Borstal Slags (30 page)

Here is my link to Clive Gould. Through this, somehow, I can get to him – and then, maybe, I can destroy him once and for all.

He looked up at Annie and felt an overpowering need to protect her from Clive Gould, no matter what the cost to himself. He had killed her father, then turned his attentions to her, drawing that poor, orphaned girl into his filthy life and into his bed and then, in time, murdering her with his bare hands. Yes, she had suffered enough at his hands already, although she could not remember it. He vowed to himself then and there that she would suffer no more.

But, before I can protect her, I’ve got a desperate, knife-wielding psychopath to deal with. First things first, Sam.

Sam slipped the watch into his inside jacket pocket and zipped it up.

‘No,’ said Donner. ‘Give it to me.’

‘Oh, I’m not listening to you any more,’ said Sam dismissively.

‘You
will
listen. I’m in charge.’

‘I trusted you!’ Sam snapped. He felt genuine indignation rising within him. ‘I was the only one out of all of them to take your side, to give you the benefit of the doubt! I stood up for you, do you know that? I saw you as a human being, not just some borstal slag to be treated like filth. I
listened
to you. But all you were doing was stringing me along!’

‘Give me that gold thing you picked up,’ said Donner, his face blank.

‘Oh yes, here we go, the dead-eyed-killer routine!’ sneered Sam, and he wasn’t play-acting. ‘The great player of games! The puppet master! The pint-sized Hannibal bloody Lecter, messing with all our minds! But you’re just a kid. A sad, broken little kid.’

Sam glimpsed Annie’s face, drawn and bloodless, her eyes wide and staring. Her whole body was tensed in anticipation of a sudden move from Donner. What would it be? Would he plunge the knife wantonly into McClintock’s windpipe? Would he attack Sam? Or would he blindside them all with something totally unforeseeable?

‘Why aren’t you doing what I say?’ Donner said. ‘I’ll kill this man if you don’t take me seriously. Give me that gold thing you’ve got.’

‘Threats,’ said Sam, unimpressed. ‘Violence. Fear. That’s what it all comes down to. That’s what we’re all supposed to be running from. “Oh please, don’t hurt, I’m too weak to defend myself, have mercy, I’m begging you …!”’ Who was he addressing his words to? Was it Donner? Or was he speaking
past
Donner, to that lurking, brooding, shadowy menace that had been faceless and nameless for so long, but that now he knew to be a stinking lowlife called Clive Gould? Maybe the two had become one, so that, when he confronted Donner, he also – if only symbolically – confronted Gould. Whatever the truth, it felt good to stand up and speak out, to refuse to be afraid, to make a stand. Sam puffed his chest out and planted himself squarely in front of Donner, fixing him with his stare. ‘You’re just a killer, and I’ve met plenty of killers before now, believe me. They’re nothing special. I thought
you
were something special. I told the others, “This lad could have been prime minister if he’d been born a few doors down the road. His only problem is bad luck. He was brought up wrong, that’s all.” But now I see I was wrong. Sometimes, what’s shit on the outside is also shit at the core. You do your best by someone, you look for the good, you give them every opportunity to prove themselves – and what do they do? Lie, kill, wave a knife around.’ Sam shook his head contemptuously. ‘But even now I’ll bet you think you’re the only victim in this room.’

‘Stop saying things or McClintock dies right now,’ Donner ordered. He held out his free hand. ‘Give that thing you picked up to me.’

‘You want it? said Sam. ‘Swivel.’

Annie pressed herself back against the wall. McClintock’s bulging eyes screwed up in anticipation of a terrible death. Even Donner’s eyes seemed to cloud over for a moment.

‘You’ve turned against me,’ the boy said.

‘No. You
made
me turn against you. You’ve given me no choice, you little bastard.’

‘You’re playing games.’

‘I thought you liked games.’

Donner thought about this. He tilted his head to one side. The boy was staring at Sam, but he did not make eye contact. He glared at Sam’s mouth, at his forehead, at his jacket, at the space to either side of him, but never into the eyes. He was utterly disconnected, regarding Sam not as a fellow human being but as an object – an object that, for reasons he could not understand, was not behaving as it was ordered. Whatever went on in that brilliant but broken mind of his, it was not reflected at all in his face. And that was why his next move was so completely unexpected.

Donner pulled the knife from McClintock’s mouth, slicing deep into his upper lip as he did so, and lunged ferociously at Sam. As McClintock tumbled from his chair, clamping his scarred hands to his face to stem the gush of blood, Sam grabbed hold of Donner’s wrist with both hands and wrenched the boy’s arms with all his might. Donner refused to let go. They locked together, fighting for possession of the blade.

Without warning, Annie rushed in, aiming a sharp blow across the front of Donner’s windpipe. The boy’s blank face hardly changed expression; a flicker of the eye, a slight twist of the corner of his mouth, no more than that.

But, despite his impassive face, Donner was struggling wildly. He swung a calculated blow back at Annie, catching her hard across the side of her head and sending her crashing into a glass-fronted cabinet, smashing it.

Sam felt his gasp on Donner’s wrist loosening as they both thrashed and writhed.

Don’t let go! For God’s sake, don’t let go!

A knee shot upwards into Sam’s groin. He let go.

The huge knife flashed before his eyes. He felt it slice through the leather of his jacket, just missing the vulnerable flesh beneath. Sam fell back, and at once Donner was on him, stabbing downwards with the knife. It hit his chest.

That’s it,
he thought, very clearly.
I’m dead.

In the next moment, a concussive boom resounded across the office. A spark leapt from the knife blade as it jerked from Donner’s hand and clattered across the floor. Donner had time to turn and glare upwards at the imposing figure who strode briskly towards him – and then a hand, clad in a black-leather string-back, struck him with the force of a speeding locomotive. The boy was lifted clear off the ground for a moment, carried helplessly by the sheer power of the blow. He landed hard, and at once tried to leap back up. But a second blow, this time from the butt of a smoking Magnum, knocked him out cold.

‘Norman Bates – you’re ruddy nicked,’ Gene growled, planting a leather-loafered foot firmly on the boy’s motionless body, like a big-game hunter posing for a photograph. With his black-gloved thumb he clicked the Mangum’s safety catch back on, and glanced across at Sam. ‘Still think my toys ain’t no good, Tyler?’

‘They have their uses,’ admitted Sam, aching and battered.

Annie rushed over to him and threw her arms around him, holding him tight.

‘I thought you’d had it!’ she said, very close to his ear, her voice unsteady with emotion. ‘I thought that knife had gone right into you!’

She released him from her hug and looked down at his jacket. It was ripped, right above the heart. Sam felt inside, his fingers reaching into the inside breast pocket, and pulled out the thing that had saved him. The gold casing of the fob watch was dented inwards where it had taken the force of the knife.

‘Shaves don’t get much closer than that,’ said Sam.

Annie hugged him again, even tighter than before, and kissed him full on the mouth.

‘Get a flamin’ hotel room, you two,’ Sam heard Gene growl. ‘It’s like one of them Swedish films down the Roxy, only crap.’

Night had settled over the city, and it found CID A-Division quiet and almost deserted. The phones were silent, the typewriters unmanned. Chris and Ray had both repaired to the Railway Arms to get thoroughly bladdered. Only Sam and Annie remained behind – and the Guv, who emerged from his office after taking a late-night call.

‘McClintock’ll live, apparently,’ announced Gene, looming out of his office. ‘That was his quack on the blower just now. They’ve got him in the hozzie being fed porridge through a drip in his arm.’

‘As soon as he’s well enough, I’m going to go speak to him,’ said Sam.

Gene frowned. ‘Go speak to Tavish McTwat? What the hell for?’

‘I just – have a few more questions for him.’

‘Maybe I’ll come with you, Tyler. Bring him some oats. And catch up with that nurse down there who’s got the hots for me.’

‘I’m not sure your company would be appreciated,’ Sam said tactfully.

‘I don’t see why not. I’m a charmer. And I do a brilliant Tommy Cooper – that’ll bring a smile to his face.’

‘I think in this instance, Guv, discretion is the better part of valour.’

‘Discretion is my middle name,’ Gene said. ‘And valour. And tripod.’ He winked at Annie. ‘Oh, maybe you’re right, Tyler. What are me and that Jock going to say to each other, eh?’

The Guv shrugged on his coat, straightened his broad tie, adjusted his cuffs and checked his reflection in one of his office’s nicotine-coated windows. He gnashed his teeth, smoothed back his hair and flicked out a bogey from his left nostril.

‘Killer,’ he told his reflection, and fired a finger-pistol at himself. And then, sauntering across to the door, he called over his shoulder, ‘Don’t forget the lights on your way out, kiddies. See you bright and breezy first thing.’

And, with that, he was gone.

‘So,’ said Sam, getting a little closer to Annie, ‘it’s now just the two of us. Alone.’

‘In CID, of all places. How romantic.’

‘We could always go back to my place. It’s crap and it’s cold and the bloke next door plays Thin Lizzy at all hours, but still …’

Annie gave him a serious look. She thought hard for a moment, and then, with great deliberation, said, ‘I really like you, Sam.’

‘That sounds like one of them sentences that continues with a “but”.’

‘Well …’ She looked for the right words. ‘I
do
like you. A lot. I really care about you.’

‘There’s still a “but” on its way.’

‘Some of the things you say … The way you talk sometimes …’

‘You mean the things I said about your father?’ Sam asked. ‘Forget about it, Annie. I talk daft sometimes, you know that. But I’m still me. I’m not like Donner, I’m not a psycho.’

‘I don’t think you’re a psycho,’ Annie said, trying to find the right way to express her thoughts. ‘Perhaps I thought you were a bit bonkers, you know, when you first said it, but then – something happened.’

‘What, Annie? What happened?’

‘That watch. The gold one that McClintock had. When I saw it, it sort of … seemed like it was familiar.’

Sam watched her as she furrowed her brow and chewed her lip, trying to make sense of whatever was going on inside her mind.

‘Not just familiar,’ she went on. ‘Important, somehow. And for a moment, Sam, it was like – like it was like when you’re trying to think of a word and it’s right on the tip of your tongue.’

‘And
did
you remember, Annie?’

She sighed and shrugged. ‘The next thing that happened was that Donner went for you with that knife, and then
everything
went out of my head.’ She tried to banish that awful memory from her mind. ‘What I’m trying to say, and making a total pig’s ear out of, is that I really do like you, Sam – and that I don’t think you’re bonkers for saying all that stuff about my dad. I think you know something – about me – something really important that I’ve forgotten. I – I don’t understand how you know, or what it is, or why I’ve forgotten it or what it means, but …’ Her troubled expression all at once cleared. She smiled at Sam, as much with her eyes as with her mouth. ‘I like you, Sam. And I trust you. And I know that, even if here and now ain’t the right time, that one day – very soon – you’ll tell me what you know. Because you’ve got a secret, haven’t you, Sam?’

Sam looked at her for a long time, and then, at last, he said, ‘Yes.’

‘A secret about yourself – and about me.’

‘Yes, Annie.’

‘And one day, when we’re not as knackered as we are right now, and when it’s the right place, and the right time, you’ll tell me, won’t you. And then—’

‘Chuffin’ Nora! You two still here?’

It was Gene, sweeping back in. Sam and Annie jumped, the fragile mood between them shattered.

‘I hope you ain’t thinking of using my office for hanky-panky,’ the Guv declared, stomping over to his desk and rummaging through a drawer. ‘Any fanny up for grabs between these hallowed walls is sole property of G. Hunt esquire. And no disrespect luv,’ he added for Annie’s benefit, ‘but I prefer ’em fuller up top and less boysy in the leg department. With pins like yours you should be playing for Bolton Wanderers. Aha!’ He suddenly flourished what he had been looking for: the keys to the Cortina. ‘The reins to my trusty stallion. Every knight needs his horse, Tyler – and I can see you’ve got yours.’

Sam looked him straight in the eye as he spoke. ‘Guv, this degree of personal abuse you feel the need to dish out, don’t you think it suggests you might have some sort of behavioural problem?’

‘Nah,’ said Gene, jangling the keys to the Cortina as he strode back across towards the door. Then he paused, thought for a moment, and said, ‘McClintock’s shitty little watch. You still got it, Sam?’

‘I have. Why do you ask?’

Gene shrugged. ‘Dunno. Something about it set me thinking.’ Sam and Annie shared a glance. Gene thought for a moment, then contemptuously waved his own thoughts away. ‘Ach, forget it. Ain’t got time to fanny about like this – the boys are expecting me to join them for a nightcap down the Arms.’

‘Give my regards to Nelson, Guv,’ Sam said.

‘I ain’t your flamin’ messenger boy,’ growled Gene as he strode out. ‘Christ, Tyler, you’re a saucy little get when you’re showin’ off to the crumpet. Birds in the department – it’s gonna spell the ruin of this place, you mark my words.’

Puffing his chest out and squaring his jaw, Gene thrust his hand flagrantly down the front of his trousers to shift his balls into a more comfortable position, cleared his throat loudly, and went striding off along the corridor lustily whistling the theme from
Van der Valk
. A few moments later, from outside, came the revving of a Cortina’s engine, and the squeal of tyres. Then there was silence. This time, he was definitely gone.