The captain stuffed the cash into his coat pocket and barked orders in Spanish at his crewmen. ‘We will be on the water in ten minutes. Please make yourselves comfortable’. The Spaniard ushered the crew towards their accommodation. ‘We will eat together later. Paella. I have excellent wine, also’.
Eddie heard the low rumble of the boat’s engines starting up and looked back towards the external door behind him as one sailor closed it.
‘How long until I see England again?’ he wondered.
Chapter Eighteen
The Victors Return
It took over two full days before the boat arrived back in its home harbour of Vigo at three o’clock in the morning. Xavier, the captain, received the rest of his money and another stern reminder as to the necessity to keep quiet.
‘I provide many things to many people, gentlemen,’ said the Spaniard. ‘But in my world, discretion is the most valuable commodity of all. You need have no concerns about me or my crew,’ the man had told them. ‘Hasta proxima, Charlie’.
‘Next time, we’re gettin’ on a plane,’ said Mike as walked down the gangway. ‘I’m goin’ to stink of poxy fish for a month’.
‘I told you before, there ain’t going to be a next time,’ Charlie had replied.
The crew returned to their vehicles, where Charlie handed Mike one of the cases of diamonds.
‘Best we split them up. Just in case we get stopped,’ said Charlie. ‘Stick it under a seat or something’.
‘Don’t worry. I ain’t lettin’ this beauty outta my sight,’ said Mike.
‘We meet back up at the bar tonight. Let’s say, ten o’clock, okay? Drinks are all on me’.
‘You might regret sayin’ that, Charlie,’ said Roger.
Charlie grinned. ‘Oh, I intend to hide the quality stuff first’. He shifted to face Roger and in a stern tone said, ‘Now, don’t be getting all sentimental about that motor. Take it to the yard and get it crushed’.
Roger glanced towards the Ford Granada and sighed. ‘That’s gonna kill me, Charlie. But yeah’.
‘You make sure you see it done. Don’t trust them gypo fuckers. You got it?’
‘Yeah, Charlie. I got it,’ said Roger.
‘See you in Marbella,’ said Charlie as he walked over to the Vauxhall, climbed into the passenger seat and lit up a cigarette.
Eddie turned back to Roger and Mike. ‘Guess I’m driving first then’.
The brothers made the long drive south to the Costa del Sol, taking turns with the driving. The temperature had peaked in the mid-thirties at six o’clock, and they were both exhausted by the time they arrived back at the roadside service station near Marbella to collect Charlie’s Porsche.
They retrieved their bags from the boot of the Vauxhall - it’s weary engine still ticking from the lengthy journey - and wandered into the cafe where they found the carwash owner propped up on the bar, fast asleep. Charlie kicked his stool, and he jolted awake.
‘Hard day?’
The man rubbed his eyes and swivelled towards Charlie. ‘I hooked up with one of my ex’s in a bar in Banús. I’d have been happy with a quick shag, but she wanted to go all bleeding’ night. I’m knackered’.
Charlie laughed and slapped the man on his back. ‘You’re getting too old to party all night, mate,’ said Charlie as he placed the keys to the gold Vauxhall on the bar. ‘What are you goin’ to do with it?’ he asked the man who was still rubbing his weary eyes.
‘I’ll take it up into the hills. There’s an old quarry up there. Nobody has used it for decades and the water is very deep. Nobody will find it there’.
‘Perfect,’ said Charlie as he cast his eyes around the bar. He reached into his pocket for his wallet and pulled out a wad of banknotes. ‘Here you are. Don’t suppose you gave me motor a wash, did you?’
‘Of course, I did it myself’. He handed Charlie the keys to his Porsche. ‘She is around the back, out of sight’.
‘Good man,’ said Charlie. ‘Pop into the bar some time and say hello. Bring your ex as well. She sounds fun’.
The man waved, before resting his head back down on the bar.
The Lawsons made their way back to Marbella and to Charlie’s bar, where he parked the German car in his private space. Eddie glanced at his watch. It was a quarter to nine. The last vestiges of the day were disappearing over the horizon to the west.
As he got out of the car, Eddie noticed a familiar red Ferrari lower down the hill. He nudged Charlie on his arm.
‘That’s Mike’s motor. He’s here early’.
Charlie peered at the red car. ‘Yeah,’ said Charlie. ‘And that’s Roger’s Jag just behind it’. He scratched at his several-days-old stubble.
‘Do you think something’s up?’ said Eddie.
Charlie looked up at the bar entrance. ‘Let’s find out’. Charlie locked the Porsche before striding up the steps to the entrance to the bar.
The bar manager approached Charlie as he entered. ‘Nice to see you back, boss,’ he said.
‘Nice to be back, Barry. Are the lads here already?’
‘Yeah. They’ve been waiting for a while now’.
Charlie scratched at his chin again. ‘Bring me and Ed a cold one, would you?’
The bar manager nodded and walked back to the bar.
‘Let’s see what’s up,’ said Charlie.
They made their way into the glazed room where Mike and Roger sat amidst several empty pint glasses. Roger’s head was in his hands. Mike was leaning back on a chair, gazing at the floor with a smouldering cigarette between his fingers.
‘Wasn’t expecting you boys already,’ said Charlie as he opened the door. Mike twisted his head to face Charlie and Eddie.
‘Show ’em, Rog,’ he said. Roger puffed out his cheeks and stood up. He was holding a newspaper, the News Of The World, which he opened and laid down on the table.
‘We’ve got a fuckin’ problem,’ said Roger.
The statement was unnecessary, the newspaper’s headline said it all; “Murdered at dawn”. An aerial photograph of the United Security depot sat underneath the large, bold type.
Eddie stepped forward to read the article which reported that armed robbers had shot a security guard at a security depot near London’s Heathrow Airport. He read the next line aloud. ‘It says, “Doctors battled for several hours to save the man’s life but to no avail”. Shit. Angus died’.
‘We’ll be wanted for murder now,’ said Roger. He sighed and sat back down.
‘Fucking Pickering,’ said Mike. ‘He’s dropped us all in it’.
‘Hold your horses there, boys,’ said Charlie. ‘Does the paper say anything about who they think did it’. Roger and Mike remained quiet. ‘Well, does it or doesn’t it?’ said Charlie. He reached across and picked up the paper. He examined the story for a few moments before flinging the newspaper back onto the wooden surface. ‘No, it don’t. It just says “masked assailants”. They ain’t got nuffin’ on us’.
‘The fuzz ain’t gonna let this lie, Charlie,’ said Roger.
‘We was careful. They don’t know we even in the country. There ain’t no way they can link this to us’.
‘What about Metcalf? He knows we were up to something,’ said Eddie.
‘Metcalf ain’t even a copper no more. He ain’t got a fuckin’ clue. No bugger’s gonna listen to him at Scotland Yard’.
‘I dunno, bruv. He seemed very intent on putting you lot behind bars when I spoke to him’.
‘Maybe we should do him in as well?’ said Mike.
‘What? You wanna stiff a bleeding copper now?’ said Eddie.
‘But he ain’t a copper no more, is he?’ said Mike.
‘Are you hearing yourself, Mikey?’ said Roger.
Charlie slammed his fist on the table. ‘For fuck’s sake, boys. Put a lid on it,’ he said, glancing at the crowded patio area outside. ‘There ain’t no crew better at this caper than us lot. We left no evidence, we was all masked, we all had gloves, and we burned everything afterwards
. Pickering and his crew know they need to keep schtum. Especially now’. He pulled up a chair and sat down next to Roger. ‘Besides, and believe me I don’t take no pleasure in sayin’ this, but Angus croaking…it’s kind of done us a favour, ain’t it?’
‘How do you figure that?’ said Eddie, hardly believing what he had just heard.
‘Coz, he was the inside man, weren’t he? The fuzz will be tryin’ to work out which of the guards was in on it. They always do, coz there always is an insider, ain’t there? Except they can’t find ours now’. Charlie put his hand on Roger’s shoulder. ‘The fuzz are gonna spend days…weeks, even, questioning the rest of them poor bastards that was there that morning, trying to make one of them crack. But we know that can’t happen’.
‘Coz our bloke’s dead,’ said Roger.
‘Sad, but true,’ said Charlie.
‘Seems Pickering did us a favour,’ said Mike.
How very convenient, thought Eddie. ‘I think you’re forgetting about Bill, though,’ he said.
Charlie removed his arm from Roger’s shoulder and sat back. ‘What about him?’
‘Well it ain’t rocket science, is it? Him getting nabbed the day before the job. That’s not good, is it? I mean, he turns up in London after several years hiding out down here. Him, a core member of the infamous Five Bullet crew, and the next day there’s a bleedin’ big robbery where some poor sod ends up with a bullet in his gut. It ain’t gonna take Sherlock flippin’ Holmes to join the dots up, is it?
Mike shifted in his chair, hands stuffed into the pockets of his cut-off jeans shorts. ‘The kid’s got a point,’ he said.
Charlie shook his head. ‘They ain’t got nuffin’ on Bill. Him getting nabbed could be a blessing as well’.
‘How’s that exactly?’ said Eddie.
‘Well, there ain’t no better alibi than being cooped up in a police cell at the time of the robbery, is there?’ He stood up. ‘Think about it. He’s only nipped back home to Blighty, to see his old dear. She’s been ill for a while now, ain’t she Mikey?’ He glanced at Mike, who nodded.
‘Yeah. Throat cancer, I think’.
‘There you go. Throat cancer. Old Mrs Taylor is poorly and wants to see her son before she carks it. She lives in Shepherd’s Bush, which ain’t that far from where we stopped over. Bill made his way to London to see her. He’s stopped to pick up a battered sausage and chips on his way, got recognised and ends up in the back of a jam sandwich’. He pointed to the newspaper. ‘The next day, a bunch of unknown assailants do a job over near Heathrow’. He took a swig from a half-empty glass of beer on the table.
‘But he’s still in the nick, ain’t he?’ said Roger.
‘If they have anything on him from the previous jobs, it’s circumstantial. They might try to get him to incriminate himself, but Bill ain’t daft. You know him as well as I do, he’s been in this situation a dozen times. He won’t give them nuffin. They’ve got no evidence to link him to the crime. Not this job, nor none of the others. He knows it’. He picked up the newspaper and crumpled it up in his hands. ‘We did it, boys. We got the job done, we got the stones and now we’re back in the sun. So relax’. He patted Roger on the back and stood up. ‘Now, where’s my sodding beer?’
Just at that moment, Barry arrived at the glass door, a tray with four fresh pints of beer on it. Charlie beckoned him to enter.
‘About flippin’ time. I’m dying of thirst here, Baz’.
‘Sorry, boss. I had to change the barrel. We’ve been rushed off our feet all week. We’ll need to get an extra order in or we’re going to run out’.
‘Well, in that case, stop serving these freeloaders and go make me some money’.
‘Yes boss,’ said the barman as he placed the glasses down and walked back out of the room, closing the door behind him.
Charlie picked up his pint glass and signalled to the others to do likewise. ‘We got the job done. Business is going well, and pretty soon we’ll have the cash to make all our problems go away’. He took a slow drink of the beer, downing half of the pint. ‘Trust me, fellas, this time next year, you’ll have forgotten about all of this,’ he said as he wiped his mouth with his arm. ‘You’ll be in fancy new villas, counting your Ferraris and wondering what all the fuss was about’.
‘I’ll drink to that,’ said Mike, holding up his glass.
‘Which means…,’ said Charlie before taking another swig of beer, ‘that I can count on you all to chip in to the property project, right?’
‘How much did you need from us, Charlie?’ said Roger.
‘Two hundred and fifty thousand,’ said Charlie.
Roger peered at Mike, seemingly seeking his friend’s direction. Mike stood up and raised his glass in a salute to Charlie. ‘I’m in’.
‘Me too,’ said Roger.
Charlie grinned and raised his glass in response. ‘Good stuff, lads. You won’t regret it. I promise’. Roger and Mike lifted their glasses to their mouths and started to drink. ‘But, there’s just one more thing,’ said Charlie. ‘We need to sort out Kenny too. He needs to get his cut on the job’.
Eddie saw Mike’s eyes bulge. The big man had clearly not been expecting to hear that. He lowered his pint glass and stared at Charlie in disbelief.
Roger, seemingly sensing an imminent confrontation, attempted to interject. ‘But Kenny wasn’t there, Charlie,’ he said.
‘He wasn’t there because Mikey messed him up,’ said Charlie, looking directly at Mike. ‘And over an argument over a poxy dinghy’.
‘It was a yacht,’ snarled Mike.
‘It don’t matter what kind of boat it was. You fucked him up for no good reason’.
‘He broke our agreement’.
‘Someone else offered him a lot more,’ said Charlie.
‘That ain’t the point’.
‘No, it ain’t. The point is that for us all to survive down here, we need to stick together. Not fall out over a bleeding’ row boat’.
‘It was a yacht,’ repeated Mike. Charlie walked towards Mike and placed his pint glass on the table.
‘Listen, Kenny wanted to come on this job, but it was me what wouldn’t let him. He wanted to do his bit, but he couldn’t even see properly. His face was a mess, and he needed to stay behind. You fucked him up, Mikey. Badly. Maybe he should have stuck to your deal, I get it. But you overreacted, admit it’. Mike still was not meeting Charlie’s stare. ‘Look at me you ugly old fucker,’ said Charlie, laughing. He put his hands on Mike’s cheeks and moved even closer. Their faces were barely an inch apart now. ‘We’re a team, we look after each other. We’ve been through far too much shit to lose it over a…yacht, ain’t we?’
Mike nodded. ‘I suppose,’ he muttered.
‘Good. So c’mon, we share it out equally,’ said Charlie. ‘Like we’ve always done’. He picked up his pint glass and finished the remaining lager. ‘Right, I’m dead on me feet. I’m going home. But tomorrow, we celebrate. I’ll get us a table at Da Vinci’s in Puente Romano. Let’s show all them fuckers out there what we’re about’. Charlie took a step back and, to everyone’s amusement, attempted a John Travolta dance move. They all laughed. ‘I’ve still got it,’ said Charlie.
‘In your dreams,’ said Roger.
Chapter Nineteen
Keeping Up Appearances
Eddie awoke. His throat was parched and the roof of his mouth felt as if covered with a slippery plastic sheen. He swallowed several times to stimulate some saliva and reached over to pick up his wristwatch he had left on the bedside cabinet the previous night. He rubbed his eyes in disbelief when he saw the time - it was three o’clock in the afternoon. A collage of strange memories collided in his head - the fishing trawler, the skanky digs that the crew had used in Kilburn, and the dilapidated factory where he had been hiding as the robbery had taken place. He remembered the meeting at Charlie’s bar the previous evening, and the unwelcome news that the security guard had died.
He rubbed his eyes and sat up. Music was emanati
ng from downstairs. He clambered out of bed, picked up the crumpled tee-shirt from the floor, put it on and made his way downstairs.
He found Charlie reclined on a sun lounger near the pool, a large glass and a bottle of Gordon’s Gin on the floor next to him. His brother was fast asleep despite a large silver portable stereo on the floor next to him which was playing a Neil Diamond song. He was snoring. He was also completely naked.
‘Ahem,’ said Eddie, but his brother remained comatose. Eddie tried again, ‘Oi, bruv. You look like a sleeping walrus. Wake up’. Still nothing. Eddie picked up the pint glass at Charlie’s side. ‘Jesus, who drinks gin by the pint?’ he thought. The glass was half full and contained the shrunken remnants of several ice cubes. Eddie chuckled as he poured the cold liquid over his brother’s midriff, an action which worked precisely as Eddie had expected; Charlie shrieking like an angry choir boy who had been bitten by a small dog.
He jolted himself up into a sitting position while simultaneously throwing his hands upon his manhood. It was the funniest thing Eddie had seen for months, and he roared with laughter.
‘What the…fucking fuck?’ Charlie yelped. He glared up at his younger sibling with extreme annoyance. ‘You wanker. What did yer do that for?’
Eddie struggled to respond. He was bent double with laughter, tears in his eyes. ‘Coz…it…was…funny,’ he replied. ‘Very…fucking funny’.
Charlie leapt up. He appeared about ready to charge at Eddie but then relaxed, a broad grin breaking out across his unshaven face before he too laughed. ‘Yeah, I suppose it was,’ he said. ‘You’re still a wanker though’. He picked up a pair of swimming trunks from the floor, stepped into them and yanked them up. ‘Had a good kip, did yer? You was gone with the fairies when I checked on you earlier’.
Eddie wiped the tears from his eyes and stood up straight. ‘Yeah, I ain’t never slept like that before. I must have needed it,’ he said.
‘We both did,’ said Charlie.
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