Nineteen Seventy-Seven: The Red Riding Quartet, Book Two (26 page)

I opened the door and switched on the light and there she was:
Lying in the bath, water red, flesh white, hair blue; her right arm dangling down the side, blood across the floor, deep snakes bitten into her wrists.
On my knees:
I pulled her from the bath, I pulled her from the waters, wrapped her body in a towel and tried to squeeze her into life.
On my knees:
I rocked her back and forth, her body cold, her lips both blue, the black holes in her hands, the black holes in her feet, the black holes in her head.
On my knees:
I called her name, I begged her please, I told her the truth, no more lies, just to open her eyes, to hear her name, to hear the truth:
I love you, love you, love you …
And she said:
‘I do, Jack. I have to.’

The John Shark Show
Radio Leeds
Friday 17th June 1977

Chapter 24

I park up on the Moors, in the place they call the Grave, the pain fading, the day too:
Friday 17 June 1977.
I take out my pen and go through the glove compartment.
I find a map book with some blank back pages and I rip them out.
I write page after page, before I stop and screw them up.
I get out and go to the boot, take out the tape and the hose and do what I have to do.
And then I just sit there until finally, finally I pick up the pen and start again:
Dear Bobby,
I don’t want a life without you.
They’ll tell you lies about me,
like the lies they told me.
But I love you and I’ll be there,
watching over you, always.
Love Daddy
.
I switch on the engine and put the note on the dashboard and stare out across the Moors where all I can see out there, beyond the windscreen, all I can see is his face, his hair, his smile, his little tummy sticking out of those blue pyjamas, making a telescope out of his hands, and then I can’t see him for the tears, I can’t see him for –

The John Shark Show
Radio Leeds
Saturday 18th June 1977

Chapter 25

‘Thanks,’ I said and walked across the lobby.
I pressed seven and rode the Griffin’s old elevator, watching the floors pass, going up.
I stepped out of the elevator and on to the landing.
I walked down the corridor, down the threadbare carpet, the dirty walls, the smell.
I came to the door and stopped.
I put my fingers on the handle and turned.
It was open.
Room 77.
The Reverend Laws was sitting in a wicker chair in the window, Leeds City Station grey amongst the chimneys and the roofs, the pigeons and their shit.
Everything was laid out on a white towel on the bed.
‘Sit down, Jack,’ he said, his back to me.
I sat down on the bed beside his tools.
‘What time is it?’
I looked at my watch:
‘Almost seven.’
‘Good,’ he said, standing.
He drew the curtains and brought the wicker chair into the centre of the room.
‘Take off your shirt and sit here.’
I did as he said.
He picked up the scissors from the bed.
I swallowed.
He stood behind me and began to snip.
‘Something for the weekend?’
‘Just a little off the top,’ I smiled.
When he’d finished, he blew across the top of my head and then brushed the loose grey hairs away.
He walked back over to the bed and put down the scissors.
Then he picked up the Philips screwdriver and the ball-pein hammer and stood behind me, whispering:
‘Thy way is the sea, and thy path in the great waters, and thy footsteps are unknown.’
I closed my eyes.
He put the point of the screwdriver on the crown of my skull.
And I saw –
the two sevens clash and it happening again, and again, and again, coats over faces, boots placed on thighs, a pair of panties left on one leg, bras pushed up, stomachs and breasts hollowed out, skulls caved in, heavy duty manners, Dark Ages and Witch Trials, ancient English cities, ten thousand swords flashing in the sunlight, thrice ten thousand dancing girls strewing flowers, white elephants caparisoned in red, white, and blue with the prices we pay, the debts we incur, the temptations of Jack under cheap raincoats, another rollneck sweater and pink bra pushed up over flat white tits, snakes pouring from stomach wounds, white panties off one leg, sandals placed on the flabs of thighs, good-time girls with blood, thick, black, sticky blood, matting their hair with pieces of bone and lumps of grey brain, slowly dripping into the grass of Soldier’s Field, the fires behind my eyes, a white Marks & Spencer nightie, soaked black with blood from the holes he’d left, so full of holes, these people so full of holes, all these heads so full of holes, Daniel before the ancient wall in the ancient days, playing with matches behind my eyes, there written
tophet:
white Ford Capris, dark red Corsairs, Landrovers, the many ways a man can serve his time
, HATE,
no subject, no object, just
HATE:
Yorkshire Gangsters and Yorkshire Coppers, the Black Panther and the Yorkshire Ripper, Jeanette Garland and Susan Ridyard, Clare Kemplay and Michael Myshkin, Mandy Wymer and Paula Garland, the Strafford Shootings and the
Exorcist
Killing: Michael Williams and Carol Williams, holding her there in the street in my arms, blood on my hands, blood on her face, blood on my lips, blood in her mouth, blood in my eyes, blood in her hair, blood in my tears, blood in hers, Blood and Fire, and I’m crying because I know it’s over, and above the fireplace opposite the door hangs a print entitled
The Fisherman’s Widow,
a man’s pilot coat doubles as a curtain over the window, Philips screwdrivers, heavy Wellington boots, ball-pein hammers, the Minstrel by a neck, the ginger beer, the stale bread, the ashes in the grate, just a room and a girl in white turning black right down to her nails and the holes in her head, just a girl, hearing footsteps on the cobbles outside, the heart absent, the door locked from the inside, keeping on running but knowing you won’t get far: shotguns in Hanging Heaton, shotguns in Skipton, shotguns in Doncaster, shotguns in Selby, Jubela, Jubelo, Jubelum, him stroking his beard, him shaking his head, winking once and gone, where you seek one there’s two, two three, three four; where you seek four three, three two, two one, the ones that get away and the ones that never can, the man I love, up in the gallery in the last days, the time at hand, when your sons and daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions and your old men shall dream dreams, no wonders for the dead, just dreams smiling through the gloom, meat between his teeth, patting his paunch, burping, primping his hair, stroking his moustache, grinning, arching an eyebrow, frowning and shaking his head, winking once and gone again after the horror: tomorrow and the day after, getting away again, wretched and close to death from my youth up, I suffer your terrors: I am desperate, my companions in darkness, and there’s got to be another way
, The Fisherman’s Widow
in wet red paint, sherry bottles, bottles of spirits, beer bottles, bottles of chemicals, all empty, just a room in hell, Twenty-five Years of Jubilee Hits, hell around every corner, every dawn, dead elm trees, thousands of them in dark panting streets, leering terrace backs, surrounded by silent stones, buried by the black bricks, through courtyards and alleyways, foot upon brick, brick upon head, the houses that Jack built, and he’s coming, ring-a-ring of roses, a pocket full of posies, he’s coming, fuck you – then you sleep/kiss you – then you wake, and he’s here and there is no hell but this one, Lucky Cow, up to five now they say four but remember Preston ’75, come my load up that one, Dirty Cow, God saves the People of Leeds and the cuts that won’t stop bleeding, the bruises that won’t heal, and I feel it coming on again so wear something pretty because this is why people die, this is why people, this is why, up to number five now you say, but there’s a surprise in Bradford, get about you know, Eddie, Eddie, Eddie; outstanding police officers who have our heartfelt thanks, men seeking death but not finding it, longing to die but death eluding them, like remission and forgiveness, an end to penance, burning niggers on Hunslet Carr, gollums on the train, Nigerians face down in the Calder, the red and the white and the blue, the Valleys of Death, the Moors of Hell, lonely hells, endlessly: the set-ups and the frames, the fit-ups and the blame, the whispering grasses, the weeping, bleeding statues, neighbour against neighbour, brother against brother, families bound and slaughtered aboard Black Ships, mothers tied and watching daughters raped aboard Bride Ships, the White Ship sunk off Albion, me trapped on a train in a snowstorm on top of the Moors, in the rooms of the dead, in the houses of the dead, on the streets of the dead, in the cities of the dead, the country of the dead, world of the dead, us driving together along a road, after the rain, after the Jubilee, the fireworks spent, the red and the white and the blue gone, drowning in the bloody belly of the whale in the last few days, men eating shotguns, sucking gas, nigger gangs slitting the throats of fat white coppers as they sit in their houses watching
Songs of Praise
with their backs to the door, their sons swearing revenge, their children crying for the rest of their lives, endlessly: lost in rooms, chimneys taller than steeples, minarets taller than chimneys, cursed Islam in every town, Backyard Crusades, crusades for the dead, crusades without end, mornings that are night, sat in sudden silences, making calls from red boxes, policemen tall and blond, covered from head to toe in blood, evil connecting with evil, green trees shining silver with the stuff, sleep-starved dreams stretching the bones, racking them, the long faces from hell, singing their songs of the damned and the doomed: odes to the dead, prayers for the living, lies for the lot, screaming coaches flying past empty, doors open, chunks of cancerous phlegm sliding down the sink-hole, standing in the shadows in the wings of the truth, bruised by sleep, help me, in the shadows of her thighs, the blacks of her eyes, fuck you – then you sleep/kiss you – then you wake, in rooms above shops, the real flesh, the stones in my shoes, sat together on bloody sofas, the night Michael Williams drove a 12” nail into his Carol’s head, INTO MY CAROL’S HEAD, to save her soul alive, my Carol, thinking I’ve forgotten something, Chinese horses flying past, backs empty, eyes open, talking nothing but surrender, futures written as pasts, people left behind in private, sovereign angsts, right royal hells, telling lies and telling truths full of holes, so full of holes, these people so full of holes, all these heads so full of holes, the time at hand, outside the dogs and sorcerers, the whoremongers and murderers crouched in Southern cemeteries raining down blows to the heads of Scottish slags with blunt household instruments, in 1977 suffering your terrors, in 1977 I am desperate, in 1977 my companions are in darkness, in 1977 when young men see visions and the old men dream dreams, dreams of remission and forgiveness, an end to penance, in 1977 when the two sevens clash and the cuts won’t stop bleeding, the bruises not healing, the two witnesses – their testimony finished, their bodies lying naked in the streets of the city, the sea blood, the waters wormwood, women drunken with the blood and the patience and faith of the saints, and I stand at the door and knock, the keys to death and hell and the mystery of the woman, knowing this is why people die, this is why people, in 1977 this is why I see –
He brought the hammer down.
–
No future
.