Читать книгу Pretty Boy - If I Come After You Beware 'Cos Hell's Coming With Me - Roy Shaw - Страница 10

‘That was the first time I felt the adrenalin rush. It started with a tingle in my feet. The anger welled up through my body like an electric current. In a flash, I felt I had the strength of ten men. It was such a high. I lashed out. BANG …’

‘THERE’S SHAW.’

I looked round. Four boys were running towards me.

‘Get him,’ they yelled.

It was the bullies. I ran as fast as I could across the school playground. Every day was the same. I knew what was coming. I was scared – bloody scared. My heart started to pound faster and faster. The harder I ran, the faster it beat. Again, I glanced over my shoulder. As I turned back, two more boys appeared from behind a wall directly in front of me. One of them grabbed me.

‘Let me go, let me go,’ I shouted.

They started to laugh. The other boys who’d been chasing me caught up. All of them circled me, laughing and jeering. I felt helpless. Scared.

‘Leave me alone,’ I yelled.

One of them shoved me hard in the back. I banged my head as I hit the ground. I pleaded with them to stop but they didn’t listen. I felt a hard blow to the back of my head as one of the bullies screamed, ‘Shut the fuck up.’

I struggled and struggled, trying to break free, but it was no good. Suddenly, they all started punching and kicking me. Blows rained down on me from every angle.

Instinctively, I curled into a ball while they bashed me. That’s how it was throughout my school years. I was taunted and bullied relentlessly. I don’t know the reason why I was picked on; maybe it was because I was small for my age, or because I was a loner. Who knows?

One thing’s for sure – I dreaded the sound of the school bell. To a child, the future is the next five seconds and a day seems like a lifetime. I was kicked and punched through the infant and junior school. In retrospect, five years of being bullied seemed an eternity and, at times, I hated the world for being born.

I was born in Stepney, East London, on 11 March 1936, within the sound of Bow Bells. I’m a true cockney, a Londoner through and through. It was the calm before the storm, three years before the Second World War started.

London was a great place to live; it was a time of ease and peace. The only force to be reckoned with were East End women, who were all gas and garters, wearing paisley pinnies with a no-nonsense look on their faces and a Woodbine cigarette hanging from the corner of their mouths. They were found daily, on hands and knees frantically scrubbing their doorsteps as though it was the only thing that mattered, or leaning over the garden fence discussing Mrs What’s-Her-Name at Number 43: ‘’Ere … you know her lodger …?’

Us kids played nearby in relative safety. I was a street urchin, a ragamuffin searching the pavements for dog-ends, using the extra tobacco to make roll-ups for my dad.

Times were hard – we didn’t have much but we were happy and content, unaware of what was ahead of us. No one could have foreseen that Hitler was about to invade Poland and every Londoner’s life would change for ever.

I was just six years old when I was evacuated to the country – Chippenham in Wiltshire – with my three sisters and my mum. We were lucky because we were packed off together as a family and I was delighted when I arrived at the rambling farm and saw two beautiful Labrador dogs. From the day I arrived, they became my best friends and the memories of those dogs remain with me to this day.

Wiltshire was different to London – bigger, cleaner, quieter. There were many farms, huge country houses and sprawling open fields, which I would run through with the two dogs for hours. When it started to get dark, Mum would send out a search party. Often I could be found with my gas mask and two knackered dogs slumped under a tree fast asleep. Mum never knew whether to kiss me or scold me.

We returned home from Wiltshire before the war had ended. The devastation in London was obvious, even to me. Complete areas of East London were flattened, reduced to rubble. Whole communities were moved out of the city and into the sticks; we were moved to a house in Dagenham which had a back garden. My first reaction was ‘Great, a garden … I can have a dog.’ I badgered Mum and Dad. I kept on and on about a dog. Dad had other ideas – a vegetable plot. I hated that garden plot; Dad made me pick up all the stones if I was naughty.

After the war, Dad was de-mobbed, and worked as a lorry driver for a timber yard and often brought home the excess wood to sell.

Half of the garden was taken up with his prize lettuces and the other half was used for chopping firewood to make into bundles and sell round the houses for extra money. I would spend hours in the backyard helping Dad. Whenever I asked for a dog he would wink and say, ‘We’ll see. Let’s get this wood chopped and sold first, then maybe.’ I never did get the dog.

Dad had two passions in his life – his garden and speedway racing, although motorbikes were his first passion. I would sit on an upturned bucket next to him for hours while he fiddled with a motorbike engine. I was Dad’s little helper. I went with him to every race meeting on the back of his bike, holding on tightly round his waist. He would watch me in the wing mirror as my lips contorted uncontrollably in the wind and he would laugh.

It was a hot afternoon on the last day of July. As usual, I was pottering round the garden with Dad. There was a big race meeting that night at West Ham speedway and I was excited about going. Jock, our lodger, came into the garden for a smoke and started chatting with Dad about the bike.

‘I wouldn’t mind going with you tonight,’ Jock said. ‘Perhaps we’ll have a pint afterwards.’

As soon as he said the word ‘pint’ I knew I wouldn’t be going. I was disappointed. I desperately wanted to go and protested.

‘But, Dad …’

Dad threw me a look. ‘You can come another time.’

It was all arranged. Jock was going and I wasn’t. For the rest of the day, I slumped around the house sulking. I kept looking at Dad with big cow eyes hoping he would change his mind. I even followed him to the bathroom and watched him shave. When it was time for him to go, I got his crash helmet and gloves from the cupboard under the stairs and handed them to him with my head bowed. I didn’t speak. I couldn’t look at him. Dad, realising I was so disappointed, pulled on a big leather glove and ruffled my hair, trying to make me laugh. He pointed to the ceiling and said, ‘What’s that up there?’

Instinctively, I looked up. He tickled me in the ribs and teased, ‘Caught you out there.’ I squealed with laughter as Dad slammed the door behind him.

That was the last time I ever saw my dad alive. I was ten years old. Later that night, the police came. I was lying in bed when I heard Mum scream. My older sisters looked after me while Mum went to the hospital. When she came back, her face was ashen. She sat me down on the sofa; her eyes were red and puffy.

‘Daddy’s dead,’ she whispered.

At first, I couldn’t take it in.

‘Daddy’s dead?’ I repeated.

There had been a terrible accident on the way home from the speedway track. A lorry had swerved out of control. One of the pedals on the motorbike hit the kerb. Jock had been thrown clear. Dad tried to regain control of his bike, but it was no good. He hit a lamppost head on and was killed instantly. It must have been fate that he didn’t take me with him that night.

Over the following week, I wandered about in a dream. I didn’t cry, not once. At night, I lay in bed listening to my mum and sisters weeping into their pillows. I couldn’t believe Dad was dead; it was so unreal.

On the day Dad was buried, there was a lot of activity in the house and far-flung relatives wearing black arm bands arrived. I sat on the sideboard watching it all. I watched them slide Dad’s coffin into the back of the hearse and Mum putting on her best black coat.

‘Where’s my Roy?’ she called out.

Mum looked round the room and saw me sitting on the sideboard. She smiled a beautiful smile full of reassurance and love. Her motherly instinct was to make me look right, so she spat on the corner of her handkerchief and wiped the dirt off my face, as if it mattered.

I sat in the church and played with my toy motorbike, the one Dad had given me. I didn’t take in what was going on until we stood round the freshly dug grave. The vicar stood at one end. ‘Ashes to ashes, dust to dust …’

They started to lower the oak coffin into the ground and it hit me like a ton of bricks. That was my dad they were putting into the ground. I shrieked at the top of my voice, ‘Don’t go, Dad,’ and hurled myself on top of the coffin. My uncles grabbed my legs. ‘Come on, Roy, you’ll be all right.’

I held on to my father’s coffin for dear life. I didn’t want to let him go. I didn’t want him to be in that cold grave on his own. Who would I go to speedway with? Who would cut my hair? Who would help me chop the wood? In that moment I realised I would never see my dad again.

Three days later I was back at school and back to the bullies. The bell rang sounding the end of the school day. I bolted out of the classroom eager to get home. For a change, I managed to get through the main gates with no one chasing me. I breathed a sigh of relief, loosened my tie, took off my blazer and wondered what was for tea. I looked up and, to my horror, standing directly ahead of me were eight boys. The bullies. I turned and ran in the opposite direction, my fear giving me extra speed. But it was no good, two more were waiting to ambush me. I was scared. My heart was pounding like a runaway train and my chest heaved as I struggled to gulp in air as they grabbed me. But this time when the bullies circled me, I felt different. Strange. I was still frightened but my fear turned to anger. An anger so deep inside of me it erupted. I was angry that my dad had died and left me, angry because one minute I was sitting on an upturned bucket next to Dad and the next minute he was gone. Where? Why? A million questions ran through my mind. Now the bullies wanted to take things from me, too; well, I had nothing left to give. I was angry. Fucking angry. I felt it was me against the whole male world.

That was the first time I felt the adrenalin rush. It started with a tingle in my feet. The anger welled up through my body like an electric current. In a flash, I felt I had the strength of ten men. It was such a high. I lashed out. BANG. I hit one of the bullies on the chin. He went over. Then another. Then another. I felt the anger and frustration come out in those first few punches.

I found a strength I never knew I had. I lashed out for all the times the bullies had taunted me, all the times I had been frightened, all the times I’d been hurt and, from that day on, I realised that bullies are cowards, and if you hurt a coward they cry the loudest. I started to whack the bullies and anyone else who stood in my way. God had given me a gift. I lost my fear and gained a power. I knew I was never going to be frightened or ever run away again. From that day on, I moved slowly, ’cos I didn’t have to move for anyone.

I started to do well at school. My dad’s brother, Uncle Alf, took me under his wing. Alf was a big man with thick ginger hair that was cut in an old-fashioned pudding basin style. Dad had four brothers, all tough, hard-working men. Alfie was into boxing in a big way and took me to the local boxing booth held on the bombed-out site in Commercial Road, Stepney. There, anyone could challenge anyone for a fight. The first time I went, my uncle shadow boxed around me, ducking and weaving, tapping my cheeks and teasing me: ‘So you think you can hold your hands up, boy?’

I laughed. ‘Yeah, I’ll have a tear-up.’

Uncle Alf grinned, then disappeared for a while. He came back chatting to a man with a towel around his neck and holding a bucket.

‘Come on then, son,’ the man said, ‘let’s see what you can do.’

I followed him into a huge circus tent, which held a boxing ring. Two boxers were slugging it out. Spectators were shouting, ‘Go on, knock ’im out.’

I was led into a makeshift dressing room to get ready, but I didn’t have anything to wear except my swimming trunks, because earlier that day I’d been swimming with my sister. I unrolled the damp towel and to my horror I saw a girl’s green seersucker swimming costume and a rubber swimming hat. I looked at the trainer. He tutted, spat on the floor, sniffed and growled, ‘Get it on.’

I was a bit nervous as I climbed into the ring. I saw my opponent standing in his corner warming up. He was wearing a long silk dressing gown, proper shorts and boots. He was on his toes, dancing like a pro. He looked at me and smirked. There I was, a skinny kid, wearing my sister’s tucked down swimming costume as shorts, plimsolls and a pair of big brown leather boxing gloves. They were huge, as big as my head and still damp inside, from the sweat of the previous fighter.

I looked at my corner to the man with the bucket. I don’t know why, maybe for reassurance.

‘Use yer jab, kid. Look busy. Move about and jab,’ he hissed.

Before I could answer the bell rang. DING DING.

My opponent rushed at me, bobbing and weaving. I stood in the middle of the ring holding my hands up. The fucking gloves were so big I could barely see over the top of them. He was boxing clever, and kept jabbing me. I couldn’t catch him because of my inexperience. Then he caught me with a good punch. In that moment, I had a flash-back to the playground bullies. I felt the anger, the adrenalin rush.

Then he made a fatal mistake and stepped within my reach. I let the big one go. BANG. He was on his arse. All I could see over the top of my gloves were the soles of his feet. The crowd erupted. Uncle Alf went wild. After that fight, I can’t remember a single fight when I was frightened.

That day I won £3 in the boxing booth. Uncle Alf realised my potential and urged me to take up boxing. I started training, and boxing became my life. By the time I was 16, I’d won the Area Championship, the Essex Championship and the Schoolboy Championship trophies which were held at the Albert Hall. Winning all the trophies boosted my confidence. I’d found the one thing I was good at – boxing – and through that I earned respect, and I liked that.

Respect and trophies were one thing but I had to earn money. So every week I continued to go to the boxing booth with Uncle Alf to put some money in my pocket. In fact, he took me to any boxing show he could, anywhere to earn cash, even a police show. The place was full of Old Bill. My uncle hated them, and knew it would be the only chance I’d get to knock out a policeman legally.

‘Make me proud, son. Knock his fucking head off,’ he laughed.

I took great delight in doing just that.

Mum got me my first job working with her in a factory as a machinist making ladies’ dresses. There were only three other men there: the manager, the cutter and the presser. The rest were all women, a gaggle of loud, mouthy factory girls, all turbans and curlers. And I was a shy, awkward boy who’d never had a girlfriend.

The women sensed this and teased me relentlessly.

‘Royston, come ’ere me little darling.’

I dreaded going to work. I’d hide behind the presses and listen to them gossiping. All I wanted to do was training and boxing. I was boxing crazy. I hated that fucking factory and I hated those fucking women. I’d rather have had ten rounds in a boxing ring than ten minutes with them.

I left the dress factory because I was boxing mad and I wanted to concentrate on becoming stronger and fitter. I got a job in a timber yard in Canning Town. I was 16 years old and weighed seven stone. From day one, I felt the other men in the timber yard didn’t like me. They’d sneer and say, ‘Bloody boys taking our jobs.’ They did their best to point out that I wasn’t good enough for the job, but I wanted to prove them wrong.

The barges laden with logs came up the river into Silver Town and Canning Town. My job was to carry each log on my back from the barges, walking along a 20ft plank which was only about 12in wide and 3in thick. Walking the plank, which linked the barge to the river bank, was a question of controlled balance. Two men would hold the log up while I got underneath it. If there was a heavy wind, I had to take care not to be blown into the river. It was bloody hard work, and the men used to try to break me by giving me the heaviest logs, but it was a matter of pride and I wouldn’t give in. At the end of the day, my back ached. When I first started the job, I’d go home and my back would be raw even to the point of bleeding. Mum bathed my sore back and urged me to pack the job in, but nothing would deter me.

At the same time, I continued with my boxing. I was never too exhausted for a fight. I persevered with my job, gained the respect of the other men and earned a good living. I took home £10 per week, which compared with my uncle who worked as a chauffeur and earned £7, and had a family to support. But best of all, I was growing in strength by the day, and was no longer a seven-stone boy with a good punch – I’d matured into an 18-year-old man with one hell of a punch.