Read September Song for Free Online Page B

empty.
    â€˜Another?’ I said.
    â€˜Why not?’ he said.
    And, just as I raised my hand to beckon Henry over from the end of the bar where he was hunched over his cigarette, Mickey, with the impeccable timing he was known for, appeared next to me.
    â€˜What you having, Mickey?’ I said.
    â€˜That’s very good of you, Tone,’ he said. ‘I’ll have a brown ale, thanks.’
    A short coughing fit wracked Henry’s thin frame, and I waited quietly for it to subside before placing my order. I decided on a brandy for myself.
    â€˜Tone,’ Mickey said, ‘I don’t want to worry you, but Dave Mountjoy’s youngest, Ricky, has been asking around about you. Just thought you ought to know. He’s been away, for a two stretch. Attacked some geezer with a knife was what I heard. Anyway, he got out a couple of months back. He was in here at dinner time.’
    Henry plonked glasses down on the bar. He coughed again. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘He was real interested in you.’
    â€˜What did you tell him?’ I asked.
    â€˜Nothing,’ he said, taking my ten-bob note. ‘I don’t know nothing about you.’ The till dinged dully as he thumped some keys. ‘Or anybody else.’ He pushed some silver and coppers my way. ‘But I’ll tell you what: I’d watch meself, if I was you.’ And he ghosted back to his corner for another quiet smoke.
    Mickey picked up his beer. ‘Cheers, Tone,’ he said, took a huge swig and looked over the rim of his glass and inclined his head slightly in the barman’s direction. ‘Henry did happen to mention as how you was a war hero and a tough nut.’
    I groaned. That’d really scare young Ricky off, and all the other would-be James Deans, looking to make names for themselves.
    â€˜Mickey,’ I said, ‘I’m not—’
    Jerry reached out a hand and gently patted my shoulder. ‘Yes, you are,’ he said.
    â€˜Anyway,’ Mickey said, ‘Henry’s right. You should watch it. He’s a right sneaky one. My eldest was at school with him. Vicious temper.’ He drank more beer and nodded at the dartboard. ‘Fancy a game?’
    â€˜Not tonight, Mickey. And thanks for the heads-up.’
    He nodded and plodded back to the board, looking around for a victim.
    â€˜What you been up to, then?’ said Jerry. ‘And who’s this Mountjoy?’
    â€˜Nothing much,’ I said, ‘and he’s the son of someone my dad had a run-in with years ago. A not very nice someone  . . .’
    Jerry looked serious, said nothing and supped ale.

FOUR
    I brooded on Ricky Mountjoy as Jerry and I rattled along deep under London and the Central Line train squealed and screeched its way into Bank station.
    I wasn’t overly bothered by the threat posed by young Ricky, although I didn’t much fancy getting striped by his razor. It was more that his antipathy might complicate matters. It seemed likely that I’d have to have a word with his grandpa if I was going to find out anything for Daphne, and it wouldn’t be easy to talk to the old boy in the best of circumstances. I was beginning to wish I’d kept my mouth shut in Vic’s. It wasn’t as if I even knew his wife, although she had my deepest sympathy.
    As we slowly lurched and shrieked our way out of Bank, I remembered another vicious, little rat-faced sod. All the NCOs in basic training had been unpleasant bullies, but there had been one lance-corporal who’d been particularly nasty. The fact that he’d been a Geordie, and pretty much incomprehensible to me and Bernie Rosen and all the other London lads, had not improved matters. Bernie, of course, had been a professional soldier’s nightmare. Unkempt, uncoordinated, uncooperative and uncommonly clever, Bernie was not cut out to be cannon fodder. He was always on a charge of some kind, but, whether he was