Read Online I Love My Smith and Wesson by David Bowker - Free Book Online Page B

chaplain calls you nigger.”
    Rawhead was quiet for a long time. Then he said, “Are you working tomorrow night?”
    Brando nodded. “No rest for the poverty-stricken.”
    â€œSomething might happen. I want you to stay at home.”
    â€œYeah, great idea.” Brando thought it was a joke.
    â€œI’ll see you get your money, even if I have to pay you myself.”
    Rawhead smiled calmly. But as Brando looked, the man at his side underwent a subtle transfiguration. His eyes darkened and he seemed to grow in stature. The face, which until that moment had looked mild and friendly, became a mask of primitive evil.
    And there was something else. A sweet, sickening smell. It was the perfume of murder, like a fragrant breeze blowing through the hole in a man’s skull. Inexplicably, Brando tasted blood in his mouth and for a few seconds he forgot to breathe.
    â€œDid you hear what I said?” asked Rawhead.
    Brando stared.
    â€œSkip work tomorrow night,” said Rawhead slowly and deliberately, making absolutely sure he was understood. “There’s going to be trouble.”

Five
    With how sad steps, O Moone, thou climbst the skies,
    How silently, and with how wanne a face,
    â€”“ASTROPHEL AND STELLA,” SIR PHILIP SIDNEY (1554–86)
    The Old Cow, a small, squalid establishment in Glossop, was renowned for its beer, its curries, and its gangland shootings.
    The yellow-toothed landlord, Snowy Rains, had a habit of standing at the bar and interrupting the conversations of his customers. Rumor had it that Snowy watered down the beer with his own piss. He didn’t. It just tasted that way.
    Snowy liked to think of himself as a face and quietly enjoyed the fact that small-time hoods came in to drink and occasionally kill each other on the premises. As long as the customers didn’t start on him, he felt the pub’s ominous reputation reflected favorably on his manhood.
    It was no exaggeration to say that Snowy’s worthless life consisted of butting in, boasting, drinking, sleeping, and farting. He liked to claim that he had rampant sex with young women whenever his wife Sheila’s back was turned, but this was untrue. The pub opened every day from eleven to three and seven to midnight. There was a lock-in every night, which meant the last stragglers would not be leaving before 2:00 A.M . This left little time for fornication.
    â€œWe’ve had members of the Priesthood drinking here,” announced Snowy.
    Until then, the pub had been silent. It was a Sunday lunchtime after Christmas. There were only four customers. In the snug, an old man and his son were watching televised darts.
    Two thugs at the bar, Pest and Jammer, were working their way through a wad of stolen scratch cards to see if they’d won anything.
    Irritated by the lack of response, Snowy tried again. “The Beast used to come in.”
    â€œI knew him,” said Pest, without bothering to look up.
    Pest was a little hook-nosed scumbag. When he was stoned, which was most of the time, he had a habit of threatening anyone in earshot. His companion, Jammer, was a tall, angular man who said little and, to his shame, hadn’t had a fight since he was thirteen, when he’d been soundly thrashed during a dispute about a packet of jaffa cakes.
    Pest and Jammer were both grammar school boys from the seventies who had deliberately dumbed down in the hope of being accepted into the criminal fraternity. It hadn’t worked. Now they were middle-aged, bitter, and unemployed.
    â€œThat’s right,” said Snowy, cig hanging from his mouth, pint of bitter in his hand. “Big bloke, quiet voice, horrible ginger hair.”
    â€œMy wife’s ginger,” said Jammer.
    â€œOh, sorry,” said Snowy. “Didn’t mean anything by it. Sometimes you can get very attractive red-haired people.”
    â€œNot my wife,” said Jammer.
    Pest nodded and smirked.
    â€œHe