Kind Hearts And Martinets Collection

Chapter 13

Machine gun fire greeted Jack across the crowded and hostile bar; Uncle Alfie was laughing and playing with Martin; Alice giggled at his side. A cheer mutated to a jeer when people spotted Jack; he wasn’t sure how to read this. Oh yeah, fuzz alert, but he brazened it and moved into the crowd wishing he had Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak.

A thug with one brain cell blocked his way. ‘Well, if it ain’t dead eye Dick.’

Jack thought, he had to be Slytherin. ‘Jack, but you can call me Jane,’ Jack said, feeling more than a bit Hufflepuff.

One cell started making pig noises. ‘We don’t like pigs in here.’

To which Jack replied, rather wittily, he thought, and with no hint of the fear he felt in his watery bowels, ‘Darcy, I would not be as fastidious as you for a kingdom,’ his best Biggam.

One Cell, obviously inspired by PP, moved onto creative thinking, ‘You’re doing my f*****g ‘ed in copper,’ obviously Wickham; you see, are you not diverted?

Alfie diverted his way through the testosteroned melee and directed himself to the skinhead. ‘Now, now, One Cell,’ blimey that was his name, ‘Jack’s my guest, got that.’ Alfie was quite clear in what he meant, and turning from One Cell, ‘Fanks for coming, Jack, sorry about the bleedin’ Nazis. Come, sit, what d’yer want to drink?’

Still beside One Cell, Jack replied in his best Hufflepuff voice, ‘Campari and soda, please, Oncle Alfie.’ Had Mandy been there she would have rolled her eyes, again.

‘f**k off,’ Alfie shouted and, turning to the bar, ‘pint of best, my table.’ He was talking to Len Bone, the fat greasy landlord in a dirty vest that seemed to stop just beneath a fine set of man boobs, supported by a thick black belt that held up huge shiny arsed trousers.

As they sat, Alfie looked at Jack quizzically, ‘You really want a Campari, Jack?’

‘No, that was for One Cell’s benefit,’ and Alfie’s machine gun, fitful laughter, was enthusiastically enjoined by the other customers, although clearly none of them had any idea what the joke was. Alfie was about the same age as Jack and had to be a good villain to survive this long, with the patent respect. Always smartly dressed in a suit, Italian, slim tie, straight out of the sixties. He was short, and that made Jack think of small-man syndrome, but Alfie had the personality, presence, and presumably the backup, to overcome any deficiencies in the height department. He was a man to be respected, whether good or bad, but Jack liked him.

Jack took a long suck of his pint. He needed this following the kiss with Alice, strange feeling that, her driving, One Cell, he had an odd sense of elation, he might get out of this pub alive. Mickey Splif sidled and sat. Alfie’s eyes swivelled in their sockets like a ventriloquist’s dummy, and Jack had to stop himself laughing, which morphed into concern Alfie was having a stroke, when Alfie’s lips screwed and he started speaking out of the side of his mouth, ‘Good fing you did for Mickey’s boy. You’re a diamond, and that’s sayin’ somfing for a filf. Got the lad a job with Osama as well.’

Something was brewing within Alfie, Jack thought, and it wasn’t a fart. But it was a fart, and he let it go by lifting one of his substantial cheeks off the chair, and the parping noise and aroma received respectable acknowledgement as the toxic miasma pervaded the bar like a nuclear cloud. Jack was put in mind of Mrs Ali’s breath as he laughed and gagged with the rest, then shut up with the rest. The gangster’s face gurneyed to release confidential information, ‘I wantsyer to see Mickey’s missus, "ave a cup of splosh, she wants ter fank yer, personal loike.’

Looking at Mickey, aware all eyes in the pub were on him, and every one of them watering due to the chemical reaction of bad eggs and onion, Jack replied, ‘Really? There’s no need.’

But clearly there was, ‘No, yer missing me drift.’

‘I’yam, I finks I’yam?’ Jack couldn’t help mimicking out the side of his mouth.

‘I’m sayin’ go see Gail, make like you’re having a good chin-wag, you might need to take some antidote for the tea wiv yer,’ and he laughed, which was a cue for everyone to start breathing again and laugh with him. ‘When you’ve spent a respectable time, take a gander at a terrace of houses down by the community centre,’ and at that, he touched his nose, apparently knowingly. This was clearly the signal for something dodgy but was also the signal, beware shagging in progress. Obviously universal, Jack thought, but he was intrigued, for Alfie to speak to him in a very pointed way meant this was something important, and he was about to question further when there was a blood-curdling squeal.

Jack knew Martin had been hurt and, looking up, saw his dog fly across the room, hit the distant wall and slump to the floor. Alice attacked One Cell, and Jack, in a berserking mist, saw another skinhead go after her. He was out of his bench seat, on top of one table then another, drinks spilled, glasses smashed as he launched himself at the now two skinheads attacking Alice. His fists and feet flailed, and the two lads had no repost, taken more by surprise than by Jack’s pensioner brute force, on the floor having the lights kicked out of them, not moving.

Instinctively, Jack moved to One Cell, pulling Alice away as he went in battering and kicking. He scurfed the brawny yob against the bar, held him, and time stood still, then out of the blue, Jack nutted him. One Cell’s nose split and teeth broke, reminding him of his mum’s best rag and bone china when, as kids, they played football in the living room. He heard in his mind his dad call “Cups,” even One Cell was shocked, but not as shocked as he was when Jack tipped him over the bar as Len Bone looked around for the cups.

Jack clambered over the bar and hoisted One Cell by the scruff, shoved his shaven head into the washing up sink, holding him under the dirty water, bloody bubbles surfacing. Alfie was calling to Jack, ‘S’alreet, you’ve done im, ease up he’s not werf it, old bill’s on its way.’

Jack released a limp thug, who slithered to the floor. Alice zipped around the bar, grabbed One Cell, laid him out and started to pump, then amazingly gave him the kiss of life, those lips that had kissed him now on this bottom feeding lowlife. One Cell was recovering as the police burst in, weighed up what was happening, grabbed Jack, and frog-marched him through the pub door, Jack protesting he was a police officer and the arresting officers’ laughing, as they thrust him into the meat wagon. Martin was limp and lifeless, blood dribbling from his mouth.

After a short drive, the van halted, ‘Out you come, sunshine,’ and strong arms steered Jack forcefully from the van to the desk in the custody room; public enemy number one. He’d been taken to Cosham nick, and when the custodian sergeant appeared, Jack thought, I know him, but what’s his name?

‘"Allo, "Allo if it isn’t Jane Austin, shag spoiler and pub brawler extraordinaire. Welcome, Jack, my old cocker, been read your rights?’

Summoning deep reserves of energy, ‘Rights, you plank, I’m on an enquiry,’ Jack pleaded.

‘In the Mother Ship? A quiet drink and a chat with those ‘ardened crim-types?’

Jack remembered this bloke now, Nitty Norris, corpulent rugby ball-shaped body with a complementary football head with wisps of hair that seemed to move in a wavy motion, and along with his mystic ping pong ball eyes, the effect had a tendency to mesmerise Jack. ‘Listen, Nitty, I’m entitled to one call, right, well, call Superintendent Bruce. I’ve got her number on my phone.’ He took his phone out, and it completely disintegrated. ‘Feckin’ duct tape.’

‘No worries, Jane, I’ll call Kingston and get her number.’ Oh no, Jack thought, and sure enough, ten minutes later, Nitty came back. ‘What’s going on in your nick, all I got was this snotty bird who kept hanging up and saying she and Mackeroon were saving the world.’

‘Nitty, lock me up, I’m tired and shagged out, but do me a flavour, get hold of Alfie Herring and ask how my dog is, please.’

Nitty’s face changed, he might not like Jack, but everyone loved Martin, there was immediate concern. ‘I’ll do that, I’ll get one of the boys to drive you home, or do you need casualty?’

Shaking his head, ‘No fanks, Nitty, just me hands are scraped to buggary and my toe’s about to fall off.’

‘What’s that, gout?’

‘Yeah, Nitty, goat.’