Authors: William Nicholson
“I don't mind.”
They drive on down the lane and Alan's mind is filled with wonder. At the complexity of people's feelings, and the delicacy with which they negotiate each other's tender bruises. He also wonders at himself. Now that he's to visit the filming at the request of his son, all his hesitations drop away. Cas is his chaperone and his alibi. He goes not to please himself, who will not be pleased, but to please his son. It's so much more straightforward doing things for other people than for yourself.
“We'll go tomorrow,” he says. “I'll find out when's a good time.”
Dean Keeley gets home early because Terry's job rolled over and died and now what the fuck does he do? There's no one in the house and without Sheena it feels empty and sad so he goes up the road to the Tally Ho for a drink. There's a pikey from Crisp Road in there and he keeps staring at him. He's got these teardrops tattooed on his cheek, one drop for each man he's killed, or maybe one drop for each year he's done inside, who knows? So Dean drinks up and moves on. Heading home past the house where he grew up he passes the old jockey who used to beat his wife. He's walking his grayhound, whistling as he goes. Go out in the garden when you were a kid and there he'd be, whistling.
The old house is in a bad way, paintwork gone on the window frames, curtains closed. Not that it was ever much. Half the estate kids went to Wallands, half to the Pells, here was noman's land, caught in the middle. Not such a great place to grow up. Terry was sitting pretty in Horsfield Road, clear Wallands territory. Always had the luck, did Terry. Not that I grudge him.
Sheena's house is something else. Dean still thinks of it as Sheena's house because she's the one who got the money together to buy it. And because they're not married. Stupid when you think about it, what difference does a ring make? My mum and
dad were married and look what a fucking joke that was. But it does say something, doesn't it? It says you belong together. All those forms you have to fill in, you put Married.
Sheena fills in forms for Dean. She doesn't mind that he can't read. One day she's going to sit down and teach him, she's promised him.
“You'll have a job,” Dean says. “I'm thick as fuck.”
“No you're not,” says Sheena. “You just never got taught right.”
Sheena keeps the house very clean. Dean has learned to wipe his boots when he comes in and hang up his coat and not leave coffee mugs out when he's finished with them. He doesn't exactly get why any of this matters but it's how Sheena likes things and so that's what he does.
The house is empty. Chipper's off somewhere with his mates. Sheena's at work. Dean thinks he might as well check in with Brad, see what's doing.
In the lounge, in the corner on the far side of the big couch, there's a small square table. On the table stands a wooden Triang fort. It has a ramp up to its entrance arch, and six battlemented towers surrounding a chipboard yard. Dean got it on eBay for
£
4.99, a low price because the paintwork is badly worn in places. It's identical to the toy fort he used to play with in his granddad's house. The soldiers too are almost the same: gray-green plastic figures in helmets, holding rifles, Second-World-War vintage. He has twenty-one soldiers. Some aim their rifles from a kneeling position, some standing. Some are running, some are hurling grenades. One of them is half crouching, a Bren gun to the fore, about to explode into action. This is Sergeant Barry Bradford of Special Forces, assigned to Fort Hawk under secret orders. His fellow soldiers know nothing of his true mission, and they don't ask. Push
Brad too much and he'll look at you in a way that makes you back off.
Dean settles down in front of the fort. He lines up a squad of eight men in the yard and stands his one officer before them.
“We're going for the big one,” the officer tells his men. “Our job is to blow the bridge.”
“Blow the bridge? That's a suicide mission!”
“So we find a guy who doesn't want to live.”
Step forward Sergeant Barry Bradford.
“One man! It's impossible!”
“Maybe it's impossible,” says Brad. “But the bridge goes.”
That's how Brad is. He never explains, never boasts. He just goes out and does the job.
Chipper comes in from the front door and crosses through the lounge to the conservatory with a nod toward Dean. He starts picking himself out a fishing rod from the rack.
“You off down the Pond?” Dean says.
“Yeah,” says Chipper.
“If you hook a carp,” says Dean, “throw the bugger back.”
“The Polacks eat them,” says Chipper.
“And the pikeys shoot them with catapults. But we don't.”
You have to keep up standards. Dean's a proper fishermen and he's taught Chipper. They've walked up the river to the Mills many a time, spent the day together catching the odd roach.
If me and Sheena got married I'd be Chipper's dad. There's a strange thought. Most of the time it just feels like we're mates.
Chipper's on his way out the back, through the conservatory, when he says, “About the bike.”
“What about the bike?”
“You said maybe you could help me out.”
“Maybe I can.”
“Lowest price on the new Kona Cowan 2010 is
£
529.”
“Lot of money, Chipper.”
“That's nothing. Custom-build a top-range bike and it'll cost you five thousand.”
“Fuck off! Who pays that?”
Chipper gives a shrug as if to say, There's things I could tell you.
“Same difference,” he says.
The lad's right. Might as well be five thousand as five hundred. It's all out of sight.
Alone in the house again Dean returns to the fort. The eight men in the squad cluster round Brad.
“So what's the plan, Brad?”
“Cover me as I go in,” says Brad. “I'll do the rest.”
“How are you going to get out, Brad?”
“That's my problem.”
Dean lifts the toy soldiers down from the fort to the carpet, and sets them going on their mission. The enemy-held bridge is the edge of the carpet, where it gives way to the tiled floor of the conservatory. The squad takes up an advanced position behind the leg of an armchair. Brad sets off on his own, crossing open terrain, and gains the protection of the doorframe. He radios the squad to mount a diversionary attack, and readies himself to blast his way in.
“You'll never make it, Brad,” the captain signals back. “There's a hundred of them, and no cover.”
“You do your job,” says Brad, “I'll do mine.”
You can call it luck if you like. People say Brad's got nine lives. But Brad knows it's something else. He doesn't feel fear, and that means he stays sharp and he stays steady. There's a reason why he doesn't feel fear. He doesn't give a shit whether he lives or dies.
You don't get rich doing what he does. You don't get famous. But you get the job done and there's a satisfaction in that. These rich bastards you read about, what do they get for their money? Robbie Williams gets back together with
Take That
and they get fifteen million each. What do they do with it? Piss it away on drugs. Buy themselves bottles of champagne for ten grand. You can buy a fucking car for that. Terry's right, they've got the money and you don't, that's what it's all about. There'd be enough for everybody if there was some justice in the world. It's not like I'm afraid to work. Give me a job and I'll do it. All I want is a few hundred quid, a ring for Sheena, maybe a bike for the lad. I just need a bit of luck.
Brad's different. He doesn't give a shit. You don't impress Brad with your Rolex and your Ferrari. Just look into his eyes and you'll see. There's a man who knows his own worth.
The front door opens and closes. Sheena back from work, surprised to find him in.
“Got sent home early,” he says.
Sheena was so pleased he'd got work he can't bring himself to tell her he's out of a job again.
As soon as she's home he starts to feel better. The house isn't right without Sheena. Very first time he saw her in the Tally Ho the afternoon of Bonfire Night, she was still with her Scotch boyfriend back then, he knew right off she was the one. Not that you'd call Sheena a looker. She's too big-boned, her face too broad for some. And she's that bit older, she's got five years on him. But when those brown cow-eyes of hers catch a look at you, you feel it all right. She's one of the sort that makes everything all right. The aggravation drops off you and you feel the way you always knew you could feel if only you could catch a bit of luck.
He watches her now as she moves about making everything be the way it should be. She puts on a kettle for a cup of tea
and while it's boiling she does a little tidy-up. She leaves the toy soldiers where he put them, but Chipper has dumped a pair of trainers in the conservatory, and she doesn't like that. She holds them up to show the holes in the soles.
“Look at that! New eight weeks ago! You know why that is? It's those bikes. They use their shoes as brakes.”
Sheena doesn't like the bikes. She thinks Chipper will injure himself, the stunts they pull on them. Most likely he will, but you can't stop him.
She sees him watching and comes over to give him a cuddle.
“You still my boy?” she says.
“You know it,” he says.
“Oh, my legs ache,” she says. “On my feet all day.”
She works at the checkout desk in Boots. But however tired she is, Sheena always keeps herself busy. Now she settles down with her cup of tea and turns on the TV. It's showing
The Weakest Link
. She takes out her sewing box. She's making a new war bonnet for Dean, for the bonfire procession, because his old one got burned. Turkey feathers sewn into leather straps, over ninety feathers, and the beadwork all done by hand exactly the way the Sioux women do it. It's going to have a peacock quill on the back.
Dean watches with awe. How did she learn to do Sioux beadwork? It seems to him that she can do anything. No one pays her millions. There she sits, her hands so busy, her beautiful eyes steady on her work. She's wearing a sleeveless top in this warm weather, and her bare arms are soft and white.
“So what have you been doing, Deanie?”
“Gutting this house,” says Dean. “Nothing much.”
“It's a job,” says Sheena. “Better doing something than nothing.”
“Won't last long.” Better to prepare her. “Looks like the owner didn't get planning permission.”
“Oh, no! That's too bad.”
She's not overly concerned. Jobs come and go.
“You can kill a person without ever harming them,” he says.
Sheena looks up from her sewing.
“Raoul Moat said that,” Dean says. “He's right.”
“He's dead,” says Sheena. “That's where that gets you.”
“What he did to his girlfriend. I could never do that.”
“I should hope not.”
She's back at her feathers. Nothing really bothers Sheena. She's steady. She's a rock.
Later that evening they're watching
Corrie
when Dean's phone rings and it's Terry.
“Been thinking, mate,” he says. “First the Cozzie, then the job. I know you could do with the money.”
“I'll work it out somehow,” says Dean. “Not your problem.”
He walks out of the lounge and into the narrow front hall.
“You with Sheena right now?”
“Not any more.”
He opens the front door and steps out onto the street. A warm night. Kids sitting on the pavement in a huddle, laughing softly together. A car crawls by, hunting for a space to park.
“Here's the thing,” says Terry. “If you need the cash quick, there is a job you could do.”
“I'm not doing another insurance job.”
“Nothing wrong with an insurance job, pal. The mistake we made was getting mixed up with Jimmy Dawes. But shift the goods on your own account, the insurance covers the loss, and you keep the cash.”
“I promised Sheena,” says Dean.
“I know,” says Terry. “Just an idea.”
“If I get nicked again, it's over, Tel.”
“You won't get nicked. I know the house, don't I? I'm doing a fencing job there. I'll call you when it's clear. You'll be in and out in five minutes. Leave everything neat and tidy, her ladyship claims on her insurance, no harm done. But it's up to you, mate. I'm just trying to help out.”
“Appreciate that.”
“Think about it. Thursday would be good.”
After the call is over Dean stays out on the street, thinking about it. He has a whole lot of questions to ask Terry, such as access to the property, valuables inside and so on, but they all come second. First is the question, Am I going to do it?
He hears Sheena calling from inside the house. He goes back to the lounge.
“That was Terry,” he says. “Looks like the job's down the toilet.”
He marvels at the ease with which he lies.
“Something'll turn up,” she says.
“That Terry,” says Dean. “He's like a brother. He really watches out for me.”
“I remember Terry Sutton when he was six years old,” says Sheena. “He was a rackety kid, always in and out of scrapes.”
“Not any more.”
“Oh no, not any more. Julie sees to that. Where would you boys be without us?”
Dean drops down onto the soft couch by her side and she pushes her workbox away so the needles won't prick him and takes him in her arms.
“Don't you ever leave me, girl.”
“Here I am, babe,” she says. “Here I am.”
Roddy Dalgliesh moves through his own house like a ghost. He wants something but he's not sure what it is. Then he identifies the desire: he wants a drink. His son Max is in the kitchen, with his girlfriend Polly, sitting facing each other across the table but separately occupied. Max is intent on the screen of his laptop, Polly is thumbing the keys of her BlackBerry. Neither of them looks up or acknowledges his presence. Roddy finds communication with Max impossible these days. His son intimidates him. He's so self-confident, so good-looking, so everything he never was at his age. He has Diana's slender form and fine features, not his own squat body and pug-like face. His girlfriend Polly Lyman scares him even more, with her serene certainties: a vegan, a climate warrior, and disconcertingly lovely. Roddy recalls his own solitude and awkwardness at the age of twenty-one, and can only marvel.