The Padded Cell

By Richard Yale

When his oldest friend is found dead in questionable circumstances, Madison Addison is persuaded out of his self-satisfied existence of indolence and measured drinking to investigate. He soon finds himself immersed in the murky world of government intrigue that encompasses the vicious murder of a beautiful young woman, conspiracies involving shadowy agencies brokering illicit deals for political expediency, and a notorious drug trafficker with a unique trading advantage.

The plot shifts between the streets of London and Dublin to the teahouses of Islamabad and the banks of the icy Bosphorous as Madison Addison and his accomplices find themselves pitted against a cast of unsavoury gangsters and international confidence tricksters.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Richard Yale
• Release date: Nov 25, 2012
• ISBN: 9781301280674

Book preview

Part 1

Madison Addison

Chapter 1

Alexandra Brompton is a notoriously blunt and potty-mouthed individual. For thirty-six hours she had inundated my media with a series of increasingly strident emails, texts and voicemails demanding that I contact her immediately. Alex and I had not been in communication for some considerable time but she is a professional researcher with relentless tendencies so I doubt that it had proved to be much of a challenge to locate a chap who was saddled with the unusual name of Madison Addison.

I first encountered Alexandra Brompton over thirty years ago while we were at university. She was considered quite a beauty although she was touchingly unaware of it. We had a brief fling but we were entirely unsuitable as lovers and even our closest friends joked that we more closely resembled squabbling siblings. I would soon realize that I was not quite dark enough to satisfy Alex’s requirements and private predilections. Shortly after we drifted apart she took up with a rum cove named Algernon Ashurst, an English aristocrat who she had met at a clay pigeon shoot. From the outset I disliked Lord Algie intensely and warned Alex to stay well clear of him. Typically she ignored me and ended up in a terrible pickle.

Lord Algie, or Algae, as he was better known, was a morose and violent drunk. Alexandra regularly sported black eyes or bruises on her cheeks and when her friends tried to intervene she explained the marks away with lies and excuses as beaten people often do.

Despite the almost unanimous advice of her closest confidantes Algernon and Alex eventually married in the spectacular grounds of Ashurst Castle. Unfortunately, but rather predictably, the marriage was a disaster and her gig as Lady Alexandra Ashurst was short-lived.

After several miserable years she finally plucked up the courage to leave Algae and I drove to their country estate to bring her to London. When I hugged her she flinched and pulled away, clearly in pain. She confessed that the previous night her husband had laid her out on the bed and whipped her back with a braided dog leash in response to some imagined slight at a dinner party. Fortunately for His Lordship he had left on business otherwise I would have felt compelled to finally mete out the retribution that he so urgently deserved.

Even following the demise of Algae, Alex still seemed to be a magnet for every low-life in town and it constantly seemed that she was trying to extricate herself from some hopeless, doomed relationship where she was being either mentally or physically abused. Nonetheless, Alex is a spirited soul and she remained rebellious and unrepentant, always certain that the next relationship would spawn the happiness she craved.

I suspected that this recent round of calls was probably as a result of yet another of Alex’s romantic misadventures. I won’t bore you with the exact wording of the last text message she sent, save to say that it was highly uncomplimentary on a personal level and I couldn’t help noticing that it was time-stamped in the middle of the night. I suspected she might have been in her cups when she had clicked on the send icon. While I drank my morning coffee, I seriously considered ignoring the latest message and simply going about my daily business; with hindsight that might have been a prudent course of action.

Alexandra Brompton is a perennially late riser so I waited until midday before calling a taxi to take me to the house she lives in close to the Chelsea Embankment. I tried calling her before the cab arrived at her front door but I only got her voicemail.

The former Lady Alexandra Ashurst lives in a three-storey mews house that was the sole settlement from her acrimonious and adversarial divorce from Lord Algernon. The ground floor is a parking garage and she lives and works on the two floors above.

I pressed the buzzer of the video entry phone and waited. There was no reply. I pressed it some more and then left my finger on the buzzer. I was just about to give up when I heard her voice.

Oh it’s you, arsehole, she growled. Come up and fix me some coffee.

The second floor living area was deceptively spacious. I entered through the second heavy door at the top of the stairs. Alexandra had installed every security device imaginable after her aristocratic former husband had broken in and threatened her with a knife.

I knew my way around the house and made my way across the lobby and went into the kitchen to make coffee. This task was not as easy as it sounds. Alexandra had installed an enormous stainless steel contraption in a style that would more usually be found in cafes along the seaside promenades of the Italian Riviera. I was so busy studying it that I didn’t hear her step up behind me.

It’s nice to see you I suppose, drawled Alex catching me by surprise. What the fuck are you doing there, doofus-head? It’s really quite simple.

I turned around. Alex was dressed in a brushed denim shirt with popper buttons up the front. She was barelegged and bare-foot and was wearing a pair of wraparound sunglasses.

Nice to see you too, I grunted stepping out of the way. She fiddled with the machine, turning knobs and pressing buttons on the digital dashboard.

See, she said smugly. I’ll jump in the shower while it’s brewing. She made no mention with regard to the apparent urgency of her calls.

While I waited for the contraption to perform its wizardry I went into the living room. Alexandra is a technology buff and gadget freak. She had installed an enormous plasma TV screen above the mantelpiece and Miles Davis was being piped softly through numerous invisible speakers discretely housed in the chamfered ceiling beams. However, the quiet ambiance of the room was rather spoiled by what appeared to be the aftermath of a barroom brawl. There was a broken champagne flute on the coffee table; another smashed in the fireplace and the bottle had spilled over on the wood floor. An ashtray had also dispelled its contents and several cigarette ends lay soggily in the wine stain.

I picked up several cushions from the floor and replaced them on the sofa. Then I returned to the kitchen to look for a dustpan and brush.

I had restored some kind of order to the living room when Alexandra returned. She was wearing a sarong and turban formed out of white towels and had changed her sunglasses.

I went over to her and removed her shades suspiciously. She pulled a face. There was no sign of bruising.

I know what you’re thinking, but things have changed around here, she told me. I kicked his fool arse. I mean it, really. I kicked his fucking arse. I took up taekwondo and I don’t let that stupid shit happen to me anymore.

She looked up at me questioningly. You have no idea why you’re here do you? she said wearily.

I shook my head. I just assumed that you’re in some kind of trouble and needed the services of a man in a white hat.

She snorted in a somewhat derisory manner but her pretty face quickly contorted into a ghastly grimace. Not me, she told me. She stepped up close and put her arms around my neck and laid her head against my shoulder momentarily. I clumsily returned her hug.

Come on Alexandra, what’s going on? Who’s in trouble?

She looked up at me and I was surprised to see tears in her eyes. Oh shit, she sighed. I hate to be the one to break the news. I’m so sorry Madison, but the night before last Jamie Patton was found dead in the flat above the Padded Cell.

I gaped at her incredulously, spluttering and stammering incoherently. I muttered some inane questions that didn’t require any response. She continued to look up at me while I tried to gather myself.

I know, it’s hard to believe and even harder to comprehend, she said finally. They say he was drunk and fell and banged his head on the corner of a coffee table. Then she made a cynical grunt. Or at least that’s what’s on the initial police report. For a second she buried her head in my shoulder again. When she looked back at me her tears were streaming down her cheeks. After all the shit that that family’s been through and now this.

I stood silently for a few moments, still trying to digest this terrible news. How’s Bobbie? I asked stupidly.

How the fuck do you think? Alex snapped at me.

Sorry, I muttered. Dumb question I guess.

Alex shook her head. It’s okay, I’m just shaken up. Bobbie flew back from Spain yesterday and is staying with the family. She begged me to track you down and tell you that she really wants you to come to the funeral. Madison, you have to come for Skip and Julia’s sake. Jamie was your best fucking friend and the Patton’s were like family to you. I want you to come, even if you are an arsehole, she said insistently. You can’t blow this off just because you’re suffering from some retarded form of adolescent angst over a roll in the hay that happened five fucking years ago.

She pulled away from me and made a rather unsuccessful attempt to wipe her eyes with the tail of the towel that was wrapped around her head. I replaced her sunglasses. Is the coffee ready? she asked hopefully. I’m going to dry off and dress, she told me, and then we can go over to the wine bar and talk. I think we both need a drink.

I watched her retreat towards the bathroom and tried to make some sense of what she had just told me. Alexandra Brompton, Jamie Patton and Bobbie Brooks were my oldest friends. It was incomprehensible that any mortal harm could have come to any one of them, most especially Jamie, who despite his chosen occupation as a war correspondent I had always considered to be invincible. I rummaged around the kitchen and located a cigarette.

Chapter 2

My friendship with Jamie Patton also dated back to my university days where he had been a larger than life character around the campus at which we both studied. At six feet three inches tall and two hundred and thirty pounds Jamie was an imposing figure with a full head of dark hair that would barely recede in later life. He had noticeable scars over both his eyes and a slightly battered-looking nose courtesy of his swashbuckling exploits as the fullback for the English schoolboys’ rugby team. Nonetheless, despite these facial irregularities, girls in the student union bar often referred to him as being unreasonably handsome. Although he was a rugger player and I played for the university football team we buddied around sharing a taste for a minimum of a gallon of beer a night, a passion for sports and a common aspiration to become media titans.

We were both reading English and planned on making our careers as newsmen, albeit in different fields. As long as I can remember I always imagined myself as a 1930’s hack, sitting high up in a Chicago skyscraper, collar and tie loosened, cigarette hanging from the corner of my mouth, typing insightful features for a newspaper named the Globe or Tribune. Since childhood tales of corruption, malfeasance, government incompetence, and other general societal ills had fascinated me. I devoured books on conspiracy theories and came up with several of my own. In Jamie Patton I found an agreeable and sympathetic audience. He may not have completely agreed with my rants and ramblings but he listened cheerfully enough and encouraged me to write.

Jamie frequently told me that his own thirst for flirting with danger had been inspired by the experiences of his grandfather, and more importantly his father, during one of the darkest moments of the Second World War. The first time I was invited to visit the Patton family pile Jamie took me to see his grandfather’s Distinguished Services Medal that was displayed in a place of honor at the boathouse of the local Royal National Lifeboat Institute.

Jamie Patton was always immensely proud when he recounted the story of Grandfather Patton setting off from the North Norfolk town, which the family made their home, in a RNLI vessel and heading out across the English Channel. Amongst the eight-man crew under the command of Coxswain Patton was his son Skip, barely sixteen years old but ready and willing to participate in the legendary evacuation of Dunkirk. Under heavy fire they towed small wherries in to the beach and brought stranded soldiers out to the deeper draft ships that waited offshore. Over a period of thirty-six hours, despite constant German artillery bombardment, the boats evacuated almost eight hundred men without losing the life of a single member of their lifeboat crew.

Jamie never tired of telling that story and I had never tired of hearing it. He was fascinated by war correspondents and he revered the likes of Robert Capa, Gilles Caron and Don McCullin. He admired the courage that they had displayed while operating in the earth’s most traumatized and deadly regions and made it well known that he planned on following in their footsteps.

After the end of the Second World War Grandfather Patton and his son Skip had reestablished the family boat building and maintenance business until it became the major employer in the area. In later years Jamie’s father had probably hoped that his eldest son would join him in the family enterprise but when he saw his son’s determination to steer his own course he offered his uncritical support and followed his son’s courageous career with enormous pride.

I introduced Jamie to Bobbie Brooks, whom I had met while I was trying to scratch together some extra wedge by submitting unsolicited concert reviews of the burgeoning punk rock scene to the national music rags. As I scurried from dive bar to dive bar I had often noticed Bobbie standing discreetly in the shadows watching through the viewfinder of her camera. What initially fascinated me was that she never pointed her lens at the stage, instead she was capturing the antics of the audience as they pogoed and spat the night away adorned in their New-Wave regalia.

Bobbie Brooks was almost certainly the world’s most unlikely punk rock photographer. In contrast with the sallow-faced, speed-addled spiky-heads, she was olive-skinned by way of her Hongkongese father and Argentinean mother and wore her lush black hair halfway to her waist. Amongst the swarms of kilts and safety pins she seemed comfortable dressed simply in over-sized men’s shirts and black jeans. Even the motorcycle jacket that she favored was not a fashion accessory. Bobbie Brooks generally got around town astride a Harley Davidson sportster.

We struck up a friendship and following gigs we would often find late night watering holes where we would drink cheap wine out of silver teapots and exchange notes and swap yarns. The first piece ever published under the Madison Addison by-line was titled ‘Punk on a Motorbike’ and featured the grainy black and white images that Bobbie captured nightly through her Nikon.

I fell madly in love with her and we dated sporadically in a good-natured and semi-passionate way, but I could tell that Bobbie never took the relationship too seriously. She often came up to the university town at weekends and stayed at the flat I shared with Jamie. It wasn’t long before I sensed the writing on the wall. Bobbie managed our separation with a gentle kindness and discretion that would typify her throughout her life. However, no sooner was the Addison-Brooks relationship finally done and dusted than Jamie and Bobbie would firmly establish themselves as a loyal and faithful unit. At least, to the best of my knowledge it had remained faithful until a disastrous brandy drenched evening five years ago that would sour my longest and most enduring friendship.

At the time Patton was away in Sierra Leone. Some years earlier he had taken a film-crew on location with a United Nations peacekeeping force that was making their last push to quash the RUF in the aftermath of the orgy of looting, murder and amputation known as ‘No Living Thing.’

Patton and his crew were returning to make a follow-up documentary on behalf of relief agencies and charitable organizations that were trying to clean up the carnage and human devastation left in the wake of the brutal and catastrophic war.

I had been nominated for a press award and as usual I was between girlfriends and didn’t have a date. There was nothing unusual about Bobbie donning her glad rags and acting as my escort. For twenty-five years she had often stepped into the breach and hung on my arm at various formal gatherings. Jamie would watch with fraternal self-amusement, joshing me liberally about my surrogate wife.

Despite our close friendship Bobbie was singularly tight-lipped about her past and particularly her childhood. At some point she did confide in me that Brooks is not her real name. She was christened Carmen Fu, in Hong Kong, nearly fifty years ago. She was the first child of an Argentinean heiress and the fifth and youngest child of her philandering father. I am scant on details but she did occasionally refer to being ferried between nannies and schools and she rarely mentioned her parents.

On her eighteenth birthday her father visited her and explained that now that she had come of age he was divorcing her mother and selling his diverse business empire for cash. He informed her he would personally retain fifty percent of the proceeds, then after making cash settlements with his ex-wives he would split the remainder of the spoils amongst his five children. He also informed Carmen that he had purchased a sprawling estate in the Philippines and was installing a harem to look after his needs for the remainder of his life.

The sole requirement for Carmen Fu to receive her endowment was that she never attempted to contact him again. Apparently she changed her name to Roberta Brooks and went about her business.

Her business was to establish a private drinking and dining club located in a gentrified corner of North West London, which she named The Padded Cell. Bobbie somehow managed to design and construct a space that provided a balance between the warmth, ambiance and smoky mystique of a local boozer with the sophistication of the upstairs haut cuisine dining room.

The club would provide the fulcrum for my friendships with Alex, Bobbie and Jamie for years to come. Most evenings I would drop by the club for drinks and camaraderie. Charm, wit and generosity of soul were the main prerequisites for membership. Moneyed boors routinely found their applications rejected. Over the years Bobbie’s watering hole would provide safe haven to an extremely eclectic group of bon viveurs, raconteurs and gastronomes. Bobbie would regularly play hostess to sumptuous celebrations of birthdays, anniversaries and the professional successes of her clientele regardless of whether they could afford the tab or not; it was like participating in the longest cocktail party.

The awards ceremony had proven to be a long evening. Unusually Bobbie was drinking alcohol and was getting steadily squiffy. Generally she had learned as the owner and hostess of the Padded Cell to drink sparingly whilst always appearing to be holding a glass in her hand that wasn’t in immediate need of refreshment. I escorted her back to the bar by taxi and persuaded myself in for a last drink and a night in the spare bedroom in the apartment above the club where she lived with Jamie.

In the morning I awoke still half-intoxicated, reaching across the bed. I opened my eyes. The far side of the bed was empty, but it was still warm from the heat of Bobbie’s body. I lay back and gave myself time to piece together the scattergun memories of the previous evening. I recalled dancing to Frankie Sin and I remembered kissing her; playfully at first, nibbling her ears and kissing her neck. Her hands rubbed up and down my back teasingly as we danced, and she looked up at me smiling mischievously. I kissed her on the mouth, running my tongue over her lips. She had pulled her head back giggling, but continued to sway with me to the music. In our defense, if there is one, we were extremely inebriated. I leaned forward and kissed her again. This time she responded and we kissed French style with the passion of drunken ex-lovers.

As best as I could remember the lovemaking was not a great success, but we had laughed a lot and drank brandy straight from the bottle. She had passed out first and I had snuggled up with her, falling asleep to the sound of the gentle breathing of the woman I had once been crazy about.

Warily I made my way downstairs to the kitchen. Bobbie was seated at the kitchen counter, dressed in a kimono and smoking a cigarette. She turned her head towards me and blew smoke slowly through her nostrils, her face arranged into an inscrutable oriental mask. Nonetheless, she slipped off the barstool and padded across the kitchen and poured me a cup of java, which she expertly slid across the counter in my direction like a professional barkeeper.

Probably not our finest hour, Madison, she said quietly. Fun maybe, but hardly commendable.

I took the coffee and sipped it, then nicked a fag.

The foolish, drunken night with Bobbie would cause a disruption to our friendship that would not be resolved for five years, although it would be inaccurate to claim that any actual rift ever really occurred. After I left the club I was riddled with guilt. I was mortified that I should have betrayed my oldest friend while he was away in some hellhole shooting documentary footage of the ravages of war.

I purposefully avoided the Padded Cell, unwilling to confront Bobbie. I continued to see Alexandra, who always bitched and moaned when I insisted on meeting at alternative watering holes. I invented a convoluted excuse about an argument with Bobbie and assured her it would soon blow over.

Patton returned from Freetown and left numerous messages on my answer phone demanding that I come to the club to celebrate his safe return. I changed my phone number and forbade Alexandra to give him the new one.

Months passed by and I had still not plucked up the courage to meet with Jamie and Bobbie, and then a series of events in my personal life would distract me for most of the next five years.

Chapter 3

It had been many years since I had last frequented the wine bar but it was immediately clear that Alexandra remained a regular and popular patron. No sooner had we found a table close to the open fire than a waitress came over with a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice, a cup of coffee and a flute filled with bubbles. I ordered a cold beer with no glass.

I waited until we were settled and the waitress was out of earshot.

When did Bobbie tell you? I asked.

Alex shrugged. A few years ago I guess, she told me.

Did she tell Patton?

Don’t be ridiculous Madison, she said sharply. It was a non-issue to Bobbie; it strikes me that it was you who made an unnecessary palaver out of it.

I didn’t respond and sipped my beer.

Where did you go? Alexandra asked absently. You should at least have called me. Why the fuck did you sneak off like a thief in the night? I could have helped, we all could have helped, or at least we could have tried. That’s what friends are for.

I sipped my drink. I traveled, I said noncommittally. There was nothing anybody could do.

Just tell me one thing Madison, there’s something that’s bothered me for a long time, she fixed me with a gaze. Tell me that your disappearance or whatever you want to call it wasn’t just about sleeping with Bobbie? There has to be more to it than just that?

I took another sip of beer. Initially it was a contributing factor, I admitted, but no, it’s a little more complicated than that.

She waited for me to elaborate and then finally she shrugged. Whatever. You’re still an arsehole.

I glared at her. We had been doing this dance for as long as I had known her. I was about to retort rudely when she turned to face me.

Jamie couldn’t understand it when you suddenly stopped hanging out at the club. He was always quizzing me about whether I’d seen you and I had to fucking lie for you, Madison. I didn’t like that, she told me pointedly. After a while he stopped asking and then when they started publishing all that crap about you in the papers he just expected you to reach out to us for support. She sipped her coffee. None of us doubted you, Madison. We’re all in the communications game and we can all smell bullshit a mile away. We knew that you were being stitched up like a kipper and we all wanted to help. Especially Patton, you know how blindingly fucking loyal he could be, god help any poor arsehole who said a word against you. She picked up the champagne flute and took a small sip. Clearly it met with her approval and she slammed the remaining contents down in one. Alex waved at a passing waitress and called for another round. We even tried to track you down. I found out that you were married, she shot another gimlet glare in my direction, and I went to your house. Your wife, some woman that! She was not a lot of help.

Somehow that did not surprise me. Ex-wife, I interjected.

Whatever, she said dismissively. Best as we could tell you had fallen off the face of the fucking earth and when the furor died down I guess we just stopped looking and went on with our lives, she continued. Patton was the most affected by your disappearance. He really never understood what had happened to you. Finally I suppose he just accepted that you were doing something that you felt that you needed to do and he stopped talking about you so much. Then, when Teresa was killed Jamie just assumed you would suddenly magically reappear out of the ether. But you didn’t, Madison, you chose to stay away, she said accusingly. That hurt him the most. He was absolutely devastated.

I gaped at her again. Teresa?

She looked at me across the table. Yes Teresa! You remember Teresa? she said coldly, and then momentarily her face softened again. You don’t know? You really don’t know?

I shook my head. I really didn’t know what she was talking about.

Where the hell were you? she asked in exasperation. "It was all over the news for days. Two years ago Teresa was found dead in a car in the Wicklow Mountains. She