1980

Back into the rain, back into the night, through deserted city streets, under broken Christmas lights swinging in the wind, along Boar Lane, the shopping centres and the vacant offices dark and huge, black canyon walls looming, up Market Street, the queues of empty buses all lit up with no place or passengers to go, through the Kirkgate stalls, past the mountains of rubbish, the rats and birds feeding, back to Millgarth, back underground, and two minutes later I’ve reversed the car up and out of the garage and am away, following the signs out to Headingley.

*

Two nights on and everything dead now -

A Leeds & Bradford A to Z in one hand, I come to the place where Headingley Lane becomes Otley Road, to the Kentucky Fried Chicken, to where the bus stops, to Alma Road and Laureen Bell.

I back into a dark wide drive and turn the car around.

I drive back towards the Kentucky Fried Chicken and pull into the car park, positioning the car so I face the main road, then I go inside.

It’s stopped raining but I am still the only customer.

I order some pieces of chicken and chips, a cup of coffee, and wait under the white lights for over ten minutes while the Asian staff prepare the order, staring at another light reflected in another cup of black coffee.

I take the food back out to the car and sit in the night, the window down, picking at the pale and stringy meat, watching the street.

No-one.

Two nights ago it must have been different.

I drink down the cold coffee, wanting another, the food salty.

I get out of the car and walk across the road to the bus stop.

It’s 9:53, the Number 13 coming up Headingley Lane.

It doesn’t stop.

I cross back and turn right onto Alma Road.

There’s police tape and two dark cars waiting.

I walk down the dim tree-lined street, crossing to avoid the cordon, past the officers sitting in the police cars.

At the end of the road is a school and I stop at the gates and stand and stare back down Alma Road -

Alma Road -

An ordinary street in an ordinary suburb where a man took a hammer and a knife to another man’s daughter, to another man’s sister, another man’s fiancйe -

An ordinary street in an ordinary suburb where a man took a hammer and a knife to Laureen Bell and shattered her skull and stabbed her fifty-seven times in her abdomen, in her womb, and once in her eye -

And then, in this ordinary street in this ordinary suburb, he stopped -

For now.

it not on your life transmission one found by a milkman at six on friday the sixth of june nineteen seventy five on the prince philip playing fields scott hall leeds with multiple stab wounds to abdomen chest and throat inflicted by a blade four inches in length three quarters of an inch in width one edge sharper than the other severe lacerations to the skull and fractures to the crown inflicted by a hammer or an axe a white purse with mummy in biro on the front containing approximately five pounds in cash was also noted to be missing from the deceaseds handbag this is the world now containing approximately five pounds in cash all this and heaven too missing but e only have eyes for you in tight white flared trousers and a pink blouse and short blue bolero jacket at twenty to ten in the royal oak at ten in the regent at ten thirty in the Scotsman fourteen whiskies and a tray of curry and chips at one ten AM stopping motorists at the junction of sheepscar street south and roundhay road leeds attempting to obtain a lift it is known from an eyewitness that an articulated lorry with a dark coloured cab and a tarpaulin sheeted load stopped at the junction of roundhay road and sheepscar street south this is the world now her handbag strap looped around her left wrist six buttons on the grass five from her blouse and one from her blue bolero jacket her brassiere pushed up her trousers pulled down about her knees her panties in their normal position there was a positive semen reaction on the back of her trousers and panties her head had suffered two lacerations one of which had penetrated the thickness of her skull there was a stab wound in her neck and fourteen wounds in her chest and abdomen although the murder weapons have not been found and no mention of the head injuries or of the weapon should be disclosed to the press all information to the murder room this is the world now a good time dead on the grass her children waiting at the bus stop for two hours for mummy to come home from shebeens the regent the white swan the Scotsman the gaiety barbareilas room at the top friday night is crumpet night if you cannot pull tonight you will never pull buy the lady a barbarella legspreader this is the world e was driving through leeds at night e had been having a couple of pints and e saw this woman thumbing a lift and e stopped and asked her how far she was going and she said not far thanks for stopping and jumped in and e was in quite a good mood and then she said did e want business and e said what do you mean and she says bloody hell do e have to spell it out so we drove to the park in my green ford capri and before we started she said it cost a fiver and e was a bit surprised e was expecting it to be a bit romantic and e am not the type that can have intercourse in a split second e have to be aroused but all of a sudden she said e am off it is going to take all fucking day you are fucking useless you are and e felt myself seething with rage and e wanted to hit her and e said hang on do not go off like that and she said oh you can manage it now can you and she was taunting me e said can we do it on the grass and she stormed off up field and e took the hammer from my tool box and followed her and spread my coat on the wet grass and she sat down and unfastened her trousers and said come on get it over with and e said do not worry e will and e hit her with the hammer and she made a lot of noise and so e hit her again and then e took out knife from my pocket and e stabbed her fifteen times e think and her arm kept jerking up and down and so e kept at her until she was very dead and then e shot off home this is the world now containing approximately five pounds in

Chapter 3

There were people on the TV singing hymns -

People on the TV singing hymns with no face -

People on the TV singing hymns with no face, no features -

And when I switched off the TV, when I pulled back the curtain, everything outside was white and without feature, except for the parked cars and the ugly gulls circling overhead, screaming -

The North after the bomb, machines the only survivors.

I’m awake, sweating and afraid -

The word shreds on my lips thinking, what face or no-face does he see?

I reach out for Joan but she’s not there -

I’m alone in cold hotel sheets, the radio on:

Dirty protests, hunger strikes, three London policemen suspended as a result of Operation Countryman, Helen Smith…

I turn over and reach for my watch on the bedside table:

It’s 5:10 -