‘This year. What about you?’
‘Twenty-five.’
‘This kid is fifteen.’
‘He’s a nutcase. You got to take him out.’
‘I know what I got to do.’
‘Take the little shit out, Crew.’
‘You should’ve done him, then and there. Broke his fucking neck. Why didn’t you? You my right arm man.’
‘Crew. Who am I? It’s got to be you. You got to do it. You got to make the point.’
Crew brushed at his dripping nose and bit his lips. He could feel the blood flushing through his veins, hear it rushing in his ears. Baz stood up and opened the fridge.
‘You know where he lives?’
‘I know where he lives but you want to do it outside, don’t you?’ Baz put the question and took a good quick swallow of cold Pepsi, wiping the creamy foam from his brown lips. For a moment, doubt shimmered in Crew’s black hole eyes before they sucked it in.
‘I’ll do it outside. ‘Course. I want to do it outside but it’s got to look right, if we do it outside. The punters will be watching. It’s got to be the business.’
Baz crushed the can in his hand.
‘OK. Half an hour and he’ll be in the chippy, playing the machines,’ he said and Crew began to giggle, a high-pitched sort of snort and sniff, clapping his white sinewy hands together.
‘Take away in a take away. Let’s do it. Yeh, let’s do it,’ he said, jumping up.
Baz drew a line of powder on a spare piece of foil while Crew pulled on his waistcoat, a black chunky life jacket with pockets everywhere, inside, in front, at the side, at the back, at least one for the Browning 380 automatic, another for the cartridges. When he’d finished, Baz turned around bits of white powder clinging to the nostrils of his flat nose. Crew took the foil and breathed in deeply, sucking up the drug until the words snapped out of him like hot popcorn.
‘YES, YES. Oooooh YES. Let’s go. Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go. Go get the little fucker. YES.’
Baz followed him and side-stepped in front, handing Crew his black sunglasses before opening the door to let the blazing light of that dull evening shaft the corneas of the man’s blinded eyes. He took his place a little behind Crew, all down around the dirty stairwell, the walls moulded with dark stains and barbed wire graffiti, boom box signatures that said ‘Canning Town Kingsnakes Kick Yow Ass’ and ‘Get BoY’. Baz made sure he kept talking, geeing the man up.
‘You know him don’t you? You’ll know him. He’s cut his dreads. You know that. He got a sort of picture cut into the back and those little Hula Hoops on top.’
‘What sort of design?’
‘The Ace of Clubs.’
‘The Ace of Spades?’
‘Clubs. Clubs.’
Baz kept on until they got to the row of garages. Crew unlocked theirs and Baz took out the Kawasaki and the masks.
‘You gonna wear one?’ Baz asked as Crew worked the slide of the Browning to push the cartridge in the chamber. Crew turned his clammy face to look at Baz pulling on his paper bag with the holes for his eyes and tear for a mouth, and his black soft leather gloves. The gun was ready to fire.
‘My eyes. I need the glasses. You know how it is,’ Crew said. Baz knew, but it wasn’t his problem, not then. He saw the dull summer evening for what it was because only Crew had snorted the cocaine deep into damaged sinuses and rushed the soft polygons of his honeycomb brain. Baz had merely rubbed a little powder under his nose with his finger. He didn’t have to squint into the half light. He felt anxious, but not three-quarters paranoid like Crew. For Baz, it was just tension building like hunger in his belly. This had to go right now or he was a dead man.
‘You want people to see your face?’ he said.
Crew thought for a moment and tucked the Browning into a pocket.
‘So they see my face? They want some? Who’s going to fucking tell? Who’d they think they’re looking at?’
Baz didn’t reply. He mounted the Kawasaki, jumped the pedal and when Crew was at his back, they were gone.
All the boys looked around when they heard the bike roar in and Crew fired once at the one that didn’t, the one with the short worm wool hair and the three bags of chips. The Ace of Clubs now the Ace of Bleeding Hearts. He could hear a girl screaming, and a woman. Crew got off the bike, picked the spent cartridge from the floor and put it in the top pocket of his vest.
’What you looking at?’ he screamed at the muddled black faces with their wide white eyes. He shouted his name loud, head back towards the laughing gods and raised his finger to write number one in the bright face of heaven. He didn’t make it. The pain entered his head like fire, his arms turned like windmills, and the last sound he heard was the Kawasaki fading away into the summer night.
71-73 CHARING CROSS ROAD by MAXIM JAKUBOWSKI
Dear Mr Jakubowski,
I feel compelled to write to let you know how much I enjoyed that book you selected for me. I didn’t know that one could possibly laugh so much at the spectacle of someone else’s pain, but the sequence where the hood was attacked by the dog, and his later flight with its head still attached to his arm and the ensuing gangrenous folly was just too much. Hilarious.
I look forward to your next recommendation.
Yours sincerely,
Katherine Macher
Dear Ms Macher,
I hope you enjoy the enclosed. Another dark story of dogs but this time taking place in a hellish version of New York, rather than the semi-comic sleaze of Miami (which I actually visited recently on the occasion of a book fair).
It’s a well-known fact that I’m no great animal lover, but I assure you that dogs are not at the top of my hit-parade of least lovable pets. Cats are. But sadly, cats in crime fiction are always endearing, cuddly and engagingly cosy. Maybe one day I should write a tale where unwelcome members of the feline species come to all sorts of grim and deadly exits.
Enjoy.
Best regards,
Maxim Jakubowski
Dear Mr Jakubowski,
You’ve hit the right nerve or funny bone again. I didn’t realize there were so many uses for a dead dog!
I’m no cat lover either. Once, when I must have been seven or eight and temporarily living with my aunt, I developed a strong antipathy to her cat (I don’t recall its name all these years later – why must pets always be given names, stupid ones at that? An absurd habit), and one evening fiendishly poured some turpentine into its milk bowl (I used to spend many of my leisure hours painting by numbers and was given a small bottle of turpentine to clean my brushes). Naturally, the next morning the cat was found belly up in the garden. My aunt, who lavished all her affection on the horrible thing, became madly emotional but I never came under suspicion. Thus, you might say, began my career in crime…
Yes, you should write a story where cats come to all sorts of horrible ends. It would be fun. I’d heard you wrote in addition to owning the bookshop, but have never read anything of yours. Do send me something. I’d love to read what another sworn enemy of the animal kingdom might conjure up.
Yours,
Katherine Macher
Dear Katherine,
Thanks for your letter.
It’s been a long time since I’ve written any fiction I’m really satisfied with. And, fortunately, past mistakes are now out of print, so I shall have to disappoint you. Also, most of my past work has not been in the crime and mystery field. Mostly fantasy, doomed tales of love and death in other dimensions or imaginary worlds that were too often rather close for comfort and reminiscent of the all-too-realistic world that surrounds us, or rather me. All very self-centred, I must say in retrospect.
I do a lot of non-fiction, though. Writing on film, rock music and of course crime. Here’s a remaindered copy of a recent critical effort, which won a prize in Canada of all places. It should be useful. Not all the books mentioned in it are still available, but do let me know if any sound interesting to you, and we can try and provide you with them.