The Last Card

by Kolton Lee

  H backed away and walked back down the street.

  25.

  It was all to do with green-eyed Brenda. The woman was destroying him. Gavin prided himself on being fit, healthy and in top notch-condition. His blond hair might have been a tad thin and his waist not quite as trim as it had been, but Gavin was, he reflected, still a fine figure of a man. He had been an Olympiad, for God’s sake! In the 1980 Lake Placid Winter Games – the fourth man in the English bobsledding team, the man with the most powerful thighs.

  But Gavin was worried. Green-eyed Brenda was insatiable. He had come into work today barely able to walk. In the green eyes of Brenda a quickie was something one did when one felt horny. And Gavin was certain nobody could possibly feel more horny than him. The twenty-three-year-old Brenda, he had just this evening decided, must be some kind of freak. She had no concept of foreplay. The idea that two people about to have sex might enjoy the time taken to arouse one another, however one chose to do that, had never entered her beautifully crafted head. No, what green-eyed Brenda wanted, constantly, was a quickie. She would either lie prostrate before him, or occasionally she would thrust her pert little bottom in his direction. She wanted him to do it at a moment’s notice. Nothing more, nothing less.

  Gavin had tried to sit the poor girl down and explain to her the workings of the male body as opposed to the female body. Men sometimes needed … stimulation. And the ability of the male organ to climax repeatedly was something that … declined with age. And that was Gavin’s big, big mistake. To mention age. Because after a long, detailed and elaborate explanation of the occasional male need for assistance, green-eyed Brenda, with an innocence that would have thrilled a pimp, had asked if this whole conversation was because Gavin was old.

  Gavin had stopped dead in his tracks. With one, well-aimed question she had felled his love for her, a love that had begun three weeks before after a chance meeting in ‘My Old China’, aCantonese restaurant and take-away in the centre of Purley.

  Now, Gavin sat at the bar in Roxy’s and pondered the many paths of true love, contrasting them with the imponderables of the quickie. Opposite him Nina sat and talked. Something about a trip to Brighton with Hilary James. All he’d gathered of any substance was that things were going according to plan and that she was making moves to encourage him to take on Alan. When she’d begun talking about how they’d driven to the beach and talked about men and women and where she’d grown up and … his mind had drifted.

  Gavin’s legs ached. The previous seven nights with Brenda, plus the quickies he’d encountered during the seven days that went with those seven nights, were wearing him out. That was the truth. He was now walking with a slightly ambling gait that made him resemble an ageing John Wayne. He raised himself from the stool at the bar, and looked around him, stretching his aching legs. Nina stopped her chatter in mid-flow, looking up at Gavin with surprise.

  ‘Stretching,’ he said, by way of explanation. ‘Carry on.’ But when Nina resumed her chatter, Gavin’s attention wandered around the club. It was just after nine – still early in the evening. Tonight, there would be less women punters, more gay men and transvestites. It would be a slightly younger crowd, the atmosphere harder and more conventionally clubby. As Gavin looked around, flexing his knees and legs, he saw Hilary framed in the doorway. H caught his eye and came over. As Nina rose to greet him, Gavin was surprised to see her blushing.

  ‘Look what the wind blew in.’ She said it casually, but Gavin could hear the sudden tension in her voice.

  ‘How are you?’ Hilary addressed the question to Nina, but as he said it he swung round to face Gavin. Gavin nodded to him without a word, his expression blank.

  It was Nina who responded.

  ‘A lot better for seeing you. So …’ She leant towards him, taking his arm and half turning away. As she did so she winked, ever so subtly, at Gavin. Gavin was unable to catch the whispered exchange but when Nina turned to him a moment later, he gathered from the look on her face that she wasn’t pleased.

  ‘Gavin,’ she said, ‘Hilary wants to see Alan.’

  ***

  Slightly bow-legged, Gavin stood on the landing outside Alan’s office and knocked gently. A muffled ‘come in!’ reverberated. Gavin glanced behind him. H was straightening the jacket of his crumpled suit. Gavin opened the door, standing aside to allow him to pass.

  ‘Hilary! The very man!’ Gavin noted that Alan seemed to be in a good mood. He was sitting behind his desk, closely examining his teeth in a small mirror. In his free hand he held a plastic flossing fork. His face turned from side to side as he grimaced into his reflection like the head on top of a totem pole. If Gavin played his cards right he thought he might be able to leave work early tonight and perhaps have some kind of conversation with green-eyed Brenda. She was a waitress in the Chinese restaurant and finished work at 2.30 a.m. She was usually home by three. Maybe he could be there before her. Catch her before she jumped on the computer. Which was another thing that was beginning to annoy him about her. She surfed the internet for hours at a time, day or night. He had no idea what she was looking for or what she was –

  ‘You’re asking me to throw the fight?!’ At the far end of the office Gavin was jolted back to the matter in hand by the tone in the H’s voice.

  ‘I’m happy to waive the matter of the fifteen thousand pounds you owe me, I’m not greedy. We’re all friends here after all.’ Gavin held his breath as he waited for the Hilary’s response. He eased forward on the balls of his feet, ready.

  ‘What?! I’m not throwing the fight! I don’t care who …!’

  ‘I’m not asking you, I’m fookin’ telling you! You are going to throw that fight an’ you’re goin’ t’ throw it in the first fookin’ round! I ’ad money riding on Hodges and with ’im out the picture it’s now riding on you! A lot of it!’

  H was staring at Alan, clearly struggling with his emotions. Gavin sidled closer, letting Hilary know that if he made a move, he would be on him.

  ‘You think you’re something special’ White Alan continued. ‘Well, you’re not. You’re an ant. I piss on people like you. You’re going down in the first round.’ Hilary said nothing. But his eyes remained firmly on Alan.

  ***

  Hilary had long gone when Gavin left Alan’s office. He eased his underpants away from his crotch as he walked slowly to the stairs. So it was true. Alan was definitely looking for a big score, a big pay-day. Alan hadn’t said so but Gavin thought maybe he was looking for the big pay-day. One that would see him retire. What about the business? No. Gavin was not going to allow it to end like this.

  At the bottom of the stairs Gavin hobbled along the short corridor and into the club. It was busy now and the bar area was crowded. Gavin sat on a stool and turned to the stage, where Nina was singing the final lines of ‘I Will Survive’.

  Moments later she finished her song to enthusiastic applause. She bowed, and when she joined Gavin at the bar he rose and graciously offered her his seat. Gavin could have done with the stool, but he’d made this gesture to Nina for a reason and it certainly wasn’t chivalry.

  ‘What are you drinking?’ he began.

  ‘Tanqueray and tonic. Thanks.’

  Gavin turned to order her drink.

  ‘How’s it going with lover-boy?’

  ‘Didn’t I tell you how it was going earlier?’

  Now that Gavin thought about it, she had. Something about Brighton beach?

  ‘Well I’ve got some good news. Hilary has a big fight coming up, as a replacement for one of Alan’s boxers, Hodges. The interweaving of life’s rich and varied tapestries never ceases to amaze me.’

  Nina gave him a blank look. She clearly had no idea what he was talking about.

  Gavin elaborated. ‘Alan had a large money bet on Hodges on the understanding that Hodges would take a dive against Mancini. Now that Hilary has replaced him, Alan’s put an even bigger bet on Mancini and is leaning on Hilary to take the very, same dive, but this time in
the first round. Trouble is, Hilary doesn’t want to.’

  ‘So? How can he make him?’

  ‘Alan wants you to meet him, accidentally-on-purpose, and use your charms to make sure that he takes that dive’

  ‘Great. That’s classy.’

  ‘Can you handle it?’ There was a pause. And then for the first time in a long time, Gavin saw Nina smile. It was tight, but it was a smile.

  ‘This is what they call irony, isn’t it?’

  ‘No, this is what they call serendipity.’ Gavin looked smug.

  ‘Alan doesn’t know that I’ve already met Hilary, does he?’

  At that moment a short, burly black man pushed himself conspicuously and without ceremony between Gavin and Nina. He signalled a barman. ‘Yeah, gimme a rum and black.’

  Gavin eyed the man with distaste. He had half of his hair in some kind of tight, plaited style that kept it close to the scalp, while the other half grew loose and wild. He was wearing a full-length quilted coat with ‘New Jersey’ emblazoned on the front and back.

  ‘Do you mind?’

  ‘Do I mind what?’ The man looked back at Gavin with something that made Gavin’s pulse quicken. Was it insolence?

  ‘I’m having a conversation here. There’s no need to push.’

  The black held Gavin’s gaze for a moment then turned slowly to look at Nina. As slow as you like he turned back to Gavin looking him up and down.

  ‘Do I look like I’m stopping your conversation?’

  Gavin stood up and squared himself as he now faced him. ‘If you have a problem with me perhaps we should take it outside and discuss it.’

  ‘Yeah, man, let’s step.’ The stranger opened his coat and a small movement with his hand in front of his trousers revealed a bulge. It was a move guaranteed to catch Gavin’s attention. Silence.

  ‘Rum and black.’ The barman looked at the guy, who was staring at Gavin who was staring back at him. ‘Er … that’s £3.40.’ It was Nina that broke the spell.

  ‘Your drink. It’s ready.’ One beat. Two beats. The black man turned to Nina, gave her a nod, paid for his drink and then moved away back into the heart of the club.

  ‘What the hell was that?!’ Gavin said, breathlessly. ‘And what the hell is he doing in here?’

  ‘I don’t know, but he didn’t seem to like the look of you.’ Gavin snapped round from looking after the disappearing stranger to looking at Nina.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?!’

  ‘Easy, tiger, he’s nothing to do with me!’

  ‘Well what is to do with you is how to get the other nigger to do what we want.’ Gavin saw Nina flinch at the word ‘nigger’ but he didn’t give a damn. ‘We now have leverage.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Puzzled.

  ‘If he didn’t want to take the dive before, he now has a personal reason to do what we want, doesn’t he?’

  ‘I don’t need more leverage,’ Nina snapped. ‘I know exactly what makes Hilary tick. He’d do anything for his little boy, Cyrus.’

  ‘He’s got a little boy?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, good. I hope you’re right. For both our sakes.’ Nina turned away and sipped from her drink. Gavin turned back to the body of the club looking for the insolent black who needed teaching a lesson. He couldn’t see him. He glanced at Nina’s back with a rising contempt. He had a sudden thought; maybe his problem with green-eyed Brenda was that, on some deep, fundamental level … he just didn’t like women.

  26.

  Dunstan sat and watched Ade play with his little girl, Tawana. Ade was good with kids generally, but with Tawana in particular. The little girl was almost two years old; she had known Ade for as long as she could remember and she referred to him lovingly as ‘Uncle Ade’. Improbably, Tawana was a caring, happy child with a sweet temperament. Ade was very fond of her. But for some reason whenever the little girl called him ‘Uncoo Ada’ Dunstan found it hilarious. It reminded him of the old black man on boxes of Uncle Ben’s rice. Ade had asked Dunstan on a number of occasions what Uncle Ade had to do with Uncle Ben and Dunstan had never been able to come up with an adequate answer. Ade had learnt to ignore him. He considered it beneath him to respond to such childish provocation.

  Today, however, Dunstan was serious. In fact he had been in a rather serious mood for at least forty-eight hours. Since the other night when he and Ade had made their drive-by attempt on Paul Akers, things had been very serious. After they had driven off, unsure if they had killed him, the two of them had been staying with Dunstan’s babymother in South Wimbledon. They had been there for two days now and Dunstan was well past stir-crazy.

  Firstly, it had been confirmed that Paul Akers was very much alive. That was bad news. You beat an animal badly enough, Dunstan reasoned, it will give up, back away; classic shock and awe tactics. Leave it only slightly wounded however, it’ll keep fighting. In their failure to kill Paul, Dunstan and Ade had shown weakness. Who could tell what Alan’s next move might be? Dunstan was driving himself mad thinking about it. And what was the word on the streets of Stokey and Hackney about him and Ade? People would know by now that he and Ade had stepped up to the plate and tried to ‘hit’ Paul. Most of Dunstan’s crew would welcome the hit because they knew that Paul was a liability. However, since he didn’t finish the job, how many of his crew would remain loyal in the face of Alan’s undoubted response?

  Add to all of this the presence of Shirley, Dunstan’s babymother, and his troubles were complete. Dunstan loved Tawana and came to see her whenever he could (at least once every two or three months?) but Shirley was a different proposition.

  Before Dunstan had entered the realms of gangsterism he had been one of a crew of dancers, all black and all from his estate in Stokey. They had called themselves the G-men and been attached to the sound system of the same name. Whenever the sound was on the road, playing in different parts of London, the G-men would go too, performing their routines and doubling as security. One night they were playing an event in Streatham at a community centre called The Castle. As Dunstan and the rest of the boys well knew, going across the river into South London meant dealing with ‘pure leggo-beast gial an’ savage manhood’. So when, as Dunstan and his dancers were spinning, body-popping, doing the slide and generally going through their paces, a group of girls started to heckle them, it was only to be expected, them being leggo-beast. Three of the girls were black, two of them white, and one was wearing a full-length burqa and was therefore of indeterminate race. Dunstan’s attention was drawn to one of the black girls, a redskin who looked to be about fifteen. She was the one with the loudest, most caustic remarks, swearing like a sailor. She had the kind of slackness in her laugh that would make a black man blanch.

  ‘Urrgh! You call dat fuckin’ dancin’! My fuckin’ grandmuvver could drop moves better dan dat, you know’t I mean!’ The next time Dunstan dropped to the rubber mats that they were dancing on, balanced on his head and prepared to spin, his view of the redskin was upside down. Despite the danger of the move he was attempting – it could easily have ended with a broken neck – the redskin continued to heckle.

  ‘Look a’ you! You fink you’re fuckin’ good, don’tcha!’ She was looking right at Dunstan. ‘I seen babies do dem moves, you know’t I mean! Dem is old time moves dat my dad does! Get some new fuckin’ moves, man, my dad’s got a Chihuahua dat can dance better dan dat, ha, ha, ha, I seen de Chihuahua spinning on its ’ead an’ it’s got moves dat you ain’t even got! Ha, ha, ha!’

  That was it. Dunstan dropped his feet back down to the mat, flew over to the redskin and grabbed her by the throat. But not even that could halt the stream of poison issuing forth.

  ‘Go on den, you fuckin’ bastard, ’it me, go on, ’it me, I ain’t afraida you pussies from up norff you know, you can’t fuckin’ dance anyhow …’

  Under the circumstances Dunstan was left with little choice. He let go of her throat and punched her in the face. He knocked her clean off her feet, knocki
ng her front tooth out in the process. At that point DJ Ruffntuff, the sound system stalwart, was flung sideways from behind the deck, the cans were ripped from his ears and someone slammed a chair down on top of the cold cuts that had been keeping the crowd in The Castle bubbling all evening. Suddenly it was a free for all, a mass fight that did nothing to dispel the ugly and scurrilous rumour that South Londoners were indeed fine examples of ‘savage manhood’.

  If Dunstan had been any way unconvinced of the ugliness of the rumour about South London girls, he had it confirmed for him half an hour later round the back of The Castle. It was there that the redskin – he later discovered her name was Shirley – clung to his penis like a woman drowning on storm-tossed seas. She handled his organ with an enthusiasm that Dunstan could only admire.

  Two months later she was pregnant with Tawana, was given her own two-bedroomed flat on a nice, leafy estate in South Wimbledon and she and Dunstan were tied together for the foreseeable future. When the stresses and strains of working in the city proved too much Dunstan would retire to South Wimbledon and impose his will on Shirley to the best of his ability. The problem was that Shirley was a redskin witch; the manner in which she had made herself known to Dunstan – by swearing and heckling him – was a feature of her personality that had remained a fixture. Domesticity for Dunstan could never be bliss with Shirley for a partner.