Kidnap

by Philip McCutchan

“I’m not moaning. I’m just stating a fact, that’s all. I don’t like the bloody job.”

  Ag shrugged and went off to the kitchen. Mr Blundy heard her banging saucepans about in a temper. Gloom settled like a pall, a thick blanket of despondency. Mr Blundy’s back ached from unaccustomed work, hard work with broom and hoover, polishing cloths and all that. Women’s work, and his workmates were mostly women — not personable women, not birds. Hags, more like, middle-age and up. Very different from the unclad young girls of Mr Blundy’s dreams.

  Sod the job.

  *

  Down the boozer on Saturday evening, spending what Ag allowed him out of his own hard-earned wages. A nice pint of mother-in-law — stout and bitter. Froth edged Mr Blundy’s greedily sucking mouth. A finger dug him hard in the small of the back, causing some spillage.

  Mr Blundy swung round indignantly. Indignation didn’t last; this was a piece of luck. An old friend.

  “Just come out, Ern,” the friend said.

  “Heard you was inside.”

  “Yes.” The speaker was not unlike Mr Blundy, but taller; thin and slightly stooped with an overlarge head that was totally bald in front and covered at the back, when last at large, with shoulder-length brown hair. This was now trimmed to prison requirements. It would grow again. The man was Bernie Harris, known as the Loop in Mr Blundy’s circle, the reason for this name having been lost in the mists of time in both senses of the word, though there was possibly some connection with his extraordinarily hooked nose, which looked quite like a teapot handle. Bernie Harris, whose perpetual grin, friendly or oily according to taste, hid a crafty and dangerous mind, had been in and out of prison since the age of around twenty, and Borstal before that. He was unique among criminals in that he changed his line after every nicking, on the principle, quite a clever one, that the Old Bill expected all villains to stick to their last. This stratagem hadn’t in fact helped all that much, but the Loop clung to it obstinately. Versatile, he was: safe-breaker, con man, forger, pick-pocket, car thief … you name it. Not very successful, never having served a proper apprenticeship in any skill. Jack of all trades. As a safe-breaker he’d been pathetic, waited so long for his charge to go off on his one and only attempt that he’d been a sitting duck for the Bill.

  “So what are you doing now?” Mr Blundy enquired.

  “This and that. How about sitting down for a natter? I’ll take a pint with me, thanks very much.”

  They carried their glasses over to a table in a quiet corner for the natter. The Loop asked, “How’s things with you, eh?”

  “So so.”

  A quick glance and a nod. “Not so good, eh? What you been doing, Ern?”

  “Going straight,” Mr Blundy said reluctantly.

  “You never.”

  “Got a job.”

  “Jeez!”

  “Bloody house cleaner, aren’t I?”

  “Well, blow me down, what a lark.” The Loop considered for a moment then asked, “How’s the wife?”

  “She’s okay.”

  “That’s good.”

  “Yes.”

  “How’s she taking it, Ern? You going straight. I mean, there’s not a lot of money in going straight, now is there?”

  “There bloody isn’t.” A lot of feeling had gone into that utterance. “But as a matter of fact it was Mrs Blundy that insisted I should go straight.”

  “You being serious, Ern?”

  “Yes.” Mr Blundy lifted a hand and scratched moodily at his head. “Maybe she’ll get over it. Me, I reckon she will. She likes being in the money, does Mrs Blundy. So do I.”

  The Loop nodded. “Time of life,” he said.

  “Eh?”

  “Mrs Blundy. Menopause. Made her go funny?”

  “She had that a few years back. Or said she did.” Mr Blundy suspected that Ag had used it as an excuse to stop doing it for a while, but the while had gone on and on. The Loop was frowning in what looked like concentration, his mind not quite with Mr Blundy. Mr Blundy fell silent too, moodily contemplating his emptying glass and wondering if the Loop was going to refill it for him. Then the Loop piped up again.

  “Whereabouts is your house-cleaning job?” he asked. “South Ken.”

  “Class, eh. Decent houses.”

  “Money,” Mr Blundy said. “Oodles of it. Pours out of their lug-’oles. Never seen the like, never.”

  “Right,” the Loop said. “Worth bearing in mind, is that. You’ve got the entrée — or will have once they know you. And trust you, like.” He paused. “Got a bloke to see. Be seeing you — maybe put some business your way.”

  The Loop went off then, not buying his round, which was just like him. Bloke to see, Mr Blundy thought, my arse! He didn’t put much hope in the Loop’s unspecified offer. On the other hand, well, you never could tell. In any case, nothing ever did come of it.

  *

  It wasn’t him — house cleaning. It was demeaning. It was murder. Backache, dust up the nostrils, cheeky kids. After the following Monday’s gruelling work Mr Blundy went into a caff for a cup of coffee as the mean bitch at his workplace hadn’t given him one.

  He felt people were staring at him, looking at failure.

  “You all right, love?” A small, skinny old waitress with a shrivelled face. Mr Blundy looked blank and said, “Me? Yes, I’m all right. Thanks for asking.” Deep down he longed for some conversation, longed to open up to someone who wasn’t Ag, tell them his troubles, his hopes and aspirations — tell them he wasn’t all right at all. “Nice of you. Not many bother these days.”

  “That’s all right, love, if you’re all right you’ll want the bill.”

  So that was all she’d wanted, to know whether or not to bring another cup of coffee, or a bun. She shoved a bit of paper at him and moved on. Mr Blundy got up and paid at the desk then went out into the street. Raining again, sod it.

  Mr Blundy didn’t so much as mention the possibility of work via the Loop’s good offices. Not to Ag; for one thing, Ag didn’t much like the Loop. Bernie Harris, she’d said more than once in the past, scorning the use of his nickname, was a twister. Well, of course, that was dead true, he was; but she didn’t mean it quite like that. She meant that even his pals couldn’t trust him. That might also be true, though Mr Blundy couldn’t say the Loop had ever done him dirt.

  Anyway, it wasn’t fair. Life wasn’t fair. It just wasn’t fair at all. All those shop windows, trudging as he did along Kensington High Street. Big stores, little boutiques, they were all there for people who had the sponduliks. Expensive clothes, wonderful eats — delicatessens full of cheese and caviare and that — gift shops with lovely things made of leather and whatnot. Girls going in and out. Mr Blundy liked today’s fashions, they accentuated the curves and crevices — those crevices! — wonderfully, even if it was a bit difficult sometimes to tell if it was a bird or a fellow till you got round to the front and looked back. The hair and bums were mostly unisex.

  Ag didn’t have crevices. Not that he’d noticed.

  On the way home after work that evening Mr Blundy called in at the usual boozer. He had hopes of a word with the Loop, but the Loop wasn’t there. Mr Blundy went home to Ag more bitter than ever. He was going to give up the job if the Loop didn’t come up with something soon. The DSS was a far better prospect.

  *

  Saturday, and they went to Brands Hatch. There was to be Formula 3000 racing, not the big stuff like at Silverstone, but still. Ag didn’t like motor racing anyway, so why take her at all? Mr Blundy knew why: she insisted on coming, wouldn’t let him out of her sight in case he picked up a bird. Ag moaned all the way there, criticising his driving, criticising the poor old Granada, which had certainly seen much better days.

  “We’ll never get there.”

  “Yes we will.”

  “If we do, we won’t get home. Going to fall to bits, if you ask me.”

  “No it isn’t.”

  “Don’t look after it proper, that’s the trouble.”


  Mr Blundy ground his teeth. All that polishing, all that sweat, all the muck when he changed the oil, all the hard work and skill when he buried his head beneath the bonnet. All he said was, “She’ll do.” What he wanted was to give Ag a good, hard kick up the backside … a reflex action made him ram the clutch out involuntarily. There was a surging jerk as he let it back in, bang.

  “Your driving! Want lessons, you do.”

  “Shut up, do.”

  An indrawn breath. “Don’t you ever tell me to shut up! I never heard the like, never.” She shook with anger. So did Mr Blundy, being at the end of his tether. He had his revenge. He got her in a real tizzy by the time they made Brands, by using his feet in conjunction with his loaf. She thanked God for a safe arrival. “In spite of your rotten driving,” she almost spat at him.

  They entered the car park for the enclosure — Mr Blundy certainly couldn’t afford the stands. It would be a day of trudging from one vantage point to another in order to snatch the best views of the track, but it would also be a day of thrills and a display of authoritative knowledge on the part of Mr Blundy. He would come into his element. He would participate in, and communicate to Ag, each and every emotion suffered by the drivers as they went into Druids or stormed along Bottom Straight to zoom, howl and snarl their thunderous passage round South Bank Bend and past Clearways for Pilgrim’s Drop and Hawthorns.

  “Come on, Ag.” Once parked, Mr Blundy was impatient for the smell of oil and burned-up tyres.

  “Coming, aren’t I? Don’t fuss.” Ag came out bum first, dragging a basket of lunch — paste sandwiches, bottles of lemonade, packets of crisps. She handed all this to Mr Blundy, who locked the car doors meticulously, knowing his cloth only too well. They made their way over rough ground, all tufts of grass and hard-packed earth ridges where mud had been churned up and then dried. Down to the roadway running behind the stands, under the Dunlop arch. Ag went into the Ladies’, leaving Mr Blundy to wait with the lunch basket. Mr Blundy cast an eye towards a bar farther along; he could do with a can of lager. Fill up while Ag emptied: past experience told him there should be ample time.

  In the bar, a miracle happened. The Loop, ahead of him in the queue, whistling softly to himself and waving a ten quid note all ready to place his order. No time like the present: Mr Blundy left the queue and approached the Loop.

  “Well, blow me down if it isn’t Ern.”

  “Didn’t know you liked motor racing.”

  No comment from the Loop on that, but a curious look in his face. “How’s things, Ern?”

  “Same.” Mr Blundy lowered his voice. “Hoped to be seeing you down the boozer.”

  “What about, Ern?”

  “What you said. Maybe a job.”

  “Oh, that.” The Loop gave him a dirty look. “Do you mind? There’s a time and a place for everything. Right?”

  “Sorry, mate. Sorry to offend, like.”

  “Yes, well.” The Loop looked mollified. “Now listen, Ern. I might be able to … help. See? No promises. I just might. Doing anything Monday night?”

  “No —”

  “See you in the boozer, six-thirty.” The Loop turned away. Mr Blundy left the bar. Outside, Ag was waiting, glaring round and about.

  “That was quick,” he said.

  “What was quick?”

  “What you went to do, pee. Usually take —”

  “Place was all locked up, wasn’t it?”

  “Oh.”

  “And I s’pose you went for a drink.”

  “Yes, I —”

  “With that friend of yours. Don’t tell me, I know. I just seen something I don’t like: Bernie Harris.”

  “Oh yes?”

  “What’s he want?”

  “Oh … nothing. Ag —”

  “Don’t you act the innocent with me, Ernest Blundy. Just tell me what he’s after.”

  She’d have to know sooner or later. “Just might be able to put something in my way, like.”

  “Such as what?”

  “Didn’t say. Come on, Ag. Let’s get along to the paddock.”

  “Paddock,” she said disparagingly. “Silly name for a garridge. Don’t know why I come.” (But he did.) “Now look, Ern. That Bernie Harris. You watch your step. Put everything he says under the microscope.”

  “Yes, I will, Ag. I haven’t committed myself to anything —”

  “Then don’t you, ever.” She was quite angry. “All he does, it’s for his own benefit, see.”

  “Yes, Ag. Let’s get to the paddock before it fills up. Wait outside if you like. It’s cheaper.”

  “You shut your face.”

  *

  In the paddock, the busy mechanics were at work on last-minute adjustments. Lovely cars — great gleaming monsters of speed to Mr Blundy, though Ag remarked crushingly, as she always did, that she was surprised how small they were close to.

  “Telly gives you the wrong impression,” she said.

  Mr Blundy’s mind wandered to Silverstone and the Grand Prix the year before. The Formula Ones had all been there — Ferrari, Lotus, Williams — in their shining immaculate cellulose, all colours of the rainbow. Mr Blundy had got close to Nigel Mansell, his current God — had even managed to touch his splendid overalls, which was really great and made Mr Blundy go all hot and cold and shiny eyed. Gerhard Berger had smiled in his direction but Mr Blundy, humble as ever, had turned swiftly and seen the bird who responded to that smile. In Alain Prost’s stall, or cubicle, or garridge, Mr Blundy had acquired a spurt of engine oil on his anorak, and even though it wasn’t Nigel Mansell’s engine oil, it was great too — Mr Blundy would treasure that black stain all his life: Alain Prost’s Uniflo, how big an accolade could you get, it was dead lucky was that, better than seagull shit even! Today, leaving the Brands paddock after a whole hour’s lovely ramble, Mr Blundy and Ag turned left.

  “Where we going?” Ag asked.

  “Druids. Best view there.”

  “Best view of crashes.”

  Mr Blundy set his teeth. Bitch. Druids was certainly a nasty sharp corner and a lot of drivers did spin off there. People like Ag had a way of saying motor-racing fans only went for the spin-offs and the brew-ups, for the thrills of injury or death, but it just was not true of the real fan. Not true at all: the real fan appreciated the skill in cornering, the mastery of the gearbox, the use of the brake and the rev counter — not the bad luck or slight mis judgment that led to accidents. The real fan hated seeing a noted name go wrong and was as sincerely sorry, when that happened, as any soft-hearted old lady in lace and lavender over the death of a cat. Ag wouldn’t have that, though. When Mr Blundy remonstrated she squashed him with a scornful laugh.

  Ag, however, had her physical uses at Brands. By now the place was filling up tight and the common enclosure crowds were, like Mr Blundy and Ag, sorting themselves out towards the best vantage points, a situation in which the tank-like qualities of Ag made their passage a whole lot easier. Ag simply moved forward and Mr Blundy followed, into and through a dedicated crowd of men and women, men and women mostly bearing transistors and little boards to which were clipped lap records, some with stopwatches, some with banjos, many with a mass of beer cans and baskets of sandwiches and flasks of coffee wedged down with Dad’s pullover. And a variety of dress, or in some cases undress: half-bare girls (lovely), men with funny hats or baseball hats or no hats at all — hairy men, smooth men, sometimes smelly men. It was great, and it wasn’t much like Ascot. Mr Blundy fancied he’d be right in saying the Queen hadn’t yet come to Brands. He wondered she didn’t, really.

  Afterwards, it took Mr Blundy all of two hours of stop-start-stop to get clear of the car park.

  “Why come when you got to go through all this after?”

  “It’s a day out and I enjoy it.”

  “Always got to be what you enjoy.”

  “You can always get out and walk.”

  “No need to be rude. Or stupid.”

  “Leave off, can’t you.�
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  Argue, argue. Argue all the way home to Paddington. Mr Blundy’s head swelled and retracted and swayed. He thought maybe he ought to have his blood pressure checked some time, though he doubted there was anything the quack could do so long as Ag was still around.

  *

  Monday evening, no Loop in the boozer.

  Every night that week Mr Blundy went down the boozer at six-thirty, feeling that perhaps he’d gone and mistaken the day, though he was sure he hadn’t.

  No Loop.

  Mr Blundy made a few casual enquiries, very discreet: the Loop hadn’t been in at all. Not all week.

  All week!

  That week stretched for months.

  Through the rest of the year, September, October … over Christmas, over New Year.

  Into February. Mr Blundy tried to forget that wonderful but evidently phony promise, but it rankled: it wasn’t fair, to raise his hopes and then just vanish into thin air (and not inside; Mr Blundy had checked that one out). It was all part and parcel of his lot, just another thing that hadn’t come off, another thing that had gone wrong. From time to time the image of his father flashed before him, saying: “It’s good for you to go without, Ernie lad.” God, hadn’t he gone without enough yet?

  You couldn’t do anything else but go without, not on the DSS. Over Christmas Mr Blundy had gone down with ’flu and had felt so ill after that he’d chucked the house cleaning.

  Then the Loop turned up.

  Down the boozer, Saturday night, first week of February — that was when the miracle happened. The Loop breezed in bright and happy, with just a casual apology.

  “Been busy. This and that — getting things organised. All for you, Ern, all for you. Takes time to organise a job like this one.” The Loop clapped Mr Blundy on the shoulder, hard. “Bring your glass over. We’ll talk.”

  Over once again to the nice quiet corner — quiet in a special sense, though really it wouldn’t have mattered where they talked considering the din. Bloody juke-boxes, Mr Blundy thought angrily as he was cannoned into one off a fat girl and lost half his stout-and-bitter.

  “This is big,” the Loop said. They were having to talk ear-to-mouth through the din.