The Guv'nor (12 page)

I didn't know it at the time, but two years later Sherry got pregnant at 14, and Irwin, being his own horrible self, slung her out of the house. As far as I know, he has never set eyes on her or her baby since that day – and that's his own flesh and blood.

About six years later my sister Sherry came to visit me. She was about 20 and her little baby was six. She had this drug addict with her who I had no time for, but she was in lumber so I let it go. I let them stay the night then I stuck 200 notes in her hand to sort out her bit of trouble and I gave another £200 to Val so she could take them down
the market and rig the baby out. That was done. We had a kiss and cuddle. I wished her all the best, and off they went. By this time I realised that Sherry was on the gear just like her boyfriend.

The next day, Val found a load of jewellery missing; rings, bracelets, some of it good stuff, the rest my little girl's bits of cheap kids' stuff. It didn't matter, though. Forget the value, you don't thieve off your own.

I went down to Hertfordshire and found out where they were living, and followed them up. They both denied touching our gear, then I smacked it out of them both. And I mean smack. I know when to hold back. They both admitted it and I gave them a right roasting. I told her I never wanted to see her again, that we were finished. It was no good me remembering that little girl who used to follow me all over the place, that little baby I loved so much. That was then; now she was a screwed-up adult, but I wouldn't allow her to screw my family. I haven't seen her since. Sticking that shit up her nose she might be dead by now, and if she is, I'm sorry, but it's out of my hands. Put another notch on your stick, Jim Irwin, for fucking up another one.

Mum's death was the one thing I could never imagine. I said before, you think you've got a mum for ever. It doesn't matter where you go, what you get up to, good, bad, or bloody evil, you've only got to go home, open that door and there's Mum, same as always. Who do you run to when you've grazed your knee as a kid, or you've had a knock back as a grown up? Who do big, tough men cry out for when they're lifed off? Mum every time.

But it had happened. I knew she was at rest now, so I tucked her into a little corner of my heart and got on with my life. Watch over me, Mum – but not too closely.

CHAPTER SIX

I
t was about this time I thought I'd leave out the heavy stuff for a bit. I was still available for the right job but, let's face it, I'd had a bloody good run. I hadn't been nicked since I was a kid. I don't care how good you are, it's very difficult to earn your living having it away and not get a pull every few years. So while I was on a roll, I thought it was about time I got myself into a different game. What I was looking for was a nice regular earner. Something where I didn't have to knock my bollocks off and something not too iffy, so I wasn't looking at a nicking every five minutes. I came up with working myself into the minding game.

I picked out a decent little drinker – no minders and a good turnover. This was the Victory in Kingsland Road. I was known in there, but I started going in a bit more regular. I gave it a while, then I got four lads to kick off with a good brawl – you know, break a few glasses, knock the tables over while they're giving each other some. Then like the seventh cavalry at Saturday morning pictures, McLean jumps off his stool and breaks it all up. Chucks the kids out, straightens up the tables. Nice one, Lenny – drinks on the house. This is for starters. Give it a couple of nights, same again, different chaps. I had given them their drinking money so they can have a fight in the first place, so they're not doing me any favours.

The governor's well pleased again. ‘Lenny, I don't know what the place is coming to. What are you drinking?'

‘Forget the drinks,' I said, ‘give me a pony a week and I'll mind the place for you.'

‘Lovely, Len, you're on.'

Nice little pension. The thing was, though I started the aggro in
the first place, if genuine trouble started I did what I was paid to do, so it wasn't really such a rip off. Once word got around that Lenny McLean had a place under his wing, troublemakers tended to go somewhere else. But I didn't have to sit in the boozer all night – like I said, the word was enough. So I pulled the same stunt in a few other pubs – it never failed, and I pulled in a pony from each one. I had to do a bit of running around at night to show my face at each one, but it was worth it for the dough.

Most of the time my name kept trouble out, but there were always a few tearaways; tough kids and plastic gangsters who wanted to make a bit of a name for themselves. A bit like the Wild West – who's going to bring down Jesse James? Nobody took Lenny McLean down, though. I can't blame them for trying. When I was younger, I did the same myself. New face on the manor, let's try him out. Sometimes I could have three fights in one night. Short and sweet.

Then as quick as this nice little number started, it dried up, when I got a visit from Old Bill. It seems that the bloke running the Basing House in Kingsland Road reckoned I was demanding money with menaces. If the law had anything on me, I would've been pulled in, so I thought they were trying it on.

I flared up a bit. ‘Do what, you c**ts? Every one of them clubs and pubs came to me and asked me to look after them for wages. What's the game, are you two looking for a pension out of me?'

They said, ‘No, Len, this is official. We've been told to give you a warning. You're hurting too many people and wherever you are there's nothing but trouble, so take a tip and move out of this manor.'

‘Or what?' I said.

‘Or you'll find yourself well fitted. You know the score, we know the score, so fuck off to the other side and stop taking the piss.'

They definitely couldn't pin anything on me or else they would have pulled me, that's why they were a bit heavy on the threats. Still, they had my nuts in the wringer, so I had to tell Val that we were moving.

On top of all the removal expenses, I had to lay out a long one. 100 pound notes, and I didn't begrudge one of them. This cash was a drink for some up-and-coming youngsters to redecorate the Basing House. Apart from the usual ruck as they smashed the inside up, they finished off by putting dustbins and crates through that grassing bastard's windows. Serves him right for dropping me in the shit because he was too tight to pay what was due to me.

So we moved out of Hoxton and over to Bethnal Green again, to 51 Allen Road. It was the best move I ever made.

I'm soon skint again. I've paid out fortunes, I've got no work, and there's no little fiddles about. On top of that, my motor gave up on me just as I was coming out of Blackwall Tunnel. There was oil, water, and fuck knows what pissing out of it and about ten miles of traffic building up behind me. In those days, I wasn't too clever about paperwork, MOT, insurance, driving licence and all that cobblers, so I stuck two fingers up to all those mugs behind me and started walking home. The car wasn't worth anything and wasn't registered, so it couldn't be traced back to me.

Now I had to find some new wheels, otherwise I'd be bolloxed for doing a bit of business. So I ended up at a little car site in Kingsland Road. The owner mainly dealt in vans and lorries, but I knew he took in part exchanges and knocked them out on the cheap.

His name was Kenny Mac and he was the size of tuppence, but could he give some old fanny. He wanted 60 notes for a Cortina that had had the clock turned back twice, the tyres were smoother than my bum, and there was a weed growing out of the back wing. Still, it had a fresh MOT and, ‘On my life, mate,' he assured me the last owner was a nun. Did he see me coming or what?

We settled on £47.50, all the money I had in my pocket at the time. Well, all right, it wasn't, but if these dealers think they can get a few extra quid out of you, they'll turn you upside-down and shake it out of your pockets. As I pulled out of the yard, he said, ‘Don't forget, it's guaranteed until the end of the road.' I thought he was joking. I put up with this heap for a couple of days, then I got a pal to tow it back to the lot.

I'm steaming, the motor's steaming, and this Mac fella's grinning all over his mug. To give him his due, he had some bottle. I said, ‘You've taken a diabolical liberty flogging me that motor. Just because I give you shit money don't mean I want to buy a shit motor. Only time it goes is when you push it.'

I'm putting on a bit of an act because I've taken to this little bloke, but I still want my money back. He said, ‘Put up a bit more money and I'll fix you up with something a bit decent.'

‘I'm potless,' I said. Like I told you, you've got to graft a bit cagey with these blokes.

‘Tell you what,' he comes back with, ‘I've heard about you. You're a bit tasty with your fists, so if you want to pick up a few quid, why don't you have a fight?'

I said, ‘That'll do me, come on then – how about a straightener?'

‘Hold up,' he said and he backed up the yard. ‘Do you think I'm
off my head? I don't mean with me, I mean I can arrange something for you, do us both a bit of good.'

Anyway, we sorted the car business. He let me take a nice little Escort on spec and said he'd give me a bell when there was something fixed up. He didn't hang about. I got a call that night saying he'd arranged a fight with some gypsy bloke. £500, winner takes all, and Kenny would put up the money. He stood right up on his toes when he told me, ‘You lose this one, Lenny, and you'll have to take me on, because where money's concerned I'm a wild man.'

‘Yeah, in your dreams,' and I lifted him off the ground and gave him a cuddle.

Gypsies are fighting men. It's a way of life. But they don't just fight for the sake of it, they're always proving something. My son's a better fighter than your son, my cousin can murder your best. They do it with their dogs and their fighting cocks and there's always got to be money on it. The money's not the important thing. It's the prestige and the bragging that counts.

Val was a bit worried, but I told her, ‘Babe, I've been fighting people all my life and nobody's come near me except that fucking Jim Irwin when I was a baby. Well, I'm not a little kid any more, and just because it's for money don't make any difference.'

I got down to Kenny's car site about half-seven. The big gates were all closed up. I gave a shout and some kid let me in then locked up again. There was a big crowd of gypsies all standing around and they all turned and gave me the once over. Around the back of the site on the waste ground there was a big gypsy camp. They did a lot of dealing with Kenny – horses, lorries, motors – that's how he knew them. I think he was a bit of a pikey himself though he didn't look it.

He'd set up a bit of a ring. Nothing fancy, we'd be scrapping on the dirt, but he'd marked out the area with gas bottles for corner posts, and tied a bit of rope between each one. The spectators were a bit one-sided. In my corner was a kid of about 13. Kenny was the ref. In the other bloke's corner there were about 50 men all telling him what he should do when it started. Arms were waving about, they were pushing and shoving, but I've got to hand it to the other fighter. He ignored them and just stood with his hands at his sides staring at me, trying to get my bottle going. Some hope.

He was about 6ft and 17 stone – a big bastard, hard looking and full of himself. At about that time I weighed in at 16 stone and stood 6ft 2in – twice as hard and bloody handsome with it.

Kenny shouted, ‘Righto, righto, keep it down, we're ready for the
off,' and he gave one of the empty gas bottles a kick. Ding. The gypsy came tearing out of his corner like his arse was on fire. I was a little bit slow coming out, and he swung a curving right-hander at my head. I went through his guard and smashed him full in the face with everything I've got, and he went down. I couldn't believe it. I mean, I know what I can do but, fuck me, I thought a monkey was going to be harder to earn than this.

Talk about lose interest. One minute all the gypsies are behind their fighter, then when he's spark out they all piss off back to the camp – all except one old bloke who's trying to bring him round, his dad I suppose. I didn't give a bollocks either. I just left him there and went to pick up the wedge.

Kenny handed over the 500 and I said, ‘Hang about, what about your cut and the motor?' He gave that big daft grin of his. ‘It's all yours, mate. I done well out of the side bets.' Side bets, eh? I had a lot to learn about this game.

So me and Kenny Mac, as his mates called him, were in business. Not a very legal business, but when was anything I did legal?

I'll put you in the picture about the fighting game. There's boxing proper. It's all licensed and strictly regulated by the British Board of Boxing Control. Everything's legit and above board, well, in the ring anyway. Behind the scenes it's as shitty as any business, no matter what they tell you. Boxers are vetted for health and background. So if you've got a metal plate in your head or a criminal record for violence, forget the licence. Once they climb in the ring, boxers have to stick to the Queensberry Rules. On the other hand, unlicensed boxing is what it says. Unlicensed. It's still legal as long as it's in a ring, supervised and both boxers wear gloves. Though quite often, when tempers flare up, the rules go out the window.

Bare-knuckle fighting is in a class of its own and definitely illegal. There are only two rules and that gets sorted before the off. One is the straightener – that's a stand-up fistfight and as near to a boxing match as street-fighting could ever get. The other is an all in, where anything goes – kicking, gouging eyes and, if you're that way inclined, biting your opponent's nuts off. Bones are broken, ribs caved in, some fighters are blinded, and every now and then somebody dies. But everyone involved thinks it's worth it.

The prize money is out of all proportion to the time it takes to earn it. The only drawback is that the loser gets nothing, not even expenses or a few shillings for plasters. But none of the fighters put
up, or take a challenge, expecting to lose. Every one of them thinks they're the business.

Me? I never doubted that I was the best. My training in taking punishment had started when I was five and had gone on for a dozen years. I've read that karate experts sit for hours just thumping the heel of their hand on a block of wood. Eventually, that hand is a solid weapon that can't be hurt. That's me –pounded and belted until I don't feel a thing. Ask anybody who's seen me fight. Does Lenny ever back off? No. He keeps moving forward all the time. Does Lenny ever react or flinch when he's taken a punch? No. He feels nothing. Just dishes it out. Anyone taking me on was putting a loaded gun to their head, but it never stopped them trying because they thought, ‘One day he'll be put down and I want to be the one who does it.'

A bit later, Kenny's fixed another bout. Same money, same set up really, but a different bloke. This one's a bit older and no novice judging by his lumpy knuckles and flat nose. Noisy bastard though; he said he was going to tear my head off, rip my guts out and break my back. I thought, ‘Shut up, you c**t, your bottle's going already.' Ding. In goes Kenny's boot to the gas bottle, and we're off.