by David Peace
I count to five, then say: ‘You’re joking?’
‘Unless the bloke had no hands or teeth when he moved in, no.’
‘What?’
‘Whoever it is, they’d cut off his hands and smashed in his teeth.’
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, I’m thinking, counting to five.
‘What a fucking place,’ says Hillman for all of us.
Me: ‘So they can’t get a name?’
Craven’s shaking his head.
‘You any ideas?’ I ask him.
‘Me? Why would I know who it is?’
‘You were his bloody partner, Bob?’
‘For all of six months.’
‘Who’s handling it?’ I ask.
‘Alderman.’
Fuck, fuck, fuck, I’m thinking, counting to ten.
Then I look back across the room at Craven and I say: ‘Six years today, Bob?’
Craven: ‘Who’s counting?’
I am, I think -
I fucking am.
Hillman: ‘Can I ask something?’
I nod.
‘This letter you got? Any word on that?’
‘Pete Noble sent it over to Wetherby. Still waiting for word from them.’
Murphy: ‘Everything all right?’
‘How do you mean, John?’
‘On the home front?’
Joan, Joan, Joan, I’m thinking, counting to fifteen.
‘She’s fine,’ I say. ‘Thank you.’
Murphy: ‘How about Bob Douglas? Any word from Roger and the lads on that?’
‘No, John,’ I say, shaking my head and thinking:
Never fucking ending -
Death and paranoia -
Murder and lies, lies and murder -
A total war.
We’re all downstairs at the Griffin, bags packed -
John Murphy getting us all a round in -
A Christmas drink.
He brings over the beers and the shorts, Mac singing along to the piped electronic versions of Christmas carols, but I’ve had a belly full of Christmas music:
Ray Conniff and We Wish You a Happy Christmas -
The Little Drummer Boy.
And I’m already on my third drink, the room suddenly hot, Hillman asking me if I ever met Mr Ray and I’m saying I can’t say I ever did but Mac is saying I must have done – big bearded man who kept pigeons.
‘Pigeon fancier, was he?’ laughs Murphy. ‘Knew a bloke got five years for that.’
‘Another?’ shouts Mac, getting up.
‘A quick one for the road,’ I say, looking across the table at Helen Marshall and smiling -
She smiles back and raises her glass and says: ‘Make mine a double, Mac.’
There are blue lights in the rearview mirror, sirens -
And I’m thinking, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck -
I pull over somewhere on the Moors and wait for them.
The tap comes on the glass -
I wind down the window.
‘Would you mind stepping out of the car please, sir?’ I nod and open the door -
Get out and stand there, against the car.
‘May I see your driver’s licence please, sir?’ asks the young policeman, about twenty-five -
About the same age I was when they brought me up here -
Up here to dig.
He’s looking at the licence with his torch, then he shines it up at me and glances back at the police car.
‘Mr Hunter?’ he asks.
‘Yes,’ I say.
‘Just a minute, sir,’ he says and goes back to the police car, its blue lights spinning silently in the night.
And I stand there, against the car, and I stare up at the sky – quiet for once with just the stars twinkling, and then I look back down at the ground, at the Moors all around me, stained with snow -
Digging ever since.
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ he mumbles, coming back. ‘We didn’t realise it was you.’
I nod.
‘Here you are, sir,’ he says and hands me my driver’s licence.
‘Thank you,’ I say.
‘Sir?’ he says -
I try and focus.
‘Would you like us to call you a taxi or something?’
I shake my head.
‘You’re sure? It’s no trouble.’
I raise my hand, swallowing sick, and shake my head.
He looks back at the police car and says: ‘You don’t look very well, sir?’
I say: ‘What’s your name, son?’
‘Williams,’ he says. ‘Mark Williams.’
‘How old are you Mark Wilhams?’
‘Twenty-four, sir.’
‘And do you like being a policeman, Mark Williams?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Well Mark Williams,’ I say loudly, taking his hand and shaking it and shaking it. ‘You have a merry Christmas.’
‘Thank you. And you sir.’
‘I will,’ I say, getting back in the car. ‘I will.’
‘Drive carefully,’ he says, closing the door for me.
‘Merry Christmas Mark Williams,’ I say. ‘Merry bloody Christmas.’
There’s another police car outside the house when I get there.
I nod at the two officers as I pull in and park in the drive.
I wave at them as I get out and struggle to lock the car door.
I nod again as I walk round the house to the back door.
It’s locked and I fumble with my keys and then turn and walk down the path to the shed.
I unlock that door and open it, staring in at the maps and the photographs on the wall in the dark, the thirteen faces staring back at me, and I turn to the garden, to the washing hanging on the line in the dark in the snow, a bag of pornography in one hand, sick down my shirt, my fly undone, the carols deafening, thinking:
How much longer?
Part 3. We are all prostitutes
and pain and never happiness to go outside and find no one there but a man who would not frighten anybody sat in a white corsair with a five pound note in his hand and a ball pein hammer under the seat of his car asking are you doing business transmission eight found on Saturday the twenty seventh of may nineteen seventy eight sitting on wasteland in a slumped position against the fence of a car park at the rear of manchester royal infirmary identified as doreen pickles and when her reversible coat was removed it could be seen that her stomach had been so badly mutilated that her intestines had spilled out onto the ground where they wallowed like pigs in the mud below a sign around her neck that in cruel words read e am the way into the doleful city e am the way into eternal grief e am the way to a forsaken race before me nothing but eternal things were made and e shall last eternally abandon every hope all ye who enter and she opens her lids to show the white blank eyes of the dead and says who is this one approaching who without death dares walk into the kingdom of the dead by a chain link fence on a rubbish pile in the corner of the car park looking like a doll lying on her right side face down her arms folded beneath her legs straight and her shoes placed neatly on her body and rested against the fence after three operations and with just one lung death came with three hammer blows twelve feet away hit on the head three times help help help and dragged across the gravel to the fence where e raised her dress and underskirt and stabbed her in the stomach repeatedly through the same wound also in the back just below the lower left ribs her right eyelid was also punctured the eye bruised but after this there will be silence and people will think e have gone away that e have found a woman and settled down a woman who is the opposite of a tart who is religious or even the devout member of a religious sect someone e can pamper at whose feet e can worship someone who is in my eyes a paragon of virtue wearing a reversible coat blue and brown town chequered on one side and all blue on the other a short length floral dress blue canvas shoes a pink cardigan white knickers white underslip and a blue and white bra and e opened my
lids to show the white blank eyes of the dead and said dear officer sorry e have not written about a year to be exact but e have not been up north for quite a while e was not kidding last time e wrote saying the whore would be older this time and maybe e would strike in manchester for a change and you should have took heed that bit about her being in hospital funny the lady mentioned something about being in hospital before e stopped her whoring ways the lady will not worry about hospitals now will she e bet you have been wondering how come e have not been to work for ages well e would have been if it had not been for your cursed coppers e had the lady just where e wanted her and was about to strike when one of your cursing police cars stopped right outside the lane he must have been a dumb copper cause he did not say anything he did not know how close he was to catching me tell you the truth e thought e was collared the lady said do not worry about the coppers little did she know that bloody copper saved her neck that was last month so e do not know when e will get back on the job but e know it will not be bloody chapeltown too bloody hot there maybe bradford manningham might write again if up north jack the ripper he who thought to walk so boldly through this realm let him retrace his foolish way alone and you who led him here through this dark land you will stay and they slam the heavy gates in
Chapter 15
It was the night before Christmas. There was a house in the middle of the Moor, lights shining in the windows. I was walking across the Moor, light snow underfoot, heading home. On the front doorstep I stamped my boots loose of snow and opened the door. A fire was glowing with artificial coals and the house was filled with the smell of good cooking. Under a lit Christmas tree, there were boxes of beautifully wrapped presents. I took a big box, gift-wrapped in newspaper from under the tree and pulled the red ribbon loose. Carefully I opened the newspaper so I might read it later. I stared at the wooden box on my knee. I closed my eyes and opened the box, the dull thud of my heart filling the house.
‘What is it?’ said Joan, coming into the room and switching on the TV.
I tried to cover the box with my hands but she took the box from me and looked inside.
The box fell to the floor, the house full of good cooking, the thud of my heart, and her bloody screams.
I watched as the fetus slid out of the box and across the floor, writing spidery messages and swastikas with its bloody cord as it went.
‘Get rid of it,’ she screamed. ‘Get rid of it now!’
But I was staring at the TV, the people on the TV singing hymns, the people on the TV singing hymns with no face, no features -machines, the gulls circling overhead screaming, the wings in my own back, out of the skin, torn, huge and rotting things, and I stared down at the baby on the floor and it sat up, hands across its heart, and smiled a faint and dreadful smile and I looked at the tag on the box, the tag on the box that said:
Love Helen – the night before Christmas.
I open my eyes -
The radio’s on:
Christmas messages: Carter telling the world that all fifty-two hostages are alive and well; the Pope’s message for Poland; Thatcher’s for Northern Ireland; nominations for people of the year: Ayatollah Khomeini; the eight US soldiers who died trying to rescue the hostages; the boat people; JR Ewing; Voyager 1; or John Lennon?
The Yorkshire Ripper?
Radio off -
I close my eyes.
‘Merry Christmas,’ says Joan -
I open my eyes.
‘Merry Christmas,’ I say.
‘How do you feel?’
‘Not so good.’
‘What happened to you?’
‘A few too many Christmas drinks.’
‘Where?’
‘Leeds.’
‘How did you get back?’
‘I drove.’
She sits up in bed: ‘Peter!’
‘Sorry.’
She gets out of bed and puts on her dressing gown.
‘Sorry,’ I say again.
She goes downstairs.
My head is killing me, my stomach churning, on the verge of throwing up -
I close my eyes.
Downstairs, she’s put on the Christmas tree lights and started making breakfast.
I go into the kitchen.
‘Do you want a cup of tea?’
‘Please,’ I say.
I go back into the lounge and look out of the window at a wet and grey Christmas Day.
‘Here you go,’ she says and hands me a cup of tea -
‘Thanks.’
‘You think I should take them something?’ she asks, looking at the police car parked at the bottom of the drive.
‘They might as well get off,’ I say. ‘Now I’m here.’
‘Doesn’t it make you feel secure?’ laughs Joan.
‘Watched more like.’
I walk down the drive in the drizzle and my dressing gown -
‘Merry Christmas,’ says Sergeant Corrigan, winding down the car window.
‘And to you Bill,’ I say, bending down and nodding at another man I don’t recognise.
‘Thought you were bringing us a bit of turkey, sir?’
‘Bit early for that,’ I say.
‘Aye, hear you had a late one,’ he laughs -
‘Don’t,’ I say.
‘Not feeling too good, are you?’
I shake my head: ‘Listen, you can get off if you want.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Yep,’ I say. ‘We’ll be doing the rounds of the relatives most of the day anyway’
‘You sure?’
I nod: ‘Go on.’
‘Right then,’ says Corrigan, starting the car. ‘You know where we are if you need us.’
‘Thanks, Bill.’
‘Have a Merry Christmas, sir.’
‘Same to you.’
We eat bacon and scrambled eggs on toast at the kitchen table, the TV on in the other room – a church service.
I ask: ‘What time they expecting us?’
‘Twelve, mum said. Same as always.’
I nod.
‘You going to be OK?’ she asks.
‘I’m fine.’
I get dressed upstairs and come back down, the presents in two big bags by the door.
She comes out of the kitchen, her coat on.
I say: ‘Shall we go?’
She smiles and hands me a small and beautifully wrapped box in green Christmas paper with a red ribbon: ‘Merry Christmas, love.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I didn’t have time.’
She nods: ‘I know. Don’t worry.’
I say: ‘Can I open it?’
Of course.’
I pull the red ribbon loose and carefully open the paper -
‘Can you guess what it is?’ she says.
I shake my head and open the box -
‘Happy?’ she asks, squeezing my arm -
I nod, taking out the digital watch.
‘It’s a calculator as well,’ she says.
I take off my father’s old watch and put it on.
‘Happy?’
I smile: ‘Thank you.’
‘Merry Christmas,’ she says, kissing me on the cheek.
I say again: ‘I’m sorry, I haven’t got you anything yet.’
‘Don’t worry. You can take me to the sales.’
I put my father’s watch on the windowsill and look at my new one.
‘What time is it?’ she laughs.
‘Just gone eleven-oh-one and seventeen seconds.’
‘Shall we go?’
I nod and open the door.
She points at the tree: ‘Going to leave the lights on?’
‘Better had,’ I say and lock the door behind us.
We drive slowly into Warrington, listening to the local radio as we go, pop songs and carols, not saying very much, and we’re early when we get to her parents but they’re already back from church, waiting -
We park on the road just as her brother and his family arrive.
Their
three kids are out of the car, carrying brand new toys up the drive and stretching to reach the doorbell, but her dad’s already there at the door, wearing a paper hat and waving a cracker, wishing us a merry Christmas.
I reach over and take the two bags of presents off the back seat.
‘What’s in there?’ asks Joan, looking at another bag on the back seat.
‘Just work,’ I say, but taking the bag full of back issues of Spunk and locking it in the boot – sure I’d left them in the shed last night.
I say hello and merry Christmas to Joan’s brother John and Maureen, his wife, and we all walk up the drive talking about the miserable weather we’re having and how there are never any white Christmases any more.
Her father is carving the bird, mother in the kitchen, Joan and Maureen bringing in the vegetables, John and I holding sherries, moaning about City and the terrible season they’re having, his son and two daughters, the twins, itching to get eating so they can open the presents from their Nanna and Grandad Roberts and their Uncle Peter and Aunty Joan and then watch Top of the Pops in peace.
The food smells great and my mouth is wet.
We all sit down and I uncork a bottle of Asti Spumante and pour as Joan’s father serves the turkey and sausage and we all help ourselves to vegetables, bread sauce and gravy, the children wanting some of this and none of that, their parents laughing and frowning, telling stories about Carl, Carol and Clare, how they’re growing so fast and there’s really no denying they do seem to grow up quicker these days.
The pudding gone, we’re slumped in various chairs watching Top of the Pops, various new pens and socks, diaries and chocolates to our name, Joan’s parents telling us how they really liked the Beatles all along, Joan and John disputing the fact, the kids wanting us all to pipe down as after Kelly Marie it’s The Police, Carol insisting we play Monopoly later, although Carl’s got a new game about Napoleon he wants to play and his dad had promised him that Uncle Peter would want to play, which his dad denies and says Uncle Peter’s here for a rest and not to play with him, but Clare prefers Cluedo anyway, although her mum thinks Uncle Peter’s probably also had enough Cluedo to last him a lifetime, but I shake my head and tell her would that it were so, would that it were so.
There’s a round of ham sandwiches and jelly at half-five, just after it turns out to have been the Reverend Green in the study with the candlestick, just after Live and Let Die and just before Eric & Ernie’s Christmas Special, just before we say we really must get going as we’ve still to pop in at Hale on the way home.