by David Peace
“I’m looking for Paula?”
“I heard. Let’s go outside and talk about it.”
Two big men with moustaches stood behind Foster, the three of them all in tuxedos and bow ties, frills down the fronts of their shirts.
“I’m here for Paula.”
“You weren’t invited. Let’s go.”
“Merry bloody Christmas from Johnny Kelly,” I said, flicking Kelly’s invitation at Foster.
Foster glanced at his wife and then turned slightly to one of the men and muttered, “Outside.”
One of the men stepped towards me. I raised my hands in surrender and walked towards the door.
Turning round at the door, I said, “Thanks for the Christmas card, Pat.”
I watched the woman swallow and look at the carpet.
One of the men gently pushed me forward into the hall.
“Is everything all right, Don?” asked a man with grey curly hair and a fist full of Scotch.
“Yeah. This gentleman was just leaving,” said Foster.
The man tilted his head my way. “Do I know you?”
“Probably,” I said. “I used to work for that bloke over there with the beard.”
Chief Constable Ronald Angus turned and looked into the other room, where Bill Hadden was stood talking with his back to the door.
“Really? How interesting,” said Chief Constable Angus, taking another mouthful of whisky and rejoining the party.
Donald Foster was holding open the door for me and I got another gentle push in the back.
There was laughter coming from an upstairs room; a woman’s laugh.
I walked out of the house, the two men at my side, Foster behind me. I thought about sprinting across the lawn, making a dash for the Golden Fleece, wondering if they’d try and stop me in front of the party, knowing they would.
“Where are we going?”
“Just keep walking,” said one of the men, the one wearing a claret shirt.
We were at the top of the drive and I could see a man coming up from the gate towards us, half running, half walking.
“Shit,” said Don Foster.
We all stopped.
The two men looked at Foster, waiting for an order.
“It never bloody rains,” muttered Foster.
Councillor Shaw was out of breath, shouting, “Don!”
Foster walked a little way down to meet him, arms open, palms up, “Bill, nice to see you.”
“You shot my dog! You shot my bloody dog.”
Shaw was shaking his head, crying, trying to push Foster away.
Foster took him in a big bear hug, hushing him.
“You shot my dog!” screamed Shaw, breaking free.
Foster pulled him back into his arms, burying the man’s head inside his velvet tux.
Behind us on the steps to the door, Mrs Foster and a few guests stood shivering.
“What’s going on, love?” she said, her teeth and glass chat tering.
“Nothing. Everyone go back and have a good time.”
They all stood there on the steps, frozen.
“Go on. It’s bloody Christmas!” shouted Foster, Santa rucking Claus himself.
“Who wants to dance with me?” laughed Pat Foster, shaking her skinny tits and turning everyone back inside.
Dancing Machine thumped through the door, the fun and games resumed.
Shaw stood there, sobbing into Foster’s black velvet jacket.
Foster whispering, “This isn’t the time, Bill.”
“What about him?” said the man in the claret shirt.
“Just get him out of here.”
The other man in the red shirt took my elbow and started to lead me down the drive.
Foster didn’t look up, whispering into Shaw’s ear, “This is special, special for John.”
We walked past them, down the drive.
“You drive here did you?”
“Yeah.”
“Pass us your keys,” said Claret.
I did as I was told.
“That yours?” said Red pointing at the Viva, up on the pavement.
“Yeah.”
The men smiled at each other.
Claret opened the passenger door and lifted up the seat. “Get in the back.”
I got in the back with Red.
Claret got in behind the wheel and started the engine. “Where to?”
“New houses.”
I was sat in the back wondering why I hadn’t even bothered to try and get away, thinking maybe it wouldn’t be as bad as all that and how it couldn’t be any worse than the beating I’d taken at the Nursing Home, when Red hit me so fucking hard my head cracked the plastic side window.
“Shut the bloody fuck up,” he laughed, grabbing me by the hair and forcing my head down between my knees.
“If he were a nig-nog, he’d make you suck his cock,” shouted Claret from the front.
“Let’s have some fucking music,” said Red, still holding my head down.
Rebel Rebel filled the car.
“Turn it up,” shouted Red, lifting me back up by the hair, whispering, “Fucking puff.”
“Is he bleeding?” shouted Claret over the music.
“Not enough.”
He pushed me back towards the window, gripped me by the throat with his left hand, sat back a little way and rabbit-punched me on the bridge of my nose, sending hot blood across the car.
“That’s better,” he said and gently laid my head against the cracked glass.
I looked out at the centre of Wakefield on the Saturday before Christmas, 1974, the warm blood trickling from my nose to my lips and down on to my chin, thinking it’s quiet for a Saturday night.
“Is he out?” said Claret.
“Yep,” said Red.
Bowie gave way to Lulu or Ferula or Sandy or Cilia, The Little Drummer Boy washing over me, as Christmas lights became prison lights and the car bumped over the waste ground of Foster’s Construction.
“Here?”
“Why not.”
The car stopped, the Little Drummer Boy gone.
Claret got out and held up the driver’s seat as Red tipped me out on to the ground.
“He’s fucking gone, Mick.”
“Aye. Sorry, like.”
I lay face down between them, playing dead.
“What we supposed to do? Just leave him?”
“Fuck no.”
“What then?”
“Have some fun.”
“Not tonight Mick, I can’t be arsed with it.”
“Just a bit, eh?”
They took an arm each and dragged me across the ground, bringing my trousers down to my knees.
“In here?”
“Aye.”
They pulled me through the tarpaulin and across the wooden floor of a half-built house, splinters and nails ripping through my knees.
They sat me on a chair and bound my hands behind my back, pulling off my trousers over my shoes.
“Go bring car over here and put lights on.”
“Someone’ll see us.”
“Like who?”
I heard one of them go out and the other one come in close. He put his hand down inside my underpants.
“I hear you like a bit of cunt,” Red said, squeezing my balls.
I heard the engine of the car and the room was suddenly filled with white light and Kung-Fu Fighting.
“Let’s get it over with,” said Claret.
“Joe Bugner!” said a punch to the gut.
“Coon Conteh!” said another.
“George fucking Foreman,” said one across the jaw.
“The Ali Shuffle,” a pause, me waiting, then one from the left, one from the right.
“Bruce fucking Lee!”
I went flying back on the chair on to the ground, my chest fucked.
“Fucking puff,” said Claret, bending down and spitting into my face.
“We should fucking bury the cunt.”
Claret was lau
ghing, “Best not mess with George’s foun dations.”
“I hate these fucking brainy bastards.”
“Leave him. Let’s go.”
“That it?”
“Fuck it, let’s just get back.”
“Take his car?”
“Get a taxi on Westgate.”
“Fucking hell.”
A kick in the back of the head. A foot upon my right hand. Lights out.
The cold woke me.
Everything was pitch-black with purple borders.
I kicked the chair away and pulled my hands out of the binding.
I sat up in my underpants on the wooden floor, my head loose, my body raw.
I reached across the floor and pulled my trousers to me. They were wet and stank of another man’s piss.
I put them on over my shoes.
Slowly, I stood up.
I fell back down once and then walked out of the half-built house.
The car was sitting in the dark, doors shut.
I tried both doors.
Locked.
I picked up a broken brick, walked round to the passenger window and put the brick through it.
I put my hand inside and pulled up the lock.
I opened the door, picked up the brick and battered in the lock on the glove compartment.
I pulled out map books and damp cloths and a spare key.
I went round to the driver’s side, opened the door and got in.
I sat in the car, staring at the dark empty houses, remem bering the best game I’d been to with my father.
Huddersfield were playing Everton. Town got a free kick on the edge of the Everton area. Vie Metcalfe steps up, bends the ball round the wall, Jimmy Glazzard heads it in. Goal. Referee disallows it, forget why, says take it again. Metcalfe steps up again, bends the ball round the wall, Glazzard heads it in. Goal, the whole crowd in fucking stitches.
· fucking 2.
“Press’ll have a field day. Bloody bury them,” laughed my father.
I started the engine and drove back to Ossett.
In the drive at Wesley Street, I looked at my father’s watch.
It was fucking gone.
Must have been about three or so.
Fuck, I thought as I opened the back door. There was a light on in the back room.
Fuck, I ought to at least say hello. Get it over with.
She was in her rocking chair, dressed but asleep.
I closed the door and went up the stairs, one at a time.
I lay on the bed in my piss-stinking clothes, looking at the poster of Peter Lorimer in the dark, thinking it would’ve broken my Dad’s heart.
Ninety miles an hour.
Part 3
We are the dead
Chapter 10
Sunday 22 December 1974.
At five in the morning, ten policemen led by Detective Super intendent Noble broke down the door of my mother’s house with sledgehammers, slapped her across the face when she came out into the hall and pushed her back inside the room, ran up the stairs with shotguns, dragged me from my bed, pulling my hair out in clumps, kicked me down the stairs, punching me as I landed, and dragged me out the door and across the tarmac and into the back of a black van.
They slammed the doors and drove away.
In the back of the van they beat me unconscious, then slapped me across the face and urinated on me until I came round.
When the van stopped, Detective Superintendent Noble opened the back door and pulled me out by my hair, spinning me across the rear car park of Wakefield Police Station, Wood Street.
Two uniformed officers then pulled me by my feet up the stone steps and inside the Police Station, where the corridors were all lined with black bodies, punching and kicking and spitting on me as they dragged me by my heels again and again, up and down, up and down, the yellow corridors.
They took photographs, stripped me, cut the bandage off my right hand, took more photographs, and fingerprinted me.
A Paki doctor shone a torch into my eye, wiped a spatula round my mouth, and scraped under my nails.
They took me naked into a ten by six interrogation room with white lights and no windows, sat me down behind a table and handcuffed my hands behind my back.
Then they left me alone.
Sometime later they opened the door and threw a bucket of piss and shit across my face.
Then they left me alone again.
Sometime later they opened the door and hosed me down with ice water until I fell over on the chair.
Then they left me alone, lying on the floor, handcuffed to the chair.
I could hear screams from another room.
The screaming went on for what seemed like an hour, and then stopped.
Silence.
I lay on the floor and listened to the humming of the lights.
Sometime later the door opened and two big men in good suits came in carrying chairs.
They unlocked the handcuffs and picked up the chair.
One of the men had sideburns and a moustache and was about forty. The other man had fine sandy hair and his breath smelt of puke.
Sandy said: “Sit down and put your palms flat upon the desk.”
I sat down and did as I was told.
Sandy tossed the handcuffs to Moustache and sat down opposite me.
Moustache walked around the room behind me, playing with the handcuffs.
I looked down at my right hand, flat upon the table, four fingers made one, a hundred shades of yellow and red.
Moustache sat down and stared at me, putting the handcuffs on his fist like a knuckle-duster.
Suddenly he jumped up and brought the handcuffed fist down on top of my right hand.
I screamed.
“Put your hands back.”
I put them on the table.
“Flat.”
I tried to lay them down flat.
“Nasty.”
“You should get that seen to.”
Moustache was sitting down opposite me, smiling.
Sandy got up and went out of the room.
Moustache said nothing, just smiled.
My right hand throbbed blood and pus.
Sandy came back with a blanket and put it over my shoulders.
He sat down and took out a pack of JPS, offering one to Moustache.
Moustache took out a lighter and lit both their cigarettes.
They sat back and blew smoke at me.
My hands began to twitch.
Moustache leant forward and dangled the cigarette over my right hand, rolling it between two fingers.
I pulled my hand back a bit.
Suddenly he leant forward and grabbed my right wrist with one hand, grinding the cigarette into the back of my hand with the other.
I screamed.
He let go of my wrist and sat back.
“Put your hands back.”
I put them on the table.
My burnt skin stank.
“Another?” said Sandy.
“Don’t mind if I do,” he said, taking another JPS.
He lit the cigarette and stared at me.
He leant forward and began to dangle the cigarette over my hand.
I stood up, “What do you want?”
“Sit down.”
“Tell me what you want!”
“Sit down.”
I sat down.
They stood up.
“Stand up.”
I stood up.
“Eyes front.”
I could hear a dog barking.
I flinched.
“Don’t move.”
They moved the chairs and tables to the wall and left the room.
I stood in the centre of the room, staring at the white wall, not moving.
I could hear screams and the dog barking in another room.
The screaming and the barking went on for what seemed like an hour, and then stopped.
Silence.
I stood in the centre of the room, w
anting a piss, listening to the humming of the lights.
Sometime later the door opened and two big men in good suits came in.
One of the men had grey greased-back hair and was about fifty. The other man was younger with brown hair and an orange tie.
They both smelt of drink.
Grey and Brown walked around me in silence.
Then Grey and Brown brought the chairs and table back to the centre of the room.
Grey put a chair behind me.
“Sit down.”
I sat down.
Grey picked up the blanket from the floor and put it over my shoulders.
“Put your palms flat on the desk,” said Brown, lighting a cigarette.
“Please tell me what you want.”
“Put your palms flat.”
I did as I was told.
Brown sat down opposite me, while Grey walked around the room.
Brown laid a pistol on the table between us and smiled.
Grey stopped walking around and stood behind me.
“Eyes front.”
Suddenly Brown jumped up and pinned down my wrists, as Grey grabbed the blanket and twisted it around my face.
I fell forward off the chair, coughing and choking, unable to breathe.
They continued to hold down my wrists, continued to twist the blanket around my face.
I knelt on the floor, coughing and choking, unable to breathe.
Suddenly Brown let go of my wrists and I spun round in the blanket into a wall.
Crack.
Grey threw off the blanket and picked me up by the hair, standing me against the wall.
“Turn round and eyes front.”
I turned round.
Brown had the pistol in his right hand and Grey had some bullets and was throwing them up and catching them.
“Boss says it’s all right to shoot him.”
Brown held the pistol with both hands at arm’s length, poin ting at my head.
I closed my eyes.
There was a click and nothing happened.
“Fuck.”
Brown turned away, fiddling with the pistol.
There was piss running down my leg.
“I’ve fixed it. It’ll be all right this time.”
Brown pointed the pistol again.
I closed my eyes.
There was a loud bang.
I thought I was dead.
I opened my eyes and saw the pistol.
There were shreds of black material coming out of the barrel, floating down to the floor.
Brown and Grey were laughing.
