All to Play For (4 page)

“Never mind, it’s only a student production.” Maggie had meant to comfort him, but he looked affronted. “Sorry, didn’t mean to sound patronising. I, er, oh fuck it… ” She couldn’t be bothered with the hurt feelings of a bloody Footlights type.

The door opened again and Chris appeared looking pleased with himself, followed by a sergeant.

“Okay yous lot, you’re all free to go. Just mind out what you do, in future. I don’t want to see any of you in here again.” The sergeant stood at the door and gazed sternly on them as they filed out thankfully, reserving his dirtiest look for Jonathan who sheepishly brought up the rear.

Outside on the pavement they turned to Chris and demanded to know how he had swung it.

“Oh, I just told them who I was and what happened,” he said modestly. “That’s all. They were perfectly reasonable.”

“You were marvellous, then,” exclaimed Jill, giving him a little hug and a peck on the cheek. “We’re all in your debt.” Only Nicky looked sullen. He didn’t want to be in Chris’ debt.

Maggie noticed and couldn’t help commenting, “Come on, Nicky. Don’t be a tosser.”

“Do what?” he exclaimed.

“Stop pretending you’re such a tough guy. Thank Chris for getting you out of there.”

Nicky stuck his hands in his pockets and stared at the sky sulkily.

“Never mind,” said Maggie, annoyed. “After all, he’s only a kid. He’ll grow up one day.” The others smiled uncomfortably.

“Not at all, don’t be silly,” said Chris. “Look, there’s a cab.” He hailed it, and gave the driver a fiver. “Take the lady wherever she wants to go,” he said, and held the door open for Jill.

“Thank you, thank you so much,” she gushed, overwhelmed by emotion again.

“I say, you’re not going towards the Haymarket are you?” said Jonathan, suddenly realising that he had a chance of rescuing his career prospects.

“I haven’t a clue, but we will if you like. Hop in.”

“How about you, Nicky?” asked Chris. “Presumably you’ve got somewhere to go?”

“He’s just a nit with no future,” smirked Jonathan. “Didn’t you hear the officer?”

Nicky turned and scowled. “Fuck off you stuck-up twat. I’m just as good as you lot, you know. You ain’t heard the last of me.” He turned and stalked off up the road. No-one was impressed.

Chris and Maggie shared a feeling that they wanted to remain in each other’s company: she loitered behind him and he failed to offer her a ride in the taxi. It pulled away, leaving them on the pavement.

“Well. What’s Nicky’s problem?” said Maggie.

“He’s fifteen. He’s working class. And he’s a twerp,” said Chris succinctly.

“Whereas you turned out to be a knight in shining armour!”

“I don’t know about that,” he said awkwardly. “I feel in need of a shower. My hotel’s down there, d’you want to come back and clean up?” He was fairly sure that there was a promising sexual tension between them, but was uncertain of the correct way to act on it. He didn’t usually go in for casual sex, and Maggie was not really his type, but today’s events were extraordinary all round, and his triumph over the police force had inspired a sense of omnipotence.

“Actually that would be great,” said Maggie, who found Chris something of a curiosity, and engaged in casual sex whenever she felt like it. “I’ve missed my show anyway.”

They walked together into the large modern hotel, and up to Chris’ room, where he took a shower while Maggie drank a beer from the mini-bar and watched the local news on television. Then Maggie took a shower while Chris drank a beer. By the time she emerged, wearing the hotel’s white towelling dressing gown, a tray of sandwiches had been delivered by room service.

“Wow, this is the life.”

Chris smiled, and stopped himself remarking that she was easily impressed. “Feminist theatre has to be low-budget, I suppose?”

“Too right. Lucky to get a mattress on the floor, never mind free crisps with your sandwiches. This is what you get when you’re a producer at the BBC, is it?”

“All this and much, much more!” said Chris expansively. He made space for Maggie to sit beside him on the bed, and offered her the plate.

“Well it’s very nice,” said Maggie, biting the corner off a cheese sandwich. “But I don’t know. Do you have, in the words of our new friend, freedom of speech? Artistically, I mean? Or have you sold your soul?”

“Not that I know of, I don’t recall that being in the contract.”

“I should read it again, if I were you,” said Maggie provocatively, “when you’ve had your specs mended.” She poured another beer and wondered whether he was ever going to make a move. They smiled at each other lingeringly, and Chris’ nostrils flared a little. Suddenly he put his arm round Maggie, took her in his arms, and kissed her.

Ooh, she thought, he’s the strong, silent type. Wants to be in charge.

“Let’s lie down,” he murmured, and they did.

Forty-five minutes later they said a friendly goodbye outside the hotel, and departed with an equal sense of purpose: Maggie to the Assembly Rooms to further the cause of feminism, and Chris to the opening event of the television festival, to debate with his colleagues on weighty matters of broadcasting.

Chapter Two

Nicky played down the incident when he told the youth theatre about it later; he was worried it might get back to his dad, who was a sergeant at Ilford police station. I could tell he was dying to brag about his street-fighting prowess, but he restrained himself as his mam and dad would disapprove. He asked me and Steve not to mention it to them.

He needn’t have worried on my account, because my role in the NYT ended shortly after the Edinburgh trip; I had too much work on in my final year of study and teaching placements. (And yes, if you must know, Steve’s wife found out.) I lost touch with them and to be honest I forgot all about Nicky until years later when I read an article on him in a broadcasting paper, which brought back that period of my life in vivid memories. It’s funny how certain times become completely closed off to you as you move forward, and then someone opens a door suddenly and it’s all there again, laid out in a dusty old room at the back of your mind.

Anyway. Back to the boy.

Nicky had wanted to join the police force ever since he was a toddler. He hoped to become a detective, and planned to join the force as soon as he left school. He worked hard to pass his exams, and his dad, Les, told him there was no reason why he wouldn’t be accepted. When the application forms arrived they went through them together.

Nicky’s mum, Doreen, watched them through the serving hatch as she cleared up the kitchen after dinner. They sat at the dining table in the living room, heads bent over folded arms. Nicky was built just like his dad, neat and well-formed, and only just tall enough to qualify for the force. He had the same handsome features, dark hair and healthy complexion, but in Nicky flowed all the energy and impatience of youth which had long since evaporated from Les.

Doreen was proud as anything. She and Les had waited ten years to have their baby, suffering three miscarriages before he arrived. Hopes of a large family were put aside as they accepted their fate and celebrated their one great blessing. Nicky was much loved, but never spoiled. They believed in discipline and instilled respect in him. When Nicky was five, they left their council flat in Canning Town and moved to a police house in Ilford. It was a step up for them, they now had two good-sized bedrooms and a garden front and back.

She was delighted for Les that Nicky had stuck to his ambition. They would have been just as happy for him to choose another career – as long as it was a sound one – but Doreen knew that it meant a great deal to Les. While it was nice to be hero-worshipped by a little boy, it was a real compliment to have a young man follow in your footsteps.

They had wondered whether the interest in drama would give him other ideas, but had refrained from warning him against trying to make a career in the theatre. They had the sense not to provoke a reaction, having seen plenty of youths do precisely what their parents warned them against. Nicky had spent four years in the Newham Youth Theatre, and they had attended all his shows, complimenting him without going overboard, and never complaining about the politics, which often struck them as unnecessarily left-wing. Les did, however, allow himself to comment on the director’s sexuality.

“Camp as a row of tents, that Steve,” he would remark after every opening night.

“So how come he’s married with two kids?” was Nicky’s usual reply.

“Don’t mean a thing, son. Believe me, I’ve seen it all.” Nicky would shrug and accept his father’s experienced world-view. He liked Steve and had never seen anything to support Les’ theory except larking about, and perhaps touching people more often than most men did – but then again, in the theatre, everyone did. It was a different way of behaving altogether. Nicky understood the rules both inside and outside the theatre, and was equally at ease with either. He was confident and self-possessed; he was liked, and he knew what he wanted. These were enviable qualities in his neighbourhood.

The truth was he had never seriously considered trying to become an actor or anything similar. He knew he had no special talent for it, and feared the prospect of financial insecurity. He had no intention of being gay either. He accepted Les’ view that gay men were second-rate, that real men were big, strong and hairy, with rugged faces and stern frowns. No self-respecting man would ever take it like a woman, and women came even lower down the social scale than gay men.

“Look at film stars today,” Les liked to point out. “Since they legalised homosexuality they’re completely different. They’re pretty boys, not proper men.” Doreen agreed. She found the likes of Kirk Douglas far more attractive than Tom Cruise. Nicky went along with them, he was content to live and let live, as long as no-one put him on the spot – in which case he would assert himself with his fists. By Ilford standards, he was very easygoing. If ever he felt a twinge of teenage attraction for another man, he dispelled it. A gay boy he would not be.

A couple of weeks before Nicky’s interview at the police college in Hendon, he came home one afternoon to find his parents clinging together on the sofa. His father was weeping, but he stopped when Nicky appeared and blew his nose.

“Is it Nan?” asked Nicky, sitting on the edge of the armchair.

“No darling,” said his mum. “She’s fine. Everyone’s fine. Your dad’s had a nasty shock, that’s all.” She patted Les’ thigh and sighed.

Nicky leaned back in his chair, and waited for them to tell him what had happened. They seemed reluctant. “Don’t tell me if you don’t want to,” he said, trying to sound mature, but failing to keep a hint of sulkiness from colouring his remark. Les looked at him for a moment and dropped his red-eyed gaze to the floor.

“Shall I tell him?” Doreen asked gently. Les nodded and his face creased up as despair overwhelmed him again, his head dropping into his hands. “Your dad’s been suspended from work, along with four other officers. He’s being investigated.”

“What for?”

“Corruption!” Doreen’s anger was apparent. “Can you credit it? Twenty-eight years’ impeccable service, and they’ve got the nerve to accuse him of something like that.” Her lips sealed tight and she hugged Les the way she used to hug Nicky when he had been thumped by another boy.

Nicky took a deep breath and blew his cheeks out. He gazed at the pair of them, completely gob-smacked. No-one spoke, and in the silence they heard a distant police siren amid the gentle whoosh of traffic pouring round the North Circular Road.

“Shall I make a cup of tea?”

“Yes please Nicky, that would be just the thing.”

Nicky went in the kitchen in a daze. As he waited for the kettle to boil he pondered. There were two absolute constants in his scheme of things: the integrity of his father, and the integrity of the police force. Suddenly, both had been called into question. Either his father or the force was in the wrong. It couldn’t be his father. That meant it was the force. It must have made a mistake. But how could it get everything so wrong as to betray one of its own most loyal members?

He took the mugs into the living room and set them on the coffee table, sitting in the armchair again. His father had tried to pull himself together, but looked awful. Nicky had never seen him like this before, and he found it embarrassing.

“Don’t worry, Dad, they must have got the wrong man. It’ll all come out.”

“That’s what I told him,” responded Doreen. “It must be a mistake. Especially if they’ve suspended Dick and Terry and Walter as well.”

“Have they?” Nicky was amazed to hear Les’ old friends named. They were all as familiar and reliable as Les himself. “What are you all supposed to have done, then?”

Les cleared his throat. “Apparently a local villain’s been giving us all a bung to turn a blind eye to his rackets.” He tried to laugh it off, but the sound he made was more like a sob. He spread his hands and shrugged. “As you can see, we’ve been living it up for years at his expense. Big cars, fur coats, fancy holidays.”

Doreen smiled bitterly. “As if! There you are, you see, there’s no evidence. It won’t come to anything. I expect they’ve just suspended you so they can be seen doing the right thing. You’ll all be back on the job in no time.”

Les nodded miserably. Nicky wondered why he was taking it so badly. Normally his father was totally confident. The shame of the accusation must have hit him very hard indeed.

“No-one’s going to think you’re guilty, Dad, no-one who knows you could possibly think that.”

“Mud sticks, son.”

“What about all that
walk tall, walk straight and look the world right in the eye
stuff you used to tell me when I was a kid?” Nicky tried to coax Les back into behaving like the father he wanted him to be. This was weird. Really weird.

Doreen got up. “Nicky’s right, Les. Take a bit of your own advice. Show them all you’re innocent. The truth always comes out. I’m going to put dinner on.” She left the room.

Les glanced up at his son uncomfortably. “I wish it was that simple.” Nicky bit his thumbnail. He knew perfectly well that justice wasn’t always meted out fairly, and innocent people did sometimes go to jail. But he was amazed to see his father brought so low. Where was his courage, why so much despair?