Rant (18 page)

He raised the gun and pressed it against my forehead.

I closed my eyes.

‘Please,' I said. ‘Please.'

‘Any last words, Mr Rant?'

Nothing came, nothing except, ‘I'm sorry, Anna.'

‘How touching. Goodbye, Mr Rant.'

I felt him cock the gun.

I held my breath.

I waited for the explosion and darkness.

All I heard was a ringing sound in my ears.

Is that it?
I thought.
Is that all I get?

The ringing continued.

I carefully opened my eyes and squinted, cross-eyed, at Barbu's finger on the trigger as he dug in his jacket pocket. He lifted a mobile to his ear with a curt greeting, and then listened.

I watched his finger tighten on the trigger.

He said something quietly, and then disconnected the call. I was still staring at his trigger finger, which had gone white. The slightest twitch, and… I carried on holding my breath, though there were now spots swimming in front of my eyes from lack of oxygen.

I frowned, wondering what the delay was, and tried not to flinch as the gun dug deeper into my forehead.

There was a long, long pause as I watched Barbu try to get a grip on himself. He walked across the room, screamed, kicked out at a pile of rubbish that was lying there, gnashed his feet and stamped his teeth. Or something like that. If I didn't know better, I'd say he was a tad miffed at something.

He came back over and pushed the gun into my forehead again. His finger tightened and loosened, tightened – and then he seemed to gain control, taking deep breaths.

Eventually, he hissed, ‘Well. It would seem that we have something of a problem, Mr Rant.'

We?

I cleared my throat, and blurted out, ‘What kind of a problem I mean if there's any way I can help you know I'll do all that I can the case is yours after all so let's go get it anything to be of service just tell me what you need I know we can work well together what's the story morning glory?'

I sucked in a breath before I passed out and was about to start in again when he said, ‘It would appear that my office at home has been…breached. Certain files were deleted or stolen and my safe has been emptied. Your Mr Milligan has indeed been cleverer than I thought.'

I gulped. It was louder than I thought it would be, causing Barbu and his bodyguards to jump and look around. Barbu glared at me.

‘Sorry,' I said.

‘This being the case,' he continued, lowering the gun, ‘it would seem that you and your friends—'

‘No friends of mine,' I said, ‘hate them, and hate them, nasty men. And woman. Ptoooee.'

I spat. We both looked at the gob on his nice Gucci shoes.

‘Sorry,' I said again, whilst one of the bodyguards rushed forwards and wiped it off with his hanky.

‘…it would seem that you and your colleagues—'

‘Not my coll—'

‘Shut up!'

Up I shut. The bodyguard slapped me across the head for good measure. It was quite a gentle slap, considering, but they had to pick me and my chair up off the floor before Barbu could continue.

‘Now. It would seem that you and your
colleagues,
' – he glared at me for a moment but I kept shtum – ‘that you now have something which is of the utmost value to me. Now, I know that you can supply some of what I need. And it would appear that the only lead we have left to one half of the goods is our Romanian friends.'

He looked at me, obviously wanting some kind of response.

‘Uh-huh,' I said.

‘And it would appear that you are our primary contact with them, as they are obviously expecting a call from you in the near future.'

‘Yup,' I said.

‘And if you were to assist me in this matter, I might be able to see my way to rescuing your wife.'

‘Uh-huh.'

‘And perhaps Mr Milligan will consider selling…some part of the collection to them anyway. As we have already established, this is all about money, and from what I can gather, Billy the Pill is a very greedy man. And more importantly, the Romanians must have some contact information for him. So if nothing else, I have the feeling that Mr Milligan will want to tie up some loose ends and make sure that there is no chain of evidence that leads back to him.'

Collection? Goods?
I thought. ‘Mm-hmmm,' I said.

Barbu waited.

‘Well?' he asked.

I let him stew for a couple of seconds, while my mind tried to process this latest turn of events. Perhaps, at long last, events were beginning to turn in my favour. I needed to take advantage. How to play this? Then suddenly I had it. Gathering my last reserves of energy and trying desperately to ignore the pain, I summoned up the spirit of Vinnie Jones. I gave a crooked smile and looked Barbu in the eyes.

‘Hmmm. It would appear that the shoe is on the other foot now.'

‘Pardon?' said Barbu.

‘Well,' I said, realising that I did indeed have the upper hand, or foot, or whatever. ‘Say please at least.'

‘
Pardon?
' said Barbu.

‘Say please. I mean, it's the least you could do. After all, it would appear that you now need me to help you. After all this shit, you seem to think that you just have to snap your fingers and I'll do exactly as you ask. I'll run along and get the briefcase I hid, then toddle off and set up the men who stole, or wanted to steal, whatever it is you're hawking. Where do you get off, anyway? Some bunch of cheap crooks running around trying to get one up on another bunch of cheap crooks, torturing people, kidnapping people, lying, cheating…thinking you're some kind of royalty because you can extort or beat money out of people. Maybe you're going to have to convince me why it's in my best interest to help you anyway. What? Cat got your tongue?'

He looked at me long and hard.
Got you now,
I thought.
Pricked your conscience at last.
They're like casting directors. Sometimes all it takes with these people is to show them that you're not impressed with their pathetic little schemes and they fold like a director at the BBC who's been shown the ratings for ITV's latest reality show.

I know what you're thinking. I should've just gone along with whatever they wanted, got Anna back, let them fight it out amongst themselves, gone home, tended my wounds and got on with my life. All I can say in my defence is that I was tired and emotional after my time with these people, and my mouth seemed to be running off on its own. Though, as you've probably gathered by now, I don't need the excuse of extended periods of torture and pressure to succumb to verbal diarrhoea.

And Vinnie Jones?

‘Come on,' I said, ‘let's see you grovel. Who's the daddy now?'

A moment more of silence, then,

‘Eugene,' said Barbu.

Eugene didn't answer, just stood to attention.

‘I think now might be a good moment to give Mr Rant an anti-Semitic.' He paused.
‘Please.'

Oops. Me and my big gob.

Within seconds I went from Vinnie Jones to Corporal Jones.

‘Whoa,' I shouted, ‘let's not panic. Just hold on a sec—'

‘No, Mr Rant, you are quite right. After all of the abuse that my employees and I have put you through I am sure that you will need a great deal of convincing that it is in your best interests to help us. But let's see now, all we really need is your voice on a telephone to set up the meeting, and some directions to the other briefcase. It does not matter if you speak in a slightly higher register than usual. See you in a little while, Mr Rant.' He turned back to Eugene. ‘Make it slow. And make sure you keep him alive. For the moment.'

And with that, he left.

I tried calling after him but there was no response and a few seconds later the steel door clanged shut.

Well,
I thought,
at least it's only two against one now. The odds are definitely getting better.

Eugene walked to a table in the corner of the room and picked up a rather rusty old pair of wire cutters and a cross-headed screwdriver. I tried desperately to cross my legs, but they were securely fastened to the chair. My bottom seemed to have gone strangely dormant, my sphincter so tightly puckered that only the tiniest trump managed to sneak out, with a sound probably only dogs could hear. Just when I needed my deadliest defence, too.

‘Okay, Barbu,' I shouted, as loud as I could. ‘You win, you've convinced me. I'm sorry I had a go at you. You can call off the boys now. You've had your fun. Ha ha hahaha! Very good. Barbu? Mr Barbu? Sir? Barbu! Ow, ow,
owwww,
get off me you dirty bastard. Aaaaaaaarrrggghhh—!
Oooooh.
'

This last was because, after grabbing a handful of flesh, Eugene had succeeded in (quite gently, I thought) inserting the screwdriver down my urethra and was using it to hold my Right Honourable Member for Piddlington out straight. He now held the wire cutters in his other hand and was studying said member the way my father used to eye up the Sunday roast, before laying into it with a fork and carving knife and ripping it into unrecognizable chunks.

I vaguely heard the sound of a car pulling away outside, and realized that there wasn't going to be any reprieve.

‘Eugene,' I said, in my best menacing Alan Rickman voice – though it wasn't that convincing, even to me. I don't think he uses quite so much vibrato when he does it. ‘Eugene, think about this. You could be in very serious trouble if you do this. Now, if you let me go, I promise I'll put in a good word for you with the police and – now, Eugene, don't do that! Careful with those wire-cutters, Eugene!
Eugene!
'

The wire cutters felt cold as he slid them around my gender-defining bits, and I suddenly found myself beyond words.

‘Say goodbye to Mr Rant Junior,' said Eugene, smiling.

‘Bye, bye,' I squeaked, like Sweep saying farewell to Mr Corbett. There was a tear or two in my eyes at the thought of being parted from my lifelong companion. ‘Bye, bye.'

Reflexively, I went for my last line of defence.

And threw up on Eugene's head.

He stepped back, disgusted, and walked over to the table to mop himself down with a somewhat unsanitary towel. I could see him considering the value of obeying his orders and keeping me alive. He must have been sorely tempted to just finish me off then.

He started back towards me, and from the look in his eyes he definitely meant business. And as far as I was concerned, business was not good.

Then the lights went out.

I sat as still as I could, the cold steel still pinching at my parts, as all around me a series of snaps, crackles and pops led me to believe that heaven (or maybe hell) is a bowl of cereal.

I just had time to register a thick, sickly smell that caught in the back of my throat and made me want to cough (and I really wasn't in a position to start coughing) before I found myself being dragged backwards across the floor on the chair. I peered into the gloom over my shoulder but everything was misty and my eyes were beginning to water.

As we neared the door, the light from outside backlit a gas masked figure as I was dragged, bumping, over the step. (Aren't screwdrivers a lot
bigger
than you would think when you hold one in your hand?) I squeaked with relief as the wire cutters came loose and fell away, hoping against hope that nothing else had fallen away with them.

Friday May 7
th
. Shortly after midnight
.

I was bundled into the back of a transit van by my rescuers, still tied to the chair and still naked. The doors slammed before I could ask what was going on and we sped off.

We rattled along the road a ways, taking a few turns at random, obviously attempting to throw off any pursuit. I heard the engine turned off and a few seconds later the back doors opened.

A man climbed into the back with me I regarded him upside down. He looked familiar… Yes! It was the policeman from the sewage works! The Scottish one.

I breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Thank God,' I said, ‘I was beginning to wonder who'd gotten hold of me this time. Can you untie me please? Bit chilly in the back here.'

‘No' just yet, Mr Rant. We'll need tae be away again in jist a jiffy. Ah jist wanted tae ask whit yae did wi' thi sootcase. Huv thu still goat it at the warehoose? Huv
you
goat it? We couldnae find it.'

‘No,' I said, ‘I've hidden it up my arse. Of course I don't have it. I hid it in the sewers by the sewage works. We can go and pick it up if you untie me.'

‘Jist tell me where—'

‘No. I have been tied naked to a chair for hours, beaten, humiliated, and then dragged out into the night with a screwdriver up me pongo. I'm saying nothing until you untie me and give me something to wear.'

He gazed at me thoughtfully for a second and then acquiesced. When I was free he watched, wincing, as I delicately pulled the tool from my tool. We both sighed with relief when I'd finished. Then he reluctantly handed me his overcoat.

‘I'll give it you back as soon as—'

‘Nae, laddie,' he said, looking a little bit nauseous, ‘You keep it.'

I noticed he was careful not to touch me as he loosened the ropes and handed the coat over. I didn't smell that bad, did I? Well, come to think of it, I did – but it was nothing compared to earlier.

‘Thank you,' I said, wholeheartedly. ‘Who are you?'

‘Name's Mallefant, Inspector Mallefant.

‘Pleased to meet you, Inspector,' I said, holding out my hand.

He gazed at it for a moment, then pulled out a pack of sterile wipes, slipped one from the packet and wrapped it around his own hand. Then he shook mine, looking uneasy.

‘Aye, nice tae make yer acquaintance, likesay.'

What a strange little man.

‘Come away up and sit in the front,' he said.

We climbed out of the van and walked to the passenger door. As I opened it I saw Ms Agent Smith sitting behind the wheel. I screamed. It was a manly, hero-who's-been-through-the-wars kind of scream, but a scream none the less.

‘Whisht, laddie,' hissed Mallefant. ‘They might still be in the area. Whit's up with you?'

‘It's…her!' I said, pointing. ‘She's…one of them!'

‘Aye, Ah ken that,' he said.

‘Well, arrest her!' I shouted.

‘Well, liking other lassies is no' a criminal offence these days. She cannae help the way she is.'

‘No,' I shout at him, ‘She's with them – the bad guys. Well, when I say the bad guys, they're kind of the good guys compared to the other bad guys, but they're still bad guys compared to likes of, say, you and me, though I admit I've done some things that might make other people think I'm a bit of a bad guy, but I'm sure if you let me explain then you'll understand I'm a good-ish kind of a guy. Unless...you're a not-quite-so-bad guy...and you're working with...the good...the bad...the...'

I could feel my voice, my body and my entire system of thought and logic giving up on me as the sentence faded away. I let out a strangled sob and sat down on the pavement.

‘Rant, calm down,' said Ms Agent Smith. ‘This man is a bona fide police officer and he's here to help us. I was trying to track down what was going down with Sam Smith and his cronies – I work for the Secret Service. And this man is my uncle Menzies. Menzies Mallefant. We're trying to help you. We are the good guys.'

‘The
good
good guys or the
bad
good guys?'

‘Rant, it doesn't matter right now. We're all you've got. Or we can leave you out here in a coat and nothing else and your wife and child will be dead by this evening.'

It was a fair point. Resignedly I climbed into the cab of the van. Mallefant climbed in after me, being careful to first lay down some antiseptic wipes on the seat, and making sure no part of him touched me as he sat down next to me. He kept his hand over his mouth the whole time. Some people are just plain rude, don't you think?

I directed them to the manhole cover I'd escaped from and Ms Agent Smith climbed down and up in no time, carrying the suitcase and my gun as though they weighed nothing. She didn't even break a sweat or wince at the smell that came off the suitcase. It must be a lesbian thing; my eyes were watering even before she opened the rear doors and threw the case into the back of the van. And Mallefant looked like he wanted to run screaming into the night. He pulled out a paper face mask and slipped it on.

‘My place or yours?' said Ms Agent Smith.

‘My place is two hundred miles north of here,' I told her.

‘I wasn't talking to you,' she said to me. ‘Uncle?'

We both looked at him. What little we could see of his face was a mask of horror.

‘My place it is then,' she said.

For the rest of the journey I didn't bother to speak to him or answer his questions. The combination of the mask and the accent made it impossible to understand him. And Ms Agent Smith was too busy driving to talk, so I let myself slip into sleep.

When I woke up we were outside a very nice block of flats next to the river. Agent Smith grabbed the case and hustled me inside, with Mallefant bringing up the rear, watching the street in case we'd somehow been followed.

I was dead on my feet. Everything hurt. Even saying
ow
hurt. I was more hurt than a Newcastle fan when they were relegated out of the premiership and Sunderland stayed up. (Well, maybe not quite
that
hurt.)

‘Why don't you lie down?' Ms Agent Smith asked. ‘You look done in.'

I nodded and waddled off in search of a bedroom. At the door, I paused. ‘By the way, what happened to Agent Smith? The boy one. I saw him get shot at the sewage works.'

‘He took a round in the shoulder, but he's going to be fine. We got him to the hospital pretty quickly.'

‘Didn't they ask awkward questions?'

‘Took him to an Army hospital. They're used to that kind of thing.'

I supposed they were.

I went down a short corridor and found a bedroom, I think.
There was no bed in it so I just I lay down on the floor but, though I dozed on and off, I couldn't sleep. Every time I got close and could feel my battered and bruised body gratefully succumbing to unconsciousness I kept thinking about Anna, and I jerked awake, and my body was in no fit state to be jerking, if you see what I mean. Anna. How was I going to help her now? If Ms Agent Smith had turned against the others then we were out of the loop. Would Sam and Co. really care whether she lived or died? According to Barbu they were only in it for the money.

And if Barbu was lying then they were only in it for King and Country. Or whatever it was that Americans got into it for. President and State or something. Rock and Roll. Peanut butter and jelly... I jerked awake again. Whimpered.

I wished Anna was here.
Come back, Anna,
I thought,
even if it's only to kill me for the mess I've gotten us into. Come back and dead me, don't be dead.
Awake again. Ow.

The Romanians could be anywhere, and only they knew where the meet would be, and Sam had their contact details. Showaddywaddy, where are you now? I could phone their agent. I could phone my agent. I could phone Ms Agent Smith and she could come and get me…?

I jerked awake once more. It was only then that a thought occurred to me.

I got up and went back through into the living room, walking like the scarecrow in
The Wizard of Oz
. I found Ms Agent Smith and Mallefant bent over a laptop computer.

‘How did you know where I was?' I asked.

‘Transponder,' she said, still staring at the computer screen. It seemed to have them both transfixed.

‘Oh,' I said. ‘What's a transponder?'

‘Tiny radio,' she said distractedly, ‘I injected it into your arm last night at the safe house after I'd given you the painkiller. So we could keep tabs on you.'

‘You mean I've been chipped? Like a mangy dog?'

‘You said it.'

‘Isn't that an invasion of my human rights?' I screeched. Or probably squeaked. I didn't have the energy to screech.

‘Saved your life, didn't it?'

I couldn't argue with that. The issue of whether it had been worthwhile seemed a little less clear.

‘What are you looking at?' I asked, and went over to join them.

On the screen, two men and a woman were indulging in what I can only describe as a lewd act. Lewd and loud. Surely they couldn't be watching porn together, an uncle and niece? How disgusting was that? And the quality really wasn't that great. I debated whether to sneak out and pretend I hadn't seen anything when the action on screen got even more disturbing. And up close and personal.

‘Isn't that...' I couldn't finish my sentence, I was so distracted.

‘The principal undersecretary of the Health Minister, yes,' said Ms Agent Smith.

‘I was going to say “illegal”,' I managed to get out.

‘Believe me,' said Mallefant, his voice managing to convey both how appalled he was, and the undying admiration he felt for a man of such advanced years moving so gymnastically, ‘this is tame compared tae what's on most of these disks.'

‘Are these from Barbu?' I asked.

‘Aye, they are indeed,' said Mallefant.

‘So it was just about porn,' I said, sadly shaking my head. ‘And fairly low grade gonzo porn at that. What is the world coming to?'

‘This isnae just porn, laddie,' he said, smiling for the first time since I'd met him. ‘This is dynamite. Nah, no' even that. This is a bloody great atomic bomb that's goin' tae blow the kecks off this Government.'

I closed my eyes, almost too tired and definitely in too much pain to care.

‘Tell me,' I said.

So they told me. I didn't believe them. So they told me again. I still didn't believe them so they showed me. And believe me, dear reader, had I been wearing kecks at that point they would have been well and truly blown off.

‘Tell me more,' I said.

It went something like this.

Mr Barbu wanted to make money. Lots of money. He was planning to take over the governance of Romania, his adopted country and private bank, but in order to do this he needed lots and lots of capital.

His plan (and it was probably only the tip of the iceberg) was to get this money by buying all of the land, on which the Olympics would take place, for a song. Compulsory purchase orders for old, unusable land that nobody had wanted for decades. At rock-bottom prices.

How would a foreign national with no obvious stake in the Olympics manage to do this?
I hear you ask.

Well, in the good old fashioned way that politicians and the well-to-do have achieved it since time immemorial. By blackmail and corruption.

What he had amassed, on the disks we now possessed, was incriminating footage of members of every department of Government, every police force in the land, every branch of the media – in short, everyone who had any power to naysay what he was attempting to do.

And he had let them know. And had let them know that there was more than one copy. All those hundreds of people in positions of power, caught in positions of weakness.

He had gathered his footage from highly encrypted sites within the CIA, MI5, MI6, the FBI, Interpol and the vaults of the late lamented
News of the World
. His minions had hacked into every one and made copies of every person of import who was ever caught on camera or on tape committing naughtiness.

But today the CIA, having distracted him by disrupting his little
gathering at the sewage works, had managed to hack him right back and
had stolen or corrupted every computer network that he had access to.

‘So we really are sitting on the only copies he had left?' I said, rubbing my hands with glee.

‘Well,' said Ms Agent Smith, ‘we're sitting on one half of it. Sam Smith has the other half.'

‘But,' I continued, ‘just think what we could do with this. We could get the government, the police, to mobilise everything they've got to find my wife.'

I resisted the urge to add that we could make ourselves rich beyond our wildest dreams. I was using the “noble” motivation for my character and I think it went across rather well. My audience was moved.

‘Well, laddie,' said Mallefant, sadly, ‘Ah'm afraid we cannae dae that. Much as Ah'd like tae see some of they numpties brought low, we've the national interest tae think of, ken? This hes tae stay between us. Naebody can know.'

‘But,' I whimpered, ‘Anna...'

‘We've still a chance to get to Anna,' said Ms Agent Smith, consolingly. ‘Sam doesn't know I'm working for someone else. He thinks I'm on their side still. I'll let him know that I've captured you and other suitcase. I'll tell him we're in on the deal and we'll arrange to go to the meeting – as far as I know he still intends to sell his half to the Romanians. That way we'll get everyone who knows about this in one fell swoop.'

‘And if Sam doesn't go for it?' I asked.

‘Then we follow the transponder I put in Joshua's chair.'