1977

As I hang up two black SPG transit vans fly down the street and I’m thinking, fuck the Spencer Boys:

HEAVY DUTY DISCIPLINE COMING DOWN.

It’s going up to eight and the car is getting smaller, light starting to fade. Across Leeds 7 bonfires are going up, and not fucking Jubilee Beacons. Me and Ellis are still sat off Spencer Place, doing fuck all but sweat and get on each other’s tits.

Nervous, like the whole fucking city:

Ellis stinks and we’ve got the windows down, smelling the wood and Rome burn, cat calls and yells upon the hot black air: the ones we’ve not pinched building barricades, putting out the milk bottles for later.

Edgy:

I’m thinking about giving Louise a ring, wondering if she’ll be back from the hospital, feeling bad about Little Bobby and yesterday, coming back to Janice and getting fucking stiff, and then it all comes down.

HARD:

Glass smashing, brakes slamming, a red car careering down the road, zig-zagging, its windscreen gone, hitting one kerb, flipping over at the foot of a lamppost.

‘Christ,’ shouts Ellis. ‘That’s Vice.’

We’re both out of the car, running across Spencer Place to the upturned motor.

I look up the street:

There’s a bonfire on a piece of wasteland at the top of the road illuminating a small gang of West Indians, black shadows dancing and whooping, thinking about finishing off what they’ve just started, sticking the boot in.

I stare into the black night, the barricades and bonfires, the high flames all loaded with pain:

A proud coon steps forward, all dreadlocks and Mau Mau attitude:

Come and have a go.

But I can already hear the sirens, the SPG, the Specials and Reserves, our sponsored fucking monsters let loose on the wind, and I turn back to the red car.

Ellis is bending down, talking to the two men upside-down inside.

‘They’re all right,’ he shouts to me.

‘Call an ambulance,’ I say. ‘I’ll stay with them until cavalry get here.’

‘Fucking niggers,’ says Ellis, running back to our car.

I get down on all fours and peer into the car.

It’s dark and at first I don’t recognise the men inside.

I say something like, ‘Don’t try and move. We’ll have you out in a minute.’

They nod and mumble.

I can hear more cars and brakes.

‘Fraser,’ moans one of the men.

I peer in and over at the man trapped in the passenger seat.

Fucking Craven, Detective Inspector Craven.

‘Fraser?’

I pretend I can’t hear him, saying, ‘Hang on, pal. Hang on, mate.’

I look back up the road again and see a transit van spewing out SPG, tearing off after the wogs through the bonfire.

Ellis is back. ‘Soon as the ambulance gets here, Rudkin wants us back at the Station. Says it’s a right madhouse.’

‘Like this isn’t? You wait with them,’ I say, standing up.

‘Where are you going?’

‘I’ll be back in a bit.’

Ellis is muttering and cursing as I tear off back up towards number 2, back up towards Janice.

‘Fuck you want?’

‘Let us in. I just want to talk.’

‘There’s a surprise,’ she says but opens the door to let me in.

She’s barefoot in a long flower skirt and t-shirt.

I stand in the centre of the room, the window open, the smell of smoke and the start of a riot outside.

I say, ‘They threw a brick or something at a Vice car.’

‘Yeah?’ she says, like it doesn’t happen every other night of the fucking week.

I shut my mouth and put my arms round her.

‘So that’s what you want?’ she laughs.

‘No,’ I lie, fucked off and hard.

She squats down, pulling at my zip as I fall back and sink into the bed.

She starts sucking, my mind black sky with stars popping in and out, listening to the sirens and the screams, knowing the shit hasn’t even begun.

‘Fuck you been?’

‘Shut up, Ellis.’

‘It was fucking DI Craven in the car, you know?’

‘You’re joking?’

I get into the car, the street still full of blue lights and SPG.

The bonfires out, the wogs nicked, Craven and his mate in St James, and DC Ellis still not content.

I let him drive.

‘So where were you?’

‘Leave it,’ I say quietly.

‘Rudkin’s going to fucking murder us,’ he moans.

‘Is he fuck,’ I sigh.

I stare out the open window at Black Leeds, Sunday 29 May 1977.

‘You think no-one knows about you and that slag?’ says Ellis suddenly. ‘Everyone knows. Fucking embarrassing, it is.’

I don’t know what to say to him. I don’t care if he knows or not, don’t care who knows, but I don’t want Louise to know and now I can’t keep little Bobby’s face out of my mind.

I turn and say, ‘Tonight’s not the night. Save it for later.’

For once he takes my advice and I go back to the window, him to the road, steeling ourselves.

Millgarth Police Station.

Ten o’clock going on the Middle Ages.

Live from my own Dark Ages:

Down the stairs into the dungeons, keys and locks turning, chains and cuffs rattling, dogs and men barking.

Let the Witch Trials begin:

DI Rudkin’s in his shirtsleeves and crop at the end of the white heat/white light corridor.

‘Good of you to join us,’ he smirks.

Ellis, pinched face and itching palms, nods in apology.

‘Bob Craven all right, is he?’

‘Yeah, cuts and bruises,’ gabbles Ellis.

I say, ‘Got anything?’

‘Full house tonight.’

‘Anything concrete?’

‘Maybe,’ he winks. ‘And you?’

‘Same as before: the Irish, the taxi driver, and Mr Dave Cortina.’

‘Right then,’ says Rudkin. ‘In here.’

He opens a cell door and it’s, aw fuck.