Serial Killer Part 1: Chapter 11
Inside the snug, there was no room to move and Barber and Dave – hunter and prey – were uncomfortably close. Barber swivelled a shielded green wall light round into Dave’s face to begin the interrogation. ‘I’ll make this short, but not painless.’
He continued eating his pub meal as he spoke. ‘I hope you don’t mind? I can eat and eviscerate at the same time.’
He didn’t wait for Dave’s approval. ‘So …you’re Dave Maudling, editor of …The Spanker?’ He lingered on the name, enunciating with relish.
Dave nodded penitently.
‘You know my reputation?’
‘You’re the most feared man in Fleet Street.’
‘I broke the Profumo scandal. Christine. Mandy. Stephen. I knew them all.’ He raised a bushy eyebrow meaningfully. ‘Intimately. I made my excuses and stayed.’ He smiled arrogantly, enjoying his little joke.
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Dave tried some light-hearted banter, hoping to keep things jokey and get on Barber’s good side. ‘Perhaps if we spanked Christine Keeler, I’d be in even more trouble?’
Barber ignored it. ‘Tell me about your comic for Borstal bum boys, Maudling. This Caning Commando individual who says, “I see Germany as one big arse that needs a colossal thrashing.” ’
‘Well, it’s a fictional character. And a fictional arse.’
‘Do you now plan to stop peddling this filth to our nation’s children?’
‘That’s not up to me. I’m only obeying orders.’
Dave quickly realised how unfortunate that sounded. ‘I mean–’
Barber recited his copy to himself; he never wrote anything down. ‘A spokesman for The Spanker said, “We intend to carry on peddling this filth.” All in bold.’
‘I didn’t say that,’ protested Dave.
‘So now an innocent young boy has been cruelly injured, are you satisfied?’
‘Of course not.’
‘ “We aren’t satisfied with just one child being injured,” the spokesman added. Exclamation mark.’ Barber smiled to himself. ‘This is good.’
‘I didn’t say … I never … It’s meant to be a funny war story, not The Diary of Anne Frank,’ protested Dave.
‘ “At least our comic is funnier than The Diary of Anne Frank” added the heartless editor. Full stop.’
‘Could that be “Handsome, heartless Editor”?’ suggested Dave, trying to make the best of his impending destruction.
‘With the headline: “Playground turned into Killing Fields by comic-crazed thugs.” ’
‘Actually, make that “Single, available, handsome, heartless editor,” ’ said Dave, looking across at Joy, Sharon, Ron and Greg watching him from the bar.
Maybe Joy would come and visit him in prison? He’d heard that seeing men helpless and in trouble sometimes turned women on. His sister Annie once told him she had lustful thoughts about a handsome, half-naked, helpless Jesus nailed to the cross, and at her mercy.
Maybe that was the way to nail Joy?
Once again he heard that Stevie Wonder song “Don’t You Worry ’Bout A Thing”.
Then a great idea came to him in a flash: how to turn the tables, how to win out against all the odds, how to finally stand up and be counted. How to be an alpha male. Even if it was his mum’s idea.
‘Any final words from the condemned man?’ asked the Demon Barber.
‘Oh, yes,’ said Dave with newly discovered confidence. ‘Wouldn’t you prefer a front page story?’
The reporter’s eyes lit up. ‘Always.’
Dave stalked across and grabbed Greg’s briefcase before his assistant could stop him. ‘If you think The Spanker is bad …’ Barber emerged from the snug as Dave took out the dummy copy of Blitzkrieg! and passed it to the journalist. ‘See what my colleague, Greg here, is planning.’
Barber read the cover. ‘Achtung! Achtung! The Great New War Comic for Boys. Blitzkrieg!’ He leafed through six, powerful, exciting, illustrated war serials: ‘Panzerfaust. Angerman of the Afrika Korps. Stormtrooper. Legion of Verdammt. Graf Fear. Prussian Blue.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘German heroes!’
A worried Greg joined them. ‘There is Longest Day Logan as well,’ he pointed out lamely. ‘At the end.’
‘Perhaps he should be called Lonely Day Logan, because he’s outnumbered by his Wehrmacht chums,’ suggested Dave unhelpfully.
He pinned the tin foil medal to Greg’s black polo neck and quoted. ‘Free Iron Cross with Issue One.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Barber. ‘This is much better.’ He considered possible headlines. ‘Puss in Boots to Jack Boots Horror! … Nazi comic shocker! From Ha Ha to Haw Haw!’
He looked Greg up and down in his black outfit and leather trenchcoat. ‘Blackshirt editor invades Britain.’
Ron had joined them. ‘What’s going on, chum?’
‘Obergruppenfuhrer Greg has been secretly planning a new comic, Ron,’ said Dave.
Ron flicked through the dummy, then handed it back to Barber without a word, pursing his lips as he stared grimly at Greg.
‘It could be worse, Ron,’ said Dave helpfully. ‘He was going to call it Stormtrooper.’ Then, just to really rub it in: ‘I guess we didn’t win the war, eh?’
A guilty and embarrassed Greg turned nervously to Ron. ‘Ron …I can explain …Let me buy you a drink.’
Ron just looked contemptuously through him and walked away silently with a proud, stiff military bearing, like a veteran on Remembrance Day.
So Dave was off the hook. It would be back to business as usual on The Spanker now, he told himself as a little later, he strolled triumphantly back through Fleet Street toward Fleetpit House. The spotlight would be on Blitzkrieg! instead. Nationwide negative publicity from the Demon Barber would trigger uproar from parents, Mary Whitehouse and the British Legion, and the board would definitely kill the war comic. It was history.
Greg’s dream of becoming his comic overlord were over.
It had all turned out rather well, he thought. Although he would need to work on his guilty face, which had nearly let him down. That guilty expression was not because he felt bad or ashamed of what he had done. It was because he thought he was going to be caught.
‘Play up being a buffoon,’ he told himself. ‘It’s the perfect mask that no one can see through. So they have no idea who I really am. Everyone thinks I’m a harmless arsehole, whereas, in fact, I am an extremely dangerous arsehole.’
He smiled evilly. ‘Oh, yes. It’s not a good idea to make an enemy of Dave Maudling. Not with my inner demons. The Gadarene swine are on my side and they are Legion.’
Dave could hear Lou Reed’s “Perfect Day” playing inside his head as he walked back. A good choice by his mum, for once, he thought. She had taken it from his memories and probably didn’t know about the drugs connection, it would have been after her time.
He didn’t pay any attention to those softly spoken words at the end of the song, ‘You’re going to reap just what you sow.’
Serial Killer by Pat Mills & Kevin O’Neill is the first book in the Read Em And Weep series and is on sale digitally or as paperback.