Pat was in the office, as always, on a Monday night. Monday was when they worked out the debts, collected any rents owed and decided who was going to be where for the rest of the week. It was their busiest day and Lance was now sitting opposite his brother and waiting for the lecture he was sure would be arriving at any moment. It was boring. Pat thought he was some kind of fucking film star the way he carried on.
‘Listen, Lance, you are starting to get on my fucking wick. Do you think I won’t hear what you’re doing?’
Pat was so annoyed it was all he could do not to lamp his brother there and then.
‘What, what is it now, Pat? Did I breathe wrong, or what?’
The sarcasm was heavy and Pat sat back in the padded leather chair, forcing himself to relax.
‘You beat up a fucking working man. He’s got three fucking kids and you’ve nearly crippled him. How’s he going to fucking earn a crust now? How are we gonna get our poke? The poke that is so important that you nearly crippled him for nine hundred quid. Nine hundred fucking quid and you beat him with a tyre iron . . .’
Lance shrugged, as always, as if he had the weight of the world on his shoulders.
‘He was two weeks late, what was I supposed to do?’
‘You cunt. You knew he was on holiday, he’s always had an account with us and his credit is fucking exemplary. He always pays on the nose, you fucking stupid, arrogant little shite.’
Pat was out of the chair now and Lance flinched. Despite himself he was worried.
‘Three fucking kids and a fucking life and you destroy it all without a fucking thought, you . . .’
Pat was hovering over him now and the urge to hammer him was so strong he could almost taste it.
‘I ain’t having it any more, Lance. This is your last chance and I mean it.’
‘It was an accident . . .’
Pat walked away from his brother and stared out of the window at the pavement below.
’Accident, my arse. You are on a fucking final warning, you vicious, vindictive cunt. How can I trust you now, eh? Even Spider and Mackie think you have gone too far this time. You’re making enemies and your enemies eventually become mine.’
Lance knew that this was serious. Normally Patrick went off on one and that was that. After all, their reputation for collecting money so quickly had been built on the fact he didn’t take any prisoners. If the money didn’t come to them at the designated time then the person was made to see the error of their ways. This was normally achieved with brute force and his unerring instinct for knowing what frightened the person involved the most, and using that knowledge without pity.
‘This is too far, Lance. You have finally gone too far.’
Pat was still on the verge of taking a tyre iron to Lance himself. See how he liked being beaten over the head and back with a heavy object. The thought of hammering him was so fucking tempting, just to vent this colossal anger. And all this over less than a grand in cash, it was laughable.
He knew Lance’s strong points and he used them to his advantage, he admitted that. But this attack was a reminder of what he was dealing with on a daily basis. Lance was slowly becoming a liability and he didn’t know how to rein him in without them falling out big time.
If he was honest, he was beginning to loathe the sight of Lance, and yet once they were outside of work, his brother was a different person. It was as if he was proving something all the time. But what that was, exactly, he had no idea.
Pat looked back at Lance. He was a strange cove, there was no doubt about that. From his ill-fitting suit to his scuffed brogues, he looked like Worzel Gummidge’s little brother. Even his hair wasn’t cut in any kind of style, he often needed a shave and he looked like he was a bit simple. But he wasn’t. That was another one of his strengths, people believed he was a fucking retard and he wasn’t. Lance was sharper than a samurai sword when he needed to be. He acted like a mong and kept away from the pubs and the clubs, rarely venturing out unless it was to harm someone. He was a fucking weirdo and he knew that something had to be done about it. Other than Kathleen and little Shawn, Lance had no care for anyone or anything and it bothered him.
‘Just go, Lance. Fuck off out of my sight . . .’
Lance still sat there, his heavy body slumped in the chair and his sarcastic half-smile in evidence, as usual.
But Lance knew he had gone too far this time. Pat was distancing himself from him and he wasn’t sure that he even realised what he was doing himself. They were spending less and less time together and it hurt him. Lance wanted to be his brother’s best friend but it was impossible. Pat was happy to be friends with anyone and Lance couldn’t be like that, no matter how hard he tried, and he had tried. He knew he made people uneasy. He knew that for some reason he didn’t gel with anyone. He knew he looked odd and that made people uneasy and it wasn’t deliberate, at least not at first.
Now he admitted that sometimes he used his personality to his own advantage. When he turned up on a doorstep at five in the morning with his smile and a blunt instrument, people tended to pay him what he asked without question. He was also asked by outsiders to collect particularly difficult debts on occasion and he was very well-paid for it. In fact, he had a reputation as the best collector in the Smoke. He was admired for the simple reason he collected them alone; Pat had not been out collecting with him for a long time and he very rarely used anyone else. He had a few people he might ask to collect a small debt but not the big ones. Not the important ones. He preferred to collect those personally.
Why he had gone over the top this time he wasn’t sure. In fact, he had known at the time that it was too much. But he had not cared, he had never liked the man. He was a clean-cut type with well-ironed shirts and a penchant for a flutter now and again. He was a fucking drone, a fucking suit. He was nothing to him and why Pat was so upset about it all he couldn’t really understand. But he was, and he had to show some remorse to make Pat think he was sorry about it.
‘Look, Pat, he fucked me off . . .’
Pat turned on him again, shouting angrily, ‘Don’t fucking lie to me. That bloke couldn’t get the hump if he was Quasimodo. You were out of order again. This ain’t the first time, is it? A few months ago you broke Jackie Tenant’s fucking legs and he still can’t work. You are the reason people have stopped betting with us, did you know that, eh? Punters are frightened you are going to turn up all guns blazing for a fucking drink, the equivalent of a fucking giro.’
Pat poked a finger in his brother’s face.
‘You are costing me money, mate, and that is something I will not fucking allow. Once you start being a liability, you’re out the door.’
‘Oh, have a day off, Pat . . . I was out of order, I admit. But at the end of the day we are fucking brothers and you’re talking to me like I’m nothing.’
Patrick could see the confusion in Lance’s eyes and knew that he didn’t really comprehend what he had done that was so wrong. He had always been like that, he pretended he was remorseful, but Pat knew he wasn’t. It was like the girl on the bus all those years ago. He preyed on anyone weaker than himself; it was in his nature to do so.
‘We are brothers and nothing can change that, but I will cut you off like a diseased limb if you cause anything like this again. People are talking about it. You might not have liked him but plenty of other people did, and you are bringing too much fucking interest on to us from the punters. It stops and it stops today, right?’
‘Of course, Pat. I said I was sorry...’
‘No, you’re not, but all that shit aside, I am warning you to keep your temper in check.’
Pat walked back to the window. His heart was beating so loud he could hear it and he knew that it was from anger and his disapproval of his brother’s way of life.
’All right, Pat, I’m going and, once more, I’m sorry. I get carried away.’
‘Like when you were on the bus all those years ago? I ain’t a mug, Lance, and don’t treat me like one.
You can go now and keep out of my face for a while until I calm down.’
He had his back to his brother, knowing that he was still angry enough to actually strike him if he didn’t leave him alone.
When Pat turned around, the office was empty; Lance had walked out without a sound as usual. He was good at that, was Lance. He knew it was the barb about the bus that had made him go. Lance hated that to be mentioned in any way. Pat knew he wondered if people still talked about it, remembered it. The girl he had thrown off the bus was the only person who seemed to have forgiven him; she came round with her mum and she always said hello to him. The world was full of strange things but that, he had to admit, was one of the strangest things he had ever come across.
Spider and Mackie were in a lock-up garage in Bethnal Green. The whole floor space was covered in black bin bags and the bin bags were full of cannabis. The smell was overpowering but, where they were, it only masked the smell of engine oil and overflowing bins.
As they waited for the buyers to arrive, they sat on a bench and smoked a joint together. It was a heavy smoke, all buds and no seeds. The first few hits gave them the spaced-out feeling that was the whole point of smoking dope in the first place. It was what dub reggae was for and why junk food was invented.
They were both aware of every noise, no matter how quiet, and they felt the heaviness that seemed to crawl all over their bodies while they waited.
‘That’s a good fucking draw, Dad.’
Spider nodded in agreement. He was still taking short, quick puffs, determined to prolong the high for as long as possible.
‘Too good to sell to this fucking shower, anyway.’
They both laughed then. Most of the dope they sold outside the community was not up to the standard they had come to expect.
‘I love the quiet, don’t you? It seems to seep into your skin and lets you become a part of it all.’
Spider nodded once more; he knew exactly what the boy meant.
It was like becoming at one with the world. Unless someone interrupted that, of course, and then it was a different high altogether.
‘You seen anything of Jimmy Brick lately?’
Spider shook his head again. It was a question he was being asked on a far too regular basis.
‘Why you keep asking me that?’
Mac sighed. ‘Just interested, that’s all. I know he’s working with Pat. But I thought you were mates, that’s all.’
‘We are, or perhaps I should say, were. Since he came back from Spain, he’s not the same somehow. I don’t know what it is, boy.’
Mackie looked at his father then and he saw the heaviness of his dreads and the glittering of his dark eyes. He was well stoned.
‘You didn’t keep in touch then when he was away?’
‘No. I didn’t even know where he was, to be honest. After Patrick died, it was all fucked up you know. He didn’t seem to have anything on paper, even my partnerships with him were fucking disputed. He was a shrewd man but he wasn’t expecting to die, was he? So, like many a man before him, he was investing his poke and living off the proceeds. With people like us, it’s the equivalent to an overdraft. There was a lot of fucking doubting and fighting over it. Brewster won because he had the biggest crew behind him and, of course, he looked like he was avenging the death. A death that he had actually had a hand in arranging.’
Mac listened to his father with interest.
‘How come you wanted me back on the scene so suddenly?’
Spider was taken aback at the words. ‘What the fuck do you mean?’
‘What I say. You had a new family, didn’t you? You paid for us but you didn’t really see much of me until I grew up. I used to wonder where you were, you know, wonder what you were doing. Is it because my mum was white?’
‘What the fuck you on about, boy? All my kids are taken care of and you never went without anything that you needed. Your mother was the fucking bugbear there, her and her father, who, incidentally, hated me from the moment I knocked on his front door.’
Spider was laughing again. It was the loud and boisterous laugh of the very stoned.
‘Don’t you tell yourself things that never happened, OK? You were my firstborn and I loved you from the moment I saw you.’
‘You’ve got three boys and we’re all called Eustace. Don’t you think that’s fucking strange? Because, to be perfectly honest, Dad, I do.’
Spider shrugged nonchalantly. ‘No, actually, I don’t. Now stop this stupid fucking talk. I can hear a car outside, the dealers have arrived.’ He didn’t say anything else to his son but the conversation had unsettled him.
Lil was with the kids watching a film and as Lance came in the room Annie jumped up, as always, to get him a drink of some description.
‘What you watching?’ He didn’t ask anyone in particular, this was how he communicated when his mother was in the room with him.
Colleen, who was lying on the sofa with her legs across her mother’s lap, answered him. ‘An Officer and a Gentleman. It’s really good.’
He sat down on one of the armchairs and Annie brought him in a glass of beer. He took it with a nod and Lil had to concentrate to block him out of her mind. Annie settled herself in the other armchair and Eileen and Lil were tangled up together on the sofa with Colleen. Christy was sprawled on the floor, his hands under his chin, and Shamus had a glass of shandy beside him.
‘Is Kathleen all right?’
Once more, Lance was talking to the room in general and, once more, Colleen answered.
‘She’s upstairs talking to herself again.’
Lil sat up and smacked Colleen’s leg noisily.
‘Don’t say that about her!’
Eileen didn’t take her eyes off the screen as she said quietly, ‘Why not? It’s true. She was at it all last night, effing and blinding to the air as per usual. It gets on my nerves.’
‘She can’t help it and you know that. So stop being so bloody nasty.’
Lil sat up now, her nice evening ruined. ‘Why do you always fucking come in and cause upset, eh, Lance? Why can’t you just leave us all alone for once?’
No one said a word. Christy was hunching his shoulders as if warding off a blow and Colleen had closed her eyes tightly.
Lil knew she shouldn’t lose her temper so quickly but she couldn’t help herself. When Lance asked about Kathleen she felt a note of accusation in his voice and she knew it was there, she wasn’t imagining it. He was good at masking it but she knew him better than he knew himself.
‘Did you see Pat’s new flat?’
Lance didn’t answer her as she knew he wouldn’t.
’About time you got yourself somewhere and all. This place is getting too small now this lot are growing up and Kathleen needs a room to herself, as does Eileen.’
There, she had finally said it out loud. The sooner he went, the better; she knew what had happened this week. She had been the one who had been left to tell Pat all about it.
‘Leave him alone, Lil. Who’ll look after Kathleen if he goes?’
Annie’s voice was worried. Lance was the reason she got up in the morning and they all knew that in one way or another.
‘Why don’t you go and live with Nanny?’
This was from Christy, who was always trying to keep the peace. ‘She’s in that flat all on her own and there’s plenty of room there.’
Lil could have kissed him, but she kept herself in check. Annie had been angling for this for a long time and now she knew that Lance had been put in a position where he had to make a stand of some kind.
He sipped his beer noisily and then he looked at his mother and said loudly, ‘I can’t leave Kathleen. I’m the only one who can calm her down and you know it. I pay my way and if you want me out you’ll have to throw me out.’
Lance’s voice was as cold and flat as always. No inflection at all, it was a monotonous voice that was like a loud scratch across a blackboard to Lil.
‘Consider yourself thrown ou
t then, Lance.’ The words were clipped and very determined.
Annie was pleased. She knew Lance would come to her, if only to be near Kathleen. He wasn’t capable of living alone like Patrick. He couldn’t even boil an egg for himself and, as Annie had waited on him hand and foot all his life, it didn’t seem likely that was going to change at any time in the future. He didn’t have girlfriends, so unless Lil pushed him out of the nest it was likely he would never have gone. He walked out of the room with Annie bustling after him, as always, and everyone breathed a collective sigh of relief.
‘Can I really have his room, Mum?’
‘Course you can, Eileen. Do me a favour and decorate it, will you? I’ll pay and you can do it how you like, babe.’
‘What about when I need a room of me own?’
Lil looked at Colleen and saw the burgeoning breasts and the slim legs and Eileen seemed to notice her at the exact same time and she said, with false resignation, ‘I think you had better share with me and then Shamus can go in with Christy.’
Colleen was thrilled at the prospect of sharing a bedroom with her big sister; she envisaged make-up and nail varnish, and Eileen envisaged someone who would sneak down and let her in if she had a late one.
Annie came back into the room. Her face was wearing its usual frown and Lil noticed that she was getting old. She seemed to be thinner suddenly and her skin was papery.
‘That was a bit harsh, Lil.’
Lil lit a cigarette.
‘Look, Mum, you got what you wanted. I don’t want him living here at thirty, do I? And the way things were going, that was a distinct possibility. We need the room and you know we do. Now, shut the fuck up and pour us both a nice drink. I have to go to the club later and I want a bath. It looks like the film is a fucking write-off, don’t it?’
Ivana and Pat were sitting at the bar of the club. Most business was done from the premises now and Ivana was a useful addition to the club in more ways than one. She was quite happy to seat the girls and scam the punters and she did it very well with a nice smile and a friendly attitude. Even his mother had thawed towards her over the last couple of years. The more Ivana made herself useful, the more time Lil could spend with Shawn.