from Lvov. Came to this country before t’ first war, changed their name to Craner. So now you know. Corona supplies the Ukrainian Club wi’ soft drinks and mixers. A lot of ’em are ex-forces that got left in Yorkshire at t’ end of t’ war. Same as for t’ Poles. Lvov wor part of Poland back then. Did you know that?’
‘No, Mr Craner.’
I wor thinking they could come from t’ moon for all it mattered.
‘All t’ things you don’t know or show no interest in. Connections, boy. To get on in life you have to show interest and propagate connections. It’s no good sitting back and waiting for life to grab you by t’ goolies. Remember that and you’ll make summat of yersen.’
‘Like you, Mr Craner?’
‘Aye, like me.’
‘Use your connections?’ Eric said. ‘Is that what he said?’
We wor parked up by t’ side of t’ road, scoffing lunch. We’d peeled off our shirts and the sun wor baking our bods through t’ windscreen, our reddened arms and necks contrasting wi’ t’ paleness of t’ rest. I liked sitting there half-naked, wi’ Eric half-naked alongside me.
I said, ‘Well, it wor Mitch’s connection to Craner that got me this job, so there must be summat in it.’
‘I wouldn’t trust Craner an inch. Not an inch. As for that shite about cricket and U-Cranes … I bet Craner don’t even know where U-Crane is.’
‘Hey, geddit? U-Crane? Craner? Funny one, that.’
‘No bloody wonder we’re losing the cricket,’ Eric said, ‘what wi’ it being so hot and the pitch so parched and playing like it is. Put up a few banana trees and they’ll think they’re back home.’
We ate slobbily, shovelling fried duck and eggy rice wi’ ‘special curry sauce’ into our mouths, washing it down wi’ swigs of pop. Sauce droplets slithered off our plastic forks and, I clocked, splattered onto Eric’s crotch area.
‘Bloody ’ell,’ he muttered to himsen, rubbing the spots wi’ his hankie. ‘Bloody effin’ ’ell. These keks wor clean on this morning.’
He mopped his forehead wi’ t’ same hankie, screwing his face up at the sun.
‘Must be up in t’ 90s today. Granddad’s as pleased as punch. Says it’ll bring on his allotment lovely, all this sunshine will. He’s out there every day, tendering, watering. Won’t last, mind.’
Eric rolled up the Sun and squished a wasp against t’ windscreen.
‘So, tell Eric, who is she?’
‘Who is she what?’
‘The girl, stupid. You know – Saturday afternoons? You all tetchy and eager to finish the round and cash up and get away at day’s end. Come on, spill all. We’ve all been there.’
I flicked the dirt from under a fingernail. The distant tower blocks shimmered in t’ heat. Somewhere nearby, an ice-cream van tinkled listlessly.
‘Ain’t no one.’
‘Ain’t no one? Is she blonde? Dark? Pretty? Don’t tell me, she’s already got a boyfriend and you’re seeing her on t’ sly? Married? If you want any advice on the best way to …’
‘I don’t need no advice. There’s some stuff I prefer to keep to mesen.’
Eric scented the air like a gun dog.
‘Vanessa’s right, you’re a dark horse all right.’
He scrunched up his foil tray and tossed it into t’ road. He pulled on his shirt.
‘We’d best get on,’ he said, turning the ignition key. The engine spluttered into life.
‘Aye,’ I said, buttoning up my own shirt. ‘We’d best get on.’
The heat wave lasted ’til t’ end of August. The grass withered away, leaving brown, naked patches, the sunbathers and park picnickers turned red and weary. Allotments, including Eric’s granddad’s, wilted away and fell foul to insect plagues and hosepipe bans. The government put up standpipes. Van washing, even washing the outsides of t’ bottles, had been banned, and everything wor looking grimy. In t’ queues for water, neighbours rediscovered each other and chattered like finches set free.
It wor August Bank Holiday before t’ heavens finally opened, but not before t’ Windies had crushed England in t’ final Test at the Oval. Every West Indian on t’ round wor celebrating to our faces. Back at t’ depot, our two West Indian drivers, Phillip and Chester, wor hollering to all who could hear, ‘Who said we’d grovel? Eh? Didn’t the England captain say it, eh? Didn’t he say he’d make dem West Indies grovel?’
I shrugged. ‘I couldn’t give a rat’s behind about cricket.’
Chester wagged his finger at me. ‘You’s saying that now! You’s be saying that now!’
If it wor too hot for cricket, it wor surely too hot for murder. That summer, nowt happened.
For t’ next few weeks I wor riled to find Jim’s good-for-nowt brother answering the door to Blandford Gardens. I longed for him to skedaddle back to where he came from. But three week became a month, and a month became three. He wor a friggin’ scrounger and a layabout if ever I saw one. He’d taken to ordering an extra couple of bottles of Coke for himsen on Jim’s money. Spent his Saturday afternoons watching Grandstand, and most likely spent his evenings in t’ pub.
I asked after Jim, keeping it casual, but Steve always said he wor either out or kipping. Besides, what wi’ t’ hot weather an’ all, sometimes we only finished the round after Jim wor on his way to t’ bikkie factory. To put the hearts in Jammie Dodgers.
Then one afternoon I found a note in an envelope under t’ empties. I tore it open.
Just one bottle of tonic water and one Coke. Jim. x
He’d left the exact change. I folded and pocketed the envelope and swapped over t’ bottles. Steve had finally pissed off back to Glasgow or wherever. I spent the rest of t’ round singing and whistling and joking wi’ Eric, and at the end of t’ day I told him to drop me in town. I ran full pelt the quarter mile to Blandford Gardens rather than wait for t’ bus.
Again, there wor no one home. It wor that dead hour of t’ day – too early for t’ pubs, but t’ shops wor already shut. I hung about for a while, my mood sinking wi’ t’ lowering early-autumn sun. I mooched off about t’ neighbouring streets and then up past Leeds Uni. I found mesen idling before t’ window of some feminist bookshop, fumed up about Jim being out even though Steve had gone, not wanting to go home and undecided about what to do wi’ mesen.
The bookshop wor closed. The plate window wor a proper jamboree of notice cards, adverts and magazine covers wi’ names like Spare Rib, Marxism Today and Leeds Other Paper. On t’ far wall above a tatty sofa wor a pro-abortion poster and a Che Guevara poster. Studenty-politico-women’s-commie-lesbo stuff. I wor thinking about breaking in, or at least bricking the window, cos smashing summat up might make me feel better about t’ world, when my eye wor drawn to a word on a lavender-coloured card that wor taped to t’ side window. I took a furtive gander. The card read:
No mention of t’ friggin’ time.
As soon as I pushed through t’ pub saloon doors I knew I wor way too early. Apart from a few gruff old men strung along t’ bar and a teenage couple snogging in a corner, the Empress wor deserted.
I ordered a lager and lime and pitched up at a low corner table. I sat there a friggin’ age, shredding beer mats. Eventually two women entered, one of them portering a cardboard box.
At once I wor as alert as a fox. I watched ’em blathering