Billy Rags (28 page)

She shook her head.

“Well, then,” I said. “So you make us that cup of coffee and bring it through in a minute when I've arranged things with Ronnie. All right?”

I heard the key turn in the lock. Sheila and Timmy were sitting on the bed behind me. Timmy was asleep in Sheila's arms.

I bent down and looked through the keyhole. Ronnie came in first, pushing the door wide open. Then he stood back and two young tearaways carried a packing case into the room.

“Anywhere,” Ronnie said. “Just dump it anywhere.”

The tearaways placed the packing case in the centre of the living room floor. Then they had a good look at their surroundings.

“Nice gaff,” one of them said.

“Yes, it is,” Ronnie said. “And now you've been here forget how nice it is. And the nice neighbourhood.”

Ronnie ushered them out. Before he went he placed the key on the dining table. Then he closed the door behind him.

I opened the bedroom door and went over to the packing case. The top was open and there were some objects wrapped in newspaper packed in the straw. I unwrapped one of the objects. A cut spirit glass. I smiled. Ronnie must have noticed we weren't very well off for glasses. I took all the glasses out of the packing case. There were a dozen altogether.

Sheila came into the lounge. She'd laid Timmy down on our bed.

“Ronnie's brought us a present,” I said.

Sheila looked at the unwrapped glass but she didn't say anything.

I rummaged under the straw until my fingers touched something very cold. Much colder than the glass. My fingers closed round the object and I lifted. I pulled out a sawn-off shotgun. It was a beauty. Almost brand new. Sheila watched me, her arms folded, while I broke the gun and snapped it shut again and held it the way it was meant to be held.

The snap of the shotgun must have woken Timmy up. He came through the door, running towards me.

“Dat, Daddy?” he said. “Dat, Daddy?”

I looked at Sheila. She turned and went into the kitchen.

“This?” I said. “Nothing. Nothing for little boys.”

Sheila and Timmy were out. Rain streamed down the windows, muffling the noises from the street outside. The air in the flat felt hot and sticky. I tried to read but I couldn't concentrate. I got up and went into the bathroom and turned the bath taps on. While I was waiting for the bath to fill I looked at my face in the cabinet mirror. My complexion was the colour of old newspapers.

I went into the bedroom to get a bath towel from the airing cupboard. But instead of doing that I went over to the wardrobe and got my hat and coat and put them on. Then I went back into the bathroom and turned off the taps.

This time there were people in the pub. Quite a crowd, considering where the pub was situated. And this time the woman wasn't alone behind the bar. Two young barmen, Kilburn Irish, were scurrying up and down doing the drinks while the woman occasionally dished out shepherd's pie. I ordered a shandy and went and sat down at a table by the window. The pub felt stale. The smell of cigarettes and damp macintoshes filled what air there was. None of the customers could be called locals. Just lunch-time trade from the offices. And there were too many of them for my liking. I wasn't used to so many people squeezed together in one spot. They all seemed to be pressing in on me. I'd wanted company, a change of scene, but I hadn't expected it to be like this, and this was too much to take.

I finished my drink and got up and left the pub. The street was almost deserted. I pulled my hat down against the driving rain and began to walk back towards the flat. I turned into the street that led back to the High Street. Halfway down I was aware of a car turning in off the main road, coming towards me.

By the time I realised that it was a police car there was nothing I could do about it.

I couldn't turn and run. There was nowhere I could shelter myself before the car got to me. I could do nothing.

Except keep walking.

I froze all thoughts about my own stupidity that had come flooding into my mind. Those could wait. I tried to blank my mind of any thoughts at all, as if by doing that it would be easier for me and the police to pass each other without me being recognised. Make myself an ostrich and everything would be all right.

The car was nearly up to me now. The street was narrow, a one-way, and the car was sitting on the crown of the road. Four feet, five feet away from me at the most as it passed.

Somehow my legs kept working and I kept going forward. The car kept moving at the same speed. No slowing down prompted by recognition. I sensed rather than saw that there were three rozzers in the car. Two uniforms in the front, plainclothes in the back. All eyes would be on me, however briefly: there was nothing else in the street for them to look at. I couldn't turn my face away. That would really do it. I just kept walking into the rain as the car swished past me.

The head of the plainclothes man turned in my direction.

Then the car was past me.

It didn't stop. When I reached the end of the street I turned right and I ran.

I lay in the bath, staring up at the ceiling. Sweat poured off my head: it hadn't stopped since I'd seen the police car. I felt weak, both physically and mentally. I'd nearly blown everything. Just for the sake of going to that fucking pub.

I heard the front door open and the sounds of Sheila and Timmy coining in the lounge. Then Sheila's footsteps as she hurried from room to room, looking for me. I called out to her:

“I'm in here.”

The bathroom door banged against the side of the bath. Sheila burst in and stood by the bath, looking down at me to make sure there wasn't just bathwater in the bath.

Then she went limp and leant against the edge of the door.

“Jesus, Billy,” she said. “Jesus.”

“Thought they'd been and gone with me, did you?” I said.

“Don't joke,” she said. “I really did.”

There was a silence. I said:

“Why don't you go and make a cup of tea?”

Sheila looked at the glass of brandy at the end of the bath.

“What, you as well?”

“Makes me sweat,” I said. “So does tea. I've got to keep myself in trim somehow.”

I looked at my watch. The luminous face told me it was quarter to five. The faint blue of dawn was beginning to lighten the oblong shape of the bedroom window. I hadn't slept all night. My mind had been too full of the turning head in the police car. I'd seen that head turn a thousand times since I'd got into bed at eleven thirty. The minute Sheila had switched off the light, the face had been there. But it was a face without features, as impressionistic as when I'd actually seen it. And however hard I tried I couldn't imagine what I hadn't seen: the expression. Had it been curious, blank, full of recognition, what?

I couldn't have been recognised. The car would have stopped, wouldn't it? But if the recognition had been late in coming, and by the time it had dawned on them I'd made it round the corner, then that would be different. They'd have thrown in everything they'd got. They'd check out the occupants of every house, flat and room in the area. And sooner or later they'd check who was living over that tobacconist in the High Street, and for how long, and then in no time at all they'd have it sorted. The removal van would be out and I'd be answering the door sometime shortly before eight in the morning.

I got out of bed, pulled on my dressing gown and went into the lounge. I turned on the gas fire and lit it and lit up a cigarette at the same time. I sat for a while crouched over the fire watching the whistling gas-jets.

When I'd finished the cigarette I got up and went into the bathroom and opened the door to the airing cupboard. I carefully took a pile of washing from one of the shelves and put the washing down on the bathroom floor. Then I slid forward the cardboard box that had been hidden behind the washing and opened the lid. I took out one of the snub-nosed revolvers and a box of ammunition and loaded the chamber. Then I put everything back the way it had been before. After I'd done that I unscrewed the top of the lavatory cistern and took some bandage tape from the bathroom cabinet and taped the gun to the underside of the cistern lid. After I'd done all that I went into Timmy's bedroom and sat by his cot until he woke up.

Sheila came into the kitchen at a quarter to eight. I'd already given Timmy his cornflakes and I was mashing up his boiled egg for him as Sheila came through the door. I could tell from her face that she knew I was worried but I also knew that she wouldn't say anything until we were well into a safer part of the day. Sheila didn't believe in tempting fate.

“One thing about old Tim,” I said as Sheila poured herself a pot of tea, “he doesn't half like his eggs. Don't you, me old son?”

Timmy grinned and a globule of yellow ran down his chin.

“Funny,” I said, “because when I was a kid I couldn't stand them. Probably something to do with not having them during the war: by the time you could get them again I'd probably got set in my likes and dislikes. You know how kids are.”

I shot a glance at the clock as Sheila drank some tea. Ten to eight.

“Timmy's always liked his eggs,” Sheila said.

Timmy dropped his spoon and I picked it up for him.

“What are you going to have?” Sheila said.

“Nothing,” I said. “I had some toast.”

“Shall I do you some bacon?”

“No thanks,” I said. “I'll have another cup of tea, though.”

“It's stewed. I'll make some more.”

Sheila filled the kettle and lit the gas and emptied the tea-pot. Timmy finished his egg and squirmed off his chair. He ran out of the kitchen and into the lounge, got one of his comics and ran back into the kitchen again.

“Daddy read,” he said. “Daddy read.”

I hoisted him up on to my knee and spread the comic out on the table in front of us.

The clock said five to eight.

Instead of reading to Timmy I pointed to things in the comic and asked him what they were. Sheila made the tea and put my cup down on the edge of Timmy's comic. A moment later Timmy violently turned over one of the pages and upset the cup of tea. I jolted the chair back but some of the tea went on Timmy's legs and he began to scream.

“You stupid bloody bitch,” I shouted. “Have you no fucking sense?”

Sheila took Timmy from me and sat him on the edge of the table and sponged the tea from his legs with the dishcloth.

“It's all right, darling, never mind, you were frightened, weren't you? Wasn't very hot, was it? You were just frightened, that's all.”

“Bloody stupid thing to do,” I said.

“If you're so bloody clever why didn't you see it coming and do something about it?”

“I'd no time, had I?”

“No, course not.”

“Now look, don't go trying to blame it on to me.”

“There now, lovey, that's better. Feeling better now? There's a brave little soldier. Let's give you a biscuit for being so brave. All right? There we are.”

Timmy sniffed a bit and munched on the biscuit. I poured myself another cup of tea and sat down again. Sheila turned to the sink and began to slam dishes about in the bowl.

I looked at the clock again. It was five past eight.

I got up and carried my tea into the lounge and pulled the door to behind me and walked over to the window. I parted the curtains slightly and looked down into the street.

The Avengers
blurred across the TV screen, out of focus in my mind. The sound seemed to come from a long way away. Sheila was sitting opposite me, knitting a cardigan for Timmy. I was thinking of the night ahead. Would I be able to sleep now that a day and a half had gone by or would it be worse now that the odds had shortened? I wanted to talk to Sheila about what had happened, but of course I couldn't, not without admitting what I'd done.

As if she'd been reading my mind, Sheila said:

“What made you think it was going to happen this morning?”

I looked across at her. She still had her head bent over her knitting.

“Nothing, really,” I said. “Just one of those feelings. You know the sort.”

“Yes,” she said. “But I just wondered . . . maybe you'd heard from Ronnie. Maybe he'd said something to worry you.”

“If I'd heard from Ronnie I'd have told you.”

“You might not. Not if you didn't want me to worry.” She let her knitting fall on her lap. “I'd rather know if there was anything, Billy.”

“There isn't, love. Honest. I just had one of those feelings. I couldn't sleep last night. It sometimes happens.”

Sheila went back to her knitting.
The Avengers
finished and the commercials came on. In a minute it would be
News at Ten
so I got up to get myself a beer while the commercials were on.

The cool of the kitchen cleared my head a little. I opened the fridge door and took a can of Bass out and poured it into a glass. I drank some of the beer and topped the glass up.

The door bell rang.

I just stood there. I couldn't move, I couldn't think, nothing. I was vaguely aware of Sheila's panicked movements in the lounge. Then the kitchen door opened. I turned round and I was looking at Sheila's staring eyes. We stayed like that until the door bell rang again. Then I rushed out of the kitchen and into the bathroom and began to unscrew the cistern lid. Sheila followed me.

“Christ, Billy, who is it? Who is it, Billy?”

“I don't know.”

I lifted the lid and ripped the shooter off it.

“Billy, what are you doing? What . . . ?”

“Don't be bloody silly.”

I put the shooter in my pocket.

“Billy, don't . . .”

I took hold of her by the shoulders.

“Listen, we don't know who it is. So we go back into the lounge. Whoever it is knows we're in because of the telly. So we answer the door. If it's the Filth we're snookered. There's no way we can get out now, not without the shooter. So we answer the door and if it's the law I cop for the first one and put the shooter on him. That's the only chance I've got.”