Guns Of Brixton (8 page)

    'Arthur,'
said Margaret Jenner. 'Really.'

    Then
his father turned on her. 'And turn that sodding racket off.'

    'It's
the new Hollies single,' John protested. 'It's the business.'

    'I
don't care if it's the new pansy's single. That's what they are and you as
well,' said his father.

    Before
Arthur could get into his stride, they heard a ring at the front door. 'That'll
be Billy,' said John, relieved at the interruption.

    'It
might be the man from the Pru,' said Margaret. 'Or the milkman. He wants
paying.'

    'I'll
go and see,' said John, leaving the kitchen and walking the length of the short
hall to open the front door. It was Billy. 'Thank Christ,' said John. 'The old
man's doing his nut as usual.'

    Billy
was still strictly mod. That morning he was dressed in pristine brown suede
Hush Puppies, white socks, checked hipsters with a slight flare, held up by a
wide, white leather belt, a navy blue button down shirt with a massive collar
and a scarlet jacket in the same style as his friend's. 'Come on in, blue
eyes,' said John. 'I've just got home.'

    'Where
you been?'

    'I
went to that new place in Fulham. Met a bird. Had it off. You should've seen
her. Well tasty.'

    'You
lucky sod.'

    'I
told you to come.'

    'I've
got no dough.'

    'You
will have.' And he led his friend back to the kitchen.

    'Hello,
Billy,' said Margaret. 'Cup of tea? Something to eat?'

    'Are
you feeding the whole world now?' said Arthur. 'You'd think we were made of
money.'

    'Don't
pay any attention, love,' said Margaret, busying herself with the kettle.

    'Just
a cuppa please, Mrs J,' said Billy.

    'And
I'd better get changed,' said John. 'I fancy a trip up west, have a gander at
what's new round the shops.'

    'Poofs,'
said Arthur. 'The pair of you.' And the boys laughed out loud.

    Billy's
hair was strictly mod, too. Lighter than his friend, it was razor- cut with a
one-inch part at the front and a slight bouffant backcombed Over the crown.
That was poofy too, according to Arthur. Almost everything the boys did was
poofy according to him. Arthur still sported the short-back-and-sides he'd kept
since his army days, when his drill sergeant had assured him that only
homosexuals grew their hair long. The fact that the neighbourhood girls flocked
around his son and his friend was still a source of amazement to the older man.

    'A
spell in the army would do you both good,' Arthur said. 'Why they ever stopped
National Service I don't know.'

    It
was an old song the boys had heard a million times before and they pulled faces
behind Arthur's back. 'Leave them, Art,' protested his wife. 'They look
lovely.'

    'Lovely,'
said Arthur getting into his stride, but knowing he couldn't win and deep down
not really wanting to. 'I'll give 'em lovely. Got a job yet, Bill?' Billy had
had several jobs since leaving school but hadn't been able to hold on to any of
them, which was a source of constant irritation to his own father.

    'Still
looking Mr J,' he said. The conversation reminded him too much of what he got
at home.

    'You
wouldn't last long in this house, I'm telling you. Now I'm going to the lav','
said Arthur, and he took his
Daily Mirror
and retired to the outside
lavatory where the rest of his family knew he'd probably stay for at least an
hour.

    'Take
no notice,' said John's mother. 'It's just his way.'

    'Sure,'
said John. 'Now I've got to have a bath and get changed. Give me half an hour.'

    He
went next door to the tiny scullery and shut the door firmly behind him.
Christ, he thought. I can't wait 'til I get somewhere with a proper bathroom
and a lavatory where you don't have to go out in the rain to have a piss and
freeze your dick off when you're doing it, let alone anything else. He took the
lid off the narrow, battered bath where i doubled as a seat or a shelf, and
turned on the tap that set the Ascot water heater belching and farting as it
sent a stream of boiling water into the bath tub.

    When
he was satisfied with the temperature, he hopped in and shaved whilst he was
sitting in the water, peering into a tiny mirror surround by seashells and the
slogan 'A Present From Scarborough', and using plastic jug for a shaving mug.
Once clean he let out the water and ran a rag round the tidemark. With a thin
towel wrapped around his waist, he went back into the kitchen.

    'Wow,'
said his mother. 'Charlton Heston.'

    'Yeah,
Mum, sure. Got any clean shirts?'

    'I'd
never live it down if I hadn't. They're in your room.'

    John's
small bedroom was in the eaves of the house and there was scarcely room in it for
a single bed and a chest of drawers. The house was really too small for the
three of them, but Arthur refused to contemplate moving and he told John in no
uncertain terms that if he wanted somewhere bigger to sleep he'd bloody well
better get out and find one.

    John
went up the two flights of stairs into the tiny, hot, airless room and found
half a dozen pristine shirts hanging up behind the door. He chose a pink,
frilly-fronted item from the same shop that The Kinks bought their stage clothes.
It had already almost caused several fights in that tough part of town. He
teamed it with tight, narrow-legged jeans, desert boots and a black leather
jacket.

    He
went back downstairs and pulled Billy out of the kitchen where he'd just
finished his tea. 'See you later, Mum,' he said as they left.

    'Are
you back for tea?' she shouted behind them.

    'No,'
replied her son. 'There's an alldayer at the 'Mingo, then we're off down the
Scene. We'll be back in the morning.'

    'You
boys,' she said exasperatedly. 'Just be careful. You hear.'

    In
fact they had no intention of visiting either of the clubs they'd mentioned.
But they still made the long trip up to Soho. Soho was where John and Billy
felt most at home, where they occasionally caught sight of their favourite
group members. They felt that they fitted into the area, and they headed for
their favourite cafe, the Blue Angel, to discuss their plans. Once inside, at a
quiet table, with a cup of frothy coffee each, they went over them for the last
time.

    'Right,'
said John out of the corner of his mouth. 'The warehouse is underneath the
arches at Vauxhall. It's a piece of cake getting in. Just a crappy old burglar
alarm "with wires sticking out everywhere. I had a good look last week. We
cut those and jemmy the door. Wally's borrowed his brother's van. We need that
to get the pills to the shed.'

    Arthur
had an allotment by the railway in Heme Hill that he never bothered with. Why
bother growing your own when you worked at Covent Garden, where the fruit and
veg just dropped off the shelves and into your voluminous pockets? he'd say.
But he refused to give it up as it was the right of every Englishman to have a
piece of land to work. That summer John and Billy had volunteered to tidy up
the place, much to Arthur's amazement. That gave them access to the shed on the
tiny patch of land. It was secured by a padlock to which John now had the only
key. There was a narrow side street beside the allotments where they could park
the van and so transfer the pills. Wally was an old mate. Another mod, he'd
give them the use of his brother's old minivan in exchange for speed. Simple.

    'What
time we meeting him?' asked Billy.

    'Ten.
It won't get dark 'til then this time of year.'

    'So
what do we do now?'

    'Go
to the pictures. There's the new James Bond on at the Odeon. We can sit through
it twice.'

    Which
they did.

    At
ten o'clock that night, John and Billy were waiting near the Oval tube station
when Wally arrived in the van. Earlier that week John had dropped off a couple
of pairs of gloves and two torches at Wally's place and they were waiting for
them underneath the front seat. The two youths climbed into the tiny vehicle:
John in the passenger seat, his friend in the back, moaning about the dirt that
was getting on to his trousers. 'You'll be able to buy a dozen new pairs next
week,' said John as the van drove off towards Vauxhall.

    The
job was as simple as John had said it would be. Once over the front fence, the
alarm succumbed to the blades of the wirecutters, and the lock on the front
door of the warehouse was almost laughably simple to break open. Once inside,
John and Billy, with Wally at the door keeping watch
for passing
coppers, found the boxes full of jars of amphetamine tablets, one thousand per
jar, one dozen jars per box. There were ten boxes in all. The two boys' heads
swum at the thought. Then John found something else. By the light of his torch
he saw a box marked 'Mandrax Tablets'. Mandies. The famed sleeping pill that
was also reputed to be an aphrodisiac. 'A mandy makes 'em randy' was what he'd
heard. And there were two boxes of them. One thousand to a box. The three of
them swiftly transferred the twelve cartons to the little motor, then headed
for Heme Hill.

    There
the transfer was quickly made and Wally took his payment of a thousand purple
hearts. John thought it was a bit much, but a deal was a deal. At least it
would keep Wally happy for long enough to give them a chance to move the swag
again. An old mate or not, if Wally knew where the drugs were, the chances were
he'd come back for more.

    John
and Billy watched as the tail lights of the minivan vanished up Denmark Hill
and they shook hands. 'We've done it, mate,' said John. 'We're going to be
rich.'

    And
that was how it all started proper,' concluded John Jenner.

    'I
never really knew about all that.'

    'You
never asked.'

    'I
know. I was too full of myself. So what happened next?'

    'Lots.
I'll tell you another time. There will be another time, won't there?'

    'Looks
like it, don't it? Now I'm back in the bosom of hearth and home.'

    'Yeah.
You haven't seen your room yet. You hungry?'

    'Not
really. I'm still stuffed from that lunch.'

    'Yeah,
me too. But I've got to eat regular. Got to feed the cancer'or else it gets
angry and gives me grief.'

    'I
don't know how you can talk about it like that.'

    'Because
it's part of me. As much a part now as my eyes and ears.'

    'But
it's going to kill you.'

    'Well
something had to.'

    'Does
it scare you?'

    'Terrifies
me more like. Not the dying part, or the being dead. I don't think we go up in
front of Saint Paul with his big book of what we did right or wrong. Mind you,
if we do I'm destined for…' He held up his hand with the thumb down."… I
reckon you just go to sleep. Must be nice. I just hope you don't dream. Some of
my dreams…' He didn't finish the sentence. 'No. What frightens me is the pain
getting worse and not going away. Or even worse, dying alone. That's why I want
you here. You and Martine and Chas. As much of my family as there is left.'

    Mark
felt tears sting his eyes again. 'You won't die alone, Uncle John.

    Not
whilst we're around.' But he felt he was getting in too deep and changed the subject.
'So who does the cooking these days? Not you, I bet.'

    'Chas
mostly.'

    'Are
you kidding me?'

    'Not
at all. When we're not out and about, which ain't often these days I'm afraid,
he's in front of the cooking channel on cable. He loves it.'

    'What
about Martine?'

    'Martine?
You're having a laugh, aincha? She can cook all right, just like her mum. When
she can be bothered, which ain't often. So all she does is wreck Chas's kitchen
and leaves him to clear up. He curses her out.'

    'I bet
he does.'

    'Anyway,
I heard him come back just now. I'll get him to knock up something. Now come
and see your room.'