Gun Dog (5 page)

I almost call out when I see the
handcuffs
. The filth have Uncle Jack handcuffed. He’s never committed a crime in the whole of his life. And he’s in his mid-seventies for fuck’s sake! Yeah – takes a lot of guts to arrest an old man and treat him like that. I’m angry – you bet I am. But what am I going to do? I know only too well that I can’t speak out on Uncle Jack’s behalf. I bet these brave pigs wouldn’t think twice about treating me the same way and I’d be joining him down at the nick. And yet
there
are the Rogers scum, yelling and swearing and threatening. And they are not being arrested.

Uncle Jack gets to the garden gate, and
some tiny slip of a woman cop opens it. You can just imagine
her
trying to arrest one of the Rogers scum. I can only feel contempt. Uncle Jack lifts his head and turns to look back, and that’s when I see Aunty Margaret stood in the doorway. There she is, framed by the little house she and Uncle Jack have made lovely, have turned into a true home. There is Aunty Margaret crying and holding out a pathetic hand towards her husband while those Rogers bastards call her all the vile names that you can imagine. There is Aunty Margaret who has always been a friend and helper to everyone in this dreadful place. And there she is, standing all alone and crying, so that tears fall down my face too. Why are they taking Uncle Jack? What can have happened?

‘We’d better get going.’

Andy has a hand on my arm. I turn to look at him, no longer caring whether or not he sees my tears. But Andy isn’t paying any attention to me. I turn my face to look where he’s looking and I see that the little shit Derek Rogers is staring across at us.

I just turn and start to walk. There’s nothing I can do here. Andy is by my side.

‘Rogers Bastards.’

I can’t say anything, not even to agree. I can’t get the images of Uncle Jack and Aunty Margaret out of my mind. I just can’t. I think I’m realising for the first time that what I actually feel for Uncle Jack and Aunty Margaret is a kind of love. There, I’ve said it. It’s like they’re my own family. They’re part of my childhood. Part of me, who I am. And it kills me that I can’t do anything to help them. I’m managing to hold back the tears for now. But I know they’ll just come flooding when I’m safe at home in my room. And of course I’m thinking of the Ruger. Who wouldn’t be?

It’s early Saturday morning and I’m up, standing at my garden gate. It’s that time of year when the mornings are cold and you know that there is mist in the air. All the cars parked at the roadside outside the houses are covered in beads of freezing dew. It’s incredibly quiet.

I’ve been awake all night, unable to sleep. Clouded in a fog of sadness, I’ve been clicking the mouse and following pages on the internet.

I know this off by heart now. Not that I went out of my way to learn it; I wasn’t even aware that I was reading it. My mind has been elsewhere; outside Uncle Jack and Aunty Margaret’s house; down at the nick watching Uncle Jack being DNA swabbed and having his finger prints taken. That information will be on the records forever now, even if Uncle Jack isn’t convicted of anything. Once they’ve got you recorded, they never let you go. Uncle Jack will be immortalised, along with the rapists and paedophiles and ponces and thugs.

I turn my head to look as the sound of a front door clicking open breaks the silence. It’s the house next door and I nod a silent hello to our neighbour Alan, who spots me as he ushers his two excited Springer Spaniels out before him. The dogs stand on Alan’s lawn looking back at him, their backsides wobbling as they wag their tails furiously. They’re excited, yes, but they’re patient. They’re well brought up so they’ve learned to respect authority and not to fool around. Alan is wearing a green waxed Barbour jacket that looks heavy and is covered with voluminous patch pockets. He’s wearing camouflage pants and hiking boots. Alan’s front door clicks as he closes it softly behind him so as not to wake his still sleeping wife and not disturb the neighbourhood. I guess we’re lucky to have a neighbour like Alan.

I watch the dogs fall in behind Alan as he strides along his garden path. They’re still excited enough to pant, but they don’t bark and they keep nice and close without him having to tell them.

‘Starting to get cold.’

Alan smiles and rubs his hands together before reaching to open the gate.

‘So long as it’s not raining.’

My reply is feeble, but I have to say something if only to be polite. Actually, I’m staring at the long narrow green canvas bag slung over Alan’s shoulder with a broad leather strap. I know that it contains a shotgun – Alan sometimes shares the spoils of his morning activities with us – but I have never seen it. Alan is careful to keep it concealed and unloaded until he’s out in the woodland where he’s going to shoot. He’s lucky enough to be friendly with a farmer not too many miles away who has woodland. It’s mostly wood pigeon that he kills, but there have been other game birds. Mum plucks and dresses them and we have game pie, which I’m told you would only normally see on the menus of fancy restaurants. Amazingly I like this game pie when we have it, even though now and then I’ve come close to breaking a tooth on lead shot.

‘Rain, shine, it doesn’t bother me.’

Alan is already opening the tailgate of his Subaru wagon, and the dogs are jumping in as he says this.

‘Just getting out in the fresh air is good. And they love being out and about.’

He’s nodding at the dogs as he slides the shotgun, still in its canvas carry-bag, into the back of the car.

I look at the dogs, just before the tailgate shuts to close them in. The spaniels are gun dogs. They’ve been bred to retrieve and trained to fetch shot game without eating or damaging it. Powerful jaws that can be very gentle.

Gun dogs. I find myself thinking about that as Alan slides into the driver’s seat of the Subaru, closing the door carefully behind him, still respectful of the hour, of his neighbours. Surely it’s wrong to call the dogs by that name. The dogs are only acting in accordance with their nature. Surely it’s the people who carry the guns who are really the gun dogs.

Rifling of six grooves refers to the number of narrow slots cut in spirals along the inside of the barrel. 1:10 means that the rifling goes through one full rotation every ten inches – not that the Ruger has a ten inch barrel. Rifling keeps the bullet straight and accurate when it’s fired.

Calibre 9mm means that the diameter of the inside of the barrel – and therefore the ammunition needed – is 9mm. That’s a powerful round. And it carries fifteen such rounds in a fully-loaded magazine. The magazine is a metal box that slots into the base of the handle. I’ve heard the wannabe
Gangstas
at school talking about guns – as if they’d ever been near one – and saying that such and such a gun carries a twelve round clip or a ten round clip or whatever.
I now know for certain that they’re talking crap. A clip is a disposable device that lets you speed-load a magazine.

The Ruger P95 in my hooded sweatshirt pocket carries a fifteen round magazine and it’s fully loaded.

Alan’s car pulls away from the kerb and I watch it as he accelerates gently down the road. The dogs are standing in the rear of the wagon, looking at me out of the window. I look back at them as I slide my hand into my pocket and my fingertips caress the polymer frame of the Ruger. Nah, they are not gun dogs. But maybe I am.

It has started to drizzle with rain. Not enough to worry about, but enough for me to see the tiny droplets coating the fleece of my hooded sweatshirt. My hands are in the pockets and the fingertips of my right hand are absently caressing the cool polymer frame of the Ruger P95. I don’t want to think about why the gun is in my pocket.

I’m standing on the pavement opposite Uncle Jack and Aunty Margaret’s house. I’m still sad about what I saw last night. But I’m not weepy now. Actually, I’m numb. I want to know what exactly went on last night and why Uncle Jack has been arrested.
I’m looking over at the house, where the curtains are drawn because it’s still pretty dark. It doesn’t look as though anyone is up in the house because no electric light escapes the inevitable curtain gaps.

Every now and again, my gaze wanders to the side of the house and I have to look away quickly. I can’t bear to look upon the battered little Nissan. It makes my fingers tighten on the cold object in my pocket. So I look at the house, and while I’m still feeling sad and angry and ashamed at my impotence last night, somehow looking at the house is more bearable.

I notice a twitch at the curtain. Someone in the house is awake. Whoever it is can’t help but have seen me standing here. Not that I’m trying to hide. And it’s not many seconds later that I see the front door slowly open. The hallway is dark behind, with no lights switched on. But there’s a figure in the doorway, a woman dressed, and not speaking, not beckoning. Just looking at me looking at her. It’s Aunty Margaret.

We stand like this, facing each other like melancholic gunslingers, for a few seconds that feel heavy and burdensome. But it’s not a contest so I move first, crossing the road. As I approach, I see Aunty Margaret’s face as I have never seen it before, so sad and disillusioned and defeated. A lump comes to my throat and I fight it down. I open the gate and step onto the concrete path leading to the front door. The lawn to the left of the path is billiard table-neat, the surrounding borders of dark soil all broken and even and weed-free, even though it’s autumn and the best of the summer flowers have long since died.

As I approach the front door step, I look up at Aunty Margaret and her face just crumbles as the tears begin to flow.

‘Oh Stevie…’

I put my arms around her and hold her to me. She is so dejected that she cannot even bring herself to hug me back and her arms hang limply down by her sides. We stand like this for a few moments with
her sobbing against my shoulder, before I gently usher her back inside the house and I close the door on a prying world that just wouldn’t care.

Minutes later, we’re sitting in the living room with the curtains still closed, even though it’s getting light outside. We’re drinking tea and I’m eating slices of homemade sponge cake despite it being very early in the day. I know that I have to indulge Aunty Margaret right now.

‘He only went outside to tell them to clear off. They were climbing all over the car and throwing bricks at the house.’

Bit by bit, through tears, I get the story. Uncle Jack went out to tell Rogers and his goblin followers to clear off after the rocks started to thump against the walls of their living room. And that’s when it did get personal. Once Uncle Jack had dared remonstrate with them, rocks that had until that point accidentally hit the car and the house, now began to rain down on those twin targets with a purpose. Uncle Jack
went out to remonstrate again and told these young children to clear off and make their mischief closer to their own homes.

‘Who’s going to make us?’

And you can just see the inbred Derek Rogers with his evil slitty eyes standing his ground against Uncle Jack, the Korean War veteran Grenadier Guardsman.

‘I’ll show you who.’

And Jack had gone out and grabbed the kid and smacked him on the back of his head, and had kicked his backside as the kid had turned to run away. Within half an hour, Derek Rogers was back and this time his brother Wayne was with him. They began shouting and swearing outside the house. And further damaging the car. Uncle Jack went out again to stop them. I can only imagine how distressing and terrifying it must have been for Aunty Margaret. Actually, I don’t have to imagine; I can see it in her eyes right now.

Well the swearing and the vandalism and the intimidation continued until eventually, Uncle Jack called the police. And this is the part that bewildered Uncle Jack and Aunty Margaret but doesn’t surprise me at all. It took half an hour to actually get to speak to someone, only to be told that no one could be despatched to come to the house. Friday night you see, and all units are busy in the town. You can hardly believe that can you? But let me tell you, you can never get a cop to come and deal with any kind of crime on our estate. They just don’t want to know.

Five times Uncle Jack called those cops last night, only to be fobbed off each time like he was some kind of senile timewaster. Finally, much later, with Aunty Margaret crying fit to break your heart and a brave old soldier made a prisoner in his own home by yobbish filthy criminal scum, blue lights could be seen flashing outside the house. The police had turned up after all. Uncle Jack had gone out to greet them, to invite them in, ready to give a statement. But it hadn’t been a statement that they’d been
after. They’d come to arrest Uncle Jack. They hadn’t come as a response to his telephoned pleas for help. They’d actually shown up as a response to a complaint by the Rogers family. These filthy scum criminals had called the police to complain that Jack had assaulted their darling little boy, the angelic Derek.

Oh come on, of course you can believe it. The filth don’t want to know about an elderly couple being terrorised by the violent, criminal Rogers family. But get the chance to arrest and terrorise that elderly couple themselves and they’re out
mob-handed
, quicker than you can spit. A quick and easy arrest of an unresisting old man and it helps their clear-up rate. They have crime clear-up targets to meet and an arrest and conviction of Uncle Jack will count for just as much as solving a child-murder or a rape. Oh yeah, they’re brave and trustworthy alright, the filth. I’ve known stuff like this all my life, but for people like Uncle Jack and Aunty Margaret, and even people like my mum and dad, it all comes as a shock. They still live in a past where
the police could be relied upon to see that order was maintained on the streets. And worked to uphold the law in favour of the gentle and the good against the violent and the criminal and the selfish.

I find out that Uncle Jack has been kept in the police station overnight and that Aunty Margaret is out of her mind with worry. I try to comfort her as best I can. In the end, I agree to go down to the police station with her. I don’t know what we’ll be able to do there, but it’s the only thing Aunty Margaret wants. And I’m not about to let her go there alone.