"Higgins, Jack - Prayer For The Dying" - читать интересную книгу автора (Higgins Jack)

"His mother." Kristou reached for the photo and looked at it himself. "Every Thursday morning without fail, wet or fine, there he is with his bunch of flowers. They were very close."

He put the photos back in the manila folder and looked up at Fallon again. "Well?"

"What's he done to deserve me?"

"A matter of business, that's all. What you might call a conflict of interests. My client's tried being reasonable, only Krasko won't play. So he'll have to go; and as publicly as possible."

"To encourage the others?"

"Something like that."

Fallon moved back to the window and looked down into the street. The car was still there in the alley. He spoke without turning round.

"And just what exactly is Krasko's line of business?"

"You name it," Kristou said, `dubs, gambling, betting shops..."

"Whores and drugs?" Fallon turned round. "And your client?"

Kristou raised a hand defensively. "Now you're going too far, Martin. Now you're being unreasonable."

"Good night, Kristou." Fallon turned and started to walk away.

"All right, all right," Kristou called, something dose to panic in his voice. "You win."

As Fallon moved back to the table, Kristou opened a drawer and rummaged inside. He took out another folder, opened it and produced a bundle of newspaper clippings. He sorted through them, finally found what he was looking for and passed it to Fallon.

The clipping was already yellowing at the edges and was dated eighteen months previously. The article was headed The English Al Capone.

There was a photo of a large, heavily built man coming down a flight of steps. He had a fleshy, arrogant face under a Homburg hat and wore a dark-blue, double-breasted melton overcoat, a handkerchief in the breast pocket. The youth at his shoulder was perhaps seventeen or eighteen and wore a similar coat, but he was bareheaded, an albino, with white shoulder-length hair that gave him the look of some decadent angel.

Underneath the photo it said; Jack Meehan and his brother Billy leaving Manchester Central Police Headquarters after questioning in connection with the death of Agnes Drew.

"And who was this Agnes Drew?" Fallon demanded.

"Some whore who got kicked to death in an alley. An occupational hazard. You know how it is?"

"I can imagine." Fallon glanced at the photo again. "They look like a couple of bloody undertakers."

Kristou laughed until the tears came to his eyes. "That's really very funny, you know that? That's exactly what Mr.. Meehan is. He runs one of the biggest funeral concerns in the north of England."

"What, no clubs, no gambling? No whores, no drugs?" Fallon put the clipping down on the table. "That's not what it says here."

"All right," Kristou leaned back, took off his spectacles and cleaned them with a soiled handkerchief. "What if I told you Mr.. Meehan is strictly legitimate these days? That people like

Krasko are leaning on him. Leaning hard - and the law won't help."

"Oh, I see it all now/ Fallon said. "You mean give a dog a bad name?"