We Are Toten Herzen (TotenUniverse Book 1)

by Chris Harrison

  "You're not here for money?"

  "No."

  "Fame, ambition, achievement?"

  "Achievement probably comes closest. There's not much achievement in writing articles. They don't have a long shelf life, they tend to be forgotten within a week and you have to start all over again, but seeing a band come back to something. Being part of that is an achievement."

  "If it works," said Susan, gripping the gearstick. She ran it through the gears. "Like I said there's still a lot for you to learn." She took the ignition key and opened the door. "Remember, I'm a lot older than you. I know what I'm talking about."

  -

  "If anyone asks we're going to a funeral," said Dee as everyone headed for the entrance.

  "You should have said. I would have dressed for the occasion," said Elaine. Her red leather jacket matched the colour of her hair and both glowed under the intense streetlights.

  Inside the cemetery the footpaths led the righteous and the damned through a variety of dark forms and figures, some more solid than others. They arrived at a crossing of paths and waited quietly. So many observers, so few eyes. After several minutes another figure appeared and slowly came towards them.

  "Is he like us?" said Wallet to Rene.

  "Ooh, no. Not a bit. Same age, but smarter, richer, maybe not better looking, but I'll leave that to the ladies."

  "Yes he is," said Dee.

  "Okay, he's better looking too, but he's a shit bass player."

  The figure approached closer. "A bit melodramatic isn't it, meeting in a cemetery?" he called.

  "I thought you might like the irony," said Susan.

  Rene shook the guy's hand and walloped his shoulder. Susan was more gentle, tender. Hugging him without speaking. The guy stroked her hair back from her face to try to see her in the darkness. "It's a little dark, but I think you look okay," he said.

  "Well I got a mirror now."

  "What?" He stepped back.

  "Marco this is Rob Wallet," said Susan. "Rob, this is Marco Jongbloed, bass player with After Sunset."

  "Nice to meet you," said Wallet.

  "Yeah, you too. How are you adjusting?"

  "Adjusting?"

  "Sorry, I'm assuming you're a corpse like these guys now or didn't you know?"

  "Didn't know I'm a corpse or they're all corpses." This must be Dutch humour, thought Wallet. "They're all weirdos, but then who isn't these days." He shook Marco's hand. It was warm.

  There was a moment allowed for Marco to give Dee a bear hug followed by a more sophisticated kiss on both cheeks for Elaine. "Colour of the jacket's visible even in this light."

  "Nothing ironic about it," said Elaine smiling. Smiling!

  "Marco, Rob doesn't have a clue what's going on," Susan said.

  "Been like that since day one," said Dee.

  "But I think maybe we can start to let him in on things," Susan continued. "Not too much because he has a habit of putting his foot in his mouth, but, you know."

  "People management," said Marco rocking on his heels like someone who knew what people management was. Someone who was well versed in people management. A people manager. "I told you to give clear sets of responsibilities and parameters. I suppose you didn't listen."

  "No she didn't," Wallet jumped in before Susan could answer. "They leave me to do what I want then get upset when I fuck up." They all waited for him to stop. "I'm not part of the Plan, what do I know."

  "How old are you, Rob?" asked Marco.

  "Forty six. Give or take."

  "You were still at school when this plan was created."

  "Okay, so this is where we split up," said Susan. "We can meet back here in a hour." Everyone agreed and Susan and Marco wandered off arm in arm. Wallet hesitated for a fraction of a second.

  "Okay. Come on," said Dee tugging his arm. "Let the lovers have their time together."

  "Lovers? He's three times her age."

  "You're as old as you feel, Wallet. They teach you nothing in the asylum?"

  -

  A wide path ran alongside a canal that curved its way around the cemetery and out of sight. It was lined and decorated with houseboats, all merry in their accessories and trinkets, the painted watering cans and planting boxes, discarded bicycles and satellite dishes. "So what's the story with those two?" asked Wallet. The four of them were sat next to the water, feet dangling just above the surface. Top Trumps in hand (Motor Cycles, so no need to worry about the Boeing 747 card) they passed an hour or so and enjoyed the still of the summer night-time.

  "We've stayed in touch ever since the split in '73," said Rene.

  "Really," said Wallet. "Revs, 7200."

  Rene shook his head. "We made a deal. When Micky formed Toten we said we'd give it three months and if didn't work out we were going back to Rotterdam, reforming and trying again. We'd be a little bit wiser, better players, know the industry better. 6500."

  "7250." Dee waived her card: BMW R 100 RS.

  "Feed me," said Elaine. "8000."

  "What? What's that," said Wallet handing his card to her. "Hercules K50 RL."

  "But it worked out," Rene continued. "We did okay, no need to go back, but we still had that covered too"

  "200 kmh," said Elaine.

  "Ah, fuck it you've got the Munch, haven't you," said Wallet. No one could beat the Munch 1200 TTS so the other cards were handed over. Elaine was on a roll.

  "Susan and I said we'd use our money to help them out if they needed anything," said Rene rearranging his cards.

  "And how did that go, he looks fairly well off," said Wallet. He was holding another losing hand.

  "182 kmh," said Elaine.

  "Ha!" Dee had the winner. "210."

  "210?" said Wallet. "I thought the Munch was the fastest?"

  "Laverda 1000," said Dee. "Come on, hand them over." She gathered the other cards then looked at her own. "Got a right dog here. 7000 revs."

  Rene was still giving the low down on Marco. "He lives just to the west here, Bergweg. Big apartment."

  "City apartment," said Dee. "And he has another house near the coast. Come on, what you got?"

  "8500," said Elaine.

  "8600," said Rene.

  "7600." Wallet handed Rene the Laverda 125. "And was his wealth down to you guys in some way?"

  Rene stopped to think. His Honda GL 1000 had a big engine capacity. "Sort of. But it nearly didn't work. 999cc." He wiped out the others with that and took the cards off them.

  -

  About a month after meeting with Lenny Harper we were staying with Wim, here in Rotterdam, Wim Segers, and we were talking about what we could do for him. It was four years after our agreement, but the fact was we had just enough money to look after ourselves. We did some calculating and Wim suggested Micky Redwall wasn't passing on everything we'd earned, everything we were owed. So we went back to England to see him.

  Micky Redwall was at home one evening when he got a phone call. "Hello, Micky Redwall."

  "Micky, it's Susan Bekker."

  "Susan! Fuck, Susan, where are you, where's the rest of you?"

  "We're outside the Blue Elephant Curry House. We need to talk, Micky."

  "Fucking right we need to talk. Are you coming here or do you want me to meet you there?"

  "Meet us here. Fifteen minutes."

  Micky turned up and we went inside the restaurant. He booked a table for five and received a few funny looks, but you could tell he was on a mission. And so were we. The waiter found a quiet table for us and Micky said we'd choose something later.

  "So, where'd you go. Where d'you go without telling me?" Micky said.

  "Back to Rotterdam. We have friends there who can help us out until all this blows over." Susan was in a belligerent mood that night and as we talked everyone's breathing rate was starting to go through the roof.

  "I can help you out until it all blows over."

  "Can you? I don't think you can." Susan took a small notebook out of a purse. "We've been doing some
figures and we think we've sold about eight million albums. And all the concert tickets we've sold and t-shirts, patches, posters. Would you say maybe eighteen million pounds over four years is a conservative estimate?"

  "No." Micky sounded pretty sure. But maybe he wasn't; he still hadn't taken his coat off. "No, not that much."

  "Eight million records alone, Micky, and you've paid us about twelve thousand pounds each, per year. Out of eighteen million." Susan added up the figures again. "Do you want me to tell you how many concert tickets we sold?"

  "No, no, Susan you don't have to add it all up. Look the label takes a cut, promoters take a cut, venue owners take a cut, then there's the distributors, record shops, pressing the vinyl, printing the sleeves, transportation, hotels for all the crew. It all adds up. It all adds up and it doesn't leave much. When you split it five ways, because I need to earn a living as well, you're getting a good whack."

  I don't think any of us were convinced. We knew who was taking a cut, we knew the percentages. Susan knew the percentages. She referred to her figures and came back to answer every one of Micky's arguments. Then the waiter came back.

  "Ready to order sir?"

  "Er, yeah. I'll have a lamb balti," he was at sixes and sevens, probably wasn't hungry. You could have served him a raw potato and he wouldn't have noticed.

  "Your friends not joining you yet, sir?"

  "Friends?"

  "A table for five. I can move you to a smaller table if you wish?"

  Micky caught us smirking, grinning, laughing. I think the penny dropped almost instantly. "They're held up. They'll be here, you're all right." He completed his order, but I think his appetite was pretty much shot to pieces by then. "Can he not fucking see you?" he whispered. Susan shook her head. "How long you been able to do this?"

  "Took a while, but it's quite easy now," Elaine told him.

  "Why are you recorded as the publisher of my songs?" said Susan as the waiter reappeared with a glass of beer.

  Micky waited for him to go. "It's normal, that's the normal thing. . . ."

  "No it isn't. I'm the songwriter," said Susan, "but I'm getting nothing because my name's not on any publishing deal. You haven't written anything. Look, it's like this Micky. We want what you owe us. Nothing more. We know some of it is due to you, but we should have more than forty eight thousand pounds each out of all this."

  We eventually persuaded Micky to set up another account for us and pay money into it. The account was with a German bank and he wasn't a signatory to it. Money was transferred and then a new publishing deal, or rather the first publishing deal was set up that gave Susan one hundred per cent of royalties. Cut Micky right out of it.

  -

  The story was familiar. It still went on, but today it was even more voracious. A young band with a sharp manager and little understanding of what's happening outside the studio, sealed away from the offices where the contracts are signed and the money is divvied out amongst the important players, the ones who matter. Except the band also matters, but their lofty ideals and devotion to the craft locks them out of the nitty gritty and shit of the contractual labyrinth. Susan was idealistic, she would have been easy to trick back then, but Micky Redwall wouldn't have known how quickly she could learn. And she soon caught up with him.

  "8000 revs," said Rene.

  "I done it again. Lovely Hercules," said Dee.

  "How many?" said Elaine.

  "8600. Suck that, four stringer."

  They all forfeited their cards and moved on.

  "We went back to his house a few days later, towards the end of April," Rene continued, "and he was waiting for us with another deal. He quits as our manager, but keeps all mechanical rights. In effect the music is ours, but we can't make money from music sales. He has the rights to the recordings."

  -

  "So you can fuck off back to Rotterdam, or Germany or wherever your fucking tombstones are located and you can start all over again and see how far you get."

  "And that's your last offer," said Susan. I could see Dee was starting to get a bit twitchy. She hadn't fed for a couple of days and Micky was a big guy. I remember thinking there's a lot of blood inside you, man, and she can drain you dry when she's hungry.

  "You've got your money, you've got your publishing deal. What do you want now, blood?" He thought he was being funny.

  "Blood?" Susan considered the offer. "Why don't we give you a minute's start and let's see how far you get?"

  Micky was uncertain what to do. This wasn't a contractual offer. There would be no more signatures. Dee was the first to go for him. Maybe Susan should have given some kind of signal, but it was too late, Dee was hanging off him. He was throwing his arms around trying to dislodge her, but she was so far gone it was only a matter of time. The rest of us followed them out of the house. He was screaming, pirouetting, writhing like he was on fire. Dee was like an angry pit bull and you could hear the flesh tearing off him. Then, as if a space had opened up Elaine joined her at the table. There were dogs outside, chained up, and they were going demented.

  "You must have known who Lenny Harper was?" Susan asked the question, but I think it was probably rhetorical. She was always suspicious that Micky let the attack happen, or at least knew it was possible. She stepped towards him. "You even tipped people off, you cunt." He was on the ground by now, still alive, but he wasn't struggling anymore. Dee and Elaine were ravenous, but they eventually sat back as Susan stood over the body. She slammed her fist into his chest and ripped his heart out. She wanted to see for herself if he had one.

  On the way out we unchained the dogs and they had a late night snack of their own.

  -

  Wallet wondered where that entry was in Susan's diary and how she remembered it. "So that was late April, 1977. Everyone thought he was killed by his own dogs."

  "I think he was a little bit anaemic," said Elaine. "Do you remember he tasted a little bit. . . ."

  "Peppery," said Dee. "Oh, cobblers to it. One cylinder."

  "One!" said Rene. "One for me too. Harley Davidson SS 250. One cylinder."

  "Peppery?" Elaine grimaced. "Red peppers maybe. Four. One for each string, babydoll."

  "Wallet?" Dee shouted.

  "Just the two," he said.

  "I was beginning to wonder," said Dee as Elaine snatched the losing cards off everyone.

  "You know what we need now," said Wallet taking out his phone. The others checked their cards and waited. Wallet offered his phone to the night so that everyone could hear, enjoy and appreciate Eye Level, the theme tune to Van der Valk. "Now we're in fucking Holland!"

  -

  To the west, Susan and Marco looked across Bergweg at a bakery next door to a small restaurant. The two businesses shared a name: Seger. The bakery was closed, but the restaurant was still open to late night stragglers so hand in hand, they ran across the road, dodging the slow moving traffic. Marco was out of breath by the time they entered the restaurant. They found a table towards the back, out of sight of most people, and waited for service.

  "I like this table," said Susan. "It's cosy."

  "Cosy," said Marco surprised. "A word I can't associate with vampires."

  "Yeah, yeah. I've told you before, we get a bad press. We're not all monsters." Susan's dark eyes enlarged with menace and followed up with a beaming smile.

  "When you smile like that, oof, your teeth. I still think they're incredible." Marco slipped his overcoat off.

  Susan ran the tip of her tongue over a sharp canine. "They're pretty lethal you know. Not something to joke about."

  "No, I know. But they still look incredible. You never tell me what your dentist thinks?"

  "So you're happy everything's in place? Did Almer come through with his investment?"

  "Yeah. He's happy with fifteen per cent return, but we'll top that up if everything goes okay."

  Susan took her phone out and showed Marco a new trick. "It's an app Rob found for a tablet. It flips the webcam video so
it's like a mirror." She held it in Marco's face and he checked the closeness of his shave, the grey highlights in his hair.

  "He has his uses."

  "Yeah." Susan didn't sound too sure. "Tom Scavinio took some convincing to take over from Rob, but it means we have an expert managing us and we can leave Rob to deal with publicity and one or two other things."

  "What things?"

  Susan had other thoughts outside of the plan. "If he's good at one thing it's turning things up. Fuck, if he found us he can find anything. Some guy is writing a lot of crap about us and we're not sure what he's up to, whether there's anything more to it than just eccentricity."

  "Susan, there are millions of crazies on the internet, don't go chasing them all."

  "I know, I know."

  A waitress arrived to take orders and Susan was faced with the usual dilemma when she came here with Marco. Order food, pretend to eat it, transfer most of it to Marco's plate, watch him fatten. . . .

  "Just the avocado salad," he said.

  "I'll have a barbecue chicken," said Susan, keeping her head down as she spoke. "Not too big a portion." She ordered water, Marco had his usual double beer.

  "You saw the beers Almer named after you all?"

  Susan laughed. "I don't think his customers get the joke. I didn't know what pale ale was until he showed us. The Drummer's Mild - which he isn't - Dee's Golden Sweet, which is a joke if ever there was one because she's neither. English sense of humour."