Seatown Blues (The Peter Ord Yarns Book 2) - Paul D. Brazill

Seatown Blues (The Peter Ord Yarns Book 2) by Paul D. Brazill

Book excerpt

Dead is a Four-Letter Word

The train shook and rattled like an alcoholic in the first stages of withdrawal, dragging me out of the deep, dark womb of sleep by my lapels and into a searing, painful consciousness.

‘Bollocks,’ I muttered. ‘Not again.’

I rubbed my eyes and tried to focus. I looked out of the window. A thick fog hung outside.

‘Where the bloody hell are we?’ I croaked. My throat felt like sandpaper. ‘Is this Seatown?’

‘We’re almost there, mate,’ said the ageing punk rocker that was sat opposite me, wearing a stained Santa Clause costume.

‘Yeah?’

‘Yeah, and it looks a lot friggin’ better when the weather’s like this, I can tell you,’ he said.

‘Not too fond of the place, then?’ I said, stretching my aching arms.

‘Nah, mate. It’s as grim as fuck and every fucker looks like Phil Collins.’

‘Even the women?’ I said.

‘Especially the women.’

We both laughed and he took a swig from a can of Special Brew. He burped loudly.

‘Pardon my French,’ he said.

I chuckled and stood up. I felt my joints ache. I stretched my legs and took my black leather holdall from the overhead luggage area. I put on my black overcoat.

‘I expect it’s changed a fair bit since I was last here,’ I said. ‘Hopefully for the better.’

‘Well, they say that every underdog has its day,’ said the punk.

‘They do indeed,’ I said.

I yawned and walked to the door as the train shuddered to a halt.

‘Are you not getting off here, then?’ I said.

‘Naw, mate, you wouldn’t catch me in that shithole,’ said the punk. ‘No offence, like.’

‘None taken,’ I said, chuckling.

The punk knocked back his lager and crushed the can, like Quint in Jaws. He put it into a tattered Body Shop carrier bag.

I waited for the doors to hiss open and I got off the train. Mist draped the deserted railway station. A foghorn sounded. Someone nearby was letting off fireworks despite the fact that no one could see them in that dense fog.

I pulled a black woollen hat from my pocket and put it on over my shaven head.

My footsteps echoed as I walked across the rusty, metal railway bridge. A steely fog had spread itself across Seatown and I could no longer see the trains creeping slowly below me, although I could hear them. They seemed to rasp and groan. I walked carefully down the steps and paused at the bottom to get my bearings. Smudges of streetlamps trailed off into the distance along Church Street.

My phone buzzed and I took it out of my pocket. It was another text message from Craig Ferry, checking that I was on my way. I replied in the affirmative and headed off down the cobbled street, past the rows of partially demolished terraced houses that looked like broken teeth in the wan light. I could just about make out a radio somewhere playing an old Portishead song about a bow and arrow.

Somewhere in the distance, sirens screamed and a church bell echoed through the icy-cold winter morning. I followed the GPS down the snow smothered street towards the park and paused at its wrought iron gates. My breath appeared and disappeared in front of me like a spectre as I pulled my black woollen hat further over my ears and turned up the collar on my black overcoat.

The purr of a passing car grew to a roar, almost masking the sound of the gunshot, and a murder of crows sliced through the whiteness. I started to run, which certainly wasn’t one of my better ideas.

‘Oh cobblers!’ I said, slipping and sliding on the snow. ‘Oh, what the bloody hell now …’

As I tumbled forward, my glasses fell from my face into the snow and I suddenly felt like Velma from the Scooby Doo cartoons. I lay flat on the ground for a moment to catch my breath and then I picked up my spectacles. I cleaned the lenses with my scarf and scrambled to my feet.

Looking through the smudged lenses, I slowly, trudged towards a parked black BMW. A dark, motionless shape lay next to it in the snow along with five wooden crates.

‘Oh, well, now that is a delightful sight,’ I said, as I looked down on the corpse.

The head had been blown to smithereens, leaving a Rorschach splatter of blood across the stark white snow.

‘It’s like a Jackson Pollock painting gone horribly wrong,’ I said.

‘Jackson Bollocks more like it,’ said Craig Ferry, stepping out of a small copse of trees with a Glock automatic pistol in his hand.

‘Mind you, poor old Olaf there wasn’t exactly an oil painting when he was alive. And dead as a doornail, he looks a hell of a lot worse,’

‘Well, you don’t mess about Craig, I’ll say that for you,’ I said.

‘Time waits for no man,’ said Craig.

He was dressed as a priest and wearing black wraparound sunglasses. He had a fake tan and although his salt n pepper hair now erred on the side of Saxa, it had been very stylishly cut.

‘Morning, Craig,’ I said.

‘Morning, Peter,’ said Craig, taking off his sunglasses. His eyes were red and sore. ‘Well, was a bit of a surprise to find out you were heading back to the ample bosom of your home town. I thought you’d headed off to London with Julie Christie to find literary fame and fortune.’

I shrugged.

‘It’s all fake news these days, isn’t it? Anyway, home is where your arse is.’

‘What can I say?’

‘Quite a lot, usually.’

Craig laughed. He took an energy drink from his jacket pocket, cracked it open and took a swig.

‘Had a bit of a night on the tiles?’ I said.

Craig grunted.

‘Yes, unfortunately. I had to spend the evening at the Masonic Hall, enduring a Duran Duran tribute band just to keep our Bev happy,’ he said. ‘And then she dragged me to The Last Chance Saloon, for the fancy dress karaoke. Hence the clothing.’

‘Spectacles, testicles, wallet and watch,’ I said, making the sign of the cross. ‘And what particular tune did you massacre this time?’

‘Would you believe ‘Bohemian Rhapsody,’ though even I have to admit I was far from magnifico. I thought our Bev was going to die with embarrassment, I really did.’

‘Ah, yes. She’s such a sensitive soul is your sister.’

I smiled. Bev Ferry was as hard as bloody nails, though she did seem to take her pub’s karaoke nights a tad too seriously.

Craig yawned and massaged his temples.

‘You look like death cooled down,’ I said. ‘Which is actually quite comforting since I always take great pleasure in someone looking much worse than I feel.’

‘Well, you know where you can stick your schadenfreude, lad.’

Craig stuck out his tongue and I chuckled.

He put the gun in his jacket pocket and opened the car’s passenger door. He shivered, took out a black overcoat and put it on.