MORE THAN a GAME

by Sylvester Young

  ‘You gotta get even, for Devon,’ said Patrick. ‘In twenty years time do you want your baby goin’ through the same shit? Think about it, Audley, your family ’as suffered enough. If you don’t think that violence an’ gettin’ even with the cops is your ting then ’ave a think about who you’re playin for. Mek a stand, yeah? For Devon.’

  He felt like a man travelling that final mile to a place of execution. Mark had looked in the mirror before he left home and wondered if he looked like a guilty man. Driving to work, he had stopped trying to figure out what he should wish to find as he arrived at the plant. If George Rowley was back at work it would mean the cops were happy with his version of events and they were looking for someone else; if he wasn’t there then Mark could be in the clear – but an innocent man would be taking the rap for him. Either way he was not going to feel good about it and wished then that he had not taken the money.

  Hardly any work was done during the morning. Mark had put himself behind his desk and stayed there, wanting to ask colleagues if they had heard about what was going on but scared to hear their answers. He was deliberating about what he should do at lunchtime when Tom Howard appeared in his doorway. ‘Not running today, Mark?’ he asked. Mark wondered if there was some sort of insinuation behind the question. Maybe Tom had spent the weekend pondering over what had really happened in the office, and what the sports bag had been all about. Maybe he had worked out there was no way Mark had arrived at George’s office only ‘two seconds’ before he had; and that George had locked the safe after he had returned from washing his hands. A little baffled by the lack of an answer, Tom went on: ‘Only if you’re not, we’re going to have a short meeting in my office to say a few prayers for George. I suppose you’ve heard.’

  ‘Heard wha’?’

  ‘That George was charged over the weekend.’

  Mark felt himself turn weak; he had imagined it was the best news he could hear but now it was a reality he thought he was going to be sick. Tom was talking but he couldn’t make his brain decipher what was being said. ‘Sorry, Tom, I’m so shocked that I didn’t catch wha’ you jus said.’

  ‘I said that George admitted to everything. He’d been siphoning off money for years, they think he took well over a quarter of a million. He gave most of it to the church and good causes. He was in court this morning – at least they have given him bail, I don’t think he would last in prison.’ It was at that point Mark almost slid off his seat and fell to his knees to give thanks. He was in the clear: the twenty grand he’d taken was small change in comparison to the sums embezzled by George. Sweet Lord, what he’d done wasn’t even stealing, it was a reward for uncovering a crime. This was the best possible outcome, and one he could never have imagined. It was a sign, the omen that he had made the right decision. He went along to Tom’s office and doubted if anyone there could have said more heartfelt prayers.

  He was walking on air for the rest of the afternoon, his car as good as floated home; it was just a pity it was Rachel waiting for him rather than Marcia but it wouldn’t be long before that changed. However it wasn’t just Rachel who was waiting for him to return home – Ian was in his lounge, sitting sullen-faced in an armchair. ‘He won’t tell me what’s wrong,’ explained Rachel, ‘he’s been sitting there for half an hour without saying a word.’

  Mark surmised there had been bad news from Aston Villa and instantly all the envy he had felt vanished. Although his own attitude toward football had changed radically over the last few days, Mark was not about to give Ian crap about it not being the end of the world. Because he knew that football was the world Ian still inhabited, it was still so easy for Mark to recall his pain when his own world had shattered. He went over and put a hand on Ian’s shoulder. ‘So what’s up, bro’? Is it about Villa?’

  Ian dropped his head. ‘In a way,’ he mumbled. ‘Dad found out I drove the car to the West Park yesterday an’ went crazy. He says he ain’t gonna take me on Wednesday because of it. Then when Mom tried to talk him round he lost it completely. Man, he was sayin’ some strange things, callin Mom some … some bad things, you know, Mark.’

  ‘Like wha’ strange things?’

  ‘Like, ‘none-a my family good at football, dem get it from your side, so you tek the bwoy’. So I took the car, it was quiet an’ I’ve done it before so why is Dad actin’ like this now? Why is he tryin’ to spoil my chances?’

  Ian let the question hang, as if he suspected his older brother should know. Mark did have his suspicions. He’d heard his mom and dad argue when he was younger and he’d also heard a rumour, just once, that had led to a fight. Until Ian had raised the question he had erased the incident from his memory, but now he recalled how the boy he’d beaten up had said something about Ian not having the same daddy and that his mother had taken Rudolph Naylor’s ‘holy seed’. ‘I don’t know,’ Mark said softly. ‘You know Mom, she’s always quotin’ the pastors’ sermons an’ that, Dad is probably gettin sick of it. An’ he did tell you not to drive that car unless me or him are with you, didn’t he? By the time you go back he’ll have cooled down, he’ll feel bad for blowin’ his top an’ will probably arks if you wanna go for a drivin’ lesson later.’

  A big globulous tear dripped from Ian’s chin. ‘Yeah, you’re right. I just wish I could tell him some stuff, you know, about how I appreciate everythin’ he’s done for us ’cause I know he thinks I take it for granted. I know he’s mad about me not goin’ to church but I love him an’ I feel embarrassed jus sayin’ that to you but he’s never given me an openin’ so I can tell him. It’s like he knows I wanna say it but he don’t want to hear it.’

  ‘That’s ’cause of the time an’ place he’s comin’ from. He ain’t the sort-a man who would know wha’ to say if his big son started talkin love. Anyway, if he’s still in a sulk Wednesday I’ll knock off work early an’ take you myself.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Sure. I was gonna come around to you later to find out if you wanted to go over the park for a bit of practise. Work on that right foot of yours so you can do more than jus stand on it.’

  When Ian went home Rachel told Mark that she had overheard some of the things he had said. ‘I thought it was really lovely that you offered to take him to the trials, it sort of reminded me of why I fell in love with you.’

  She slipped her arms around his waist and he drew her close. While staring over her head he thought about Marcia and about how many more days he would have to pretend with Rachel. But it was bearable because soon he would have forty grand and a way out. Still hugging her, he thought he would count to ten before easing her off him so he could get changed into his tracksuit.

  22

  Business in the barber shop had been slow, even for a Tuesday morning. Mervyn Palmer hadn’t stopped long; he had put his cheque from the pools company into a bank the previous week but they had given him some nonsense about having to wait for five working days before he could make a withdrawal against it. ‘Mi rahteed,’ he’d sighed ‘it a pools company, you know, dem good fe de money.’ It was difficult to believe but banks elevated even Mervyn to a moral high ground and, from that lofty position, in his estimation they were a bunch of crooks. ‘Usury is a sin, you know,’ became a favourite saying of his. Today was the day he was going to remind the bank of its sinning ways again and take every penny of his winnings home. Before he went, Horace McIntosh decided that this was about the best time to ask Mervyn for a little sponsorship; just a few pounds towards the pre-match breakfast he had planned. Mervyn said yes too quickly to be believed: when a Jamaican responded like that he usually meant ‘no’ and Horace doubted if he would see Mervyn again until after the final had been played.

  Horace didn’t say a great deal after that, he seemed preoccupied and Frank Grant thought he had something other than the approaching final on his mind. As there were no customers about, Frank sat down and read the newspaper Mervyn had left behind. ‘Look like that IRA man on ’unger strike is gonna die any time now,’ he sa
id. ‘Problem is dem gonna be showin all dem riots in Ireland an’ givin de yout ’ere ideas.’ It was his attempt to let Horace know that there were matters beyond their control and if Wolverhampton erupted in violence and mayhem there was little either man could do but to sit tight and watch it happen.

  It was since Courtney Wright had ambled over from the bookies to tell them the news about Devon Robinson that Horace had become more withdrawn. He sat in the red swivel chair in front of the mirror as he again mulled over if he had done the right thing in getting Devon out of the police station. Perhaps the police had fooled him; perhaps they knew they had hurt Devon and Chief Inspector Forbes would have released him anyway even if Horace hadn’t mentioned it first. The early edition of the Express and Star had Devon’s hospitalisation on the front page. There was a quote from a doctor saying that the kidney failure was down to a long-standing, if previously undiagnosed, illness. A woman who said she was a spokesperson for ‘Black Defence’ said she believed that the violence that had been meted out by the police was a contributing factor and announced that there would be a peaceful vigil outside Dunstall Road Police Station. Both sides were gearing up for conflict and a pattern of behaviour was emerging: the only evidence that was going to be accepted on either side was that which backed up their own viewpoint. A police representative retorted that the woman from Black Defence was from outside the area and said agitators were coming into town to stir up trouble between the police and ‘the local West Indian community’.

  Frank tried to bring the conversation around to football with reminiscences of the Jamaica versus the Caribbean All-Stars match in 1950 at Sabina Park in Kingston. ‘Me was jus tinkin last night about Gil Heron, man, wha’ a player …’ ‘An’ Lindy Delapena,’ Horace responded spontaneously, ‘he was a bit better than Gil.’

  ‘Nah, man, Gil was a better player than Lindy. Blouse an’ skirt …’

  And so it went on. They’d had this conversation many times before, swapping statistics and anecdotes and stuff they had just made up. Frank would keep it up, sometimes with outrageous fabrications, until he felt he had won the argument. But this time he would keep Horace talking just for the sake of it. For Frank it was a bit like treading water next to his friend to stop him from drowning in a deep pool of depression.

  Buckshot Pinnock had been out most of the morning looking for spare parts around the various scrap-yards in Fox’s Lane. With so many of his customers unemployed there was often a lot of haggling over the price and most of them took the option of using second-hand parts. On his return to his repair shop he saw Sergeant Boyd and his sidekick waiting for him. ‘Hello, Vince, I thought I’d just make a social call.’

  Buckshot opened up the padlock on his double gates and went in without replying. Boyd and his oily-faced colleague made a quick scan of the yard, just in case Buckshot had slipped up and left something incriminating around the place. ‘Why don’t you get yourself a search warrant an’ waste some more people’s time?’ Buckshot asked Boyd as he started to replace a rear brake disc.

  ‘Are you trying to tell me that I’ve grounds for applying for a warrant, Vince?’ Boyd turned to the constable and said, ‘That’s a result, I count it as almost an admission.’

  ‘I’m busy, sergeant, I’m very busy, so why don’t you get to the point, arks your questions an’ let me tell you that I don’t know one damn ting.’

  ‘And they say there’s bad relations between the police and black people, if only they could hear us two, going at it like two old mates.’

  ‘Yeah, well that’s one ting we’ll never be.’

  ‘I tell you what, Vincent, you know how to hurt a man’s feelings. You got a big match the weekend, haven’t you? I was wondering where it’s being held as me and a few friends might come and cheer you on, seeing as we know most of the team in a professional capacity. Pity about Carl Hooper finding himself on remand, I don’t think we’ll be seeing the big man for quite a while. Funnily enough, the same day he banjoed his old man a bloke fitting his description was seen in a car park just before an RS2000 went missing.’

  ‘I’ll keep an eye out for you.’

  ‘I’m sure you will, Vince, I’m sure you will. Saw another of your mates the other day, a Mark Beckford at the steel plant. Seems a very nice lad, makes me wonder how he fell in with a group like you lot. But I’m delighted to say that, on this rare occasion, a member of Sabina Park Rangers was not the prime suspect.’

  Buckshot didn’t bother with a reply; he was too busy straining to undo a rusted nut after pouring a little diesel over it. He gave it a little more torque and with a final heave it suddenly came away, as did the skin from two of his knuckles. The blood oozed from beneath the layers of oil and grease. ‘As I thought,’ said Boyd, ‘scratch us and we’re all the same underneath.’

  In an exemplary exercise in self-control, Buckshot kept his lips squeezed shut and went looking for the antiseptic cream. As he applied it to his hand he couldn’t help but think of the little dog’s battyhole. ‘Are you still here, Mr Boyd?’ he asked as he was about to resume work.

  ‘You’re making us feel so unwelcome, Vince, that I nearly forgot what I came here for.’

  ‘Yeah, an’ wha’ was that exactly?’

  ‘Picked up some info the other day. There’s this girl, she took a hell of a beating off some pimp but of course she won’t press charges. We went and had a chat with him anyway, turns out it was Danny Rankin. And guess who was with him, only your sister Shannon. Now this isn’t bullshit, Vince, she didn’t look great, in fact she looked bleeding awful.’

  The mention of his sister’s name froze him for a split-second but the memory of the pain she had caused him sent a pulse of hot anger through his veins to get him moving again. ‘She mek her own bed.’

  ‘Then she’s lying in a bed of shit. She’s in Franchise House, number 67 if you’re interested. I think she’s in need of help. If you don’t want to maybe someone else in the family might. And don’t think I’m telling you this because I want some favour back, Vince, as far as I’m concerned it’s an attempt at crime-prevention. I told you before, Danny Rankin, like any of his brothers, is a nasty piece of work. If you’d seen what he’d done to this other girl’s face I don’t think you’d be here now, you’d be straight up to Blakenhall to pull her out of that flat. But it’s up to you. Put it this way, if Rankin fell down a few flight of steps there would be some happy people in Wolverhampton, a lot of them in the place where I work. Take it from me, if he tried to make out someone pushed him down those stairs there are very few of my colleagues who’d believe him.’

  The constable had turned away, as if to say he had heard nothing of what Sergeant Boyd had just said. ‘When you say awful,’ said Buckshot, ‘do you mean as in beat up awful, or drugged up awful?’

  The constable looked over his shoulder at Buckshot and then at Boyd as if to caution the sergeant about how he should answer the question. Boyd rubbed a thumb against his chin and then said, ‘Let’s say, she looked awful in more than one way.’

  23

  It was gone. It had disappeared. Mervyn Palmer checked again and then tried to think if he could have put the money anywhere else. He screamed curses and blasphemed more than once as he checked all his shoes and the lining of his navy blue suit one more time. He sat down on his waterbed with thirty-five thousand pounds but all he could think of was the six grand that had gone missing. His stash had meant more to him than the pools win because of the time and trouble it had taken to accumulate. Many a woman and child of his had tried to trick him out of it with their hard-luck stories but he had always been too sharp for them, or so he had thought. He put away his winnings in a place he had specially prepared behind a skirting board in a partition wall of his bedroom while cussing every single one of those he suspected, until his mind fixed on the one he thought the most grasping and greedy of them all.

  Replacing the brake cylinder on the Ford Cortina took much longer than Buckshot had first estimated but he knew h
ow difficult it would be to try and get more money for the job, so he would put it down to being just another part of a bad day. The worst part was the visit of Detective Sergeant Boyd with news of his sister.

  Shannon was twenty, a grown woman, and it was no longer any of his business what she did with her own life, or so he told himself. When Shannon had first gone to Germany he did not want to think about what she might be up to and went along with the modelling story. At first he found comfort in the fact that she had been signed up with an agency in Birmingham when she was seventeen. They had found her work with a hair products company – but that was about all: in the 1970s there was little demand for black models outside of the ‘ethnic minority market’. As more girls travelled from the West Midlands to Hamburg for ‘glamour work’ it became increasingly hard for Buckshot to even mention his sister, never mind go along with the charade about what she was doing. A lot of those who had gone the ‘modelling’ route were emotionally vulnerable young women and that’s what made Shannon’s actions harder for Buckshot to understand, or accept. It was if she were broadcasting to the world that she too had a troubled family background and that there was something wrong with the Pinnocks. Even the other SPR players had stopped bringing her up in conversation because they felt embarrassed for him. Now, if Boyd wasn’t just winding him up, she was back in town and her presence threatened to increase his shame.