Eoin Miller 01 - Faithless Street (4 page)

“No, didn’t need to.
Heard them.”

“Heard them climb
over?”

“No, heard them
running back to their bit, through the gap in the fence.” I turned back to look
at the garden fence, but Bennett shook his head, “Not that one. I’ll show you.”

He lead us back
through the house and up the driveway. Across the road, in a gap between two
houses, I could see a high metal fence. We walked over to it, and it became
more imposing the closer we got. The original fence was made of thin strips of
grey metal, rising up about ten or twelve feet off the ground. Sheets of metal
had been bolted over that frame, keeping the world beyond hidden from view.

Ten feet further
down, where the fence ran behind the garden of another house, the metal had
been pulled back, creating a gap to the other side.

“Is there any reason
they’d target you? I mean, it would be quicker to burn one of these houses,
wouldn’t it?”

“What reason do you
want? They’re scum. Don’t pay taxes, don’t have jobs. They just sit there and
expect to be treated like the rest of us.”

Becker nodded, a
sympathetic touch. “Must be tough. Don’t know how you stick it out, to be
honest, I think I’d move away.”

Bennett looked at
Becker like he was insane.

“Move? And give in to
them? No way, mate. This is our home. I bought this house, and I work 6 days a
week to pay the bloody mortgage, which is more than they do.”

We both nodded our
thanks and Bennett turned back towards his house. He was still talking as he
walked away, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying.
 
I ran my fingers over the tear in the
metal, marveling at the sheer force of will it would have taken to break
through.

“We need to put a lid
on this one quick,” Becker said. “Once the media comes sniffing? Shit, it’s
stoked enough as it is.”

“The camp’s under an
eviction notice, right?”

“Yeah. The council
haven’t issued the 28 day notice yet because there’s an appeal, but they’ve
been told the land isn’t theirs and to prepare to leave.” He made to turn away.
“I’ll go get the car, we’ll drive round to the camp.”

“Yeah, you do that.”

I climbed trough the
hole in the fence.

***

The other side of the
fence was covered in graffiti. At the top of the fence was a coil if barbed
wire, which hadn’t been visible from the other side.

On the other side,
the fence had said
security.

On this side it said,
Fuck Off.

The land this side
was muddy and uneven. There were signs that the ground beneath me had once been
concreted over, but it was smashed and broken, weeds climbing through towards
my feet. To my left was a large patch of land that looked like it had once been
an allotment, providing the camp with vegetables and berries, but the plants
looked like they’d been trampled into the ground and taken over by more weeds.

In front of me was
the camp. A loose grid of caravans squashed into a small corner of the old farm
land. Each one had a small yard, with low picket fences, and wooden extensions
built on to them to provide extra rooms. People were stood in the doorway of
every caravan, staring at me, willing me back through the gap in the fence.

I smiled and nodded at
them, and started walking deeper into the camp, through the maze of caravans
and cars. I figured I didn’t need to look for the man in charge, he’d come
looking for me.

The ground got better
the further into the camp I walked. The concrete had been left intact and it
ran alongside rectangular sections of grass which had washing lines and
children’s toys.

The children ran from
all around to stare at me, but they kept a distance of around ten feet, forming
a circle around me. I hadn’t expected to see any Roma at the camp, but I saw an
old man leaning on the gateway to a caravan’s front yard. He had the dark looks
of a Cale or Romanichal, and he was eyeing me with contempt.

“
Rom
?” He said as I drew near. I nodded. He eyed my suit and took a
guess at my job. “
Bawlo?
” Pig. I
nodded and he spat in my face.

The children parted
to allow a lean and wiry man to walk through. He stepped in close to me and
squinted, “I’d say you’re here about the fire?” He had the Irish tilt to his
words of someone who had never set foot in Ireland.

“I am, yes.”

Up close he looked to
be around the same age as me, but he carried himself like the burdens of the
world were bearing down on him. He walked like a man twenty years older.

He looked over my
shoulder, back toward the fence, “Other cops come in through the front, with
back up.” He smiled as his focus came back to me. “Pretty brave coming in that
way on your own.”

“I’ve been in a fair
few camps in my time.”

“You’re that gypsy
cop I heard about, aren’t ya? The one they wheel out in the local press
whenever they want to get away with shitting on a minority group?”

I didn’t know how to
answer that, so I just said, “Yes.”

He laughed and
offered his hand for a firm shake, “Michael,” he said, “Michael Shannon, my
father settled this place. Come on inside, I’ll get you a coffee and we’ll get
your face cleaned up.”

***

“This was all ours,
once.” Shannon passed me a coffee and settled onto the sofa opposite mine.

His caravan was at
the centre of the camp, and was more like a chalet. It was too large to be
towed by a car, and had three extensions built into it. The inside was
decorated like any other home, pictures, furniture, a fireplace. There was a
collection of children’s toys in a pile by the TV, but there were no other
signs of a child. Come to think of it, I couldn’t see any signs of a woman
either.

“He bought the land
from the old farm. All of it. Got planning permission for this place, “ he
waved at the walls around him, “and a few of the others around us, then more
people came.”

“More Irish?”

“More everything.
Yours, mine. A few people who just fancied the lifestyle, burned out hippies
who’d taken too many drugs. The whole thing grew.”

“What happened?”

He shook his head and
pointed at me, more out of humor than anything else, “You know how it goes. The
council wanted us off, wanted the land for themselves. They tried all the
tricks, they changed the town’s borders to fall down the middle of the land,
they reclassified it as greenbelt, we had homes torched by vandals in masks,
all the usual. But we fought them each time, in the courts, like, with suits
and ties.”

“That’s the way to do
it.”

“That’s what my dad
said. Every year he’d get a new hotshot solicitor, someone who wanted column
inches, and every year we’d win a few and lose a few. I can tell you, it was
taking years off my old man’s life, but he wouldn’t quit.”

“What happened?”

He took a long time
to answer. He sat sipping at his coffee and I saw his jaw clenching through his
cheeks. When he did answer, it was with a voice that had fought against
emotion, “Planning permission. They got us on planning permission. After 30
years of fighting, they finally took a look at all the original paperwork.”

“You said you had
planning permission though?”

“Aye. For this house,
and for ten others, we did. But all the other settlers who came? Not a chance.
There were too many of them too soon and, well, I guess we didn’t think of it.”
He paused again, choked up. “They came in with bulldozers and tractors, they
tore through most of the camp, wiped it out. Then they put up that fence over
there, make sure we knew our place.”

“And your father?”

“Cancer. He was
diagnosed during the last round of legal fights, his own guts were eating him.
He lived just long enough to see the fence go up.”

“I’m sorry.”

His eyes were cold
when they met mine, “Sorry for what? For my father? Or for coming here to help
them take what’s left?”

***

Before I could turn
the conversation to the fire, we heard noises outside. People had gathered
together and were talking loudly, all at once.

A teenager burst in
on us. He looked like a younger version of Shannon. “Dad, there’s more fucking
pigs here.”

He stepped back out
through the door without ever acknowledging my presence. Shannon looked at me
and shrugged before climbing to his feet. “You brought some friends then?”

I followed him
outside, where a crowd had gathered to shout abuse at the new arrivals.
Becker’s car was inching its way towards us, trying not to hit the people who
stepped in the way. The two marked cars were following close behind, their
lights were flashing but they’d kept the siren off.

Great.

Just great.

I walked through the
crowd and stepped in front of Becker’s car. He waved when he saw me, but I
shook my head. I walked round to his side and waited while he rolled the window
down.

“What the fuck?”

“I told you I was
driving round.”

“Yes,
you
. Not you and two shiny friends. You
bring me along to try and do things the easy way, then you come rolling in like
the fucking Sweeney.”

“I should send the
uniforms away?”

“You should send the
uniforms away.”

He nodded and relayed
the message on the radio. We both watched as the marked cars started inching
backwards, looking for a safe place to turn around. The crowd cheered, but it
was only a muted success, as far as they were concerned there were still two of
us on the camp. I caught a glimpse of the teenager again, who I figured for
Shannon’s son.
 
He was stood at the
edge of the crowd staring at the car, his eyes were focused with anger.

I told Becker to go
back down to the road and wait there unless I called him. I gave him Shannon’s
name and asked him to run a background check while he waited, then I turned
back towards the crowd.

Shannon was waiting
at the front, his face stayed locked in determination until Becker’s car was gone,
then he turned to me, “You trying to show how brave you are?”

“It’s more a case of
confirming my stupidity, probably.”

He cracked a smile
and nodded for us to walk.

He led me through the
camp, nodding at everyone as he passed, stopping to greet each of the women by
name and ask after their children.

“Do you know Tom
Bennett?” I asked as we walked.

He nodded, “Sure.” He
was going to leave it there, but saw that I wanted him to elaborate, “He was
one of the first people to move onto the estate.”

“Did you meet people
as they moved in?”

“We tried. I made a
point of going round and knocking on their doors, tried to explain we weren’t
looking for trouble, be neighbors, like, aye?”

“How did they take
it?”

He shrugged, “Oh, you
know. Some gave us a chance, some didn’t. Bennett did at first, used to come
through the gap and buy eggs off us, promised to take my son to a football
match.”

“What happened?”

“You have to
understand, we see
them
as the
squatters. My father bought that land. He owned it, had a piece of paper with
his name on it.”

“So-”

“People from over
here started going over there and causing trouble. They’d steal things, or
damage property. A couple of our boys burned out Bennett’s car.”

“Why target him?”

Another shrug,
“Because he was there.” He stopped walking and turned to look at me. “Look, I
was born here. Most of us were. You want us to just give that up? They’re going
to keep coming and people here are going to keep fighting back.” I turned to
continue walking put he pulled at my arm and continued talking, “When they come
for us, they’re coming for you too. Do you think of that?”

A Clash song popped
into my head unbidden.

Bass and violence
running through my head.

***

I found Shannon’s son
sifting through the mess of the ruined allotment.

“What happened?”

He didn’t acknowledge
me at first, but looked up once he realized I wasn’t going away. “What’s it to
you?”

“Just wondered.”

“I come here to
think, sometimes. This was my mum’s favorite place, you know? She loved coming
down here and working. We had chickens, over there,” He pointed to a twisted
heap of wood and chicken wire. “I’d come and help out, feed them, or dig the
soil.”

“Where is she? Your
Mum?”

He shrugged and I
left it alone.

“Men come over
sometimes,” he said. “They made that hole in the fence, they come over when
they’ve had too much to drink, wreck our stuff. They trampled this, and mum
said she’d had enough. Took my little brother with her.”