MALTA 1 – SCOTLAND 0

There can be few sounds more sickening than that of a pint glass being slammed into some poor bastard’s face. There’s also an inordinate amount of gushing blood and large helpings of squealing – and justifiably so if you ask me – on the part of the unfortunate victim.

     I am in a pub in Soho. The year is 1977 if that matters at all. Makes no difference to the squealing Scotsman writhing on the floor at my feet. Blood has splashed on my shoes and trousers. How inconsiderate of the bastard. These shoes are only a week old. Still, I suppose it will wash off easy enough, I just hope the flying shards of glass haven’t scratched them too much.

     ‘Time to go boys,’ barks the fat Malt.

     I didn’t need any verbal encouragement to leave and almost tripped over my own blood stained feet as I scrambled for the door. Jesus, it wasn’t even four in the afternoon yet and I’d already been party to a particularly gruesome act of gratuitous GBH. Not that the Scots geezer had been without guilt in the incident. He was an irritation to say the least. He seemed to have a problem with Malts. Major bad move that in 1970’s  Soho. Porno shops, strip clubs, illegal street card scams, clip joints, seedy sex cinemas, haggard peroxide blonde Toms sitting in squalid first floor hovels waiting for their next punter – you could bet your last pound a Maltese gentleman was making a fat wedge of dosh out of them all. They owned the turf and controlled their dominion by the best method known to them – unmitigated, unrestrained violence.

     To be honest I had initially found the pissed up Hibernian rather amusing: he was small in stature with a pock marked face and dressed in the manner of a man who preferred to spend his money on booze than clothing. Not quite rags but not a kick and an arse off. Charlie, for that was the Malt’s name, looked impassively at me as the Scot launched his tirade at him.

     ‘Ye fooken Malt twats, ye think ye own the fooken toon ye stinkin ponces!’

     It was the last straw. Charlie sipped his G and T without emotion, continued talking to me whilst winking to the third member of our little party. This was his minder, a gorilla of a man from Manchester – I forget his name – employed to ensure Charlie had safe passage round the West End streets. I think he expected him to whack the Scot, maybe the minder simply forgot he was holding the pint glass, I really don’t know. It mattered not – the deed was done. I don’t know who was the more shocked, me or the pisspot. I looked on with a mixture of awe and – I’m ashamed to say – a kind of juvenile admiration as the minder (I really do wish I could remember the bloke’s name) pitched the Scot unceremoniously backwards over the bar counter. He narrowly missed the landlady as he did so – I remember her name, it was Betty – and she regarded the squealing piece of humanity as no more than garbage waiting to be put out onto the street where it belonged. She smiled at Charlie and wished us all a cheery ‘see you later chaps’ as we quit the pub.