There’s something to be said for a story that starts like a James Bond movie, throwing you straight in the deep end, a perfect way of getting to know the main character, David, or is that Alistair?
A retired spy, well not so much a spy as a retired errand boy, David’s rather wry description of his talents, and a woman that most men would give their left arm for, not exactly the ideal couple, but there is a spark in a meeting that may or may not have been a set up.
But as the story progressed, the question I kept asking myself was why he’d bother.
And, page after unrelenting page, you find out.
Susan is exactly the sort of woman the pique his interest. Then, inexplicably, she disappears. That might have been the end to it, but Prendergast, that shadowy enigma, David’s ex boss who loves playing games with real people, gives him an ultimatum, find her or come back to work.
Nothing like an offer that’s a double edged sword!
A dragon for a mother, a sister he didn’t know about, Susan’s BFF who is not what she seems or a friend indeed, and Susan’s father who, up till David meets her, couldn’t be less interested, his nemesis proves to be the impossible dream, and he’s always just that one step behind.
When the rollercoaster finally came to a halt, and I could start breathing again, it was an ending that was completely unexpected.
I’ve been thinking a lot about Bill’s service, and the characters he meets along the way, some of whom shape the man he became, others he remained friends with after he was discharged, and those that were killed.
Several have a direct bearing in the main story, for instance, Brainless, a rather ubiquitous nickname, given to him because of his actions, that is to say, he acts without thinking, sometimes when in great peril, a man who never quite recovered, but is, for all intents and purposes Bill’s friend and someone he feels responsible to look after, perhaps because of how many times he saved Bill from death, or worse.
There is also Manilow, but we’ll save him for later.
So, this is where ‘Brainless’ get’s his introduction:
It was the first time I’d been hit by a bullet, and it hurt. It was a steep learning curve, realizing you have been hit, and then the brain going into overdrive to tell you first it going to hurt like hell, and then begin to assess the damage, running every scenario from ‘it’s a flesh wound’ to ‘Oh God, I’m going to die’.
At least, that was what had happened to me for my first time.
Seconds, or minutes, or hours later, a man who doubled as a Medic came scrabbling over to me and looked at the wound. A silly thought, how did he know I’d been shot? Had I screamed? He made a quick assessment, told me I’d live, and dressed it as good and as quickly as he could.
There were other casualties.
I lasted until I was brought into a clearing some miles further on, after the enemy had been killed, or had retreated, and loaded onto a helicopter. There I was told everything would be OK and then the lights went out.
My first visit to a mobile army hospital, after being hit, was a novelty. It was nothing like a real hospital. Nor was the staff. It took a different sort of medical personnel to man a front-line hospital where you were just as likely to become a casualty yourself.
The doctor was quite jovial about the whole matter saying I would be back out again in no time, not exactly a prospect I was looking forward to. It was almost a mend job without anesthetic and the memory of it remained with me for some time. Facilities were not primitive, but they just appeared that way.
I was one of the less needy casualties that day. After being stitched up, a nurse took me to a bed in a ward with a mixture of serious and not so seriously wounded.
The nurse, whose name was Wendy, had the same sense of humor I had. She insisted we be on first name terms from the start. How she kept her humor was a mystery, for most noticeable was her tired look as if she had been doing the same thing for too long.
The bed was comfortable, the temperature bearable, and the food edible. Being, and remaining, injured had its good points.
I slept well the first night. I presumed the injection she’d given me was to ensure I had a restful sleep. It was long overdue and much needed.
The next morning the numbers had thinned. Two men had died, several others returned to duty. To my left was a sad and distant private, who, from time to time, would start moaning. He’d been in the middle of a mortar attack and was both deaf and had serious psychological problems.
To my right, there was a large man who barely fit in the bed. He was a perpetually unhappy person, with only minor injuries, a bullet wound to his upper leg. Nothing serious, he said, and just wanted to leave as soon as possible. Brainless, the nurse called him. Always wanted to get back to the war and kill some more of the enemy. An obsession, she said.
He was staring morosely at the ceiling when I woke. It took a few minutes to regain full consciousness, a sign I’d been in a drugged sleep.
“What are you in for?” he asked.
“Leg wound. Nothing serious.” You?”
“Leg. Bastards snuck up on me. And the useless rearguard didn’t do his job properly.”
“Landmine?”
“Sniper.”
I’d seen both. Tread in the wrong place, and you didn’t do it again. Sniper’s fire came from almost anywhere, taking out soldiers and civilians indiscriminately. You could never hear the bullet, just feel it.
“Mongrel,” I said with feeling.
“Yours?”
“Probably the same. I didn’t see it coming. I hate it when you can’t see the bastards. There ought to be some law they send you a message first. Give you a chance….”
“Chap other side killed himself. Had enough. It was written all over his face. What kind of sooks are we bringing over here?”
“National service,” I said quietly.
“You?” he asked.
I could feel his contempt for ‘Nashos’ and to be glad I was not one. “I believe I volunteered.”
He didn’t ask what I meant, and even if he had, I probably would have made up a lie. I hardly thought if I said my father in law hated me that much he would send me here, would make any sense, particularly to this man beside me.
He snorted. “More the fool you, then.”
We were both released on the same day. His unit had suffered major casualties, and the story he gave me in the hospital was not quite true. He’d gone down trying to save what men he could in an ambush. Heroics came to mind, but his selfless actions were much more than that. Without a unit, he joined ours.
Wendy remained in my mind for some time after that visit. When I returned the next time, my injuries being more serious, I enquired as to her whereabouts, only to discover she was dead too, a victim of her own hand, simply because she could not cope with the death, mutilation, and waste.
There was no doubt it affected all of us in different ways. Some didn’t like the idea of going back out into the jungle and found their own peace. Others, like Wendy, needed something more, but all too often, no-one recognized what the solution was until it was too late.
Now that I have paved the way, I must get back to the main story and write the part where Brainless enters the picture.
50 photographs, 50 stories, of which there is one of the 50 below.
They all start with –
A picture paints … well, as many words as you like. For instance:
And, the story:
Have you ever watched your hopes and dreams simply just fly away?
Everything I thought I wanted and needed had just left in an aeroplane, and although I said I was not going to, i came to the airport to see the plane leave. Not the person on it, that would have been far too difficult and emotional, but perhaps it was symbolic, the end of one life and the start of another.
But no matter what I thought or felt, we had both come to the right decision. She needed the opportunity to spread her wings. It was probably not the best idea for her to apply for the job without telling me, but I understood her reasons.
She was in a rut. Though her job was a very good one, it was not as demanding as she had expected, particularly after the last promotion, but with it came resentment from others on her level, that she, the youngest of the group would get the position.
It was something that had been weighing down of her for the last three months, and if noticed it, the late nights, the moodiness, sometimes a flash of temper. I knew she had one, no one could have such red hair and not, but she had always kept it in check.
And, then there was us, together, and after seven years, it felt like we were going nowhere. Perhaps that was down to my lack of ambition, and though she never said it, lack of sophistication. It hadn’t been an issue, well, not until her last promotion, and the fact she had to entertain more, and frankly I felt like an embarrassment to her.
So, there it was, three days ago, the beginning of the weekend, and we had planned to go away for a few days and take stock. We both acknowledged we needed to talk, but it never seemed the right time.
It was then she said she had quit her job and found a new one. Starting the following Monday.
Ok, that took me by surprise, not so much that it something I sort of guessed might happen, but that she would just blurt it out.
I think that right then, at that moment, I could feel her frustration with everything around her.
What surprised her was my reaction. None.
I simply asked where who, and when.
A world-class newspaper, in New York, and she had to be there in a week.
A week.
It was all the time I had left with her.
I remember I just shrugged and asked if the planned weekend away was off.
She stood on the other side of the kitchen counter, hands around a cup of coffee she had just poured, and that one thing I remembered was the lone tear that ran down her cheek.
Is that all you want to know?
I did, yes, but we had lost that intimacy we used to have when she would have told me what was happening, and we would have brainstormed solutions. I might be a cabinet maker but I still had a brain, was what I overheard her tell a friend once.
There’s not much to ask, I said. You’ve been desperately unhappy and haven’t been able to hide it all that well, you have been under a lot of pressure trying to deal with a group of troglodytes, and you’ve been leaning on Bentley’s shoulder instead of mine, and I get it, he’s got more experience in that place, and the politics that go with it, and is still an ally.
Her immediate superior and instrumental in her getting the position, but unlike some men in his position he had not taken advantage of a situation like some men would. And even if she had made a move, which I doubted, that was not the sort of woman she was, he would have politely declined.
One of the very few happily married men in that organisation, so I heard.
So, she said, you’re not just a pretty face.
Par for the course for a cabinet maker whose university degree is in psychology. It doesn’t take rocket science to see what was happening to you. I just didn’t think it was my place to jump in unless you asked me, and when you didn’t, well, that told me everything I needed to know.
Yes, our relationship had a use by date, and it was in the next few days.
I was thinking, she said, that you might come with me, you can make cabinets anywhere.
I could, but I think the real problem wasn’t just the job. It was everything around her and going with her, that would just be a constant reminder of what had been holding her back. I didn’t want that for her and said so.
Then the only question left was, what do we do now?
Go shopping for suitcases. Bags to pack, and places to go.
Getting on the roller coaster is easy. On the beginning, it’s a slow easy ride, followed by the slow climb to the top. It’s much like some relationships, they start out easy, they require a little work to get to the next level, follows by the adrenaline rush when it all comes together.
What most people forget is that what comes down must go back up, and life is pretty much a roller coaster with highs and lows.
Our roller coaster had just come or of the final turn and we were braking so that it stops at the station.
There was no question of going with her to New York. Yes, I promised I’d come over and visit her, but that was a promise with crossed fingers behind my back. After a few months in t the new job the last thing shed want was a reminder of what she left behind. New friends new life.
We packed her bags, three out everything she didn’t want, a free trips to the op shop with stiff she knew others would like to have, and basically, by the time she was ready to go, there was nothing left of her in the apartment, or anywhere.
Her friends would be seeing her off at the airport, and that’s when I told her I was not coming, that moment the taxi arrived to take her away forever. I remember standing there, watching the taxi go. It was going to be, and was, as hard as it was to watch the plane leave.
So, there I was, finally staring at the blank sky, around me a dozen other plane spotters, a rather motley crew of plane enthusiasts.
Already that morning there’s been 6 different types of plane depart, and I could hear another winding up its engines for take-off.
People coming, people going.
Maybe I would go to New York in a couple of months, not to see her, but just see what the attraction was. Or maybe I would drop in, just to see how she was.
As one of my friends told me when I gave him the news, the future is never written in stone, and it’s about time you broadened your horizons.
I’m working on the latest book and it is not going well. I don’t have writer’s block, I think it is more a case of self-doubt. It’s why I can’t concentrate.
It’s why I’m thinking about the next story and not staying on track. And that pesky outline, or synopsis, or whatever it wants to be called has gone missing under a pile of paper.
Next resolution, clean up this goddam mess!
This leads me to be over critical of what I have written and much pressing of the delete key. Only to realize that an action taken in haste can be regrettable, and makes me feel even more depressed when I realize the deletions are irrecoverable.
Damn. Whatever happened to ‘undo’?
I think I’d be happier in a garret somewhere channeling van Gogh’s rage.
Lesson learned – don’t delete, save it to a text file so it can be retrieved when sanity returns.
If it returns…
I was not happy with the previous start. Funny about that, because until a few weeks ago I thought the start was perfect.
What a difference a week makes or is that politics?
Perhaps I should consider adding some political satire.
But I digress…
It seems it’s been like that for a few weeks now, not being able to stick to the job in hand, doing anything but what I’m supposed to be doing. I recognize the restlessness, I’m not happy with the story as it is, so rather than getting on with it, I find myself writing words just for the sake of writing words.
Any words are better than none, right?
So I rewrote the start, added about a hundred pages and now I have to do a mass of rewriting of what was basically the whole book.
But here’s the thing.
This morning I woke up and looked at the new start, and it has inspired me.
Perhaps all I needed was several weeks of teeth gnashing, and self doubt to get myself back on track.
With my attention elsewhere, I walked into a man who was hurrying in the opposite direction. He was a big man with a scar running down the left side of his face from eye socket to mouth, and who was also wearing a black shirt with a red tie.
That was all I remembered as my heart almost stopped.
He apologized as he stepped to one side, the same way I stepped, as I also muttered an apology.
I kept my eyes down. He was not the sort of man I wanted to recognize later in a lineup. I stepped to the other side and so did he. It was one of those situations. Finally getting out of sync, he kept going in his direction, and I towards the bus, which was now pulling away from the curb.
Getting my breath back, I just stood riveted to the spot watching it join the traffic. I looked back over my shoulder, but the man I’d run into had gone. I shrugged and looked at my watch. It would be a few minutes before the next bus arrived.
Wait, or walk? I could also go by subway, but it was a long walk to the station. What the hell, I needed the exercise.
At the first intersection, the ‘Walk’ sign had just flashed to ‘Don’t Walk’. I thought I’d save a few minutes by not waiting for the next green light. As I stepped onto the road, I heard the screeching of tires.
A yellow car stopped inches from me.
It was a high powered sports car, perhaps a Lamborghini. I knew what they looked like because Marcus Bartleby owned one, as did every other junior executive in the city with a rich father.
Everyone stopped to look at me, then the car. It was that sort of car. I could see the driver through the windscreen shaking his fist, and I could see he was yelling too, but I couldn’t hear him. I stepped back onto the sidewalk, and he drove on. The moment had passed and everyone went back to their business.
My heart rate hadn’t come down from the last encounter. Now it was approaching cardiac arrest, so I took a few minutes and several sets of lights to regain composure.
At the next intersection, I waited for the green light, and then a few seconds more, just to be sure. I was no longer in a hurry.
At the next, I heard what sounded like a gunshot. A few people looked around, worried expressions on their faces, but when it happened again, I saw it was an old car backfiring. I also saw another yellow car, much the same as the one before, stopped on the side of the road. I thought nothing of it, other than it was the second yellow car I’d seen.
At the next intersection, I realized I was subconsciously heading towards Harry’s new bar. It was somewhere on 6th Avenue, so I continued walking in what I thought was the right direction.
I don’t know why I looked behind me at the next intersection, but I did. There was another yellow car on the side of the road, not far from me. It, too, looked the same as the original Lamborghini, and I was starting to think it was not a coincidence.
Moments after crossing the road, I heard the roar of a sports car engine and saw the yellow car accelerate past me. As it passed by, I saw there were two people in it, and the blurry image of the passenger; a large man with a red tie.
Now my imagination was playing tricks.
It could not be the same man. He was going in a different direction.
In the few minutes I’d been standing on the pavement, it had started to snow; early for this time of year, and marking the start of what could be a long cold winter. I shuddered, and it was not necessarily because of the temperature.
I looked up and saw a neon light advertising a bar, coincidentally the one Harry had ‘found’ and, looking once in the direction of the departing yellow car, I decided to go in. I would have a few drinks and then leave by the back door if it had one.
I had once said that Grand Central Station, in New York, was large enough you could get lost in it. Especially if you were from out of town.
I know, I was from out of town, and though I didn’t quite get lost, back then I had to ask directions to go where I needed to.
It was also an awe-inspiring place, and whenever I had a spare moment, usually at lunchtime, I would go there and just soak in the atmosphere. It was large enough to make a list of places to visit, or find, or get a photograph from some of the more obscure places.
Today, I was just there to work off a temper. Things had gone badly at work, and even though I hadn’t done anything wrong, I still felt bad about it.
I came in the 42nd street entrance and went up to the balcony that overlooked the main concourse. A steady stream of people was coming and going, most purposefully, a few were loitering, and several police officers were attempting to move on a vagrant. It was not the first time.
But one person caught my eye, a young woman who had made a circuit of the hall, looked at nearly every destination board, and appeared to be confused. It was the same as I had felt when I first arrived.
Perhaps I could help.
The problem was, a man approaching a woman from out of left field would have a very creepy vibe to it, so it was probably best left alone.
Another half-hour of watching the world go by, I had finally got past the bad mood and headed back to work. I did a wide sweep of the main concourse, perhaps more for the exercise than anything else, and had reached the clock in the centre of the concourse when someone turned suddenly, and I crashed into them.
Not badly, like ending up on the floor, but enough for a minor jolt. Of course, it was my fault because I was in another world at that particular moment.
“Oh, I am sorry.” A woman’s voice, very apologetic.
I was momentarily annoyed, then, when I saw who it was, it passed. It was the lost woman I’d seen earlier.
“No. Not your fault, but mine entirely. I have a habit of wandering around with my mind elsewhere.”
Was it fate that we should meet like this?
I noticed she was looking around, much the same as she had before.
“Can I help you?”
“Perhaps you can. There’s supposed to be a bar that dates back to the prohibition era here somewhere. Campbell’s Apartment, or something like that. I was going to ask…”
“Sure. It’s not that hard to find if you know where it is. I’ll take you.”
It made for a good story, especially when I related it to the grandchildren, because the punch line was, “and that’s how I met your grandmother.”
John Pennington’s life is in the doldrums. Looking for new opportunities, prevaricating about getting married, the only joy on the horizon was an upcoming visit to his grandmother in Sorrento, Italy.
Suddenly he is left at the check-in counter with a message on his phone telling him the marriage is off, and the relationship is over.
If only he hadn’t promised a friend he would do a favor for him in Rome.
At the first stop, Geneva, he has a chance encounter with Zoe, an intriguing woman who captures his imagination from the moment she boards the Savoire, and his life ventures into uncharted territory in more ways than one.
That ‘favor’ for his friend suddenly becomes a life-changing event, and when Zoe, the woman who he knows is too good to be true, reappears, danger and death follow.
Shot at, lied to, seduced, and drawn into a world where nothing is what it seems, John is dragged into an adrenaline-charged undertaking, where he may have been wiser to stay with the ‘devil you know’ rather than opt for the ‘devil you don’t’.
We all know what this means, without moisture, in other words not wet.
It could also mean dull factually, as in reading some non-fiction books, and quite often those prescribed as mandatory reading at school.
You could also have a dry sense of humour, where you have to be on your game to understand, or get, the humour.
It could also describe boredom by saying that it’s like watching paint dry.
For those who like a bit of a tipple, the last place you want to go is a dry bar, where no alcohol is served.
Perhaps this should be mandatory for weddings and funerals, places where feelings often run very high and do not need the stimulus of half a dozen double Scotches.
And speaking of alcohol and cider in particular, you can have it sweet, dry, or draft. Many people prefer dry, sometimes the drier the better, especially wine, and oddly martinis.
Aside from whether they are shaken or stirred.
But the most fascinating version of dry is dry cleaning. Just how can you ‘dry’ clean clothes?
I’m back home and this story has been sitting on the back burner for a few months, waiting for some more to be written.
The trouble is, there are also other stories to write, and I’m not very good at prioritizing.
But, here we are, a few minutes opened up and it didn’t take long to get back into the groove.
Chasing leads, maybe
…
A second later the light came on and I was temporarily blinded.
The woman had to be on the other side of the door, and coming into the room, I must have passed her. Her voice sounded quite old, so it must be the mother.
“Turn around, slowly.
I did. By that time my eyes had readjusted, and I could see a woman, still dressed, with what looked to be an Enfield WW1 rifle. Just as dangerous now as it was then, particularly at this close range.
“Mrs Quigley, I presume,” I asked. Remain polite and conversational and keep her from getting nervous.
“Who are you?”
“Sam Jackson.”
“Is that your real name?”
“Why would you presume to think it wasn’t?”
“You’re breaking into my house which means you’re a criminal, and criminals by nature are also liars. Why would I think you any different to the rest?”
Good question. “I knew your son.”
“Which one?”
“Adam.”
“He’s not here. He hasn’t been around since he gallivanted off overseas a few years back.”
“I saw him only a few days ago, in London. Not gallivanting, by the way, but with feet firmly planted on the ground.”
“He’s not here.”
“Do you know where he is?”
She didn’t know he was dead, and I didn’t think it was my business to tell her. That was Dobbin’s job, and I was surprised he hadn’t. Or, I only had her word for it he hadn’t.
“Are you hard of hearing.” Get into the middle of the room.”
I moved slowly into the middle, watching her edge slowly towards the writing desk while keeping the gun aimed at me. If I tried to run for it, and if she was any sort of shot, I’d be dead before I got three, possibly four paces. If I could get a shred of surprise.
I hadn’t seen the phone on the desk, and watched her pick up the receiver, and, with the same hand, started dialing a number.
“Put it down.” Another voice, another woman, coming from the doorway.
Jennifer.
With a gun in hand, pointed at the woman.
“What if I shoot him, or you?”
“You’ll be dead before either scenario happens. Just put it down. I’m not here to shoot anyone if I can help it.”
Of course, this was just like one of those scenes out of a comedic spy film. Guns pointing in all directions.
And, true to form, a click, and a voice. “You put your weapon down.”
He appeared out of the shadows and had the gun pointed straight at Jennifer’s head at very short range.
Adam Quigley, aka O’Connell, and very much alive.
Jennifer dropped her gun, but Adam didn’t take his gun off her.
That meant we had to make the journey from New York to New Jersey, by train. It involved the underground, or as New Yorkers call it, the subway, from Columbus Circle which by any other name was really, 80th street, to 34th street which apparently was the New Jersey jump-off point for us to get overground, well a lot of it was overground. So, were we going uptown or downtown?
Apparently, it was downtown, and to 34th Street on the A train.
You would not think this to be a difficult task, but for people not used to the subway, and where they were going other than some internet derived instructions, but without the help of a man at the station, just getting tickets may have stopped us dead in our tracks. With his help, we determined the return fare for three of us and then get through the turnstile onto the platform.
We get on the A train, but soon discover it was not stopping at all stations. There was for a few minutes, a little apprehension we might just simply bypass our station. Luckily we did not.
Now, finding your way to the New Jersey transit part of Penn station might appear to be easy, on paper, but once there, on the ground, and mingling with the other passengers which all seemed to be purpose going somewhere, it took a few moments to realize we had to follow the New Jersey transit signs.
This led to a booking hall where luckily we realized we needed to buy more tickets, then find the appropriate platform, and then get on the right train, all of which, in the end, was not difficult at all.
Maybe on the return trip, it might be.
At Newark Penn station it was momentarily confusing because the exit was not readily in sight, so it was a case of following the majority of other passengers who’d got off the train.
This led us to exit onto the street under the train tracks. Luckily, having been before to Prudential Stadium to buy the tickets, we knew what the stadium looked like and roughly where it was, so it was a simple task to walk towards it.
We were early, so it was a case of finding a restaurant to get dinner before the game. So was a great many others, and we passed about 6 different restaurants that looked full to overflowing before we stopped at one called Novelty Burger and Bar.
It looked inviting, and it was not crowded.
It was yet another excuse to have a hamburger and beer, both of which seemed to be a specialty in American. I could not fault either.
And soon after we arrived, this restaurant too was full to overflowing. Thankfully there were other Maple Leaf fans there because being in a room full of opposition teams supports can be quite harrowing.
That was yet to come when we finally got to the stadium. I was not expecting a lot of Maple Leaf fans. We went to this game with high hopes. New Jersey Devils were not exactly at the top of the leader board, and coming off the loss in Toronto, this was make or break for whether we would ever go to another game.
It’s remarkable in that all the Ice Hockey stadiums are the same. Everyone has an excellent view of the game, the sound systems are loud, and the fans passionate. Here it seems to be a thing to ride on the Zambonis. At the front door they were handing out figurines of a Devil’s past player, and it seems a thing that you get a handout of some sort at each game. At Toronto we got towels. And, finally, we were in luck.
The Maple Leafs won.
And it was an odd feeling to know that even though their team lost, there did not seem to be any rancor amount the fans and that any expectation of being assaulted by losing fans was totally unfounded, unlike some sporting events I’ve been to.
Perhaps soccer should take a leaf out of the ice hockey playbook.
That also went for taking public transport late at night. I did not have any fears about doing so, which is more than I can say about traveling at night on our own transport system back home.
Oh, and by the way, there are train conductors who still come to every passenger to collect or stamp their tickets. No trusting the passenger has paid for his trip here. And, if you don’t have a ticket, I have it on good authority they throw you off the train and into the swamp. Good thing then, we had tickets.
Thrills, Spills, and just a dash of Romance 