A Fistful of Knuckles

by Tom Graham

  ‘I know the one you mean, Guv.’

  ‘Good. Keep her in mind. She wears a blindfold, Sam, but don’t think she ain’t got her eyes on you and me.’

  Beep! Beeeeeep!

  In his own time, Gene settled back in his seat, put the Cortina into gear, and calmly moved on. He turned right.

  ‘You’re going the wrong way,’ said Sam.

  ‘No I’m not.’

  ‘The hospital’s straight on the left.’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘Then why aren’t we going straight on and then left, guv?’

  ‘Because we’re not going to the hospital, you dollop. God, Tyler, for a professional copper you can be unnervingly slow on the uptake.’

  ‘If we’re not going to the hospital, where are we going?’

  The Cortina nosed its way up a walled-in service road until it reached the grounds of a derelict factory. The sun was starting to set behind the rotting corrugated iron roofing.

  ‘What the hell are we doing here, Guv? Are we carrying out an extreme makeover on this place?’

  Without answering him, Gene cruised the car round the yard until he saw an open shed with dilapidated doors. He parked the car inside.

  ‘This’ll do,’ he said.

  ‘Guv, please, I’m not getting my head around this. What’s going on? Why have we come here?’

  Gene pointed. Sam looked through the windscreen of the Cortina and out through the doors of the warehouse. In the courtyard beyond, a rough-looking group of men appeared, hurrying through the evening shadows towards a large abandoned warehouse. As they disappeared inside, several more men appeared and went in after them.

  ‘Who are they?’ Sam asked.

  ‘Punters,’ said Gene.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Well, Tyler, while you were having a tender heart-to-heart with Spider, me and the boys were getting on with some real policework. We were digging up some old contacts from the underworld, putting our ears to the grapevine, getting the word from the street, and all that bollocks. Looks like Patsy O’Riordan’s still active as an illegal bare-knuckle fighter. He’s something of a legend. Nobody’s ever beaten him. And like the fastest gun in the west, whatever town he rolls into there’s always somebody keen to take him on.’

  Sam watched as more men arrived and headed inside the old workshop. Now that he thought about it, he saw that it was the perfect place to hold an illegal fight. It was enclosed, private, walled-off from prying eyes. A hundred men or more could gather in that workshop and the world outside would know nothing about it.

  ‘Forget your poncey plan about posing as fight promoters,’ said Gene. ‘We’ll just wait for O’Riordan to knacker himself out fighting, then nick him.’

  ‘Nick him? Here?! In front of a crowd? Guv, we’ll get ourselves lynched!’

  Gene drew deeply on his cigarette, unconcerned.

  But Sam was insistent. ‘Think about it, Guv. We don’t have enough evidence to put together a case.’

  ‘And at this rate we never will. I want that bastard banged up and off the streets. If you’re right and he’s ready to do a disappearing act, then we can’t afford to fanny about anymore. We’ll nick him after the fight – it don’t matter what the charge is – lock him in the cells so he can’t go nowhere, put together the rest of the case, then charge him. No need for pricking about undercover, Tyler.’

  ‘It won’t work, Guv.’

  ‘You’re not the one to make that decision,’ said Gene firmly. He fixed Sam with a granite stare.

  Sam stared back, said: ‘You’re jeopardizing the case, Guv.’

  ‘I’m your DCI, so lump it.’

  ‘Sir, I will not.’

  ‘Sir? You’re calling me sir now? That sounds ominous.’

  ‘I refuse to arrest Patsy O’Riordan before we’ve established a watertight case against him,’ said Sam, his voice controlled but angry. ‘It is reckless, unprofessional and counter-productive.’

  ‘No, Sammy-boy, it’s just good basic policing. And I won’t argue about it.’

  ‘Sir, I formally urge you to reconsider.’

  ‘There’s that word again! I could get used to it. Sir Gene Hunt.’

  ‘If you’re going to go ahead with arresting O’Riordan …’

  ‘Which I am.’

  ‘Then you’ve left me no choice,’ declared Sam. ‘You’re on your own here tonight.’

  And with that, he flung open the door and clambered out.

  At once, Gene popped up on the other side of the Cortina and glared fiercely across the car roof at him.

  ‘Don’t you walk out on me, Tyler!’

  ‘You’ve given me no option!’

  ‘I’m your superior officer, I don’t have to give you ruddy options!’

  ‘Is all this macho stuff going to your head, is that what’s going on? I saw you in Stella’s Gym, Gene, you were behaving like bloody Popeye Doyle, swaggering about, acting the big man. Why? Why? What the hell for?’

  ‘Because I’d had me spinach.’

  ‘Popeye Doyle, Gene! From the bloody French Connection, not the one with the anchors! Oh for God’s sake! What is it that gets into you and makes you carry on like this? Does it make you feel good? Or are you such a bloody hairy-knuckled caveman that when you’re around hard nuts and muscle men you just have to give ‘em all the old Mike Tyson routine?’

  ‘The whaty-who routine?’

  ‘Is it Ray who’s put this idea into your head about coming here and nicking Patsy?’ barked Sam. ‘I bet it is. I bet you and him were talking while I was interviewing Spider. That poofy Tyler, all tea ‘n sympathy, he don’t have the balls for a case like this. Stuff ‘im, Guv – nick O’Riordan, bring ‘im in, put the squeeze on his ol’ ball bearings and get him to fess up!’

  Gene narrowed his eyes suspiciously: ‘Have you been eavesdropping on us, Tyler?’

  ‘No, Gene, I just know you and Ray too well. You want to play John Wayne out here with the tough guys? Fine. Do it. Do what the hell you want. I can’t stop you. But I won’t be part of you screwing up this case. I won’t sink to your level. And I’ll tell you why.’

  ‘Oh, please do Tyler, I’m hangin’ on every word.’

  ‘Because I’m a man, not a little boy.’

  Sam slammed the Cortina door and stomped furiously away. He could feel Gene’s stare boring into the back of his head. As he reached the doors of the warehouse, Gene called after him:

  ‘I accept your resignation, Tyler. Get your desk cleared by the time I bring O’Riordan in.’

  Sam kept walking. He didn’t turn and he didn’t speak. If Gene wanted to interpret what he’d said as a resignation, then so be it. So be it. There was no reasoning with the man. In fact, there was no point trying to work with him at all. Macho, arrogant, conceited, knuckle-headed, backward …

  ‘Borderline alcoholic, homophobic, racist …’ Sam added under his breath as he stormed across the factory courtyard making for the street. ‘… Unprofessional, bigoted, unthinking, unfeeling …’

  ‘Wrong way, son,’ growled a huge man with a bristling beard who suddenly blocked Sam’s path. Laughing with his equally huge and hairy companions, he clamped his massive arm around Sam’s shoulders and swept him along. ‘The action’s through here!’

  Sam tried to unhook himself from the man’s iron embrace, but the next thing he knew he was stumbling and tripping through a set of doors into a cavernous abandoned workshop. It was filling up with men – with blokes – unwashed, unshaven, reeking of cheap tobacco and booze and stinking breath. They were gathering around a cleared space, an arena, empty but expectant, the bear-pit where Patsy O’Riordan and his opponent would clash.

  The workshop doors clanged shut. A bolt was thrown. Nobody was getting in or out. Sam glanced round. He caught a glimpse of a camelhair coat amid the eager press of bodies, then lost sight of it.

  Damn it! he thought, feeling trapped and frustrated. And then: Damn you, Hunt, for getting me stuck here! You stupid mac
ho pig! Damn you!

  Okay, Sam told himself, getting his head together. Since I’m stuck here, I can do something useful. I can make sure Gene doesn’t arrest Patsy O’Riordan, because if he does – if he shoots his bolt too soon – I can see this whole case going right down the swanny.

  He looked around, trying to get a fix on where Gene was, but he couldn’t see him. The place was a riot of excited men, shouting and clamouring and flapping wads of fivers and tenners at each other as they slapped on their bets for the fight to come. Billows of cigarette smoke fogged the workshop. Cans of lager cracked and frothed. There was pushing, shoving, sudden outbursts of temper – men squared up, flung a few punches, were dragged apart; there was braying laughter and phlegmy coughing, burps and belches and huge, ripping farts. Men stood against the wall and pissed openly.

  I bet Gene feels completely at home here, thought Sam. It’s all blokes. Just blokes. Nothing but blokes. Blokes being blokes. Full-on blokeage. A bloke-fest. Wall-to-wall bloke-a-rama in widescreen with THX sound. A world of pure bloke.

  Streams of urine trickled from the makeshift latrines, flowed across the floor, and pooled round Sam’s feet. Disgusted, he forced his way through the jostling crowd to escape a soaking. Heaps of fag ash fell across his jacket. Somebody pulled the ring on a can of lager and showered him in foam.

  And still he couldn’t locate Gene Hunt amid the scrum.

  What’s Gene’s plan? He said he’d nick Patsy after the fight – presumably when he’s exhausted. But would an ogre like Pasty ever go quietly? And what about everyone else in here – does Gene really think they’ll stand by meekly and watch O’Riordan led off to the station? They’ll lynch him!

  The place was a powder keg, charged with testosterone and the thrill of imminent violence, ready to go up if Gene was stupid enough to start flashing his police badge and shouting the odds.

  I need to stop him. He’ll not only blow the whole case, he’ll get himself killed into the bargain!

  ‘You need me, Hunt,’ he said to himself. ‘You’ll just have to delay my resignation for another day.’

  All at once, the atmosphere in the room shifted. There were cheers, shouts, sporadic booing. Sam saw the monstrous figure of Patsy O’Riordan appear in the arena, the demon face inked onto his huge body glaring and snarling. Patsy postured, flexed his muscles, prowled about like an animal. It was the same sub-human display he had put on at Terry Barnard’s Fairground, just before he had pasted that foolhardy kid who’d so rashly gone up against him.

  But his opponent this time won’t be a kid, Sam thought. This is a serious fight. This is the real deal.

  The crowd parted, revealing the biggest, broadest, blackest man Sam had ever seen. He was a hulking mountain of muscle. His jet-black skin shone. His eyes blazed like points of cold, white light.

  A chant went up from a section of the crowd: Chalk-ee, Chalk-ee, Chalk-ee!

  Chalky. What else would he be called? This was the 70s.

  Confidently, Chalky stepped into the arena and eyeballed his opponent. Patsy stared right back. The crowded bated and goaded them, but neither man moved. A man with combed-over hair and catastrophic teeth pushed himself between the two boxers, keeping them apart. This was the ref – or rather, the nearest thing a fight with no rules would get to having a ref.

  No gloves, no rules, no mercy, thought Sam. This is going to be a nasty fight – nasty and vicious and bloody and cruel.

  At that moment, he sensed something – a sharp, lemony fragrance that managed to cut through the stench of fag smoke and aftershave and body odour and piss. He knew it at once. And the moment he recognized it, a voice whispered in his ear – husky, hard, but definitely female.

  ‘Didn’t expect to see you, soft-boy. Is this business or pleasure?’

  Sam turned, and there was Stella, all lipstick and eye shadow, winking at him. She drew regally on a cigarette held between her red-taloned fingers and blew the smoke into Sam’s face.

  ‘You want to know what I’m doing here?’ coughed Sam. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Getting my rocks off, what do you think?’

  Her eyes glittered expectantly at the two men about to beat the living shite out of each other in the arena. A shiver of delight ran through her body.

  ‘Have you got your beautiful guv’nor with you?’ she asked. ‘Don’t tell me you left him at home.’

  But Sam said nothing. He was thinking. Was Stella the one who had betrayed Denzil? Spider had said she had no motive, but here she was at a Patsy O’Riordan fight. It was surely no coincidence. Was there a connection between her and Patsy? And if there was, did she have a motive to betray Denzil, and Spider too?

  Before he could think of something to say, he saw Stella’s face tighten into a tense expression of sexual arousal – and at the same moment, there was a surge and roar from the crowd.

  The fight was on.

  The referee leapt clear from the arena, his comb-over flapping loose, as Patsy and Chalky slammed into each other like colliding freight trains. It was a far cry from the blind thrashing the boy at the fair had hurled at Patsy; these two huge men fired punches like artillery shells, pounding each other’s faces with staggering force. They grappled together, rabbit punching, biting, kneeing each other in the balls – then broke apart, the sweat flying from them, and the blood too. Chalky hulked menacingly, his huge hands clenching. Patsy stared out through his tattooed flesh, eyes blazing, his tiny, compact fists raised and ready, the ridges of his knuckles hard as iron.

  Seconds later, they were at each other again, pummelling and pounding. The crowd went wild. The roar of men’s voices was deafening. Stella shamelessly ran her hand down her body and between her legs, her eyes widening then narrowing but never wholly blinking as she followed the action in the arena.

  Between the no-holds-barred fighting, and the wildness of the crowd, and the flagrant arousal of Stella, Sam felt he had materialized in some lawless, subhuman zone outside of civilized society, somewhere where all decency had broken down, where there was nothing but violence and lust and cruelty. He was amongst savages.

  Perhaps Stella didn’t need a motive to betray Denzil. Perhaps the pleasure of witnessing violence was motive enough.

  As he looked at her, he tried to imagine her reacting in just this same way to Patsy beating Denzil to death in his bedsit. Had she licked her lips then as she was doing now? Had her breasts heaved in the same way? Had she rubbed her crotch so shamelessly as Denzil Obi was killed in front of her?

  She’s clearly a sadomasochist. But is she a monster? Would her depraved pleasures lead her to be complicit in murder?

  He found it hard to believe – and yet, here she was, under the same roof as Patsy O’Riordan, lapping up the violence like it was quality erotica.

  But this was no place for him to pursue a line of enquiry. The clamour of the men was deafening. In the arena, Patsy was slugging away at Chalky like a man demolishing a wall. Blood was splattering and streaming down Chalky’s face. Wet, red chunks were flying into the air. Blow after blow impacted against the man’s jaw, lips, nose, eyes, until his face was so pulped that it looked as if it were melting. Patsy rammed a punch into his opponent’s stomach, doubling him up. Chalky vomited. Patsy slammed him upright again with an uppercut, then battered his head this way and that with a rapid succession of left-right-left-right punches. Sam waited for the ref to intervene, for the bell to sound – and then realized that this fight would continue, unchecked, until only one man was standing.

  Go down! Sam silently urged Chalky. For God’s sake, don’t take any more of this! Go down! Go down!

  Incredibly, Chalky ducked Patsy’s blows and staggered past him. There was still one last scrap of fight left in him. Blind and disoriented, he hurled drunken blows at Patsy, stepped into the pool of his own vomit, skidded, lost his footing, and fell. And as he did, Patsy got in one last blow – a crowd-pleaser, an act of pure theatrics on an already defeated opponent. It was a merciless left hook
that caught Chalky full-on as he toppled, spinning him over in mid-air and sending him crashing into the ecstatic crowd.

  Thank God it’s over, thought Sam.

  But it wasn’t over. Pumped up and raging, Patsy waded into the crowd which parted before him like the Red Sea, revealing the crumpled, bleeding remnants of Chalky on the hard concrete floor – lying in a red sea of his own. Patsy leathered into him, kicking him like he was a football, stamping on his head, aiming blows into his neck, his kneecaps, his genitals.

  It’s Denzil Obi all over again …

  This couldn’t go on. It wasn’t boxing. It was obscene.

  Sam shoved forward, roughly pushing his way through the howling men.

  ‘Stop!’ he bellowed. And then, his instincts taking over: ‘Police! Stop!’

  His voice was swallowed by the noise. He was an agent of the Law, but the Law had no place here amid these hollering, blood-crazed men. Struggling to reach O’Riordan, he found himself the target of blows and kicks from the crazed onlookers. He stumbled and went down, glimpsing Stella’s glistening, wet-lipped face loving every second of it. Furiously, he fought his way back up. Somebody grabbed his shoulder and hauled him powerfully to his feet – and in the next moment, Sam was nose-to-nose with Gene Hunt.

  ‘Tyler, you twonk!’

  ‘Get your hands off me, Hunt! I’m nicking him!’

  ‘You’ve changed your tune all of a sudden!’

  ‘Somebody has to stop this! Now get off me!’

  ‘You wade in now, Tyler, and O’Riordan will kill you! And I mean kill you!’

  ‘Now look who’s changed their tune!’

  A few yards away from them, Patsy was picking up from the floor what was left of Chalky, holding his limp body with one hand so that he could pulverize it further with his other. Sam glimpsed Chalky’s head lolling from side to side, his face a shapeless pudding of blood.

  ‘Wait!’ hissed Gene as Sam fought to get free of him. ‘Wait till he’s done!’

  ‘That man will be dead!’