A Cool Head Part 1

A Cool Head.

by IAN RANKIN.

To Richard Havers, who took me to the Beach Boys concert where I got the idea for this story. They were singing a song about always keeping a cool head and a warm heart. I started to wonder about the opposite - a hot head and a heart as cold as stone.

Chapter One.

Gravy's Story.

My dad used to say to me, 'Try to keep a cool head and a warm heart.' At least, I think it was my dad. I don't really remember him. I've got a s...o...b..x with photos in it, and in those photos he's always showing his teeth. I've rubbed my thumb over his face so much, he's become blurry, and that seems to be what's happened to my memories, too. They're fuzzy at the edges, and sometimes even fuzzy in the middle. If I went back to see Dr Murray, he'd tell me to start taking the pills again. But I don't like the pills. They make my head hot. My dad wouldn't like that. If he's still alive, he'll be fifty or sixty. I'm thirty, or something like that. Sometimes I stick my hand under my shirt just to check that my heart is still warm.

Cool head. Warm heart.

I remembered those words when I saw Benjy staggering towards me. He was holding a hand to his chest. His T-shirt was white mostly, but with a lot of red. The red looked sticky and dark. There was a bag in his other hand, the kind you get at the grocer's shop, made of blue plastic.

I didn't recognise Benjy at first. What I saw was a car. It came in through the graveyard gates. There wasn't supposed to be a burial today, so I was a bit surprised. Visitors usually park on the gravel outside the gates. There's a big sign, PARKING FOR VISITORS. That was where visitors were supposed to park. But this car drove through the open gates. I wondered if I would get in trouble for leaving them open. I wondered who was in the car. It was a black car, nice and shiny. Maybe it belonged to someone official. The driver wasn't a good driver. He nearly hit one of the gravestones. The car kept hopping forwards, kangaroo petrol, they call it. That meant the driver was a learner, but I couldn't see any L-plates.

The car stopped and the door opened. n.o.body got out at first. But then I saw a leg. And then another leg. And then the driver managed to get out of the car. He made a groaning sound, and that's when he pressed his hand to his chest. He left the door open and started walking towards me. I was collecting leaves and twigs and bunches of dead flowers. They would all go on my bonfire. I had a wheelbarrow and a rake, and I was wearing my thick gloves.

'Gravy!'

It was when he said my name that I knew I was supposed to know him. His face and hair were covered in sweat. He had a denim jacket and his jeans had splashes on them. He was wearing an old pair of trainers. I was surprised to recognise Benjy. Benjy always wears a black leather coat. He always wears cowboy boots, and tight black trousers, and a black T-shirt. Today was different, for some reason.

'Gravy!'

Everyone calls me Gravy. It's got nothing to do with food. I can't really cook. Just microwave meals and things from the chip shop. Toast, I can make toast - and beans and fried eggs. But not lasagne or that sort of thing . . .

'Gravy!!!'

No, that's not why I got the name. It's short for graveyard, because that's where I work. And before I even worked here, I would come for walks here. I would read the people's stories on all the headstones. When they were born, where they lived and what their jobs were. I like all that stuff. And the bits of poems and prayers, and sometimes a carving or a photo. Those photos always get damp, though, even when they're in plastic. They rot or they fade, like thoughts and memories - and people in the ground.

'Where's your coat?' I asked Benjy. He was near me now, only ten feet away. Or maybe twelve feet. He'd stopped walking and was bent over at the waist, as though tired.

'Never mind that,' he said. Then he tried to spit, but it was all gloopy and just hung there until he wiped it away with the bag hand - the hand carrying the bag. There was something heavy in the bag. Small but heavy. That's a good way of telling you about Benjy, too. He's small but heavy. He used to say he was a boxer. His punches would just miss my chin when he showed me. He wasn't really a boxer, but he knew about boxing. He went to matches and he watched videos of fights.

When he stopped bending over, he looked around, as if making sure there was no one else in the graveyard.

'Got something you want me to hide?' I asked. I'd hidden things for him before. Sometimes, weeks or months later, he asked for them back. Other times he didn't. That was how I met him the first time. He was hiding a bag behind a gravestone.

'Yeah,' Benjy said now. 'Me, for a start.' I didn't say anything. He made another of those groaning noises and tipped his head back. Then he said a swear word, and that made me a bit embarra.s.sed. I looked away, leaning with one hand on my rake. The man who worked with me, my boss, had gone home ages ago, like most days. He told me what to do, and then went and sat in his hut with a newspaper or book, his radio, a flask of tea and some food. He usually threw away the sandwiches his wife made him and went to a baker's instead. He never gave the sandwiches to me, and never brought back anything for me from the shops. I waited until he went home, then I picked the sandwiches up off the compost heap. I always checked them to make sure there were no bugs or bits of leaf.

So, anyway, it was just me and Benjy in the graveyard. The sun had left the sky, so maybe it was time for me to go home too. I can't tell the time, so I have to guess these things. I do have a home, though. It's a room in a house. There are other people in the house. And if I lose track of time, one of them comes and fetches me, if they remember . . .

'Gravy? You paying attention?'

'Yes.'

'You need to pay attention.'

'Yes, Benjy.'

'I need to hide somewhere. How about your boss's hut?'

'Did he say it was all right?'

'Sure he did. I just spoke to him.'

'That's fine, then.'

'Is it locked?'

'He always locks it.'

'But you've got a key?'

I shook my head. I used to have a key, but then my boss found me sleeping in the hut one morning. I'd been there all night. It was so peaceful and quiet. Benjy was making a hissing sound. Then he started coughing, and the spit that came out of his mouth was pink, like he'd been eating sweets. He tried wiping it away again, but the bag was too heavy.

'I need to hide,' he repeated.

'Didn't he give you the key?'

'No.'

'That's a shame.' I thought for a moment. 'How about hiding behind the hedge?' I pointed to it. That's where the bonfires happen. It's where the compost is kept. And the digger. Not a big digger, but big enough for a hole six feet deep.

Benjy didn't seem to be listening. He fell to his knees and I thought maybe he was going to pray. 'Tired,' was all he said.

'Yes,' I told him. 'You must be.'

He managed to look up at me. 'Nothing gets past you, Gravy.' Then he shoved the bag forward. It was sitting on the ground in front of him. 'Hide this for me.'

'Sure. Will you be wanting it back?'

'Not a chance.' His head slumped forward again. I could see his chest and shoulders rise and fall. He really was tired, so I left him there and tiptoed to a different part of the graveyard, and did some more raking.

It was almost dark by the time I got back to him. My wheelbarrow was empty. I'd left it with the rake next to the digger. I kept my gloves with me. They would go home with me. They were good gloves.

'Benjy? I've got to lock the gates now,' I said. 'Boss doesn't like them left open. People come in at night. They leave things lying around. Sometimes they paint things on the headstones or try to start fires. There's a big chain for the gates. Do you want me to move your car? Benjy?'

His shoulders weren't moving. He still looked like he was praying. My mum used to pray. She would be on her knees at the side of her bed, hands pressed together. I did the same thing, and sometimes I still do. But I always whisper the prayer so the other people in the house don't hear me.

'Benjy?'

I placed my hand on his shoulder and watched as he fell forwards until he was face down on the pathway. I knew what that meant. And when I turned him over, his eyes were closed, his mouth wide open. I pulled up his shirt and saw the hole in his chest. Blood had stopped coming out of it. His skin was cold to the touch.

'Bad,' I said. It was the first word that came into my head. 'Bad, bad, bad, bad.' Five times for luck. There was a dog barking somewhere. Dogs like the graveyard. So do cats and foxes and rabbits. Birds, too, in the daylight. I'd never seen or heard an owl. Or a bat or a rat or a mouse. One old lady from the estate told me there were badgers nearby, but she couldn't tell me where. She said she could smell them sometimes. I always wish I'd asked her what they smelled like, then I'd know.

'Bad badger, badger bad,' I said, liking the sound of it. Four more times for luck, then I looked inside the blue bag. It was a gun. It looked like a real gun. There was blood on the inside of the bag. The gun smelled of oil or grease. I'd hidden a knife for Benjy in the past, but never a gun. First time for everything, I thought to myself.

Then I noticed the car. There was a light on inside it, and that gave me a shock. But the door was open, and that had to be the reason. When you opened your door, a little light came on. I walked over to the car and looked inside. More sticky blood on the seat and the steering wheel, and a balaclava on the floor. The key was in the ignition. The car smelled of leather, and there was a little green tree hanging below the mirror. Benjy had forgotten his other bag. It was the kind people carried when they were going to play football or visit the pool. It was red and shiny and, when I opened it, it was full of bits of paper. I lifted out one of the bundles and held it up to the little light in the car's ceiling.

It was money.

The notes all had 20 on them. That meant each one was worth twenty pounds. I put the bundle back in the bag and looked through the windscreen. Benjy was still there. So was the blue bag with the gun inside. He wanted me to hide the gun. But what about the car? What about the red bag?

And what about Benjy?

Chapter Two.

George Renshaw's Sc.r.a.pyard.

'I'm not happy,' Gorgeous George said.

This was true. But then he wasn't gorgeous either. As Don Empson stared at his employer, he wondered how George had ended up with the nickname. Maybe it was ironic, a sort of joke. Like calling a glum bloke in the pub 'Smiler'. Gorgeous George was as wide as he was tall, and he wasn't exactly short. He always wore his shirtsleeves rolled up. His arms were hairy, with a lot of tattoos. The tattoos were from his days in the Royal Navy. There were thistles and pipers and naked women. George was completely bald. His scalp gleamed. There were nicks and scars on it, and more scars on his face and neck. He wore a large gold ring on each and every finger, right hand and left, plus a heavy gold ID bracelet on one wrist and a gold Rolex watch on the other. When he laughed, which didn't happen very often, you could see a couple of gold teeth towards the back of his mouth. His eyes were small, almost childlike, and he had no eyebrows. His nose was red and pulpy, like an overripe strawberry. He sat behind his desk and drummed its surface with his jewelled fingers.

'Not happy at all,' he said.

'You're not the only one,' Don told him. 'How do you think I feel? Nice easy job you said. A simple delivery. I mean, someone sticks a gun in my face. I'm not happy either.'

Okay, so it had been his stomach rather than his face, but Don reckoned face would sound better.

'Time was,' George muttered, 'you'd have taken that gun away from him and slapped him about a bit.'

'Time was,' Don agreed. It was true, he was getting old. He'd worked for George's dad for the best part of thirty years. When Albert had died and George had taken over the business, Don had reckoned he'd be put out to pasture. But George had wanted him around, 'a link to the old days'. Don hadn't been keen, not that he'd said anything.

And now this.

'You sure you didn't recognise him?' George asked again.

'He was wearing a mask.'

'And he was on his own?'

'As far as I could see.'

'And there were three of you? Three against one?'

'Looked to me like he was the only one holding a shooter.' Don paused. 'Are you sure we should be discussing this here?'

He meant bugs. George was worried the cops had planted bugs in his office. George scowled at Don's question, but then thought about it and nodded. 'Let's take a walk,' he said, rising to his feet.

The office was a Portakabin and the Portakabin stood in the middle of a sc.r.a.pyard. Don was wary. He knew what those words could mean, let's take a walk let's take a walk. Didn't always end well for people, the walks they took in this sc.r.a.pyard, walks they took with Gorgeous George.

Don's shoulders and arms were tensed as they stepped outdoors. The crane, the one with the big magnet swinging from its arm, had finished work for the day. The compactor sat in silence. In the past, it had crushed its fair share of cars. Sometimes those cars had contained evidence . . . and sometimes body parts.

'I've told you,' Don said to his boss, 'I'm getting too old for this. World's changing too fast. It's younger guys like Sam and Eddie you should be relying on.'

'But it comes down to trust in the end, Don,' George replied, 'and I wouldn't trust either of them the way I trust you. My dad always told me, "Don's the guy. Any problems, Don'll sort things out." '

'All in the past, George.'

George had slung an arm around Don's shoulders. They were walking past the German Shepherds. The two huge dogs stared at them, tongues lolling from their mouths. But they didn't bark. They knew better than to bark at George. If Don was on his own, they'd be straining at the leash, keen to sink their teeth into a leg or an arm. But right now, George was protecting him.

The two men were heading into the heart of the sc.r.a.pyard. Cars and other vehicles were piled on top of each other. Many had been hauled here from the scenes of accidents. People would have died in those accidents. People would have lost limbs and loved ones.

'So tell me again,' George said. 'Tell me how it all happened.'

Don thought for a moment and took a deep breath. 'Well,' he said, 'I drove into the garage, like you told me. Hanley wasn't there yet, so it was just me and Raymond. Raymond was working on a Bentley, polishing the dashboard, really doing a thorough job . . .'

'He's a car valet.That's what he does.'

'Not any more.'

George managed a sympathetic look. 'Not any more,' he agreed.

'So anyway, I was talking to him, just the usual stuff . . . and then Hanley arrives. He drives on to the forecourt but leaves his car there, keeps the engine running. He wasn't planning on sticking around. The bag was in the front seat of my car. Should only have taken us two minutes . . .'

'So when did the bandit arrive?'

'He came out of nowhere. Balaclava pulled down over his face. Just a couple of holes for the eyes and one for the mouth. He was carrying a pistol. Funny thing is . . .'

'What?'

'Well, I had this wild thought when I saw him. I wondered if you'd sent him.'

'Me?'

'That way you'd get your money back, and Hanley couldn't complain. He'd still have to keep his side of the deal.'

George was shaking his head. But he was thinking too. Don reckoned he knew what he was thinking, Wish I'd thought of that . . . Wish I'd thought of that . . .

'And you just handed the cash over to him?' George asked.