When my mother and one of her sisters went to identify the body, they couldn't say for certain if it was his. Paul and I had seen Bernie only a few weeks earlier, so the police asked us to view the corpse. We were both living in London at the time, so we travelled to Birmingham together. I'd been working the night before the journey and felt tired. I hoped to catch a few hours' sleep on the coach. I stretched out across the back seat. Trying to relax, I took off my trainers and used my coat as a pillow. I soon fell sound asleep.
Paul had been drinking the night before. He continued drinking from a carrier bag full of beer. He woke me when we reached Birmingham two and a half hours later. I sat up, stretched and rubbed my eyes. As I bent down to put on my trainers, Paul shouted, 'No! No! Don't put them on.'
'Why not?' I said.
'Because there's no toilet on here and I had to piss in them.'
'You had to piss in my fucking trainers?'
Paul looked at me earnestly and said, 'Well, of course I did.'
I began doing my nut. He seemed sincerely confused by my anger. He said, 'What's up with you? What fucking choice did I have? I couldn't piss on the floor, could I?'
His cold logic had defeated me. The problem with this logic is that it fails to take into account other people's needs and rights. In his world, only his needs exist. They take priority over everything and everyone else. He has a coldness that puts people on edge. He almost never laughs. My father taught us as children to repress all feeling and emotion. He wanted to make us cold, hard and callous, just like him. Paul is a successful product of my father's parenting skills.
I left my urine-soaked trainers behind on the coach. Fortunately, I found a shoe shop near the station, so I didn't have to hobble too far in my socks. I bought a new pair of trainers before heading off to carry out our grisly task.
At the mortuary, an official warned us that Bernie had sustained head injuries which we might find distressing. He told us to wait while the body was 'prepared'. Eventually, he returned to lead us into a spine-tinglingly cold room divided by a large glass panel. Curtains covered the panel. The official pressed a button. The curtains opened slowly to reveal a body lying on a trolley. A sheet covered the body to its chest. I'd been hoping and praying they'd made a mistake, that the body lying there wouldn't be Bernie's, but I recognised him instantly, even though his swollen eyes were no more than slits, one of his ears was the size of my hand, and bruising covered his face and head.
When we left the room, the official told us the date of Bernie's forthcoming inquest. He said we didn't need to attend, as it would just be a formality, the most likely outcome being a verdict of accidental death.
His words shocked me. I said, 'Accidental death? You're calling that a fucking accident? Have you seen his face?'
The official said the police believed Bernie had accidentally fallen off the bench.
I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I said, 'Where was the bench he fell off? On top of the fucking Empire State Building?'
The official said he couldn't comment. He said, 'You can raise any concerns you may have at the inquest.'
The inquest went ahead. I got the impression the police hadn't spent too much time investigating 'the incident'. I also got the impression the coroner didn't give a shit about the dead 'tramp'. Despite our protests, he recorded a verdict of accidental death. I felt livid. I believe to this day that someone beat Bernie to death. If he'd been leading a 'normal' lifestyle, the police would have investigated his death fully.
One Christmas Day, I went for a lunch-time drink in
Wolverhampton with my three brothers and my friend Millie. Everyone was in a good mood. As we stood chatting near the bar, a middle-aged man accidentally knocked into Paul, spilling his drink. The man, who was drunk, didn't apologise. I don't think he even realised what he'd done. When I looked at Paul's face, I knew that, unless I intervened quickly, the man was doomed.
Before Paul could do anything, I manoeuvred the drunk away and gripped Paul's arm. I said, 'Leave it, Paul. Please fucking leave it.'
He said, 'That fucking ignorant cunt's bumped into me and he's not said a word.'
I said, 'Paul, it's Christmas Day Forget about it.'
The man went into the toilet.
I tried to change the subject. Paul said, 'When he comes out, he either apologises or he gets it.'
I told him again to forget about it. He said, 'Fuck "forget about it".'
I knew the way his mind was working: if the man didn't apologise, then he must have done it deliberately. And if he'd done it deliberately, then he deserved punishment.
I still hoped to step in to prevent an unpleasant incident. The man came out of the toilet and squeezed past, putting his hand lightly on Paul's shoulder. The man didn't say anything. Without a word, Paul grabbed the man by the throat, forced his head down and gripped him in a head-lock. Then he picked up a pint glass, smashed it and began shoving the jagged stump repeatedly into the man's face. 'Ignorant cunt,' he said with each stab, 'ignorant cunt, ignorant cunt, ignorant cunt.'
When the glass had totally disintegrated, Paul let the blood-soaked man fall to the floor, his face cut to ribbons.
Paul neither ran nor showed any emotion. Instead, he asked for a fresh pint. The trembling barman said, 'Sorry, mate. I can't serve you.'
Paul sat down. I said, 'Get out of the pub, you thick cunt.'
Paul said, 'I'm going fucking nowhere.'
Millie stood there shocked and on the verge of tears. I asked her to go outside. At the same time, I grabbed Paul and manhandled him out into the car park. One of my brothers had called for two taxis, which arrived quicker than the police and ambulance. I put myself and Millie in the first, then left my three brothers to get in the second.
Paul could never grasp why I'd brought our little Christmas drink to a premature end. Later, he said, 'What's your fucking problem, Bernie? He asked for it. He was an ignorant cunt.'
'Yeah, you already said,' I muttered. I didn't bother arguing. The police didn't catch up with Paul for this attack.
Paul has been scary and unpredictable for as long as I can remember. You can never relax in his company, because you don't know what's going to happen next. You're always at risk of saying or doing something that might somehow offend him. You can't really talk to him, let alone reason with him. Sometimes, after some awful and unnecessary bit of violence, I've tried to get him to reflect on what he's done and why. But he's just exploded and accused me of picking on him.
Some years later, in the late '80s, I went for a Sunday afternoon drink in south London with Paul, my brother Michael, Army Game's dad, Adolf and a few other friends. Paul started playing cards for money with two Scotsmen and a mate of mine from Codsall called Gary 'Chop' Lambeth. After a few hours of play, several hundred pounds had piled up on the table. Slowly, the Scots lost the lot. When they could play no more, having run out of cash, one of them foolishly made a grab for the money.
Paul punched him in the head. We all joined in on Paul's side. The fight only lasted a few seconds before the penniless, and now battered, Scots found themselves bundled out the door. One of them shouted, 'We'll be back for you, you English cunts.'
I saw Paul's face don its psycho mask. A minute or so later, he got up and left the pub. I could tell he had unfinished business, but I didn't want to be party to whatever hideous act he might now commit. Moments later, a woman pushing a buggy burst into the pub and screamed, 'Murder! Murder! Call the police! Someone's been murdered!'
I ran outside with Gary 'Chop' Lambeth. About a hundred yards away, we saw one of the Scots lying face-down on the pavement next to a zebra crossing. He wasn't moving. We ran over. His back, his head and the pavement were all soaked in blood.
Paul, in his rage, had left the pub, got into his Transit van and sped after the Scots. As they'd stood between a park fence and the pole of the zebra crossing, Paul had mounted the pavement and driven into them from behind. One had managed to jump out of the way - and
had run off. The other had been run over - literally. A gaping v-shaped wound covered his back. His flesh had been torn off. I learned later the damage had been caused by the nut used to drain oil from the van's sump. I felt for a pulse. Although unconscious and badly injured, the Scot was still alive.
Then I heard the roar of an engine. I looked up and saw Paul's van shoot through a red light up the road outside Clapham's Cavendish Road police station. I assumed he was now making his getaway. To my surprise, the van skidded round in the road - and started tearing back down towards us. I guessed instantly he wanted another run at the motionless man, who'd surely die if I allowed that to happen. I wasn't prepared to let Paul serve a life sentence over a game of cards, if only because I knew I'd probably be the only person prepared to visit him inside.
I didn't fancy spending the next 15 years traipsing round the country once a month to sit in a prison visiting room. So I stood over the injured man, even though I didn't have much sympathy for the cheeky scumbag at my feet. As Paul hurtled towards us, I saw him waving and flailing his arms at me. From his gestures, I knew he wanted me to get out of the way. I stood my ground. For a moment, I really thought I might die. But, realising he'd have to run me over in order to squash the jock, Paul swerved at the last moment, taking out a zebra-crossing pole on the traffic island before screeching to a halt.
He jumped out of the van and ran to where I was standing. He wanted to know why I'd stopped him. What did I think I was playing at? Then he grabbed his unconscious and blood-soaked victim by the hair and began kicking him in the body, screaming, 'Dirty fucking cunt. You dirty fucking cunt.'
I'm no referee, but the jock had certainly lost this one.
I tried pulling Paul away, but he'd lost it so much he started on me. I said, 'For fuck's sake, Paul. Get in your van and disappear or you'll get nicked.'
Paul shouted, 'Fuck the police, fuck you and fuck him.' Then boot, boot. He started kicking the rag doll again. Finally, he turned, jumped in his van and disappeared.
I turned the Scot over. I thought at first he'd been glassed or stabbed in the forehead, but the mess must have been caused when his head hit the pavement. Gary and I fucked about with him for a short while. When we were happy he was breathing all right, we left him. The buggy-pushing woman who'd run into the pub screaming blue murder had been taken home by Del Boy. He'd told her he needed to take her name and address in case the police wanted to get in touch. He said, 'Don't bother calling them. They'll call you, if they think it's necessary. But I don't think it will be, because we know who did it.'
That night, Paul went round to the victim's house, kicked his door in and threatened the man's parents. He said he'd be back for them if their hospitalised son grassed him up. Paul wasn't even questioned over the incident.
I might have given the impression he gets away with a lot. That's not true. He spends his life yo-yoing back and forth through prison gates. A cell has been his home for at least half his life. He's also himself often been the victim of extreme violence.
I got a call from him once from hospital. I knew something serious must have happened, because he was laughing, which he normally doesn't do. And what had provoked this hilarity? He'd just come out of intensive care. He said he was lying in bed with plaster covering most of his body. Apparently, he'd fallen out with one of his 'friends' (his word for short-term acquaintances as weird, unstable and psychotic as he is). He'd beaten up this 'friend', who, a few days later, had invited him to return to the flat for a 'reconciliation' drink. A normal person might have been wary of the olive branch, but not Paul. His 'friend' and two others were waiting for him with baseball bats. Paul only narrowly escaped with his life.
I've let him stay with me a few times over the years. I wouldn't do that now. Once, in Deptford, I went away for a week and came back to find my motorbike had disappeared. A little agitated, I asked Paul if he knew when it had been stolen.
'Stolen?' he said. 'It wasn't stolen. I got you a very good price for it.'
I said, 'What d'you mean? Have you sold it?'
He claimed a stranger had knocked on the door and offered to buy it. 'Don't worry,' said Paul, 'I got you more than it's worth.'
Trying to come to terms with the bike's loss, and hoping to draw some consolation from the episode, I said, 'Well, how much did you get, then?'
'About three hundred quid.'
'So where's the money?'
'I've spent it.'
A few years later, he came to stay with me at a south London squat I was living in temporarily. I came home to find he'd stripped the whole house of lead and valuable metals. And not just off the roof - he'd ripped out internal pipes and appliances too. According to his logic, the stuff didn't belong to me, so he had as much right to it as I or the squat's other occupants.
It just didn't register with him that what he'd done was wrong. However hard I tried to explain things, he just couldn't see what my problem was. The truth is that Paul only understands violence. He only respects the opinions and rights of people who hurt him. And that's only till he's well enough to come back and stick something in them.
One sunny Sunday afternoon - I think it was around 1989 - I was walking with Paul through a housing estate in Battersea, south London. We'd just had a lunch-time drink in a nearby pub. The happy sound of children at play filled the summer air. People were snoozing in deckchairs or mowing their lawns or washing their cars. England was at peace. But not for long.
Tabloid newspapers had been running a campaign against dangerous dogs (by which they meant breeds like Rottweilers, American pit bull terriers and Staffordshire bull terriers). The papers had been demanding the muzzling in public places of the animals they'd branded 'Devil Dogs' after a spate of horrific attacks on children.
As Paul and I strolled down the street, a weedy little cross-bred collie dog started barking at us from the other side of a hedge. I say 'barking', but in fact it was making more of a wimpy little yapping sound than a full-throated bark. That was enough for Paul. He suddenly leapt across the hedge and attacked the dog. He struggled with it violently on the ground, apparently trying to throttle it.
The dog's male owner stood at his open front door and shouted, 'What the fuck are you doing? Leave my dog alone!' Paul lifted the dog up and gave it a punch in the head that launched it flying across the garden. It landed on its back and rolled over before scampering to the corner furthest from Paul. It didn't dare bark. It just stood there, cowering, waiting to see what the lunatic would do next.
The owner was screaming at Paul, who said, 'That's a flicking Devil Dog. It tried to attack me. It was jumping up, barking and snarling.'
The man said he was calling the police. He went inside. I told Paul we had to go, but he wouldn't listen. He'd now switched to full psycho mode. 'Let him call the fucking police,' he said. 'That's a fucking Devil Dog and it should be muzzled.'
A police car arrived swiftly. Two policemen got out and asked what was wrong. Paul said, 'That man has a Devil Dog which tried to bite me. I want it put down.' The police spoke to the owner and viewed the 'Devil Dog', which still sat cowering in the corner, shaking with fear.
The police told Paul to move on or get nicked. I tried to grab Paul by the arm, but he shrugged me off. One of the policemen said again, 'I've told you. Move on or you're nicked.'
Paul said, 'Fucking nick me, then.'
I knew what was coming. The policeman put his hand on Paul's shoulder. My brother punched him to the ground with a right-hander. The other officer jumped on Paul. He, too, ended up on the ground. They called for back-up.
I was saying, 'He's all right. He's sound. He's with me. I'll look after him.'
Paul turned on me, 'What d'you mean, I'm all right? I'm not fucking all right. I've just been attacked by a Devil Dog.'
A police van screeched to a stop beside us. The riot squad jumped out and dived on Paul. In the struggle, they ripped off his shirt. They finally managed to handcuff him and load him into the back of the van,
where he continued to writhe, kick and scream about the 'Devil Dog', which he was now claiming had bitten him.
Charged with assaulting police officers, Paul defended himself at his magistrates' court trial. He explained the danger he'd felt himself to be in from the 'Devil Dog'. The elderly magistrate told him he couldn't understand his concern if the dog had been in its own garden and not in the street.
Paul said, 'If you can't understand that, then you must be a fucking senile old cunt.'
The magistrate sent him to the cells for contempt of court. After an hour, Paul was brought back up. The magistrate told him he expected an apology. Paul said he had no intention of apologising, because facts were facts. He said, 'If you can't understand a straightforward explanation, then you must be a fucking senile old cunt. Simple as that.' The magistrate gave him three months' imprisonment for assaulting the police - and an extra seven days for contempt.
Paul's psycho behaviour can frighten anyone, but can terrify normal people, who are sometimes forced to take desperate measures to escape him. One time, Paul met a quiet and shy pianist called Jonathan in a south London pub. He invited himself back to Jonathan's flat, where he ordered him to play the piano. Jonathan had to play for hours. Over the next few months, whenever Paul wanted to hear some music he'd say, 'I'm going to Jonathan's.' He used to use him like his personal jukebox. I saw him once frogmarching a scared-looking Jonathan down the road for yet another piano session.
In the end, Jonathan just disappeared. He moved - probably to another country - without leaving a forwarding address.
For many years, Paul had no trouble finding girlfriends. At school, the girls thought him handsome and used to swarm over him. He fathered his first child in his teens. That relationship, like his other relationships, didn't last long. Subsequently, he had a child with another woman. He's had very little contact with the children. In the early '90s, he started going out with a woman in south London. They had a daughter. I think Paul looked upon his girlfriend's happiness with her daughter in much the same way that my father looked upon our happiness with our mother. It drove him insane with jealousy, which soon became anger. Paul had turned into my father.
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