Chapter 10: Old Scores

"Why is it always cold at football matches?" Stacie wanted to know. Coat-collar turned up against an unseasonably chilly breeze and a spatter of light rain, she stood on the touchline clutching a microphone in her hand, ready to do a piece to camera when she was required.

Mickey, playing the producer in shades, a sheepskin jacket and a neat goatee beard, patted her shoulder sympathetically. "Sometimes we have to suffer for our art." He squinted across the pitch to where Ash was setting up the last camera near the goal mouth in the hopes of catching Matt in the act of making a classy strike. "What time was Albert meeting with Freddy Hall?"

"About half past two, he said." Stacie glanced at her watch. "Hopefully by the time he gets back we'll be in the warm with a cup of hot chocolate…" She broke off as Ash came across, hands in his pockets.

"That's it all rigged up. You ready, Stace? If we crack on now and we've made a start when they're coming on it'll look a bit flashier."

Stacie nodded and took up her position, a bright smile on her face and the mic in her hand. Ash stepped behind the camera, checked the focus and gave her the thumbs-up. "Good afternoon, and welcome to our live report from the training ground at the University of Central London, where local students are doing their part to raise money for a worthy cause. This afternoon sees the university team taking part in the filming of a DVD which will be distributed to local primary schools as part of a campaign to promote sport and health awareness amongst the capital's youngsters…"

As her spiel continued the team, lead by Matt, appeared from the changing-rooms and Mickey strode across to meet them.

"All right, Mr Buckingham?" Matt gave a cheery wave and jogged up to shake Mickey's hand before leading him across to the other players.

"This is extremely good of you all." Mickey shook hands all round. "We've arranged a voucher for free drinks at a local bar…"


"Free drinks? For students?" Eddie was appalled.

"It's a good deal, Eddie." Matt leaned forward across the bar in a confiding manner. "It's supposed to be exclusive to pubs round the university but I thought you'd like a piece of the action." Furtively he produced a small ticket and passed it over, concealing it in his hand. "They give these out," he continued, sotto voce, "and the students can only get them redeemed in certain places. They go there for the freebies and then end up staying on and drinking all night. It's part of a scheme to draw students out into the community and get them mixing with the locals."

Eddie glanced toward the door and asked in a low voice: "So how'd you get on the end of this, then?"

Matt tapped his nose knowingly with a long finger. "Still got connections there. I coach one of the football teams, and their striker tipped me off – asked me if I wanted some tickets. I thought if I added you to the list I could bring a few mates down one night, have a bit of an evening." He glanced over his shoulder. "I'll bring a good crowd – you should make a bit of a killing if you're lucky."

Eddie considered. "Okay, yeah. Sounds like a good idea. Let me know what night and I'll buy in some extras."

"Cool!" Matt winked, shook Eddie's hand and loped out of the door, beads clattering on his shoulders.

"Managed all on your own, then?" Stacie materialised from a doorway and fell into step with him as he strolled down the street.

"Yeah, no problem. Eddie likes me, cos I'm rubbish at card tricks. He wins about twenty quid every time I practice on him." They walked a few paces in silence before Matt added: "Probably better if he doesn't connect you lot to this anyway – he's not going to be too happy the next morning."

"Why? Is there likely to be any damage?"

"Stacie..." Matt said patiently, "we're talking about free beer and a student football team here."

Stacie grimaced. "Poor Eddie…"

"…and the lovely Alicia will be signing autographs as soon as she's finished her piece to camera."

A cheer went up amongst the small crowd of young men as Stacie looked over her shoulder and gave a twinkly-eyed wave before signing off with a flourish and walking across to join them. As she all but disappeared under their boisterous welcome, Mickey made his way back to the touchline where Ash was taking down the camera. "All right?"

"Yeah." Deftly folding the tripod, Ash picked up it and the camera. "Tell him not to mess about too much." He jerked his head in Matt's direction. "We want it to look like a match, not a one-man show." Mickey opened his mouth to reply, but Ash was already heading in the direction of the waiting van. He'd managed to acquire it for an afternoon from the local news team, thanks to a senior technician who owed him a favour and had put the van down as being in the workshop for a service.

Mickey stared after his departing friend with a slight frown on his face, which he hurriedly smoothed away on hearing someone approaching.

"Only me!" Stacie arrived at his elbow. She followed the direction of his gaze and sighed. "There's really something bothering him, isn't there?"

Mickey made a non-committal sound as he looked over at the pitch, received the thumbs-up from Matt and turned back to wave across at the truck.

"I thought maybe it was the row over Matt joining," Stacie ventured, "but..."

Mickey shook his head. "Ash doesn't bear a grudge. He said his piece on that, he was outvoted, and that's the end of it as far as he's concerned. Anyway, he likes Matt. No - whatever it is, it's between him and Albert." He thought for a moment and then shrugged his shoulders. "If they want input from us, they'll tell us."

"Couldn't we, you know – push things on a bit?" Stacie hooked her arm through Mickey's and about-faced them both so that they could show an interest in the game as well as continue their conversation. He looked at her enquiringly and she elaborated: "Why don't we go out, the three of us, and leave them to it? Give them some space to talk, if that's what they need to do."

On the far side of the pitch, Matt neatly intercepted the ball, jinked his way past a couple of midfielders, dribbled past the defence and stuck the ball through the goalie's legs into the back of the net. As he applauded the goal, Mickey considered Stacie's suggestion. "Couldn't hurt, could it?"

*********************************************

Never one to let the grass grow under his feet, Mickey made his move that night. With the filming done, the van returned, Albert looking very pleased at the results of his meeting with Freddy Hall and Matt the proud scorer of two more goals, Mickey suggested that he, Matt and Stacie go out to the cinema. Once they had departed Albert found a bottle of brandy and two glasses and installed himself and Ash in the library for a quiet evening.

Although they had pretty much transferred operations to the Lansdowne Park whilst setting up the store, they had been cautious about which rooms they occupied. The library was at the back of the main house and looked out onto the stable-yard, which meant that they could use it without fear of lights being seen from the road at night. It was a comfortable room which smelled of wooden floors and leather bindings and its atmosphere was soothing to twitchy nerves. Albert settled himself at the reading table in the centre of the room, a copy of The Times open at the announcements page and a red biro in his hand with which he began marking items of possible future interest. Ash, who liked to take the opportunity to top up his store of random useful information whenever possible, pulled down a large book on Japanese history and customs and took it across to read in one of the armchairs by the window.

A long, companionable silence was broken by Albert's voice: "Something on your mind, Ash?"

Ash glanced up from the page. "No … no, nothing much."

"Good book?"

"Yeah, pretty interesting."

"Only you've been on page eighty-seven for the last fifteen minutes."

Ash sighed, seemed to gather his thoughts and finally come to a decision. "Look – I hate to say this, Albert, but I think we're over-reaching ourselves."

Albert slowly removed his spectacles and rested his elbows on the table, saying nothing.

"Going after Oscar Andersen. Who's not only the chairman of Blackwall FC, and Darren Duncan's boss, but happens to be Charlie Kane's brother-in-law." Ash looked his friend straight in the eye for the first time in two days. "You didn't think I'd miss that one, did you?"

"All right, Ashley?"

Had Ash not been sunk in morose thought he would have noticed that he was being followed. As it was, he was ignorant of the fact until he heard the voice behind him. The use of his full name was a dead giveaway; no-one else called him anything but Ash, ever. He was anticipating trouble even as he turned his head to see who'd spoken. When he saw Charlie Kane's smile he knew he'd been right. He nodded unencouragingly. "Charlie."

"Charles to you. Been looking for you, matey. You're a hard man to find."

"Busy." Ash began walking again, facing straight ahead.

Kane matched his pace, snakeskin boots clattering on the paving stones. "Got a job for you. Nice easy number. Ten grand."

"I'm working."

"Cash."

"Sorry, Charles, but I'm working. Can't help you."

Kane was a big man; his slightly longer legs enabled him to take two strides that put him in front of Ash and blocked his path.

"Don't think you quite get it, matey. Not asking you. Telling. You're going to do me a job, and I'm going to pay you ten K. Cash. Then we're all happy."

Ash stepped back slightly so that he could meet Kane's gaze without having to look up. "I get it, "matey", but I'm saying no. I promised the wife. Okay?"

"That's very sweet. She's a spirited lady, your missus. I can see why you wouldn't want to upset her." Ash took a half pace to the left and Kane shifted to his right without pausing for breath. "So you wouldn't want to have to go home and tell her you'd lost that nice legit thing you've found yourself, would you?" Kane reached inside his jacket and extracted a thick notebook bound in honey-coloured leather, which he consulted theatrically. "William Robson, security guard. Not very imaginative, is it? Only take a call. Tell William Robson's boss there's no such person. Bye bye Bill, and arrividerci Ashley. And if you were back inside, who'd look after June then? It's a rough old world these days, Ashley – you never know…"

Ash was shorter by half a head, and lighter by around a stone, but he moved so quickly that Kane, caught by surprise, found himself suddenly pinned against the wall, Ash's forearm across his throat.

"You don't change, do you, you tosser?" Ash ground out between clenched teeth. "Don't you ever get tired of shafting people?"

Kane's eyes were bulging slightly from lack of oxygen, but he still managed to appear triumphant. "Thought you were above violence these days. Left all that behind when you started poncing about with Albert Stroller?"

"I can still work out how to rearrange your face without referring to the manual."

"If it makes you feel better. Long as you're ready for those two…" Kane managed to twitch his head fractionally sideways to indicate a couple of heavily-built knuckle-draggers who were moving rapidly in their direction. As they closed in, Kane smiled. "Do yourself a favour, Ashley." His voice was becoming a reedy croak. "Both know you're going to do this job."

Ash held his grip long enough to make Kane's face turn an interesting shade of dark purple, then released him and stepped back, breathing heavily. The goons were at his shoulders, but Kane warned them off with a wave of his hand and leaned forward, catching his breath. He coughed several times, spat on the pavement and straightened up.

"Got a delivery to make. Your place of employment. All you do is say nothing, do nothing, check nothing. Got it? Easiest money you ever made, matey. Old rope."

Seething with frustration, Ash glared. "Stuff the money, Charlie. If I do this, you get off my case. This is the last one, you understand?"

"Loud and clear." Kane straightened his jacket and gave a maddening smile. "Pay you anyway. Never know when you might need it."

With a last glower at Kane, Ash turned and walked away. He was half-expecting Kane to unleash the heavies but no-one made a move to follow. He told himself it could have been worse – June didn't need to know, and ten grand would be welcome enough. He'd do the job, take the money, and be rid of Kane for good.

Not until he opened the door of the flat three weeks later to find a policeman on the step did he realise how thoroughly Kane had stitched him up.

Folding his hands on the table in front of him, Albert leaned forward. His usual air of affability had evaporated and there was steel in his voice and in his eyes as he said: "Kane's a snake. He waited till you were down and then he took a kick at you. He fitted you up and he put you in jail. He doesn't walk away from that."

Ash sighed again and set down his book with a thud. "It just feels like one throw too many. This is going to be a good crew, Albert, but at the moment it's three kids and two old lags and we're green as grass."

"Mickey's nearly thirty years old," Albert ticked off the list on his fingers as he spoke. "Stacie's sharp as a tack and she's shown her quality already. Matt will do as he's told and he can think on his feet. I'll ignore the fact that you've just referred to me as an "old lag", and instead point out that you and I have years of skill and experience to add to the mix."

"It's ancient history now, anyway."

"He has it coming," Albert insisted. "I tell you, Ash – it's a gift from the gods. This whole thing dropped right into place. I've had Darren Duncan in my sights for months, watching the stories get wilder and wilder. When I started looking into the club, I hit paydirt. Petersen's crooked as a nine-dollar bill. There's a blind eye turned to a large quantity of recreational drug-use at Blackwall FC and in the social scene around the players, and those drugs come through Charles Kane. If we do this, we make Duncan and Hall look like the idiots they are, take Petersen's cash and we give Charlie Kane an unexpected pay-cut, all in one juicy package. A once-in-a-lifetime offer." He broke off, seeing Ash still unconvinced, and his voice became gentler. "Okay - if you feel it's necessary, we can put it to the vote. Blackwall's not an essential part of the plan; if the others feel I'm gilding the lily I'll get Hall to introduce me elsewhere and we'll just run the football scam."

Ash sighed again, knowing it was the best he was going to get. "Cheers, Albert."

***********************************

"You shared a cell with Charlie Kane??? Wow – that's really cool!" Matt registered Albert's reproving look, Mickey's hastily-covered smile, Stacie's elbow in his ribs and Ash's wince at the memory all at one moment, and hastily backtracked "… I mean, he's a bit hardcore, yeah?"

"He's a gangster," Mickey said, the smile fading from his face. "Recently he's started courting respectability by involving himself in legitimate businesses…"

"…like football clubs, for example?" Stacie was half a step ahead once again.

Albert nodded. "He's using Blackwall FC as a channel to filter drugs out into the wider world. No brown envelopes in backstreets for this boy."

"He's the real deal." Smoke wisped from Ash's direction as he spoke. "If we mix it with him we're likely to end up kneecapped."

"So what's the story, Albert?" Matt asked.

"It's not my story to tell." Albert looked at Ash, who drew hard on his cigarette and exhaled, watching the blue coils dissipate lazily into the air.

"Okay. So," – another quick drag – "inside, it's what you know and who you know, yeah? And I've always been able to find out who wants what and I can usually find the someone else who's got it. Anyway." He stubbed out the end of the cigarette in the ashtray and took a quick drink. "I kept Charlie in fags and dirty magazines and he watched my back a bit. Mutual arrangement. Then when I got out, he called me and said he'd got work, so I did bits, over the years. Forgeries, moody notes, a bit of fencing – but he was drifting more and more into hard stuff. I started to back off a bit…"

"…and he didn't like it." Mickey was leaning forward, elbows on knees, listening intently, watching his friend.

"No. Well, they don't, these control-freak types. It was a like being an extra in the bloody Godfather. And when I teamed up with you and Albert, he was livid. Came round my place, gave me grief about how I was part of his crew, I'd betrayed him – the full monty."

"What did you do?" Stacie asked.

Ash shrugged. "Told him to get lost. Said I didn't like the way he was going and I'd got other plans. Didn't go down too well." He stared at the table for a moment. "And once I met June, well … she couldn't stand 'im, so that was basically that as far as I was concerned."

"A woman of taste," Albert remarked mildly.

"Yeah, sort of. She went out with him for a bit. I mean, they'd split up before I met 'er, but only a few months before, I think."

"Oh, come on!" Matt pointed both index fingers at him gleefully. "Nicking Charlie Kane's ex – even you've got to admit that's cool."

Ash grinned a little into his drink. "Charles didn't think so!"

"So what happened?" Mickey knew there had to be more to it than this.

"He came after me, in the end." Ash spoke seriously now, and none of the others moved to interrupt him. "I'd married June, tried to go straight, got a job as a security guard." Mickey caught the tiniest glance flashing between Ash and Albert and knew there was something not being said, but held his peace. "He looked me up, told me he'd got one last job, and I was doing it for him. If I didn't, he'd grass me up to my boss and go after June. So I did it, and he set me up with the cops instead."

"That's how you ended up inside this last time?" Mickey asked. "Because Kane set you up?"

Ash nodded.

Stacie was bolt upright in her seat, her eyes flashing. "Right. I say we get this bastard!"

"No, no, no. Look…" Ash rubbed his forehead wearily. "I don't want you lot pulled into a revenge job…"

"It's not just about that, though, is it?" Mickey put in. They turned to look at him. "If Kane's got a grudge against you, Ash, he's got a way to all of us. A crew of grifters is a unit – he knows you, he knows Albert. He's never met me, but he knows my name. How long before he gets to the rest of us?"

"If we can put Blackwall FC on the front page for financial irregularities," Albert said, "then Kane is going to be too busy cutting ties to the club, keeping himself out of the picture and trying to find a new source of income to worry about us for some time to come."

"So we get back at Kane, keep him out of our hair, reveal Darren Duncan and Freddy Hall to the world as the total prats they are, while making a pile of money out of Blackwall's chairman … and Albert becomes a grifting legend," Stacie summarised, unwittingly echoing Albert's words to Ash a few hours before.

Ash opened his mouth to begin a protest and, finding himself in a logical dead end, changed it to a plea. "Okay. All right. But only to get him off our backs. Nothing else."

Albert nodded. "This isn't just some scheme off the back of a matchbook, Ash. It's a job, like any other, and I don't play percentages. Ever."

"I thought you were a gambler?" Stacie teased.

Mickey snorted. "Have you ever played him at cards?"

Albert rose to his feet and patted Ash briefly on the shoulder. "It's been a long day. I think we should turn in, and make for an early start." Pausing in the doorway he added: "Stacie, you and Matthew need to go shopping tomorrow – he looks far too much the student to be a soccer player."

Stacie regarded Matt with an assessing eye. "Don't worry, Albert – I'll soon bling him up!"

Albert raised a hand in acknowledgement and disappeared in the direction of his room.

Matt unfolded himself from his chair. "I'm all yours, Stace – but the hair's off-limits, right?"

"Don't worry!" She reached up to put a reassuring arm across his shoulders. "The ethnic look's very now."

"Cheeky mare!" he said good-naturedly.

Catching Mickey's eye, Stacie slapped Matt on the back. "Come on then, student. Show me round your wardrobe and let's see what I've got to work with."

"What? After you dissed my 'do?" He squinted down at her. "Only if I can have a fake Rolex as part of the makeover."

As they bickered their way down the corridor in the direction of the kitchen, Mickey turned to Ash. "You're still not happy. What is it?"

There was a long silence, born of a sudden knowledge that this was uncharted territory. Albert was the leader, Ash his lieutenant, Mickey the up-and-coming talent. That was how it had always been. Now here they were, behind Albert's back, after a group decision had been made and agreed upon, with Mickey's treasonous question hanging in the air between them.

Ash shoved his hand in his pocket, drew out his cigarettes, took one from the packet, lit it, inhaled. "I'm scared, Mick." And with three words the laws of the universe shifted a little and there was no going back.

Mickey walked quietly to the door and closed it. Then he came back and sat down opposite his friend, leaning forward intently. "You think Albert's made a mistake?"

"Not with the plan. The set-up's genius. But ever since he said Anderson's name the other day… I've been over and over it, I can't see the flaw, but then I get this image in my head…" He stared at the closed door, through which the sound of Stacie laughing at one of Matt's jokes could be heard, his blue eyes clouded with worry. "Kane's a nutter. Serious. He uses people, gets inside your head. I've known him for years, thought I could handle him, and he smoked me like a kipper. Messing with him just isn't safe. If he gets a sniff of the idea that any of us are part of this we've got real trouble, Mick, I mean it. And Albert…" he groped for the words whilst Mickey waited patiently. The cigarette was almost a stub before Ash spoke again. "It's not that I think Albert's wrong," he said finally. "Just – he wants it to go right so much – you know?"

Another silence followed, long enough for Ash to grind out his cigarette in the ashtray, light a second and smoke half of it. Then Mickey stood up, walked over to the sideboard and poured two large drinks. Crossing back to the table he handed one glass to Ash and took a hefty swig from the second. "Okay…" he said. The conversation that followed lasted far into the small hours of the morning.