by Iain Parke
There were even wreaths from clubs like The Hangmen and Dead Men Riding. We might be enemies but we were still bikers who could respect each other.
His family hadn’t wanted a church service so there was a memorial event in a hall just at the cemetery gates. He had an open casket so we could all see he was being buried in his colours, colours that he had worn for less than a day.
Sharon had chosen the music. So the coffin left the hall for his final trip to the graveside to Bat out of Hell.
I gave her a lift back afterwards.
*
It was Gyppo’s death that shocked me out of what had become a downward spiral.
Gyppo. My friend, my brother. Was gone.
Sharon and I held each other and cried for I don’t know how long.
We never actually really said anything, but we stayed together.
She moved out of their flat. It had too many memories, so she moved her art and herself into mine, temporary at first but then it became permanent.
We married.
I met up with Dazza again a few weeks after the funeral. I told him that I had decided to get out of dealing. That I didn’t want to end up the way Gyppo had. I thought it was going to be a problem, telling Dazza that I wanted to quit, that it would mean trouble. But much to my surprise, he seemed quite relaxed about it.
I collected in the last of the dosh that was due to me, sold Billy the last of my stash and he took over the connection to become Dazza’s distributor in the region. By this time I suppose it didn’t matter to Dazza if I wanted to lay off as he had plenty of other customers in the club to cover the region, Sprog for one.
I got a job. I had good A levels that had got me into Uni and so I got work in an estate agents as a mortgage advisor of all things. I had to take out my earrings when I went to work and long sleeved shirts covered my tattoos, but then after a few years I qualified as an IFA and went self-employed. It suited me; I had a range of clients who I organised mortgages for along with insurance and some investment advice; I could work when I wanted so I could take time off for runs and club business. My job meant that I had to keep myself clean but then I got voted to Road Captain which helped.
Sharon and I used the last of my and Gyppo’s dealing profits as the deposit to buy a little terraced house in the west end of town. I had the money from my business to buy bikes.
I still saw Dazza regularly enough as we met and partied with The Brethren. In fact I noticed he’d got his Bonesman badge the next time I met him.
So by this time, into my late twenties and then past thirty and turned thirty-one I was drifting again, only this time I was drifting out of the life, into being a part time outlaw.
The only problem with that now, five years after the merger, ten years after we had first patched up, was that there was no such thing as a part time member of The Brethren.
The Brethren wasn’t a lifestyle. The Brethren was a one hundred percent, twenty-four seven life.
The other guys and I were going to have to make a serious choice.
PART 3
26 April 1994 to 8 August 1994
New clubs are either completely new,
or they’re an extension of an existing club.
Damage 2008
Chapter 4 – THE CHOICE
A split in a club, pitching brother against brother, is the worst thing in the world.
The following night, we, Tiny, Gut, Butcher, Popeye and me, as the officers, gathered at the club house for a council of war.
As President, Tiny led the discussion.
‘I know everyone will have their own views on this, both here in this room and across the club.’ There were nods around the table. ‘So we need to find out what these are and how we are going to deal with them, as a club,’ he said with emphasis, looking around the table at us, ‘so that, as a club, we can decide what we are going to do.’
Like most clubs we were very democratic in our own way. We voted on new members. For anything else, in the normal course of things, Tiny would consult, take the temperature, see how the guys felt, until after a time some form of consensus emerged as to what we would do.
The trouble was that this time, we didn’t have time. Dazza had made that clear. But still we were a club and we would need to work out how we were going to take a decision.
Next week was the May Day bank holiday, our first big run of the year and the one I’d been planning for the last few weeks which would mean there were no prayers next week. That evening we all agreed the run should go ahead as planned but we arranged that each cohort’s prayers over the following couple of weeks would be full patch meetings on their own turf. As the Presidents of their local cohorts; Tiny for the Borders, Gut for Westmoreland, Butcher for Wearside and Popeye for Northumberland, would ensure that every member who wanted to could have their say at these sessions. Then by the end of the month we could reassemble for High Church and a formal secret ballot before the Whitsun bank holiday run at the end of May.
‘What about the strikers?’
‘What about ’em?’
‘Don’t they get a say?’
‘No.’
‘What if they get made up?’
‘Yes then.’
‘Any of ’em ready?’
‘I’d put Wibble to a vote, but not the others.’
Tiny looked around the room. ‘OK then, Wibble gets voted on but otherwise that’s it?’
No one seemed to object.
‘Agreed?’
‘Agreed,’ we said.
‘OK, so let’s do it. Meanwhile we need to let The Brethren know what we are doing and when they can expect to hear our decision.’
‘We also need to know exactly what they’re offering.’
‘Yeah, so we need to keep talking to ’em. Damage?’
‘OK, no problem, I’ll handle keeping Dazza in the loop.’
As the only officer without a cohort to look after and lead over the next few weeks, I was the obvious choice. As secretary-treasurer Popeye would normally be responsible for handling the vote as well but we decided that since he would have the Northumberland cohort to look after, I would take this on as well.
Meeting up with Dazza at a café on the outskirts of town a couple of days later I was surprised to run into Billy at his table already but then Billy was obviously still working for him.
Dazza seemed to be expecting what I had to report. ‘OK, it sounds sensible. You need to make sure that you bring all the guys with you. Like I say, we respect other clubs’ ways of doing things and I guess it’s the way we would do it ourselves.’
‘I still don’t understand why you need us.’ I said, ‘Why d’you need The Legion patched over? You know which side we’d be on if it ever came to it anyway so why take in more members in such a big hit? And it’s not like the territory’d be worth a lot to you. You’ll be getting most of the business out of it as it is through muggins here and the like,’ I said, gesturing at Billy who was lounging against the bar next to me.
‘Hey don’t go looking on the bad side, and don’t go putting ’em off making the offer!’ objected Billy, ‘I for one can’t wait.’
‘Ah but he’s got me,’ said Dazza, joking. Looking round for effect he leant forwards and whispered conspiratorially, ‘Want to know the real reason?’
‘Go on then. Like you’d tell me of course!’
‘Holes,’ he said in mock seriousness.
‘Holes?’
‘Yeah, it’s simple,’ he leant back against the bar, a broad smile on his face, ‘haven’t you ever seen Casino? You want to watch it mate, it’s good stuff. Very educational. Joe Pesci, he says “there’s a lot of holes in the desert.” Holes are useful, there’s a lot of holes in those hills of yours.’
‘Yeah right, you want us ’cos you need a body dump. What’s the matter, your crew got too fat and lazy to dig their own? Well that explains it all then.’
‘Well we have got loads’ve holes,’ chipped in Billy.
‘
Really?’ I was surprised to see that Dazza looked genuinely interested.
‘Yeah, there’s one just down the hill from the clubhouse in the wood the other side of the road, an old drift mine. They’re great places, go in straight for miles some of them, they’re really something.’
‘Aren’t they all blocked off?’
‘Some of them are, the ones by the road that anyone can see and some of the ones on private land, but there’s still a lot that are open if you know where to find them. There’s so many of them around here that nobody bothers to block them all off, they were all over the place. We used to explore them as kids.’
I nodded in agreement. I knew the one he meant, it had been one of our favourites, hidden away amongst the scree and tailings, the entrance almost impossible to see from the road, surrounded as it was by trees. Funny, I’d never taken Dazza for someone who would have an interest in that sort of thing but you never knew with people. I suppose he was a serious guy as well and had some serious interests outside of the club and business.
‘So you can still go down the open ones?’
‘Yeah, generally.’
‘Wow,’ Dazza looked impressed. ‘Well, I was joking but maybe you boys really do have something here. Must get you to show me sometime.’
‘Yeah, no problem. They’re full of shit but it’s quite interesting.’
‘You have to watch what you’re doing down there though,’ I cautioned, ‘they can cave in if they get disturbed too much. Still he’s right though, they’re worth having a look at. Just shows what a fucker it must have been to have to work for a living in the old days.’
Dazza laughed and picked up another bottle of beer. ‘I’ll drink to that.’
So would I. But I still couldn’t work out what he was after.
*
Over the next few weeks the club was a mess of politics and politicking.
Some guys clearly had strong objections. ‘They’re all about money these days!’ was something that a lot of the anti guys said. Which was code for those who were worried about the degree of ‘serious business’ that might be involved.
But there was an equally strong attraction for others, like Billy.
We were all aware of The Brethren’s reputation for involvement in crime, particularly drugs. But as a patch club ourselves, we had a bit of insight into how it worked, we knew that sort of activity was self-selecting, the degree to which any member might want involvement was largely voluntary.
The Brethren was always very clear that the club didn’t deal drugs. That was true enough, the club as an organisation didn’t.
They always admitted that individual members might deal drugs, they could hardly do otherwise really as again, that was true enough. But they always maintained the distinction for public consumption, that individual members dealing drugs wasn’t club business.
But what was really left unsaid was that, just the way it had been for us when we’d first patched up all those years ago, it was the club’s reputation, the club’s patch, which enabled those people to deal drugs. The Brethren patch was a brand that members could use to make money. As Gyppo had explained to me all those years ago when he first took me to meet Dazza, for anyone who wanted to buy stuff it was safe to approach a member with a Brethren patch because you knew their reputation, that no plod had ever infiltrated them, so you knew they were safe to deal with.
So for the guys at the top of the tree, or anyone entrepreneurial who wanted to try, membership of the club could be a route to making serious money, with a willing pool of bodies amongst the lower ranking patches and support club members after some easy money, together with prospects and even hangarounds looking to prove themselves, to do the work on the ground.
As a patch club with members who dealt, we had the same issues.
Sometimes people would ask us why we didn’t disassociate ourselves from one of our guys who got had up for doing something, or condemn what they had done. Anyone asking that sort of question just showed they didn’t understand what membership of a club like ours meant.
Within the club we had quite a challenging regime. Like anywhere else you would have your core group of buddies within the club, the guys you hung around with, rode with, partied with. Every group was different, things changed over time, but even within this core group there would tend to be a continual process of mutual testing, winding each other up, checking to see commitment. This went further the less well you knew another member.
But whatever we might say to each other inside the club; whatever we might say in coming to club view; we never, never, never disagreed outside the club in front of, or to, non-members. As a patch, you never betrayed your brothers, whether they were part of your close local circle or someone from another cohort that you hardly knew, by word or deed to anyone outside the club, whatever you might say or do privately. The absolute rule was always absolute solidarity with anyone inside the club against anyone outside; a non-member. Whatever they said, whatever they had done, a brother was always right.
In a club like ours, or like The Brethren, you could rely on your brothers, and their silence.
For them, it was also a world of Brethren. As they said, ‘The sun never sets on a Brethren patch,’ and so with their worldwide network of charters, members of The Brethren had access to an international set of connections if they wanted them.
So those of our guys who were already well in with The Brethren, dealing with them on drugs or whatever, were generally very pro. Like Billy, they saw this as their big opportunity to move up the ladder from membership of a friendly but separate club to a Brethren patch themselves. Besides, if we fell out with The Brethren and their connections, where else could they get their stuff?
But it wasn’t just a simple question of business. There were a whole range of both personal and club reasons why people were pro, anti or undecided.
But one thing was clear. There was now no status quo ante. It was join, disband, or fight.
North-east president or not, Dazza wouldn’t have the authority to make this offer on his own. This was not a local decision. This affected The Brethren nationally in bringing in a whole club as new members, as well as the impact it would have on the balance of power in their rivalry with The Rebels in the UK. It would have to be something that had been agreed and approved by The Freemen leadership. Making an offer like that without proper authorisation would have been a fatal decision on Dazza’s part.
And what an offer. It was almost unheard of. Normally, if a club like The Brethren wanted us to patch over it would mean the entire club, or those guys that were wanted anyway, going back to being strikers for a Brethren patch. We’d put on their bottom rocker, get our heads down and do our time. OK so you’d expect that if they wanted us, we’d be put up fairly soon, fast tracked to a patch vote after say three or six months, no one would be expecting us to stay striking for a year or more the way a straight tagalong, some potential wannabe would. After all, the reason the offer would be made would be because they could see we were stand up guys, good material with what it took.
But the point was, whatever you’d worn before, to wear a Brethren patch, you would still have to strike for it, either individually or as a club.
A straight patch swap, a guy transferring full membership straight from club to club, with no screwing about as a striker? Well sure we knew that occasionally, very, very occasionally it happened, in really special circumstances, but it was the rare, the extraordinary exception.
But this, this was something else. What Dazza was proposing was absolutely unheard of. The Legion weren’t just being offered the chance to patch over. The Brethren were offering a full patch swap for the whole club. Just like that.
One day The Legion, the next day Menaces.
It was such a fantastic offer it was scary in itself.
Coming to our club house that evening, Dazza hadn’t been speaking for himself, or for the north-east charter, or even for the Great Britain charter. He was by implic
ation speaking for the worldwide Brethren. And to say no was to say no to them all.
It was also a decision that could not take too long. The Brethren would want an answer.
So it was a period of uncertainty.
Me, to be honest I wasn’t sure how I felt about it.
I was attracted certainly by the chance to share in their reputation. But at the same time I was cautious. There was no denying it, joining The Brethren was a serious step up in commitment. I knew that if we went in we would have to live by The Brethren’s rules, and that meant the club would come absolutely first, the way we had tested strikers, but more so; before family, before friends, before work, before anything, for the rest of my life as a patch. And was I ready for that level of commitment? I had as I’d realised been drifting away from the life for a while now. I was still fiercely proud of my colours, of my club, of my loyalty to my brothers and their loyalty to me. But these were shared now with other things. I had Sharon, we had a home, we had a life at home outside the club, things that I’d not had for many years. I had my business. I could feel myself settling down. We had even talked about having kids.
And it was also a commitment for life, when they said ‘BFFB’, Brethren Forever, Forever Brethren, they meant it.
*
We jacked Wibble the next week.
Prayers were over and as the guys headed down to the bar Butcher went in search of Wibble who was boots up again on the desk with one eye on the screens and one eye on the porno mag he was flicking through. From up where we were, I could hear Butcher bawling him out, a tower of tattooed rage as Butcher ran him through the bar and up the stairs to where we, the other officers, had hung around in the meeting room.
We’d all picked up baseball bats from where we’d stacked them earlier. Tiny had his on the table in front of him while Gut was swinging his back and forth, just getting the feel of it.
‘Fucking piece of shit,’ stormed Butcher as he pushed through the doors with Wibble, ‘goofing off on the job.’