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Deviance
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Текст книги "Deviance"


Автор книги: J. F. Penn


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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 13 страниц)

Chapter 6



Magda sighed, her face suddenly looking much older.

"Nick's murder is just the latest in a series of worrying events. There've been a number of people going missing round here recently. Sex workers, illegal immigrants, homeless people. Not exactly the cream of society, but people from our community." Magda paused for a moment to take a sip of her coffee. "Of course these things happen everywhere, but this area is under development and many in power want us gone. Since the Shard was built, prices have shot up and there's a lot of money to be made round here," she said, referring to the 87 story skyscraper in Southwark that opened in 2012 and was still under construction. "If only they can get rid of the deviants, the misfits, those of us who don't fit their idea of the future borough."

"If we're gone," O said, "then they can pretend it's all hipsters and expensive coffee and build luxury flats over the sins of the past."

"What have the police been doing about the disappearances?" Jamie asked.

"We report all of them," Magda said. "But missing persons aren't unusual in these transient lines of work, apparently."

Jamie nodded, understanding the other side. The police didn't have the resources to tackle every MISPER in London.

Magda looked at her watch. "I've got to head along South Bank for a meeting at the Tate Modern. If you want to walk with me, I'll show you where some of the people disappeared from as we walk."

"I'll come along too," O said. "I'm heading in that direction."

They left the studio and walked back towards Borough Market, turning down Southwark Street and then into Maiden Lane. Neat terraced houses were interspersed with old converted warehouses as they approached the river.

"This was one of the main streets for prostitutes," Magda said, "back when the Globe and the Rose theatres were the center of the red-light district. Bankside was the Elizabethan Soho. If you look at maps of London, you can tell the areas where sex was for sale, although the street names are changed to something more genteel now, of course."

They walked down to the Anchor pub on Bankside, now flanked by a Premier Inn. The budget accommodation seemed appropriate to the history of the area, a place that a modern Chaucer's pilgrims might stay. Magda pointed to a service doorway round the side of the Anchor.

"A friend of ours, Milo, used to sleep rough here," she said. "He disappeared about a month ago. He preferred sleeping out to the hostels where he'd just get bothered." She smiled, her features soft in reminiscence. "He had the face of a fallen Greek god. I've got some photos of him back at the studio."

"He also had a gorgeous back tattoo," O said. "We compared ink one time. He loved dragons and they flew over his skin, scaled in hues of purple and orange flame."

"And you've never heard what happened to him?" Jamie asked.

Magda shook her head. "He's not the only one, and with Nick's murder, I'm worried that Milo may have ended up the same way." She pointed up at the Anchor pub. "The location echoes with Nick's murder, too. The Anchor used to be a brothel and a tavern, a popular place near the bear-baiting pits round the corner in Bear Gardens."

"The Stews," O said. "That's what they called this area. And it's only a block from here to the Palace of Winchester, where the Bishop who licensed the whores sat in luxury. For four hundred years, it was the Bishop's right to exploit the brothels here, and many of London's most attractive architecture is built on the proceeds of the sex trade."

Magda laughed, a hollow sound that reflected the irony of the past. "For all its official line on celibacy and prudery, the church turned a blind eye to prostitution, believing it to be something that would always be part of life. As Saint Augustine said, 'Suppress prostitution and capricious lusts will overthrow society.'"

They walked down a little further to stand on the banks of the Thames. The waters ran swift today, in hues of grey and brown. A working river for trade and commerce, as fast as the city itself, taking goods to the world.

As they continued on, Magda gazed over to the towers and high-rise office blocks on the north bank.

"Look at the City over there. A square mile of conformity, where they slander us by day and then come to play here by night."

She pointed up at a carved stone head with two faces, one pointing east towards the sea and the other west towards the interior of England.

"It's Janus, the god of two faces," Magda said. "A perfect metaphor for London."

Jamie understood the dichotomy. London was both sinner and saint. It was glamorous and gorgeous, a rich and intoxicating pleasure garden. But there was also dirt here and darkness and the stink of rotten dead, the wretched mad and crazy drunks lying in its gutters.

Magda turned to face Jamie, her eyes soft. "This is where the women of the outcast borough have always walked, where men have sinned upon them through sex and lies and judgement. But the earth beneath us and the river that flows through here has nourished us for generations. Someone or some group is trying to move us on, trying to sweep the darkness under the carpet and pretend we don't exist. That's why people are disappearing. But we're not going anywhere."

They continued west along Bankside, the south bank of the river, a popular path with tourists and locals alike. Every time Jamie walked here, her love for the city was renewed. She had been offered a job in the police far away from the city after Polly died. But this was her home now and what was happening in Southwark made her even more sure of her place here. London could rip you up and spit you out and leave you with nothing, but then you wanted more of it. And Jamie craved that edge.

A violinist played in the underpass under Southwark Bridge, the sweet strains of music filling the confined space. O gave a little twirl and put some change in the violin case, blowing the young man a kiss as she did so. There were posters for a masquerade ball pasted along the underpass walls, emblazoned with coquettish eyes peering out from colorful masks.

"You must come to the ball, Jamie," O said. "We're all going and it's going to be such fun. It's a fundraiser for cleaning up Southwark and a number of the Mayoral candidates will be there."

Jamie thought of her nights at tango, a side she had kept away from her professional life in the past. Perhaps it was time that she integrated both into her new life.

"I'll be sure to get a ticket," she said.

They emerged out of the underpass into the sun and walked a little further to the replica of Shakespeare's Globe, a magnet for tourists who snapped pictures against the backdrop of the round, white theatre.

"This was a popular place in medieval times to pick up customers," O said. She flashed a flirtatious smile at a handsome young tourist. "Perhaps it still is …"

Jamie still wasn't certain what O did. The police side of her was ready to ask, but another part wanted to encourage friendship. In the end, curiosity overcame politeness.

"Do you …"

Jamie's words trailed off but O picked up the meaning.

"Sell sex?" O said, her eyebrows raised. She appraised Jamie for a moment, as if weighing trust. "Does it matter?"

Jamie shook her head. "No, not at all. I've seen you dance and I would think you'd have people queuing up after that."

Magda grinned. "That she does – but you're picky, aren't you, O?"

They stood for a moment looking out at the Millennium Bridge, a silver parabola that spanned the Thames between the Tate Modern and St Paul's in the City. Tourists walked over it, their footsteps and happy laughter filling the air.

"I used to do a lot more," O said, "but most of my income is from dancing and modeling these days. I still have a few regulars and of course I campaign for better safety. The situation is crazy right now. It's legal to buy or sell sex, but it's illegal for women to join together in a brothel. So we can't practice safely together, we can't get security to protect ourselves from the nut-jobs who inevitably try it on. Sex work is just another kind of work after all, and we should all be safe in our jobs." Her face softened. "Most customers aren't too bad, though."

Magda stretched out her tattooed arm displaying the image of Mary Magdalene kneeling in front of Christ in the garden of Gethsemane. The reformed prostitute as the devoted servant of God.

"Many of my previous clients wanted to cuddle," she said. "To be touched by another person. They were lonely."

"Why did you give it up?" Jamie asked.

"I'm called for other things now," Magda said. "But I know how it feels to be treated the way these women are by a society that can't do without them. It's important for our community to accept the freak and the stranger." She touched the face of Mary on her arm. "The sinners."

"Who is the sinner, anyway?" O said, indicating St Paul's with a nod of her head. "Did you know that the lanes around there are some of the best pickings for the boys?"

O looked at her watch. "Right, I've gotta get to the Kitchen or I'll be late for my shift. When can I see the photos, Magda?"

"I'll have the edits for you tomorrow morning if you want to come over then?"

"Great." O leaned in and kissed Magda on the cheek.

"Can I come to the Kitchen with you?" Jamie asked. "I've heard a bit about it, but I've not been down there yet."

"Sure." O smiled. "We're always in need of a helping hand."

Chapter 7



They walked a couple of blocks into a warren of streets near Mint Street Park, finally reaching a rundown warehouse in a cul-de-sac.

"It's not much, but we try to look after our own round here," O said as she pushed open the back door and stepped into the Kitchen. Jamie followed her inside to find a storage area, shelves stacked high with tinned goods, all labeled and ordered by date. Many were over the sell-by date and O caught Jamie's sideways glance.

"We get a lot of the tins from supermarkets when they go over date," she said. "But there's a period when the stuff inside is still fine. The food bank gives out specific rations, but then we let people take what they want from the over-date bin. Sometimes that makes all the difference." She pointed at a tin of sticky toffee pudding. "I mean, come on, what's not to like about that?"

O laughed, a silvery sound that lifted the dank atmosphere of a place set up to feed the increasing number of poverty-stricken Londoners. She led the way into a commercial kitchen area where several other women had already started work. They called greetings to O as she passed.

"Can you help Meg with chopping vegetables? We've got to get the stew on." O pointed Jamie towards an older black woman with dreadlocks tied back in a blue patterned scarf. She stood by a large sink with a mountain of potatoes in front of her and a box of carrots and other mixed veg next to it.

"Of course." Jamie headed over and introduced herself, grabbed a peeler, and started on peeling the carrots. Although tentative at first, Jamie was soon into a rhythm. There was a meditative state in food preparation, a repetition that left the mind free to wander.

"This stew is for the evening run," Meg said. "It's best to cook it for a long time to soften the offcuts of meat that we get, so we have to start cooking it soon. We get a load of regulars every night and then we take any leftovers out into the parks round here." She smiled and Jamie saw that her teeth were crooked and bent. The wrinkles in her skin were deeper than a woman of her age should have and there were faint scars around her neck. Meg put down her knife and Jamie noticed her hands shaking, perhaps a symptom of long-term alcohol abuse.

"For some who sleep rough, it's their only meal of the day." Meg pointed to a number of round mixing bowls on the side, covered in tea towels. "That's bread, too – we make it ourselves. We have an allotment out east. That green veg is from our garden." There was a quiet pride in Meg's voice and Jamie wondered about her past. Her own tragedy was just one voice in a city of hurt and sometimes it was good to get some perspective, to realize how much others suffered too. Everyone dealt with life in their own way.

O's laugh rippled through the kitchen area and Meg looked up.

"She's magic, that one," she said. "Keeps everyone's spirits up, even when we're overrun. She can bring a smile to the most depressed of our clients, and I've seen her face down a huge man high on meth. She's fearless."

Jamie watched O as she organized the various teams with a smile and a personal touch that left people beaming. She made them laugh with light remarks, always remembering their names. Jamie thought how different this place was from the police, how isolated she had been there. Her own independence had been partly to blame, but as a woman in a male-dominated environment, she had definitely felt left out. But here she might find a place in a community that really seemed to care for its people.

"Time, everyone," O called out and went to the front door, unlocking it to allow a stream of people into the front area, set up with long tables and benches. They had clearly been queuing outside and they knew the drill. They were quiet as they came in, taking a bowl and lining up for thick porridge liberally doused in white sugar.

One woman with cardboard pieces tied around her body hefted her plastic bags into one corner and stood silently in line.

An old black man shuffled forward with little steps, his gait evidence of Parkinson's, his hands shaking as he reached for a bowl.

A waif of a girl slid through the door, a dirty denim jacket over a short dress, her arms wrapped around herself for warmth. Her eyes were black with kohl and darted around with nervous energy, her movements jerky and jolting.

The smell of unwashed bodies pervaded the cooking area, but no one reacted to it. Jamie supposed it was nothing unusual here. She finished the carrots and began chopping the bunches of green leafy veg. Meg pulled two huge saucepans from a rack and began browning onions and garlic, her shaking diminished as she concentrated on working.

O served strong instant coffee from a big vat, handing it to each person with a smile and a welcome. There was no judgement in her eyes as she looked at them, and Jamie saw that her respect gave the homeless more dignity. They walked to the benches a little straighter in posture, their humanity restored even for a brief moment. Jamie had seen the other side of poverty in the police: the crime and domestic abuse that often resulted from money problems. She had seen these people as criminals, but O and her team saw them as people needing food, warmth and a community.

After everyone had been served, O went around the benches, speaking in low tones to each person. She carried a bunch of leaflets, clearly trying to help with advice as well as food. The waif-like girl kept her head down as O approached, turning her face away. But O sat down next to her, whispering soft words and after a few minutes, the girl reached out a hand and took a leaflet about the sexual health services she could access.

The breakfast service soon finished and as each person left, a young man on the door gave each one a brown bag. He had a blue streak in his blond hair and Jamie recognized him as the guitar player from the Cross Bones memorial. Some people snatched the bag away without thanking him, but others were effusive in their gratitude. One woman had tears in her eyes as she left, clutching the bag close to her chest as she walked out into the day.

"Right, let's get the benches to the side and start weighing out today's rations." O rallied the team as Jamie helped Meg add the meat to the pans and begin to brown them, adding some oregano and other herbs. A delicious smell began to waft through the warehouse, drowning out the unwashed stench that still lingered. The smell of cooking reminded Jamie of the opulence of Borough Market, where food carts overflowed with amazing produce at prices only few could afford. This place was just a few streets away and yet here, they were scraping the barrel to feed the hungry.

"We can't give people anything they want," Meg said, noting Jamie's interest in the rationing preparations. "There are rules for the food bank and we have to weigh out rations for people who come to make sure there's enough for all. We give them three days' emergency food based on the stamps that they bring for themselves and their families." Meg shook her head, a look of despair on her face. "Problem is that some days we don't have enough food here to feed all who come. Makes you wonder, don't it?"

O organized the packing of boxes, some with more perishable food in them than others. Jamie knew that some families didn't even have a way to cook, so there was a balance of tins to whatever fresh food they could get hold of. O made sure to add a couple of apples to each box and Jamie noticed her frown as she surveyed the room, a shadow crossing her beautiful face as she calculated what they had left.

Meg crumbled some stock cubes over the meat, added salt, and poured in a kettle of hot water on top of each pan, then covered them with lids.

"We'll let these simmer for a while now," she said. "I'll get the bread on. Why don't you go help pack boxes? I can manage here."

Jamie walked through the kitchen area and joined in the packing production line, finding a place next to the young man who had been on the door.

"First day?" he asked Jamie, as he added a tin of beans to a box before passing it on to her. Jamie added a packet of macaroni cheese and passed the box to the next woman.

"I guess so," Jamie said, realizing that she would come back here. Looking at the Kitchen made her doubly grateful for what she did have, and she knew that it was only luck and circumstance that put her on this side of the fence.

"We have our ups and downs," the young man said. "Some days we win and we feed everyone. Other days one of our regulars doesn't show up and we hear of suicide or death in the streets. But Southwark is our community and this is our way of caring." He smiled at Jamie. "This place saved me, that's for sure."

O stepped up to the table, a broad grin on her face.

"Ed is one of our regulars. He's a superstar." Ed blushed under O's praise and Jamie saw a glimmer of the unspoiled youth beneath his harder exterior. O brought that out in people. "How are you finding it, Jamie?"

"I'm amazed at everything you do here," Jamie said. "I had no idea, honestly. I'd love to come and help again."

O smiled. "We'd love to have you back." She looked at her watch. "Ten minutes," she called across the room and everyone on the line speeded up their box packing. "Hungry people incoming. Let's feed them all today."

Chapter 8



"We have to shut down that soup kitchen," Mrs Emilia Wynne-Jones said, clutching her designer purse to her chest like a shield as she stood to speak. "It's a danger to the schoolchildren who walk that route every day. And all those homeless beggars …" She shook her head. "One of them might harm a child, because they're probably sex offenders, you know. It's criminal to let them sleep there."

"Not to mention that it's affecting the house prices in the area," one of the older men in the hall said with a grunt, thumping his walking stick on the ground for emphasis.

The church hall echoed with murmurs of assent as the gathered crowd shifted on their seats. The tabled agenda had been finished and now they were onto Any Other Business, which usually consisted of a litany of complaints.

Detective Superintendent Dale Cameron nodded, his face serious as he met the eyes of the complainants. He always enjoyed the meetings of the Society for the Suppression of Vice. They were full of his kind of people, those who were ready to take the hard decisions necessary to make the city great again. After years of focused ambition, his day job was finally taking him into a position of real power.

He looked out at the crowd in front of him – the older stalwarts near the front, middle-aged men and women who voted to get rid of immigrants and return Britain to the white paradise they believed could exist in a multicultural world. Towards the back were a younger group, men with shorn heads and thick-soled boots, hands deep in pockets and wary eyes. They brought physical energy to the old who gathered to complain every week. They were the ones Dale Cameron really aimed to inspire. Men who only looked for a leader to give them permission to act.

Dale nodded at the discussion, his face set with concentration as he listened with one part of his brain even as the other dissected the crowd. He was aware of the impression he made on them. He exuded confidence and control, and years of studying body language had given him an ability to change his behavior to manipulate any situation. With his salt and pepper hair and trim runner's body, he looked more like a corporate CEO than a senior police officer. Not that he expected to be in the police for much longer. He was running for Mayor and fully intended to win.

As the discussion tapered off, he held up his hand for quiet. His authority silenced the room in seconds.

"You all know that I stand for cleaning up the city," Dale said, his voice strong and well measured. "That includes moving the homeless out of the central areas and into communities further away. There's plenty of council housing up north, if we can only get people to accept it."

"Ungrateful little –"

"What are you going to do about the sex workers?"

"When are you going to develop Cross Bones?"

"How will you deal with the drug problems of Southwark?"

Dale held up a hand again, calming the barrage of questions.

"I share the concerns of the Society," he said. "But I can only act with a mandate as Mayor. City Hall is around the corner, so it makes sense that my first acts will be cleaning up my own borough."

"Hear, hear," someone shouted, and Dale smiled out into the crowd. He made eye contact with many of them as applause rang out around the church hall. As they clapped, a ray of sunshine split into myriad colors on the floor, filtered by the brilliant stained glass windows above. Jesus fed the five thousand in one window and healed the blind on another. Dale found himself thinking of Borough Market round the corner. These days, Jesus would probably have to feed the hungry with multigrain spelt bread and wild salmon, that's how entitled they all were.

"You can help drive out the sex workers and the drug addicts," Dale said, and his eyes met those of the hard men at the back. "Report them to the police. Make it difficult for them to work. Make life more unpleasant for them and they will move on – or go back to their own countries."

The applause began again, and then it was time for tea. A queue formed in front of the dais of those who wanted a little one-on-one time with Dale. He would give them all the time they wanted, understanding that every individual connection was one more vote for him in the Mayoral election. His campaign manager was right – it was all about 'high touch.'

As his team organized the line, Dale accepted a china cup of tea from a frail old woman. Her liver-spotted hands shook as she handed it to him. Her eyes were rheumy and her skin sagging around a face that had witnessed the cultural change of the city since the Second World War.

"It's good that you're here, love," she said. "None of those other politicians understand that we have to reclaim what belongs to us before it's too late. It's time to stamp out the cockroaches and you're the man to do it." She patted Dale's shoulder and shuffled away, leaving him to ruminate on the surprising nature of some of the members.

The Society for the Suppression of Vice had been started in the nineteenth century to promote public morality, a successor to the Society for the Reformation of Manners. Dale liked the overtones of the word reformation, but manners were something few cared about and didn't quite have the dramatic ring to it. But who could object to the suppression of vice, a word that conjured all the nasty, dirty things that went on under cover of darkness. Surely no one could openly support those making money from vice – the prostitutes, the drug pushers, the criminals. Who would stand for them? Of course, Dale thought, as he took another sip of his tea, such obvious vice was merely the thin end of the wedge. He wouldn't rest until the city was clean in all senses of the word.

His idea of a future London centered around the temple of Salt Lake City, a beacon of shining white against a backdrop of blue. Not because of faith, but because of those who looked to it as the pinnacle of good behavior and of perfect obedience.

Whereas London … Dale shook his head as he stirred his tea. Well, London had been a melting pot of multiculturalism, artistic expression and personal freedom for far too long. The Society sought to redress the balance and take back the city for morality – pushing a right-wing agenda that would move the poor on benefits out of the city, clean up the streets of hookers and drug pushers, scrub the stain of graffiti from the walls of Shoreditch and Hoxton and renew a sense of pride in the city.

One of the younger men from the back approached and Dale waved him forward. The man sat opposite him and leaned closer. His jaw was much larger on the left than on the right, an asymmetry that Dale tried not to stare at. The man smelled of tobacco smoke and fried bacon. The thought of a breakfast fry-up made Dale's stomach rumble.

"There's some of us that want to help with your campaign," the man said. "We work out at the boxing gyms in South London and there's a lot of support for what you want to do. If you need us, give me a call. Here's my card."

The man handed over a business card with frayed edges and a blue boxing glove in the middle. Dale took it, noting the scars on the man's knuckles.

"Thank you, I appreciate the offer. There will definitely be leafleting to be done over the coming weeks." Dale met the man's steel gaze and saw that they understood each other. "I'll have my office call you."

They shook hands and the man walked off without looking back.

A well-preserved middle-aged woman sat down next, her designer outfit coordinated in shades of camel and ivory. She placed her knees together, her slim legs and high-heeled shoes tucked under the chair. She placed her hands in her lap, manicured nails with a hint of natural color. A large diamond sparkled on her left hand alongside a gold wedding band. Dale noticed how soft her hands looked and he wondered briefly how they would feel on his skin.

"Detective Superintendent –" she began, her eyes darting to his.

"Dale, please," he said, putting a hand briefly on her knee. She colored a little and raised a hand to her neck, touching the pulse point there.

"Oh. Dale, then." She smiled and he saw opportunity in her gaze. Flirting was always a good way to get another vote.

"I'm part of a group within the church," she said. "We're trying to encourage the sex workers into an abstinence program. We've had some success, but we'd like to get official backing from the Mayor's office. Perhaps even some funding?"

Dale smiled, pouring sincerity into his gaze.

"Of course, that's the kind of program I'd like to encourage. Once I'm elected, I'd appreciate it if you could submit your proposal to my office. I will personally make sure it gets the proper attention."

"Thank you," the woman said, her smile wider now. "Our aim is to honor what the original Society intended."

Dale knew that the Society had been formed by William Wilberforce in order to stem the immorality so rife in the Georgian period, when prostitution added almost as much to the economy as the thriving London Docks. It aimed to ban public drinking, swearing, lewdness and other immoral and dissolute practices, as well as ending the obscenity of pornography and disorderly pubs and brothels. It was a good model for the modern Society. But in Dale's opinion, they had made one mistake that still rippled through the strata of Britain. By banning what they called 'obscene publications,' they had also stopped the distribution of contraceptive advice to the working classes, giving rise to more births amongst the poor.

One of Dale's intentions was to introduce a substantial one-off payment to any woman who underwent sterilization, which would encourage those worse off in society to stop breeding. About bloody time the class balance was redressed, he thought. Once the dregs of society were dealt with, then he would start trying to get the right sort of people to have more babies. They would need a working group on how to influence more intelligent women to stop pursuing aggressive careers. It was an unfortunate correlation that the more educated a woman was, the fewer children she had.

"May I have your autograph?" the woman asked, pulling a pad from her handbag. "Once you're Mayor, you'll be far too busy."

She bent forward and Dale caught a trail of her scent in the air. Ponds Cold Cream. His breath caught in his chest and he was back in that room with his mother. As she stroked the cream into his skin, the door had slammed open. His father stood in the doorway, still wearing his police uniform, his face red from drinking after his shift. You little faggot. His father's voice had been a growl, an animal sound as he stepped towards them with fists clenched.

He always rolled up his sleeves before he began, revealing the tattoos on his forearms. One arm displayed Justice as a beautiful woman holding a sword in one hand, her weighing scales in the other, blood dripping beneath from her blindfold. The other arm was inked with the words his father lived by: When justice is done, it brings joy to the righteous but terror to evildoers. Psalm 21:15. Dale understood his father's right to discipline his family – it was how he felt about London now. After all, spare the rod, spoil the child.


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