The Know (48 page)

‘My old mum went on the bash when we was kids. Me dad had gone on the trot and she had eight of us to feed. Hard graft, bless her. Loved the bones of that woman, I did. She was worn out before she was fifty. Never saw me old man again until I was doing well, had made a name for meself like. Then he turned up like the poncing leech he was.’ He laughed loudly, only this time it was hollow-sounding.

‘What did you do?’

Big John’s face set like stone.

‘Same as you would if your old man turned up for a hand out: I gave him a grand and told him if I ever saw him again, I’d kill him.’

He took a deep toke on the joint.

‘Never saw hide nor hair of him again, the cunt! I’d have had more respect if he’d thrown it in me face, but he slunk off just like all those times before when I was a kid. Just upped and disappeared like he always had. Left me, the eldest, to bring up me brothers and sisters, see them all right, which I did. Good riddance to bad fucking rubbish, eh?’

Jon Jon nodded sagely. Half stoned and half straight, he felt an embarrassing urge to cry.

‘I never knew my old man,’ he confessed.

Big John handed him the joint.

‘Just as well, son, he’d only have disappointed you. Wankers always do. Now then, what were you talking to Jesmond about today?’

‘What?’

Shock and surprise were evident in Jon Jon’s face and voice. That was the last thing he had expected to be asked.

Big John laughed, cupping one ear to take the sting out of his words as he said matter-of-factly, ‘I hear everything, son. One of the blokes who works for me, works for him. I’ve more grasses than Wimbledon Centre Court. It keeps the opposition in its place - bit like Tony Blair, only I don’t sell them down the river when it all falls out of bed. They don’t have to top themselves either, I make a point of doing that for them.’

He grinned, and Jon Jon remembered reading somewhere about tombstone teeth. He could see what that meant now.

‘I’ve had Ginger . . . you know, his number one, otherwise known as Manky Foot? He’s a raspberry ripple, but he can have a row . . . anyway, I’ve had him on my payroll for a couple of years. He told me that you and Bernard were after a straightener with his boss.’

He toked on the joint once more and said in his best Jeremy Paxman piss-taking voice, ‘So, Sonny Jim, or Sonny Jon Jon if you prefer, I am going to cut us a couple of lines of this very expensive and might I say rather excellent Colombian marching gear while you tell me everything I need to know.’

He grinned.

‘And you
will
tell me, son, understand that much.’

It was a threat and they both knew it, but a carefully judged one. It was up to Jon Jon whether or not to take umbrage. Which of course he wouldn’t, he wasn’t that stupid.

He was just amazed at the way his day had turned out.

‘When Paulie said to come here, I thought we had a new deal going down. I mean, that’s why you went to see him, after all.’

Big John studied Jon Jon’s face as he absorbed all that was being said to him. He was quick and he had savvy. Give the boy a few years and he would be a force to be reckoned with. He was also loyal, a must have in Big John’s organisation.

He decided to be honest. Or at least as honest as he could be until he knew this boy was on board.

‘Listen, son, I went to see Paulie today because I wanted an in to you. The Amsterdam deal may or may not occur - I’ve got higher priorities right now. You going after Jesmond today done my head in, took me by surprise like. Maybe a few years from now I might have expected it as the natural course of events. Someone was going to take what he had one day and it might as well be you. You’ve already got a good rep, I’ll give you that much. But at this moment in time you’re still a babe-in-arms. I deduced that you had to have a personal reason for going up against him. And, me being me, I want to know what that reason is.’

He opened the box carefully and respectfully as befitted a decent bit of gear, at the same time pointing one finger at Jon Jon.

‘There’s stuff you don’t know yet. I’ll rephrase that,
can’t
know yet. But you will if I hear what I want to hear.’

Jon Jon watched as he cut two lines expertly and with the minimum of fuss. That much in itself was different. Most people talked about how good their gear was when they iced it out, bragged about the quality, how good it was. But Big John imported his own and no one in their right mind would question its quality. This was an education and Jon Jon was determined to take in every lesson he could from the evening’s entertainment.

But he was still wary of saying too much, too soon. He decided to change the subject while he thought out what to do.

‘How do you know my mum?’

Big John grinned.

‘I remember her from years gone by. Nice woman, Joanie. No one ever had a bad word to say about her, and why would they? She’s sound, done a few favours for friends over the years. Time was, when my old woman wouldn’t shit till your mother had done her Tarot cards! When I was banged up they were a lifeline to Kathy. She loves your mum.’

It was good heart-warming stuff but Jon Jon wasn’t fooled.

‘What kind of favours did she do for friends?’

He had taken the main point and this made Big John smile. He genuinely liked this kid. For all his dreadlocks and his Kiss 100 clothes he was a shrewd little fucker, and John McClellan liked shrewd little fuckers - they made you money.

‘Never you mind, you ask her yourself. But Paulie always had a soft spot for her, I know. Wouldn’t admit it, of course. Him with a brass! But I tell you something, she was worth fifty of that fat whore he married. Wouldn’t get an honourable mention at Cruft’s, her!’

Jon Jon didn’t dispute what the man was saying. He snorted a line quickly, and felt the rush almost immediately.

‘This stuff will keep you up longer than an Irish marching band!’ Big John was laughing again. ‘So come on, what have you found out?’

Jon Jon looked at him and wondered if this was a set-up. He decided to tell it in as ambiguous a way as possible. Feel it out as he went along.

‘Well, you see . . .’

‘Just call me John, son.’

He’d guessed rightly that Jon Jon didn’t know how to address him.

‘It’s complicated.’

Big John smiled and this time it didn’t reach his eyes.

‘Life’s complicated, son. Surely your sister’s disappearance proved that. By the way, I heard about Joanie trying to give that nonce an acid bath.’

‘You seem to hear everything, John.’

Big John looked at him for a moment. He was obviously choosing his words carefully.

Then he said, ‘Let’s see if we’re singing from the same hymn sheet here. I’ve heard a few rumours about Jesmond and Paulie and Pippy Light. Not exactly Brain of Britain is Pippy Light. When everyone else went into computers he bought his first abacus, but I digress. It’s Paulie Martin I’m really interested in. I hear through the grapevine that he makes money off of little kids and I think you can enlighten me further about that.’

He paused before continuing, ‘At least, I hope so. Jesmond would sell his own mother for a few beers. Pieces of shit like him can’t help it, but at least he never pretended to be anything else, do you get my drift?’ He sniffed loudly to make his point but also to bring the coke as far up his nose as possible.

‘Now Paulie, he’s a different kettle of fish altogether. You see, he acts like butter wouldn’t melt. But you know Paulie’s trouble, don’t you?’

‘No, I don’t. Exactly what is his trouble?’

Jon Jon knew he was chancing his arm. Animosity was coming off Big John in waves now and when all was said and done Jon Jon worked for Paulie Martin. They were friends. But for all that Jon Jon was getting seriously antsy about the number of times he was hearing about his boss today, and from some very unexpected quarters.

‘Paulie’s problem, son, is he has
never
done a lump in his life, and I am very wary of anyone who’s been going as long as him and never had so much as a night in the cells. Do you see where I’m coming from?’

Jon Jon could see all right, though he wasn’t sure he wanted to. It was strange the way Paulie had never had his collar felt. Luck of the devil, he always said. But maybe not.

‘Now I had a capture, done me time, head down, arse up. A capture and a half and all, over twenty years.’

Big John started to cut another line.

‘But it’s real life, ain’t it? You’ll do a lump one day, son, because you won’t sell out your mates, see? It’s all part of the learning curve for people like us.’

Jon Jon’s mouth was dry from the unaccustomed cocaine. He had left it alone for months. But he also knew it was because he was getting nervous. This was clearly personal for Big John. Jon Jon had suddenly realised that he was expected to serve Paulie up to him on a plate.

‘Maybe he was just lucky?’

Big John laughed again, louder this time, and then in the blink of an eye he was not smiling. Staring Jon Jon full in the face, he said, ‘No one is that fucking lucky, boy. If he had that much luck going spare he’d be getting a cheque from Dale Winton. Think about it.’

Jon Jon thought about it, he didn’t have much choice. It was all going pear-shaped and he didn’t know what to do. He would just have to sit this out and play it by ear. There was no way he was walking out of here with the hump, he would be lucky to get as far as the lifts.

But, for all that, Big John was making a deadly kind of sense.

Jeanette walked into the flat full of smiles and good humour. Joanie wasn’t in the mood for either. In fact, Jeanette was the last person she had expected to see tonight.

Time was when her daughter coming home was a cause for rejoicing, but not now. She tried to keep her temper while Jeanette poured herself a drink and informed her that she was staying the night. She said it as if she was doing her mother the favour of a lifetime.

Joanie smiled with difficulty.

‘If you don’t mind, love, I need the place to meself tonight.’

Jeanette grinned.

‘Oh, yeah! You on a promise?’

Joanie smiled as best she could.

‘You could say that.’

‘Oh, come on, Mum! Tell me.’

She saw her daughter’s evident pleasure and knew that whatever else had happened to this family, Jeanette had come out of it all a better person. It was what she had needed, a bit of an eye opener. But what a price Joanie had had to pay to see this other daughter of hers smile at her with real affection.

‘There’s nothing to tell, love.’ Joanie took a vodka from her and sipped it before saying quietly, ‘Just do me a favour, will you, and go back round Jasper’s?’

Jeanette picked up on the nervousness in her mother’s voice.

‘What’s going on here?’

She was suspicious now, she knew a blank when she got one.

‘Nothing, love. I just need the place to meself.’

‘Oh, leave it out, Mum. Do I look like a lemon?’

Jeanette was trying to make light of it all and Joanie gave her top marks for that. But she wanted her out of the house before she saw Bethany and started asking questions. She really didn’t need this tonight. Jeanette would just confuse the situation.

As her daughter walked towards the bedroom she’d shared with Kira, Joanie bellowed in annoyance.

‘Why can’t you just for once do what the fuck I ask?’

Jeanette turned to look at her mother.

‘What’s going on here?’

Joanie took a deep breath before she replied, ‘Please, Jeanette. Just go to Jasper’s, will you?’

Her voice was tired-sounding and she looked even more battered than usual.

‘Mum, please, what’s going on?’

Joanie pulled herself upright and shouted as loud as she could: ‘Would you just fuck off! For
once
in your life, just do what I’m asking, will you?’

Jeanette stared at her for long seconds before saying nastily, ‘Well, thanks a fucking bunch, Mother.’

She was mortally offended now and Joanie wanted to make it all better but she couldn’t. Not yet. Not until she had found out what she needed to know. Jeanette would just hassle the girl and that was the last thing Bethany needed now. It was taking all Joanie’s own will-power not to beat the truth out of the poor kid, for all her noble thoughts. Whereas Jeanette, if she knew the score, would not think about it twice. She would punch first and think later.

She was her mother’s daughter in that respect.

Jeanette stormed out of the flat and slammed the door. Joanie sank down on to the floor. She didn’t know what the hell to do. For the first time in her life, she didn’t know how to make it all better.

In the bedroom Bethany was shrinking into the sheets and wondering what all the shouting was about. The only thing she knew was that this trouble was over her.

 
Big John was flying and he looked like he was flying. He was red in the face, talking nineteen to the dozen, but his head was as clear as the water skimming a tropical beach.