Tag: suspense

The fourth attempt, other factors, and people

There are two other characters that will be used in this rewrite, the second an addition to give the main character a means of letting the reader get to know a bit about him.

His name is Milt, an African American that’s always been on the fringe.  Another who is a victim of his circumstances but not letting it get the better of him, the sort of man who makes the best of a bad situation.

He’s seen active service in the army, honourably discharged, but still affected though not as bad as some of those he served with.  He is in fact the ideal man for the job, with combat experience, so he’s not likely to get flustered in a shit storm.

And probably not the man you want on this site.  Being in desperate circumstances doesn’t mean you do desperate things.

He is one of a team of four and our main character drew the straw to partner him.  There are two others, based on the other side of the park, neither of whom are trustworthy, Smithy, the overall leader, to whom they all report at shift start and end, and Carruthers, an Englishman reputed to be ex SAS, but no one is inclined to believe him. 

The scars on his neck tell a story, but it was left to the other’s imagination, as he doesn’t talk about it.  Milt was of the opinion he was captured in Afghanistan and tortured, but that could be just be canteen scuttlebutt.

Whatever the circumstances, Graham kept away from him as much as possible, and was glad when he didn’t have to partner him for the shift.

The other character. Penelope has featured in the earlier versions of the story.  Over the changes her background has changed, but I’ve settled on a medical surgeon career, renown for doing tricky procedures with a high success rate, and in doing so gained a reputation, some not always good.

Wealth and ego don’t always make a good pair, and marrying wealth brings its own rewards and pitfalls, particularly when you discover the man you married isn’t exactly whom you thought he was.

It is of course a typical scenario, but I’m going to try and weave it differently.  There will be no more teasers until the story starts.

But she will be introduced earlier than in the previous iterations because she needs some backstory too, otherwise just arriving at Graham’s work and getting shot, while provoking a volatile situation that drags the reader in, out of left field is not exactly the best start.

So, let’s begin.

© Charles Heath 2022

The cinema of my dreams – It’s a treasure hunt – Episode 68

Here’s the thing…

Every time I close my eyes, I see something different.

I’d like to think the cinema of my dreams is playing a double feature but it’s a bit like a comedy cartoon night on Fox.

But these dreams are nothing to laugh about.

Once again there’s a new installment of an old feature, and we’re back on the treasure hunt.

…

Back at the newspaper archives

…

Boggs didn’t come home.

His mother and I waited until way after dark, and when I raised the possibility that something might have happened to him, she didn’t agree, nor did she look all that concerned.

The fact he had experience in cave exploration, and used to camping out with his father and later uncle Rico and had suffested he might not be back for a few days and was not a cause for concern.

It didn’t register that he might get into trouble considering the instability of some of the caves, nor the fact they have warning signs and or been boarded up to stop explorers.

It bothered me.

He was starting to emulate his father, with this obsession.  If the story in the paper was anything to go by, at worst he could finish up just like his father, buried under a pile of rubble.  That was one of the more speculative reults to his treasure hunt, besides leaving his family penniless and heartbroken.

Did I believe that was where his father was?  I didn’t think he disappeared of his own volition but as to the who, well, there were only two principal suspects, and no evidence of the complicity.

Boggs’s father might never be found.

But, in the end, I didn’t know what to think, because the waters were so muddied by people who were driven by self-interest.

There was so much more to this story, mostly driven by self-interest, revenge perhaps, and, worse, greed.  It was perhaps a symptom of everything that had gone wrong in not only this town but what was happening on a much larger scale to the whole country.  But, that was someone else’s problem.  My concern was here, now, and saving Biggs from following the same destructive path his father had

And, to do that, I needed to know more.  That meant, first thing the next morning, a trip to the newspaper office.

When I returned to the newspaper office Lenny was in his usual seat with a paper in hand, reading.  Keeping up with the competition, he said, though the difference in circulation was counted in millions.

There was a woman behind the other desk.

“Staff journalist,” he said when he saw me looking at her.  “And family.  My wife, Jennifer.”

I’d not seen her before, and she didn’t come from here, or I would have recognized her.

She smiled, and there was something in that expression that struck me as familiar.

“Are you related to the Ormistons?”

It was a vague resemblance, after seeing so many pictures of the Ormistons, that everyone looked like them.

“It’s a name I don’t use anymore,” she said, “for obvious reasons.  My grandfather stirred a lot of resentment.”

“And,” Lenny added, “it’s between us and these four walls, Sam.”

I nodded.  I could understand the sentiment.  And it explained Lenny’s depth of knowledge.

“Just to be clear, your grandfather didn’t find the treasure?”

She sighed.

Lenny said, sharply, “Sam!”

I shrugged.  “Sorry.  I had to ask.”

“No, he did not, and believe me, that’s a sore point with everyone whose lives he destroyed.”

“I can imagine.  Does anyone know what happened to him, the real story?”

“There is no real story Sam.  I tried to discover the truth and failed.  For Jennifer’s peace of mind.  We may never know what happened to him.”

“But surely you don’t believe he died in a cave somewhere?”

“It’s the most plausible.”

“And what about Boggs’s father?”

“He was a fool,” Jennifer said.  “From what I remember of him, he was always insistent that the treasure was in a cavern up in the hills, accessible only by an underground river that flowed down to the sea.  He originally thought it was the one the mall was built over, except every cave had a dead end.”

“Before or after the mall was built?”

“My father explored the cave system, with my grandfather, extensively, before the mall was built.  There was no underground river.”

“How did the mall get destroyed in a flood then?”

“That was the Benderby’s cost-cutting the foundations.  The flooding was man-made, not an act of nature like they said it was.  That was just so they could claim the insurance.  No one could really tell the difference, and the specialist the got to sign off on it lied.  The same guy that turned up dead on Rico’s boat, by the way.”

“The Benderby’s cleaning up another mess, but their way.”  Jennifer sounded, and probably had every right to be, resentful.

“Then there still could be an underground river somewhere along the coast?”

“If there is, I haven’t found it, and neither has Alex and that fancy boat of his.  It’s another dead end, and like as not, another nail in the coffin of what was a fairy tale, to begin with.  There was no treasure, just a fable invented by the Cossatinos.”

“Even so, it’s part of the folklore of this county and will have a place in the history I’m writing.  I noticed over the years the treasure had a prominent place in the paper.”

“My father, and his before him thought it would be good for the town. You know, bring in tourists.  It was my father’s idea to print treasure maps, and then the Cossatino’s embellished it but producing what they called ‘the real map’ each a slight variation on the other, commanding a special fee, and swearing the purchases to a promise of silence, and adding to the authenticity, demanding a 19 percent share of whatever they found.  People lapped it up and my father said they’d made a fortune out of it.  Boggs’s father hand-made the copies and used that money to fund his own explorations.  Everyone made money out of it, one way or another except Ormiston.”

A bitter irony if there was ever one.  There was more money in the illusion of treasure than the actual treasure itself.

“And the so-called real map that Boggs reputedly found in the pirate’s hideaway?”

“No one ever saw it, except that one time it was authenticated age-wise, so no one ever got to see it.  Boggs made sure of that, and never let it out of his sight.  Now we’ll never know.  I’m sure Boggs junior doesn’t have it, but with him, he’s as daft as his father was.”

“He had a lot of his father’s stuff he found in a box in the attic recently.  I’ve seen some of it, but not an authentic map, so maybe your right.”

“Of course I am.  When you have an idea of what this history of yours is going to look like, let me know. And I’ll publish in parts if you want, maybe pass it on to the dailies.  It might be worth something.”

“Thanks.  I will.  But more study first, you have the history of the place in that back room, maybe you should write something yourself. Being the journalist.”

“Too busy with births deaths and marriages, Sam, and the antics of the Benderby’s and Cossatino’s.  Do you know that Benderby is demolishing the mall and putting a marina in its place?  Talk of building a hotel, boosting tourism.  Talking of running for mayor, you know, the first stop on the way to the presidency?”

“A crook for a mayor?”

“Wouldn’t be the first, won’t be the last.  But one thing is for sure, that kind of news sells papers.”

It did, but I had a feeling the Benderbys were all about creating a distraction, and something else was going on at that mall site.

A construction crew had arrived, and more secure fencing was being erected, and the two points where I’d entered the sire with Boggs on one hand and Nadia later, they were gone.  There was also an increase in the security guards, covering more of the fence line in shorter intervals, and worse, arc lighting lit the whole outside area like a sports stadium.

Not even an ant could sneak in without being seen.

…

© Charles Heath 2020-2022

Ideas come from everywhere

I have an electronic notebook on my smartphone and writing pads at the ready at home in my office/writing room/library.

As soon as one hits, I get it down, either on paper or on the phone app. I use SomNote as it’s easy to export the text to an email or have a version of the app running on my computer and just copy and paste. SomNote is great because I can use it anywhere.

Of course, it doesn’t work so well in the shower, so I’m still waiting for a waterproof phone. Or perhaps it can wait for a few minutes until I’m finished.

But the trouble with that is, these ideas come so quickly and are sometimes so vivid that they need to be put down as quickly as possible. I have come up with the perfect dialogue for a tricky scene and played it all out in my head, and by the time I got to the paper, it was almost gone.

Perhaps a whiteboard and a permanent marker on the wall.

Or is that going too far?

A long time ago, I received a portable tape recorder for a present, you know, the one you can hold in your hand, and the tapes so small you wonder how much will fit on it. The gifter said that when ideas came to me, all I had to do was speak. It was also voice-activated.

Needless to say that conjured up a few ideas right there.

But I used it, but I found it quite weird to be talking, ostensibly to myself, in the car whilst driving home, or going to, work, and the curious looks I’d get from others. One thing it did teach me was that when a conversation was replayed, it would sound ok or like most of the time, hardly what one expected a conversation would really be like.

So, because of that device, I learned to read out all conversations, and if they sounded stupid, they were.

So, ideas come in the shower, ideas come while driving, ideas come when reading the newspaper, and ideas even come when reading books.

This leads me to another point that I learned early on. Writers must read. Not only novels of their chosen genre, but any reference books that go with it. The research was, a friend and more successful author than I told me, was mandatory.

So too was the reading to the classics, old English, and sometimes American, literature, to gain an appreciation for the written word. We might not follow those styles, but we can learn the majesty of the English language.

That author taught me a lot, though at the time I didn’t realize it. Perhaps I thought I was already smart enough to write, but I’m guessing that it took a long time before I felt my writing was worth reading before publishing it.

I don’t profess to have a full understanding of the language. I might have loved that school subject called English, and later in university, creative writing, and literature, but not all of it soaked in. But writing is one of those odd things, that it can take many forms and styles, but at the end of the day, if the reader understands where the story is going, and when at the end, is satisfied that it was ‘a good read’, then the author’s work is done.

The only trouble is, getting the next idea, and then they were able to write a second book, or third. It is said everyone has one book in them. For those who can write more, well, that might be what might be called, a gift.

My trouble is that I have too many ideas, too many starts, and brief outlines to work with, I don’t know which story to start on next. I guess being spoilt for choice is a good thing, yes?

The A to Z Challenge – D is for – “Did you hear that?”

It started with a phone call, a phone call that I never expected to get.

I was one of those people who went through life, almost invisible.  It was not what I wanted, it just happened.

I was not the sociable sort, at school I tended to spend my time studying and then being labeled a nerd, I didn’t make friends, except for those who wanted help with their homework.

Few friends in elementary school, fewer in middle school, and none in college, that is no one that you could call a true friend.  They were more acquaintances that were there for the help I could give them, but no one that would invite me to parties, or to just hang out.

That continues on into university. Except there were several new acquainted that were a little more than that, though not quite BFFs.

There was one, in particular, Anna, who was one of the study group, the one who needed the most help, someone who had been wavering on returning after the first year.

My trouble was that I liked her more than she liked me, my opinion of course, based on what I called the indifference factor, but perhaps I had more expectations than she did

She was doing uni because it was expected of her, not because she wanted to be there.  She could take it or leave it, and the last time I spoke to her, she was going to leave.

And when she left to go back home, it was the last time I expected to see or hear from her.

Until that phone call.

“What are you doing this weekend?”

A dumb question, nothing of course, but I wouldn’t tell her that.  I was still in shock that Anna would call me, for anything other than school, if at all.

“Not a lot.”

“Good.  How would you like to housesit with me?”

House sit?  Surely she had a dozen others who would do anything for her.  She was that popular and well-liked.  And would probably be far more amusing than I ever could be.

“If you like.  I had no idea you did house minding.”

“I don’t, but an aunt is going away for the weekend, and she wants someone to look after the cat.  I hope you like cats.  And gardens.  It has a nice garden.”

Cats I could take or leave.  Gardens, it was probably a birdbath, two beds of roses, a large tree with a seat under it, and neighbors peering over the fence.

But it was a weekend somewhere else other than my little room, and Anna would be there.  Maybe I could try to get past my shyness and actually talk to her.

“OK.  I’m in.  Do I need to bring anything?”

“No.  I’ll send you the address and see you there at 5 pm. Friday.”

Why did I get the feeling I was being set up?

That feeling of impending doing followed me down the path from the front gate to the front door.

Far from the house being a small thatch cottage, based on the address she gave me, it turned out to be a three-story manor house with a large outhouse that looked to be once a stable and coach house

It seemed far too large to be a house for one person.

When I rang the doorbell, I expected a butler to answer the door, but it was Anna herself.

“Nice place,” I said.

“Too large and too hard to maintain.  Were trying to convince her that she would be better off in something smaller.  But you should see the back.”

Based on the front garden which could happily grace the front cover of any country living magazine, I couldn’t wait.

She let me pass and closed the door behind us.  It sounded like the vault was closing and there would be no damage until the timer released the locks.

Inside, the whole place reeked of heritage and antiques, and the personality of its owner.  The walls had paintings, table tops had old magazines, the seats worn leather, and worn carpet squares covered floorboards that creaked when you walked on them.

At the end of a long corridor was the kitchen at the end if the house, after passing several sitting and dining rooms.  It was a very large house and raised a very important question.

She had not mentioned any family or relatives with anything like the wealth this house exuded.  In fact, she had often implied that she was just an ordinary person.

This was anything but ordinary.

I caught up with her on the back patio, just off a large sunroom, to view what had to be an acre or more of manicured laws, garden beds, and trees.  All it was missing was a maze.

“Do you actually have a secret life?”

“I was always told not to advertise our wealth.”

“Isn’t showing me this, a form of advertising?  After all, I’m apparently from the wrong side of the tracks.”

“I trust you.”

“But you don’t know me, or anything about me.”

“Why do you think you’re here?”

If I wanted to make an educated guess, my first thought was to set me up for something, for the very reason she was aloof, and people like her, and those she kept company with, were not people like me associated with.

I was surprised not to see the two girls I’d once nicknamed ‘the dynamic duo’, Melissa and Winona, with her.  Maybe they would turn up later.

My second thought, the most improbable reason, was that she wanted to get to know me, but, why choose a place like this?  To make me feel small, grateful, impressed? Ten minutes in a Cafe was all she needed to find out what she needed to know about me.

An alarm bell went off when I asked her where I could get a drink of water, and she said, the kitchen, but didn’t really know where it was. I got an instant bad feeling.

That was followed by a bang that I thought came from the rear of the house.

“Did you hear that?” I asked.

“You hear all sorts of noises in places like these.”

If she wasn’t worried, neither was I.

Then the door chime rang.

“You expecting more visitors?”  My internal fear factor was rising exponentially.

“No, but I’d better find out who it is, just in case.”

I shrugged and headed towards where she indicated the kitchen was, the rear of the house, what I would call an educated guess

After I found the kitchen, not technically at the rear, I returned to find my worst fears had come true.  Not only the dynamic duo but also their boyfriends, Chad and Lester, two of the worst bullies from school days.

“Well, look who it is.”  Chad was particularly menacing.

A glance to the side, it was hard to tell if Anna was looking pleased or neutral, but she wasn’t surprised. I glanced in Anna’s direction and all I got was a tilt of her head.

“Shouldn’t you be down the country club trying to prove you’re a new version of your drunken bully of a father?”

His smile turned into a very angry look.  “Don’t go there, Scanlon.”

“Why are you here then?”

I expected to hear Anna had invited them.  Instead, “we’re here to make sure Anna doesn’t make a mistake.”

“I don’t need your help or advice Chad.  In fact, you should leave.”

None of the four looked like they had any intention of leaving.  “Not until we’ve impressed upon both of you, the error of your ways.  We thought you were smarter than this or did Scanlon force himself on you?”

She shook her head, not necessarily in anger, but more in despair.  “I don’t know where you get your ideas from Chad, but you are very much mistaken.  So, I will only say this once more, Chad,” she added quietly, “otherwise you will find yourself in a world of pain.  Leave now while you still can.”

Chad, being Chad, was the master of ceremonies, puffed up as he had been in the schoolyard when he was about the unleash his gang on some poor misguided fool, usually me, or one of three others.  But it was Melissa who spoke instead, “You go teach Scanlon a lesson outside by the pool while we have a talk to Anna.”

Lester took the cue, came over, and grabbed me by the shoulder.  I thought about trying to shrug him off, but Chad was across the room before I could initiate anything.  Best to leave calmly and sort it out outside.

I gave Anna a last look, but she was wearing her poker face.  Had she set this up?  It seemed as though she hadn’t, but then, it didn’t look like she was worried about the dynamic duo.

I shrugged.

Intentional or not, Chad and Lester were about to learn a very valuable lesson, and revenge, at least on them, was going to be sweet.

…

©  Charles Heath 2022

The cinema of my dreams – It’s a treasure hunt – Episode 69

Here’s the thing…

Every time I close my eyes, I see something different.

I’d like to think the cinema of my dreams is playing a double feature but it’s a bit like a comedy cartoon night on Fox.

But these dreams are nothing to laugh about.

Once again there’s a new installment of an old feature, and we’re back on the treasure hunt.

…

With Nadia seeking gold at the beach at The Grove

…

I was waiting to be picked up at the bus depot by Nadia, trying to keep out of the public eye, knowing very few people I knew would be there at that hour.

It was early for me, not long after getting home from the night shift, with just enough time to change and get something to eat at the diner a block from the depot.

Nadia didn’t understand my obsession with anonymity, but being seen with her was just going to raise questions, and, if either my mother or Boggs found out, that would be two very interesting conversations.

I just didn’t need the aggravation.

I was not sure what to wear so I dug out the clothes I wore to a farm that a friend of my mothers owned and my mother had graciously offered my services.  It hadn’t been such a bad day, but it was hard work.

The clothes had the added advantage of making me almost invisible among the many seasonal workers currently in town.

I nearly missed her because I had been looking for her usual car, but when a large pickup truck pulled up at the curb where I was standing, it took a moment to recognize her behind the wheel.  A very unglamorous plain Jane, without make-up and her hair a mess, or so it looked to me.  I knew well enough not to make a comment.

The truck was battered and seen better days, but the engine sounded like that of a racing car.  A Cossatino’s getaway car.  Oddly, I could imagine her behind the wheel waiting for a team of bank robbers, fuelled no doubt by the many old movies I’d seen in my younger days.

I climbed up into the cabin and she had driven off before the car door was closed

“Are we in a hurry?”

“No parking zone.  Don’t need the sheriff’s deputies giving us a hard time.”

No, indeed.

“Where’s your car?”

“Too recognizable.  Where we’re going it’s better not to be recognized.”

That didn’t exactly fill me with confidence.  I knew it was going to be somewhere along the coastline, her idea to see if any more of the gold coins had fallen out of the treasure chests as they were being brought ashore.

The question was, was there any part of the coastline that hadn’t been surveyed?  That was when it occurred to me she might be headed for that stretch of coastline that belonged to The Grove, split by the coast road, either side of the road fenced off and signs telling people they would be shot on sight if caught trespassing.

There had been rumors of shootings but nothing ever made it to the sheriff’s office.  I hoped she told someone where she was going if that’s where she was taking me.

“You’re quiet this morning?”

“Just got off shift, and a little tired.”

“You should have said something.  I didn’t think…”

“It’s fine.  You’re currently the one ray of light on a very dark horizon.”

She looked sideways at me.  “That is a compliment.”

“I hope you take it that way.  With Boggs on some sort of crusade, my mother giving me dating tips, and Benderby hanging around, being with you Breaks the gloom and doom.” 

I turned slightly to get a better look at her.  If it was anyone else, I could fall in love with her, but knowing a Cossatino was a dance with the devil, and dangerous for your health.

“Well, I’m glad I bring some light into someone’s life.  It seems I can’t do anything right at home.”

“Why did you come home.  It seems to me you were happier away from this place.”

“Reasons I now think were stupid.”  There was a finality in her tone that warned not to go any further with it.

Instead, we were passing the old mall and I saw the transformation.  Fort Knox would be easier to get into.

“Do you know what’s going on at the old mall?”

“The Benderby’s are demolishing it, mainly because they have to, and do a lot of remediation, whatever that is, before they build the new marina and condos. They’re going to tap into the retirement market.”

That premise, according to a financial market magazine left on my desk, and which made interesting reading, was the next gold mine for those who had the foresight, and the financial means.

Benderby had both, and in another article, which to me at the time seemed to be profiling Benderby, opining the fact some of the new rich had not all made their fortunes legitimately, harking back to the war days and profiteering.  Had Benderby’s father and his before him, plowed this path to success, and the son and grandson found other Illegitimate means like drugs and worse to perpetuate it?

Was it possible, in this day and age to make a fortune without crossing the line somewhere?  No one could link Benderby to anything crooked, but rumors, there were plenty, including the mall, and the fact it was a huge insurance write-off.

Lenny seemed to think so, but cleverly, never quite put what he thought into words.

“Lucky them,” I muttered.

Several miles past the mall, she turned off the main road onto a track that had not been used for some time, heading towards the ocean

I could see now why we were in the truck.  A car would not be able to make it without getting bogged.  It was wet and muddy, with pools of water forming in ruts. 

When we hit a couple and got soundly shaken up, she slowed down.  Then, suddenly, the ocean came into view, and the track headed for the cliff, veering at the last minute, and going down the side of the hill until at the bottom we stopped outside a weather-beaten shack about the size of a large room.

She switched off the engine and let the silence surround us until I could just hear the sound of waves breaking on the rocky shoreline.

“Welcome to my castle.”

There was a whimsical expression on her face.

I opened the door and climbed out, in an instant the temperature dropped 10 degrees, and the effect of the wind almost knocking me over.

She slammed the door shut and went to the door of the shack, unlocking, then opening the door, then switching on a light, giving the inside a gloomy yellowish aura.  She motioned me to go in, then followed behind closing the door, and immediately it was much quieter.

“Not much of a castle.”

“It is when you want to get away from the rest of the family.  It used to be a bathing shack, but the waters around here got too treacherous for swimming, and it fell into disrepair.  I had it fixed up and this is where I come when I want to disappear.”

It didn’t look like it had been used in a while, a thin film of dust settled in everything, and smudged footprints on the floor, showing recent signs of habitation.  Two metal detectors were sitting on the table.

“It’s like a different world to be in when you have the family I have.”

“They don’t know about this place?”

“They probably do, but it’s been a wreck for years, and no one ever comes here, not anymore.  I found it one day, wandering along the coastline, exploring the boundaries of The Grove.  This is the southernmost tip.  There’s one on the northernmost tip too, where the building is much larger and used for storage.”

Say no more, I thought.  The Cossatino’s were allegedly smugglers on top of everything else, and that’s probably where the smuggled good were stored.  This part of the coastline was treacherous at best, with underwater reefs and craggy rocks along the cliff line.  There were some sandy stretches, but it was hard work to reach them, and at a guess, Nadia knew how to get there without slipping and falling.

Boats could only get within 50 years of the shoreline before the possibility of being dashed on the rocks, and for that reason, Boggs told me, that whole beachfront could not have been used by the pirate to bring his treasure ashore.

The little I’d seen from where the truck was parked verified that, at least for this section.

“But we’re here to check for gold coins, see if there is a possibility the treasure cane ashore somewhere along the Grove’s shoreline.  I know the consensus of opinion said it’s not possible, but from my explorations, I reckon there are at least a dozen spots where a longboat could land, especially if you came on the tide.”

That, I was guessing, was high tide, and it may have been a coincidence when the pirate arrived on this shore.

“The reefs would be submerged and even more dangerous.”

“There are ways.  I’ve been out there in a canoe once or twice with Vince, looking for passageways.  And, before you jump to any conclusions, I’m not a smuggler, and we may have been once, but an accident ten years ago put paid to that.  We lost four of the family, and six others in a hair-brained night landing in rough weather.”

I remembered a piece in the paper, the coastguard had been trailing a large yacht with suspected drugs aboard, waited until the Cossatino’s had transferred to the longboat that had gone out to meet the yacht, then chased it to the reef where a navigation mistake saw the longboat hit the reef, sink with all the evidence, and all but Vince had drowned in the heavy surf.

“Vince was lucky.”

“Vince was an idiot then and a bigger idiot now.  It made him believe he was invincible.  He’s not.  But let’s not talk about him, or the rest of them, we’re not exactly on speaking terms at the moment.”

She went to the table and picked up one of the metal detectors and held it out.  “Yours.”

I came over and took it, and it was heavier than I expected.

She picked up the other.  “Ready?”

For anything, I thought, then nodded.

…

© Charles Heath 2020-2022

NaNoWriMo – April 2022 – Day 5

First Dig Two Graves, the second Zoe thriller.

…

Talk about rescue missions gone wrong.

John is not very good at this, though who’s to say Sebastian isn’t as good as he thinks he is.

So, tossed in a basement awaiting his fate, who should he discover: Zoe

Mission accomplished.

Of course, no good deed goes unpunished as she tears strips off him for being a fool, firstly to come after her, and second, for trusting Sebastian.

But, they’ve been in tighter scrapes before, and the fun is just about to begin.

After a few minutes of catching up!

And, no doubt, Sebastian is somewhere near plotting his own operation to fix up the first operation.

…

Today’s writing, with Zoe and John equally surprised to see each other, 3,050 words, for a total of 11,921.

The cinema of my dreams – I always wanted to go on a treasure hunt – Episode 16

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 instalment of an old feature, and we’re back on the treasure hunt.

 

Rather tired and bleary eyes, I made it to the fishing store five minutes late.  I had a lot on my mind, woken late, and then had to battle traffic.  I longed for the day I could afford a car, though riding the bike kept me fit.

It also took my mind of the encounter last night, the one that had kept me away, my imagination almost getting the better of me.

Boggs was there, and he didn’t look happy.

“Where were you last night?  I tried to get you, but you weren’t answering.”

I had the phone on silent.  Ringing phones had a way of bringing unwanted attention.

“I had something I had to do.”

“You went to the Lantern without me.”

What?  Does he have a network of spies I knew nothing about?  “So, I heard it went respectable and had to check it out.”  And hoping Boggs didn’t know who was in attendance, other than me.

“We said we would go there together.”

“You apparently had something else on last night.”

“It’s not what you think.  I had to go with my mother to the hospital for her 6 monthly checks.”

It was easy to forget.  She’d had a cancer scare a few years back, and had undergone chemo for a few months, sending it into remission.  But it came with 6 monthly checks, and both Boggs and his mother were constantly worried it might come back.  It seemed it always did when you least expected it.

“And what was the verdict.”

He relented a little.  “Good.”

“Then, I assure you that was more important.”  No point in telling Boggs what I was doing, just in case it backfired, or he disagreed.  “And I can assure you the place is not worth it anymore.  Boring as shit.”

He shook his head.  Not pleased, but at least not angry.

“Has Rico shown his face?” I asked.

“Yes, about an hour back, some of those people he associates with came and they went off together.”

Perhaps he was annoyed that I hadn’t been there because I’m sure Boggs would follow him.

“You’ve been here all this time?”

“He came to our place last night.  I’m sure it was him who searched in my room.  Not much of a professional thief, he left a mess behind.  Went through the outhouse as well.”

“Looking for the map?”

“Seems so.  He didn’t find it.”

No, he wouldn’t, because Boggs had it with him.  At least that was what I thought he intimated a day or two ago.

“Copies?”

He reached for his back pocket and pulled out some folded paper.  “Thought you might like to keep a copy for yourself.”

I tried hard to keep the excitement out of my manner.  It saved me having to make up an excuse as to why I wanted a copy of the map, and I didn’t want to tell him about the plan involving Nadia, not unless I had to.

“Thanks,” I said, and slipped it into my pocket.

“Now, let’s go check out his boat.”

 

© Charles Heath 2019

The fourth attempt, other factors, and people

There are two other characters that will be used in this rewrite, the second an addition to give the main character a means of letting the reader get to know a bit about him.

His name is Milt, an African American that’s always been on the fringe.  Another who is a victim of his circumstances but not letting it get the better of him, the sort of man who makes the best of a bad situation.

He’s seen active service in the army, honourably discharged, but still affected though not as bad as some of those he served with.  He is in fact the ideal man for the job, with combat experience, so he’s not likely to get flustered in a shit storm.

And probably not the man you want on this site.  Being in desperate circumstances doesn’t mean you do desperate things.

He is one of a team of four and our main character drew the straw to partner him.  There are two others, based on the other side of the park, neither of whom are trustworthy, Smithy, the overall leader, to whom they all report at shift start and end, and Carruthers, an Englishman reputed to be ex SAS, but no one is inclined to believe him. 

The scars on his neck tell a story, but it was left to the other’s imagination, as he doesn’t talk about it.  Milt was of the opinion he was captured in Afghanistan and tortured, but that could be just be canteen scuttlebutt.

Whatever the circumstances, Graham kept away from him as much as possible, and was glad when he didn’t have to partner him for the shift.

The other character. Penelope has featured in the earlier versions of the story.  Over the changes her background has changed, but I’ve settled on a medical surgeon career, renown for doing tricky procedures with a high success rate, and in doing so gained a reputation, some not always good.

Wealth and ego don’t always make a good pair, and marrying wealth brings its own rewards and pitfalls, particularly when you discover the man you married isn’t exactly whom you thought he was.

It is of course a typical scenario, but I’m going to try and weave it differently.  There will be no more teasers until the story starts.

But she will be introduced earlier than in the previous iterations because she needs some backstory too, otherwise just arriving at Graham’s work and getting shot, while provoking a volatile situation that drags the reader in, out of left field is not exactly the best start.

So, let’s begin.

© Charles Heath 2022

The cinema of my dreams – It’s a treasure hunt – Episode 68

Here’s the thing…

Every time I close my eyes, I see something different.

I’d like to think the cinema of my dreams is playing a double feature but it’s a bit like a comedy cartoon night on Fox.

But these dreams are nothing to laugh about.

Once again there’s a new installment of an old feature, and we’re back on the treasure hunt.

…

Back at the newspaper archives

…

Boggs didn’t come home.

His mother and I waited until way after dark, and when I raised the possibility that something might have happened to him, she didn’t agree, nor did she look all that concerned.

The fact he had experience in cave exploration, and used to camping out with his father and later uncle Rico and had suffested he might not be back for a few days and was not a cause for concern.

It didn’t register that he might get into trouble considering the instability of some of the caves, nor the fact they have warning signs and or been boarded up to stop explorers.

It bothered me.

He was starting to emulate his father, with this obsession.  If the story in the paper was anything to go by, at worst he could finish up just like his father, buried under a pile of rubble.  That was one of the more speculative reults to his treasure hunt, besides leaving his family penniless and heartbroken.

Did I believe that was where his father was?  I didn’t think he disappeared of his own volition but as to the who, well, there were only two principal suspects, and no evidence of the complicity.

Boggs’s father might never be found.

But, in the end, I didn’t know what to think, because the waters were so muddied by people who were driven by self-interest.

There was so much more to this story, mostly driven by self-interest, revenge perhaps, and, worse, greed.  It was perhaps a symptom of everything that had gone wrong in not only this town but what was happening on a much larger scale to the whole country.  But, that was someone else’s problem.  My concern was here, now, and saving Biggs from following the same destructive path his father had

And, to do that, I needed to know more.  That meant, first thing the next morning, a trip to the newspaper office.

When I returned to the newspaper office Lenny was in his usual seat with a paper in hand, reading.  Keeping up with the competition, he said, though the difference in circulation was counted in millions.

There was a woman behind the other desk.

“Staff journalist,” he said when he saw me looking at her.  “And family.  My wife, Jennifer.”

I’d not seen her before, and she didn’t come from here, or I would have recognized her.

She smiled, and there was something in that expression that struck me as familiar.

“Are you related to the Ormistons?”

It was a vague resemblance, after seeing so many pictures of the Ormistons, that everyone looked like them.

“It’s a name I don’t use anymore,” she said, “for obvious reasons.  My grandfather stirred a lot of resentment.”

“And,” Lenny added, “it’s between us and these four walls, Sam.”

I nodded.  I could understand the sentiment.  And it explained Lenny’s depth of knowledge.

“Just to be clear, your grandfather didn’t find the treasure?”

She sighed.

Lenny said, sharply, “Sam!”

I shrugged.  “Sorry.  I had to ask.”

“No, he did not, and believe me, that’s a sore point with everyone whose lives he destroyed.”

“I can imagine.  Does anyone know what happened to him, the real story?”

“There is no real story Sam.  I tried to discover the truth and failed.  For Jennifer’s peace of mind.  We may never know what happened to him.”

“But surely you don’t believe he died in a cave somewhere?”

“It’s the most plausible.”

“And what about Boggs’s father?”

“He was a fool,” Jennifer said.  “From what I remember of him, he was always insistent that the treasure was in a cavern up in the hills, accessible only by an underground river that flowed down to the sea.  He originally thought it was the one the mall was built over, except every cave had a dead end.”

“Before or after the mall was built?”

“My father explored the cave system, with my grandfather, extensively, before the mall was built.  There was no underground river.”

“How did the mall get destroyed in a flood then?”

“That was the Benderby’s cost-cutting the foundations.  The flooding was man-made, not an act of nature like they said it was.  That was just so they could claim the insurance.  No one could really tell the difference, and the specialist the got to sign off on it lied.  The same guy that turned up dead on Rico’s boat, by the way.”

“The Benderby’s cleaning up another mess, but their way.”  Jennifer sounded, and probably had every right to be, resentful.

“Then there still could be an underground river somewhere along the coast?”

“If there is, I haven’t found it, and neither has Alex and that fancy boat of his.  It’s another dead end, and like as not, another nail in the coffin of what was a fairy tale, to begin with.  There was no treasure, just a fable invented by the Cossatinos.”

“Even so, it’s part of the folklore of this county and will have a place in the history I’m writing.  I noticed over the years the treasure had a prominent place in the paper.”

“My father, and his before him thought it would be good for the town. You know, bring in tourists.  It was my father’s idea to print treasure maps, and then the Cossatino’s embellished it but producing what they called ‘the real map’ each a slight variation on the other, commanding a special fee, and swearing the purchases to a promise of silence, and adding to the authenticity, demanding a 19 percent share of whatever they found.  People lapped it up and my father said they’d made a fortune out of it.  Boggs’s father hand-made the copies and used that money to fund his own explorations.  Everyone made money out of it, one way or another except Ormiston.”

A bitter irony if there was ever one.  There was more money in the illusion of treasure than the actual treasure itself.

“And the so-called real map that Boggs reputedly found in the pirate’s hideaway?”

“No one ever saw it, except that one time it was authenticated age-wise, so no one ever got to see it.  Boggs made sure of that, and never let it out of his sight.  Now we’ll never know.  I’m sure Boggs junior doesn’t have it, but with him, he’s as daft as his father was.”

“He had a lot of his father’s stuff he found in a box in the attic recently.  I’ve seen some of it, but not an authentic map, so maybe your right.”

“Of course I am.  When you have an idea of what this history of yours is going to look like, let me know. And I’ll publish in parts if you want, maybe pass it on to the dailies.  It might be worth something.”

“Thanks.  I will.  But more study first, you have the history of the place in that back room, maybe you should write something yourself. Being the journalist.”

“Too busy with births deaths and marriages, Sam, and the antics of the Benderby’s and Cossatino’s.  Do you know that Benderby is demolishing the mall and putting a marina in its place?  Talk of building a hotel, boosting tourism.  Talking of running for mayor, you know, the first stop on the way to the presidency?”

“A crook for a mayor?”

“Wouldn’t be the first, won’t be the last.  But one thing is for sure, that kind of news sells papers.”

It did, but I had a feeling the Benderbys were all about creating a distraction, and something else was going on at that mall site.

A construction crew had arrived, and more secure fencing was being erected, and the two points where I’d entered the sire with Boggs on one hand and Nadia later, they were gone.  There was also an increase in the security guards, covering more of the fence line in shorter intervals, and worse, arc lighting lit the whole outside area like a sports stadium.

Not even an ant could sneak in without being seen.

…

© Charles Heath 2020-2022

NaNoWriMo – April 2022 – Day 4

First Dig Two Graves, the second Zoe thriller.

…

John’s search for Zoe was at an impasse, simply because it was her job to disappear and reappear at will, and he knows he’s no match for her in that regard.

So, having gone to her residence in Paris, not finding her there which was predictable, the place looked like it had not been visited in months, he concluded a short stay might help to clear his head.

Until he gets a phone call.

Kidnappers, other than the Russians, have captured Zoe, and they’re ringing him for a ransom.

Odd, because he was not the one who placed the kidnap order on her, so why would they be ringing him?

This was initiated by Zoe, no doubt playing the kidnapper by sending him to a bigger payday.

If that’s the case then John has to deduce she has faith in him to come and get her.

Which he’s going to do, but not on his own.

It’s time to call Sebastian, someone John knew would know what to do.

Or at least hope he does!

…

Today’s writing, with Zoe languishing in a dungeon waiting for a white knight, 3,270 words, for a total of 8,871.