by Gerald Wixey
Getting ready to go to war.
Six years after everyone else maybe, but ready nonetheless.
*****
I shivered into my jacket, stayed close to the wall of the terrace. The air heavy after early summer rain. I looked down at my watch and waited.
Wyn whispered, ‘There he is.’
I had found out the name of the referee, a dockworker from Bermondsey. He’d had a few fights himself, but was relatively new to refereeing. Just over forty, heavy, with abundant black hair, a hooked nose and surly mouth.
He took our approach badly, wild eyed stares up and down the street. Wyn soothed him, guided him through his own front door. His wife stood over the badly stained kitchen sink, forever washing children’s clothes. Some sort of stew, nothing too rich by the smell of it. We walked through the narrow hallway into a tiny living room, paper roses the centrepiece in a bowl on the small table. Peach coloured wallpaper and a sagging sofa. He fumbled around and found his tobacco pouch. Wyn gestured to me, I offered him a tailor made.
‘I know who you are; you could get into a lot of trouble with the fight coming up so soon.’ He blinked at me, ‘Get us both in a lot of trouble.’
I tried to reassure, ‘We know what’s going on, don’t worry, we’re not after any trouble.’
Much.
Wyn took on the mantle of smoother, ‘We just want you to reassure us about the fight.’
‘Me – it’s a done deal mate.’
Wyn reached across and touched the man’s leg, ‘Listen, its best if my brother hands out a beating first. Before losing the fight, makes it more credible don’t you think?’
His eyebrows went up – go on.
‘We’ve talked to Teddy about this, his lot are going to place more bets as the fight goes on, the odds will get better the more Harry belts the living daylights out of Teddy’s man… don’t you think?’
He stubbed his cigarette out, stared into the ashtray and then brought his eyes our way. ‘I’ve got no choice, three kids and her out in the kitchen. I had no choice.’
‘How much did Teddy …’
‘Nothing just cut me fucking throat if it goes wrong.’
‘Don’t worry, it won’t.’ Wyn pulled a roll of banknotes from his jacket pocket, sent him a bundle and said it again. ‘Don’t worry, he’ll get roughed up and my boy will go in the tank in round six.’
In the tank.
Wyn was becoming familiar with the terminology of the whole stinking operation. I wondered if he considered the consequences for the man sat next to him. Unlikely I suppose.
*****
It was a fortnight later before Harry found out. Wyn told him ten minutes before we left the club and drove across London to the fight. Poor Harry, the woman he loved suddenly out of his life and now this. Some Mozart drifted out of the radio and filtered into our consciousness like an unwelcome visitor at Christmas. I glanced across towards Harry, a reluctant curiosity on my part. Frightened by his temper and threats, more frightened by the likelihood that he’d carry them out. He stared towards the empty piano – a symbolic headstone for his embryonic romance.
I couldn’t stand this any longer. One wanted to strangle Teddy, one wanted to carry on and operate normally, I said to Wyn, ‘What Have you told him?’
Harry frowned our way, I looked down at the table – even if it wasn’t directed my way, a glare too much for me to cope with.
Harry glared on.
Wyn twitched a couple of times. ‘You’re supposed to take a dive – round six.’
Harry stood up and shouted. ‘What? Fuck off, the pair of you with your schemes. I’m not throwing anything, just going to throttle the bastard and fuck off back down the pit.’
‘Listen, Teddy and all of his mates I guess – well they’ve all bet on you losing in the sixth. He came around here and told me to make sure that’s what happens.’
‘When? Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?’
Wyn sighed, ‘I didn’t want it to upset your training.’ Harry’s blood vessels in his neck stood out like worms wriggling away under damp tissue paper. Wyn showed Harry the palms of his hands. ‘Jack and me, we’ve loaded some money and put it on you to win… in the sixth of course.’
Harry brought the flat of his hand down onto the bar; I jumped and thought about ducking in the same way I used to when the V1’s were screaming towards the ground. He shouted at Wyn, ‘How the fuck do you think I can stop a good fighter in that round? In any round come to that.’
I said, ‘He’s not expecting a fight.’ Reluctant to become too involved, I pressed on nonetheless. ‘It’s a shot to nothing – we cover the bet with another on you to win in any round.’ Harry’s frown relaxed a touch as I continued. ‘Of course you still have to win. We’ve spread it across town, small bets with every bookmaker in London.’
‘Whose idea was this?’ Harry glared at me.
Wyn nodded my way too, I had the feeling that if Harry come up with the goods, my idea may well turn out to be Wyn’s brainwave.
Wyn said, ‘Get your revenge this way – as long as you don’t get knocked out in the sixth, Teddy and his goons lose and lose big. Think about it, like Jack says. It’s almost a shot to nothing, think about it … a small revenge I know, but it makes him look like a loser at least.’
Teddy - 1945
Teddy tried not to laugh when he heard the muffled conversation from the kitchen. People were so predictable, none more so than the couple downstairs. Laughter preceding them up the stairs, minutes later the strange noises, animal somehow, then the rhythmic grunting, all the time getting louder. Skin slapped against skin, sounding like an old fashioned leather drive belt on a thrashing machine. Then she wailed out something indistinguishable. A man’s voice, someone apparently reaching the end of a sprint of a journey, closely followed by the sound of air brakes hissing.
Then she whimpered.
He imagined the blonde’s legs still wrapped around him, as the breath jolted out from the pair of them.
No, that was too painful.
He went back to his teenage days, how he looked across at the camp bed in the corner – another night in the attic listening. They had stamina that’s for sure, but there was no sexual jealousy on his part, it was down to them the way his talent developed – he laughed out loud at his clever use of words. Developed, that reporter would have liked that. He pursued this pursuit with macabre, schoolboy eagerness and it had never lessened over the years.
A secret and no one suspected, he breathed easily and he felt his eyes close. Suddenly raised voices from below woke him, he heard his own name being shouted out, then heavy footsteps down the stairs, a door being slammed and his mum shouting fuck off then.
Teddy tried to place the jigsaw together – it would have to wait until after the fight – he rubbed his hands together. Oh we’ll soon be together again.
Where?
He came back abruptly, sat and stirred his frothy coffee, his mind spun like the top of his cappuccino. He rubbed his eyes and flinched.
Had he cracked up?
Blown out by that bitch of a wife of his and she’s probably worrying some other bloke half to death. Teddy felt that things should be on the up, but obviously not, as he started another long slide down into another abyss. His latest little scheme meant trouble heading his way. He shouldn’t have hit her, when he punched the old woman things began to close in again. Dirty old dripper offering him a free fuck. She deserved it, lucky it wasn’t a blade.
Enough.
No more of that, yet his mind raced on.
Drag those bastards down and then he could settle down. A club owner with Shirley. He needed her, it would be different at her flat, she would see reason.
He always had his photographs to fall back on. No he felt secure again, convinced the old woman would say nothing. Why had he got involved with her anyway? He had little interest in sex, except when he was with Shirley. He likened it to pornography, it bored him quickly. Watching was different,
the constriction in his throat, the tight chest, the blood throbbing into his penis. Afterwards a low groan as something had been satisfied deep within.
He took a deep breath and the pain shot across his chest, half an hour earlier and he had walked out of that club, no blonde. Plenty of blondes, but not the right blonde that’s for sure. He expected to see them, both of them laughing like love struck teenagers.
Sweat came into his palms, ‘Anything else love.’ Someone cooed in his ear. He brought his hand down onto the Formica toped table, the noise of condiments brief jumping journey causing eyes scattered around the small Café to round on him.
Fuck them.
He smiled at the thought of the blonde, but then the memories came flooding back and the hurt never lessened. Turning the clock back and watching them together again hurt him. The bad memories came back like a deluge. Coming home from school, his auntie always held him, made him a drink and talked. Then it all changed, overnight it seemed, coming through the door that afternoon; there they were, sat at the kitchen table, drinking tea, gazing into each other’s eyes. A half empty bottle of Gordon’s on the table, her eyes were especially sleepy.
‘Hello Teddy.’
That was all she said, pouting her lush mouth at him, she smelt of smoke and gin and something else, wild and earthy. Heavy breasts straining against the confines of her coffee coloured lace top, all luxurious curves – a body that shouted sex at you was gaping, showing four bruises, two on each breast. All four the same bite size and perfectly round, standing out starkly against her white skin. She saw him staring but made no attempt to cover up.
Teddy took his eye reluctantly across the table, eventually coming to rest on the dapper man, check jacket, cravat, and Ronald Coleman moustache – smiling at him. After a while, the moustache spoke to his aunty. Why did his old man grow that moustache?
‘It’s a nice afternoon; shouldn’t you be out playing with your friends?’
She stood and came over and pulled him to her and planted a big kiss on his cheek. There was a strange smell on her breath, a sickly sweet smell that disgusted him. He pushed her away and rushed out leaving the back door open.
For years, the nightmare tortured and tormented him. No wonder he had moved out as soon as he could, eighteen and running wild, often earning good money. Then his mind span back again, she was another one always happy to flash the gusset of her knickers at all and sundry as well.
As he drained the dregs of his cup, he noticed the old woman coming his way, strapped into her coat like some Russian peasant woman scrapping for kindling. A cheap old scrubber that said, ‘Hello love, you look like you need a fuck.’
She’ll do.
10
Jack -1980
A ghost.
One that no longer dwelt along the Vauxhall bridge road, but someone that still lived close to the Thames. In the salubrious village of Sonning now, just east of Reading. Not the tenements and the flashing, slashing razor blades of old. The ghost had not only come back to life, but a social climber who had somehow moved upwards. His wife appeared much younger; I imagined too much make up on her face. I could see the expensive, glitzy jewellery and the well-tailored suit. Like her husband, the blackest of black.
She confirmed her name, but without the cockney drone. Home Counties and well educated too, but dull. Flat monotone that indicated someone grief stricken and trying to retain some control over her emotions. Or maybe someone heavily sedated, perhaps both.
I leant across to Stuart and whispered in his ear, ‘Get outside and take some pictures of the father when he comes out. Stay out of the way when you do it though.’
Stuart leant back and stared.
It’s cold out there.
I ushered him out with the back of my hand as the coroner briefly listed the injuries, lung and kidney damage. Either of which probably would have killed her. If the damage to the back of the skull hadn’t done the job instantly that is. He detailed the drugs and then came to the more interesting detail. The sex within a couple of hours of the fall. I let my mind drift, two hours? One? Minutes? The voice droned on, something inserted up the anus. Not full anal penetration though, then the coroner stopped, raised his large head and addressed the parents.
‘I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but Celia was pregnant.’
Pregnant?
Mably had kept that from me. I felt the air whistle out from my lungs. I heard the mother gasp and lean against her husband. He never put his arm around her. Just stared at the coroner. I thought the coroner unused to the withering gaze. He coughed a couple of times and then began to read the three witness statements out. Both Tommy and Stopcock Arthur breathed sighs of relief that neither parent wanted to question them.
Then the coroner apologised for itemising all of the distressing detail and then promptly announced an accidental death verdict. Don groaned and shook his head, vigorously enough to catch the coroner’s eye. Who blinked a couple of time at this show of dissent before releasing the body for burial, once again commiserating and then he stood. Despite his dullness, a sentimental man and sensitive man who had tried to spare the parents more pain. He’d done that to the best of his ability and upset the local constabulary as well. I closed my notebook and watched the coroner sweep out with all the elegance of a bulky tramp steamer bobbing up the Clyde.
The usual murmurings from the gallery, like a swarm of bees buzzing away in the background. I glanced away to my left at the half a dozen reporters. Shuffling out, avoiding my eyes… good. My feelings of bitterness hanging over me diverting any offers of a drink and halting the fraternal farewells. Farewell to the outsiders muscling in because they see a rich, suicidal public schoolgirl with a penchant for older men and various drugs. I watched them off the premises, gone forever I hoped, they’d lost interest. Not even a suicide verdict, what an anti-climax for them.
My glance went back to the grieving parents, both with heads bowed and both sitting resolutely in the chairs. Then he stood and without the merest of words to his wife, he strode for the exit. I felt my mouth hang open. I thought he was going to glance my way and my heart stopped, my chest stopped as well in apparent sympathy. But he just stared fixedly in front, there could be no mistake. Fuller of face that’s for sure, but the cheekbones, the skin colour and most of all those piercing eyes. Teddy looked good, not much younger back then and not much older right now. He pushed the door open rather like a rugby player’s stiff armed hand off. Never bothered to wait for his wife and the door swung back into her face. Well used to this sort of behaviour I guessed, she just sighed and then followed him out of the building.
I sat back down, spread the fingers of my right hand and massaged my pounding temples. As Harry would have put it… fucking hell. If I hadn’t have been so shocked, so disoriented I could have sat back in wonderment at how fate had knitted all of our lives together like this. Treachery apparently woven to longing, aspiration chain linked to resentment. Throw in some romanticism, adoration, lust, a murder or two, probably a missed bus in their somewhere. Hurl a late train or two and a cancelled flight into the equation and then the ringmaster pulls the strings and we all dance the dance. Surely it couldn’t be another dance of death? It may have been thirty five years ago. Back then that tango was to the death and now forever etched into my memory. And here we are once again, fate, or coincidence?
Either way I had the feeling of a solitary rabbit cornered by a fox out on the prowl. I crept out into the car park, the earlier winter sunshine replaced by heavy cloud and an icy blast straight down from Greenland. I scanned the scene, saw Stuart hurrying away, camera in his left hand. He was going to the same safe haven as I intended to. After the ghost had driven his black Ford Grenada out onto Church Street and past me. Mr and Mrs Ghost, both with expressionless features, faces clamped tight. After all, you’d expect nothing less from a pair of phantoms.
I rushed headlong down Grove Street, raced past my office and on towards friendly faces and comfort that I craved.
Past Goldstone’s shop, I noticed him out of the corner of my eye, mouth open and ready to exchange pleasantries. I flashed past, crashing through the door and into to the public bar. Hit between the eyes by the heat from the blistering coal fires that blazed away at each end of the bar. Stuart was leaning against the bar talking to Shirley, he smiled my way and pulled me a pint. I sighed, what is it to be nothing less than predictable, ah well that’s reassuring in itself I suppose.
Shirley stubbed her cigarette out and looked across, about to speak.
I beat her to it. ‘Where’s Harry?’
Stuart shook his head, ‘Out the back.’ He tipped his head a touch, ‘Are you ok? You seen a ghost or something?’
I threw some beer down my throat as Shirley spoke softly, ‘Suicides are bad enough at the best of times, a young girl… well.’ She shook her head and stared down at her bright red, beautifully manicured nails. ‘Changing the subject, guess what? Some idiot in a car gave me a mouthful of abuse five minutes ago…’
Sorry Shirley, drivers shouting her way was a common enough event. I put my hand up and whispered, ‘Go and get Harry – it’s important.’
Shirley raised her eyebrows at me, unused to being interrupted in full flow, she glanced at Stuart. Stuart shrugged and said. ‘I’ll get him.’ As he started to turn, the front door opened and Don came through. Stopped in front of Shirley and stared freely at her.
She never looked his way, calmly stood, brushed her skirt down and said, ‘I’ll get Harry for you.’
She still moved fluidly, hips and shoulders synchronised to perfection. Don watched her, her arse to be precise as she slinked out through the door. Well, enough sexual tension between those two to keep us gossipers going for weeks. I wondered what happened the other night between those two, or never happened perhaps.
Don’s sarcastic tone brought me back. ‘Didn’t see you in there, skulking away at the back as usual?’
He smiled my way, but his sneering, leering face never expressed amusement as such, just a mocking contempt for the whole world it seemed. Full faced and heavy lips that turned down whenever he talked. I shouldn’t have taken this too personally, he addressed everyone this way, but it still got to me. Just like it did for everyone it seemed.