Me and My Brothers

by Kray, Charlie

  As we left the town and headed towards the A20 and London, I sank back in my seat and closed my eyes, trying to take in that from that very moment I could do precisely what I wanted when I wanted with no questions asked, no permission to be sought. I was a free man, and it was a blissful, blissful feeling which sent a shiver of exquisite pleasure through me.

  I cannot remember a more enjoyable hour’s drive.

  One of the first things I did was persuade Mum to give up her office cleaning job. On my pre-release weekend I’d been shocked to learn that she was getting up at four in the morning for this, then waiting on tables at the Blue Coat Boy at lunchtimes. She said she needed the money to be able to afford to go on prison visits, but it made me ill to think about it. All the people who had had money from us over the years! You would have thought somebody would have helped her out with a few quid. I didn’t mind her doing the pub work, because she was an outgoing type who enjoyed company but I hated the idea of her getting up in the middle of the night to clean bloody offices. So when I was home for good I told her that that was the end of it. Mum, bless her heart, said she couldn’t give it up – the cleaning company boss was a lovely man and she did not want to let him down; but I persisted and eventually she rang him and said she was quitting. He was very understanding and thanked her for all she had done.

  Mum had started with nothing, suddenly had everything, and now she was back to nothing again. Yet she never complained, never moaned. I was so pleased for her and the old man that they still had that flat in Bunhill Row. When we bought the house in Bildeston, people suggested we should sell the flat, but I said: supposing something happens and we’re not around, what would they do? Well, something did happen, and the house had to be sold. But Mum just went back to living in the flat and took on two jobs to make ends meet. Living the high life in the West End or on the breadline in the East End, she was still the same lady.

  Money was a nightmare. I’d gone into prison with a lifetime’s experience of threepenny bits, tanners, half-crowns and ten-bob notes, and I came out to the complexities of decimalization. The old half-crown had bitten the dust and the much-loved half-a-quid note was now a fifty pence piece.

  For a while it was like a foreign currency and, on my second night home, it hit me just how much I had to re-learn. I was staying with George and Sue at their home in Orpington and while I was in the local pub I decided to ring Gary. Without thinking too much about it I went to the phone, but I couldn’t work out how to use it. Coping with the new money was bad enough, but the phone system had changed too. I went back to George and Sue, feeling pathetic. ‘I can’t do it,’ I said, like a child. They fell about.

  Once I had picked it up, I seemed to be on the phone all the time, trying to pick up the threads of my life as fast as I could. I was always flying about, always in a hurry. I couldn’t bear the thought of standing still; I’d idled away nearly seven years of my life, and I was determined to make up for lost time.

  For two weeks I didn’t think of driving, even though my licence was up to date. But then, after a night at Mum’s, I asked George if I could drive us back to Orpington. Like swimming, or riding a bike, driving is something you never forget, and I drove the twenty miles as safely as if I had never been away from the wheel. After that, I was eager to drive everywhere. But I was still in a hurry: if I needed to stop for a paper or cigarettes, I’d see a shop then think, ‘I’ll wait for the next one.’ Then I’d do the same at the next shop. It was as if I felt I’d be missing something, losing my place in the queue of life, if I allowed myself to pause. The changes took a bit of getting used to: I lost count of the number of times I took a sharp turn into what I thought was a traffic-beating back-double, only to find myself facing a block of flats or a one-way street that had not been there before. Then when I did calm down and took Shanks’s pony I’d find the traffic had increased so much that crossing the road was a major, life-risking event.

  There were people who were wary of me because of my name, but on the whole I found nearly everyone very friendly. I never took anything for granted, however, and was always on my guard. One night in the Chinbrook pub in Grove Park, South London, I was aware of a man at the next table staring. Then he said something to his wife, who looked over; it was obvious they were discussing me.

  I felt a bit awkward – rather like an animal in a zoo – but ignored them and carried on chatting to George and Sue. The man continued to stare and I began to feel uneasy: the Kray trial had affected a lot of people and even though seven years had passed one couldn’t be sure of people’s reaction to meeting one of the convicted men.

  Finally, George, Sue and I got up to leave. The man got up too, and walked towards me. He was about sixty, but huge – about six foot six. I tensed inwardly. This is it, I thought. He’s going to take a pop at me, or slag me off. He certainly didn’t look the type who wanted my autograph.

  The gentleman looked me in the eye, but instead of giving me a load of abuse or even a right-hander he merely extended his hand and said, ‘I hope you don’t mind me asking, but how are you?’

  I replied, ‘I’m very well, thank you.’

  ‘Oh, that’s good,’ he said. ‘I’m so pleased. I’d like to wish you all the very best for the future.’ And then he shook my hand warmly.

  He was a middle-class, confident sort of man who, I believe, said what he meant and meant what he said. I left the pub with Sue and George, feeling buoyant. The encounter boosted my confidence no end.

  I decided I had to talk to Dolly. Even though I knew Nancy was not my child I still wanted to see her; the upset of that last prison visit when Dolly had half-dragged her out still bothered me and I was missing her more than ever. I went to the flat in Poplar, which I had handed over to Dolly along with everything else, and discussed visiting arrangements. Dolly agreed it was best if I popped up whenever I liked and for the next few weeks I did that. For a while it was quite friendly; Dolly often cooked a meal and I looked forward to the visits, which I found rewarding and enjoyable.

  Suddenly everything changed, however. For some reason Dolly decided she didn’t want me to see Nancy any more and I got a summons ordering me to go to court to fight over custody. I was shocked then angry, thinking this is all I need – court! I could not understand what it was all about. I didn’t want Nancy to leave her mother and live with me; I just wanted to see her once a week or so. Surely that could be arranged without the hassle and expense of going to court?

  I started wondering what possible legal argument could be put forward to stop me seeing Nancy whenever I wanted. Surely Dolly wasn’t going to come clean and tell the truth about Ince? When Dolly’s solicitor eventually told me, I burst out laughing. ‘One of the points we shall be making,’ he said pompously, ‘is association.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ I said. ‘And what do you mean by that exactly?’

  ‘That it is not in the child’s interests to be associated with you, a convicted criminal.’

  I laughed in the solicitor’s face. Well, what a joke! Dolly knew full well that I had served a sentence for something I didn’t do, and here she was, living with a man who had done time for something he admitted, yet it was me who was not a good influence on Nancy.

  The court case went ahead. I won the right to see Nancy once a week and did so for a while. But it became clear that Nancy was not bothered about seeing me and gradually I stopped going round to the flat altogether.

  Once I’d got back into the swing of normal life again, I turned my mind to tracking down Diana. The first weekend I could; I drove to Leicester. But seven years is a long time and I couldn’t find anyone I knew who could give me some leads to try to trace Diana. George, my old Maidstone mate, had discovered that she and her husband had once owned a pub, so we did the pub circuit again, but with no luck. Leicester is a fairly big city and Diana could have been anywhere. On the other hand, she may well have left the area entirely. I returned to London none the wiser.

  George and I agreed to try ag
ain the following weekend, but during the week I got involved in some work that made it difficult for me to get away. George rang me and I explained that our private detective business would have to wait a week. An hour after I put the phone down, George rang back. ‘1 bet you’ll come up now,’ he laughed.

  ‘Why?’ I asked.

  ‘I’ve found her,’ George said.

  Suddenly I found myself short of breath.

  George had discovered Diana’s pub was called The Carousel and had rung there. He had learned she was still married, and was ready to put the phone down if her husband answered, but luckily it was Diana who picked it up. When George told her he had a message from a ‘mutual friend’ Diana, who later said she knew that the ‘mutual friend’ was me, was pleased, but also wary; she had been questioned by the police after my arrest and didn’t know if what she’d read about the murders was true. Anyway, she told George, she didn’t like talking to strangers on the phone. George immediately went to the pub, discreetly introduced himself to Diana and told her that I’d been thinking about her for nearly seven years. Diana was not totally convinced but agreed to go to a Leicester hotel a couple of days later to meet me again. The agreed time was 8 P.M.

  As a boxer, I never suffered from butterflies. I knew I was good arid could handle myself, and always walked from the dressing room to the ring with no tummy rumblings at all. But waiting for Diana in the hotel room that evening I went slowly but steadily to pieces. By 8 P.M. I was almost a nervous wreck. Seven years was a long time, I kept telling myself. Things change; people change. Before the arrest, I’d been a happy-go-lucky man about town – a wealthy businessman with a neat line in chat to match my expensive clothes, not bad-looking for my forty-four years, and supremely confident in myself because of my business success. In short, a winner. But I knew that prison had changed me. Seven years for something you did was hard enough to take; seven years for something you didn’t do was a knockout blow that was bound to take a heavier toll. I looked at myself yet again in the mirror. Yes, I had lost weight, and I was seven years older. But would Diana detect something lacking in me? Would she feel that the happy-go-lucky spirit that had attracted her all those years ago had died? That my eyes had lost their sparkle? That the effervescence and cavalier approach to life had been replaced by a quieter, almost inhibited, shyness? That seven years locked away from society had robbed me of my personality, leaving me a shadow of my former self? Would she see not the winner she had once admired, but a loser to be avoided?

  In the end, I bottled it. After all the build-up, I couldn’t face the confrontation and the accompanying possibility of rejection. Not in the hotel foyer, anyway. If the reunion was not to be how I had imagined and dreamt throughout all those imprisoned years, I wanted it to take place in the privacy of the room, where we could at least be polite and brief and make small talk, then go our separate ways without too much hurt and certainly without any fuss.

  So, at 8 P.M., I asked George to go down and bring Diana to the room. As I started on yet another packet of cigarettes new worries started banging away in my brain. What if she was scared to go to a hotel room with a man she had met just once? What if she wasn’t just scared, but mightily offended? What if she just walked out? What if…? I was piling one obstacle on top of the other when the door opened and there she was standing before me, blonde and beautiful, just as I remembered her. As we stood there looking at each other, smiling shyly, I knew it was going to be all right, and I walked over to her and gave her a kiss.

  ‘Well, I think I’ll be going,’ said George, bless him. And he went out, closing the door quietly behind him.

  Diana and I talked and talked. She was eager to tell me how much she had wanted to get in touch; how many letters and cards she had written, only to tear them up because she didn’t want to cause me problems. In the end, she said, she reluctantly decided that she would leave it to me. She was so pleased that I’d tracked her down and had felt confident that I would do so. For my part, I was eager to tell her that I felt the same about her as I had done before I went away, but I stressed that if everything was all right in her life I didn’t want to spoil things and cause her problems. She immediately reassured me that I’d come back at the right time. She had left home once while I was away, but had returned; now she was so unhappy with her husband that she was on the point of leaving again. When she had read that I’d been out for a pre-release weekend she’d considered ringing, but had feared that I’d be too busy.

  The talking went on and on, and then, quite naturally it seemed, we went to bed. I would like to be able to describe the sheer joy of holding, caressing and making love with a woman you adore after nearly seven years without any female contact whatsoever, but it is beyond me; I would think it is beyond most people.

  There is only one word to describe my feelings that night – they were wondrous.

  Life as a free man was wonderful. But there was always something nagging at me that would not allow me to enjoy it to the full. It was that unfinished business of injustice.

  I started to pop up to Leicester regularly, and eventually Diana decided to leave home. It was a difficult decision for her because her daughter, Claudine, was only twelve, but she felt it was best for everyone involved, so she moved in with a girlfriend in Beulah Hill, at Crystal Palace in South London.

  Diana was so good with people, particularly the elderly, that I couldn’t wait to introduce her to Mum and the old man. I felt sure they would adore her as much as I did, and I wasn’t disappointed. The old man did not make friends easily, but he took to her at once; Diana really cares about people and the old man quickly realized this. They got on really well. Mum thought she was great and said it was a pity I hadn’t met her years before. Mum never spoke badly of Dolly, but she went off her after the shabby way she behaved over the Ince affair. More than once Mum said my life could have been so much happier if I had met Diana first.

  A friend of mine, Wilf Pine, former manager of the hugely successful rock band Black Sabbath, kindly loaned me a house, and Diana and I moved in together. Immediately after the breakup Claudine and her brother Ian stayed with their father in Leicester, but it wasn’t long before Diana and her husband agreed that it was best for the children if they moved to London. Some loyal pals made sure I had a few quid to help put me back on my feet and I was able to buy a flat in Worcester Park in Surrey. The kids came down and soon we were all living happily under one roof.

  Sleeping had never been a problem for me. I’d always had the knack of being able to cut myself off from the hassles and aggravation of everyday living, and I managed this in prison, despite all the problems. But when I started living with Diana I would wake up in the middle of the night, shouting at the top of my voice. A dream would set me off and I’d wake up in a sweat but I could never remember what the dream was. It did happen once in prison – at Maidstone – and I woke myself up shouting. When it happened at home I would get up and have a coffee then go back to bed but then I’d have to get up again, and it would be backwards and forwards like that all night. Diana was worried, and a little frightened to begin with, but as soon as she senses the build-up now she shakes me and I slip back into a peaceful sleep.

  I found I could go on television to talk about the past and my time inside, but in one-to-one situations – particularly with women –I’d find myself stumbling over my words with embarrassment. So you can imagine how awkward I felt when people actually wanted my autograph.

  I’d got a job working on a big cutlery and silverware stand at the Ideal Home Exhibition at Olympia and attracted a lot of publicity. Around 80,000 people passed through the Exhibition each day and after a while I started feeling as though many of them were looking at me and pointing me out to their friends. One day a couple of girls asked me for my autograph.

  Not knowing what to do, I said, ‘You must have got me mixed up with someone else. I’m nobody famous.’

  One of the girls laughed. ‘We’ve seen your picture. And read ab
out you. You’re the Kray twins’ brother, aren’t you?’

  Of course I signed my name for them, but I did feel funny doing it. And then it happened again, and again. A London Evening Standard reporter must have noticed, because he came up for a chat. He mentioned I was working, as though it must be a new experience for me. I told him I’d always worked, despite the notoriety.

  ‘But ten hours a day?’ He was shocked.

  ‘I like it,’ I said.

  The next day I picked up a copy of the Standard. The reporter had written an article saying Charles Kray was working at Olympia and signing more autographs than he was selling cutlery. I thought it hilarious.

  Communication with Dolly became cold and casual. We only spoke to each other about our son Gary but I knocked even that on the head when she did something I’ll never forgive her for. Dolly would be the first to admit that she is a hard, unemotional individual, but what she did to my family, particularly Gary, was quite spectacular in its selfishness and brutality.