The Mammoth Book of Pulp Action

Dog Life Mark Timlin

There wasn’t anything they could do for Billy Dukes when they found him. There hadn’t been anything anyone could do for him for quite a while. Two boys found him. Brothers. One twelve, the other ten. The pair had been trawling for anything they could find on the filthy beach left by the receding tide round the Isle of Dogs in east London. Once upon a time the boys would have been called mudlarks. Urchins. And they would’ve had the backsides hanging out of their trousers. But these two were dressed in the height of fashion for the time, the second year of the new millennium. They didn’t often find much when they wet their new trainers in the Thameside mud. Mostly old truck tyres, supermarket trolleys and the occasional used condom, knotted at the top, the gases inside blowing up the rubber like balloons. Billy Dukes had blown up too, his arms and legs sticking straight out from his torso like the Michelin man in those old advertisements. His body had been damaged by the water, bruised black and blue, and green with rot. But it hadn’t been just the river that had taken its toll. Someone else had done that before he’d been thrown in the water. Someone had taken a baseball bat to his knees and elbows and head. And then someone had cut his eyes out with a knife leaving two empty sockets staring up at the grey, London sky.

The boys looked at the body for a long time, but they didn’t touch it. Not that it would have worried them to do so. They were too young to realise that one day, maybe sooner, maybe later, they too would stare with sightless eyes at some stretch of sky as they joined Billy wherever he had gone.

The eldest boy used his newly acquired mobile to call the police. He felt very grown-up dialling three nines and telling the faceless voice on the other end what he and his brother had found.

The young police constable first on the scene knew all about mortality though, and he disgorged the egg, bacon, sausage, tomato, fried bread and two cups of strong tea he’d eaten in the station canteen a few hours before behind one of the massive wooden breakwaters that stuck out into the river at that point, in the shadow of the Millennium Dome just across the river. As he held onto the rotten wood it peeled off under his fingers just like the flesh of the dead man lying a few yards away, still under the watchful eyes of the two boys, would if touched.

The two detectives who arrived a few minutes later were made of sterner stuff, but they still took on something of the colour of Billy’s face after they had shooed the boys and the constable off and stood looking down at the dead body that looked up at them, but could see nothing.

The two plain-clothes coppers called for Scenes of Crime Officers, although they knew that it was unlikely that anything on the beach would throw up any information about the crime as the body would have been subject to the tidal flow of the Thames. SOCO duly arrived as the river started to come in again and the body was swiftly transferred to a coroner’s wagon to be taken to the police mortuary in Lambeth as the detectives spoke to the brothers who had now been joined by their mother, also called on the eldest boy’s mobile from the flats where the family lived just a short walk away.

Before the body was taken away, SOCO discovered a sodden wallet in the deceased’s back pocket which itself contained nothing but a single ten-pound note, a phone card and the remains of a UB40 that the social security department would eventually identify as belonging to Billy Dukes, a fact confirmed when the pathologist expertly removed the skin from his fingertips and checked the prints thus found with the police central computer files on convicted felons.

The funeral was a low-key affair attended only by Billy’s wife, their two sons, his mother and a lone detective. Billy was planted in Greenwich cemetery close by the river where he had been thrown by person or persons unknown, and if Billy’s family could have afforded a headstone, it would have looked out over the river to the exact spot he had been found.

No one was ever arrested for the murder of Billy Dukes, and as the days after his discovery turned to weeks and months, the case was consigned to the unsolved file, and eventually almost forgotten by the overworked Metropolitan police.

The Dukes had lived in a tower block on the south side of the river, a single concrete slab that stood tall and gave the finger to the surrounding low-rise buildings in the area. When the man who came looking for Billy’s wife found the block he expected the front door to be smashed in, the foyer daubed with graffiti and stinking of urine, and the lifts to be out of order. But, in fact, the local council had taken pity on the residents and restored the flats, so that the door was firmly locked against intruders, a concierge sat at a desk inside in front of a bank of CCTV monitors, the foyer was freshly painted and smelled only faintly of disinfectant and the four lifts ran smoothly. The concierge admitted the man, confirmed that the Dukes lived on the twenty-first floor and allowed him entry to the bank of elevators that transported him up into the sky. The man walked around the corridor with its magnificent view of London, found flat twenty-one-oh-six and rang the bell.

The woman who answered the door was overweight, with greasy, stringy hair and the look of defeat that her visitor had seen in many countries in the world.

“Yes,” she said, with the air of one who expected the Jehovah’s Witnesses or someone to cut off the electricity.

“Mrs Dukes,” said the man politely.

“Who wants her?”

“My name’s Vincent. Vincent Graves. I was a friend of your husband’s.”

“Billy. He didn’t have any friends. Only the bookies. And that’s because he left most of his dole behind the counter.

And a few publicans. They got the rest behind the jump.”

“I haven’t seen him for years,” said the man, “I only just heard what had happened. I wonder if I might talk to you.” He had a gentle voice, and kind eyes, and Veronica Dukes, Ronnie to her friends, found herself, almost against her will, opening the door wider and allowing him inside.

“Come through to the kitchen,” she said. “I’m just making a cuppa. Want one?”

The man smiled and nodded and he followed her down the hall.

If he had half expected the place to be a tip, he was surprised again. Pleasantly so. The flat was warm and spotlessly clean. The carpet through to the kitchen a deep red and thick under the soles of his boots. And the kitchen itself sparkled under the fluorescent lights, the tops wiped and everything in its place. A young boy sat at the table reading a comic and he looked up when his mother and her visitor entered.

“Go and watch TV, Jim, there’s a good boy,” Ronnie Dukes said, and without a murmur the boy concurred and a minute after he left they could hear the sound of Homer Simpson’s voice from another room. “Half term,” Ronnie explained. “That’s Jimmy, my youngest. Little Billy’s doing the shopping. They’re good boys, thank God. Not like their father.”

Vincent Graves stood awkwardly for a moment before sitting unbidden on the seat the boy had vacated as Ronnie Dukes found the makings of tea. When two mugs were prepared she set one in front of him and sat opposite with her own and looked at him. He wasn’t tall, just average size and dressed all in black. His monkey boots were cracked and down at heel and toe, but highly polished. His black Levis were worn white at the knees, and under a scuffed leather jacket he wore a black sweatshirt. But, despite the shabbiness of his clothes, he looked neat and contained, as if waiting for inspection. Between his feet lay the black leather bag he had been carrying on his arrival. Ronnie looked closer at his face. He was, she guessed, about the same age as her husband, his tanned skin, lined and worn, his hair the colour of cigarette ash, thin and cropped close to his skull.

He looked tired, but there was something in his eyes that she liked.

“I’m sorry about Billy,” he said, taking a pair of glasses from inside his jacket. They were rimless, and one ear piece had been attached with a piece of fuse wire. He saw her notice and pulled a face. “One day I’ll have them fixed,” he said.

“Why are you here?” she asked.

“Like I told you. I was sorry to hear about Billy.”

“I’m glad someone is. He didn’t owe you money, did he?”

He shook his head at the question. “No. We were old friends.”

“He never mentioned you.”

“Did he not?” The man didn’t seem surprised.

“No.”

“We went to school together.”

“You can’t have seen much of him then. From what I’ve heard he was hardly ever there.”

“Nor was I.”

She laughed mirthlessly and found a packet of cigarettes on one of the kitchen tops, offered the man one which he refused and lit one for herself.

“What exactly happened?” the man asked after a moment.

“God knows,” she said. “Billy must’ve done something out of order. Nothing new there. They cut out his eyes.”

She started to cry then and the man put his hand over hers. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean...”

“No. I’m the one that’s sorry,” she said and wiped her eyes on her sleeve. “It’s just that no one’s done anything.”

“The police.”

She laughed again without humour. “What do they care?”

He made no reply.

“He was a grass,” she went on. “An informer. That’s what they do to grasses round here. To warn anyone else off. They broke his knees and elbows and cut out his eyes, then tossed him into the river like so much rubbish. He wasn’t much, my Billy, but I loved him. And now there’s no one.” She looked past him with red-rimmed eyes and saw only a future alone.

“I’m sorry,” Vincent said again. “If I’d’ve known I’d’ve come sooner, but I’ve been... away.”

“Prison?” Ronnie asked.

The man shook his head. “No. But it’s been close a couple of times.”

“Billy did time.”

“I know.”

“How?”

“Sorry.”

“How do you know about him? Being in prison. Being dead.”

“I keep in touch as much as I can. Of course, as time goes on it’s harder. People move. People die.”

“You can say that again.”

“He saved my life once,” said Vincent.

“Did you pay him?”

“No.” He looked surprised at the question.

“Because he didn’t do much for free, my Billy.”

“He did that. It was a long time ago,” Vincent explained. “When we were kids. Out there.” He gestured towards the kitchen window with its view of the river sparkling in the autumn sunshine. “When it was still a working river. He dared me to swim out to a boat and see what I could find. I did it. I was a puny kid then and I got into trouble. The wash from another boat. I nearly drowned. He jumped in and saved me.”

“Blimey,” said Ronnie. “He never mentioned that either. Mind you, Billy’s life was all secrets.”

Vincent nodded as if his too had its share, which it had.

“So you have no idea who did it?” he asked at length.

She shook her head.

“I’ll find them,” he said.

“Who, you? What can you do?”

“What I said.”

“Fat chance.”

Outside, a helicopter flew low over east London.

“Do you really think you can?” she asked when it had passed by.

“Yes.”

She shook her head. “If the cops can’t...”

“I’m not the cops.”

“You can say that again. I don’t fancy your chances.”

“You don’t know me.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Then trust me.”

She smiled ruefully as if trust was a currency in short supply in her life. “OK,” she said. “You’re better than nothing, I suppose.”

He made no reply to that.

“How will I know?” she asked.

“What?”

“That you’ve found them. Him. Whatever.”

“You’ll know.”

“How?”

“You just will.”

The look in his eyes convinced her and she nodded.

“But now I’d better go. I don’t have much time,” he said.

“Something important on?” she asked.

He smiled. “Not really. But I have to be somewhere. Anyway, thanks for your time.”

“That’s all I’ve got these days.”

“You have your sons.”

“For how long? They’ll be gone too soon. That’s what kids do.”

“That’s what everyone does.”

She nodded in agreement and he got up to go.

“Thanks for coming,” she said as she opened the front door to let him out.

“I owed him at least that. Goodbye, Mrs Dukes. I hope things go well for you.”

She shook her head and she was still shaking it as he waited for the lift and entered it.

She never saw him again.

Vincent Graves spent the next three days visiting pubs in Rotherhithe, Greenwich and the Isle of Dogs. He walked for miles, sipping halves of lager, water and juice as he watched and listened, occasionally ingratiating himself into conversations and questioning bar staff. The day he’d visited Ronnie Dukes he found a room in a boarding house in Poplar run by a fat Asian gentleman. The toilet was unusable and the bathroom was filthy and Vincent smiled at the thought of how many time he had been ordered to clean latrines with a toothbrush until they sparkled, and wondered how the Asian would take to being forced to do the same, but did nothing about it. It was a place to flop, that was all. Cheap, and handy for his search. But when he went out in the morning he always took his bag, because the lock in his room door appeared to have been forced as many times as it had been opened with a key.

On the evening of the third day, the sun had set early behind banks of low, purple clouds, and the rain had started as the rush hour began. Vincent had walked to a pub that stood above the northern entrance to the Blackwall Tunnel and looked at the traffic speeding in both directions before entering. The line of cars coming from the north were stuck solid and looked like a diamond necklace with their headlamps full on, and the vehicles heading back in that direction like a string of rubies, and the man smiled to himself before entering the pub.

It was quiet at that hour and he only stayed long enough for one glass of mineral water. When he left and walked onto the island, the rain had stopped, the puddles on the pavement were as black as ink and reflected the sodium street lights.

There was a new hotel on one corner and another pub at the end of that street and he decided to investigate. But before he could reach the warmth of the bar, his walk was interrupted as a man stepped out of a concealed entrance and blocked his path. Vincent felt a surge of adrenalin through his body. He knew that eventually this was bound to happen. Sooner or later someone would mark his progress and do something about it.

“Oi, you,” said the figure in front of him. “What’s your game?”

“Game?” Vincent replied without rancour. “No game.”

“You interested in Billy Dukes, the dirty grass,” the figure said, and Vincent sensed more movement behind him and turned so that his back was against the wall that surrounded the hotel. Two other figures had appeared from the hotel car park. One was carrying a baseball bat. The man noted that it was made of wood. Somewhere he remembered reading a story where two assassins discussed the merits of wooden bats versus metal. He couldn’t remember where, or who had written the story.

“That’s right,” said Vincent, dropping the bag he was carrying and taking off his glasses and slipping them into the inside pocket of his jacket.

“Well, you’d better forget about him and go home.”

“Did you kill him?” asked Vincent.

“Killed his bloody self. With his gob.”

“Shut up,” said the one with the bat. “Let’s get this done.” And with that he swung the bat hard at Vincent’s head. Hard enough to take it off his shoulders if the blow had connected. But it didn’t. Almost faster than the eye could follow, Vincent lifted his left hand and caught the fat end of the bat on his palm with the sound of an axe hitting a tree, stopping the weapon dead, about three inches from his skull. Then, as easily as most men would have taken a lollipop stick from a small child, he twisted the bat out of his assailant’s hand, transferred the handle to his right, and smashed him on the outside of his left knee with exactly the same sound, plus the unmistakable noise of at least one bone snapping. The erstwhile attacker screamed then, a sound so high that only the dogs that lived on the eponymous island that they made their home could hear. Then Vincent broke the bat across his knee as easily as another man would have broken the same lollipop stick.

If the trio of attackers had the wit to realise how difficult a task this would be, the bat being almost three inches in diameter at its thickest point, that would have been the time to realise that discretion was the better part of valour and go home to cocoa and a warm bed. But neither wit nor time was on their side and they decided to continue.

The original speaker produced a knife from inside his Puffa jacket and stabbed at Vincent’s stomach. He moved smoothly aside, allowing the point of the knife to slide past his belt, took hold of the attacker’s arm at the elbow joint and pressed hard. Another scream and the clatter of the knife hitting the pavement as Vincent twisted the joint and the crack of the break echoed off the bricks. Vincent tossed the man into the gutter and turned his attention to assassin number three, who he lifted up by his throat and asked without pausing for breath, “Who sent you?”

The third man’s feet lifted off the ground and he kicked frantically as he searched for purchase on something solid. “Jimmy Silver,” he gasped.

“Who is he?” asked Vincent.

“He owns it round here.”

“Owns what?”

“Let me down, please.”

Vincent could see the man’s face reddening almost to black under the pressure of his fingers and he dropped him back on his feet where he doubled up searching for air. “Owns what?” Vincent asked again, kicking the man with the broken knee in the ribs as he tried to crab away to somewhere safe where his reputation as a hard man was still intact.

“Everything,” said the third man, holding his hands to his throat. “Fags, booze, dope. Everything.”

“Where do I find him?”

“You don’t. He finds you.”

Vincent backhanded him casually around the face. “He must have a place,” he said. “Don’t mess around or I’ll really hurt you.”

The third man considered what pain he’d already felt, and what being ‘really hurt’ would entail.

“The Golden Hind pub on the island,” he said. “It’s his place. He’s there all the time. Lives upstairs in the week.”

Vincent considered the three men littered about around him. Broken Knee was now lying holding his ribs, at least one that Vincent had felt crack as he kicked him. Broken elbow lay in the gutter unconscious, his snorting breath disturbing a pool of rainwater. The third one was leaning against the hotel wall, his head bowed. “I suppose the first thing you’ll do will be to call Jimmy Silver,” said Vincent.

“No. No, mate. I’m off.”

“Liar,” said Vincent.

“Don’t hurt me no more, mate,” said the third man. “I just did this as a favour.”

Vincent smiled. “No good deed goes unpunished,” he said. He knew he had two choices. Kill’all three or walk away. But this was London, and a triple murder wouldn’t go unnoticed, and he had no time or means to hide the bodies. “Tell Silver I’m coming,” he said and, picking up his bag, he walked away.

Back at the boarding house Vincent looked up the address of The Golden Hind in the tattered directory next to the pay phone in the narrow corridor that acted as a foyer under the watchful eye of the proprietor as if he was about to steal it. Next he checked his A-Z and found the street, a narrow thoroughfare close to the DLR railway between Mudchute and Island Gardens. It was not a pub he had visited previously.

That same evening he went on a recce. It was a worn out house with peeling paint and a wonky sign that creaked in the breeze. But it was busy. Mostly locals, he surmised, being far from the glittering towers of Canary Wharf, and advertised all-day breakfasts, live music and karaoke. From where he was watching there was a constant to-ing and fro-ing of punters, but there was also a suspiciously large presence of big men in leather jackets with heavy boots and shaven heads. Obviously the word was out that the three stooges had been taken apart and Jimmy Silver was taking no chances.

Vincent stood in the shadows for more than an hour, then, after slipping on a pair of thin leather gloves, went into a nearby council estate, looking for a warmer and safer reconnaissance point.

He found it in the shape of an old Ford Thames van which he broke into and started easily. The petrol gauge showed just under half full, and with the lights off he pulled out of the estate’s car park, then switched on the sidelights and drove back to the pub. Once there he parked a hundred yards or so down from the front door in the darkest space he could find, killed the engine and lights and climbed into the back. The van was obviously used by some sort of handyman and was littered with tools and old, paint-covered sheets that Vincent made into a nest which he lay upon with a clear view of the pub through the back windows. He didn’t know how long it would be before the owner noticed the vehicle missing, but as he had seen little police presence on the island on his travels, and considering the dilapidated state of the Ford, he surmised it would not be on the local coppers’ high priority whatever happened, and he hoped he would only need it for a few hours.

Chucking-out time seemed to be a movable feast at the Hind. Drinkers drifted out in ones and twos from eleven-thirty onwards, and the lights in the bar were not dimmed until after midnight. Vincent lay patiently in the van and waited.

Lights also went on and off in the rooms above the bar but, finally, around twelve-thirty, the downstairs lights went down to a dim glow and through the glass on the front doors he saw someone snap the bolts at the top.

He gave it another twenty minutes before he stretched his stiffening muscles, crawled back into the front of the van and exited from the driver’s door. First of all he headed away from the building, then took a circuitous route around the back that was protected by high walls trimmed with barbed wire. Then he strolled around to the front and sensed a human presence, before he saw one of the large men standing by the corner smoking a cigarette, facing away from him. Vincent sucked in a breath and, silently, on the toes of his rubber-soled monkey boots drifted closer to the smoker.

The man never saw or heard a thing until Vincent propelled him by the back of his neck into the brick wall of the Hind, where his cigarette burst in a cloud of sparks and his nose broke with an audible snap. A rabbit punch finished the assault and Vincent dragged the unconscious body into a gap between the pub and the next-door building and left the man snoring quietly, a bubble of blood popping out of one nostril with each exhalation.

Where there’s one there’s usually two, he thought, and walked round the corner, almost bumping into a twin of the first man. “Sorry,” said Vincent, doing a body-swerve around the surprised heavy before smashing him in the kidneys with the extended three fingers of his right hand and breaking his jaw with the palm of the other. The man slumped to the ground and Vincent pulled him out of sight between two parked cars.

He went straight back to the van, found a sharp screwdriver amongst the tools in the back, started the engine, then, leaving it running, went to the back of the vehicle, screwdriver in hand, found the fuel tank and ruptured it with one straight stroke of the blade. He ran back to the driver’s seat, smacked the Ford into gear and did a screeching U-turn, drove up onto the pavement and stopped by the front doors. He pulled open the back doors which he’d unlocked from the inside, collected the pile of sheets and ran across the road to where the trail of spilt petrol lay like a rainbow on the damp tarmac. He lit a match and dropped it onto the liquid, watched as flame ran across the street and headed to the back of the pub again as the petrol tank exploded like a bomb. There was one more explosion as the engine caught, and he pulled himself up the pub wall, tossed the sheets over the barbed wire and rolled over to drop into the pub’s back area amongst a pile of crates and empty beer barrels.

As lights came on at the top of the house, Vincent kicked the back door in and ran upstairs. He had no idea of the layout inside the building but trusted his instincts to find who he was looking for. As he ran, thick smoke filled the stairwell and he covered his mouth and nose with his sleeve.

A door opened in front of him and a man ran out and hammered on the next door. “Are you all right, Jimmy? I’ve called the fire bri—” Vincent didn’t let him finish. On his travels he had noticed that there was a fire station less than a mile away, and he didn’t have much time. Vincent hammered the man to the carpet and opened the door. Inside was a bedroom. In the bed were two figures, one female, one male. The female sat up pulling the bedclothes over her ample breasts. Next to her, clearly visible in the light leaking through the curtains, was a moustachioed man just coming awake.

Outside, Vincent could already hear the sound of sirens.

“Who the hell...?” said the woman above the noise, but Vincent was at her side of the bed in an instant and silenced her with a punch to the jaw.

The man sat up too, his face indignant.

“Jimmy?” said Vincent.

The man said, “Who wants to know?”

“I’m a friend of Billy Dukes,” said Vincent. “You’re Jimmy Silver.”

But Silver wasn’t paying attention. He was staring at the door, and suddenly Vincent felt a strong arm around his throat, and another clamped his arms to his side. His breathing was constricted and the light from the window darkened. With all his strength Vincent stamped back with one boot heel. Once, twice, three times on the instep of his captor, who loosened his grip enough to allow Vincent to strike back with his elbow. The breath whooshed out of the man and Vincent felt for his groin. He found the man’s balls tight in denim, and he twisted hard. Hard enough so that he could feel the rupture grow in his hand as the man screamed and loosed his hold. Vincent spun round and flat-footed him hard in the stomach, and he dropped to the carpet. When Vincent turned back, Silver was groping for something in the drawer of the bedside cabinet. Vincent vaulted the bed and slammed the drawer shut on Silver’s wrist.

“Bastard,” said Silver.

“Goodbye,” said Vincent and broke Silver’s neck with one hand as at least one fire engine skidded to a halt outside. Vincent pulled Silver out of bed and with both thumbs dug into his eye sockets and popped out both eyeballs. He broke the strings and gathered the two damp orbs into one gloved palm before leaving.

Outside the bedroom the smoke was thicker, more fire engines had arrived, and helmeted figures appeared at the foot of the stairs.

Vincent ran down, his arm covering his face again. “Upstairs,” he yelled at one of the firemen. “There’s people trapped,” and ran past as the firemen clattered up past him. As the last one went by, Vincent shouted, “Hey.”

The fireman turned and Vincent said, “These belong to the boss here,” and he dropped the eyes from his gloved hand into the fireman’s own.

“What?” said the confused man, looking down through the breathing mask he was wearing. “What’s this?” But Vincent was already through the back door and saw that the gate to the street had been opened, and he pushed through into the fresh air. He jogged down the road and lost himself in the council estate.

Vincent cut across the island and went back to the boarding house to collect the bag he had left with the owner. Then he left the area never to return. When the story of the fire at The Golden Hind broke, the various assaults meted out to customers and staff, and the death of its owner, Jimmy Silver, by person or persons unknown, much was made of the grisly nature of the way Silver’s eyes were given to the fire officer. Up on the twenty-first floor of the tower block in Rotherhithe, Ronnie Dukes read the story in her morning paper and knew what Vincent had promised her had come true.

The next time she visited her late husband’s grave she found a wilted, blood-red rose dropping its petals on the dirt. It was held fast by a stone. Under the stone was a single sheet of paper torn from a notebook. On it was written one word — Goodbye.