Civvies

by Lynda La Plante

  Malone pointed at Dillon, neck pumping. 'That bastard set this up with the gippos -'

  Dillon jerked his head at Steve, who reached into the jeep and took out a shotgun. He tossed it to Dillon. 'What's this, Malone?' Dillon hefted the shotgun, his eyes flat and cold, his voice scathing. 'Only one of us was armed, and you still turned tail and ran…'

  Griffiths was still having trouble taking all this in. He went to the back of the truck, where Don opened the doors and proudly showed him the containers of salmon inside. Malone knew something was in the wind. Something stank, and it wasn't rotten fish. It was starting to look bad for him, and he wasn't going to stand for it. That bastard Dillon was behind this, he felt it in his water. He strode after the estate manager, anxious not to have his nose pushed out. And sure enough, Griffiths was smiling, clapping Don on the back. Malone was about to lay into him when Dillon strolled up. White to the lips, Malone turned on him instead, almost incoherent in his fury.

  'Guys like you, Dillon, are bein' churned out into civvies every day of the week… an all of them thievin' bastards.' He pointed at the back of the truck. 'You set this up!'

  Dillon squared up to him. He'd had as much as, and more than, he was ever going to take from Malone. But his tone was quiet and calm, and he was in total control.

  'Okay, Malone,' he said evenly, 'in front of witnesses. We want that five hundred quid you nicked from us. If you want to make it double or quits, now's the time.'

  Malone got his meaning loud and clear. It wasn't just the money Dillon was on about. Something more important had to be settled, once and for all. It almost amounted to a blood feud between the two of them. Like a festering boil of bitter black hatred, it had to be lanced. The wound had to be torn open, the gangrene exposed and gouged out.

  Griffiths, as well as any of them, knew what was about to take place; he sensed that it was inevitable, and no matter what he said or did it was bound to happen. But he wasn't prepared for its raw brutality, for its sheer animal ferocity.

  But then, he'd never witnessed a one-to-one brawl between two ex-Paras before.

  Malone didn't wait for the off. He charged straight in, head-butting Dillon, opening up the old sniper abrasion above his right eye. Blood spurted out, running freely down Dillon's face, soaking into his shirt collar.

  Leering, Malone raised both hands, waving him on. 'Come on then, Dillon, you been beggin' for it, come on…'

  Still dazed, Dillon shook his head to clear it. He looked at the blood on his fingers, and then stripped off his camouflage smock.

  Although both men were expert in the techniques of unarmed combat, they'd had their share of dirty street fighting too, and that's what this turned into. It was ugly to watch. Clawing, biting, scratching, kicking, each sought to disable his opponent by any means possible. Malone, bigger and heavier, could have beaten Dillon in a test of pure physical strength, but Dillon wasn't going to give him that chance. He kept in close, fingers clawing at Malone's eyes, trying to rip off his ears. Malone bit into Dillon's forearm and it took a knife-edged open palm across the bridge of the nose to make him let go. Then a savage kick swept Dillon's legs from under him. Down he went, dragging Malone with him, the two of them rolling in the dirt, using fists, elbows, knees to inflict maximum damage.

  Appalled, Griffiths watched as the two men grappled with each other, tumbling and rolling across the compound towards the stables and the fodder barn. The lads kept pace with the action, crouching, fists clenched, cheering Dillon on. It was a fight to the finish, to the bitter end; no truces, no split decisions; one victor, one vanquished.

  Scrambling up, Malone grabbed a rake, swinging it viciously at Dillon's head. Ducking low, Dillon dived for a pitchfork leaning against the barn door. The two weapons clashed together, striking sparks. Dillon twisted the pitchfork, snapping the rake in two, then jabbed at Malone's stomach, forcing him inside the barn. The lads crowded in the doorway, yelling Dillon on. Half-blinded with blood, his face and neck covered in cuts and bruises, Dillon was eking out his last few precious ounces of strength. Malone sensed it. He waited, arms spread wide, for Dillon to jab again, then wrenched the pitchfork out of his grasp and turned it back on him. Dillon tripped, went sprawling backwards onto the straw-covered floor. With a snarl, Malone thrust downwards at Dillon's head, the four sharp tines burying themselves in the earthen floor as Dillon squirmed out of the way. He made a grab at Malone's leg, bringing the big man down – splat! – in a heap of horse manure.

  'Good one, Frank!' Harry's usual florid complexion was shining beetroot-red. He pumped his fists like pistons. 'Go for it, finish him off, Frank!'

  Smeared with horseshit, Malone pulled a fire bucket off its hook and hurled sand in Dillon's eyes. As Dillon backed away, temporarily blinded, he followed up with a kick to the groin that made every man there's eyes water. Dillon went down clutching himself, doubled over in agony.

  'For God's sake,' Griffiths cried out, ashen-faced, 'someone had better stop this…'

  Cliff raised an eyebrow. 'You want to get between them sir?' he inquired.

  Malone spun a tap above a metal drinking trough and sluiced his head, shaking water out of his eyes. He pushed his hand through his glistening black hair, alert once again, ready for the final round.

  'Look, Dillon, call it off,' Griffiths begged, wringing his hands. 'I'll make up the five hundred he owes you, this has gone far enough.'

  Dillon spat out a mouthful of sand. He was back on his feet, but none too steady, and even after Harry tipped a bucket of water over him, he seemed dazed, blinking at Malone as if unable to focus. Chest heaving, water dripping off him, Dillon looked exhausted, all but done in.

  'You quittin', Dillon?' Malone taunted him, teeth bared in a sneering grin. 'Want to quit, Dillon…?'

  Dillon wiped his hand down his face. When it came away, his eyes were staring. He was seeing Malone all right. The big square face, the black bar of his eyebrows. But Malone wasn't grinning. His face had a sickly grey pallor. His eyes were rolling, the whites showing, his mouth slack and quivering, as he burst from the toilet cubicle in the side passage of Hennessey's Bar…

  'Come on Malone, get back in there!'

  After swearing the pub was clear, the bastard was trying to do a runner. Didn't have the guts to stay and help. Only interested in saving his own yellow skin. Throwing Dillon off, barging his way into the crush of people jammed in the narrow passage, pushing bodies aside in a frantic effort to get out.

  Still staring, Dillon said, 'Like the way you ran out on my lads?' He shook his head, his breathing hoarse. 'I'm not quitting!'

  Malone lunged forward. Dillon hit him. Once. A sweet right hand, smack in the teeth. Malone went cross-eyed. His legs buckled and he sank, very slowly, to his knees and toppled over.

  'You had that coming for a long time, Malone,' Dillon panted, and with a smile at the lads fell down flat on his face.

  'Just keep still… you're gonna have a beaut, split open like a tomato, mate.' Harry dabbed with a red-speckled towel, then stuck a plaster across Dillon's right eyebrow. Cliff stood nearby with a bloody sponge and a bucket of rose-tinted water. 'How's your ribs?' Harry asked.

  Dillon eased himself into a sitting position in the back of the jeep. If his eyebrow was like a split tomato, the rest of his face resembled a blue and purple pumpkin. He pushed Harry's hand away. 'Gerroff me… you're makin' it worse!' Groaning, Dillon gingerly touched his cheekbone. 'I feel terrible…'

  Jimmy bounded up, grinning fit to bust. 'How's about this to make you feel on top of the world, mate!' He waved a thick bundle of notes in the air, licked his thumb and peeled through the twenties. 'Two weeks' wages, plus – you won't believe this, but his Lordship thought you took a beatin' from the poachers – bonus – one grand!'

  Cheers and shouts from the lads clustered round the jeep. 'No, wait,' Jimmy held up his arms, 'plus, plus – Malone is out, and…' He wrapped his arm around Don's shoulder, who gave him a shy, quizzical smile. 'Don-boy here is now h
ead keeper!'

  Don went beetroot-red, stuttered, thank you, thanks, nodding his head up and down. Afraid to show how much it meant to him, he did a runner, running like the deer he loved, and they watched him running, watched him take a flying leap into the air, then they heard him whooping at the top of his voice, arms above his head, fists clenched.

  Jimmy laughed. 'Well, he seems happy enough! Guy's a real fruit!' Then he leaned closer to Dillon, whispering. 'Eh, what you say Frank, we can make it a nice round figure…' He flicked the wad of notes and slipped his arm around Dillon's shoulder. 'We could take him tonight, drive the carcass to Edinburgh, with nature boy owin' us, he can turn a blind eye, what you say Frank?'

  'Forget it!' Dillon shrugged him off. He called out, 'Come on, let's get home.'

  'Why? Who's to know it was us?'

  Dillon didn't think it needed explaining, but obviously it did.

  'Because he's free, Jimmy, don't let some bastard nail him to a wall.'

  'Dillon!' Malone shouted.

  As he came towards them, Jimmy whispered nastily, 'Okay, we'll nail this bastard instead…'

  'Just stay put!' Dillon said.

  Malone stopped a yard away, looking anywhere but into Dillon's face. He hesitated, then in a mumble, 'Rumour has it you and your lads are startin' up your own security firm.'

  'Yeah, we're thinking about it.'

  Malone took a thick buff envelope from his inside pocket and held it out. 'You won this, take it, it was double or quits, right?' He cleared his throat. 'It's a grand, Frank. Cash.'

  Dillon took the money, handed it to Jimmy. He didn't say anything, just watched Malone's lowered head, the Adam's apple jerking in his throat. Dillon thought he was going to turn away, but then Malone said in a rasping voice that was full of torment, 'I checked out that pub, Frank, I swear before God…' His choking voice faded away to a whisper. 'Those lads that died… it wasn't my fault.'

  Not his fault. That was all right then. Big fucking consolation.

  Dillon said, 'Thanks for the dough.'

  The jeep drove out. Malone stood watching until it was gone from sight. As if to himself, he repeated. 'I checked out that pub, Frank, I swear before God…' but no one heard, he was alone with his guilt, as he had always been, feeling it eating into him, seeing the bodies lined up outside the charred remains of the pub, seeing those six young lads Dillon had strode in with, seeing their faces hideously disfigured, their bodies twisted. He had never forgiven himself, would never forget their six pitiful bodies, the bodies of the women and young blokes. They stayed locked inside his big barrel chest, locked inside his bullish head, and when the memories squeezed out in his nightmares, when he woke up sweating, he always saw Frank Dillon's face, his blue eyes more brilliant, like ice shafts in his smoke blackened face, that accusing vicious face haunted him like the dead. Malone knew why Dillon hated him, knew it, took it, and no matter how far he tried to hide himself, even to a bloody salmon farm in Scotland, Dillon caught up with him.

  'I checked out that pub, Frank, I swear before God… it wasn't my fault.'

  CHAPTER 21

  Dillon went up the steps of the Clyde Hotel, calling back to the lads in the jeep. 'I'll be five minutes!'

  The lads exchanged knowing grins, and a chorus of whistles and cat-calls followed Dillon inside. From reception he glimpsed Sissy at the top of the stairs. She saw him and quickly turned away.

  'Sissy… Sissy wait. I wanted to say goodbye, me and the lads are on our way home.' As Dillon mounted the stairs, Jimmy came in behind him and nipped through to the bar. Dillon went up, attempting to explain, 'I don't want them boozed up for the drive… Sissy?'

  She was in her room, sitting on the bed, her face to the window.

  Dillon knew at once. Even though Sissy wouldn't say anything, or even look at him, Dillon knew the instant he saw the angry bruising on her cheekbone, the puffy lip where it had been split. He knelt on the carpet, his stomach trembling, and gently took her face in his hands. 'Steve did this to you?'

  'I didn't call the police, or anything, he -' Sissy swallowed, her eyes downcast. 'I even feel sorry for him, he's sick…'

  'Yeah, everyone always feels sorry for Steve,' Dillon said, his eyes hard as stones. 'Makes excuses for him. But this is different.'

  A sob came up and Sissy squeezed her face with both hands, shoulders hunched and shaking. Dillon fished for a handkerchief. Sissy pointed to a box of tissues on the dressing-table. Dillon took one and knelt before her, wiping her wet cheeks.

  Sissy blinked tears away. 'You look terrible,' she told Dillon.

  'Had a bump into a tree.' He smiled and traced the outer corner of her lip with his finger. 'It won't scar…'

  He cupped her face and brought it closer, and gently kissed her, away from the swelling. A discordant chorus of Why are we waiting… oh why-eye are we waiting…? sailed up from the forecourt below.

  Dillon stood up and went to the window. He stared out at the curve of moorland beyond the trees. There was a deep angry stillness about this man, Sissy thought, that she recognised but did not understand. As if he was waging a continual battle to keep a welter of seething emotions under iron control. A dark, brooding mystery to him that both baffled and attracted her, sensing that Dillon had lived several lifetimes already, and she hadn't yet lived one.

  Sissy got up and went to him, pressing her body to his back, her head resting on his shoulder. The singing beneath the window faltered, died away.

  In a small, faraway voice, Dillon said, 'You know the stag? When we found out how much he was worth we thought about knocking it off. Five grand's a lot of cash. But…' He gave a tight shake of the head.

  'But?'

  'He makes you think about freedom,' Dillon said, deep within himself. 'None of us has had too much of that, it's not the way the Army trains you. Everything is ordered, you live by rules and regulations.' Leaning against him, Sissy could feel the muscles in his arms tautening, then going slack, then going taut again.

  'You don't know it's happening to you,' Dillon went on in the same quiet, charged voice. 'When you're on leave it's short-lived, you need booze and more booze to loosen you up, like you can't handle not having anyone watching your every move…'

  He turned and laid his hand gently to her cheek. 'I did five years in Belfast, I hated the city… the kids spitting in your face, old ladies looking at you with hatred. Hate. You can feel it, but you act as if nothing is happening -' A tremor passed across his bruised face. He seemed to physically shake it off, but the effort left his eyes unnaturally bright, moist in the corners. Sissy could hardly bear to look at him.

  'You call low-life "sir"…' The words stumbled out. 'the players – we call the IRA suspects players…' The dam on the point of cracking, breaking, bursting open. Dillon shut his eyelids tight, wetness squeezing out. 'But in the end, the game's been on us…'

  Sissy let the moment prolong itself. The pain ebb away. She said, then, 'Do you have kids?'

  Dillon opened his eyes and looked into Sissy's. He nodded. Raucous shouts rang out from below, 'Frank!… Come on, Frank…'

  'It's time I went home,' he said. And then, for only the second time she could remember, Dillon smiled. 'God bless, love.'

  There was a cheer as Dillon came out. A long drive ahead of them, and the lads were eager to be off. Dillon walked to the jeep, hefted Steve's holdall from the back, dropped it on the gravel. He jerked his thumb. Out.

  Steve slowly climbed out. Dillon took a fistful of money from his pocket and offered it. Steve backed away, fear in his eyes. Dillon gripped his lapel, pulled him close, and without even bothering to look at Steve, stuffed the money in his top pocket.

  'Take it! You're on your own, Steve.'

  Steve's face was white. The fear in his eyes was now mingled with the abject, cringing look of a whipped dog. He hesitated, then reached out a trembling hand, tried to catch Dillon's arm. Dillon jerked his arm free. He climbed into the passenger seat next to Jimmy, looking straight ahead
.

  The jeep backed away from the front of the hotel, wheels churning gravel, and shot off down the driveway. Lashed to the radiator was a stag's head – old MacFarland's stag's head – that Jimmy had swiped from the bar. Steve saw the spread of its antlers above the hedgerows as the jeep sped along the lane, heard the bellow of a song floating back on the breeze, gradually fading, fading, fading away.

  'Ten green bottles

  Hanging on a wall,

  And if one green bottle

  Should accidentally fall…'

  The stag's head went up, antlers raised high, scenting danger. It stood poised on the crag, all senses alert, its massive tawny flanks quivering slightly.

  High up on the facing southern slope, Steve lay cushioned in the coarse grass, hidden by the waving fronds of heather. The wooden stock of Jimmy's L42A1 sniper rifle, fitted with a cheek rest, nestled against his shoulder. 7.62mm calibre shell, muzzle velocity 838 metres per second. Effective range 1,000 metres plus.

  Steve squinted through the sighting telescope.

  Beside him lay his empty holdall, his kit neatly spread out on the grass. Next to his wallet, a single photograph of Steve in his parade uniform. Face shining, smiling into the sunshine. Silver badge of winged parachute, crown and lion on his Red Beret. The Red Beret he was wearing now, with his jeans and denim shirt and the neckerchief swathing his throat.

  Clearly outlined on the ridge, the stag slowly turned its head. Poised, muscles tensed, nostrils twitching, it looked in Steve's direction, seemed to stare directly into Steve's eyes.

  The crack of the rifle shot scattered the peace of the valley. Screeching birds scattered, wheeled into the sky. Before the first echo had died away the stag was leaping down, crashing through the bracken, seeking the safety of the wooden glen.

  On the grass, Steve's kit lay undisturbed, the photograph spotted with three splashes of blood, the largest one obscuring the smiling face. The impact had thrown the body backwards, arms flung wide. The rifle rested between his legs. Some distance away, the Red Beret lay on the grass, unmarked, pristine, cap badge shining bright.