Mud Pie

by Emma Lee Bole

  Chapter Six

  Clubhouse

  “The thing is,” said Hugh, “Charlotte had a letter.” He leaned forward confidentially over the rugby club’s Formica table, his long, amiable face unusually serious. His slender fingers clasped each other as if in prayer. I liked talking to Hugh, but I didn’t want to hear this.

  “What sort of letter?” I said, although I could already guess.

  “That sort of letter.” He pulled a face. “You know. Threatening. Not nice. Addressed to the bakery.”

  “Oh. They can write, then?”

  “On a computer,” said Hugh. He sat back and shrugged his eyebrows. Charlotte’s horsy face, on him, was lugubrious and charming. “It looked very official, apart from the language. Not pleasant. They’re not nice, these people, are they? I never realised, back then when I… well, you know. I’m glad I got out of that. It’s a nasty business.”

  “What did it say?”

  “No, I’d rather not, Lannie. All a bit obscene, really.”

  He didn’t need to tell me. I knew exactly what it said. I could hear the words: they were the ones that had been shouted at me, and which were so indelibly recorded in my head that they kept playing themselves back no matter how I tried to erase them. Oddly, I’d managed to erase the trial itself entirely. I couldn’t recall a word of it apart from the verdict and the sentence.

  “I mean, Charlie laughed it off,” said Hugh, “but I made her go to the police.”

  “Did they laugh it off?”

  “No, they didn’t. They kept the letter, and sent a constable round to the shop once or twice.”

  I bit my nail. The attempted break-in might conceivably have been coincidence, but this wasn’t. This was my fault. Poor Charlotte, reading those revolting insults that were meant for me, trying to laugh off the curses that should be aimed at my head, not hers. “Is she worried?”

  Hugh looked doubtful. “She doesn’t seem so. She says they’ll clear off once it’s obvious you’re not around any more. They’ll have better things to do, surely. It’ll all be old hat soon, won’t it?” He didn’t understand. Settling grudges mattered. It was a question of saving face. They wouldn’t give up so easily.

  The courtroom was still clear in my mind, small, beige and claustrophobic. Karl looked very blank and pale. He was the only one I could focus on: the others were just so much fuzz and blur. When the verdict came in, I saw a strange expression, one I didn’t recognise, pass across his face.

  Afterwards, in the lobby, Peel walked swiftly past me. We’ll get you, Herron, the voice as thin and cold as a knife. And as I stepped outside, another voice, not so quiet, called from behind a car. Then the whole jungle of shouts and curses started up as all the faces around me pulled back into sharp, unforgiving focus, snarling with hatred and contempt.

  I knew then what I’d witnessed on Karl’s face. In the past I’d seen him angry, resentful, bored, frustrated – but I’d never seen him scared, not for years, not since the age of five when he screamed and sobbed against me in that mouldy, suffocating bedroom. Back then, his sobs ripped me apart. Yet it was sweet to be the one he clung to, the one who could comfort him.

  All those years later, in the courtroom, I saw Karl terrified again. There was no clinging or comfort for him that time. I didn’t even recognise his fear: not until I was made to feel it for myself.

  And now it was not just for myself.

  “Hugh? Has anybody contacted you?”

  “Lord, no. Even if it is – you know – what would they want with me? Don’t worry about me. But Charlotte insisted that I tell you. She said, be careful, Lannie.” He smiled wryly. He had a lovely smile. “I’m not sure what more you can do in practical terms, though. You’re living in Frank’s old house, right?”

  “Moved in last week.” It had taken five minutes.

  “Well, that’s more secure than the tent, anyway. Just keep a big stick handy by the door!” He added hastily, “No, no, only joking. Sorry, Lannie. I mean, it’s not nice right now, but it’ll all blow over, won’t it? It’ll be yesterday’s news. That lot won’t have long memories. They’ll have other things to get irate about about. There’ll be no problem.”

  “Of course not.” Sweet Hugh, he had no idea.

  “You mustn’t worry, nobody knows where you are.”

  “Nobody?”

  “Apart from me and Charlotte.”

  “You haven’t told anybody here about – about Karl’s friends being after me?”

  “Of course not! You asked me not to, so my lips are sealed. It’ll all blow over, Lannie.” He stood up, stretching tall in his rugby kit, making me yearn ever so slightly. “Well, I’d better get out there and do my bit. Good luck with the pies.”

  “Thanks.” Lovely Hugh, so gallant, so naïve. He was clever enough – now steadily climbing the ladder in insurance, Charlotte told me proudly – but streetwise, not. It was naivety that got him into trouble years ago. I was glad he was well clear of it. Hugh was too good-natured to understand the mentality of those who wanted my blood. Too gentle, surely, to be a rugby player.

  At least Karl’s friends should stand out a mile if they ever managed to follow him here. Which they wouldn’t: I was worrying needlessly. Hugh was safe. And he was wearing shorts, which was rather nice. It occurred to me that the number of young men wandering loudly around the clubhouse in shorts was an unforeseen perk of this job.

  Becki, the barmaid, evidently thought so. It was almost the first thing she said to me as she swaggered into the kitchen where I was investigating industrial-size tins of marrowfat peas. The kitchen was good. Stainless steel, proper catering standard, spacious and spotlessly clean, which was probably Rhoda’s doing.

  Becki leaned casually on the gleaming worktop. “Hi! I’m Becki. Becki with an i,” she announced. There was a bellicose edge to her chumminess. “What happened to your nose?”

  “An accident.”

  “Shit, bad luck... Never mind, you’ll fit in well, plenty of noses like that here! Are you a girlfriend of one of them?” She’d already eyed my fingers for a ring. I felt her weighing me up.

  “No. I’m the new cook.”

  “Oh, that’s it! You got a boyfriend, then?”

  “Not at present,” I said, amused. The last boyfriend had been Shane at the White Duck; we’d dumped each other when I moved to Tzabo. Chefs shouldn’t go out with chefs, I reckon.

  “Well, I tell you, if you’re looking for a bit of action it’s a good move getting a job here.” Becki had evidently decided that the nose meant I wasn’t competition. Her manner grew friendlier.

  “Oh?”

  “Totally full of well fit guys, and most of their girlfriends can’t even bother turning up! Can you believe it? They don’t know what they’re missing! You should see some of them in their kit! Or out of it.” She winked at me inexpertly. “Plenty to go around. Fix you up no trouble.”

  “Thanks,” I said, eyeing the passing players doubtfully. Even if I wasn’t dead, I had no intention of being fixed up with any of this lot. They weren’t all as athletic as Hugh. Brendan wasn’t the oldest, or even the stoutest, by any means. The fittest guys were mostly too young, while the older ones generally bore noses even more wrecked than mine, along with generous waists – which didn’t necessarily matter – and wedding rings, which did.

  Maybe Becki didn’t mind. Twenty-two or three, chatty and self-assured, she wore tight jeans and a tighter T-shirt over a balcony bra that had them just about jumping off. “Up for it,” said the T-shirt, so I assumed she was. On seeing me hugger-mugger with Hugh, she came ambling over in case I got ideas above my station.

  “Hallo, gorgeous,” she said, putting her arm around his waist and twanging his shorts. Hugh didn’t seem to mind. Great thing about Hugh: he never minded anything. “Introduced yourself already, have you?”

  “Old friends,” said Hugh cheerfully. “Lannie went to college with my sister,” and then changed the subject by teasing Becki about her hairstyle.
Her dark hair was pulled high in a girlish ponytail. Becki, eyes flashing, enjoyed being teased. Though not quite pretty, she was lively enough to make up for it. The T-shirt helped too. I felt deader than ever.

  I left them and went to tackle my breeze-blocks of frozen pastry and tins of peas the size of oilcans. Slabs of chuck steak with the colour and sheen of walnut veneer lay sourly waiting to be chopped. To Niall’s indignation, I had insisted on ordering real meat for the meat pie.

  I took out my chef’s knife. A chef’s knife is the only knife you need at all really, but I was a collector. I had three chef’s knives, all different, a paring knife, a flexible boning knife, a Sashimi, a Santoku and an offset serrated, which I never used: but the Global was the biggest and the best, the main man. Its blade glided through the tough brown slabs as if they were fillet. What a friend. An ally. It always calmed me to have my knife in my hand.

  When they came for me at Tzabo, my knife wasn’t in my hand. Nobody thought to stop them until they were right inside the kitchen, the doors swinging in their wake. Maybe it was because the black guy wore a bow tie with his suit, like a headwaiter, and spoke in a low rumble that was barely audible over the hissing, clanking kitchen racket.

  “Miss Herron?”

  Klaus jerked his head. “Over there,” he shouted. “You not moonlighting on me, are you, Lannie?”

  “What?” I looked up, no alarm bells ringing until the second one slunk in behind him, wearing a dirty hoodie and a smirk of anticipation. A rat in the kitchen. It was one of my pursuers from the tram.

  The clock stopped. Everything went small and distant and very quiet except the first man’s voice, as heavy as a stone falling into deep water.

  “Lannie Herron,” he said. “You’re dead meat.” As he spoke his hand slid inside his jacket. I was armed with a bowl of sugar and a spoon.

  I dropped the bowl and groped wildly for my knife, which I kept at my station as a talisman, since it wasn’t often needed for puddings. At the same time I was glancing frantically round for a tray – a lid – anything to use as a shield, because the gun was out in plain view now and there was nothing for me to duck behind. No escape route. No shelter.

  “Scheiss!” yelled Klaus in alarm. “Not in here! Not in here!”

  At that all the chefs looked up, and there was a chorus of multilingual bellows. Olivier started shouting in French, waving his cleaver in one hand and a rack of lamb in the other. Klaus flourished his twelve-inch like a cutlass, and then Kyle and Stef and Glasgow Jock all brandished their knives likewise. Jock grabbed the lobster-pliers for good measure, wearing a smirk of anticipation like a playful torturer.

  By this time I had the Global in my hand ready to throw although I didn’t want to as it might ruin the blade; and was trying to calculate the annoyance of a ruined blade against the inconvenience of having my head blown off.

  I didn’t really believe he’d shoot, you see. Not in this impregnable steel engine room. But he did. He tried, at least, and it was probably only Klaus’s indignant roar and the shock of so much flashing steel that made him miss.

  The first bullet ricocheted around the kitchen with a deafening clatter like a saucepan accident, dimpling oven doors, and the second ended up in the ceiling because by that time Klaus had the black guy’s wrist in his big scarred grip and his twelve-incher very close to his throat.

  “Come on then, you bastard,” said Klaus. “Drop it.” His glistening face was alight.

  “Shit,” said the hoodie. I guess he had never met chefs before. He gazed open-mouthed at the bunch of sweating madmen with their handfuls of gleaming weaponry, before the dragon’s mouth of roaring grills. I suspect the lobster pliers decided it, or else the sigh of desire in Glasgow Jock’s whisper: “I’d love to see what these can do to your testicles.”

  The black guy blinked, and dropped his gun. Klaus put his foot on it.

  “You needn’t think you’ve won, Herron,” rasped the hoodie.

  “I think I’ve won, Scheisskerl.” Klaus’s knife was nudging the bow-tie.

  The black guy didn’t move. His eyes, half-closed, rested on me as cold and languid as a lizard’s. “We’ll be back,” he murmured. “We’ll find you when you haven’t got your friends around.”

  “Oh, yeah?” My voice came out high and unconvincing. “I can’t wait.”

  “Don’t worry,” he said softly. “You won’t wait long.”

  “You’ll get yours, Herron,” snarled the hoodie. “We know where you live.”

  “Not any more,” I said, but felt my throat suddenly closing up with fear.

  “You want to leave with both your ears or just one?” enquired Olivier. Klaus stroked his knife along the guy’s neck, then gave him a contemptuous push. They both got out, fast.

  There was a lot of cheering and clapping on backs, even on mine. Three steaks got burned, but Klaus just swore good-humouredly, shouting, “Use them for well-done,” instead of grabbing the offender by the hair and the balls as he normally would. He threw the gun disdainfully in the bin, but later retrieved it to hand over to Tzabo’s owners, a pair of creepy Russian brothers who I think kept it for their own purposes rather than get involved with the police.

  “Don’t you worry, Lannie,” Klaus told me, “they can’t touch you in here. Nobody touches nobody in my kitchen.” Actually, they’d all spent the last seven months since I arrived at Tzabo touching me, tweaking, pinching and the rest, but that was just part of the job.

  For the first time, I felt I fully belonged. But that was the last time too, because after that I knew I had to go.

  And ended up here. Chopping stringy beef and knobbly spuds amidst the smells of beer and liniment and mud. And a trio of hairy youths who leaned over the counter to snicker and nudge each other until one asked,

  “You the new flanker, are you?”

  “What?”

  “The nose. It’s a dead giveaway. That’s a flanker’s nose. Why don’t you get it fixed?”

  “What for?” I wasn’t feeling amiable. I stood my knife on its point and balanced my hand on it.

  “Give you a better chance of pulling.” But he wasn’t looking quite so cocksure now.

  “Pulling who? You?”

  “Yeah, if you like.”

  I nodded, once. “That’s why,” I said.

  “Grow some manners, lads,” announced a balding guy in a forceful schoolmaster’s voice. To my surprise they slunk guiltily away muttering sorry, yeah no offence? “They’re just students up from Stoke,” the schoolmaster explained. “Thoughtless lads, don’t mean any harm.”

  I shrugged. This was going to be a doddle after Tzabo, in all respects.

  The beef was simmering in a vat of onions by the time my helpers turned up: two stone-washed denim wives who sat at the bar gabbing since it was clear I had everything under control. No-one else was left in the clubhouse apart from the bar staff and a grumble of old codgers on the leatherette benches by the telly. I went for a walk.

  Outside, the matches had started. There was a lot of running up and down and grunting and shouting, watched by five or six spectators who did their best to supply in noise what they lacked in numbers. Brendan was playing, his legs pumping hard and fast without seeming to carry him very far. He was grey with mud, apart from his face, which was bright pink. I wondered why he enjoyed this.

  Over on another field, Hugh and the other fitter, more interesting legs were hurtling up and down a good deal faster. Niall was one of them, with an 8 on his back, doing a lot of bellowing. This was the first team, evidently, and therefore got the better pitch, though it was still water-logged. The rest of the field was occupied by grazing geese, some black-necked and some dirty grey ones. They ignored the players’ shouts, only waddling indignantly away when the ball rolled too close. One flapped and hissed at me like a cup of water thrown in a wok. The grass was spattered with green droppings.

  I watched Hugh’s legs for a few minutes, but even their allure wasn’t enough to overcome the boredom
of a game I didn’t understand. So I returned to the clubhouse and, avoiding the wives, went to see what the codgers were watching on TV. Rugby, of course.

  I studied the walls: read the gilded lists of freemen and club captains, inspected the photograph of the first fifteen of 1976, with poodle haircuts and a pointy-eared trophy; and pondered the large striped rugby shirt that was spatch-cocked in a flat glass case on the wall.

  “That’s Wade Dooley’s shirt,” said a codger, seeing me looking.

  “Really.” I had no idea who Wade Dooley was.

  “Yep. Preston Grasshoppers, Pennine Plate, ’91 that must have been.”

  “’92,” said another codger. “They beat us 27-3.”

  “And Mr Dooley donated his shirt? That was kind of him.”

  “Oh, he insisted. Tommo had just thrown up all over him in a ruck. Too many jars the night before.” Codger One swivelled in his chair and offered me a hand that resembled one of my slabs of beef. He wasn’t really old, only forty-something, although his granite boulder of a head bristled with grey. He had alarming ears.

  “I’ve seen you at the Woolpack,” he said with menacing geniality, “though I don’t think you noticed me. New cook here, aren’t you? As well as Brendan’s. I believe you might be cooking for Dimmock now, too.”

  “Who?”

  “Dimmock, Charlie Dimmock, Frank.”

  “Um, no.” News travelled fast.

  “No, he’s moved in with his lass,” said Codger Two.

  “Of course he has. Poor sod. I’m Bob. Propped with Brendan for years.” He released my hand at last.

  “Lannie,” I said. Bob’s watchful eyes took in the name and the nose, but he merely asked,

  “So how did you like Himself?”

  “Who, Brendan?”

  “No, Niall. Our gracious chairman.”

  “Oh, yes. Fine.”

  “Yes, he would be,” said Bob, “pretty girl like you. How about KK?”

  “Which?”

  “He’s looking very thunderous today,” said Codger Two to Bob.

  “Due for another ding-dong in the line-out?”

  “Himself’s not much better, though.”

  “Wins and Flipper’ll keep the lid on it.”

  “Hah! Ever see Flipper talk KK out of a ding-dong?”

  “Drop-Goal’s done his knee again,” said Bob. “Got trevored against Buxton last week.”

  “Having a crap season, Drop-Goal.”

  They were doing it on purpose. I turned on my heel, aware of a chuckle behind me, and returned to the bar. Frank came in, said merely,

  “Hi, Lannie,” and without any further attempt at conversation dumped his coat, collected a beer and went to join the codgers. I wondered what I was doing here.

  “Do you understand rugby?” I asked Becki and the other barmaid, Samantha.

  “Not a clue,” said Becki cheerfully. “Don’t need to, do I? It’s the laughs I come for. Me and some of the guys usually go down a club afterwards.”

  “A club? Round here?”

  “Nah, over in Cheshire.”

  “I play,” said Samantha. She was shy, blonde and muscular.

  “She plays,” said Becki, rolling her eyes. “Crazy.”

  “You’re not playing today, though?” I asked.

  “Tomorrow, Leek Ladies. I’m earning money today.”

  “We should be getting danger money today,” said Becki, “the mood KK’s in. Have you seen him? Got a right cob on.”

  “KK’s the barman?”

  “Niall’s brother. Mad as a snake.”

  “He is today,” said Samantha.

  “He even had a go at Hugh. Lannie knows Hugh.”

  “Hugh’s lovely,” said Samantha wistfully.

  “Yeah, hands off!” Becki was amiable, but firm.

  “Hugh’s got a girlfriend,” said Samantha. “He told me.”

  “He hasn’t told me,” said Becki, less amiable. I was surprised, because Hugh hadn’t told me either. But then, why should he? Maybe she was someone very new. Very temporary.

  “She’s called Tamara,” said Samantha.

  Becki snorted. “You know what I reckon? I reckon AnneMarie fancies KK. Seen the way she looks at him?” She demonstrated a sidelong leer.

  “No,” said Samantha determinedly.

  Becki turned to me. “You’re living with Frank, aren’t you?”

  “In his house,” I said. “He’s living somewhere else.”

  “So is he gay?”

  “What?”

  “I think Frank’s gay. What you reckon?”

  “I doubt it,” I said. “He’s moved in with his girlfriend. Who’s AnneMarie?”

  “She’s Niall’s wife. Now, she really is crazy. Drinks like a fish, smokes like a chimney, always on my bloody back, always moaning.” None of this sounded particularly crazy to me.

  “She’s all right,” said Samantha, mollifying.

  “She’s right up her own arse,” declared Becki, her eyes flashing. Before she could start on anyone else, I excused myself and went back to the kitchen. I wondered if I would face every Saturday dealing with crazy women and men who talked in code, even if they were in shorts.

  Rolling out an acre of pastry, I slapped it on the pies. Becki came over to borrow my knife to slice lemons with and didn’t return it. I couldn’t tell if she was trying to annoy me or just prove who was boss. After ten minutes I went to retrieve it. The Global was better suited to steak than lemons. I watched Becki slice her thumb open and said, “I’d like to keep that in the kitchen, thanks,” as mildly as I could manage.

  “I won’t be a minute. Nice knife, this,” said Becki admiringly, while her thumb dripped on the bar.

  “Yes. And valuable. I don’t want to lose it.”

  “I only said it’s nice! I’m not trying to steal the freaking thing!” She glared at me for a moment before deciding to grin, carelessly wiping my knife on someone’s discarded jacket. “We all help each other out here. Share and share alike! You’ll help at the bar, and I’ll come and help you with the teas.”

  “Not without a plaster on that thumb.” I didn’t expect her to live up to her words, but later, duly plastered, she helped serve up the teas with a good grace. Every player got a loud helping of banter with their pie. She coveted my knife; kept using it to serve. Showing it off, flashing it like a street kid with a new tool. She wouldn’t have lasted two minutes back home. Here it was harmless enough, though.

  The ovens were good. When the damp and sweetly shampoo-scented players came to eat, I got several compliments that made me wonder what the teas had been like before.

  “That actually looks quite nice!” said one of the denim wives, astonished. “Oh, no thanks, I’m dieting.” She raised a well-plucked eyebrow as I began to eat my own work. I always eat on the job, on principle. At Tzabo it was the only way I’d had time to eat at all.

  I hung around the tables, listening to the fragrant players, who were surprisingly relaxed and cheerful considering both home teams had lost. Niall lounged with his huge tan boots up on a table, tossing back his mane of sandy hair as he held forth about their many errors. King of the club, a lion in repose. I would have knocked those big feet right off the table, but it wasn’t my place.

  The seconds filtered back from Glossop and hoovered up the leftovers. They included the Killick brothers who greeted me with far more animation than they’d ever shown in the pub. Frank, too, was doing more talking than I’d ever seen him do before, though not to me.

  The balding school-master introduced himself as Flipper the scrum-half, and told me to let him know if those daft young lads gave me any stick and he’d have a word, though he didn’t doubt I could look after myself. I didn’t doubt it either.

  Niall complimented me repeatedly on the food. The Irish accent strengthened as he introduced me with proprietary lordliness to everyone within reach, including AnneMarie and their young sons, Tige and Cormac.

  “Tige? Like Tiger Woods?”
r />   “Taidhgh,” said AnneMarie. “And our daughter is Aoife.” She spelt the names out in a high, accentless voice. Her face was pretty and languid, her hair sleek. She looked smart, and talked posh. No sign of craziness that I could see. The children sat and ate industriously, the boys glancing gleefully at each other when the swearing got particularly loud.

  “Language,” said Niall over his shoulder.

  “Bollocks,” said the addressee.

  “Children,” said Niall ominously.

  “Ah, right. Sorry, kids. Where’s KK?”

  “Gone to casualty,” said Bob. “Clashed heads.”

  “Fuck me. Again?”

  “Language!” repeated Niall, exasperated. “Ladies present.”

  “Ah, right. Sorry, ladies.”

  “I don’t mind,” I said.

  “But I do!” snapped Niall. “Someone has to uphold the standards in this place.”

  “So that’ll be you, then, will it?” enquired Bob.

  “If nobody else can be bothered. Like everything else important, it seems to get left up to me.”

  “Now actually I don’t think that’s altogether strictly true, Niall,” said Brendan.

  “Depends on your idea of what’s important,” said Frank thoughtfully.

  “Oh, I know what’s important in your eyes,” cried Niall, “a drink and a joke and a laugh–”

  “Well, that’s the general idea,” said Bob, but Niall was still going.

  “–with no thought for the running of the place, no thought for the fundamentals! The standard of language just proves my point. As Chairman I have to set an example.”

  “Don’t set it on my account,” growled Bob. “I’ll uphold my own fucking standards, thank you very much.”

  “Not everyone can live up to your standards, Niall,” said AnneMarie, her voice cool and flat.

  “Not everyone can talk out of their fundamentals like you can,” added Bob into his beer. Either Niall didn’t hear him or he didn’t get it, because he just nodded as if that was all settled.

  Brendan had warned me about the language, needlessly. It wasn’t that bad. He’d never worked in a kitchen, where the swearing was constant, loud, repetitive and murderous. The swearing at the rugby club was constant, loud, inventive and benign. I preferred the club.

  “Does Niall often get on his high horse?” I asked Brendan later, as we piled empty plates.

  “Ah, well, he does a lot for the club. Always going on about the finances and hunting out freebies and sponsors, is Niall. He built the roof on the clubhouse extension for us. We couldn’t have afforded it else. I suppose we rely on him.” Brendan paused with the plates clutched to his chest. “So what do you think? Will you do this again?”

  I hesitated. I was knackered. I longed for the peace of Nan’s parlour. All this racket didn’t suit me, being dead. I wanted to lie down on Nan’s crimson carpet and think of nothing; no past, no future. But the dead don’t make decisions. They just take whatever’s offered.

  “Yes,” I said. Nothing would ever happen here but eating, talking, and the trampling of mud. That was why I was here. It was a place of safety, after all.