Tag: Fiction

The cinema of my dreams – I never wanted to go to Africa – Episode 43

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.

 

The hut was a barracks, with bedding and ablutions for twenty men.  Since this was one of two, I assumed the other hut housed the twenty soldiers that the Colonel had alluded to.  There would be no more than one or two others including the Captain.

Hopefully, there were not more in Nagero.

The two hostages had been taken to the Captain’s office where I assumed there was probably a brig for them to be locked in.  Not quite what I was expecting, but no plan was ever perfect.

I went to the rear and sat down at a table that could accommodate about ten.

Davies and Shurl joined me.

I looked at Shurl.  “Good work, and glad they didn’t shoot you.”

“So am I.  Monroe had joined the others.  I had to make a lot of noise before they found me, so I don’t think this is a crack troop.”

“The Captain, or whatever he is, looks sharp,” Davies said.

“New command perhaps.  Can’t believe his luck, I’m guessing.  Did you get a look at the plane?”

“As much as I could without looking like I was looking at it.  It’s been well maintained, and I have no doubt we can get it off the ground.  It just depends if we need help to get the engines started.  It’s possible they don’t, though it’s not usual for this type of plane.  We shall see when the time comes.”

“Can you take off at night?”

“It’s a bit dangerous without lights.  I see they have a lighting system, so I suggest, if and when we break out of here you get someone to find the switch.”

“Noted.”

“Any idea when that’ll be?”

“I’m sure we have people working on that as we speak.”

The door at the entrance to the hut opened and the Captain stood next to his officer, with a gun pointed loosely in our direction, just in case we got the idea we could escape.

“Mr. James.  Time to tell me all about your escape plans.”

“I’m not so sure they could be called that, now.”

His tone hardened.  “Don’t keep me waiting.  I have people waiting for my report.”

I shrugged and got up.  “Just make sure everyone is ready to move when the time comes.  Tell Baines that I expect him to find the generator and get the lights working.”

The Captain’s impatient look told me not to keep him waiting any longer.

The Captain led the way, and his officer kept the gun pointed at me, just in case of what I’m not sure.  Inside his office, rather spacious, and with a door which likely led to some form of accommodation and the brig where the hostages were being held.  The door was closed so I couldn’t see, so it had to be an assumption.

The officer remained in the doorway, while the Captain sat behind a large desk, and gestured for me to sit the other side.  It didn’t look like a comfortable chair.

I thought I’d start the ball rolling.  “I’m assuming that there isn’t always an army guard on this airstrip?”

“No.  When we heard you were coming for the prisoners, a detachment was sent.  Fortuitous wouldn’t you say?”

“For who.”  Time to sow some seeds of discontent.

“What do you mean Mr. James?”

“Your mate back at the militia camp just pocketed two million US dollars’ worth of diamonds for those two men.  What was your cut?”

A shocked look, one that eased back into benign slowly.  No cut from that look, I’d say.

“We pride ourselves on being above bribery.  That was the old way of doing things.”

“Clearly the militia don’t agree.  Are you going to give them back to the commander so he can raffle them again?”

The Captain didn’t seem to understand the word ‘raffle’.

“Sell them back to us for another two million.  Maybe you should talk to your superiors and see what they think.  If you left us go, I can arrange for five million, for you and your friends to share.”

Disdain, or disappointment.

“What did I just say about bribery.”

“That it’s not the way things are done.  Maybe not in the capital, but this is the boondocks, and you’re the man in charge.  Five million can go a long way, but I suspect if you tell your superiors, you won’t get to see any of it.  Or perhaps you should take a few men over to the Militia commander’s camp and demand your share, or just take it.  After all, Captain, who is in charge of this sector, him or you?”

At least he was thinking about it.  Five million was a lot of money, but in US dollars, that could take him anywhere.

I remembered my old instructor saying, one, ‘every man has his price’.

I just had to find the Captains.

“Aside from trying to bribe me, Mr. James, what were you hoping to achieve here?”

“A rescue.  I know we tried once before and not succeeded, but you know how it is, if you at first don’t succeed, try, try, try again.”

“That it failed before should be a warning that we are not as weak as you might think we are.  The US Army is not necessarily the best in the world.”

“So I’m beginning to discover.  Did we train you?”

“No.  I spent some time in England, training with the British Army.”

So that was where he got his accent and ramrod stiff never a crease out of place posture.

“But,” he said, “this not about me, but you.  And your so-called film crew.  How did you expect top escape through this airstrip, flights are restricted, and you can’t possibly fly in a Hercules?  The runway is not long enough.

“No, we were hoping for something a bit smaller than that, but we’ll find out tomorrow what it is.  I’ll be standing on the patio looking as surprised as you are when it arrives.  Now, let me ask you a question.  Do you know who those men are that you have in detention?”

“Militia prisoners.”

“For doing what?”

“I don’t ask questions.  I obey orders.

“Then I’ll tell you.  They were trying to set up a trade agreement for some precious metal you have in abundance here.  Good for the country for income, and employment.  Might even help you get on better terms with the rest of the world.  Unless of course, you don’t want to.”

“I am a soldier, not a politician.  That’s their problem.  I was told to hold you until my superiors arrive.”

“Who told you?”

“The Colonel.  He’s based in Ada.”

So, we had a leak.  Surprising given the limited circulation of the plan.  It might be down to Jacobi, but somehow, I didn’t think it was him.  He had several opportunities to turn on us and he didn’t.

“So, you’re saying we basically drove into a trap?”

“Yes.  So much for the smart Americans who have all the technology and answers.

I could understand his contempt, especially when the attempt had failed so badly.  Pity then he didn’t understand what was about to happen to him.

© Charles Heath 2020

“Quickly, quickly…” – a short story

It was odd having a voice in your head, well, not really in your head as such, but in your ear, and sounding like it was in your head.

You could truthfully say you were hearing voices.

It was the next step after going through some very intensive training, having someone else as your eyes and ears when breaching a secure compound, and avoiding the enemy.

I’d signed on for this extra training thinking one day it would land me in the thick of the action. Some of the others thought I was mad, but someone had to do it, and the fact it was quite dangerous added just that extra bit to it.

But as they say, what you learn in training, and practise in a non-hostile environment, is nothing like being in that same situation in reality.

Now on was on my first assignment, part of an elite team, packed and taken to what was to everyone else, an unspecified location, but to us, it was the point of incursion.

The mission?

To rescue a government official (that was how he was described to us) who had been illegally detained in a foreign prison.

Our job?

To break him out and get out without the knowledge of the prison staff, or anyone representing that government. Yes, what we were doing was highly illegal, and yes, if we were caught it was more likely than not we would be executed as spies.

…

We were under cover in an abandoned farmhouse about three miles from the prison. We had been brought in under cover of darkness, and had only a few hours to set up, and then wait it out until the following night.

It was now or never, the weather people predicting that there would be sufficient cloud cover to make us invisible. Two of us were going in, and two remaining strategically placed outside to monitor the inside of the prison through a system of infrared scanners. We also had a floor plan of the building in which the prisoner was being held, and intelligence supplied, supposedly, by one of the prison guards who had been paid a lot of money for information on guard movements.

To me, it was a gigantic leap of faith to trust him, but I kept those thoughts to myself.

We had been over the plan a dozen times, and I’d gone through the passageways, rooms, and doors so many times I’d memorised where they were and would be able to traverse the building as if I had worked there for a lifetime. Having people outside, talking me through it was just an added benefit, along with alerts on how near the guards were to our position.

I was sure the other person going with me, a more seasoned professional who had a number of successful missions under his belt, was going through the same motions I was. After all, it was he who had devised and conducted the training.

There was a free period of several hours before departure, time to listen to some music, empty the head of unwanted thoughts, and get into the right mindset. It was no place to get tangled up in what-ifs, if anything went wrong, it was a simple matter of adapting.

Our training had reinforced the necessity to instantly gauge a situation and make changes on the fly. There would literally be no time to think.

I listened to the nuances of Chopin’s piano concertos, pretending to play the piano myself, having translated every note onto a piano key, and observing it in my mind’s eye.

My opposite number played games of chess in his head. We all had a different method of relaxing.

Until it was 22:00 hours, and time to go.

…

“Go left, no, hang on, go right.” The voice on my ear sounded confused and it was possible to get lefts and rights mixed up, if you were not careful.

It didn’t faze me, I knew from my study of the plans that once inside the perimeter fence, I had to go right, and head towards a concrete building the roof of which was barely above the ground.

It was once used as a helipad, and underneath, before the site became a prison, the space was used to make munitions. And it was an exceptionally large space that practically ran under the whole of the prison, built above ground.

All that had happened was the lower levels were sealed, covered over and the new structures built on top. Our access was going to be from under the ground.

Quite literally, they would not see, or hear, us coming.

The meteorological people had got it right, there was cloud cover, the moon hidden from view, and the whole perimeter was in inky darkness. Dressed in black from head to foot, the hope was we would be invisible.

There were two of us heading to the same spot, stairs that led down to a door that was once one of the entrances to the underground bunker. We were going separate ways in case one of the other was intercepted in an unforeseen event.

But, that part of the plan worked seamlessly, and we both arrived at the same place nearly at the same time.

Without the planning, we might easily have missed it because I didn’t think it would be discernable even in daylight.

I followed the Sergeant downstairs, keeping a watchful eye behind us. I stooped at the point where I could see down, and across the area we had just traversed.

Nothing else was stirring.

As expected, the door was seamless and without an apparent handle. It may have had one once, but not anymore, so anyone who did stumble across it, couldn’t get in.

Except us. We had special explosives that were designed to break the lock, and once set, would not make a lot of noise. Sixty seconds later we were inside, and the door closed so no one would know we’d broken in.

I was carrying a beacon so that the voice in my head could follow my progress. The sergeant had one too, and he led.

“Straight ahead, 200 yards, then another door. It shouldn’t be locked, but it might be closed.”

In other words, we had no way of knowing. Our informant had said no one had been down in the dungeons, as he called them, since the munition factory closed, and had been sealed up soon after the prison building had been handed over for use.

We were using night goggles, and there was a lot of rubbish strewn over the floor area so we had to carefully pick our way through which took time we really didn’t have. It looked as though our informant was right, no one had been down there for a long time. We were leaving boot prints in the dust.

We reached the door ten minutes later than estimated. Losing time would have a flow-on effect, and this operation was on a very tight time constraint.

“Once you are through the door, there’s a passage. Turn left and go about 50 paces. There should be another passage to your right.”

“Anyone down here?”

“No, but there is a half dozen prison officers above you. Standard patrol, from guardhouse to guardhouse. Unless they can hear you through five feet of solid concrete, you’re safe.”

My instincts told me five feet of concrete were not enough, but I’ll let it ride for the moment.

The door was slightly ajar and it took the two of us to pull it open so that we could get past. Behind it was the passage, going left and right. Trusting my invisible guide was not getting mixed up again, I motioned right, and we headed down the passage.

Despite the fact we should be alone, both of us were careful not to make any noise, and trod carefully.

At 50 or so paces, the passage came into sight. The sergeant went ahead. I stayed back and kept an eye in both directions. The passage before us was the one that would take us under the cell of the captive we were sent to retrieve.

There would be no blasting our way in. The floor to the cell had a grate, and when removed, a person could drop down into the ‘dungeon’. Currently, the grate was immovable, but we had the tools to fix that.

The sergeant would verify the grate was where it was supposed to be, then come back to get me.

Five minutes passed, then ten. It was not that far away.

I was about to go search when the voice in my head returned, but with panic. “We’ve been compromised. Get the hell out of there, now. Quickly…”

Then I heard what sounded like gunshots, then nothing.

A minute later there was a new voice. “I don’t know who you are, but I’d strongly advise you give yourself up to the guards. Failure to do so within one hour, I’ll execute the two men I now have in custody.”

Ahead of me there was a sudden explosion, followed by a cloud of dust and fine debris.

Hand grenade, or mine, it didn’t matter. The sergeant wouldn’t be coming back.

I sighed.

Plan B it was.

…

© Charles Heath 2021

Searching for locations: Queenstown, New Zealand

Queenstown is as much about skiing in Winter as it is hiking in Summer or any other time.  It is, in fact, the ideal place for a holiday any time of the year.

We have stayed there simply to relax, though with all that scenery, and stuff to do, it’s nearly impossible to stay indoors all the time.

Usually, we stay in a place called Queenstown Mews, not far from the lake, and it gives us the perfect opportunity to walk down to the lake and follow the shoreline around to the town, and have coffee and cake as a fitting reward for the exercise.

Along the way, there is the view of the Remarkables:

And, further around, behind the park and gardens, a spectacular view across the lake towards Walter Peak farm:

To get to the farm you can either drive a very, very long way or take the T.S.S. Earnslaw, otherwise known as the ‘Lady of the Lake’.

This vessel plies Lake Wakatipu from Queenstown to mostly Walter Peak Farm but has been known, on occasions, to go to Kingston or Glenorchy.

Here it’s sitting at the pier at Queenstown, ready to depart for Walter Peak Farm.

earnslaw1

And this is it returning to Walter Peak Farm to take the visitors back to Queenstown.

earnslaw2

We have been to Walter Peak Farm for Afternoon Tea and Dinner, and both occasions were an amazing experience.  You can also get up close and to the animals

There are other experiences to be had in Glenorchy. and the views whilst driving there are every bit as spectacular, especially as late afternoon settles in:

And in visiting the Lord Of the Rings filming locations.

Then there is Kingston, where the road follows the lake and you are literally between the mountains and the lake:

Kingston used to have a train running, which then became a tourist attraction, but for the moment does not seem to be running currently.

But for me, the real experiences is travelling on the vessel.

Not bad for 103 years old.

The cinema of my dreams – I always wanted to go on a treasure hunt – Episode 4

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 back on the treasure hunt.

…

“Who the hell is that horrible man?” I asked, still staring after the car, long after it had gone.

I knew trouble when I saw it, and that man was serious trouble.

And the fact he believed there was a treasure map…

“My uncle Rico, he was the one my mother always credited leading my father astray.  Whatever they had been doing back then, it was never anything legal.”

So, he knows about the treasure map?”

“He knows nothing.  He thinks he knows something, he thinks I know something, but he’s not going to get it out of me.”

“What if he comes after me next?”

It was a daunting prospect, and just looking at Rico was enough to scare me.  If he had a machete to back up his insistence I tell the truth?  I shuddered.

“You tell him the truth.  We have a map, we bought it at the bar like everyone else.”

He was right.

“Boggs?”

His aunt yelled out his name in a manner that meant he was in trouble.

He motioned to keep quiet and follow him.

He took one step before she added, “You take one more step away from this house, and you’ll have more than Rico to worry about.”

A shrug, a wan smile, and then he turned back.  “Nothing more today.  See you at the Bar tomorrow, and we’ll start the search.

“Surely you don’t think that map is real?”

“Real enough, with missing pieces, we have to track down.  Tomorrow.”He turned and went back into the house, the wooden screen door slamming shut behind him.

Followed by the raised voice of an angry Aunt.  “What is all this malarkey about a treasure map, and what the hell were you doing in a bar?  I bet it was that Johnson kid leading you astray again.”

Never, according to her, Boggs’ fault, and always mine.

I guess it was time to take one for the team!

…

© Charles Heath 2019-2021

The A to Z Challenge – S is for -”So, what do you think?”

I thrived on the notion that I was invisible.

Every time I went out with friends, no one ever asked my opinion about anything, and I never really ventured one, and it had been that way all my life.

It came from learning at a very young age that I should listen not prattle and speak only when spoken to.

All through school I spent most of my time studying alone, or with one or two others who wanted to help with their schoolwork, and I think that after a while I’d become a definitive nerd.

Things changed a little when I went to university and found there were quite a few just like me, and we sort of gravitated towards each other.

After that, getting a job, I still found myself more or less keeping my own company though from time to time one or other of my contemporaries would ask I’d I was going to the drinks after work on Friday night, which usually I avoided.

My contemporaries were a little too outgoing for a self-confessed boring person.

Then things changed, a promotion to a different branch in an office in the next state, with new people and a different atmosphere, fuelled a desire to break the mold I’d created for myself.

It was time to be more outgoing.

…

What kicked off the new attitude was a meeting of department heads.  I found that the company had brought together a group of people, hovering in the middle management group, of which I was only one of about a dozen of similar age, experience, and qualifications.

It was an interesting meeting because it was addressed by the current CEO, a man who was rarely seen out of head office, on the other side of the country.  We were, he said, the up-and-coming future of the company, and our time in this particular branch would determine our trajectory.

So much easier then to crash and burn.

I was last to leave the room, with much to ponder.

“You’re new, aren’t you?”  One of the female attendees had been talking to several others, then turned her attention to me.

“Two weeks on Thursday, but yes.”

I’d see her at various times during the last week, in different parts of the building, leaving me to think she had some sort of managerial role.  It was no surprise to learn she was in sales.

“Jennifer Eccles.”

‘Daniel Wells.”

We shook hands, which was a surprise.

“New to the city then?” She asked.

“I am.  I’m still working on what I want to see, but there’s plenty of time for that.  I have a mountain of reading to get through.”

“You know the saying, all work, and no play…”

She had a look about her that suggested she might be the life of the party, certainly if the meeting was anything to go by, the center of attention.

“I’ll bear that in mind.”

…

I had made our acquaintances in the first week, Oliver Birtwhistle, another introvert like myself, a candidate settling into research and development, right down to the white coat and pencil pack in the pocket.

He had also been at the meeting, and had Bern at the company for three months and had been giving me the drill, who to avoid, who had nuisance value, and how to get ahead if I was that way inclined.

The thing is, he had said, you were sent to this place to prove your boss’s faith in your potential.  Each manager of each branch hot to pick the brightest candidate.  I had been my manager’s choice, odd because there were others who would have appreciated the opportunity more than me.

He had to go past my office to get to the laboratory and dropped in, flooding into the lounge chair along the sidewall, a remnant of the last office owner who used to sleep on it overnight while going through a messy divorce.

“I see you were ambushed by the incorrigible Jennifer Eccles.”

“You say it as if it’s a bad thing.’

“That’s because it is.  You would be well advised to steer clear of her.  The last three people like you she selected as work partners all left broken from the experience.  She sucks novices dry of all their knowledge, claims it as her own, and moves up another rung.”

“She seems quite nice “

“So does a rattlesnake until it bites you.”

“Well, forewarned is forearmed.  She doesn’t have anything to fear from me, I’m not the ambitious sort.”

“That’s not how it works here.  You need to be competitive just to stay here.  There are no free lunches.  Next meeting you’ll be required to make a pitch, and if the boss doesn’t like it, you go back home.”

“You’re still here?”

“That’s more because I have an incompetent manager.  It’s easy to create cost/benefit savings when his methods ate all last century.  All I’m saying is watch your back.”

…

I never gave Oliver’s advice another thought, as the days passed, and Jennifer was just a shadow on the horizon.

Until she dropped into my office, on her way to somewhere else.  Another person, also wary of her, had said she burned shoe soles faster than a spendthrift spent money.

“How are you settling in?”

She sat exactly where Oliver had been a month before.

“Feels like home.”

“See anything of the place?”

“I bought a car, moved into company-assisted accommodation, just haven’t had the time to get out and about.”

“OK.  Tell you what, I’m free this weekend, come by my place and I’ll show you around.  And, Friday night, drinks in the bar off the cafeteria.  You should come, meet the competition.”

“Do I want to?”

“Of course, you do.  You want to at least meet the people who are most likely going to stab you in the back.”

“Is that what you do?”

“Me, no.  I’m a woman.  We use poison.  Much more efficient “

…

So, curiosity got the better of me, and on the way out, I had a last-minute change of heart, thinking about what the harm could be.

When I arrived most of the staff cafeteria was already there, and underway, and by the look of it, for some time.

As I’d surmised, Jennifer was the Queen bee surrounded by her drones.  Crossing the room, I tried to pick of the ones she had picked up and spat out.  Probably all of them, hence her interest in me.

She stopped mid-sentence when she saw me, and then abandoned the group, to come over and give me a kiss on the cheek, and a hug.  It did not go unnoticed.

Then we went back to the group with several new faces, and she introduced me.  I was ‘the new guy in marketing’ who was ‘working on a huge new concept’.  Of course, I had no idea what she was talking about, but let it ride.  It was a close approximation of the truth.

This informal get-together was much like a brainstorming session, but to me, with one purpose in mind.  Run, clearly, by Jennifer, for the purpose of mining their ideas.

I was encouraged to talk about my huge ideas, but in reality, they were just pie in the sky clouds, there was nothing to talk about.  And that seemed to annoy her.  It wasn’t for the want of gentle prodding, down to outright asking me, but I generally ignored her, and it was noticed.

Then she manicured us to be alone at the bar.  Was this going to be the big push?

“Haven’t forgotten about tomorrow, have you?” She said, sliding a Millers across to me.

She was a beer drinker, a tick in a box if I was ticking boxes.

“No.  Looking forward to not talking shop.”

“Oh, you never stop living a breathing work at this level.  It can be all-consuming for some.  Just as a matter on interest, had any of the orders spoken about me?”

There was that fraction of a second hesitation that could be construed in a dozen different ways. I tried covering it, but she knew, so I tried walking carefully through the mindfully.”

“I suspect that most of the guys I’ve spoken to consider you just a little out of their league. I should be so lucky to be spoken of so highly.”

I had always dreamed of following my father into diplomacy, but there was little on offer these days.  The old days had long since been replaced by the new generation who considered diplomats anachronisms of a colonial empire.

She smiled.  She was smart enough to see what I was doing.  But I was still treading water.

“So, what do you think of me?”

Direct.

“That’s a question of whether you want me to tell you what you want to hear, or tell you what I think, which is something entirely different.”

“What you really think, of course.”

I could see that she didn’t, but this was rapidly leading up a one-way street to the firing squad.

“Here’s the thing.  I learned a long time ago that opinions count for nothing, and more often they cause more grief than anything else.  You don’t need other people’s opinions of you to validate who you are, and what you want to do with your life, especially not from me.

“I have no opinion.  As for me, I am not ambitious, and truth be told I don’t belong here.  If the powers that be thought I’d play the competition, there wrong.  Actions speak louder than words, and I will do my job to the best of my ability, but I won’t depressive someone else of an opportunity because I think I’m better than them.  I’m not.

“I like you, and I’m happy to be your friend or something else if it ever comes to that, but don’t expect me to play the game, or be something I’m not.”

There, I said it, and it was what I intended, and perhaps if she was to read the subtext, would realize I was subtlety telling he she didn’t need to screw everyone over to better herself, but the truth is, she was, and perhaps she didn’t really know it.

Judging by the look on her face, I was blindfolded up against the wall in front of the firing squad, and then we’d just received the ready, aim, and about to say fire.

“Friend, you say.”

“There’s a lot of wiggle room with a word like that.  It’s all in the individual interpretation.”

“Wow.  For not giving an opinion…”

“I’m sorry it was not what you were expecting.”

It was interesting if not strange in a way to watch her expression change with each new thought pr reaction.  I wondered for a moment if any of the other men spoke to her in such a manner

Perhaps not, because they would not want to sully their chance of getting a date with what was a woman that had both brains and beauty.  As for me, I hadn’t been thinking of her in that way, but only in terms of how we could work together.

Perhaps that would be regarded as strange also.

Then she smiled, or perhaps it was a smirk, I was not quite sure, but it seemed she had come to a conclusion.

“You do realize no one has ever spoken to me in that manner, especially the men here.  I can see now that asking me on a date, or the preliminaries before that are not on your immediate agenda, and, in fact, I suspect you did that to some of the other women here, you’d get a very cold shoulder.  I’ll admit now, that you intrigue me, and I want to know more about you.  You still want to go touring tomorrow?”

“Of course.”

“Then you can take me home, so you know where to pick me up.  But, for now, we’d better get back to the others before we become the subject of tomorrow’s water cooler gossip.

My take: Perhaps I could refine what is and isn’t opinion before I actually did upset someone.

© Charles Heath 2022

NaNoWriMo – April 2022 – Day 22

First Dig Two Graves, the second Zoe thriller.

…

Rupert follows Worthington and Arabella to and from the concert, and then observes them over dinner, wondering what it is that’s missing in his life until they go back to the room for the night.

To him, it seems like it’s just a sex weekend with cultural embellishments.

Until he spies Worthington on the move at two am, leaving the hotel on foot.  It turns into a meeting between him and two other men in the park before Worthington returns to the hotel, business concluded.

It has to be something to do with John and Zoe, otherwise, the meeting would have been in the hotel, not the deep recesses of the park.  Rupert has photographs and gives them to Sebastian for identification.

At least they now know the reason for Worthington being in Vienna.  Arabella just makes it look more casual.

John breaks his plan to Zoe over breakfast, and she is surprised.  It’s a good plan, and once she had dealt t=with the problems, it would be a go.

And, she added quite sombrely, if they all survive.

The bad news was she would be leaving the next morning to visit an old friend, Dominica, who probably isn’t so friendly now, to get information.  And, no, she was not sure what would happen after than, but if she could, she would call him.

With the two me identified, and the danger they presented, Sebastian had to move to plan B and sets it up.  He deliberately doesn’t tell either of them because he knows they would strenuously object.

The plan:  sniper to shoot them from a building across the road, not to kill, but to slow them down.  It would be difficult to be out plotting when in the emergency ward of a hospital.

But, as usual, things don’t quite go to plan.  Worthington is hit and wounded, though not severely as Sebastian had hoped, but Arabella moved slightly just before he pulled the trigger, and he couldn’t see what happened but what he could see, it looked very, very bad.

…

Today’s writing, with Sebastian dusting off his sniper rifle, 1,882 words, for a total of 56,217.

A photograph from the inspirational bin – 32

This is a spot behind a group of restaurants at Victoria Point, Queensland.

But it could be anywhere, like a spot we saw on a boat trip on a river in the Daintree, in far north Queensland

So, this could be a spot, not far inland from the ocean where smugglers, or drug runners come ashore, in a place so remote they would never get caught.

Unless an enterprising federal agent comes up with a plan to track them from the ocean side using satellite images, or reported sightings of suspicious activity.

My money is on a random sighting, a vague report files in a small town police station, and a body washed up in shore, apparently the victim of a crocodile attack. Or not a crocodile.

It cold be a fishing trip gone wrong in a backwater stream, a weekend away by a dialled group of friends, who are not really friends, which all comes to a head when one of the friends go missing.

Or, I’d you like the idea of historical drama, a story about the first expedition from the bottom of Australia to the very top, for the first time, with all the hazards of rivers to cross, paths to create though the bush, the heat, the animals, the local inhabitants who have yet to see Europeans.

To be honest, I would not want to be one of those early explorers, especially those who went inland and struck desert, or died just short of their goal.

Just as an aside, we did learn about these people, Hume and Hovell, Blaxland, Wentworth and Lawson, Burke and Wills, and others.

The A to Z Challenge – Q is for “Quirky relatives”

One of the recurring memories I have of my childhood was the annual pilgrimage to Grand Marais, Minnesota, located on the North Shore of Lake Superior.

It was the place where my father grew up, along with three brothers and a sister, and where his parents had been born, lived, and eventually died.

The other memory, that his parents never came to visit us, we always had to go to them.  That, and the fact my mother hated them, that animosity borne out of an event at their wedding that no one ever spoke about.

Not until a long, long time later, after my father had passed away.

We stopped going when I turned eighteen, though I don’t think that was the reason.  Mt grandparents hadn’t died or gone anywhere, it was just the week before our pilgrimage was to begin, my father announced there would be no more visits.

You could see the relief on our mother’s face, much less ours because they were, to put it mildly, quirky.  Steven, the youngest brother put it more succinctly, weird and creepy.

Perhaps it had been the house, a large sprawling two-story mansion that had been added to over the years, and reputed to have thirteen bedrooms.  Thirteen.

They had a butler, a housekeeper, a chauffeur, and several housemaids.  Odd, because I got the impression my grandfather didn’t work, and yet they were, reputedly, very wealthy.  Equally odd, then, that wealth didn’t extend to my father.

Which, in the final analysis, was probably the reason why we stopped going.  He had been cut out of the will.

…

Of course, none of this would have reached my consciousness if I had not received an email from one of the sones of my fathers, brother, and uncle who had never visited us, I’d seen probably three times in my life, and who had lived with his parents in the mansion.

I’d not seen, or heard of any children of any of the other brothers, or sisters, so this was a first, and aroused my curiosity.  I had thought that our part of the family had been exorcised from all their collective memories.

Apparently not.

And, that curiosity would soon go into overdrive because with the email came an invitation to come and stay, and meet the other members of the family. 

I had a sister, Molly, and called her once I got the email, and she said she had one too.

Was she going?  Hell yes.  It, for her, was going to be the unearthing of all the secrets.

What secrets, I asked, knowing full well there had been a few, but she had simply said I’d have to wait and see.

…

The drive brought back a lot of memories, and unconsciously I found myself listening to the same songs we did when Dad droves us.

Molly had come to my place, and we drove there together.  In itself, it was a good reason for us to reunite after so long being apart.  It was even more profound considering we did not live all that far apart, it was just life and family that got in the way.

She, like myself, found herself reliving the annual pilgrimages, her memories being hazier than mine, but that was because she was a lot younger.

She had been the one to leave home first, finding our restrictive parents unbearable.  My departure took longer because my mother had implored me to stay, and not leave her with ‘that unbearable man’.

That final few miles from the outskirts of town, past the waterline, then inland was hushed with anticipation.  I last remembered the house, although forbidding, as impeccably maintained, with gardens, I was sure, that featured in ‘Architectural Digest’.

This vision as we approached was so different than the last, in the last vestiges of the evening, a dark forbidding place still, only a lot more sinister.  The gardens had been abandoned long ago, and everything was overgrown.

The fountain out front, the centerpiece of the gardens, was buried and gone.

The house had also fallen into disrepair, and I was surprised the local authorities hadn’t condemned it.

I parked the car in the driveway, and we sat there, staring at it.

“That motel back down the road is looking good,” Molly said.

The invitation also included staying in one of the thirteen rooms.

“Depends on how many ghosts there are.”

“The motel or here?”

I shrugged.  “I guess we’d better get to the front door before it’s dark, just in case.”

Closer to the stairs leading up to a veranda, I could see the different shades of timber when rotten planks had been replaced.  We made it to the front door, Molly hanging on to me just in case.

I pulled a ring dangling from a chain and heard a gong go off inside the house.  A minute passed, two, then the door creaked open, and an old man in a dinner suit was standing there.  “Mr. Garry, and Miss Molly, I presume.

He stood to one side before we answered, and we went in.

The inside was utterly different from the outside, having been renovated recently, much brighter than I remembered from the endless wood paneling.  The old man ushered us into a large lounge room, on one side a huge log fire was burning, and around the walls, where there wasn’t a bookshelf full of books were family paintings.

“It’s like a mausoleum,” Molly said.

I recognized a lot of those faces in the paintings, including one of our father and mother together, probably not long after they were married.  The men of that family all looked the same, except when it came to me, I looked more like my mother.

“Much better than it used to be.”

“I don’t remember much.”

To one side there was a large staircase that you could go up one side and down the other, and as children, we used to run up and down, and generally be annoying.  Sliding down the banister was strictly forbidden, until after everyone went to bed.

I was half expecting to see the old man come from the depths of the house, but instead, a man that I could easily mistake as my father came through from the rear, where, I remembered, there was a room before the kitchens.

“Garry, I presume.  And Molly.  My God, it’s been too long.”

A shake of the hand for me, and a hug for Molly. 

“David, or Jerry?”

“David.  You remember.  We used to run amok in this place.”  He grinned.

He was the wild one, and all I did was follow.  There were about seven of us, in the end, before we stopped coming.

“The others will be here tomorrow, and they’re dying to meet you.  My dad was the last man standing, and he left the place to me, not that it was much by that time.  I’ve spent years doing it up, but there’s a long way to go before it returns to its former glory.  By the way, there are no ghosts in the bedrooms, and they are modernized with their own bathroom.  I saw you out in the car before, looking horrified.  Just a word to the wise, that motel does have ghosts.  The jury is out on whether grandfather still roams the hallways, but I guess that’s something you’ll find out tonight.  He was a horrid man by all accounts.  Sorry, my wife says I babble when I’m nervous.”

“He does.”  A woman, a few years older than Molly came out from the back.”

“Angelina?”

“You remember me.”  She smiled.

I remembered her, had for a long time because back then, she was the first girl I thought I was madly in love with.  The fact she was a cousin didn’t seem to matter.  She just ignored me anyway.

And her beauty had not diminished over the years.  “How could anyone forget you?”

“Yes, I had that effect on boys, didn’t I?  It’s good to see you again.”

We both scored a hug, and yes, being close to her again did increase my heart rate just a little.

“Come,” David said, “sit and we’ll have a drink.  Have you eaten?”

“Not for a while.”

“Then we were about to have a bite, I’m sure there’s plenty for everyone.  Sit, and we’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“No wife, husband?”

“Yes on both accounts, but we would never bring them here.  This family is difficult enough for us let alone outsiders.  The rest of the group, well, you’ll see, are just plain quirky relatives.  If you ever saw the Addams Family, TV series or movies, well, they’d fit right in here.  But you’ll see.  More on that soon.”

He and Angelina disappeared outback and silence fell over the room.

“Why do I get the feeling we might be murdered in our beds tonight?”

It was beginning to look like that was a possibility.

…

When David returned with the old man, Angelina, and what looked to be a maid with food and drinks, we sat down again, turning our fears of being murdered into a severe frightening of ghosts.

The old man was enough to think ghosts were alive in the house.  It couldn’t possibly be the butler from the last time I saw him because he would have to be about 120 years old.

When all of us were settled, David began.

“There is another reason why I asked both of you here, along with all the others, by the way, there are around ten of us.  Your father never told you the truth, or perhaps anything, of the situation when he stopped coming to visit his parents, did he?”

“He just said it was a difference of opinion, that his father would never see reason, didn’t like my mother or her family and gave up trying to be civil.”

“It was worse than that, he told him that if he didn’t give up your mother, he would cut him off from the family fortune, which eventually he did.  It’s probably why you found life a little tougher for a few years.”

That was one way of putting it, we were taken out of our private schools and had just about all our leisure activities curtailed, and the worst, no more holidays.  Mother even had to get a job, which disappointed her family, but they were not as rich as my father’s family was, so couldn’t help us financially.

“It was difficult.”

“Well, the good news is, your grandmother, our grandmother, was not as quirky or pedantic as her husband and never forgot the service your father did for her when he could.  In that regard, she has left a bequest to both you and your sister, Molly.  It’s been a long, hard battle to get it through the system, but it’s finally sorted.”

“I liked grandmother more than grandfather,” Molly said.

“Most of us did.  He was a rebel himself, going against his family, a very interesting bunch themselves.  Our quirkiness probably came from them, the last of the relatively unknown banking and railroad tycoons more famous in the 19th century than today where we are relatively forgotten.  It is of course a blessing in disguise.  But you ask, what is that quirkiness worth?”

“Not much I would imagine, after all this time.  Our father taught us the value of money, so it’ll be nice to have some extra.”

“Some extra.”  He smiled.  “It’s about 125 million dollars, each.  Enough I would say that you can now afford some quirks of your own.”

© Charles Heath 2022

NaNoWriMo – April 2022 – Day 20

First Dig Two Graves, the second Zoe thriller.

…

There’s a certain air of inevitability in the air, that the bad guys are going to succeed in tracking down Zoe, using the very person who wants to keep her safe.

IT’s not exactly the result of a sneaky plan using lies and deception to get what Worthington wants, it’s more a fact that the woman he is about to use had already made a bed for herself that others would hardly want to lie in.

Arabella was not a woman who understood or practiced monogamy.  She was always a rebel, always had more than one man on the go, and had only married for the convenience, and the money and lifestyle that went with it.

Having children had been a bore, and once they were delivered, they were someone else’s problem.  She was then able to go back to her jet-set lifestyle, touring and cruising the world.

It was also a world that which Worthington and his brother had moved in, and Worthington had been and still was, one of her lovers.  It was what made it so easy for him to enlist her, though she was not really interested in what her son John was up to.  He was too much like his father, and she needed little reminder of him.

For Worthington, he could not believe his luck, for a second time.  It was as if the Gods were lining up the ducks all in a row for him.

But she agreed to a weekend in the best hotel eating the best food and going to a very exclusive concert, where they would be mingling with ‘almost’ royalty.  She loved to drop names.

However, the secret was not a secret the moment she was seen with Worthington by Sebastian, all be it by chance.  Sebastian would have to find John and alert him to the dangers that were about to present themselves in the benign form of his mother.

Could things get any more complicated?

…

Today’s writing, with Zoe languishing in a dungeon waiting for a white knight, 1,650 words, for a total of 52,769.

The cinema of my dreams – I never wanted to go to Africa – Episode 42

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 was not sure how the Congo commander was going to react when four cars with people who looked more like mercenaries than a film crew turned up at the front gate.

Not that we had the film equipment to use as a cover. I guess that was the reason the kidnappers had removed it from our cars. One less reason to believe our story. I would have been curious to hear just how the commander had described us to his Congo counterpart.

Or what sort of treatment we were going to get. I don’t think the hostages were going to like the idea of becoming hostages again, albeit with a new set of ransom demands, and probably a lot of harsher treatment. Mercenaries could be rough, but they needed resources, and trying to negotiate with overly damaged goods wouldn’t set much of an example.

The Government military, on the other hand, would not be too particular. And capturing an invading enemy force, spies if you will, well, that was going to be a feather in the cap of the airfield commander.

But would he tip his hand at the gate or wait till we pulled up outside the headquarters building. If there was one.

We were about to find out. The gate was in sight and flanked by two very bright lights which we had all seen for about the last half mile, flickering through the undergrowth. The road was well made, and we would have made good time, but I deliberately slowed down to give Monroe time to get into place.

Another brief report from the Colonel told me they reckoned on 20 troops deployed at different parts of the field, just in case we decided to ‘sneak’ in on foot.

At the gate the road widened into a large turning circle for turning back cars.

I stopped right on top of the gate. A non-commissioned officer came out of a small shack by the gate and joined two men standing either side of the gate. Weapons weren’t pointed in our direction, but that could change quickly.

I was going with the film crew going home story first.

“Who are you?” I noticed the officer had a clipboard and made a show of looking at it, and the page underneath. “You are not on my list.”

“Probably not. We have been filming a documentary, and it’s time to go home. We have an aircraft coming in tomorrow morning to pick us up.”

One of the guards came through the gate and went down one side of each car, then came back up the other side, peering in through the windows. Back at the gate, he spoke to the officer.

“You have weapons. That is unusual for a film crew isn’t it?”

Highly, if we were anywhere else in the world. “We were warned about militias. Luckily we didn’t run into any.”

“Then, before you enter the airfield I suggest you, and your men, surrender any weapons.”

“Of course.” I relayed the instruction back through the cars. The soldier then came down the car and collected the weapons in a bag. As I’d assumed, we were not going to gain admission to the airstrip armed. It was probably also a law which in any country made perfect sense.

Once the soldier returned the officer had the gate opened, and came over to me.

“Fill in the form, and we’ll get you on your way soon enough.”

He handed me the clipboard, and then stepped away, taking out a radio unit of his own and spoke into it in a language I didn’t understand. Perhaps we should have kept Jacobi with us for a little longer so he could interpret.

When I filled out the form and handed it back, he said, “Drive up the road about a half-mile to a hanger and park your cars out the front. I suggest when getting out of the cars not to make any sudden or suspicious moves.”

Like we’d been told almost word for word back at the commander’s camp. Interesting.

The men at the gate didn’t follow us, but I did see, coming from two separate points back from the runway, or what looked to be the runway, two groups of five soldiers in each, in a proper formation. That was not the actions of a motley militia.

Serious soldiers perhaps.

It didn’t take long to reach the hanger, quite large, but in a sorry state of repair. Beside it was two old army huts that were in better repair and lit up. At the top of the steps of one stood the commander, a Captain. Clean, fresh, snug-fitting uniform, looking the part. Newly promoted, with something to prove.

With him were another six soldiers, armed and ready. That made 16 plus him. Where were the others?

Another non-commissioned officer came out of the hut and briefly spoke to his commander. Then he went back inside, and the commander came down the stairs to greet me. The rest of the team stood together, in front of the third car, and about 20 feet away. They were trying their best to cover the two hostages.

“Good evening Mr. James.” Reasonably good English, polite, but there was a slight edge to his tone.

“Good evening.”

“May I ask, which way do you come?”

“From Faradje, on the way to Nagero. I was going to drive into Nagero but changed my mind. Best to get here and be ready.”

“I heard there were some elements of the militia on the road. Did you meet any?”

“No. I was told that this country is quite safe and that we would not be harmed, thanks, I’m told to the good services of the Government’s military. You will be pleased to learn that it is quite safe, a point I will be spreading when I return home. Hopefully that will bring in more tourists.”

“If, as you say, you’ve been making a documentary, it seems odd to me that on one hand, you don’t have any equipment, and on the other, that you have not included Garamba.”

“A valid observation. We had to call the shooting off because two of our crew are ill and need to be returned home, and we left the equipment back in Faradje, our last stop, ready for the replacement crew who will be scheduled to fly in, in the next week or so.”

I had considered what I might say and tried to make it sound plausible, but in the end I don’t think it mattered what I said, especially if the other commander had forewarned the Captain of our impending arrival.

“Yes. That may be true, or it might not. I’m assuming the two sick members of your team are over next to the film crew. In that case, I believe both of us know that those men do not belong to your crew, but are escaped prisoners.”

He gestured towards his men and they went over to the group and extracted the two hostages.

Seemingly it was game over.

“So Commander Ntumba called you after we left?”

“Not a lot happens here without my knowing it. It was in his best interest to inform me.”

Something in the distance caught his eye, and I moved my line of sight to match his. Shurl, hands in the air, with two more soldiers behind him, coming from the bush line on the other side of the runway.

Commander Ntumba would also have told him about our sniper, as I’d surmised, and there was no mistaking the look of glee on his face. Outsmarting what he would consider a crack team of mercenaries from the United States.

I turned back and shrugged.

“Yes, he also told us about your sniper Mr. James. You didn’t think he was going to sneak up on us like he did Commander Ntumba did you?”

“It was worth a try,” I said in my best-defeated tone.

“Right. For the time being you will be kept in detention until I speak to my commander. You will not be leaving this airport. Your rescue plane, when it arrives, will be detained. I will have further questions for you later. Film crew indeed. Take them to B Block,” he said to the officer, then headed back up the stairs to his office.

As far as he was concerned, it had been all too easy.

© Charles Heath 2020