‘You want be the next fucking Liddle Towers?’

He swallows.

‘Answer me.’

‘NO!’ he screams.

‘So sit down and start talking,’ I yell, pushing him down into the chair.

Noble and Rudkin are smiling, Ellis watching me closely.

I say, ‘Now Kenny, we know you knew Marie Watts. All we want to know first is how come your fucking stuff was at her place?’

His face is puffed up, his eyes red, and I hope he’s fucking smart enough to know I’m his only friend here tonight.

At last he says, ‘I’d lost me key, hadn’t I?’

‘Come on, Kenny. It’s not fucking Jackanory.’

‘I’m telling you. I’d taken some stuff from my cousins and I lost my key and Marie says it was all right to dump it at hers.’

I look up at Ellis and nod.

DC Ellis brings his fists down hard from behind into Kenny’s shoulder blades.

He screams, falling to the floor.

I’m down there with him, eyeball to eyeball.

‘Just fucking tell us, you lying piece of black shit.’

I nod again.

The uniforms haul him back up into the chair.

He’s got his fat pink mouth hanging open, tongue white, hands to his shoulders.

‘Oh, why are we waiting, joyful and triumphant,’ I start singing as the others join in.

The door opens and another bloke looks in, laughing, and then goes back out.

‘Oh why are we waiting, joyful and triumphant, oh why are we waiting…’

I give the sign and it stops.

‘You were fucking her, just say it.’

He nods.

‘I can’t hear you,’ I whisper.

He swallows, closes his eyes, and whispers, ‘Yeah.’

‘Yeah what?’

‘I was…’

‘Louder.’

‘Yeah. I was fucking her, right.’

‘Fucking who?’

‘Marie.’

‘Marie who?’

‘Marie Watts.’

‘What about her, Kenny?’

‘I was fucking her, Marie Watts.’

He’s crying; big fat fucking tears.