Huka Falls is located in the Wairakei Tourist Park about five minutes north of Taupo on the north island of New Zealand.
The Waikato River heading towards the gorge
The water heading down the gorge, gathering pace
until it crashes over the top of the waterfall at the rate of about 220,000 liters per second. It also makes a very loud noise, so that when you are close to it, hearing anything but the falls is impossible.
Our hero knows he’s in serious trouble.
The problem is, there are familiar faces and a question of who is a friend and who is foe made all the more difficult because of the enemy, if it was the enemy, simply because it didn’t look or sound or act like the enemy.
Now, it appears, his problems stem from another operation he participated in, and because of it, he has now been roped into what might be called a suicide mission.
I spent another hour trading stories of Army life, none of mine bearing any resemblance to the truth, before the party started.
I said to him, several times, that in my estimation, a part would start at a particular time. He seemed intrigued by how that could be possible when all my men were locked up and guarded.
The Captain, it seemed, was a man of limited intellect.
Or just plain overconfident that he had quelled the incursion and attempt to take the prisoners home.
I was under house arrest, just not in the house with the rest of the men. The Captain decided, being the ranking officer of our group, that I should be accorded facilities befitting my rank. It didn’t change my opinion of the Captain, but it did raise the respect level slightly.
As an officer and a gentleman, as he described himself, he was also a student of Army procedures and practices, not only of his own army but that of others. I admired his hobby out of working hours.
We were just discussing aspects of the first World War, and the part Africa played in it, when both of us suddenly heard gunshots. So did the guard and picked his gun and carefully went out the front door.
The Captain pulled his pistol from out of the top drawer and made sure the magazine had bullets in it. Just in case he needed to use it. All the men, suddenly increased to six, armed and dangerous, in that room had a gun, similar to the Captain. They were commanded by another soldier dressed in fatigues, perhaps a Colonel or higher.
I’d notice some Africa countries had a higher proportion of Generals, to say Lieutenants, and deduced from that, field promotions were a regular thing. That was not my experience here. So far.
I heard another gunshot, this time closer to the hut. Was it my people, mounting their attack? Or was it the Commander, back to retake what was his.
There would be no love lost between the Captain and the commander, and if was a betting man, in a fight, my money would be on the commander.
The sounds of gunfire continued for about ten minutes, then it became sporadic, then none at all. There were footsteps on the boards at the front of the hut, and then a cautious entry, gun barrel first, then, “if you have a gun pointed at the door, I suggest you put it down.” Monroe.
Having caught the Captain’s attention from the front, the Colonel came in the rear, and had his gun barrel pointing to the small of the Captain’s back. “Drop it now.”
The Captain did as he was told.
“You had more men on the perimeter?” he said with a sigh.
“Yes. I thought it prudent to have more than one sniper, a fact that the Militia commander hadn’t given a thought to.” I looked over at Monroe. “Have we secured the airfield?”
“Yes. 10 surviving soldiers, some of them in a bad way, are in the second barracks. They won’t be mounting a counterattack.”
I heard an engine; a large plane engine being started.
“That will be Davies playing with her new toy. Someone is on the runway lights; the rest are heading for the plane. Where are the hostages?” She glared at the Captain.
He shrugged.
Shurl burst in the door. “Out, back through that door,” I said. “Be careful there isn’t a guard waiting for you.”
Monroe looked at me. “Can I shoot the insubordinate bastard?”
A look of surprise, not terror, crossed the Captain’s face.
“Just take him back to the cells and lock him up.”
Shurl came out with the two hostages, just as the second plane engine fired. Monroe took the Captain back to the cells and returned a minute or so later. Shurl had taken the hostages to the plane. Baines would be waiting to switch on the lights at the last minute, and hopefully, the rest were on board.
They would be waiting for Monroe and me.
The both engines were running smoothly, and Davies was testing the rudder and flaps. Suddenly the runway lights came on, and Baines came running towards the plane. Monroe and I jumped aboard, then Baines followed, pulling the door shut behind him.
I heard the engine noise increase, and then we were moving.
I headed up to the cockpit and joined Davies. She was now in her element, her fact a picture of concentration. We were slowly moving to the end of the runway, and I could see her working her way through the preflight checklist.
I tried to speak to her, but she couldn’t hear. She had headphones on. There was a pair near the co-pilot’s seat. I sat down and put them on.
“Everything OK?”
“Nearly. Be quiet for a minute.”
We were at the end of the strip and she turned the plane. She would have checked the wind, not that I’d felt any, and adjusted the take-off direction accordingly.
Then, after what looked like a deep breath and slow exhale, she pushed the engine controls to maximum, and we started moving, slowly gathering speed. The runway surface wasn’t exactly flat, but it was enough not to impede forward motion. Not long after the rear of the plane rose, then in what seemed effortless, we were in the air.
Odd then, when we passed through 2,000 feet, I wondered who this plane belonged to.
© Charles Heath 2020
An Invitation to Dinner
…
I did not go back to the hotel, but instead went home from the airport, half expecting to find Cecilia still there.
She wasn’t, but the lingering scent of her perfume hung in the air as a reminder. I entered if it might stir up Violetta’s ghost because more than once I thought I heard her moving about the house.
It was, of course, my imagination, but just the same it was a slim possibility. I guess talking to her even though she was not there didn’t help.
I had no intention of seeing or talking to Juliet lest she alerted Larry to my visit. It needed to stay anonymous for it to be effective.
A shower, a change of clothes and into the anonymous car that looked like a million others on the road.
Oh, and a little deft driving to lose the car that followed me away from the garage. The Frenchman was persistent, I’ll give him that.
Larry’s mother lived in a mansion overlooking the Mediterranean, and I’d spent a few afternoons on the patio sampling the energy and cheese of a country that knew how to excel in both.
When Violetta first got sick, we had been invited to stay for a few months and she had loved it. It had made her feel better, but in the end, there was no beating cancer that was very aggressively attacking her.
Perhaps it was fitting she took her last breath in the place she loved so much.
I hadn’t been back since, and passing through the gates brought back a flood of sad memories and a tear or two.
Not enough to blur my sight, and take down the two guards Larry had lurking near the gate, supposedly in hiding, with a tranquilizer gun.
I dragged the bodies deeper into the hedgerow. They wouldn’t be waking up for at least 12 hours, time enough to do what I had to.
It was a pleasant but invigoration walk up the hill keeping to the cover the garden provided until I stepped out just in front of the patio, and beyond the open doors the dining room where five people were seated.
“What, not waiting for the guest of honor?” I said, stepping out into full view of the diners.
Two men on the door turned swiftly and both were tranquilized before they could take a step. I turned and looked over my shoulder at the site I thought Cecilia would take, then turned back to see both Larry and his mother out of their seats.
First observation, I didn’t know Larry had three children only two. The son was a replica of him, the girls, both more than ten, were identical twins and like their mother. Once again, I had to wonder why a woman like Brenda would be interested in a man like him.
“What are you doing here?” Larry growled, stopping short of approaching me, eyes on the tranquilizing gun.
The thought crossed my mind that I should just put him to sleep, taken away, to have a less civilized conversation, something he would understand.
“I invited him to dinner. He is an old friend, and you know him as well as I do.”
Her eyes were on the bodyguards on the ground, and Larry, waiting for his reaction. She came over and hugged me. “So nice to see you again.”
“You were in London,” he said tonelessly. It was a statement, not a question.
“Marvels of modern transport. You should stop using leaking rowboats to come and go and embrace the jet age. Sit down Larry, you’re making a scene in front of your family.”
“Who is he dear,” his wife asked as he threw himself back in the chair next to her. The three children looked me over like they would a new toy, the son in particular, with a trademark scowl on his face.
“A policeman of sorts.”
“I didn’t know you were working with the police.”
It was an interesting statement, and if I didn’t know better, it seemed to me she was pushing a button. The look she gave him was priceless.
“Perhaps you and the children should leave the table and let me sort this small problem out.”
“No dear. I want to hear what he has to say.”
He turned to glare at her, a particularly dark expression, whether it was the result of my unexpected arrival or her defiance which I thought was brave under the circumstances, whatever the reason, it showed her to be vastly different from the description of her in the department’s files.
“I told you…”
“You do not raise your voice at me, or anyone, at the dinner table. You also apparently have some explaining to do because when I asked you what happened to your brother, Trevor, you told me the police killed him. I’m assuming that by police you mean in the form of our dining companion who just arrived.”
He looked surprised, no I would say that he was shocked. “You seem remarkably well-informed about something you really know nothing about.” He was showing remarkable restraint because I knew if it was anyone else, they’d be all but dead.
“I know that Trevor told you several times he wanted nothing to do with the business. We used to spend time talking about what he wanted to do with his life and lament the fact you wouldn’t let him. I know you coerced him into running that errand for you because he rang and told me, no asked me, to intervene on his behalf. It seems he knew that there was a traitor in your organization, that he told you his suspicions, but you said it couldn’t possibly be that person. Then when it all went, as he said, to hell in a handbasket, he called me to tell me what happened, and then called your mother, at the behest of your so-called police assassin, and she was talking to her when you arrived. So, Larry, the key question here is, what did you do that took a brother who was alive when you arrived, to dead on arrival at the hospital? You were there, so only you know what happened.”
“I did nothing. He was alive when I put him in the ambulance.”
“Who went with him to the hospital?”
“Jimmy.”
“The person he told you was the traitor. The person you said couldn’t possibly be one. He didn’t go with Trevor to the drop-off, so how did he get there?”
I’ll be honest, I was fascinated, if not hanging on every word. One nuance I did pick up on, was the way she spoke about Trevor told me they had more than just conversations. Had Larry known that also?
“He was not a traitor.”
“And yet you have no explanation as to why he disappeared shortly after Trevor died. Convenient, don’t you think?”
She sat there, face to face, with the man she had married twenty years before, then a relatively naive young woman who knew who he was, but not what he was to become. She didn’t rate highly in the files simply because she purposely stayed out of the limelight, and distanced herself from the business, and Larry’s business associates. I suspected it was to shield her children from the uglier side of the criminal world. Now, I got the impression Larry was trying to induct his son into the business, although only 16, and she was not happy with it or with him.
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.” Less bluster, it was odd to see Larry in a situation where he wasn’t in charge.
“You mean, for once in your life, you don’t have the lies at your fingertips. Let’s leave that for the moment and move on to Jaime Meyers.”
Now he was truly shocked, like a man who just received an umpteen-volt jolt.
“How do you know…” He turned and glared at me.
“Don’t look at me, Larry. I haven’t told anyone about our conversation in London, as per the agreement I made with her. I think you might want to consider the possibility that your wife is not the dumb blonde you tell your friends she is.”
A cat among the pigeons’ statement drew a very dark look from her. “Trevor told me you called me a dumb blonde and I didn’t want to think that was true, but when Elaine told me she overheard Lorenzo talking to his friends using those exact words, I was disappointed.”
That was when Cecilia crashed the party.
© Charles Heath 2022
You know how it goes, you just get into a writing rhythm when the phone rings and it’s another of those pesky scam calls.
Or in my case not one but three, so far.
The first, to do with the NBN, which is Australia’s laughable answer to world-class internet, and which is, in reality, a complete stuff up that cost us, the taxpayers, 50 billion dollars, and for nothing.
Most nights during the peak hours, you cannot continuously stream without breaks, pixelation, or just nothing at all.
World-class? I’m afraid not. Perhaps I should relocate to Romania where, I hear, the internet is much faster and more reliable.
Enough with the rant, the call this time regarding the NBN is a scam, where they try logging into your computer and stealing everything, including banking information, credit card information, and the rest of your life, if it’s possible.
I have no life so they would be badly disappointed.
The second scam call id for solar panels. Yes, they are selling solar panels, but they are the junk no one else wants, years out of date, and then charge three times what they’re worth, even when you get the government rebate.
I’ve got solar panels already, so I don’t care. I just put the phone on the other side of the desk and let them prattle on. They get the message eventually.
The next is for raffle tickets. It generally relates to some form of charity, in which the caller goes through the charity’s functions chapter and verse and then try to hit you up for ten tickets at a discounted price.
Sounds legit. Yes, I’ve heard of the charity. Yes, I know what it does.
But…
It’s not the real charity calling, bt some scammer trying to get your credit card details, along with that all-important 3 digit cvc number.
Not today Josephine, or whatever your name was.
I’ve got an app on my phone that tells me if the caller is a scammer, and this one had red lights flashing and a large red ‘fraud’ stamped across it.
An hour later, all thoughts are gone.
I suppose I better have some lunch and try again later.
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I’d read about out of body experiences, and like everyone else, thought it was nonsense. Some people claimed to see themselves in the operating theatre, medical staff frantically trying to revive them, and being surrounded by white light.
I was definitely looking down, but it wasn’t me I was looking at.
It was two children, a boy and a girl, with their parents, in a park.
The boy was Alan. He was about six or seven. The girl was Louise, and she was five years old. She had long red hair and looked the image of her mother.
I remember it now, it was Louise’s birthday and we went down to Bournemouth to visit our Grandmother, and it was the last time we were all together as a family.
We were flying homemade kites our father had made for us, and after we lay there looking up at the sky, making animals out of the clouds. I saw an elephant, Louise saw a giraffe.
We were so happy then.
Before the tragedy.
When I looked again ten years had passed and we were living in hell. Louise and I had become very adept at survival in a world we really didn’t understand, surrounded by people who wanted to crush our souls.
It was not a life a normal child had, our foster parents never quite the sort of people who were adequately equipped for two broken-hearted children. They tried their best, but their best was not good enough.
Every day it was a battle, to avoid the Bannister’s and Archie in particular, every day he made advances towards Louise and every day she fended him off.
Until one day she couldn’t.
Now I was sitting in the hospital, holding Louise’s hand. She was in a coma, and the doctors didn’t think she would wake from it. The damage done to her was too severe.
The doctors were wrong.
She woke, briefly, to name her five assailants. It was enough to have them arrested. It was not enough to have them convicted.
Justice would have to be served by other means.
I was outside the Bannister’s home.
I’d made my way there without really thinking, after watching Louise die. It was like being on autopilot, and I had no control over what I was doing. I had murder in mind. It was why I was holding an iron bar.
Skulking in the shadows. It was not very different from the way the Bannister’s operated.
I waited till Archie came out. I knew he eventually would. The police had taken him to the station for questioning, and then let him go. I didn’t understand why, nor did I care.
I followed him up the towpath, waiting till he stopped to light a cigarette, then came out of the shadows.
“Wotcha got there Alan?” he asked when he saw me. He knew what it was, and what it was for.
It was the first time I’d seen the fear in his eyes. He was alone.
“Justice.”
“For that slut of a sister of yours. I had nuffing to do with it.”
“She said otherwise, Archie.”
“She never said nuffing, you just made it up.” An attempt at bluster, but there was no confidence in his voice.
I held up the pipe. It had blood on it. Willy’s blood. “She may or may not have Archie, but Willy didn’t make it up. He sang like a bird. That’s his blood, probably brains on the pipe too, Archie, and yours will be there soon enough.”
“He dunnit, not me. Lyin’ bastard would say anything to save his own skin.” Definitely scared now, he was looking to run away.
“No, Archie. He didn’t. I’m coming for you. All of you Bannisters. And everyone who touched my sister.”
It was the recurring nightmare I had for years afterwards.
I closed my eyes and tried to shut out the thoughts, the images of Louise, the phone call, the visit to the hospital and being there when she succumbed to her injuries. Those were the very worst few hours of my life.
She had asked me to come to the railway station and walk home with her, and I was running late. If I had left when I was supposed to, it would never have happened and for years afterwards, I blamed myself for her death.
If only I’d not been late…
When the police finally caught the rapists, I’d known all along who they’d be; antagonists from school, the ring leader, Archie Bannister, a spurned boyfriend, a boy whose parents, ubiquitously known to all as ‘the Bannister’s, dealt in violence and crime and who owned the neighbourhood. The sins of the father had been very definitely passed onto the son.
At school, I used to be the whipping boy, Archie, a few grades ahead of me, made a point of belting me and a few of the other boys, to make sure the rest did as they were told. He liked Louise, but she had no time for a bully like him, even when he promised he would ‘protect’ me.
I knew the gang members, the boys who tow-kowed to save getting beaten up, and after the police couldn’t get enough information to prosecute them because everyone was too afraid to speak out, I went after Willy. There was always a weak link in a group, and he was it.
He worked in a factory, did long hours on a Wednesday and came home after dark alone. It was a half mile walk, through a park. The night I approached him, I smashed the lights and left it in darkness. He nearly changed his mind and went the long way home.
He didn’t.
It took an hour and a half to get the names. At first, when he saw me, he laughed. He said I would be next, and that was four words more than he knew he should have said.
When I found him alone the next morning I showed him the iron bar and told him he was on the list. I didn’t kill him then, he could wait his turn, and worry about what was going to happen to him.
When the police came to visit me shortly after that encounter, no doubt at the behest of the Bannister’s, the neighbourhood closed ranks and gave me an ironclad alibi. The Bannister’s then came to visit me and threatened me. I told them their days were numbered and showed them the door.
At the trial, he and his friends got off on a technicality. The police had failed to do their job properly, but it was not the police, but a single policeman, corrupted by the Bannisters.
Archie could help but rub it in my face. He was invincible.
Joe Collins took 12 bullets and six hours to bleed out. He apologized, he pleaded, he cried, he begged. I didn’t care.
Barry Mills, a strong lad with a mind to hurting people, Archie’s enforcer, almost got the better of me. I had to hit him more times than I wanted to, and in the end, I had to be satisfied that he died a short but agonizing death.
I revisited Willy in the hospital. He’d recovered enough to recognize me, and why I’d come. Suffocation was too good for him.
David Williams, second in command of the gang, was as tough and nasty as the Bannisters. His family were forging a partnership with the Bannister’s to make them even more powerful. Outwardly David was a pleasant sort of chap, affable, polite, and well mannered. A lot of people didn’t believe he could be like, or working with, the Bannisters.
He and I met in the pub. We got along like old friends. He said Willy had just named anyone he could think of, and that he was innocent of any charges. We shook hands and parted as friends.
Three hours later he was sitting in a chair in the middle of a disused factory, blindfolded and scared. I sat and watched him, listened to him, first threatening me, and then finally pleading with me. He’d guessed who it was that had kidnapped him.
When it was dark, I took the blindfold off and shone a very bright light in his eyes. I asked him if the violence he had visited upon my sister was worth it. He told me he was just a spectator.
I’d read the coroner’s report. They all had a turn. He was a liar.
He took nineteen bullets to die.
Then came Archie.
The same factory only this time there were four seats. Anna Bannister, brothel owner, Spike Bannister, head of the family, Emily Bannister, sister, and who had nothing to do with their criminal activities. She just had the misfortune of sharing their name.
Archie’s father told me how he was going to destroy me, and everyone I knew.
A well-placed bullet between the eyes shut him up.
Archie’s mother cursed me. I let her suffer for an hour before I put her out of her misery.
Archie remained stony-faced until I came to Emily. The death of his parents meant he would become head of the family. I guess their deaths meant as little to him as they did me.
He was a little more worried about his sister.
I told him it was confession time.
He told her it was little more than a forced confession and he had done nothing to deserve my retribution.
I shrugged and shot her, and we both watched her fall to the ground screaming in agony. I told him if he wanted her to live, he had to genuinely confess to his crimes. This time he did, it all poured out of him.
I went over to Emily. He watched in horror as I untied her bindings and pulled her up off the floor, suffering only from a small wound in her arm. Without saying a word she took the gun and walked over to stand behind him.
“Louise was my friend, Archie. My friend.”
Then she shot him. Six times.
To me, after saying what looked like a prayer, she said, “Killing them all will not bring her back, Alan, and I doubt she would approve of any of this. May God have mercy on your soul.”
Now I was in jail. I’d spent three hours detailing the deaths of the five boys, everything I’d done; a full confession. Without my sister, my life was nothing. I didn’t want to go back to the foster parents; I doubt they’d take back a murderer.
They were not allowed to.
For a month I lived in a small cell, in solitary, no visitors. I believed I was in the queue to be executed, and I had mentally prepared myself for the end.
Then I was told I had a visitor, and I was expecting a priest.
Instead, it was a man called McTavish. Short, wiry, and with an accent that I could barely understand.
“You’ve been a bad boy, Alan.”
When I saw it was not the priest I told the jailers not to let him in, I didn’t want to speak to anyone. They ignored me. I’d expected he was a psychiatrist, come to see whether I should be shipped off to the asylum.
I was beginning to think I was going mad.
I ignored him.
“I am the difference between you living or dying Alan, it’s as simple as that. You’d be a wise man to listen to what I have to offer.”
Death sounded good. I told him to go away.
He didn’t. Persistent bugger.
I was handcuffed to the table. The prison officers thought I was dangerous. Five, plus two, murders, I guess they had a right to think that. McTavish sat opposite me, ignoring my request to leave.
“Why’d you do it?”
“You know why.” Maybe if I spoke he’d go away.
“Your sister. By all accounts, the scum that did for her deserved what they got.”
“It was murder just the same. No difference between scum and proper people.”
“You like killing?”
“No-one does.”
“No, I dare say you’re right. But you’re different, Alan. As clean and merciless killing I’ve ever seen. We can use a man like you.”
“We?”
“A group of individuals who clean up the scum.”
I looked up to see his expression, one of benevolence, totally out of character for a man like him. It looked like I didn’t have a choice.
Trained, cleared, and ready to go.
I hadn’t realized there were so many people who were, for all intents and purposes, invisible. People that came and went, in malls, in hotels, trains, buses, airports, everywhere, people no one gave a second glance.
People like me.
In a mall, I became a shopper.
In a hotel, I was just another guest heading to his room.
On a bus or a train, I was just another commuter.
At the airport, I became a pilot. I didn’t need to know how to fly; everyone just accepted a pilot in a pilot suit was just what he looked like.
I had a passkey.
I had the correct documents to get me onto the plane.
That walk down the air bridge was the longest of my life. Waiting for the call from the gate, waiting for one of the air bridge staff to challenge me, stepping onto the plane.
Two pilots and a steward. A team. On the plane early before the rest of the crew. A group that was committing a crime, had committed a number of crimes and thought they’d got away with it.
Until the judge, the jury and their executioner arrived.
Me.
Quick, clean, merciless. Done.
I was now an operational field agent.
I was older now, and I could see in the mirror I was starting to go grey at the sides. It was far too early in my life for this, but I expect it had something to do with my employment.
I didn’t recognize the man who looked back at me.
It was certainly not Alan McKenzie, nor was there any part of that fifteen-year-old who had made the decision to exact revenge.
Given a choice; I would not have gone down this path.
Or so I kept telling myself each time a little more of my soul was sold to the devil.
I was Barry Gamble.
I was Lenny Buckman.
I was Jimmy Hosen.
I was anyone but the person I wanted to be.
That’s what I told Louise, standing in front of her grave, and trying to apologize for all the harm, all the people I’d killed for that one rash decision. If she was still alive she would be horrified, and ashamed.
Head bowed, tears streamed down my face.
God had gone on holiday and wasn’t there to hand out any forgiveness. Not that day. Not any day.
New York, New Years Eve.
I was at the end of a long tour, dragged out of a holiday and back into the fray, chasing down another scumbag. They were scumbags, and I’d become an automaton hunting them down and dispatching them to what McTavish called a better place.
This time I failed.
A few drinks to blot out the failure, a blonde woman who pushed my buttons, a room in a hotel, any hotel, it was like being on the merry-go-round, round and round and round…
Her name was Silvia or Sandra, or someone I’d met before, but couldn’t quite place her. It could be an enemy agent for all I knew or all I cared right then.
I was done.
I’d had enough.
I gave her the gun.
I begged her to kill me.
She didn’t.
Instead, I simply cried, letting the pent up emotion loose after being suppressed for so long, and she stayed with me, holding me close, and saying I was safe, that she knew exactly how I felt.
How could she? No one could know what I’d been through.
I remembered her name after she had gone.
Amanda.
I remembered she had an imperfection in her right eye.
Someone else had the same imperfection.
I couldn’t remember who that was.
Not then.
I had a dingy flat in Kensington, a place that I rarely stayed in if I could help it. After five-star hotel rooms, it made me feel shabby.
The end of another mission, I was on my way home, the underground, a bus, and then a walk.
It was late.
People were spilling out of the pub after the last drinks. Most in good spirits, others slightly more boisterous.
A loud-mouthed chap bumped into me, the sort who had one too many, and was ready to take on all comers.
He turned on me, “Watch where you’re going, you fool.”
Two of his friends dragged him away. He shrugged them off, squared up.
I punched him hard, in the stomach, and he fell backwards onto the ground. I looked at his two friends. “Take him home before someone makes mincemeat out of him.”
They grabbed his arms, lifted him off the ground and took him away.
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see a woman, early thirties, quite attractive, but very, very drunk. She staggered from the bar, bumped into me, and finished up sitting on the side of the road.
I looked around to see where her friends were. The exodus from the pub was over and the few nearby were leaving to go home.
She was alone, drunk, and by the look of her, unable to move.
I sat beside her. “Where are your friends?”
“Dunno.”
“You need help?”
She looked up, and sideways at me. She didn’t look the sort who would get in this state. Or maybe she was, I was a terrible judge of women.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Nobody.” I was exactly how I felt.
“Well Mr Nobody, I’m drunk, and I don’t care. Just leave me here to rot.”
She put her head back between her knees, and it looked to me she was trying to stop the spinning sensation in her head.
Been there before, and it’s not a good feeling.
“Where are your friends?” I asked again.
“Got none.”
“Perhaps I should take you home.”
“I have no home.”
“You don’t look like a homeless person. If I’m not mistaken, those shoes are worth more than my weekly salary.” I’d seen them advertised, in the airline magazine, don’t ask me why the ad caught my attention.
She lifted her head and looked at me again. “You a smart fucking arse are you?”
“I have my moments.”
“Have them somewhere else.”
She rested her head against my shoulder. We were the only two left in the street, and suddenly in darkness when the proprietor turned off the outside lights.
“Take me home,” she said suddenly.
“Where is your place?”
“Don’t have one. Take me to your place.”
“You won’t like it.”
“I’m drunk. What’s not to like until tomorrow.”
I helped her to her feet. “You have a name?”
“Charlotte.”
The wedding was in a small church. We had been away for a weekend in the country, somewhere in the Cotswolds, and found this idyllic spot. Graves going back to the dawn of time, a beautiful garden tended by the vicar and his wife, an astonishing vista over hills and down dales.
On a spring afternoon with the sun, the flowers, and the peacefulness of the country.
I had two people at the wedding, the best man, Bradley, and my boss, Watkins.
Charlotte had her sisters Melissa and Isobel, and Isobel’s husband Giovanni, and their daughter Felicity.
And one more person who was as mysterious as she was attractive, a rather interesting combination as she was well over retirement age. She arrived late and left early.
Aunt Agatha.
She looked me up and down with what I’d call a withering look. “There’s more to you than meets the eye,” she said enigmatically.
“Likewise I’m sure,” I said. It earned me an elbow in the ribs from Charlotte. It was clear she feared this woman.
“Why did you come,” Charlotte asked.
“You know why.”
Agatha looked at me. “I like you. Take care of my granddaughter. You do not want me for an enemy.”
OK, now she officially scared me.
She thrust a cheque into my hand, smiled, and left.
“Who is she,” I asked after we watched her depart.
“Certainly not my fairy godmother.”
Charlotte never mentioned her again.
Zurich in summer, not exactly my favourite place.
Instead of going to visit her sister Isobel, we stayed at a hotel in Beethovenstrasse and Isobel and Felicity came to us. Her husband was not with her this time.
Felicity was three or four and looked very much like her mother. She also looked very much like Charlotte, and I’d remarked on it once before and it received a sharp rebuke.
We’d been twice before, and rather than talk to her sister, Charlotte spent her time with Felicity, and they were, together, like old friends. For so few visits they had a remarkable rapport.
I had not broached the subject of children with Charlotte, not after one such discussion where she had said she had no desire to be a mother. It had not been a subject before and wasn’t once since.
Perhaps like all Aunts, she liked the idea of playing with a child for a while and then give it back.
Felicity was curious as to who I was, but never ventured too close. I believed a child could sense the evil in adults and had seen through my facade of friendliness. We were never close.
But…
This time, when observing the two together, something quite out of left field popped into my head. It was not possible, not by any stretch of the imagination, but I thought she looked like my mother.
And Charlotte had seen me looking in their direction. “You seem distracted,” she said.
“I was just remembering my mother. Odd moment, haven’t done so for a very long time.”
“Why now?” I think she had a look of concern on her face.
“Her birthday, I guess,” I said, the first excuse I could think of.
Another look and I was wrong. She looked like Isobel or Charlotte, or if I wanted to believe it possible, Melissa too.
I was crying, tears streaming down my face.
I was in pain, searing pain from my lower back stretching down into my legs, and I was barely able to breathe.
It was like coming up for air.
It was like Snow White bringing Prince Charming back to life. I could feel what I thought was a gentle kiss and tears dropping on my cheeks, and when I opened my eyes, I saw Charlotte slowly lifting her head, a hand gently stroking the hair off my forehead.
And in a very soft voice, she said, “Hi.”
I could not speak, but I think I smiled. It was the girl with the imperfection in her right eye. Everything fell into place, and I knew, in that instant that we were irrevocably meant to be together.
“Welcome back.”
© Charles Heath 2016-2019
As some may be aware, but many not, Chester, my faithful writing assistant, mice catcher, and general pain in the neck, passed away some months ago.
Recently I was running a series based on his adventures, under the title of Past Conversations with my cat.
For those who have not had the chance to read about all of his exploits I will run the series again from Episode 1
These are the memories of our time together…
This is Chester. He’s checking the outside temperature.
And the heat goes on with no relief in sight.
Chester has taken to spreading out on the cool tiles floor, trying to get some sleep.
He tells me its too hot for the mice to come out.
I believe him.
I was going to chat about the so-called climate emergency, but here’s the thing. It’s been this hot before, endless days of relentless heat, days where the temperature hits 40 degrees centigrade in the shade.
It happened when we came to Queensland for a holiday 30 odd years ago, and long before Chester was thought of.
The first day it rained. After that it was nearly two weeks of very hot days.
We live in the tropics. You could expect more rain, but rain is a fickle thing.
We have bushfires everywhere, and Chester can’t sit at the doorways because of the pervading smoke permeating in the atmosphere.
I should be writing he says, but instead I’m on a settee in the living room, under a slowly rotating fan.
He jumps up and joins me, the sitting on my lap, not exactly the coolest spot to be. He’s getting the effects of the fan, I’m not and I’m guessing that’s the point.
I tell him he can go for a run outside, something I’ve never let him do.
He sees it for the gesture it is and climbs down, back to the cool floor. I get a long cold stare, and then he leaves me in peace.
No work today, for either of us. I can do without the verbal sparring.
Perhaps there will be a cool change tomorrow.
…
Christmas is just around the corner, a time to be with family. For Will Mason, an orphan since he was fourteen, it is a time for reflection on what his life could have been, and what it could be.
Until a chance encounter brings back to life the reasons for his twenty years of self-imposed exile from a life only normal people could have. From that moment Will’s life slowly starts to unravel and it’s obvious to him it’s time to move on.
This time, however, there is more at stake.
Will has broken his number one rule, don’t get involved.
With his nemesis, Eddie Jamieson, suddenly within reach, and a blossoming relationship with an office colleague, Maria, about to change everything, Will has to make a choice. Quietly leave, or finally, make a stand.
But as Will soon discovers, when other people are involved there is going to be terrible consequences no matter what choice he makes.
On this occasion, we drove from Florence to Innsbruck, a journey of about 500 kilometers and via the E45, a trip that would take us about five and a half hours.
We drove conservatively, stopped once for lunch and took about seven hours, arriving in Innsbruck late in the afternoon
The main reason for this stay was to go to Swarovski in Wattens for the second time, to see if anything had changed, and to buy some pieces. We were still members of the club, and looking forward to a visit to the exclusive lounge and some Austrian champagne.
Sadly, there were no new surprises waiting, and we came away a little disappointed.
We were staying at the Innsbruck Hilton, where we stayed the last time, and it only a short walk to the old town.
From the highest level of the hotel, it is possible to get a look at the mountains that surround the city. This view is in the direction we had driven earlier, from Florence.
The change in the weather was noticeable the moment we entered the mountain ranges.
This view looks towards the old town and overlooks a public square.
This view shows some signs of the cold, but in summer, I doubted we were going to see any snow.
We have been here in winter, and it is quite cold, and there is a lot of snow. The ski resorts are not very far away, and the airport is on the way to Salzburg.
There is a host of restaurants in the old town, and we tried a few during our stay. The food, beer, and service were excellent.
On a previous visit, we did get Swiss Army Knives, literally, from a small store called Victorinox.
And, yes, we did see the golden roof.
“Sunday in New York” is ultimately a story about trust, and what happens when a marriage is stretched to its limits.
When Harry Steele attends a lunch with his manager, Barclay, to discuss a promotion that any junior executive would accept in a heartbeat, it is the fact his wife, Alison, who previously professed her reservations about Barclay, also agreed to attend, that casts a small element of doubt in his mind.
From that moment, his life, in the company, in deciding what to do, his marriage, his very life, spirals out of control.
There is no one big factor that can prove Harry’s worst fears, that his marriage is over, just a number of small, interconnecting events, when piled on top of each other, points to a cataclysmic end to everything he had believed in.
Trust is lost firstly in his best friend and mentor, Andy, who only hints of impending disaster, Sasha, a woman whom he saved, and who appears to have motives of her own, and then in his wife, Alison, as he discovered piece by piece damning evidence she is about to leave him for another man.
Can we trust what we see with our eyes or trust what we hear?
Haven’t we all jumped to conclusions at least once in our lives?
Can Alison, a woman whose self-belief and confidence is about to be put to the ultimate test, find a way of proving their relationship is as strong as it has ever been?
As they say in the classics, read on!
Purchase:
http://tinyurl.com/Amazon-SundayInNewYork
Here’s the thing…
Every time I close my eyes, I see something different.
I’d like to think the cinema of my dreams is playing a double feature but it’s a bit like a comedy cartoon night on Fox.
But these dreams are nothing to laugh about.
Once again there’s a new installment of an old feature, and we’re back on the treasure hunt.
Life for me returned to something like normal when I was back in the warehouse, surrounded by endless shelves filled with all manner of items.
It was the central repository for all the spare parts that were needed for the factory’s machinery in one section, a large variety of stationery, and office, items in another, and groceries for the cafeteria in another.
My in-tray was filled with requisition form received from the previous day, that hadn’t been processed by Roger, the morning shift clerk who inhabited my desk when I wasn’t there.
As usual, he had managed to idle away most of his shift by doing absolutely nothing, which I guess was acceptable because Roger was one of Alex’s cronies, as were many others scattered about the factory.
One of the managers from another department knocked on the open door, perhaps to wake me before he walked in, something he had told me once before he was used to doing, and after a few seconds came in.
“The afternoon shift doesn’t sleep on the job,” I said. He was one of the good managers, so he knew I was not admonishing him.
He saw the pile of requisitions, a good indication of why his order for stores had not been processed.
“Busy day?”
“It will be.” I shuffled through the pile and pulled out his requisition. Only one item.
“Is it possible I could get it today?”
“Better still. Take a seat, I’ll get it myself.”
“That’s what I was hoping you’d say”
He sat in one of the plastic chairs designed to keep people moving and picked up an old National Geographic. I was fascinated to find there were issues going back as far as the 1920s. I wondered if Benderby knew they were collectors’ items and worth a lot of money.
I headed towards the door. “Make yourself comfortable, I won’t be long.”
The only other time I had seen a building as big as the warehouse was indoor basketball courts. It was a hundred yards across, and half a mile long, and sometimes it was easier to hitch a ride with the forklift driver to get the other end quickly.
The fork life driver had gone missing, so it was a walk. The shelf I was looking for was somewhere near the middle.
Something else about the building, it had remarkably interesting acoustics, and sometimes I could hear conversations between the supervisor and the forklift driver when they were some distance away, and out of sight.
About 100 yards from the shelf, I heard voices. They were indistinguishable, but as I got closer, broken sentences became more understandable. I used one of the cross paths so see if I could locate the source of the voices and found them in the third aisle.
Alex and the man I’d seen earlier at the mall.
They had pulled two seats and a carton of the shelves and were sitting, feet on the carton, smoking cigarettes, right underneath a ‘No Smoking’ sign.
Typical. Not much further along was the ‘Inflammable Goods’ sign, but something like that for Alex would be an invitation to press his luck.
“You sure it was them?”
“Course. I’d recognize that kid you call Smidge anywhere. And his crazy offside, Bloggs or something. What do you think they’re doing out there?”
“Must be something to do with the treasure. That kid’s holding back on us. We’ve been searching the coastline for those two rivers. Nothing but drains now. I got Dad to lean on one of the councilors to get us some old maps of the coastline, and one had five rivers. Talk about trying to find a needle in a haystack.”
“Perhaps we’re trying too hard. One of those old maps showed the Navy Yard, and the cove they’d dredged. One of the maps she showed me has evidence there was a once a river running into that cove, and according to the old biddy in the library, that area was once owned by a chap called Orminson. She also thought his descendants didn’t move too far away from here after they sold the property to the Navy. I’ve got a copy of the map, so we can check if it lines up with some of the other maps we have, and, of course, the treasure map.”
“We should find these descendants. Perhaps they have more information.”
“Already on it.”
“What we also need, but probably won’t be able to get, is the architectural plans of the Naval site, before, during, and after the works.”
“I’ll get Brains onto it. He’ll have some way of getting the documents.”
“Good. Sooner rather later OK.”
“I reckon that Boggs must have some knowledge of this. You want me and the boys to go and rough Boggs up a bit more, see what he knows about this?”
“No. Not a good idea, as much as I would like it to happen, just to wipe the smug look off his face, but the last time the old man came down on me for being, as he calls it, un-subtle, whatever that means. It’s not as if he hasn’t beaten the crap of people for information before. The same goes for Smidge. Just watch and report. That’s all. For the moment.”
“You got anything else you want me to do?”
“Yes. Get some of the boys to follow them. And try not to get seen. Boggs might be a fool, but Smidge isn’t. He’s a lot smarter than I gave him credit for.”
“He’s just a kid, Alex.”
“Well, you keep thinking that, and when he outsmarts you, you know what will happen.”
Alex stood. “And clean up this mess before you go.”
© Charles Heath 2020
Thrills, Spills, and just a dash of Romance 