Free THE DOMINO BOYS (a psychological thriller) by D. M. Mitchell Page A

find Donnie Craddick standing looking out of a magnificent bay window onto a tangle of glossy rhododendron bushes outside.
    Rooms filled with gracious period features, mostly High Victorian and Art Nouveau in influence, had been ripped bare by Mickey Craddick as soon as he moved in, and the house duly filled with furnishings and furniture that looked cheap and tawdry, like you’d find in those pseudo-classy hotels abroad that were all plastic and chipboard, thought Alfie.
    ‘It must have cost him a small fortune to make it look this bad,’ said Donnie Craddick as if reading Alfie’s mind. He turned to him. ‘He had no idea what taste was. He had the money, of course, but money and taste don’t always sit hand-in-hand in my experience. He wouldn’t employ any kind of interior decorator, always insisted he knew best.’ He laughed. ‘The evidence is before you. I rest my case!’
    ‘Why’d you beat up Duncan?’ said Alfie, not sure where the words or the strength to say them came from.
    Donnie stared hard at him. ‘It’s no business of yours. All you do is clean the carpets under my feet.’
    Alfie drew in a breath, thought he’d best button his lip. ‘Where do you want me to start?’
    ‘In here,’ he said. He went over to a small pile of red-backed books on a table, scooped them up and put them all in one of the desk drawers. All bar one. He opened the remaining slim volume and thumbed through the leaves. ‘You know, I’ve always been fascinated by the British Empire. It’s a dirty word right now, all that heavy-handed expansionism built on the backs of domination, slavery, violence and the like. But you’ve got to admit, it worked for a time.’
    ‘Sure,’ said Alfie, ‘but it working doesn’t make it right.’
    ‘What’s wrong, what’s right? That’s a very personal viewpoint. Me, I don’t see anything wrong in the survival of the fittest, that’s how nature operates. Hell, it’s the very basis of our free market economy, laissez faire and all that.’
    ‘The two aren’t the same,’ said Alfie.
    Donnie Craddick raised a brow. ‘Suddenly the expert?’
    ‘The free market principles and practices laid down in the eighteenth century and perpetuated today are a bastardisation of the theories of the economist Adam Smith from his book The Wealth of Nations . He was appalled at the brutality and poverty endured by the lowest classes in society and suggested that everybody, including the poorest, might benefit from freer, properly managed markets. Instead, it was big business, the factory owners, those in power, who interpreted it to mean profit at any cost, by any means – they used their version of laissez faire as an excuse to do what they wanted to maximise profit, at the expense of people if necessary, and blamed bigger forces at work. And that bastardisation is still with us. Look around you if you want to see what that means in practice. Look at Overthorpe. Look at you.’
    Craddick clapped slowly. ‘Well, Alfie, quite the bookworm, aren’t we? I’m surprised.’
    ‘I may clean carpets, Donnie, but I’m no idiot. I see what you’re doing.’
    ‘I’m carrying out a little mercantile expansionism of my own, that’s all. Filling a void left by my father. Building on his empire.’
    ‘And you don’t care who you crush to get it, right?’
    ‘Survival of the fittest.’ he said. ‘But I suppose you have something profound to say about that too, eh?’
    Alfie shook his head. ‘I’ll let you read up on the subject for yourself. They did teach you to read, didn’t they?’
    Donnie Craddick’s face fell deadly serious. ‘Watch your mouth. I’ll warn you now, this particular book is dedicated to you, Alfie,’ he said. ‘And just as the British Empire was forged with redcoats, this small pile of little red books in the drawer is my red-coated army in Overthorpe.’ He closed up the small red book, raised it dramatically. ‘Alfie Parker, this is your life! Remember that old