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  GUN

  A novella by Ray Banks

  This edition copyright 2011 Ray Banks

  Introduction copyright 2011 Martyn Waites

  Original edition copyright 2008, Ray Banks

  First published by Crime Express, 2008

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without permission of the author.

  All the characters in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

  Cover design by JT Lindroos

  Visit Ray Banks' website:

  http://www.thesaturdayboy.com

  Visit the print publisher's website at:

  http://www.fiveleaves.co.uk/crime.html

  ALSO BY RAY BANKS

  The Big Blind

  Saturday's Child

  Donkey Punch

  No More Heroes

  Beast of Burden

  California

  Introduction

  I was talking to another crime writer not so long ago and Ray Banks’ name came up. This other writer gave me a funny look. "Ray Banks?" he said. "You know him, don’t you?" I replied that I did. "Yeah," this other writer said. "I think I’m a bit scared of him . . ."

  This other writer was talking about Ray the man. Never short of an opinion (always strongly expressed, often the opposite of everyone else’s, but usually correct), an insult or a brilliantly constructed joke. (My favourite Ray Banks one liner was a throw away tweet he made once: I will miss the X Factor. In the way that Christopher Lee and pals miss the constant satanic attacks orchestrated by Charles Gray.) Clever, funny, acerbic, precise. His writing to a t.

  Most writers don’t bother with short stories now. They’re a dying art, they say. They don’t pay. They take up so much time that you could be using on a novel. (Which does pay – but usually not very much.) Or this one: You’re either a novelist or short story writer. Not both. Well, Ray Banks puts the lie to that theory. He’s the author of five brilliant novels (including the excellent Cal Innes quartet), several novellas (including the excellent Gun, of course) and numerous short stories. And, I have to admit – begrudgingly, because I’m useless at short stories and not too good at novellas, either – that he’s brilliant at all of them.

  What makes them so good? A strong sense of terrain, both physical and emotional, evoked with the most precise of words. The dialogue. It just leaps off the page straight into the reader’s head. And the characters. Jesus, the characters. They’re at the bottom of the food chain, barely clinging on. The ignored, damaged dregs of a society whose collective eyes are somewhere else. Probably on the X Factor. They’re desperate enough to try anything that’ll leap frog them, short cut their way a couple of Darwinian steps higher. They’ve got their stories, they’ve got their journeys to take. And they use anything to hand. Guns. Knives. Machetes and hammers. Cunning. And above all, a burning anger and a loathing of themselves and their situation. Of course, we know that’s just not going to happen. They’re not going to get anywhere. Because somewhere along the line they get let down. More often than not it’s the very thing that’s stuck them at the bottom to begin with that sends them tumbling back down again.

  But if that wasn’t enough, he does something else. He takes those bottom-feeding characters, the kind of people you’d probably cross the road to avoid in real life, and makes the reader root for them. More than that, empathise with them. It’s a rare gift.

  And then there’s the title novella, Gun. I have to confess, I’ve got a bit of history with this. Before I became a writer I was an actor. Oh, not a famous one, just a jobbing one. I hardly do any of that now but I still do audiobooks. And I had the pleasure of reading Gun. And what a pleasure. Those characters, that dialogue ... Usually, when I do an audiobook, I’ve got plenty to say about it. And the producer has too. But not this time. I had the time of my life in that studio, working with those words to life. I just hope I did it justice.

  So yeah. This is Ray Banks. For my money one of the top crime writers currently operating in Britain. But scary? No. Not in that way. But scary talented? Hell yes. If you’re another British crime writer, you should be very scared indeed ...

  -- Martyn Waites, May 2011

  GUN

  a novella

  1

  Course, when he thought back on it, it was all Goose's fault. He was the one gave him the job in the first place.

  "You want to know what a real war is, you have to go right back to the last big one, the last World War. There, right, you was looking at total annihilation of a democratic way of life. Fuck the rest of them." Goose started counting on his fingers. "Korea? Police action. Vietnam? Police action. The Falklands?"

  Goose paused, sucked his teeth. Then looked at the lad in front of him.

  "Last ditch attempt to curry favour with the general public by sending us all out there to slaughter a bunch of fuckin' shepherds. Don't get us wrong about it or nowt. I was over there, I did what I had to do. And I wasn't under any fuckin' illusions about it, neither. I mean, I knew we was the better soldiers, we was the trained ones. Them lads, the only things they was supposed to be good at was shearing and dying. But them cunts managed to get lucky a couple times." He slapped his stump. "Including the time they took me leg off us, the bastards."

  Goose fell silent. Looked like he was waiting for Richie to say something. Behind Goose's wheelchair, BBC News 24 rattled on.

  Richie didn't want to get into it. Wasn't even fucking born when Goose was over there. Didn't know what to say.

  So he said, "Right y'are."

  Goose's eyes dropped to slits, then he ducked to the tray in front of him, snorted a thick line of coke. When he came back, he thumbed one nostril. Pointed at Richie. "You just got out?"

  "Aye."

  "How long?"

  "Give us eighteen month, like."

  "A fuckin' tickle," said Goose. "What for?"

  Richie frowned. "You told us to go round and chin Hacky Curtis, remember?"

  Goose started to shake his head until something fired in his brain. "Oh, aye. Right, I thought that was a kid I told to do that."

  Richie looked at the carpet. "Aye."

  "How old?"

  "Sixteen, almost seventeen."

  "And they got you on GBH, did they?"

  "Nah, it was Actual," said Richie.

  "Right, then you didn't do what I told you to do, did you?"

  Richie looked up, his mouth open.

  "I say chin someone," said Goose, "you get a GBH."

  "He was in the hospital. And I was at Deerbolt."

  "That's for adults, son."

  "I got in trouble at the remand."

  Goose regarded the lad. "You know, you get caught again, that's it."

  Richie nodded.

  "That's you right back in the shit, back at the YOI."

  "Aye," said Richie. "They explained it to us. But then I could go back to the shit just being here with you. Known criminal an' that." He wiped his nose, smiled. "Jumped the Metty to get here an' all."

  "What d'you want, a fuckin' badge?"

  "Nah, I want a job."

  Goose blinked at Richie. Then he burst out laughing. It was a low sound, cackling high in the middle. A coke laugh that tore right through Richie, tensed him up. Goose shook his head, waved one hand at him.

  "Wex said you had jobs going, like," said Richie.

  "Oh, Wex, is it?"

  Goose's laugh wound down to a chuckle. He ran his tongue over his bottom teeth, then breathed out. Kept glancing at Richie with this weird smile on his face. A lot of thoughts running through Richie's head, the same old story about a lost leg on Goose Green when everyone knew what really happened – stupid bastard mainlined an artery. But you never said that t
o Goose. He might've been a fucking cripple and nose-deep in his own product, but Goose had a rep that stretched back since before the riots. And that rep was what brought Richie over today.

  "Wex," said Goose again, and there wasn't any laughter in his voice now. "That twat wants a fuckin' seeing-to, he keeps sending people round here. I got dealers, son. And I got muscle. So unless you want to run errands –"

  "Okay," said Richie.

  Goose smiled. "You got a family to support?"

  Richie thought about lying. Realised that Goose probably already knew about his girlfriend. Even if he didn't, it wasn't so hard to find out. "Aye."

  Goose nodded, as if that was the answer he was hoping for. He shifted his arse in the wheelchair. "I got something, maybe. Not much, like. But it'll pay."

  "Alright."

  "You keep this to yourself."

  "You can trust us."

  "I know I can, else I wouldn't be telling you." His eyes narrowed. "I need protection."

  Richie didn't say anything.

  "You know what I'm talking about," said Goose.

  "Aye. And I thought you had a gun."

  Goose looked long and hard at Richie, one eye going lazy. "I had one, aye. But now I need another one." He grinned wide. "You can never have too many fuckin' guns around the place, the job I'm in. And it's not like I'm going to give anyone a good kicking, is it?"

  Richie smiled, but he didn't laugh. He knew better than to laugh in Goose's presence. A smile you could explain away if the cripple got bolshy; laughter was a lot harder, and if Goose reckoned you were laughing at him, you could forget about it. He'd been known to launch himself at blokes, especially if he'd had a couple of lines before the meeting. And right then, Richie was glad Goose didn't have a gun, because the man's eyes narrowed, waiting for the smile to turn into a laugh.

  "What d'you want us to do?" said Richie.

  Goose moved again in his wheelchair. The coke made him itchy, and Richie had to drop his eyes whenever he moved his stump. Then Goose breathed out hard as he dropped back into his seat. In his hand was a stack of cash, all fivers. He tossed it to Richie. The money was still arse-warm.

  "You know the Leam?"

  Richie nodded. "Been there a couple times."

  "So you know how to get there and back in a day."

  "Not that far, is it?"

  "I know it's not. I'm wondering if you know. So's I don't get the fuckin' excuses later on that you didn't know where you was going and now you're fuckin' lost."

  "I'm not like that." Richie raised his chin. "I been down there, I can handle it."

  "Alright then. There's a gadgie on the Leam called Florida Al. I'll write down the address." He pulled out a small pen, wrote the address on a used bus ticket he'd pulled out of his pocket. Handed it to Richie – a house number and address. Richie had an idea where it was. Wasn't that far from the Metro station, so he could probably walk it.

  When Richie looked up, Goose had a mobile phone in his hands.

  "What's that for?"

  "In case you get any bother."

  "I won't."

  Goose raised his eyebrows. "Like fuck, you won't. I know Al, and I know what kind of fuckin' bastard he can be. Anyone goes there on my behalf, he's going to try and skin you. Cunt thinks he's fuckin' special. But we all know he's not, and the fuckin' Jocks know he's not an' all. Lad couldn't even run a stand-and-tan, he's hardly the fuckin' Godfather. Anyway, you think he's trying something on, he gives you any shit, you give us a ring on that – the number's in the contacts, it's the only one – and you put him on the fuckin' line. I'll straighten him out."

  He barked a laugh, handed Richie the phone, who felt weighed down with all this stuff.

  "He asks you what gun you've come to pick up, it's a Brocock ME38 Magnum, right? Al should've already procured and drilled the fucker. He should've loaded it an' all." Goose pointed. "You better check on that an' all, because he'll fuck us out of bullets if he thinks he'll get away with it."

  "Okay."

  "Either way, you get the gun, you give us a ring."

  "Got you," said Richie. He straightened his hoodie, tried to pat the pockets flat, then made to leave.

  "One last thing," said Goose.

  Richie nodded.

  "You know who I am."

  "Aye."

  "So you know what happens to people with notions."

  Richie breathed out. Slowly, so Goose wouldn't notice. He knew what happened. He wasn't daft. Them lads down in Gateshead, that ginger dealer called Moses and his mate. Goose sent down a couple of smackheads with a hunger to take their fucking teeth out. That was the rumour anyway. And Richie wasn't about to question it.

  "Aye," said Richie. "I know what happens."

  "Good. Off you go."

  He did as he was told.

  2

  Richie got the Metro through to town, then changed at Monument and headed south. When he got to Heworth, he checked his watch. He was supposed to go down the dole today, but this job from Goose meant it'd probably have to wait until tomorrow. His Becka would be disappointed, but that'd have to be the way it was. He couldn't make money and look for a job at the same time. She'd understand. She'd have to. It was the way he always provided.

  "You're a skivvy," she said to him once she'd had a skinful. "You do that running around for these people like you're their fuckin' slave. If you was a smackhead, I could understand, y'know, you'd be itching about something. But you're not. And you still do it."

  "It's a job."

  "It's something that's gonna fuckin' kill you one of these days." And she'd get tearful, wave her hand and leave the room before he got a chance to calm her down.

  Then he'd be sat there, staring at the telly, a can of Ace going warm in his hand. Thinking she was right, but there wasn't nothing he could do about it. A man had to work, and he made better money taking care of things for Goose than he ever did in a job-type job.

  Still, it bugged fuck out of him that Goose didn't remember Hacky Curtis. Richie went to remand because of that twat, and it was all down to Goose that he did the fucking time. See, when the polis came round, knocked Richie up the morning after he put the boot to Curtis, it was Goose's name they kept saying. When they brought him in, Goose was all they wanted to hear about. And just before they shoved him into the eighteen month stretch, it was the same old questions, the same old shite.

  Richie hadn't said a word.

  He got on the 15 that took him to Leam Lane, took about quarter of an hour. He hopped off the bus and pulled at his hoodie. It was still morning, still had that chill in the air. And this place wasn't his usual haunt. From what he knew about the Leam it was notoriously territorial. Your face didn't fit, you shouldn't be hanging round for long. That was his experience of the place, anyway.

  Richie took the address out of his pocket and looked at it. He had an idea where the street was, reckoned he remembered from the last time he was down here, and headed that way. He kept one hand in his pocket, tightly gripping the bundle of money. He stopped for a moment to light a tab, then he carried on, sucking in nicotine and keeping an eye out for anyone who might fancy confrontation.

  Nobody did. But that didn't stop Richie's arse from tightening right up when he saw a bloke heading down the path of Florida Al's house, staring right at him. The bloke carried himself like a bouncer gone to seed, and looked as if all this standing outside a door on an empty street had made him slap-happy.

  "Fuck d'you think you're going?"

  Richie pointed behind the bloke with his free hand. "In there."

  "What for?"

  "None of yours."

  "Like fuck."

  "See Al."

  "Like fuck. You?"

  "On behalf of someone."

  "On behalf?" The bloke smiled, the word alien in his mouth. "Who?"

  Richie didn't know if he was allowed to name-drop. He figured what the fuck. "Goose."

  The doorknob looked at him for a long time after he heard that
word. Richie reckoned he'd hit a nerve, jogged a memory. Maybe both.

  "Alright then, son. I'll bring you in."

  The bouncer led the way, opened the UPVC door a crack and shouted through, "Got one?"

  "Aye," said someone from inside. "Got the call."

  The bouncer nudged the door open, and Richie stepped inside the house to the smell of pizza. His gut bubbled at the thought.

  "Straight up," said the bouncer.

  Florida Al was in the living room, sitting in the couch like he'd fallen and couldn't get up. Next to him was a massive, quarter-eaten pizza. He wore a silk Aloha shirt that framed chilled, pale skin and clung to a spare tyre that belonged on a monster truck. Richie stood in the doorway, didn't know if he should clear his throat or something. Al seemed intent on the television.

  Then Al's eyes flickered to Richie. "Who're you?"

  "I'm here to pick something up for Goose."

  "I didn't ask that. What's your fuckin' name?"

  "Richie."

  "Good."

  Al struggled to sit up, nudged the pizza box with his ample thigh in the process. Richie tried not to watch. Al sucked his teeth and muted the television. Waved one hand for Richie to come further into the room. He did, and when he glanced at the telly, saw the two naked blokes going at it like dogs.

  Al was watching him, with half a smug smile creating more chins. "You mind if we have this on? Or is it too distracting for you?"

  "Nah, y'alright," said Richie. "Don't do nowt for me."

  "So what was it you were picking up?"

  Richie sniffed. Wondered why this fat poof was testing him so much. "How, look, Goose sent us, right? He told us to go pick up a Brocock ME38 Magnum, drilled and loaded."

  "Right, so he's already paid for it, has he?"

  Richie stared at Florida Al and shook his head. "Nah."

  Al smiled wider now, revealing teeth that belonged in the middle ages. Richie was positive he could see green in there. Al moved his head slowly, and Richie caught a little movement in his peripheral. He glanced that way, saw a cracked door to what he guessed was the kitchen. There was someone in there, watching.