JACK OF DIAMONDS

Reggie sat on the train holding the violin case as though his very life depended on it; considering where he's bringing it, he thought, that could well be true. Dressed in the only suit he owned--threadbare and faded, the elbows shining faintly in the afternoon light--he hardly felt like the gentleman he hoped he looked like. Wearing a dark brown pinstripe--a colour Claire said did nothing for him--he pulled his tie loose and looked out of the window at the slowly disappearing countryside. The lush, green rolling hills of Devon had too quickly given way to the stark industrial reality of what would soon be London. And when did that happen, he wondered? One moment, he's sitting in his seat looking at the passing countryside, and the next moment, they're near a tenement row of houses, with swings and picnic tables in the yards.That was the moment he realized he hadn’t missed it. He shifted uneasily in his seat, his hip feeling sore because of all the time he’d spent sitting in the one position.

It'd been more than five years since he’d been to London—has it really been that long? he wondered—realizing now that he’d left London to get away from the dirt and squalor of what life had to offer him before the War. Before the War, his had been a life of dirt and squallor, and he imagined it would be the same dirt and squalor for a great many of the people living there still. He could see now that he needed the peace and quiet of the countryside, and while he knew the man he was before the War would’ve never thought it possible to leave that life behind, now he wondered how he could’ve lived like this in the first place.

It’s the colour, he told himself, shifting uneasily in his seat again. Devon's all greenery and open fields, and London, well, London’s London, isn’t it?

There was plenty to see and do in a place like London, he knew, and he was sure Claire would’ve loved the idea of coming along, but that part of London never interested him. He wasn’t a man to enjoy the art, and architecture the city had to offer. That was Artie’s world, he’d told her; a man like himself was never meant to be a part of that world. While people would do what they could to enjoy the natural beauty of the city’s parks and walkways, he was more concerned with trying to escape the noise and confusion of a burgeoning traffic problem that seemed to crop up with the new century.

Reggie could only see London as a place to get away from.

That’s the way life was, or is, in the city, he told himself. While before the War…well, it always comes down to that, doesn’t it, for all of us.

His had been a life of violence and crime, and it took the War for him to realize that life was more precious than that. There's more to life than London’s streets, he told himself, stepping out of the train at Paddington Station. The cold hit him with a slap and he felt it in his hip as it sifted through his pants, reminding him of what the cold could be like. He was woefully unprepared, he realized.

Gloves would’ve been nice, he thought, or maybe a heavy coat.

Death had always been the only price to pay when he was younger he reminded himself as he made his way out of the crowded station. He’d be glad to get away from these shunting trains with their sibilant whistles of hissing steam pissing out of unseen valves. The crowd was enormous, and only served as a reminder of how much he hated being here.

Give me the peace of the countryside, he thought, quickly realizing there was nothing left for him here. His father had been a miserable drunk more inclined to beating his children than providing them with a safe haven. My sons will have a different life, he swore. It was nothing to shiv a man in an alleyway and take whatever he had, simply because you were bigger, badder, and meaner. Men like him were feared because they lived outside the law, and when you lived beyond the law, the rules of Man didn’t apply—not if you were smart, he thought. If you let yourself get beaten down, if you don’t fight for yourself, no one else is going to do it for you. As soon as he’d understood there was no one there watching his back, or simply watching over him—knowing he had to take care of himself because there was no one else—that was the moment he realized his life could be moulded into whatever he wanted to make of it. That was when he’d learned how to fight. As a child growing up, he’d been beaten by his father, his brothers, as well as the older children of the neighbourhood. By the time he was a teenager, he knew he’d never live to see old age. Boys like him were not meant to live long, he remembered one old codger from the streets telling him.

Cannon fodder, he’d called me.

And while it may not have mattered to him when he was a young London tough walking through the streets of Soho in the rain, things were different once he’d found himself laying in a shell hole with a shattered hip, the big guns blasting overhead, all the while praying none would fall on him—and then after, praying they would. He remembered laying on his back, his hands pressing his helmet down, sobbing into the mud and fighting the pain down as shells burst around him day and night. Your bones would rattle, and the concussion would blow you off your feet if a shell dropped nearby—which had happened to him, he remembered.

If it was too close, it’d blow your insides out through your asshole. There are no atheists in a shell hole.

He remembered hearing that once, but he couldn’t tell you where he’d heard it; except that he’d add: just rats. Five days in agonizing pain. No food, or water—but plenty of rats, he reminded himself, plenty of rats—until he was forced to drink the muddy water he was laying in. It wasn’t hard to see how a man’s life might take on new meaning having faced certain death from the moment he wakes up, until the moment he lays down. He’d been lucky to maybe catch three or four hours of sleep—and that only when he passed out from the pain. It’s hard to believe in the future when everything you believe in is dying all around you.

It's the same here in London, and don’t tell me no different, he thought, his hip already burning. There was no future for him here he realized as he made his way through the streets. After five days in that shell hole, he wanted nothing more than to embrace the future.

But not in London, he told himself, looking into the eyes of every man he approached with a sense of defiance; daring them to try and stare him down. He couldn’t say what it was he was looking for, until he saw the flash of a hammer hanging from the inside of a coat. It was subtle, but enough that he’d seen it. He kept his eye on the lad as he crossed the terminal.

It’s good to know that Charlie’s boys are still applying their trade.

Hammerboys. Looking for targets—rubes and marks like himself, he thought.

He instinctively held the violin case closer.

Once he left Paddington Station, he began making his way out to Soho. The prospect of a long walk after sitting in the train for all those hours didn’t appeal to him, and he knew it would probably aggravate his hip, but he didn’t have a lot of money and couldn’t see himself wasting it on a Tube system he didn’t understand. Besides, he liked to know where he was, and there’d be no way of knowing that if he couldn’t see where he was. The buses were just as bad. He’d looked at a schedule, but it made no sense to him.

Before the War, he would’ve waved down a hack. Back in those days, people knew the name Reggie O'Dowd. They were willing to take him wherever he wanted to go because he paid, and paid well. He could see those days were gone now, and set out for London Street, heading toward Hyde Park. From there, it would be a short trek to the Marble Arch, through Mayfair and then into Soho.

Thirty minutes.

Tops.

He’d always liked the Mayfair neighbourhood, with it’s rich, in-your-face opulence. He was never one to hold wealth against a person--as long as that person earned it. It was another matter if a man inherited his wealth. Those were people who felt as if they were entitled to their wealth. Just like the six families back in Devon, he reminded himself. Mayfair may have been home to the aristocracy a hundred years ago, but now it was just as likely to be home to a business tycoon who fought his way up from the streets. There was something to be said about how far a man might reach with no regard to class or titles.

The wind blows the same in Mayfair as it does in Devon, he thought, and picked up his pace, feeling the pain in his hip like a dull throb—I'll bet you I'd feel the same after being beaten with a cricket bat, he told himself. The trees lining the streets of Hyde Park on his right had all turned to colour, their leaves all but gone now with the wind, and he could see the fragile husks of what were once leaves blown up against walkways and buildings, chasing the wind, or being chased, it didn’t matter he told himself.

He soon found himself skirting through the Park, feeling the wind cut through him. He swore at himself again for not having worn a heavier coat. Leaving the Park, he crossed over to Oxford Street, surprised at the sight of heavy traffic on the wide open avenue. Recently becoming a major thoroughfare since the last time he'd been in London, all he could think of were were the horses and wagons of his youth replaced by omnibuses, lorries, and automobiles the likes of which he’d never see in the country. It was the noise and the steady influx of traffic that struck him, though. In his youth, there would be an endless tattooing of horse's hooves on the paving stones--a seraphic sound softened into melody by the the very stones themselves--the screams of hawkers selling their wares, and children playing endless games, while stealing from the vendors. Now, there was the chugging machinery of motorcars, lorries, and omnibuses; the sibilating squeal of hissing tires on wet stones, of horns blaring endlessly, and the heavy stench of exhaust that seemed to hang in the air as thick as the London fog. There were no more vendors, and what children he saw reminded him of his own, harsh, childhood.

There's no future here for their lot.

*

The Arrogant Frog was a small pub on the corner of Greek Street and Moor in Soho--where the two streets converged on Old Compton Street. Reggie knew it as Charlie Sabini’s old haunt and was hoping he’d find him at his usual table. Because some things never change, he told himself, and Charlie's always been a creature of habit. He could see Hammerboys everywhere he looked, watching him as he looked through the front window. Sunlight slipped in through half-drawn venetian blinds, scattering across the stained floor through upturned chairs resting on the tabletops.

He pushed the door open, watching the dust motes floating in bars of light, dancing at the end of a wispy broom a barmaid was using to sweep the floor. The girl looked up briefly, hesitating at her chore, the broom at a stutter before she turned to look at the barman standing behind the counter, who nodded briefly. The bottles and glasses lining the wall briefly caught the light coming in through the door, reflecting diamonds of light that shimmered across the room. A lazy fan with one broken fin slowly spun in the shadowy depths of the timbered ceiling, a trail of cobwebs caught in its orbit as if they were the tail of a distant comet.

Charlie looked up briefly from the newspaper he was reading, and laughed, kicking a chair out from under the table toward Reggie. A squat, square shouldered man with a florid face, and small pince nez glasses, Charlie sat stooped over a cup of coffee as he read his newspaper. Reggie wondered if it was the lack of proper lighting, or poor eyesight causing Charlie to lean over the newspaper; he knew it wasn't the coffee. That was just a prop. He wore a three piece suit with a matching waistcoat of olive green pinstripe, as well as black and white wingtips shoes. Charlie picked up his hat and gloves, moving both across the table, smiling a gap-toothed grin as Reggie reached for the chair.

“Hello, Charlie,” Reggie smiled, laying the violin case on the table, directly in front of Charlie.

Sitting in the chair with his back to the sunlight, Reggie relished what little warmth the sun had to offer. It's a far cry from being outside, he thought, shifting his hip uncomfortably in the chair.

“I’d ‘eard you were dead, Reg,” Charlie said briefly, looking up from his newspaper. "Apparently that was a mistake."

“More of an exaggeration,” Reggie smiled. "Wishful thinking, maybe?"

Charlie nodded, sitting back in his chair, studying Reggie. He rested his hands on his chest, his fingers laced, his thumbs hanging onto the sleeve openings of his waistcoat. Suddenly, looking as if he'd come to a decision, he looked at the violin case and shrugged, then leaned forward and turned the page of his newspaper.

“What’s this?” he asked, leaning back and taking a sip of coffee.

“A mutual friend of ours sends it with his best regards,” Reggie laughed.

“A mutual friend? What kin’ o’ mutual friends we got, Reggie?” Charlie asked, and leaning forward again, opened the violin case. He looked at Reggie with a quizzical knot of his brow.

“What’s this, then?” he asked again, and sitting back in his chair decided it was time to clean his glasses. He replaced them on his nose and turned his attention back to his newspaper, turning the page and scanning the headlines. There was that same quizzical knot of his brow as he scanned the page.

“Can you believe this guy?” he said, pointing at the page. “Fuckin' Germans. Guy thinks he can take over the country, so he organizes a coup, but none of his followers follow him. And why would they, I ask you? Just look at the man. Goddamned Germans. When they gonna learn?”

“I don’t know. I don’t follow politics too much, Charlie.”

“No? Well, maybe you should?” Charlie smiled up at him. “I follow it a lot. You have t’ if you wanna survive in this line of work. Politicians, judges, police, you have t’ know who’s pockets t' line if you wanna stay safe. And you have to know who the nutbars are. This man?” he pointed at the photograph, "this man is a nut. You can see it in his eye. But the real scarey part of it is the people he has following him. Thousands of them. And that's just Munich.

“You've always been good with that part of the business.”

“You runnin’ 'round with thieves now, Reggie, is that it?” Charlie asked, changing the subject with a simple turn of the page.

“I wouldn’t go as far as to say that.”

“No? But surely you know the man I expected this t’ come from; he’s a thief, Reggie.”

“I wouldn’t know anythin’ about that, Charlie?”

“No? Then how did you come by it?”

“I told you, he's a friend of mine. He's someone I met during the War.”

“Someone you served with?” Charlie smiled, and leaning forward turned the page again. “Don’t sound t’ me like you left your old life behind, Reg. Sounds t’ me more like you’re part of the concern. Is that what you are, Reg? Are you part of the concern?”

“I’m out of it, Charlie. For good.”

“An’ how’s that?”

“What do you mean, ‘how’s that’? I simply am.”

“An’ yet—out of the blue—you bring me this violin as...what? A peace offering?”

“I told you, he’s someone I know from the War. I’m doing this as a favour for him.”

“A favour?”

“That’s right, Charlie. I owe him.”

“You owe him?" he said, and sat back in his chair. He took another sip of coffee. "Where you livin’ these days, Reg? I heard you moved out to the country. Is that true? I din’t wanna believe it myself. I mean, a farmer? You? I was certain you’d be coming back home, but you din’t. Why’s that? You like farming?”

“Funny as it sounds, I do. There was nothin’ here for me t' come back home to Charlie.”

“Nothin’? There’s plenty ‘ere, Reg, an' all ripe for the pickin’, I’ll have you know. A lot of the old Vets, when they came back, did well for themselves. They’re not afraid to mixed it up, if you know what I mean. They all got that nothin' to live for attitude you need t’ survive, especially out here. You don’t seem t’ have that about you anymore; not like you did before.”

“Maybe that’s on account of me thinking I got something to live for? I learned a lot about what mattered most to me, what, with shells dropping all around me and me waiting to die because I couldn't move.”

"Couldn't, or wouldn't?"

"Couldn't Charlie, because my hip was shattered and my back was busted. Five days I laid there, with no food, or water. I finally broke down and drank the muddy water I was laying in. It was pink from my own blood. And when it rained, I was certain I was going to drown. I called out into the night, as loud as I could. I'd call, and they'd hear me. They shot flares in the air, to see if they could spot me. They sent patrols out searching, and still, it took them five days to find me. What does that tell you about the size of it, Charlie? That they could hear a man calling out to them for help, and it still takes them five days to find him?"

"Jesus, Reg."

“That's why I got me a little farm out in the country—I inherited it, too. Got me a letter from some lawyer while I was laid up in a Paris hospital bed for God knows how many months.”

“And now you live in Devon?”

“Who told you I was in Devon?”

“You don’t think I asked, Reggie? Like I said, I'd heard you were dead, and then I heard you were alive. So I asked around. I didn’t say anythin’ about it because you obviously din’t wanna come back here, an' I can respect that. A man wants t’ go the straight an’ narrow, I say let 'im. But now you show up with this violin—an’ it’s a very valuable violin, I’ll have you know—an’ you say it’s from a friend. A mutual friend of ours, who just happens to be a thief.”

“An’ he wants me to say he's sorry.”

“He’s sorry? Pooh, pooh, Reggie. No! You’re sorry when you hurt someone accidentally. You’re sorry if your actions lead t’ someone losin' something they value—like a favourite cricket bat, or a good football. Does that make any sense? But when you break into a place an' steal what doesn’t belong t’ you—a diamond bracelet given by someone—you’re not sorry. You’re just a thief. That's something that's done with intent. It’s almost like a conviction—okay, that may be a poor choice of words—but a belief, if you want. Call it a belief. Or maybe it's nothing more than a pastime? All the same, that’s somethin’ that can never be forgiven.”

“What are you telling me?”

“What am I telling you!” He slammed his hand down on the table and leaned forward, pointing a finger at Reggie to make his point. “You tell that son-of-a-bitch I want my pound of flesh. ‘E’s not gettin’ off that easy. He still owes me, an' he’ll do what I tell him, when I tell him. Do you think you can do that, Reggie?”

“Why you gotta be like that, Charlie?”

“Why?” Charlie smiled, leaning back in his chair and looking down at the newspaper again. He picked up his coffee one last time, drank and dropped it down on the table, then turned the page of his newspaper.

“Do you know about this, Reg?” he asked, pointing at the page.

“Who’s that?” Reggie asked, leaning over to look.

“Howard Carter? Ever heard of him.”

“Sounds familiar. Who's that?”

“He’s the bloke what found all that treasure buried in some pyramid in Egypt. King Tut’s tomb? Surely, you've heard of that?”

“King Tut? Sure? What about him?”

“Well, it’s cursed, isn’t it?”

“Cursed? How's that?”

“Kinda like your friend. He’s cursed. He broke into my place--my mistress's to be honest--an' took my treasure—just like this Carter bloke. Only their treasure was cursed, like I said. They din’t pay any attention to that though, did they? They just chalked it up to ancient superstition, an’ because of that, people died.”

“He’s dead?”

“No. Not Carter. Curses don’t work that way, Reggie. But the man behin’ it all—the man with the money? He’s dead.”

“How’d he die?”

“Like I said, there was an ancient curse, an’ as soon as they opened the tomb, they let the curse out."

"I find that hard to believe."

"The money man wasn’t the only one who died, Reg.”

“No? Who else?”

“A lot of the workers who dug in the tomb, died.”

“So what’re you trying to say?”

“I think you know. Your friend’s cursed.”

“And by association, me?”

“You?”

“Yeah. Why tell me about all these workers on site are dying if that’s not a promise of things to come?”

“Not you, Reggie! You're just the messenger, right? But your friend? Well, he has family in Kent. At least, that’s where his sister is at the moment. I've been watching her. An’ there’s an uncle here in the city. They run an insurance brokerage. The family business. They insure things like this,” he smiled, pointing at the violin. “Of course, I could never go in there and ask them to insure it, because it’s stolen, but you get my drift.”

“I’m sure I do.”

“I thought you might.”

“So what happens to me, then?”

“You?”

“C’mon, Charlie, how long have I known you?”

“Since we were kids.”

“That’s right. And haven’t I always played straight by you?”

“You did. And what’s that I used to say?”

“ ‘Don’t shoot the messenger.’ But you always did, Charlie.”

“I’m not gonna shoot you, Reg. I am gonna offer you a job.”

“I'm not interested in doin' any kinda jobs.”

“I got a meet set up with my some Russian friends I've recently met.”

“Russians? Now you're dealing with Russians?”

“Hear me out before you decline my request, Reg. The Solomon brothers got some sort o’ deal happenin’ between them an’ the Russians, and, well, they asked me t’ help ‘em out. I guess they're thinkin’ maybe I know how to speak Italian? I don't know.”

“But the Solomon brothers?”

“It's just a little protection job for the Russians. It's right up your alley.”

“What kinda protection? An' why are they coming to you?”

“I think they're hopin’ t’ raise some serious coin flippin’ a shipment o’ dope. They asked me t’ get them in with the Sicilians. They wanna sell to the Solomons."

"The Solomon's are looking to buy dope? And they come to the Russians looking for it? The same Russians who asked you to broker a deal between them and the Sicilians--who if I'm not mistaken, are already selling heroin in the city. Did you tell them they’re outta their fuckin’ minds?”

“It might have. Can’t quite remember if I did or not, you know? I thought you din’t follow politics?”

“Hard not to know ‘bout some things. Like that Carter bloke.”

“Well, is there ever such a thing as a lost cause?”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Nothin’. That's the best part of the deal. You just stand there lookin’ big an’ tough, the way you used to. Harry Solomon has a history of double-crossin’ geezers, you know that. I just don’t want anythin’ goin' wrong. He could've maybe made a deal with the Micks, for all I know.”

“What've they got to do with any of this?”

“Nothin’. But I heard they’re pokin' around town looking for a line on somethin’ of theirs what got nicked.”

“Someone hit the Micks?”

“Nabbed a load of guns, they did.”

“So now they’re all over this as well?”

“I’ll give you twenty pounds.”

“Twenty?”

“It’s more money than you’ll get from anyone else in town.”

“I don’t need the money. I won't take it.”

“Sure you do, Reg. Ever’one needs money. Besides, it’s one night’s work. It’s just a delivery. Nothin’ can go wrong. ”

“But you I don’t trust myself with him about.”

“Who? Harry Solomon? Yeah, and I asked myself why? Do you know, I couldn't even remember why. I gotta ask myself, don’t you like the Jews?”

“That has nothing to do with it. Just because I don’t like Harry Solomon, or his brother, don’t mean I don’t like the Jews. I just don’t like that particular Jew. I don’t trust him. I should've killed him years ago.”

“Do you want a gun?”

Reggie shook his head. “Don’t need the temptation.”

“What temptation?”

“Of shooting Harry Solomon, of course.”

Charlie laughed. “You do this for me, an’ we’ll be square. Our mutual friend is free--for this yime. I won’t come after him, or his family.”

“An’ we’ll be square?”

“Tight,” Charlie smiled, holding out his hand.

Reggie considered, and then leaned forward, shaking on the offer.

“And when do you need me?”

“Tomorrow, in Plymouth.”

“Plymouth?”

“Look at it this way, at least you’ll be half way home.”