, Ade tapped his fingers to the Afro-Cuban beat of the Buena Vista Social Club. Ibrahim Ferrer was crooning an up-tempo number about the passion that he felt for his girlfriend and how every time they made love it felt like the bed was going to catch fire. What! Them was lyrics, boy! Ade couldn’t honestly say he was a hardcore fan of the Afro-Cuban music scene but when this album had first dropped it had reminded him of his father, who’d been a big fan of the hi-life music scene. Ade could remember how his father would drop ‘African Woman’ on to the record player, take Ade’s mother into his arms and swing her round the small living room, mad with the music. Ade’s mother was a big woman, and his father had swung her round,
bouncing
his hip off her large bottom – the two of them used to laugh and laugh and laugh. Ade and his sister, Maxine, would stand by clapping and laughing.

But Ade hadn’t put the album on to remember his father. He’d put it on deliberately because he knew Dunstan didn’t like it. Ade wanted to put Dunstan in a certain mood. And he wanted to put Dunstan in a certain mood because he’d been thinking more and more about Dunstan’s ideas about globalisation. Ever since Dunstan had phoned White Alan, he seemed to be backing away from the logic of his own arguments about globalisation. But if Dunstan didn’t want to deal with the real, Ade knew a man who probably would; a soldier from North London, a brer named Wha Gwan that he and Dunstan both
knew. Wha Gwan was a brer that didn’t ramp. But that was for later. For now, Ade played the Buena Vista Social Club to irritate and annoy Dunstan, hoping to add some steel to Dunstan’s backbone for their meeting with White Alan. He turned the volume up.

The Latin rhythms of fire and passion blared inside the car and Dunstan, in truth, had a scowl on his face that would have put fear into a small child. They had just driven past Ronnie Scott’s when Ade saw a parking space. Perfect. He nipped out of the line of traffic and slipped in; they were meeting Alan and Paul in Bar Italia just across the road.

Ade snapped the stereo off. He and Dunstan climbed out of the car, locked it and then the two of them high-stepped to the coffee shop. It was the middle of a fresh, April afternoon and Frith Street was busy with gay man and Soho trendies. No wonder Akers wanted the meeting there. As they approached Bar Italia they could see it was crowded. People were sitting round the four tables outside on the street, as well as filling the inside of the coffee shop.

‘Dis is no fucking good, is it? De place is cork!’ Ade looked around him, aggressively. The sight of so many gays had put him in a bad mood. He bet most of them worked in the media. For the BBC: the Bourgeois Batty Club. Ade noted with a modicum of satisfaction that Dunstan also high-stepped with a look of bad intent on his face. His voluptuous afro was leaning back against the breeze and Ade knew from past experience that he had to watch what he said from this point on. It was allllll good!

‘It’s all about globalisation.’

‘What?’

‘Nothing. I was just thinking about what you were saying about globalisation.’ They arrived outside the Bar Italia and looked around for a space. There was none.

‘Listen, Ade, give it a fuckin’ res’ about globalisation, will ya? When de time is right I’m gonna be de firs’ one to fuckin’ move on it, ya get me? Cha! No budder get me vex up now!’ As he looked about him for somewhere to sit, the afro comb poked out of the extreme
munificence of his hair. It quivered with anticipation.

‘Easy, man, easy. We have to play it cool for dis meeting.’

‘Wha’?! Who you talkin’ to?! Listen, dread, when my man finally gets ’ere I ain’t playing nuffin cool, ya get me?! Bou’ “fuck all you wogs and niggers”!’

Dunstan was speaking with volume at this point and Ade glanced down at the two men nearest them. They looked to be in their
mid-twenties
and they drank their coffees from little white coffee cups, both of them frothy with foam. Wrapped in puffa coats against the slight chill in the air, they sipped with an effete diffidence, both now glancing up at Dunstan. No doubt the shouting about ‘wogs and niggers’ had them worried. Ade saw one of them shake his head warningly and quickly drink down the rest of his coffee. His
companion
did the same. The first one rose, his friend followed him. Ade waited for them to pick up some bags they had with them and then he and Dunstan bagged the table.

‘But we still have to know when to strike,’ Dunstan continued. ‘Dere’s no point in steamin’ in dere before we’re ready, you know’t I mean?!’ Dunstan kissed his teeth. ‘Give me some fuckin’ credit, Ade!’

‘Hey, relax, Dunstan, you de man, you know dat.’ In his heart of hearts Ade already knew that Dunstan was no longer the man but he held up his hand invitingly anyway. Dunstan slapped it and they slid their hands apart, ending the slide with a finger click. ‘You know I’ve got your back.’ Ade rose. ‘Coffee?’

‘What else dey got?’

Ade turned to peer into the coffee shop. On the white board behind the counter was a long list of what they had to offer. Ade pointed to it. ‘It’s on the board, dere.’

Dunstan peered short-sightedly into the coffee store. He leaned forward and his eyes narrowed as he tried to make out what was on the list. Making sure that Dunstan didn’t see, Ade had to smile.

‘Dere’s a million different types of coffee,’ Ade said helpfully ‘but basically it’s coffee. Is dat good?’

Suddenly self conscious, Dunstan leaned back and stopped squinting.

‘Dey got chocolate?’

‘Judging by the lenffa dat list I would say yes, yes?’

‘Good. Get me a chocolate. Large.’

‘Moody, Dunstan, moody.’ Ade rolled into the coffee shop and eased his way to the counter. Boy, dis place was small! He ordered his drinks and turned to look back out on to the street. Just as he did that he had to catch his breath. His stomach flipped. He saw the two Akers brothers arrive, Dunstan stand up and the three of them shook hands. Moments later all three looked into the coffee shop. Ade maintained a grim expression as he nodded at them. Alan Akers gave a smile and a theatrical half bow. It went with the off-white, ‘70s suit he was wearing with the white crew neck jumper and the white leather boots. The man was a living joke. Paul Akers just nodded at Ade, equally grim, probably still thinking about how Ade had shot at his arse.

Ade picked up his coffee and hot chocolate and carried them outside. Conversation stopped as he placed them on the table. He looked around for a chair. Alan had taken his. Ade saw a free one at another table, picked it up and returned with it. As Ade sat, Alan was looking at him, puzzled.

‘What? Don’t we get one?’ Alan now looked between the coffee and Ade, a hurt expression on his face. For a moment Ade looked flustered, then Alan broke out into a broad smile. ‘You’re all right, I’m only joking!’ He looked over at his younger brother. ‘Thought I was serious!’ Alan chuckled, willing Paul to share the joke. Apparently Paul wasn’t in a joking mood because he failed to crack a smile.

‘So anyway, Ade, Dunstan and I have had a talk.’

Ade didn’t say a word, he just looked between Dunstan, Alan and Paul. ‘I know you and Dunstan have been naughty boys. Haven’t you?’ Both Alan and Paul were looking directly at Ade now, waiting for him to answer. Having been taken by surprise with their comment about the drinks Ade was not going to give them the upper hand now. He was a warrior. He shifted his gaze to his coffee, picked it up, took a careful sip and replaced it on the table. He looked up. White Alan and Paul were both still staring at him.

‘Dunstan’s already said his piece, Ade, is there anything you’d like to say?’ Ade looked at Dunstan but Dunstan kept his eyes on the table and said nothing. Ade looked at Alan, making sure to look him in the eye.

‘Like what?’ Ade kept his voice even. If they wanted war, they could have one, whatever Dunstan said. Globalisation, you know’t I mean?

‘You’ve been out of order.’

‘Says who?’ There it was. The challenge was out in the open, on the table. Alan could pick it up or kick it away, whatever he felt up to. Ade kept his gaze focused on Alan’s eyes. Ade didn’t blink. He was a warrior. His father taught him that. He was a Nigerian, from the Yoruba tribe. Yoruba were warriors and no fucking dry-up, old white man would make him back down.

‘I could go on about this’ said Alan. ‘But I won’t. There’s too much money involved.’ He now looked at Paul. ‘And I know this one has been a right fucking banana. A fool.’ He turned back to Ade and Dunstan, looking between them, very serious now. ‘It’s over.’ Paul and Dunstan glanced at each other and quickly glanced away. If body language meant anything it was clear that whatever Alan might say, it wasn’t even nearly over.

‘Are you two going to kiss and make up, or do I have to bang both your heads together?’ Alan looked at both Dunstan and Paul, but he addressed the comment to Paul.

‘Come on, Dunstan,’ said Paul. ‘It’s over. No one wins in a war, no one makes any money.’ The words stumbled, squeezed and slid without enthusiasm from Paul’s throat. Paul was a man under orders, delivering a script that he clearly did not believe. The look he gave Dunstan did away with any doubt. That was the moment when Ade knew Dunstan’s globalisation plan was a winner. For some reason Akers didn’t want to take them on! Akers must respect his and Dunstan’s power, and if Dunstan wasn’t aware of it, he, Ade certainly was.

Dunstan had the vision. He might not have the balls to carry his vision through, but Ade had to give him credit for the breadth of his imagination. If he needed steel in his backbone Ade could provide that, but if that wasn’t enough for Dunstan then fuck him. Fuck him! Paul, meanwhile, extended his hand – like a set of defrosted fish fingers – to Dunstan. Dunstan shook it for the briefest moment. White Alan raised his hand to playfully ruffle Dunstan’s hair but Dunstan moved his head away just in time. Alan laughed.

‘I’m glad you two decided to be smart. I thought I was going to have to kill you right here in the open, you little monkeys!’ Alan looked at the pout on Dunstan’s face and burst out laughing. Even Paul
smiled. Dunstan looked between the two of them saying not a word, the beginnings of a rictus-like grin flirting with the corners of his mouth. ‘I’m just kidding,’ smirked Alan ‘Just kidding!’

Ade looked between the three of them, Paul, Alan and Dunstan. Business might well go on as usual for a while … but a day of
reckoning
was coming. Ade had just seen the future and it didn’t include Alan or Paul Akers. In fact, as he looked at the fake grin on Dunstan’s face, he realised it didn’t include him either.

H
sat in a shadowy part of Blackie’s shebeen, in a corner at one of the smaller tables. At the main table in the centre of the room a game of stud poker was in full flow but H wanted no part of it. While Shampa dealt the cards with her usual aplomb, most of the players were unknown to H and even if he had known them he’d still have vowed to give up gambling. And he had … kind of. He was playing match kalooki, a card game so boring you could hardly call it gambling – or so H told himself.

Ten o’clock on Sunday night and H found himself sitting opposite Blackie, mano y mano. A stack of notes lay in the middle of the table. Grimly, H cast his eyes over it. He still couldn’t control the urge to gamble! What was wrong with him! He wanted to scream! H’s
talisman
sat vindictively next to him on the table. Next to that H had a shot glass of JD. While this had hardly been touched, Blackie was uncharacteristically drunk. He drank steadily from the tumbler of Mount Gay which sat next to him.

Blackie and H were nearing the end of a game. Each of them had just one playing card in their hand. H had a nine, Blackie a queen. The deck lay to one side of the money and each of them, in turn, picked from the top. Each was waiting for one card to close out the game. In the joyless, heavy silence between them they picked with the regularity of a metronome.

It was H who picked the winner. A jack. Blackie had a set of three jacks in front of him and H laid his freshly-picked jack alongside them. Game over. He scooped up the money in the centre of the table. It
was over £300 but the blank manner in which H scooped up and pocketed his winnings would have told Blackie that the win gave H no pleasure. Blackie looked back at him with the leaden eyes and the slack jowls of a man in serious need of sleep.

‘Man, you lucky tonight!’ It was Blackie’s face that had emitted the words but you could hardly tell; the man was so pickled with rum that the muscles in his face looked as though they’d been pumped with Botox. Blackie collected the cards and shuffled them.

‘Really? My life’s like a bad plane crash: Beverley wants me to stop gambling, I want to stop gambling, but I can’t stop gambling and I’m ‘lucky’! Is that right, Blackie?’

‘Listen, man, listen. I know dis chap once. He used to come to my old place in Ladbroke Grove, regular! Ibazebo. Nigerian chap. ’E don’t come no more since ’is wife ketch ’im wid a nex woman an’ brok ’is arm. Now ’e an’ ’is wife split up. Anyway, ’e was a sharp Nigerian man, brilliant min’. It was ’im dat tell me dat ’e t’ought gamblin’ was a, was a … ’ow did ’e put it?’ Blackie’s eyes glazed over as his face personified the expression ‘the lights were on but nobody was home’. They came back into focus. ‘’E did say gamblin’ was a kind of a comfort; comfort for de … ’emotionally insecure’. Das ’ow de man put it.’ Blackie paused as though he’d just revealed the secret of the universe and H should have been be shocked by its simplicity. H was not shocked but he could feel his blood beginning to boil. Blackie carried on talking as he now dealt the cards.

‘I had to stan’ up in de man face and tell ’im ’e tarkin’ rrrrrubbish! All de time ’e’s gamblin’ an’ ’e cian see what ’e doin’! Gamblin’ … is a … spiritual t’ing; a t’ing dat can bring us closer … closer to Gawd. I mean …’

H couldn’t contain himself any longer. ‘Blackie?! You’re the one talking rubbish!’ He dropped the cards he’d been dealt on to the table and rose.

Blackie looked up at him with uncomprehending eyes. ‘I tarking rrrrubbish?’

H bent down to speak directly into Blackie’s leaden, black, greasy face. ‘Remember Dipak? Did gambling bring him closer to God?’

Blackie’s face took on a look of fear. ‘Dipak?’ Blackie whispered the name.

H turned to leave but turned back. ‘You’re drunk and you’re
talking out of your arse!’ H jammed his talisman in his pocket and swept out of the shebeen.

The night was surprisingly warm as H turned into Wardour Street. The air was still. The street buzzed as H passed through and arrived on to Shaftesbury Avenue. He paused. He pulled his talisman out of his pocket, pumping it nervously, turning it over and over and over. Blackie was a good man but when he’d had a few drinks you just couldn’t talk to him. H knew he could leave this scene behind for the next ten, fifteen, twenty years, come back and Blackie would be exactly the same. A little more battle-scarred, a few fewer teeth.

H slipped his talisman back into his pocket and headed towards Chinatown. Out of the endless questions in his life he could hear Nina’s low, seductive voice. Providing answers. ‘If you wanted to take White Alan out of the game it would be so easy,’ the voice said. ‘He does the same thing every Sunday night.’ H passed Gerrard Street and headed deeper into Chinatown proper, turning left into Lisle Street. He walked a little way until he saw before him what he was looking for: the brightly lit Chinese restaurant called Yee Tsang’s. It was on the corner of Little Newport Street and Newport Place. He could see that the restaurant was busy and the diners, an equal mix of white and Oriental, ate and chatted, enjoying a late Sunday night meal. Life outside the restaurant was equally busy with people, tourists, passing by in both directions, and the shops around the restaurant were all open for business.

H stood across from Yee Tsang’s and watched. The voice in his head continued. ‘He leaves the club about eleven and goes to
Chinatown
. He’s got a friend there. A Mr Tsang’. H took a step forward, as though in a daze, as though about to approach the restaurant, but then he stepped back. The voice continued.

‘He’s some kind of business associate. They meet up, they have a drink. They do their business. Alan will stay there for maybe half an hour. He normally has Gavin with him but I’ll make sure that he won’t be there this time. He’ll leave alone.’ As the voice in H’s head receded, he slipped into a doorway on Lisle Street, disappearing into the shadows.

The street was quiet now and White Alan, looking cool and relaxed, stood at the door to Yee Tsang’s finishing a conversation with a short, jovial, stringy-haired Chinese man. Wearing a white, short-sleeved, linen safari suit, coupled with a silk cravat, Alan looked as though he’d just stepped out of a Laura Ashley fashion shoot. From the recess of the doorway next to Yee Tsang’s, H eyed him carefully, asking himself why this man had such an eccentric fascination for white.

Moments later White Alan finished his conversation with the Chinese man, shook hands with him and headed up Newport Place. H remained hidden in the doorway. When he was about ten metres away, H now stepped out and followed. The voice in his head began again. ‘When he approaches Gerrard Street you do it there. It’s all small Chinese stores in that area, no one will say a word. It’s a tight-knit community, they won’t speak to the police.’ White Alan was at the top of Newport Place, about to turn into Gerrard Street. H picked up his pace closing in on White Alan’s back. ‘Twice. Shoot him twice. Make sure he’s dead. Then you go straight back to the office at Roxy’s. Before anyone knows he’s missing, you clean out the safe. Simple.’

H moved silently and swiftly up behind White Alan. He was now close enough to reach out and touch him. Just as White Alan reached the beginning of Gerrard Street H grabbed his arm and spun him round. For the first time since H had met him, Alan’s face betrayed fear.

‘What? What do you want?’

‘I’m not throwing the fight. I’m not throwing it. You’ll get your fifteen grand and then we’re quits. It’s as simple as that.’ White Alan’s eyes quickly scanned H for signs of a weapon. Nothing. H looked coolly back at him.

‘Is that right?’

‘That’s more than right. What are you going to do to me, Alan? The bet has been laid.’

Alan stared back at H, an uneasy smile on his face. ‘I don’t need to do anything to you. The question is what’re you going to do to
yourself
?’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means I know about you, Hilary. You tried to take Mancini as an amateur and he beat the shit outta you. And now you’re a gambler
stuck on the cards.’ H just stared. ‘You’re one of life’s losers; one of the little people; a low life. You are going to let Mancini win, and not only win, you’re going to let him beat the shit out of you. Again. How do I know this?’ H still said nothing. Alan leaned in closer so that H could smell the stench of spicy pork on Alan’s breath. He whispered in H’s ear. Because you have no … moral integrity.’ Alan now leaned back and smiled playfully at H. ‘But also, if you don’t lie down, I’m going to cut you like a fookin’ grapefruit.’

White Alan now conspicuously turned his back on H, smoothed out any ruffles that might have disturbed the lines of his linen suit, and continued on his way. H watched him turn the corner into Gerrard Street and go about his business. And only then did he realize that the hand that had spun Alan round was shaking.