Despatches: CBX400 Madness

I'd been stitched up on the hp deal. Told one thing, signed my life away in reality. The dealer's passing resemblance to Shylock should've warned me but the low mileage CBX400 was a lovely bit of tackle in an otherwise destitute showroom.

Later, these couple of Mafia types turned up at the bedsit demanding I pay off the outstanding loan. Luckily, the house was full of Hell's Angel types who normally didn't give me the time of day but they obviously had even less time for the suited types. They went away reluctantly.

Two days later there was an early morning commotion. Some suitably large hoodlums trying to lift the CBX into the back of a Transit. I rushed out, screaming my head off, which woke up the whole street. More threats, but a street full of angry neighbours dissuaded them from going terminally violent. They went off and the CBX was placed in the hallway, already crowded by valuable choppers... the landlord was some old Indian gent who only ventured out his basement to collect the rent and seemed more reassured by the mass of grateful tenants than threatened.

Reams of legal paperwork kept coming through the post but I just kept on binning it whilst roaring around London earning a living, of sorts. Because I expected to have the bike repossessed, all I did was add oil and petrol when necessary. Given the reputation of the related CBX550 engine, this should've been a quick way to kill the DOHC four cylinder mill but I had to grudgingly admit that it was a tough little bugger - maybe the motor was designed as a 400 in the first place and upping the capacity to 550cc stretched its limits too far.

As well as the mechanical neglect I was pretty easy going as regards the cosmetics. This all started when I scraped along the side of a car that tried to knock me off. I don't know what he expected to happen, probably not having large chunks taken out of his metalwork. The engine took off the front bumper with a fittingly final bang. The few minor scratches on the Honda encouraged much more destruction.
Despatching in Central London was the usual mixture of highs and lows; didn't take me long to react to cagers that tried to kill me by ruining their day with a bit of well directed violence. Like kicking in their doors, hammering their roofs or just riding off so fast and fluidly that they ended up looking like plonkers.

One cop car tried to cut me up, I braked and they almost accelerated up on to the pavement. They wouldn't give up easily, almost causing a mass pile up as they swerved the other way to stop me overtaking them. They failed again. I shot off down an alleyway that had insufficient width for them to follow, circled around to intersect with them a couple of minutes later. Coming up on their blind side, I gave them a blast of the air-horns and a good kicking to the rear lights before disappearing again. They probably spent the next few weeks trying to track me down...

The DR boss was a bit of a bounder who'd try to con you out of your own piss if you gave him half a chance. The concept of paying taxes wasn't one he had yet to grasp, so he didn't give a shit about doc's supporting our supposed identity and we could rake in the money without too many worries. This went as far as fixing fake numberplates on the bikes and photocopying the one real set of tax and insurance doc's that a newcomer had been foolish enough to sort. We took the piss out of him no end but he didn't seem to mind.

By contrast, Shylock had taken down my whole family and life history and wouldn't agree to the hp deal until he'd seen a stack of supporting evidence. Given that I'd changed companies three times since buying the bike, the only remaining lead he had to me was my cheap bedsit, which I was loathe to give up as everywhere else was two to three times as expensive, and they usually claimed it was gone when motorcycling was mentioned. Can't think why!

But as I'd failed to completely ruin the Honda when riding in fully fledged neglect mode and I was actually beginning to like the bloody thing, there didn't seem much option. DR riders fall into two categories - they're either married, up to their eyeballs in mortgages, or they're single and living in squalor with their mates. It was to the latter that I went in search of new digs.

After a few false calls, one of which included a basement with what looked like a swimming pool in the living room (only it wasn't meant that way), and another than involved a Hackney landlord who refused to believe I was in any kind of employment, I finally found the abode of my dreams. Or nightmares. Ten bikers crammed into a family home that had been cut up with some creative use of wafer thin plywood. The living room had been turned into a workshop and garage! An old jukebox, TV and large fridge filled with beer added to the atmosphere. Getting drunk out of our heads the only way to get to sleep of a night.
This was also in Hackney, with a couple of rival crack gangs fighting it out; we looked so disreputable, despite our minor executive sized earnings, that they left us well alone. Living in such a place had the major benefit of a few biker molls hanging out, who spread their favours far and wide. Three into one will go, so to speak.

My clever plan to evade Shylock came to naught, though! You would've thought that assuming a false identity, sporting fake doc's and riding a bike on made-up plates would've kept me out of harm's way. The only problem was that the bastards had my parents address. These are the kind of citizens who go into a major panic if they are a day late paying their bills. Gangster-like thugs turning up in suburbia with a bill that had grown to thrice its original sum had them so panicked that they wrote a cheque...it's one thing to cheat Shylock but quite another one's own parents, so I'm paying off the highly inflated bill in stages.

That means riding like a lunatic to make some extra dosh, all the time distracted by thoughts of exquisite revenge on Shylock, who last time I saw him was riding around in the newest, biggest Merc money could buy and gave me a most regal wave... I've been trying to persuade the parents to move so that I can inflict serious retribution but they can't understand what's gone down. It's not really the money but the principle of the deal. At least the CBX400 is still going strong.

As to the DR scene - it's brilliant! There ain't any other way to make serious dosh without becoming a boring suit - who else is going to give you wads of money when you look like you've just crawled out of a sewer? Easy answer, huh? As to the CBX400 - it's also brilliant, takes loads of abuse and neglect, comes back for more and costs very little to run. Just get the loan from the bank and not some Shylock type dealer. As to me - I'm having the time of my life. Honest!

Tom Davis