As soon as his man had vanished through the plate glass doors and into the burger bar; Fitchett instinctively moved back and leant against the shop front. A brief glance back up the road simply confirmed what he already knew, that everyone else had done the same. It's what they did, kept out of sight, blended in. That's why there were no colours. Replica shirts were for other football fans, not them. Another world watching the same game in a completely different way. He dumped his cigarette, lit another and smiled as the Saturday-morning shoppers walked past without even seeing. Forty-three lads right in their midst and all of them ready to go at a moment's notice. So much potential violence simmering in the middle of a sea of blandness. His eyes remained fixed on the front door of McDonald's.
‘They haven't a fucking clue,’ he thought, ‘all these Cockney bastards so wrapped up in their own little world and not giving a shit about anyone else. Arrogant cunts who think they're better than we are. They're just scum.’ He smiled to himself; he was beginning to look forward to hurting someone later on.
‘Fitch.’ The noise made him start a bit and he looked round to see Alex discreetly nodding up the road. Leisurely turning round, he spotted a small group heading in their direction but on the other side of the road. About fifteen lads, aged between sixteen and twenty-five, their clothing smart but anonymous. The uniform of hooligans everywhere.
‘Who are they?’ he asked.
‘Fuck knows,’ replied Alex, ‘but they haven't seen us yet. My guess is that they're about to walk into Pillow.’
Fitchett slowly returned his gaze to the front of McDonald's. The last thing he wanted was to be spotted and rapid movements were a dead give-away. Keep the element of surprise, the greatest weapon any hooligan firm ever had. ‘Baz, take your lads back up the road and get over there. Dave, get up to that crossing and get in behind them. I'll cross here with Al and Nick.’ He barked out his orders like a military commander and as he did so his troops obeyed without question. His troops.
‘They still haven't seen us,’ Alex whispered, his words coming like a running commentary, keeping his leader informed, ‘and Pillow is still inside.’
Fitchett surveyed the battleground and then looked back across at the front of McDonald's. ‘If he comes out now, we'll be all right; otherwise …’
‘We can't do this in there Fitch, there's too many kids.’
Fitchett looked up to see Nick looking at him. In other people, he would have thought that their bottle had gone, but not Nick. He was a mate and he was sound. He'd been an accepted member of the hard-core for around two years now and Fitchett trusted him totally. After all, Nick had been the one who'd saved him when he'd been battered unconscious by the 657 Crew at Portsmouth. You don't forget things like that. ‘We might not have any choice mate; we can't let Pillow take a spanking.’
Nick smiled and turned back to face McDonald's. ‘I don't know; he's an ugly cunt. It might be a giggle.’
The three men laughed quietly but they all knew Fitchett was right. If they went inside and sussed Pillow, then they'd have no choice but to go in and get him out. And that would mean only one thing.
‘Here we go.’ The small group of lads stopped outside McDonald's for a moment and then began walking up the road again. Past the red and yellow neon, the plate glass and the laughing kids. And Pillow.
‘Shit,’ said Alex. ‘I was sure they'd go in.’
Fitchett spun around and looked up the road, frantically searching for Baz and his fifteen lads. ‘Where the fuck are they?’ he said out loud, spotting them even as he spoke. They were all but invisible among the shoppers as they made their way towards their foe.
‘This could be fun,’ said Alex. The three of them watched as the drama continued to unfold. Two groups of lads, on a collision course in the middle of a North London street. Violence a split second away.
Suddenly, a shrill whistle exploded and they turned round to see Pillow standing outside McDonald's. He had a mobile phone in one hand and was holding the young kid by the collar in the other. ‘Got the fucker!’ he screamed, his thick Brummie accent cutting through the traffic noise like a Stanley knife. ‘He was hiding in the bog!’
Fitchett looked round at the group of lads, half hoping that they hadn't heard him shouting but knowing that they had.
‘Fucking idiot,’ said Alex. ‘D'you think they've seen the others?’
‘No. Not yet. But they've seen us.’ The small group, the enemy, had stopped and were now talking excitedly among themselves, their discreet glances merely confirming the fact that the four of them had been sussed. Fitchett looked across at Pillow in an attempt to catch his eye but he was preoccupied with the kid who was struggling in vain to get away.
‘Here they come,’ said Nick, his voice calm and steady without a hint of fear. ‘They're going for it!’
Fitchett looked back up the road to see that the enemy were now moving quickly back down the street towards them. He was about to shout out to Pillow when the enemy broke and ran out into the traffic, forcing drivers to slam on their brakes. The squealing of rubber punctuated with a loud crunch as a taxi ran into the back of a small yellow van. No abuse from the drivers though, not this time. That could wait.
Fitchett smiled to himself. He loved this bit, when it was about to kick off. Half terror, half ecstasy. The adrenalin surging through him like an electric current. His breathing coming in short gasps and his stomach trying to push its way up through his throat. ‘The Buzz’, they called it. And they were right. Fitchett was buzzing, this was what it was all about for him. This blast of magic. He glanced at the other two, knew they were feeling exactly the same and then looked up and down the road to check on his troops. Baz and his lads had worked out what was going on and were now closing in behind the enemy, still unseen. Dave and his group were fifty yards down the road but had stopped to watch what was happening. Not fear, but common sense. They knew the score and, if they were needed, they'd be there like a shot. Fitchett looked back at the enemy. ‘OK then, we're set,’ he thought. ‘Come and get it.’ The enemy, his enemy, were walking into the classic football ambush and they didn't have a fucking clue. Fitchett moved forward until he was in front of all the shoppers and against the steel barrier. That way, he could get a few digs in as they tried to get over it. The best way.
Then the shouting started. ‘Come on then! Come on you northern wankers!’ Ugly Cockney accents and swearing, just noise designed to gee themselves up and disguise their fear. ‘They think they're something. Fifteen onto four but they're shitting themselves and they're about to get spanked.’
Still Fitchett kept quiet. ‘Let them come,’ he thought, ‘and then we'll do them properly.’ He looked across at Pillow, who had let go of the kid and was now running across the road towards the enemy, catching them by surprise as they had half expected him to do a runner. Without even slowing, he steamed in, his first punch a vicious right hander which sent one of them sprawling across the bonnet of a black cab. Within seconds he had vanished under a pile of bodies. Fists and boots flying out like an old Andy Capp cartoon.
Now they were at the barrier, no wrong, some of them were over the barrier. Shit, Fitchett hadn't seen that. They were working their way through the shoppers, who were suddenly waking up to the fact that they were in trouble: Saturday morning and standing slap bang in the middle of a riot. That'd give them something to talk about in the pub later on. Something different. Fitchett reached into his pocket, the black canister in his hand like an old friend. Grabbing one of the enemy, he pulled him forward and lashed him across the face with the red spray before stepping to one side and throwing him past. The lad screamed in pain as the pepper spray burned into his eyes. Fitchett moved forward, away from the spray to avoid breathing it in himself. And then the shouts went up, ‘Selector, Selector.’ Baz and his lads. And the fear in the faces of the enemy as they realised that they had been ambushed. The realisation that they were being hit by the Selector, one of the most infamous and dangerous hooligan g
roups in England. And they were fucked.
Fitchett leapt over the barrier and stood there, like some working-class Napoleon. The whole thing going on around him like it had been captured on video and he was watching it at home with the sound turned down. The background of the North London high street blurred out of focus, the shoppers, running for cover from the battlefield, just grey formless shapes. And the lads, vividly graphic as they battered and bullied their opponents. Miller, normally a quiet bloke bordering on shy, but when it kicked off, he became a fucking madman, grabbing some piece of scum round the neck and running him full pelt into the side of a courier's van. Stevie, the new boy desperate to be accepted into the hard-core, straight-arming some little Cockney shit across the Adam's apple. Johnny the boy, dragging someone off Pillow and throwing him face down onto the road before dropping on him. The motion punching his knee into the small of the scum's back with a force that would leave him in agony for days. Good lad, he's learning. Bodies everywhere and his lads were dishing out a real lesson. His lads, and he'd led them as they battled their way up to the top. Chelsea, Sunderland, Leicester, Millwall, Forest: they'd been to all of them over the years and done them all.
And suddenly, there's their top boy. His arrogance almost tangible and marking him out better than any colours could ever do. Standing there in the middle of it all and screaming, trying to rally his troops. ‘Stand you cunts, stand. They're fuck all!’ And Fitchett's across the bonnet of a black cab and at him like a wild animal. The first head butt exploding the bastard's nose across the front of his face, leaving Fitchett covered in blood and someone else's snot. And then his trademark, the elbow. Delivered with a sickening crunch into the right cheek. Their top boy is down and they're all over the place.
‘Go-go-go!’ comes the desperate cry, and they're off. Dragging their casualties with them. Up the road and into the waiting arms of Dave and his lads. Running into another kicking, and on their own ground. The ultimate humiliation. Two minutes. That was all it had taken. Two minutes.
And now they were moving. Instinctively. Away from the scene of their triumph. Away from the stunned shoppers and the furious cabbies and away from recognition. The troops falling in behind Fitchett as he walked.
‘Fuck me lads, that was fun.’
Fitchett turned to see the cause of all the problems walking right beside him. A trickle of blood coming from his nose. ‘Pillow, you tosser,’ he laughed. The tension gone, the adrenalin flowing back into its reservoir for later on.
‘Where the fuck did they come from?’ Pillow asked.
‘Never mind that, who the fuck were they?’
‘Well the kid was scouting for Arsenal,’ said -Pillow. ‘But Christ knows who they were.’
‘Best we find out then,’ said Nick. ‘You still got that mobile?’
Pillow took it from his pocket and hit the redial button before handing it over.
‘Who's that? … Who's this? … Oh we're just a few tourists from Birmingham way and I've got news for you me old cock sparra’; I think we've just met some of your lads in Camden High Street. Well, I think they were your lads; they were wankers and they were covered in red. Or at least they are now.’ He listened intently for a moment and then took the phone away from his ear, looked at it with a mocking expression of shock on his face and then threw it into the road. ‘Well really! Have you ever heard such language!’
‘Were they Arsenal?’ Fitchett asked.
‘He said not. Nothing to do with them. The Gooners were waiting for us in the West End but the coppers are all over them now. Seems someone tipped them off and we wrong- footed ‘em. They won't be seeing us today after all.’
‘Well whoever that lot were, they won't forget that in a hurry,’ Baz added, ‘but we'd better get the fuck out of here.’
Fitchett looked at Alex as the noise of approaching sirens punctured the air, the still static traffic giving them precious time to escape from the scene of their victory.
‘Back onto the tube,’ said Alex. ‘Go right at this next junction and there should be a station about twenty yards up the road. Mornington Crescent.’ Fitchett looked at him, always cool and always collected. ‘And you'd better lose the shirt, Fitch.’
Fitchett looked down; their top boy's blood was all over his new Ralph Lauren shirt. ‘Bollocks,’ he said.
And they were off. The leader, his general and his troops. Another victory for the battle flag.
Chapter 2
Monday, 6 September 1999
07.05
Paul Jarvis parked his BMW and climbed out. Grabbing his briefcase from the passenger seat, he slammed the door and pressed the alarm button on his key ring. The car gave a satisfying bleep and a flash of its indicators as he walked through the almost empty underground car park towards the lift. Usually, he loved Monday mornings, but today, well he wasn't expecting to get home much before the end of EastEnders. Not that he watched it anyway, but that wasn't the point.
He pressed the lift button and waited for a few moments before angrily pressing it again three or four times. ‘This poxy bloody lift,’ he said out loud to himself, glancing across at the door to the stairs before quickly deciding against it. His office was six floors up and he hadn't even had a cuppa yet, never mind any breakfast. ‘Bastard cleaners have probably propped the door open,’ he thought, giving the button yet another prod.
The sound of a car entering the car park made him start and he watched as a blue Ford Escort slid immaculately into the space next to his BMW. ‘Smart arse,’ he thought. ‘I bet he couldn't do that again. I must have left loads of room.’ He turned as the lift doors opened behind him and, with a brief and barely audible ‘thank fuck for that’, walked in and hit number 6 on the panel. The doors stayed stubbornly open and he hit the button again. ‘Come on you bastard,’ he hissed, desperate for the doors to close. He didn't want to have to wait for the driver of the car because he wanted, no needed, that last moment of peace before the chaos of the day began. Of course there was another reason he wanted to get moving. After all, he'd been made to wait so why shouldn't they? Let their day start off on the wrong foot as well. It was petty, he was the first to admit that, but it was one of those little things that made life all the better. Like climbing out of an empty lift and pressing all the buttons. Get one over on everyone else. He knew it was sad and childish, but he loved doing that.
The doors began to slide shut and as they did so, a woman's voice rang out, ‘Wait for me!’
‘Shit,’ he thought, and stuck out his foot to keep the doors from closing. He looked across the car park and watched as a woman walked briskly towards him. Quite slim, about thirty, very pretty and very blonde. Her long hair tied tightly behind her head with a black ribbon and dressed from head to foot in black. It was a look he loved. The smell of her perfume entered the lift before she did and he made a mental note that she pressed the button for the fourth floor. Jarvis took a deep but discreet breath. Sucking in as much of the perfume as was humanly possible without drawing attention to himself. ‘Jesus Christ,’ he thought.
‘Hi,’ she said with a beaming white smile and a voice that held a faint southern accent. ‘Thanks for waiting for me. This lift is awful isn't it? You would have thought that someone would have done something about it by now.’
Jarvis smiled and quietly thanked God for sending this vision to him just in time to kick-start his day. ‘Excuse me asking,’ he said, ‘but how the bloody hell can you look so good this early on a Monday morning?’
She looked at him, blushed and laughed. ‘Lots of love from a good husband and a ton of make-up.’
Jarvis laughed out loud and clicked his fingers. ‘Damn,’ he said. ‘Well, when you get home, make sure you tell him how lucky he is.’
The lift stopped and she smiled at him as the doors opened. ‘I'll do that,’ she said, ‘but I'm sure he knows already. See you later.’
The doors closed behind her and the lift began its journey upwards. ‘He better,’ he said to himsel
f, ‘or he's a fucking idiot.’
The doors of the lift opened and he surveyed the familiar scene in front of him. He hated open-plan offices. There was no privacy. Just a sea of desks, a hundred computers and total chaos all illuminated by a thousand strip lights. He didn't want to get out. He knew that the second he did, the spell would be broken and the week would start. The lingering smell of perfume infinitely preferable to a day spent rummaging around in a sea of paper.
‘What are you doing?’ a male voice asked.
‘Dreaming,’ he said. ‘Just dreaming.’
‘Well sod off and dream somewhere else.’ Jarvis stepped out of the lift and smiled. A well-built man in his early forties stood in front of him, his white shirt straining to keep the beer-fuelled contents of his stomach under control.
‘And a good morning to you too, Al,’ he said. ‘Nice weekend?’
‘Not bad. Made a nice change, no football. You heard about the Camden thing?’
Jarvis shook his head. ‘Haven't seen anything yet. I need tea first.’
The man stepped into the lift and the doors began to shut. Jarvis turned round and put his hand in between them. Forcing them back open. ‘Smell that,’ he said. The man standing in the lift took a deep breath and smiled. ‘That is the smell of a vision and I had it all to myself for about forty- five seconds just now.’
He took another breath. ‘That's Chanel that is. Right classy. Who was she?’
‘Don't know,’ said Jarvis. ‘Never seen her before. Blonde hair, very pretty. Works on the fourth floor.’
The man looked at him with a quizzed look on his face. ‘About thirty? Hair tied back? Nice figure?’