GB84

by David Peace

  The President was a liar. The President had lost –

  That was it –

  End of story. Finished.

  The President switched off the TV. The President went upstairs.

  The National Co-ordinating Committee was meeting in the Conference Room –

  For the first time –

  Today was the hundredth day of the Great Strike to Save Pits and Jobs.

  Terry picked up the phone. Click-click. He had tears in his eyes. In his dreams –

  Tell the world that you’re winning –

  The hundredth day.

  Malcolm listened to the tapes. He played it all back. Listened to the tapes. To them pay it all back –

  ‘If a highwayman holds you up, it is always possible to avoid violence by handing over to him what he wants.’

  EVERY WOMAN’S GOT ONE –

  ‘– shields up –’

  [– sound of body against Perspex shield –]

  ‘– breach of line at middle holding area. Request –’

  BUT MARGARET THATCHER IS ONE –

  ‘– heads –’

  [– sound of rock hitting Perspex shield –]

  ‘– field operatives be advised horses imminent –’

  DE DEE DEE DEE –

  ‘– take prisoners –’

  [– sound of police truncheon against body –]

  ‘– DSGs D and E to Main Gate –’

  DE DEE DEE DEE.

  ‘– bodies, not heads –’

  [– sound of police truncheon against body –]

  ‘– Zulus in retreat. MP 4 and 5 stand down –’

  HERE WE GO –

  ‘– can’t throw stones if they’ve got broken arms –’

  [– sound of police truncheon against body –]

  ‘– target is wearing white T-shirt, blue jeans and distinctive hat –’

  HERE WE GO –

  ‘– on then, fucking hit him –’

  [– sound of police truncheon against body –]

  ‘– officers down at topside holding area. MP 6, please respond –’

  HERE WE GO –

  ‘– fuck off back where you come from –’

  [– sound of police truncheon against body –]

  ‘– prisoners to be restrained in vans until further notice –’

  HERE WE –

  ‘– Commie bastards are going to lose and so is that bald bastard Scargill –’

  [– sound of police truncheon against body –]

  ‘– exceptional DSG B. Exceptional. Drinks are on us –’

  HERE –

  ‘We are going down the royal road in this country that Northern Ireland went down in 1969.’

  Malcolm listened to the tapes. He played it all back. The tapes never stopped. Listened to her –

  The Union burying another one under the ground today –

  Pay it all back (but she would never, never, never stop).

  They were playing Shostakovich upstairs again. Loud again. The Seventh Symphony. Leningrad. Terry Winters had his head in his hands. There were now five separate legal actions:

  Lancashire. North Wales. North Derbyshire. Nottinghamshire. Staffordshire.

  The Tweeds knocked on his door –

  Day and night they knocked –

  ‘This is serious, Comrade,’ they told him, day and night.

  Terry agreed. Terry said, ‘But everything is in its place.’

  They left the door open –

  The Denims in the corridor. Arms folded. Backs to the wall –

  Day and night they watched Terry Winters –

  It was not Leningrad. It was Stalingrad.

  Terry slammed the door. He walked to the window, forehead against the glass –

  How long has it been?

  They had buried another yesterday. Terry had put on his best black funeral suit. Had told Theresa he was off to Pontefract. Told the President and the Tweeds he had to work out the implications of the legal actions against South Wales. Then he’d gone to Hallam Towers. He had taken off his best black funeral suit and fucked Diane in the Honeymoon Suite –

  ‘They’ve left me with no choice,’ he had told her. ‘No choice at all.’

  They had cut him out –

  ‘Because I’ve never worked in a pit. Because my father wasn’t a bloody miner. Because I’ve never been a Communist. Because my father was never a Communist. Because I’m not working class. Because I’m from the fucking South. It makes me laugh. It really does. Their talk about equality. Fraternity. Socialism. You can hardly breathe in the place. It’s that snotty. Egotistical. Solitary –’

  Diane had kissed his left ear. She had licked his ear. She had sucked it. She had bitten it. She had held it in her mouth. Then she had moved down his cheek to his mouth. She had kissed his bottom lip. She had licked his lip. She had sucked it. She had bitten it. She had held it in her mouth. Moved down his neck to his chest. She had kissed his left nipple. She had licked his nipple. She had sucked it. She had bitten it. She had held it in her mouth. Down his stomach to his cock –

  ‘Looking for something down there, are you, Comrade?’

  Terry opened his eyes. Terry turned from the window to the door –

  Paul Hargreaves held out an envelope. He said, ‘Happy reading, Comrade.’

  Terry took the envelope. He opened it. He read the letter. Read the words –

  YOUR FUTURE IS IN DANGER –

  Terry looked up –

  Paul had gone. He had left the door open again –

  The Denims in the corridor. Arms folded. Backs against the wall –

  The Shostakovich shaking the ceiling.

  Terry put his head back against the glass. Terry closed his eyes again –

  ‘They have left me with no choice,’ he had told Diane again. ‘No choice at all.’

  Peter

  thought of them – He’d marked their cards. They’d marked his – Put him in Rotherham Hospital. Beaten up Jack Taylor down Catcliffe end and all – Least lads had given ITN a good kicking. They’d get their revenge at 5.45 mind – Knew Mary and our Jackie would be watching. Knew it wasn’t over yet, either – There were young lads wanting to get on with it. Lads on about making petrol bombs. Police had got guns, they said. Back of them vans. Be tear gas out next, they said. Rubber bullets. Paras – Bloody Monday, that’s what this is. Bloody Monday – Don’t know why I fucking stopped there. I was that bloody knackered from all running, though. So fucking hot – I should have kept walking, though. But then it all started up again. For last time – Blokes were throwing brick down at police line. Line broke again. Out came horses. Short shields behind them. Hundreds of them – They weren’t stopping, either. Not this time – They were here to clear field. To take bridge and take road. Hold them both – Knuckle and boot for anyone in their way. Batons out – Barricades going up. Vehicles dragged out of this scrapyard. Set alight. Thick smoke. Cars burning. Tyres. Thick smoke all over place. Barricades looked like hedgehogs, that many spikes sticking out of them. Hand-to-hand fucking combat. Coppers had bridge. Coppers tried to hold bridge. Coppers couldn’t. Missiles falling through sky on them from out of scrapyard. Coppers heading off back down road behind their shields – Lads all cheering. Not for long, like – Coppers regrouped. Mass charge again – Horses. Men – That fucking white horse back for more. Bastards – Up Highfield Lane. Pushing us right back over bridge all way down Orgreave Lane – But then I saw this one young lad. This one young lad who’d got left behind – He was walking about alone in field. Blood from his head. White with shock, he was – Let’s go get them, he was shouting. Give them a good sorting. Let’s – He was alone in field. God deaf and far from here – Horses still coming. Sticks out – I went back for him. I grabbed hold of him. I took him back over bridge with me. I ran into village with him. I sat him down behind this garden hedge; old couple stood at their window just watching us. Lad turned to me. Looked at me. He said, I won’t go back down pit again.
I won’t, you know. I’ll not work down there no more. I won’t do it. I want to go home now, please. I want to go home – I got out my handkerchief. I tried to stop blood from his head. He put his hand out towards us. He touched my mouth. He had blood on his hand – He said, What happened to you, like? I put up my hand. I touched my mouth. I’d got blood on my hand. No front teeth. I looked down at myself. My shirt was ripped. Strap of my watch was broken. Face stepped on and crushed. My father’s watch it was and all. Shoes split open. Trousers ripped at bottom. Felt a right big bruise across my back. Ribs and my shins. Cuts and marks all over me. I stood young lad up. I said, Best get you home, hadn’t we? I walked us away through all people – Police. Pensioners. People with Asda carrier-bags full of shopping. Like it was all normal – Ambulance drivers effing and blinding at policemen. Blokes being brained in front of them. Beaten up behind their houses. In their gardens. Their alleys – Up by truck company there were a bloody icecream van. This one bloke just sat having a fucking ice-cream. Like it was a day out – Back up road you could still see smoke. Black, bitter smoke from cars and tyres. Police just watching us go. Behind their visors. Two of them waving tenners at us. Bye-bye, I thought. I’ll not see thee again. Not where you’re going. Not where you’re going – Been a week tomorrow. Bloody long one and all. I’d spent most of it looking at ceilings. Bedroom. Dentist’s. Welfare. One time I did go out in open air was for Joe’s funeral. Beautiful and sad day, that was. There was a coach laid on, but that were full by nine. So Little Mick took Keith Cooper and their Tony with us in his car. No sign of Martin again. Met up with coach in Knottingley. There were eight thousand easy. Put me in mind of Fred Matthews. His funeral in 1972. He’d been killed on a picket outside a power station and all. Keadby. Been

  The Seventeenth Week

  Monday 25 June – Sunday 1 July 1984

  It is flesh time in the corridors and toilets of Westminster. The Jew whistles Waterloo. They pat him on the back. They shake his hand. The Jew says:

  ‘Four thousand men in one hundred and eighty PSUs. Forty-two mounted police. Twenty-four dog handlers. Spotters in among their men. Helicopter and military surveillance. Regiments in reserve. One hundred arrests. Countless injuries inflicted –

  ‘Orgreave was a battle; they are right to call it that. Because it is a war –

  ‘But it was a battle we won. And it is a war we shall win.

  ‘Our finest hour to date, gentlemen. Our very finest yet. Rugeley power station alone received one thousand and twenty-eight deliveries of coal that day and –’

  The Jew stops mid-flight. The corridor has cleared –

  There is a fresh hand on the Jew’s back. A word in his ear. Then the hand is gone.

  The Jew rushes into the toilets. He comes out again. He’s not whistling –

  He smells of vomit.

  Neil Fontaine fetches the car.

  Malcolm Morris drove down to London. To Hounslow. This was the place where they’d built the village. The place where they trained their divisional support groups. Their mounted police –

  In Hounslow.

  Malcolm found his plastic pass inside his clothes. He handed it to the officer at the metal gates. The officer took it inside a sentry hut –

  Malcolm waited in the car with the radio on –

  I Won’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me.

  The officer came back with his pass. The gate went up. Malcolm was inside again.

  He drove past the stables. The kennels. The barracks –

  He could hear them banging their shields. Practising.

  He turned into the village –

  Pitsville, UK –

  Two rows of mock-redbrick houses either side of a strip of road with an estate of mock-grey semis behind them. Malcolm watched the mounted police and the snatch squads drilling by a row of mock shops. Boarded-up shops. Charging –

  NATO helmets on. Staffs drawn –

  Men in donkey jackets and yellow stickers ran. Loudspeakers on street-corners barked orders. The horses stopped their charge. The horses cantered back –

  The men were banging their shields again. Training.

  Roger Vaughan was parked in the mock car park by the mock pub –

  The Battered Ram –

  Roger waiting today. Not Jerry.

  Malcolm parked. He got out. Shut the car door.

  Roger got out of his car. Roger said, ‘I’ve been waiting, Malcolm.’

  Malcolm walked round the back of his car. He opened the boot. Took out the Slazenger holdall. He placed it on the tarmac. He closed the boot. Picked up the holdall again. He walked over to Roger. Handed him the holdall.

  Roger took it. Roger said, ‘Two?’

  Malcolm nodded.

  Roger said, ‘Wrapped in green?’

  Malcolm nodded again.

  Roger took out an envelope from his coat. He handed it to Malcolm.

  ‘Wrapped in red, white and blue?’ asked Malcolm.

  Roger smiled. Roger said, ‘There was one other small matter, Malcolm

  Malcolm waited.

  Roger said, ‘That business in Shrewsbury?’

  Malcolm waited.

  Roger said, ‘Jerry and I would be very grateful if we could have the tapes.’

  ‘The tapes were destroyed,’ said Malcolm.

  Roger stared at him. Roger said, ‘Is that right?’

  Malcolm nodded.

  Roger sighed. Roger said, ‘That’s a shame, Malcolm. A very great shame.’

  ‘Standard procedure,’ said Malcolm. ‘In compromised operations.’

  Roger said, ‘The operation in question was not subject to standard procedures.’

  ‘But it was compromised.’

  ‘In your opinion.’

  Malcolm turned to go. He said, ‘I don’t like loose ends, Mr Vaughan.’

  ‘Neither do we, Malcolm,’ shouted Roger after him. ‘Neither do we,’

  Malcolm turned back. He said, ‘I hope that wasn’t a threat, Mr Vaughan?’

  ‘No, Malcolm,’ said Roger. ‘That wasn’t a threat.’

  The Jew paces his fourth-floor suite. The Jew wants to get his show back on the road. Back to the front line. Back among his new-found friends. And foes. Fighting the good fight. The Jew is tired of the offices and the corridors of the capital. Tired of the handshakers and the backstabbers. Tired of the good news/bad news brigade –

  The Jew asks Neil for another cup of tea. He says, ‘Did you speak with Frank –’

  ‘Fred?’ says Neil.

  The Jew blinks. The Jew says, ‘Did you speak with him or not, Neil? Yes or no?’

  Neil Fontaine closes the suitcase. He says, ‘Briefly.’

  ‘And how is life with our hero?’ asks the Jew. ‘The John Wayne of Pye Hill?’

  ‘He thinks the pit managers and local police are talking people out of returning –’

  ‘What?’ screams the Jew. ‘What? Tell me you are joking with me, Neil.’

  ‘To avoid bloodshed.’

  The Jew throws his cup against the wall. He screams again, ‘What?’

  Neil Fontaine nods.

  The tea runs down the wall. The tea drips onto the carpet.

  The Jew looks at Neil. The Jew shakes his head from side to side –

  Neil Fontaine nods again.

  ‘Remember what she once said, Neil?’ asks the Jew.

  Neil Fontaine waits for the words of wisdom from the wise –

  ‘A criminal is a criminal is a criminal,’ says the Jew. ‘Remember, Neil?’

  Neil Fontaine nods now.

  ‘The good news?’ asks the Jew. ‘Please tell me there is good news, Neil?’

  ‘The strike in Lancashire is about to be ruled unofficial by Justice Caulfield up in Manchester; their delegate decisions at their area conference will be meaningless; their hands tied. The Union won’t be able to discipline members who cross picket lines; the Union won’t be able to instruct members not to cross picket lines; the Union won’t be able to call the strike or
the picket lines official –’

  But it is not enough –

  ‘There is still talk, though, of a return to court by the likes of British Rail and Steel. Rumblings at the Board, too. The Cabinet.’

  The Jew nods. The Jew asks for a fresh pot of tea. The Jew picks up the phone –

  The railways will stop tomorrow and certain newspapers not appear –

  The Jew shouts down the phone again:

  ‘No, no, no. Use their own domino strategy against them. Take the individual area ballots that went against a strike and use them to beat the National Union. These actions – these actions from within – these will be the very key. The key to victory –

  ‘How many more times must we go over this?

  ‘Further action from British Rail, from British Steel, from the Board itself, will only be detrimental to the overall strategy. The nation perceives this dispute to be about the assault and intimidation of ordinary men who simply want to go to work but who are being prevented and frightened by the vicious hooligan thugs of an extra-parliamentary hard left –

  ‘Assault and intimidation are a matter of criminal law not industrial legislation. The individual actions by members against their own Union underline this perception –

  ‘OK? OK?’

  The Jew throws the phone against the wall. The Jew closes his eyes –

  The broken telephone lies on the damp carpet in a pool of cold tea.

  Neil Fontaine puts the Jew’s suitcase and briefcase by the door. He says, ‘Sir?’

  The Jew opens his eyes. He looks at Neil Fontaine. The Jew smiles. He says, ‘Neil, there are two separate paths for them to choose now; they will either choose the way of the ballot or, better yet, they won’t. Either way, the courts can really roll now –

  ‘Really, really roll now, Neil.’

  *

  The Union was alone in an upstairs room in Congress House. There was still no support. Just a few sandwiches. The Union was on its own. Isolated –

  ‘I remember we gave that bastard an oil lamp back in 1980,’ said the President. ‘He had tears in his eyes. Tears in his eyes because of support our lads had given his lads. Our lads who would rather salvage used steel in old workings than touch any scab steel. Now they sit by sea in Scarborough and their conference applauds the striking miners. Gives us a bloody standing ovation. Promises of moral, financial and physical support. Then they go back to their plants and their offices and handle scab coal and scab coke. There’d have been no need for Orgreave if they did for us what we did for them. Bastards. Bloody bastards. Thank Christ for the railwaymen –’