Skinhead Page 6

  She was a pretty girl beneath the grime of their outdoor existence; a girl with a high I.Q. gone to “pot”. She liked calling herself that. It amused her to watch intelligent faces light up and acknowledge her witticism.

  “Cherry’s right, Rog,” Joel Standish said calmly. His American accent bit into the wind. “They’re coming after us!” For himself, he didn’t give a goddam what happened. He was sick and needed hospitalization anyway. His ulcers were reaching danger point. In a way, he’d welcome a beating and deportation. He could think of better places to go hippie than England. He thought about California and the communes; about the searing head of Death Valley and the wild life the likes of a Manson could have there. He thought about orgies where the girls were all naked and the pot was freshly imported from Mexico and the desert sun beat down to provide a love nest of shifting hot sand.

  Then, suddenly, he thought about his draft dodging and how they’d grab him and toss him into a hoosegow once he set foot in Uncle Sam’s land. Fear clogged his nostrils. “Let’s get the hell away from here, Rog,” he yelled, turning to run.

  “No...”

  Roger was too late. The moment Joel turned tail, Joe and his mob broke into a run.

  Cherry screamed, threw herself over a low fence and rolled down the incline, her sleeping bag denting her soft side as she rolled over and over.

  He couldn’t tell it was a girl trying to escape. He jumped the fence, slithered down the steep incline and landed on top of her as she sprawled on the pebble beach. His tool rose ready to smash down on the unprotected head until he saw her face.

  Slowly, he lowered his hand, ripped her duffle coat open and felt for her breasts.

  “You bastard!” she screamed up at him.

  Billy felt the old urge return as he squeezed soft yielding flesh. His hand worked inside her jeans down... down, until he felt her pubic hair. “Christ, I’m goin’ to rape you,” he mouthed.

  Cherry fought. She didn’t mind the act itself but she objected to being used in plain sight of these animals. His hand was hurting her, his fingers exploring without regard for the tenderness of her body. Her fist smashed into his face... into the damage of last night. He yelled, his tool catching her a hard blow above the eye. She slumped dazed, shocked, unable to resist his frantic attempts to rip her jeans off.

  Joe felt his boot sink deep into the tall one’s groin. He lashed out again, catching the other under the chin as he sank to the ground, hands clutching the injured parts. Like an automaton, Joe kept kicking... each blow bringing him greatest satisfaction as the moans of hurt rose above the screaming wind. He didn’t care if he killed the hippie or not. He wanted to hurt... to rid himself of the feeling within his chest; a feeling bordering on murderous rage.

  Don laughed, slammed his shortened axe handle almost down the hippie’s throat as the man valiantly tried to resist. It was easy, Don thought, kicking his opponent in the balls, listening to the rapturous sigh, the explosive groan. He hit the falling hippie on the head, hearing the crunch of bone against axe handle, and kicked into the ribs.

  Tony watched blood flow from the ripped head of his target. That made two for him. The other wasn’t moving now. A few fast belts with his tool and several well aimed kicks had taken care of him. He glanced down the incline, saw Billy mounting the girl, and yelled joyously. He kicked his second opponent in the face, slammed the tyre iron down on the bloody head again and vaulted the fence.

  “Me next, mate,” he yelled, watching Billy penetrate the half-stupefied girl hippie. Her jeans lay on the beach, her thighs pimpled with cold, her buttocks bruised by the relentless rocks that formed this section of the shoreline.

  Joe wanted to keep kicking the hippie but, somehow the pleasure had ebbed since the other ceased to fight back; since the unresisting body had stopped moving. He turned away in disgust to seek another fresh target for his rage.

  “Bloody fools,” he yelled, catching sight of Billy and Tony. He glanced down the road, saw a familiar car starting to enter it from the direction of the marina. He jumped the fence and raced downhill. “Get out of the bitch!” he hollered at Billy, tearing his mate from the girl’s nakedness. “Fuzz...”

  “I ain’t finished it yet,” Billy wailed, eyes wild and staring at her nudity. God how he loved thick pubic hair! She had the thickest covering of any bird he’d ever stripped.

  “You’ll be finished if the fuzz get you,” Joe snapped. “Come on – run!” He started running along the beach, seeing Don slither and fall as he followed in their wake. He didn’t care if Billy had to run with it out – that was his fault for trying to do two things at once!

  *

  The train took its time leaving the station. Joe felt on edge, seated at the window, straining to see if the fuzz were coming down the platform. At last, as the wheels began to catch, he breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Bleedin’ lucky, mate,” he told Billy. He saw Preston Park flash past as the train gathered speed. “Christ, can’t you ever go on an aggro without trying to find a bird to fuck?”

  Billy sulked. He felt worse than he had earlier. He had a bad case of “lover’s balls”. If only Joe had let him have just another couple of plunges...

  “Did you see it, Joe?” Tony asked.

  “Yeah, so wot... she’s no different from other birds.”

  “Jeeze, she had...”

  “Shuddup,” Billy growled. “I know wot she ’ad.”

  Joe grinned. He’d expended his hatred. Now, he could afford to vent a little spite on Billy. “Tell me about ’er, Tony,” he said deliberately. “Was she hairy...?”

  Billy tried to close his ears as Tony delighted in describing the girl in intimate detail. He couldn’t help overhearing how Tony had viewed his hasty mating nor how he had looked when Joe dragged him off the bitch. He wished the fuzz had caught the others and let him finish. He’d have to find a bird when they got back to Plaistow or else he’d have an awful night of it again...

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  For four days of every week Joe worked for a coal delivery merchant. He never worked a Tuesday, but that was tomorrow and his reasons did not bear thinking about until...

  He hated Monday almost as much as he hates hippies. He had read the Mirror’s account of the young thugs who had viciously attacked five hippies in Brighton and tried to mass-rape the girl with them. He had read, with a high degree of pleasure, how the four male hippies were in serious condition in Brighton hospital and that the girl had been released after getting stitches in a head wound. Fortunately, the description issued by the police would fit any skinhead in London so he didn’t think they’d ever trace the mob from Brighton.

  His mate on the delivery lorry was a man of about forty – an illiterate Cockney with a fantastic sense of humour but nothing else to qualify him as Joe’s mate. Joe worked his fiddles with a recklessness that increased the thrill of robbing old age pensioners and old women too timid to object to his overcharging. He had a standard method of getting a few bob from every customer – he simply altered their half of the delivery slip to read a higher amount. If they argued, which was seldom, he argued back – and usually won. If they threatened to telephone the company he’d back down with a grin and explain that some stupid bastard of a clerk had made a mistake.

  There were a few calls where fiddles were strictly verboten – like when they had a delivery to Mrs. Marrinor. He always let his mate heave the coal into her basement. And, naturally enough, he never appeared again until he had satisfied the middle-aged nympho’s craving for a “dirty coalman to jump on top of my lily-white flesh”.

  Oh, there were perks galore for delivering coal!

  Another non-fiddle place of call was on the estate. Mrs. “bleedin’ heart” Bassault, the French bird whose husband always seemed to be away on some ship or another. Joe knew all about her. She was the Point professional fuck. Any man with enough ready cash left after a night in the local boozer could stop off at her flat to avail himself of her excellent services
regardless of whether or not he could, or could not, perform with a skinful on. Mrs. Bassault had never been known to fail when she was paid for relieving frustrations. One way – or another – she guaranteed results.

  This Monday they had six bags for Mrs. Bassault.

  “Look, mate,” Joe told his driver, “she’s due for it. Let me ’ave it today?”

  The older man screwed his piggish eyes into slits and considered Joe’s request. He had been thinking how nice it would be for himself. He hadn’t been getting his share off the old woman for weeks and he was overdue to make a personal delivery to Mrs. Bassault’s bedroom. “I dunno...” he said.

  “A quid if you let me...”

  “Shit! I’d pay twice that to call at night.”

  “Okay, two quid!” Joe felt generous. He’d made forty-seven shillings that morning already. And, he had what was left of the robbery in his wallet, too.

  “Done! Ram her for me, eh?” the driver chuckled as he eased his lorry into the Point driveway and parked directly behind the Bassault block.

  Mrs. Bassault didn’t question Joe’s urgent knocks. She looked at him and said, “Coal today?” She stood back and added, “I’m short of cash but...” Her robe fell open displaying knickers and brassiere and expanses of creamy flesh.

  Joe crudely pulled the front of her knickers down and studied the pubic region. “Sorry, Mrs. Bassault – we’re short on cash this week. I’m afraid I can only deduct a quid...”

  “You’re a big boy, “she replied. “I suppose...” She moved away as the coal-dust on his hand left a black mark down her gently-rounded stomach. Where his fingers had gripped her pink knickers the individual black prints showed too. She glared at these, and said testily, “I hate washing them, Joe.”

  “Take everything off,” he said, starting to unzip his flies. “I won’t dirty your bed today, either. The floor’s great.”

  She spread newspaper on the carpet, stripped and lay back with her thighs wide apart. Her hands came up, and out. “Don’t keep me waiting, Joe...”

  *

  “Was it good?”

  Joe inclined his head. “Like it always is... in, out, up, down and thanks for bringing the coal, Joe.”

  “We’ve got Sally Vincent today, “the man said slowly, watching Joe’s face.

  Joe cursed. He should have studied the delivery sheet. If he’d known Sally was one of their customers he’d have let this bastard fuck the French whore.

  “I get ’er, eh Joe?”

  “Yeah, you get Sally!”

  After he heaved the coal down Sally’s chute he returned to the lorry and sweated out the half-hour before his mate returned. His imagination ran riot thinking of Sally. He knew exactly what would happen inside her house... he’d been through the procedure often enough to visualize her performance. She didn’t believe in intercourse in the ordinary way. She didn’t want a bastard, she always said. She had her own pleasurable method for making her delivery men pay for her creature-comforts. The milkman for one, got his treatment every Monday. The laundryman got his on Friday. The gas and electricity blokes always came away swearing she had been a frugal customer. And, whenever she wanted coal, she got a delivery and a forty-five minute thrill. Not to mention what the coalman got.

  “Hey, Joe... she let me into ’er...”

  Joe felt sick. Ever since he took this flamin’ job he’d wanted into Sally. Now, this old bastard had done the bit.

  “She was pissed,” his mate kept saying. “Pissed! Seems she discovered her old man put one in her oven and she don’t give a cunt anymore!” The driver chuckled, got behind the steering-wheel. “Cor, she did give me one! I tell you – there ain’t no woman with a better set or a more active...”

  “For chrissakes, dry up!” Joe shouted.

  He felt so rotten he didn’t even attempt to argue when an old age pensioner contested his charges. He changed her figures back to normal, stamped off to the lorry and growled for his mate to hurry. For once, the Cockney humour was lacking. His mate didn’t wish to rile Joe. He’d have ample opportunity to sleep in a cold bed that night and cogitate over his earlier success.

  *

  The church basement was crowded with clean, respectable teenagers. They were enjoying their weekly social and the vicar kept changing the discs and serving the coffee without one single word of discouragement.

  They were an exuberant crowd, perfectly content in the knowledge that St. James’s was a church young people could be proud of, and assured of a weekly welcome from the with-it vicar.

  Every Sunday, the church was able to boast of superlative attendances – mostly consisting of teenager adherents to the open policies that had initiated their decorous youth club.

  Peter Bloomfield studied the group dancing and inwardly congratulated himself for the success he had had with what had always been classified an unruly element in his district. In his opinion, God was not a harsh God, nor an authoritarian. God was love and love should be that emotion shared with one’s fellow man or woman (always depending, naturally, on the holy state of matrimony; he did not condone the permissiveness that certain elements of society tried to force churchmen into accepting).

  “How are things at home, Albert?” he asked as a tall, thin youngster came to stand beside him.

  Albert Newton shrugged casually. He wasn’t one of those who accepted Bloomfield as the “teenager’s saviour”. He had his reservations and, mostly, they revolved around the vicar’s pet theory that sex before marriage was illicit, immoral, bad for a “God-blessed” union. Albert was virile and could always get any girl he went after. He enjoyed feeling around and exercising his manhood. For that reason he was the blackest sheep in the vicar’s little fold.

  “Not bad, Mr. Bloomfield,” he replied, conscious of the need to treat the man with a certain respect. He didn’t realise that it was this deference that made him Bloomfield’s special target. In the vicar’s mind, any teenager willing to show respect was worth saving.

  “Has your father found a job yet?”

  Albert grunted. “How could he?”

  There was no answer to that, Bloomfield thought. Mr. Newton was one of nature’s favourite layabouts. He had feigned illness so long he would not know how to find the strength to go for an interview.

  “I see Betty Rowe is here tonight...”

  Albert tightened up inside.

  “She asked if you were coming...”

  Albert lit a cigarette.

  “Have you thought about what I suggested the last time we met?”

  The boy grinned. “Yeah. No!”

  Peter Bloomfield felt the immediate urge to rant at the youth. He calmed himself and said: “There’s nothing wrong with being a police constable, Albert.”

  “No?” Albert savagely stubbed his cigarette into the palm of one hand – a feat he had perfected since seeing it done on television by a so-called hard man. “They’re underpaid, nobody likes ’em and I don’t want my head kicked in at demos...”

  “Ah, “the vicar smiled, placing a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “I see.” He didn’t really! “You think all policemen spend their time getting maltreated?”

  “Don’t they?” Albert wanted to hurt. Ever since the vicar had suggested he join the force he had seriously tried to get his inner-self to agree. He liked the idea of walking round his district in a nice blue uniform. He enjoyed the prospect – imaginary, of course – of apprehending villains. Yet, he couldn’t go against public opinion and his mates.

  “What I had in mind,” the vicar continued with his infectious enthusiasm, “was a course at a police college. None of the beat pounding trivia for you, Albert. I have funds at my disposal. The Church would provide a grant to see you through the course...” His face broke into a benevolent smile and his eyes searched through Albert – almost to the closed soul-door.

  Albert hesitated. He wanted to accept – on the spot. He wanted to tell this man that he was the best person he had ever met... and couldn’t. His upbri
nging forbade any emotional response. His father’s constant claims that the State owed its citizens a living, that nobody got anywhere offering their services stuck in his mind; and in his heart.

  “I tell you, Joe – they’ve got birds in there would turn your head,” Billy remarked as they lounged outside the church hall.

  “Wot’s keepin’ us from getting a few?” Don asked.

  Joe scowled. He’d had his bit for the day and tomorrow was Tuesday. He had to keep reasonably virile for Tuesday! “Christ – you wanna go in?” he asked sulkily.

  “Yeah!”

  “Okay...” Joe shoved the door open and faced a frightened goody-goody boy. “Move aside, pansy,” Joe shouted, shoving the boy over amid a collection of flying tickets.

  For a moment, nobody noticed their arrival. Then, when Billy grabbed one of the girls, a scream split the hall into factions and Joe’s mob found themselves confronted by hostile glares. Just glares. Nothing else.

  “Keep dancin’,” Joe announced. “We ain’t goin’ to rape you bleedin’ virgins.” He grinned and added in a stage-whisper to Billy, “Are we?”

  “I bloody-well am,” Billy said in a loud voice. “That one over there!” He indicated a girl of about fifteen wearing a mini and a tight blouse. Billy took a step towards the girl...

  “Just a moment!” Peter Bloomfield tried to control his seething anger. First, he turned the record player off, then he walked through the parting crowd of his flock and stood facing Joe Hawkins. He recognised Joe; knew that this was the most serious crisis ever to be thrust upon his small gathering. Joe represented evil; Lucifer in clip-on braces and wearing devilish boots.