Blighted Land: Book two of the Northumbrian Western Series (Northumbrian Westerns 2) (3 page)

‘Hayabusa 1300 and ZZR 1400.’

There was another reply.

He straightened up and grabbed his tattered union flag and raised it.

The bikes revved, their riders’ heads twisted towards Starter Lad.

He dropped the flag.
 

They roared off, one popping and cracking as it went. They disappeared up the track leaving the smell of cooked tyres and part-combusted fuel. Soon enough brake lights glowed at the end as they passed the tree.
 

I started the Triumph and rode it over. Now it was my turn. The light had faded so that the track disappeared off before me, invisible beyond the Triumph’s headlight beam, past Starter Lad and the spectators. The Ducati appeared beside me and I did up my leather jacket, adjusting my open-face. My opponent hunched forward and adjusted his lid. He revved his bike as Starter Lad jumped around, his torn flag in the air. I tapped the fuel tank, like I did every race.
 

Starter Lad dropped the flag. Race time.

I wound the throttle and released the clutch, the Triumph lurching forward as the air-cooled twin moaned. The handlebars shimmied, clocks shaking as the needles moved round to the right. I held on as the bike rattled and roared, the road flying under its wheels. I shifted up to second, the Ducati’s front wheel parallel as I held the throttle wide open and let the revs touch the red before shifting up again, a gulp coming from the two into two. The road was swallowed up by the headlight, the engine bellowing as it drew through its race filters.
 

Then I snicked up into third. I left the Ducati and shot past the ghostly pine. Figures appeared in the headlight. I grabbed the brake with my right hand, easing my foot down on the pedal. The bike rose up at the back, its weight shifted forward, forcing the front tyre onto the tarmac. I dropped it down through the gears, blipping the throttle and braking as it slowed and swung round, driving it back to pull up at the kerbside. The two fellas at the finish line came over. The Ducati stopped by the verge further up.

‘Good run,’ said one of them. ‘He was close.’
 

I turned the engine off. He had been close. Too close. I collected the winnings, minus my stake. That was how it worked; we all betted on ourselves.

The two big Japanese bikes were at the opposite side of the road and I parked near them. They were talking about The Incident. What they’d heard about the tank going through town. I didn’t join in the conversation.

I wanted to see who else came along. Whether there was someone worth racing. Someone I could beat.
 

Back at the start line a couple of bikes lined up, the two lightweights that had been hanging around. They set themselves up, their engines rising and falling. Headlamps swinging around.

Then they were off. They raced up to the finish line and the Honda shot past trailing a plume of smoke. The Daelim cruised through, the rider seeming unaware that racing meant going fast.
 

The Ducati had moved off and turned down the road to the left, the lane that we used to get us back to the far end. I fired up the Triumph and followed him. Maybe he’d be daft enough to race me again. Lose again.

He parked near the start line and got off his bike.
 

I pulled up beside him, ready to ask him if he wanted a second run.
 

Then another bike rode up. Roared in. This was one I didn’t know. It was a Yamaha, late middleweight: R6 in blue and white. Its fairing was intact and alloy polished, every bolt shining. It stopped hard in the middle of the road and then settle back onto its suspension. The rider was slim, in race leathers, leathers that were close fitting. Tight enough to suggest this wasn’t one of the usual bikers. In one move the helmet came off and long hair spilled out, bright red.
 

The woman looked me over with her dark eyes. She killed the engine and flicked the side-stand down, walking over to me and the Ducati rider. Each step was carefully placed, one foot in front of the other.

‘I want to race,’ she said, giving me a look. A good eyeballing. Then a smile, a smile women had given me before. A smile that made me uneasy.

The Ducati fella seemed keen so I left him to it.

I started the Scrambler’s engine, manoeuvred it round. With a last look at her I rode off.
 

Life was complicated enough as it was.

T
HE
NEXT
DAY
A
sea-fret rolled across the town, over the buildings along the roads and into the alley. The sun was a pale circle in the sky as I did my patrol for Round Up. Wednesday was my half-day. Half an hour then I’d be finished. So far the shift had been quiet, as if sometimes was in the morning. There’d been a handful of drunks sleeping out and a couple rowing. Nothing big. Nothing until now.
 

I heard the voices as I joined Gladstone Street. There was a group of lads up ahead, messing around, swearing and shouting. People rode past on bicycles, on their way to the docks, or pubs. Some going the other way. No one reacted or did anything. That’s how it was in Faeston. Leave it to Round Up.

I moved backwards, into an alley, away from the noise. Leaning against the damp wall I curled and uncurled my fingers, forming fists them opening them out again. If I waited there was a chance they’d go away. Or I could change my route and pretend I’d never seen them.

They’d be easy enough to sort out but I didn’t have the inclination. The headspace. There seemed to be too much going on in the town. This was supposed to be one of those places where nothing much happened. Nothing changed. That had been the case for the last year and a half.
 

Now there’d been two new arrivals in the last day: the tank and that woman. An armoured vehicle crashing in was an oddity, really out of the ordinary. But she had unsettled me as well. People like her didn't just appear. Not in Faeston.
 

Maybe I was just getting jumpy.

There was more noise from the street. A crash and laughter. The troublemakers were jumpy as well. I’d have to do something. I stepped out of the alley and moved along the pavement so they could see me.
 

If they’d spotted me, they didn’t pay much heed. There were three of them: a tall one with teeth missing, one with a shaven head and a third whose face was covered by a tattooed swastika. The tattoo shifted as he laughed and shouted, reminding me of someone else, someplace else. They all wore blue overalls, the drab attire of dockworkers. One of the them snatched a wooden chair from outside a café, swinging it up into the air. It smashed into pieces on the road. The others laughed then each grabbed a chair themselves, ready to swing it onto the road.

‘I wouldn’t do that,’ I said.
 

The shaven-headed lad frowned, lowering the chair. Then he raised it again, flinging it to join the other. It clattered across the tarmac. They all laughed, coarse grunts of pleasure.

‘Tut-tut,’ I said, walking over to them. Seemed they weren’t going to be reasonable.
 

The swastika-ed lad picked up a chair, laughing. ‘Hey, make it three, eh?’

I snatched it, yanking the lad off balance, slipping the chair out of his grip and placing it on the ground. I was getting really pissed off with them now.

‘Hey, what the fuck?’

I shook my head. ‘Time to go home, boys.’

Swastika-face and tall one stared at me, hard eyes as they stepped closer. The shaven headed one stayed back.

I reached into my jacket, took out a joint of confiscated home-grown and slid it into my mouth, a casual move to distract them, not escalate things. ‘Just leave it.’ When they came towards me some more I stepped back. Though it was tempting to knock their heads together that would take effort. And time. ‘You don’t want to be rounded up.’

The shaven headed one grabbed the others’ jackets, stopped them. ‘Hey, wait, you know —’

 
‘He’s on his own,’ said the tallest.

‘He’s Round Up, you know…’

I lit the joint and blew out smoke that joined the fog, now thinning in the midday sun. Maybe they were going to see sense. ‘Fetch the chairs and I’ll forget all about it.’

The shaven headed lad let go of the others and stepped out into the road towards the chairs. He put his hand on one but moved no further. The other two faced me, motionless. Gulls cried out up ahead and there was a rattle from a chain down at the docks, the cry of distant voices. I smoked. There was a chance the lads would just walk away, leave and not force it.

‘What you gonna do?’ Swastika-face squared up to me.
 

He was the troublemaker. With him taken down the other two wouldn’t cause any bother.

‘Howay!’ He came right up to me, shoving me with an open hand, laughing.
 

It looked like he wasn’t going to make it easy. I stepped back, exhaling smoke, balancing and positioning myself. I balled my hand into a fist and right-hooked him on the jaw. He staggered back eyes all over the place and hands flapping.
 

Tall lad glanced at his companion, his expression hardening, body straightening up. Before he had a chance to join in I punched him between the eyes. Not hard but enough to unsettle him.
 

Swastika face lay curled up and the tall lad rubbed his forehead, holding onto one of the chairs. The joint had fallen from my mouth so I bent and picked it up, smoking some more. There was no need to do anymore. They were just kids, not serious trouble makers but annoying.

I stared at the third lad. ‘About those chairs…’

He dragged the undamaged chair and placed it with the others outside the café. Then he picked up the bits of the bust one, held them in his arms and stood by his friends.

I prodded Swastika-face with my foot. ‘Next time, I round you up.’ Then I walked off. I’d done my job, finished my shift, sorted out some trouble.
 

At the end of the road I stubbed my joint out and glanced back. The two lads standing helped the third one up. Then they stared at me, looks of fear, possibly hate.

I turned my back on them and walked into town. Past the houses and workshops open for the day’s trade. As I joined High Row the sun cleared through the last of the haze and shone down on the quayside, a soft light on the ships moored there, their sails furled. Some cargo was still being loaded by men who carried barrels and bundles up the ramps, now at a steep angle due to the high tide. But most of it had already stowed with hatches battened and crews making-ready for sail. Voices drifted up from the ships, instructions and orders; I passed the shops, all busy with last minute trade where red faced men queued up with bits of bust tackle from their ships, keen to get out with the tide.

The stalls were all set up further along, stacked with chunks of meat and scabby vegetables, the staple diet of the town. No one asked where the meat came from, what animal it was. Drunks slumped outside the Globe Inn and I slid past them, up Blind Lane with its cracked paving, taking the stairs down to the office below the pub.
 

I held the door handle for a second, let the sounds of the port clatter around me. I had to go in and claim my money, take what I was due. But Nico, Will and Gregg had started to get difficult, as bad as the kids who wandered the street. As the heads of Round Up, they’d got to be big fish in the town. Big nasty fish.
 

But Monday night, The Incident, was worth something. They owed me for sorting that out.
 

They three of them were there when I went in, sitting at the stained table, drinking whisky and playing Black Jack, same as most days. The main headquarters, Round Up Central, was on the other side of town but they like to hang around here. Drink and play cards. The light filtering through the filthy windows caught the dust and smoke in the air.

‘You finished already?’ said Nico. He didn’t look up from his hand. As usual he was in his dark suit, black pinstripes and flared trousers, ancient and threadbare. His shades were pushed up on his curly hair, a different pair from the other night.

Will and Gregg were in overalls, Gregg’s bunched up under his beard, bulging on his belly, contrasting with Wills that hung off him.

‘Sit down, lad,’ said Nico.

I hated being called lad but he knew that, so I didn’t take the bait. I pulled up a chair and sat at the end of the table, taking a glass, pouring some whisky. There were rattles and muted voices from the bar upstairs.

Nico topped his glass up. ‘Any bother?’

‘Not much.’ I drank some of the whisky. It burned my throat and made my eyes water. Nasty cheap shit.
 

‘No round ups?’

‘Not today.’

 
He looked up, the first time he’d taken his eyes of his cards. His pupils were dilated, soft in that hard face. There was laughter from upstairs and the sound of something heavy falling over. He smiled, always a bad sign. ‘We might have something extra for you to do.’

‘You owe me for Monday night.’

‘You’ll be paid. You did well. Pity about the truck but….’