Free Nineteen Seventy-Four by David Peace Page A

door.
    Nigh on penniless, I stepped into the dark and narrow hall and the stink of Hamlet the Alsatian; a stink I had hoped I would never have to suffer again.
    The Widow Sheard, seventy irritable years if she was a day, ushered me through into the front room and once again I found myself sitting in the gloom with Enid Sheard, her memories and her lies, as Hamlet scratched at the foot of the glass kitchen door.
    I perched on the edge of the sofa and said, “Mr Hadden said you wanted to talk…”
    “I’ve never spoken with this Mr Hadden of yours…”
    “But you do have something you want to share with us about the events next door?” I was staring at the blank face of the TV, seeing the dead eyes of Jeanette Garland, Susan Ridyard, and Clare Kemplay.
    “I’d thank you not to interrupt when I’m speaking, Mr Dunford.”
    “I’m sorry,” I said, my stomach hollowed out at each thought of Mrs Garland.
    “You smell of alcohol to me, Mr Dunford. I think I’d prefer to meet with that nice Mr Whitehead of yours. And not on a Sabbath, mind.”
    “You spoke to Jack Whitehead?”
    She smiled with thin lips. “I spoke to a Mr Whitehead. He never told me his Christian name and I never asked.”
    I was suddenly hot inside her cold black hole of a room. “What did he say?”
    “He said I should speak to you, Mr Dunford. That it wasn’t his story.”
    “What else? What else did he say?” I was struggling for air.
    “If you’d let me finish…”
    I moved along the sofa towards the Widow’s chair. “What else?”
    “Really Mr Dunford. He said I should let you have the key. But I said…”
    “Key? What key?” I was almost off the sofa and in the Widow’s lap.
    “The key to next door,” she proudly announced.
    Suddenly the kitchen door flew open with a crash and a thunder of barking as Hamlet the Alsatian charged into the room and jumped between us, his tongue hot, loose, and wet on both our faces.
    “Really Hamlet, that’s quite enough.”
    It was night outside and Mrs Enid Sheard was fumbling with the back door key to the Goldthorpes’ bungalow. She turned the lock and in I went.
    A month ago the police had point blank refused all requests to view the scene of the tragedy and Enid Sheard had not even so much as intimated that she might have had any means of access, but here I stood in the Goldthorpes’ kitchen, in the Lair of the Ratcatcher.
    I tried the kitchen light.
    “They’ll have disconnected them, won’t they?” whispered Mrs Sheard from the doorstep.
    I gave the switch another flick. “Looks that way.”
    “Wouldn’t fancy going in there without any light. Gives me the willies just standing here.”
    I peered into the kitchen, wondering when Enid Sheard last had any willy. The place smelt stale, like we’d just got back from a week at the caravan.
    “You’ll have to come back when it’s light, won’t you? I did tell you you shouldn’t work on a Sunday, didn’t I?”
    “You did indeed,” I mumbled from under the kitchen sink, wondering if Enid Sheard had enjoyed her last willy and if she missed it and how that would explain quite a bit.
    “What are you doing down there, Mr Dunford?”
    “Hallelujah!” I shouted, coming up from under the sink with a candle, thinking thank fucking Christ for that and the Three Day Week.
    Enid Sheard said, “Well if you will insist on looking around in the pitch dark, I’ll see if I can’t find you one of Mr Sheard’s old torches. He was always a great one for his torches and his candles was Mr Sheard. Be prepared, he always said. And what with all these strikes and what have you.” She was still chund-ering on as she walked back to her own bungalow.
    I closed the back door and took a saucer from a cupboard. I lit the candle and dripped the melting wax on to the saucer, securing the candle to the base with a few drops.
    Alone at last in the Lair of the Ratcatcher .
    The blood in my feet had run cold.
    The candle lit up the walls of the kitchen