Free Jammy Dodger by Kevin Smith Page B

for the first time was I unable to decipher the emotion this engendered. As I laboured I was trying to keep half an ear on the conversation developing behind me. Why on earth was Mad Dog suddenly talking about drama? The people’s theatre ? Did I hear that correctly?
    Beside me Oliver had ceased ripping manila and was staring at the wall with his hand cupping the side of his face. I heard a sniffle.
    â€˜Oliver, are you … are you crying? ’
    â€˜What? No! Just … a paper cut.’
    â€˜Pull yourself together man – we’ve got to … hang on, what’s this?’
    I had hit paydirt. A clump of crumpled school jotter-style pages with spidery, left-leaning hand-writing. Five poems: Ballyclava Blues , The Dead Wo’nt Leave Me Alone , World of Heat and – on the softer side – Black & Decker Daydream and My Ma . The spelling was highly unorthodox and they were signed ‘By Mad Dog’.
    â€˜Come on, you fucken balloons, what’s keeping yese?’
    â€˜Yep, with you now.’
    I took a minute to skim the verses and formulate some vaguely convincing terms of praise – multi-purpose crowd-pleasers like unashamedly hard-hitting … refreshingly visceral … bold and iconoclastic and, if it looked like the author’s ego could fend off his paranoia, works of profound genius . But as I resumed my seat I sensed there had been a change in direction, a mutation of the group dynamic.
    â€˜So you’re telling me you have absolute power? You can say yes or no and what you say goes?’ Mad Dog was asking.
    â€˜Well, yes I suppose I am,’ Winks replied loftily. ‘That is, I mean, between me and my colleagues. That’s what we do.’
    Mad Dog’s blink rate was increasing as he assimilated some kind of possibility.
    â€˜So … if you thought something, let’s say for example, a play , should be put on by a theatre, then that theatre would have to put on that play?’
    â€˜If they wanted to keep their funding coming in, and by extension, their jobs, yes.’
    Mad Dog fell silent. Then he began to laugh, a strange, slow, staccato guffaw, as though someone was trying to start a water-logged tractor. I looked at Winks. He was giggling like a schoolgirl. This was grotesque. Winks was showing off to a man who had come to remove our kneecaps.
    Oliver and I swapped incredulous glances.
    â€˜Ah Holy God, that’s brilliant,’ said Mad Dog, swiping a hairy forearm across his damp eyes. ‘That is fucken brilliant.’
    What happened next could not have been predicted.
    (Mind you, this was not your average Monday morning.)
    Mad Dog jumped to his feet and in three swift strides had Winks by the throat and the muzzle of the gun pushed hard into the centre of his forehead.
    â€˜Now you listen to me Mr Fancypants,’ he hissed. ‘Do you feel that? DO YOU FEEL THAT? Fucken cold isn’t it? Well that’s how cold YOU’LL be if you don’t do what I fucken tell you.’
    He glared sideways at Oliver and me.
    â€˜And don’t you two get any ideas, you hear me? Or I’ll plug ye.’
    Oliver moved his head from side to side. I nodded. Fifty thousand volts wouldn’t have produced an idea in either of us. I’m not even sure I was breathing.
    Mad Dog turned back to Winks, whose eyes were bulging so much they appeared to be smudging the inside of his glasses.
    â€˜Right you. This is how it’s going to be.’ His tone was measured, deadly serious. ‘Forget the poetry. Fuck the poetry. I have wrote a play. And you are going to get it performed. By real actors. At a proper theatre. With all the bells and whistles. Adverts, posters, radio, TV, the lot. And it’s going to be good. And it’s going to be soon. Very soon. In fact, if this isn’t happening by September I will come after you. I will hunt you down and I will make you wish you had never been born. And then I will