Faces (66 page)

Danny Boy was not only impressed, he was humbled by this boy’s determination to get on in life. He saw himself in him. Indeed, he saw his brother’s humiliation at his hands as fate, because it had brought Donald into his orbit. He would help this boy in any way he could. Like the Bible said, ‘Let those among you cast the first stone.’

This boy had sinned, he had smacked his little brother. In their world that was a big sin. A
seriously
big sin. Well, he had no intention of throwing any stones at him; he was going to reward him instead for his guts. He understood the boy’s predicament and he also admired the boy’s front in how he had dealt with the situation. So many young men would have backed down, would have thought of him, Danny Boy, and not their own self-worth. Well, he was a sinner of renown, and so was this young man and, by the time he had finished with him, he would be a sinner of fucking outrageous proportions.

Let Old Bill cast the first stone, Danny Boy was, as always, ready and able to deal with them. He had something no one else had, and that was a mental facility for knowing who he could trust and who he couldn’t. He could trust this kid, and he would shower him with glory because he knew it would come back to him one hundredfold.

 

Marsh had not spoken for ages and Arnold was getting nervous.

‘Give him a poke, will you, make sure he ain’t overdosed or something.’

Michael’s voice was full of laughter as he said it, he knew that a cokehead could go from having far too much to say for themselves to an introverted nervous wreck in moments.

‘He is all right, Michael?’

‘ ’Course he is. All that’s wrong with him is that he’s shitting it. He knows he’s out of order and he’s contemplating his punishment.’ Unlike Arnold, who was really worried about their victim, Michael was playing the game. He was talking for effect.

Michael knew, from experience, the value of a threat over direct action. The thought of something happening was far worse than an actual physical assault; though Marsh would be getting one of those as well, naturally. After all, a threat on its own was pointless unless it was seen through to the bitter end.

Michael agreed with Danny Boy that the laws of the land were not effective because they were never seen through in their entirety. Unless the crime involved money or property, the judicial system saw fit to let people have a pass. To allow burglars and suchlike to have an easy walk. It was laughable. No wonder there were no boundaries or guidelines for the young people any more. The fact they were young was seen as reason enough to let them get away with anything, including murder. Murders that had no place in the world, murders of complete fucking strangers for a few quid and a rifle in the victim’s fridge before they went home to Mummy and Daddy. It was fucking outrageous how these people managed to come out of it all as the wronged party. At least, if they had a grudge, it was with good reason, and the person involved knew the likely outcome of their fucking actions. Rob an old lady, terrify her, grab her little bit of pension, and you got probation; rob a fucking building society and you wouldn’t see the light of day for at least twelve years. It was wrong, and even the general public were seeing it from that point of view these days. A creeper, a burglar, was lower than the fucking low in stir. Unless it was a great big house owned by a lord, or suchlike, it was seen as an abomination by the criminal fraternity. The same with muggers and con artists who preyed on the elderly or the infirm. They were bullies who needed to be locked away from society, who, by their very actions, and their complete disregard for the weaker people in their orbit, had forfeited the right to be allowed out to prowl the streets.

And here they were now, with a so-called pillar of society, a Filth who had a gambling habit that was only outweighed by his coke addiction. A man who had been introduced to them by his boss; another fucking waster whose only saving grace was that he agreed with them about the way the law seemed to favour the wankers in their society. This man was responsible for looking after the honest people in society. The people that Michael and his ilk had no interest in robbing at all. In fact, they would be the first ones there if they heard of such an occurrence. Yet it was them who were classed as the blight on society, not this man or the fucking gas-meter bandits who robbed their own. Bent Filth always gave him the hump, especially when they overstepped the mark, when they outgrew their usefulness. As this one had, because of his blatant stupidity, his drunken antics, and his unwavering belief that he was beyond their jurisdiction. Why did Old Bill always believe they were in control, even when they took money each week and, by that very act, they had given up any kind of regard they might been given as a straight Filth? They were lower than fucking second-hand lino; it stood to reason. After all, they were quite happily betraying the people they worked with, as well as the people they were supposed to be protecting.

Michael turned the car onto a dirt road and, as they crept along it in the moonlight, Arnold looked around him with interest. ‘Where are we?’

Michael pulled into a small driveway and parked the car under a huge oak tree before answering, ‘This is one of Danny Boy’s investment properties, it’s empty so we can make as much noise as we like.’

He turned in his seat and said to Marsh, ‘You can scream the place down and no one will hear you.’

Jeremy was already in mortal fear for his life, as Michael had anticipated. Pulling him from the car he dragged him into the darkness of the garages that lay behind the house. Inside, he put on the light and motioned for Arnold to go to the workbench and wait for him to give him directions. Arnold did as he was asked, but he was feeling nervous; pasting an Old Bill was one thing, taking him out of the ball game was something else entirely. Like Marsh, he was also looking nervously at the tools laid out so neatly on the old wooden bench. From screwdrivers to awls, everything there was more than capable of inflicting serious harm, and both Arnold and Jeremy believed that would be the case.

Michael grinned then. Pulling an old kitchen chair up he sat down heavily before saying quietly, ‘You have fucked me off and you know that, don’t you?’

Jeremy Marsh nodded his head furiously, his eyes bulging from his head with a mixture of fear and sleep deprivation.

‘People are talking about you and your new lifestyle. Horrible
people
, the wrong people, are asking questions about where your money comes from. And that is not something I can allow to happen. You are now what’s known as a liability. A fucking albatross hanging around my Gregory Peck. I have had two calls from colleagues of yours warning me that you are bringing attention to yourself. So, what have you got to say in your own defence?’

Jeremy Marsh was so frightened that he was almost struck dumb. He was sweating profusely, it was dripping down from his forehead into his eyes, making them sting. His clothes were stuck to his body and the smell was ripe even in the dusty, oily stench of the garages. He looked like someone from a horror film who had just seen the murderer approach him with a chainsaw. ‘Look, Mike, I’m sorry. I can see where you’re coming from, and this won’t happen again. But you know I can be really useful to you and Danny Boy . . . I have been. Danny and me, we have a rapport. Ask him. Talk to him about it. He’ll tell you how much I’ve helped him get things sorted. Ask him about what I’ve done for him.’

Michael and Arnold were watching the man with a morbid fascination, he was almost stuttering with fright. Yet both men sensed that he was in possession of knowledge that he felt might get him out of this trouble.

‘And what the fuck have you done that’s so fucking important, eh?’ It was Arnold speaking now and, to push his point home once and for all, he punched Marsh hard in the head. Giving it all his considerable strength he watched in satisfaction as Marsh flinched, drawing his head into his shoulders as the blow landed heavily and noisily on the side of his head. His ear split immediately, the skin holding it in place tearing like rice paper and leaving it hanging there, the blood already soaking into his clothes. He was crying now, silent tears that ran down his face and mingled with the snot from his nose. He was broken and they knew it.

‘Come on, then, what makes you so fucking special to Danny Boy, eh?’

Jeremy Marsh knew that he was beaten, knew that he was in far deeper than he had ever imagined. He knew that if he was to come out of this alive he needed something to use as a bargaining tool. All he had was this one thing to help him out of this mess and he couldn’t understand why Michael Miles was acting like he was unaware of his usefulness. Was acting like what he did was nothing. Was worth nothing to them.

‘Don’t you know, Mike? You have to know.’

The question was there, and so was the realisation that maybe Michael Miles really was in the dark about his actual role in the Cadogan scheme of things. That he suddenly had a bargaining chip, a real one. Pulling himself up to his full height Marsh said loudly and cockily, ‘I took over from David Grey. I am Danny Boy’s go-between.’

Chapter Thirty

Danny Boy woke up in his own house; he knew that by the smell. It always smelled of perfume and bleach. As he opened his eyes he could feel his wife’s slender body tight against him in the huge bed. He had his arms wrapped around her, and he knew that she was only there because she couldn’t get away from him. That she was already awake was a foregone conclusion. She never slept when he was beside her, and that thought saddened him this morning. He had loved her the night before, had taken her and enjoyed her in every way possible. Her compliance spurred him on these days. He enjoyed her complete detachment, it made the act so much more exciting. He was like a director, directing her so she did whatever he wanted her to. She said what he wanted her to say, and so acted like she was having the time of her life at his command. Hugging her even tighter to him, he kissed the back of her head gently. ‘Make me a cup of Rosie Lee and a bit of Holy Ghost, eh?’

Her husband’s voice was so soft, so gentle, that Mary forgot for a little while how dangerous he could be, was grateful for this little kindness he was showing her. Slipping from the bed she pulled on a dressing gown and he sat up as he watched her. Leaning back on the pillows and surveying his surroundings with the practised eye of the bully, he decided to be nice. Decided, today, to overlook her shortcomings. She had been good lately, and he had unloaded another bird in the last few days, causing him to feel the need to be reacquainted with his married life. It was always the same, and Mary knew that. He came home for a while, gave them all the pretence of a home life until he felt the urge to disappear once more for weeks, sometimes months, on end. He’d leave her wondering when he was going to show up for more than a change of clothes and a shower and, more to the point,
how
he would be when he did finally arrive back into the bosom of his family.

Today Mary sighed with relief at his friendliness, at his decision to take it easy on them all. As she was pinning her hair up she could feel him watching her, knew that it was the little things like this that could either set him off on one of his tantrums or, just as easily, reduce him to tears. She never knew what was going to happen, and she felt the nervous tension gripping her belly like a vice. As he watched her pinning up her thick glossy hair the girls came into the room and, seeing him there, propped up against the pillows, a smile on his face, they stopped in their tracks. Then, a split second later, Leona, always the leader, ran into his arms, Lainey following her happily.

‘What are you doing here, Daddy?’

Leona’s piping little voice and her honest question caused her mother to hunch her shoulders and grit her teeth in terror as she waited for the onslaught. But Danny Boy was on his best behaviour this lovely sunny morning, as was sometimes his wont, and laughing, he said happily, ‘I wanted to see me girls, me babes; I’ve missed you.’

Leona rolled her eyes in mock exasperation, and that just made him laugh even more.

 

Carole was worried about her husband. He had come in late the night before and, instead of coming to bed as usual, he had sat in their living room alone and in the dark. She had heard him come in; she never really relaxed until she knew he was home anyway. When he had not come up to bed she had got up and looked for him. She wanted to know why he wasn’t lying beside her, why he had not even checked on the kids. He always looked in on the kids, and he always came home to her. She wasn’t stupid, she knew the life he led, and she knew she was lucky, because Michael wasn’t a chancer, didn’t need the cachet of a little bird hanging on his every word like Danny Boy. He was happy enough with her and his family. That was why his actions had frightened her, had worried her. He was bothered about something, and she needed to know what that was. Her fear was always that he would get a capture, be nicked by Old Bill. She knew it was a possibility even as she knew that he felt he was far too powerful for that to ever happen to him. But, by the same token, nothing was a definite in their world, and she knew that if the Old Bill wanted them bad enough, they’d get them. If only for no other reason than they were so powerful they might need knocking down a peg or two. Her husband’s business was not exactly kosher, and she was as aware as he was of the pitfalls. Unlike him though, she felt there was chance that, for all their might, and all their money, they would never be completely safe from prosecution. It only took one person to start the ball rolling, and that was that. Big sentences brought on big mouths. Michael had said that to her many years before and she had never forgotten it.

So his strange behaviour caused her to wonder what had happened to him in the last twenty-four hours, and why it had made him act so out of character.

She placed a pot of tea on the table and, sitting down opposite her husband, she asked him once more, ‘Please, Michael, tell me what’s wrong.’