David Peace - GB84

Paul had finished his speech. Paul had sat down. Paul was staring at Terry –

Terry started to cough. Terry started to scratch his arms. Terry made his excuses. Terry left them to their increasing talk of a return without settlement –

Living to fight another day –

Terry walked down the corridor. He went down the stairs. Terry left the building. He found a phone box. Terry picked up the receiver. Click-click. He dialled the number –

They could pound and pound. Bang on and on —

Terry said, ‘Clive Cook, please.’

‘I’m afraid Mr Cook is on a temporary leave of absence,’ said a woman’s voice. ‘Perhaps I may be of assistance? To whom am I speaking?’

Terry hung up. He stood in the phone box. Terry closed his eyes. He prayed –

It had run and run but now it had collapsed, lying here before him –

Flat out upon the floor. This body upon the shore. The beach soaked in blood. Theblue waves stained red—

But Terry Winters knew, dead was dead.

*

From the corner of the Euston Road and Warren Street. From Grosvenor Street and on to the Joint Services Intelligence Centre outside Ashford in Kent —

They had sent Malcolm to Lisburn, Ulster —

To the six-fingered fist that held and gripped. That squeezed and crushed until –

Everything blurred. Everything merged. Distorted and faded —

In the shadows at the back, where the truths and the lies, the promises and the threats, the voices and the silences, the prayers and the curses, became one —

In Lisburn, Ulster —

From there everything whispered. Everything echoed. Everything moaned —

These voices from these shadows, these silences and spaces, these truths and lies,their promises and threats, Malcolm’s prayers and his curses —

A deafening, deafening wall of horrible, horrible sounds –

MI5. MI6. Special Branch. The RUC. The army and the SAS –

Until everything became one long, long scream —

One long, long scream of places and names, terror and treachery –

Deny. The Bogside. Belfast. The Lower Falls. The Shankill Road. Chichester-Clark. Faulkner. Stormont. McGurk’s Bar. Bloody Sunday. Widgery. Bloody Friday. Direct Rule. Operation Motorman. Sunningdale. The Ulster Workers’ Council. Dublin. Monaghan. Guildford. Birmingham. The Miami Showband. Tullyvallen Orange Hall. Whitecross. Kingsmills. Mrs Marie Drumm. Captain Robert Nairac. The Ulster Unionist Action Council. La Mon Hotel. The Irish National Liberation Army –

Directed or undirected, formal or casual, acknowledged or not —

Sources and agencies; agents and informants; information and disinformation —

Codes changed. Numbers changed. Names changed. Places changed –

Tapes changed, but the job stayed the same —

Home or away. Near or far. England or Rhodesia. Yorkshire or Ulster –

The job stayed the same. Always the same –

In the shadows. In the silences.

*

These are the most dangerous of days. The financial markets are in crisis and turmoil; seven billion pounds have been wiped off the value of shares; base rates have risen between 12 and 14 per cent. There have been calls for a national government. For a government of reconciliation to heal the divisions in the nation. Echoes from the dark days. The Prime Minister and her Cabinet have launched a television offensive –

TV Eye. Weekend World. This Week, Next Week. A Week in Politics –

The message is loud. The message is clear –

No fudge. No forgiveness. No fudge. No forgiveness —

Unmistakable. Unambiguous. Unequivocal –

Explicit.

The Jew stares at the TV. The Jew smiles at her face. But the Jew cannot focus –

‘— I do not wantanother round of talks to fail.I want them to succeed. I know there are many, many striking miners who want them to succeed too, so they can get back to work and who, I believe, would accept past procedures and would like to get backon that basis —’

‘The play’s the thing,’ mumbles the Jew. ‘The play within a play —’

‘— and I want them to go back. But I do not wish their hopes to be dashed by another round of talks, which are doomed to failure. It is because I want the talks to succeed that I do not want these talks to go ahead on a false basis —’

‘A Revenger’s Tale,’ mutters the Jew to himself. ‘A Revenger’s Tale.’

Neil Fontaine could not agree more. But Neil can wait no more –

He tucks up the Jew in his bed. He switches off the lights at the wall –

‘Sweet dreams, sir,’ he calls from the door of the fourth-floor suite –

‘He always does,’ whispers the Jew in the dark, to no one. ‘He always does.’

Neil Fontaine takes the back way down the back stairs to leave by the back door. Neil had a message waiting for him this lunchtime. Three words –

Trident Marine Limited —

Neil let his fingers do the walking. Neil found it in the Yellow Pages —

Queen Street Place, EC4 –

Right under his fucking nose.

Neil Fontaine changes his clothes. Neil Fontaine changes his car –

He parks again. He watches again. He waits again.

Neil Fontaine breaks into the third-floor offices of Trident Marine Limited.

Neil Fontaine switches on his torch. Neil Fontaine shines a light –

On their offices and their desks. On their letterheads and their directors –

The offices and desks that they share. The letterheads and the directors –

The senior civil servants. The Cabinet secretaries. The City bankers –

The commanding officers of the British armed forces –

Past. Present. And future —

Friendships planted in foreign places –

Malaya. Cyprus. Rhodesia. Ulster. Sheffield. Sizewell –

Jupiter Securities runs Trident Marine. Trident dumps nuclear waste at sea –

For the government. For them. For her.

*

The restaurant was quiet. Empty again. The chairs on the table. The orchestra gone —

Malcolm put down his evening paper. He shook his head and smiled —

The Right Honourable Member had referred the business to the Prime Minister.

Malcolm traced circles. Loops. Rings with his finger —

There was an ancient, enduring majesty to the annular —

Like the fylfot.

one, he said. Might be last one — You just behave yourself, I told him. He laughed. He said, Be telling that to titheads and all, will you? That’s what I mean, I said. Just watch yourself. They’ll be thinking it might be last one and all. He nodded and we went inside. Lads started to arrive. Big Chris. Kev. Tim. Gary. John from Top. Fair few faces I hadn’t seen for a while — Little Mick. Paul Thompson. His Daniel. Graham from Crescent — Last bloody man still out on that street. Best way to let folk know I’m not a fucking scab, he said — Lads all wanting to know what was going on down in London with talks. Not much news in first papers or on radio — Did a quick count of heads. Made sure cars were all full. Brass sorted out. Rang round for them that had overlaid. Click-click — Then off we set. Damp and dark as usual. Radio on as we drove. Bit of music to cheer us up — Nellie the Elephant. Russ bleeding Abbot — Big Chris telling us all jokes he could remember from time he’d seen Black Abbots at Filey. Least it got us to Cortonwoodwith a smile on our faces. Coppers must have thought we were on happy pills — Lot of them waiting. Krk-krk. Transits and Land-Rovers. Mesh across their windows, Line of police with long shields out across road — Knew we were coming, of course. Knew how many by looks of things, too — Lot of us, though. Three thousand — Three thousand men. One bloody message — No Surrender . Made our point and all — In every face. In every stare. In every shove. In every shout — TheMiners. United — Willnever be defeated. Maggie, Maggie, Maggie — Out!Out!Out! — Fuck. Keith called round ourson Thursday night. He said, They’re restarting production at Kiveton tomorrow — I know, I said. It’s all over telly — What’s going on, Pete? I don’t know, I said. I’d no idea — No idea what to tell him. Tell anyone — Talks had collapsed. Thatcher had asked for all kinds of written preconditions. Board telling miners to vote with their feet. Looked to be no way out of this for us. Not now — My stomach knotted each time I went down Welfare.I dreaded it — Faces. Questions. Looks. Comments — Kev Shaw sat down. Pete, he said. I’ve got something to say — I know what you’re going to say, I told him. It’s all round village — He nodded. He said, It’s right and all — I shook my head. I said, So don’t waste your breath and my time — Look, he said, you’ve always been right with me and I want to be right with you — Then don’t start scabbing, I said. Not now — He looked at me. He said, I’m going back Monday. Nothing will make me change my mind. I’ve had enough abuse before I’ve even set foot in place. But I’ve seen my kids go without for too long. Wife trying to feed us all on a fiver a week and I’ve had it up to here, Pete. You’ve been decent and you’ve helped us with bills and what-have-you and I’ve no complaints about you and branch. But I’m off back to work on Monday. Come-what-may — Kev, I said. What do you want me to say? You want some kind of bloody dispensation — I’ve done my time, he said. I’ve been on more pickets than most. I nodded. That you have, I said. And now you’re going to piss it all down drain and be known for rest of your life as a scab. He looked away then — First time since he sat down. His eyes didn’t meet mine — This is going to end, I told him. Not going to go on much longer. Might even be over by Tuesday and you’d have scabbed for just twenty-four hour out of eleven month. He looked up. I shook my head. I said, Twenty-four hour, that might be all you’d have scabbed. But for rest of your life you’d be known as Kev the Scab and your kids as the children of Kev the Scab. He looked away again. Down at floor again. I said, You want to be like one of them old blokes that can only have a pint in Sheffield? Places where no one knows he was a scab sixty year ago. You’ve seen that one up at top end. Out by bus stop in all weathers? Kev nodded. You know he was a scab? Kev nodded again. You know how many days he scabbed back then? Kev shook his head. He looked at me. I said, Me neither. That’s my point — it doesn’t matter whether he scabbed through whole strike or just last bloody day — He was a scab then and he’s a scab now — Kev had his eyes closed. He nodded — I leant forward. I put my