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his coffee.
    Mr Arthur Robinson had not always been a building contractor. He had originally trained as a chef. Pastry had been his speciality; no one could coax a choux bun to rise the way
he had. ‘Feeling hands,’ his supervisor at the Grand Hotel in Maidstone had told him, ‘your hands can feel, Robinson.’ He thought about it sometimes, his sensitive past. But
there was more money in bricks and mortar. It was solid, and solidity was what was required of a man with three teenage daughters and elderly parents.
    Arthur Robinson raised his bulk and wandered over to the window. Outside his portakabin, his lads were on their lunch break, sitting in companionable silence around the new cement mixer. They
were good lads, his lads. It had taken him years to put together a team like the one he had now. Most builders didn’t give a toss; easy come, easy go – operatives were two a penny.
Arthur liked to treat his employees properly. He took them out for drinks. He gave them bonuses. Once a year he took them racing and paid for the first bets. Jim the Chippie had won six hundred
quid last time, on a horse called Smiling Esmerelda. From the look on his face as it had crossed the line, Arthur Robinson knew that Jim the Chippie had never won a penny in his life. Working for
Robinson Builders was lucky for you, he liked to make them think. They were his boys.
    He returned to his desk and opened the right-hand drawer. From it he withdrew a little plastic packet. He opened it and slid the contents out onto his desk. Small round sweets in different
colours toppled out: red, orange, green, yellow and mauve. Arthur Robinson rubbed his hands together and smiled.
    As Richard approached the portakabin, it began to rain. The group of men around the cement mixer looked up at the sky. One of them swore. As they rose to their feet, Richard
called over, ‘Alright lads?’ He raised the flat of his left hand in greeting.
    The men glanced across. Most of them knew him by sight. The nearest to him nodded neutrally. The others stared.
    Richard tripped up the cement block steps and knocked on the door of the portakabin. He opened the door to see Arthur Robinson beaming at several piles of sweets which he had arranged on his
desk according to colour; a pile of red, a pile of green, a pile of orange . . .
    As Richard came in, Arthur scattered them with his hand and leant forward, placing an arm over them protectively. ‘Oh, hello Richard,’ he said hastily. ‘Surprise.’
    Richard brushed at the shoulders of his coat. ‘Raining,’ he said. He went over to a free-standing gas heater which sat burbling beneath the window. Outside, the men had disappeared.
One of them had left an open tupperware box on the ground next to the cement mixer.
    ‘I don’t have much time,’ Richard said. ‘Supposed to be on my way to Hammersmith. You got anyone you really trust?’
    Arthur Robinson had pushed his sweets to one side while Richard was talking. Now he selected a mauve one, popped it into his mouth and rolled it around while he talked. ‘Well you know
me,’ he replied genially. ‘I trust all my boys. You know the way I like to work. It’s not everybody’s way but that’s how I do things.’
    ‘Yes I know,’ replied Richard. He was still looking out of the window at the deserted yard. The tall wooden gates opposite stood open and traffic rushed and zoomed up the Kennington
Road. ‘I mean really trust. For something tricky.’
    ‘Arnolds?’
    Richard shook his head. ‘Uh-uh. There can’t be a connection. Just in case.’ He turned. ‘It’s serious. Either this gets done right or we all get blown out of the
water.’
    Arthur Robinson held Richard’s gaze. I have never liked you, you weasel-faced git, he thought to himself. Richard was smaller than Arthur, but compact. Arthur was all soft belly and fleshy
face. Richard had muscles that began on his forearm and seemed to make their way up across his shoulders to his neck in one