“And your aunt? She doesn’t mind?”

“I haven’t spoken to her. As long as you treat her well, you’ll be alright. If you mess her around, though, she’ll have your balls.” He said this with a bright smile but Edward knew that there was truth, and a gentle warning, in his words.

* * *

BILLY WAITED UNTIL EDWARD WAS ALONE. He was sitting at the bar, taking a whisky and smoking a very good cigar. It had been a decent evening, all things considered. The nonsense with Joseph had been put behind them and Edward had started to feel more optimistic. He felt more comfortable. With a little luck, he would be able to restore things to the right footing, the way he saw them in his more optimistic moments: he would bring himself closer to Joseph, he would demonstrate his value and then, over time, he would make them realise that they needed him. He was working on that. It was going very well.

There was Chiara, too. He would be around the family all the time and they would grow to accept him; to like him, even. Violet and George would see the error of their foolish assumptions. He had paced himself carefully through the evening and, although he was starting to feel the effects of the alcohol, he was still reasonably clear-headed. He felt suddenly hopeful and strong and, allowing himself a little scope for celebration, he downed the remnants of the whisky and enthusiastically ordered another.

Billy took the stool next to him. He smelt of alcohol and cigarette smoke. “Having fun?” he said.

“I am,” Edward replied, managing to smile at him. “Good party.”

“I want a word.”

“Oh yes?”

“It’s about you, actually.”

“Not now, old chap,” he said, nervously looking down at the tumbler in his hand. “It’s late and I’m tired. I don’t have the energy.”

“No, you want to have this conversation, you really do.”

“What is it?”

“I know about you.”

Anxiety flared and he rubbed his palms together anxiously. “Don’t be tedious,” he said gruffly.

“I know.”

“What are you on about? I’m not in the mood.”

“See, I’m not sure what I should call you any more. Why don’t you tell me? What do you prefer: Edward Fabian or Jack Stern or Roger Artis? There are probably others, too, right? Other people you pretend to be.”

Edward felt his eyes stretch wide, terrified, and though he knew his fear was just what Billy would want to see, and that it would encourage him, there was nothing he could do to hide it away. He put out a hand, resting it against the cold brass rail that was fixed to the bar. A moment of intense dizziness washed over him and, for a moment he thought he would fall from his stool. He had known it was Billy who had broken into the flat. “I don’t know what you mean,” he managed to say, but it was a pitiful denial and Billy grinned wolfishly at it.

“You’ve had us all fooled, haven’t you? All this stuff about being a doctor. None of it’s true. I couldn’t believe it when I found out. It’s all moonshine.”

“Billy––” He saw his own face in the mirror behind the bar: he had a wall-eyed stare that made him look rather idiotic and frightened.

Billy sniggered. “It was that bloke who came into the garage that started me thinking. He swore blind that you were his brother. I said he must have been wrong but he was so sure, eventually I had to take him seriously. And then I thought about it a bit more. There’s always been something about you that’s been a bit off. So I had a look around your place the other day. Found all sorts of interesting stuff.” He reached into his pocket and laid a passport on the bar. Edward looked down at it fearfully: it was for Jack Stern, his real passport. “There’s another couple of these, plus Registration Cards and all sorts of other things you probably don’t want people knowing about. I’ve just borrowed them for a bit. Letters, too. I had a good read of all of them. It was your uncle who put me in the picture. Uncle Jimmy. I went to see him the other day. Lovely chap. He said I didn’t know what I was talking about at first, just like you, but I can be persuasive when I want to be. You know that, though. That’s why you asked me to help with the milkman.”

Edward rose so quickly that the stool clattered against the bar. He closed the distance between them but Billy did not flinch, raising a hand and holding it lightly against Edward’s sternum. Joseph had turned at the sound of the stool. Billy smiled at him, took his arm and put it around Edward’s shoulders and turned him away to face the bar. In the mirror, he saw that the colour had drained from his face. He was as white as a ghost. “Don’t do anything silly,” he advised quietly. “You’d rather we kept this between ourselves, right?”

He reached into his pocket again, took out the engagement ring and dropped it onto the bar.

Edward reached impulsively but Billy cupped his hand over it.

“Wouldn’t want Joe to see that, would you?”

“If you’ve hurt him I’ll––”

“You’ll what? You’ll do nothing, mate. Sweet fuck all. Me and good old uncle Jimmy just had a friendly little chat and it all came out. Every last detail. And you’re not in a position to make threats, are you? I’ve got everything I need. The ring you stole from him, the passports, pictures of you when you were younger, letters, and––I nearly forgot––I know where your old man is. Jimmy told me all about it. Basket case, ain’t he? Dribbling into his soup. From now on, see, when I tell you to do something, you’re going to do it. Understand? Because if you don’t, I’ll pay your Dad a little visit like I did with Jimmy. And when I’ve finished with him I’ll go to Joseph and explain how you’ve led us all up the garden path since you got on the scene. How you’ve been working for Spot. And then I’ll tell Violet, I’ll tell George and I’ll tell Joseph’s sister, too. That’s the best of all, how you’ve pulled the wool over that poor little bitch’s eyes. How do you reckon she’ll feel, learning that she’s been spreading her legs for a con artist like you? I reckon she’ll want to be the first in line to watch what her brother and her uncle does.”

Edward flinched at Billy’s arm across his shoulders. “What do you want?” he said, his voice knotted.

“We’ll get to that but you can answer a few questions first. I was wondering––the real Edward Fabian––did you top him?”

Edward gritted his teeth. “He was already dead. He was killed by a German bomb.”

“So you made it look like Jack Stern died instead? Just took his papers and off you went?”

“Very good, Billy. You always were sharp.”

“Mind your tongue. You don’t want to upset me no more, do you? How’d you do it?”

“I had a friend working in the mortuary. He doctored the papers.”

“Clever. It was all going so well, too.”

“How much do you want to keep quiet?”

“We’ll start at a ton and see how we go from there. Every Friday. No exceptions. Mess up and”––he lifted his cupped hand for a moment, the ring sparkling beneath, and then replaced it––“everyone knows about your dirty little secrets.”

“Alright,” Edward said. “Fine.”

“You know what?––I always knew there was something wrong about you, Jack. I had a feeling in my gut. But it’s all over now, isn’t it? Now that I know.” He tightened his arm, squeezing him closer to his body. He leant closer, breath that reeked of alcohol on Edward’s ear. “And unless you want everyone else to know, you’ll do exactly what I say.”

55

EDWARD LEFT THE CLUB and walked hurriedly to the Shangri-La. This was a nightmare, he thought. The worst nightmare he could have imagined. Billy had him in a terrible spot. Everything was suddenly put back at risk again but it was worse this time. It was not just his place with the family that was at risk. It was everything: his clothes, his car, his apartment, his lifestyle. His freedom. Billy could go to the police and take his liberty from him. Everything would be revealed. Something awful was going to happen now, he knew it. He had been lucky for too long and now the world was going to mete out his just desserts. He had been lucky for nearly seven years in avoiding detection for what he had done but his luck had finally run out. They would find out who he really was and, from there, it would be a simple enough matter to tie him to what had happened in Sicily. His mind became fixated on his fate. He would be hung. The life he wanted to lead, the things he wanted to see, and to own, the places he wanted to visit, all of it would be denied to him. A fatalistic premonition of his own doom settled over him and he felt that there was no way that it could ever be lifted.