Civvies

'I've never forgotten the way you came round… it, well, it meant a lot to me.'

'I was just sorry it had to be him.' Dillon shuffled, staring down at the soiled black Pumas. 'He was a really good soldier…'

'My boy thought the world of you, always mentioned you in his letters home…' Newman's flat delivery skirted the edge of something near real emotion. 'We never hit it off that well, I reckoned he joined up to get away from me.' Newman's pale grey eyes sought Dillon's. 'I've sort of made it my business to give a helping hand to his pals when they get into civvies.'

'Billy was a good lad,' was all Dillon could think to say.

'Meant a lot, you coming round the way you did, to Maureen. She's dead now. I think Billy's going took the heart out of her… we only had the one, just the one son.' Newman studied the glowing tip of the cheroot. Outwardly, the neatly-parted grey hair and grey moustache gave him the distinguished yet dated look of a thirties matinee idol, but Dillon wasn't deceived. He didn't, never could, trust those cold flat eyes, a predator waiting to pounce.

Dillon shifted uneasily as Newman placed a hand on his shoulder.

'I reckon I owe you a favour. I can offer you a lot of work, and with Jimmy on my payroll, be like old times…' The sunken cheeks creased in a smile. 'He's a card, isn't he? Eh? Jimmy… I think you'd make a good team.'

'Thanks, Mr Newman, but -' Dillon shrugged, staring at the ground. 'I've got a few things in the pipeline…'

'Have you?'

'Yes.' Dillon cleared his throat. 'I want – well, eventually – to open up a security firm. Me and a few of the lads.'

'Good.' Newman seemed genuinely pleased. 'That's a good idea. Well, if I can be of any assistance, you know Jimmy can always put you in touch. I'd like to see you set up with a few readies in your hand. I know it's tough coming out, and, well, I'll be straight with you, Frank -'

Dillon stepped back, held up his hand. 'That's just it, Mr Newman. I want to go straight. Whatever Jimmy does is his business.' He turned quickly away, jogging off. 'But I appreciate your offer…'

Newman stared after him, the friendly warmth instantly extinguished by a glacial stillness, as if Dillon had struck him. With a flick of the wrist he tossed the cheroot away and made an abrupt gesture to Jimmy, who slid off the Jaguar's bonnet and went after the running figure, now leaping up the concrete stairway, two at a time.

'Frank… wait! Wait a minute!'

Dillon halted on the first-floor landing and looked down as Jimmy reached the bottom of the stairs, swept-back hair bouncing, features strained in a matey grin.

'No, Jimmy, you wait.' Legs braced apart, outstretched arms pressed against the brick walls either side, Dillon looked in no mood for the old pal's act. 'I don't want any involvement with that crook. I don't want him brought round my place, near my place. And if you'd got any sense, you'd walk -'

Jimmy broke in. 'He's trying to do you a favour!'

'Whatever I did for Billy, I'd do for any of my lads. I joined up because of men like Newman. His own son tried to get away from him. He's rotten. Billy knew it, I knew it.' Dillon's voice sank, but the intensity didn't. 'I know it, Jimmy, because his type was all I had going for me when I was a kid. Now I want more, Jimmy, and I want it legit.'

A slight flush mottled Jimmy's cheeks. He gave one last guarded look at Dillon, as if he'd been caught out in a lie, then turned sharply away, muttering tersely, 'I hope you find it, Frank!'

Dillon watched him go. Angry, bitter, but most of all sad.

Jumped-up pompous twits with their bloody bits of papers and petty rules! Newman's visit had put him in a foul temper and his trip to the DSS office later that afternoon didn't improve it one iota. Christ, he could have sat on that plastic chair staring at the muddy green wall till the cows came home for all the good it did him, till his teeth dropped out. What did they care? Three, four years ago Dillon had run across an old mate with sixteen years' service under his belt who'd recently got his discharge. This bloke, ex-sergeant, had asked the C.O. for a reference, set him up in Civvy Street, and the C.O. had written in his file: 'Suitable for petrol pump attendant.' After all the bullshit about serving Queen and Country and upholding the honour of the Regiment and drumming it into you that you were the cream of the Army's elite fighting men, that's how the system treated you. All of a sudden you were a social leper. Brain-dead. About as much use as a wet fart in a wind-tunnel. Thanks ever so much for all you've done, old chap, now kindly fuck off.

Well, the DSS could go fuck itself, in spades, as far as he was concerned, Dillon thought savagely, slamming the front door shut behind him and stopping in the nick of time from cracking his shin on the bikes in the hallway. He went through, wrenching his tie loose, feeling sweaty and ridiculous in his best suit that Susie had pressed for him that morning. She looked up, eyebrows raised, hopefully or expectantly, he was past caring.

'I been in that dump all afternoon, waiting like a prat, for my number to be called out -'

'And? Well, what did they say?'

'Number twenty-three to cubicle four…' Dillon mimicked a prissy officious voice. 'Number twenty-four to cubicle five. I was number fifty-three. Went to the friggin' job centre section, came back and I'd missed me number!' He took a pale-green ticket from his breast pocket, tore it in half and scattered the bits on the coffee table.

'So you didn't sign on, did you?'

Dillon was on his way back through the hallway, jacket half-off. 'I'll get Steve, go for a run.'

'Fine, you go and see Steve.' Susie was up quick, after him. 'And while you're up there could you tell him to throw out his empty bottles and his dirty bandages… Did you tell them about your experience in the Army? Frank?'

Leaving his jacket draped over the banister post, Dillon started up. 'Anythin' I've done was in the Army, and that don't mean nothin'. Bloody IRA think more of us!' He suddenly turned, hot angry eyes burning down into hers. 'Every Para's worth seven grand to them. Six, if you're dead.'

Steve leaned over the banister, mouth working, croaking at Dillon. 'YoU'D bE – burp -BetTEr off cOMin' OuT -burp - Of thE nlcK!'

Too right, mate.'

'What did he say?' Susie frowned.

'He said I would be better off comin' out of the nick!' Dillon threw a punch. 'Move, Steve – let's be havin' yaaaa!'

Steve gurgled something and Dillon responded with force, 'Right, mate, half-way houses, career officers, counsellors, subsistences, therapists, psychiatrists, physiotherapists…'

The phone rang on the hall table, Dillon's voice floating from above ('An' if that's Jimmy, I'm not in.') as Susie snatched it up.

'Hello?' Susie listened, eyes growing bigger, then in a rush, 'Oh, yes, yes, he is, just hang on a second…' Head craning up the stairs, yelling excitedly, 'Frank, it's that friend of Mum's – he owns a building site… quick!'

Dillon cleared the banister rail and did a free-fall drop, arms parallel with his sides, to land at Susie's feet, springing lightly up and grabbing the phone. He coughed and said, 'Frank Dillon…' listening and nodding as Susie stuck both thumbs up. '…there's two of us, yeah.' He grinned then, nodding harder as if somebody had tightened his spring. '… Fantastic!'

Beaming a great big smile, Susie punched holes in the air, fists raised high. Yippee!

CHAPTER 6

The tinny blare of a transistor playing Radio One echoed round the building-site, some berk with a mid-atlantic accent and no sense of humour trying to crack jokes at seven-fifteen on a dismal grey Monday morning. The young bloke alongside Dillon in the cradle, twenty feet up, supposed to be – literally -'showing him the ropes', considered himself something of a joker too, and a patronising bastard into the bargain. Making clever cracks ever since Dillon and Steve had walked on the site at seven o'clock, bang on time.