Month: April 2025

Writing a book in 365 days – 100

Day 100

Writing Exercise

You need a good first line, one that grabs your attention and makes you want to read on…

…

I woke up that morning believing it would be the first day of the rest of my life.

I stretched and luxuriated in the comfort and warmth of the bed, after a dozen years of suffering a very hard, uncomfortable, and cold cot, if it could be called that.

Prison life had been harsh. Being unjustly imprisoned had been harsher, and the years of battling to have the evidence that finally exonerated me finally paid off.

Release.

Perhaps it was not a coincidence that the day I stepped out of the prison was the day the snow started, the first of the season, bringing with it the winter chill. I would not have survived another winter in that prison.

Perhaps it was also not a coincidence that the ex-girlfriend of the man I had supposedly murdered in a jealous rage arrived on my doorstep the same day I was released. It was her evidence, circumstantial at best, but convincingly relayed in the courtroom, a performance even the newspapers said was worthy of an Academy Award.

She still firmly believed I was guilty, evidence or not, and that I would be damned to hell.

That might be true, but not from the so-called murder of her ex-boyfriend, but the deeds I had to do to survive in what could only be described as hell on earth. I tried to tell her that I’d paid my dues, as unjust as they were, and that was the end of it. She had got her pound of flesh.

The parents of the ex-boyfriend were not as unforgiving and wished me well. They had never believed that I was guilty, no surprises because their son and I had been the best of friends from a very early age, when they moved into the house next door.

Those years were gone, as was the house, and everything else. It had been burned to the ground by a bunch of vigilantes riled up by Samantha, who marched on the house just before my arrest. Nobody was blamed for the deaths of my parents, caught in the fire, but the judge did admonish Samantha, in a monologue that all but handed the blame to her. It was, he said, going to be a battle for her conscience.

Now I had nothing.

My lawyer said it was a clean slate, and to put what I needed into a backpack, and get on the first train out of town. There was nothing for me, no reason to stay.

The very thought in my mind when I woke and looked out at the sea of white, and the steady downfall of snow drifting down from the sky. The forecast was snow for a day or so, then clearing. It would halt the trains, so I would be here for at least another day.

Enough time for Samantha to round up another mob and come burn down the hotel.

That was reason enough not to get out of bed.

Except…

The phone beside the bed rang, one that had a shrill insistence about it.

I slipped out from under the covers, shivered slightly in the cool morning air then picke dup the receiver.

“Yes?”

“There’s a Miss Andrews here to see you.”

Miss Andrews. It was a name that lurked on the fringe of my memory, in the life before prison section, and was not quite coming to me.

“Did she state her business?” I assumed it was a reporter here to get my story, one that they were hoping, no doubt, I would be suing the state for false imprisonment.

“No, but she is insistent she sees you.”

“OK. I’ll be down in fifteen minutes.”

…

During the time it took to throw on some warm clothes, I ran the name through my recollection of people I’d met, and her name didn’t come up. I expect she was a reporter, or perhaps a junior from a law practice looking to get me to hire them for the law case against the state.

I took the stairs, it was only two flights of stairs, and I needed to warm up. For some reason, the passageways and then the foyer felt cold. The front desk clerk saw me step off the last stair and nodded over towards the fireplace, where some large logs were burning.

Sitting on one of the chairs was a woman, about my age, who looked like someone’s mother. I had no doubt she would appear to be disarming and polite, but then strike like a cobra. IT was how I came to view both Lawyers and reporters.

She had seen me coming from the stairs and stood as I approached.

“Mr Peverell?”

“You could hardly mistake me for anyone else.” Maybe not the first words I would have said, but I was tired, and steeling myself for a pitch.

I saw her mentally brush aside my attitude and smile. “How are you this morning, not that the weather is being polite.” I saw her glance outside through the large panoramic windows. The carpark was slowly disappearing.

“Not the sort of day to be out on a whim,” I said. I still couldn’t place her.

“No, indeed. Please,” she motioned to a chair by the fire, two together.

I sat. She sat, then arranged the layers. It had to be quite warm with the coat she was wearing. She had removed the fake fur hat. It actually looked good on her.

“What is so pressing that you had to see me?”

“I need your help.”

“How could I possibly help you or anyone with anything. You do realise I have just spent twelve years locked away from the real world. I’m lucky to remember my name, let alone anything else.”

Yes, the warden and his officers had tried very hard to take everything from me and all the other prisoners, some of whom would never get out of that prison.

“Of course. But left me to introduce myself. My name is Bettina Whales. I’m a private investigator, and I have been commissioned to find out who murdered David Lloyd-Smythe.”

Odd, but then, it just occurred to me that now I was exonerated, the real killer was still out there. It had been on my mind briefly the day before, but I decided I was over it. The murder had robbed me of 12 years of my life. Enough was enough.

But there was an element of curiosity. “By who?”

“Your wife, of course.”

I shook my head. She had dumped me so fast once I was arrested, it made my head spin. Of course, her parents had probably kidnapped her and kept her prisoner from the day she was arrested until yesterday, but I thought if there was a way she could just tell me why she had abandoned me, it might have been tolerable, but she didn’t.

I had decided long ago that she was gone and I would never see her again.

I shook my head. “I don’t believe you. You are here for some other reason, one I’m not going to like.”

She smiled. “She said you’d say that. And I’ll admit when she explained why you would, I had to say I agreed with you. But she can tell you herself. She’s right over there, coming in the door.”

I stood, faced her, and watched mesmerised. Twelve years had not aged her, not like they had me, and she still had that ability to take my breath away. And she still could command a room simply by walking through it. All eyes, and particularly the men, were on her.

Then she was in front of me. That loose way of standing, the smile, the disarming manner.

“You thought I had forgotten you?”

“I didn;t know what to think, other than a part of me had died.”

“And I am sorry about that, but you know my parents. I had to disappear, lest shame be brought upon the family. Been in Europe, in a castle no less. It took me an age to find the people running your case to get out, and then I had to surrupticiously hire an army of lawyers. The lady behind is the one who found the evidence that got you off. She’s the best of the best. Now we’re going after the person that put you there, the real killer.”

Just like in the old days, the take-charge girl, even if you didn’t want to do anything. She, like her father, had no ‘off’ button.

“And if I don’t want to?”

“Don’t be silly, Pev.” She looked at the private investigator. “Get yourself a room if you haven’t already. Pev and I had things to talk about.” She looked back at me. “I can see you threw something on, so we can go back to your room and talk. Or whatever.” She took my hand. “We have twelve years to catch up. Then we’re going to hunt down the bastard that took you away from me. Miss me?”

I gave her hand a squeeze. “I did.”

She smiled. “Good. I hope you have a good room.”

…

© Charles Heath  2025

The first case of PI Walthenson – “A Case of Working With the Jones Brothers”

This case has everything, red herrings, jealous brothers, femme fatales, and at the heart of it all, greed.

See below for an excerpt from the book…

Coming soon!

PIWalthJones1

An excerpt from the book:

When Harry took the time to consider his position, a rather uncomfortable position at that, he concluded that he was somehow involved in another case that meant very little to him.

Not that it wasn’t important in some way he was yet to determine, it was just that his curiosity had got the better of him, and it had led to this: sitting in a chair, securely bound, waiting for someone one of his captors had called Doug.

It was not the name that worried him so much, it was the evil laugh that had come after the name was spoken.

Doug what? Doug the ‘destroyer’, Doug the ‘dangerous’, Doug the ‘deadly’; there was any number of sinister connotations, and perhaps that was the point of the laugh, to make it more frightening than it was.

But there was no doubt about one thing in his mind right then: he’d made a mistake. A very big. and costly, mistake. Just how big the cost, no doubt he would soon find out.

His mother, and his grandmother, the wisest person he had ever known, had once told him never to eavesdrop.

At the time he couldn’t help himself and instead of minding his own business, listening to a one-sided conversation which ended with a time and a place. The very nature of the person receiving the call was, at the very least, sinister, and, because of the cryptic conversation, there appeared to be, or at least to Harry, criminal activity involved.

For several days he had wrestled with the thought of whether he should go. Stay on the fringe, keep out of sight, observe and report to the police if it was a crime. Instead, he had willingly gone down the rabbit hole.

Now, sitting in an uncomfortable chair, several heat lamps hanging over his head, he was perspiring, and if perspiration could be used as a measure of fear, then Harry’s fear was at the highest level.

Another runnel of sweat rolled into his left eye, and, having his hands tied, literally, it made it impossible to clear it. The burning sensation momentarily took his mind off his predicament. He cursed and then shook his head trying to prevent a re-occurrence. It was to no avail.

Let the stinging sensation be a reminder of what was right and what was wrong.

It was obvious that it was the right place and the right time, but in considering his current perilous situation, it definitely was the wrong place to be, at the worst possible time.

It was meant to be his escape, an escape from the generations of lawyers, what were to Harry, dry, dusty men who had been in business since George Washington said to the first Walthenson to step foot on American soil, ‘Why don’t you become a lawyer?” when asked what he could do for the great man.

Or so it was handed down as lore, though Harry didn’t think Washington meant it literally, the Walthenson’s, then as now, were not shy of taking advice.

Except, of course, when it came to Harry.

He was, Harry’s father was prone to saying, the exception to every rule. Harry guessed his father was referring to the fact his son wanted to be a Private Detective rather than a dry, dusty lawyer. Just the clothes were enough to turn Harry off the profession.

So, with a little of the money Harry inherited from one of his aunts, he leased an office in Gramercy Park and had it renovated to look like the Sam Spade detective agency, you know the one, Spade and Archer, and The Maltese Falcon.

There’s a movie and a book by Dashiell Hammett if you’re interested.

So, there it was, painted on the opaque glass inset of the front door, ‘Harold Walthenson, Private Detective’.

There was enough money to hire an assistant, and it took a week before the right person came along, or, more to the point, didn’t just see his business plan as something sinister. Ellen, a tall cool woman in a long black dress, or so the words of a song in his head told him, fitted in perfectly.

She’d seen the movie, but she said with a grin, Harry was no Humphrey Bogart.

Of course not, he said, he didn’t smoke.

Three months on the job, and it had been a few calls, no ‘real’ cases, nothing but missing animals, and other miscellaneous items. What he really wanted was a missing person. Or perhaps a beguiling, sophisticated woman who was as deadly as she was charming, looking for an errant husband, perhaps one that she had already ‘dispatched’.

Or for a tall, dark and handsome foreigner who spoke in riddles and in heavily accented English, a spy, or perhaps an assassin, in town to take out the mayor. The man was such an imbecile Harry had considered doing it himself.

Now, in a back room of a disused warehouse, that wishful thinking might be just about to come to a very abrupt end, with none of the romanticized trappings of the business befalling him. No beguiling women, no sinister criminals, no stupid policemen.

Just a nasty little man whose only concern was how quickly or how slowly Harry’s end was going to be.

…

© Charles Heath 2019-2024

In a word: Mine

Well, that’s his, and this is mine.  Possession is 9 points of the law, or so they say.

What’s mine is mine and what’s his is mine.  Sound like a divorce settlement?  Sure is!

There are often a lot of arguments over the possession of goods, and who they belong to.  Perhaps it’s best to own nothing, then no one can take it from you.

Sound like a lawyer contesting his own divorce?  Probably.

But that’s not the only mine.  Take for instance a land mine or a sea mine.

Devilish things to walk on or brush up against.  It spawned a new type of ship, a minesweeper, and I’ve read a few books about the exploits of those aboard, and how close they come to death when a ship hits one.

And land mines, the damage they can cause.

Then, of course, you can go underground, way underground, into a mine.

Gold in South Africa, coal in Wales, tin in Sumatra, copper in New Guinea.

And it doesn’t have to be underground.  You can have an open-cut mine, which accounts for a lot of coal mines in Australia.

Oddly, you can mine data, the sort that’s stored in databases on computers.  I’ve done a bit of that in a former life.

You can mine talent,

Or you can mine Bitcoin, but that’s a whole different ballgame, and everyone seems to be in on some sort of scam when it comes to Bitcoin.  It seems to me the only way you would make money out of Bitcoin was to buy units the very first day it was released.

It’s not, and never will be, something I’ll dabble in.

‘Sunday in New York’ – A beta reader’s view

I’m not a fan of romance novels but …

There was something about this one that resonated with me.

This is a novel about a world generally ruled by perception, and how people perceive what they see, what they are told, and what they want to believe.

I’ve been guilty of it myself as I’m sure we all have at one time or another.

For the main characters Harry and Alison there are other issues driving their relationship.

For Alison, it is a loss of self-worth through losing her job and from losing her mother and, in a sense, her sister.

For Harry, it is the fact he has a beautiful and desirable wife, and his belief she is the object of other men’s desires, and one in particular, his immediate superior.

Between observation, the less than honest motives of his friends, a lot of jumping to conclusions based on very little fact, and you have the basis of one very interesting story.

When it all comes to a head, Alison finds herself in a desperate situation, she realises only the truth will save their marriage.

But is it all the truth?

What would we do in similar circumstances?

Rarely does a book have me so enthralled that I could not put it down until I knew the result. They might be considered two people who should have known better, but as is often the case, they had to get past what they both thought was the truth.

And the moral of this story, if it could be said there is one, nothing is ever what it seems.

…

Available on Amazon here: amzn.to/2H7ALs8

…

The cinema of my dreams – I never wanted to go to Africa – Episode 47

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.

…

At least the helicopter pilot hadn’t hit the fuel tanks or any of the control wires.

Because of the holes in the fuselage, we couldn’t fly any higher than between two and five thousand feet or go as fast as Davies would like, but the plane settled into a routine and got us where we wanted to go.

Just a few miles from the base, fuel almost exhausted, we got a fighter escort.

At first, I thought the base commander thought we were an unidentified flying object, mainly because something else had been hit, our communications. We couldn’t tell the base we were coming, and they only had the Colonel’s transmission of an approximate arrival time, much earlier than the actual time we were supposed to arrive.

On the ground, we were met with fire trucks, and a military escort, with weapons that could take out a mouse at one thousand yards. Just in case we were terrorists, I suppose.

We were parked in a bay away from the main terminal area and had to wait for a half-hour before we were met by Lallo. Monroe’s comment, that he was probably finishing his lunch which would be more important than meeting us, had kept us waiting.

The two abductees were the first to leave the aircraft, then Shurl’s body was removed after the doctor certified he was dead.

Then the rest of us were allowed to leave the aircraft. A bus was waiting, and everyone bar Monroe and I had boarded and been taken away. Under guard. Perhaps their service had not mitigated their prison sentences. I didn’t ask Lallo why; I’d probably not get the truth anyway.

“Good job,” he said, after watching the bus depart. “Pity, it wasn’t done right the first time.”

A compliment followed by disparagement.

“Next time you can do the job yourself,” Monroe said. “And until you’ve been in the field and actually got shot at, you’d do well to keep that trap of yours shut.”

“May I …”

“…remind me you’re my superior officer? No. I’m sure that status won’t last much longer. I’m applying for a transfer.”

He looked at me. “What about you?”

“Nothing to say, except I don’t blame her. Now, since all you’ve done is prove to me you’re an idiot, I’ll take my leave.”

In the distance I could see a large American car, the sort that proliferated in the 1950s and 1960s before petrol prices were a problem, cutting across the runway at speed. Was it the owner of the DC3 coming to see the damage?

No. When it got closer I could see Bamfield, cigar in mouth, beaming. I suppose no one felt they had the authority to tell him not to.

The car stopped behind Lallo’s jeep and Bamfield got out, then leaned against the driver’s side door and looked at us over the roof.

“James, Monroe. Still alive I see. Pity about the plane; I know the chap who owns it. He’s going to be pissed when he sees the cannon holes. What happened?”

“Bad guys,” Monroe said.

“Of course. Get in, I’ll give you a ride back to the terminal. We can talk on the way.”

Neither of us moved. If Monroe wasn’t going to suffer fools gladly, neither was I.

“Well…”

“I’d rather walk,” I said.

“We’d rather walk, sir.” With a heavy emphasis on the ‘sir’.

“Look, you did a great job, minimal losses, and we got two assets back. Everyone is happy. But, we have a small problem down in South America…”

…

© Charles Heath 2020

The cinema of my dreams – I always wanted to write a war story – Episode 47

For a story that was conceived during those long boring hours flying in a steel cocoon, striving to keep away the thoughts that the plane and everyone in it could just simply disappear as planes have in the past, it has come a long way.

Whilst I have always had a fascination with what happened during the second world war, not the battles or fighting, but in the more obscure events that took place, I decided to pen my own little sidebar to what was a long and bitter war.

And, so, it continues…

——

Johannesen went to find Wallace.  He had seen Jackerby leave the castle alone, which couldn’t be a good thing.  He had also noticed most of the Resistance members had gone too and had considered going back to the dungeons,

If he had been picking team members, Jackerby would not have been one of them.  He might act British and speak perfect British English, but he was a Nazi at heart, perhaps more Nazi than the Nazis’

It was not unsurprising.  The file Wallace had on him along with one for all of them, wasn’t exactly describing a life of roses.  His grandparents were German, and the British had killed them during the first world war.  There was no doubting he had based his whole life on one day avenging them, and this war had given him the opportunity.

To be a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Johannesen guessed that was an apt description of him.  He was a devoted follower of Mosley and the English Fascists, openly supporting Hitler until it came to choosing a side.  That was easy, become part of a fifth column, Worthing from within.

And when the Reich became the all-powerful country when they won the war, there would be a position for him, a war hero.

Losing the war hadn’t figured in the story, but despite the successes, there were more failures, and tactical errors, like trying to invade Russia, and he could see that it was going to be the reason Germany lost.  Superior weapons were not going to staunch the losses, and it was only a matter of time.

The time he would use to figure out how not to get shot as a spy and somehow get back on the other side.

But, not today.

Wallace was trying a new wine, have the same thirst for wine, but not as swill as those Resistance members like Leonardo, a deep-colored red.

“You should try a glass, Johannes.  It’s an exceptional vintage.”  He picked up the bottle and looked at the label, then cleaning the dust off the label, said, “1907 no less.  Bastards never sold any of this to us to try.  We should liberate the cellar, and share it with our compatriots after the war.  At a price, of course.”

Like all the soldiers he’d met along the way, always looking to make a profit.  Goering and Hitler steal all the paintings, they were talking about the wine.  What did the people finish up with?

“Not really a red man, sir.”

“That’s because you’ve never had one like this.”

“Why not.”

Wallace poured him a glass.

Johannesen sipped it.  Wallace was right, it was better than any other he had tasted, not that he could really remember the last time he had the opportunity.

“It is quite good, sir.”

“It is.  You know Jackerby says you are a double agent, which is pretty rich coming from him.  Strictly speaking, if wouldn’t be a double agent, but a triple agent, if that was the case.  You’re not, are you?”

The smile on Wallace’s face didn’t extend to the eyes.  He was not amused, or annoyed.

Just fishing.

“That’s the problem with our situation.  We’ve been lying to everyone for so long, that it’s hard t tell what is the truth and what isn’t.  At the moment, the British don’t know where my allegiances lie, they think I’m the sleeper in this group, and Atherton, well, he’s not sure if that’s the case or not.  No doubt Jackerby told you about my trip to the dungeons to get the woman to talk.  Jackerby offers the big stick and that isn’t going to work on these people.  She’ll die before she gives up any secrets.  They all will.  And by all accounts that breute Leonardo was executing her compatriots in front of her to make her talk, and all they are is dead, and we’re no closer to anything.  What do you think I am?”

“Clever.  But that isn’t going to be my problem in,” he looked at his watch, “two hours.  We have a new commander, and a few more people arriving to weed out this elusive Atherton and the few resistance that’s left.  People higher than me want Meyer returned to Germany.  Whatever you are, Johannesen, you might have to plead your case to someone else far less understanding.”  He stood.  “Enjoy the wine.  It might be your last.”

Reading between the lines, Johannesen got the impression Wallace no longer cared what happened.  For all of them, it had been a long war, and it was dragging on with no success in sight.

And it was becoming abundantly clear he picked the wrong side.  Now, all that was going to happen was that he would end up in the crossfire.  Perhaps he had known all along that the German notion that no one could ever be trusted, that everyone should be treated as a traitor first, was going to be the death of all of them.

He had no doubt the new arrivals would be Waffen SS, battle-hardened, and sent on this mission as a sort of holiday.  They would find Atherton and the remnants very quickly and snuff out a problem Jackerby couldn’t.

Or, if Jackerby knew the Waffen SS was coming, had he left, knowing his loyalties would be called into question.  Pure German soldiers versus double agents, Johannesen knew who’d he believe first.

For the first time, Johannesen knew he was not going to see the end of this war, or that Germany had any hope of winning.

He needed a plan of escape, and that woman in the dungeons was the only one who could help him.

——-

© Charles Heath 2020-2022

A to Z Blog Challenge – April 2025 – V

…

V is for – Valhalla, where the souls of those who died bravely in battle go

…

For some, death comes when you least expect it.

I was not a soldier.  I was never meant to be on a battlefield.  I had no interest in slaying the enemy, whoever that enemy might be.

And yet there I was, trying to figure out how it came to be.

Six hours earlier, I was asleep on a cot in a tent, one of about a hundred scattered back from the river in a valley that belied the fact that it was near a contentious border being fought over.

Two facts I learned before crawling exhausted into that cot, religion, and disputed borders were in the top three reasons to start a war against your neighbour.

It started out with two men, one on either side of the river, stating the river belonged to them and the other paid ‘rent’.  Then shots were fired.

In three months, it escalated, turning the river and valley surrounding it into a killing field and two previously friendly countries into bitter enemies.

I had been sent over by my media company to report first-hand on the effect it was having on the people, international relations, and responses by the rest of the world.

The latest report, not by me but one of my brethren, was that we were heading inevitably towards World War three.  Given the rhetoric I had just heard, I was almost convinced he was right.

I managed to get three hours before being woken by my army liaison officer, the leader of a small group of soldiers who were charged with surveillance.  I had been attached to them, mainly because they did not approach the front line.

They were simply there to observe enemy locations and report back.  Their position gave me a very good view of the battlefield, the destruction of mortars, cannons, air force strafing, bomb runs, and snipers.

To a layman, it was terrifying and horrifying.  To the hawks of war, it was a proving ground for their new weapons.

“Were up.  Sorry about the short notice.  There’s going to be an offensive in a few hours.  Want to join us?”

My first instinct was to say no, but being embedded with this group afforded me an excellent view of the war and the uselessness of it all.

The two men could have sat down and worked it out.  But no, they had to settle their differences with guns.  Both were dead, as were their families, and most of the valley’s inhabitants.  Now, it was extending beyond the valley and into the bigger cities and infrastructure like power stations and refineries.  Bullets had gone to mortar bombs to cannons to drones to missiles.

Thousands had been killed, and negotiations for peace had failed.  The only people winning in this war were the arms manufacturers.

How could I say no?  “Of course.  When?”

“Fifteen minutes.  Outside the mess tent.”

The two trucks carrying the men slowly crawled over the rough ground that led up to our lookout.  The road was constantly bombed to stop troops’ movements in and out, and was pockmarked with bomb craters.

The trip was a mile, but in the time it took, three mortar shells exploded in front and behind us, the last showering us in dirt and rubble.  Missiles passed overhead and exploded some distance on the enemy side.  A prelude to the new offensive. War didn’t stop at night or at weekends.

We made it in one piece and offloaded, the last shift climbing into the truck.  They looked exhausted.  There were three sets of men who manned the lookout 24 hours a day.  Invariably, at least one man died each shift.  This had two, stretched out and put in the truck.

The leaders exchanged paperwork, and he saluted and left with his men.

The replacements had taken up their positions.  We had two anti-aircraft guns and three snipers who tried to take out the drones.  Every change of shift, a surveillance drone would come and check us out.

I wore my neutrality vest, but that wouldn’t necessarily save me.  I would not be the first media representative to be killed in battle.

As I went into the bunker, I heard a loud crump of a bomb exploding and turned.  At first, I thought it had missed the truck because I couldn’t see it behind the wall of rubble.

Then it cleared, and there was nothing, no wreckage, no people, nothing.  It was as if it had just disappeared.

I shrugged.  There was nothing we could do.

I just shut the door when there was another loud crump, so close and so loud it was deafening.  The bunker could withstand several direct hits, and this one had hit the roof.

Eight feet of concrete on top of six-inch steel plating.

The bunker was filled with dust and grit, and men were on the ground.  It’s not the best way to start a shift.

The morning was given over to watching the missile attack, one that involved more missiles than ever before, targeted strikes on allegedly military targets on the other side, and the observers charting the hits and misses

Most notably, the gun that targeted the truck and our bunker had fallen silent, and it was written down as a possible success.

Everything had fallen silent on the other side of the river, and we were relaxing in that euphoria of not waiting for the next bomb to fall.  Anticipation was a terrible thing.

I went up the ladder to the lookout, temporarily unmanned due to the silence, for the first time in a year.

There was nothing but desolation, bomb craters, little vegetation, and once or twice the scene also had the bodies of men who had charged at the enemy and mown down.

Worse than any scene from World War One in France.  We had learned very little from that or any other war.

I then saw movement, like a rabbit in the thicket, and then a bang.

Then nothing.

Last thought: you do hear the bullet that has your name on it. You just don’t see it coming.

I was standing in a hall, well not so much a hall but a huge building that had statues on either side evely spaced and which armour, weapons and heraldry.

High up windows allowed the daylight to shine in such a way that it illuminated the statues.

They were not all men, but those there were of strong, muscled, tall, and bearded who would have no trouble holding the swords that were next to them lying across the statue base.

I don’t think I could lift one, let alone use it.

I turned slightly, and the man beside me was almost an exact relica of that on the statue.

“Welcome to Valhalla, sir.”

“Where?”

“It is where hero’s stand for eternity.”

“I am no hero.”

“Not in the sense these people might be but a hero none the less.  Words and actions, there are many forms heroism can take.  You will write a document that will bring peace to an unsettled land when men have temporarily forgotten what it is to be men.”

Was her speaking in riddles?  Was I dead, and just dreaming about a place my mind had taken me because it couldn’t deal with the reality of my death?

I doubted any of my work here would stop anything other than a draught under the door.  My grandmother used newspapers in many novel and interesting ways.  She never cared much for the news that was in them.

“Am I dead?”

“That depends on you.  If you don’t fight, then it will be the end, but you will not be coming here.  As I said, you have a job to do, and when you do, here I will be to welcome you.”

“These are all genuine heroes if this is Valhalla.”

“Semantics, but your time is up.  You must go back.”

I opened my eyes and saw three men standing at the end of the bed.

The platoon leader, the camp commandant, and my editor.

The room was in a hospital.

“What happened?” I asked.

“You were shot by a sniper from the other side.  Near killed you.”  My editor, with an undertone of outrage in his tone.

I took a moment to take in what he said, then to realise I was lucky to be alive.  It had been a shot to the head.

“I should not be here.”

“No, but you were lucky.  The bullet missed everything useful, though you might suffer a little amnesia and inbalance from time to time.  We’re glad you survived.  Quite a few didn’t.”

The platoon leader came over and shook my hand, and did the commandant.  Then they left, leaving me with my editor.

It seemed odd that he came all this way out to see me, injured or not.  He sat beside the bed.

“Damn fine piece you wrote.”

“When?”

“After you were shot.  You insisted that they get what you had to say down.  They reckon you being mad as hell was what kept you alive.”

“I don’t remember…”

“Possibly not.  But it’s there down in black and white, and it was enough to precipitate a ceasefire, and you being shot, well, that wasn’t taken lightly.  Stupid men who could have sat down over a glass of wine and simply agreed to share the bounty Mother Earth had granted them all.  It was the clarity that all of them had lost.  The pen truly is mightier than the sword.”

I shook my head.  Where had I heard similar words said?  Somewhere lost in my imagination I guess.

“The war over?

“Yes.  The one person who could stop the madness read your piece and decided to stop supplying weapons if the other side agreed.  Perhaps they might not have listened had you not been shot, but there it is.  You are now in the history books, like it or not.  I just thank God you were working for us.”

…

©  Charles Heath  2025

Writing a book in 365 days – 99

Day 99

Don’t give up your day job.

…

OK, I know some of you do, and lock yourself away until the next bestseller is written, but that’s only an option if you saved up a million dollars so you could take the year off.

And if you are like me, I’d probably be out partying every day rather than put words on paper. Sometimes it is easier to just party.

However, for the more serious of us, our day job could work in our favour in several ways. Firstly, it gives us time away from the project so that we can dwell on how the story might progress the moment we get back in the door at home.

Besides that, the job may be so utterly stultifying that you can have the time to work through plotting and planning during the day, and writing by night.

There again you might have exactly the job that provides the inspiration for writing the story, and it is very useful.

That aspect worked for me because I was in the exact place that was a company like the one I was writing about, in a remote location, on an island with isolation and native people. And I had photos of the operations running since 1898.

All the more reason to seriously consider whether or not to give up your day job.

Oh, and there is one other thing. If you’re not living with your parents, you still need to pay the bills.

Searching for locations: Kaikoura, New Zealand, and, of course, the whales

I’m sure a lot of people have considered the prospect of whale watching.  I’m not sure how the subject came up on one of our visits to New Zealand, but I suspect it was one of those tourist activity leaflets you find in the foyer of motels, hotels, and guesthouses.

Needless to say, it was only a short detour to go to Kaikoura and check out the prospect.

Yes, the ocean at the time seemed manageable.  My wife has a bad time with sea sickness, but she was prepared to make the trip, after some necessary preparations.  Seasickness tablets and special bands to wear on her wrist were recommended and used.

The boat was large and had two decks, and mostly enclosed.  There were a lot of people on board, and we sat inside for the beginning of the voyage.  The sea wasn’t rough, but there was about a meter and a half swell, easily managed by the boat while it was moving.

It took about a half hour or so to reach the spot where the boat stopped and a member of the crew used a listening device to see if there were any whales.

That led to the first wave of sickness.

We stopped for about ten minutes, and the boat moved up and down on the waves.  It was enough to start the queasy stomachs of a number of passengers.  Myself, it was a matter of going out on deck and taking in the sea air.  Fortunately, I don’t get seasick.

Another longish journey to the next prospective site settled a number of the queasy stomachs, but when we stopped again, the swell had increased, along with the boat’s motion.  Seasick bags were made available for the few that had succumbed.

By the time we reached the site where there was a whale, over half the passengers had been sick, and I was hoping they had enough seasick bags, and then enough bin space for them.

The whale, of course, put on a show for us, and those that could went out on deck to get their photos.

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By the end of the voyage, nearly everyone on board was sick, and I was helping to hand out seasick bags.

Despite the anti sickness preparations, my wife had also succumbed.  When we returned and she was asked if the device had worked, she said no.

But perhaps it had because within half an hour we were at a cafe eating lunch, fish and chips of course.

This activity has been crossed off the bucket list, and there’s no more whale watching in our traveling future.  Nor, it seems, will we be going of ocean liners.

Perhaps a cruise down the Rhine might be on the cards.  I don’t think that river, wide as it is in places, will ever have any sort of swell.

NANOWRIMO – April 2025 – Day 25

…

The Fourth Son

…

Old girlfriends

Eleanor, a princess by birth, was selected by the new king’s mother as his perfect match, and yes, in this principality and the other arranged marriages for their children were still done.

Marriage for love was frowned upon, but our new King was by virtue of the fact he had moved away because fourth sons were not going to be crowned king any time soon, was allowed to annul the arrangement.

The truth of the matter was that although they were good together, temperament-wise, they would have ended up killing each other.

Too young and too silly, that first attraction died away before they reached an age to know what love meant, and for our prince, what responsibility was.

Now, she was Richard’s choice, again not in line for the throne, and she found him a far more suitable and placid person to be with.

The truth was she had fallen in love with the country, and the lifestyle that she freely confessed was far better than her home.

When our new king meets up with his old paramour, whom he has not seen for many years, there are feelings there, but not enough to make an impression.

Now that Richard is gone, it’s a question of what she is going to do with the rest of her life, and it seems she wants to stay.

Why not?