Long Reach

by Peter Cocks

  PROLOGUE

  Donnie gunned the Mercedes back across the Medway bridge. It had been a busy old night and he took a nip from his hip flask to settle the early morning acidity in his gut. Heart FM gurgled out of the radio; comforting words and familiar tunes for the waifs and strays that found themselves going to or coming from their crap jobs at this hour.

  Wage slaves. Bean counters. Shit shovellers.

  Losers.

  Donnie knew that none of them would ever know the kind of job satisfaction he felt now. If he put his foot down, he should be back in time for breakfast.

  He had dropped Dave off in Plumstead, then had been all the way down to Thanet to ditch the tools in a bit of the creek where they would never resurface. Then he had cleaned the blood and the mess out of the boot and switched the Vauxhall at one of the family-owned garages in Chatham. Replaced it with the Mercedes, which he’d left there the previous morning.

  Tidy job; all done and dusted in twenty-four hours flat.

  Donnie knew the mood at the firm would be good today, that they would all be relaxing and congratulating themselves. Glad to have the heat off for a bit; pleased that they had found where the leak was. And fixed it.

  The boss might even have something lined up for them. A day at the races maybe. A nice bit of nosebag somewhere posh.

  The thought of a rare steak and the other four or five courses got Donnie’s juices really flowing. Twenty minutes later, he pulled out of the Blackwall Tunnel and turned left into Greenwich, where he stopped at a greasy spoon and ordered the Breakfast Special: two eggs, bacon, sausage, tomato, beans and fried slice. He ordered black pudding as an extra and sat down in the steamy café with a mug of tea and a copy of The Sun.

  He turned to page three, looking for something to whet his appetite. The girl was good-looking, he thought, if tit-jobs were your thing, but he had seen nicer. No disrespect, but the one he fancied was real, better-looking – curvier – but you wouldn’t catch her getting her threepenny bits out in the paper. Donnie shuddered at the thought. Not a chance. Just as his huge breakfast arrived, he looked out through the steamed-up glass and saw a black shape hovering like a spectre over the Mercedes, which he’d parked on a double yellow right outside. Donnie jumped up and opened the door to see a traffic warden about to issue him with a ticket.

  “Oi,” Donnie bawled.

  The traffic warden went to say something, then saw who was doing the shouting and kept his mouth shut.

  “Now piss off,” Donnie shouted. The warden did as he was told, and Donovan Mulvaney went back in to his breakfast.

  I

  Eddie

  ONE

  “We found him face down in the mud at Long Reach.”

  It was only 7 a.m. and you rarely see a copper in tears so early in the day. Even off-duty.

  My mum looked wide-eyed at Tony Morris as he tried to get the words out, but his face collapsed like a leaky balloon, and the sentence turned into sobbing, snotty gibberish. Mum pulled Tony in by the arm. He dragged his sleeve across his eyes to try and staunch the flow of tears and get control of his voice.

  “He’s dead. Steve’s dead.”

  My mum had known the instant she’d opened the door, and so had I. The feeling had been growing between us, unspoken, for days. She had just needed to hear the words and then she began to cry, throwing herself back against the wall in the hall and banging her head rhythmically against the wallpaper.

  “He was down river. Place called Long Reach. Near the Dartford bridge. Looks like he might have jumped off.” Tony looked at me through wet, red eyes. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “Sorry, mate. Your brother was a hero.” His voice dissolved into sobs again.

  The emotion hit me like a fist to my stomach, but no tears would come. Mum and Tony were clinging to each other in the hallway and I pushed past them, through the open front door and out into the wet street.

  I ran across the road and over the railway bridge up to the park, past a couple of hardcore joggers and commuters heading towards the station. From the empty park I looked out over the misty outskirts of London, my breath coming in gulps. The gulps quickly turned to sobs and a loud, animal wail forced itself out of my throat.

  The realization hit me that I would never see him again; breathe the smell of his leather jacket when he hugged me, catch the beer on his breath and feel his stubble on my cheek.

  Never again.

  I looked across at Canary Wharf, twinkling with early morning lights, and on to the Dome and the sluggish grey flatness of the river as it widened out on its way down through Kent. Looked out at the stretches of mud where they had found my hero, my brother.

  Steve’s funeral was a month later. No fuss and bother: just a simple service at a crematorium with a few words from a vicar who had never known him.

  Our old man didn’t even turn up. Although possibly he didn’t know Steve was dead. Mum had kicked our dad out years ago, when I was only a toddler. He was always pissed apparently, drifted from job to job, until eventually he went a bit nuts and became violent. Steve had had a big fight with him: beat the crap out of him until he’d left. I’d only met him a couple of times since, shabby and unshaven. Once he turned up to a family wedding; the other time I saw him asleep on a bench in Lewisham. I hardly knew him.

  Steve had looked out for me.

  It had taken them that whole month to do the post-mortem and all the paperwork. It was a nightmare, not just because of the way that Steve had died, but because officially it had been difficult to prove that he ever existed. Because, it seemed, Steve Palmer had worked on something a bit hush-hush, with various false identities, and it was hard to work out that he actually was the real Steve Palmer. It made my head ache. He was Steve. I knew he’d been light on his toes, but his aliases were new to me. A secret he’d never shared.

  And then there was the coroner’s verdict to swallow.

  Suicide.

  It struck me at the funeral that I didn’t know much more about my brother than the vicar did. Steve was twelve years older than me, for a start; he’d always been at home when I was small, but I was just “the kid”. He wasn’t easy to know, but I knew he was smart. That he was the first one in our family to go to university. He’d done an industrial chemistry degree in Essex, or somewhere, ten years ago or so. I also knew that around that time he’d got into a bit of trouble with drugs, organized raves and house parties, and had got caught knocking out cannabis to other students.

  According to Mum, Steve had made a deal with the police, working for them as a trade-off for a sentence. Poacher-turned-gamekeeper; feeding back information here and there, giving them leads on drug deals, illegal raves, that kind of thing.

  Tony Morris had sorted it out for him.

  Tony had always been there for us, as far back as I could remember; the loyal family friend. He was plain clothes or CID – as far as I knew – and he’d drop round from time to time, just to make sure Mum and I were OK after the old man went. He’d be there to reassure Mum whenever Steve went on the missing list for a few weeks.

  I knew that Steve hadn’t been whiter than white, and I knew he could be difficult. I just couldn’t understand how he had got to a place where topping himself was the best option.

  I couldn’t understand and I was angry. How could he do it to me … to Mum?

  We drove back to the flat in the hearse. Heavy rain drummed on the big, black roof and our breath steamed up the windows, protecting us from the stares of passers-by. I hugged Mum close to me in the back of the car. Suddenly she felt very small, as if the month grieving and preparing for the funeral had shrunk her. She’d bought sandwiches and snacks from Marks & Spencer. They didn’t look anything like the ones you see on the telly: These are not just sandwiches, these are M&S funeral-pack
sandwiches, dried-up and curly in the central heating.

  They didn’t seem to put anyone off, though. Tony Morris and some of Steve’s mates tucked in, cracking cans of bitter and laughing and talking in loud voices that disguised their grief.

  I felt very alone.

  There was no one else of my age there. Plenty of people gathered around Mum, making the right noises, but nobody seemed to know what to say to me. Tony must have noticed me standing there on my tod, looking pissed off, and he came over.

  “Beer?” he said, passing me a can.

  I tipped it at him and took a swig, lukewarm and metallic. Tony shuffled awkwardly.

  “Been back to school yet?” he asked.

  I shook my head. I’d never been a big fan of the education system and I’d had my fair share of trouble at school. I figured that being fairly average in a massive South London comp wasn’t going to secure me a six-figure City-boy salary or a degree in rocket science. As soon as I could, I wanted to be off.

  “Well, you’ve got a pretty good excuse for skiving off for a bit, I’d say.”

  “I’m not going back,” I said.

  The previous year, I had finally stopped mucking about, buckled down and done a few GCSEs. It would be fair to say I hadn’t broken any records, but I had the basics under my belt. I’d done all right in maths and English, got decent grades in drama and French. But ICT was my thing. Technology came as second nature to me. I’d gone back to do an A level in it, but school was really doing my head in now.

  Tony stared at his shoes. “You sure? Bright bloke like you…”

  “I’ve had enough, Tony,” I said. “It’s not been a great year. I thought I might get a job.”

  I could almost see the cogs turning in Tony’s head. “What sort of thing?”

  “Dunno. Something with computers maybe.”

  There was a moment’s pause.

  “I’ve been thinking about you over the last couple of weeks,” Tony said. “How old are you now?”

  “Seventeen,” I replied. I felt defensive. Where was this leading?

  Tony considered a moment. “Listen, I’ve got something of Steve’s I’d like you to see.” He went over to where his briefcase was sitting on a chair and pulled out a padded envelope. “Here you go, old son,” he said. “Don’t show this to anyone, it’s still a bit sensitive. Just have a look and let me know what you think.”

  He took a card from his pocket and handed it to me. “When you’re ready, give me a bell.” Then he grabbed me in a bear hug and when he released me I could see the tears pricking his eyes.

  “I might have a job for you,” he said.

  TWO

  I emptied out the envelope onto the bed.

  There was a certificate and a small box. I opened the box and inside was a medal, bright as if it had been made yesterday. It was silver with the Queen’s head on one side and a crown on the other, with the words The Queen’s Gallantry Medal. I unfolded the certificate. It had a royal seal at the top and underneath it declared that the medal had been awarded to Stephen Palmer, “for acts of great bravery”.

  Tears began to blur my eyes.

  Tony was right. Steve had been a hero.

  I held the medal in my palm as if somehow it would connect me to my brother – to explain – but I felt nothing. I carefully folded up the certificate and put the medal, warm from my hand, back in its box.

  I kicked back on the bed and closed my eyes. It had been a long day and my brain was struggling to absorb this latest piece of information. I tried to sleep, but my mind was running too fast. I kept rewinding and going over the past month – the way my life had changed, the gloom that had infected the flat and settled like a damp, grey blanket over me and Mum. She hadn’t spoken much for days and just sat for hours on end, staring at daytime telly with the curtains drawn; watching naff celebrities giving people’s houses makeovers or changing their lives for a grand.

  I pulled the thin duvet up around my neck and caught a whiff of my own smell. The sheets hadn’t been changed for a month and that, added to the mess in my room, brought me up sharp. Unless I pulled my finger out and did something about it, we were heading for some kind of meltdown. I couldn’t expect the old girl to snap to it and miraculously pull everything together. I wouldn’t pretend that it was all happy families before Steve went, but losing him felt like we’d lost our anchor.

  I finally began to drift off, but the very thoughts I was trying to banish from my mind kept coming back: Steve playing football with me … the three of us on holiday in the Isle of Wight … Steve sparring with me in the garden, grinning, telling me I was a loser who punched like a girl, before leaving himself open to a sucker punch and pretending to be knocked out, declaring me the champion of the world.

  Every image seemed to be bathed in sunlight. I seemed to have blotted out the bits where Steve had come home looking starved and shagged, and had slept for days on end. Or the days when he prowled around the flat, doing nothing except smoking and peering out from behind the net curtains. Or, more recently, the times when he’d turn up, unexpected, pissed and talking fast, his hands shaking.

  I remembered that holiday. About six years ago Mum had found us a place to stay in Ventnor. It was a flat in a big Victorian house that smelt of old books and damp from being so close to the sea. Steve had cooked us a fry-up for breakfast every morning and we’d spent every day on the beach, swimming and throwing stones at Coke cans, which Steve set up on the breakwater. I don’t remember it raining, but it probably had.

  Tony Morris had come down for the night halfway through. He’d had some business in Portsmouth and thought he’d pay us a visit. He took us for dinner to a pub overlooking the sea where we’d eaten prawns and crabs, and I’d been allowed to drink cider. I remember Mum being happy, and Steve a bit pissed and cracking jokes. To anyone looking in, we’d have looked like an ordinary family of four.

  Steve and Tony had stayed on in the pub for another one while Mum took me back to flat. I remember seeing the two of them, huddled together over a table as we left, their talk suddenly dark and serious as they sipped whisky chasers.

  Tony went back the next day, but after that we ate out every night. Steve paid for everything; said he’d had enough of eating tinned soup and toasted sandwiches in the holiday flat. He took me out fishing on a boat and to a waxworks museum, which had a chamber of horrors showing people being tortured with hot irons and a moving skeleton playing a church organ. That really freaked me out.

  Of course, when I got back to London I acted to my mates that drinking cider and looking at torture was part of my daily life with Steve. I’d big him up to them until he was at least ten feet tall with a punch that would fell Mike Tyson.

  Happy days.

  I woke up about four. It was still dark and the duvet was twisted around me in a knot. I was thinking good thoughts for a second, caught up in happy memories. And then the reality came back to me; a thump, low in my guts. I tried to go back to sleep, but lay with my eyes open until it became light. I got up and took a dump, trying to ease the knot in my stomach, then stood outside the door of the small bedroom that Steve had stayed in when he was home.

  Neither Mum nor I had even touched the room since he’d gone, let alone had the heart to chuck anything out. I pushed the door silently across the carpet and stepped into the early morning light that streaked through his window. Another dawn that Steve would never see.

  There were no surprises. It was what it was: Steve’s room. The sofa bed that he slept on was folded up and boxes of his things still littered the floor. It smelt of Steve. I shut my eyes, took a deep breath and he could have been in the room with me. I flicked through the stack of CDs: mostly classic seventies rock dinosaurs and eighties bands that I’d never heard of.

  I searched through the boxes: weights, some lads’ mags, a glass bong. Nothing personal, just stuff. Nothing that told me any more than the little I already knew about my brother.

  I opened the wardrobe, put m
y face into the clothes hanging there and inhaled leather jacket and faint aftershave, and he came back to me again. I searched his pockets and found nothing but empty fag packs and train tickets to and from New Cross.

  And then I found a plastic wallet, tucked inside one of his jackets. There was no money in it, just another train ticket and a card. It was a membership card for a club in New Cross, The Harp Club. It had a picture of a harp and a shamrock printed in green. There was a photo of Steve a couple of years ago, with a beard. I remembered him growing the beard. Mum hated it. Steve had laughed – said it hid his double chin.

  Next to the photo was his name. Not Steve Palmer, another name. James Boyle. Another identity. Jimmy.

  I shut the bedroom door and went into the kitchen to make some tea and toast. I stared at the card again, and tried to read the blank, passport-photo look on Steve’s face. It was giving nothing away. I glanced at my watch; it was nearly nine. Another day about to drift away, so I made a decision. I picked up the phone.

  “Tony Morris,” came the voice on the other end.

  “It’s me,” I said. “You mentioned a job.”

  THREE

  I don’t really know what I was thinking when I walked into Tony Morris’s office. I hadn’t got a clear idea of what his job was about. I guess I was more interested in asking him exactly what my brother had been up to.

  Getting there was the maddest bit about it. He gave me an address in town near Leicester Square and when I found it, it turned out to be a music shop. In fact the whole street was music shops, with instruments hanging in the windows and heavy guitar riffs strumming out of the shop doorways. I checked the street number again. It was definitely right, but the shop was chock-full of electric guitars.

  I walked in. A bloke wearing a Jack Daniels T-shirt and a scrubby beard was noodling on a guitar. He looked up and nodded. I nodded back and he stopped playing.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “I don’t know if I’m in the right place,” I replied. “I’m looking for Tony Morris?”