by Dc Alden
He took a shower and dried off, taking stock in the mirror. He wasn’t in great shape for thirty-eight. His short blond hair was rapidly thinning, his body a little more soft and baggy. Vicky once told him that he looked like the actor Jason Statham, but Roy didn’t see it. The truth was he’d grown lazy over the years. A bag of shite, he heard Jimmy laugh.
He brushed his teeth and cracked the bathroom window. It was quiet outside. Roy liked this time of day; most people had gone to work, the kids to school and the rest of the estate was a long way from surfacing. It was a sliver of tranquillity, but Roy knew it wouldn’t last. Soon the muffled drone of a TV would filter through the wall on one side, later the jackhammer thump of a sound system on the other, rattling the family photographs in the sitting room. Right now they were still, arranged in a collection of neat frames above the wonky shelf and the fake electric log fire; Roy and Jimmy as children, Mum and Dad standing behind, beaming faces and ice cream cones. Teenage Jimmy in full parachute gear, grinning as he waited to jump from an aircraft ramp; an older, unshaven Jimmy in dust-caked civvies, an assault rifle slung across his chest, a wide smile across a face burned brown by the Afghan sun. And Roy’s favourite, the black-and-white ten-by-eight of Jimmy and Max, the toddler suspended in mid-air, his chubby face a mask of delight, Jimmy’s strong arms held aloft to catch the boy. Irrepressible Jimmy, Max’s forgotten uncle, Roy’s rock – gone. And no one knew where or why.
He got dressed in jeans, T-shirt and a navy blue jacket and left the flat. On the balcony outside he heard his neighbour hurling a mouthful of abuse at her brood of fatherless kids. He ducked into the stairwell and vowed for the umpteenth time to get his act together and get as far away from the Fitzroy Estate as possible.
He crossed the road and entered the park opposite, a cold wind whipping at his clothing as he headed for Kingston town centre. An hour later and Roy was trudging up Whitehall, past the long lines of police vans that stretched towards Trafalgar Square. Nelson’s famous column loomed ahead and soon he was swept along with a steady stream of protesters.
The demo was a big one, maybe a hundred thousand crammed into the square, a living organism that ebbed and swayed before a huge platform erected in front of the National Gallery. Thousands of flags and banners fluttered in the breeze, and a police helicopter clattered overhead, an angry wasp probing the crowd with its high-definition cameras.
Roy headed towards the media stand erected in front of Canada House, pushing and shoving his way through the throng until he found himself directly beneath the rows of TV cameras, guarded by steel barriers and thick black lines of riot police.
He opened his jacket and produced his folded cardboard sign, insignificant as it was, but he was close enough to the cameras to be noticed. He unfolded it and held it above his head, hoping the news crews might catch the large, block capital words in thick black ink: Justice for Jimmy Sullivan. Inquiry Now! He looked towards the stage as the crowd suddenly roared, the noise deafening.
‘Here we go,’ an ageing protester next to him grinned, rubbing his hands together. The man wore a sheepskin coat with a peace badge pinned to the lapel. He was fired up for the occasion and Roy felt it too, although he was certainly not political. All he cared about was his homemade sign, and the hope that someone, somewhere, might ask, who is Jimmy Sullivan?
Onstage, the diminutive figure of Anna Reynolds, the formidable Member of Parliament for Selly Oak, took up position behind a bloom of microphones. Roy craned his neck as the cheering crowd pressed forward and Reynolds’s booming voice cut through the chill air.
‘It warms my heart to see so many decent, hardworking people here today…’
The crowd roared. She was a pro, Roy had to admit, a bridge across the social divide, privately schooled yet a champion of the working classes, her provocative words and dramatic timing stirring the crowd’s emotions. As the minutes ticked by her voice began to rise in pitch and she began stabbing the air towards Whitehall, where police vans had formed a blockade across the road. Even Roy found himself jeering along with the crowd.
‘Our world is changing,’ Reynolds boomed from the stage. ‘Today, less than twenty giant corporations now dominate more than a third of the world’s economic activity. One of this government’s biggest sponsors is TDL Global, a corporate entity richer than Italy, Portugal and Greece combined, yet the hardworking families of this country are forced to struggle against a tide of rising prices and failing local services. Let them go there,’ she cried, ‘let them talk to the beleaguered communities, let them try and explain to a pensioner living in a tower block that the lifts don’t work because of crippling cuts, greedy banks and government inaction! This cannot, must not, be allowed to happen!’
The crowd thundered its approval, a wall of noise that made the hair on the back of Roy’s neck stand on end. Reynolds was in full flow, like Boadicea rallying her fighters, preparing them for battle. Flags and banners waved manically, and the crowd surged back and forth. Sign held aloft, Roy’s arms were beginning to ache.
It was just after the second speaker had left the stage, when the dark clouds had drifted overhead and the first drops of rain began to spatter the crowd, that Roy noticed them. They were forty strong, maybe more, masks and bandanas covering their faces, moving as one through the crowd. They congregated a short distance from the stage, close to Roy and the glaring eye of the news crews.
Trouble, was Roy’s immediate thought.
The third speaker took to the stage, a little-known environmentalist. Gone was the inflammatory rhetoric of Reynolds, replaced instead by the dull tones and measured arguments of a stuffy academic plunged into the spotlight. Roy sensed a change of atmosphere, the mood of rebellion unexpectedly tempered, replaced by a tide of impatience that rippled through the throng.
The catcalls started a few minutes into the speech, whistles and jeers competing with the amplified drone from the stage. Someone barged past him, a whip of fair hair, followed by a man with a camera perched on his shoulder. TV people, hungry for good footage, pressing into the crowd. As rain began to slice across Trafalgar Square Roy’s eyes were drawn to the speaker onstage. He felt sorry for the man, his thin hair plastered to his head by the sudden squall, the pages of his speech clutched like a wet rag in his hand. Poor bastard.
‘Shut up, will you? We can’t hear him!’ shouted the man in the sheepskin coat.
A dreadlocked anarchist twisted around, lashing Roy’s face with his dreads. He snarled something unintelligible, then shoved Roy hard in the chest, causing a ripple through the crowd. Roy felt himself pushed forwards, and before he could recover his balance the fists began to fly.
He heard a woman shout, saw the TV reporter being slapped and punched by a masked anarchist. Roy lunged forward and punched him full in the face. The man went down hard and Roy grabbed the woman around the waist, pulling her back through the melee until they were swept up against a barrier.
Missiles arced through the air, a barrage of bottles, stones and paint bombs. People were getting hit, some dazed and bleeding, many more covered in pink and green paint. The riot cops surged forward, unleashing a fusillade of baton blows on the closest demonstrators. Roy clutched the reporter’s hand and shoved his way through the throng until they found a break in the barriers. He ducked through and led her beneath the safety of the scaffold stand as the missiles continued to fly. Breathless, Roy sank to his knees.
‘Thank you.’
She was thirtyish, slim, with a bob of mousy hair. Her nose was a little bloodied, her shirt ripped at the neck, her face paled by the proximity of violence. Still, she seemed pretty together despite her close call. Roy watched her cameraman squeeze through the gap and join them beneath the stand.
‘Thanks, buddy.’
‘No worries,’ Roy muttered, getting to his feet.
The woman held out her hand. ‘I’m Kelly Summers, MSNBC. You kinda saved me back there.’
The cameraman winked at Roy. ‘A three-week stint in Kabu
l and she thinks she’s invincible.’
Summers smiled sweetly. ‘Fuck you, Art.’
‘Classy,’ Art chuckled, checking his camera.
Summers asked, ‘What brings you here today?’
It took a moment for Roy to realise the opportunity that had presented itself. He produced his placard and launched into his story.
Summers held up a hand, positioned them both in front of Art’s camera, and smoothed her hair down. ‘You’ve got ninety seconds.’
As Summers wound up the segment a firework exploded overhead, a huge bang that rained a brilliant shower of sparks onto the crowd below. They panicked like a herd of cattle, and a phalanx of riot police charged into them, armour-plated Robocops swinging their batons mercilessly, their visored faces contorted with delicious rage. The noise was deafening, the chaos complete, the air ripe with body odour and fear.
A barrier gave way and the mob spilled into the media pen, scattering in all directions. Roy found himself swept away on the human tide, clutching and clawing at those around him, desperate to stay on his feet. The historic square had become a coliseum of mayhem.
‘Come here, you!’
Roy yelped as a cop’s gloved hand yanked his collar. He struggled free, plunging into a tight gap between two outside broadcast vehicles, the familiar dome of the National Gallery looming above him. He burst out of the narrow opening and hurtled straight into a trio of yellow-jacketed policemen, sending them tumbling to the ground like fluorescent skittles. They were on him in seconds, his arms wrenched and twisted into painful locks, stiff handcuffs ratcheted over his wrists.
‘You’re under arrest, violent disorder,’ puffed an overweight plod as he frogmarched Roy toward a waiting van.
His protests fell on deaf ears. He was searched and shoved inside the van, squeezed up against a catch of grumbling detainees. He leaned his head against the mesh-covered window, bumping and swaying with the motion of the van as they headed along Pall Mall. His little interview, his one real chance of telling Jimmy’s story, would be swallowed up by the riot, the mayhem played out again and again on every TV and news channel across the country. Who’d care now about a missing Brit in Iraq? The opportunity had passed. He wouldn’t get another one like that.
The van raced along the Mall and turned hard right into Horse Guards Avenue, passing the famous parade square, the Cabinet War Rooms, the bronze soldiers on their granite plinths. His thoughts turned to Jimmy and the dream, the pain it represented. When his parents had died their loss had been heart-breaking, yet he’d got over that eventually.
But not Jimmy.
Despite the passage of time there was still no peace. His brother haunted him, and Roy was scared.
He peered out through the grimy Perspex window as the van howled through the busy streets of Victoria. He watched the crowds as they swept past, saw the anxiety in their faces, their nervous flight towards bus stops and train stations, escaping the city before the violence spread. Roy felt their fear too, a sense of trepidation that plagued his dreams, a growing apprehension that made his mouth dry and his heart beat fast inside his chest.
Something was coming.
Something dark and terrifying.
Chapter Two
Reverend Clarence Hays was halfway through his sermon when he noticed the man with the red ponytail seated in the rear pew. He’d seen him before, several times in fact, but he stood out simply because he was white, and it was unusual for a white man to be a part of the congregation at the Calvary Southern Baptist church on West 131st Street.
Not that Hays minded of course; all were welcome in God’s House, even here in Harlem, where white folk were scarce and usually only seen behind the windshields of police cruisers.
Yet the man intrigued him. Hays recalled the first time he’d walked in, midway through a Wednesday evening service. He’d loitered at the back of the church, hands in the pockets of a black winter coat, baggy pants gathered around a pair of scuffed shoes, a few days of carroty growth on his face. At first Hays presumed he was homeless, seeking temporary shelter from the winter storms, but lately he’d re-evaluated that assessment. He didn’t possess that beat down quality that bent the backs of most unfortunates. This man had bearing.
Hays finished his sermon and the first notes of the piano began to echo around the hall. Soon the swaying choir were in full voice, the achingly sweet sound of James Pullin’s He’s Faithful filling the room. Hays watched the white man bringing his hands together and mumbling the song’s words. There was a strange intensity about him, his lips playing catch-up with the lyrics, his clapping hands trying and failing to keep the simple rhythm, the expression on his face far removed from the beaming joy of his fellow worshippers. Hays had seen that look before, in the faces of the sick and the dying, the Death Row inmates back in Kentucky. It was a look of desperation.
He knew he didn’t have long. As the hymn filled the rafters, Hays slipped out into the corridor at the back of the church. He grabbed a black felt homburg and overcoat from his office then threw the bolt on the rear door. Out in the alleyway he popped the collar of his coat up against the chill and made his way to the street, a thin crust of frozen snow crunching under his shoes. As he reached the end of the alleyway he saw the white man trotting down the steps of the church. He stopped beneath the red neon cross, zipping up his jacket and tugging a Yankees beanie over his head. The street was empty, silent, the temperature hovering somewhere just below zero, crystals of snow drifting through the light of the streetlamps.
They were alone.
Reverend Hays wasn’t a large man, but behind his lectern he felt as big as a mountain. He felt that same strength now, an instrument of God’s work. He held up a hand as the man headed towards him.
‘Excuse me, sir.’
Immediately the man veered to his right, large hands springing from the pockets of his coat. He moved out into the street, watching Hays but saying nothing.
‘I don’t mean you any harm. I’m Reverend Hays, from the church.’
Hays smiled and raised his homburg, allowing the light to reveal his ebony face. The man hesitated. A distant siren wailed on the cold night air.
‘What do you want?’
Hays smile widened. ‘I have everything I need. It’s what you want that I’m interested in. Can we talk?’
The church was empty, the congregation long gone. Settled in the warmth of his cramped office, Hays poured two coffees into chipped black mugs with Christ is Lord emblazoned in swirly gold lettering. The stranger sat in the shadows, out of the glow of the gooseneck lamp on Hays’ desk. He eased himself into his creaking chair and studied the stranger as he sipped his coffee. He was a big man, six-four, wide-shouldered, and there was some meat on those bones too, though not as much as there should be. Probably played some football in college. He was thinning on top, a dusting of freckles on his scalp, his remaining red hair tied into a thin ponytail that dangled past the frayed collar of his shirt. Those deep-set eyes missed nothing, Hays was sure of that. They roamed the walls, the floor, the dusty bookshelves, the ancient laptop that whirred quietly on his desk. Most of all they studied Hays, his face, and especially his hands. The stranger tracked them as Hays moved, as he scratched the grey curls of his beard and drank his coffee. The man was stretched tighter than a snare drum. Maybe he was a fugitive from the law, although on second thoughts Hays doubted it. White men didn’t exactly blend in Harlem.
‘It’s just us,’ he soothed. ‘Please, try to relax.’
‘I’m fine.’ His voice was deep, resonant. There was authority there, but Hay’s couldn’t place the accent.
‘My name is Clarence. What do I call you?’
‘Frank will do.’
‘Okay,’ Hays smiled, rising from his chair. ‘Well, Frank, let me officially welcome you to our humble church.’
His guest hesitated, then took the offered hand. He had a strong grip, and clean fingernails too, unusual for a man on the streets. Frank retreated back into t
he shadows.
‘Without sounding like a bad movie, I’m guessing you’re not from around these parts.’
Frank twisted the beanie in his lap with those big hands. ‘I like the singing,’ he said. ‘Reminds me of when I was a boy.’
He’s from Boston.
‘Well, we sure like to sing around here,’ Hays chuckled. ‘Prayers are mighty fine of course, but I truly believe that people connect with the Lord on a different level when they sing. Cleanses the soul, wouldn’t you agree, Frank?’ His guest said nothing. Instead he slurped the dregs of his coffee. ‘You want another?’
‘Got anything stronger?’
Hays’ face clouded. ‘I’m not in the business of feeding a man’s vices, Frank.’
The man smiled, for the first time. ‘I’m no alcoholic, Reverend, though for a time I tried my best to become one.’
He had good teeth, Hays noticed, clean, even, and the eyes, unclouded by the ravages of liquor or drugs. This was no bum.
‘Too much coffee makes me edgy,’ Frank said. ‘I tend to smooth it out with the occasional drink.’
Hays reached into the bottom drawer of a battered filing cabinet and produced a bottle of Old Crow Reserve and two glasses. ‘Made in my home state of Kentucky. Not the finest, but not too shabby either.’
He poured a couple of shots and watched Frank take his glass without lifting it to his lips. Okay, so he wasn’t a drinker. Hays’ instincts were right about this man. He had a story, one of pain and loss that would be as desperate as the thousands he’d heard in thirty-five years of being a minister. All Frank needed was someone to tell it to. Hays leaned back in his chair and sipped his own liquor. The computer hummed faintly, the alleyway outside deserted, silent.
‘It’s not just the singing, am I right, Frank? There’s another reason why you came to us.’
The big man nodded, staring into the untouched contents of his glass as he swirled it around in small circles. When he spoke he did so quietly, eloquently, without hesitation.