himself to be suckered in out of boredom.
‘Come on, Andrew,’ Andy Collins taunted him from across the table. ‘Put up or fold up. Or are you chicken?’
Winston never got a chance to answer the challenge. A strange hand plucked the three cards from his hand, dropping them face down on the table.
‘He’s not chicken – he’s just sensible.’
Winston whirled round, ready to jump to his feet and ready for a fight. Interfering with a man’s gambling hand was serious business. He recognized Lieutenant-Colonel Davies at once, instantly relaxing. His face broke into a surprised grin. ‘Hello, boss. What a coincidence, seeing you in this boozer.’
Davies shook his head. ‘Not really. I was looking for you.’
Winston was still puzzled. ‘How did you know I’d be here?’
Davies smiled. ‘I didn’t. But I’ve already been to just about every other pub in Hereford.’ He nodded at the cards. ‘Pick up your money. I need to talk to you.’
Winston looked uncertainly at the two players remaining in the game.
‘Don’t even worry about it,’ Davies assured him. ‘Collins wasn’t your real threat, except he’d have kept you both in the game longer and cost you more money. Pretty Boy’s the danger. My guess is that he’s holding a run – or better.’
It was a prediction which was about to be put to the test. Emboldened by the fantasy that he had bluffed Winston out of the game, Collins dropped his jack flush triumphantly. ‘See you, Pretty. Got you, I reckon.’
Pretty Boy Parrit shot him a scornful glance. ‘You got to be fucking joking, my old son.’ Slowly, deliberately, he laid out the king, queen and ace of spades and reached for the ashtray full of money.
Collins’s face dropped. ‘You spawny bastard. I thought you were bluffing.’
Pretty Boy grinned wickedly. ‘Who dares wins,’ he joked, scooping up the pot.
Impressed, Winston looked up at Davies. ‘How did you know?’
Davies shrugged. ‘Probably from playing a damned sight more games in the spider than you’ve had hot dinners. And from knowing men, being able to read faces.’ It was an expression of quiet confidence, rather than a boast.
Winston pushed himself to his feet. ‘But what if you’d been wrong?’ he asked.
Davies grinned. ‘I’d have paid you myself,’ he said – and Winston had no doubts at all that the man was perfectly sincere.
‘So, what did you want to talk to me about, boss?’ Winston asked, after Davies had bought fresh pints and led the way to an empty table. Davies took a sip of his bitter, eyeing Winston over the top of the glass. ‘Something’s coming up,’ he said flatly. ‘And I want you in on it.’ He paused for a few moments, savouring his beer. Finally, when the glass was half empty, he launched into a slightly edited account of the events of the past two days.
Winston listened carefully until Davies had completely finished. There was a slightly ironic smile on his face when he finally spoke. ‘Excuse me for pointing it out, boss, but aren’t you forgetting something rather important.’
Davies looked puzzled. ‘What?’
Winston laughed. ‘For Christ’s sake, you’re looking at it. Or are you getting colour-blind in your old age? I’m black, in case you hadn’t noticed.’
Davies stared at the big Barbadian’s grinning features with a perfectly straight face. ‘Fuck me – are you?’ he said, in mock surprise.
Both men shared the joke for a few moments, before Winston spoke again. His face was more serious now. ‘No, seriously though, boss. If we’re really talking about mixing with a bunch of these crazy fascist bastards, having me around ain’t going to help much, is it?’
It was Davies’s turn to be serious now. He felt a little awkward, knowing that he had to step on sensitive ground. ‘Maybe you’re forgetting something, Andrew,’ he pointed out. ‘Like it or not, the fact is that a high proportion of London’s drug abuse occurs within the black community,’ he went on, almost apologetically. ‘You’ll be able to get to places, gain the confidence of people who wouldn’t give us poor honky bastards a chance.’
Winston conceded the point with a nod. ‘Yeah, you’re right there, boss. I hadn’t thought of that.’
There was a moment of thoughtful silence. ‘Well, what do you think?’ Davies asked eventually. ‘Do you want in?’
Winston didn’t really need to think about it. He was normally a mild, easy-going man who never made a big thing out of race, and he was well aware that some of his more militant brethren would probably refer to him disparagingly as a white nigger for doing the job he did. But he had a quiet, but unshakeable pride – both as a man and as a black man. All extremes of bigotry offended his sense of decency and humanity. As he would sometimes say, if pressed on the matter: ‘We all bleed the same colour.’
He looked Davies in the eyes, nodding his head firmly. ‘I’m in,’ he muttered. ‘All the way.’
‘Good.’ Davies raised what was left of his pint by way of a toast. ‘I’m calling a briefing in the Kremlin for 0900 hours on Thursday. Meanwhile, I’d like you to come up with a few names, if you can. You’re closer to ground level than I am these days.’
‘Who have we got so far?’ Winston wanted to know.
There seemed no reason to withhold the information, Davies thought. He felt totally confident that he could count on the man’s discretion. ‘I’ve already called in Major Anderson from Belfast. And Captains Blake and Feeney will be at the meeting,’ he said. ‘With you on board, that should take care of the officer level. What we need now is a couple of dozen young but reliable troopers with plenty of recent experience in the Killing House. If we’re putting combat-armed men out on the streets, they’re going to need bloody fast reactions.’
Winston nodded in agreement. Davies was right about the last point. Knowing the difference between friend and foe was preferable in combat, but not absolutely crucial. Mistakes could, and did, happen – a death by ‘friendly fire’ was an unfortunate but accepted risk that every trooper took. If it happened, there would probably be an enquiry, but not a major scandal. The same could not be said for a mistake being made among the civilian population. One innocent person shot by mistake, and at least seven different flavours of shit would hit the fan.
That was where the ‘Killing House’ came into its own. Officially known as the SAS Close Quarter Battle building, it created remarkably lifelike situations in which mock battles could take place – often demanding lightning-fast reactions and split-second judgement by the combatants. At any moment they might be confronted by a dummy or pop-up target which could be anything from a terrorist with an Armalite to a blind man wielding his stick. Hesitate and you were dead, losing valuable points. Shoot too hastily and you risked being sent back to basic training, or worse. More than one SAS hopeful had been RTU’d purely on poor performance in the Killing House.
‘You’ll also be needing at least four specialist snipers, of course,’ Winston added.
Davies nodded. ‘And a couple of men with Bomb
