Full of Money Read Free Page B

who didn’t really suit. Is this coincidence, or is it Oxbridge?’
    â€˜Didn’t suit in which way?’ Edgehill said.
    â€˜Yes, in his undergrad days he was at Oxford, this one,’ Dean replied.
    â€˜Who?’ Edgehill said. ‘Did something happen?’
    â€˜We had an eye on him, as you’d expect, but then, suddenly, unnecessary.’
    â€˜The murdered journalist?’ Edgehill asked.
    â€˜I’ve got a note somewhere about Ince and the college.’
    â€˜And you’ve done surveillance on me , too?’ Edgehill said. ‘You have a note?’
    â€˜Big, ugly, official word – “surveillance”,’ Dean said. ‘Not at all one Adrian would be happy with. We’ve familiarized ourselves in a general, practical and I trust helpful fashion, that’s all. What else are neighbours for?’
    â€˜In strictly germane aspects only,’ Pellotte said.
    â€˜Germane how?’ Edgehill said. Hell, he must get a car and vary his routes. After all, you could rent a lock-up garage on the estate and not leave your vehicle unprotected in the street. But the awkward thing about ‘lock-up’ as a term on Whitsun was it didn’t really mean ‘lock-up’, not in a lasting sense of lock-up. It expressed a hope only. ‘Lock-up’ definitely indicated you could lock up the garage when you first took it over, and the lock had been checked and replaced after a previous tenant. But, soon, the lock to the lock-up would be re-wrecked by visitors one night or day, drawn to it, naturally, because it was locked up and could therefore be assumed to have something inside worth locking up, such as a car, and/or items too hot to be kept at home or offered to a fence at a decent price yet, or a stack of crack, skunk, H and other commodities. So, the garage wasn’t a lock-up except historically, and the car previously securely locked up in the lock-up was then in as bad or worse situation than parked on the street, where it would at least be in sight; if they left it there, that is.
    Also, the lock-ups tended to be in secluded, cul-de-sac corners of Whitsun Festival – and the same, probably, on Temperate Park Acres – locations where at dusk or later, or virtually any fucking time at all, group numbers could be unfavourable to you, and non-Festive and non-Temperate matters might happen when you walked to or from the vehicle, regardless of closed-circuit television surveillance, which, in any case, had usually been fucked up. On the whole, Edgehill knew the suburbs would have more comfortable conditions, including garages that were actually part of a house – i.e., integral – as with his parents’ avenue in Petts Wood, Kent, but, so far, Edgehill considered the burbs too distant – and, of course, pathetically . . . suburban. Larry had the awkward half-conviction that in his kind of work he should stay close to ordinary London lives. And this possibly meant where he was, for the present. A sort of rickety logic came into play – the only sort available to Edgehill currently. This said, forget car ownership and the very fluid meaning of that word, ‘ownership’, when applied to Whitsun cars, Larry, boy. Take public transport.
    â€˜You speak of surveillance, Larry,’ Dean said. ‘No, no, no. Intrusiveness is simply not Adrian’s style. Clearly, that would hardly be live and let live. Why would we need to do surveillance on you, for heaven’s sake, Larry?’
    â€˜Yes, we must let you get along,’ Pellotte said. ‘You’ll doubtless have a full day ahead, in preparation for the next A Week in Review . Simply, we wanted to touch base and express our approval. We are groupies of your show! But perhaps we’ll make contact again in due course. There are certain continuing matters. Substantive.’
    â€˜Oh?’ Edgehill said. He disliked the sudden