Blood Relatives

by Stevan Alcock

  He said he’d eavesdropped on t’ service from t’ church foyer, watched the burial from a distance, watched us all – Gran, Mitch, Mavis and Don, the smattering of friends – saw him lowered into t’ ground and earth sprinkled on him, and then, when we’d all gone, he’d stood by t’ side of t’ grave for a long time and said his own prayer.

  ‘I was with Frank when he became unwell. It was here, in this house. He started having chest pains, and his speech was slurring. I thought it would be quicker to drive him down to Leeds General Infirmary A & E than to wait for an ambulance.’

  He paused, lit a fresh ciggie wi’ wobbling fingers.

  ‘He had a major heart attack right there in the hospital foyer. The hospital staff took over, and whisked him away. I knew I couldn’t wait. I left details with the front desk on who to call. I didn’t want to be there when you all showed up, but I couldn’t desert Frank either. As far as the hospital was concerned, I wasn’t a blood relative. I wasn’t next of kin. So I sat in the car and waited. I prayed. I’m not a religious man, but I prayed all the same that he would pull through. Then I saw you all arrive in that old van your father drove. Some time later I saw you all leaving. I knew at once that Frank was gone.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’

  ‘What was I supposed to say? “Hello, I’m your late granddad’s lover”? I didn’t know what was for the best. So I decided – wanted – to befriend you. I have to say that I expected you to tell me to get lost. But you didn’t. Why was that, Rick?’

  ‘Dunno. I admit I wor wary at first. To be honest, I think it wor Fazel who decided it for me. Just summat he said.’

  ‘Ah yes. Fazel.’

  I looked about as if t’ ghostly traces of my granddad might be present in t’ corners.

  ‘Was my granddad often here?’

  ‘Oh, he didn’t mind the old prefab, if that’s what you mean. Prefab house, prefab life. Of course, staying overnight was quite another matter. That’s the trouble when you have a wife who never goes anywhere. Never went away for a weekend on her own, or to see anyone, or anything like that. She had no relatives to speak of, apart from a half-sister in Hull, and they didn’t get along. So she never went out unless Frank took her. Wedded to her house, she was. And she expected him home every night. Married duty.’

  ‘So how did you first meet? Where?’

  ‘Late fifties, and it was a public toilet. Where else could you meet anyone in those days? I couldn’t bring him back here while my mother was alive, of course, so before she passed on it was all secret meetings in the back of the car, in woods, sometimes at friends’ houses. I was terrified that we’d get caught. Before ’67 it was illegal, for one thing, and if you were caught you risked imprisonment, ridicule, your name in the papers. I knew of men who’d killed themselves out of shame, others who’d had their marriages wrecked. But Frank was devil-may-care, and that terrified me sometimes. I’d lost Brendan; I didn’t want to lose Frank too. People thought we were horseracing chums. Before I met Frank I’d only been to about one race meet in my life.’

  ‘Don’t you like horseracing?’

  ‘Not especially. But it gave us an excuse to be together openly. Of course, Frank being married was perfect cover. Although your grandmother was always rather cold toward me. But that was her way, Frank said. I was merely Frank’s racing buddy. You become the master of façade.’

  I looked across at the horseracing prints on t’ far wall.

  ‘A present from Frank,’ Gordon said.

  ‘Do you remember when I was born, then?’

  Gordon clapped his hands together, as if delighted. ‘Of course I do! In fact, I was with Frank at the races the day after you were born. It was me who suggested that you be christened Richard.’

  ‘You?’

  ‘His first grandchild. I’d never seen him so happy. So we bet on an outsider …’

  ‘Lionhearted Richard.’

  Gordon uncoiled a laugh. ‘Lionhearted Richard, no less!’

  ‘Richard Lionel Thorpe,’ I said dully. ‘I’d never made the connection wi’ my middle name before.’

  ‘Lionel was my suggestion.’

  ‘Can’t say I like it. Makes me think of that Lionel Blair.’

  Gordon chortled. ‘Then I apologise. Do you know, you have a few of Frank’s mannerisms. I like that. It reminds me of him.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Oh, that way you scratch the bridge of your nose when you’re puzzled, the same gait.’

  ‘My mum remembers going wi’ Granddad and some other bloke to t’ races when she wor little …’

  ‘Have you said anything to her?’

  ‘Hell, no. I’ve not even told her I’m gay. Friggin’ sis has worked it out though. Don’t know if I could tell Mum – especially after all that’s happened. I think she might know, but she don’t ask none. Eric says women only ever ask you what they already know. Like they want to see if you’ll lie about it or not.’

  Gordon dragged on his ciggie and exhaled toward t’ ceiling light. ‘That Eric talks a load of baloney, if you ask me.’

  ‘All t’ stuff that happened before I wor born, or when I wor too small to know any better – all these secrets …’

  ‘Ibsen’s Ghosts.’

  ‘Eh? You’ve lost me.’

  Gordon crouched beside me, grabbed my hand. ‘No, my boy. I’ve gained you. Don’t you see that?’

  His fingers tightened about mine. I bit my lip, looked at the floor in a swirl of thought. A small spider scuttled out of t’ shadows. Gordon stood up, went over to t’ gramophone and started cranking the handle. ‘Shall I play some music? What would you like to hear? Something uplifting?’

  ‘You’re daft, Gordon, you know that?’

  ‘I’ll take that as a compliment.’

  I watched the spider scurrying for sanctuary under t’ sideboard.

  ‘Did you ever meet Gerald?’

  ‘Only the once.’

  ‘It’s a shame that he died of a heart attack too.’

  Gordon flinched. ‘Gerald didn’t die of a heart attack. Is that what you’ve been told? Gerald was found with a hosepipe connected to the car exhaust and the engine running.’

  It wor late, so Gordon suggested I kip in his mother’s old bed. The sheets wor crisp and cold, the pillows unforgiving. I lay on my back, pinned beneath t’ scratchy blankets, my arms flat by my sides, my thoughts twirling like some nauseous fairground ride. Granddad Frank swore blind, Gordon said, that Gerald wor murdered and it wor made to look like suicide. But the death notice said otherwise. Maybe Gran had lied when she read it out. More likely, the notice had lied. I couldn’t see Gran having the guile to hide summat like that. Although I reckoned she knew more than she let on. Perhaps she saw through t’ horseracing façade. I’d been right not to read Don’s letter. What use would it have served? Let the fat bastard stew in his own guilt.

  Unable to sleep, I got up and dressed. Through t’ thin partition wall I could hear Gordon’s steady snoring. I crept out of t’ house and set off down t’ road ’til I came to a bus stop. A night bus took me as far as Lower Briggate. From there I walked toward t’ canal, past the doorway to Charley’s Club, past the Dragonara Hotel where Mother and Mavis had once waited an age in t’ foyer for t’ Three Degrees to come out of t’ lift, on past the New Penny, which wor closed and silent.

  Reaching the canal bridge, I paused. The wind wor getting up, scudding giant clouds over t’ moonlit sky. If I had the dosh I’d take off for t’ South, go in search of Tad. Somewhere without secrets and serial killers. But at the end of t’ week my pockets wor empty these days. Below me, the water had a steely, metallic smell. Industrial foam shimmered in stagnant corners. The night water burbled like a beckoning tune. But it worn’t a tune I recognised.

  III

  Jacqueline Hill

  17/11/1980

  As far as everyone wor concerned, HE had been dormant for nigh on fifteen month. Some said he wor inside, or that he’d toppe
d himsen. Others that he wor in t’ army, and had been posted overseas.

  Gina had disappeared again. Mand had found a new job, working full-time at Scene and Heard record shop in Leeds. Mother wor still at Clark’s. We got by, but it wor a struggle.

  Then on Wednesday, 19 November, we heard that HE had struck again. In Headingley. We heard that two days before, a student had found a bag in t’ street wi’ a bank card in it. That the cops had made a search of t’ surroundings but found nowt, and the bag had been recorded as lost property. That the bag belonged to Jacqueline Hill, a second-year student at the uni.

  HE wor back in our lives.

  ‘And how’s Mrs Husk this morn?’

  She huffed at me and pressed one hand to her wig, checking it wor on right. Lord Snooty, who in cat years wor just as ancient as her, wor by her swollen feet, his nose buried in t’ foil container of t’ meals-on-wheels dinner she’d been unable to finish.

  It wor plain as day that Mrs Husk wor starting to go downhill. She no longer levered hersen out of her chair when I knocked on t’ door and shouted my usual ‘Corona!’ She didn’t seem as sharp as she once wor.

  By her armchair stood a zimmer frame that social services had given her to help her get about. The pot of tea on t’ table wor cold, and a cup upended onto a saucer. She’d been reading the friggin’ leaves again.

  ‘There’s been another,’ I said.

  Mrs Husk flapped a hand, as if shooing me from t’ room.

  ‘You know, Mrs Husk, I nearly went to t’ cops that one time. I actually walked up to t’ desk and wor all set to say summat.’

  Her thin lips quivered, as if she wor remembering how to speak. ‘What do they know? Nowt, lad. It’s a waste of time reading the leaves if no one’s listening, ain’t it?’

  ‘I listened, Mrs Husk. I tried, didn’t I?’

  ‘Aye, lad. Seems that you did.’

  ‘So you know that HE’s back, Mrs Husk. Another innocent, they say.’

  Mrs Husk’s fingers nuzzled Lord Snooty’s neck. ‘I know, lad. I saw it.’ She nodded toward t’ teacup. ‘In t’ leaves. He wor never really gone. There’ve been others. Others that the police don’t know about. Or that they don’t think wor him.’

  ‘Others? You mean he’s done in other women?’

  ‘Three in t’ past few month. One wor a foreign lady. At least she lived.’

  She turned her face toward mine, fixing me in her sights. I shuddered like I’d walked right through a cold spot. The bottle of ginger beer I’d been holding nearly slipped from my fingers. I set it on t’ table.

  ‘Do you think they’ll ever get him, Mrs Husk?’

  ‘We all get careless, lad.’

  ‘The tape …’

  ‘Is the devil’s own deception. That tape is not him. Get away wi’ you.’

  The mantel clock chimed the quarter to t’ hour. Lord Snooty miaowed.

  ‘Money’s on t’ table, lad.’

  I didn’t have the heart to tell her the price of pop had gone up again. I took what she’d left. She wor seven pence short.

  The murder of Jacqueline Hill wor like one of them horror films where some hapless female thinks she’s finally escaped the evil and is safe, only for IT to come rushing back in for one last friggin’ hurrah. The cops had gone into overdrive and put together some Super Squad. Then came t’ Newsnight prog on t’ telly.

  We all knew it wor going to be about HIM. The BBC had made sure we knew. Like t’ first squall of winter ripping the last leaves from t’ treetops. As it happened, though December hadn’t arrived yet, winter wor already blown right in.

  The programme kicked off wi’ some poncy Southern reporter as always, standing outside t’ bus station roundabout opposite Millgarth cop shop, talking about t’ Northern folk like we wor an alien life form.

  Mand said, ‘Must we watch this?’

  ‘You can go and play your records if you want,’ said Mother, ‘as long as it’s not too loud or too late. You have to be up for work in t’ morning.’

  Mand folded her arms tightly, her endless silver bangles jiggling like a friggin’ gypo’s dancing bells. ‘I’m off ’til Monday.’

  The reporter wor now on a shopping street in Leeds, on a busy Saturday afternoon by t’ look of it. I draped a leg over t’ sofa arm and slumped back into t’ cushions, feigning casual interest.

  Mand said, ‘What does tangible mean? He just said it.’

  Mother shrugged briefly to mean she neither knew nor cared.

  … DEEP REVULSION …

  Mand’s bangles jiggled again as she reached for a toffee from t’ bowl on t’ table.

  … WALL OF HATE …

  … PSYCHOPATH …

  … SEVENTEEN ATTACKS …

  ‘Seventeen?’ I said. ‘Nah – he’s got that wrong. No way have there been seventeen …’

  ‘Have you been counting them?’ said Mand, tossing the toffee wrapper toward t’ waste bin. ‘I think it’s disgusting, counting them like that. Like knocking down skittles. Seventeen ruddy skittles, each wi’ t’ face of a woman on it.’

  Mother shushed us both and shifted hersen to t’ edge of her chair.

  … HATRED … SPAWNED …

  Now t’ reporter wor standing in a terraced street. It looked like Harehills, but could have been anywhere.

  … BOTTLED UP …

  The reporter wor saying that the relatives of t’ victims wanted to talk to t’ Ripper himsen. A woman’s head appeared, sideways on. She turned to face us.

  Talking Head 1: Mrs Irene MacDonald … BEAST … COWARD …

  Sis faked a yawn. Her tongue wor stained wi’ t’ toffee. ‘Must we?’

  I said, ‘I wonder whose idea this wor? Getting them to talk to t’ camera like this?’

  Talking Head 2: A woman wi’ short grey hair and glasses. She also starts sideways on, but facing t’other way. Then she’s facing us. She hasn’t turned her head, she’s just suddenly staring out into our rooms … NOT A MAN … DESPICABLE … DESPISE …

  Talking Head 3: The reporter introduces her as Mrs Olive Smelt, who wor attacked in 1975 in Halifax. This wor t’ first I knew of her. I never knew there wor others before Wilma. I gazed at Olive intently. One of her eyes wor very dark, much darker than t’other one, like she couldn’t see out of it any more. But it could have just been t’ camera light and shadow, I couldn’t rightly tell. Her voice wor soft, kindly.

  Then we got Talking Head 4: Her husband, Harry Smelt. Again he wor fully sideways on to t’ camera, then face on, like he wor in a police photo-fit. His face wor like a boy melding into an old man … PRETTY LOW SEXUALLY …

  Mother fidgeted, making her stockings rustle on her inner thighs.

  Talking Head 5: The father of one of t’ victims, murdered only last year … LOWEST OF THE LOW … TAPE TO POLICE … GUINNESS BOOK OF RECORDS …

  ‘Mrs Husk says that tape ain’t HIM. You know, that Geordie bloke on t’ tape. Are you getting me, Mother? This woman on my pop round, Mrs Husk, she reads the tea leaves. She says the tape’s a hoax.’

  Mother got up and turned up the volume, then sat back down again. Without taking her eyes from t’ screen, she said, ‘I’d have thought you’d know better than to believe owt that some batty old woman on your pop round tells you.’

  Talking Head 6: The mother. She has highly arched eyebrows and long sideways lashes. … INADEQUATE PERSON … PHYSICALLY … MENTALLY …

  ‘Who wor it, eh?’ I said. ‘Who wor right there when that Wilma McCann wor found? Me, that’s who. Who’s sat and listened to all t’ stories from prozzies on t’ round … and … and … we’ve all seen what happened to folks’ marriages, haven’t we, to Don and Mavis … even to us … what wi’ all t’ talk and deceit, all t’ lies …’

  Sis grabbed another toffee and hissed, ‘You of all people can talk about deceit and lies. Hiding yersen away, pretending!’

  ‘You can go to hell. You’re not even my proper sister. You’re only …’

  ‘Enough!’ Mother gla
red at us. ‘Shut it! Both of you!’

  Talking Head 5 wor Maureen Long, who wor attacked in 1977. She had such a deep, dark voice for a woman, it almost vibrated through t’ telly speaker.

  There wor a shift. The Talking Heads wor no longer addressing HIM directly, but the woman in his life, whoever that wor.

  ‘How do they know,’ I said, ‘that there’s a woman in his life? There might not be a woman in his life at all, which is why …’

  … HARBOURING … LOATHSOME …

  Mother said, ‘Someone has to be protecting him. Someone knows, and most likely it’s his wife.’

  That got me thinking about t’ time when two coppers came calling and Mother covered for Mitch, but I said nowt.

  Sis got up. ‘I hate HIM. I hate the way he’s part of our lives! I wish I lived somewhere else, somewhere right across t’ country where he can’t get at us!’

  ‘And where are you off to?’

  … GIVE HIM UP … DESPISED … EVERY WOMAN …

  ‘Why should you care?’

  … US MOTHERS …

  ‘Mandy?’

  … THE DEVIL ITSELF …

  Mother yelled, ‘I can’t hear t’ telly! I want to watch this!’

  A horn parped outside, quickly, like it wor a warning or someone signalling summat. I bounded upstairs and peeked through t’ hole in my curtains. A white Ford van had pulled up outside t’ house. Some young bloke, black hair, black leather jacket, washed-out grey jeans, jumped out, and Mand rushed out and threw her friggin’ arms around him. Marcus. I watched them snogging forever, their tongues dental diving. Then sis came back indoor while Marcus leant against t’ van and tossed a chew of some sort into his gob. A few moments later sis reappeared, dragging a bag. Marcus took it from her and heaved it into t’ passenger side of t’ van. Then sis got in. I suddenly remembered: Marcus’s band wor playing some gig in Nottingham. I’d read it in her diary. Sis wor skedaddling off wi’ Marcus to Nottingham. Stupid cow. By t’ time I’d reached the bottom of t’ stairs I could hear t’ van pulling away. Mother came out of t’ lounge.

  ‘Who wor that?’

  ‘I think Mand’s just done a runner.’

  Mother looked at me all nonplussed. ‘In this weather? Oh, the stupid little fool. And HE’s out there. Why am I always being kept in t’ dark? Why don’t no one ever tell me what’s going on?’