Born Under Punches (20 page)

Until September. Now. The month Mick should have been starting college.

Mick sighed again. ‘Look,' he said, ‘I'll go with Dougie tomorrow. Then that'll be it. I promise.'

‘Don't do it, Mick, please. I don't like you doing it.'

Angela's eyes were becoming redder, wetter.

‘I hate turning on the telly and seeing the miners. Hearing the things you're being called. Opening a paper and reading hate. I can't stand it. I can't stand it.'

She took two shuddering breaths.

‘And what have you got to show for it?'

She made a helpless shrugging gesture, held emptiness in her hands.

Mick said nothing.

‘Please, Mick, don't go. Tell them I'm sick. Tell them you can't go. Tell them anything. Please, Mick.'

Mick sighed, face contorted. ‘I'm sorry, Angela, I promised …'

Angela pulled herself awkwardly from her chair, made it to the door before the tears started.

Mick put his hand out.

‘Angela …'

She batted it away.

‘Leave me alone …'

He heard her go upstairs, heard the bedroom door slam, then nothing but the faint sound of muffled tears.

Mick sat silently on the sofa, thinking nothing, looking at nothing. Then he stood up, went into the kitchen, opened the fridge. There stood four cans of Guinness. Bought to keep Angela's iron levels up, but she hadn't liked the taste so they had left them there. He took one out, popped the ring pull, drank.

It tasted cold and bitter.

Good.

He carried the can back to the front room, flicked the TV back on, sat back on the sofa.

A toupeed, dicky-bowed comedian was turning easy targets into vapid jokes. The unemployed. Arthur Scargill. The miners.

Canned laughter answered his punchlines, distorted and cruel.

Mick watched.

And drank.

While Mick drank alone, Angela cried and Dougie and the rest of the town drank together, the police arrived.

Erecting barricades, checkpoints, deploying barriers and cones. Implementing a well-drawn, well-practised operation. Working through the night, remaking Coldwell, reordering it in a new image, to a new plan.

Their plan.

Leave cancelled, overtime doubled. Reinforcements called in on mutual aid. Stocking up on helmets, body armour, shields and batons. Given roles to play. Strategies to act out. Horses groomed and ready.

A silent, night-time invasion. Ready for the morning.

Their briefing:

‘They'll be expecting confrontation. Make sure we're ready for war.'

Tea and oranges: Tony was treating half-time seriously.

‘Come on, tracksuits on.' Tony clapped his hands twice. ‘Keep those muscles warm.'

Larkin, who hadn't yet taken his tracksuit off, helped himself to a cup of tea.

The mood was happy, buoyant: the men reliving their first-half heroism, building their contributions up to legendary status, honing and perfecting experiences into future treasurable anecdotes. Larkin smiled too. Although not really a part of the group, the enthusiasm of their achievement was infectious.

Tony came over to Larkin.

‘Good first half,' Larkin said.

Tony nodded. ‘Could have been better from a professional point of view, but the lads did a great job. Turning ordinary men into heroes. Even on their own heads. That's what it's about.' Tony smiled. ‘There's a quote for you.'

Larkin nodded, looked at the team. The inner fire that they had seemed to be lacking before the game was well and truly lit. They were kindled by something no external ravages could touch.

‘Your opposite number didn't look too pleased.'

‘Dave Wilkinson? Tries to pretend it's no big deal, but he takes it very seriously. Very competitive bloke.' Tony leaned in closer, his voice low. ‘And I know that him and his lot'll hate the fact that they're one–nil down to a bunch of ex-addicts. Hate it.' He gave a conspirational smile. Pride in his eyes.

Larkin smiled back.

‘Right.' Tony turned to the team. ‘Listen up, lads. You did a smashing job out there. Pace, commitment, the lot. I was very proud of you all. Now, a couple of things …'

Tony gave notes. Detailed, descriptive ones assessing each player's performance in turn, praising their strengths, addressing their shortcomings. He didn't sugar-coat the pill; he spoke to them like professionals and they responded in kind. He gave them respect. They returned it.

‘Right.'

He told them he had to pop out but would be back before the second half and left the room.

Larkin looked at the men. They were talking, bonded, happy. They didn't need him there. He put his plastic cup down. The tea had gone straight through him.

He wanted to look for the toilet and made his way into the corridor. Dave Wilkinson's voice was audible through the closed door of his team's changing room, all along the hall. He was giving less a half-time talk, more of a team character assassination.

Larkin glanced both ways, looking for a sign. As he looked left, he saw Tony standing at the end of the corridor, talking. The man he was talking to was in his mid-thirties with cropped hair and a well-tailored suit which showed highly defined muscles. He stood with authority.

He looked familiar. Larkin knew him from somewhere. He spun the face through his mental rolodex. There was something …

‘You all right?'

Larkin turned. There stood Claire Duffy.

‘Oh, yeah. Just looking for the toilets.'

She gave him directions. They were the opposite way to Tony and his friend.

‘Thanks. Oh, Claire?'

She looked him square in the eyes. ‘Yes?'

‘Who's that guy talking to Tony up there?' He gestured along the corridor.

‘Oh.' She seemed slightly disappointed. It didn't look like that was the question she had been expecting. She followed his gaze.

‘Him? That's Tommy Jobson.'

Click. That was it.

‘Tommy Jobson? Is he a friend of Tony's?'

‘Yeah. Local businessman. Owns casinos or something. Gives loads to charity. Well, loads to us, anyway.'

Larkin nodded, said nothing. That description didn't match the Tommy Jobson he was aware of.

‘Why d'you want to know?'

Larkin shrugged. ‘Just … thought I recognized him, that's all. Must be someone else. Well, I'd better be off to the loo.'

Larkin turned to walk away.

‘Hope you see some action in the second half,' Claire shouted after him.

‘Me too,' he said without turning around.

By the time Larkin returned to the changing room, Tony was there. His rallying speech was in full flow.

Agincourt in Coldwell.

Henry V inspiring his army of recovering addicts.

It worked. They were ready to run back on and play their hearts out.

Larkin joined them.

Dougie had never seen anything like it.

At fifty-two he was too young to remember what occupied France looked like during World War Two. But he could imagine. It would have looked like Coldwell did now.

The town had joined the list of those under siege, martial law.

The gates to the colliery were locked shut, ringed by tooled-up, visored woodentops. They stood impassively, waiting. It looked like a border checkpoint between warring neighbour states. Keeping one side out, one side in.

Word had gone round late at night, early in the morning. Homeward-bound partygoers leaving the Miners' Welfare Hall had seen the police operation but were too physically depleted to take action against it. The news had spread, angrily at first, then with a contemplative sense of inevitability: the gains of the previous day couldn't go unpunished.

There was no procession today. Word had gone out: pack the gates with bodies. Yesterday's remaining flying pickets were there, as were neighbouring miners, plus the near-acronyms: RCP, SWP, WRP. Their numbers were much depleted from the previous day, the organization haphazard. The chants had no rhythm, the shouts were random: scatter-gun targetting. The banners were absent.

The men were dressed for work again; boots and denim, plus a smattering of Frankie Says Coal Not Dole T-shirts.

Tension choked. Tension stifled. Tension ate up the air between the two tribes.

Dougie hadn't had much sleep. The elation of the previous day, the previous night had drained completely away. He had watched through bleary eyes and an aching head as convoys of police buses, vans and support units had rolled up and disgorged officers, riot visors rendering them faceless, identities as blank and unaccountable as their numberless epaulets.

As the police buses had passed, coppers had waved money out of the windows, tenners and twenties, shouted taunts about how much overtime they were making, the holidays in Majorca they were taking. Some of the older ones had looked embarrassed at this, had looked at Dougie and shrugged apologetically:
This isn't what I wanted from my job.
Dougie could empathize with them. This wasn't what he wanted from his, either.

The roads and walkways had been reshaped. With bollards, cones and barriers, the only way round was the way the police wanted. Junctions were manned, routes enforced, entry scrutinized. Anyone intending to enter the town was stopped, questioned and sometimes searched. Pickets and sympathizers or suspected pickets or sympathizers were turned away with as much force as individual officers felt like inflicting. Anyone granted entry was directed to a designated parking area. The police had everyone where they wanted them.

Dougie looked around at the townspeople, the locals. They watched helplessly as, piece by piece, their town was taken away from them. And with that, their dignity, their pride. Even neutrals, people who had no connection with the mine or the strike, were drawn in. With each decision, each section of Coldwell claimed by the police, lines were drawn. Divisions made. Sides, out of unconscious necessity, were taken.

The people's faces reflected anger hardening into hatred. Complacency turning into resolve. But above all, fear. Fear of the future. Fear of the present.

Fear of the immediate future.

The mini was travelling towards Coldwell, the Redskins on the tape player. Larkin nodded along to the beat, sang snatches of lyric. Bolland unconsciously kept time on the steering wheel. Larkin, buoyed by the events of the previous day, was allowing the music to carry him further up.

‘X. Moore wrote these songs on a picket line, you know,' said Larkin.

‘Is that supposed to make them sound better?'

‘Yeah. Thinks they have more honesty and heart because of it.'

Bolland smiled. ‘Some catchy tunes might be a better idea.'

Bolland was a friend of Larkin's, a journalism student at Newcastle Poly. He had an eye for a dramatic picture, marking him out as an excellent photojournalist of the future. They had worked together before and were good friends, although Larkin suspected Bolland's George Michael-style coif extended further than his hair roots.

Larkin was about to argue back when they saw it. The roadblock.

Stretching the width of the road, manned by over a dozen policemen flagging down cars indiscriminately. The smell of testosterone was almost corporeal.

‘Shit,' said Bolland. ‘That wasn't there yesterday. What're we going to do?'

‘Don't worry. Leave it to me,' said Larkin. ‘We'll be fine.'

A policeman flagged them down, pointed to the side of the road.

Bolland pulled over, waited.

‘Better turn the tape off,' said Larkin.

‘Morning, gentlemen,' said the copper. Only school age but already swaggering, as if natural authority came woven into the uniform. ‘Tell me where you're headed?'

Bolland swallowed. ‘Coldwell.'

The policeman tensed, a hard, anticipatory smile developing on his lips.

‘And can I ask what for?'

‘We're journalists,' said Larkin.

‘Really.' The copper scoped them: Levi's, DMs. Larkin wearing his Meat Is Murder T-shirt. ‘Working for who?'

‘The
Daily Mirror
.'

‘Oh, yeah?' The copper looked over to his comrades, readying them for some fun.

‘Yes,' said Larkin. He opened his jacket, took out the card Pears had given him, held it up. ‘This is our boss. Call him if you don't believe me. The name's Stephen Larkin.'

The policeman looked at the card, hesitated. A blip in his cockiness. Larkin held his gaze.

‘Are you going to call him?' asked Larkin. ‘If you are, could you do it quickly? I don't mean to be rude, but we've got a job to do. Deadline to meet.'

The policeman was confused. His instinct was not to let them through, but Larkin's insistence, his calm, unblinking gaze, seemed genuine. He decided to take the chance.

‘Go on then, off you go.'

‘Thank you, constable,' said Larkin, smiling.

They drove off, Bolland putting his foot down.

Bolland sighed with relief. Larkin laughed.

‘Fucking fascist bastard,' he shouted, looking back at the retreating figure of the policeman as he watched them go.

‘Cunt,' he said.

Larkin turned the tape back on.

‘Do we have to?'

‘What's the alternative? Your stuff? Wham?' said Larkin.

Bolland said nothing.

‘We've got through the first stage. Let the lyrics inspire you.'

Larkin settled back in his seat, mouthing the words.

‘Bring it Down.'

Dougie entered the Miners' Welfare Hall.

Last night's party was a distant memory. Formica-topped tables were pushed together, newspapers, mugs and notebooks scattering the tops. Mick was just putting the phone down.

‘How's it goin'?'

Mick sighed. ‘Not good. The Yorkshire pickets got through all right. Most of them stayed here last night. But the Notts lads and the Lancashire men haven't. They've got roadblocks all the way down the A1. There's coaches and vans blockin' the lanes … It's chaos everywhere.'