Dear Beneficiary (16 page)

I didn't tell Tracey what I really thought, because we needed to stick together if we were going to think of a way to get out of our prison. Commenting on whether or not she could pass for someone younger, one of Tracey's favourite topics of conversation, wasn't really an option.

‘Yes, yes,' I said, hoping that she'd forget the fishing line of a statement she had thrown to me in the hope of hooking a compliment.

‘I've thought of something but I just need to work through the details,' I said.

Tracey looked pensive.

‘The guards are here most of the time, and even when they aren't, Chike and Fasina show up, and I wouldn't want to get Chike cross. After his hissy fit over his bloody sewing, I reckon he's the type that could murder you for no reason,' said Tracey.

I sat down on the space beside her and patted her knee.

‘We're going to have to be resourceful,' I said, picking up the banana skin from where Tracey had finished eating, placing it on the tray beside her.

I explained my plans, in the best way I could to someone who probably wouldn't understand them, when there was a loud hooting and the sound of a car making its way up the narrow pathway behind the shacks. It screeched to a halt before Chike and Fasina's voices could be heard.

‘We have it, we have it,' shouted Chike. ‘Party time,' he shouted again, and within minutes the area outside the shack sounded like a carnival. There was cheering and clapping and the distinct tones of
Max Bygraves' Greatest Hits
pumping through the car's stereo system.

‘It sounds like they've something to celebrate,' I said to Tracey, who'd stood up to see if she could catch a glimpse of what was going on through the gaps in the door.

‘Looks like they have some people with them,' she said, squinting as she peered through the small gap she'd managed to expand just below the hole that had been gouged out for the padlock bolts.

The music got louder and I put my hands over my ears. I have a sensitive reaction to most music, finding much of it superfluous to my life, but particularly that of Palladium-style crooners with absolutely no classical training. Why on earth were they listening to Max Bygraves in this day and age?

The noise was deafening and went on for some time before Gowon made his way to our shack, via the usual ritual of padlocks, to bring us the nightly cups of herbal tea and a selection of newspapers and magazines. I noticed one of them was
Needlepoint Monthly
. He was smiling at both of us as he put the tray down.

‘What is going on? Why such frivolity?' I asked him. As I looked at him I thought he was a bit drunk. His eyes weren't focusing, and when he spoke it was with a bit of a slur.

‘You've brought us good luck. Things will happen soon,' he said.

I swelled inwardly. This must mean Darius had come forward to save me and we were to be freed. My logic had been skewed by over-optimism, but I didn't let a lack of knowledge about the facts get in the way of my sense of hope.

‘The boss is very pleased,' said Gowon, who clearly shared the same optimism about a great outcome.

‘What's happened?' asked Tracey, hopeful for the first time in a while that it might be news of her fiancé. ‘Is it Baz? Obassi?'

Gowon shifted on his feet and rubbed the side of his face with his right hand, which still held the padlock key he had let himself in with.

‘I do not know for certain, he said. ‘But I know the boss man is pleased. So we are pleased.'

‘Does that mean we will be released?' I asked, as anticipation rose like mercury in a sauna's thermometer.

‘Oh, God, I hope so,' said Tracey. ‘I want out of this hole. I need to get my nails done, my hair sorted and a new tooth, and I want some decent grub.'

Gowon ignored her and looked kindly over to me, moving his eyes up and down my body and allowing his eyes to meet mine. I thought they looked a bit watery and couldn't work out if that was the drink or emotion.

‘Big boss is very happy. But you're not going anywhere. You bring us the luck. So we wait.' Then Gowon turned and left, locking us in without any further explanation.

I eyed up the door and my thoughts crystallised further. I had a plan to get us out of our prison but needed to think very carefully and make sure Tracey was fully capable of following my instructions – something I wasn't one hundred per cent sure was possible.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

The magazines provided much-needed light relief. Reading that Bernie Ecclestone spent £12m on his daughter's wedding led to some animated discussion between the two of us. Tracey thought it was quite reasonable to spend that kind of money on one event, if you had it, whereas I could only refer to Bobbie's wedding, which involved a parsimonious meal of sausage and mash in a damp marquee on a Sussex farm. We were still discussing the details while we were waiting for our (late) breakfast when Chike burst through the door.

‘Get up, get up!'

He seemed agitated, and I reminded myself not to show fear and remember hostages are generally worth far more alive than dead. It also occurred to me that a man with a passion for needlepoint might not have quite the killer instincts you'd expect from a kidnapper.

‘You need to come with me – now,' he said, as he marched around our bed, kicking the mattress with his booted feet.

‘What's up with him?' said Tracey, as she hauled herself to a standing position dressed only in pants and a bra. The night had been particularly close, and if we'd had a window we would've opened it.

‘Don't speak!' shouted Chike. ‘Come with me.'

Tracey looked over and uncharacteristically shrugged before crumpling up her face as if to cry. She didn't, but took a deep breath and let it out in one juddering go. It was difficult to anticipate how she'd react to anything. I sometimes wondered if there were three personalities in our shack: me, her and her hormones.

Chike held the door open and gestured for us to move through. He hadn't handcuffed us or offered us the option of breakfast or the washroom. Thankfully we had our bucket to use for early morning and the inevitable middle-of-the-night excursions that seem to hinder a full night's sleep for many women over forty-five – and the lid made a difference.

‘Move. You must come.'

Thankfully I'd already dressed and so could make my way towards the door while Tracey struggled to wiggle herself into her leggings and a strappy top that looked like it'd been torn off her shoulder in a fight with a hungry goat.

When we got to the guards' shack there was a video camera set up on a tripod. It was like nothing I had seen before. Much larger than the camera Tom often used, it was pointing at two seats in front of a draped white sheet, hanging loosely over the back wall. Fasina was fiddling about with some sheets of paper.

‘Your people need to know you are in danger,' said Chike. ‘Tell them to send money now.'

Tracey said, ‘I thought you'd already found our families and they were going to get us out of here.'

Chike sucked air through his teeth and pursed his lips. It made him look like a ventriloquist's dummy.

‘You,' he said, pointing a stubby finger at Tracey, ‘have no family – you are worthless. But Mrs Hartworth here is a wealthy woman and has people who want to get her back, so will pay.'

I sincerely hoped Tracey could hang on to her limited self-esteem at that point to prevent a further outburst of tears. It seemed she could, as she was busy eyeing up the cigarettes Fasina held in his hands.

‘Could I have one, please?' she asked in a childlike voice. Fasina passed them over and threw her a lighter.

As she lit up, Chike snatched the papers off the table and thrust them into my hands.

‘You read this, to the camera,' he said, shoving me across the room towards the chair.

I looked at what was written and knew I would find it difficult to read the words that had been written for me.

‘Are you sure?' I asked.

He pushed me down on the chair and indicated to Fasina that he wanted him to start filming.

‘Speak. Tell them what is written on the paper,' barked Chike.

Fasina was told to only film my face and nothing else. He didn't want any viewers to see I was reading from a script.

I faltered with the first sentence because I found the writing difficult to understand; partly capital letters and partly scribble, it was like my doctor's writing on a bad day.

‘My dearest family members,' I read, trying to sound as plausible as possible. I didn't want to annoy Chike when he was showing signs of psychotic behaviour. ‘I will die without you. I need your peaceful support and harmonious attention to my friends in Nigeria,' I continued.

Tracey looked bemused, and I can't say I blamed her. If my family were to think these were my own words they would think dementia had set in on the flight over, or I'd taken leave of my senses and joined a religious cult experimenting with personality transplants.

‘These people are worthy of all you can give them. Sell my house and car if you need to, but give them what they ask as it goes to good men, women and children who have been subjected to terrible wrong.'

I couldn't read the next sentence but made it up as I went along, hoping Chike wouldn't notice my illicit editing.

‘I just want to be back home safely. If you need to find help please do so.'

I hoped the last sentence would indicate I thought it highly appropriate to call in the authorities, who knew what they were doing. That was if anyone ever got the recording. Fasina seemed to be unsure about the lens he was using, and I'm sure he'd left the cap on while filming. Not being a photographer it was difficult to tell.

He called to Tracey to sit in front of the camera, on the seat I'd vacated.

‘You – read the same,' he shouted to her. ‘And put that cigarette out, no one said you could smoke.'

I questioned Fasina's stability. It was he who'd given her the cigarette in the first place.

Tracey read her way through the script, faltering through most of it and sounding about as convincing as a double glazing salesman telling his prospective customer he had a one-off discount just for them. I wondered who the kidnappers would contact on Tracey's behalf. It was clear they'd found a number of connections for me and were aware of my social standing, but who would fork out for her? I hoped my release wasn't dependent on her ransom being paid.

‘Go back now,' said Chike, as Fasina gave the thumbs up to indicate recording was finished. Chike picked up his needlepoint by way of bringing our discussions to an end and I noticed he was using the brown yarn to outline all the sheep.

Fasina grabbed us both by the arms and frog-marched us back into our shack where we found breakfast waiting: more eggs, some cake and two tubs of American ice cream, which had melted.

‘That was a bit weird, weren't it?' said Tracey once he'd gone, picking up the ice cream and sniffing it.

I thought much the same. Even if my family were to get the message they would think it peculiar and probably hand it to the police. Between them they could raise a fair bit of cash but I doubted that would be considered the sensible route. Even taking into account the fact I suggested selling my house and car, there'd be a number of practical considerations about that – not least me not being there to sign the paperwork. Jonjo would need to consider the implications regarding the best use of his inheritance, while Paddy would want to wait it out in the hope things got sorted without requiring any of his input. It was sobering to consider what lengths my family would need to go to in order to save my life.

‘I'm not sure what they are planning on doing with the tape but let's hope it resolves our predicament,' I said. ‘I can only assume they will be sending it to any contacts of ours they can find in the hope that someone stumps up the cash.'

Tracey replied: ‘Can't see how it will help. Either people know where we are or they don't. If they do we might get out of here, although I can't see Posh Git paying to get me out of here if that's the case. He's the only one with any dosh, but he won't even buy me a birthday card, so I reckon a ransom demand is out of the question.'

Feeling somewhat stunned by the morning's experience, we sat down to eat our food, which was very welcome, not for its taste but for its fairly substantial quantity. I'm not one to overeat, but even the church mouse's poverty-stricken maiden aunt wouldn't be full on what we were normally given, so every morsel was valued. I'll never criticise the portion sizes of Marks & Spencer's ‘Feel Fuller Longer' range ever again.

While enjoying the flavour of the cake, which I dipped in the melted ice cream, I started to leaf through the various newspapers Gowon had brought us the night before. I noted various stories on local farmers fighting for government subsidy, political intrigue and officials talking about their points of view on a number of subjects. I was about to turn to a newer edition of a Nigerian supplement to do a sudoku puzzle when I spotted a picture of a woman who looked very familiar. Small, petite features, hair loosely gathered in a bun, with tendrils dropping to the side of her ears and excellent bone structure. It was me.

I didn't say anything to Tracey, who was trying to devise a new game of ‘Guess the Celebrity Partner' by tearing various faces out of the magazines she wanted me to match up at a later stage, on the basis they were sleeping with each other. As I didn't recognise anyone but Bill Clinton, who could have been bonking any or all of the women she had decided to decapitate, I thought it was a bit of a tricky game.

I looked again at my photo and, checking it definitely was me, read the story. It was basically a plea for anyone who had seen me to get in touch with a company called Forensix Inc. That was the name of the company where Darius worked. I remembered the name from the business card, although he wasn't mentioned in the article. A man called James Grant had been quoted as saying he was keen to know my whereabouts as I hadn't been seen since boarding a flight from London to Lagos over a week ago. It went on to add that my family had received email messages to suggest I'd been kidnapped, and that a ransom demand had been issued.