The Graft Read online

  Or so at least he hoped.

  Nick Leary would have to talk to Tyrell, they were all agreed on that one. It should give him the closure he so desperately needed but Nick needed to be well briefed on what he would be taking on because Tyrell was a mate to Louis, a good mate, and Louis loved him like a brother.

  Now Billy had to put the hard word on Nick Leary and didn’t want to. He hoped for Nick’s sake he would listen or Billy had no option but to bring in his brothers, ‘The Heavy Brigade’ as they were known locally.

  He wondered how Tammy was. He had shagged her many years ago and hoped she had never felt the urge to confide this in her husband. He had liked old Tammy, and felt she got a rough deal from Nick even though in fairness you never heard about him with other women. Another reason people didn’t entirely trust Nick. With money came spare, and the spare in Essex was par excellence as far as Billy was concerned. But he had a feeling that the coldness he had seen in Nick many years before extended as far as his marital bed.

  Tammy needed love, she thrived on it like most women do.

  He wasn’t sure Nick was even capable of feeling the emotion.

  ‘You have to do it, don’t you, Tammy?’

  She laughed.

  ‘Do what?’

  Nick walked away from her and into the kitchen. As usual lately his mother left the room as soon as he entered it. Following her into the entrance hall, he shouted, ‘What the fuck is the matter with you?’

  Angela turned at the bottom of the stairs and looked at her son for long moments.

  ‘Hester is coming over later to pick me up. I’m going to stay with her for a while.’

  The mention of his sister’s name threw Nick for a few seconds.

  ‘What - you’re going to stay with Hester?’

  He sounded as if he had not heard her right and this made Angela smile. She nodded. Nick was lost for words, just stood and watched her climb the stairs. Then he shouted spitefully, as loudly as he could, ‘Well, fucking stay there, and don’t come back!’

  Angela didn’t answer him.

  He went back to the kitchen. Cutting a few lines on the granite work surface he snorted two, one after the other, to stop himself shaking with the anger that was threatening to envelop him. He could feel the buzz arriving in seconds. Then, going down to the cellar, he picked up a case of Smirnoff Black Label vodka that had fallen, miraculously without breaking one bottle, off the back of a lorry.

  As he picked it up he saw that someone had been rifling through his private papers again. He knew Tammy kept a lead on what he was doing, he expected that much but it still annoyed him. And he was already irritated that his mother was going to Hester’s. He rarely saw his sister because his mother had hardly opened her mouth to her since she had married her husband Dixon. The big black man had set off something in his mother that had lasted for years. Now though the miserable old bag was going round there after all the years of strained gatherings at Christmas and New Year. The two-faced old cow.

  When he went back into the kitchen it was to see his wife snorting a line herself and then going to the large American fridge for a bowl of ice.

  ‘If you can’t beat them . . .’ Tammy said gaily.

  He hugged her to him then.

  ‘You are one argumentative bastard, Tams.’

  She grinned.

  ‘I know, and that is all part of me charm.’

  He poured them both large vodkas.

  ‘Thanks for getting me out yesterday anyway.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘What was it all over?’

  He knew, and she knew he knew, it was the game they played.

  ‘Oh, this and that. Too much gear, too much booze, and that prat has a mouth like a docker’s auntie.’

  ‘She can have a row though, Tams.’

  She grinned again, and he wiped the cocaine from under her nostril as she said confidently, ‘Not any more she can’t.’

  He laughed at her. She had perfect comedy timing and in another life could have made a fortune in the movies or on stage. Her whole life was one big pretence in any case. She could not distinguish between reality and fantasy any more. Though it was getting like that for him as well these days.

  ‘Will I have to put the hard word on her old man?’

  It was a loaded question.

  ‘ ’Course not, Nick, stop being a wanker for five minutes. Give yourself a day off, will you!’

  He had to admire her front. Only Tammy could do what she did and still front it out as if she was the victim.

  ‘Do you know what is going on with me mother, you two being so close and all?’

  The sarcasm was not lost on Tammy but she answered him anyway. Knowing she had to box clever, she smiled sweetly and said, ‘You have got up her nose, probably the drug-taking and the drinking, but even I was taken aback to think that poor old Dixon is preferable company to us two! She has hardly opened her mouth to their kids, has she?’

  Nick nodded sagely. ‘She completely ignores Dixon. Even I keep quiet about them in case someone puts their foot in it round here by asking too much about them. It’s the one thing I never understood with her, Tams, why she is so racist?’

  Tammy shrugged. ‘It’s an age thing I think, Nick. What does it matter now anyway? If she goes for a while it’ll give her a chance to calm down. We’ve all been hit by what happened in one way or another.’

  He nodded then, seeing her point of view.

  ‘Do her good to get away. I think she gets lonely here, misses all her old mates and that.’

  The buzzer that heralded an arrival at the front gates broke into their conversation then and on the CCTV camera Nick saw Billy Clarke’s face smiling at him.

  ’All right, Billy boy! Don’t get out of the car until I come on the drive, the dogs are loose, OK?’

  ‘Just let me in, you tosser.’

  Nick was laughing as he pressed the button to open the gates.

  ‘What’s he want?’

  Tammy’s voice was wary and Nick knew why that was, though as usual he didn’t let on. One day he was going to try and find a man under the age of seventy she hadn’t slept with.

  ‘We’ll soon find out, Tams, he’ll be here in a few minutes. Cut another couple of lines and I’ll go and greet our guest.’

  She smiled and did as she was bidden.

  King’s Cross was busy as usual on a Friday afternoon. Commuters swarmed round Tyrell. Everyone wanted an early shoot on a Friday, and the place was buzzing with all sorts. The smell of Kentucky and McDonald’s vied with travellers’ damp coats and the rubbish thrown carelessly underfoot.

  There was also the smell of rent boys and prostitutes. They were both out in force, and as Tyrell listened to the boy beside him he was in shock at what he was hearing.

  ‘That boy over there, right? With the green shirt and black jeans. His name is Thomas, and he grooms for some of the older boys. He makes friends with the younger kids and introduces them to the bigger boys for a bit of gear. He’s a heroin addict, see, a lot of them are. He’s HIV as well. It was him who told me what was wrong with me a while ago. I thought I just had a cold like and couldn’t shake it off.’

  Willy blew his nose before continuing.

  ‘Now the boy he’s talking to is called Kerr and he’s a dealer. He will know where to find Justin, they’re good mates.’

  Tyrell looked at the tall black boy with the new dreads and the sneaky look of a child dealer. He was forever peering around him, watching and waiting to see who was on the horizon. Tyrell had grown up with boys just like this Kerr, chancers who would sell their own grannies for a few pounds to put something in their arms. It was like looking at a negative of Jude.

  Dealers who were also users were a dangerous breed. They cut the fuck out of everything to make the maximum money regardless of who they might harm in the process. Keeping the lion’s share for themselves just hastened their own slide down the slippery slope. Eventually they scoffed all the gear, left themsel
ves in enormous debt and ducked and dived until the main supplier caught up with them.

  And they always caught up with them, it was what they did to protect their own livelihoods. A scar across the face and the kicking of a lifetime were the least you could expect if you failed to pay your bills on time.

  Tyrell was suddenly depressed. It was like looking in a window and knowing that you were observing your own life, except he was observing the daily dealings of his dead son instead.

  ‘Walk back to my car and put yourself inside in the warm, OK?’ He passed Willy his car keys. ‘I am going to have a word with little Kerr. You’ll be OK?’

  Willy nodded happily. If Tyrell was asking him to sit in the car then he wasn’t leaving him here, which meant Willy might get another night at his flat.

  He hoped so, it was great there.

  Tammy had left the men to themselves. As she went Billy was shaking his head at his friend’s liberal use of cocaine.

  ‘You want to grow up, Nick, at your fucking age. You sell the fucking stuff, you don’t snort it! Where the fuck is the profit in that, I ask you?’

  Nick laughed.

  ‘Don’t tell me you’ve fucking hit the wagon, Billy? Is this the same Billy Clarke who snorted so many amphetamines in his youth he put the price up because they were scarce! Fucking Billy the Dyson Clarke!’

  ’As you said, that was in my youth. We’re past all that now at our age. Look in the mirror, mate, you look fucking dreadful. If I met you and didn’t know you, I would think you were in your fifties not your forties.’

  Nick looked in the mirror above the fireplace in his lounge and grinned even though he knew what his friend said was true. He looked terrible. His blue eyes were red-rimmed through coke and lack of proper sleep, his jowls were hanging down like a Bassett hound’s and his skin was dough-coloured. He looked like the kind of man he had always despised. He still made a joke, though, as was expected of him.

  ‘Why do you care, want to be me boyfriend or something? Stop fucking nagging, you old tart, and tell me what brings you here?’

  Billy sighed heavily.

  ‘Not good stuff, but I’m here as an emissary like.’

  Nick rolled his eyes to the ceiling at this turn of phrase and said resignedly: ‘Who sent you?’

  ‘No one. Me and me brothers have a bit of a problem and hope you can help us solve it.’

  The mention of his brothers did the trick as Billy knew it would. He hated using them as a lever with an old pal but Nick in his state needed to be told exactly how important this errand was. And judging by the way he was carrying on, he would need a reminder as well. Thank God he had come alone. Terry would have been on it with Nick in minutes and ended up having a row with him. Or worse than that, nipping off with the ever-delectable Tammy.

  Within five minutes of Billy’s being in the house she had practically shoved her threepenny bits in his face. She would never change, old Tammy. But in fairness she still looked good. Nick was sobering up quickly now and due to the cocaine was paranoid as well.

  Before he could answer Billy his sister Hester arrived to pick up their mother. Nick hurried to tidy away any signs of drug-taking before letting her in. Hester had not been in this house for many years. Her falling out with their mother had caused a family rift of Olympic standards.

  Angela had never accepted the fact that her daughter had been in love with the big black man who had known her daughter since school. It was not that she was racist, as such, but she did not believe in mixed marriages, at least that was how she explained it to herself.

  Dixon’s mother, a thin Jamaican woman with a serious work ethic and prematurely grey hair, felt exactly the same way. Consequently, they had married and lived a life without family around them. Both mothers unaware that they were so alike in their thinking it was uncanny.

  Hester loved their mother, she had fought for them all their lives against the drunken Irishman she had married. It had broken her heart when Angela had turned her back on her and her children without a second’s thought.

  Nick knew it must have taken a lot for her to come here today. He also knew she would be rejoicing inside because finally her mother had wanted to see her. The fact she had her husband Dixon with her now spoke volumes. Nick and he got on like a house on fire. Grabbing his brother-in-law’s hand firmly, Nick cried, ‘Hello, mate, come in, come on in. You know Billy Clarke?’

  Billy happily shook hands with the tall black man. They had worked together many times and had also been friends as boys, growing up on adjacent estates.

  ’All right, Bill?’

  It was the usual form of address, not a question.

  Hester, tall and naturally blonde, was plumper than she had been as a girl but it suited her. She was what was called years before ‘voluptuous’. As far as Dixon was concerned, she was sex on legs.

  ‘You got the old dragon then, for a few weeks?’

  Dixon grinned.

  ‘So it seems.’

  Hester kissed Billy on the cheek, and Billy being Billy could not resist squeezing her to him and copping a quick feel.

  ‘I’ll go and get Mum’s bags, but before I do, what’s happened?’

  ‘I don’t know, Hes, but I tell you something, I’ll be glad to be rid of her miserable boat-race for a while.’

  As Nick said it his mother walked into the room, hat and coat on and her make-up perfect from the thick face powder to the cupid’s bow lips.

  ’A nice thing for a mother to hear, Nick Leary.’

  He looked shamefaced and Billy and Dixon wondered at the power of motherhood. The hardest men in the world could be scared of their own mothers.

  ‘Well, if you won’t tell me what’s wrong, what the fuck am I supposed to do?’

  ‘I’ll tell you what you do, Nicholas Leary, you walk your poor mother to the car.’

  He rolled his eyes at the ceiling once more and followed her out of the room. Everyone wanted to laugh but no one did. By the car his mother waited until Nick had opened the door and settled her inside before she said quietly, ‘You want to know what’s wrong with me?’

  He nodded, just stopping himself from shouting at her.

  ‘Look in my safe. There’s something there of yours, and when you see it you’ll understand why after today I never want to clap eyes on you again. Never - do you hear me?’ Angela pushed him away from her as if to touch him made her feel sick and then said, ‘I’ll send for me bits when I decide what I’m doing.’

  She shut the car door on him then and he stood on the drive surrounded by his dogs, wondering what had made her go like this. Angela sat staring straight ahead, not allowing herself even a glance in his direction. Shaking his head, Nick walked back into the house. She was finally off her trolley. That was all he could come up with to explain such mad behaviour.

  Tyrell walked slowly around the station, watching Kerr as he did his rounds. He saw him slipping packages into small grubby hands and chatting to other boys. Waiting his chance, he followed at a distance until the boy walked out of the station and around the corner.

  As Kerr looked round to check for traffic, Tyrell grabbed him firmly by the top of his arm. Squeezing him tightly, enough to hurt but not to mark, he whispered, ‘You walk with me, Kerr, and if you try anything I will punch your fucking lights out, you hearing what I am saying, boy?’

  Kerr looked up into the man’s face. He was frightened and it showed. It was only then at such close quarters that Tyrell saw how young this boy was. Distance and his height made him look a lot older.

  ‘Who are you, man? What you want with me?’

  ‘I am Sonny Hatcher’s dad, Kerr, and I want a little chat with you.’

  The boy stopped struggling then and walked sedately beside him back to where the car was parked. But Tyrell still kept a tight grip because he knew now that you could not trust anyone.

  Anyone at all. Even those closest to you.

  Chapter Twenty

  Tammy didn’t even realise tha
t her mother-in-law had left the house, she was too busy getting ready to go out. In her heart of hearts she was embarrassed by the events of the day before and, being Tammy, had decided to get all her cronies together again and front it all out.

  Every time she thought about that fight she flushed with shame. This had happened to her a lot over the years. She would wake up the day after a big tear up, think about what had happened and want to die there and then in her bed, always vowing it would be the last time she drank or drugged.