“It’s not over.”
“No!”
“It’s not over, Johnny.”
He was coughing tears and bile. “It is.”
“Tell me, you piece of shit.”
“I can’t.”
I saw the moon in the day, the sun in the night, me fucking her, her fucking him, Jeanette’s face on every body.
I had him by the throat and hair, the hammer in my bandaged hand. “You fucked your sister.”
“No.”
“You were Jeanette’s fucking father, weren’t you?”
“No!”
“You were her father.”
His lips were moving, bubbles of bloody spit bursting on them.
I leant close into his face.
Behind me, she said, “George Marsh.”
I span round, reaching out and pulling her into us. “Say again.”
“George Marsh,” she whispered.
“What about him?”
“On the Dewsbury Road. It was George Marsh.”
“George Marsh?”
“One of Donny’s foremen.”
“
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know.”
I let go of them and stood up, the hall suddenly much bigger and lighter.
I closed my eyes.
I heard the hammer drop, Kelly’s teeth chattering, and then everything was small and dark again.
I went over to the phone and took out the telephone direc tory. I went to the Ms and the Marshes and found the G. Marshes. There was one in Netherton at 16 Maple Well Drive. The telephone number was 3657. I closed the directory.
I picked up a soft floral phonebook and turned to the Ms.
In fountain pen,
Bingo.
I closed the book.
Johnny Kelly had his head in his hands.
Mrs Foster was staring up at me.
“
“How long did you know?”
The eagle eyes were back. “I didn’t,” she said.
“Liar.”
Mrs Patricia Foster swallowed, “What about us?”
“What about you?”
“What are you going to do with us?”
“Pray God forgives the fucking lot of you.”
I walked towards the front door and Donald Foster’s body. “Where are you going?”
“To finish it.”
Johnny Kelly looked up, bloody fingerprints on his face. “You’re too late.”
I left the door open.
“
I drove Eraser’s Maxi back into Wakefield and out through Horbury, the rain beginning to sleet.
I sang along to Christmas songs on Radio 2 and changed to Radio 3 to avoid the News at Ten, listening to England lose the Ashes down under instead, shouting out my own news at ten:
Don Foster dead.
Two fucking killers, maybe three.
Me next?
Counting the killers.
Pushing the Maxi out Netherton way, the sleet now suddenly rain again.
Counting the dead.
Tasting gun metal, smelling my own shit.
Dogs barking, men screaming.
Paula dead.
There were things I had to do, things I must finish.
“
I asked in Netherton Post Office and an old woman who didn’t work there told me where Maple Well Drive was.
Number 16 was a bungalow like the rest of the street, much like Enid Sheard’s, much like the Goldthorpe’s. A neat little garden with a low hedge and a bird table.
Whatever George Marsh had done, it hadn’t been here.
I opened the little black metal gate and walked up the path. I could see TV pictures through the nets.
I knocked on the glass door, the air making me gyp.
A chubby woman with grey permed hair and a tea-towel opened the door.
“Mrs Marsh?”
“Yes?”
“Mrs George Marsh?”
“Yes?”
I pushed the door hard back into her face.
“What the bloody hell?” She fell back on her arse into the house.
I barged in over the Wellington boots and the gardening shoes. “Where is he?”
She had the tea-towel over her face.
“Where is he?”
“I haven’t seen him.” She was trying to stand.
I slapped her hard across her face.
She fell back down.
“Where is he?”
“I haven’t seen him.”
The hard-faced bitch was wide-eyed, thinking about some tears.
I raised my hand again. “Where?”
“What did he do?” There was a gash above her eye and her lower lip was already swelling.
“You know.”
She smiled, a pinched little fucking smile.
“Tell me where.”
She lay there on top of the shoes and the umbrellas looking straight back up into my face, her dirty mouth in a half-open smile like we were thinking about having a fuck.
“Where?”
“The shed, up on the allotments.”
I knew then what I would find.
