by Shaun Baines
“Stop struggling,” Daniel said.
“I know I have to die, but not that.”
Daniel shook him roughly. Fairbanks’ teeth banged together. Bloody saliva slipped from his mouth as he bit his tongue, but Daniel wouldn’t stop. The muscles in his arms raged and his burnt back screamed. It was the anger he had carried with him for days, his desire for revenge. When Fairbanks went limp, Daniel gasped for breath, feeling his daughter’s eyes on him, listening to Fairbanks’ groans.
“Not that,” he repeated over and over. “Not that.”
Looking into his pale face, Daniel searched, seeing the shadows and things no-one else could see. Something clicked in his mind and when he pulled back, he was embarrassed at his stupidity. Fairbanks, his father, his brother, they might never have shown mercy, but Daniel would because no-one was truly evil. At worst, they were simply alone.
Revenge didn’t have to end in murder. He could show his daughter the Daytons were kind as well as cruel, that forgiveness wasn’t only for the weak. As he caught her watching him, he hoped it might halt the growing violence inside her.
“This was never about a bloody dog, was it?” Daniel said.
Fairbanks raised his head and smiled sadly.
“It was your uncle,” he continued.
He nodded and Daniel released him.
“The thing about the dogs…” Fairbanks said, shrugging and faltering for words. “Well, it helps in this game if people think you’re psychotic, but you and your daughter are the real deal, aren’t you?”
He looked out over the water and did up the collar button of his shirt. “My Uncle was the only person who ever treated me like I mattered.”
“Did you kill him?”
The horror on Fairbanks’ face shamed him and Daniel cast around for something else to look at, but his eyes were drawn back to the earring.
“It was a hit and run,” Fairbanks said. “Something random out of the blue. Here one minute. Gone the next.”
Daniel remembered his father and how his death could be attributed to his choices, like stepping stones along a treacherous path. Every misdeed and crime was a fateful progress toward a brutal end whereas Fairbanks’ uncle was snatched from existence through no fault of his own. Maybe that’s why Fairbanks needed to control everything. It was an attempt to mitigate his pain, but there was no avoiding what was about to come.
They looked at one another, rain coursing down their faces. Daniel thought Fairbanks might understand that now.
“Do you want to give me a second chance?” Fairbanks asked with a half-smile. Daniel shook his head and when Fairbanks held out his hand, he ignored it. Instead, he stepped to one side, pointing to the river and the path Fairbanks was about to undertake.
Fairbanks nodded slowly and walked backwards to the top of the grassy embankment. He undid the buttons of his soaked shirt and threw it to the ground. The rain sluiced the mud from his skinny torso. He looked cleansed. Perhaps this was some sort of baptism, Daniel thought.
“I always loved the water,” he said, “but do you honestly think I’m going to jump to my death?”
His hand snaked around his back. With a wince, he produced a gun. Daniel recognised it as a Colt Eagle, but with black duct tape hanging from its sides like broken wings.
Fairbanks smiled, his dead eyes flashing with triumph. “I’m starting to get used to handguns. I taped it to my back just in case.”
Daniel heard footsteps and suddenly Eisha was in front of him, protecting him from the bullet. Her hair hung in wet streaks and she growled like a guard dog, but Eisha barely reached his midriff, giving Fairbanks opportunity to shoot them both. He grabbed her and although she was cold, he felt the warmth of her body.
“Don’t do it,” Daniel said. “Leave her out of this. Please.”
Fairbanks closed one eye and aimed as his earring caught a ray of light.
“Who goes first?” he asked.
The wet mud under his feet gave way. His face froze into a rictus of panic, his bulbous eyes were stricken with fear. And then the mud shifted. His Eagle flew into the air as he tumbled backward with a scream, his arms flaying. Daniel and Eisha ran to the shoreline. He held her firmly, fearful she might fall. Fairbanks splashed into the water and was dragged under by the current. He re-emerged, choking and fighting for breath before slamming against a rock. Daniel found his daughter’s hand as they watched Fairbanks being swept away, his pale form showing signs of red. He disappeared under the surface and the river rumbled on. Like Fairbanks, they held their breath, waiting to be sure of his death.
“There,” shouted Eisha, pointing to the waterfall. Above the roar and the spray, Daniel saw Fairbanks pitched over the edge, his mouth agape and his hands grasping for purchase, but the river was too strong. It took him into its embrace and left nothing behind, save for the smile on Eisha’s face.
Daniel bowed his head, wondering what to feel. He counted to ten and made it to nine before he led his daughter away through the wood. Finding the track, they trudged back to the picnic area in silence. The table they’d blown up was still smouldering. In the distance, they saw Bronson frantically running from bush to shrub, appearing to have lost something.
The rain stopped and Daniel peered into a grey sky. His carnivorous family were all but gone. His duties were dispensed with and he finally felt a sense of lightness and possibility. Daniel was free to live his dream.
He watched Eisha skip along the track. She was his carefree daughter again, showing no signs of having witnessed a man fall to his death. This daughter hadn’t even been there. It was his other daughter, the one who wanted to take a life to protect his. The corruption of the Daytons had begun and he knew it would get worse if they stayed.
“Would you like to live in Scotland?” he asked.
Eisha stopped in the middle of a puddle and cocked her head to one side. He tried to read her thoughts, but her face was blank. Pulling his wet clothing tighter, he braced himself against a cold breeze. The clouds darkened and it started to rain again.
“No,” she said. “Better things happen here.”
Chapter Forty-Two
Bronson parked in a bay outside a tower block known as the Devil’s Playground. No sooner had he pressed his key fob, beeping the alarm on Ed Dayton’s BMW, than he was surrounded by children aged between six and ten. Their faces were grubby and their clothes torn. One young girl wore a T-shirt with ‘Pussy’ emblazoned on the front while a young boy wore no top at all, preferring to wander the estate bearing his pigeon chest.
“Watch yer car for you, mate?” It was the tallest boy who spoke, though judging by his face, he was also the youngest. He wore a dirty Parka jacket down to his knees and clenched an unlit cigarette between his teeth.
Bronson dug his hand into his pocket and handed over a fiver. He’d just washed and polished the vehicle, as he did every week, but that wasn’t why he gave them the money. If he didn’t pay the toll, he’d come back to scratched paint work and slashed tyres. It was the same scam he’d pulled as a child.
In the months that followed Fairbanks’ death, Bronson set about rebuilding the Dayton’s empire without a Dayton in sight. Daniel was keeping a low profile, spending time with his daughter in the empty rooms of Five Oaks. Eisha was ill and he made it clear he didn’t want visitors. After what the bairn had been through, Bronson didn’t blame him.
As the lift door opened, Bronson shivered. He stepped inside, carefully kicking aside syringes and cotton swabs stained with blood. It was a short ride to the fourth floor, but made longer when the smell of urine was so powerful.
He’d visited Liz in her apartment in Gateshead a few times. She was thinner these days, though it had little to do with diet and exercise and more with wine consumption. The apartment remained in her name, but the income she received from the Daytons had ceased.
“Why has Daniel cut me off? What did I do wrong? And why haven’t you found Monica yet?” she’d asked before passing out by the window over
looking her city.
He didn’t have the guts to tell her it had been his decision to stop her money. There simply wasn’t enough to go around anymore.
The lift door opened and he stumbled onto the fourth floor. He gasped for breath, but the air wasn’t much better outside the lift. It was stale and tinged with the aroma of a hundred spoons browning chemicals over a lighter. The bulbs along the corridor had been stolen again, pitching it in darkness. Somewhere somebody was crying while someone else argued for their turn on a pipe. He rechecked the package under his arm and proceeded into the shadows.
A boy of eighteen sat outside room four-one-four. He looked up when Bronson approached and adjusted his clothing so they looked neater on his thin frame. When he smiled, Bronson noted his front teeth were missing.
“He’s waiting inside for you, sir,” the boy said, jabbing his thumb toward the open door.
The room was similar to the one where Bronson had tortured the long forgotten Enoch; small, damp and furnished with belongings that looked like they’d been scavenged from a skip. He’d insisted on installing a few home comforts however. A kerosene heater and lamp to ward off the nightly chills. A double bed free from lice and stains. And a camping stove for hot meals should the occupant ever feel like eating.
Waiting for him by the bedroom door was Clive Hawk, the so-called king of the Devil’s Playground. Clive was taller than Bronson, but thin, like most of the inmates of the tower. He was in his early fifties and wore a mismatched combination of camouflage trousers and a V-neck sweater. It pictured a yellow smiling face popular with ravers in the eighties.
“Charlie,” he said, throwing his arms up in the air. “We always look forward to your visits.”
Bronson handed over the package and Clive ran a tongue over his cracked lips, a greedy light flashing in his eyes. He might run this tower like a king, thought Bronson, but he was a dirty skaghead just like the rest of them.
“Payment for services rendered?” Clive said.
“You know the deal. He gets his share first and the rest is yours for looking after him. Okay?”
“I’ve been taking very good care of him, as you’ll see. In fact, I’ve just given him his morning kick. I doubt you’ll get much sense out of him, but at least he’s happy.” Pointing to the floor, Bronson followed Clive’s finger to a blackened spoon and used syringe. “Can I go?”
Bronson dismissed him with a wave and Clive scuttled away. He lit the kerosene lamp and ventured into the bedroom.
The curtains were drawn and the room smelled of sweat and take-away cartons. The blankets had been soiled and kicked to the bottom of the bed. Before he sat down, Bronson checked the restraints on the headboard. They were solid, but not too tight. There was no need to make this worse than it already was.
“Are you awake?” he asked.
The figure on the bed moaned and shimmied away until the chains clunked. “It’s okay. It’s me. It’s Bronson,” he said, as if it would make a difference.
He lifted the lamp, shining it on the figure in the bed. He checked his arm. Still muscular, but pockmarked with needle wounds. None were infected, thought Bronson with relief, but his head needed shaving again. He didn’t want him getting infested with lice. Overall, Clive had made good on his word and Bronson relaxed.
“I’ve come with the news,” Bronson said, settling into a chair. The figure in the bed stirred, but didn’t open his eyes.
“We’ve drawn a complete blank on Noodles. We don’t have the money or the manpower to mount a proper search so it’s just going to have to wait.”
The figure pulled weakly on the restraints binding him to the bed.
“There’s no point complaining about it and I’m not here to take orders,” Bronson said.
He stared down at his new shoes. They were as bright and polished as his new car. Pulling on his shirt collar, his skin prickled with warmth, though the heater wasn’t on. His throat was dry and he wished he’d brought some water.
“I saw Lily this month. I bumped into her at the Mayfair club. Nice girl. We didn’t chat long. Got the impression I reminded her of the bad old days.”
“Monica?” The name was slurred, but there was no mistaking it.
“I told you to stop asking. I don’t know.”
His restraints rattled. Bronson stood and paced the floor. “The last I heard she was shacked up with some banker, okay? She should count herself lucky. There’s not many blokes would take a pregnant woman on, you know? She’s better off.”
The room was stifling. He needed air, but the window was nailed shut. Instead he pulled open the curtains and the outside world flooded in. He felt a moment of respite, turning to the figure on the bed who cringed away from the sunlight.
Bronson’s stomach lurched at the sight of him. He was as tall as he ever was, dressed in the same suit he wore on the day Bronson had brought him here, engaging Clive as his captor. It was tattered now and dirty. Vomit was encrusted on his chin and his lips were blue. His skin was paler, but when he opened his eyes, they still flashed like frostbitten steal.
It wasn’t enough to simply restrain him, Clive had said. He insisted he be hooked on heroin. It was the only way to control a man as dangerous as Scott Dayton. Bronson agreed with his reasoning, but having returned every month since, he worried about his decision more and more.
“I know you hate it, Scott. Maybe it would have been kinder to kill you, but I couldn’t so you’re stuck here.”
Picking up the kerosene lamp, Bronson extinguished the flame. “This is your punishment. For what you did to Eisha. For the betrayal of your father, the Dayton name and all the things I loved. No-one knows you’re here. Everyone thinks you’re dead. It’s purgatory for us both. Christ, if Daniel only knew - “
The mention of Daniel’s name roused Scott. He rolled his head toward Bronson, his brow knotted in anger, the tendons in his neck stretched taut. He moved his lips as if he was talking, but nothing came out. Scott continued like that until his strength was spent. He closed his eyes and Bronson watched the ragged rise and fall of his chest as he slipped back into a drug induced coma.
He didn’t say a single word, but Bronson was left in no doubt as to the meaning. If Scott ever escaped, he and Daniel were dead men.
Sitting for a further five minutes, Bronson sighed and repeated his apologies like he did on every visit. Checking his restraints, he left Scott to the rancid cell.
Bronson abstained from the lift and took the stairs. With each step downward, the oppression of Scott’s room evaporated. Outside, his car was in the same gleaming condition as he had left it, though the children protecting it were gone. Savouring the fresh air, a smile crept onto his face as he climbed into his car.
His future lay ahead like an open road and Bronson started the engine.
Pallbearer
Shaun Baines
Copyright © Shaun Baines 2019
The right of Shaun Baines to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
First published in 2019 by Sharpe Books.
Chapter One
The curtains of his bedroom weren't just closed. They were stitched together with gardener's twine in a crude series of crosses. The lightbulb that once hung from the ceiling gathered dust in his bedside cabinet. There were no ticking clocks. No creaking floorboards.
Daniel Dayton's six-foot-eight frame barely fit his bed. He wrestled with his sheets, throttling them in large hands, neither asleep nor awake. He was by the shore of his father's man-made lake playing football with Scott. Daniel was ten, his brother a little older.
Daniel would think it nonsense on waking. Like most of his dreams.
His dead brother swept the ball from between Daniel's legs, knocking him to the ground again.
"Watch out," Daniel said, pulling sharp shingle from his palms.
Scott kicked the ball skywards and catapulted himself into the air. "Back of the net.
"
Placing a hand over his eyes, Daniel squinted into the sun as his football shrank to a speck. It splashed down on the lake, drifting to the shoreline of an island they were forbidden to visit.
"That was my football. It was signed by Alan Shearer." Daniel scrambled from his knees, rounding on his smirking brother. His heart thudded in his ears, drowning out the sound of the lapping waves. "You have to go and get it."
Scott flipped him the finger and walked up the grassy slope to the double doors of Five Oaks.
"Bastard," Daniel hissed, launching into a run. He was small, but tackled his brother at speed. They fell in a tangle of thrashing arms and legs. Daniel's bony elbow whipped across Scott's nose.
There was a crunch and Daniel froze. Only his eyes dared to move, widening at the blood turning his brother's face into a crimson mask. Beneath the red, Scott's skin went white.
That was the tell-tale sign. The one he'd grown to fear. Red didn't symbolise danger. It was always white.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Daniel said.
His limbs were rubbery, useless against his brother. He ran, but Scott clawed him to the ground, flipping him onto his back. A hand clamped over Daniel's mouth and nose.
Daniel tried to scream, tried to breathe. His lungs were bursting. He stared up at his brother, a chill washing over him, his world darkening. Tears coursed down his cheeks. He kicked impotently, but he was too weak and his brother was too cruel.
"What are you doing?" The voice came from above and Daniel searched frantically for its source.
Their father loomed over them, a frown on his handsome face. Ed Dayton sipped from his whisky and ice and fixed Scott with a stare. "I asked you a question."
His brother scowled, but withdrew his hand from Daniel's mouth. "He was being a pansy again."
Drawing air into his lungs, Daniel coughed and spluttered. "He kicked my ball into the lake. It's on the island."
Scott folded his arms. "You shouldn't have been playing with it anyway. Alan Shearer signed it."