I'll Pray When I'm Dying Read online

  The woman, slack-mouthed, remained frozen, sprawled on the wet ground. Weeping softly and holding a trembling hand to her jaw. She moaned a few times. Gazing imploringly at the young man with muddy eyes. Shaking her head violently from side to side. Lips shaped deliciously desperate. The young man avoided eye contact, turned, hesitating a moment and then the sound of his boots quickly echoed his departure down the street towards the Thames riverside, fading away into the darkness.

  The policeman chuckled again, sighed, reaching down a blood sticky hand to the woman. She slapped it away, scowling.

  “Get off. I’ll get myself up. You’ve given me a bloody fat lip, you ‘ave.”

  “You’ll come along with me now then, unless you’ll be wanting more of the same.”

  “Down the nick? But I wasn’t doin’ nothin’, honest to God. We was just talkin’ for Christ’s sake. No crime in having an innocent conversation, surely? Is there?”

  The policeman threw back his head and laughed. A large heartless sound. Hollow. An echo in a churchyard. Laughter with a hard edge, a rusty clawhammer.

  “You think I’d waste my time dragging your worthless state down the station? Embarrass myself like that? No, darlin’. You’ll accompany me over to Brick Lane. There’s an unlit courtyard there I use often where we shan’t be bothered none.”

  “I should ‘ave known it. Just another ruddy cozzer lookin’ for a giveaway ain’t ya? I’ve heard about you. You’re the one that’s been beatin’ on the girls. Everyone’s been warned about you.”

  “You want another fucking smack for your lip, harlot?” He grabbed the woman by the scalp, shaking her head backwards and forwards violently. She screamed through crooked clenched teeth. Sobbed and screwed her face up. Still nothing more than a very young woman. Her creamy face in the streetlight angelic.

  Lavender. Red wine. Milky skin. Paris.

  Her hair in his fist like the threads of something very fragile and the Sergeant felt himself become hard. He pushed her roughly up against the brick wall.

  “I love you so much and you always hurt me so,” he whispered, panting, reaching up her thighs, pulling roughly at her knickers. She pulled herself free from his grasp, hitched up her filthy dress and took off quickly in the direction of the young man’s retreat. Running like a ghost story into the night.

  “George! George! I’d rather go along with you? I’m frightened! Wait for me, please. George?! Please! Wait. George?!” her voice came breathless and desperate down the empty street.

  The policeman growled, grinned bitterly and stalked after her, bringing the worn, smooth brass knuckles casually from his trouser pocket and sliding them over his right fist. Placed a long silver whistle in his lips, gripping it between his teeth. Tonguing, tasting the bitter metal. Something like a fever burning through his body. A biblical combustion. The dull ache of an aged betrayal as hot as a straight razor in his guts.

  He spotted them then, standing outside The King’s Head pub, squabbling like a couple of infants. The whore had a hold of the boy’s arm, pulling him back towards an alleyway. Wide eyed in the twilight and desperate to make the little amount that would enable her to get a place in the bunk house for the night. They saw the policeman and froze. Two hares caught in a game warden’s torchlight.

  “Sergeant, please,” said the boy in a tired voice. He slid his hands out in a gesture of surrender and the glow from the nearest streetlamp gloved his palms in a taint of sickly yellow.

  “It’s all right, son. It’s all right,” The policeman mumbled soothingly through a clenched jaw, biting down hard on the whistle and giving the boy a vicious one-two combination. A flickering jab with the brass knuckles and then a straight over the crown with his truncheon, splitting the boy’s head open. Blowing down hard on the whistle as he backhanded the whore and kicked her hard in the stomach to shut her trap from screeching. The boy collapsed unconscious to the wet ground. His skull cracked against stone. Teeth rattled across pavement like rain drops. The policeman continued to blow out on the whistle as he kicked the boy’s legs open. Wider, splayed. Satisfied with the length of the space between, he began to stamp down on the boy’s crotch. Stamping and kicking. He spat out the whistle. Screamed.

  “Fuck my woman?! You want to fuck my woman, do you?!”

  Lost in an all-encompassing boiling, bright black fury until another patrolling police constable came running in answer to his bellows and pulled him off the ruined heap of the boy. The girl long gone into the darkness of the East End. Police Sergeant William Hughes, pushed off the arms that held him, sat down heavily on a curb, panting and lit a cigarette. Picking a flake of tobacco from his tongue. Feeling a little better about the memories that burned inside his mind.

  Paris. The taste of red wine and lavender on the whitest, purest skin.

  He cursed, wishing he had kept a grasp on the filthy, little whore. Betrayer. There was always the next night. Always another harlot.

  “Bloody hell, Sergeant. I think this boy might be dead,” the young constable said.

  Sergeant Hughes dragged long on his cigarette, flicked it onto the cobblestones and stood up, brushing down his rain-dampened trousers. Exhaled a cloud of smoke into the other younger man’s concerned face.

  “Well, he was resisting arrest. You shan’t be needing an ambulance wagon now in any case, will you? Saved a lot of time and grief, I did,” he placed a hand on the young constable’s shoulder and squeezed hard. Glaring into his eyes until the other policeman stared down and away.

  “You deal with this, constable. If anyone asks, you tell them I’ve gone to The Ten Bells pub for a nightcap and they’re more than welcome to come search me out if they’ve got any fucking questions that need asking,” he said walking into the darkness and smog of Whitechapel.

  South Boston, USA

  Monday, February 18th, 1946

  The sky a clotted kind of grey. Dorchester Street an icy kind of dead.

  Stevie Wallace washing the windows of The Seven Shamrocks social club, a limp cigarette hanging from his thin, scarred mouth. Grey hair windswept. Hunched-shouldered and wearing the same ratty, faded blue bathrobe he always wore as of late. The bitter reek of whiskey emanating from him tangible as Ben came up from behind with the leather doctor’s bag. He spoke to Ben, squinting into the soapy reflection of the glass.

  “Here he is now. Fucking Sherlock Holmes himself. The Englishman with the rent,” he grinned, scratching at the salt and pepper stubble on his chin. Ben grinned too, couldn’t help himself, placing his hand on the old man’s shoulder. Stevie “boxer” Wallace, one of only a few people Ben could touch without a jarring feeling of disquiet. Without having to wash the prickling, dry irritant of filth from his hands in the nearest sink. He almost loved the old man. Stevie had been the boss of Southie since ’33 when King Solomon, the old boss, caught a few bullets in the back of the head while taking a piss in the swanky restroom of The Cotton Club.

  “Everyone’s paid up, Stevie.”

  “Of course they have. There was never any doubt. Did you take your boss’s percentage and god forbid, your own?”

  “You know I did,” Ben grinned again.

  “That I do. Never a doubt. Also know you made another fucking mess over in Seaport not an hour before.”

  “That was unavoidable, unfortunately. Crime in progress. News always travels fast around here, doesn’t it?”

  “Sure, the news? I made the news in ’20. Olympic Featherweight contender for these United States of America. The fucking Olympics. You know that, Benny?”

  “Yes, I’d heard, Stevie. More than a few times, actually.”

  “Went all the way to Antwerp. Never even been out of Southie before that. All the way to Europe. Benny, they didn’t even let me fight, you believe that shit? I could have gotten the gold. People, they called me ‘The Tommy Gun Kid’, the fastest jab in the whole of this white America,” said Stevie, dropping the sponge into the bucket of water and shadowboxing his reflection.

  “Sur
e, you could’ve, Stevie. It’s freezing cold today. You’re going to get sick standing out here in that bathrobe. It’s February in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  Stevie stopped the punch combinations and snatched up the sponge from the bucket again with a deep sigh. “Of course I fucking noticed it’s February, you English moron. Someone’s gotta clean these windows. Not going to clean themselves, are they? March weather be damned.”

  “February. February weather be damned, Stevie. Anyhow, I was inferring about the bathrobe.”

  “‘Inferring’? ‘Inferring’ were you? Now that’s a lace curtain word if I ever heard one. Don’t trust words like that, nor the men that utter them, Benny Boyo. And you wonder why the lads don’t trust you any?”

  “I don’t wonder. I couldn’t give a fuck about them either way. Come on inside and have a drink with me. Sit down for a while.”

  “Sit down? I’ve got shit to do. These windows ain’t gonna clean themselves, are they? The club is starting to look like a dump. Where the fuck is that kid Tommy Shea? He always helped me out around here. Good kid that boy.”

  “You know where he is, Stevie.”

  “What do you mean? Where is he?”

  “Shea’s six years into his stint at Charlestown Pen. Armed robbery. Him and that little fuckhead Blondie, both. You held their going away party here. Blondie pulled a knife on the Mulligans. You remember now?”

  Stevie frowned confused at Ben a moment, then looked down at the bucket of water, nodding as though he understood.

  “Sure, sure, of course I remember. You think I’m some kind of an eegit? Is that it?”

  “No, not at all, Stevie. You’re the boss of Southie. Come on inside.”

  “I gotta go and do some collections. Jimmy Noonan still owes my brother vig for the last three fucking weeks.”

  Stevie shambled off into the street, his bath robe catching in the chilled breeze and exposing pale flesh. A rusted Chevy pickup swerved, honked its horn irritably. Ben jogged after, took the old man gently by a skinny arm, guiding him back towards the safe confines of the sidewalk and the club.

  “You can’t do the collections now, Stevie. You have to clean these windows, remember? Besides, your brother and Jimmy are both departed. Years back now, Stevie.”

  “What are you yammering on about?”

  “Never mind, it’s all right. Now, you want this money or not?” Ben placed his hand softly on the old man’s back, feeling bones protruding through the matted fabric of the bathrobe. Lifted the leather doctor’s bag aloft.

  “Sure. Sure. Go inside and give the bag to the Fat Man. Have a piece of cake that’s on the bar, my Debbie made it.”

  Stevie went back to sponging the windows with scummy icy water and then glanced at Ben again as though for the first time. “Here he is, now. The Englishman with the rent.”

  Ben tried to smile; his face hurt. Shook his head and went through the doors he’d been going through since he’d been a child.

  The big kids had dark brown freckles on their faces and orange hair. The freckles looked like insects crawling angrily across their cheeks. Ben was running as fast as he could. His legs hurt bad. Heart pounding a hole through his vest. He could hear the boys behind him. The sounds of their dirty shoes slapping down on the sun-baked street floor. The bad words they shouted. Why did everything always have to be so ugly? He didn’t know. They were gaining on him. Too quick. He was running as fast as he could. Biting into his bottom lip painfully to stop the tears from coming. They’d beat him worse today if they witnessed him crying.

  “Stop! Stop running, you cowardly little chicken shit!” the tallest boy shouted.

  “You little limey piece of shit,” the one with brightest orange hair shrieked.

  Ben kept running.

  The smallest boy held a cockroach in his enclosed hand, and they were going to put it in his pants they’d cheered. Knowing from school how much he hated the things. How he screamed at the sight of anything with six legs scurrying.

  An old man stepped out of the barbershop suddenly and Ben twisted to avoid hitting him, losing his balance. Falling hard to the street. Stones and grit cut into the palms of his hands and knees. He screamed and hated himself for it. The old man chuckled and walked away whistling as Ben struggled back to his feet.

  The two larger boys collided with Ben, knocking the breath from his lungs. Wrestled him back down to the asphalt. Shoving their knees painfully into his arms. Ben tried to say the words of the poem his mother had taught him thousands of miles and a year ago, but the words didn’t come. Refusing to form into sounds willing to leave his throat. Abandoning him. One of the boys punched his nose and banged his head against the ground. Ben screwed up his eyes and wept. The tears slid burning hot down his face. Not knowing why life always had to be so ugly.

  “Look it, the little limey baby is crying for his momma.”

  They cackled in unison.

  The smallest boy placed his filthy foot on Ben’s chest, brown stains smeared over cotton fabric. Ben squealed.

  “This roach is going stir crazy in here. Think it’s pooped on me. Quick open his mouth before it bites me,” the smallest boy said, waving his cupped hands in the air excitedly.

  Ben squealed again. His father’s face flashing through his mind. His mother’s lips. He clamped his mouth shut.

  The older boys twisted Ben’s ears, one of them hissed, “when he screams again shove that bug in the little sissy’s mouth.”

  They all hooted. An ugly sound bouncing off bricks, tarmac and cobblestone.

  Then a different noise. The sound of a door gliding open. A man’s boots stomping into view. Ben squinted up at the shape towering over them all, shrouded by the afternoon sun.

  “What the Jesus are you little shits doing outside my club?”

  The older boys let go of Ben, standing up quickly. “Nothing at all, Mr. Wallace, honest to God,” the tallest said.

  “Be honest to me, not God. Sure as hell don’t look like nothing. Three against one? That’s how the wops and the coloreds and those rats in Charlestown fight each other. It’s not the way we do it here in Southie.”

  “He’s an Englishman, Stevie,” the smallest one murmured under his breath.

  “I don’t give a shit if he’s an Englishman or a man from Mars and it’s Mr. Wallace to you, you little gobshites,” the man said, cuffing the three boys around the backs of their hung heads in quick succession. The boy with the brightest orange hair started to snivel. The smallest one wailed and dropped the cockroach he’d been carrying since the school yard. It scurried into a drain, dragging a leg behind it and disappeared. Ben sighed audibly.

  “Now, get the hell out of here before I tell your fathers,” Wallace growled.

  The boys ran.

  The man gazed down at Ben for a long moment grinning and then ruffled his hair roughly. “Your nose is bleeding, and your head is cut, Englishman. Come inside the club and we’ll clean you up. My Debbie’s got some iodine. It’ll sting like a bitch, but it’ll clean the dirt out of the gash. You thirsty? We got some soda, I think.”

  “Thank you, Sir,” Ben said.

  “Call me, Stevie. And don’t worry about those little hooligans. They’re mad dogs like their fathers. It’s in the blood.”

  “What’s in the blood, Mister Stevie?”

  “Our father’s madness… passed down in the blood. You like boxing, kid? You know, I went to the Olympics in ’20?”

  Ben followed Stevie into the Seven Shamrocks holding his burning ears and almost smiling.

  Way past its glory days, the place stank of disease. Diseased hopes. Diseased regrets. Old beer, stale tobacco. Piss. The same group of Irish heist men sat around the same table, playing the same game of poker. Talking the same shit. Ben’s guts coiled up and dropped. The muscular, flame haired Mulligan brothers, Connor and Christopher, and skeletal, pale Hughie IOU. They hushed, pausing to gaze at Ben coolly, nodded and then went back to their game. Fat Man Leary behind the bar ea
ting a large slice of grey, dry looking sponge. He nodded at Ben as he entered the place. Engulfed the last of the cake into his swollen, pink face and wiped the crumbs from his mouth with the back of a bloated hand that had the last three fingers missing. Smooth stumps of a past mistake. Ben hung back, eyes darting from Leary to a barstool. Cake crumbs clung to the fat man’s dark, scraggly beard.

  “That punch-drunk fool still out there freezing his balls off, English?”

  “He is. And if word gets back to the Italians that Stevie is a few sandwiches short of a picnic, wandering up and down the street in his bathrobe and piss-stained undershorts talking to himself, they’ll hit you all hard and fast. Buccola’s already testing the waters over in Seaport. I’ve been telling you to try and keep him inside,” Ben said, dropping the bag down on the bar.

  “Stevie don’t listen none. Don’t stop yammering on about fighting in the 1920 Olympics, neither. Sick to the back teeth of hearing about it, truth be told.” Leary hefted the bag into air, shook it and then dropped it behind the bar out of sight. “That everything? How’d you say? Consolidated?”

  “It’s everything that’s anything,” Ben said sitting down at the end of the bar, the stool furthest from Leary and the table of Irishmen. He didn’t remove his hat. Hughie IOU muttered something; the Mulligans laughed it up. Ben eyeballed IOU until he looked down at his cards. The Mulligans stared at the tabletop grinning. They were talking about him. Laughing at him again. Ben knew it. Sure he heard someone whisper the word ‘buggy’ under their breath. Ben shook out a handkerchief from his jacket pocket and rubbed at his moist hands. Whispers rattled like dry leaves blown across concrete. Crazy. Sick. Father. Mother. Weak. Ill. Dishonorable Discharge. Sick. Filthy. Sick. Crazy. Buggy. Ben pulled the necktie from his throat, rolled it up and placed it in a jacket pocket, wiped sweat from his brow, his eyes and turned to glare at the table again. His heart choking in his chest. Someone whispered ‘buggy’ under their breath again.