‘— you could drag me to hell and back, just as long as we’re together —’
Neil Fontaine turns up the radio. Neil Fontaine mixes the Jew one last cocktail. Neil Fontaine hands the Jew the latest photographs with a screwdriver.
The Jew sits down on the sofa. The Jew examines the photographs one by one –
The President speaking in Cardiff. Birmingham. Edinburgh and Newcastle.
The President in his car. His office. His street and his home.
The President meeting the TUC. The Labour Party. The French and the Soviets.
The President talking. Whispering. Grimacing and glowering.
The Jew puts down the photographs. The Jew says, ‘His war is lost.’
Neil Fontaine nods. Neil Fontaine hands the Jew a fresh cocktail to celebrate.
The Jew smiles. The Jew laughs. The Jew thanks Neil and raises his glass.
The Jew’s insistence on intransigence has been vindicated –
No one mentions power cuts any more; no one talks of general strikes –
Man by man. House by house. Street by street. Village by village. Pit by pit –
The Jew is winning his war –
4484 back last week; 4982 this week.
The Jew downs his drink in one and picks up yet more reports from the pile –
The Jew never rests. The Jew loves to dwell here among the details and analyses; to speak of the deterioration of the coal faces and the need for compulsory redundancies; the prospects for privatization, the rebirth of the industry and the creation of wealth –
Remarks here and remarks there; words in this ear and words in that –
Words in her ear; words that win wars.
For the Prime Minister is winning her war; her many, many wars –
The IRA. British Leyland. GCHQ. Cammell Laird. CND. The Belgrano. The GLC.
She never rests. Ever. But she prefers to live among the larger print and syntheses; to talk of the dangers to democracy from the ruthless few; the terrorist gangs at one end of the spectrum and the Hard Left at the other; inside our system, conspiring to use union power and the apparatus of local government to break, defy and subvert the laws –
These are her words; her words that win wars; her many, many wars.
The Prime Minister and the Jew; together they are winning the war, all her wars. But the Jew knows there is still work to be done. Much more to, come. Much worse –
The sight of strikers in the snow. Their children in the cold –
Northern funerals and famine; local poverty and pain.
The Jew knows there will be those without the stomach, the guts or the balls –
Neither the courage nor the conviction. Not the will to triumph.
The Jew puts down his papers. The Jew raises a last glass before bed –
‘Now is the time to steel ourselves‚’ declares the Jew. ‘The final hours are here. The endgame approaches, Neil.
‘That one last battle nigh.’
*
The four of them caught the five o’clock early evening train from Sheffield to London. The four of them got a table in second class. The other passengers in the coach stared. One man threw a meat pie at the President. An old woman chucked a cup of scalding tea. Loyal Len and the guard tried to calm things down. Joan wiped pie and tea from the President’s suit and tie –
‘This wouldn’t happen if we were sat in first class,’ said Terry.
The President picked pieces of hot pie from his hair. He shook his head. He said, ‘This wouldn’t happen if we abolished first class, Comrade.’
Terry Winters nodded. Terry sponged his newspaper dry with his handkerchief. He looked at his watch –
The train was fifteen minutes late into London. Len went off to get them a cab –
The President, Joan, Terry and Len took the taxi direct to the Embassy.
The President borrowed Terry’s calculator. The President punched numbers. The President wanted cash commensurable to the Soviet support of 1926.
The taxi stopped at the back door to the Embassy. Terry Winters paid the driver.
The Soviet Labour Attaché and diplomatic staff were waiting to welcome them. To take them inside. To offer them tea and biscuits in large and under-heated chambers. To make small talk about composers and goalkeepers –
The living and the dying. The dying and the dead.
Then the Labour Attaché asked to speak with the President in private.
Joan, Terry and Len went outside to wait in the large and under-heated corridor. To sit and stare at the social-realist paintings of the Soviet state. To shiver and snooze.
The President came out fifty minutes later with a smile and a spring to his stride –
The President had got his way. The President had got what he wanted.
The President, Joan, Terry and Len stepped out of the Soviet Embassy –
The flashbulbs exploded. The cameras rolled. The microphones pointed.
Len hailed them a cab to the Barbican. They sat in silence in the back of the taxi. The taxi stopped outside the President’s block of flats. Terry paid the cab driver again. The President and Joan walked on ahead. Len waited for a word with Terry Winters. Terry put away his wallet. Terry smiled at Len. Len punched Terry in the stomach –
‘That was the fucking last time,’ said Len Glover. ‘Last time you betray us.’
Terry knelt on the pavement. Terry held his stomach. Terry coughed.
‘There was just us four that knew about that meeting,’ said Len. ‘Just us four.’
Terry coughed again. Terry clutched his stomach. Terry shook his head.
‘It had to be you that tipped off the press,’ said Len. ‘It had to be you, Winters.’
Terry shook his head again. Terry rubbed his stomach. Terry tried to stand up.
Len pushed him back over. Len kicked him in the stomach. Len spat on him.
Terry tried to stand up again. Terry gripped his stomach. Terry shook his head.
Len pushed him back over onto the ground again. Len walked away. Len shouted, ‘You’re fucking finished, Winters. Fucking finished.’
Terry shook his head again. Terry touched his stomach. Terry tried to stand –
But Terry was laughing. Terry’s sides splitting. Terry howling –
‘Look in the mirror, Len,’ shouted Terry. ‘Look in the mirror, Comrade Len!’
Martin
This stede is dimm. I watch fires die up ahead. I pickup a fragment in my hand — Don’t fly as much as before. Can’t. Problems enough on our own doorstep. Half of cars are knackered and all. Mine’s still out front with black bin-bags for a windscreen. Pete’s asked Barnsley for some brass for it. He’s heard nothing back. They’ve got a van for this morning. Lot of usual lads — Keith. Tom. Chris — No sign of Gary or Tim again. They told me they were going on spoil seven days a week now. I’ve not been for a bit. There are no more blind eyes and back handers on top now — They catch you, they sack you — That was message from pit. Likes of Tim and Gary don’t give shit, though. No choice, way they see it — They catch them, they catch them. They sack them, they sack them — Makes no odds to them. Fucking DHSS are withholding another bloody quid from folk. Them that even fucking get anything in first place — Talk about nails and bloody coffins. Turns of fucking screw. Fuck me — This morning it’s Frickley. More to show willing than anything else — Down Welfare for half-four. Bacon sandwich and a cup of tea and we’re on road for five. Usual arguments about best way versus this way and that way. Head up through Thurnscoe and Clayton. Back way into Frickley and another front line. Keith parks up and out we get. It’s cold and damp. Krk-krk. There are about sixty police. Two hundred pickets, maybe. Scab bus comes up and there’s a big push — Line breaks for a moment. But only for a moment — Bus goes in and that’s that again. People start to walk off. Back to their cars and their vans. Police giving out their usual wit — I catch eye of one of them. Always a fucking mistake — He steps out into road in front of all his mates. He gives us a right boot up my arse. He says, Come on, Doris, pick your fucking feet up. He kicks me again couple of times. I just keep walking — Keeping my head down. Feel fucking daft, though. Two foot tall. Everyone watching him kick us like that — Two foot tall, that’s how I feel. Every fucking day. Two foot fucking tall — Day 269. Keith drops us off. Has a laugh with us about state of our car, then he goes back home. He’s his wife and his kids. Has it hard but he has them — Police can spit on him. Make their comments. Push him about. Kick him up arse. Chase him. Beat fuck out of him. Take out his teeth even — But he’s got his wife and his kids. He’s one of lucky ones — I open door. Nothing. No one — Just another fucking copy of Coal News waiting for us on floor with another fucking letter from Mr Moore at Colliery. That and a letter from TSB in Rotherham and another one from solicitors — They never give up, those kind. Never — Nails and coffins. Turns of screw — Bloody lot of them. Like an army, they are — I shut door. I stand in hall — I look at my watch. It isn’t even twelve o’clock yet — Not even halfway there. Not even close — I walk through into kitchen. Place where kitchen used to be — I look out on back garden. I light a cigarette — Expensive habit that, she says. I turn round — I fly off handle. Shut up! Shut up, I shout. Shut up! I go back into hall — I pick up that letter from Mr Moore. I stand there in hall with it in my hand — I put the fragment to my face — I open it — Itis cold and it is old — I read bloody thing this time — I hold the fragment to firelight — I read his offer — I see it for the first time— To meet me any time I want — I see it and I stare — To meet me any place I want — Istepback — To discuss my future — I look around me at this place — My welfare and my happiness — Thisplace is old. Thisstede is niht— My safety and my security — Thisplace is cold. Thisstedeis dimm — My change of heart and my piece of mind — I see this place for what it is. I see this fragment for what it is — To arrange my return. My return to work — I hold the fragment of a skull in my hand, stood upon a mountain of skulls — I drop letter on pile. Pile of statements and bills. Bills and final demands — The skulls sat in monstrous and measureless heaps. The empty nests of dreams and desires — Demands and threats — Delusionsand deceptions — I close my eyes — I whisper. I echo.I moan.I scream — I open my eyes. I stand in my hall — Under the ground — I moan and I scream.