Darkmans

From the tender age of twelve he fought for money. He was a gambler. He could win or take a beating – he didn’t care which, particularly – so long as he was paid for it. He loved his family but he despised their life of grinding penury. He wasn’t political (and in Diyarbakir it was difficult not to be) and he did not actively support the PKK (let’s face it: when Ocalan was arrested, things actually got better: schools were opened, they could speak in their own tongue again…Ocalan was certainly a hero, but he was also a spitfire; didn’t really care where his stray bullets landed, just so long as he satisfied his overall agenda. He was single-minded – heroes often were – and matched the Turkish armed forces, blow for blow, in his ceaseless promulgation of violence and terror).

Politics were all well and good, Gaffar reasoned – ideals and such – but money was the language of progress. Money actually got you out of there; into the colourful world which flickered on the screens of the cable tvs in local cafes. Into freedom. Into Eden.

Gaffar was a bare-knuckle boxer, all over the region (developed quite a reputation, as he grew older, although eventually, inevitably, this began to work against him). The trick was in his stature. He was small, looked wiry. But underneath he was impregnable. His will was the iron rod in his spine which kept him standing (or told him the precise moment at which to fall). His will was indomitable. He was the God of his own insides.

But the whole world (alas) didn’t start and end upon his skin’s smooth surfaces. There was an outside (he could smell it, he could taste it. Sometimes it kicked or bit or bruised him). Outside all was chaos. And this chaotic outside – if it really wanted to – could suck you in.

There was no point resisting.

He got caught up (the hook went straight through his cheek) aged fourteen, fifteen, in the opposing currents of politics and corruption (dragged back and forth, aimlessly, between them). He hadn’t tried, it’d simply happened; he’d attracted attention, had become almost a talisman.

He hung around in the backwash for a while (rejected by family, embraced by the local mafia, imprisoned for a year), then finally – out of sheer desperation – he struck a deal (it was the gambler in him). He risked everything (made promises to God, crossed his fingers, held his breath, you name it). And it worked.

Six long hours in customs and he was spat out, with due ceremony, into the United Kingdom (thirty neat little bags of heroin killing time inside his colon).

King-dom?

They had a queen, they spoke English, they ate beefburgers and drank beer.

London. North London. Wood Green (no woods, not much greenery, but who cared? He was here. This was his big chance. His break for freedom…).

Hmmn

It’d looked better on the telly. And there was dubbing, too, in Turkey (or subtitles; hell, he wasn’t fussy).

When people spoke it sounded utterly foreign. He couldn’t react. He couldn’t respond. He was rendered dumb. It terrified him.

Language (not just violence, or poverty) was now his determinator. The people he needed to get away from were the only people he could communicate with (everybody important spoke Kurdish here).

It was a different world – he could certainly vouch for that – but it was still run by the same rules (the sky the same colour, the ground just as hard, his belly just as hungry, the same battles for territory). So he chugged on. Became a Bombacilar – a henchman for a gang in the Green Lanes area. Shelved his dreams of a boxing career. Supported Turkey in the football. Developed a taste for American lager.

Until everything crumbled – 22 January 2003. A vicious gang-fight on Green Lanes. A massacre. The accidental death of an innocent bystander. An armed swoop on a Haringey cafe. A police officer attacked with a kebab skewer. Illegal gambling. Nine arrests. Operation codename NARITA. Commanding officer Steve James and a friendly – a very friendly – interpreter. (Oh that friendly interpreter! The dire threats she’d made! And the bewildering promises!)

Her name was Marta. She was sixty-three years old, half-Cypriot and a widow, with a mixed degree in psychology and philosophy from Trent University –

Marta

She’d reached out her hand to him, and Gaffar had taken hold of it (it was a soft hand, smelled of hazelnut nougat and –

Mmmm

– Indian rose-water).

Marta, it soon transpired, was to be Gaffar’s Jonah (although the whale was not a tent this time, but the claustrophobic courtroom in which he’d calmly turned state’s evidence).

Gaffar – like his father before him – had niftily slipped the border. And on the other side?

Ash-ford?

What a clumsy word

So this was where his journey ended. This was where he’d sunk his anchor. This was his port, his haven, his harbour. This was where he disembarked: a crummy job, an old shirt, his faithful Thermos (a leaving present from a favourite aunt). Two weeks rent paid up in advance…

This –

Ah yes

– was his Brand New Start.

But only so long as he did Absolutely Nothing Wrong, Mate – D’ya hear?

Someone had to take custody of the two dogs, so Kane (having first glanced around him for any other likely candidates – bugger. Not a one) reluctantly agreed to shoulder the responsibility.

Once the ambulance had pulled off, he ushered them both inside. The big one was a little snappy, but they trotted into the narrow corridor gamely enough, turning at the foot of the stairs (leading up into Kane’s first-floor section of the flat) and gazing over at him, expectantly, as if awaiting further instructions.

Kane tried to move past them and the larger one growled –

Oh, really?

He tried again. This time it snarled, and the smaller one –

The little shit

– backed him up.

Right

Kane considered his options –

The pound?

Pest control?

The butcher?

Ten seconds later, there was a knock at the door. He answered, still musing. It was Gaffar. He was holding a large, brown envelope (which he’d discovered over by the wall) and a small, silver trainer. ‘This her,’ he said, proffering the trainer politely, like a down-at-heel Buttons in Cinderella.

‘Pardon?’

Kane really was quite exhausted.

‘These two items belong to your skinny whore,’ Gaffar reiterated.

‘Oh…yeah,’ Kane said, recognising Kelly’s distinctive footwear, and then (much to his horror) the brown envelope she’d mentioned previously. ‘Shit. This must be for Beede. Thanks…’

He took the two objects, tucked them under his arm, and was about to close the door (a symphony of growling promptly resuming behind him) when his conscience briefly pricked him and he paused. ‘So d’you get a roasting?’ he asked abruptly. ‘From your boss?’ ‘Eh?’

Kane mimed the throwing of the Thermos and then pointed to the chipped window.