Brighton Rock by Greene Graham

Author:Greene, Graham [Graham, Greene]
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
Published: 2010-05-18T23:00:00+00:00

PART FIVE

EVERYTHING went well: the inquest never even got onto the newspaper posters; no questions asked. The Boy walked back with Dallow, he should have felt triumphant. He said: "I wouldn't trust Cubitt if Cubitt knew."

"Cubitt won't know. Drewitt is scared to say a thing and you know I don't talk, Pinkie."

"Fve got a feeling we're being followed, Dallow."

Dallow looked behind. "No one. I know every bogy in Brighton."

"No woman?"

"No. Who are you thinking of?"

"I don't know."

The blind band came up the kerb, scraping the sides of their shoes along the edge, feeling their way in the brilliant light, sweating a little. The boy walked up the side of the road to meet them; the music they played was plaintive, pitying, something out of a hymn book about burdens; it was like a voice prophesying sorrow at the moment of victory. The boy met the leader and pushed him out of the way, swearing at him softly, and the whole band, hearing their leader move, shifted uneasily a foot into the roadway and stood there stranded till the boy was safely by, like barques becalmed on a huge and landless Atlantic.

Then they edged back, feeling for the landfall of the pavement.

"What's up with you, Pinkie?" Dallow said.

"They're blind."

"Why should I get out of my way for a beggar?"

But he hadn't realised they were blind; he was shocked by his own action. It was as if he was being driven too far down a road he wanted to travel only a certain distance. He stood and leant on the rail of the front while the midweek crowd passed and the hard sun flattened.

"What's on your mind, Pinkie?"

"To think of all this trouble over Hale. He deserved what he got, but if I'd known how it would go maybe I'd have let him live. Maybe he wasn't worth killing.

A dirty little journalist who played in with Colleoni and got Kite killed. Why should anyone bother about him?" He looked suddenly over his shoulder. "Have I seen that geezer before?"

"He's only a visitor."

"I thought I'd seen his tie."

"Hundreds in the shops. If you were a drinking man I'd say what you needed was a pick-up. Why, Pinkie, everything's going fine. No questions asked."

"There were only two people could hang us, Spicer and the girl. I've killed Spicer and I'm marrying the girl. Seems to me I'm doing everything."

"Well, we'll be safe now."

"Oh, yes, you'll be safe. It's me who runs all the risk. You know I killed Spicer. Drewitt knows. It only wants Cubitt and I'll need a massacre to put me right this time."

"You oughtn't to talk that way to me, Pinkie.

You've been all bottled up since Kite died. What you want's a bit of fun."

"I liked Kite," the Boy said. He stared straight out towards France, an unknown land. At his back beyond the Cosmopolitan, Old Steyne, the Lewes Road, stood the downs, villages and cattle round the dewponds, another unknown land. This was his territory: the popillous foreshore, a few

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