Bungay dreaded calls like this one. It wasn’t the first he had had and he knew with a positive certainty that it wouldn’t be the last. Sometimes he would lie awake at night, his pyjamas drenched in a cold sweat, praying that the phone wouldn’t ring.
“Good evening, Mr. Bungay. This is Tommy Windsor from Mr. Bellini’s office. I’m sorry to disturb you so late in the evening but I need to ask for your assistance.” Tommy’s voice was matter of fact and almost ingratiating. He sounded to Bungay like a latter day Uriah Heep, but he knew that this was no more than a veneer. Whatever was wanted, he would have to comply. He had no choice. He knew from past experience that it was a foolish move to fail to comply with any of Mr. Bellini’s ‘requests’. He looked down at the gnarled stump which used to be the little finger of his left hand to prove it. The mental scars were worse.
“What can I do for you, Mr. Windsor?” He did his best to control the tension and fear in his voice but he singularly failed.
“We have a package, two in fact. Material that has become surplus to our requirements. We need to dispose of the discreetly, quickly. You understand?”
Bungay understood – he didn’t need to ask, he knew only too well what would be meant by ‘packages’. He certainly didn’t want to ask, for fear that he might be told.
“Our site at the Docks should be able to accommodate them, without too much difficulty.” Bungay tried to draw comfort from being as businesslike as possible, it was as if he was trying to detach himself from the reality of his situation. “The foundations of the first two units are ready. We can dispose of your ‘packages’ under the lower shuttering and I can arrange for a layer of concrete to be poured first thing in the morning.”
“First thing?” Tommy stressed the urgency. He didn’t need to.
“I think that would be wise, don’t you? What time would you like to meet me there?”
“About twelve.”
“Very well, Mr. Windsor. I’ll be there. I believe you know where the site is. I’ll attend to the security guard and I’ll leave the gate open for you.”
“Thank you very much. We’ll see you at twelve.”
Bungay hung up. He ran towards his toilet where he heaved and brought up a bellyful of bitter, sickening bile. Why the hell had he got involved in this? With gangsters? Real, bloody gangsters. Not Jimmy Cagney or Edward G. Robinson, but hard, violent men. Men with no sense of morality. Men with guns. Men who were prepared to use them. Men who would kill you if you crossed them. His reason had been money, of course. What else could it have been? He hadn’t needed it, the firm was doing well enough and he had a comfortable house in the nicer part of Chigwell. But he had been greedy, he had wanted more. Also, he told himself, to assuage his conscience, it would have been hard to turn down Don Bellini. Even then, Bungay had known of his reputation. But now it was all getting too much for him. He lived a daily dread that someday, either metaphorically or literally, something, or worse, someone he’d buried would turn up. He’d have a hard job explaining a corpse and he was under no illusions about getting any support, any backup from Bellini. He could, would, he corrected himself, go to prison and he knew that he wouldn’t be able to cope with that. He had tried to talk to Mr. Bellini about retirement. He wouldn’t have done if he’d appreciated Bellini’s definition of the word. He hadn’t been well, he told him. The ulcer was playing up and he was getting too old to run the business. It was a young man’s world. Bellini would hear nothing of the sort, he had a good ten, fifteen even, years left in him. He told him how much he valued his experience and that evening Bungay had cried himself to sleep.
Now, he sat in his darkened car at the construction site. It was quiet apart from an incessant, dull drone from the motor works nearby. To his right, the Thames ran swiftly. Tonight it seemed to smell quite rancid which was, Bungay thought, perhaps more than a little fitting. In front of him, beyond the car factory, he imagined the old marshes stretching out, sweeping inexorably into greater Essex. In the old days, Bellini’s boys could have got rid of the bodies there. But that was many years past. Bungay had paid off the man from Premier Security Services with a hundred pounds stuffed into the top pocket of his uniform and he was told to have the night off. Bungay would be here, he had paperwork to do in the site office that would last well until the morning. The man took the money gratefully. He didn’t believe the story about the V.A.T. No, more likely he was playing away from home, he had a bird coming over while the wife was tucked up in bed. Dirty old bastard, he thought enviously as he collected his thermos flask and left.
Shortly after midnight, Tommy’s old white Ford Mondeo, with a dent in the driver’s door that he’d never bothered to get repaired, made its way cautiously along the duel carriageway, pulling off into a discretely marked side exit. He drove steadily, just within the speed limits. The last thing he wanted was to be pulled by a traffic cop now. At the second junction, he turned right at the ‘caution site traffic’ notice into the small unmarked lane, crossed the railway line, past the back of the old warehouses on his right. The buildings were looking their age now and they would soon be superseded by South Essex Construction’s gleaming high tech Technology Park that would, in ages past, have gloried under the title of Trading Estate. Tommy slowed as he reached the site’s makeshift gates and Nate, who everyone still jokingly referred to as ‘the boy’ although he was now twenty two and as hard as nails, hopped out of the passenger’s seat and pulled the gates wide, closing them again as soon as Tommy had passed through. He paused to allow Nate to get back into the car.
Bungay flashed his lights twice to identify his position and Tommy drew up and parked beside him. The three men got out of their cars and Bungay offered his hand.
“Good evening Mr. Windsor, Mr. Carroll. I see you found us alright.” Bungay had met both men before and was trying desperately to show that he was not afraid of either them or the business at hand. He was none too successful. Nate couldn’t remember the last time anyone had called him Mr. Carroll and looked around instinctively for his father. “Shall we get down to the business then? I don’t want to detain you gentlemen any longer than necessary.”
“Let’s do it.”
The dug foundations of the industrial unit they were currently working on were cordoned off. It looked uncomfortably like a police crime scene to Tommy. He didn’t like the thought and he immediately banished it.
“There’s wooden shuttering on the floor. It’s only loosely laid. If you lift some of it and dig down a little way, that should be good enough. I’ve put a ladder there for you, and a couple of spades.”
Both men had come sensibly dressed for manual work, jeans, boots and old sweaters but Nate couldn’t resist a dig at the suited Bungay.
“Aren’t you going to help?” He knew he wouldn’t, Bungay was way too fat, his jacket stretched to meet across the vast expanse of his belly, the product of too many business lunches, wining and dining and of too few rounds of golf. That was the world he belonged to, not this. This was sordid. It was contemptible to him and it should have been beneath him. If there was any justice in the world. Had he helped with the heavy work he would have probably had a heart attack from a combination of exertion, repulsion and fear.
“I’m afraid I can’t. Doctor’s orders. I’ve got a weak back. No heavy lifting. Nothing.” Lies, of course. There was no way he was going to get involved with this. And he certainly wasn’t going to touch any corpse, get his finger prints all over it, get roped into murder. He shivered with a sudden cold chill as if someone had walked over his grave.
“Let’s get to it, Nate” Tommy had no time now for banter or witty repartee. The ground was hard and despite the chill they had both built up quite a sweat before they had gone down far enough to comfortably take two bodies. The two reluctant gravediggers dissipated the displaced earth, to make it look as natural as possible before climbing from the nether regions back up the ladder to the upper world.
“Thirsty work that. Have you got anything to drin
k?” Nate asked Bungay, who simply shook his head in reply as Tommy fumbled for his keys, and still breathless from his exertions, opened the boot. It was a tight fit. Thank God that Tommy had had the foresight to roll Asif and Salim Malek as best he could into rough approximations of the foetal position before rigor mortis had set in. Otherwise he would have had to cut their legs off – or heads – and he had no stomach for that. It wasn’t easy getting a purchase on the thick black plastic sheeting taped tightly around the corpses and Tommy’s hands, still damp with the sweat of his work, slipped as one of the bodies, Salim he thought, was being raised over the rim of the boot and it fell to the floor with a heavy thud.
“Christ, he’s heavy for a little bastard” said Nate as he and Tommy picked him up once more and unceremoniously threw Salim Malek into the pit of the foundations, as close as possible to the shallow grave. Asif followed and with the jolt of his landing heavily on top of his brother, the thick polythene split revealing his sad, pathetic head, a look of eternal surprise and complete disbelief would remain on his dead face until the worms, maggots and the inexorable process of decay removed it forever. This was too much for Bungay. He had been able to cope with it as an abstract concept before but now, suddenly, it had become all too real. This was a real man. Flesh and blood, like him. Some poor bugger who’d crossed these evil, mad bastards and had paid the price. He retched violently and vomited with a violence that wracked his stomach and sent his entire body into an involuntary spasm of panic.
Bungay couldn’t watch as he Nate and Tommy laid the Malek twins to rest and battened down their coffin lids of cheap wooded shuttering. Nate took both the spades and, following him up, Tommy raised the ladder.
“Tomorrow morning, then, this’ll be filled?” He sought another confirmation.
“By eight o’clock Mr. Windsor.” It would take wild horses to prevent Bungay leaving it any later than that. “I’ll be staying here tonight. Just to make sure that nothing is disturbed.”
“Wise move. You’ll call me in the morning? As soon as it’s done?” Bungay nodded in assent. He too was sweating now, though not through exertion. His was the painful sweat of abject fear. “You’ve got my mobile number.” Tommy knew that he had and Bungay accompanied them to the gate, as much to make sure that they really gone as to lock up behind them. Then this nightmare could finally come to an end. Finally.
“Call me tomorrow.” Tommy re-emphasized his final instruction.
“Thanks for your help. See you soon,” Nate said with a smile and a little wave out of the passenger window, fully realizing that these words would cut Bungay more deeply than the sharpest knife. The Mondeo drove off into the pitch, embracing blackness of the night. Tomorrow Tommy would have the car valeted, steam cleaned, to remove all but the tiniest trace of its fatal cargo. Bungay wrapped the thick chain tightly around the gates and fitted the enormous padlock that even bolt croppers could not eat into. He pulled it, hard, to make sure that it was firm, and then pulled it again.
He was dejected as he walked to the site office. His head hung down plaintively and he felt defeated. See you soon, the little bastard had said. See you soon. Bungay had no doubt that he meant it.
Chapter Five
Despite his refusal to admit it to himself, the heroin, was a significant contributory factor in Bellini’s decline. It had to be. Such drugs have their place in an ordered world. As diamorphine its on the side of the angels, prescribed to ease the pain and passing of the hopeless and hopeful alike. In its other forms, it is something altogether more insidious. Creeping and caressing. Softly taking the soul to oblivion, its grip tightening and tightening until it possesses it completely. In the past, Bellini had never touched the stuff. The thought of doing so had been abhorrent to him. In spite of the vast revenues they brought him, he had, in fact, always despised his customers. He had looked down on them from the very height of the certainty of the ivory tower of his personal moral rectitude. They were weak people; they had no respect for themselves or anyone else. He hadn’t even been able to imagine losing control of himself. Just once, he had tried pot whilst at university. He vaguely remembered giggling helplessly like a pre-pubescent schoolgirl at the trivia of existence, feeling fuzzy as everything around him grew increasingly surreal. He made up his mind then and there that it wasn’t for him. He hated the warm passiveness of the experience but he was sure as hell glad that so many others embraced it so readily. Karl Marx had said that religion was the opium of the masses, but long ago, it had lost its place to T.V., he thought. Now, thanks to the regular, cheap supply of entrepreneurs like his dear father, opium was the opium of the masses. Or shit like this. And crack. And smack. Bellini thanked God for free enterprise, for the capitalist state and for the blessed virgin Margaret Thatcher. He had no illusions about his father’s trade. It was never hidden at home even when he had been very young, although it was never really openly advertised either. He knew his old man would be furious if he had ever found out about his experiment with the weed but thankfully he never did. Pander to your customers, that was his father’s philosophy. Cater for their every need. Grow rich off their addictions, feed like leeches off their despair and misery. Bleed them dry like a vampire bat, if you can. And usually you can. But never, on no account, never ever become like them. Never emulate them. They’re not real people. Not like us. They’re something less than human. They’re not worthy, not deserving of the good things in life. All they can hope for is a brief seductive kiss that only temporarily numbs the pain that is an inevitable by product of their pathetic little existences.
He was sitting alone now in his office of the Mount of Venus, reflecting. Thinking about his father which was something he often did. He would have hated all this. Stupid little man. Try as he might, Bellini could not even remember how his drug habit had begun, let alone why. Was it the pressure? The stress? Was it curiosity? Or just the fact that it was there that day – it couldn’t have been more three months ago, could it? – locked in his immense safe, safely recessed deep into the concrete floor of his office, waiting for distribution by men like the Maleks? He tried to blame his wife. That seemed to fit. Most things had been her fault, especially since she had packed her bags a couple of weeks before, not long after he killed the Malek twins. She had led the kids by the hand to the Jeep Grand Status Symbol that they all looked far too small for, and after spouting an un-necessary tirade of vitriol and abuse at him had sped off into the night to her mother’s. She could stay there for ever for all he cared. What the bloody hell was the matter with him? she’d said. He hadn’t just changed, he’d metamorphosized into a monster. Did he have any idea what he turned into? Frankie bloody Doyle, that’s what. Didn’t they see it at work? Why didn’t they tell him? She couldn’t stomach it any more, all these ranting and raving. He was more like a ravenous beast than a rational man. All for no reason. And then there were the arguments. Over nothing. But this had been the last straw. He’d never raise his hand to her again, she swore. He’d never bloody see her again. Or the kids.
They were lucky. They got out just in time.
His first instinct was to be relieved that they had gone. He didn’t need all that shit and it was becoming increasingly difficult to hide the track marks of his hypodermic needles from them. He could no longer wear polo shirts and had even taken to wearing pyjamas in bed for the first time since he was eleven. On one occasion he’d even tried to inject directly into his thigh to make it less conspicuous but he hadn’t been able to raise a vein. He wasn’t an addict, though. It was just recreational, that’s what they call it. His first hit had been so beautiful. It was warm and caressing and touched him in ways that he had never even been able to imagine before. Then came the euphoria. The euphoria grew into ecstasy and the ecstasy into pure 24 carat gold, angelic bliss. For a moment he could do anything, travel anywhere, become anyone. Jesus Christ! No-one had told him it felt like this. Even coming down wasn’t too bad. Nothing like as bad as he had heard or expected. He remembered worse hang
overs as a teenager although now he had been tea total for years. Still this was definitely a one off. Just an experiment to touch the experience. He wouldn’t ever go there again. Never. That would be bad for business. Well maybe just one more time – why not? His good intentions had lasted a week. Nearly. And then he was on the rocky road to his own personal heaven and hell. His usage grew with frightening rapidity as his dependency developed. By this time, he was taking a hit every day. At least once a day. And the doses he took were growing ever larger as his body built up a tolerance and the highs seemed a little lower with each successive hit. What had been a seductive and inviting experience had now become demanding and insisting. Just as the highs weren’t so high anymore, so the downs were worse too. Darker, deeper, blacker, more despairing and demanding. Lasting longer. In a strange way he sort of enjoyed that too. He thought, it was only when he was coming down, that he could truly see himself for what he was. He could see with a sharp twenty twenty acuity of vision, accentuated by the actual physical pain he felt, that was not present in the blurry unreality of his drug induced Nirvana. He wasn’t an addict though. He still wouldn’t accept that. He knew it for sure. Addicts were the scum suckers who lived in shitty little squats and had to whore themselves or nick money from their mothers’ purses for their hits. He wasn’t like that. Unlike most heroin users, Bellini had no problem with supply. He controlled the supply. He was the supply.
Lost in Shadows Page 6