Dead Man's Time

make ends meet. Thing is, you
see—’
    Lucas Daly interrupted him. ‘I’m looking for Lawrence Powell.’
    ‘Yeah? You’ve found him.’ He gave him a stony stare.
    ‘I’m a mate of Amis Smallbone. He told me to tell you that you’re a tosser.’
    Lawrence Powell grinned. Then, looking uneasily, first at the Apologist then back at Daly, he said, ‘Thought he was still inside.’
    ‘He’s out.’
    ‘He’s a fucking idiot, that one.’ He shook his head, then tapped the side of it. ‘Nutter. So what can I get you, gentlemen?’
    ‘A San Miguel and a Diet Coke.’ Daly glanced at the Apologist for approval, and got it. The man never drank alcohol. ‘Do you have any food?’
    ‘Crisps.’
    ‘That all?’
    ‘Plain or cheese and onion?’
    ‘One of each.’
    The drinks arrived, with the crisps. Daly dug into them hungrily, while the Apologist drained his Coke. The barman stood, silently and patiently, behind the bar. ‘So, Amis is all
right?’ he asked.
    ‘He was needing a good dentist, last time we saw him.’ Daly smirked at the Apologist, who nodded pensively, but distractedly, as if his mind was on some forgotten sadness.
    ‘I’m looking for some people living out here,’ Daly said. ‘I’m told you know them. Eamonn Pollock, Tony Macario and Ken Barnes?’
    ‘You’ve got nice friends,’ Powell replied.
    ‘I only do quality.’ Lucas Daly glanced at a barstool, two away from where he was sitting. He could see the bullet hole in the top of the seat, where a previous occupant had been
shot through the groin in an argument over a woman. He’d been in here when it had happened, and still winced, five years on, at the screams of pain from the .38’s recipient.
    ‘They shouldn’t be hard to find,’ Larry Powell said. ‘Eamonn Pollock’s halfway up his own asshole. You just need a powerful torch. Tony Macario and Ken Barnes are
all the way up it. They’re so far up it they could clean his teeth through his throat. They’re easyJet gangsters, them two.’
    ‘Meaning?’ Daly asked.
    Powell shot a glance at the group in front of the television, to make sure none of them was listening, then leaned forward conspiratorially. ‘They do jobs for Pollock. He keeps his nose
clean and his belly filled with the proceeds of their labour. Nice work. He fixes jobs for them in England, pops them on an easyJet flight. Twenty-four hours they’re back here. He makes sure
never to use anyone with a British criminal record. No dabs, no DNA.’ He shrugged, and sipped his lager.
    ‘And if someone I knew wanted any of them whacked?’ Daly asked.
    Lawrence Powell shrugged again. ‘Not a problem. Give a Moroccan a Bin Laden.’
    Daly swigged down some of his beer, straight from the bottle, frowning.
    ‘What? Did you say,
Give a Moroccan a Bin Laden
?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Can you talk in English?’
    Lawrence Powell led them outside onto the terrace, and pointed out across the Mediterranean, at two hazy shapes on the horizon. ‘That lump of rock is Gibraltar. The other’s North
Africa. Morocco,’ he said. ‘Their police have a useless fingerprint database and an even more useless national DNA database. A Moroccan can come over here, do a hit and be back in his
own country before the police have even reached the crime scene. He’ll be harder to find than a specific grain of sand in the desert.’
    ‘And a
Bin Laden
?’ Lucas Daly asked.
    ‘A five-hundred-Euro note. They say they’re as elusive as Bin Laden was.’ Powell grinned. ‘Morocco’s a short ferry ride away from Ceuta.’ He jerked a finger
to his left, west. ‘A Moroccan can live a couple of years on that kind of dough. Life’s cheap there.’
    ‘And you have access to these Moroccans?’ Daly asked.
    ‘I have access to everything.’ Lawrence Powell rubbed his index finger and thumb together.
    Behind them, in the bar, there was a loud cheer as someone scored.
    Back inside, Daly put a hundred Euro note on the counter, followed by four more.
    Powell slipped them behind the bar. ‘So what’s in it for me?’ He looked at them expectantly.
    ‘How long does it take you to deliver?’
    ‘Same day service. Just bell me.’ He pushed a business card across the counter.
    Daly slipped it in his wallet, then pulled another hundred Euro note out and placed it on the counter. Powell looked at it like it was a dog turd. Daly added a second. ‘Pollock, Macario
and Barnes. Where do I find them?’
    Powell raised three fingers,