Friendly Fire

Friendly Fire

Ed Bruce (c) 2001

The Jersey Evening Post reported the facts of the trial without taking
sides. The tabloids, with their CRIME PASSIONEL headlines and their
imperative for a villain and a hero, crucified Steve and all but
canonised Tony. Only Tony, Elaine and myself knew the truth and we each
had our own reasons for keeping quiet. I thought I could live with the
consequences of that, but I was wrong.

oooOOOooo

Of the Channel Islands, Jersey is the Mecca for hedonists. Tax-dodging
millionaires abound, but are seldom seen. For holidaymakers it's Spain
with much better food, while for the male seasonal migrant worker it's
easy living, plus an ever-changing selection of sun-seeking single
girls.

More than a dozen of us hung around together that first summer, all
single, willing to take any job available and dedicated to boozing,
rock and roll, sunshine and random sex. At a time when the
contraceptive pill was mainly available only to married couples,
copulation was like Russian roulette. But cheap drinks and the holiday
island feel-good factor, meant that hangovers were more common than
hang-ups. We were a motley bunch of dropouts from various parts of the
British Isles, most of us with vague plans to move on to the
continent.

Tony from Southampton just needed to feel he was one of the boys. He
introduced himself at a pub in St. Peters Valley, where the only
cabaret consisted of the landlord and his wife throwing things at each
other. I recall him telling me about the German Underground Hospital, a
relic of the world war two occupation. He seemed to have a thing about
local history and military artefacts, and mentioned that he was
arranging to buy an old Luger pistol from the elderly drunk sitting
next to him. The Jerseyman was spouting about wartime collaboration
involving the island's landed gentry. It was all too heavy and I slid
away to feed the jukebox, but when I returned Tony had bought us a
round of drinks. He just tagged along after that, like a benevolent
Jonah.

Bricklayers like Steve were as much an endangered species on the
island as the animals at Gerald Durrell's Zoo, whereas there was no
call for whisky blenders like myself; so each time he went to a new job
I was part of the package as his labourer. We were both in our early
twenties, but Steve had the edge on me in life experience and I
respected that at the time, especially where girls were concerned. He
was tall and lean, with a ready smile and could jive better than most.
Original chat-up lines came easy to him, but what I admired most was
his discretion. He never spoke, even to me, about his conquests, just
moved on to the next, a rare trait amongst our age group. At the time I
thought of him as invincible, but he was just being lucky.

The defence lawyer called him a deceitful man, lacking in moral fibre,
but he was talking about society's code of conduct, not ours. Steve was
guilty of negligence, but there's nothing unique in a man being
influenced by his groin rather than his grey matter. And when his life,
as well as his partner at the time, went pear shaped, he didn't try to
flee the consequences - like many would have.

Being of an entirely different calibre, Tony seemed to tolerate rather
than enjoy our escapades. He would go with the flow, but he had to work
at it. He once made a citizen's arrest on the beach at St. Brelade. It
transpired that the man, from Portsmouth, was heavily in debt to the
car exporting company Tony worked for in St. Helier. Although such
detention was legal under an obscure local law, he missed the important
paragraph that said he would have to pay for the debtor's board and
lodging while awaiting trial. And prison accommodation doesn't come
cheap.

Having gone our separate ways for the winter, most of us met up again
at our favourite haunts in the spring. Tony surprised us all by turning
up with a lovely wife named Elaine. They had been childhood
sweethearts, he said, and had married in their hometown, over
Christmas. They'd rented a cottage near Gorey Castle and planned to
live there and raise a family.

By the end of our second summer most of us had steady employment and
self-contained accommodation on the island. We even formed a club
whereby we each hosted a party at the weekends. Elaine was enthusiastic
and persuaded her husband to join in.

Our close comradeship continued and the circle widened. Soon we were
mixing with staff from the airport, including aircrew, as we became
aware that winter on the island could be as much fun as in the summer
season. While the island hibernates, a small subculture of foreigners
continues to flourish within the community, happily co-existing with
local people, though their paths seldom cross. We were gathering moss,
getting involved; something only Tony had ever planned to do.

Steve was the first to emulate Tony, to everyone's disbelief, by
setting up home with his pregnant girlfriend Yvonne. It was a gesture
of defiance because her Jersey/French parents' disapproval. He told me
he was also paying child maintenance to another young lady on the
mainland. The signals were plain enough, but we ignored them.

A virtual epidemic of pregnancies swept through our na?ve little band
that year, and few of us survived as bachelors. Plans to hike around
the world were postponed indefinitely. My own marriage, held in the
shadow of the shotgun, was memorable only for the arrests that followed
a riotous reception. Afterwards Mary's mother ran our affairs,
including young Jason's birth, on the telephone from Yorkshire. I was
superfluous.

Our party circuit prevailed, indeed flourished, into the third season,
as we each pretended to be able to live with our involuntary grown-up
status, without becoming boring. It was noticeable that the general
level of alcohol intake was on the increase at these gatherings,
particularly where Tony and Elaine were concerned. Sometimes, as
visions blurred, so did the perception of who was with whom - and
whether it mattered. On one such occasion, a tipsy Elaine was all over
Steve like blossoms at the Battle of Flowers, but he appeared not to
respond. Although Tony feigned indifference, his possessiveness showed
and he stayed at home after that.

While his wife lapped up the sun and the nightlife, Tony became morose.
All around him unplanned conceptions abounded, yet it was apparent that
he and Elaine were unable to start a family. He joined a shooting club
and used that as a reason for missing parties. Elaine would often
arrive unescorted.

Their place at Gorey was the largest of the venues and Elaine was
persuaded to continue to host a gathering in spite of Tony's
disinterest and his rumoured fertility problem. That evening he was
trying his best to be hospitable when, out of the blue, Elaine shocked
everyone by announcing that she was expecting a baby. The news was
greeted by the usual mumblings of congratulations, then a silence,
broken gradually by a babble of speculative chattering that all but
drowned out the music. Tony left the room hurriedly and didn't
return.

Our next shindig was at Steve and Yvonne's bungalow overlooking the bay
at Petit Port. A short, steep, unlit winding track, unsuitable for
cars, led from the main road. Theirs was the most remote and
picturesque of the party locations, although hardest to reach.
Partygoers had to park up and climb a steep, unlit path for a hundred
yards or more. Steve had never fixed the broken doorbell, so friends
just walked in, while strangers hammered on the heavy cast iron
knocker.

At least two people were later to testify that they heard knocking just
before Steve disappeared from the party that night. Some of us stayed
on till daybreak to help Yvonne search the surrounding terrain right
down to the shore, to no avail. They had no near neighbours and his car
hadn't been moved. The police were called.

Some suggested our friend had simply decided to make a dramatic exit
and maybe caught a plane to London early next morning; but most of us
knew that wasn't Steve's style. Besides, he didn't appear to be drunk
and it was simply inconceivable that he would wander off alone from his
own party.

His body was washed up near Corbierre Lighthouse a week later, badly
marked and disfigured. In time the police interviewed as many of the
partygoers as they could track down, while speculation mounted as to
the cause of death. Since he had been a strong swimmer, there was no
explanation that made sense. Then Tony was arrested.

When she had calmed down a little, Elaine told me how her husband had
been moping around the house for more than a week, drinking heavily.
One day he suffered a fit of remorse and told her how he had killed
Steve. Stunned by the detail of his disclosure, she was unsure whether
she felt anger or pity. By the time the police came to question him, he
had been too distraught to offer an alibi. She immediately engaged a
lawyer.

oooOOOooo

The media located the dead man's former girlfriend in England. As I
remembered the young lady, she wasn't very bright, yet in print she was
suddenly articulate, denouncing Steve as a worthless villain, in words
she couldn't have known the meaning of.

Although he declined to take the stand at the trial, Tony was described
as a pillar of the community. An unblemished employment record, an
interest in Jersey and its history, a devotion to his wife and home,
all served to confirm this. His statement to the police, confessing to
his involvement the crime, was presented in a way that elicited pity.
He had, he said, gone to Steve's home that night to challenge him, now
certain that he and Elaine were having an affair. They walked down to
the small harbour where a fight took place, during which Steve
stumbled, hit his head on the concrete and fell into the sea. The
defence lawyer went on to paint a picture of an honourable man driven
to the edge of insanity by his wife's adultery with his close friend; a
crime of passion.

The prosecution was unable to challenge this account. With
corroborative medical evidence, a sympathetic jury found Tony guilty,
but on the lesser count of manslaughter.

oooOOOooo

What Elaine wanted most of all was to have a baby. When her husband
refused to go for tests, she saw Steve, with his reputation for
promiscuity, as the ideal person to father her child. It was to be a
one-night stand with no strings. She didn't count on him turning her
down, but he did. She spent the night trying to change his mind and
drinking too much. There was a scene when she and Tony got home, during
which he vowed never to be embarrassed like that again.

It was quite soon afterwards that Elaine propositioned me, knowing full
well that I couldn't resist. Our affair probably started when we first
met. It was the secret, knowing look, the casual touching of hands,
nothing more than that. There was an understanding, a respect, a
promise, an arm's length intimacy. It was a flirtation, an unfulfilled
dream. But I never considered being unfaithful, not seriously, until
she asked me to share her bed.

I had kept it bottled up, but I didn't just fancy Elaine, I lusted
after her. I struggled with my conscience, but not for long. I worked
out the excuses and discreetly booked the hotel room. I realised Tony
wouldn't thank me for the gesture, but in my mind I was helping him to
kick-start his family, a labour of love - friendly fire.

oooOOOooo

I can't pretend to know what it was like for Tony. Since Elaine told me
the pathetic details of his anguished confession - the true one - I
have tried to understand, but I can't forgive.

He finally cracked, he told her, when Elaine announced she was
pregnant. Having witnessed her crawling all over Steve that night, he
knew who had to be the father. It was a cruel injustice that people
like Steve were scoring by accident, while he himself could only fire
blanks.

During the journey to Petit Port his rage built up. He even wondered
whether he had the courage to kill his rival. Although Steve was
physically stronger, the loaded Luger tipped the scales in his favour.
He would humiliate him, make him apologise and beg for his life, then
decide his fate.

When the host answered his knock, Tony stuck the Luger in his ribs and
forced him to walk ahead of him right down to the quay. The moon was
nearly full. All the way down the path he subjected Steve to threats
and verbal abuse, shouting down any attempt to reply.

He forced his captive to kneel on the concrete, holding the pistol
close to his head. Then he told him to plead for his life. But Steve
shocked him by denying that he had ever slept with Elaine and
challenging him to pull the trigger, if he didn't believe him. Now Tony
was wavering, losing the initiative and his nerve. In a last attempt to
exert his authority, he pointed the gun towards the night sky and
pulled the trigger. The pistol jammed.

It was breaking point. In a flash, all the anger and self-pity of the
recent past came flooding into his brain as he reflected upon the
injustice of it all. The citizen's arrest that cost him part of his
salary for three months, the wife he brought over to impress, only to
find he couldn't sire her children, the humiliation of Elaine's
adultery, and now the gun that wouldn't discharge its bullet. A litany
of impotence!

He turned the gun around, grabbing the barrel and bringing the butt
down hard on Steve's temple. As his much stronger opponent struggled to
rise, he repeated the action, then again and again until he slumped
forward exhausted over the body of his one time friend. Then he rolled
the lifeless form off the wharf and into the sea.

oooOOOooo

Of course our coupling at the Cote du Nord was never ever going to be a
one-off, both Elaine and I realised that at the time. During and after
the trial, we found it impossible to stay apart.

My own loveless marriage ended in amicable divorce. Mary remarried, but
I keep in touch with her, and see Jason when I can.

Tony was released after serving three years. I told him about Elaine
and I, and that I intended to tell the truth about what happened at
Petit Port, to clear Steve's name. He didn't seem to care. He had
decided to leave Jersey, he said, go abroad, maybe tour the world. I
wondered if he could see the irony in that.

Our own girl, Laura, was the joy of our lives and we thought it would
be nice to give her a little brother or sister. Elaine was broody all
the time, but it just didn't seem to be happening for us. That's when
she suggested maybe we should lighten up, start going to parties again.
And she knew I'd do anything to make her happy.

Ends.