Rule of Night by Trevor Hoyle Page B

outraged glances with the woman selling sweets, cigarettes and Butterkist from her cubbyhole barricaded with confectionery.
    Crabby voted for the Pendulum but as usual was shouted down. Skush said, ‘What about the White House?’ – a pub right on top of the moors a few yards from the Lancashire-Yorkshire border. Everybody jeered, ‘What about the White House?’ and Skush turned his back, going red, and continued looking at Greta. He felt dizzy from the pills he had been taking, which so far that evening hadn’t had time to produce the desired effect; he needed a couple of pints to really get them working in his head. What he really needed was a girl. What wouldn’t he have given for a girl.
    After a lot of pushing, laughing, falling about and futile discussion somebody came up with a plan of action: get the diesel to Manchester Victoria and buy a ticket for the next train scheduled to leave, no matter where it was going.
    â€˜We could end up in bloody Brighton!’ Arthur said, excited at the idea.
    â€˜They don’t go to Brighton from Victoria,’ Kenny said, and twisting his mouth to make the word sound even more scathing: ‘Twat.’
    â€˜They could,’ Arthur said, sticking his chin out. ‘They could. All the lines join up so you could get to Brighton from Victoria. Nothing to stop you.’
    â€˜Nothing to stop you except they don’t bloody go from Victoria.’
    â€˜I didn’t say they
did
. I said they
could
. Could!’
    â€˜You bloody well said they did.’
    â€˜I said they could.’
    â€˜
Did
, you said.’
    â€˜Could.’
    Crabby said, ‘We followed the Dale to Brighton.’
    â€˜You didn’t go on the train though,’ Arthur said, behind him on the stairs leading to the upper deck of the bus. There were seven of them and they each took a seat to themselves.
    â€˜I didn’t say owt about a train,’ Crabby snarled.
    â€˜You went on the coach.’
    â€˜I know we went on the coach.’
    â€˜Ellen Smith’s.’
    â€˜Yelloway,’ Crabby said.
    â€˜Was it buggery Yelloway – Yelloway don’t go to Brighton.’
    â€˜How do you know when you weren’t there?’
    â€˜Yelloway don’t go to Brighton.’
    â€˜How do you know when you weren’t there?’
    â€˜I’m telling you.’
    â€˜How do you know when you weren’t there?’
    â€˜It was Ellen Smith’s.’
    â€˜How do you know when …’
    This conversation didn’t slacken off and finally tail away until they were on the diesel rattling over the points to Manchester Victoria. It was early for a Saturday night and there weren’t many in the long rocking compartment: just the odd bird dressed to kill who had a boy-friend to meet under the station clock, and the occasional middle-aged couple sitting huddled together in hats,scarves and heavy clothes. Kenny took out the stick of indelible red marker and wrote his name on the back of the seat in scrawling capitals, adding, ‘ASHFIELD RULE OK’.
    â€˜Give us it,’ Crabby said, leaning across the aisle.
    â€˜Piss off, lavatory face.’ Kenny jabbed at him and left a red mark on Crabby’s chin. The others rolled about shrieking.
    Andy said quietly, ‘Wherever we go let’s find some birds.’
    â€˜Yeh, let’s get some birds,’ Skush said. His face was very pale and his watery eyes were staring out of his head. The pupils had shrunk to black dots, the proverbial pissholes in snow.
    Fester, a short, very broad lad with a hanging gut from drinking too much ale, and enormous square hands like a robot’s, took a metal spike out of his pocket (a pulley spindle specially sharpened at work) and pricked his name in the plastic covering; then for a full-stop pushed the spike clean through the seat where it struck Arthur in the back. It made a hole in his best jacket. There was a