‘Well, why didn’t you tell me? Bloody hell, Jake, she’s just a kid.’

‘Not really. Besides, they were all looked after, none of them suffered any hardship. I think his youngest was sixteen, nothing lower than that. All consenting age.’

Tony shrugged. ‘Yeah, I suppose, but, they’re still kids. They should be having a shag around the back of the bike sheds like normal teenagers. Not sleeping with a fat junkie. Personally, I think it was all about manipulation. They did what he told them to do because they didn’t know any better.’ Tony’s face showed the distaste he felt.

‘Anyway, do you know that drunk doctor, the one who got struck off?’ asked Jake.

‘No.’

‘Yes, you do. He lives in some shitty bedsit down Camberwell. I got Dan to have a quiet word with him. He tested that Tupperware box and it had cyanide in it.’

‘It had to be something like that to work as quick, but I wish you hadn’t involved Dan and this doctor bloke.’

‘I just wanted to find out what it was. How the hell did Marlon get his hands on that kind of shit?’

‘He was a drug dealer, Jake. They can get anything. I’ve heard that he sometimes mixed cocaine up with rat poison to get rid of his enemies. With me not taking any of that shit, he had to come up with something else.’

Jake felt deflated. For once he thought he had come up with a good idea, asking the alcoholic doctor to test it. Now, with hindsight, he wished he hadn’t involved anyone else. Tony was right. He had acted hastily.

‘Dan will keep his mouth shut, Jake, but this drunken doctor needs taking care of. Make sure he has a nasty drunken fall and breaks his neck, eh? That Angus will do it. Keep it nice and quiet, and then only you, me and Dan know about what Marlon had in mind.’

‘What makes you sure we can trust Dan?’ Jake was now kicking himself. He had involved too many people. If people thought Tony and Marlon were at each other’s throats, the police would be suspicious.

‘Dan’s a good boy; he reminds me of myself as a kid. He’s streetwise and knows what side his bread is buttered. He likes the money and he likes his friends knowing he works for Tony Lambrianu.’

A few days later Tony heard that some drunken doctor who always sat in the pubs hoping someone would buy him a drink had been buying more drinks than he could usually afford. He was on his way home when suddenly he slipped while crossing the road and fell in front of a London bus.

No one was surprised or cared.

Now was a good time to toast Marlon, Tony thought. He had been a good associate, in many ways, but in the end someone else who simply couldn’t be trusted. Now Tony was the undisputed gangland boss of London, and that was how he liked it.