security guards. I was the only civilian. I dropped the wine bottle into a rubbish bin. It was empty and the bottle hit the bottom with a blunt thud that went straight to my temples. âGo home, pal,â ordered a honcho in an Armaguard uniform. âThe showâs over.â
I could, I supposed, have identified myself, claimed some small entitlement to information. A pretty picture that would have made. A crumpled suit, grass stains on my fingers, a gutful of souring wine, trying to throw my rather limited weight about. And for what? To find out how come my hot date had been cut short?
Snatches of radio chatter and snippets of half-overheard conversations gave me more than enough clues to satisfy my immediate curiosity on that point. The body in the cowboy boots had been found by a security guard. Heâd come outside for a cigarette and noticed a dark shape lying on the bottom of the moat, in the shadow of the retaining wall. He thought it was a roll of carpet. Idiots were always dumping things in the moat. He shone his torch into the water and saw what it was. He called another guard and they attempted resuscitation. It was no use. The guy could have been lying there for hours. An empty scotch bottle was found beside the body.
I trudged across Princes Bridge to the dormant railway station, laid my cheek upon the rear-seat upholstery of the only cab at the rank and murmured my address to the driver, a Polish scarecrow in tinted plate-glass hornrims. âHot,â he said. âWery hot.â
âGdansk, it ainât,â I agreed.
Chauffeured for the third time that day, the pulse of the passing streetlights throbbing at my temples, the grog finally catching up with me, I succumbed to a headachy doze. And in my waking sleep, I found myself thinking unbidden thoughts of a time long gone.
My father had just taken the licence of the Olympic Hotel, his fourth pub in ten years. Apart from the name, there wasnât anything sporting about the Olympic, not unless you counted the horse races droning away on the radio in the public bar. Mum hadnât been dead long when we made the move, and Dad had taken me out of St Josephâs and put me in the nearest government secondary school. It was a haphazard choice. He said he wanted me near him. More like he didnât want to keep paying the fees.
That was okay with me. Compared to where Iâd been, Preston Technical was a breeze. Nobody gave a flying continental about academic results. Soon as they got to fifteen, most of them were straight out the door and into apprenticeships or factory jobs. Plenty of work for juniors in those days, the sixties. But not much teenage entertainment. Not unless you could get your hands on some piss. Not unless you knew how to handle the kid whose father owned the pub.
At St Joeyâs the only real source of fear was the Brothers, pricks with leather straps, a weight advantage and the high moral ground. At the tech we had the Fletchers, fifteen-year-old twins and their older brother, ferret-faced thugs who hunted in a pack and made the Christian Brothers look like the Little Sisters of Mercy. There was an older Fletcher still, but he was in Pentridge prison. The initial charge was manslaughter but the magistrate believed him when he said that if heâd been seriously trying to hurt the bloke heâd have worn his kicking shoes. So he got off with reckless endangerment and grievous bodily harm. Five years.
The Fletchers lived on the Housing Commission estate, prefab concrete boxes built in 1956 to accommodate the Olympic athletes and already falling to bits when the welfare cases moved in after the Games were over. When you rode your bike to school through Fletcher territory you needed steely nerves, strong thighs and tough friends. Thatâs what they told me at school, anyway. But I was the new kid. I didnât have any tough friends. Not until I was adopted by the one they called Spider. Then I had a
I could, I supposed, have identified myself, claimed some small entitlement to information. A pretty picture that would have made. A crumpled suit, grass stains on my fingers, a gutful of souring wine, trying to throw my rather limited weight about. And for what? To find out how come my hot date had been cut short?
Snatches of radio chatter and snippets of half-overheard conversations gave me more than enough clues to satisfy my immediate curiosity on that point. The body in the cowboy boots had been found by a security guard. Heâd come outside for a cigarette and noticed a dark shape lying on the bottom of the moat, in the shadow of the retaining wall. He thought it was a roll of carpet. Idiots were always dumping things in the moat. He shone his torch into the water and saw what it was. He called another guard and they attempted resuscitation. It was no use. The guy could have been lying there for hours. An empty scotch bottle was found beside the body.
I trudged across Princes Bridge to the dormant railway station, laid my cheek upon the rear-seat upholstery of the only cab at the rank and murmured my address to the driver, a Polish scarecrow in tinted plate-glass hornrims. âHot,â he said. âWery hot.â
âGdansk, it ainât,â I agreed.
Chauffeured for the third time that day, the pulse of the passing streetlights throbbing at my temples, the grog finally catching up with me, I succumbed to a headachy doze. And in my waking sleep, I found myself thinking unbidden thoughts of a time long gone.
My father had just taken the licence of the Olympic Hotel, his fourth pub in ten years. Apart from the name, there wasnât anything sporting about the Olympic, not unless you counted the horse races droning away on the radio in the public bar. Mum hadnât been dead long when we made the move, and Dad had taken me out of St Josephâs and put me in the nearest government secondary school. It was a haphazard choice. He said he wanted me near him. More like he didnât want to keep paying the fees.
That was okay with me. Compared to where Iâd been, Preston Technical was a breeze. Nobody gave a flying continental about academic results. Soon as they got to fifteen, most of them were straight out the door and into apprenticeships or factory jobs. Plenty of work for juniors in those days, the sixties. But not much teenage entertainment. Not unless you could get your hands on some piss. Not unless you knew how to handle the kid whose father owned the pub.
At St Joeyâs the only real source of fear was the Brothers, pricks with leather straps, a weight advantage and the high moral ground. At the tech we had the Fletchers, fifteen-year-old twins and their older brother, ferret-faced thugs who hunted in a pack and made the Christian Brothers look like the Little Sisters of Mercy. There was an older Fletcher still, but he was in Pentridge prison. The initial charge was manslaughter but the magistrate believed him when he said that if heâd been seriously trying to hurt the bloke heâd have worn his kicking shoes. So he got off with reckless endangerment and grievous bodily harm. Five years.
The Fletchers lived on the Housing Commission estate, prefab concrete boxes built in 1956 to accommodate the Olympic athletes and already falling to bits when the welfare cases moved in after the Games were over. When you rode your bike to school through Fletcher territory you needed steely nerves, strong thighs and tough friends. Thatâs what they told me at school, anyway. But I was the new kid. I didnât have any tough friends. Not until I was adopted by the one they called Spider. Then I had a
Similar Books
