The last of the men in the car park were marshalled onto the van and they found their places among those that were already inside. The seats were coated in a sticky fabric that was pretending to be leather. There were gashes in some and seat-padding was spilling out. Some gashes had been made deliberately. They had been cleanly slashed by a bored and frustrated labourer who had sunk the blade of his penknife into the soft cushion rather than into the taut muscles of his own thigh. Most of the holes were from wear.
The foreman had left the engine running and the radiator on. It was gorgeously warm. The windows had steamed up so the cold world outside looked like it was shrouded in a close fog. I made my mark with my finger. I traced a single line of about six inches across at the height of my eyes like the thin slit in a knight’s helmet. I looked out through my visor. My nose pressed on the glass made a further mark in the damp glaze.
The van was not half full and Cathy and I were the only two people sitting next to one another. All of the men had chosen a pair of seats for themselves so they could spread themselves out with an arm up on the neighbouring headrest or their coat or bag between them and the aisle. They all appeared to know each other quite well but they protected their individual space nevertheless.
A man sat in the row directly in front of us. He was wearing a black beanie hat and a bomber jacket that was more British racing green than military green. When the doors were shut and the driver had got going, the man took off his outer clothes. Beneath his hat he had a shaved head and on the back of his neck a tattoo of a word or phrase written in a gothic script so dense I could not make out the letters. Beneath his jacket he wore a white vest. He bore the signs of a thin man who had worked hard to build himself up. His muscles rested uneasily on his bones.
As he arranged himself in his seat he noticed me looking. He turned and used the window as his back-rest so that he could face us and talk.
‘Not seen you two before.’
‘Needed money,’ said Cathy.
‘Aye, don’t we all.’
He had brought an apple with him and began shining it on his trouser leg like a cricket ball. He then raised it to his mouth and took a bite, cleaving a quarter of the apple’s flesh with a loud crack. He chewed what he had bitten off and swallowed the mouthful before turning back to us.
‘You must have got desperate if you’ve come up to work with us lot,’ he pointed out.
‘Suppose so,’ said my sister.
‘Not seen either of you before, is all, and it’s shit work, this.’
‘Is it?’ said Cathy. ‘How shit?’
‘Shit.’ He lowered his voice, ‘And bosses are right bastards. Us lot only do this work because we’ve got no other choice.’
‘How come?’
‘Most of us are just out of prison, or else our working record is so bad we can’t get owt official. Dole-wallers, the lot of us. Only bosses encourage it. They drive us up to our probation office or job centre to get our money, and they know that way they can pay us less.’
‘How much?’
‘Twenty quid for a ten hour day. Cash in hand, mind. The days are getting longer, and all. Hardly anyone wants to do it any more – not even Lithuanians – it’s not worth it. It’s just us few who’ll put up with it. We fancy an extra bit of cash on top of our dole-money for a few pints and a packet of cigarettes.’
‘I roll my own.’
‘Do you? Clever girl. You got any for me?’
Cathy took out her tobacco and began rolling a cigarette for the man. When she had finished she passed the ivory stick between the headrests of the seats in front and he placed it behind his right ear. ‘Can’t smoke it now. Will save it for later.’
‘Who is boss?’ asked Cathy.
‘Coxswain today. He’s one of worst, but none are good.’
‘Who else do you work for?’
‘All sorts. All the landowners round here. Sorting potatoes and that, and doing odd jobs. There’s casual work in slaughterhouses too. Jim Corvine’s a boss. Dave Jeffreys. Price.’
‘Price?’
‘Aye, Price. He’s one who fucking terrifies me, but we don’t see him much in person. Too important, that one.’
‘Aye but when you do see him, what’s he like?’
The man shrugged. ‘Like I say, I’ve not had much contact with him. None of us have. Only I know not to mess with him. One of lads a couple of years back, maybe it’s five years now, got his leg badly mangled in some machinery up at Price’s farm. Don’t know what work he was doing for him but it was after dark and place wandt lit properly. Well Johnno – that’s name of lad – he got talking to some men down pub and next thing I knew he were trying to get some money out of Price. Some compensation for his injuries.’
‘Did he succeed?’
‘Did he fuck. He got half his family evicted from homes. Price owned lot. Not only was he evicted but also his poor little mum, his sister with her new baby who had a flat up in Donnie, and even a fucking cousin or summat, who lived in a house of Price’s right on other side of county. All of them turfed out as quick as you like. You don’t fuck with Price, no you do not. Oh yes, there’s many of us who’d like to take that man down a peg or two but there’s few who’d dare.’
‘Would anyone dare?’
The man shrugged and took another, similar sized, bite from his apple. The edges were turning golden brown.
‘Someone who’s got nowt to lose, I suppose.’
Cathy looked at me. I felt her thigh move closer to mine and we began, unconsciously, to breath in unison, knitting ourselves together in a common cause.