me. He roared out, ‘I’m not fucking listening to this crap!’
He got a total of two steps to the door before Hod grabbed him by the shirt collar, said, ‘Think again, bonny lad.’
Paul squirmed, trying to claw at Hod’s hand in his collar. His face was turning red. I fronted up to him, got right in his coupon and roared, ‘What you afraid of, Paul?’
He barked back, ‘Fuck you!’
Gillian rose, came running to my side. ‘Mr Dury!’
I dropped my cigarette, put hands on the streak of piss, grabbed his collar. He struggled harder in Hod’s grip. ‘Still playing the Big I Am, Paul?… You’ve got plenty to be scared about. Two people have died.’
Gillian shrieked, yelled at me, ‘Let him go!… Let him go!’ She tugged at my hands, I felt her nails dig deep. ‘Mr Dury… let the boy go!’
I loosened my grip.
Paul bent like a hinge for a moment, then turned for the door. He stumbled at first, but soon found his stride. In the hall he turned back, pointed a finger at me. He tried to speak but his voice deserted him.
I imagined what he might have wanted to say; didn’t scare me.
Chapter 35
GILLIAN WENT AFTER THE BOY, tears streaming down her face. Her feet splayed out in that erratic girlie manner as she ran. It wounded me to see her abandon her composure like that. I felt for the poor woman: she had been through a lot – she was as much a victim as Ben. And I doubted she’d had the right kind of support from Tina; who had done a grand job of making a fool of her. The daft scrubber didn’t know when she was well off.
I nodded to Hod. He went after Gillian, caught her up and put an arm around her. She took a few seconds to register what was happening, then she turned and sobbed into his chest. For a moment or two she beat him with fists, but she soon ran out of energy, folded like a woman beaten, defeated. Hod had to hold her up as she lost control of her legs.
‘C’mon… it’ll be okay,’ he said.
Gillian started to mumble. Her words were indecipherable at first, choked deep in her throat. She broke off from Hod, pushed him away and screamed out, ‘No, it won’t be okay!… Don’t you understand? It’ll never be okay again!’
She dropped her arms to her sides, her knees collapsed and she fell to the floor. I watched her swoon. It seemed affected, like a stage fall, and then I heard her head connect soundly with the tiled floor and I realised that she wasn’t acting. She was sparked out cold.
‘Fucksake!’ said Hod.
‘Pick her up.’ We took her back through to the front room, gently slapped the life back into her cheeks. She came round; looked woozy, lost. Like a woman on the edge; like someone who’d lost the world.
‘Would you like something to drink?’ I asked.
She touched her dry lips, spoke softly: ‘Tina… where’s Tina?’
‘Don’t worry about Tina… Hod, get her a brandy.’
Hod went to the sideboard, picked up a decanter, poured. When he returned, Gillian’s hands were shaking as she took the glass. ‘My head hurts.’
‘I’m not surprised… that was quite a clatter you gave yourself.’
‘I want Tina.’
I nodded, rose. ‘I’ll go get her.’
As I went for the door, I called Hod. He put a hand on Gillian’s shoulder for a brief instant, then followed me out.
‘Aren’t you going to call Tina?’ he said.
I tutted, ‘That slag’s the fucking last thing she needs.’
In the van we headed back to Amy’s flat. The city was awash with fly-posters for the Festival. Every available wall, phone box and empty shopfront had been slapped with an ad for comedians I’d never heard of. I recognised one or two of the faces on show, with their T4 haircuts and overconfident manner shining out. They were all about the same age, all middle class and, as always, the humour would be the same: shite. I’d seen a Jerry Sadowitz show at the Festival once – pure working-class bile, and hilarious. He had commented that the only time he’d make it big was when he died and some Oxbridge student decided to recreate his show as a tribute. The sad thing was, he was fucking all too right.
This town has always been a schizophrenic schism of haves and have-nots, but more and more now it looked like those at the top were getting away from the rest. The game was fixed. A bolt of anger turned in my gut when I thought of Paul and Ben and the rest of their pathetic little crew running around the city as though they owned it. In their own way, they did.
Was I bitter, jealous? I didn’t think so. I didn’t aspire to their level. It was the injustice that fired me. Always had. Even though Ben hadn’t been the kind of character I’d go for a bevvy with, he’d deserved better than a short drop. He got overambitious and got in the way – the system shut him down. His mother was broken, and I had seen enough families destroyed to know the territory. The way Fitz had spoken about the Craft and how the case had been swept under the carpet, the more something like ambition fired in me. I wanted to blow this case wide open. I wanted to be the fly in the ointment. I wanted to do this one thing, because I could, and because I could do nothing about the rest of it. This life was a fixed game, but I had a chance to show everyone at the table for what they were, even if it was just this once.
My only problem was, I was no further forward after talking to Paul. I had hoped he would expose something important, let slip something I could use; but he had been ready for me. Had I been on better form, not losing my mind to alcohol, I might have seen the angles more clearly. Nothing was stacking up, I’d need to rely on a break. But I had a few more moves left to play. I wasn’t out yet.
When we got back to the flat, Amy arked up. ‘So, what’s the go?’ she said.
‘No go,’ said Hod.
Amy turned her jaw to her shoulder, putting a bead on me. ‘You didn’t bust Paul?’
I shook my head, removed my tweed – it felt like a straitjacket – and went to sit by the window, staring out at the skyline. The traffic was buzzing in the street below.
Amy came to sit down beside me. Hod went through to the kitchen, shouted as he ferreted in the fridge, ‘So, what now?’
I kept staring out the window. My mind was awash with possibilities… each one of them turning onto a dead end.
‘Gus, what now?’ echoed Amy.
We were at a brick wall. ‘Look, what did you both expect, that the kid would just spill his guts? He was too smart for that.’
Amy crossed her legs, leaned forward; stray curls from her fringe fell over her eye, ‘Okay, so how does it work, Gus?’
I drew my gaze away from her, turning back to the grey sky. ‘The kid’s rattled… trust me.’
‘He is,’ said Hod. ‘We both saw that.’ He’d brought through a can of McEwan’s, cracked it open. ‘You think he’s rattled enough, though?’
I rose, followed Hod’s cue, got myself a can, fired in. It tasted like an old dream, I wanted to fire into a lorryload of them, but fought it. My thoughts were on other matters and that helped. Said, ‘My worry is that he’s
‘Come again?’ said Hod.
I took another belt then lowered the can. ‘If he’s too scared, he’ll kick off and that could be dangerous… Unless.’
Amy and Hod looked at each other. I could tell they were weighing up my words. Hod spoke: ‘You mean, unless Gillian talks him round?’
‘Bullseye.’
