Tom Graham - Life on Mars - Blood, Bullets and Blue Stratos

‘I sometimes wonder why you got into this job, boss,’ Ray put in, halfway through his pint already. ‘It’s almost like you don’t enjoy it.’

‘I know I’m banging my head against a brick wall with you guys, but things have got to change in this department,’ Sam said. ‘ You understand what I’m saying, Chris, surely.’

‘Why me, boss?’ Chris frowned.

‘Because you nearly died today.’

‘Don’t remind me!’

‘But that’s the point,’ Sam ploughed on. ‘This job, it ain’t a joke. It’s serious. People get hurt – and not always the ones that deserve it.’

‘I think we’ve all had enough of your speeches for one day, Tyler,’ Gene put in. ‘This is a pub, not a bloody pulpit. Save the sermons for that soppy bird Cartwright you’re always sniffing after. Nelson, we need chasers with these pints. Doubles – on the double!’

Nelson reached towards the optic holding an upturned bottle of Irish whiskey.

‘I ain’t touching that stuff!’ pouted Chris. ‘I ain’t touching anything Irish, not never again – whiskey, spuds, leeks …’

‘Leeks are Welsh,’ said Sam.

‘Don’t care. I’m not taking any chances.’

‘And I’m not dying of thirst just because you tripped over your own knickers this morning,’ declared Gene. ‘Nelson – four Scotches. Scotches , Chris, you listening? Jock water, not Paddy piss.’

Nelson obliged with four shot glasses of Scotch whisky.

‘Scots are as bad as the Irish,’ muttered Chris, but he grudgingly agreed to join the others in knocking them back.

‘Your prospective bit of leg-over Annie’s been earning her pennies today,’ said Gene, blowing smoke at Sam through his nostrils. ‘She’s been doing some productive police work – unlike some, Christopher.’ Again, Chris averted his face. ‘Looks like she’s come up with a juicy lead, a possible link in the Paddy chain.’

‘The what chain?’ frowned Ray.

‘I’ll show you,’ said Gene, and he planted an empty whisky glass on the bar. ‘This glass is a bunch of Paddies over in Ireland, stashing up guns and explosives. And over here’ – he plonked down another glass, twelve inches from the first – ‘is another bunch of Paddies, but this lot’s on the mainland, all Guinnessed up and looking to blow eight barrels of shite out of anything with a Union Jack fluttering out the top of it. What links this bunch of Paddies to this one is this’ – he placed a smouldering dog end between the two glasses – ‘the link in the chain, the couriers fetching the goodies from over the water and supplying the terrorist cells on the mainland. Now, Annie’s dug up a likely ID for that middle link, a husband-and-wife double act, and – no surprises here – Paddies an’ all. Looks like they might have been involved in supplying the fireworks for this morning’s fun and games.’

‘If it was the IRA,’ said Sam. ‘I’m not so sure it was anything to do with them.’

Gene threw his head back and rolled his eyes to the fag-stained ceiling. ‘Oh, Christ, not all this again.’

‘Think about it, Guv,’ Sam pressed on. ‘The hand painted on the wall – the letters RHF …’

Gene exhaled smoke like a bored and rather tetchy dragon. Sam looked to Chris and Ray for support, but neither of them looked much impressed.

‘I’m sticking to my guns on this,’ Sam insisted. ‘We’re dealing with some kind of terrorist organization, but it’s not the IRA. Even the way the explosives were rigged up – in a toilet for God’s sake! It doesn’t smell of the Provos to me.’

‘Chris was certainly smelling of the Provos when he jumped off that khazi,’ grinned Ray.

‘That ain’t fair, I was keeping it in ,’ protested Chris.

‘We all saw the inside of your drawers this morning, Christopher,’ put in Gene. ‘Barry Sheene don’t leave so many skid marks.’

Nelson leant close to Sam’s ear and whispered, ‘I’d not be botherin’ tryin’ to talk sense to these boys, Sam – not tonight I wouldn’t. They ain’t in da mood.’

‘You’ve got that right, Nelson,’ said Sam, and he took a slug of bitter.

It was at that moment that Annie appeared, stepping out of the night into the warm glow of the pub. She had wrapped herself in a brown leather coat, pulling the wide collar up around her neck to keep out the cold. As if to greet her, the Rolling Stones’ ‘Angie’ sobbed from the loudspeakers behind the bar:

Seeing her round face, with its Harmony hairsprayed curls and warm, mischievous eyes, Sam once again felt a sudden stirring of his heart. He told himself to stop being so adolescent, that he was too old for such gushing, seething emotions.

But then Annie glanced across at the bar, caught his eye, and at once her face lit up. It made Sam’s heart beat a little faster – for a brief second, he felt he was the king of the world – and he forgave himself such a schoolboy response to her. It felt too good to feel bad about.

Annie clip-clopped over in her heeled boots and examined the four pints and four empty shot glasses crowding the bar.

‘Taking it easy tonight, are we?’ she said.

‘Nelson – another round of pints!’ ordered Gene. ‘And some sort of poofy squash for the bird.’ Turning to Sam he said, ‘Don’t let us stop you taking your pint and totty to another corner, Sam.’

‘Why’d you say that?’

‘A lifetime in the force, Sammy – it’s made me sensitive to picking up vibes . And I’m picking up vibes right now – ones that say you and her would rather be alone just now.’

‘Well, Guv, I would like a chance to be with Annie in private. You know, for a little tête-à-tête .’

‘I’ve never heard it called that ,’ muttered Ray. Chris sniggered.

‘Here you go,’ grinned Nelson, passing over drinks. ‘A rum and Coke for the lady of my dreams, and a fresh pint o’ me finest for me good friend Samuel.’

‘Clear off with her and have your chinwag – you’re bugger all company tonight,’ Gene ordered. ‘Just make sure you’re both bright-eyed and bushy-tailed in the morning – we’ve got an IRA arms-smuggling chain to break.’

‘The incident this morning, Guv – it wasn’t the IRA,’ said Sam.

‘Discuss it with WPC Crumpet,’ Gene replied flatly. ‘I’ve got a liver to abuse.’

And, as Sam and Annie carried their drinks away, he lifted his glass in a toast to them, growled, ‘Cheerio, amigos ,’ and tossed three fingers of neat whisky down his gullet.

‘Sometimes,’ Sam whispered as they walked away, ‘sometimes, Annie, I really do think seriously about killing him.’

‘The guv?’ Annie smiled back. ‘You’d have your work cut out. I reckon you’d need a silver bullet. Or a stake through the heart.’

‘Or an atom bomb,’ said Sam. ‘Come to think of it, he’d probably survive – him and the cockroaches.’

‘ And he’d be radioactive. He might go all big like Godzilla.’

‘Oh, God, Annie, not even in jest …’

They settled themselves into a corner, the Rolling Stones still weeping from the speaker on the wall above them.

‘Well then,’ said Annie, ‘here we are, having our moment, just the two of us.’

‘I was hoping for something a little bit more … A little less …’

They both glanced briefly at Gene, Ray and Chris sharing a filthy joke only feet away. Ray was using his hands to describe the shape of some sort of enormous saveloy in the air.

‘Just carry on like they’re not there,’ said Annie. ‘Believe me, Sam, that’s what I do. Every day. You think I’d have stuck this job so long if I didn’t?’