Civvies (4 page)

Smothering a yawn, Susie Dillon side-stepped the kid’s bikes and opened the front door of the flat, wrapping the dressing-gown around herself more firmly when she realised that Frank had someone with him. For a moment she just stood there blinking, brushing a hand through her tousled russet hair, smoothing her fringe down while she took in Dillon’s bloody nose and the yellowish bruise on his right cheek. If anything, the young man he was holding up looked even worse, his face like chopped liver, as if he’d been given a right going over. ‘Hello, love!’ Dillon greeted her, tossing his suitcase into the hallway and shrugging off his leather grip, looped over his shoulder. ‘This is Steve Harris, he was one of my Toms. Steve…?’ But all that came from Steve was a croaking rasp as his head lolled forward. Dillon manoeuvred his way into the hallway. ‘He can’t talk — had his throat shot out by a sniper in Belfast…’ ‘Where do you want to put him?’ Susie asked, shifting the bikes out of the way. ‘Shut the door … fix up the spare room eh?’ Susie closed the door and stood watching him helping the boy upstairs. First day out of the Army and he looked like he was back from the bloody wars. ‘You gonna chuck up, Steve?’ she heard Dillon say. Susie sighed and propped up the bike her husband had still managed to knock over.

‘He was awarded how much?’ Susie gaped at Dillon and repeated in a hoarse whisper, ‘How much?’ Dillon shot her a fierce look across the bed they were making up in the spare room, warning her to keep her voice down, though going by the retching and spluttering as Steve threw up in the bathroom next door, there wasn’t much need. ‘Over a hundred grand, and he’s not got a cent left — nothing. He’s had to tap me for a few quid.’ Susie unfolded a sheet and shook it out. ‘What did he do with it?’ ‘Stupid bastards hand over a cheque to a twenty-six-year-old, already having head trouble. He was a right handful when he first joined up — he took some beatin’.’ ‘A cheque?’ Susie said incredulously, tucking the sheet in at one side while Dillon did the other. ‘They gave him a cheque? I don’t believe it…’ Dillon scowled. ‘Captain told him in hospital he’d never jump again. He went from Al fit to P6 – P7’s deceased. They tried to say he was forty per cent fit, the C.O. had to appeal. Eventually got put down seventy-five per cent disabled, so he’d been through it before they sent him the cheque. By then he was —’ he indicated the pillows ‘ —pass ‘em over, a head case.’ Susie tossed over the pillow slips, studied Dillon as he stuffed the pillows inside. She said quietly, ‘How long is he staying, Frank?’ ‘It’ll just be until I can get him back on his feet —’ He glanced up as Steve appeared behind Susie in the doorway, and said in a cheerful voice, ‘Hi, Steve! You want a cup of tea?’ Susie edged past Steve, giving him a quick smile. ‘I am just going to get a blanket,’ she enunciated loudly. ‘He’s not deaf, Susie.’ Dillon beamed at Steve, beckoning him in. ‘Come on, get yer head down!’ ‘I’ll put the kettle on.’ Susie lingered a moment on the small landing with its square of
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cord carpet, looking in as Dillon helped Steve off with his suede jacket, torn at the shoulder seam, a muddy smear down the back. The boy seemed permanently hunched, hair hanging over his face, and she knew now why he wore that paisley-patterned scarf, tied gypsy-style, round his neck. She hissed at them, ‘And keep the noise down, the boys are asleep. They wanted to wait up, but —’ Susie couldn’t keep up the frost, she sighed, resigned over the years for the unexpected, ‘Welcome home, Frank!’

Steve up-ended the bottle of Tuborg into his glass, filling it to the brim, with the studied deliberation of the experienced piss-artist intent on not spilling a drop. They had been sinking the booze all afternoon, after Dillon had dragged Steve to meet the head of the ‘Swallow’ club, a club organised to assist men from all sections of the military with vocal chord damage. The membership entree was simple, if you had had your throat cut, or blown out, you were in. The major who ran the club showed Dillon his scars, and with eerie clarity explained that he spoke on a burp of wind, having no vocal chords. They had a speech therapist and a number of men who would gladly assist Steve. It would be a long slow process, but, joining them in the nearest bar, and gulping a frothing pint, he suggested that this was the best way for the ‘beginners’ to learn, as the beer was good and gassy. The major had thoroughly enjoyed demonstrating his prowess, but Steve had remained stubbornly silent, simply downing one pint after another. They had virtually had to pour the burping major into a taxi, before deciding to return home and continue the ‘lessons’. Dillon was beginning to think the entire episode had been a waste of time, even more so as Steve was very obviously an alcoholic, sinking more and more pints in rapid succession, but remaining in stony silence. ‘For chrissakes Steve, you got to just try it.’ Dillon having joined Steve in the boozing was getting as pissed as he was. ‘Go on, just try… burp and say a word.’ Steve raised his glass to his lips, sank a good half of it, and emitted a raucous belch that somewhere had ‘Fuck off in it. Steve had been offered speech therapy sessions, but the attractive woman had been at such pains to make him comfortable, she had made him feel more and more inadequate. A woman he could have pulled spoke to him as if he was ten years old, kept on saying that as soon as he had a break through he would feel better, as if he was sick, or mentally retarded. He was not sick, he was not mentally sub-normal, he was just dumb, and his frustration turned into aggression until he was asked not to return unless he was sober. He had attempted one more session, and was sober, but hearing his efforts replayed on tape, hearing himself speaking like a distorted Donald Duck finished him off completely, he decided that he would prefer to remain silent. Dillon kept on and on, even trying it himself, until Steve burped out a few words, almost as if to show Dillon that he could do it, but chose not to. Dillon thought Steve sounded like a Dalek with laryngitis, but he heard an entire sentence. ‘Piss-Goff an’ gleeeve glme gl gla… lone!’ Dillon applauded Steve’s effort, doing his best to focus, elbows in a puddle of lager on the formica kitchen table littered with their training session. Steve gulped down another mouthful and, riding on the back of a huge belch came… quite clearly, ‘Baaa… ssst… aaard.’ ‘Yeah, great, that was great,’ Dillon nodded, with an effort forcing his eyelids wide, as if they were lead shutters. ‘…bastard, right? Am I right?’ Dillon grinned crookedly. ‘You bastard.’ Steve doubled over in a wheezing laugh that turned into a paroxysm of gurgling and bubbling. He went a shade of blue and had to thump himself in the chest to clear the air-lock in the plastic tube that served as his wind pipe. Only Steve knew the terror of the tube getting blocked. Even though he had been told over and over by the doctors and the specialists just how dangerous it was to get drunk, to be out of control and that a vomit attack could suffocate him, he ignored the warnings. He could no longer laugh, but gave guttural snorts, the sound to his own ears hideous. Steve hated his disability, was incapable of caring for himself because he felt he was a social misfit, his only way of dealing with it to become even more of one than he already was. Dillon was not the first to try and help him, but somewhere in the Steve’s confused, drink-befuddled mind he had a premonition that, maybe, Frank Dillon was the last hope he had of straightening out. He couldn’t as yet thank him, he didn’t know how to… Susie walked in to find them laughing like drains, noting the rows of empty bottles with a decided coolness. ‘Frank, I want to make the supper! The kids are hungry —’ Dillon waved her to silence. ‘Show her how you talk…’ Susie waited patiently, her hand on Dillon’s shoulder, as Steve drank straight from the bottle, held his breath, and belched, ‘Suu — sss — ieee’ Dillon, three sheets into the wind, didn’t catch it, though Susie did, and couldn’t help smiling. ‘My name — did you say my name?’ Steve gave her a boyish gleeful grin, tickled to death. Susie’s smile faded at the edges as she saw Dillon pick up a crate of lager and make off with it. ‘Where you taking that?’ she demanded suspiciously. But all she got was a muffled profanity as he collided with something in the living-room, followed by a yell, ‘Steve — upstairs. Mind the bikes!’ Susie stood on the blue-and-white squared linoleum, surveying the wreckage of her kitchen, listening to their unsteady progress through the hallway and up the stairs. A bell tinkled, a clash of tangled spokes, one of the bikes was over. Susie closed her eyes and counted to fifteen.

Steam rose from Dillon’s face. His hair was wringing wet. A towel around his neck and tucked into his tracksuit, black Puma trainers on his feet, he reached the third-floor landing and turned, jogging on the spot, and bellowed down at Steve: ‘Come on, come on, keep your knees up! — come on! One-two, one-two, on your toes —’ Two flights down in the block of red-brick council flats that formed a square surrounding a paved central court, Steve Harris laboured up the concrete steps, a bergen containing four house bricks wrapped in newspaper strapped to his back. Ten-past-eleven in the morning and he was on his sixth climb, chest heaving, his tracksuit top practically drenched. Still, in better bloody shape than he was a week ago, Dillon thought with satisfaction. Couldn’t beat the tough Para training regime to work the flab off, tauten muscle tone, get the old heart-and-lung machine functioning. And in the process drag Steve up from being the useless fat knacker with no future he’d turned into after two years in civvies. Susie came out of the flat, buttoning up a fawn topcoat that had seen better days, a shopping-bag in the crook of her arm. ‘I’m going to the shops,’ she announced to Dillon, still jogging, elbows back and forth like pistons. ‘You want anything?’ ‘Where are the kids?’ Dillon asked, but he was more interested in Steve, who’d stopped, panting for breath, on the floor below. ‘Oi! Move it, Steve, don’t slack off. Keep moving.’ ‘They’re at school.’ Susie’s voice had a sharp, irritable edge that had nothing to do with kids and school, everything to do with the subject she’d tried to raise at breakfast. ‘Are you going to sign on, Frank? You said you’d go today…’ Steve finally made the last few steps, stood with hands on hips, head thrown back, gasping for air, totally wiped out. ‘Go on — down again.’ When Steve didn’t immediately respond, Dillon stuck his arm straight out and pointed. ‘Go on!’ Off he went, staggering a little under the heavy pack. Susie tapped her foot. ‘Frank? Did you hear what I said?’ ‘Yeah, yeah, I’ll go this afternoon…’ Dillon brushed past her on the stairs, jumping three steps at a time, calling out, ‘Right, back up, Steve, come on, push yourself.’ He skipped down and started pushing Steve up from behind. Susie had to flatten herself against the wall as they came by. ‘Don’t leave it too late, Frank… you should have gone yesterday.’ ‘I said I’d go, all right?’ Dillon snapped back at her. From the landing above he called down, ‘Oranges. Get some oranges for juice, not that bottled stuff!’ ‘Oh, right —’ Susie said, marching down, heels ringing on the concrete steps. ‘— I’ll just go and pick ‘em for you! You want them, get them yourself.’ Wiping his face with the towel, Dillon silently cursed himself and hung his head over the brick parapet, but she was lost to sight. That was all he knew, rapping out orders to squaddies and Toms — Do this, soldier, do that — expecting to be obeyed on the instant, and it was hard to break the habit, even with his own wife. He’d better start learning. This was Civvy Street, where anarchy ruled. Nobody took orders from anybody. Dillon, about to turn away and suggest to Steve a shower and a well-deserved beer, happened to notice a car parked by the estate entrance. Nothing too unusual about that — except the locals in this part of the East End who could afford to run a jalopy just scraped by with a clapped-out Skoda or a Lada with a failed
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. Not a sleek black J-Reg Jaguar Sovereign 3.2. The Jag’s push-button window slid down, a face appeared flashing a cocky grin, red hair plastered straight back, and Dillon ducked away, but a fraction too late. ‘Hey, Frank!’ Jimmy Hammond hailed him. ‘Frank!’

‘How ya doin’?’ Jimmy greeted him, climbing out, all smiles, giving Dillon a bear-hug and a punch for good measure. ‘You okay? Everythin’ okay?’ ‘Yeah!’ Dillon’s glance slid sideways to the passenger in the back seat. ‘Just been workin’ out.’ Jimmy followed his look. ‘You know Mr Newman, don’t you?’ Dillon gave a brief nod, went over as the rear window glided down; a slender elongated hand encased in blue-black leather took his in a soft, limp handshake. ‘Hello Frank, you remember me, don’t you?’ Dillon remembered the voice too, flat and expressionless, nearly as soft as the handshake, so you had to listen hard. Some people had to take orders after all, Dillon reminded himself, and this was the voice that gave them. He said politely, ‘How ya doing?’ ‘Jimmy said you were looking for work…’ Dillon cast a sidelong glance at Jimmy, cool and sharp in his tailored blue suit leaning against the Jaguar’s glossy bonnet, arms nonchalantly folded, wearing his fat grin. Always the fixer, trying to run other people’s lives for them. Newman uncoiled from the car, a tall emaciated figure that with his dark business suit and leather gloves put Dillon in mind of a long dry-skinned lizard. And yes, there was even something reptilian in the sunken flaking cheeks and deadpan grey stare, the tongue flicking out along the thin wide mouth. Newman strolled a few yards, a cheroot trailing smoke in his wake, and indicated with a small incline of the head that he wanted a private word. Dillon followed, waiting as Newman sent a plume of smoke thoughtfully into the air. ‘I’ve never forgotten the way you came round … it, well, it meant a lot to me.’ ‘I was just sorry it had to be him.’ Dillon shuffled, staring down at the soiled black Pumas. ‘He was a really good soldier…’ ‘My boy thought the world of you, always mentioned you in his letters home…’ Newman’s flat delivery skirted the edge of something near real emotion. ‘We never hit it off that well, I reckoned he joined up to get away from me.’ Newman’s pale grey eyes sought Dillon’s. ‘I’ve sort of made it my business to give a helping hand to his pals when they get into civvies.’ ‘Billy was a good lad,’ was all Dillon could think to say. ‘Meant a lot, you coming round the way you did, to Maureen. She’s dead now. I think Billy’s going took the heart out of her… we only had the one, just the one son.’ Newman studied the glowing tip of the cheroot. Outwardly, the neatly-parted grey hair and grey moustache gave him the distinguished yet dated look of a thirties matinee idol, but Dillon wasn’t deceived. He didn’t, never could, trust those cold flat eyes, a predator waiting to pounce. Dillon shifted uneasily as Newman placed a hand on his shoulder. ‘I reckon I owe you a favour. I can offer you a lot of work, and with Jimmy on my payroll, be like old times…’ The sunken cheeks creased in a smile. ‘He’s a card, isn’t he? Eh? Jimmy … I think you’d make a good team.’ ‘Thanks, Mr Newman, but —’ Dillon shrugged, staring at the ground. ‘I’ve got a few things in the pipeline…’ ‘Have you?’ ‘Yes.’ Dillon cleared his throat. ‘I want — well, eventually — to open up a security firm. Me and a few of the lads.’ ‘Good.’ Newman seemed genuinely pleased. ‘That’s a good idea. Well, if I can be of any assistance, you know Jimmy can always put you in touch. I’d like to see you set up with a few readies in your hand. I know it’s tough coming out, and, well, I’ll be straight with you, Frank —’ Dillon stepped back, held up his hand. ‘That’s just it, Mr Newman. I want to go straight. Whatever Jimmy does is his business.’ He turned quickly away, jogging off. ‘But I appreciate your offer…’ Newman stared after him, the friendly warmth instantly extinguished by a glacial stillness, as if Dillon had struck him. With a flick of the wrist he tossed the cheroot away and made an abrupt gesture to Jimmy, who slid off the Jaguar’s bonnet and went after the running figure, now leaping up the concrete stairway, two at a time. ‘Frank… wait! Wait a minute!’ Dillon halted on the first-floor landing and looked down as Jimmy reached the bottom of the stairs, swept-back hair bouncing, features strained in a matey grin. ‘No, Jimmy, you wait.’ Legs braced apart, outstretched arms pressed against the brick walls either side, Dillon looked in no mood for the old pal’s act. ‘I don’t want any involvement with that crook. I don’t want him brought round my place, near my place. And if you’d got any sense, you’d walk —’ Jimmy broke in. ‘He’s trying to do you a favour!’ ‘Whatever I did for Billy, I’d do for any of my lads. I joined up because of men like Newman. His own son tried to get away from him. He’s rotten. Billy knew it, I knew it.’ Dillon’s voice sank, but the intensity didn’t. ‘I know it, Jimmy, because his type was all I had going for me when I was a kid. Now I want more, Jimmy, and I want it legit.’ A slight flush mottled Jimmy’s cheeks. He gave one last guarded look at Dillon, as if he’d been caught out in a lie, then turned sharply away, muttering tersely, ‘I hope you find it, Frank!’ Dillon watched him go. Angry, bitter, but most of all sad.