The Hitnan: A Tale of Blood and Canes

by Wez Wallie

  "Hey, that weren't my fault."

  Marion shot her a sarcastic look.

  "It's true, Miss Mal. Someone tampered wit de gas line at de back of de oven. Did ye let anyone inta de house in recent days?"

  "No, of course not! Well, only the Council surveyor who was fixing up the mould in the kitchen corner."

  "Surveyors don't fix anything, Marion, they just survey and get blokes in to do it."

  "Well, how am I supposed to know that?"

  "Clue's in the bleedin' name!!"

  "Did’je leave dem alone at any point, Miss Mal?"

  "Well yeah, of course, I had to pick Shonny up from school that afternoon. It was only a half hour or so!"

  "Bleedin' hell. Did you even check his ID or anything, or did you just say, 'Hey, you look like you'll do. Get on in here and sling yaself on the kitchen table - who needs to go Ikea to get a fix of sticky meatballs'?"

  "I don't do that anymore, mother! Also, it was a woman, so stop being prejudice thinking only men can be surveyors."

  Peader and Dotty exchanged a worried look.

  "What did she look like, dere, Miss Mal?"

  "Uh, she was slightly older than me, seemed quite posh and was very slim and stupidly tall, actually."

  "Okay, and this is very important,” Dotty warned. “Did she look like a Marxist Helen Mirren?"

  "She did have a red beret on yes; looking back now I suppose there were warning signs..."

  Peader and Dotty fell back in their seats shaking their heads.

  "What, you think she tried to kill us?"

  "Naw," said Peader, quickly covering and letting rip a nervous fart. "Council workers always have our best interests at heart. Prob'ly came loose on its own. It was old and busted anyways." Mal seemed to nod and accept it, whilst covering her nose. "Speaking of, I'd better get yer modder back ta her bed and let youse get some rest."

  She was falling asleep again after all the drama and revelations, (or maybe just from the lethal botty stench). She took Peader's hand. "I'm sorry if I was stupid; I was in a rush that afternoon, and looking after a child on your own is hard, Peader... please forgive me."

  "Hey now, dere's nuttin' ta fergive. Get some rest, sweetheart." He kissed her on the head and she gave herself totally to a deep slumber.

  "What a silly git! Imagine letting in some rando luvvie into ya kitchen and then leaving her alone to sabotage ya gas pipes! I mean honestly, what a donut."

  Peader was just leaning over Mal, stroking her hair and holding her hand as she slept.

  Dotty noticed and quietened.

  "You crying, lad?"

  "Naw, Ms Walker, I jus' got sum pink eye left over, like."

  "In both eyes?"

  He slumped back down in his chair and wiped his cheeks, facing Dotty on the other side of the bed.

  "It's jus' me luck, Ms Walker. She says yes to a date and den gets blown ta kingdom come - typical!"

  "Really, Peter - is it really, typical?"

  "It is actually, Ms Walker. All de girls I've asked out on a date have blown up somehow after saying yes ta me. In fact, dis is de third time it's happened so it's actively a pattern now - I tell ye, I'm cursed, like!"

  Dotty just stared, baffled as to where this could possibly be going.

  "Fer starters, dere was de first ever girl I asked out on a date when I was seventeen at a bonfire party; but me mate Dazzo didn't steady de firework down enough an’ it shot off horizontally between de girl's legs and took her up fer a ride over de Limerick skyline! Apparently, half of de city made a wish on her tinkin' she was a particularly loud shootin' star. Dey found her de next mornin’ in de smashed ruins of a neighbour's shed halfway across town, and she was quickly taken away fer trauma t'erapy and bone restructurin' and I nedder saw her again."

  "Well, at least she wasn't boring."

  "Naw, de display was amazing, ta be fair, like. And den it happened again when I was twenty-one at de Agency training academy, where I was courtin' a girl in me car, and I asked her ta come out on a date wit me, when suddenly I could start ta smell fumes. She hadn't long said yes before she was being ejected t'rough de feckin' sunroof when de whole car exploded! I managed ta crawl out wit nuttin' but me burned up pride and a nice Dublin haircut, but I had learned me lesson den not ta bodder wit asking girls out anymore. Dey all seemed ta blow up in me face, like. Liderally. Guess it's true. I'm sorry, Miss Mal... it’s all me fault."

  "Wow." Dotty was stunned. (And horny for some reason.) "Did you ever find out what caused the car to go kablooey?"

  "Oh, yeh well dat's de embarrassing part. Ye see, one of me first assignments from de Agency was ta design a world-changing innovative invention, so I t'ought I would get ahead of de game and focus on reducing 100% of carbon emissions from all vehicles..."

  The pride in his voice began to crack and fade.

  "...Turns out sticking a jacket potato in a Fiesta's exhaust pipe only reduced de emissions fer a short period, before science jus' gave up and screamed 'feck you'!"

  "Mental." And this geezer actually passed the Agency training!

  "Anyway, let's get ye back, 'cos it's geddin' quite dark here now. Doe at least we have dese flowers here ta brighten de place up, like."

  He motioned to the vase of Violets sitting above Dotty's head on the counter.

  "Dat was very nice of ye ta get her some flowers, Ms Walker. Nice ta see ye being t'oughtful fer a change."

  "Peter. I have been in a coma for three weeks. You have been with me all day. When did you see me buy flowers and snip them into a vase, you dopey prat?"

  "Huh. Yes... yes, right yer are dere, Ms Walker. Come ta tink of it, I didn't get dose flowers eider! I got dose ones, dere, like!"

  He pointed to the withering petrol-station bouquet drooping next to the Violets.

  Dotty looked at him, then back at the pretty flowers. She brought them down and read the card slotted within them. It read:

  "Dear Dorothy:

  No Hard Feelings.

  Love, TM."

  Chapter 11

  Dotty and Peader had finally made it home, after spending ten days holed up in the local Premiere Inn.

  "Cor, it's good to be home. I tell ya, that place was a disgrace. If Lenny Henry were still around, he'd be rolling in his grave!"

  "Hang on now, Ms Walker - Lenny Henry's not dead!"

  "Isn't he," she said matter-of-factly, whilst waving the hotel's leaflet in his face and displaying Lenny's giant washed-up and desperate grin. "Isn't he though..."

  "Remind me again why we didn't jus' crash at Mal's empty flat, Ms Walker?" he asked, whilst hanging his cap on a piece of plywood protruding from the scuffed wall, both relieved that their hair and eyebrows had now begun to grow back.

  "Tilda would have done extensive stake-outs and known where we all live. She may be a posho but she ain’t no amateur. Besides, I refuse to be forced out of my own house. And now it's back in some sort of shape we can get back to business. And if Tilda Maffews decides to come back and finish the job, well, Dotty Walker and her tubby sidekick will be ready for her."

  "Uh, tubby Handler, ma’am."

  He assisted in helping Dotty shed her light-brown trench coat from her white blousy-body. “Least we finally got you some new underpants, eh. I’m sure they’ll be lucky in no time!”

  “Yeh, but I’m not too sure about dese Alvinny Clines. I don’t like me balls being too free in boxer shorts; I don’t want dem geddin’ any ideas now, y’know what I mean, Ms Walker?”

  “Peter. How on earth would I know what you mean?”

  The house, with the mostly repaired and rebuilt exterior, still looked like a bomb had hit it from inside, and so they had hired an all-in-one builder to reconstruct the interior of the home whilst the pair recuperated and regrouped.

  The builder said his name was Robert, and if they ever made that joke he'd come at them with Black and Dekker nut remover.

  "Tilda coontin' Maffews..." Dotty stretched her legs and chucked her cane on
the pile of bricks in the centre of what used to be the living room, as her anger built at the sight of the aftermath. "...First, she shags me 'usband back in the day, then she steals me contracts, and now she tries to blow me to Kingdom Come!" The Hitnan was furious. "It's one fing to come after me, but to explode me fam just to make it look like an accident? That's crossing the line, son."

  "Yeh. Speakin' as one of de blowed-up-ees, I tink she needs ta be dealt wit too, Ms Walker. Someone like her won't stop until de jobbie is done, like." Suddenly, a light bulb went off above his head, (likely as a result of exposed wiring), and he said with a worry: "Maybe she was after me all along, Ms Walker! Ye know, 'cos I'm de brains of de operation, making all de clever gadgets an’ tings?"

  Dotty ignored the "brains" comment and simply shook her head in dismissal. "Nah. Can’t be that simple. If she wanted to take you out she could’a just fed you a flump."

  "Scuse me, luv, didja know you had asbestos in the walls?" said the builder, walking in on their private meeting nonchalantly. "Do ya want me to just plaster over 'em or what?"

  Dotty just looked him up and down. "Not to worry, dear. I've lived here yonks and I'm still going strong!" She started suffering a coughing fit. "Bleedin' fags!" she covered.

  "Hmpf. This place looks like a Derry & Tom's hit it (bomb). You ain't even got a couch or a Roger Mellie! (telly)."

  Dotty just stared. "You know cockney rhyming slang is pointless if you have to keep saying the actual word after it, right?"

  Robert went red and shrugged.

  "Well anyway, that's what happens when some silly mare fiddles with the oven. By the way, my name is Dotty and this is Peter just here."

  "Peader, ma’am. I hired him so he knows me, ma’am."

  "He will be happy to look after you and brew you some tea if you'd like?"

  "Ooh, hot choccie if you have it, mate!"

  Robert looked like a builder, as in a stereotypical look: an ageing cockney geezer in his late fifties who appeared more like a typical working class Del Boy than David Jason did on his best day. He even said "luvly jubbly" when Peader handed him his beverage. He was small-ish of height for a bloke, (similar to Peader in fact), and his bald bonce was real smooth to the touch. He also had surprisingly red freckles, and such fair skin that looked like he could develop melanoma from an open flame.

  Dotty smiled politely then dragged Peader upstairs as Robert padded down his splodgy overalls and put in his earphones, before returning to retiling the kitchen floor.

  "Honestly, Ms Walker, we really need ta consider putting in dat stairlift we were talking about a few months ago. Now would be de perfect time really."

  Dotty stood at the top of the stairs looking down at his hunched-over form that was gripping the handrail for dear life whilst struggling for breath. "I will when you consider eating that salad I keep banging on about."

  She grabbed the scrunch of his neck and flung him up and into her bedroom where he collapsed on the bed and caught his breath.

  "Gosh. Who needs de gym when ye have stairs! Oh my, Ms Walker," he said looking around at the pink walls which seemed to be perfectly preserved from the blast, "I t'ought I was never permitted inta yer bed chambers, like under any circumstances ye said?"

  "Well, these are extenuating circumstances, my rotund friend, and we need to talk privately."

  She shut the door and sat him up straight.

  "Right. This is war. That beret-bitch has come after me directly and clearly thinks once again that collateral damage is acceptable. Except this time the collateral was my family. Me, my daughter, granddaughter..."

  "And I was also here."

  "Fanks, but that doesn't make fings better. She has to pay."

  Peader looked over at a picture-frame which held a single photo of Dotty, Marion and Shonny grinning widely whilst going down the flume on Logger's Leap at Thorpe Park, circa 2015.

  Peader stood up beside her. "Aye, she does."

  Dotty sprung to her feet. "You get ya gear together son and find Tilda Maffews. I'm going over to Gus's caffy to get our Shonny. Then I'm going to start rippin' some arseholes. She's going to regret crossing Dotty fackin' Walker. Again…"

  "DAMN RIGHT, MS WALKER! …Actually, can I have a wee first?"

  "You can try. But the bathroom was above the kitchen, so you'll probably end up sloshing on poor Robert’s head."

  *

  A fellow fogey took her arm with chivalry and escorted her off the bus, but was so doddery himself that he missed the step and ended up tumbling into the drain and almost taking her down with him.

  "That was a close one, love!" he shouted up feebly from the gutter as a few other members of the public rushed over to help him up.

  Dopey cunt.

  Dotty smoothed out her sleeve and hopped over the curb, thanking the driver ever so nicely for getting her here safely as she walked over to "Gus's Good Eats" café.

  Inside the ‘restaurant’, the usual clientele was having their daily lunch, and those same two Councillors were still licking the wall tiles, even though presumably there were no stray beans flicked upon them this time. Perhaps they had just got a taste for it. Or maybe it was just preferable to ingesting whatever the heck Gustavo had served them up, given the eggs on their plate had a slightly green tan and the hash brown was a bubbling congealing mess of muck.

  Speaking of, I must remember to pick up a flump for Peter.

  She laid her handbag on the counter, leaning over at the middle-aged Turkish immigrant currently buttering his spuds in the corner. "Cooey!"

  He spun around: "Doddy!"

  "Dotty, Mr Gustavo. I'm not a deceased male comedian, now."

  "Oh, my a-pologees, Ms Dorothy. You do have similar hair."

  Be very careful you snivelling -

  "Have you come for your Miss Shonny now I presume?" Gus flashed an almost-desperate smile, as the pencil behind his ear quivered with tensing temples.

  "Oh now, Gus, have you tired of her already?"

  "No, no, Ms Dorothy. Of course not. It is just, well… she keep giving 2 star review on Eatypeasy foody-feedyback website! Telling Gussy how many onion to chop for meaty pie!" Gus had begun to vent like he was releasing some pent-up frustrations. "And I have got through many supply of Kleenex this week - red crayon very hard to remove from mouth, Ms Dorothy!"

  Dotty laughed with a tinge of class. "Yes well, she does want to be a make-up artist when she grows up. Good to get practice in early!"

  He sighed and laughed casually whilst wiping his forehead with an empty tissue box.

  "Haha, haha, ha. Yes, yes, of course. Ha. So... you want egg?"

  "No thank you, Mr Gus, I just wanted to ask if you could keep hold of Shonny for a little while longer."

  His face dropped and his spuds shrivelled.

  "It's just, with her mum in hospital still, I wouldn't be able to cope with her, you know how it is..." Dotty made her hands shake a little to give the required effect.

  "Oh, huh," Gus said thinking as quick as he could, "but don't you have that carer man who could -"

  "No..."

  "Um, okay, well to be honest, I have agreed -"

  "Brilliant! Should only be another week or two. I'll tell her mum to hurry up healing."

  "Nanna!"

  Speaking of the devil, Shonny came running out from the back office and hugged Dotty, showing off her creative output when a scrawny teenage boy shuffled into the doorframe behind her looking despondent and caked in crayon. His eyebrows looked to have been plucked out and redrawn on, and he weakly leaned against the frame with the air of an abused mutt.

  Gus began yelling at him in Turkish and the boy just whined back in the same foreign language, totally demoralized, and flailing his limbs in the direction of the kid in Dotty's arms. Gus lobbed a tea-towel in his face, along with an empty paper box and the penny tin from charity donations that was sat on the counter: "MORE KLEENEX!"

  "Is my mummy here?" asked Shonny.

  "No, love, just me today
. Mummy's still sleeping." Dotty gave her a gummy kiss and put her down. "Oh Shonny," she said, sitting them down at a table in front of the counter, "I'm so pleased you're alright!"

  "Me too! Lucky I was on the other side of the house when the big boom went off."

  "What, you were in my bedroom?"

  "Yeah, I was playing dress up with your pearls and rings – lucky, weren't it."

  "Hmm. I s'pose. Least your birthday gifts were safe too.” Bloody expensive they were!

  "I'm glad you woke up too - I thought you were a goner for sure. I did come to visit you when you were sleeping. You looked funny with only half an eyebrow, so I plucked them for you but didn't have time for your lip, sorry."

  Ooh, you little shit!

  "Oh, that's uh... that's thoughtful of you... you know you must stop bothering people's eyebrows, Shonny. Anyway, I'm sorry you didn't get to have a birfdy party with all your little friends."

  "It's okay, I shared a cupcake with mummy and Peader in the hospital with a candle on it. And then Gus let me throw a small party out the back last week with all my friends! His cousin had locked himself in the pantry by 8 o'clock for some reason so we went wild! But hey, how's Uncle P?"

  "He's fine."

  "He took me to see mummy last weekend. And a few days after school."

  "Oh, how is school?"

  "Okay. Gus's younger cousin came over here from his country for a few weeks, so I am walking him to school."

  "You mean he is escorting you to school?"

  "Nah. I take him for walks to and from College. Otherwise, he just tries to climb trees all day."

  Dotty frowned.

  "Sometimes I give him some of my Dairylea Lunchables if he goes the whole trip without chasing a squirrel."

  "What? Why would he be chasing squirrels?"

  "Apparently he lives in the woods back home and hunts them for breakfast. So it's very confusing for him here."

  "How do you know? You speak Turklish now?"