Sure – a couple. Experience? Cadet corps and that. He thought this would explain his familiarity with the tools, although when he got to training his RSM knew damn well it wasn't so. Regiment? Something with a reputation, fighting reputation. Infantry and that. Royal Green Jackets? Why not?
‘Bantu’ looked dead stupid on the form. He grinned at the sergeant: ‘Ought to be “Zulu”, really.’
‘We don't care what you call yourself, my son. You've got a new family now, give yourself a new name if you like.’ So that's how he became Danny. This was 1991 and Danny signed on for a two-year tour.
At least he had a home to go to when he got out of the army. He'd been prudent enough to put most of Skank's money into a gaff on Leopold Road. An Edwardian villa that was somewhere for Aunt Hattie, and Darcus, and Tembe, and all the other putative relatives who kept on coming around. Danny was a reluctant paterfamilias, he left all the running of the place to Aunt Hattie. But when he came home things were different: Hattie dead, Darcus almost senile, nodding out over his racing form, needing visits from home helps, meals on wheels. It offended Danny to see his uncle so neglected.
The house was decaying as well. If you trod too hard on the floor in the downstairs hall, or stomped on the stairs, little plumes of plaster puffed from the corners of the ceiling. The drains kept backing up and there were damp patches below all the upstairs windows. In the kitchen, lino peeled back from the base of the cooker to reveal more ancient layers of lino below, like diseased skin impacted with fat and filth.
Danny had been changed by the army. He went in a fucked-up, angry, potentially violent, coloured youth; and he came out a frustrated, efficient, angry black man. He looked different too. Gone were the fashion accessories, the chunky gold rings (finger and ear) and the bracelets. Gone too was the extravagant barnet. Instead there were a neat, sculpted flat-top and casual clothes that suggested ‘military’. Danny had always been slight, but he had filled out in the army. Darker than Tembe, his features were also sharper, leaner. He now looked altogether squared-off and compact, as if someone had planed away all the excess of him.
‘Whadjergonna do then?’ asked Tembe, as the two brothers sat spliffing and beering in front of Saturday afternoon racing. Darcus nodded in the corner. On screen a man with mutton-chop whiskers made sheepish forecasts.
‘Dunno. Nuffin’ criminal tha's for sure. I'm legit from here on in. I seen enough killing now to last me, man.’
‘Yeah. Killing.’ Tembe pulled himself up by the vinyl arms of the chair, animated. ‘Tell me ‘bout it, Bantu. Tell me ‘bout the killing an’ stuff. Woss combat really like?’
‘Danny. The name's Danny. Don’ forget it, dipstick. Bantu is dead. And another fing, stop axin’ me about combat. You wouldn't want to know. If I told you the half, you would shit your whack. So leave it out.’
‘But . . . But . . . If you aren't gonna deal, whadjergonna do?’
‘Fucking do-it-yourself. That's what I'm gonna do, little brother. Look at the state of this place. If you want to stay here much longer with that fat bint of yours, you better do some yersel’ as well. Help me get the place sorted.’
The ‘fat hint’ was Brenda, a girlfriend Tembe had moved in a week after his brother went overseas. Together they slept in a disordered pile upstairs, usually sweating off the effects of drink, or rock, or both.
Danny started in the cellar. ‘Damp-coursing, is it?’ said Darcus, surfacing from his haze and remembering building work from four decades ago: tote that bale, nigger; Irish laughter; mixing porridge cement; wrist ache. ‘Yeah. Thass right, Uncle. I'll rip out that rotten back wall and repoint it.’
‘Party wall isn't it?’
‘No, no, thass the other side.’
He hired the Kango. Bought gloves, goggles, overall and mask. He sent Tembe down to the
‘Bantu’ looked dead stupid on the form. He grinned at the sergeant: ‘Ought to be “Zulu”, really.’
‘We don't care what you call yourself, my son. You've got a new family now, give yourself a new name if you like.’ So that's how he became Danny. This was 1991 and Danny signed on for a two-year tour.
At least he had a home to go to when he got out of the army. He'd been prudent enough to put most of Skank's money into a gaff on Leopold Road. An Edwardian villa that was somewhere for Aunt Hattie, and Darcus, and Tembe, and all the other putative relatives who kept on coming around. Danny was a reluctant paterfamilias, he left all the running of the place to Aunt Hattie. But when he came home things were different: Hattie dead, Darcus almost senile, nodding out over his racing form, needing visits from home helps, meals on wheels. It offended Danny to see his uncle so neglected.
The house was decaying as well. If you trod too hard on the floor in the downstairs hall, or stomped on the stairs, little plumes of plaster puffed from the corners of the ceiling. The drains kept backing up and there were damp patches below all the upstairs windows. In the kitchen, lino peeled back from the base of the cooker to reveal more ancient layers of lino below, like diseased skin impacted with fat and filth.
Danny had been changed by the army. He went in a fucked-up, angry, potentially violent, coloured youth; and he came out a frustrated, efficient, angry black man. He looked different too. Gone were the fashion accessories, the chunky gold rings (finger and ear) and the bracelets. Gone too was the extravagant barnet. Instead there were a neat, sculpted flat-top and casual clothes that suggested ‘military’. Danny had always been slight, but he had filled out in the army. Darker than Tembe, his features were also sharper, leaner. He now looked altogether squared-off and compact, as if someone had planed away all the excess of him.
‘Whadjergonna do then?’ asked Tembe, as the two brothers sat spliffing and beering in front of Saturday afternoon racing. Darcus nodded in the corner. On screen a man with mutton-chop whiskers made sheepish forecasts.
‘Dunno. Nuffin’ criminal tha's for sure. I'm legit from here on in. I seen enough killing now to last me, man.’
‘Yeah. Killing.’ Tembe pulled himself up by the vinyl arms of the chair, animated. ‘Tell me ‘bout it, Bantu. Tell me ‘bout the killing an’ stuff. Woss combat really like?’
‘Danny. The name's Danny. Don’ forget it, dipstick. Bantu is dead. And another fing, stop axin’ me about combat. You wouldn't want to know. If I told you the half, you would shit your whack. So leave it out.’
‘But . . . But . . . If you aren't gonna deal, whadjergonna do?’
‘Fucking do-it-yourself. That's what I'm gonna do, little brother. Look at the state of this place. If you want to stay here much longer with that fat bint of yours, you better do some yersel’ as well. Help me get the place sorted.’
The ‘fat hint’ was Brenda, a girlfriend Tembe had moved in a week after his brother went overseas. Together they slept in a disordered pile upstairs, usually sweating off the effects of drink, or rock, or both.
Danny started in the cellar. ‘Damp-coursing, is it?’ said Darcus, surfacing from his haze and remembering building work from four decades ago: tote that bale, nigger; Irish laughter; mixing porridge cement; wrist ache. ‘Yeah. Thass right, Uncle. I'll rip out that rotten back wall and repoint it.’
‘Party wall isn't it?’
‘No, no, thass the other side.’
He hired the Kango. Bought gloves, goggles, overall and mask. He sent Tembe down to the
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