The trouble was, they had fucked up the central heating, and he would never have done that. He couldn’t see a radiator anywhere, and as for a fireplace, forget it. It was the coldest house he had ever been in, though there was bright blue sky at every window, and lights on in every room. He climbed a spiral staircase to see what was on the next floor but funnily enough couldn’t go any further because some steps were missing. There was no carpet and they were so filthy with broken glass and wet dead leaves he nearly went arse over bollocks. Then his breath was torn out like a flame, and when he tried to jump to where the steps began, instead of backing down like a sensible lad, he fell, and kept on falling.
Clouds were dividing, such gaps showing the Big Dipper. Aaron’s pleasing fantasy was to have it turn into an actual scoop, and clear a ten-mile lane through the snow, along which they could walk to freedom. Beyond the gate, Lance and Wayne leaned against the side of the van as if asleep. His watch showed six o’clock, eyes closing, and the ache in his arms total. He went a few paces back towards the hotel and, no coordination in any limb, fell sideways.
The wind beat as if to power the massive sails of a ship, at war with stillness, not the random drumming of the blizzard, but gusting with some new purpose not yet apparent. Alfred and Parsons had given up half an hour ago. The clean and welcome smell momentarily revived him. Drawing his spade out of the snow, like Excalibur from the Stone, he cradled it for fear he would lose such a prime tool of their endeavours.
The even piping of jet engines came from thousands of metres up in blue sky and sun, telling those living near an airport that another ordinary day was soon to start, a sound reminding him that the trap they were locked in could not stay closed for ever.
The van stood out, stark and dark green, coils of pale smoke from its exhaust, almost alive in relishing its power to destroy them all. Keith looked dispiritedly at the ramp of snow, and at the Trojan Horse it seemed impossible to budge more.
Wayne took off his helmet, a smile followed by the gesture of a hand across his throat signifying that he’d had enough. Lance turned his visor towards Keith as if to say that whoever owned the head inside would do no more. But Keith knew there was always more energy where that came from, an untapped abundance in everyone still, that last black rock of reserve waiting to move the van another hundred yards.
They followed him like a patrol of yetis, Lance in the lead, Aaron and Wayne together. The glow of false dawn about the yard faded as clouds closed. Snow flurries irritated his face, a hand sliding over the greased features, stung his eyes that were barely able to see.
He stood alone in the dark between the cars, did not know why. An animal sound mimicked the wind, a note of despair turning to a tone of wonder at surface snow flying into clouds of mist to find a better position and becoming more and more irritable at knowing they never would. The issue of life and death had lost its bite. Utter exhaustion stopped him knowing where he was. Belonging nowhere softened the spirit, till he remembered that the job was not yet done, and forced himself to go in after the others.
Fred needed no help, but Eileen followed him from lounge to kitchen, and from bar to store room — like a little dog, the lucky bitch, because she surely knows about the bit of paper that rustles in my pocket where’er I walk.
He was jealous of his work, work being precious, work being like gold to him. He made each task last, spun it out because while there was something to do he wasn’t worrying about past or future, nor the present which could end more abruptly than he wanted and which therefore didn’t bear thinking about.
He had never known what happiness was, only that if he worked he was not unhappy. Work was a luxury — especially in this situation — as long as enough money came with it to keep him in food and shelter, and the little packets of those cigars that he puffed with such relish. He had faith that Keith would bring them sound in wind and limb through the night, and keep the bikers working so hard that they wouldn’t have the energy to torment him any more.
By dawn, if you looked at the way things were going, the hotel would no longer be habitable. The attics were full of snow and debris, the ceilings of the bedrooms were patched with damp, icy wind was coming down the stairs. In other words, it would be a write-off. He would claim full insurance, and begin the great work all over again — like that bloke who kept pushing a boulder up a hill because God or whoever at the top always rolled it back to the bottom. This time though he would buy a place on the coast in a more benign climate. Maybe he would even start up somewhere in Spain, because Doris would be sure to come back to him then.
‘I love the smell,’ Eileen said, as he laid strips of streaky bacon from a five-pound pack on a hotplate over the fire. ‘It’s the best meal in the world.’
‘I prefer the smell of roast turkey,’ he said, ‘when it comes out of the oven at Christmas.’ She was complimenting him on his work, so he could almost take to her. ‘Turkey and stuffing: it’s the best smell in the world.’
She moved from the warm rail to let him throw more logs into the stove, his best dried logs held back from the fire in the lounge. ‘Did you have a party, then?’
‘At this hotel we did. I set up a Christmas Special, at twelve quid a head. All anybody could eat. And did they eat! It did me good to see ’em, except that they were robbing me blind. They said I made the best garlic bread they’d ever tasted. I came out on top, though, financial-wise. And I didn’t mind, anyway, because it was good for trade at other times, except that it’s been falling off a bit lately.’
She leaned forward to light some paper for her cigarette: ‘I wish I’d been there.’
He struck a large kitchen match for her. ‘You should have been.’
‘Well, I was elsewhere, wasn’t I?’
‘Where was that?’
‘At my boy friend’s. We had a can of beer and a pizza between us.’
‘That’s not much to celebrate on.’
‘We enjoyed it, though.’
‘If I’ve got a place by next Christmas,’ he said, ‘you can come and eat all the stuff you like. I shan’t charge you anything.’
‘I don’t want charity. If I’ve got no money I’ll do some work for you to earn it.’
‘No, you won’t. I’ll treat you. For old times’ sake.’
If what Keith had said was true, she thought, he would either be dead or in prison. She still didn’t know. But she had to believe what he had said about his wife, because nobody would tell a whopping lie like that.
‘Now what are you crying for? He’s alive, isn’t he? Listen, I can hear them coming in. It’s a good job we’ve got these bacon sarnies on the go. Everybody loves a bacon sandwich.’ It might be better if he was dead, though, he told himself, and then she would have his money. The daft young thing don’t know how lucky she is. No, she would only lose it in six months, so he’d better stay alive.
The first run they had done was to the West Country, and Lance remembered them belting down the M5 like skirmishers trying to get in front of an army, Garry in front, followed by Wayne, and then him, weaving between the cars of happy holidaymakers with noddy toys hanging in the back and kids either puking up or howling out for water. All three heading next summer for Devon they would gun along in the sun, stopping for a cream tea at a place Garry had known from his earliest roadworthy days. But even with such a picture he felt so dead tired it was a struggle to keep both hands at the bacon sandwich and chew it down.