This Human Season Read online

  She pushed her hair back from her face and stood up to look for the other lighter. ‘They’re bound to take it out on them, for the prison officer murders . . .’

  ‘Executions.’

  ‘Aye, shootings, what-have-you, I always get the wrong word. But what I mean is, it’s going to get worse in there before it gets better. Ach, Brendan, those lads in there shouldn’t be fighting this war! They’re in there because they’ve done their bit.’

  Brendan stood up, he took the lighter from the far end of the mantelpiece and offered her a light. As she bent forwards the tip of her cigarette shook over the flame and she drew harshly and turned away from him, pushing her hair back again, looking out the back window.

  ‘I’ll be honest with you, Kathleen, I hope to Jesus it doesn’t get worse in there. We’re morally opposed to them fighting the war inside. That’s why we’re focusing on the screws on the outside, to get them to go easy.

  But you know Kathleen, they’re proud, they’re in there because they believe in the struggle. You can’t stop them from fighting back at the treatment they’re getting.’

  ‘Well I’m morally opposed to my son getting beaten senseless day in day out so I’d as soon throw my lot in with yous properly like and help you, however I can, if you’ll have me. ‘

  They were about the same height. His face was worn, rough-shaven, pale. In the gloom, she was all dark-red hair and angles, thin and uncertain.

  ‘It’s going to be all right, Kathleen.’ He stood there, looking at her with warmth, amusement.

  Lost for something to say, she took the ashtray to empty it in the bin and he came along into the kitchen behind her, with his cup, saying, ‘You’ve a nice place here. I had an aunt moved into one of these after they were built and she lived here up until last year. Thirty years. Good houses these.’

  Leaning over the bin, she was considering whether to lift the stub off with her fingertip and what was beyond his smile – then she heard the tap running and startled, let the ashtray go. It sank soft and snug amongst the tea-bags. She couldn’t be bothered to recover it.

  Over at the sink she tried to take the cup from his hands. ‘No you don’t,’ she said. The water from the tap hit the side of the cup and sprayed outwards over both of them.

  ‘Look at you now!’

  Her dark brown shirt was splattered with water. She had drops of water about her face. She wiped them off with her sleeve.

  ‘Well you can leave off washing your own cup in my house!’

  ‘I’m a well brought-up lad,’ he said, his hands reaching for the teatowel.

  ‘Are you now?’ She went to take the dishcloth from him but he didn’t let go.

  ‘Well, more or less.’

  ‘I’m a mess,’ she looked down at her shirt and pulled it away from where it was clinging. He was still holding the tea-towel. Donegal.

  The front door went and with a great deal of noise and dispute her family were home. He let the tea-cloth drop on to the kitchen counter.

  Chapter 10

  At lunchtime in the mess, Dunn passed on Shandy’s fruitcake.

  ‘Christmas cake gone wrong, so it is. Made it myself. Nothing the matter with it, it’s just a wee bit loose,’ Shandy said, looking wounded and closing up the box. ‘Aye, well we’ll go off and get some grub and have a few drinks as well. We could use them.’

  John Dunn and Frig had spent the morning in the mess, for the most part. Frig had been on the piss the night before and took some shuteye in the stores. There were wooden slatted-shelves in there that the men had rigged up with mattresses and blankets nailed up at the side of them like curtains. They called it the Orient Express; it was taken regularly by those travelling to a hangover. In thick black pen on the side of one ‘bunk’ someone had written, ‘Peg-Leg wanked off here. March 3rd, 1979’.

  The night guards did a split shift and they and the orderlies gave the prisoners their food while the officers on early unlock went off for their lunch. The officers on dirt blocks got an hour off for lunch plus thirty minutes showering time and twenty minutes walking time there and back. They took Dunn over to the canteen, rising to go at precisely two minutes before twelve-thirty.

  ‘It’s twelve-thirty from the block door,’ said Shandy.

  ‘We can do it in eight minutes depending on who’s on the grilles. Gives you a total of an extra four minutes, which is roughly a quarter pint of beer or a shot of vodka.’

  ‘You can’t argue with that.’

  ‘Or, for some people round here who I won’t name, it’s a sip of lemonade top.’

  After a plate of sausages and champ they headed across to the sergeants’ mess, which served spirits at lunchtime; a smoky den with prison officers in a hurry to get the drink down their necks.

  ‘Shandy likes to buy them in wholesale,’ said Frig. He handed Shandy a couple of quid and Dunn followed suit.

  ‘That way we don’t waste precious drinking time queuing. We’ve got it all worked out Johnno. Stick with us.’ He bought them two pints and two vodka chasers apiece. They were stood near the dart board alley. There were no spare seats, the place was packed.

  ‘And it’s all right to drink that lot is it? Even when you’re on the white sheet?’

  ‘All right? Why do you think they have nine frigging bars in the place?’ said Frig, lighting up.

  ‘What the fuck else is there to do?’ Shandy put his pint to his lips.

  ‘Cheers. Your health.’ He took half the glass in one draft and shook his head with his cheeks loose. ‘Now I need a gasper. Jeez. What are these? Brummy Boy’s best?’

  ‘Buy your own then. He’s tight as a nun’s twat.’

  Dunn stood smoking, staring across at the bar, watching a young lad new to the job, smart as himself, but much younger, getting the mickey taken by some of the others. He thought about his son, Mark Wilson. He thought about the letter; just the shortest of notes, to introduce himself.

  He’d slept with the boy’s mother, Carol, on just one occasion, in a single bed in a bed and breakfast on the coast. She used to call him at the barracks at Tidworth. They’d gone out to the cinema a few times. It was the late fifties. Those years of his life were spent with a permanent hard-on. He’d got her to agree to come away to Bournemouth. In the morning they’d been kissing on the bed and he’d finally persuaded her to let him inside her. There was a knock on the door and the landlady shouted in, ‘Time to check out now please.’ They’d been embarrassed. He saw there was a bit of blood on the bed when he put his trousers on. They had to hurry out. He’d felt bad. He didn’t like to do things like that, to leave a mess behind him; those small wrong things added up, in a way, and over the years they got you down. He hadn’t known what to say to Carol afterwards. She’d sat in the car on the way back to Andover with her hands on her lap and a little fixed look, as if viewing the scenery. She’d given him a smile when they said goodbye and when he looked back at her, in the driving mirror, he’d seen her real face. He could see it now, the way she looked.

  ‘Hey, Johnno, listen to this. Have you heard about the ramps allowance?’ said Frig.

  Shandy was coughing and laughing. He wiped his mouth and took his vodka chaser down in one.

  Frig went on in his slightly wheedling voice. ‘See, if you’ve noticed, when you drive in you pass over twenty-five or thirty ramps. Now that takes it out of the suspension of your car so the union’s got us a special compensation called the Ramps Allowance. You get a penny a ramp. Don’t forget you probably do thirty in and thirty out, so that’s what, Shandy mate?’

  ‘Sixty pence a day, three pound sixty a week . . .’

  ‘You’re kidding,’ said Dunn.

  ‘Scout’s honour.’

  ‘Gospel truth.’

  ‘The money they’re paying people in here. I mean it’s not like anyone’s been properly trained or anything . . .’ Dunn looked around: a group of men playing cards, another group following the words of a senior officer with intense enjoyment, the four-man d
eep crowd at the bar showing signs of edginess.

  The three of them sat down quickly at a table that had just become vacant.

  ‘Listen lads.’ Dunn continued. ‘All that carry on the other day, in the yard, it puts the wind up me.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘You see someone like your Mr Campbell . . . Well, look, when I was in the army, you had to do the job right, you couldn’t be seen to get personal.’

  ‘What are you saying?’ Shandy sat forwards.

  ‘I did more than twenty years in the army, with prisoners, terrorists and all that. All that big man stuff, all the aggro, it doesn’t pay when it’s prisoners you’re dealing with, well not in my book. It just makes them stronger as a group. The thing is to divide them, to set them against each other.’

  Frig was looking at Shandy and not at all at Dunn.

  ‘I’ll tell you straight Johnno, mate. Twenty years or not, you’d best be getting off your high horse real fast. When you get a smack in the face with one of them piss pots, you’ll see red. When it’s your missus they’re telling you’s going to be next for a bullet, you’ll work things out fast. Is it going to be one of them or is it going to be one of us that takes the hiding? Like in the army, you fire the fucking gun so your pal next to you doesn’t catch it. Am I right? If you don’t fire it, you’re both dead. They’re murdering us on the outside. Why aren’t they doing it in here? Because they can’t. We don’t play games, we keep them down, however we can. Simple as that. We run the place, your man Campbell, myself and one or two others. And we’re under no illusions about what we’re dealing with here, Mr Dunn.’

  Shandy looked both contrite and annoyed that he’d had to spell things out. He paused, booze-blown eyes trembling like jelly, his feet planted either side of his chair, riding it. ‘They’re killers who’re totally single-minded and cunning as fuck. Last week I’m walking one of them to visits and he says to me, ‘New car then?’ He’d only seen that my car keys had changed. Do you see what I’m saying? They don’t miss a thing. We’ve got nine dead this year so far – nine prison officers. And you want to play Mr Nice Guy?’ Shandy gave a dry, rattling laugh. ‘Who do you think’s organizing the killings, telling them who to go for next? Your man O’Malley that’s who. Well he’s one of them anyway. This place is IRA H-fucking-Q.’

  ‘Is that right?’

  ‘Are you scared? You should be.’ He stared at Dunn, unfocused, belligerent. Evidently Dunn’s expression conceded too little, so Shandy came forwards again, ready to pick up where he hadn’t left off. ‘We’ve got the top brass in here, Dunn. We need to send them a message. It’s not just a case of locking doors here. We’re fighting a war.’ He downed the remainder of his beer, pointed out a prison officer, said something to Frig that Dunn failed to catch, then laughed a couple of times, lighting a cigarette and pulling an open-mouthed expression that Dunn knew belonged to a popular comedian.

  ‘I’m not fighting a war. I’m earning wages.’ Frig was biting the inside of his cheek.

  ‘Then you’re a fool,’ said Shandy flatly. ‘Who’s going to get all your money when you cop it? You’ve got no one.’

  Frig seemed to consider this with a flicker of comprehension before alighting on a more general fact.

  ‘One way that they put it in here is that you’re either an officers’ man or a prisoners’ man. And believe me pal, you don’t want to be a prisoners’ man.’ He took a sip of his beer, checked on Shandy’s face.

  Dunn couldn’t afford to stand alone. Isolated, he’d crack up. ‘Another beer lads?’

  ‘Aye, go on then.’

  ‘Apologies fellas if I spoke out of turn,’ said Dunn, when he got back from the bar. Settling the beers, Dunn took his seat and laid down a new pack of cigarettes on the table, offering them to the other two, who both took one. Frig supplied a communal light and their heads dipped into it quickly, careful not to touch, each head springing back from the noose.

  ‘Who is a prisoners’ man, then. Anyone?’

  Shandy put a fingertip in his nose and withdrew it hooked. His hands disappeared under the table.

  ‘That assistant governor fella – he’s a prisoners’ man. They’re all the same that lot. University degrees and they’re brainless. We take the crap then he comes by from time to time, currying favour with the streakers. They’re spineless the lot of them but he’s the worst. The shit that comes out of his mouth. Every other week he’s down chatting with them. Then once a year he comes round to speak to us, for the annual report. “Don’t think I like you because I’m talking to you,” I says to him last year and I’ll say the same this year. What’s it we call him, Frig? Cunnilingus. It means eats pussy because he’s got no dick. It’s Greek, so it is, right Frig, them being the dirty fucks who started it.’

  ‘Carl Lingard, his name is. The Greeks didn’t start it.’

  ‘No, it was your lot from Birmingham.’

  ‘Yeah, that’s right mate,’ said Frig happily. With exaggeration he pretended to remove a hair from between his two front teeth; the invisible hair was apparently endless.

  ‘That Lingus – he knows fuck all about what it’s like here. Now you, you live here now, so do me a favour, put your hand up your arse and pull yourself together.’

  ‘All right,’ he said. ‘Fair enough.’

  Shandy stood up, each of his five glasses empty. Frig stood up beside him. They put their caps on. Sitting, Dunn looked up at them. With their foreheads obscured, a shadow over their faces, the outsized black uniforms with silver buttons, lapels and key chains, they looked like big, powerful, anonymous men. Even Frig. Peter Pan, thought Dunn. His thoughts were loose from the booze. He looked up at Shandy. Widow Twanky.

  A few greetings were exchanged on their way out. When the three of them got to the bar door there was a small group gathered trying to get through at the same time, some banter and a lot of alcohol-fuelled competitive belching. One man trod on Dunn’s foot but didn’t appear to notice.

  On his way into the toilets on the block that afternoon, there was an orderly knelt, washing the floor, his back to Dunn, a large bucket on wheels beside him. It wasn’t Baxter. Dunn shifted on his feet, making it clear he was waiting. The man ignored him, Dunn said, careful as a tourist, ‘Excuse me, can I just get past you there quickly? Got to take a leak.’ The man looked up at him with hostility, a dark-haired man, hatred down the length of his nose. ‘No you can’t get past me quickly,’ he said. Dunn was taken aback. Then all of a sudden the man stood up and waved Dunn through, his hand showing the wet shiny floor for Dunn to tread.

  ‘I asked you nicely,’ said Dunn, stopping right alongside him.

  ‘And there’s no problem. No problem at all.’

  Dunn stood in the cubicle peeing, his back tense, hearing the soft swishing of the man’s cloth in the background. He couldn’t figure out why an orderly, a prisoner, should feel safe enough to speak to him like that. When he turned back round, the man was in the medic’s room – the door was ajar, held back by the bucket.

  Going off for his break at five, the officer that trod on his foot in the bar was asleep on the ground at his grille. Dunn had to rouse him to get him to let him through.

  Back in the mess that evening, he made himself a coffee and accepted a piece of Shandy’s cake.

  ‘Good cake that is,’ he said, popping a piece of torn glacé cherry in his mouth.

  ‘I told you so.’

  Chapter 11

  ‘It’s too bloody cold now, so it is. We’ll do it again in the summer.’ Noticing Coogan, Sean corrected his posture and stood the way he always stood when there was a man in the house, straight-backed and facing him as if wanting to see official papers. Brendan Coogan offered his hand. Sean looked at it.

  ‘Brendan has come up from the Republican Press Centre to have a word about Sean,’ said Kathleen. She was stood there in tight jeans and with her shirt wet. Her hair was only partly tied back. She saw her husband assess her first; then he took the man’s hand
.

  ‘I knew your daddy. You take after him, so I hear. Sure wasn’t I only with the boys last night and they were telling me how you were the young man to get the thing straightened out, you and that Tommy McEvoy.’ He made to dismiss Kathleen. ‘Some tea love, a biscuit for Brendan here.’

  ‘I’ve had a cup thanks.’

  ‘Now your father and I were in the same crowd back in the early sixties. We were both in what was to become the Stickies, but we were always Provies at heart, so we were.’ Sean reached for the pack of cigarettes on the mantelpiece and offered one to Brendan. ‘Even before they was invented! Take one,’ he insisted. ‘Go on with you!’ he winked.

  ‘They’re American. Best in the world.’

  ‘He came here to talk about your son,’ said Kathleen.

  ‘Sean? On the blanket, so he is. Give the man a cup of tea love. I knew he would. Chip off the block that way. He’d never have said a word but I knew he was in the Provies. Of course, I was caught in a difficult position when it came to the split you see. I had friends in the Stickies and in the Provies.’

  Brendan appeared to submit to Sean’s enthusiasm and sat down on the settee. He glanced over at Kathleen, kept his smile folded. Sean took the chair.

  ‘Go on and make the tea, Liam,’ said Kathleen, giving her son a shove towards the kitchen. He curved his back to suggest she’d hurt him.

  ‘Well you remember how it was in ’69? No guns and the IRA was “I ran away”. Did you know a man name of Finbar McNamee? He was in it with me, right since after those shenanigans with the flag and Paisley, back in ’64. We got no guns, I says to him. We’ve got to have guns. Even then I could see what it was coming to. I was in the Merchants, back and forth from Australia and New Zealand, making a fair bit of money on the side.’ He winked heavily. ‘Bought her mother a pair of canary birds one time. When I went round to see this one, they was laying in the cage, feet up. She’d never fed them.’

  Aine had sat down on the carpet with her chin on her father’s armchair seat. She shook her father’s arm.