David Peace - 1983

No turning back .

In and down the corridor to the front of the shop, Dick straight up the stairs -

Me past the window full of school portraits. I tap on the door. I open it for Jim.

He steps inside.

I point at the ceiling.

He puts on his balaclava. He follows me through to the back stairs -

Up the narrow steep stairs past a dark room on the right and into a living room-cum-bedroom on the left.

Dick is standing alone in the room on a carpet of photographs -

Photographs of young girls -

School photographs -

Thousands of eyes and hundreds of smiles shining up in our faces:

Pairs of eyes and sets of smiles all against that same blue-sky background -

That same sky-blue background favoured by Mr Edward Jenkins, photographer.

I take the photograph from my pocket -

The photograph of a young girl -

A school photograph -

Eyes and smile shining up in my face:

Mongol eyes and crooked smile against that same blue-sky background -

Jeanette Garland .

I take off my balaclava. I put my glasses back on -

Their thick lenses and black frames -

The Owl:

I am the Owl and I see everything from behind these lenses thick and frames black, everything in this upstairs room with its carpet of innocent eyes and trusting smiles, abused and exposed under a single dirty light -

Unblinking -

A single dirty light bulb still left on.

I put the photograph of Jeanette back in my pocket.

‘He’s gone then,’ says Jim.

I nod.

Dick hands me a large black Letts desk diary for 1974. ‘Forgot this in his haste.’

I turn to the back. I flick through the names and addresses -

Initials and phone numbers listed alphabetically.

I turn the pages. I read the names. I see the faces:

Looking for one name, one number, one face -

I see John Dawson. I see Don Foster -

I see me -

I see Michael Myshkin, John Murphy, the Badger and then -

That name, that number, that face:

GM: 3657 .

I close the book -

They’re all going to die in this hell;

Close my eyes -

We all are .

‘What now?’ Jim is asking.

I open my eyes.

They are both staring at me.

‘Torch the place,’ I tell them.

They nod.

I walk back down the stairs. I go out into the alley.

It is daylight now.

I take off my glasses. I wipe them. I put them back on. I look up at the sky -

The moon gone -

No sun -

Jeanette Garland missing five years and six months -

Susan Ridyard missing two years, ten months -

Clare Kemplay dead five days -

Dead:

The windows look inwards, the walls listen to your heart -

Where one thousand voices cry;

Inside -

Inside your scorched heart;

There is a house -

A house with no doors;

The earth scorched -

Heathen and always winter;

The room murder -

This is where I live :

The grey sky turning black -

Fresh blood on my hands -

No turning back .

I drive out of Castleford -

Over to Netherton.

I park at the end of Maple Well Drive -

The morning sky black.

All the bungalows have their lights on -

Even number 16;

Fuck -

Never leave, never leave, never leave;

I get out -

I walk along the road.

The living room light is on -

Their white Ford Transit parked outside.

I go up the path -

I ring the doorbell:

A grey-haired woman opens the door, pink washing-up gloves dripping wet: ‘Yes?’

She’s put on weight since last we met.

I say: ‘Mrs Marsh?’

‘Yes.’

‘Police, love. Is your George in?’

She looks at me. She tries to place me. She shakes her head. ‘No.’

‘Where is he?’

‘He’s at his sister’s, isn’t he?’

‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘That’s why I’m asking you.’

‘Well, he is.’

‘Where’s that then? His sister’s?’

‘Over Rochdale way.’

‘When did you last see him?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘When did you last see your husband?’

‘Day he left.’

‘Which was?’

‘Last Thursday.’

‘Heard he was sick?’

‘He is. He’s gone for a break.’

‘Is that right?’

‘That’s what I just said, isn’t it?’

I want to push the door back hard into her face. I want to slap her. To punch her. Kick her. Beat her.

‘Is everything all right?’ asks a man from the doorway to the kitchen -

A tall man in black, his hat in his hands -

A priest.

I smile. I say: ‘Thank you for your time, Mrs Marsh.’

She nods.

I turn. I walk away, back down the garden path.

Back at the gate, I turn again -

Mrs Marsh has closed her front door, but there’s that shadow again -

Behind the nets in the front room -

Two shadows.

I walk back down Maple Well Drive -

Back to the car.

I get in and I wait -

I wait and I watch -

I wait.

I watch.

You sleep in the car. You wake in the car. You sleep in the car. You wake in the car -

You check the rearview mirror. Then the wing -

The passenger seat is empty.

The doors are locked. The windows closed. The car smells. You switch on the engine. You switch on the windscreen wipers. You switch on the radio:

‘Latest opinion polls have the Conservatives still 15% ahead of Labour; Mrs Thatcher accuses SDP leaders of lacking guts; Britain faces a 1929-style economic crash within two years whatever party wins, according to Ken Livingstone; Michael Foot speaks at a Hyde Park rally attended by 15,000 people at the end of the People’s March for Jobs…’

You switch everything off.

You can hear church bells, the traffic and the rain:

It is Sunday 5 June 1983 -

D-4 .

You are parked below the City Heights flats, Leeds.

Halfway to the tower block, you turn back to check the car is locked. Then you walk across the car park. You climb the stairs to the fourth floor. You read the walls as you go:

Wogs Out, Leeds, NF, Leeds, Kill a Paki, Leeds .

You think of your mother. You don’t stop. You turn one corner and there’s something dead in a plastic bag. Your father . You don’t stop. You turn the next and there’s a pile of human shit. Fitzwilliam . You don’t stop. You are walking in another man’s shoes, thinking of lost children -

Hazel .

On the fourth floor you go along the open passageway, the bitter wind ripping your face raw until there are tears in your eyes. You quicken past broken windows and paint-splattered doors -

Doors banging in the wind, in the rain;

New tears in your old eyes, the lights are already going on across Leeds -

But not here -

Not here before a door marked Pervert .

You knock on the door of Flat 405, City Heights, Leeds.

You wait.

You listen to the smash of glass and the scream of a child down below, the brakes of an empty bus and an hysterical voice on a radio in another flat -

The church bells gone.

You press the doorbell -

It’s broken.

You bend down. You lift up the metal flap of another letterbox. You smell staleness. You hear the sounds of a TV.

‘Excuse me!’ you yell into the hole.

The TV dies.

‘Excuse me!’

Through the letterbox, you can see a pair of dirty white socks pacing about inside.

You knock on the door again. You shout: ‘I know you’re in there.’