The Crooked Bullet
The Crooked Bullet
Rotimi Ogunjobi
Upton Park, East London. Someone has stolen Raj Desai’s lucky charm. His daughter has also gone missing. To the rescue comes Frank Wire, private detective by day and disc-jockey by night.
Hot on the trail of a faceless and ubiquitous organization, Frank must also escape from a gang of hoodlums, mysterious assassins, and a bothersome jilted lover from a distant past. His frantic search through the streets of London brings him in contact with its many unimaginable and grimy secrets. When his fiancé is again also kidnapped, Frank Wire knows that he must unravel the mystery of The Crooked Bullet.
THE CROOKED BULLET
A Frank Wire Mystery
By
ROTIMI OGUNJOBI
© 2021 Rotimi Ogunjobi
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
AM Book Publishing Limited
www.ambookpublishing.com
TABLE OF CONTENTS
THE CROOKED BULLET (#ulink_3accedd7-5778-5df8-b1b6-2cde33f50b98)
CHAPTER 1 (#ulink_4942ba08-e7ed-53e8-9cb6-2b984d45a4eb)
CHAPTER 2 (#ulink_4c3c0700-45ac-51ba-9abb-05faeb10313d)
CHAPTER 3 (#ulink_b81e8522-a98d-52c7-9441-59e8f73d9fdf)
CHAPTER 4 (#ulink_abcc9bbb-c085-5fea-87ee-34200aa05c49)
CHAPTER 5 (#ulink_51b19a7b-dc1d-54ea-8141-28bfcbc30918)
CHAPTER 6 (#ulink_40adad14-8e3c-5a25-b1fe-49fe2761bc75)
CHAPTER 7 (#ulink_d88169c1-9e95-5496-afb6-2699075e54a0)
CHAPTER 8 (#ulink_474299fa-e4c4-5b7e-8be8-3f3c65716e0d)
CHAPTER 9 (#ulink_a0d8aec9-9cdb-5f3a-849d-78b5e1e838ee)
CHAPTER 10 (#ulink_89d17ea6-5fc1-5161-9253-c75221045719)
CHAPTER 11 (#ulink_3a3341b7-0280-503b-af3e-60b449b2d667)
CHAPTER 12 (#ulink_8500901a-bce1-5c53-8531-fc5af544e683)
CHAPTER 13 (#ulink_512d6e1e-8363-5912-8bcd-a9a34063e29d)
CHAPTER 14 (#ulink_a382720b-9308-5b9d-99f0-5209cab2a247)
CHAPTER 15 (#ulink_502de81f-cb15-5d26-a411-ea8d2e74ee9c)
CHAPTER 16 (#ulink_e6e5a1a7-0fc5-5f92-b047-940d5903c3b9)
CHAPTER 17 (#ulink_3ac8a283-1971-5635-af2b-3d19690c88b5)
CHAPTER 18 (#ulink_c5365134-ac88-5695-b576-2a2612892dac)
CHAPTER 19 (#ulink_217353f2-e83d-5c38-9aa4-3b9345f12357)
CHAPTER 20 (#ulink_deabb3c2-1224-5216-822f-32f721ac0405)
CHAPTER 21 (#ulink_fbea07c9-d507-5fa8-ae15-a87da63991dc)
CHAPTER 22 (#ulink_829a9f41-a562-575f-a34b-8f5fec2b5949)
CHAPTER 23 (#ulink_5fd4a011-febd-5a2b-b485-ecd9981b17fa)
CHAPTER 24 (#ulink_2d45b5df-7c3f-5776-9246-f44dbcf62fe4)
CHAPTER 25 (#ulink_6e54999f-4967-5a19-a9c2-8b54aa21325f)
CHAPTER 26 (#ulink_3bb54f9f-7c04-58fa-820f-fcaddb1e7f62)
CHAPTER 27 (#ulink_b00c19c6-1c9d-5c3b-b99b-27474e2ad1b5)
EPILOGUE (#ulink_8a4ee8ac-c7f0-574e-9e8e-94e4c6f1406b)
CHAPTER 1
Upton Park, London.
Raj Desai sat alone in the back office of his jewelry shop. It was Saturday night, and the staff and security had left; but like every other night, Raj locked up by himself – he was a very careful man.
He opened the front door to peek up and down the street, Bhatti’s Jewellery was on Green Street and about a hundred yards away from the tube station. All around, the street this night teemed with African and Asian immigrants, many of whom perpetually looked defeated.
Not a lot different from what he and his wife must have looked like when they had come to live here more than two decades ago, he knew. The only appreciable commercial traffic at this time was from the Tesco supermarket. It wasn’t football day, else the pubs around would have been rowdy with drunken revelers from the stadium down the road where Westham FC played their home matches. Here on these streets, spotted with phlegm and perpetually smelling of disinfectant, he and his late wife had nevertheless found good fortune
Raj shut the door and turned the key. He failed, however, to see Kalyan Shetty his son-in-law to be, running down from the train station. Kalyan knocked eagerly on the door just as Raj turned away. He is dressed in a dark suit; obviously coming from work. Raj again opened the door to let him in and then drew down the electric-operated front window security grille.
“Good evening Papa. How are you today?” Kalyan asked.
“Very well thank you, my son. You are coming from work?” Raj Desai replied. They both spoke in Hindi,
“Yes, Papa. Rupinder says to meet her at home, but it is too early since she does not arrive from work at the hospital for another two hours. So I thought to come to have a chat with you, and then maybe go home along with you “, Kalyan said
“That is fine. She works long hours at the hospital sometimes. Too long for a woman even if a doctor.” Raj regretted.
They both entered Raj’s office at the back of the shop floor. Conspicuous on a wall of the cramped office were three portraits. One was of his deceased wife Sangita, her scowl still intimidating even in the picture. The second was of his only daughter Rupinder in her graduation attire from medical school. The third portrait was of Raj, Sangita, and Rupinder, taken twenty-two years back in Mumbai, and when Rupinder was just about three years old.
Raj looked up and pointed to the picture of Rupinder.
“She takes after her mother. Unfortunately, Sangita died when Rupinder was still a little child and left us alone.” he seemed to apologize.
“I am always sorry to hear that Papa. You have done quite well, however.” Kalyan told him.
“Oh no, she has done quite well. All that you see here in this shop means nothing to me. This shop, Bhatti’s Jewellery belonged to Sangita, and she made it a success by hard work. Only she taught me enough to be able to make it prosper still. This shop we bought the shop from her uncle Shami “Bhatti” Bhatnagar. He was widowed, quite fed up with his bad arthritis, and going back home to New Delhi. We came here poor, she determined to make us rich, and rich we became. Bhatti’s belongs to Sangita, my son, Rupinder is my only success. You will take care of Rupinder for me when you eventually get married will you?” Raj asked
“I promise Papa; I promise.” Kalyan patted his hand.
Raj opened a solid wood locker and brought out a black box, expensively decorated with black velvet and gold trimmings and about the size of a medium-size pizza box. Inside, the box was lined with purple satin. It contained a gold pendant attached to a gold chain. The pendant has the shape of a bent bullet.
“Look at this; what do you think?” Raj eagerly asked.
“It is beautiful Papa, and it looks very valuable,” Kalyan confessed.
“Yes, it is valuable. It is the Crooked Bullet. It is supposed to bring peace to the marriage. By family tradition, it must be passed to the first son to get married in the family as it had been passed down for five generations. But since I do not have a son, I will give it to you”.
“Thank you, Papa. I will take care of it and cherish it.”, Kalyan was pleased to learn.
“The pendant must not be lost though, else the result will be a life plagued with great hardship for many generations following.” Raj Desai warned.
“It will not be lost, Papa. I promise to keep it and also give it to your grandson when the time comes.” Kalyan promised
Raj closed the box, quite lovingly tucked it away again in the locker, and turned the key. Then he opened a big steel safe door to put the key in. The safe contained a lot of money that had been carelessly thrown in. He changed his mind; opened the locker once again, took out the box, and put it in the safe, nodding his head in the satisfaction that this made more sense.
“You have too much money in that safe Papa; you ought to take it to the bank at the end of every day.” Kalyan worried.
“Yes, I know. There must be more than a hundred thousand pounds inside there, which are the cash sales for the entire day. Too many customers prefer to pay cash for the jewelry you know. Sangita would have insisted that the cash should be taken to the night deposit at the bank down the road, but never mind I will do that in the morning. Nobody is coming to steal a safe my son, this is London.” Raj reasoned. Up on the wall, the scowling picture of Sangita seemed to accuse him even more and to make him momentarily nervous.
“After you and Rupinder are married, I think I will sell the shop and like old man Shami “Bhatti” Bhatnagar, return home to Mumbai.” He declared
They both exit the office, switching off the lights behind them. Raj engaged the shop security system, after which they both exit the shop through a side door, which Raj also locked. Raj’s car, a Mercedes, was parked a few yards away, and both walked slowly toward it.
There was still a bit of a chill outside; summer was still several weeks away. Raj pushed his wool cap tighter on his head and wrapped his coat tighter around him. He had been thinking of what to do next. When you were nearly sixty, life seemed to become so routine, and the choices available for nearly everything became so few. Before Kalyan arrived, he had been trying to make a choice between having dinnerat the Hyderabad Darbar Restaurant down the road or going nearer home at Romford to Aroma on High Street. And maybe thereafter going to The Bitter End pub for a pint or two and a chat with the denizens. Now he wasn’t quite sure anymore what to do with himself, his coveted companionship with loneliness suddenly broken
“Give me the key Papa, I will drive you home,” Kalyan suggested. They both entered the car and drove away into the darkness.
Later that night, a grim conference took place at an upmarket health spa known as Woodstock. The place, located near Chigwell had previously been a farm. Now it was a celebrity hideout – where the annual membership was rumored to cost nearly as much as a brand new Rolls Royce. The rules inside Woodstock were for those to whom money meant very little – the primary of those rules being that shoes were not permitted to be worn within the grounds of the estate.
The office in which the night conference took place looked quite like it had been time-warped from the sixties. Moses Samuel or Rabbi Zulu as the proprietor of Woodstock was more fondly called, was having a discussion with four men of Eastern Europe stock. Also in his office were three other people, one of them his closest aide Sasha Cohen, a slightly plump lady who habitually wore dark John Lennon glasses.
The huge room was completely decorated with vintage furniture and fittings; including a large Beatles grandfather clock and an RCA radiogram. On one of the walls were two huge posters each of them about eight feet tall. One was of the singer Isaac Hayes playing at the Sahara Tahoe in the “70s – with dark aviator sunglasses, a heavy chain around his neck, naked to the waist and looking so sweaty sexy. It was an image Moses Samuel always faithfully tried to imitate to the limit that his own white skin would permit. The other poster was of a barefooted Masai warrior in a full battle leap. This was the one around which he had built the new philosophies behind his life and business.
Only one of the four men in attendance spoke English, but they all nevertheless understood the instructions that were being passed to them.
“The bank is in Hackney. It was in there that a person I knew, a hard-working man, lost his home to them way back and killed himself as a consequence, do you understand?” The men nodded.
“Yah! Yah!”; they understood. They also still understood the intolerable iniquities of uncontrolled capitalist economics.
Moses Samuel pointed to a television camera on the table before them.
“See this thing? Real techie stuff. I had it specially made for me in China. It is not only a camera; it will also scramble all CCTV signals and disable all other security equipment, and so nobody will be able to understand what happened. After the job, you will drive away to Dover from where you will cross the channel and then get a plane to Brazil. By the time you return home in a couple of months, you will have no worries. Plus you will be rich.”
Sasha gave the leader of the men a large envelope which contained plane tickets, some fake travel documents. They nodded quietly and left with the television camera.
Moses Samuel switched on the huge gleaming imitation vintage RCA radiogram standing in a corner of the room, and eagerly twiddled the tuning dial till he found the channel he was looking for. It was a rogue radio channel. A hip-hop remix of an Earth Wind and Fire ballad seeped out of the large speakers of the retro-modern music center.
You will find peace of mind
If you look way down in your heart and soul
Don’t hesitate “cause the world seems cold
Stay young at heart “cause you’re never (never, never, ..) old at heart
“He’s good, isn’t he?” Moses Samuel nodded his head, and at the same time seeking the ladies” approval.
“Yes, He’s cool,” Sasha said. The other girl in the room was not so committal; neither was the small, bespectacled young man who looked like a newspaper guy. They didn’t understand this type of music.
“I’d surely enjoy working with this guy. We do have a lot in common”, Moses Samuel said.
“Half of London is dying to know who he is. Keeps extremely modest for a musician, I think. I admire that”, said Sasha.
“Ex-Man,” Moses Samuel gushed. “Ex-Man; the most mysterious and perhaps the most talented musician in England. I love the name - Superhero; superstar.”
“I’ve got to go to bed now Rabbi”, Sasha said with a reverent bow. Moses Samuel pleasantly waved both ladies goodbye.
“This job you asked those men to do at the bank, do you think it has a hope of success?” the young man asked.
“Why not?” Moses Samuel seemed surprised that anyone could think this way.
“Oh well; robbing a bank with a camera. It seems such a ridiculous notion as I see it “, the man truthfully opined.
“Exactly,” Moses Samuel agreed with him. “And it is because it looks so ridiculous that is why it will succeed. Difficult to rob a bank with a machine gun; a hundred times easier to rob a bank with a camera”.
Together they had a good laugh over their ridiculous plan. The young man shut his laptop computer and lugged it out of the room, with a reverent bow at the door.
Alone in the office, at last, Moses Samuel sat behind his huge ornate oak desk nodding and humming to the music. Ex-Man’s weekly hour-long broadcast had become a phenomenon - regularly bringing the boredom index in London crashing down every Sunday night. The pirate radio came on around eleven till midnight and then completely disappeared from the air till the next week. Within a short time, it had become one hour that discerning Londoner came to look forward to.
Much of Ex-Man’s music was not new. Much of it was really a remix of old tunes but done in ways that nobody had ever thought possible. Now, Moses Samuel thought, here was one musician worth putting money on to go places. Ex-Man’s first single - “Dynomite”, had just about a month ago, hit the chart and quickly climbed up as fast as a monkey with its tail on fire. But still, nobody knew who Ex-Man was and so deliciously, neither was he going about advertising his identity.
Dynomite had been quietly released by Def Adam - a new and unknown private label - no parties, no press. Def Adam as he found out was owned by an Isle of Man company of the same name but with nominee directors, and the distribution of the four records of the label so far was being done by Michael Jah, a Jamaican agent from a shop hemmed in between two vegetable shops right inside Brixton Market. There the trail had gone dead.
“I just sell records man, I don’t sell comics. Yeah man”, the seemingly perplexed records broker had reasoned with him.
Moses Samuel had subsequently been even more intrigued by and full of respect for this unknown artist. Certainly not like any of the no-talent wannabes parading selves as musicians on the strength of being able to ingest a lot of mind-bending chemicals and scream at the top of their voices as a consequence; the papers were always plastered with their stupid faces.
Who was Ex-man? Ironically, that mystery really had contributed in a major way to the success of the new record. Moses Samuel loved that bit of irony. As a matter of fact, it was the same sort of device which had moved his life and business forward.
He walked over to another table on which sat the one-foot high scale model of what was a shopping mall, though anyone else could have called it an art gallery. It was two-stories high, looked about a hundred yards wide, and was painted up like Andy Warhol had been at work on it. Who is Moses Samuel? Yes, they did have a lot in common, him and Ex-Man; they were both definitely destined to go places. Possibly together.
CHAPTER 2
Dynoooomite!!
The wide-mouthed black youth looked like J.J. Walker from the old-time TV series Good Times. He was wearing a hooded sweatshirt and doing a mime to Ex-Man’s remix of Tony Camillo’s Dynomite on MTV. Frank O’Dwyer woke up to find the time was ten o’clock. He was horrified. When you had a boss who didn’t like you very much, and you woke up at ten o” clock on Monday morning, you knew dead cert that your ass was already grass.
Frank had fallen asleep on the couch, as he realized. An open can of Guinness was spilled on the carpet. He had no recollection of when he had popped the can or switched on the TV; he also couldn’t tell for certain how he had got home last night. It had been really a hell of a gig and a demon or two were still trapped in his head, hacking away with sharp axes and picks. Frank picked up his mobile phone and called his office at East End Mirror.
“Ellen, I am going to be a bit late this morning, I am not feeling so well,” he told Ellen Wescott, the secretary.
“Frank, you had a meeting scheduled for nine-thirty with Spencer, and He’s hopping mad. Better come in as soon as you can, but I think you’re dead meat already”, Ellen told him.
Frank’s heart sank. It was the day of the monthly departmental meeting with his boss Spencer Cowley akaThe Beast; who also owned the East End Mirror newspaper. As the journalist who handled the crime beat, Frank’s absence wouldn’t go unnoticed, at least not by Spencer who seemed quite lately to have a special place in his heart for him - a place where poisons were kept.
David Fernandez would be there of course. David was the bespectacled young Indian rookie journalist who presently covered the trivia departments and the cocktail circuit. David was okay really - quite friendly and efficient. He was also very unnaturally gifted with computers, and so prodigiously prolific that Frank suspected the little guy had programmed his computer to crank out fake stories.
David did remind him of a long time foe Phil Jenner, who used to work with The Independent but had somehow just disappeared; like fallen off the face of the earth. Phil Jenner had been quite a terror to Frank’s life because Spencer Cowley always compared Frank’s puny effort to the prodigious Phil Jenner. And so prolific had Phil Jenner been that it appeared he manufactured his own stories – like when he wanted to report a murder, he just went off and killed somebody. But somehow he disappeared, and life had since then become more bearable for Frank – until David Fernandez showed up. Later though, Frank had learned to his shame that David Fernandez just made more creative use of Google and Yahoo! Frank had afterward learned to live amicably with David since their tasks rarely encroached.
Somewhere along the line though, Spencer had determined that newspapers thrived more on gossip and trivia than on real news and thus had David become to be much more seriously reckoned with at the East End Mirror. And as David grew in importance so had Frank begun to feel his own relevance diminished. In his nightmares, the little Indian guy now played a significantly menacing role, and as a matter of fact, Frank suspected that David was being prepared to take over from him in the event of his demise, which now seemed quite near.
Never one to distress nevertheless, Frank took off his seven-inch wide plaque which said MC Wire, had a quick shower, coffee, a burnt buttered toast, and eventually set out for work. Trevor “The Mad Scientist” Cook, his tandem deejay act, did bring him home last night, he knew. Trevor had just bought a new BMW, and they’d together taken it for a spin to Brighton for a gig along with two mad West Indian chicks and two cases of wine. Pity he couldn’t now remember the girls” names.
The sun seemed unusually bright and hot this morning; shining with such intense malice. The entire world seemed to jog along sluggishly around him like gargantuan mobile Dali sculptures. Frank’s flat was mere minutes from Hackney Central, which was not too crowded at this time. From there he caught a bus to the office of the East End Mirror, located in Shoreditch, ten minutes away.
It was an open-plan office containing ten cubicles on either side of a central aisle. A conference room, as well as the office of the proprietor Spencer Cowley, was at the far end. Frank slipped in quietly, said a quick hello to Fernandez with whom he shared a cubicle. Frank had barely sat down at his desk when Spencer Cowley breezed by. He is a burly man with fat jowls and a booming voice
“Could you come with me for a little chat Frank,” he said, without a pause in his steps and without looking in his direction. Frank noted that nobody was looking in his direction either. The greetings this morning had been quite lukewarm all around - something heavy definitely seemed expected.
Frank found Spencer in the small conference room at the end of the corridor which ran the entire length of the office. Everyone remembered the room as the place where major negotiations were made: such as hiring, promotion, ass-kicking, and firing. Spencer was smoking a cigar when Frank came in, and Frank felt an irresponsible urge to point to the No Smoking sign on the wall. An irresponsible urge because here at the East End Mirror, Spencer Cowley, owner, Chief Executive, and Chief Editor was the law.
“Good morning Spencer. Sorry I was late. I wasn’t feeling well this morning when I woke up”, Frank apologized.
“Oh, of course, yes, and I guess I am the cause of it, isn’t that right? Especially as this happens so frequently. Frank, what do you think this place is about?” Spencer didn’t sound amused.
Frank grimaced. He had a very bad headache which was presently being exacerbated by Spencer’s loud voice. He looked away into the clear glass tabletop and doodled nervously on it with a finger.
“Frank, do you honestly think this newspaper is a joke?” Spencer asked, puffing violently on his cigar like a mad marijuana fiend. Frank thought this a trick question and safely kept quiet. Besides, his head hurt like hell.
“Let me put it another way, Frank, do you honestly enjoy working here?”
Against common sense, Frank this time around had an irresponsible impression that Spencer genuinely had his best interest at heart; like your anxious mother hassling you for spending the whole night out at a party. Frank looked away into the clear glass table and doodled nervously on the top with a finger.
“No I don’t enjoy working here, Spencer”, he truthfully replied; and this did somehow make him feel good.
“So why don’t you be man enough about it then and quit?” Spencer said to him, and this made Frank feel bad.
“I’m sorry I didn’t mean to say that” Frank apologized. Too late though; he found Spencer looking into his eyes with contrived pity, slowly and very sadly shaking his head.
“I’m sorry I’ve got to let you go Frank”, Spencer said to him; and this made Frank feel a lot worse. He tried to feel man enough about it nevertheless.
“Don’t I get any kind of notice?”
“Your contract entitles you to one month's notice Frank, but never mind. I have signed you a check for the next month, and you can leave today”, Spencer told him, offering a sweaty handshake.
“If you need references, I will be pleased to give you some. I’ve already given Ellen a check for you, and you may collect it immediately. Good luck Frank”.
Frank returned to his desk and silently began to empty the drawers. The entire office seemed unusually quiet and busy around him. He felt angry with them all, with Spencer Cowley and most of all with himself for handing Spencer the perfect excuse to throw him out, right on a golden platter. It hadn’t been a great job, but it paid the bills. Ellen came around a few minutes later with his check.
“He’s in a hellish mood today, innit?” She commiserated.
“Yeah, well it’s got to happen one day; and I guess the sooner, the better,” Frank puts up his brave front.
Fernandez came over, cautiously.
“Wat happened over there Frank?” he worriedly asked.
“Just lost my job. I guess you will be doing the crime watch circuit all by yourself for a while unless Spencer has found a replacement for me yet.” Frank wheezed.
“That’s awful. What are you going to do now Frank?” Fernandez sounded genuinely concerned.
“I don’t know yet. You never plan to lose your job, I believe, or do you? I’ll get by somehow, I am sure.” Frank shrugged his shoulders.
“I’m happy you can think like that. It’s all really no more than just a job, see? Just hang on to that truth and you won’t feel so bad anymore” Ellen advised.
“Thanks, Ellen,” Frank said to her and signed the voucher for his check.
“Good luck Frank, we’re going to miss you” Ellen shook his hand
“Going to really miss you, Bro. I know we didn’t get along so well on some issues, but I really think you are a great guy. Namaste.” Fernandez also emotionally took his hand.
Frank emptied much of the contents of his desk into the bin. They were mostly half-written stories that were long dead. This completed, he left the office of East End Mirror, giving one last tired salute at the door, and his few prized possessions in a little box under his arm. Spencer Cowley standing menacingly in the middle of the news office returned the salute.
Frank caught a bus home from Shoreditch to Hackney Central, looking pensively out of the window all through the journey. At Hackney Central, he bought some fruits from a stall and walked to his flat which was about two hundred yards away.
It was still just around midday. He found it strange and a really confusing experience to be home at this time of the day.
Frank put the fruits in the fridge, took out a can of Guinness, and lay on the sofa to watch MTV. The Ex-Man’s newly released video was still getting prime-time play treatment. Every time he heard the song, he always got this feeling that he knew the voice even though it had been passed through a synthesizer. But then a lot of rap often sounded quite like the same, unless you were doing it in some patent way like Snoop Dogg or even like Grandmaster Flash, who he very much thought was the boss. Frank soon drifted off to sleep.
There were three missed calls on his phone when he woke up. He dialed his voice mail. There was one message from Trevor:
“How are you doing, Frankie? You did have quite a skinful last night, didn’t you? Talk later” [click]. The second message brought him fully awake.
“Hi Frankie, it’s me Nancy. You’ll call me back, will you? [Click]”. No, he wouldn’t. Nancy Hughes was an old flame, who had house stepped on her foot three weeks ago at a rave party. Life had a way of working funny new habits into lonely people’s lives because as much as Frank had ever known, Nancy was chronically agoraphobic and would rather watch a golf game on television than from the middle of a mile wide green. That was how shocked he had been to find Nancy at a rave, where six dozen lunatics were getting smashed on cheap booze and screaming above the deafening music.
The third was from his mum in Manchester, wanting to make sure that he was still wearing clothes and not walking around naked in the night like all those hooligans. Now, Frank knew this was an important message, and if he didn’t reply to his mum’s call, she would probably come knocking on his door the next morning. So Frank called mum and assured her yes, he still was wearing clothes; no he wasn’t wearing manacles around his neck; no he wasn’t smoking pot yet, and yes He’s still got a job - the last one being now a lie.
He returned to watching television. Again the video of an EX-MAN rap rendition of Herbie Hancock’s “Chameleon” was playing on MTV. He liked it.
CHAPTER 3
When Frank woke up the next morning, he found three more missed calls on his phone. They were all from the same number and certainly didn’t belong to anyone in his phone directory. Frank had a policy of not returning missed calls from unknown callers – primarily because it costs money and again you never know whom they are from. From experience, unknown callers usually spelled trouble – debt collectors, tax office, and bank calling about your un-approved overdraft.
It was a nice Tuesday morning, and Frank was just getting into the routine of preparing for work until it suddenly occurred to him that hey you got no job, man. Nevertheless, he dressed up. The unemployed always have a place to go - the Jobcentre never turned anyone away. And in any case, the Jobcentre was the logical place to start looking for another job – theoretically.
He took Spencer Cowley’s check with him, tucking it into his shirt’s pocket; and thinking to visit the bank, later in the day. The check was not for a lot, and he didn’t imagine it would take him quite far. So he definitely needed to get a job really fast, primarily because the rent needed to get paid by the first day of each month, which was just about a week away. The last thing he needed at this time was to have himself thrown in the street. Frank thought the check was mischief really because he usually got paid by bank transfer. It occurred to him that Spencer intended to make a statement with the check - like he didn’t want to have anything more to do with Frank.
Hey, here is your pay you fucker; now get the hell out of here and don’t ever come back.
Frank hated visiting the Jobcentre, primarily because as everyone knew, it was the place where you went in hopeful and came out hopeless. There, as he expected, he found himself in the company of the drunk, the druggies, and the born layabouts-, all waiting to be fed into the omnivorous mill of the unemployment benefit processing machine.
He made a quick start at the job search computer, and it confirmed because that seemed its only purpose for which it seemed to have been made, that there was no job available for journalists within 50 miles of Hackney. Not about to completely lose hope though, Frank joined the queue to see an employment officer.
“What kind of job are you looking for?” the lady asked. Frank had a feeling that she didn’t care, and was just going through the rote.
“I am a journalist,” Frank told her. She tapped some keys on her computer, and ruefully shook her head.
“No journalist job here,” she said.
“I know that; I just checked from the computer by myself and couldn’t find any listing. I thought maybe you had some other jobs that haven’t been yet listed.” Frank replied, mildly annoyed.
“Would you be willing to consider any other job?”
Frank had a fleeting thought that having a full-time job as a disc jockey would have been so cool but he didn’t think they made jobs in that model yet; at least not in London.
“Yes, depending on what you have available. I really must pay my bills somehow”, Frank replied. Humming gaily, she tapped some more on her computer.
“I have got some vacancies for truck drivers. Do you have a license?”
“No I don’t have a license to drive anything on wheels,” Frank laughed; thinking he had no desire to drive a fucking truck.
“Door security?” She again suggested.
“I have a problem standing for long,” Frank told her.
“You wouldn’t consider a street cleaning job either I guess because of your disability?” Frank imagined she was mocking him, with the way she said “your disability.” Nevertheless, he just shook his head, thinking no way was he going to be scooping dog poop for anybody.
“Traffic warden?” She asked. Again Frank laughed and shook his head. As far as he knew, nearly everyone who owned a car was looking for a traffic warden to murder.
“Okay then, could you check back next week and we might hopefully have something along your street. In the interim would you like to sign on to receive unemployment benefits?”
At this time a mail boy passed – probably sixteen years old or so.
Get off that chair and go do some work like a man you lazy motherfucker; his disgusted eyes seemed to say to Frank.
“No I don’t want to sign on for anything,” Frank told her.
“Suit yourself then,” she said.
Frank’s bank was only a hundred yards down the street, and it took him less than five minutes to get there. A small bus with BBC stenciled on the sides was parked outside the bank, but he didn’t really pay attention to that.
The bank was a little crowded which didn’t make sense, not so early in the morning.
“What’s going on?” he’d asked the door security.
“A little bit of equipment malfunction, but I am sure all will be back to normal in a few minutes. We were alerted”, the tall happy Nigerian told him. Frank seated himself near an old West Indian granny while he waited for the queue to get moving once more.
“Hello my dearie, I am Mrs. Williams. “, the granny told him. Frank shook her hand and told her his own name.
“My name is Frank. I learn the computers have gone funny, that’s odd, isn’t it?” he asked.
“Nothing odd at all dearie; the bank is full of funny business these days, aren’t they? Last year me bring me check here. You know we old citizens get some allowance for our heating equipment and stuff. Now me hand me check over to this rass teller over there you see, and next time I look back he gone. Went away with my money; old woman money. And so about an hour later he back again, and me kick a fuss and lick him on the head with me bag. Give me back me money you thief me shout at him. And his supervisor come and beg me cool doun; cool doun he say because all the man do is go for break. Cool doun, bloodclat say to me. Can you believe that, young man? Idiot boy go for break with me money”.
Frank nodded miserably and agreed with Mrs. Williams that yes, all bank workers were thieves and must be put in prison. But she was not even halfway done yet. Mrs. Williams proceeded to recite her biography and especially the rather touching bit about her granddaughter Harriet, whose picture she carried around in her handbag and was pleased to show Frank.
“You know Harriet, poor girl who shouldn’t have married the goat goes by the name of Winston who can’t keep a job and all he do is play trumpet in a reggae band as if he in Jamaica. This is sad because living in London is hard man; not like back-a-yard in Jamaica.”
It made Frank guilty that this nice lonely lady Mrs. Williams actually thought she was talking to a nice young white man who had his life altogether. Nevertheless, he obediently nodded and agreed to all she said.
In an open cubicle, a dejected Antipodean was trying to convince his personal banker that he qualified for an overdraft, but from the look on his face, he was not making any progress at all. The banker punched some keys on her computer, made some busy humming noise, and came to a final verdict, or more correctly the computer came to a final verdict. She shook her head.
But Ozzie was not giving up easily His life depended on getting the overdraft, this being perfectly understandable since he had just lost his job, was living in a rented house with a pregnant wife, and his immigration status did not qualify him for unemployment benefit.
“For three years I have faithfully made this particular bank home to my salary, and if not for this unfortunate incident I wouldn’t need an overdraft,” he desperately pleaded his case; but the bank computer remained merciless.
Frank eventually had a chance to cash his check. He thought he should have just paid the check into his account, but another thought came to him to cash the check first.
In another part of the bank, a camera crew of four from BBC had been interviewing the bank supervisor, who was happily enjoying the show and describing how the bank security system worked. The camera crew from BBC was now leaving the bank. They were leaving with a box which looked full of money – and yes it was. The supervisor grinned at the camera, enjoying the show and explaining how the security system captured this sort of situation. Out went the camera crew into a van that had pulled up in front of the bank. The supervisor waved them away. The agreement appeared to have been for the van to drive around the block for five minutes or so and come back with the box of money, and then for the camera crew to see in the bank’s security office how the whole event had been faithfully recorded.
“Hey your bank has been robbed,” Frank told the supervisor who patiently paced the banking hall, waiting for the camera crew from BBC that failed to return.
“Of course not, they are from BBC,” he scolded – through a mind which was clogging up with fear.
“But you have been robbed, those blokes left with your money.”
“I know sir, but they will be back in a minute. They are doing a documentary on bank security for BBC”.
“I’ll be fucked if they come back,” Frank told him.
Now very sweaty the supervisor disappeared into his office. A couple of minutes later, two police squad cars wailed to a stop in front of the bank and three officers hasted toward the supervisor”s office.
“The bank has been robbed,” Frank told Mrs. Williams.
“Really? Praise the Lord, serve them right for a change”, Mrs. Williams was joyful. Struck with joy, the Australian loan-seeker, proudly stood from his chair in front of the personal banker and her evil computer; his face ecstatic.
“The bank has been robbed,” Ozzie joyfully muttered over and over as he left the bank. Finally outside he couldn’t contain his happiness anymore. He went leaping like he had experienced a profound miracle. And off he went, broadcasting the triumph of justice over greed straight into the path of a speeding Bus 242. And even as he breathed his last, a rapturous expression rested on his face.
“The fucking bank has been robbed,” he silently shouted.
“Who said that?” asked the supervisor who again returned to the banking hall this time in the company of the three unsmiling police.
“I did” Frank volunteered.
“Can you step this way for a minute please?” one of the policemen beckoned with his head. Frank found himself hustled into the supervisor’s office.
“How much do you know about this?” he was asked “Nothing more than I saw with my eyes while standing to cash my check,” Frank told them.
“You don’t know any of those men from BBC?”
“Of course not; any fool could have seen that heist coming” Frank chuckled.
The supervisor glared; he clearly didn’t like being called any fool. But in any case, he knew that in a matter of hours he was likely to be without a job and quite likely to need a lawyer to save his behind from prison. His wife and children were going to be angry with him for a long time. They finally let Frank go after taking his identification.
. Outside Frank found the building cordoned off behind police tape. The bank was now a crime scene. A large crowd had gathered to learn what had happened. Mrs. William was there right before them all; basking in the spotlight as a witness to the crime. A smaller and now dispersing crowd had gathered to see the remains of Ozzie being taken away by an ambulance.
Frank usually went to the Hard Luck Café on Lower Clapton Road to catch up on the latest news and stuff. Usually never before sundown, but today he needed somewhere to go, was short of ideas, so he ended up at the Hard Luck Café for an early lunch.
“What is the matter Frank, you’re not at work?” Lester Bowie asked. Lester was the waiter at the Hard Luck Café – once a temporary draft from the Dinosaurs Over-50s Employment Network. Lester always kept the customers irritated or amused but never alone, so Maureen Smith the owner of the café had retained him now for more than two years. At fifty-two Lester still didn’t really know what his life was about and appeared not to care anymore.
“None of your businesses, Frank told him.
“Well, since when have you ever come into here at a quarter past noon to order Bubble and Squeak and a Guinness? So I say what ales you” Lester chuckled, putting a pun on the “ale.”
“Fuck off and do your job Lester,” Frank told him.
He had picked up a copy of the Sun at a newsstand near Hackney Central, and he dived lustfully into the page three half taken up by a topless model.
“Nekkid girl, what she selling den,” Maureen laughed behind him.
“Hi Maureen,” Frank flashed her smile. Maureen was the owner of Hard Luck Cafe, forty-something full-breasted beauty with a motherly smile. Maureen always minded her business and didn’t hassle you with questions. Lester came back with Frank’s food at last and set it on the table with a wink.
“Dirty newspaper pictures make you go blind you know?” he said.
“Fuck off,” Frank waved him away, and silently ate his food while reading the paper.
Become a Private Investigator.
Somewhere in the last pages of the paper Frank again saw a small advertisement that he had noticed the previous day. It was about a private detective course or something like that. There was a phone number at the bottom of the advertisement, and having nothing else to do after his meal, he called the number.
The call was taken by a giggly girl who answered, “Hi my name is Mandy, and how may I help you?” .Frank extracted the address of Eagle Detective Training Institute from Mandy. It was somewhere near Elephant and Castle, and since it was the right day for time-wasting, Frank thought why not check it out.
While making the call to Eagle Detective Institute, Frank found that he had a missed call, and so he called his voicemail. Nancy had left another message.
Nancy. He hadn’t seen her in years and wondered what it was she wanted. Frank and Nancy had together kept a single-bedroom apartment together for almost a year. It had been so wonderful initially, two kids just having fun in all possible ways. Then Nancy had started to want more, hinting at marriage. For a guy without a steady job getting hitched wasn’t a thought that Frank thought he wanted to mess with, so he had persistently navigated away off the topic as well as he could.
But Nancy had also remained persistent, and it soon became that the only way to avoid talking about getting married was to avoid speaking with Nancy and eventually to avoid seeing Nancy, which was pretty difficult, for two people living together in a single bedroom flat.
Then Thomas had appeared on the scene. Frank had initially become sure that Nancy was seeing someone else. How else to explain that some weirdo kept sending in flowers every day
“Hey, what’s with all these flowers; the flat’s like a fucking undertaker’s,” Frank complained to Nancy.
“None of your business,” she had tersely replied; which was partly correct because even though they shared the rent, the lease of the flat was in her name. And even though Frank was relieved that Nancy was no more discussing marriage, the flowers still kept him freaked; like they forebode someone’s funeral.
Frank came in one night to hear moaning noises from the room which he used to share with Nancy before the living room couch became more comfortable for him.
The bedroom door was open, and on the bed, he found Nancy with one of his friends, Thomas Pawney; both of them naked. Angry from both the effrontery and the betrayals, Frank hauled Thomas naked out of the flat. Nancy had also done the expected and thrown Frank’s stuff out of her flat that very night.
Looking back, Frank thought that was the best thing that happened to him and Nancy. He remembered sleeping on the buses that night. Well, there wasn’t really much sleep. He just got himself on whichever bus was going the furthest distance and tried to get some sleep during the journeys. And at the terminus, he changed into another going the other way and got a bit more sleep on the way. That was how that night had passed.
Jay Winch had been a lucky find the next day. Jay, a software guy, was going off to do some better-paying gig in Chicago or wherever and needed someone to mind his flat for a couple of years. So with no reference and without a deposit, Frank had quite impossibly found himself the proud tenant of a two-bedroom flat in Hackney. The next day he called Nancy and quite maliciously told her how much he wished her and Thomas Pawney a miserable lifetime and a house full of retarded children together.
But somehow and quite impossibly Nancy Hughes had shown up at a rave party at Dalston a few weeks back, without her Thomas Pawney. Nancy had come along with two plump Scottish girls on a suicide mission from Glasgow, and who had spent the entire night knocking down Vodka shots, and the rest of the early morning vomiting them up on the sidewalk.
“What happened to Thomas Pawney?” Frank found a minute to ask Nancy during the night.
“Not my type, he wanted to marry me,” Nancy told Frank; leaving him with the conviction that most women are mad?
“Thought that was what you wanted,” Frank reminded her.
“Yes with you maybe; not with Thomas Pawney. I don’t love him”, she ruefully smiled. Being afraid of what was coming up Frank took off but not quickly enough to prevent Nancy from getting his phone number. He now ruefully regretted he had not given her a wrong number.
And so, there on my phone was Nancy for the umpteenth time in a month asking him to return her call.
Lester was watching the television with Maureen since no other customer was yet about. They were watching a football match between Liverpool FC and Arsenal. Lester normally looked to Frank as a hopeless case in his plaid apron, but today Lester really did strike him differently and invoked respect. At least Lester had a job going for him.
“You done guv?” Lester asked. Frank gave him the OK sign, took out the money from his wallet, and bailed himself from the Hard Luck Cafe.
CHAPTER 4
Frank found Eagle Detective Training Institute on the second floor of the mall at Elephant and Castle. It was a sparsely furnished small office, with only one desk, behind which he found Mandy seated, quite engrossed with her OK magazine. An ornately framed black and white portrait of a distinguished-looking gentleman with handlebar mustache supervised his discussion with the giggly Mandy, who was the o.
“I called you about one hour ago about the detective course,” Frank explained to her.
“Yes, you did. It is, of course, a home study course, and it normally costs four hundred pounds, but you can buy for only two hundred and forty-nine pounds and ninety-nine pence at the discount price if you buy today. “, Mandy went straight to business.
“That’s a lot of money, is there an installment payment option?” Frank asked.
“No, unfortunately. It’s a bargain though, and there is a certificate inside the package. After you are done with your studying you just print your name on the certificate put it in a frame and hang it in your office to prove that you are a real detective”, Mandy actually failed to see how ridiculous she sounded. She went into a store behind the office, came out with a box which she placed on the table in front of Frank.
“Heck, I can’t read all this,” Frank told her. Mandy shrugged her shoulder.
“In any case for ninety-nine pounds extra you could purchase the entire courses recorded on CDs and listen to be trained as a detective,” she advised.
“That sounds better. Okay, I will just have the CDs then.” Frank happily offered. Mandy firmly shook her head.
“No, the CDs must be bought together with the books, not alone. Don’t be lazy with your studies; it is not easy to become a detective you know.” she playfully scolded.
“That’s a lot of money,” Frank scratched his head thoughtfully.
“Well, the advertisement did say that you could actually earn a hundred quid per hour as a private detective so this is cheap. You get all your money back in four hours.” Mandy shrugged and giggled some more.
The man in the portrait appeared to glare at him with much disapproval. Frank handed his bank card to Mandy for payment. Mandy was glad to pass Frank’s card through a processing machine which dutifully deducted three hundred and forty pounds from his bank account. Mandy cheerfully wrote him a receipt.
“Who is the bloke in the picture? Is that the owner of this business? Out of curiosity, he pointed to the portrait.
“I don’t know; I met him here,” Mandy replied, returning to reading her OK Magazine.
Frank left Eagle Detective Training. He checked his phone again and found that he had another missed call. He called his voicemail; Nancy had left another message. Frank grimaced.
Lugging the parcel home took all the energy out of him. Nevertheless, back at home, he ripped open the seal of one of the boxes. He popped one of the CDs into a portable player. It was topic number two of the detective course and the title from the cover said: Tracing Missing Persons. Frank thought this could be the most interesting part of the entire course. He grimaced at the badly recorded voice of the instructor, who had obviously been reading from the course notes. He sat on the couch to listen nonetheless and was soon lulled to sleep.
When he woke up, it was around six o’clock in the evening. Taking a quick shower, he decided to visit his girlfriend. He took a bus for Stratford Station, and at the station, exit bought a bunch of flowers, and walked up to a nearby block of flats. He took the lift to the second floor and pressed the bell at the second door to the right of the lift, which was where Sade Leigh lived Hers was a two-room job, a room of which she had converted into a garment design studio. Sade was a vivacious Nigerian dressmaker, with a very colorful taste, in clothes. Frank would often wonder what she admired in him since they seemed exactly opposite in almost every way.
“Vegetables again,” Sade groaned, taking the bouquet Frank had brought and putting it in a vase.
“They aren’t vegetables honey, they are the best. They cost me a bunch at the station”. Frank laughed.
“Pity you can’t eat them, which is even worse than paying so much of good money for a bunch of vegetables, Sade playfully nagged.
“Oh, you impossible witch,” Frank contrived an agonized groan.
“Yes, I’m now going to cast a spell on you and make you take me to dinner,” Sade purred.
“Yes, yes o wicked witch, I am under your evil spell. I will take you to dinner.” Frank agreed with her.
A great film was showing that night at the Stratford cinema, and they decided to watch the film first, after which they went to Nando’s; just a stone throw away. Sitting at a feast of flame-grilled chicken and baked potatoes, Frank had more than a bit of update for Sade.
“You mean you were arrested for a bank robbery?” Sade was incredulous.
“Yes, my dear,” I knocked off a high street bank all by myself and the police let me off on good behavior,” Frank told her.
“And before that, you lost your job; so how are you going to survive Frank? Not by weekend party gigs obviously.”
“Not enough to sustain me honey; and I couldn’t certainly afford you by doing weekend party gigs.” he laughed
“So what are your plans, Frank?” Sade sounded genuinely worried for him.
“I was coming to that. Today I bought a detective course. I found that working as a detective isn’t quite different from what I did as a journalist and it certainly looks like you could make a lot more in that business. Do you know that people actually fork out as much as a hundred and fifty pounds an hour to get a private detective?” Frank told her.
“Wow!” Sade sounded full of suspicion. “A hundred pounds an hour? I don’t believe that.”
“Better believe, because it’s true. So I am going to start building myself a new and enduring profession honey”.
“So what are you going to call yourself? What is your...erm.... handle going to be like”?
“Handle? I am not a mug, sister”
“You are a really smart dummy you know; what are you going to call yourself? Under what handle will you be working ...Sam Spade…Colin Fetchit..? What is it going to be like? I personally am not going to employ Frank O’Dwyer to find even a lost cat.”, Sade was sincere.
“Yeah, you’ve got a point there. I was thinking something like Frank Xero”.
“Xero? That sounds awful”
“No, it doesn’t. Like a private investigator zeroes in on a crime and gets it solved real quick; Gerrit?”
“Well, it’s your business, not mine. It still sounds like a photocopy shop to me, like Xerox. Are you sure you aren’t going to get sued by some of these business creeps in black suits?”
“Never worry Sade. On the positive side, it is going to make me easy to remember”.
“No it’s crappy, and I don’t like it” Sade confessed “Try something more sensible like Frank Wire. It is also easy to remember I think. And it sounds rather cool. Like you are the new British werewolf – Frank Wire by day, MC Wire by night”, she giggled.
“Hey what will I do without you, o witch” Frank nipped her ear with his teeth.
“Don’t Snoop Dog me dude; not here” Sade pushed him away. “I think you are forgetting something though. Don’t you need a license for this? “
“Not as far as I know, “Frank told her. He had indeed checked earlier on his computer. Anyone with the wish could become a private detective.
Sade had updates of her own.
“I am happy for you then, and I hope you make a lot of money. I am participating in a fashion exhibition at the Barbican in a couple of weeks. It is an ethnic fashion show; I am so excited about the opportunity, Frank. It would be nice to have my designs break the ethnic barrier though. I am wishing for good contacts at the event”, she told him.
“I love your designs SADE, especially the Dashiki tops. Trevor absolutely loves them too. I hope you are going to have a lot of them on display. Very nice to wear in summer.” Frank encouraged.
“Yes, you both put a lot of business my way. I think it is time for me to break the ethnic barrier and something tells me the Barbican exhibition is going to be it, for me. “, Sade was full of hopes.
“Go for it then, girl. You’ve got awesome talent in that lovely head of yours, and it is time for you to really make it big.” Frank kissed her on the cheek. Sade put her arms around him.
“It’s not only about the money though. I am proud of where I came from, and I would wish to change some unfortunate mindsets along the way. I aim to have elegant girls black and white, modeling exquisite Yoruba fashion as you’ve never seen before. For me, this will not be just another clothing exhibition; I want it to be a major cultural statement.” Sade said.
“I believe you, honey. I am sure one day; you will make a statement that will be heard and remembered all over the world.” Frank said to her.
Together they went to the Sainsbury’s supermarket for a couple of bottles of wine for the night..
CHAPTER 5
There had been more robberies than the bank job as Frank learned from the East End Mirror. A headline read:
CAMCORDER ROBBERS STRIKE AGAIN.
Pretty small-time stuff all the robberies had been but done in the same insanely ridiculous way. A jewelry shop near Eastham got hit; they even did a pizza shop. The thought made Frank chuckle. A pizza shop getting knocked off; certainly looked very desperate to him. Somehow these stories could only be found in the East End Mirror, which Frank still dutifully read every day primarily in the hope that one day, the front page would contain a goodbye message announcing the demise of the newspaper, preferably due to the death of the proprietor, Spencer Cowley. Frank longed to be able to get rid of that dangling piece of his life – to see Spencer Cowley punished as the architect of his current unemployment situation.
But this never happened and the East End Mirror kept on. In any case, as Frank would wonder, East End Mirror was the only paper that reported these robberies, which gave the suspicion that something shady was afoot. Frank wondered whether Fernandez had at last strayed off the straight and narrow. But heck, the East End Mirror really wasn’t his responsibility anymore. He didn’t have a job with the East End Mirror anymore and therefore no business poking his nose into whatever went on there.
His payoff had dwindled very fast with bills knocking on his door daily. He had for a while swallowed his pride and tried a couple of those jobs he had previously rejected at the Jobcentre.
Frank tried the parking attendant job first, and it didn’t last two weeks. He had quickly come in contact with some of the ugliest human beings in the world.
“I know where you live,” a huge bricklayer had one afternoon told Frank as he snatched the ticket off his van, which had exceeded its time at a meter near Trinity Square Garden. The errant bricklayer’s tree trunk size arms were covered with colorful serpent tattoos, and with a finger drawn menacingly across his throat, he emphasized his threat to Frank. The threat looked serious enough, but Frank wasn’t going to make him believe that he was scared, so he flipped the man his middle finger, from twenty yards away, satisfied to see his jaw drop in both surprise and anger. Frank could feel the heat of the fellow’s anger on him till he turned a corner into another street, and off to hand in his uniform and equipment. He certainly couldn’t risk coming back here anymore.
Next, he took an easier job as a security guard at the local Tesco. It was a relatively easier beat, and Frank was stationed near the liquor shelves of the supermarket. It suggested that a lot of booze got stolen in these places, Frank would initially think. He also thought what a waste of time and money his mission was because any theft would occur between the innocent removal from the shelf and the dishonest non-payment at the check-out counter; the stolen item having disappeared in-between, into a large pocket or into an old lad lady’s bag. It was a drudge job. He thought to give the Warden job at the underground a try next; at least he would get some fresh air all day. He now had a job again and could afford not to worry about many of his regular bills, but again he had this awful feeling that his life was again definitely going down the drain.
He got a call on his phone mid-day one extremely depressing Monday.
“Is this Frank Wire?” a husky voice came to him. Frank was initially confused. Then he remembered that he had paid for a classified advertisement to run in the Loot advertisement pages, and yes he was indeed the one advertised as Frank Wire, private detective.
“That’s right sir, how may I be of help?” Frank replied with a show of importance.
“My name is Harvey Simpson; I saw your advertisement for a private investigation service.”
“Yes, that is what we do sir,” Frank told him.
“Can you meet me in about one hour; I am at the Funky Munky. Do you know the place?
“The Funky Munky at Whitechapel I presume?”
“Yes, that is the one; you know it then?” Harvey Simpson seemed happy to learn this
Frank, of course, knew the Funky Munky; together with Trevor, he’d done a few gigs there, when it was still a dancing club and before it became a bar and restaurant.
“But I can’t make it for the next two hours or so because I’m presently on a case,” Frank told him.
“Never mind; I can still wait two hours “; Harvey Simpson said.
Frank felt a surge of excitement coming into his life again. He went to his supervisor and reported sick. She didn’t look happy to hear that, but Frank wasn’t interested in her happiness. Having thus relinquished his duty at Tesco for the day; he hopped on the bus for Whitechapel.
In the afternoon much of Whitechapel Road was a market, and you had to push and shove through a mass of bodies before you could get wherever you were going. Funky Munky was located in the block of houses that flanked the entire length of the market. It was a badly lit pub, and Frank found Harvey Simpson sitting at a table near the door, but not so near the glass front that the sun could reach him. Frank didn’t know how he guessed that he would find him, Harvey Simpson, with a glass of Stout before him. Harvey didn’t offer to buy him any. Frank nevertheless took a seat in front of Harvey and orders one too.
“Do you know my wife?” Harvey asked. There was something Frank immediately found very disagreeable about this man. Not that he was a naturally evil person; far from it. Nevertheless, he had around him so miserable an aura that made him appear at least mildly schizophrenic. Indeed Harvey Simpson looked concurrently suicidal and homicidal. He certainly was not the kind of person Frank wanted to hang around having a drink with. In fact, he was not the kind of guy Frank wanted to work for. He was tempted to get up and walk away, but then remembered he’d worked for worse; he had worked for Spencer Cowley.
“Does this involve your wife them?” Frank asked needlessly.
“Yes it does, I think she’s seeing another man,” Harvey Simpson told him, his voice suddenly very weary.
“Another man such as her GP or maybe the mailman?” Frank tried to bring some laughter into his conversation, but Harvey Simpson merely scowled.
“Okay then, I think you want me to find out if he is seeing another man; like in having an affair, right?” Frank tried again.
“That’s right, Harvey said. “Is that something you could do for me?”
“Of course yes, we do it every day. I’ve got four clients presently signed on “; Frank told him.
“I want you to find out and bring me photographic evidence,” Harvey said. Harvey wasn’t interested in Frank’s business.
“My rate is a hundred pounds an hour,” Frank told him; “and this could take days you realize.”
Harvey didn’t look at him. He took out a roll of notes from his pocket, peeled off three fifties which he neatly folded and placed on the table.
“I will pay you three hundred for this job; and here is the deposit. I will pay you the balance when you deliver”, he said to Frank. This was not even near what Mandy from Eagle Detective Agency had advised, but Frank guessed three hundred pounds was a good enough start.
“Okay, I will do this for you, knowing how it feels like to have your partner cheat on you. I think we men should stick together,” Frank said. Harvey didn’t seem at all interested in Frank’s fraternal opinion either. He nodded morosely and drank from his glass. Frank stood to leave but remembered that some question needed asking.
“How am I to know what your wife looks like when I find her?” he asked.
“I thought you’d never ask”, Harvey replied with a malicious smile. He handed Frank an envelope. It contained a photograph and a slip of paper.
“That is a photograph of my wife Ida. House address is on the paper; we live in Kentish Town”.
Frank gave him a thumbs-up, disappeared the money into his coat pocket together with the envelope. He drank the rest of his beer, gave Harvey Simpson a thumbs-up, and left the Funky Munky.
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Rotimi Ogunjobi
Upton Park, East London. Someone has stolen Raj Desai’s lucky charm. His daughter has also gone missing. To the rescue comes Frank Wire, private detective by day and disc-jockey by night.
Hot on the trail of a faceless and ubiquitous organization, Frank must also escape from a gang of hoodlums, mysterious assassins, and a bothersome jilted lover from a distant past. His frantic search through the streets of London brings him in contact with its many unimaginable and grimy secrets. When his fiancé is again also kidnapped, Frank Wire knows that he must unravel the mystery of The Crooked Bullet.
THE CROOKED BULLET
A Frank Wire Mystery
By
ROTIMI OGUNJOBI
© 2021 Rotimi Ogunjobi
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
AM Book Publishing Limited
www.ambookpublishing.com
TABLE OF CONTENTS
THE CROOKED BULLET (#ulink_3accedd7-5778-5df8-b1b6-2cde33f50b98)
CHAPTER 1 (#ulink_4942ba08-e7ed-53e8-9cb6-2b984d45a4eb)
CHAPTER 2 (#ulink_4c3c0700-45ac-51ba-9abb-05faeb10313d)
CHAPTER 3 (#ulink_b81e8522-a98d-52c7-9441-59e8f73d9fdf)
CHAPTER 4 (#ulink_abcc9bbb-c085-5fea-87ee-34200aa05c49)
CHAPTER 5 (#ulink_51b19a7b-dc1d-54ea-8141-28bfcbc30918)
CHAPTER 6 (#ulink_40adad14-8e3c-5a25-b1fe-49fe2761bc75)
CHAPTER 7 (#ulink_d88169c1-9e95-5496-afb6-2699075e54a0)
CHAPTER 8 (#ulink_474299fa-e4c4-5b7e-8be8-3f3c65716e0d)
CHAPTER 9 (#ulink_a0d8aec9-9cdb-5f3a-849d-78b5e1e838ee)
CHAPTER 10 (#ulink_89d17ea6-5fc1-5161-9253-c75221045719)
CHAPTER 11 (#ulink_3a3341b7-0280-503b-af3e-60b449b2d667)
CHAPTER 12 (#ulink_8500901a-bce1-5c53-8531-fc5af544e683)
CHAPTER 13 (#ulink_512d6e1e-8363-5912-8bcd-a9a34063e29d)
CHAPTER 14 (#ulink_a382720b-9308-5b9d-99f0-5209cab2a247)
CHAPTER 15 (#ulink_502de81f-cb15-5d26-a411-ea8d2e74ee9c)
CHAPTER 16 (#ulink_e6e5a1a7-0fc5-5f92-b047-940d5903c3b9)
CHAPTER 17 (#ulink_3ac8a283-1971-5635-af2b-3d19690c88b5)
CHAPTER 18 (#ulink_c5365134-ac88-5695-b576-2a2612892dac)
CHAPTER 19 (#ulink_217353f2-e83d-5c38-9aa4-3b9345f12357)
CHAPTER 20 (#ulink_deabb3c2-1224-5216-822f-32f721ac0405)
CHAPTER 21 (#ulink_fbea07c9-d507-5fa8-ae15-a87da63991dc)
CHAPTER 22 (#ulink_829a9f41-a562-575f-a34b-8f5fec2b5949)
CHAPTER 23 (#ulink_5fd4a011-febd-5a2b-b485-ecd9981b17fa)
CHAPTER 24 (#ulink_2d45b5df-7c3f-5776-9246-f44dbcf62fe4)
CHAPTER 25 (#ulink_6e54999f-4967-5a19-a9c2-8b54aa21325f)
CHAPTER 26 (#ulink_3bb54f9f-7c04-58fa-820f-fcaddb1e7f62)
CHAPTER 27 (#ulink_b00c19c6-1c9d-5c3b-b99b-27474e2ad1b5)
EPILOGUE (#ulink_8a4ee8ac-c7f0-574e-9e8e-94e4c6f1406b)
CHAPTER 1
Upton Park, London.
Raj Desai sat alone in the back office of his jewelry shop. It was Saturday night, and the staff and security had left; but like every other night, Raj locked up by himself – he was a very careful man.
He opened the front door to peek up and down the street, Bhatti’s Jewellery was on Green Street and about a hundred yards away from the tube station. All around, the street this night teemed with African and Asian immigrants, many of whom perpetually looked defeated.
Not a lot different from what he and his wife must have looked like when they had come to live here more than two decades ago, he knew. The only appreciable commercial traffic at this time was from the Tesco supermarket. It wasn’t football day, else the pubs around would have been rowdy with drunken revelers from the stadium down the road where Westham FC played their home matches. Here on these streets, spotted with phlegm and perpetually smelling of disinfectant, he and his late wife had nevertheless found good fortune
Raj shut the door and turned the key. He failed, however, to see Kalyan Shetty his son-in-law to be, running down from the train station. Kalyan knocked eagerly on the door just as Raj turned away. He is dressed in a dark suit; obviously coming from work. Raj again opened the door to let him in and then drew down the electric-operated front window security grille.
“Good evening Papa. How are you today?” Kalyan asked.
“Very well thank you, my son. You are coming from work?” Raj Desai replied. They both spoke in Hindi,
“Yes, Papa. Rupinder says to meet her at home, but it is too early since she does not arrive from work at the hospital for another two hours. So I thought to come to have a chat with you, and then maybe go home along with you “, Kalyan said
“That is fine. She works long hours at the hospital sometimes. Too long for a woman even if a doctor.” Raj regretted.
They both entered Raj’s office at the back of the shop floor. Conspicuous on a wall of the cramped office were three portraits. One was of his deceased wife Sangita, her scowl still intimidating even in the picture. The second was of his only daughter Rupinder in her graduation attire from medical school. The third portrait was of Raj, Sangita, and Rupinder, taken twenty-two years back in Mumbai, and when Rupinder was just about three years old.
Raj looked up and pointed to the picture of Rupinder.
“She takes after her mother. Unfortunately, Sangita died when Rupinder was still a little child and left us alone.” he seemed to apologize.
“I am always sorry to hear that Papa. You have done quite well, however.” Kalyan told him.
“Oh no, she has done quite well. All that you see here in this shop means nothing to me. This shop, Bhatti’s Jewellery belonged to Sangita, and she made it a success by hard work. Only she taught me enough to be able to make it prosper still. This shop we bought the shop from her uncle Shami “Bhatti” Bhatnagar. He was widowed, quite fed up with his bad arthritis, and going back home to New Delhi. We came here poor, she determined to make us rich, and rich we became. Bhatti’s belongs to Sangita, my son, Rupinder is my only success. You will take care of Rupinder for me when you eventually get married will you?” Raj asked
“I promise Papa; I promise.” Kalyan patted his hand.
Raj opened a solid wood locker and brought out a black box, expensively decorated with black velvet and gold trimmings and about the size of a medium-size pizza box. Inside, the box was lined with purple satin. It contained a gold pendant attached to a gold chain. The pendant has the shape of a bent bullet.
“Look at this; what do you think?” Raj eagerly asked.
“It is beautiful Papa, and it looks very valuable,” Kalyan confessed.
“Yes, it is valuable. It is the Crooked Bullet. It is supposed to bring peace to the marriage. By family tradition, it must be passed to the first son to get married in the family as it had been passed down for five generations. But since I do not have a son, I will give it to you”.
“Thank you, Papa. I will take care of it and cherish it.”, Kalyan was pleased to learn.
“The pendant must not be lost though, else the result will be a life plagued with great hardship for many generations following.” Raj Desai warned.
“It will not be lost, Papa. I promise to keep it and also give it to your grandson when the time comes.” Kalyan promised
Raj closed the box, quite lovingly tucked it away again in the locker, and turned the key. Then he opened a big steel safe door to put the key in. The safe contained a lot of money that had been carelessly thrown in. He changed his mind; opened the locker once again, took out the box, and put it in the safe, nodding his head in the satisfaction that this made more sense.
“You have too much money in that safe Papa; you ought to take it to the bank at the end of every day.” Kalyan worried.
“Yes, I know. There must be more than a hundred thousand pounds inside there, which are the cash sales for the entire day. Too many customers prefer to pay cash for the jewelry you know. Sangita would have insisted that the cash should be taken to the night deposit at the bank down the road, but never mind I will do that in the morning. Nobody is coming to steal a safe my son, this is London.” Raj reasoned. Up on the wall, the scowling picture of Sangita seemed to accuse him even more and to make him momentarily nervous.
“After you and Rupinder are married, I think I will sell the shop and like old man Shami “Bhatti” Bhatnagar, return home to Mumbai.” He declared
They both exit the office, switching off the lights behind them. Raj engaged the shop security system, after which they both exit the shop through a side door, which Raj also locked. Raj’s car, a Mercedes, was parked a few yards away, and both walked slowly toward it.
There was still a bit of a chill outside; summer was still several weeks away. Raj pushed his wool cap tighter on his head and wrapped his coat tighter around him. He had been thinking of what to do next. When you were nearly sixty, life seemed to become so routine, and the choices available for nearly everything became so few. Before Kalyan arrived, he had been trying to make a choice between having dinnerat the Hyderabad Darbar Restaurant down the road or going nearer home at Romford to Aroma on High Street. And maybe thereafter going to The Bitter End pub for a pint or two and a chat with the denizens. Now he wasn’t quite sure anymore what to do with himself, his coveted companionship with loneliness suddenly broken
“Give me the key Papa, I will drive you home,” Kalyan suggested. They both entered the car and drove away into the darkness.
Later that night, a grim conference took place at an upmarket health spa known as Woodstock. The place, located near Chigwell had previously been a farm. Now it was a celebrity hideout – where the annual membership was rumored to cost nearly as much as a brand new Rolls Royce. The rules inside Woodstock were for those to whom money meant very little – the primary of those rules being that shoes were not permitted to be worn within the grounds of the estate.
The office in which the night conference took place looked quite like it had been time-warped from the sixties. Moses Samuel or Rabbi Zulu as the proprietor of Woodstock was more fondly called, was having a discussion with four men of Eastern Europe stock. Also in his office were three other people, one of them his closest aide Sasha Cohen, a slightly plump lady who habitually wore dark John Lennon glasses.
The huge room was completely decorated with vintage furniture and fittings; including a large Beatles grandfather clock and an RCA radiogram. On one of the walls were two huge posters each of them about eight feet tall. One was of the singer Isaac Hayes playing at the Sahara Tahoe in the “70s – with dark aviator sunglasses, a heavy chain around his neck, naked to the waist and looking so sweaty sexy. It was an image Moses Samuel always faithfully tried to imitate to the limit that his own white skin would permit. The other poster was of a barefooted Masai warrior in a full battle leap. This was the one around which he had built the new philosophies behind his life and business.
Only one of the four men in attendance spoke English, but they all nevertheless understood the instructions that were being passed to them.
“The bank is in Hackney. It was in there that a person I knew, a hard-working man, lost his home to them way back and killed himself as a consequence, do you understand?” The men nodded.
“Yah! Yah!”; they understood. They also still understood the intolerable iniquities of uncontrolled capitalist economics.
Moses Samuel pointed to a television camera on the table before them.
“See this thing? Real techie stuff. I had it specially made for me in China. It is not only a camera; it will also scramble all CCTV signals and disable all other security equipment, and so nobody will be able to understand what happened. After the job, you will drive away to Dover from where you will cross the channel and then get a plane to Brazil. By the time you return home in a couple of months, you will have no worries. Plus you will be rich.”
Sasha gave the leader of the men a large envelope which contained plane tickets, some fake travel documents. They nodded quietly and left with the television camera.
Moses Samuel switched on the huge gleaming imitation vintage RCA radiogram standing in a corner of the room, and eagerly twiddled the tuning dial till he found the channel he was looking for. It was a rogue radio channel. A hip-hop remix of an Earth Wind and Fire ballad seeped out of the large speakers of the retro-modern music center.
You will find peace of mind
If you look way down in your heart and soul
Don’t hesitate “cause the world seems cold
Stay young at heart “cause you’re never (never, never, ..) old at heart
“He’s good, isn’t he?” Moses Samuel nodded his head, and at the same time seeking the ladies” approval.
“Yes, He’s cool,” Sasha said. The other girl in the room was not so committal; neither was the small, bespectacled young man who looked like a newspaper guy. They didn’t understand this type of music.
“I’d surely enjoy working with this guy. We do have a lot in common”, Moses Samuel said.
“Half of London is dying to know who he is. Keeps extremely modest for a musician, I think. I admire that”, said Sasha.
“Ex-Man,” Moses Samuel gushed. “Ex-Man; the most mysterious and perhaps the most talented musician in England. I love the name - Superhero; superstar.”
“I’ve got to go to bed now Rabbi”, Sasha said with a reverent bow. Moses Samuel pleasantly waved both ladies goodbye.
“This job you asked those men to do at the bank, do you think it has a hope of success?” the young man asked.
“Why not?” Moses Samuel seemed surprised that anyone could think this way.
“Oh well; robbing a bank with a camera. It seems such a ridiculous notion as I see it “, the man truthfully opined.
“Exactly,” Moses Samuel agreed with him. “And it is because it looks so ridiculous that is why it will succeed. Difficult to rob a bank with a machine gun; a hundred times easier to rob a bank with a camera”.
Together they had a good laugh over their ridiculous plan. The young man shut his laptop computer and lugged it out of the room, with a reverent bow at the door.
Alone in the office, at last, Moses Samuel sat behind his huge ornate oak desk nodding and humming to the music. Ex-Man’s weekly hour-long broadcast had become a phenomenon - regularly bringing the boredom index in London crashing down every Sunday night. The pirate radio came on around eleven till midnight and then completely disappeared from the air till the next week. Within a short time, it had become one hour that discerning Londoner came to look forward to.
Much of Ex-Man’s music was not new. Much of it was really a remix of old tunes but done in ways that nobody had ever thought possible. Now, Moses Samuel thought, here was one musician worth putting money on to go places. Ex-Man’s first single - “Dynomite”, had just about a month ago, hit the chart and quickly climbed up as fast as a monkey with its tail on fire. But still, nobody knew who Ex-Man was and so deliciously, neither was he going about advertising his identity.
Dynomite had been quietly released by Def Adam - a new and unknown private label - no parties, no press. Def Adam as he found out was owned by an Isle of Man company of the same name but with nominee directors, and the distribution of the four records of the label so far was being done by Michael Jah, a Jamaican agent from a shop hemmed in between two vegetable shops right inside Brixton Market. There the trail had gone dead.
“I just sell records man, I don’t sell comics. Yeah man”, the seemingly perplexed records broker had reasoned with him.
Moses Samuel had subsequently been even more intrigued by and full of respect for this unknown artist. Certainly not like any of the no-talent wannabes parading selves as musicians on the strength of being able to ingest a lot of mind-bending chemicals and scream at the top of their voices as a consequence; the papers were always plastered with their stupid faces.
Who was Ex-man? Ironically, that mystery really had contributed in a major way to the success of the new record. Moses Samuel loved that bit of irony. As a matter of fact, it was the same sort of device which had moved his life and business forward.
He walked over to another table on which sat the one-foot high scale model of what was a shopping mall, though anyone else could have called it an art gallery. It was two-stories high, looked about a hundred yards wide, and was painted up like Andy Warhol had been at work on it. Who is Moses Samuel? Yes, they did have a lot in common, him and Ex-Man; they were both definitely destined to go places. Possibly together.
CHAPTER 2
Dynoooomite!!
The wide-mouthed black youth looked like J.J. Walker from the old-time TV series Good Times. He was wearing a hooded sweatshirt and doing a mime to Ex-Man’s remix of Tony Camillo’s Dynomite on MTV. Frank O’Dwyer woke up to find the time was ten o’clock. He was horrified. When you had a boss who didn’t like you very much, and you woke up at ten o” clock on Monday morning, you knew dead cert that your ass was already grass.
Frank had fallen asleep on the couch, as he realized. An open can of Guinness was spilled on the carpet. He had no recollection of when he had popped the can or switched on the TV; he also couldn’t tell for certain how he had got home last night. It had been really a hell of a gig and a demon or two were still trapped in his head, hacking away with sharp axes and picks. Frank picked up his mobile phone and called his office at East End Mirror.
“Ellen, I am going to be a bit late this morning, I am not feeling so well,” he told Ellen Wescott, the secretary.
“Frank, you had a meeting scheduled for nine-thirty with Spencer, and He’s hopping mad. Better come in as soon as you can, but I think you’re dead meat already”, Ellen told him.
Frank’s heart sank. It was the day of the monthly departmental meeting with his boss Spencer Cowley akaThe Beast; who also owned the East End Mirror newspaper. As the journalist who handled the crime beat, Frank’s absence wouldn’t go unnoticed, at least not by Spencer who seemed quite lately to have a special place in his heart for him - a place where poisons were kept.
David Fernandez would be there of course. David was the bespectacled young Indian rookie journalist who presently covered the trivia departments and the cocktail circuit. David was okay really - quite friendly and efficient. He was also very unnaturally gifted with computers, and so prodigiously prolific that Frank suspected the little guy had programmed his computer to crank out fake stories.
David did remind him of a long time foe Phil Jenner, who used to work with The Independent but had somehow just disappeared; like fallen off the face of the earth. Phil Jenner had been quite a terror to Frank’s life because Spencer Cowley always compared Frank’s puny effort to the prodigious Phil Jenner. And so prolific had Phil Jenner been that it appeared he manufactured his own stories – like when he wanted to report a murder, he just went off and killed somebody. But somehow he disappeared, and life had since then become more bearable for Frank – until David Fernandez showed up. Later though, Frank had learned to his shame that David Fernandez just made more creative use of Google and Yahoo! Frank had afterward learned to live amicably with David since their tasks rarely encroached.
Somewhere along the line though, Spencer had determined that newspapers thrived more on gossip and trivia than on real news and thus had David become to be much more seriously reckoned with at the East End Mirror. And as David grew in importance so had Frank begun to feel his own relevance diminished. In his nightmares, the little Indian guy now played a significantly menacing role, and as a matter of fact, Frank suspected that David was being prepared to take over from him in the event of his demise, which now seemed quite near.
Never one to distress nevertheless, Frank took off his seven-inch wide plaque which said MC Wire, had a quick shower, coffee, a burnt buttered toast, and eventually set out for work. Trevor “The Mad Scientist” Cook, his tandem deejay act, did bring him home last night, he knew. Trevor had just bought a new BMW, and they’d together taken it for a spin to Brighton for a gig along with two mad West Indian chicks and two cases of wine. Pity he couldn’t now remember the girls” names.
The sun seemed unusually bright and hot this morning; shining with such intense malice. The entire world seemed to jog along sluggishly around him like gargantuan mobile Dali sculptures. Frank’s flat was mere minutes from Hackney Central, which was not too crowded at this time. From there he caught a bus to the office of the East End Mirror, located in Shoreditch, ten minutes away.
It was an open-plan office containing ten cubicles on either side of a central aisle. A conference room, as well as the office of the proprietor Spencer Cowley, was at the far end. Frank slipped in quietly, said a quick hello to Fernandez with whom he shared a cubicle. Frank had barely sat down at his desk when Spencer Cowley breezed by. He is a burly man with fat jowls and a booming voice
“Could you come with me for a little chat Frank,” he said, without a pause in his steps and without looking in his direction. Frank noted that nobody was looking in his direction either. The greetings this morning had been quite lukewarm all around - something heavy definitely seemed expected.
Frank found Spencer in the small conference room at the end of the corridor which ran the entire length of the office. Everyone remembered the room as the place where major negotiations were made: such as hiring, promotion, ass-kicking, and firing. Spencer was smoking a cigar when Frank came in, and Frank felt an irresponsible urge to point to the No Smoking sign on the wall. An irresponsible urge because here at the East End Mirror, Spencer Cowley, owner, Chief Executive, and Chief Editor was the law.
“Good morning Spencer. Sorry I was late. I wasn’t feeling well this morning when I woke up”, Frank apologized.
“Oh, of course, yes, and I guess I am the cause of it, isn’t that right? Especially as this happens so frequently. Frank, what do you think this place is about?” Spencer didn’t sound amused.
Frank grimaced. He had a very bad headache which was presently being exacerbated by Spencer’s loud voice. He looked away into the clear glass tabletop and doodled nervously on it with a finger.
“Frank, do you honestly think this newspaper is a joke?” Spencer asked, puffing violently on his cigar like a mad marijuana fiend. Frank thought this a trick question and safely kept quiet. Besides, his head hurt like hell.
“Let me put it another way, Frank, do you honestly enjoy working here?”
Against common sense, Frank this time around had an irresponsible impression that Spencer genuinely had his best interest at heart; like your anxious mother hassling you for spending the whole night out at a party. Frank looked away into the clear glass table and doodled nervously on the top with a finger.
“No I don’t enjoy working here, Spencer”, he truthfully replied; and this did somehow make him feel good.
“So why don’t you be man enough about it then and quit?” Spencer said to him, and this made Frank feel bad.
“I’m sorry I didn’t mean to say that” Frank apologized. Too late though; he found Spencer looking into his eyes with contrived pity, slowly and very sadly shaking his head.
“I’m sorry I’ve got to let you go Frank”, Spencer said to him; and this made Frank feel a lot worse. He tried to feel man enough about it nevertheless.
“Don’t I get any kind of notice?”
“Your contract entitles you to one month's notice Frank, but never mind. I have signed you a check for the next month, and you can leave today”, Spencer told him, offering a sweaty handshake.
“If you need references, I will be pleased to give you some. I’ve already given Ellen a check for you, and you may collect it immediately. Good luck Frank”.
Frank returned to his desk and silently began to empty the drawers. The entire office seemed unusually quiet and busy around him. He felt angry with them all, with Spencer Cowley and most of all with himself for handing Spencer the perfect excuse to throw him out, right on a golden platter. It hadn’t been a great job, but it paid the bills. Ellen came around a few minutes later with his check.
“He’s in a hellish mood today, innit?” She commiserated.
“Yeah, well it’s got to happen one day; and I guess the sooner, the better,” Frank puts up his brave front.
Fernandez came over, cautiously.
“Wat happened over there Frank?” he worriedly asked.
“Just lost my job. I guess you will be doing the crime watch circuit all by yourself for a while unless Spencer has found a replacement for me yet.” Frank wheezed.
“That’s awful. What are you going to do now Frank?” Fernandez sounded genuinely concerned.
“I don’t know yet. You never plan to lose your job, I believe, or do you? I’ll get by somehow, I am sure.” Frank shrugged his shoulders.
“I’m happy you can think like that. It’s all really no more than just a job, see? Just hang on to that truth and you won’t feel so bad anymore” Ellen advised.
“Thanks, Ellen,” Frank said to her and signed the voucher for his check.
“Good luck Frank, we’re going to miss you” Ellen shook his hand
“Going to really miss you, Bro. I know we didn’t get along so well on some issues, but I really think you are a great guy. Namaste.” Fernandez also emotionally took his hand.
Frank emptied much of the contents of his desk into the bin. They were mostly half-written stories that were long dead. This completed, he left the office of East End Mirror, giving one last tired salute at the door, and his few prized possessions in a little box under his arm. Spencer Cowley standing menacingly in the middle of the news office returned the salute.
Frank caught a bus home from Shoreditch to Hackney Central, looking pensively out of the window all through the journey. At Hackney Central, he bought some fruits from a stall and walked to his flat which was about two hundred yards away.
It was still just around midday. He found it strange and a really confusing experience to be home at this time of the day.
Frank put the fruits in the fridge, took out a can of Guinness, and lay on the sofa to watch MTV. The Ex-Man’s newly released video was still getting prime-time play treatment. Every time he heard the song, he always got this feeling that he knew the voice even though it had been passed through a synthesizer. But then a lot of rap often sounded quite like the same, unless you were doing it in some patent way like Snoop Dogg or even like Grandmaster Flash, who he very much thought was the boss. Frank soon drifted off to sleep.
There were three missed calls on his phone when he woke up. He dialed his voice mail. There was one message from Trevor:
“How are you doing, Frankie? You did have quite a skinful last night, didn’t you? Talk later” [click]. The second message brought him fully awake.
“Hi Frankie, it’s me Nancy. You’ll call me back, will you? [Click]”. No, he wouldn’t. Nancy Hughes was an old flame, who had house stepped on her foot three weeks ago at a rave party. Life had a way of working funny new habits into lonely people’s lives because as much as Frank had ever known, Nancy was chronically agoraphobic and would rather watch a golf game on television than from the middle of a mile wide green. That was how shocked he had been to find Nancy at a rave, where six dozen lunatics were getting smashed on cheap booze and screaming above the deafening music.
The third was from his mum in Manchester, wanting to make sure that he was still wearing clothes and not walking around naked in the night like all those hooligans. Now, Frank knew this was an important message, and if he didn’t reply to his mum’s call, she would probably come knocking on his door the next morning. So Frank called mum and assured her yes, he still was wearing clothes; no he wasn’t wearing manacles around his neck; no he wasn’t smoking pot yet, and yes He’s still got a job - the last one being now a lie.
He returned to watching television. Again the video of an EX-MAN rap rendition of Herbie Hancock’s “Chameleon” was playing on MTV. He liked it.
CHAPTER 3
When Frank woke up the next morning, he found three more missed calls on his phone. They were all from the same number and certainly didn’t belong to anyone in his phone directory. Frank had a policy of not returning missed calls from unknown callers – primarily because it costs money and again you never know whom they are from. From experience, unknown callers usually spelled trouble – debt collectors, tax office, and bank calling about your un-approved overdraft.
It was a nice Tuesday morning, and Frank was just getting into the routine of preparing for work until it suddenly occurred to him that hey you got no job, man. Nevertheless, he dressed up. The unemployed always have a place to go - the Jobcentre never turned anyone away. And in any case, the Jobcentre was the logical place to start looking for another job – theoretically.
He took Spencer Cowley’s check with him, tucking it into his shirt’s pocket; and thinking to visit the bank, later in the day. The check was not for a lot, and he didn’t imagine it would take him quite far. So he definitely needed to get a job really fast, primarily because the rent needed to get paid by the first day of each month, which was just about a week away. The last thing he needed at this time was to have himself thrown in the street. Frank thought the check was mischief really because he usually got paid by bank transfer. It occurred to him that Spencer intended to make a statement with the check - like he didn’t want to have anything more to do with Frank.
Hey, here is your pay you fucker; now get the hell out of here and don’t ever come back.
Frank hated visiting the Jobcentre, primarily because as everyone knew, it was the place where you went in hopeful and came out hopeless. There, as he expected, he found himself in the company of the drunk, the druggies, and the born layabouts-, all waiting to be fed into the omnivorous mill of the unemployment benefit processing machine.
He made a quick start at the job search computer, and it confirmed because that seemed its only purpose for which it seemed to have been made, that there was no job available for journalists within 50 miles of Hackney. Not about to completely lose hope though, Frank joined the queue to see an employment officer.
“What kind of job are you looking for?” the lady asked. Frank had a feeling that she didn’t care, and was just going through the rote.
“I am a journalist,” Frank told her. She tapped some keys on her computer, and ruefully shook her head.
“No journalist job here,” she said.
“I know that; I just checked from the computer by myself and couldn’t find any listing. I thought maybe you had some other jobs that haven’t been yet listed.” Frank replied, mildly annoyed.
“Would you be willing to consider any other job?”
Frank had a fleeting thought that having a full-time job as a disc jockey would have been so cool but he didn’t think they made jobs in that model yet; at least not in London.
“Yes, depending on what you have available. I really must pay my bills somehow”, Frank replied. Humming gaily, she tapped some more on her computer.
“I have got some vacancies for truck drivers. Do you have a license?”
“No I don’t have a license to drive anything on wheels,” Frank laughed; thinking he had no desire to drive a fucking truck.
“Door security?” She again suggested.
“I have a problem standing for long,” Frank told her.
“You wouldn’t consider a street cleaning job either I guess because of your disability?” Frank imagined she was mocking him, with the way she said “your disability.” Nevertheless, he just shook his head, thinking no way was he going to be scooping dog poop for anybody.
“Traffic warden?” She asked. Again Frank laughed and shook his head. As far as he knew, nearly everyone who owned a car was looking for a traffic warden to murder.
“Okay then, could you check back next week and we might hopefully have something along your street. In the interim would you like to sign on to receive unemployment benefits?”
At this time a mail boy passed – probably sixteen years old or so.
Get off that chair and go do some work like a man you lazy motherfucker; his disgusted eyes seemed to say to Frank.
“No I don’t want to sign on for anything,” Frank told her.
“Suit yourself then,” she said.
Frank’s bank was only a hundred yards down the street, and it took him less than five minutes to get there. A small bus with BBC stenciled on the sides was parked outside the bank, but he didn’t really pay attention to that.
The bank was a little crowded which didn’t make sense, not so early in the morning.
“What’s going on?” he’d asked the door security.
“A little bit of equipment malfunction, but I am sure all will be back to normal in a few minutes. We were alerted”, the tall happy Nigerian told him. Frank seated himself near an old West Indian granny while he waited for the queue to get moving once more.
“Hello my dearie, I am Mrs. Williams. “, the granny told him. Frank shook her hand and told her his own name.
“My name is Frank. I learn the computers have gone funny, that’s odd, isn’t it?” he asked.
“Nothing odd at all dearie; the bank is full of funny business these days, aren’t they? Last year me bring me check here. You know we old citizens get some allowance for our heating equipment and stuff. Now me hand me check over to this rass teller over there you see, and next time I look back he gone. Went away with my money; old woman money. And so about an hour later he back again, and me kick a fuss and lick him on the head with me bag. Give me back me money you thief me shout at him. And his supervisor come and beg me cool doun; cool doun he say because all the man do is go for break. Cool doun, bloodclat say to me. Can you believe that, young man? Idiot boy go for break with me money”.
Frank nodded miserably and agreed with Mrs. Williams that yes, all bank workers were thieves and must be put in prison. But she was not even halfway done yet. Mrs. Williams proceeded to recite her biography and especially the rather touching bit about her granddaughter Harriet, whose picture she carried around in her handbag and was pleased to show Frank.
“You know Harriet, poor girl who shouldn’t have married the goat goes by the name of Winston who can’t keep a job and all he do is play trumpet in a reggae band as if he in Jamaica. This is sad because living in London is hard man; not like back-a-yard in Jamaica.”
It made Frank guilty that this nice lonely lady Mrs. Williams actually thought she was talking to a nice young white man who had his life altogether. Nevertheless, he obediently nodded and agreed to all she said.
In an open cubicle, a dejected Antipodean was trying to convince his personal banker that he qualified for an overdraft, but from the look on his face, he was not making any progress at all. The banker punched some keys on her computer, made some busy humming noise, and came to a final verdict, or more correctly the computer came to a final verdict. She shook her head.
But Ozzie was not giving up easily His life depended on getting the overdraft, this being perfectly understandable since he had just lost his job, was living in a rented house with a pregnant wife, and his immigration status did not qualify him for unemployment benefit.
“For three years I have faithfully made this particular bank home to my salary, and if not for this unfortunate incident I wouldn’t need an overdraft,” he desperately pleaded his case; but the bank computer remained merciless.
Frank eventually had a chance to cash his check. He thought he should have just paid the check into his account, but another thought came to him to cash the check first.
In another part of the bank, a camera crew of four from BBC had been interviewing the bank supervisor, who was happily enjoying the show and describing how the bank security system worked. The camera crew from BBC was now leaving the bank. They were leaving with a box which looked full of money – and yes it was. The supervisor grinned at the camera, enjoying the show and explaining how the security system captured this sort of situation. Out went the camera crew into a van that had pulled up in front of the bank. The supervisor waved them away. The agreement appeared to have been for the van to drive around the block for five minutes or so and come back with the box of money, and then for the camera crew to see in the bank’s security office how the whole event had been faithfully recorded.
“Hey your bank has been robbed,” Frank told the supervisor who patiently paced the banking hall, waiting for the camera crew from BBC that failed to return.
“Of course not, they are from BBC,” he scolded – through a mind which was clogging up with fear.
“But you have been robbed, those blokes left with your money.”
“I know sir, but they will be back in a minute. They are doing a documentary on bank security for BBC”.
“I’ll be fucked if they come back,” Frank told him.
Now very sweaty the supervisor disappeared into his office. A couple of minutes later, two police squad cars wailed to a stop in front of the bank and three officers hasted toward the supervisor”s office.
“The bank has been robbed,” Frank told Mrs. Williams.
“Really? Praise the Lord, serve them right for a change”, Mrs. Williams was joyful. Struck with joy, the Australian loan-seeker, proudly stood from his chair in front of the personal banker and her evil computer; his face ecstatic.
“The bank has been robbed,” Ozzie joyfully muttered over and over as he left the bank. Finally outside he couldn’t contain his happiness anymore. He went leaping like he had experienced a profound miracle. And off he went, broadcasting the triumph of justice over greed straight into the path of a speeding Bus 242. And even as he breathed his last, a rapturous expression rested on his face.
“The fucking bank has been robbed,” he silently shouted.
“Who said that?” asked the supervisor who again returned to the banking hall this time in the company of the three unsmiling police.
“I did” Frank volunteered.
“Can you step this way for a minute please?” one of the policemen beckoned with his head. Frank found himself hustled into the supervisor’s office.
“How much do you know about this?” he was asked “Nothing more than I saw with my eyes while standing to cash my check,” Frank told them.
“You don’t know any of those men from BBC?”
“Of course not; any fool could have seen that heist coming” Frank chuckled.
The supervisor glared; he clearly didn’t like being called any fool. But in any case, he knew that in a matter of hours he was likely to be without a job and quite likely to need a lawyer to save his behind from prison. His wife and children were going to be angry with him for a long time. They finally let Frank go after taking his identification.
. Outside Frank found the building cordoned off behind police tape. The bank was now a crime scene. A large crowd had gathered to learn what had happened. Mrs. William was there right before them all; basking in the spotlight as a witness to the crime. A smaller and now dispersing crowd had gathered to see the remains of Ozzie being taken away by an ambulance.
Frank usually went to the Hard Luck Café on Lower Clapton Road to catch up on the latest news and stuff. Usually never before sundown, but today he needed somewhere to go, was short of ideas, so he ended up at the Hard Luck Café for an early lunch.
“What is the matter Frank, you’re not at work?” Lester Bowie asked. Lester was the waiter at the Hard Luck Café – once a temporary draft from the Dinosaurs Over-50s Employment Network. Lester always kept the customers irritated or amused but never alone, so Maureen Smith the owner of the café had retained him now for more than two years. At fifty-two Lester still didn’t really know what his life was about and appeared not to care anymore.
“None of your businesses, Frank told him.
“Well, since when have you ever come into here at a quarter past noon to order Bubble and Squeak and a Guinness? So I say what ales you” Lester chuckled, putting a pun on the “ale.”
“Fuck off and do your job Lester,” Frank told him.
He had picked up a copy of the Sun at a newsstand near Hackney Central, and he dived lustfully into the page three half taken up by a topless model.
“Nekkid girl, what she selling den,” Maureen laughed behind him.
“Hi Maureen,” Frank flashed her smile. Maureen was the owner of Hard Luck Cafe, forty-something full-breasted beauty with a motherly smile. Maureen always minded her business and didn’t hassle you with questions. Lester came back with Frank’s food at last and set it on the table with a wink.
“Dirty newspaper pictures make you go blind you know?” he said.
“Fuck off,” Frank waved him away, and silently ate his food while reading the paper.
Become a Private Investigator.
Somewhere in the last pages of the paper Frank again saw a small advertisement that he had noticed the previous day. It was about a private detective course or something like that. There was a phone number at the bottom of the advertisement, and having nothing else to do after his meal, he called the number.
The call was taken by a giggly girl who answered, “Hi my name is Mandy, and how may I help you?” .Frank extracted the address of Eagle Detective Training Institute from Mandy. It was somewhere near Elephant and Castle, and since it was the right day for time-wasting, Frank thought why not check it out.
While making the call to Eagle Detective Institute, Frank found that he had a missed call, and so he called his voicemail. Nancy had left another message.
Nancy. He hadn’t seen her in years and wondered what it was she wanted. Frank and Nancy had together kept a single-bedroom apartment together for almost a year. It had been so wonderful initially, two kids just having fun in all possible ways. Then Nancy had started to want more, hinting at marriage. For a guy without a steady job getting hitched wasn’t a thought that Frank thought he wanted to mess with, so he had persistently navigated away off the topic as well as he could.
But Nancy had also remained persistent, and it soon became that the only way to avoid talking about getting married was to avoid speaking with Nancy and eventually to avoid seeing Nancy, which was pretty difficult, for two people living together in a single bedroom flat.
Then Thomas had appeared on the scene. Frank had initially become sure that Nancy was seeing someone else. How else to explain that some weirdo kept sending in flowers every day
“Hey, what’s with all these flowers; the flat’s like a fucking undertaker’s,” Frank complained to Nancy.
“None of your business,” she had tersely replied; which was partly correct because even though they shared the rent, the lease of the flat was in her name. And even though Frank was relieved that Nancy was no more discussing marriage, the flowers still kept him freaked; like they forebode someone’s funeral.
Frank came in one night to hear moaning noises from the room which he used to share with Nancy before the living room couch became more comfortable for him.
The bedroom door was open, and on the bed, he found Nancy with one of his friends, Thomas Pawney; both of them naked. Angry from both the effrontery and the betrayals, Frank hauled Thomas naked out of the flat. Nancy had also done the expected and thrown Frank’s stuff out of her flat that very night.
Looking back, Frank thought that was the best thing that happened to him and Nancy. He remembered sleeping on the buses that night. Well, there wasn’t really much sleep. He just got himself on whichever bus was going the furthest distance and tried to get some sleep during the journeys. And at the terminus, he changed into another going the other way and got a bit more sleep on the way. That was how that night had passed.
Jay Winch had been a lucky find the next day. Jay, a software guy, was going off to do some better-paying gig in Chicago or wherever and needed someone to mind his flat for a couple of years. So with no reference and without a deposit, Frank had quite impossibly found himself the proud tenant of a two-bedroom flat in Hackney. The next day he called Nancy and quite maliciously told her how much he wished her and Thomas Pawney a miserable lifetime and a house full of retarded children together.
But somehow and quite impossibly Nancy Hughes had shown up at a rave party at Dalston a few weeks back, without her Thomas Pawney. Nancy had come along with two plump Scottish girls on a suicide mission from Glasgow, and who had spent the entire night knocking down Vodka shots, and the rest of the early morning vomiting them up on the sidewalk.
“What happened to Thomas Pawney?” Frank found a minute to ask Nancy during the night.
“Not my type, he wanted to marry me,” Nancy told Frank; leaving him with the conviction that most women are mad?
“Thought that was what you wanted,” Frank reminded her.
“Yes with you maybe; not with Thomas Pawney. I don’t love him”, she ruefully smiled. Being afraid of what was coming up Frank took off but not quickly enough to prevent Nancy from getting his phone number. He now ruefully regretted he had not given her a wrong number.
And so, there on my phone was Nancy for the umpteenth time in a month asking him to return her call.
Lester was watching the television with Maureen since no other customer was yet about. They were watching a football match between Liverpool FC and Arsenal. Lester normally looked to Frank as a hopeless case in his plaid apron, but today Lester really did strike him differently and invoked respect. At least Lester had a job going for him.
“You done guv?” Lester asked. Frank gave him the OK sign, took out the money from his wallet, and bailed himself from the Hard Luck Cafe.
CHAPTER 4
Frank found Eagle Detective Training Institute on the second floor of the mall at Elephant and Castle. It was a sparsely furnished small office, with only one desk, behind which he found Mandy seated, quite engrossed with her OK magazine. An ornately framed black and white portrait of a distinguished-looking gentleman with handlebar mustache supervised his discussion with the giggly Mandy, who was the o.
“I called you about one hour ago about the detective course,” Frank explained to her.
“Yes, you did. It is, of course, a home study course, and it normally costs four hundred pounds, but you can buy for only two hundred and forty-nine pounds and ninety-nine pence at the discount price if you buy today. “, Mandy went straight to business.
“That’s a lot of money, is there an installment payment option?” Frank asked.
“No, unfortunately. It’s a bargain though, and there is a certificate inside the package. After you are done with your studying you just print your name on the certificate put it in a frame and hang it in your office to prove that you are a real detective”, Mandy actually failed to see how ridiculous she sounded. She went into a store behind the office, came out with a box which she placed on the table in front of Frank.
“Heck, I can’t read all this,” Frank told her. Mandy shrugged her shoulder.
“In any case for ninety-nine pounds extra you could purchase the entire courses recorded on CDs and listen to be trained as a detective,” she advised.
“That sounds better. Okay, I will just have the CDs then.” Frank happily offered. Mandy firmly shook her head.
“No, the CDs must be bought together with the books, not alone. Don’t be lazy with your studies; it is not easy to become a detective you know.” she playfully scolded.
“That’s a lot of money,” Frank scratched his head thoughtfully.
“Well, the advertisement did say that you could actually earn a hundred quid per hour as a private detective so this is cheap. You get all your money back in four hours.” Mandy shrugged and giggled some more.
The man in the portrait appeared to glare at him with much disapproval. Frank handed his bank card to Mandy for payment. Mandy was glad to pass Frank’s card through a processing machine which dutifully deducted three hundred and forty pounds from his bank account. Mandy cheerfully wrote him a receipt.
“Who is the bloke in the picture? Is that the owner of this business? Out of curiosity, he pointed to the portrait.
“I don’t know; I met him here,” Mandy replied, returning to reading her OK Magazine.
Frank left Eagle Detective Training. He checked his phone again and found that he had another missed call. He called his voicemail; Nancy had left another message. Frank grimaced.
Lugging the parcel home took all the energy out of him. Nevertheless, back at home, he ripped open the seal of one of the boxes. He popped one of the CDs into a portable player. It was topic number two of the detective course and the title from the cover said: Tracing Missing Persons. Frank thought this could be the most interesting part of the entire course. He grimaced at the badly recorded voice of the instructor, who had obviously been reading from the course notes. He sat on the couch to listen nonetheless and was soon lulled to sleep.
When he woke up, it was around six o’clock in the evening. Taking a quick shower, he decided to visit his girlfriend. He took a bus for Stratford Station, and at the station, exit bought a bunch of flowers, and walked up to a nearby block of flats. He took the lift to the second floor and pressed the bell at the second door to the right of the lift, which was where Sade Leigh lived Hers was a two-room job, a room of which she had converted into a garment design studio. Sade was a vivacious Nigerian dressmaker, with a very colorful taste, in clothes. Frank would often wonder what she admired in him since they seemed exactly opposite in almost every way.
“Vegetables again,” Sade groaned, taking the bouquet Frank had brought and putting it in a vase.
“They aren’t vegetables honey, they are the best. They cost me a bunch at the station”. Frank laughed.
“Pity you can’t eat them, which is even worse than paying so much of good money for a bunch of vegetables, Sade playfully nagged.
“Oh, you impossible witch,” Frank contrived an agonized groan.
“Yes, I’m now going to cast a spell on you and make you take me to dinner,” Sade purred.
“Yes, yes o wicked witch, I am under your evil spell. I will take you to dinner.” Frank agreed with her.
A great film was showing that night at the Stratford cinema, and they decided to watch the film first, after which they went to Nando’s; just a stone throw away. Sitting at a feast of flame-grilled chicken and baked potatoes, Frank had more than a bit of update for Sade.
“You mean you were arrested for a bank robbery?” Sade was incredulous.
“Yes, my dear,” I knocked off a high street bank all by myself and the police let me off on good behavior,” Frank told her.
“And before that, you lost your job; so how are you going to survive Frank? Not by weekend party gigs obviously.”
“Not enough to sustain me honey; and I couldn’t certainly afford you by doing weekend party gigs.” he laughed
“So what are your plans, Frank?” Sade sounded genuinely worried for him.
“I was coming to that. Today I bought a detective course. I found that working as a detective isn’t quite different from what I did as a journalist and it certainly looks like you could make a lot more in that business. Do you know that people actually fork out as much as a hundred and fifty pounds an hour to get a private detective?” Frank told her.
“Wow!” Sade sounded full of suspicion. “A hundred pounds an hour? I don’t believe that.”
“Better believe, because it’s true. So I am going to start building myself a new and enduring profession honey”.
“So what are you going to call yourself? What is your...erm.... handle going to be like”?
“Handle? I am not a mug, sister”
“You are a really smart dummy you know; what are you going to call yourself? Under what handle will you be working ...Sam Spade…Colin Fetchit..? What is it going to be like? I personally am not going to employ Frank O’Dwyer to find even a lost cat.”, Sade was sincere.
“Yeah, you’ve got a point there. I was thinking something like Frank Xero”.
“Xero? That sounds awful”
“No, it doesn’t. Like a private investigator zeroes in on a crime and gets it solved real quick; Gerrit?”
“Well, it’s your business, not mine. It still sounds like a photocopy shop to me, like Xerox. Are you sure you aren’t going to get sued by some of these business creeps in black suits?”
“Never worry Sade. On the positive side, it is going to make me easy to remember”.
“No it’s crappy, and I don’t like it” Sade confessed “Try something more sensible like Frank Wire. It is also easy to remember I think. And it sounds rather cool. Like you are the new British werewolf – Frank Wire by day, MC Wire by night”, she giggled.
“Hey what will I do without you, o witch” Frank nipped her ear with his teeth.
“Don’t Snoop Dog me dude; not here” Sade pushed him away. “I think you are forgetting something though. Don’t you need a license for this? “
“Not as far as I know, “Frank told her. He had indeed checked earlier on his computer. Anyone with the wish could become a private detective.
Sade had updates of her own.
“I am happy for you then, and I hope you make a lot of money. I am participating in a fashion exhibition at the Barbican in a couple of weeks. It is an ethnic fashion show; I am so excited about the opportunity, Frank. It would be nice to have my designs break the ethnic barrier though. I am wishing for good contacts at the event”, she told him.
“I love your designs SADE, especially the Dashiki tops. Trevor absolutely loves them too. I hope you are going to have a lot of them on display. Very nice to wear in summer.” Frank encouraged.
“Yes, you both put a lot of business my way. I think it is time for me to break the ethnic barrier and something tells me the Barbican exhibition is going to be it, for me. “, Sade was full of hopes.
“Go for it then, girl. You’ve got awesome talent in that lovely head of yours, and it is time for you to really make it big.” Frank kissed her on the cheek. Sade put her arms around him.
“It’s not only about the money though. I am proud of where I came from, and I would wish to change some unfortunate mindsets along the way. I aim to have elegant girls black and white, modeling exquisite Yoruba fashion as you’ve never seen before. For me, this will not be just another clothing exhibition; I want it to be a major cultural statement.” Sade said.
“I believe you, honey. I am sure one day; you will make a statement that will be heard and remembered all over the world.” Frank said to her.
Together they went to the Sainsbury’s supermarket for a couple of bottles of wine for the night..
CHAPTER 5
There had been more robberies than the bank job as Frank learned from the East End Mirror. A headline read:
CAMCORDER ROBBERS STRIKE AGAIN.
Pretty small-time stuff all the robberies had been but done in the same insanely ridiculous way. A jewelry shop near Eastham got hit; they even did a pizza shop. The thought made Frank chuckle. A pizza shop getting knocked off; certainly looked very desperate to him. Somehow these stories could only be found in the East End Mirror, which Frank still dutifully read every day primarily in the hope that one day, the front page would contain a goodbye message announcing the demise of the newspaper, preferably due to the death of the proprietor, Spencer Cowley. Frank longed to be able to get rid of that dangling piece of his life – to see Spencer Cowley punished as the architect of his current unemployment situation.
But this never happened and the East End Mirror kept on. In any case, as Frank would wonder, East End Mirror was the only paper that reported these robberies, which gave the suspicion that something shady was afoot. Frank wondered whether Fernandez had at last strayed off the straight and narrow. But heck, the East End Mirror really wasn’t his responsibility anymore. He didn’t have a job with the East End Mirror anymore and therefore no business poking his nose into whatever went on there.
His payoff had dwindled very fast with bills knocking on his door daily. He had for a while swallowed his pride and tried a couple of those jobs he had previously rejected at the Jobcentre.
Frank tried the parking attendant job first, and it didn’t last two weeks. He had quickly come in contact with some of the ugliest human beings in the world.
“I know where you live,” a huge bricklayer had one afternoon told Frank as he snatched the ticket off his van, which had exceeded its time at a meter near Trinity Square Garden. The errant bricklayer’s tree trunk size arms were covered with colorful serpent tattoos, and with a finger drawn menacingly across his throat, he emphasized his threat to Frank. The threat looked serious enough, but Frank wasn’t going to make him believe that he was scared, so he flipped the man his middle finger, from twenty yards away, satisfied to see his jaw drop in both surprise and anger. Frank could feel the heat of the fellow’s anger on him till he turned a corner into another street, and off to hand in his uniform and equipment. He certainly couldn’t risk coming back here anymore.
Next, he took an easier job as a security guard at the local Tesco. It was a relatively easier beat, and Frank was stationed near the liquor shelves of the supermarket. It suggested that a lot of booze got stolen in these places, Frank would initially think. He also thought what a waste of time and money his mission was because any theft would occur between the innocent removal from the shelf and the dishonest non-payment at the check-out counter; the stolen item having disappeared in-between, into a large pocket or into an old lad lady’s bag. It was a drudge job. He thought to give the Warden job at the underground a try next; at least he would get some fresh air all day. He now had a job again and could afford not to worry about many of his regular bills, but again he had this awful feeling that his life was again definitely going down the drain.
He got a call on his phone mid-day one extremely depressing Monday.
“Is this Frank Wire?” a husky voice came to him. Frank was initially confused. Then he remembered that he had paid for a classified advertisement to run in the Loot advertisement pages, and yes he was indeed the one advertised as Frank Wire, private detective.
“That’s right sir, how may I be of help?” Frank replied with a show of importance.
“My name is Harvey Simpson; I saw your advertisement for a private investigation service.”
“Yes, that is what we do sir,” Frank told him.
“Can you meet me in about one hour; I am at the Funky Munky. Do you know the place?
“The Funky Munky at Whitechapel I presume?”
“Yes, that is the one; you know it then?” Harvey Simpson seemed happy to learn this
Frank, of course, knew the Funky Munky; together with Trevor, he’d done a few gigs there, when it was still a dancing club and before it became a bar and restaurant.
“But I can’t make it for the next two hours or so because I’m presently on a case,” Frank told him.
“Never mind; I can still wait two hours “; Harvey Simpson said.
Frank felt a surge of excitement coming into his life again. He went to his supervisor and reported sick. She didn’t look happy to hear that, but Frank wasn’t interested in her happiness. Having thus relinquished his duty at Tesco for the day; he hopped on the bus for Whitechapel.
In the afternoon much of Whitechapel Road was a market, and you had to push and shove through a mass of bodies before you could get wherever you were going. Funky Munky was located in the block of houses that flanked the entire length of the market. It was a badly lit pub, and Frank found Harvey Simpson sitting at a table near the door, but not so near the glass front that the sun could reach him. Frank didn’t know how he guessed that he would find him, Harvey Simpson, with a glass of Stout before him. Harvey didn’t offer to buy him any. Frank nevertheless took a seat in front of Harvey and orders one too.
“Do you know my wife?” Harvey asked. There was something Frank immediately found very disagreeable about this man. Not that he was a naturally evil person; far from it. Nevertheless, he had around him so miserable an aura that made him appear at least mildly schizophrenic. Indeed Harvey Simpson looked concurrently suicidal and homicidal. He certainly was not the kind of person Frank wanted to hang around having a drink with. In fact, he was not the kind of guy Frank wanted to work for. He was tempted to get up and walk away, but then remembered he’d worked for worse; he had worked for Spencer Cowley.
“Does this involve your wife them?” Frank asked needlessly.
“Yes it does, I think she’s seeing another man,” Harvey Simpson told him, his voice suddenly very weary.
“Another man such as her GP or maybe the mailman?” Frank tried to bring some laughter into his conversation, but Harvey Simpson merely scowled.
“Okay then, I think you want me to find out if he is seeing another man; like in having an affair, right?” Frank tried again.
“That’s right, Harvey said. “Is that something you could do for me?”
“Of course yes, we do it every day. I’ve got four clients presently signed on “; Frank told him.
“I want you to find out and bring me photographic evidence,” Harvey said. Harvey wasn’t interested in Frank’s business.
“My rate is a hundred pounds an hour,” Frank told him; “and this could take days you realize.”
Harvey didn’t look at him. He took out a roll of notes from his pocket, peeled off three fifties which he neatly folded and placed on the table.
“I will pay you three hundred for this job; and here is the deposit. I will pay you the balance when you deliver”, he said to Frank. This was not even near what Mandy from Eagle Detective Agency had advised, but Frank guessed three hundred pounds was a good enough start.
“Okay, I will do this for you, knowing how it feels like to have your partner cheat on you. I think we men should stick together,” Frank said. Harvey didn’t seem at all interested in Frank’s fraternal opinion either. He nodded morosely and drank from his glass. Frank stood to leave but remembered that some question needed asking.
“How am I to know what your wife looks like when I find her?” he asked.
“I thought you’d never ask”, Harvey replied with a malicious smile. He handed Frank an envelope. It contained a photograph and a slip of paper.
“That is a photograph of my wife Ida. House address is on the paper; we live in Kentish Town”.
Frank gave him a thumbs-up, disappeared the money into his coat pocket together with the envelope. He drank the rest of his beer, gave Harvey Simpson a thumbs-up, and left the Funky Munky.
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Rotimi Ogunjobi
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Триллеры
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: TEKTIME S.R.L.S. UNIPERSONALE
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: Upton Park, East London. Someone has stolen Raj Desai’s lucky charm. His daughter has also gone missing. To the rescue comes Frank Wire, private detective by day and disc-jockey by night.