Blood Relatives (26 page)

‘On t’ menu in any caf …’

‘Not the same though, is it?’

‘You didn’t come here to blather on about liver and onions.’

Don fingered the ends of his hair.

‘Did you know the bastards had me banged up for nearly eight hour before they told Mavis? She’d been going frantic, ringing around t’ hospitals and everything, fearing the worst. I tell you, when this fucking jumped-up copper asked me if I wor t’ Ripper I just lost it. Totally lost it. I wor panicking, thinking they wor going to fit me up for all t’ murders. It took four of t’ buggers to hold me down.’

‘She rang Mum.’

‘I know. Pam’s a good’un, all right.’ He ran his sleeve about his nostrils, then said, ‘Will you get a message to Mavis? Tell her you’ve seen me? Let her know … you know …’

‘That you miss your liver and onions …?’

‘Aye, well …’

He nodded, as if this wor as much as he could hope for. He stuck his arm beneath his sweatshirt and scratched his belly.

‘Living rough gives a man time to think.’

He produced a crumpled envelope that had been tucked in t’ waistband of his keks and held it out to me like a kid wi’ a sicknote.

I said, ‘If that’s for Mavis, I’ll not be your errand boy.’

‘It’s not.’

I took the envelope, folded it, slid it into my pocket. ‘I’ll read it later.’

‘You know, Rick, without me your mother wouldn’t have got that job at Clark’s. Christ knows, jobs are scarce enough.’

I lifted my hand from t’ bin lid. ‘At some point all t’ back-scratching gets a bit raw.’

‘We had a nice little business going, me and Mitch. Things ran very smooth for a while. Very smooth indeed.’

‘Until you mucked it up and the law got wind of it.’

‘There’s still some stuff of mine in your garage, you know, that Mitch wor looking after for me. I’ll give you half of what I get for it …’

‘I don’t have it no more.’

‘You didn’t get shot of it? Cos, if you did, then I’m owed … I …’

‘I burnt it. I didn’t want Mother finding it. Or anyone else for that matter.’

Don’s eyes roved about before settling back on me. Only he worn’t looking at me directly, but behind my left ear.

‘Burnt it?’

‘Aye.’

‘All of it?’

‘All t’ knocked-off stuff. The cops have showed up twice here already on Ripper business. That don’t stop them sniffing about for other reasons. I’m not getting nabbed for it.’

Don gazed up at the neighbouring rooftops. A few pigeons wor nestling up on t’ TV aerial, like we had a small audience.

‘All of it?’

‘As good as.’

Summat frighted the pigeons, cos they took off. I said, ‘Can I ask you summat?’

Don turned back toward me and he blinked slowly. Like a reptile.

‘About Gerald. I mean, that …’

‘You did know that Gerald’s carpet business wor just a front? You don’t seriously believe that selling a few fancy rugs would get him that nice house and car? He had a nice young dolly-bird wife, ’til she left him. A couple of years down t’ line things had got a bit hairy for Gerald. He ended up owing some gang up in Tyneside. Some big fish he’d got mixed up wi’. They came for their money. When he couldn’t pay up … That letter …’

‘I’ll read it later.’

‘It’s important that you do.’

He stretched out the fingers of one hand, examining his calluses. ‘You think you know people, Rick? Truth be told, you never really do. Everyone’s just putting out a version of themsens. The one they think the world should see. And that might be different to different folk – one face for t’ missus, one for your mates, another for t’ boss. Gerald …’

‘Heart attack. It wor in t’ paper, Gran read out the death notice. She wor always reading the columns.’

‘A heart attack? I never knew that. Is that what it said?’

Don’s voice wor fraying in his throat.

A neighbour drove by. She tooted a greeting and I waved quickly. I said, ‘Does it matter how he died?’

‘The letter.’

‘It’s about Gerald, ain’t it?’

‘Every time I look at you I’m reminded of him. The older you get, the more I can see him in you. It half kills me. The past plays on your mind like some shitty song that won’t leave your head. That letter …’

‘Am I supposed to read it right now?’

One by one, the pigeons wor returning to roost on t’ aerial.

‘You decide.’

Don turned and walked slowly toward t’ van. I called out after him, ‘Did he know about me? Did Gerald know he had a kid?’

Don’s step broke for a moment, and he cocked his head a little. ‘If it hadn’t been for all this Ripper nonsense …’

As his van pulled away I turned the envelope over and over, stroking it between my forefinger and thumb. I filleted it open and pulled the letter partway out. ‘Dear Richard,’ I read. I stuffed it back into t’ envelope, went indoor and threw it in t’ kitchen waste bin.

Gordon lived in a prefab. He’d been blathering on at me for yonks about wanting me to come over to his ‘abode’ so he could play me some of his favourite 78s. Finally I gave in, if only to get some sort of duty behind me. Truth be told, I wor curious to see how he lived.

There wor seven other prefabs on t’ site, all wi’ neatly turned-out gardens except for Gordon’s, which wor hidden behind a humungous hedge. The prefabs had an air of permanence, like caravans on bricks. There worn’t no bell, so I tapped a coin on t’ porch glass. Gordon opened the inner door, then t’ outer door, looking flustered. He said I wor a tad early, but that it didn’t matter none. Clearly it did.

He tried a light switch, apologised, and footled wi’ t’ leccy meter. The room wor chilly and smelt of stale ciggie smoke and wet wood. I heard a coin clunk into t’ meter box and the dull, cold light brightened slowly, revealing a room of solid dark furniture and threadbare rugs. In t’ middle of t’ room wor two faded leather armchairs, between which stood the 78 gramophone player like a prize exhibit at a show.

Gordon plugged in a lampstand wi’ a fringed shade. All t’ plugs wor dark brown and round-pin. He clicked on t’ lamp, then turned off the overhead light, and the furniture retreated into deeper shadows.

‘Tea?’

‘Aye, if it’s brewing.’

While Gordon wor in t’ kitchen making tea, I nosied about, stroking my fingers along t’ backs of t’ chairs and upending ornaments. The place clearly hadn’t seen a duster in a while. I picked up a paperweight, testing its heaviness in my palm.

Gordon called out from t’ kitchen, ‘Coconut slices?’

I set the paperweight back down.

‘Not for me, ta. Don’t like coconut none.’

I could hear t’ kettle on t’ gas stove starting to wheeze. I stroked the neck of a candlestick.

‘So you didn’t live here wi’ Brendan?’

I crouched down before a wooden cabinet crammed wi’ 78s in their paper sleeves. I lifted one out, tried to make out the faded silver-on-black lettering. Benny Carter and summat else. I slid it back. Just the thought of ploughing through this lot wor giving me a belly-ache. Why had Gordon insisted that I listen to a cartload of scratchy old 78s? He’d been so friggin’ enthusiastic about it, gassing on and on, and then when I gave in and said I’d come, he’d taken off his specs and looked at me wi’ eye-bulging astonishment and said, ‘Wonderful!’

Maybe, I thought, it wor a test to see if I wor worthy of my friggin’ inheritance. I flipped my fingers along t’ lines of paper-bag-brown, dull red and green sleeves. There must have been hundreds of ’em. What would I do wi’ this lot?

‘I wor saying … Brendan?’

‘Brendan? Heavens, no, we’d gone our separate ways many moons before. Brendan and I lived together in Bristol.’

‘Bristol?’

I stood up. Above a low bookcase of crusty old books hung two framed pictures of racehorses and riders jumping a thicket fence. I heard Gordon rooting around in a cutlery drawer. All I knew of Bristol wor that it had two rubbish footie teams and the Two Ronnies making a joke about Bristol being twinned wi’ Brest. Which is in France. I could hear Gordon opening and closing cupboard doors.

‘During the war I worked at Parnell’s near Bristol on developing radio communications. Highly secret stuff!’

The kettle wor starting to whistle. Gordon wor still conversationalising loudly from t’ kitchen.

‘Brendan came from down that way – I met him while he was on leave. We kept in touch. After the war ended and he was demobbed, we rented a small terraced house in Bristol and moved in together.’

I heard water being poured into a teapot and then t’ kettle being set back down on t’ gas stove.

On t’ dining table wor an empty vase, an ashtray, the
Evening Post
and a small wooden cigar box. I flipped the cigar box open, then closed it again. I picked up the vase, turned it over. It looked like it had been made by someone wi’ unsteady hands.

Gordon reappeared, carrying a two-bar electric fire, which he plugged in. He clocked me holding the vase.

‘That was a present from Brendan.’

‘Really? I wor just thinking how nice it is. Yeah, I like it, Gordon. Is it worth much then?’

Gordon smiled frugally. ‘It is to me. I might have some Rich Tea biscuits.’

He scuttled off again into t’ kitchen, returning wi’ a tin tray on which stood a Brown Betty teapot, a silver-plated sugar bowl, two bone-china teacups and an open packet of bikkies. His half-smoked ciggie wiggled on his lip, the ash about to drop into t’ sugar bowl. He set the tray on t’ floor between t’ armchairs.

‘There. That’s better.’

I grabbed a bikkie. Gordon tapped off his ash and rattled the teaspoon in his cup. He seemed nervous. I wor expecting him to open the gramophone lid and start winding it up, but he didn’t, and I didn’t want to remind him none, so I said nowt about it.

‘So, my boy. Here you are. You don’t know how much it thrills me that you agreed to come.’

‘Well, here I am.’

‘Indeed. Here you are.’

‘Inside my first prefab.’

‘There’s a thrill of sorts in that, I suppose.’

I bit into t’ bikkie. ‘So how did you come by this place?’

Gordon poured milk and then tea into two cups and handed me one of them. ‘It was my mother’s until she died in the summer of ’68. Then it became mine.’

I heaped several spoons of sugar into my cup. ‘Were you in love wi’ Brendan?’

‘Utterly besotted. I was twenty-one. Brendan was three years my senior. But living with Brendan was difficult. He found it hard to settle down after the war. The nightmares didn’t help. He’d seen some bad things. Not that he would ever talk about them. Bottled it all up. He was a lovely man when he wasn’t pressing the self-destruct button. Which he did more and more frequently. He was drinking heavily, and the pressure of concealment was eroding us.’

Gordon gulped, as if needing more air in his lungs.

‘England was a hideous place in the 1950s. We were in the dark ages – we still are, in many ways. Brendan and I were going through a rough patch when he was caught with someone else. Caught in the act. He was arrested, charged with gross indecency and offered treatment to cure him of his homosexuality. He had no option, really – either go to prison or agree to the treatment. To this day I don’t think he knew what he was letting himself in for. He thought it would be a few sessions on a shrink’s couch, and then he’d be free. The treatment involved being locked up in a cell-like room. He was pumped full of nausea-making drugs, then shown erotic photos of men. There was nowhere to be sick. He asked for a bucket, but was told to vomit onto the bed. Then they gave him more injections, and each time he was violently sick. He had to defecate on the bed as well. For five days this went on; every hour they injected him with drugs that made him sick. He had to sit, to sleep, in his own shit and vomit.’

‘Friggin’ hell. But they didn’t come for you?’

‘He held out – didn’t betray me. I guess his wartime training kicked in. He told them he was my lodger and that I was straight, and that I would be disgusted if I knew. We’d always had the spare room set up that way, just in case. After his release he went to live with his parents down in Somerset. The last I heard he’d emigrated to Canada.’ Gordon smiled weakly. ‘Finish your tea.’

I took a slurp. It had stewed. I wor still thinking on how friggin’ big Canada always looked on school maps when I said, ‘What was it you wanted to give me?’

‘Oh, yes. I almost forgot.’

He rose from his chair, went over to t’ sideboard and took out a brown-paper package, which he handed to me. It wor shaped like a book. I eyed it suspiciously.

‘Well, aren’t you going to open it then? It’s nothing much, just a token of our friendship.’

I guessed it really wor a friggin’ book. Likely as not a copy of
Urinals of Yorkshire
. Cautiously, I pulled apart the brown paper. It wor poetry:
The Poetical Works of Rupert Brooke
. I fed the pages through my fingers like a card dealer. On t’ inside page Gordon had written in ink, ‘For friendship’.

‘Ta, Gordon. Yeah, I mean, very much.’

‘I adore Rupert Brooke. Brendan used to read me his poems. Brooke was beautiful and brave and one of us.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Yes indeedy.’

Gordon took the book from me. ‘And look, I’ve researched this for you.’

He slid out a folded sheaf of paper that wor tucked inside it. ‘I contacted a professor at Leeds University, and he sent me a note on the Greek in “The Old Vicarage, Grantchester”.’

’I looked on, befuddled. I’d hardly ever read a poem in my life, not a proper one. Not unless you counted the one about some Roman soldier fancying Jesus Christ that wor pasted to t’ back of the bog door at Radclyffe Hall.

‘Thanks, Gordon.’ I put the book aside.

‘One day you’ll treasure that.’

I thought not.

I never read Don’s letter. I couldn’t think what wor to be gained from it.

There wor still t’ thorny matter of what to do wi’ all t’ knocked-off stuff stashed in t’ garage that I’d told Don I’d burnt. I decided to see if I could find that bloke Mitch knew over in Shipley. Maybe word hadn’t got to him about Mitch’s death, and he wor wondering why his little supply line had dried up. Maybe I could even take up where Mitch had left off. Come to some arrangement. Christ knows, we needed the friggin’ dosh.