James Ogburn,’ said a voice he didn’t recognise. ‘Landlord of the Dog & Butcher no less.’
‘What …?’ Ogburn felt incredibly weak; his lips dry and sticky. He gasped aloud as a slight adjustment of his posture sent a strap of intense, fiery pain across his middle. ‘Where … please, where am I?’
‘Also known as “Frankie”, “Franny”, “Oggy” and “Toady”,’ the voice said. ‘Toady? Can’t think why they call you that, a good-looking bonehead like you.’
Ogburn blinked hard. His eyes hurt and his vision was unfocused, but a clutch of dark figures seemed to be leaning over him; several standing, one kneeling. Bright lights shone down from high above. He had the impression of a skeletal framework, maybe scaffolding, towering behind them.
Again he tried to move; again the pain across his midriff transfixed him. ‘’Kin ’ell! … where … where the … the fuck am I?’
‘One thing at a time, Toady, one thing at a time.’
Ogburn had never heard that voice before. He’d never been likely to, spending most of his life in the rougher neighbourhoods of Salford. It was rich and resonant; sounded educated – like someone on television, which for some reason frightened him as well as baffled him. He tried his damnedest to visualise his captors. None of their features were remotely distinguishable … Good God, were they masked? He was so alarmed by this that he barely noticed when the one kneeling placed something heavy on his lower legs.
‘Looks like someone gave you a real kicking, Toady,’ the voice said. Ogburn fancied it belonged to the figure in the middle; whoever he was, he appeared to be leaning on a walking stick. The pain in Ogburn’s midriff was intensifying meanwhile, as was the pain in his lower legs – whatever weight had been placed there had sharp, angular edges.
‘Some … some bastards in the pub yesterday,’ he gasped. ‘Weird … one had a knife, but … I think the other might’ve been a copper …’
‘Coppers, eh?’ The man with the stick tut-tutted. ‘You just can’t trust them. There you are, an ordinary criminal going about your everyday unlawful business, and some bloody copper comes and …’
‘I’m not a criminal!’ Ogburn blurted, but the pain made him choke.
‘There you are,’ the walking stick man said, as if the interruption had never occurred, ‘going about your everyday unlawful business, pretending you run a pub but all the time fencing stolen goods …’
‘I’ve not been fencing for ages, I swear! Oh Christ, it hurts …’
‘Funny that. We heard you were Ron O’Hoorigan’s fence.’
‘Ron who?’
A second weight was placed on Ogburn’s legs, this time across his knees – though this one was dropped rather than placed. Again it was angled, sharp-edged, and terribly heavy. With a sobering shock, Ogburn realised that it was a breezeblock. It was even more of a shock to now realise that the wooden framework enclosing him was actually the rim of a crate of some sort. Jesus Christ, they’d laid him in a coffin-shaped crate …
‘Let’s not play silly games, Toady,’ the walking stick man said. ‘We’ve gone to a lot of trouble to meet you tonight, so I’m sure you’ll understand that we’re quite serious about getting our facts right.’
Ogburn was still semi-paralysed by drugs but suddenly so filled with fear that he could barely feel his injuries. Whoever these men were, they were all wearing dark clothing with peaked hoods pulled up, which cast them in monk-like silhouette against the high lighting – security lamps maybe, on a construction site. The one kneeling was so close that Ogburn could at last see what kind of mask he was wearing: it was a woollen ski-mask, with holes cut for the eyes and mouth.
‘Okay, okay, okay … I know Ron O’Hoorigan, yeah. Course I do. He’s a regular at the Dog & Butcher. But that’s all.’
‘No, that isn’t all, Toady,’ the walking stick man replied. ‘He’s a thieving little scrote. And you’re his fence.’
‘Ron hasn’t done any real jobs in ages. He got sent down for a while – to a real clink, and it scared him shitless. He’s only a bit-player now.’
‘You’re still his mate, though, aren’t you?’
‘If … if you mean does he come into the pub and tell me stuff when he gets pissed, then yeah … course he does.’ Ogburn tried to swallow, but there was barely any moisture in his mouth. ‘Loads of blokes do that.’
‘We’re not interested in anyone else,’ the kneeling figure said in a Midlands accent. ‘Just O’Hoorigan …’
‘That’s all I can tell you …’
The kneeler slammed another breezeblock down, this time over his groin. Ogburn would have doubled up and screamed had his pain-racked body allowed him to.
‘It’ll save us all a lot of time, Toady, if you’d stop kidding yourself that you’ve got choices in this matter,’ Walking Stick said calmly.
‘You’ve … you’ve got to take me back to hospital,’ Ogburn wept, when he was finally able to make sounds more coherent than agonised whimpers. ‘I had surgery this afternoon – on a ruptured spleen.’
‘My, my … that wouldn’t be a nice way to go.’ Walking Stick sounded genuinely concerned. ‘You’d better tell us exactly the sort of stuff Ron confides in you, and you’d better do it quick.’
‘Specifically about the last stretch he served,’ the kneeler said. ‘In Rotherwood.’
‘You said something scared him, Toady,’ Walking Stick added. ‘What was it?’
‘Nothing … nothing special. He just doesn’t want to go down again …’
Another breezeblock was laid on him, this one on his stomach, almost directly over his incision. Even though this one was placed relatively gently, he still gagged at the pain.
‘Facts, Toady,’ Walking Stick said. ‘Not fantasies.’
The next breezeblock was placed on Ogburn’s chest; their combined weight was now crushing his wounded body into the crate’s hard, timber floor.
‘Alright … alright,’ he said, struggling to breathe. ‘All I know is that Ron got told something that spooked him while he was in Rotherwood. That’s … my understanding from his drunken fucking babbling. Apparently he shared a cell with some bloke who was … who was looking to join a real tough firm when he got out. Said they had something massive going, and that he was going to get rich. But if this fella told Ronnie what it was, Ronnie never told me … I swear it!’
‘Did he say who this bloke was?’ Walking Stick wondered.
‘Didn’t give me a name, didn’t give me a description. Nothing.’
‘There’re lots of hard cases inside,’ the kneeler said. ‘What exactly was it about this one that spooked him?’
‘Whatever job he had lined up, I assume … oh, Jesus God!’
