Wild Thing (10 page)

The man looked at me and laughed. ‘I will go in my own time.’

Before he hit the floor, I had sent his friend crashing into the wall with a right hook. ‘Do you want some?’ I asked the third man who was with them. He looked at his two friends, who were lying motionless in a heap, turned and ran into the lift. I assumed he didn’t want trouble, so I stepped over one of the men and walked back into the main room of the club.

Peter Koster and the other door staff who had witnessed the incident laughed and said, ‘Fucking hell, Lew, we are glad you’re on our side. We could do with you being here every night.’

Two weeks after starting work at the club, I saw Roy Shaw bowl into reception with a few friends. This was the first time I had set eyes on the Guv’nor, the king of the unlicensed ring, whose crown I had come to London to take. It was definitely him; I recognised him from the numerous posters that had been plastered all over walls, billboards and bus shelters around the East End and Essex. I walked over to a man I knew named Peter Lee, who was with Shaw, and said hello.

‘Hello, Lew,’ he replied. ‘Let me introduce you to Roy Shaw.’

‘All right, mate,’ Shaw grunted.

‘Lew’s a fighter,’ Peter said.

Shaw looked at me and replied, ‘Yeh, he looks like one.’

We shook hands and exchanged pleasantries, but throughout the brief conversation Shaw hardly looked at me. I was staring at him thinking, little do you know, I have come to this town for you and your title. I had not mentioned my challenge to Shaw to any of the door staff, because people were so in awe of him they would simply have told me that I was mad to even consider fighting him. They certainly wouldn’t have taken me seriously. Knowing that and realising Shaw hadn’t even remembered my name angered me. When I later calmed down, I had to laugh at my own stupidity. Shaw couldn’t possibly have remembered my name, because when I first challenged him I was known as Martindale. Peter Lee had introduced me as Lew Yates. It didn’t matter; Shaw was going to get to know me soon enough and regret doing so. I now not only wanted to take Shaw’s crown; I wanted to shatter the illusion held by so many people that he was unbeatable. My chance, I hoped, would come eventually.

One evening I was walking around the club with a doorman named Ricky asking people to drink up. To be honest, it was the only part of the job I really disliked. There would always be some drunken arsehole staring down a glass at the last inch of his pint mumbling ‘OK, OK, I’m leaving’ but who in reality had no intention of moving. A group of about 15 heavy-looking guys were standing near the bar, and when Ricky asked them to drink up they totally ignored him. I walked over to them and said, ‘Come on, lads, drink up. We want to get home tonight.’ One of the group, whom I later found out was named Arnie, threw his drink over his shoulder. I immediately grabbed Arnie and said, ‘You’re out.’ One of his friends lunged at me, so I hit Arnie, knocking him clean over a table, and started fighting with his friend. To this day I don’t know who hit me, but I saw a heavy ‘dimple’-type glass coming towards my face. I ducked, and it exploded on my forehead. The glass cut me to the bone just above my right eye. Blood gushed out and soaked my clothing. I went absolutely fucking berserk.

As I advanced towards the man I had been fighting with, I threw punches at everybody who tried to get in my way. The man I wanted started walking backwards, trying to distance himself from me. A large black guy stood in my way and put his hand inside his jacket, indicating that he was carrying a weapon. I ran towards him; he turned and sprinted towards the safety of the lift. A doorman named Neville Sheen was shouting, ‘Watch him, Lew, watch him! He’s got a blade!’ When I got to the reception area, the black guy was with four or five of his friends in the lift. The door staff were holding me back. The lift doors closed and the men were gone. I went back into the club and knocked down two men who had been with the group. They didn’t offer any resistance, so I left them lying where they fell. I searched the club for the man I had been fighting with when I was glassed, but he had vanished.

I was losing a lot of blood, so Peter Koster and another doorman said they would take me to King George’s Hospital on Eastern Avenue. While we were in the accident and emergency department waiting room, a man came in and called Peter over. I couldn’t hear what was being said, but when he left, Peter told me that it was Billy Blundell’s driver. ‘Who’s Billy Blundell?’ I asked.

Peter said that Billy was the guy I’d been fighting with when I’d been glassed. Peter explained that Billy’s driver had been told to find out if I was going to look for them with a shooter. ‘I told them you don’t need a shooter, Lew. You can sort out problems with your hands.’ Peter told me that Billy and his brother Eddie Blundell were ‘top-drawer faces’ who had been involved in a bloody turf war during which some of their rivals had been shot. ‘They’re nice enough geezers, Lew,’ Peter said, ‘but they don’t mind going to war.’

‘Neither do I, Peter,’ I replied, ‘especially when I am in the right.’

When the doctors had finished stitching me up, Peter dropped me off at home, and I thought no more about it.

A few weeks later I was in a car being driven by a doorman named Steve Ryan. We were passing a garage in Forest Gate called Ted’s, which repaired not only cars but also commercial vehicles. I noticed there were two ice-cream vans on the forecourt. A thickset man sitting in a car parked next to them was talking to a mechanic. As we pulled up in the traffic, this man jumped out of his car and approached ours. It was Billy Blundell. ‘Hello, Lew,’ he said, extending his hand. ‘I don’t want any more trouble with you. I need to speak to Stevie.’ I eyed Billy with caution as Stevie reversed into a parking space and got out of the car. When they had finished talking, I too got out. Billy apologised about the trouble at the club, laughed and said, ‘Do you know something, Lew? I have never been hit so hard in my life. I have still got the fucking lumps on my head.’ I could hardly be rude or aggressive to such an upfront guy, so we shook hands and agreed to put the matter behind us. In time Billy and I became friends, and we still laugh about our bloody introduction every time we meet.

A month or two after the row with Billy, a tall Scottish lad came to the door of the club. ‘Are you a bouncer, mate?’ he asked, while smirking at me.

‘What makes you think that, Jock?’ I replied.

‘Because you have got a bow tie on,’ he said.

‘No, I’m not a bouncer. I just collect the fucking tickets and stand here entertaining the local idiots. The show’s over for now. If you’re going in the club, go in. If you’re not, fuck off.’ I was surprised to learn that this man, whom I’ll call Iain, managed one of Billy Blundell’s businesses. After he left the club that night, I told the door staff that I would appreciate it if they didn’t let him in again. I had resolved my differences with Billy and assumed this mug had heard about the trouble and had come to the club to try to cause more.

The following week Iain turned up at the club and was told that I had said he couldn’t come in. Iain turned, walked away and returned five minutes later with a car jack. ‘Tell that cunt Lew I am going to do him,’ Iain shouted at the door staff.

‘No problem,’ the door staff replied. ‘Somebody will let him know.’

By the time I had been informed of his threats, Iain had left the building and was walking away down the street. I got into the lift and, once at ground level, ran out after him. Iain heard me coming up behind him, ran to his car, opened the passenger door, dived in and locked himself in. I ran around to the driver’s door, managed to get my fingers in the top and began pulling the door off its hinges. Screaming in terror, Iain leapt from the car and ran. Halfway down the street he stopped running, turned and began shaping up as if preparing to box. He was throwing punches, ducking, weaving, and, I have to admit, he looked good. When I got near him, he changed his mind about fighting me and ran away again. In frustration I returned to his car, smashed every window, kicked in every panel and even bent his steering wheel. I heard no more from him until a few months later when one of the door staff said to me, ‘That Scotsman’s in here.’

‘Where?’ I asked. ‘Where? I’ll fucking kill him.’

The doorman pointed to Peter Koster, who was talking to a tall individual, and sure enough it was Iain the Scotsman. When I reached Peter, he was asking Iain what he was doing in the club. Iain, mouthy as always, replied, ‘I will go when I finish my fucking pint.’

Without saying a word, I knocked his drink out of his hand, grabbed him by the throat and said, ‘You’re all mine, you wanker.’ I dragged him through a fire exit and through the restaurant to an area behind the lift where nobody could see us. Peter had followed me out, but I told him to leave me alone with this guy. I let go of Iain and said, ‘Come on then, you and me. I thought you wanted to have it with me?’

Iain struck the beautiful boxing pose he had displayed months earlier in the street. Acting is fine on stage, but it’s pretty useless in a street fight. I hit Iain so hard that one of his teeth left his mouth like a .303 bullet. As I prepared to deliver another blow, I saw that his eyes were rolling in his head, so I stepped back. Bigmouth Iain was out cold before he had even met the floor.

Some doormen would have jumped all over him, but I had proved my point; there was no need for further violence. I dragged Iain to the lift, threw him in and sent him and it to the ground floor. The door staff below dragged him outside and left him lying in the doorway of Harrison Gibson’s department store. They later told me that Iain had urinated and soiled himself, which isn’t unusual when somebody gets knocked out like that. Forty-five minutes later, he was seen pulling himself up off the floor and staggering away into the night.

The next time I saw him, I was entering a shop in Manor Park as he was leaving. Iain glared at me, so I turned around and walked back out of the shop. He had either vanished into thin air or ran like an Olympic athlete. Either way, mouthy Iain was nowhere to be seen, and I haven’t seen him since. I did, however, get a visit from some of his friends.

Funso Banjo is not a musical instrument, as I first thought when I heard the name. Funso Banjo was destined to become, according to a national newspaper, the next Muhammad Ali. Banjo, a Nigerian prince who had been sent to university in England, was a huge man, aged around 25 and fearsome looking because of the deep tribal scars that had been carved into his face. Banjo worked on a casual basis for Billy Blundell. I was told that he wasn’t happy about the way I’d dealt with Iain and that I’d be wise to watch my back. Two Jaguar cars pulled up outside the club one night containing eight extremely large black guys and two Alsatian dogs. The manager had booked a few diverse cabaret acts in his time but I was sure this wasn’t another.

‘Mickey the Claw’, a novelty act in his own right, had a Beatles haircut, stood at 5 ft 3 in., was painfully thin, talked through his nose because of a badly deformed jaw and only had three fingers on one hand. Despite his numerous unfortunate disabilities, the Claw, as we used to call him, was a helpful and well-meaning guy who worked with us at the club. It was the Claw’s job to operate the lift that took the punters to and from the street. When I arrived downstairs after being told about the men, I saw the Claw shuffling around waving and pointing his three fingers at the men in the cars. I called out to him to stay away, then walked towards the vehicles. As I got close to the men, a police car pulled up and they drove away. The arrival of the police was unconnected to the presence of the men; the officers were just carrying out one of their regular courtesy calls to check all was OK in the club. I asked the Claw if he had recognised any of the cars’ occupants.

‘One was a guy called Rod [not his real name],’ he snorted, ‘and he was driving a car owned by Banjo.’ The Claw didn’t know who owned the other vehicle or the identities of the men in it. I knew Rod; he was 6 ft 6 in. tall and obscenely ugly. His jaw was twice as wide as the top of his head, which made it resemble a bucket.

The following Friday I noticed Rod leaning against the bar in the club having a drink. ‘You all right, Rod?’ I asked.

‘Yes, man, yes. I’m cool,’ he beamed.

‘Tell your fucking mate Banjo I want to see him,’ I said. Rod sensed that I was annoyed and stared straight ahead, not daring to reply or make eye contact. At the end of the night he came over to me and tried to make a joke about the situation. He was laughing, telling me to chill out and throwing playful punches at me. I said, ‘Don’t fuck about, Rod. If you want to throw punches, come out the back. Let’s do it for real.’ Rod was wearing a woollen hat, and as he turned to walk away I snatched it from his head. I walked towards the restaurant and urged Rod to come and retrieve it, but he remained where he was. I walked back to him, stuck his hat on the head of one of the other doormen and then punched Rod in the throat. He tried to fight me, but I slammed him into the wall, shouting, ‘You aren’t fucking strong enough, son.’

Rod, despite his size, didn’t have the heart of a fighter; he was little more than a wimp. He begged me, ‘Please, sir, please, sir, don’t hit me.’ I threw him into the lift, but even then he continued to grovel. I may sound like a bully, but this man and seven of his friends had been waiting to attack me for no reason. I hadn’t hurt him for his part in the despicable plot; I had merely reminded him that I was no fool. The next time I saw Rod, he pulled alongside me at a set of traffic lights in Forest Gate. I looked over at him. He looked back at me, then slammed his car into gear and shot through a red light, narrowly missing a tipper lorry as he sped across the junction. Our paths never did cross again.

I was working six nights a week at the Room at the Top club and earning reasonable money. Every night when I got paid, I would put most of my wages in an envelope and post them home to Jean. The remainder I used to feed and support myself. I didn’t have the time to go out and socialise as I was working nearly every night, so my existence was very cheap to maintain. Although I rang home regularly, I missed Jean and the children terribly. Some nights, after I had finished talking to them on the telephone, I would replace the receiver and be close to tears. The children would always ask when Daddy was coming home, but Jean was growing increasingly distant. I realised bringing up the children alone could not be much fun, so I suggested that she return to work. It would provide her with a bit of additional money, get her out of the house and give her a break from the kids. Jean agreed and started working part-time at a hairdressing salon in town. Billy was looked after by a close friend of Jean’s, who also met the other children out of school. Initially Jean seemed much happier, but after a while she became distant again. I don’t know what it was, but a voice in my head was telling me over and over that something was not right back home. However hard I tried to dismiss it, my sixth sense, intuition, call it what you will, would not let my troubled mind rest. I had been working for seven months in London when I asked for my first weekend off. ‘I want to surprise the wife and children,’ I confided in Peter. ‘Would you mind?’