by Iain Cameron
He started talking to Emily Grant, the flirty, sexy wife of Peter Grant, the band’s drummer. So far, and despite his best overtures and chat-up lines, she’d still resisted all his attempts to get into her pants. To her credit, she was the only wife or girlfriend to make it out to Germany to watch them, moving her up a couple of notches in his estimation and making him want her all the more.
They left Ludwigshafen, a town near Stuttgart, around midnight, although none of them had much of a chance to see either place, and headed west. They drove in convoy, Fast Eddie driving the first van, Nathan Connelly driving the second, and Derek behind the wheel of the third. The third van was reserved for people but still it included some items of kit they couldn’t fit elsewhere, so they were fighting for space with coils of cables, effects pedals, and several unyielding guitar cases.
He was in the back with Peter, and at the front sat Barry, Derek and Peter’s wife, Emily, who was saving her train fare by hitching a ride home. It was a good job Barry was sitting there and not him, as the desire to slip a hand under her pretty, floral dress would be a temptation too far and most likely earn him a slap from Emily and a punch in the face from Pete.
It wasn’t so bad where they were, as they had a couple of mattresses to sleep on, but he hoped the gear was well tied-up, as he didn’t fancy being woken from a dreamless kip with a guitar or an amp bouncing off his head. He bedded down and in combination with the number of Becks he had consumed earlier plus a small toke from the new consignment, he fell asleep almost immediately.
He woke with a start, not because gravity had set loose a piece of kit, but on hearing a loud noise. He waited a second or two for his groggy head to clear before sitting up. The van was no longer in motion and yes, he could hear shouting outside, suggesting something was going on; he hadn’t imagined it.
‘What’s the beef out there, Pete?’
Peter Grant stretched. He didn’t seem to sleep much and even though he did the most physically demanding job in the band, he was still the fittest and healthiest of the bunch. Now, how did that work?
‘I dunno, some ruck about waiting too long or something.’
‘Where are we?’
‘In Dover, in a long bloody queue waiting to go through Customs.’
‘Christ, did I snooze through Germany and a Channel crossing? That has to be some kind of record.’
‘You did, and boy do you make some strange noises in your sleep.’
‘Yeah,’ he said as he got up, careful to avoid hitting his head on the low ceiling, and tensed tired muscles. ‘I must have been dreaming I was humping your wife.’
Pete flexed those big drummer arm muscles and a few other ones on his face.
‘Only in my sleep mind, nothing else.’
‘Better not be,’ he said through gritted teeth.
‘Bloody hell, when you put on a face like that, you could play a villain in one of the Bond movies instead of playing drums in a rock band. I’m going out to see what’s going on before you explode.’
He pushed open the doors. Before he could adjust, he was assailed by a combination of fresh sea air, the bright sunshine of a Dover morning and the rumble and grind of a traffic queue, making him flinch.
A long line of vehicles, including their three vans, were waiting to be cleared by Customs but at least they were near the front of the queue. The shouting he’d heard was an argument going on between a Customs officer and a lorry driver, the latter complaining about the time he’d spent waiting and the Customs guy giving him back as good as he got.
He wandered up the line to Fast Eddie’s van as the Customs guy seemed to lose the plot with the mouthy lorry driver and decided to give his load the complete tooth-comb treatment.
‘Christ, we’re gonna be here for ages,’ he said as he scrounged a light from Eddie.
‘That’s what you get for giving a bloody jobsworth too much lip. Be nice to the buggers is my approach.’
‘Yeah, you can be nice as ninepence because all our stuff is sprayed with Eddie’s custom-made pooch fooling perfume.’
‘Too true brother, it never fails.’
Eric yawned. He wasn’t a morning person, never had been. It was an old rock cliché to think all musicians slept during the day and worked at night, not getting to bed until regular folks were heading off to work. For him, there was nothing rock ‘n’ roll about it. He preferred working this way and often came up with his best guitar licks at three or four in the morning, stoned out of his skull and a long way from a warm bed.
He wandered back down the line of cars, buses and trucks to talk to Derek, who was stretched out in the passenger seat with a snoozing Emily beside him, her head on his shoulder, the jammy bastard. Barry sat behind the wheel and the taciturn bass player with the voracious sexual appetite acknowledged his pleasant salutation with a barely perceptible nod.
‘We sail through border controls in France and Belgium,’ Derek said by way of greeting, ‘and get stuck here. No bloody wonder Britain’s in such a mess. I’ve got a meeting with a promoter at one and don’t think I’m gonna make it.’
‘What’s that about?’ Eric asked, only mildly interested, as he would willingly play anywhere the band were doing a gig and didn’t care if it was called Aberdare, Aberdeen or Aachen.
‘He came to one of the gigs in Germany and wants to put a tour together with us headlining.’
‘You’re kidding?’
‘No, straight-up.’
‘Fuck me, it’ll be brilliant. Hang on, we’re not heading back to the Bramley Scouts Hall or that dive of a pub we played in Brum when a drunken bastard came on stage and thumped me?’
‘Nah, don’t be daft. He says he’ll get us into decent-sized venues like The Dome in Brighton and Sheffield City Hall.’
‘Yeah, and there will be us strutting our stuff to big empty spaces.’
‘No chance. Watch out mate, we’re on the move.’
He stepped back to see the mouthy truck driver drive his big truck away, clearly not pleased with the treatment he’d received from the gentleman from HM Customs and Excise if a middle finger out of the window was anything to go by. The cars, vans, and trucks in the queue all edged forward and Fast Eddie was next.
Three of them were in on the deal: him, Fast Eddie and another roadie, Smelly Dave. He and Fast Eddie could represent England, an Olympic pair in the pill-popping and weed-smoking events, but Dave was too fond of buying the latest hi-fi gear and records, a way more expensive habit than dope, and as a result he was only interested in the money.
If Customs found the dope, they would claim it must have been there all this time as the cabinets didn’t belong to them, they were rented from a dodgy outfit in East London. At the very least, it would encourage the cops to raid their place which would serve the bastards right as they were always rude to him.
Eddie opened the van’s doors and the Customs guy looked in. ‘Fucking stinks in here,’ the jobsworth said. ‘What have you guys been doing?’
‘Had an oil leak,’ Eddie replied, his sad, hangdog face devoid of mirth. ‘I thought we’d fixed it but maybe it’s started up again.’
An oil leak? Where the hell did he get that little belter from? Their kit was either electric or acoustic and didn’t require more than a dab of WD40 now and again to loosen a hinge or free a stiff tuning peg. Nothing he could think of needed oil, except maybe Fast Eddie’s muscles and joints after sleeping outside in the van when he’d had a few too many.
‘Take the stuff out and we’ll let Bobby sniff around.’
‘For fuck’s sake mate, it’ll take hours,’ Eddie said.
‘Less of the mate. Just do it and shut up.’
Eric went over to help. Ten minutes later and with most of the large gear removed and piled up against the side of the van, the dog was let loose.
He cringed as the dog did its stuff, sniffing and moving around like a mad, wind-up toy. It was ten, half-ten in the morning and it looked like a nice sunny June day was in prospec
t but he was sweating as if standing in the middle of the Arizona Desert, his shirt sticking to his back, his eyes clouded in moisture like he was crying.
He was lost in a cloud of fear and anxiety, not for the shame he would bring on his parents or his vilification in the press, as they were constantly out to get him, but his inability to play guitar and hear the crowd roaring his name.
He was so engrossed in the melancholy of his own thoughts that he failed to hear the Customs guy say, ‘On your way.’ It was only when Eddie slapped him on the back and said, ‘Told you so mate, now come on and give me a bloody hand,’ did he realise they were free to go.
THIRTEEN
He was walking down the road as if looking for an address, and after spotting a house with no one at home, turned into the driveway. He continued to walk as if he knew where he was going, but as soon as he was enveloped in darkness by the shadow of the house, he stopped and listened.
He was listening for the sound of Neighbourhood Watch opening their doors and switching on torches, or passing around the matches and lighting them, knowing this area. Instead, the only noise breaking the night’s silence was an owl hooting in the trees. He flicked the toothpick over with his tongue in one movement; five minutes one way, five minutes the other.
It wasn’t this house he was interested in, but another a few doors along, and so he made his way to the back of the garden and began climbing over neighbouring fences. The gardens of these houses were extraordinarily long, no doubt the reason why properties around here were so expensive. Personally he hated gardens and gardening, many years in prison saw to that, but they provided good cover for him just in case someone decided to take a look out of their back window.
When he reached the house he wanted, he headed straight for the back door. The target would be in his garage pumping iron, as it wasn’t yet time for bed. He quietly lifted the small sturdy table at the side of the barbeque and positioned it under the kitchen window. He placed a long screwdriver under the hole he’d cut a few days ago and popped the lever holding the window closed. A minute or so later, he was standing in the kitchen.
He made his way to the hall and then towards the integral garage; he knew the way. Peter Grant lived alone now; even if he hadn’t known, it would have been easy to tell as there were gaps on the walls where pictures were once hung, indentations on the carpet where heavy furniture had once stood and several rooms were devoid of the soft, frilly touches a woman usually brought to a house. Mind you, what did he know about women? He couldn’t go out with a girl without giving her a black eye or something worse, and his mother before she died, was a drug addict. The closest she ever got to decorating was barfing on the walls and pissing on the carpet.
Standing at the door of the garage he could hear loud music. He didn’t know much about anything, but music was his thing and without hearing the track too distinctly, he knew it was Street Fighting Man by the Rolling Stones. In prison, he liked quiz nights. They were designed to be a bit of light entertainment for the boys, but often led to serious punch-ups with simmering recriminations.
He pushed open the door just a sliver and peered in. The target was at the start of his routine, lying on his back on the bench and lifting a heavy bar which was usually fifty kilos to start and progressively increased to eighty or ninety, or if he was feeling especially manly, one hundred. He waited until he dipped the bar and it began moving on its journey up towards the rest, his grunts almost drowning out the next track, Bad Company and Can’t Get Enough, before stepping up behind him. Gripping the bar with both hands, he pushed it back down.
The sap was so surprised to find someone standing there, he lost concentration and his arms buckled. The bar, 60 kilos of solid metal, fell against his chest with a deep thump. Not allowing him the time to appreciate what was happening and give him a chance to offer resistance, he pulled it up towards his throat.
‘Stop it, you bastard! I can’t...breathe. Who...the fuck are you?’ he said, gasping for air.
Frantically his fingers were clutching at the bar, trying to move it away from his throat, but the angle wasn’t good for the man on the bench and his assailant’s grip was strong. If Grant wasn't panicking so much he might have noticed that his attacker was standing in a position where his balls were within easy reach of a good punch; good job as anyone who could potentially lift one hundred kilos could pack quite a thump.
‘What’s the combination of the safe?’
‘How…how do you know...I’ve got a safe?’
‘Call it a lucky guess.’ He pressed the bar down harder on his throat.
‘Ahhh. Stop it!’
Momentarily he eased back; the man needed to speak. ‘I won't say it again, the combination of the safe?’
‘653...ah, ah 425.’
‘653425?’
‘Yes.’
He applied more pressure, and soon Peter Grant struggled no more.
FOURTEEN
What a morning. It took until ten-thirty before householders stopped reporting false alarms at houses in the Elm Grove area, temporarily incapacitated by a power cut, and then they had to return to Churchill Square to pick up yet another shoplifter. To cap off a lousy start to this week’s shift, the intruder they caught climbing through a kitchen window in Patcham was only the son of the stone-deaf woman inside who couldn’t hear him knock and didn’t see the bell alert on her visual display. All PC Cindy Longhurst wanted to do now was get back to John Street nick and enjoy a well-earned mug of Rosie Lea.
The patrol car turned into Kingswood Street and they were close enough to John Street nick for Cindy to almost taste the heavy aroma of a hot Tetley brew. Just then, Telepathic Tina, otherwise known as TT, the masochistic controller who possessed an uncanny sense of knowing when they weren’t busy or were making their way back to the station for a break, came on the squawk box and sent them to Hove. Cindy’s driver, Dave Gosling executed an angry U-turn, causing a mini-hold-up behind and giving pleasure to the twisted bastard, as his face creased into the first smile of the day as they roared off in the opposite direction.
Cindy was new to Traffic, a welcome relief from pounding the beat which she’d done for four years, but she’d always liked cars and helping people and so far the job had lived up to her expectations. This was in spite of the behaviour and attitude of her ill-mannered and all-round misogynist companion, a twenty-two-year veteran who was passed-over, pissed-on and more often than not, passed-out. In fact, he didn’t believe women should be in the force at all, but stuck at home doing his washing and ironing, and in such a comment lay the reason why no one had volunteered to marry the cranky sod.
‘When TT said this bloke didn’t turn up for work yesterday, did she say if anybody had made any attempt to contact him because if they haven’t–’
‘Yep, she did,’ Cindy said glancing at her notes and heading off another moan at Gosling Pass. ‘Friends tried his mobile and the home phone but they didn’t receive a reply. He might be inside and incapacitated in some way.’
‘How do we get in? I know the Woodland Drive area, my uncle used to live there, it’s full of big houses with smart-arsed alarm systems and big dogs. I don’t want to be the one standing there for the third time this morning with my dick in my mouth while this screeching thing wakes the whole neighbourhood, and then having to face an angry Alsatian, spitting venom because its master’s gone and tripped down the bloody stairs.’
‘Don’t wind me up Dave, you know how I hate dogs. TT said a neighbour, a Mr Charles Whiting, has the key and he’ll be there to meet us.'
‘He better be because...’
She tuned out. Life as a new-minted Traffic cop began in the enclosed space of a police squad car five weeks ago, and in this short time she now knew his views on politics, football and women. It varied little, from ‘string 'em up’, ‘they’re rubbish’ to ‘they should all be at home’ and talk of his impending retirement only made matters worse. She couldn't wait until the spring really kicked in, as he was
a keen gardener and he could then bore her rigid about flies on his fruit trees and slugs on the lettuce.
They turned into Woodland Drive and about a hundred yards down, into a driveway, and parked behind a pristine BMW Six Series. She knew it was the owner’s car, but it didn’t half make their grubby Mondeo patrol car look old and shabby.
‘Nice set of wheels,’ Dave said after easing his beer-bloated frame out of the door and stretching, as if at the end of a long journey and not a couple of miles between two adjoining towns. ‘I might buy one of them when I retire.’
‘I don’t know what sort of package you’ve been promised, from what I hear you’ll be lucky to afford a well-used pool car.’
‘I wouldn't touch a heap of crap like this if you–’
‘Good morning officers.’
Cindy turned and came face to face with a small, elderly man with thinning grey hair, clad in an ill-fitting cardigan, either his wife’s first attempt at knitting or the poor man needed to use his glasses whenever he went shopping. They didn’t hear his approach as the daft old goat was still wearing his slippers, despite the presence of many puddles from an overnight deluge, leaving drains in the road gurgling with running water.
‘I have the keys,’ he said, before turning and heading towards the house.
The door opened without drama and the piece of paper clutched in Mr Whiting’s bony fingers containing the alarm code jotted down in neat blue writing was not needed, as there was no ominous countdown and no wailing siren to spin the wheels of PC Dave Gosling’s moan-meter. Mr Whiting was standing in the hall waiting to follow them, but Dave placed a firm hand on his elbow and steered him back the way he came. ‘Sorry sir, but you’ll have to wait outside,’ he said. ‘Thank you for opening the door but this is police business.’
He closed the door on the crestfallen old-timer. No doubt he was a fan of cop shows like CSI and Scandinavian murder mysteries like The Bridge, and was gung-ho to discover his first pool of blood, a bashed-in skull or God-forbid, a dead body. With four years under her slowly expanding belt, Cindy still found the sight of a corpse disturbing, and with Mr Whiting on the wrong side of seventy, she doubted if his heart could stand the shock of finding his neighbour lying at the bottom of the stairs or impaled on the tines of a garden fork.