Guns Of Brixton

by Mark Timlin

  But that summer of 1959 had been the dog's bollocks for Chas. He'd grown tall and strong over the previous winter playing football for the school and spending hours in the gymnasium building muscle. He'd done some boxing and won every bout he'd taken part in, making him quite a star with the girls. He'd lost his virginity that spring to a little raver called Sally from St Martin's School For Girls, who must've worn twenty stiff petticoats under her brown gingham school dress. Fourteen. Early for those days, but now… pretty much average, he imagined, or maybe - looking at the little girls in the street dressed like tarts - it was as old as the hills.

  Just before the summer holidays, he'd toured the shops and cafes close to home looking for part time work. The shop where his mum bought her groceries was run by an elderly Jewish man and his wife, and he'd offered him a couple of hours' work a day, plus all day Saturdays, for the princely sum of a pound a week; Chas jumped at it. He'd yet to become the hardened thief he would be before too much time had passed, but he'd earned his spurs shoplifting small items at Woolworths, and he knew that on top of his wages he could probably nick enough fags and sweets to make his pay up to something decent. And if they left that old till unattended from time to time, he could lift a few bob as well. His pocket money from home was five shillings a week; that, plus the quid, plus whatever else he could scavenge, would soon get him that Dansette record player in the window of the electrical shop that he yearned for and admired every day on his way to school. Chas'd also noticed that the attached record bar, as they called them then, wasn't too security minded. He was sure that he could nick a few forty-fives when it got busy in there.

  So all summer he worked in the shop, delivering boxes of groceries on a broken down bicycle that the proprietor supplied, pocketing tips and stealing bits and pieces until, two days before school was due to start, he took twelve and a half quid into the electrical shop and purchased the machine. Laughable by today's standards, the record player was made of cheap boxwood covered in red and white plastic, with a BSR ten-record autochange, a four-inch speaker and a single tone control. But it became the centre of his life. He begged, borrowed and stole records from wherever he could and, although the sound was as lo-fi as could be, it played those little plastic discs to perfection. Something that his recently purchased multispace CD player could never do. Maybe it was his age, he thought. Maybe you had to be a teenager.

  It was the time of teddy boys. Italian style was just creeping into the shops. To go with his music, Chas needed a pair of Levi 501's, a box jacket and some winklepickers. His father wouldn't hear of it. 'Stout shoes,' he said. 'Stout shoes for school that will last. And if you want jeans -' he almost spat the word '- Ladybird do a perfectly good pair for ten and six at Woolworths.' So Chas had to rob the money from his mother's purse and his father's wallet. Then hide them in the garden shed and change out of his hated Ladybirds before hitting the hot spots of Streatham and Croydon. It was at these coffee bars and record hops that he met the people he admired. Young villains with money in their pockets: he dreamed of emulating them, and did so until he was caught and sent down.

  'Drink up, Chas,' said Mark, shaking the big man out of his reverie and back to the present, where rap. music was pumping out from the pub jukebox. 'We'd better be getting back.'

  If only I could, thought Chas. Get back to simpler times. Duller times too, for sure. But they fitted his skin. Not like now, when he felt like he had ants running around inside his body all the time. But he only grunted, drained his glass and followed Mark back to the car. They drove home in silence.

  Once there, Mark said to John. 'I need to know more about these people. I'm going to wander up and have a look round on my own. Nobody knows me. I'll buy some spliff and make myself busy.' Then he had a thought. 'Or maybe I'll send somebody else.'

  'You take care,' said John. 'It's the badlands up there.'

  'I'll be fine, Uncle. And soon they'll be out of your hair.'

  John Jenner touched his receding pate and smiled for the first time. 'Good. You do that, son and I'll owe you.'

  'And get Martine off my case will you, Uncle?' said Mark. 'She's getting to be a pain in the arse.'

  'Getting?' said John Jenner.

  'You know what I mean.'

  Later on his mobile rang. It was Eddie Dawes. 'I've made a meet with Tubbs,' he said.

  'When?'

  'Tomorrow. It's his day off.'

  'Where?'

  'A pub in Holloway.'

  'What time?' asked Mark.

  'Twelve.'

  'Fine. I'll pick you up at your place. Elevenish.'

  'I'll be waiting.'

  Mark arrived in the familiar street just before the allotted hour, left the car at the kerb and went to Eddie's door. He still lived in the top flat in a terraced house off Stockwell Road. It hadn't weathered well: the front door was battered and looked like it had been busted open several times and repaired by a blind man. A blind man had painted it too, sometime back in the last century, and the paint was peeling and blistered. Mark rang the doorbell marked 'Dawes', and a few minutes later Eddie appeared, pulling on his anorak. 'I'd ask you up,' he said. 'But it could do with a tidy.' If the flat was anything like the outside of the house, or indeed Eddie himself, Mark thought, a tidy was the least it needed, but he said nothing. They went to the Vogue and Eddie said: 'I knew you'd have a nice motor.'

  'It's stolen,' said Mark.

  'Yeah?'

  'Yeah.'

  'Good for you. Nick it in France, did you?' asked Eddie after examining the plates.

  'Something like that.'

  'Good on you, Mark. Andy would be proud of you.'

  Mark nodded. 'When things are sorted, I'll get something of my own.'

  'Lexus are good,' said Eddie. 'Always fancied a Lexus myself.'

  'We'll see,' said Mark as he started the car and headed towards the river.

  They were mostly silent on the drive until Eddie directed Mark into the back streets of Holloway and pointed out their meeting place. It was another theme pub. Mark was getting heartily sick of the idea. This one was a taste of blarney; the name picked out in gold script on the sign, with shamrocks instead of punctuation marks, and enough Irish memorabilia inside to dam the Liffey. There was a hockey match playing on the TV, the sound low and an Irish tenor bleating from the sound system.

  'Bloody hell,' said Mark. 'I hate these places.'

  'They're all the go,' said Eddie as they went to the bar- and Mark ordered two pints of Guinness. What else?

  There was no sign of Tubbs; the entire clientele, what there was of it, was white. A few hard looking gentlemen sat around getting the feel of the auld sod, and a couple of ladies of rather dubious virtue sat at the bar sucking on glasses of the black nectar. Behind the bar counter a young man with short hair, dressed in black trousers, a white shirt and a black waistcoat busily polished a glass, occasionally taking surreptitious drags on a cigarette he had hidden behind the till. 'Nice,' said Mark. 'You bring me to the best places.'

  'It'll do,' said Eddie. 'It serves booze and the music's not too bad.'

  Mark gave him a funny look. 'So where's the man?'

  'He'll be here.'

  Mark looked at his watch. 'Speak of the Devil,' said Eddie as the door opened and a huge black man appeared. 'Christ,' said Mark. 'Tubbs has got tubby.'

  The black man walked to their table and Mark got to his feet. 'Tubbs,' he said.

  'Crockett,' said the black man, his face splitting open to show two rows of even white teeth. 'I never thought I'd see you again.'

  'Well, here I am,' said Mark. 'And if he's not Dizzy, I'm not Crockett. Mark'll da'

  That had been their names in their youth. Crockett and Tubbs from Miami Vice, Dizzy Dawes, Elvis and Andy. What a crew. And how times had changed.

  'Drink?' asked Tubbs.

  'I'll get them,' said Mark. 'It's my treat.'

  'Rum and coke,' said Tubbs. 'With plenty of ice and a slice.' Eddie Dawes pointed at his almost empty
Guinness glass. Mark went to the bar and suddenly it was the 80s again.

  The Miami Vice boys had all gone to Tulse Hill Comprehensive together, just a few yards up the road from John Jenner's alma mater, the Strand. It hadn't been a good school and Mark was glad when John had showed him that it had been demolished. It fact it had been a dump. A sink for all the losers in south London as far as he could remember. Him included.

  The boys were all the same age and had entered their secondary education in 1981. The five had teamed up early on, in fact, just before Mark Farrow's father had been murdered. It made him something of a celebrity at the school, that his policeman father had been gunned down only a couple of miles away. They didn't start out to be villains, but circumstances, and Mark's deteriorating home life, had led them into a life of crime. He was their leader and where he went the others followed.

  Tubbs, at the time known simply as Winston McLeash, was one outcome of the marriage between a Scottish merchant seaman, Angus McLeash, who had carrot-coloured hair and the palest skin that Mark had ever seen, and a young Nigerian woman who was black enough to almost vanish in a darkened room. Winston, the eldest of their five children, all born neatly nine months after Angus's various shore leaves, had fared well by the match. He was black, but not completely, and his hair was thick and shiny as if oiled. Life was not kind to redheaded black people, Mark had noted, so Tubbs had been lucky. He'd been a slim boy despite his nickname, but now his waistline had expanded. He toasted his two old friends when Mark brought their drinks over.

  'To good times,' he said.

  'Looks like you've had more than a few lately,' said Mark, tapping him on the belly.

  Tubbs roared. 'Too much fried chicken, my friend. Doesn't do much for the figure.'

  'Well, it's good to see you, Tubbs,' said Mark. 'I've missed you.'

  The black man suddenly became serious. 'No man,' he said. 'You want something, just like the old days. But me and Eddie have fallen on hard times, as you can see. So what do you need, and how much is it worth?'

  Mark looked at Eddie. 'I thought I'd leave it up to you to tell him,' said the latter.

  Mark nodded. Probably for the best, he thought. 'A little job,' he said. 'Like the old days.'

  'What kind of job exactly?' asked Tubbs.

  Mark made a pistol out of his right hand and dropped his thumb like the hammer but said nothing.

  'It's been a long time, man,' said Tubbs. 'Me and Eddie, we're out of practice. What's the fee again?'

  'Ten grand each. Cash. Unmarked notes out of sequence. A little reconnaissance and it should be all over by the weekend.'

  'Sounds good,' said Tubbs. 'Maybe too good. Who we going to fix?'

  'Some bad black boys from Brixton,' replied Mark.

  'How bad?'

  'About as bad as they come.'

  'Ten grand each you say?'

  Mark nodded.

  'Eddie?' said Tubbs.

  Dawes shrugged. 'I've already said I'm in if you are.'

  Tubbs smiled again. 'I wish Elvis was here.'

  'Me too,' said Mark.

  'What the hell,' said Tubbs. 'I can go home to the islands with that much dough.'

  'You've never been to the islands in your life,' said Mark. 'Closest you've been to the West Indies is a week in Lanzarote in 1989.'

  'Sure,' said Tubbs. 'You're not wrong. But a man can dream can't he?'

  Mark nodded and went off to order another round.

  Chapter 20

  'You got a motor, Tubbs?' asked Mark Farrow, upon his return.

  'An old banger. Vauxhall Astra. You can't afford much on my wages.'

  'Not like some,' said Eddie.

  Mark ignored him. 'You can get a new one if you do the job,' he said to Tubbs. 'Unless you blow it all on "the islands".'

  'Might never come back,' said Tubbs. 'Open a fried chicken restaurant on the beach and spend my days drinking rum and chasing women.'

  'You'll have to lose a bit of weight,' said Eddie. 'Otherwise you'll never catch them.'

  The big man rocked with laughter again. 'You can come too, man,' he said to Eddie. 'Swim every morning.in the sea before we open up.'

  'Nice idea,' interrupted Mark. 'But we've got business to discuss here first.'

  His two old friends hushed up and listened.

  'There's a bloke called Beretta up on the Ashworthy estate. You remember it?'

  They both nodded.

  'He deals dope and whores from what I've heard, and last week him and his two main men went in and killed some business associates of Uncle John. And by the way, had it off with a pile of charlie. Now, apparently they've been hassling the old firm for months, after a bit of trouble over some money owed. It's time they were sorted. There's a lot of aggro floating around and it has to end.' 'And we're going to do it?' said Eddie.

  'Let the man finish,' said Tubbs, visions of blue seas and white sands still floating around inside his head.

  'It'll be fine,' Mark reassured them. 'They think Uncle John is finished, running scared. He's not well.'

  'What's the matter with him?' asked Tubbs.

  'Cancer. Terminal.'

  'So what's he worried about then?' asked Eddie. 'He'll soon be out of it, won't he?'

  'Thanks for your sympathy, Ed,' said Mark.

  'Sorry. But you know what I mean.'

  'And you know Uncle John,' said Mark. 'He never gives in.'

  'What started the aggro?' asked Tubbs. 'As I remember, everyone had their own patch, stayed out of each other's way and rubbed along pretty well.'

  'Times change,' said Mark. 'And three other people got dead a while back.'

  'Friends of Beretta, was it?'

  Mark nodded. 'An unfortunate overreaction from some geezers from Kent employed by Uncle John.'

  'And this mob got the hump about it.'

  'That's about it.'

  'And we've got to sort it.'

  Mark nodded again.

  'For ten grand.'

  'That's the deal. But I've had another idea.'

  'What?' asked Tubbs.

  'If we can get the dope back, I'll up the ante.'

  'How much?' asked Eddie.

  'Depends on how much is left. I reckon you two can cop for a third between you.'

  'And it was worth how much?' asked Tubbs.

  'Three hundred thousand.'

  Eddie whistled between his teeth.

  'Sounds OK,' said Tubbs. 'But if they've got rid or we can't find it, we get ten grand each, right?'

  Another nod from Mark.

  'No,' said Tubbs. 'Let's make it twenty.'. 'You don't want much, do you?'

  'Man, it's risky. These guys are stone killers, right?'

  'Right,' said Mark.

  'And they might have other friends?'

  'Almost certainly.'

  'So twenty sounds about right. Eddie?'

  It was Eddie's turn to nod.

  'I dunno,' said Mark. But he knew he'd agree in time, he just didn't want to seem like a pushover.

  'Take it or leave it,' said Tubbs, echoing Linda's words the previous day.

  'And you'll do what needs to be done?' said Mark.

  Tubbs nodded.

  'Eddie?' said Mark.

  Eddie Dawes looked at Tubbs and grinned, and suddenly Dizzy was back in the room, conjured up from some far off place where he'd lain dormant for years. 'And we fuck off after, Tubbs, you and me?'

  'That's the plan, my man,' said Tubbs. 'Just think about it. Cheap rum, cheap spliff and cheap women. We'll be kings.'

  Eddie Dawes looked at Mark. 'OK,' he said. 'Fuck this country. Fuck this winter. Let's do it, eh?'

  'Great,' said Mark.

  'So what's the plan?' asked Tubbs.

  'Simple,' said Mark. 'You, my friend go down to Brixton and make like you've got a lot of dough and are in the market for a big buy. We find out where they've got the dope and get it back, taking no prisoners. We organise a buy and fuck them up.'

  'Then I'm going to need some fl
ash,' said Tubbs. 'My Vauxhall Astra ain't exactly some big drug buyer's car of choice.'

  'We need Andy,' said Eddie.

  'Yeah,' agreed Tubbs. 'He'd get me a fucking Roller, no danger.' 'I'll organise something,' said Mark. 'Don't worry.' 'And my flash cash?'

  'There's no problem there either,' said Mark. 'Sounds good,' said Tubbs. 'Eddie,' said Mark.

  'Man, for that sort of loot I'll do anything.'

  'Don't forget they might've got rid of the gear already,' warned Mark. 'Don't be getting your hopes up too high. And these geezers are dangerous. Really dangerous. Uncle John's got twenty-four hour a day security.'

  'So why don't they get the dope back?' asked Tubbs. 'His security, I mean.'

  'They're legit,' said Mark. 'They're bodyguards, not fucking assassins.'

  'But we are,' said Tubbs. 'Remember, Eddie?'

  'I'll never forget it.'

  'And you'll do it again?'

  'Just once more.'

  'And then we'll be set for life,' said Tubbs.

  Eddie grinned, and Mark could see the boy he used to be.

  It had been a year before Mark vanished and the boys were full on rogues and vagabonds. Mark was with Linda, but the others preferred to play the field. Mark liked having a steady woman. It made him feel older and more responsible. He had to take a fair amount of piss taking from the others, but he was the boss and if it got out of hand, he soon sorted them. The 80s were almost over. The age of excess had peaked and fallen back, the pastel-coloured clothes had been replaced by darker, more sombre colours, but the boys were still up for whatever larks could be found. Mark was a busy man. Apart from working for John Jenner, he supplemented his income with money from the many and varied tricks the boys got up to. He was on coke, big style. Coke and booze and love.