It Wasn't The Bullet (14)
Chapter Eight Why are we going to Southampton? Charlie let out a long sigh and fell back into the softness of the old sofa. A wave of fatigue flooded into his body. He felt trapped and his usual ‘it will be alright on the night’ attitude had deserted him. The logistics of the next few days appeared insurmountable. He admitted to himself he had no real plan, in fact he had not even thought where to meet Roger. Why hadn’t he just gone to the bank himself? He had already broken the golden rule of the business. Never involve anyone who doesn’t need to know. ‘Fuck’ he said viciously inside his head. Maybe they should just go to Scotland and hide away until the police assumed they had escaped. He knew it was not a viable option. Boredom would set in rapidly and there he would be, drunk as a skunk in some village pub, mouthing off about stuff that would surely give him away. They needed to get to the south of France. He would finally get to see the place Terry had told him about so often. This was paramount. The extra money would always be available if all went well with the people at Fenshaw and Bennet. He wondered if those two shady characters slept well at night. Sitting in their skyscraper boardrooms, plotting god knows what and living a life of luxury on the backs of other people’s money. It must be nice to just wander around with no thought of consequence or ever having to wait in line. He suddenly grinned, and then laughed out loud, “That may just work.” He said to the fire place. He heard the soft drum beat of stocking feet on the wooden stairs and Samantha arrived in the living room dressed very conservatively. She looked like a sectary ready to go back to work after lunch. Leaning over she gave him a brief kiss on the top of his head and said, “Well Charlie, what does Ms Parker do now?” Charlie didn’t get it and Samantha did not offer an explanation. He explained how they must take one travelling bag and how the next few hours were going to be a bit tense. “We are going to France, somewhere in the south. You up for that darlin’?” She nodded and sat next to him. “I’m not quite sure exactly how we are going to achieve that but we will have to figure out the finer details as we go. First we have to meet a friend of mine between here and Southampton. Have you got any ideas?” She put on a thinking face and replied, “Chichester. It’s on the way to Southampton. Why are we going to Southampton?” “I think it could turn out to be a sneaky way of getting to France without having to go through passport control. We’ll just have to wait and see if it works. Ok let’s get this show on the road. I’m afraid that your little car is no longer viable; we’ll have to find a mode of transport to Gatwick and pick up the other car. Is it easy to get an out of area taxi to come here? I don’t want the friendly village cabbie asking you a bunch of questions.” She got up off the couch and started to thumb through the telephone directory. He left her giving the cab company directions to the cottage. He clambered up the stairs and for the first time in a while his wound started to ache. He placed his hand over his shoulder and inadvertently felt his heart thudding against his chest. Stopping half-way up the stairs, he rested at the small landing where the steps turned to make it up to the hallway. He leaned against the window that framed the picture outside, the trees seemed to bow towards him almost pointing at something that was just out of eyesight. For a split second he thought he saw Terry moving quickly in the shadows of the under growth. Perhaps he did, and Terry was once again watching his back. He climbed the four stairs up onto the main landing and walked in to the bedroom and began to pack a bag with the one set of spare clothes he had. The ride to Gatwick was uneventful and as soon as they had paid the ransom to extract Ralph’s car from the car park Charlie found a bank of pay-phones. He checked first that one would accept an incoming call and paged Roger. Samantha and he had not exchanged many words in the hour it took to get to the airport. He hoped that she was just as nervous as him and was lost in a pensive mood. As they stood waiting for the telephone to ring, she held onto his arm and stared at the receiver willing it to burst into life so they would not have to wait out in the open much longer. A police car crawled by them and Charlie did his best to act nonchalant while he felt Samantha tense. The car came to a halt ten yards past them and the copper got out of his vehicle. As he was walking toward them he placed his cap on his head and said something into his radio. Charlie gently pushed his girl off his arm and casually undid the two bottom buttons on his jacket. The policeman came nearer and Charlie pretended to scratch his chest subtly unclipping the thin strip of leather that held his gun in place. The officer was on them. “Good afternoon Sir. Is this your car?” He said pointing to the black Ford. Charlie forced himself to be calm and rational. “Yes officer it is. I know I shouldn’t have parked there but I had to call our babysitter to tell her that we’d be late.” He smiled and tried to look like a simpleton, “Well it’s not great place to leave your vehicle, now is it sir?” He gave them both a condescending look and satisfied that he had intimidated them enough said, “Well make your phone call and don’t be long, we’re coming up to rush hour. Have a safe drive home and don’t speed. Goodbye.” He turned and said something else into his radio and made his way to the patrol car. Samantha had begun to shake very slightly. As Charlie put the slip catch back his holster he said some pithy comforting words which could well have made both of them feel worse had not the telephone sprang into full voice. Charlie snatched it up and said, “Hello Roge?” “Fuck me that’s a pretty posh old bank you got there Charlie. I did everything you asked me to, and I told him…” Charlie cut him off and spoke tersely, “Roge meet me at the main rail station in Chichester. Wait in the bar nearest to the ticket counters. Someone will meet you there and offer you a cigarette, then say ‘nice day for it’. Get there as quick as possible, ok. You got that?” “Are you a fucking spy or something Charlie? What the fucks got into you, you dappy cunt?” “Just be there Roger.” Charlie almost slammed the phone down, and roughly pulled Samantha toward the car. He knew that he was on the verge of panic. A feeling he had not known for a long, long while. He told Samantha to drive and he slammed the passenger door, lit a cigarette and stared moodily through the windshield. Charlie could feel Samantha glancing over at him wanting to speak but not sure what to say. She was driving hesitantly and the other drivers were being impatient with her. He snapped, “Do you want me to drive?” The tyres screeched and the car fishtailed wildly. Charlie’s’ head slammed into the side window, he swore and turned to the driver. There were silent tears mingling with the make up on her cheeks. She was staring at him with a mixture of venom and fear. The sounds of braking vehicles and car horns surrounded them. He decided to control his anger and causally picked up the cigarette from where it had fallen. “Samantha, find a place to park the car and tell me what’s wrong.” She moved the gear lever out of park and drove determinedly to a safer and less populated resting place. In five minutes they came to a halt in a parking lot and she turned off the engine and turned to face him. Her hand reached out and lightly touched the slight lump that was forming on the side of Charlie’s skull. “I’m sorry, does it hurt much?” He let out a sigh and smiled, “I guess you could call it karma without much fear of contradiction.” He tried a lop-sided smile and continued, “This is the first time I’ve felt threatened since, well since that time. I’m scared Samantha. I don’t have Terry to keep me together. It was ridiculous of me to panic when the copper stopped us. If I had been thinking right I should have known that he was going to tell us to move a car that we had parked on a double yellow line. Instead I was trying to start a scene from the OK Corral. I had a situation and that all went pear shaped, I end up getting shot, taken into hospital, met you, escaped from said hospital, recovered thousands of pounds, attack a senior policeman, started to become attached to the attending nurse, decided to flee to Europe with no real preparation and finally thought about shooting an unarmed man who was only doing his job. I feel a little disoriented.” Charlie was going to say more, but his thoughts left him empty of further speech. They both wrapped themselves in silence for some minutes until Samantha placed her hand on top of his and squeezed. Charlie stared at her fingers. He could see the contrast on the fingers that were bearing the pressure of her grip and he marvelled at the slender, slightly freckled and beautifully shaped wrist. He was startled a little when the engine burst into life and Samantha reached across with her other hand to put the car into drive as they turned back onto the road. He fell asleep to the sound of the tyres clicking across the small tar-macadam bumps of the motorway. The blackness was complete; the stars had twinkled out of existence. He was cold and alone, there were no sounds, he turned around but could not get a bearing on where he was. The darkness was total. He opened and closed his eyes in vain. There was nothing. Charlie was now unsure whether his eyes were shut, he felt a slight pressure in his side, he tried to turn and see what was bothering him but wasn’t sure if he had even moved. The prodding got more insistent and urgent. He forced his eyes to open and was blinded by the sharp sunlight. “Bloody hell Charlie, I thought you were dead.” Samantha’s voice poured into his consciousness. He exhaled like a bomb disposal expert who had just cut the blue wire and was still around to know he had cut the right one. His body involuntary stretched out and he moaned with the exertion,. “Where are we?” he asked distractedly, still fighting to crawl back to the cognisant world. “Just outside Chichester. I stopped and bought you a cup of really awful tea.” She held the plastic cup out to him, which he took immediately, wincing as the heat soaked into his hand. “Thank you.” He propped the cup on the dashboard and groped for his pack of cigarettes. After his first inhale and slow breath out he said, “Wow, that was an interesting sleep. Weird, weird dream. Ok, let’s go and see what’s going to happen next.” He looked over at Samantha and settled on her eyes. She gazed back and began to speak, “I had some time to think while you were napping. This is the conclusion I have come to,” she paused, “I think.” Charlie felt butterflies erupt in his stomach and waited for the hammer to fall. “Charlie, I figure that I could give myself up twenty four hours after you escape and nothing terrible would happen to either of us. Perhaps I would have to go to prison, but that would be over in a few years and I could still get on with my life when it was all done. I mean plenty of people have ‘done time’,” Charlie was glad she didn’t do the air quotes, “but in an extremely strange way I’ve never felt so alive. I feel like I have been missing something. I know that you think I am a girl caught up in a world I don’t or could never understand, but I want to see it through. Perhaps it won’t last forever, perhaps it will. But a least I will have done something spontaneous. All my life; holidays were planned a year in advance, Christmas cards bought in June, always thinking I shouldn’t have another drink otherwise I’ll be drunk, and now here I am with a wanted criminal. A man I am alternatively scared by and then surrounded by compassion and tenderness. I know you can be violent. I lied when I said I didn’t know how you got John to go to Scotland. He told me you frightened him so much that he wet himself. He really believed you would shoot him. Would you have done it? Would you have killed my brother?” She peered intently at Charlie’s face, “Not that time.” Samantha shifted in her seat and he could see her mind twisting the words up for the next paragraph. “I want to come with you. Here’s the deal. When we get to where we’re going and its dusk and we’ve drunk a couple of bottles of red wine I want you to tell me how you got here. Why am I sitting in a lay-by just outside Chichester feeling thrilled and terrified? I want to know you, Charlie. You have to explain yourself to me. I don’t think that apart from Terry, whoever he is, you have told anyone about your life. Not really explained it even to yourself. If you won’t do that I’ll give you the car keys now and we’ll say goodbye. You have to promise me on whatever is most sacred to you.” Charlie had not expected anything like this. He sipped at the rancid tea and thought about what she had said. It was true. Although he and Terry were very close and their lives, several times, had depended on their mutual trust of each other, neither had revealed much about how they thought. Dreams or anything else. She was right of course, conceivably if he did let it all go, the dreams of Annie would stop. The black dreams and the unrest inside his being would be erased. Maybe he needed to purge his whole life out of him and start anew. A fresh deck of cards, a whole forest of new leaves. He thought of the thing most sacred to him and turned to face her, “Ok, I swear.” Unconsciously he placed his hand over his heart. “But you have to promise me one thing.” She nodded, “You have to trust me. Absolutely. There are going to be times in the next few days when things are going to get pretty fucked up and you have to believe in my decision, no matter how inane or stupid you feel it is. I promise not to panic again, but if I feel that you or I are in a life-threatening situation I will use extreme measures to get us out of it. Can you handle that?” “I promise and I don’t know until it happens.” She replied instantly. He smiled. If she had said yes he would have asked for the keys and left her by the side of the road. N0 one knows until they have played a part in that movie. “Let’s go. Roger might have beaten us there and I don’t want him getting drunk before we see him. Hey, did you pack that wig?” “Of course. What kind of gangsters moll would I be hadn’t.” The car shook into life and he heard the blinker start to tick as they moved forward into the hectic traffic. Typically the DJ played a song that Charlie liked just as they entered the centre of Chichester; it pained him to turn off Ian Paice as he became a fireball. Samantha was following the blue signs that directed the traffic to the railway station. They rounded a corner and it emerged from the bustling cars quite suddenly. Samantha started to guide the car toward the parking entrance and Charlie stopped her, instructing her to drive round the block a couple of times while he looked for any kind of surveillance. He had done it so often in the dead of night or in a busy shopping centre that it was almost second nature. He knew what to look for. More than two or three cigarette butts outside a car window, empty tea cups and litter. Driver and passenger slouched down in their seats, rear view mirrors at an unusual angle. It wasn’t difficult to see what you were looking for. What Charlie did see that really amazed him was the big white transit van sitting illegally parked on a kerb just outside the back of the parking lot. Emblazoned on the body of the vehicle, spelled out in garishly coloured musical notes, were the words ‘Sounds A Lot Lik’. The ‘e’ having peeled off leaving a ghostly outline. “Oh my God, I can’t believe this! Stupid fucking idiot. If anyone has put two and two together, he might just well have put a big hand in the sky with a finger pointing down and a little bubble saying ‘arrest criminal here’.” “What’s the matter?” “You saw that van with the lettering on the side?” She nodded, “That’s Roger’s van. I’m surprised he didn’t set the alarm off as well so everyone would know he was here. Oh well. Ok show time. I saw a public toilet back there. Will you change into Miss Scarlet for me? It would be better if I went in and made contact. I’ll need you to cause that exotic distraction that you do so well.” She turned the car around and parked on a side street. In twenty minutes she was back, dressed even hotter than last time. She got into the car, “Now you’re just teasing me.” Samantha gave him a wicked grin and asked what happened next. Charlie explained as they left the car. They reached the concourse of the fairly small station and looked for the bar. There was only one, and it had a panoramic glass front with a lovely view of nothing but other passengers walking back and forth. They made one pass past the place and Charlie spotted Roger sitting at the bar nursing a pint. They rounded the corner and Charlie brought them both to a halt. While pretending to peruse the departure board, he described Roger to Samantha. Before he sent her into the lion’s den, Charlie made a little speech. He told her to wait five minutes and follow him into the pub. She was to sit opposite Roger at the oval bar and wait for Charlie to make his move. If Charlie was coming out as she was entering, she was to turn around and leave immediately. If Charlie suspected something in the bar, he would cause some kind of commotion and she was to leave immediately. In both instances she was to take the car. They would split up and wait in the bar of the main railway station in Southampton between four and six each day for five days. If they did not make contact by then…. Charlie opened the fresh packet of Marlboro and pulled one out. As he entered the bar he lit it to shield his face and once past Roger he made his way to a position that was out of Roger’s line of sight unless he turned around one hundred and eighty degrees. It was apparent his appearance was sufficiently changed that a policeman wouldn’t recognise him from a photograph, but he assumed that Roger probably would. The barman wandered over and offered him a choice of beers. He chose a Stella and waited for it to arrive. He surveyed the patrons; he looked as carefully as he dared without staring. There were the usual assortment of travellers; he was looking for the man or men who didn’t appear to be in a hurry. Those with one half of a beer that had been sitting there for a while or scanning the room constantly. In short people too interested in something other than the time of their train. He looked at Roger’s back, the man couldn’t help but fidget. Probably stoned and if he had been here long enough, half cut. Charlie saw or sensed no one that aroused his suspicions. He glanced at the door and saw Samantha walk in, so did everyone else in the bar. She played it well, walking almost the circumference of the oval bar and letting everyone have a good look. She sat between two businessmen, and he waited until she ordered a drink. The barman took his time counting out her change while trying desperately to peer further down her top. She started a conversation with one of the two men and crossed her shapely legs. That side of the bar was taken care of. Even the women present were staring at the ‘fucking bitch’. Charlie grabbed his pint and squeezed in next to Roger. He too was craning his neck in the vain hope of catching more than a glimpse of Samantha. “Hello Roger had a good drive did you?” Roger turned round so suddenly his hand didn’t keep up with his torso and he split some of his beer. “Fuck me. Are you trying to give me a fucking ‘eart attack or what?” “Don’t speak so loudly, we’re just two guys waiting for a train. Did it go well at the bank?” Roger was high; he could see his pupils were dilated. Cocaine would be the most likely candidate. He was obviously making too much money. Roger took a couple of beats to compose himself and chomped up and down on the piece of gum.
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