Read Online Even the Dogs: A Novel by Jon McGregor - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Jon McGregor
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then of course when he was a
Mike always going on about it but it never seemed to happen to him. Always saying something like Danny you know what’ll happen if they try it la, you know what they’ll get for their troubles it don’t matter how many there are they’ll get their just rewards maybe not right then but later I will make sure of it I will track them down and find them one at a time and they won’t be so brave then you know what I’m saying not with an iron bar across their kneecaps an that not with a slab of paving stone dropped on their heads they won’t be laughing an that then you know what I’m
Why did it take you so long to contact the police?
I was worried I might look dodgy or something.
Why would you think that?
Just, because I was the last one there. And my record.
Do you want to tell us about your record?
You’ve got it, you can look it up for yourself.
What do you think happened to Robert?
Fuck should I know, I weren’t there.
And what do you think has happened to your friends?
I don’t fucking know.
Where do you think they’ve
Waste of time thinking about all these questions anyway, waste of time worrying whether the police were going to suspect him of anything. Like they were going to give a shit either way. Like Robert was even going to get in the papers for
Got up by the roundabout and phoned the number and it weren’t a voice he recognised, mostly they were faces you’d seen about or people you’d been introduced to but not this one. Girl who answered wanted to know where he’d got the number before anything else, so he told her about the kid and where he’d seen the kid and that he knew Ben from
Lights on in the pub but hardly no one there. Bloke in a rugby shirt behind the bar rubbing his face and looking up at the ceiling. TV on in the corner and Christmas decorations still dangling off the walls. Door swung open a minute but someone must have changed their mind because no one came out. Intercity train rattling along by the sidings, the empty carriages lit up like shop windows, the squares of light skimming over the rubbish and weeds and treestumps at the side of the tracks. The old man in the wheelchair pushing himself up the hill, the stuffing spilling out of his coat and his feet dragging along the ground as he inched his way forward one grunt at a time, each small turn of the wheel marked by a grimace across his
Huh. Hah. Huh. Keeps going but it takes him
She said All right then what you want and he said Ten dark. She said That’s all? You having a laugh? He said That’s all, and he heard her talking to someone else again, checking on something while the cramping in his stomach had him bent over and gasping, desperate to shit and his hands shaking and
The girl said It’s difficult right now see
Einstein running circles outside and scratching at the glass
And she said Right well wait there we’ll see what we can do it’ll be half an hour or something and he shoved the door open and puked into the long dead grass
And we see him there for the last time, bent double on the wasteground behind the phonebox, stumbling around in circles, desperate, waiting. We watch him through the darkened glass, getting smaller as we circle the roundabout by the Miller’s Arms and turn into the grounds of the teaching hospital, slowing between the landscaped embankments and security huts, round the outskirts of the site towards the mortuary buildings. Maybe in another place or another time we would be carrying his body ourselves, there would be music and prayer, there would be crowds, and carriages, and cameras. But there’s none of that now. We drive round the back of an industrial-looking building and down a long dark ramp, and some metal shutters are rattled open, and the photographer records each movement as the bagged weight of Robert’s body is slid on to a large trolley with a squeaking wheel by men who had hoped
Mike always going on about it but it never seemed to happen to him. Always saying something like Danny you know what’ll happen if they try it la, you know what they’ll get for their troubles it don’t matter how many there are they’ll get their just rewards maybe not right then but later I will make sure of it I will track them down and find them one at a time and they won’t be so brave then you know what I’m saying not with an iron bar across their kneecaps an that not with a slab of paving stone dropped on their heads they won’t be laughing an that then you know what I’m
Why did it take you so long to contact the police?
I was worried I might look dodgy or something.
Why would you think that?
Just, because I was the last one there. And my record.
Do you want to tell us about your record?
You’ve got it, you can look it up for yourself.
What do you think happened to Robert?
Fuck should I know, I weren’t there.
And what do you think has happened to your friends?
I don’t fucking know.
Where do you think they’ve
Waste of time thinking about all these questions anyway, waste of time worrying whether the police were going to suspect him of anything. Like they were going to give a shit either way. Like Robert was even going to get in the papers for
Got up by the roundabout and phoned the number and it weren’t a voice he recognised, mostly they were faces you’d seen about or people you’d been introduced to but not this one. Girl who answered wanted to know where he’d got the number before anything else, so he told her about the kid and where he’d seen the kid and that he knew Ben from
Lights on in the pub but hardly no one there. Bloke in a rugby shirt behind the bar rubbing his face and looking up at the ceiling. TV on in the corner and Christmas decorations still dangling off the walls. Door swung open a minute but someone must have changed their mind because no one came out. Intercity train rattling along by the sidings, the empty carriages lit up like shop windows, the squares of light skimming over the rubbish and weeds and treestumps at the side of the tracks. The old man in the wheelchair pushing himself up the hill, the stuffing spilling out of his coat and his feet dragging along the ground as he inched his way forward one grunt at a time, each small turn of the wheel marked by a grimace across his
Huh. Hah. Huh. Keeps going but it takes him
She said All right then what you want and he said Ten dark. She said That’s all? You having a laugh? He said That’s all, and he heard her talking to someone else again, checking on something while the cramping in his stomach had him bent over and gasping, desperate to shit and his hands shaking and
The girl said It’s difficult right now see
Einstein running circles outside and scratching at the glass
And she said Right well wait there we’ll see what we can do it’ll be half an hour or something and he shoved the door open and puked into the long dead grass
And we see him there for the last time, bent double on the wasteground behind the phonebox, stumbling around in circles, desperate, waiting. We watch him through the darkened glass, getting smaller as we circle the roundabout by the Miller’s Arms and turn into the grounds of the teaching hospital, slowing between the landscaped embankments and security huts, round the outskirts of the site towards the mortuary buildings. Maybe in another place or another time we would be carrying his body ourselves, there would be music and prayer, there would be crowds, and carriages, and cameras. But there’s none of that now. We drive round the back of an industrial-looking building and down a long dark ramp, and some metal shutters are rattled open, and the photographer records each movement as the bagged weight of Robert’s body is slid on to a large trolley with a squeaking wheel by men who had hoped
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