by Randal Eliot
Chapter Eleven
'Sherlock! Leave it be! Come here, boy!' Out in a frost-bitten farmer's field, a Jack Russell pup lifted his snout from the frozen carcass of a crow; his head to one side, his raised tail twitching, Sherlock clearly had reservations about surrendering such treasure. A piercing whistle from his master's chapped lips prompted him to snatch the feathery remains in his jaws and dart off to his right. From there to where? With nowhere to hide on a crop-less, open field, the little dog raced round in ever-decreasing circles until, finally, panting, he dropped the corpse at his paws and rolled over. His master whistled again; this time the pup leapt up, gleefully yapped, and bounded over the cold, hard earth to the narrow lane that ran like a vein between the sloping, empty fields. 'Heel, boy,' said Ian Randall, starting to move once more in his battered walking boots, old jeans, brown duffel and black woollen hat.
The cold snap had descended on Sunday morning and Dan's place had felt colder than a misanthropic snowman's heart. No need to drag a blade across your skin in this, Ian had thought. Now, Friday, his stubbly growth was a short brown beard, flecked with grey around the corners of his mouth and on his chin. In the wool hat, the change in his appearance was marked - Dick Wakefield, one of his old man's lifelong mates, would have strolled past him without so much as a nod if not for Ian's, 'Oi! How you keeping?'
'Not too bad, cocker.' Old Dick's pilling, chequered, blue and red wool hat was pulled down to his bushy grey brow; his runny blue eyes peered into Ian's face slowly making the connection. Impetuously tapping a folded newspaper into the palm of a black thermal glove, he declared, 'It's not fit to let a dog out.'
'They need their exercise whatever the weather,' Ian replied, glancing at Sherlock.
'Yes, well, I'm no hound and I'm on my way home sweet home, as bloody cold as it is there. Ta-ra.'
The sight of Dick shambling along the frosty pavement movingly reminded Ian that time catches up with all. Bloody hell, Dick's resilience was once renowned - after spending his Sundays knocking back umpteen bottles of potent, imported lager in the local club and pub, he'd be up, rain or shine, on Monday mornings to labour away on building sites.
Like a ghostly vapour Ian's breath ascended through the biting, silent air as he briskly ambled on down the lane. He clapped and rubbed his hands together and Sherlock, thinking some kind of game was afoot, giddily ran rings around Ian's feet, first one way, then the other. The lonely scramble back up the boozy, slippery slope of redundancy and failed marriage had persuaded Ian that a dog's faithful companionship was for him. Stuck in Dan's place, it had been extremely tough getting used to not seeing anyone from one day to the next, and Sherlock's doleful, beseeching eyes had instantly won him over when he'd visited the dog refuge. Even if someone else had abandoned Sherlock with just a lead, a collar and a name-tag at the end of a refuge worker's drive, a small, hardy terrier wouldn't be a problem for him. Or would it? The knowledge that the refuge people believed hard times had walloped half-starved Sherlock's original owners had Ian counting up to his last penny. A decent home was… Aww! Look at the little fella! It'd be tight, but how could he be left behind again? Sherlock sealed the deal by licking Ian's fingers and widdling on his training shoe.
The icy atmosphere had numbed Ian's fingers, and it was a tedious struggle to roll a cigarette - the slimline filter wouldn't go in place, effing thing! Only after much fiddling did he succeed. Lighting up with his Zippo, Ian gazed down the lane and across the terraced houses that formed one horizon and the perimeter of a sprawling estate that stored painful memories of a teenage crush and her big brother. Four stitches for his kisser rather than the snog of his dreams, Ian seemed to taste the blood on his tongue again. It now struck him that, if he had been treading the same path at this time of year in his salad days, almost every chimney would be puffing smoke towards the ashy clouds, as if socially indulging his habit. Big if. King Coal had been dethroned long ago. We can go over the same ground, Ian told himself, but never quite tread the same paths as those we youthfully strode along, always, somehow, something has changed and your route leads elsewhere. Unless it had always been destined nowhere. Twenty or so yards further along, Ian dropped the tab end and, with his heel, crushed it into a frozen puddle, crunching the ice into an anarchic web of white. The puddle had collected in the muddy imprint of a field bike's skidding tyre and he recalled how his gang used to race up and down the lanes on wrecks of motorbikes. Perhaps we went exactly the same way as the previous generation… No, that couldn't be right - wasn't his parents' marriage intact? All the same, and despite technology's promise of progress, his kids stared into a future as uncertain as the abyss he'd faced at the same age, as big industry was pitilessly cut down and sent to its grave. Things had never got any securer. Like many others, he'd dumbly fallen for the mirage of an economic miracle whilst simultaneously knowing it was a sham. Why else had fear overcome him as he'd grown older? Hadn't it turned him into some kind of moronically dutiful stick-in-the-mud, more in tune with shift patterns than his family? What a waste of energy the worry had been, for it was blindingly obvious that one day things would come to the worse if the world didn't somehow find the courage to change.
After much soul-searching, Ian had comprehended life could regain some meaning by tending to and mending the things he'd sometimes wilfully neglected. That meant it was time to clear some of the air that his frightened, big mouth had polluted.
At the end of the lane, a cinder track skirted the mix 'n' match high panel fencing of the houses on the edge of the estate's back gardens. The track led to a snicket that came out onto the street. As he pulled Sherlock's leash from a duffel pocket, the cold links of the chain nipped Ian's frozen flesh like blunt teeth. Untroubled by the weather, Sherlock trailed behind, sniffing at the bottom of a fence panel and then following a scent across the cinder track to the hedgerow. Its twigs were fluffy white with frost. Before Ian knew it that supposedly fantastical season Christmas would be on him. Groan. His redundancy money wasn't going any further and, after paying into the system all of his working life, JSA was tantamount to daylight robbery. To rub salt into the sores, the officious monkeys who performed stand and deliver on behalf of the government were already getting funny, as if he'd closed the plant down, or messed everything up so full-time employment was as rare as sightings of Santa's helpers. Calling the government every name under the feeble, hazy winter sun wouldn't help, however, although driving a giant bulldozer over a full parliament might get results. The bastards! How would the kids react when they found he had nothing to give in December? Using a credit card that he already couldn't clear was unthinkable!
Storming into a bank with a shotgun had an understandable attraction, what with the corruption bankers were mired in. More than once, before dismissing the idea as a bored mind's half-baked fantasy, Ian had tentatively considered getting his hands on the weapon Dan kept locked away. Luckily, Dan - a true brother - was letting him live at his place board-free. And that act of kindness had allowed Sherlock to be saved. 'Here boy!' Wagging his tail, the pup padded over to Ian, who knelt to clip the leash onto his diminutive friend's studded, red leather collar.
The street was as cold, still and silent as the fields, though Sherlock's keen, inquisitive nose detected a sign of life at the foot of a lamppost. He cocked his leg over it, and then, after a gentle tug of the leash, the pair crossed over the road. Twenty yards up the street, a short way down the second left, outside number sixty-six, a nineteen-seventies electric blue Volkswagen camper van was parked tight against the kerb. The scarlet CND logos sprayed on the doors touched Ian with hope. There was every chance of a violent blast unless the principle of peace was extended to all, including him. Ian had been hopelessly drunk the last time he'd seen Johnny Jacks - he had no idea as to whether his former union rep was irreconcilably pissed off.
Ian's uncertainty nagged at him. Johnny's front garden had been completely paved over and Ian noted that, God help us, the area was the size
of a small boxing ring. Defend yourself at all times, but don't look for a fight; yes, cagey does it. He opened the double wrought-iron gates, strode purposefully over the concrete slabs - barely aware of Sherlock's pull towards the birdbath by the hedge - and rang the doorbell. Sherlock yapped at the chime. 'Just a minute,' someone - presumably Johnny - called. Seconds later, the door opened. Johnny's clear-blue eyes glinted rancorously, briefly reminding Ian of the climactic shootout in his favourite Spaghetti Western. Wiry, a tad taller than Ian, hair shaved to the wood, Johnny adopted a mocking genteel tone: 'Now then, old chap, to what do I owe this…?' He stopped; his last unexpected visitor, nearly a year ago, had brought crushing news. 'Has something happened to one of the guys?'
'Nothing that bad, Johnny, thankfully. I've been keeping out of the club. You'd know more about something like that than I would, especially now my mobile's packed in.' It had never been the same since the day he'd lost his job and angrily flung it, bounce on the sofa, crash on the floor. 'I need a word.'
Johnny's arms crossed over his chest. 'I've promised my old man I'd look at his brakes.'
Ian looked Johnny up and down: he was dressed for it in a bitty navy sweater and camouflage trousers stained by oil and red paint. Should it come to a scrap, his mucky desert boots wouldn't deliver much of a kick.
'Dad's knocking on too much to be in the garage in winter - I'm about to set off, and I can't stand about with the door wide open.'
'I won't hold you up for long.'
'I know that.'
'Hear me out. I…' Ian had prepared a speech, but now he needed them, the words had deserted him. 'The thing is… All that business… I've been thinking and, you know, well…'
'Come in,' Johnny said, unenthusiastically, cringing inside at Ian's ineptitude. 'And the dog - he's welcome.'
'At least one of us, eh?'
'Kick your boots off.'
Ian had been wiping them on the doormat. Bending over - wincing at the stab of pain in his back - he undid his laces, pulled off his boots and put them side-by-side on the doorstep. Surely no one would steal such a shabby pair? Only a joker of unparalleled senselessness would be out and messing about on a day like this. Christ, didn't his toes ache like they'd turned into brittle icicles! Sherlock's furry body heat was heaven to Ian's benumbed touch as he picked up the pup and carried him over the threshold, closing the door behind them. The most comforting heating gave Ian heart as he followed Johnny across the tiny, lemon-painted hall and into the kitchen. 'The missus is at work and the kids are at school - we won't be interrupted.' Johnny flicked the switch on the electric kettle. 'Coffee?'
'White, no sugar.'
'Sweet enough?' Johnny sneered.
'Cheap enough. Or something.' Ian glanced around. No real shock in Johnny's home, the look of must buy everything consumer madness that had set the tone at his and Cathy's place was conspicuously absent. Spotlessly clean and tidy, it reminded Ian of a more contemporary version of his old folks' kitchen - the taps ran water, the oven cooked grub, and the washer cleaned stuff - functional, but with homely bits and bobs. A human touch. Like the collection of fridge magnets shaped like camper vans that highlighted the places Johnny's family had visited up and down the country, over the channel and into the continent. Beneath the magnets, a scrawled note was blu-tacked to the fridge door - a reminder to get a carton of milk and a loaf. Ian pulled a seat from under the kitchen table, turned it towards Johnny, and sat with Sherlock on his lap. 'How is everybody?'
'They'll be better when the man of the house finds work.'
'How old are your lads again?'
'Kelly's thirteen. My lad Blake is eleven.'
'Ah, yes. Looking forward to a summer of travel?' Ian nodded in the direction of the fridge magnets. 'You'll be able to get away somewhere?'
'The big end's gone and the body's plagued with rust. Besides, it's only just turned winter and you haven't come to talk days out.' The slightest encouragement was usually enough to get Johnny telling the tale of how he'd paid a few hundred quid for a beat up camper van and transformed it into a machine capable of touring Europe. 'And I ask myself, why are you here?' He handed over a cup of black coffee. 'No need to pull faces - I haven't poisoned it.'
'Much obliged.'
'And so?' With his back against the kitchen sink, Johnny plucked a cigarette he'd rolled earlier from a small leather pouch, lit it, exhaled, and raised his brow. 'You were going to say?'
'Bit of a pleasure that, eh? Smoking in the house. Probably the best thing to have come out of my move to Dan's.'
'I usually go outside,' Johnny replied, taking another drag.
'Right.' Ian looked down, stroking Sherlock from his skull to his tail.
'There's nothing stopping you from lighting up.'
'Not long put one out.' Sherlock wriggled, trying to get down to explore. 'Look at the bugger…'
'Nice dog and all that, but I told you I've an appointment.'
'It's difficult to know where to begin.' Ian gazed into Sherlock's eyes, receiving a sloppy lick on his cheek. 'Give over, you foul-breathed charmer,' he laughed nervously. You walked all this way, dummy, get it over with! Ian looked up. 'I've had plenty of time to think things through since we've been laid off,' he announced, firmly. 'I owe you an apology.'
Johnny blew smoke into the air. Waited.
'All the stuff you were doing in the union, you were right. I was a fool withdrawing my membership and saying anything to throw a spanner in the works of the men's opposition. All I could think about was this week's wages and next weeks' bills. We should have opposed the management way back, when you first brought it up. By the time we were prepared to think about doing something, it was already too late.'
'Tell me something I don't know,' Johnny answered, cool and sarcastic, after a long, thoughtful pause. Then, sharply: 'Would you have broken a strike?'
'I planned to jump back into the union if it came to industrial action.'
'So you were playing everybody?' Johnny stubbed out his rising anger by grinding his roll-up in an ashtray from Barcelona. 'Really doing your bit for the community.'
'I was trying to cover my family's backs.'
'And they shot us from the front.' Johnny started rolling another cigarette as if he had to keep his hands occupied for danger of throttling someone. When it was clear Ian had nothing else to say, he sourly conceded, 'It'd be disingenuous to claim your big gob swayed things one way or the other. And I suppose we'll never know what you'd have done if the real test came. Not many can admit they're wrong over something like this. The civilised thing to do is give you the benefit of the doubt.'
'That's appreciated.'
'Even us dinosaurs with a taste for backhanders rather than extinction have our good side, don't cha know?'
'Those names…'
'Slurs!'
'I made those personal slurs to my complete shame.'
'You said it. And you'd better not repeat them ever again.'
'Understood.'
'All this foreign investment or selling off everything to masters overseas means you can't even negotiate,' Johnny blasted, suddenly animated, pacing from the sink to the washing machine in the corner and back again, as if he was the one with everything to explain. 'You get puppets who sit tight behind the excuse that they haven't the authority to do a thing. Somebody hundreds or even thousands of miles away says something, and it's final. Guys who put twenty, thirty, forty years of their lives into a company, dumped, without a second thought. It's criminal. We all become members of the scroungers club, or whatever it is the papers call us like we haven't ever paid tax or National Insurance.'
'I've been thinking I should do something.'
'Like what?' Johnny asked, not bothering to conceal his derision.
'I was something like a hippy once,' Ian replied, overlooking the fact that he'd thought about doing 'something' in the same way he'd fantasised about grabbing Dan's gun and holding up a bank. 'I can play The Times
They Are A-Changing on guitar.'
'You can?' Johnny's eyes widened with incredulity.
'You bet.' Ian had been so thrilled with his musical progress over the last week that he'd unscrewed the oversized, oblong mirror from the bathroom wall, carried it down the stairs - nearly tripping over Sherlock at the halfway point - and propped it against one of the living room's walls. Strumming away at his Telecaster with Dan's half-assembled Harley reflected behind him, he'd looked every bit the rock god who'd been deprived of his time. Sort of. What's more, running through a few rebel songs convinced Ian that he'd achieved something, which, in one way, he had. Though when the sound of his chords died away, the only actual difference was that his imagination roamed ever wilder. 'I can tear it up with the best of them,' he bragged.
Johnny laughed, 'You must be the minstrel of Armageddon.'
'Seriously, I've been thinking things over. I kidded myself that paying my taxes and never stepping out of line made me one of the good guys...'
'It doesn't altogether make you one of the bad guys. Those tax-evading companies aren't heroes, you know.'
'You're one of the dumb-asses when you blame everybody who's weaker or who has a different colour skin, as if you're a long-suffering martyr to a cause you don't even understand. That loads of people are shouting out patriotic codswallop shows the depth of their confusion.'
'Patriotism is the last refuge of the blind as well as the scoundrel, huh?'
'Mug, in my case. Slavishly following everything has just taken me so many steps the wrong side of square one. I've got that bit older and I've even fewer chances. Maybe every one has gone. Shit, I might as well face it - I've lost everything except my kids, and it was a close call with Alicia.'
'You've lost everything?'
'We're in a mess. Until I speak to Cathy I don't know how deep it is exactly. Communication broke down as it does after a split. Maybe we could sell the house, but, there again, the kids need a stable home and there are exorbitant rents and new mortgages to consider if we take that route. In a nutshell, we bought into too much crap whenever a bank threw a bit of plastic at us. Fools to ourselves. Look at your place - you haven't gone crazy and it feels like a home.'
'It costs, believe you me. And that's much to the point. People were encouraged to get into debt by successive governments and their international paymasters, not that me and Marie fell for it. This house is of the dwindling stock of social housing. That said, my wage combined with Marie's wage never went anywhere. It's easy to see how - bang! - people got sucker punched. And, obviously, people in debt feel the pressure and are less inclined to challenge the ways of their world. The global economy is practically a dictatorship of multinationals, bankers and the so-called free market…'
'Dictatorship?'
'That's what I said.'
'They don't shoot people, Johnny.'
'You don't need to put a gun to people's heads if you're sly enough. The moneymen have conspired to nationalise their costs and debts while privatising profits. As if that isn't good enough for them, their bonanzas disappear into offshore accounts before hardly any tax is paid. Whole societies are being bled dry as the rich get ever richer and ever more powerful. Everything - and I mean everything - is going to be in the hands of the same tiny elite, the whole world over. And the rest of us? We're to be serfs with our digitalised yoke on a crazy APR.'
'Johnny, all due respect, that credit crunch calamity wasn't planned.'
'It wasn't. Not exactly. They thought their ludicrous neoliberal ideology was infallible, and that they had us all convinced that real wealth fairly trickles one way when it actually gets sucked the other. They tempt the poorest with promises of meagre rises in the minimum wage, well, even when you earn above it, you're struggling to get by. And hey ho, the next bust after the boom you didn't have a share in will soon be upon you!'
'Well, that makes sense. And it's depressing.'
'Believing in invisible hands of the market is as kooky as going for that invisible dude in the sky nonsense. And like fanatical priests the economic elite are willing to make human sacrifices. They'll bomb any weaker country to hell and back if they think they can snatch its natural resources in the name of democratisation. Ha! For decades they've been turning the ideological screw on us - their own people - even though, until recently, there were still a few things they were afraid of trying on. The financial catastrophe of their greedy making hasn't made them reason and see that they need to do things differently, more humanely - they've grasped an opportunity to put fear into people and finish a job.'
'Johnny, people aren't that bad,' Ian piped up, uncomfortably.
'You mean you don't want them to be that bad.'
'And what's this neoliberal… ?' Ian had to stop himself from exclaiming 'bullshit'. That sounded too much like the Randall of old and Johnny might suspect that his apology was insincere. 'What's this neoliberal ideology talk? You've lost me.'
'The media feeds you with certain information, and certain information only. You're supposed to be lost. That's when you blame the immigrants and the weak. Look, I've to shoot off to my dad's garage, but take it from me, many of the people who cause a financial mess will also profit from it. Everybody else pays. I can lend you some literature that'll give you more than a few ideas. Reading the right stuff gets the grey cells ticking over.'
'I've been doing a bit of reading, as it happens. Some books I had in the attic.' Hiding his doubt about hefty, stuffy, political tomes, Ian added, 'A few recommendations are welcome.'
'Just you wait on a mo!' Johnny flew out of the kitchen and could be heard, clomp-clomp, up the stairs. As Ian slurped his coffee, Sherlock leapt from his lap. He sniffed his way across the lino and, in the corner formed by the washing machine and a cupboard under the sink, he sat up, yawned, and stared quizzically at Ian.
'Yup, the books will be as dull as dishwater, little un,' Ian whispered, grinning, like a naughty schoolboy.
Johnny's footsteps sounded on the stairs. He came into the room and handed over a bulging, black Waterstones carrier.
'Phew! There are some pages in there,' Ian said, taking the weight of the bag. 'Keep me out of trouble for a while, if nothing else.'
'You might want some trouble when you've educated yourself.'
The clock on the wall over the gas oven had a Greenpeace rainbow on its face. 'Want a lift anywhere?' Johnny said, acknowledging the time.
'We caught the train into town. I've a return ticket.'
'The train station it is. By the way, I never knew you were a dog man.'
Johnny crouched down and fussed Sherlock while his master tersely related the sorry story of the pup's origins. Ian desperately wanted to get on the move - the more Johnny's words sunk in, the more the wind died in his sails. He'd be lost, aimlessly drifting on a misty sea, if he didn't anchor himself to something solid. Didn't everything Johnny say reek of socialism? Whatever it really was, socialism had been all right for their grandparents' generation, but think of the rows it would cause now. Ian could visualise the producers of news programmes and newspaper editors spitting at the sound of the word, before licking their lips and briefing their presenters and writers to crow that the civilised world had defeated its curse. Yet Ian had already noticed that they never went on to explain how that same civilised world had ended up in such a shit heap after the bad guys had supposedly had their arses kicked. Clinging onto power and privileges, that's all those people at the top were and are interested in. And it was going to take more than a few of his favourite songs or Johnny's books to put everything right. Ian's one consolation was that he hadn't signed up for anything that was going to be a waste of time. Or put him on the front line of any war, home or abroad.
'…Lovely markings, too.' Johnny stood up. 'Supposedly the sign of a good Jack Russell when their patches don't meet up.'
'He's the best, aren't you, Sherlock?' But what kind of world is it when you can only put your faith in a dog?
Ian followed Johnny into the hall and towards the front door.
'You know, Ian, I can't tell you how surprised I am by you turning up.' Johnny revved his ramshackle Fiesta at the junction. In the few minutes they'd been in the motor, the engine had developed a worrying hoarseness. 'The more people that come round to questioning the ideas they're supposed to accept, no questions asked, the better for everybody it will be. The tiny acorn beginning to grow into the big oak tree.'
'Then what? They turn up with a chainsaw and cut it down.'
'But not before it's disseminated more acorns into fertile land.'
'So they sterilise the soil.'
'Ha! You're arguing the only way they can survive is through something like a scorched earth policy. Doesn't that actually sound like somebody's days are numbered? I wish it was that simple, but they're cleverer than that. And hang fire! Aren't you getting some spirit and hope?'
'I've sussed what a crock of shit everything is. Do you call that hope? I think about my kids and their futures and…' He glanced at the bag of books between his feet and the seat. 'Maybe these will enlighten me; even then, what can one man do?'
Sherlock started yapping in the rear seat. Something exciting was happening through the window, out on the street.
'Hey, get down and shut it!'
Sherlock continued making noise.
'See? Even my dog never listens to me.'
'Just don't do debates with animals or kids,' Johnny grinned.
'As if,' said Ian, making it clear he hadn't been roped in for anything, 'right dishonourable Members of Parliament listen to the likes of me when an election isn't immediately round the corner. Once they've got your vote, they go back on every promise.'
'So you're of the view that democracy is dead? I wouldn't disagree with that unless I was going to say it might never have been alive. But convincing yourself you're powerless is the surest way of losing whatever power you have got. '
'What's the option?' Ian asked grudgingly. 'These people who call everybody comrade, gorge on soya and mooch around in sandals coining politically correct catchphrases? If they're the only crowd I can throw my lot in with, it's not even worth thinking about. You can't eat theories, books, or debates,' he said, with a sudden dose of that easy smugness of a man hiding in cynicism. Sod those rebel songs; didn't he have a few lovey-dovey numbers in his repertoire? Well, ok, he didn't have anyone to serenade, so maybe a few blues numbers; yes, the blues said it all! Except he got that vague, unsettling feeling that had always accompanied his worst lies. Worse still, who could he be deceiving but himself?
So what was a fundamental truth? He needed some readies, of course. That meant a job, and not a minimum wage dead-end. Now that was blues-inducing. He'd heard nothing about any of the applications he'd filled out in his intermittent pragmatic moods. As much comfort as Sherlock could be, didn't he need someone he could trust to talk to? In spite of his early middle-age, Ian bleakly intuited that he was an innocent, ignorant child in a world run by scheming, ruthless, grey old men.
'People always make the deadhead assumption that I believe everything is going to be simple. I know it isn't more than they do,' Johnny asserted, his temper rising because it looked like he'd been right about Randall. He personified a lost cause and wanted everyone to share his futility. Keep doing the same predictable, monotonous things and never rock the boat? No way! 'I'm the one who's stood on street corners and tried to involve people. I've seen with my own eyes how many of them only really know about rules and regulations, how something can't be done, football tables, wannabe pop stars, soap plots and the rest of it. So what? I fight on. I'd rather be dead than feign interest in that superficial dross I'm supposed to be fascinated by.' His eyes blazed across at Ian who was looking away, out of the side window. 'And another thing,' Johnny barked, 'not everybody who's got their own ideas or has had enough of it fits the stereotype that the establishment and their media have drilled into your head. Do I call you comrade or insist that you call black white? I've met fruitcakes in every walk of life, but, as far as I'm concerned, the real lunatics are running the asylum. Anyway, here we are.' Johnny pulled over in the small train station's car park. 'Looks like a train is due.'
'Lucky me,' Ian replied grimly, peering at the platform where a dozen or so people stood. He picked up the carrier bag of books, unclipped his seat belt, climbed out and opened the rear door. Putting on Sherlock's leash, he warily ventured, 'Fair play, Johnny, I'm glad we ironed out our differences. Sausage, chips and beans was never on my menu. As to the rest of it, I don't know. I'll give the books a fair go. It remains to be seen whether I'll understand them.'
'You've enough brains,' Johnny unsmilingly observed, 'just stay open-minded.'
'We'll see.' Sherlock jumped down from the car. 'Catch you later.'
'Look after the books - don't be spilling anything on them.'
Reversing at an angle of forty-five degrees, Johnny's motor screeched to a standstill; he spun the wheel, changed gear, and put his foot down. Maybe Ian's visit proved progress was still possible, maybe not. His 'apology' was likely a move that aimed to ensure his name wasn't blackened in the community. Now the lads had been out of work for a while, they'd come round to seeing things Johnny's way, at least in respect of events at the plant. No great shock to Johnny, they weren't willing to see much else. So did it matter if Randall's sentiments were genuine? It was unlikely he'd ever act on any newfound convictions, or any old ones, for that matter.
What especially bugged Johnny was the common, lazy assumption that he was driven by 'politics'. He'd never had any illusions. He knew he was a foot solider in some ragged, progressive army that always seemed to be on the retreat. With no cash behind him and too many good intentions, he had no chance of a political career. Huh, people seemed capable of thinking anything except the straightforward, honest notion that he might be concerned about his kids and their community. And what was wrong with putting humanity before inhumanity and counting people before profits? Johnny burned with the belief that he was right. My god, the injustice of it! Hadn't other people's apathetic, blind acceptance of anything and everything made his kids easy targets? No matter how well they performed at school, Kelly and Blake were most likely stumbling towards mind-numbing work and a lifetime of scrimping and… Shit! Where the hell? Johnny hit the brakes; his seatbelt tightened across his chest as he jerked forward, wrenching his neck. Ouch! Fuck! The moped swerved and straightened, fizzing off in the direction of the church ruined in the Civil War centuries ago. Rattled, Johnny eased his vehicle forward, telling himself that ordinary people never get the time to think; they're far too busy with their never-ending struggle on the tough old beaten track. And he kept his eyes on it all the way to his father's house.
After an automated announcement, Ian moved to the edge of the platform, the hood of his duffel up, Sherlock like a babe in his arms. Peering under the iron bridge connecting the two platforms and down the lines, he saw the approaching train, closer, closer; to his naked eye, the engine was half the size of a Hornby replica. Wrapped in hats, scarves, thick coats, the other passengers-in-waiting stepped forward, eager to be out of the cold and on their way. Ian half-congratulated himself on just about gaining something he'd wanted: peace with Johnny, who, as ever, had talked a good fight when he couldn't win.
Damn, the world isn't so bad, is it? It seemed true enough that the same sort of people always deal with life's shit, but imagine if they - us - rebelled; wasn't it likely a bloody change for the worse would stain the fabric of everybody's life? Weren't people generally happy enough as long as they had a roof over their heads, ate reasonably well, had clothes on their backs, and could afford a pint or three? But that was just it: regardless of how many hours you put in, you couldn't be sure of providing even that. And get real. He and Cathy hadn't been happy with the simple things in life; there were so many riches, why wouldn't anybody want a share? That very desire was the world's most dangerous thing - it was so ea
sy to manipulate it against you. And so goes the sorry story of millions of wage-slaves.
'Get here, you daft thing!' An anaemic young mother with cold sores told off her snotty-nosed infant son for wandering too close to the platform's edge. He'd been trying to get Sherlock's attention. Kids. Didn't Ian's right and wrong - his truth - concern them? How could he help Alicia and Davie realise their ambitions? Life had many hard lessons, and god knows, he'd screwed up his own dreams. Once upon a time Cathy had been his dream girl - look at how that had turned out! Despite what she'd done, Ian missed his wife like mad. Would he take her back? Her betrayal of him seemed more forgivable when he considered how he'd almost betrayed Johnny and the lads at work…
Ian looked down at the bag of books; could they be expected to provide him with any answers? And if they did, what then? He already knew he wouldn't like what he was going to read. Shouldn't he shut it out and blame everything on immigrants like so many others? Keep life simple.
Blankly, automatically, Ian held up his ticket to be inspected and punched. He was miles and years away, watching cute little Alicia put paper flags on the towers of a huge sandcastle, while keeping one eye on her giggling kid brother as he toddled, in shorts and squelching pumps, down to the sea with a bright red plastic bucket. With typical good humour, Davie had accepted the task of filling the moat so his big sister could position the flags, just so. A few feet away, gorgeous Cathy, in a skimpy black bikini, sunbathed on a lime towel she'd spread out on the sand. The blazing August sun had brought people out in droves; all across the beach, which was scorching hot to bare feet, people played games with brightly coloured bats and balls or else lounged in deckchairs or on towels. Napping, nattering, reading newspapers, books, listening to music, licking ice creams. Ian got a waft of vinegary fish and chips. A man in a kiss-me-quick hat, shades and cut-off shorts was tucking in, cross-legged on a bright purple lilo. His shoulders were lobster red. Ian looked at Alicia, her skin smeared with sticky white cream. Cathy had daubed the stuff on the kids practically every time they'd returned from paddling in the sea...
Back on the train, Ian's throat tightened and his eyes brimmed; how had their happy, secure world been ruined? More than the shortcomings of two people were to blame, he bitterly thought, looking out of the window onto the scrubby, ashy wasteland where a mine had once been sunk. He realised that it was going to be a long, barren night.