The older man stopped walking.
‘What have I told you about using that term?’
‘Eh?’ The younger man looked across for his escort, but on seeing that he was no longer by his side, Soames knew he had overstepped a mark.
‘What? What’s wrong?’ he asked innocently. ‘Oh, fuckin’ hell, Clarke. Would you chill out, man?’
The older man locked his frown in place.
‘You wanted a cigarette?’ I said, as Soames drew alongside me. ‘Here you can have one of these.’
He sprang forward excitedly. ‘Aw, nice one, geezer.’
I eased myself upright and offered him a flame with both hands.
‘He gave you a good nick there, didn’t he?’ Soames said, eyeing my brow.
Clarke waved a hand at the open pack that I offered him and joined in the examination.
‘You should’ve had a stitch in that,’ he said. ‘It’ll leave a scar now.’
Soames looked almost envious. ‘I wouldn’t mind betting the other guy needed a few more, though. You gave ‘im a right pasting.’
‘Did I?’
I never stopped to think about the damage I’d inflicted.
They both nodded, though Clarke was decidedly less animated.
‘So what’s the news?’ I asked. ‘We at war yet?’
‘Still at DEFCON 4,’ a disappointed Soames replied. ‘Not that you’d know it in this fuckin’ morgue.’
Clarke nudged him.
‘Oi, what have I told you about your language? Not in front of civvies.’ He turned and addressed me in his most professional manner.
‘In terms of public risk, we’re on high alert. Terrorists normally carry out this kind of thing in waves and so security’s been stepped up across the city. That’s why we’ve been drafted in to help.’
Soames mumbled something.
‘What’s happening in Whitehall,’ I asked. ‘They still squabbling?’
Clarke looked surprised at my intelligence and seemed to lower his guard a little.
‘Well, it’s a different story over there, I’m afraid. We don’t know anything official, but word is there are a lot of discussions going on at the minute.’
‘Basically, they’re trying to work out who’s gonna get blamed,’ Soames sneered.
Clarke shook his tired head.
‘Have they found out who did it yet?’ I asked.
‘No one’s owned up,’ Clarke said. ‘The press think that it was Al Qaeda, but there’s nothing official.’
‘It all sounds a bit messy.’
‘Who gives a shit,’ Soames said, becoming animated. ‘Just put me where the wild things are, I’ll tear the fuckers apart.’
Ignoring Clarkes instruction to be silent, the younger man began dancing around like a boxer who had just entered the ring.
‘Yeah, whatever, old man,’ he said, punching the air. ‘You is too jaded. Too slow. You needs to leave it to the new blood.’
Clarke sighed. ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah.’
‘Yeah, yeah, yeah,’ Soames jeered. ‘You just keep countin’ them days down to discharge.’
‘Bloody right I will,’ Clarke replied, ‘I can’t wait for the day when I don’t have to listen to naive little runts like you any more.’
‘Listen,’ Soames said, hitching a thumb into his puffed out chest. ‘I’m the backbone of the army, me.’
‘Backbone? Ha!’ Clarke’s face was beginning to redden with anger.
‘Y’know, you keep saying that – backbone this, backbone that – but you’re so… so fucking stupid, you can’t see how misguided you are. It’s mindless fools like you that the politicians push to the front whenever their bullshit becomes too transparent.’
‘Really?’ Soames goaded him.
‘Yes, really. You’ll remember that the first time you hear a bullet fly past your ear. Then you’ll realise that we’re the first things that gets flushed whenever panic hits. We’re nothing but the shit and piss of the army.’
‘I’ll show you shit and piss.’ Soames said. ‘I’ll show you shit and piss, just as soon as I’m in Petrol Land popping off them sand niggers.’
That was it for Clarke. He stretched out an arm, grabbed the young private by his waterproofs and wrenched him effortlessly to within an inch of his nose.
‘Soames, I swear to God, if you use that term in front of me again I’ll leave you unconscious where you stand. You understanding me?’
Although every teenage impulse within him must have wanted to retort, Soames kept quiet. It might have been a tremble or it might have been a nod, but whatever movement he made it was enough of a response for Clarke and, after holding his stare for a few seconds longer, he let go of the young soldier and continued along the path. Private Soames stood for a minute, basking in his loss of face, and then trudged reluctantly along in his tracks.
I didn’t fancy consoling anyone, let alone a squaddie carrying a pack full of testosterone, and so with all the grace of a tin man, I caught up with Clarke.
‘So you’re leaving the army then?’ I asked, wheezing.
Thinking that my question was some kind of sarcastic joke, Clarke shot a cautionary glance in my direction. The muscular intensity in his expression reminded me of a tamed bird of prey, bored yet lethal. It made me shrink back.
‘OK, fine,’ I said. ‘Just forget I asked. I’ll be on my way.’
Clarke’s face softened when he saw my reaction.
‘Hey, no, listen,’ he said, ‘don’t worry. I’m… I’m really sorry. I’ve spent the last six hours wandering around London listening to that arsehole talk about nothing but himself and so for someone to suddenly show an interest in my life feels a bit… odd.’
‘I understand. It’s no problem.’
Clarke adjusted the chinstrap of his helmet. ‘In answer to your question, I’ve got three weeks and four days before my discharge.’
‘Finishing line’s in sight, then. You been in long?’
‘Just over seventeen years.’ He tipped his head back towards Soames. ‘I was younger than him when I joined up.’
‘That is a long time.’
‘Yep. Way too long.’
The broad pathway we were following opened up into a circular junction from which sprouted three paths. Standing regally in the centre of the intersection was an ornate drinking fountain. Clarke studied it as we passed.
‘Three weeks and four days,’ I repeated. ‘So is that why you’re on park patrol?’
He smiled. ‘I was briefed to montitor public places. The parks are the safest place I could think of. Don’t tell Soames that though. Bloody fool wants all the action he can get.’
‘You were probably the same.’
Clarke shrugged philosophically. ‘I don’t doubt it. Scary thing is that I didn’t need all the fancy television adverts and websites to convince me to sign up, I couldn’t wait. Anything to get away from my old man.’
‘But you saw through it in the end, though?’
He nodded.
‘Anything specific happen, or was it just a gradual process?’
Clarke didn’t answer me immediately. He was too preoccupied with the view over towards Maida Vale.
‘I can be specific,’ he said after a while, ‘very specific actually. It wasn’t that long after I joined up. I was sent to Iraq as part of the British efforts in Desert Storm. This particular day I was on clean-up detail. The Yanks had conducted a sweep on a settlement and we were meant to be following up. Nothing complicated, just a routine patrol. Anyway, as we were entering the camp, someone threw something, a basket I think it was, into the street ahead of our Land Rover. So I jumped out to clear the way. Being new in, I didn’t think twice.’
He exhaled noisily through his nostrils.
‘Anyhow, I never heard the gunshot. Not right away. All I heard was the sound of the bullet as it passed my head. ‘Course, being a rookie, I froze. I just stood there in the middle of the road, waiting to get hit.’
Clarke turn
ed his green eyes back towards me.
‘You ever been shot at?’ he asked.
‘Not that I know of.’
‘Oh, you’ll know when you do. It’s the most surreal experience you can imagine, it sounds like someone’s blowing a dog whistle that humans can hear. When the bullet flies past, you can feel the atmosphere move ever so slightly, like it’s snagging a tiny hole in the fabric of the air.’
I was transfixed. He looked at my reaction and smiled.
‘Anyhow, turns out it was our own side shooting at me. They apologised when they realised their mistake, but that’s when I knew that something wasn’t right. All I kept thinking was, “They never told me about this in the interview.”’
I did my best to join in with his laughter.
‘I suppose that’s where you went wrong, then,’ I said.
‘How’s that?’
‘Thinking.’
Clarke’s smile wavered slightly. ‘Ain’t that the truth. Trained to kill, not to think. I’m thinking now though – oh yeah, I’m thinking all the time. There’s nothing like a taste of death to make you appreciate the important things in life. I’ve got a nice driving job lined up when I get out and that’s gonna give me all the time I need to make up for being away from my wife and kids.’
Clarke stared off into the distance again, only this time his frown was gone. After about a hundred yards we reached a road. I stopped, glanced in both directions and then asked the whereabouts of the nearest tube station.
‘Euston’s that way,’ Clarke said indicating towards the left. ‘Just behind a few rows of houses.’
I thanked him and then held out a hand.
‘Listen,’ I said. ‘I really appreciate this, you’ve helped me to make a decision that I’ve been putting off for years.’
‘That’s no problem,’ Clarke said, reviewing the conversation in his mind. ‘It’s nothing too drastic, I hope.’
‘That all depends…’ I looked at my watch and then back up at him, ‘…on whether or not you think meeting your father for the first time is drastic.’
12.20pm, Sunday, March 20, 1983
That a dog’s ears could be so perfectly soft, even when the rest of their coat was coarse and stiff, always fascinated Felix. He imagined it had something to do with their heightened aural senses: the hair needed to be fine to help pick up sounds that were inaudible to other creatures. That was why they never allowed him to play with them for too long. Felix stroked Pigeon’s black and brown brindled lobes until the greyhound finally turned its head away. Felix knew exactly how he felt. Right at that moment he loathed his sense of hearing. Right at that moment he wished he were deaf.
He had suspected what his mother was saying for a while, and there was a part of him that was actually pleased, pleased to know the truth. To finally be put out of his misery. But it was only a tiny part of him.
‘I know it hurts, love,’ Bebe reiterated, ‘but you have to understand, your father neither liked nor wanted either of us.’
Felix daren’t look at her. He felt too embarrassed. Responsible somehow.
‘He left when you were about six months old – left officially, I mean.’ Bebe said all this as she sliced the vegetables and dropped them into saucepans next to the kitchen sink.
How could she be so blasé? Felix wondered.
‘I never saw much of him, even before then, but that was the last time he came here. It was late one night; he came in, ran straight upstairs, packed a suitcase and slammed the door on the way out. Never said a word. Still woke you up though.’
‘Did he not leave anything behind? Any photographs?’ Felix asked warily.
Bebe’s tone became less assured.
‘No,’ she replied, and turned away from him. ‘They were all destroyed. All he left us with were debts and Pigeon, whom he was planning to race and make a fortune from.’ She turned back, looked down at the dog, coiled cosily in the corner and tittered at the idea. Then a light popped up above her head.
‘Actually, there was something else, it’s not much, but you might as well have it.’ She picked up a tea towel and dried her hands.
‘Let that dog out while I nip and fetch it.’ And with that she hurried upstairs.
Felix opened the back door. Pigeon’s brittle frame took a bit of convincing, but he eventually hobbled out into the garden. Felix stood next to the sink and nibbled on a piece of carrot. Through the window he watched the old dog wander around the long grass, drawn by an invisible jagged path of scent. It was hard to believe, looking at him now, that he had been named after something that flew.
Strange. Felix always imagined that his mother had bought the greyhound when he was a baby, as a kind of surrogate brother. To find out now that they were both abandoned as children made their bond take on a much greater significance. It meant that the two of them were kindred spirits.
Felix wondered how many other aspects of his past were inaccurate. How many more of his memories were false? For all he knew it could be all of them. No, that was crazy. They couldn’t all be lies.
He tried to focus on the positives, those parts of his life story that he knew in his heart to be true. But with no grandparents or other immediate family to speak of, there were no other memories that might help to bolster his insecurities. His past was barren. Nothing more than a series of events all spent in the company of Bebe and Pigeon.
Suddenly nothing was sacred. His whole past was shrouded in doubt. It was as though someone had pulled the tarpaulin from a bottomless hole that he always knew existed inside of him, and then left him there, teetering on the edge. The uncertainty made him afraid.
There was the sound of a drawer being slammed and then Felix heard Bebe’s feet on the stairs.
‘Here we are,’ she said, vigorously polishing something in the fabric of her apron. ‘I’m quite sure it’s not worth anything. He wouldn’t’ve left it behind if it were.’
‘What is it?’ Felix was glad of the distraction and became excited.
‘Ah, ah, ah,’ Bebe teased. ‘Now, close your eyes and hold out your hands.’
11
Three men were leaning against a red terrace railing, assessing a line of dogs being paraded on the track in front of them. They were the only spectators in the whole stadium.
‘Not seen him,’ the nearest of them answered without taking his eyes off the procession.
They were not the words I wanted to hear, but the smooth fur of the greyhound lying at the man’s feet was at least some comfort. I looked up at him from where I was crouched.
‘I don’t suppose you’ve got any idea where I might be able to find him?’
For the first time during our exchange, the man tore his eyes away from the track and looked scornfully down at me. Then at the dog I was petting. His dog.
‘And who might you be?’ the man barked.
‘A friend of his,’ I replied, taking the hint and straightening myself. ‘I just got into town yesterday and I need to find him. It’s quite urgent.’
The man looked me up and down.
‘Friend? I don’t think so. Mallory Shill don’t ’ave friends, specially ones like you.’ He turned away again.
‘Oh, I get it,’ I said, laughing. ‘You think I’m the law, don’t you?
Still all three ignored me.
‘Well, you’re wrong. I mean, look at me. Do you think the law would be working with this kind of hangover?’
The one in the middle pointed at something on the track and the others muttered an agreeable response.
‘Look,’ I said, losing the repartee, ‘I’ll be honest with you, shall I? I’m actually family. I’ve been sent down here to find him because his son recently passed away. I need to tell him when the funeral is.’
It worked. Three suspicious faces revolved to study me. I got the quick once-over and then the man standing in the middle, the smartest dressed, in a grey raincoat and post-war trilby, answered.
‘Kin, are ya?’
I thought it
best to nod subserviently. I needed their help, but more than that, he had a powerful Irish brogue, which seemed to demand deference.
‘Fuck’s sake,’ the man scoffed. ‘Funerals is ’ard enough at the best of times, but any family that ‘as to contest with Mallory Shill on top of that ’as moi pity.’
The other two, who I now noticed were wearing matching tracksuits, concurred.
I glanced around at the empty stadium. All of a sudden I was worried about who I was talking to.
‘I really appreciate that, but seriously, I really need to find him. I’ve tried his house but there’s no one in and this was the only other place that I could think of.’
‘E’s not been here all day,’ the Irishman replied. ‘But don’t worry, after the amount ‘e won yesterday afternoon, ’e’ll be round soon enough. That’s if ’e ain’t gone and lost it a’ready.’
‘Do you know where he normally hangs out during the day? Does he have a job at all?’
The question seemed to bring a great deal of delight into the men’s lives.
‘Mallory Shill workin’ a nine to five?’ the Irishman cackled, ‘I’d give ya fuckin’ long odds on that one, so I would.’
Once they calmed down, the Irishman continued.
‘Why don’t you try the Dog and Duck, a bit further up the Chingford Road. Last I heard, there was a few of ‘em headin’ down there for a private game.’
‘When was that?’
‘Last night. Late on.’ He looked away. The tracksuits continued to stare. My audience was over.
‘And pass my condolences on to the rest of the family, won’t you?’ he called after me.
*
When I reappeared outside Walthamstow stadium, I was not surprised to find that the taxi I had picked up earlier at the railway station was gone. There was no chance of another one. I was too far out of town. After checking the A-Z, it assured me that Chingford Road was only an inch away, and so I decided to cover the rest of the distance on foot.
The train journey from Euston to Walthamstow had given my body a chance to recover but now, after what must have only been a centimeter, I felt fatigue kicking in again. My legs were on fire, even though my entire body seemed to be suffering from rising damp, and the insole of my right shoe had completely worn through at the heel. Whenever I put my foot to the ground it was like treading on a tack. On top of all that, my cold was back with a vengeance and now and then when I inhaled, a sharp stab cut into my throat. So bad was the hike becoming that I was on the verge of tossing my search in, when the squat, shiny-bricked Dog and Duck loomed into sight.
Felix Shill Deserves to Die Page 25
