David Peace - GB84

Monday 26 November — Sunday 2 December 1984

The Mechanic drives to his mother’s house at Wetherby. He has come to say goodbye. Not see you later. Hegets out —

Drum roll –

Here come the dogs. Down the drive. Tongues out and tails up. Fuck, he missed them. Missed his dogs. Dog might not stab you in the back. But dog could still break your heart. He knows that now. The dog loves you, and you love the dog –

Breaks your bloody heart —

The Mechanic knows that now. Now it’s too late.

He looks up from the dogs. He sees his mother in the doorway. He stands up —

She shuts the door. She turns the key. She draws the curtains —

It is midday. Noon. November 1984.

The Mechanic puts the dogs in the back of the Fiesta. He drives up to the Dolby Forest with them. They get out. They walk through the forest to the place —

The Mechanic kisses the dogs. The Mechanic shoots the dogs.

He digs two pits near an old badger sett and buries them next to Dixon —

Their scents confused. Their bones mixed.

Stay. Fucking. Free –

Free of everything and everyone. Their scent and their bones.

Terry Winters had his head against the window. Terry stared down at the streets below. He didn’t know if it was dusk or dawn any more. He’d not been to bed in over two days. He ate only aspirins. He drank only coffee. High Court orders had been served on Paul and Dick as they left Congress House in London last night. The bailiff had thrown the orders into their car. Dick had thrown them back out. Left the papers to scatter into the night. But the orders had been served. The orders effected. Paul and Dick phoned Terry from London. Click-click. Paul and Dick told Terry exactly what they thought of him. Told him again and again. The orders meant their funds had been found in Switzerland and Luxembourg. The orders meant their funds would be frozen –

Five million in Luxembourg. Five hundred thousand in Switzerland –

Everything undone.

Terry had to get to the money. Terry had to get to it as fast as he could. Terry knew he could engineer the release of the money in the Luxembourg courts; that the orders were not valid outside the UK. Terry knew then he could move it –

If he could get there and get there in time.

Terry picked up the phone. Click-click. Terry phoned round airlines and airports. Click-click . Terry phoned the local owners of private aircraft and airstrips. Click-click. Terry chartered a plane. The plane would cost twelve thousand pounds. Terry said yes, he’d pay cash.

Terry phoned Mike Sullivan. Click-click . Terry told him to pack his bags –

To meet him at Leeds-Bradford airport.

Terry drove home fast. Terry had to pack quick. Terry had to pack cash –

The President was on the radio. The President talked of their debts to the dead.

Terry went up his drive. Terry went into his house. Terry went into his pantry. The tins were still there. The tins full of money. Terry emptied all the tins into one big black bin-liner. Terry thought that was enough. Terry left the suitcases alone in the loft. Terry looked at the clock on the wall. Terry piled the empty tins back up in the pantry. Terry walked out of the front door of his house with the big black bin-liner in his hand –

Terry stopped dead in the drive. Terry dropped the bin-liner onto the ground.

The President was standing at the end of the drive with Len.

Terry Winters said, ‘I can explain.’

The President shook his head. The President nodded to Len –

Len walked up the drive. Len picked up the bin-liner. Len opened the bin-liner.

Terry said again, ‘I can explain.’

The President shook his head again. Len took hold of Terry by his arm –

They took Terry with them. They took Terry in –

They tied Terry to a table. Told Terry to take his time. Take this time to think.

Terry sat in his vest and underpants on the tenth floor of the Union Headquarters. The President would talk to Terry only in his vest and pants. He didn’t trust Terry –

Not after what Len had told him. The things Len had told him.

Len leant against the door. Len with his arms folded. Len with his eyes on Terry.

The President had counted out the packets of twenty-pound notes into three piles. Each pile contained one hundred packets. Each packet contained two hundred pounds –

There was sixty thousand pounds in used twenty-pound notes on the table.

The President looked down at the cash. The President looked back up at Terry –

‘It’s from the CGT in Paris,’ said Terry again. ‘I swear.’

‘I don’t care where it’s from,’ said the President. ‘But I care where it was going.’

‘I was bringing it here,’ said Terry. ‘To pay for the plane and the mortgages.’

‘I’d like to believe you,’ said the President. ‘I want to believe you, Comrade.’

‘Mike Sullivan is waiting for me at the airport,’ said Terry. ‘Just ask him.’

The President looked at Terry Winters. Terry Winters in his vest and underpants.

‘I swear,’ said Terry again. ‘What else would I be doing with it?’

There was a knock at the door. Silence. There was another knock at the door –

Len looked at the President. The President nodded. Len opened the door –

‘It’s urgent,’ said Joan. ‘The High Court have appointed a receiver.’

The Earth tilts, the Earth turns. The Earth hungry, the Earth hunts —

The Mechanic drives. He steals another Ford and drives South. He ditches that car and steals another. And drives. He burns this one and steals another, then another –

Her eyes wide. Her mouth open. Her nose bloody —

And drives and drives. He pushes one into the River Avon and sells another one for scrap. Hesteals the next one from a supermarket carpark –

The Earth hunts you, you run. You run, you hide. Hide in the last place –

Bypasses Worcester and Shrewsbury. Takes the A49 to Hereford then Leominster. Ludlowto Wistanstow. Joins the A489 to Church Stoke. The A 490straight to Welshpool.Follows the A483 North to Llanymynech and —

The very last place.

Neil Fontaine drives the Jew and the Chairman North to Castleford. Hooded pickets armed with baseball bats attacked and badly beat a working miner in his own home at dawn yesterday morning. The man had returned to work at Fryston Colliery only four days before. He had done so because he had two young children. He had done so because he had a pregnant wife. He had done so because he had debts. He had done so because he had no way to repay his debts. He left his house at half-past four yesterday morning for a pre-arranged rendezvous with a Coal Board van. Twenty pickets were waiting for him outside his home. The pickets warned him not to go to work. The pickets made threats against his pregnant wife and two young children. The man walked back towards his house to telephone the police. The pickets called him a scab. The pickets chased him into his garden. The man ran inside his house. The pickets kicked open his door. The pickets wore combat jackets and balaclavas. The pickets carried baseball bats and pick-axe handles. The man told his pregnant wife and two young children to hide upstairs. The pickets caught the man in his own front room. The pickets set about him with their bats and steel-toe-capped boots. His wife and children listened from inside a bedroom wardrobe to their husband and their father screaming down below. The pickets broke his ankle. The pickets broke his shoulder. The pickets dislocated his elbow. The pickets dislocated his other shoulder. The pickets broke two ribs and bruised the rest. The pickets blackened his eyes. The pickets broke his nose. The Jew had been appalled when Neil had told him this tale. The Jew told Neil they must visit this Richard Clarke in his hospital bed. This lion of a man. The Chairman had been equally appalled when the Jew had told him. The Chairman told the Jew they must visit this hero in his hospital bed –