That man had been able to talk himself out of anything, and he would take the bread out of his child's mouth for a drink or a bet. It was sod's law that a large family would throw up a waster but Pat prayed that he would recognise the traits early enough to stamp them out. Beat them out of the child, if that was what it took. Unlike his old man who beat him for no other reason than he wanted to.
And his mother. She had fucked off on a regular basis, left him there with a man who had no idea how to raise a child and no interest in anything except where the next drink was coming from. He had lived on and off with various relatives all his life, so his home with Lil was everything to him, as it was to her.
Although Lil tried to make excuses for her parents, well her mother anyway, he had no such illusions about his beginnings; all he knew was that he wanted to make a good life for his family and he wanted to make his wife feel needed, loved and respected for what she was.
He still took the occasional flier of course, but he was as faithful to her as he was ever going to be. It had been a voyage of discovery for both of them. But the bottom line was that they worked well together and they needed each other.
As he stamped out his cigarette, he looked around the warehouse and wondered at this cannabis that everyone seemed so mad about. He was a Scotch man himself, but if this was what would add to his fortunes, then he was happy enough to supply it. Times were changing and if you had any savvy at all, you changed with them.
He heard the low drone of an expensive car as it pulled up outside and he smiled once more. This was what life was all about, not just the skulduggery, but also the feeling of control skulduggery conferred on the likes of him. Money was everything, and anyone who pretended otherwise was either rich by birth or afflicted by a mental ague. Too stupid to see what was around them.
Dicky Williams walked into the warehouse, as always surrounded by his brothers. They were like clones of one another, all short, stocky and with crew cuts. They all favoured tonic suits, shirt and ties. This was one of the reasons Pat liked doing business with them; they were smart, both in their minds and their appearance.
They were funny as well and this went a long way in their world. A sense of humour could be the deciding factor in many aspects of their business. Especially the debts; a first call with a smiling face and a few quips could garner more money than all the baseball bats and tyre irons in the vicinity. It was more about getting your point across to begin with; if no one took that on board then anything that might happen after the initial warning was just classed as gravy. A warning was, after all, a warning.
Why borrow money if you had no intentions of paying it back? The people who approached them knew they were not the fucking bank. If they had been welcome there in the first place they would not be asking them as an alternative, would they? So, ergo, they had to understand that, unlike dealing with the banks, they would be expected to pay the amount back not only quickly and expensively, but with a cheery smile and a promise to pass on their good fortune to friends and associates.
They were the last resort for the people who borrowed from them and they provided the money when no one else would take the chance. Shame this was what gave them a bad name in society.
Dicky came in, rubbing his hands together like Uriah Heep on Dexedrine. 'Froze me cods off, Pat. How the fuck do you stand it?'
Pat laughed.
Dicky had been to see the man they were dealing with for some clothes that had mysteriously disappeared from a large storage depot in Whitechapel. The man rummaged from a huge old house, and even if there was six feet of snow on the ground, the place was never heated and the guy never wore a coat. Consequently, he was known as Freezing Freddie Dwyer or Fucking Freezing Freddie Dwyer.
'He is off his fucking nut. You should have seen him, Pat. He was popping pills like there was no tomorrow.'
The Williams brothers all nodded in unison and this made Pat want to laugh at them now. He had more sense than to give in to the urge though.
'It's the purple hearts, see, he can't get on without them.'
Pat nodded sagely as they lit cigarettes, and then he poured them out large Scotches. This had become a ritual.
The smell of whisky and cigarette smoke still couldn't cover the stench of dirt and blood that seemed to permeate the place. The warehouses had witnessed many deaths over the years and the bodies thrown into the Thames had either made their way to Tilbury or out to the open sea depending on the tides. Either way, they were gone, and that was all that mattered to these men and their earlier counterparts.
As they sipped their drinks and chatted, money exchanged hands and the bags of green, sweet-smelling herb were put into the boots of cars.
Dicky and Pat went back years and had an easy camaraderie. They were both products of their environment and knew the pavements better than they knew their own families. It was home to them and they were comfortable with it.
Lately, they had entered into a partnership of sorts that had been as enjoyable as it had been lucrative. Between them, they had sewn up most of the main scams and, even though no one had named them outright as the new Faces on the block, people were approaching them and asking their permission before undertaking any kind of skulduggery on their streets.
They found this amusing, as well as indicative of the way they were now being regarded by the main players in their fields. If the average man on the street was giving them their due, it meant Lily Law would not be far behind them. They acknowledged this as part of the price they paid for their lifestyles and both wanted to make sure they stayed this side of the visiting room. They loved the notoriety, but they also had no intention of being five-minute wonders. Here today, going down tomorrow, was not in their plans. They wanted to be around for many years to come and they wanted to maximise their potential. In short, they thought, like many a man before them, that they were too clever to be caught.
'One thing about that freezing fucker though, he loves a gossip and he hears everything. He told me a little old bloke has been bandying our names about.'
Pat nodded. This was, it seemed, old news to him. He didn't say a word and eventually the silence was too heavy for the brothers.
'So what do we do now?' Dicky sounded stressed, unsure of himself.
Pat shrugged.
It was a statement not a question, and Dicky was more than aware of the underlying menace in Pat's voice as he snapped. 'We do what we always do: keep it fucking quiet. That is what gets people's collars felt, too much fucking rabbit. Remember the old adage, careless talk and all that.' His eyes were cold, dead. His voice was without any kind of inflection at all.
Dicky grinned. His smile was, like a lot of his contemporaries, ruined by a combination of bad diet and missing teeth. In Dicky's case though, it made him look amiable, foolish even. A mistake many men had made over the years. His demeanour hid a vicious and vengeful personality that came to the fore whenever he felt he was not being given his due. This was another thing he had in common with Pat Brodie: neither of them looked the least bit capable of the violence that bubbled away under the surface of their friendly, smiling faces.
Dicky though, brought up in a family of thirteen, was a pack-fighter. Like dogs, if one of the Williams brother went off, the others followed suit. Pat was a loner, a dirty fighter who would use anything that came to hand, be it a bottle, bicycle chain or gun. He had no preference as long as whatever it was would cause untold pain.