Crusaders (15 page)

‘Reverend Gore, aye? Am I right? I’m right, aren’t ah?’

‘Aye,’ Gore blurted. ‘That’s me. You are?’

‘I’m Stevie, Father. Stevie Coulson. Good to know you.’

‘You know my name?’

‘Aye, I saw you with the Reverend Spikings this afternoon, I meant to come owa, but you’d nipped off, hadn’t you?’

At last Coulson relinquished Gore’s hand. But there remained something strangely grave and decorous in his bearing, like a diplomat greeting the monarch, or an undertaker on duty.
Surely not for my sake
, thought Gore. He couldn’t see himself as the
recipient
of dignities from this powerhouse, with his hard-worn hands and fighter’s face and broad over-biting smile.

‘So,’ Gore tried, ‘you wanted to say hello? This afternoon?’

‘I did. You did us a good turn, see. Th’other week? I say “us”, what I heard is you took care of a young friend of mine.’

Gore made a lighting-fast mental account of his recent activities in the area. No ball was dropping.

‘It were young Cheryl MacNamara.’

‘Oh! Cheryl.’

‘Aye, her mam’s a pal of mine, see, and she were proper grateful you brought her in th’other night. So I’m grateful to you an’ all.’

‘Well, it was nothing.’

‘Ah but see, Father, it’s not everybody thinks like that. Now you’ll have another of them there, eh?’ He gestured to Gore’s bottle.

‘Oh, sure.’

‘And you’ll come sit yer’sel wi’ us in the back, right?’

Resistance, clearly, was useless. And so, after all, Gore had
company
for the evening. He found that he was served sharply this time, and carried his two glasses carefully to Coulson’s table, where the man sat at the head of four brawny broad-shouldered fellows. Three still had their own hair, one of these clearly the junior of the gang. The other skinhead wore a low brooding look of such enmity that Gore suspected he had wrecked the man’s evening. In their jeans and tee-shirts they were scruffy next to the suited and booted Coulson, though stacked to one side of the party in the shelf of an alcove was a little hillock of leather coats, clearly new or nearly so, giving off the good aroma of a tanner’s shop.

‘Now this,’ Coulson announced, ‘is the Reverend Gore I telt you’s about.’

‘Hullo. Call me John.’

‘This here’s Simms. That man’s Dougie? That sour-looking
toerag
is Shack. And who are you again?’ This was directed at the youngster, but with a sporting cackle that the group echoed. ‘Nah, that there’s Robbie. New start, see. I say Robbie, he’s Smoggie to me, cos he’s Middlesbrough, aren’t ya?’

Robbie bobbed his head bashfully – either an uncommonly forbearing soul, or a lad of limited faculties. Gore eased himself down onto a stool, shaking all hands as he went.

‘Now divvint tak’ a word of bother out of them, John. There’s not one of ’em as hard as they give out. And they all work for me, so they know to behave.’

‘You do your preachin’ round here then, do you?’ muttered Shack.

‘Actually I’m what they call “planting” a new church …’ And Gore stumbled into his stock speech, unsure of the true interest from his interlocutor, whose mouth stayed tightly pursed around his tab, the scar tissue under his eyes very pronounced at close quarters. Shack was not built to such fearsome proportions as Stevie, yet there was perhaps a surpassing hardness to him, a sense of more callous materials employed.

When Gore was done, Coulson very solemnly clapped his hands. ‘Good man, you. I tell you what, Father, you set a good example and you’ll find people sharp follow it.’

‘Well, I hope. If anyone shows up.’

‘Whey, you’ll not have bother. Plenty good people round here, good honest families and that.’

‘Aye, Stevie’s got family round here,’ announced the one called Simms, seeming to think himself a wit, for a grin lit his babyish features, these with the regrettable look of having been crushed into the middle of his face as if by a vice. Stevie shot Simms a dead-eyed look in reply. Gore could almost smell the sheepishness among these big men, a seeming acceptance that, for all their equivalent size, one alone was the dominant dog in the pack.

‘What’s your line of work, then?’ Gore asked between sips of beer.

Coulson opened his hands as if this were a complex matter, one on which he was often questioned closely. ‘What I am mainly, what I
call
myself now, I’m a security consultant.’ He dipped into the top pocket of his jacket and produced a business card, designed in blocks of black and white, bearing the legend
SHARKY’S MACHINE
.

‘It’s a lotta things these days, security. You’ve the pubs and clubs and that. Then you’ve businesses, minding premises. And there’s bodyguarding, if we have to.’

‘Right. Gosh. How long have you been at it?’

‘Whey, for what – ten, fifteen year? Started on the pub doors me’sel. Just a hired hand, y’knaa? Now look at us. I’ve got employees, man. I have to pay tax and national insurance on these lumps here.’ His look of long sufferance was comical. ‘Aye, I ought to put this boozer down on wor card, man, it’s like wor
second
office, y’knaa? This here corner right here.’

‘You should pay owld Peter ground rent, Stevie,’ offered Dougie.

‘Aye, or compensation, like,’ Simms hooted. ‘For wearing all the covers off the seats with wor arses.’

Stevie showed another hard face. ‘Eh, Simms man, what sort of talk is that?’

Gore raised his glass, sniffing a chance. ‘Don’t mind me. We’ve all got arses.’

Mild jollity, and Simms gave Gore a thumbs-up. Gore saw too that Coulson, between casting imperious stares about the table, always met his own eye with a wink.

‘So you gentlemen keep the peace all over town, is that it?’

Again Coulson appointed himself spokesman. ‘Aw aye. You get a lot of bad uns about, John, specially in the bars and clubs and that. Worky tickets, y’knaa what I mean? You’ve always got some want keeping in line. Some want a right fettlin’ an’ all. For their own good.’

‘Aye,’ grunted Shack. ‘It’s a public service.’

‘Some of them buggers, it’s a bliddy pleasure.’ Dougie smirked, as if imparting the trade secret that manners normally forbade. But Gore chuckled and reached for his glass. He was starting to enjoy himself.

‘Have you got plans up your sleeve, then?’ Coulson asked. ‘For getting folk along to your church?’

‘Well, I reckon at least it’s a day out. Cheaper than a seat at St James’s.’

‘Eh, now you’re talking.’ Simms whistled through his teeth. ‘Eh,
Stevie
gans to all the games free, but. Cos of his big mate. Did y’knaa that, Smoggie?’

So addressed as the idiot child, young Robbie made a startled face.

‘Aye, Rob,’ said Dougie, ‘and did you know it’s your bliddy shout?’ He waggled his sudsy pint glass, and Robbie hastened to his feet, clutching his head. Simms watched him go and then, with surgical precision, poured the dregs of his beer onto the seat of Robbie’s low stool. ‘Ye canna get the help these days,’ he snickered.

‘Aye, but guess what, Fatha,’ said Dougie, leaning into Gore mock-conspiratorially. ‘Stevie gans to the Toon but he’s a Mackem, y’knaa?’

‘Oh? You’re from Sunderland?’ said Gore.

‘Washington, County Durham,’ Stevie replied somewhat
reluctantly
. ‘Before it was part of Sun’land.’

‘Aye, so. A Mackem supportin’ Newcastle, like,’ Dougie
persisted
.

‘Fuck off out of it, Dougie man.’ Coulson reddened, then
rounded
on Gore. ‘I’m sorry for that one, Father, just popped out.’

‘Not at all. I understand the, uh, passions of it. The rivalry.’

‘Where
you
from then?’

‘Framwellgate Moor.’

‘Aw aye? A Durham lad and all? Do you follow football?’

Gore nodded gamely. ‘I’m black and white.’

‘Good man. Like Tony Blair, aye?
He’s
Durham, but he’s black and white. Most of Washington’s black and white, man, it’s sound. Washington, Consett, Chester-le-Street … I mean, you get a bit both, you’ll have seen that, aye?’

Gore nodded, though he had never much cared for the
distinction
.

‘Naw, it’s alreet, Sun’land,’ Coulson persisted. ‘Got some canny bits to it, like where me nana lives. Me grandda, now he was true mackem. Worked on the ships. He used to come in at night and sit in his old chair with his cap on, just bloody
ragged
, man. I couldn’t believe such a skinny fella could work that hard. He’d say to us, “Stevie, lad, them ships gan off into the sunset but me, I stop here. Bloody shipwrecked.” It was all true, but – they mack’em and tack’em.’

‘How soft is that?’ Dougie crowed. ‘Being proud of summat people slag you for?’

‘Nowt wrong with it,’ Stevie insisted. ‘That was the start of the rivalry, that was, the Tyne and Wear. Fighting owa the ships.’

‘Balls, man,’ frowned Shack. ‘It was cos of the bliddy civil war, wasn’t it?’ Coulson’s men seemed to want to fight this one out. Robbie returned with a tray of pints, set them down and reclaimed his seat, his face then twisting in outrage as the others sniggered. ‘Aw ye
buggers
…’ Somewhat apart from the
high-jinks
, Gore found that he had all of the boss’s attention.

‘I meant what I said, John, earlier. I can tell, see – you’re a
professional
, you are. And a good man. I respect that. Here’s to you.’ Coulson raised his iced drink and clinked Gore’s ale bottle.

‘Well, I hear you’re a man for a good turn yourself.’

‘Says who?’ Coulson’s eyes narrowed partially.

‘Bob Spikings?’

‘Aw aye. I used to kip in that church of his some nights, y’knaa? When I was a lad?’

‘You slept rough?’

‘Aye. Y’knaa how it is. Got wrang at home, so I ran off. Ended up round here. This is near on twenty year ago, mind. But this here boozer, it was me first proper job for money. Then I met some people, thank God, they looked after us – you know how it is, when you’re young, you need someone to shout for you, don’t you?’

Gore nodded keenly, though he had no clue what Coulson could be talking about. In respect of youthful role models, he
supposed
they had admired different sorts.

‘Are you still a churchgoer, Stevie?’

‘Not so much. Not so much. There’s only so much I can stay on top of. We’re all backsliders, aren’t we’s? A bit, like?’

‘Oh, we surely are.’

‘As long as you’re doing right by people, in the main, eh?’

‘Without a doubt.’

Stevie nodded, satisfied. ‘Cos I want to be square, y’knaa, by the man upstairs?’ He raised his eyes, waved a finger. ‘Against thee and thee only have I sinned.’ Gore smiled, mindful not to rile his new friend’s po-faced calm, and wishing he could place the biblical allusion. ‘Naw, but I find it very peaceful in church. It’s a good proper quiet you get. Private time. Time to think. We all can do with a, what’d you call it? A place like a
sanctuary
?’

Coulson lowered his chin to his chest, pensive for a moment. Gore contemplated the profile. A shaven scalp had always seemed to him a vulnerable sight, fragile, like an egg, and yet Coulson’s looked as if it might deflect an axe blow. He had never
encountered
such a jumble of elements in one man, solemn and fierce and jocular. Nor such a gargantuan frame.
A bit of a character
, yes, no question. Now he met Gore’s eye once more. ‘Listen, would you do us a favour, John?’

‘What can I do for you?’

‘Owld friend of mine, her name’s Eunice, Eunice Dodd. Lives local. She’s getting on, see, and I’ve not been round a while. Used to pop in regular. Bit bad of me. She’d be ever so glad of a visit.’

Gore shrugged. ‘Well, would you like me to call in on her?’

‘Would you? Aw, good man, you. It’s Biddle House on the Crossman Estate. Number seventeen.’

Stevie leaned back in his seat. Gore, too, considered the
transaction
a success, for the commitment seemed a simple one.

It was then he sensed that Coulson’s good humour had been displaced somehow. Now, in repose, his great bulk seemed the very substance of displeasure. Glancing about their neglected tablemates, Gore saw that they remained jovial, save for the dour Shack, whose grim disposition seemed terminal. Like Stevie, though, Shack was looking to the bar, and Gore followed these baleful gazes.

Three men stood there, in showy coats and shiny shoes,
evidently
new arrivals, seemingly desirous that all of the Gunnery’s meagre clientele be made aware of their advent. Certainly it was impossible not to hear that they were making a garrulous job of getting in their drinks, browbeating the barman for an apparent failure to oblige their preferences.

‘Haven’t you got it in bottles? Nah, draught’s horrible. Piss.’

‘What about that glass of wine, our kid? Have you not got a list?’

Then they stood back, these three, and surveyed the room, bold as brass knockers. The tallest, catching Gore’s curious eye, raised his glass. Gore looked aside and made to drain off his ale. He had achieved a nice little bit of progress here, undoubtedly. It seemed prudent to quit while ahead.

‘Well, that’s me, I’d say,’ Gore announced to the table, setting down his glass. ‘Two is my absolute limit.’

Stevie’s smile was clenched at best but Gore saw no grounds to take it personally – no more than Shack’s odd distracted gesture of sniffing at his fingers before accepting Gore’s hand as he offered it round the table.

Out of doors, twenty yards hence down the keenly nipping dark of Hoxheath Road, Gore turned on his heel momentarily and peered back at the facade of the squat pub. No question, it was fatally unappealing to the eye, but not nearly so bad within. And it felt like territory gained, a flag planted, if provisionally. His steps were sprightly, for he was consoled in himself, confirmed in his abilities, reassured a little in his purpose.

Stevie was properly put out. So much for the quiet evening. Banter had been building nicely, now it was flattened, and for the sake of three numpties, three smug ugly faces in a row. His mobile should have rung, his lookout should have done the job assigned him, but that was past. His professional vigilance had rebooted. Saturday night was work-night once again.