This morning started with a visit to the car rental place in Vancouver. It reinforced the notion that you can be given the address and still not find the place. It happened in Washington where it was hiding in the back of the main railway station, and it happened again in Vancouver when it was hidden inside a hotel.
We simply walked straight past it. Pity there wasn’t a sign to let people know.
However…
We went in expecting a Grand Jeep Cherokee and walked out with a Ford Flex, suitable for three people and four large suitcases. It actually seats 7, but forget the baggage, you’d be lucky to get two large suitcases in that configuration.
It is more than adequate for our requirements.
Things to note, it was delivered with just over a quarter of a tank of gas, and it had only done about 11,000 km, so it’s relatively new. It’s reasonably spacious, and when the extra seats are folded down, there is plenty of baggage space.
So far, so good.
We finally leave the hotel at about half-past ten, and it is raining. It is a simple task to get on Highway 1, the TransCanada Highway, initially, and then onto Highway 5, the Coquihalla Highway for the trip to Kamloops.
It rains all the way to the top of the mountain, progress hampered from time to time by water sprays from both vehicles and trucks. The rain is relentless. At the top of the mountain, the rain turns into snow and the road surface to slush. It’s 0 degrees, but being the afternoon, I was not expecting it to turn to ice very quickly.
On the other side of the mountain, closer to Kamloops, there was sleet, then rain, then nothing, the last 100kms or so, in reasonably dry conditions.
Outside Kamloops, and in the town itself, there was evidence of snow recently cleared, and slushy roads. Cars in various places were covered in snow, indicating the most recent falls had been the night before.
We’re staying at the Park Hotel, a heritage building, apparently built in the later 1920s. In the style of the time, it is a little like a rabbit warren with passages turning off in a number of directions, and showing it is spread across a number of different buildings.
It has the original Otis elevator that can take a maximum of four passengers, and a sign on the wall that says “no horseplay inside the elevator” which is a rather interesting expression that only someone of my vintage would understand. And, for those without a sense of humor, you definitely couldn’t fit a horse in it to play with.
The thing is, how do you find a balance between keeping the old world charm with modern-day expectations. You can’t. Some hotels try valiantly to get that balance. Here, it is simply old world charm, which I guess we should be grateful for because sooner rather than later it’s going to disappear forever.
In my writer’s mind, given the importance of the railways, this was probably a thriving place for travelers, and once upon a time, there were a lot more hotels like this one.
This book has finally reached the Final Editor’s draft, so this month it is going to get the last revision, and a reread for the beta readers.
…
So, here’s a question.
If your mother and her twin sister are identical twins, how will Jack know that he has rescued the right woman?
We all know how some identical twins like to play tricks on their friends, by substituting each other. It’s a wicked game on the unsuspecting, but for a criminal, it’s a ploy that just might work.
But there’s that other issue we have between the son and the mother, quite a few years of lying and half-truths to get past, and a great deal of explanation.
Perhaps their reuniting is not going to go the way the mother or the son thinks.
Meanwhile, Jack is working on the idea of visiting his real father and trying to get some explanations out of him.
And, where is Maryanne?
Is it a bit late in the day to say that I’m not quite sure how this is going to end because one is not coming to me that will satisfy tying up the loose ends.
I suspect tomorrow will be the day when the last planning will be done. It may cost a day of words, but it will get the story done.
It’s the pointy end of the project and it has to come together.
Investigation of crimes doesn’t always go according to plan, nor does the perpetrator get either found or punished.
That was particularly true in my case. The murderer was incredibly careful in not leaving any evidence behind, to the extent that the police could not rule out whether it was a male or a female.
At one stage the police thought I had murdered my own wife though how I could be on a train at the time of the murder was beyond me. I had witnesses and a cast-iron alibi.
The officer in charge was Detective First Grade Gabrielle Walters. She came to me on the day after the murder seeking answers to the usual questions like, when was the last time you saw your wife, did you argue, the neighbors reckon there were heated discussions the day before.
Routine was the word she used.
Her fellow detective was a surly piece of work whose intention was to get answers or, more likely, a confession by any or all means possible. I could sense the raging violence within him. Fortunately, common sense prevailed.
Over the course of the next few weeks, once I’d been cleared of committing the crime, Gabrielle made a point of keeping me informed of the progress.
After three months the updates were more sporadic, and when, for lack of progress, it became a cold case, communication ceased.
But it was not the last I saw of Gabrielle.
The shock of finding Vanessa was more devastating than the fact she was now gone, and those images lived on in the same nightmare that came to visit me every night when I closed my eyes.
For months I was barely functioning, to the extent I had all but lost my job, and quite a few friends, particularly those who were more attached to Vanessa rather than me.
They didn’t understand how it could affect me so much, and since it had not happened to them, my tart replies of ‘you wouldn’t understand’ were met with equally short retorts. Some questioned my sanity, even, for a time, so did I.
No one, it seemed, could understand what it was like, no one except Gabrielle.
She was by her own admission, damaged goods, having been the victim of a similar incident, a boyfriend who turned out to be an awfully bad boy. Her story varied only in she had been made to witness his execution. Her nightmare, in reliving that moment in time, was how she was still alive and, to this day, had no idea why she’d been spared.
It was a story she told me one night, some months after the investigation had been scaled down. I was still looking for the bottom of a bottle and an emotional mess. Perhaps it struck a resonance with her; she’d been there and managed to come out the other side.
What happened become our secret, a once-only night together that meant a great deal to me, and by mutual agreement, it was not spoken of again. It was as if she knew exactly what was required to set me on the path to recovery.
And it had.
Since then, we saw each about once a month in a cafe. I had been surprised to hear from her again shortly after that eventful night when she called to set it up, ostensibly for her to provide me with any updates on the case, but perhaps we had, after that unspoken night, formed a closer bond than either of us wanted to admit.
We generally talked for hours over wine, then dinner and coffee. It took a while for me to realize that all she had was her work, personal relationships were nigh on impossible in a job that left little or no spare time for anything else.
She’d always said that if I had any questions or problems about the case, or if there was anything that might come to me that might be relevant, even after all this time, all I had to do was call her.
I wondered if this text message was in that category. I was certain it would interest the police and I had no doubt they could trace the message’s origin, but there was that tiny degree of doubt, about whether or not I could trust her to tell me what the message meant.
I reached for the phone then put it back down again. I’d think about it and decide tomorrow.
Yes, I’m drawing a blank, which means I have no idea
It seems that I do this a lot these days, perhaps one of the perils of being a writer
But…
Using blank in a story doesn’t necessarily convey the antagonist is clueless, more likely he or she just used one in a gun, put there by a person who didn’t want to get shot.
No, still drawing a blank on this one.
A blank space means there’s nothing in it, and you see a lot of these in crosswords and sudoku, even when the user has been toiling for hours
I’m thinking anyone who met me might misinterpret my blank expression, well, it’s not too expressive in the first place
Perhaps before the coin becomes a coin; it is a piece of blank metal to begin with. How good would it be to get a one-sided coin, that’d be worth a lot?
And the very worst description of blank; having a blank piece of paper in front of you, and you really are drawing a blank!
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 setup.
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 to 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.
“What the hell?” Amelia asked her grandmother, somewhat exasperatedly, after suddenly waking, and finding her missing.
Despite any misgivings that briefly passed through her mind, Amelia threw on some clothes and went looking for her. If this was home, she would not be caught dead outside without the proper preparation, a half-hour system at the very least for makeup application and clothes selection.
Her instructions from her parents were quite clear. Don’t let her grandmother out of her sight. It was not that she couldn’t be trusted. It was just that she didn’t see the evil in people, and Italy was a whole different world than she was used to.
“Breakfast. I did give you a shake, then tell you where I was going?”
“You should have tried harder.”
Her grandmother gave her one of those looks, one that bordered on disdain with a tinge of incomprehension, one she was getting used to because of the generation gap, and things were getting lost in translation
“Who was he? Some rando imposing on you?”
There was that look again. “What is a rando?”
“Some guy who comes up and tries it on.”
“In the restaurant over coffee? I should be that lucky a guy would be interested in me that way. I think your imagination is a little too fertile, young lady. He’s just another tourist, and I imposed on him, not the other way around.” She looked her granddaughter up and down. “You look a mess.”
“Well, I was worried you might have gotten into trouble.”
“Your father has so little faith in me, I see. This isn’t going to work if you’re going to stress out every time I go for breakfast and you’re still asleep. You need to change your habits and be ready when I am. I’ll wait here until you get yourself together. And now you’ve enlightened me about randos; I’ll try to avoid them if possible.”
Amelia simply shook her head. She was between that proverbial rock and a hard place and regretted volunteering to chaperone her grandmother. Of course, the alternative was equally impossible.
She needed to get away from her so-called friends and that weasel of an ex-boyfriend. The idea of enduring the summer holidays with any of them was painful enough, but this gig was probably going to be worse.
She compromised on her morning routine, going with the minimal makeup look and a summery dress that she wouldn’t wear back home. It was not likely she was going to run into anyone she knew.
Back down in the foyer almost fifteen minutes after she left her grandmother in one of the lounges, she spilled out of the elevator and quickly strode into the foyer where … no one was sitting in any of the chairs.
“Damn,” she muttered under her breath. “Now, where is she?”
Her grandmother was going to be a nightmare to supervise. Her father said as much, not exactly denigrating a woman for being independent and also having a mind of her own, but he seemed to be bordering on a man who had definite ideas about a woman’s place. She was surprised her mother put up with it.
The one conversation she had with her grandmother on serious stuff like her life, was about how she had spent more of her time trying to fight against the strict social norms of her day, that she be a dutiful wife and mother, and not entertain any of those nonsensical ideas of going to work or going places, and worse still doing it on her own.
It was everything that Amelia had now without questioning how it came to pass; just that it was a right she had. Like most girls her age, she knew nothing about how hard it had been just to get some of those rights.
She went over to the door and looked out. Out by the dock where the Vaporetto came to collect and drop them off, she saw her talking to that same man and an Italian woman in a very smart suit.
She dashed out and almost ran into several people who made an unpredictable turn outside the entrance.
…
“Ah,” her grandmother said, “just in time. Jay, this is one of my four granddaughters, Amelia. She was the one I was telling you about.”
I looked at her, making out the similarities between the generations. Same eyes, same amusement lurking there. “I’ve never been called a rando before, but in any case, it has a slightly different meaning in my generation, which I was just telling your grandmother about.”
Amelia glared at her grandmother. “Did you have to mention that? Really?” Scratch that idea she was not going to suffer embarrassment.
The grandmother added, “She generally speaks in riddles, and I can never understand a word of it. This new teen language…”
“Oddly enough, I know what you mean. I have a few teens and a few older grandchildren who, as you say, talk in riddles if they talk at all.”
“Gran, we should be getting on the boat. We have places to see.”
The Vaporetto was just pulling into the dock.
“About that, Jay here has a private guide, and it seems to him overkill for just one person to benefit. He thinks we might benefit from Conchetta’s experience and knowledge. I’m inclined to agree, just for today, until we get our bearings. Unless, of course, you want to do battle with the guidebook and impress me with your Italian language skills?”
Put that way, how could Amelia refuse. Her Italian was awful, and the last thing she wanted was to take charge of going to see old buildings and boring museums. And don’t get her started in the number of churches…
“Just for today then, as you say.”
Rather than take the hotel’s vaporetto, Conchetta had arranged for a private water taxi that also had catering. It was going to be a warm day, and we would need water.
I was right when I suggested that having such a knowledgeable guide all to myself was almost criminal, and when I’d ascertained from Millie that she had no other plans than getting the Vaporetto to St Mark’s Square and wandering around, it seemed simple.
To me, anyway. I hadn’t factored in the possibility of a somewhat truculent granddaughter, but then I got the impression she had been sent against her will. It was a surprise she was not at home with her friends.
It seemed there was a little tension between the two, which made me think that the granddaughter might have been co-opted as a nursemaid, and this trip was punishment.
Or perhaps she was a little suspicious of me and whatever my motives were. There were none, but given time to think about it, it did seem like a pickup line, though given my age, that would be almost ridiculous.
But that notion of being called a rando did bring the matter back to a level of reality. A foreign country and a foreign tourist, was anyone really safe?
I assured them both that I had no other intentions other than to share my good fortune, and she seemed to accept it. After all, it was never my intention to seek out a female company or anything like that. I was quite content to be on my own.
We took a roundabout route and covered a few canals and sightseeing points, which Conchetta was quite happy to mark on the map, along with a chart of the route we were taking.
She also gave us a history lesson, because nearly everything was as old as the hills, as my mother used to describe old stuff. Of course, my idea of questions, when prompted, was more relatable to the topic.
Amelia had a more fertile imagination, like I’d expect of a teen, and asked about how many bodies were fished out of the canals and did the mafia run everything in Venice. I was sure they didn’t, but it was not a question Conchetta was going to answer definitively. In fact, she seemed amused at how Americans and the English thought.
She was very patient without being condescending. In her place, I might have been more so. It was just another painful reminder of how our children had abandoned their responsibility to bring their children up properly.
After the canal exploration, the morning was spent in St Mark’s Square, and then the Palace of the Doges. My highlight was the Whispering Bridge and the story behind it. Along with a lot of very old paintings. Amelia, predictably, was bored witless.
When it came to lunch, I politely suggested they might like to join me, though, at the time, I was not sure what Concetta had organised.
To Amelia, it signified the end of a morning of looking at boring stuff and asked if we could have lunch at a real Italian restaurant, and I could see Conchetta roll her eyes, slightly before her grandmother did, so in a quiet moment I asked Conchetta if such a venue existed given the touristy nature of the island, and melting pot of cuisines and visitors tastes.
Fortunately, she did, and I paid her extra to be our culinary host.
It was a divine lunch for many reasons, to have the authentic food, completely dissected and described with the history behind it, the authentic wine to match the food, and the company despite the youthful brashness.
At the end of the day, when the taxi was taking them back to the hotel, Millie was sitting in the cabin looking like she was having a nap, not very far away from Amelia, who seemed lost in thought.
“A penny for those thoughts, Am.”
The girl turned and smiled. “It was not as bad as I thought, even if I had to endure all that old stuff.”
“That’s just the tip of the iceberg, dear. Tomorrow, we’re going to visit churches.”
“Really?”
“You might not be interested, but I am. And the food and wine. It certainly pays to have someone like Conchetta along for the ride.”
“We could never afford that. This guy must be very wealthy.”
Millie looked back into the cabin. Not in the normal sense perhaps, she thought, because not once did he make mention of anything that gave an indication he was rich, unlike so many of his compatriots. Big, loud, brash, and demanding.
There was more to that story, but this was a one-day thing. She had been reluctant at first to agree to his proposal, perhaps a little suspicious of his motives, but as the day progressed, it was clear to her there were none.
“Perhaps, but it is none of our business.”
The girl came back to sit next to her grandmother. “Perhaps,” she said in almost a whisper, “you could cosy up to him, and we could ride his coattails around Europe.”
Millie put on her most shocked expression. “I thought you said he was a rando trying it on.”
“I might have been a little hasty. I don’t mean, you know, just if he offers, I’m sure it would be better than us two trying to muddle through.”
“I won’t ask you to explain ‘you know’, but I don’t think we can impose on him. If he suggests it, I’ll think about it, but this is about you and I going on what your father described as the trip of a lifetime.”
“Yeah. Dad says a lot of stuff, but none of it belonging to this century. As you wish.”
I woke when the boat gently bumped against the dock, and Conchetta gently shook my shoulder.
“We are here,” she said.
“My goodness. What did I miss?”
“Nothing of any consequence. It has been a long day, even for me.”
“Perhaps less formal clothes tomorrow?”
“If only I could.”
At the front of the boat, Millie and Amelia were about to get off. I looked over time the pontoon and gasped.
A surprise. Jasper, second son to my daughter Samanthan was waiting, that usual lopsided grin and shock of red hair making him stand out.
That and the fact he was wearing a suit and looked every bit the formal figure like his father.
I could see that Amelia had seen him too and had that effect he had on women of any age.
I came up behind them. “I see you’ve seen my grandson, Jasper, though why he’s here is a surprise, and hopefully not because something has gone wrong.”
“You have to be kidding, he’s your grandson? He’s like in every magazine on the planet. He is that guy that does those ads isn’t he?”
The red hair sometimes gave it away, but yes, his mother was one of those stage mothers. The movie world shunned him, but the advertisers didn’t.
“Sometimes. He has better things to do with his time.”
We were helped off the boat, and he came over and gave me a hug. I then introduced him to the two women. Amelia all of a sudden couldn’t speak.
“Dumb question,” I said to Jasper to break the moment, ” but why are you here?”
“I had to get away from mom. She was making all these plans, none of which included my input, so I got on a plane and came here. Boring churches seemed so much better than modelling gigs.”
“Then just in time. That’s our tomorrow. Oh, sorry, Millie, if you want to that is.”
“We’d love to, “Amelia said before her grandmother could take a breath.
I looked at her, and she smiled. “Of course, we’d love to.”
In that moment both Jasper and Amelia were heading towards the hotel looking almost like they’d been together forever.
Millie watched them with an amused expression, then headed up the ramp towards the hotel. “This morning, Amelia was telling me this was going to be the most boring month of her life.”
“That might also be the case for Jasper. I wasn’t expecting to see anyone, but my daughter pretends to worry about me. You’ll be glad to know Jasper is the sanest of the seven. Perhaps I am glad he’s here. And I don’t mean to put you in an awkward position. If you have other plans for tomorrow…”
“I have not, and today was a good day. One day at a time, I’ve been saying for a while. I’m sure it’s a philosophy you can understand.”
She smiled, and I held out a hand to assist her in going up the ramp. “Very much so. Now, any particular churches you want to see?”
I’ve been looking at the role of the policewoman, and her interaction with the shop’s participants.
I’m still working on whether she needs more or less of an introduction, but, for the time being, this is what I’m going with:
…
It had been another long day at the office for Officer Margaret O’Donnell, or, out in the streets, coping with people who either didn’t know or didn’t care about the law.
People who couldn’t cross the road where there were crossings and lights to protect them, silly girls shoplifting on a dare, and boys who thought they were men and could walk on water.
The one they scraped of the road would never get to grow up, and his mother, well, she was not doing another call on a family to give them the bad news.
That was her day.
So far.
At the end of the day, she was glad to be getting home, putting her feet up, and forgetting about everything until the next morning when it would start all over again.
Coming around that last corner, the home stretch she called it, she was directly opposite the corner shop, usually closed at this hour of the night. It was not. The lights were still on.
She looked at her watch and saw it was ten minutes to midnight, and long past closing time. She looked through the window, but from the other side of the road, she could only see three heads and little else.
Damn, she thought, I’m going to have to check it out.
She was aware of the rumors, from her co-residents and also her colleagues down at the station, rumors she hoped were not true.
This story is now on the list to be finished so over the new few weeks, expect a new episode every few days.
The reason why new episodes have been sporadic, 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.
Things are about to get complicated…
Joanne let me get away far too easily.
When I got back to my car, I ran the scanner over it. One tracker was easily found, another that took a full half hour to find, and some very strange stares from people on the sidewalk.
I put them both on another car and then went back to the safe house. Knowing O’Connell was just a pawn meant there wasn’t a hurry to find him. Anna had everything she needed from him, and now he was of little use to her. The only question was whether he was still alive.
Jennifer had taken my pyjamas and my bed in the master bedroom, so I was relegated to the spare.
Not happy.
We needed a plan. In all the excitement I’d forgotten O’Connell had three places, the original apartment with Herman, his mother’s house in Peaslake, and the apartment in Bromley.
I was up before Jennifer, making coffee, when she came out.
She made my pyjamas look good. And there was the distraction factor Maury was prone to banging on about.
“How did it go at the office?”
“Turns out Anna Jakovich, the apparent seller of the USB, is a biochemist herself, one who was involved in a laboratory disaster, and discharged as part of the problem. Make of that what you will, but it looks like her husband was just the fall guy.”
“Of course, it all makes sense then. Gets the husband to steal the data on the pretext they’re saving the world, then kills him, and pins the blame on him if anything goes wrong. gets us to stump up several million pounds, then ditches O’Connell and runs with the money, and the USB, to bilk another unsuspecting government, like the Russians, or the Chinese.”
“Can you read minds?”
“No. Got a call from Dobbin, though I have no idea how he found my number since it’s a burner. Seems he finally found the file on Anna, presumably the same one you got.
“He doesn’t know you’re involved.”
“He does now. He figured you’d seek help from your classmates that were still on the books. There’s two of us, me and Miss Desirable, Yolanda.”
“Didn’t she leave the Severin School of wannabes before qualifying?”
“And went straight to the city office of the department and offered up all details on our once fearless leaders for a second chance. On the books, and back in training, training we might be able to use.”
“Possibly. The question is, of course, whether she knew what they were planning…”
“Dobbin says she was fooling about with Severin, or perhaps that was Maury…”
“Then Dobbin or Monica or both knew in advance what was going to happen and could have prevented a tragedy if that was the case. I don’t think she quite knew everything.”
“Well, what I know now is that we’re simply pawns in a much larger game, dancing to a tune that is completely out of key. Makes things all the more interesting, don’t you think. By my estimation when we complete our mission, we’re likely to end up like Severin, we just have to work out which one it is before we reach our expiry date. That coffee smells divine, by the way. We’re not going anywhere until I’ve had a cup.”
At least she hadn’t decided to go back to her old life. Not yet anyway.
We tackled Peaslake first. It was a free-standing house, and we had reasonably covered access that gave us entry to the property with minimal chance of observation.
When we were close, I was nearly run off the road by a fire engine, in a hurry. Closer still we could see a plume of smoke rising from behind the trees, and when we reached the top of the street, we could see where the fire engine was going.
O’Connell’s house was on fire.
I parled the car and we went to join the throng of nearby residents, all with nothing better to do.
“What happened?” Jennifer asked one of the residents.
“There was an explosion, a fireball, someone said they thought it was a gas tank, and then a fire started. It was fully ablaze by the time the first fire engine arrived.”
The firefighters had most of the blaze subdued, and we could see the house was destroyed.
Was it Anna or O’Connell, or both covering their tracks? The house had become compromised when Jennifer and I turned up.
Five minutes later the Detective Inspector and her Sargent arrived.
“Should I be worried now you’re here,” she asked when she saw me.
“It belonged to the mother of one of our officers who is involved in the case I’m working on.”
“He has the information?”
“No, or maybe. We don’t know. We do know there’s a woman involved who was working with our agent.”
“Oh. I’ve been told there are two bodies found inside, one man and one woman. Nothing else yet, but I’m going to talk to the forensic team waiting to see if they know any more. Don’t go anywhere, I may need to talk to you.”
“Just a question. You didn’t let Jan out, did you?”
She looked puzzled. “Jan?”
“The girl who shot Severin.”
“Oh, her. MI5 came and took her away the moment my back was turned. Why?”
“She probably did this.”
“You might have told me she was dangerous. Who is she?”
“An MI5 assassin.”
She sighed. “You people are a law unto yourselves. Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be back.”
We watched her stomp away.
“Well,” Jennifer said, “that just made our life a little more difficult.”
This book has finally reached the Final Editor’s draft, so this month it is going to get the last revision, and a reread for the beta readers.
…
Planning was the order of the day, and I needed to see where this story was going.
Firstly, a meeting with Maryanne’s handler will give some perspective on what might be in the mysterious diary.
After rescuing Jack’s mother, Jack has a host of questions; about his biological father, who he was, and what happened to him when he was sent to prison.
Jack makes further contact with his biological father, now that his mother is free, and considers a meeting, but he has to be careful where and when.
This meeting, if it happens, is to get some insight into who is after the diary, and for Jack to possibly mediate a resolution between all of the people who are after it.
It’s naïve of him to think he can tread a path between them and not get hurt in the process, but people do foolish things.
Remember that Rosalie is still out there with the diary and there might be/will be a concerted effort to find her. McCallister, the people who want the diary, Jack’s mother (now regretting dragging Jack into her problems), Maryanne, and Jacob are looking for her.
There might be a possibility that Rosalie might read the diary, and then tell Jack – an eventuality that might cause more trouble.
Jacob is out there, very close, watching Jack, thinking Jack will lead him to the diary. Jack is going to ask McCallister to tell him about Jacob, though I’m not sure whether I want him to consider the possibility of talking to him about the past.
Where is Jack’s mother’s twin (Her name is Chloe), and what is she doing? The last time Jack saw her, she was tied up in the empty apartment building. The conversation with her didn’t go so well.
…
Now, possible outcomes:
Jack’s mother isn’t Jack’s mother but Chloe masquerading as her,
Rosalie does in fact get caught, because she foolishly decided to find Jack and tell him what’s in the diary,
Jack’s meeting with McCallister is interrupted by both Maryanne and Jacob, bullets fly, and people get injured,
Jack’s mother is not the innocent she pretends to be,
Jack’s life is far from what he thought it was.
…
This story is going to be finished within the time limit, and the estimated 60,000 words.
All the worries we thought we might have in getting from Lake Louise to Calgary, in the end, it was just like driving to work, only a little longer.
When we left the Fairmont, the car had two frozen bottles of water and a frozen donut, left in the car for the two days we were there, so hiding in the garage might not be a good idea.
At the garage where we refueled, it was so cold I could barely clean the windows and glad to get back into the warmth inside the car.
Thankfully as we got closer to Calgary, it got warmer.
We bypass the city going to the airport, but, as it turns out, we would not have had much time to look around anyway.It’s nice to go to an airport and actually find the car rental returns first go with adequate signing to get there.
Returning the car took a few extra minutes because we were at the end of a dozen or so others who turned up at the same time. All good, they remembered giving us a half full petrol tank.
At the check-in, it is very smooth sailing, the kiosk working and once the booking reference was entered, it spat out the desired number of boarding passes and baggage tags.
Then to baggage drop, through customs where I managed to lose my jacket, which is amazing that you would be allowed to leave anything behind.
So…
We have an hour and a half to kill, so a long soda and two long island teas settle the pre-flight nerves if we had any to start with.
Time to consider the vagaries of the flight.
Today we’re on an Airbus a320, and we are seated in the very last row, row 33. It’s always a bad thing to look up planes on seatguru.com, because it has painted them as the worst on the plane.
What’s the downside, sometimes the seat pitch is less than further up the plane, the seats don’t recline and you get the seat in front in your face, and you get the constant flushing of the toilets. And my major bugbear there’s no overhead luggage space.
What’s the reality?
To begin with, the seats recline, but not very much. We’ll wait till the plane is cruising before judging how far the seats recline in front of us.
The seat pitch is good and it doesn’t feel like were cramped into a small space, but again this is relative to what happens with the seat in front.
Overhead baggage space, none whatsoever, so if you don’t get on first you are basically screwed. We were almost first to the rear of the plane so I suspect others also know about the lack of overhead bin space.
Being at the read most part of the plane affords you a view of how the baggage handlers treat your baggage, and it’s interesting, to say the least. They smile a lot, so I suspect that a few bags might get the ‘treatment’.
Enough already.
We’re now backing out of the bay ready to leave.
We’re getting endless announcements in foreign languages so when next I fly with Air Canada I should at least learn French.
Or not…
Ah, the smell of kerosene floods our end of the plane. So much for air quality, which so it happens is being covered in the safety video at the exact same time.
