Onward and Upward

Chapter 9

  When I heard over my phone that the situation was under control I was both elated and saddened at the outcome, then I got a surprise. ‘Boss’ Charlie asked ‘can I ask you for a favour, please don’t inform either the Chief of Police or the local police hereabouts just yet.’ Harry had an inkling of what was going on but kept his mouth shut, and when the Black Hawks finally lifted off from the stud farm I thought it was virtually over, but then the lead pilot told us that Charlie, with Agnetha had been left behind, so we continued to wait, and eventually Charlie rang me again on my direct number

  ‘Could he have a word with Harry and me in private’? By now he was on the other side of the valley from the stud farm, and had just watched the local police enter it and release Francesca and her companions; he had given them an anonymous tip off that shots had been heard coming from the farm. ‘Harry, do you know of any discreet undertakers’ he continued, ‘I need Agnetha to be properly cremated so that her parents can have something to mourn’, and then went on to explain why he would not be returning to me, ever, and why money was now not going to be a problem for him, fortunately not in too much detail (plausible deniability), although perhaps he could contact Harry in the future to discuss similar situations’. He was now outside the law, but he didn’t consider himself to be a criminal in the accepted sense of the word, perhaps he could be ‘useful to him’; then he related what El Gordo had told him.

  From the comfort of his local bar a doctor with a shiny red nose certified that Agnetha had died from injuries received in a road traffic accident, he thought it would be a terrible waste of drinking time to actually view her body, and so that evening, after sitting alone through Agnetha’s ‘after hours’ cremation service (Agnetha’s religion apparently stated that her funeral should take place as soon as possible after death, usually immediately following a $50,000 cash donation to the charity of the undertakers choice) Charlie sat in an obscure motel room, on the road to nowhere in particular. He played back the audio side of the recording that he had made, noting down the instructions and then scoured the Pencils computer. On the way to the motel he had stopped twice, once for a change of clothes and then at a late night multi Media store to purchase a laser printer and fax machine. Just after two o’clock in the morning his new fax machine started earning its keep, and three hours later I rang the Chief of Police’s home number (courtesy of Harry) and woke him up.

  ‘Good morning Chief, I hope I haven’t woken you up, I just thought that you should know that Caroline and Agnetha have both turned up safe and well, it was joy riders. I have spoken to their parents and all’s well that ends well’.

  Now that did wake him up.

  Two days later, just before the Lady S was about to set sail, I held a press conference, well it was a press conference to the press, but to the Chief of Police and three of his senior staff it was a ‘free lunch’. At first he politely refused, he had heard what had happened to El Gordo and didn’t believe one little bit the story about ‘rival drug gangs’ that was doing the rounds, but when I told him that he would be seated between the Governor and the Mayor his sense of fear left him; just think of the photo opportunity.

  First off, before the press con.... sorry the lunch, it was drinky poo’s time and Chiefy thought it was a bit odd that the Governor, the Mayor, the Attorney General, the Head of Internal Affairs and some of his Officers didn’t seem at all that happy to see him, as he, his Deputy, the Head of Traffic and the Head of the Aviation Division strutted in.

  ‘Take a seat please’ I told them (mentally reminding myself to do a seat count later), and then when they were all seated (I had lied about him sitting between the Governor and the Mayor, it was between two Internal Affairs Officers, but I’d had my fingers crossed behind my back at the time so it wasn’t a real lie) I continued, ‘Remember what I said about holding you personally responsible for the safety of Caroline and Agnetha’ I said.

  ‘Yes’ he muttered ‘but what’s the problem, you told me yourself that they are both safe and well.

  ‘I lied’, I said, and suddenly the room was full of deaf people.

  I slid four envelopes across the table and instructed them to open them, and after reading what was enclosed within for a few minutes, his three colleagues very carefully, using fingertips only, removed their weapons and laid them on the table, accompanied a few seconds later by their shields. They then slowly stood up, were handcuffed and led away, then the chief (I purposefully used a lower case c) asked what I had in store for him.

  ‘First off’ interrupted the Head of Internal Affairs, ‘Weapon and shield on the table - now’.

  Slowly the soon to be ex-chief of police opened his jacket, ‘I employ other people to carry the guns’, and then he removed his shield from his belt and placed it on the table.

  The Governor then stood and took over, ‘If I may Mr Michaels, first off everything that has gone on in this room is ‘off the record’, right’, and everyone nodded, so he continued. ‘Mr Michaels has brought certain information to my attention that cannot be overlooked, but he has requested that these proceeding take place here on the Lady S for, as he freely admits, his own personal gratification - before he provides the hard evidence, and in the circumstances I believe that it is a reasonable request’, and then he continued. ‘Mr Stumpen (no wonder he liked ‘Chief’ better), the dismissal of your senior officers can be disguised in the short term as routine administrative re-assignments, but unfortunately your removal cannot come under that heading. To save your family any short term embarrassment Mr Michaels has agreed that you may publicly resign, although of course you will be under arrest as you do this. Do you agree to this?’

  Twenty minutes later ex-Chief Stumpen, totally humiliated at the news conference (the press had not believed a word that he said) walked down the Lady S’s gangway ‘accompanied’ by two IAD Officers. As he walked towards the marina exit (for some obscure reason the IAD cars had had to park outside the marina as the half empty car park inside was apparently full) he stopped, turned, and looked up in my direction - then before anyone could react he bent down, pulled a small back-up ‘piece’ from an ankle holster placed the barrel in his mouth and pulled the trigger. The calibre of the revolver was so small that the bullet did not have the velocity to exit the back of his skull, it just rattled around inside for a while, but it still had the desired effect.

  As I looked on I couldn’t work up any sorrow for the man, shock yes but not sorrow, then I looked in the direction of marina main entrance, just in time to see an SUV, with heavily tinted windows and dirty, unreadable plates, pull away into the traffic. When I had said to Charlie over the phone that I owed him my life, twice over, and if there was absolutely anything that I could do for him, just ask, he asked - but ex-Chief of Police Stumpen’s small calibre revolver had just saved him the job.

  The excitement sort of went out of my holiday after that, Sir Richard B and David C would just have to wait a little longer for the honour of my company, and so the next day Teddy came to collect me; I just wasn’t in the mood to socialise, or cheerfully wave back at the crowds when I was out in public. What I was in dire need of was a bit of Hunter therapy.

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