Pretty Boy - If I Come After You Beware 'Cos Hell's Coming With Me. Roy Shaw
dance with him. He took her hand and pulled her towards the dance floor. She yanked her arm back and started shouting. Jimmy looked back at me and shrugged his shoulders. The two girls jumped up from the table, the big one rolling up her sleeves ready for a punch-up. I started to laugh. Sensing trouble, the doormen from the Casino came over; they were the biggest doormen I have ever seen. They tried to calm the situation by explaining we had to put our name on a list for a dance with the girls and to wait our turn. Jimmy told the doormen to fuck off. I didn’t want any trouble – I shouldn’t have been there in the first place, and trouble was the last thing I needed. I told Jimmy to leave it out, but he was having none of it. He held up a bottle and hissed, ‘Do you want it, you kraut bastard?’
I closed my eyes, flinched, and thought, that’s torn it. The big doorman drew his lips back in a half smile that resembled a snarl. I knew then it was going to go off. I whispered to Jimmy out of the corner of my mouth, ‘I’ll take the biggest one.’
The doorman stepped forward, resembling a giant oak tree as he stood in front of me. I looked him up and down, from his snarl to his clenched fists. His arms were so bowed he looked like he was holding two rolled-up carpets under them.
I thought, Oh fuck, how the hell am I going to knock him over? He was a gorilla in every sense of the word, particularly as he worked at The Gorilla Club. I weighed up the situation, and knew if I just threw a punch it would lose power by the time it hit him because of his height. I’d have to throw my whole weight behind it. I clenched my fist, drew back and twisted from my waist. I hit him with a left hook followed by a right uppercut. He wobbled, then wobbled again, and over he went like a big ol’ tree.
Jimmy and I looked at each other.
‘Let’s get the fuck out of here.’
We started to run before the doorman got up. The crowded dance floor parted like the Red Sea to let us through. As we reached the double doors to the hall, Jim pushed one door and ran through. I pushed the other but my side was locked and I went through the stained-glass window and cut my hand badly. We ran around the narrow streets trying to get away from the area until we found a quiet, seedy bar on the outskirts of town. We went in and sat in the corner, trying to look inconspicuous. Twenty minutes later, the police arrived.
‘Any Englishmen must make themselves known.’
The landlord pointed to us. I tried to hide my cut hand under the table to avoid drawing attention to us, but the policeman noticed it.
‘Vot have you done to your hand?’ he asked.
I told him I was a mechanic and had cut my hand at work. He didn’t believe me and ordered us outside. As we walked towards the door, I whispered to Jimmy, ‘When we get outside, have it away on your toes.’
As we went through the doors, we started to run as fast as we could, but found it difficult because we had been drinking too much. It felt like holding a barrel of beer, only it was in my belly. We were puffing and panting, with the police hot on our tails.
‘Stop, or I’ll shoot, English bastards.’
Jimmy and I kept on going, not daring to look round. A bullet whizzed past our heads. It only made us run faster. Jimmy ran so fast I thought he was hanging on to the bullet. He ran one way, I ran the other, and I never saw Jimmy’s arse again for dust. I continued up a hill, but I was exhausted. The German police meant business and shouted, ‘STOP, OR I’LL SHOOT.’
I thought, fucking cheek, we won the war. What am I running for? I put my hands up in the air signalling defeat. The police surrounded me, pointing their guns at my head saying, ‘You come with us.’
I didn’t argue with them. I wasn’t daft and, besides, I was knackered. They took me to the local police station and I was nicked. I was taken back to the barracks and put under close arrest. Yet another court martial.
The next morning, I was marched by two Regimental Policemen in to see the Commanding Officer.
‘Left, right … left, right. Stop. Face your Commanding Officer.’
The CO didn’t give me a chance to say a word.
‘Shaw,’ he said, ‘you’re the scum of the earth.’
Scum of the earth! Who the fuck did he think he was talking to? What a liberty. I didn’t say a word. I jumped over the table and head-butted him. The Regimental Policemen grabbed me. They were tough bastards but I put up a good fight. There was blood and teeth everywhere. Obviously, I was overpowered and slung into a cell. Later, one of the RPs came back to see me. I thought we were going to have a row, but instead he took time out and explained that he recognised himself in me, that he also used to be anti-authority, and said I wasn’t doing myself any favours. If I continued, he said, I’d be going away for a long time. He made it clear the only way I had any chance of getting out of three court martials was to see the doctor and tell him I was hearing voices.
‘Hearing voices!’ I laughed. ‘Are you sure?’
The next morning, I was in the doctor’s office. He asked me if I had anything to say. I shook my head.
On the way out, the RP asked me if I’d told the doctor about the voices. I told him I hadn’t. He went back into the office and returned a few minutes later with the doctor. It had given me enough time to think about it.
‘Tell the doctor what you told me, Roy, about the voices. You know … the ones in your head.’
On the spur of the moment I had to make up a story, something I would remember. I told him that I heard voices, one a woman called Jean and the other one called John. John would tell me to hurt people and Jean would tell me not to. I explained that I felt I was torn between good and evil.
‘Ahh,’ the German doctor said, ‘you crazy.’
The RP stood behind the doctor, stuck his thumb in the air and winked. I didn’t know what he was looking so pleased about. I was taken directly to a German mental asylum. My feet didn’t touch the ground. I was taken to the nut house so quickly it made my head spin.
Nobody spoke as I was marched into the asylum. The RPs handed me over to the psychiatrist who was sitting behind a large desk with a strange little smile on his face. I spat my gum on to the floor and looked around at the high ceilings and barred windows. I wasn’t bothered, I thought I could bluff my way through; being there was just a means to an end.
A doctor and two male nurses led me down a long corridor, on each side of which were heavy steel doors that were bolted. I was taken into a ward with rows of beds on each side, each one containing a patient with a vacant look in their eyes. I was shown to a bed at the end of the ward and told to get undressed.
Over the next few days, I was seen by an endless stream of doctors and nurses. No one spoke proper English, so I could barely understand what they were saying. I just nodded and agreed and made the right noises at the right times, or so I thought.
After much prodding and poking it was decided that the best way to treat me was with electrical stimulation to the brain.
‘What the fuck is electrical-what’s-its-name to the brain?’ I asked.
The nurses tutted, sighed and dismissed the question with a wave of the hand.
The next morning, I was taken to a ward containing seven men lying on either side of the room. All were tucked up in bed, crisp white sheets pulled tightly across their shoulders, their heads being the only thing exposed. I sat on my bed looking at these poor souls, they were like the living dead. Four male nurses motioned to me to go with them. I went voluntarily. A doctor patted a leather table for me to lie on. Everyone was chatting and didn’t seem to care about me; it was all in a day’s work to them. I looked around the room at the medical equipment, the big dials and volt meters. Lying next to the leather table was an instrument that looked like a stethoscope.
Anxiously, I climbed onto the table. The doctor pulled me backwards and four men, two either side, held my legs. I started to get a bit nervous and asked them what