by David Peace
She shakes her head again. ‘They flit, didn’t they?’
‘Flit?’
‘Almost ten year ago,’ she says. ‘Bank repossessed place.’
‘They just vanished?’
‘Thin air,’ she nods.
‘I remember they had an allotment or something –’
She shakes her head. ‘Some up field behind here, but we don’t –’
‘Didn’t come with the house then?’
‘No,’ she laughs.
‘Who owns them then?’
‘Them allotments?’
You nod.
‘Don’t know,’ she says. ‘Coal Board, maybe?’
‘Thanks,’ you say.
She nods.
You turn. You walk back down the garden path.
‘Sorry,’ she calls after you. ‘Who are you anyway?’
‘Solicitor,’ you say. ‘John Piggott.’
‘No trouble is there, I hope?’ she asks. ‘About the house?’
‘No,’ you say. ‘Friends of my parents, that’s all.’
The gate to the field behind the bungalow won’t open.
You climb up over the stone wall. You lumber up the muddy tractor path towards the row of dark sheds at the top of the hill.
The sky is heavy and about to piss all over you again.
Halfway up the hill, you turn around. You look back down at the little white bungalow and the little green garden next to all the other little white bungalows and little green gardens.
You can see the chubby woman with the grey permed hair at her kitchen window.
You take out your handkerchief. You wipe your face.
Your breath smells of shit.
You spit again. You start walking again.
You reach the row of sheds –
You peer in through the gaps in the wood, the cracks between the bricks:
Seed trays and yellow newspapers, plant pots and old copies of the Radio Times –
All seed trays and plant pots until you come to the last one:
The one with the bricked-up window. The padlocked black door.
You knock on the door –
No answer.
You rattle the padlock –
Nothing.
You pick up half a house brick. You batter the padlock off the door.
You open the door –
You open the door and you see the pictures on the wall –
Pictures you’ve seen on a wall once before:
Jeanette Garland, Susan Ridyard, Clare Kemplay and –
One new photograph, cut from paper, dirty paper –
Hazel.
You know where she is.
Part 5
Total eclipse of the heart
‘Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.’
– Voltaire
Chapter 51
There is a light summer rain falling on empty flowerbeds below my window.
Doctor shines torch in my eyes again. He gives me three injections. Nurse cleans my wounds. She administers to my bandages. Doctor smiles. He shakes my hand. Nurse nods. She kisses my cheek. They leave me to dress.
Rain has stopped and there is sunshine somewhere behind clouds.
I get out of bed. I put on a heavy army greatcoat. I straighten my cap. I turn my collars up. I walk down corridor. I go into dayroom. I walk across carpet with a swastika held high in hand, rest of room prostrate at my feet in their dressing-gowns –
Fugitive sunshine caught in their tears –
I’ve been so far away;
I say my goodbyes –
So far from her arms;
Hospital clock strikes thirteen –
Hate Week.
This is North –
Where they do what they want –
Wellington Street, Leeds.
I get off bus. I go into coach station toilets. I take off my cap and coat. I unravel bandages. I look at my face in mirror. I tilt my head down. I stare up into glass –
It gets dark.
I take out my scissors. I cut my hair. I shake my head. Loose hairs fall into sink. I run taps. I take out my razor. I mix soap and water in my hand. I rub it over my scalp. I pick up razor. I shave my neck. I shave my face. I shave my head. I look at my face in mirror. I tilt my head down. I stare up into glass –
It gets dark and –
There are visions of sixes and sevens, swastikas and crucifixes inside my head, big black and white ones all splattered with blood in an underground bunker, in an upstairs bar, on a motel wall, in a hotel room on seventh floor –
A toilet wall.
It gets dark and I get confused.
I put my cap and army coat back on. I shine my best badge:
UK Decay.
I walk over to a phonebox. I step inside. I close door. I pick up phone. I dial her number. She does not answer phone:
Never answers her phone, she never answers her phone; that is her way –
It is a war of nerves.
I am hungry now. I go into café. A lovely girl asks me what I want. I take a cup of tea from her and a hot toasted teacake. I give her money. She smiles at me. I take my tea and toast over to a table. I sit down. I watch her work. I enjoy my tea and toast. I thank her. I pick up my bag and leave.
I walk down Wellington Street into City Square –
There are voices from vans;
Past two stone lions and Leeds City Station –
There are posters on walls;
Along Boar Lane, past Griffin Hotel –
There are ghosts on every corner;
Across Vicar Lane and along Call Lane –
In windows and doorways;
Through Market into Bus Station and Millgarth –
A black winged gargoyle looming;
It watches me with talons pointed as memories are dull –
It is dark now. I am confused;
I wait for bus to Fitzwilliam –
A shadow on wall.
Bus comes. I get on. I sit upstairs –
Backseat hard.
I light matches. I smoke cigarettes. I read seats –
Thornhill Whites; Jeff is gay; LUFC; Barry 4 Clare.
I light matches. I remember faces. I remember hers –
I think about her all time.
I light matches –
Will she like me? Love me? Let me in? Let me stay, way people say –
Or will she remember me? Hate me? Wish me dead, way people do.
I let them fall to floor –
Fucking cunts treat us like pricks.
I light another match –
Why this person is liked and that one is not –
Why this one is loved and that one is not.
It burns my fingers. I let it fall –
A lie to him but not to her –
A kiss for him and a slap for me.
I close my eyes –
It gets dark.
I want to open them again. I cannot –
My trousers are round my ankles. Your hands are on my cock. Your own is in my mouth. You come in my face. You beat me. You rape me all over again. You give me money. You tell me to shut my mouth. Shut my mouth or you’ll kill my mum –
My stop is next –
I am nine years old.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 –
All good children go to heaven.
I cross road. I cut through Corporation Cemetery. I come out on to street –
My street, our street:
Newstead View.
This is where it started:
Fitzwilliam, 1967 –
Not heaven.
I look at watch again. It says thirteen o’clock –
Hate Week.
I walk down street –
Our street;
I come to house –
Our house;
I open gate. I walk up path –
It is dark now. I am confused;
I press doorbell. I wait –
A shadow on her wall in
silence of her night;
I hear footsteps. I see a small body through glass –
I think about her all time;
Wait almost over –
I’ve been so far away, so far from her arms;
Now I’m home –
Back from underground.
Chapter 52
I have found her. She is safe and well. I hold her hand. We get into my car. Her family will be overjoyed. I start the car. We drive. She needs the toilet. We pull into a motorway service station. I park among the lorries and the coaches. We get out of the car. I lock the doors. We walk across the tarmac. I hold her hand. She goes into the ladies. I stand outside. I wait. Her family will be overjoyed. I wait. It starts to spit. I wait. Lorries come and lorries go. I wait. She does not come out. I go inside to look for her. There is blood on the floor. Blood up the walls. I push open the cubicle doors. I come to the last one. It is locked. It will not open. I knock. I knock and knock and knock. Blood on the floor. Up the walls. I step back. I kick in the door. She’s not there. I run outside. She’s not there. The lorries and the coaches gone. Not there. The car park empty. Blood on my shoes. On my socks. A Bloody Tide, lapping at my ankles. Up my legs. I start to run. The waters rising. The Bloody Waters. The rain coming down. The Bloody Rain. I slip. I fall to the ground. I cannot stand. I am drowning here. The Bloody Tide, a Bloody Flood.
I woke on my knees, my hands in prayer, in the shadows and dead of the night, the house quiet and dark, listening for something, anything: animal or bird’s feet from below or above, a car in the street, a milk bottle on the step, the thud of the paper on the mat, but there was nothing; only the silence, the shadows and the dead, remembering when it wasn’t always so, wasn’t always this way, when there were human feet upon the stairs, children’s feet, the slam of a ball against a bat or a wall, the pop of a cap gun and a burst balloon, bicycle bells and front doorbells, laughter and telephones ringing through the rooms, the smells, sounds and tastes of meals cooked, served and eaten, of drinks poured, glasses raised and toasts drunk by men with cigars in black velvet jackets, their women with their sherries in their long evening dresses, the spare room for the long summer nights when no-one could drive, when no-one could leave, no-one wanted to leave, before that last time; that last time the telephone rang and brought the silence that never left, that was here with me now, lying in the shadows and dead of a house, quiet and dark, empty –
Tuesday morning.
I reached for my glasses and went down the stairs to the kitchen and put on the light and filled the kettle and lit the gas and took a teapot from the cupboard and a cup and saucer and unlocked the back door to see if the milk had been delivered yet but it hadn’t and there wasn’t any milk in the fridge but I still put two teabags in the teapot and took the kettle off the ring and poured the water on to the teabags and let it stand while I washed the soup pan from last night and the bowl and then dried them both up, staring out into the garden and the field behind, the kitchen reflected back in the glass, a man fully dressed in dark brown trousers, a light blue shirt and a green v-necked pullover, wearing his thick lenses with their heavy black frames, an old man fully dressed at four o’clock in the morning –
Tuesday 7 June 1983.
I put the teapot and cup and saucer on the plastic blue tray and took it into the dining room and set it down on the table and poured the tea and lit a cigarette and then switched on the radio and sat in the chair and waited for the news on Radio Leeds:
‘Police searching for missing Morley schoolgirl, Hazel Atkins, are expected to come under renewed pressure for a breakthrough in the investigation following criticisms of the police handling of the case made by Hazel’s parents.
‘In a newspaper article in this morning’s Yorkshire Post, Mr and Mrs Atkins say they have not been kept informed of the progress of the inquiry into their daughter’s disappearance and have only learned of certain key developments through the press or television. Mr and Mrs Atkins were particularly critical of Chief Superintendent Maurice Jobson, the man leading the investigation. Hazel’s parents say that Mr Jobson spoke to them on just three occasions early in the inquiry but that he has since been either unavailable or unwilling to meet them.
‘Mr Jobson has so far refused to comment on …’
Radio off, glasses off –
I was sat in the chair in tears again;
In tears –
For I knew there was salvation in no-one else –
No other name under heaven.
In tears –
Tuesday 7 June 1983:
Day 27.
Just gone seven –
Morley Police Station –
The Incident Room.
No-one here but me –
No-one and nothing here but two dozen four-drawer filing cabinets, nearly two hundred card-index drawers, a two-tier wooden rack for the scores of Action books and ten trestle tables with five huge computers and twenty telephones, the telephones on tables fitted out as desks for writing up Actions, statements and reports, card-writing and cross-checking the house-to-houses and the cars, cross-indexing and entering data, updating files and sending out for more –
Or not, marking them:
No Further Action.
I opened the door to a small adjoining room:
Officer-in-Charge Investigation.
I sat down at my desk opposite a huge, pin-spattered map of Morley –
A huge, pin-spattered map of Morley and a photograph –
A photograph of a little girl –
A little girl, still lost.
I turned on to Blenheim Road, St John’s, Wakefield –
Old trees with old hearts cut, losing their leaves in June;
I parked in the drive of 28 Blenheim Road –
One big old tree, one big old house, one big old cut;
I closed my eyes. I opened them. I saw a star
– A single star, an angel –
A silent little angel;
I got out. I locked the car door. I spat –
Flesh;
I walked up the drive –
Shallow ugly daylight, brown stagnant rainwater;
The bottoms of my trousers, my shoes and socks, bloody –
Everything bloody;
I went inside. Up the stairs to Flat 5 –
Damp and stained –
Hearts still lost;
The door was open –
I stepped inside. I stood in the hall. I said: ‘Hello?’
There was no answer.
I walked down the hall.
The doors were all closed.
I stood before the bedroom door. I whispered her name.
Silence –
The branches tapping upon the glass.
I tried the door.
The door swung open.
The room and everything in it had been destroyed.
I went across the hall.
I stood before the bathroom door. I whispered her name again.
Silence –
The branches tapping upon the glass, their leaves lost.
I tried the door.
The door swung open.
The bath taps were on. The sink too. The room flooded.
I stepped inside. I turned off the bath taps. I pulled out the plug. I went over to the sink. I turned off the taps. I took off my glasses. I washed my face and hands in the water. I pulled out the sink plug. I dried my face and hands on my coat. I put my glasses back on. I looked into the mirror above the sink. I put my fingers to the glass –
The lipstick:
Everybody knows.
I ran back down the stairs. I ran back down the drive. I got in the car. I locked the doors.
I stared back up at the flat. I took off my glasses. I closed my eyes again;
The windows that looked inwards, the walls that listened to your heart –
Where one thousand voices cried.
Inside –
Inside our scorched hearts.
>
There was a house –
A house with no doors.
The earth scorched –
Heathen and always winter.
The rooms murder –
Here was where we lived:
Jeanette, Susan, Clare, Mandy and –
Caught in the branches and the tree –
An angel –
The branches tapping upon the glass, their leaves lost and never found –
Wanting in –
Sobbing, weeping, and asking to be found –
Hazel.
I looked down at the bruises on the backs of my hands –
The bruises that never healed.
Hazel, Hazel, Hazel –
The motorway across the Pennines, raining with occasional shotgun blasts of thunder and lightning as I drove over the Moors –
More missing children, more lost children –
More children, taken and murdered;
More voices –
Terrifying, hysterical, and screeching voices of doom, disaster and death.
I drove. I drifted –
Underground kingdoms, evil kingdoms of badgers and pigs, worms and insect cities; screaming swans upon black lakes while dragons soared overhead in painted skies of fading stars and then swept down through lamp-lit caverns wherein a blind owl searched for the last princess in her tiny feathered wings, the wolf back –
Past Manchester and on to Merseyside, that familiar taste in my mouth:
Flesh –
Fear.
I looked down at Michael Myshkin strapped to the bed.
He looked up at me –
His face sore. His eyes raw.
He whispered: ‘Only you today?’
‘Only me.’
‘Can’t keep away,’ he said.
I nodded. I smiled.
He didn’t smile back.
I opened my briefcase. I took out a photograph. I held it over him.
Michael Myshkin tried to turn away.
I pushed it towards him.
He closed his eyes.
‘She’s missing,’ I said. ‘Been missing twenty-seven days now.’
Silence –
‘I want you to tell me everything, Michael.’
Silence –
‘Everything –’
Silence –
‘About the Wolf.’
Michael Myshkin looked up at me. He said: ‘But you already know.’
I swallowed.
‘I told you,’ he said.
I fought tears.
‘A long time ago.’