Wannabe in My Gang? Read Online Free PDF Page A

me in the way that the Hollywood mafia kiss fellow gangsters. I was aware Ronnie was homosexual and so I instinctively pulled away from him.
    Ronnie could see from my expression that I was confused, but he just laughed and said: ‘Don’t worry, I’m deaf in one ear and I just wanted to say something discreet to you. I was pulling you to my good ear so I could hear your reply.’
    We both laughed and sat down at the table. He asked Jon if he would go and fetch him a few cans of alcohol-free lager from the canteen. As Jon walked away, Ronnie said that he wanted to know if I trusted Jon. I told him I wouldn’t have brought him if I didn’t. Ronnie said that was good enough for him, but he had previously had some bad experiences with the press and didn’t want anything going wrong; he was doing this interview to help James.
    I found his mood surprisingly philosophical for a man who had spent more than two decades incarcerated for crimes which had shaken the nation in the far-off days of the swinging ’60s. Ronnie Kray, friend of the famous, East End gangster and now Broadmoor prisoner, said he had no regrets. ‘What happened to me was fate, just fate,’ he reflected. ‘That’s life. You take the good with the bad.’
    Flashing Jon what probably would have passed as a menacing leer 20 years ago, he added: ‘We had a good life. We were arrested and jailed for political reasons. They wanted to make examples of us but I’m not bitter and I do not resent what happened to me; I accept it.’
    I almost burst out laughing when Ron said he had been imprisoned for political reasons. Being convicted of the murder of two men may also have been a factor. At 56, Ron was a grim shadow of the man who had ruled London’s underworld. Thin and gaunt, he chain-smoked nervously, his conversation was muffled and occasionally incoherent, but behind the mask was something uniquely sinister about the man once dubbed ‘The Colonel’ by underworld associates.
    Ronnie became quite emotional when he spoke about James. He told Jon: ‘James is a very deserving case for help. I am lucky compared to him. If you have got your health and strength then you are a lucky man. I can smoke and drink. I am not complaining about my lot. James’s is one of the most terrible cases I have heard of in my life. We have got to raise as much money for him as we can to try to give him some sort of life. I get letters every day from people asking for charity. I like to help where I can, but we’re not millionaires, you know, although some papers seem to think we are. I wish I could do more to help James and his family, I really do.’
    Ronnie said that if each of the paper’s readers gave five shillings each, it would go a long way to helping James’s family. When Ron said that I realised just how long he had been locked up and understood how far from reality he had been removed. Shillings went out of circulation around the same time as The Beatles split up. In his fine suit and jewellery poor old Ronnie was living in the past, incarcerated in Broadmoor and locked in a time warp.
    Ronnie’s mood suddenly changed. ‘Well, I think that’s enough for now,’ he said, rising to his feet. He shook hands with Jon and wandered off to another table to stand on his own.
    It didn’t occur to me at the time but Ron was acting strangely because of his paranoia. He had been wary of talking in front of Jon before we had sat down and eventually he had just got up and walked away. Ron called me over and said, ‘I am sorry, I have really got to go but will you come and see me on your own soon?’
    ‘Of course I will, Ron,’ I answered, ‘no problem. Thanks for helping James out. See you soon.’ We shook hands, Ron smiled and then he was gone, escorted from the room by two warders.
    Although I never heard from Gillett again, James Campbell kept in regular contact with me and we discussed various fundraising ideas. The event was going to be a variety show at the Hackney