Den of Snakes

by Damian Vargas

  ‘What was that?’ said Charlie.

  ‘I said yes, Charlie. Like clockwork’.

  ‘Good. Now let’s get this show on the road’.

  The crews returned to their vehicles and set off, the light blue Commer taking the lead with the Volvo following. The United Security depot was just twenty minutes away in Hatton, to the south-east of Heathrow Airport. It was still dark when they pulled up outside a disused brick building. Eddie peered up at the two-story structure as Bill jumped out of the van, a pair of bolt cutters in his hand.

  ‘It’s an old Lucas factory,’ said Gary. ‘They used to make car alternators here. It’s been like this since it closed down in the late seventies when they started importing them from Japan. Bill cut through the rusty chain that had secured the factory’s gate, pulled it open, and waved at his brother and the East Londoners to drive in. Eddie observed in the van’s side mirror as Bill pulled the gate shut again. The building was C-shaped, with a small courtyard in the middle that was just big enough to keep both vehicles out of sight from the service road on which they had arrived.

  Eddie opened the door and climbed out of the van. His boots crunched on the broken concrete surface underneath. The sun was up now, and it tinged the top of the building in a yellow-orange.

  ‘Over here,’ said Charlie, waving his torch. ‘Gary will run through things’. He laid one of his photocopied maps on the Commer van’s dented bonnet, and the two crews gathered around.

  ‘The depot’s one hundred yards over there to the north,’ said Gary. He gestured past the facade of the building behind Eddie, before handing out the sheets to the waiting men. ‘There’s a cafe here’. He pointed at a rectangle on the map. ‘It’s well busy up to mid-afternoon. There can be up to fifty punters in there. If you get a window seat, you have an unobstructed view of the east side of the depot’.

  ‘So we want to have eyes there for a start,’ said Charlie. ‘Two or three men, revolving for an hour at a time. Send two your boys with Roger, okay Bobby?’

  Pickering nodded then addressed two of his crew. ‘Dave, Gerry. You go first. Watch your manners and don’t engage in no conversations with the locals. Keep to yourselves’. He poked the boyish man in the Harrington jacket. ‘That means no chattin’ up the waitress, Gerry. No matter how good-looking she is!’

  The ginger-haired man nodded obediently.

  ‘Next up, on the opposite side of the depot, on the north side,’ Gary continued. ‘There’s a construction site. It is going to be an MFI, but it’s just a concrete shell at present. We can see the activity in the yard from there. Me and Bill will head over there for the first shift’.

  ‘Good,’ said Charlie. ‘Mike, you take Bobby and his other two lads for a long walk. Get to know the entire area. Watch out for coppers, security guards, CCTV. You know the drill. Got it?’

  ‘Where will you and Ed be?’ asked Mike.

  Charlie pointed to the upper floor of the building to their left. ‘Up there. We’re gonna check out all the comings and goings’. He swung towards Gary. ‘So, when’s the special delivery arriving?’

  ‘Around midday, according to Angus’.

  ‘And what time does his shift start?’

  Gary glanced at his watch. ‘He should be here in about ten minutes. He’s got a brown Hillman Avenger. You’ll be able to hear it a mile off, the exhaust is fucked’.

  ‘Okay, everyone clear what they’re doing?’ asked Charlie. A round of nods and grunted confirmations greeted him. ‘Right, how do we get into this place, Gazza?’

  Gary pointed towards a set of old, wooden double doors. ‘Just shove ’em open. Staircase is to the right. There are a few old chairs scattered up there’.

  ‘Good stuff. Okay gents, we all meet back here at two o’clock. Keep your eyes peeled’. He pulled a torch out of his pocket. ‘C’mon Eddie,’ he started towards the doors.

  They made their way to the top floor and towards the side of the building that overlooked the United Security depot. Eddie approached a window he gauged would afford his brother and him a suitable vantage point. A grimy film covered the inside of the glass, so he rubbed it with his sleeve in a circular motion to clear a section he could look through.

  Charlie arrived at this side, carrying two old wooden chairs. ‘Here you go,’ he said. ‘You stay here, I’m just gonna check the rest of the building’.

  Eddie lifted a small pair of binoculars from his coat pocket and peered through them at the security depot opposite his position. The building looked to be pre war, most likely constructed in the twenties or thirties. It had been extended several times by the look of it. One section seemed to have received a substantial repair - a large V-shaped section of bricks was newer than their neighbours. It was probably bomb damage from the war, thought Eddie, who could remember plenty of similar scarred buildings in his youth.

  The painful sound of a faulty car exhaust caught his attention. He pressed his face to the glass and saw a brown saloon approaching from his left. It was Angus’s brown Avenger. He watched as the car pulled over to the side of the street. A man in a security guard’s uniform got out of the vehicle. He locked the car door, glanced up towards the top floor of the disused factory where Eddie was sitting, then walked towards a service door. He waited for about twenty seconds before the door opened, then went in.

  ‘Was that Angus?’ said Charlie, who had finished his rounds and was walking back towards his brother. He reached into his bag and lifted out a battered silver Thermos flask and two white teacups.

  ‘Yep’.

  ‘Cuppa?’ asked Charlie.

  ‘Cor, not half’.

  ‘Ain’t got no biscuits though,’ said Charlie.

  Eddie smiled. ‘Remember how Dad used to dunk his digestives in his tea?’

  ‘Course I do,’ said Charlie. ‘He’d swear like a trooper if a bit of the biscuit fell off into his cup. You’d have thought he’d just stood in dog shit or something’. Charlie laughed. ‘I couldn’t stop giggling. Not till he clipped me round me head, that was’.

  Eddie took his eyes away from his portal in the window to look at his older brother. Charlie was staring at the teacup in his hand, lost in his memories. ‘You miss him?’ he asked. Charlie looked up, surprised.

  ‘Course I do. He was my old man,’ he said, his tone somewhat accusatory. Don’t you?’

  ‘I weren’t close to him. Not like you was,’ said Eddie, knowing that this was not the moment to express how he really felt. ‘To tell the truth, I never felt that he wanted me around’.

  ‘You what? Dad treated you just like you was his own’. Eddie dropped his gaze and peered back through the glass. Charlie was not about to let the topic lie, however. ‘I reckon you was his favourite’.

  ‘You’re kidding me,’ said Eddie.

  Charlie shook his head. ‘Remember that bike he got you for your birthday,’ he said. ‘When you was what…eight? Just after I got back from the Borstal. A Raleigh, weren’t it?’

  ‘A secondhand Raleigh Sport, yeah’.

  ‘He saved up for months for that flippin’ bike for you. And he spent ages scouring through the classifieds till he found one he thought you’d want’. Eddie thought back to the moment he’d first cast his eyes over the bicycle standing in the kitchen room against the table. Mrs Lawson had got him out of bed that day and taken him downstairs for his present. Mr Lawson had gone to work already.

  ‘I loved that bike,’ he said.

  ‘Did you ever tell him?’ said Charlie.

  ‘Probably not’.

  ‘The only decent bike I ever got was from uncle Bob when I was about twelve. He’d nicked it from some posh kid in Pinner. When mum found out, she took it away and handed it in at the local nick. She told them she’d found it in the park’.

  Charlie unscrewed the Thermos and poured tea into one cup, then held out the steaming drink to Eddie.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Eddie as he took the cup. He watched as Charlie poured the hot liquid into the second teacup. ‘I a
lways figured they only took me in for the extra benefit money’. Charlie looked up, an incredulous look on his face.

  ‘You ain’t serious?’ he said. Eddie shrugged.

  ‘Well, they got extra dosh, right?’

  His brother shook his head. ‘They adopted you coz mum couldn’t have no more kids’.

  ‘You what?’ asked Eddie.

  Charlie sighed. ‘She couldn’t have no more. Not after me’. Eddie gawped at his brother. ‘Wait,’ said Charlie. ‘You didn’t know? She almost died’.

  Eddie did not know how to respond to this revelation. Charlie put the cup down, fetched a cigarette from its packet and placed it between his lips. Eddie could see his brother’s fingers trembling as he lifted the lighter to the tip. ‘What are you tellin’ me, Charlie?

  His brother inhaled on the cigarette and let the smoke linger in his lungs before releasing it out and upwards. ‘After she had me, she was in the hospital for a month. Her insides were all fucked up. They had to operate. Took out her womb, didn’t they?’

  ‘What? How…how d’you know that?’ said Eddie, putting down his drink.

  ‘Mrs Green told me. Remember her? We used to call her “Auntie Green” ’.

  ‘I thought she was our auntie,’ said Eddie,

  ‘Nah, you stupid sod. She was a neighbour. Lived up the road. She looked after us when Mum and Dad was both working. I thought she was pretty hot, except for the big mole on her chin. She told me all about it one evening when she was babysitting for you when you was a nipper. I think she had a thing for the old man. She said it almost destroyed him, he was so worried’. Charlie took another long drag on the cigarette.

  ‘I had no idea,’ said Eddie.

  ‘Course you didn’t. They protected you’.

  ‘So, why are you telling me now?’

  Charlie did not answer. He stood looking down at the concrete floor, the burning cigarette in his right hand. A lorry had pulled up down on the road beneath them. Charlie swivelled around and pushed the window open a few inches. Eddie could hear a metallic scraping. He guessed it was from the security depot’s rear gates being opened, but continued looking at his brother. And then it dawned on him.

  ‘You blame yourself, don’t you?’

  Charlie remained staring through the window. He cleared his throat. ‘I wasn’t the only one,’ he said. ‘It’s probably why I never got a nice bike for my birthday’.

  Eddie sat back in his chair, unsure how to respond. ‘Bruv…listen, I -’.

  ‘Forget it. Ancient history’. Charlie’s face gave no hint of how he was feeling, his eyes fixed on the scene outside. He pointed to the depot. Eddie looked out and saw Angus standing at the gate as the orange lorry made its way into the yard. He was holding a torch in one hand as he dragged one of the big, black doors closed. He pointed it up towards the old Lucas factory where Charlie and Eddie were watching from, flashed the light on and off several times, then turned and closed the gate behind him. ‘That’s them, bruv. That’s the diamonds’.

  The following hours passed by, Charlie and Eddie waiting until it was two o’clock before they made their way down to the two vehicles to wait for the rest of the two crews. Roger and Gary arrived first, then two of the East Enders. Mike and Bill turned up a few minutes later, followed by Bobby Pickering along with Gerry and the last member of the East End crew.

  ‘Load up, gentleman. I’ll be with you in a sec,’ said Charlie while strolling over towards Pickering. Eddie watched from the back of the van as the two men conversed for a few minutes before Charlie returned and clambered into the van’s passenger seat. Pickering and his crew got into their Volvo.

  ‘What was that about?’ asked Eddie as the Volvo pulled away.

  ‘Just going over a few details,’ said Charlie. He banged his hand on the outside of the door. ‘Let’s get going, I’m fucking starving’.

  Gary dropped the Lawson brothers, Roger and Mike off around the corner from their digs in Kilburn, then he and Bill headed off in search of takeaway food and beer.

  Mike made himself comfortable in front of the TV set with Charlie watching an old Western, while Roger occupied himself with a crossword puzzle he had found on an old copy of The Sun he had found lying on the floor of the squalid flat. Eddie used the opportunity to grab some sleep and took himself off to the makeshift bedroom.

  He awoke an hour later to a commotion in the living room. He could hear Charlie’s raised voice. Something was up. He pulled his jeans on and opened the door to see Gary astride a wooden chair with his head in his hands. Charlie was shouting at him. Mike sat on the old sofa, a cigarette in one hand and a can of Heineken in the other. Roger stood peering out of the window between the swanky old curtains.

  ‘What’s going on?’ asked Eddie.

  Mike answered him. ‘It’s Bill. The rozzers got him’.

  ‘When? How?’ said Eddie.

  Gary lifted his head. ‘We was in the chippy. Bill wanted chicken. The geezer behind the till said it would be twenty minutes or so. I mean, that’s pretty normal, right? Thing is, I thought he was looking at Bill a bit funny-like. Bill didn’t notice, so I told him when the geezer had his back turned, but Bill said it was nuffin. He said I was being paranoid. I figured he was right, so I popped to the offy next door’. He paused for a moment and ran his fingers through his hair, then continued. ‘Couldn’t have been five minutes later when two jam sandwiches pull up outside and suddenly there’s six or seven uniforms running into the chippy. They had Bill out in seconds. Pushed him to the floor, cuffed him and took him away’.

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ said Eddie. ‘How come they didn’t nab you?’ Gary shrugged.

  ‘I guess no one clocked I was with him. I heard the chip shop owner talking to one of the coppers. He said he’d seen Bill’s face on that TV show. The Crampton Report’.

  ‘Mother fucker,’ said Mike. He crunched the metal can in his hand and lugged it across the room. ‘We should have shot that fucker in Marbella when we had the chance’.

  ‘Like that would have helped us,’ said Charlie as he stubbed out a cigarette into an empty beer can.

  ‘So now what?’ said Eddie.

  Charlie’s eyes darted between his brother, Roger, Mike and Gary. He reached for a can of beer, opened it, then took a slurp. ‘Gary will have to take Bill’s place,’ he said.

  Gary swivelled around on his chair to look up at Charlie, clearly surprised at the development. ‘But, I need an alibi. We agreed I’d be in my local when -’.

  ‘The rest of us ain’t got alibis,’ said Charlie. ‘If you want your cut, you take the same risks we do’.

  Gary looked to his cousin, Roger, who had pulled the curtains closed and was now leaning against the wall. ‘But I set this up. That was my job. Rog, tell him. I weren’t gonna be on the crew’. Roger stared at the floor, offering no response. Gary looked back at Charlie. ‘That weren’t the plan’.

  ‘Plan’s changed,’ said Charlie. ‘Deal with it’.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Big Day

  The crew got up at five o’clock again the next day, but there was none of the banter of the previous day. They checked then rechecked their equipment in silence as if they were veteran soldiers preparing to go into battle. It triggered half-forgotten memories in Eddie’s mind of preparations for early morning border area patrols in Northern Ireland. Roger was the last to step into the living room, where he dropped his rucksack to the floor.

  Charlie stood, holding a brown and orange sports bag. He looked at his watch. ‘Good. Now, before we go, I want everyone to have one last check to see if we’ve left anything. I don’t want no sign we were ever here, got it?’ The crew nodded. ‘We’re meeting Pickering and his boys at the Wheatsheaf. Gary will be here any minute now. He’s got a Transit van that he borrowed a few weeks back. He’s had it resprayed and fitted with fake plates.’

  ‘We ain’t in that bleedin’ Commer van then? Thank the Lord,’ said Mike, smirking.

  ‘He still ain�
��t happy about being the driver,’ said Roger.

  ‘We’re a man down. It has to be that way,’ said Charlie. ‘And it ain’t the only change’. All eyes turned to him. He cleared his throat. ‘It will be Mike, Roger and me that go into the depot with Pickering’s crew’.

  Eddie shot his brother a confused look, thinking that perhaps he had misheard him.

  ‘But, what about Ed?’ said Roger.

  ‘Eddie’s goin’ to be looking out for us,’ said Charlie while he reached into the holdall at his feet and lifted out a black walkie-talkie. He held it out to Eddie. ‘Take this. I want you up in the factory watching for the signal. I was going to use one of Pickering’s boys, but better they’re all in the depot with us’.

  Eddie refused to take the radio. ‘You’re kidding me, right?’ said Eddie, but Charlie ignored the question.

  ‘Radio me a report every sixty seconds. Use channel twenty-seven. I want to know if you see so much as a paperboy move on that street. You got that?’

  ‘What the fuck? You got me all the way here just to be a friggin’ lookout?’ said Eddie.

  Charlie looked at Roger and Mike and gestured to them to leave.

  ‘You two get yourself downstairs and look out for Gary’. The two men picked up their gear and walked towards the rear door, avoiding eye contact with Eddie.

  ‘I don’t understand. What did I do?’ said Eddie.

  ‘You didn’t do nothing, bruv’.

  ‘What then?’

  Charlie hesitated for a moment, struggling, it seemed, to find the right words to say, then looked straight into his brother’s eyes. ‘This might not go to plan’.

  ‘Which is why you need me in there with you,’ growled Eddie.

  ‘Ed, you’ve got a fuckin’ toy gun in your pocket’.

  ‘Which you said is enough to scare the guards’.

  ‘Listen, that depot’s full of experienced security guards. They might not be easily intimidated. Maybe this is one time when scaring them ain’t enough’.

  ‘That’s bullshit. I’m coming with you’.