‘Can we kill Barney?’ I asked.
“Are you serious?’ said Rich.
‘I’m just trying to come up with options that don’t involve me spending time in Brixton Prison, or worse.’
‘Worse?’
‘You know? Actually living in Brixton…’ Rich smiled, but his heart wasn’t in it and besides it wasn’t that good a joke. Getting Barney bumped off was definitely something that had flitted across my mind.
Another idea that raced across my thought horizon was the idea of somehow getting Barney to go to prison, but I could not think of any way we could make that possible unless we could make him commit some gross episode of violence against one or both of us. I had seen people fitted up for things in the movies but I always thought that the police, on the whole, were better than that and could spot a fit up a mile off.
What also dissuaded me from this fiendishly bad plan was the fact that a man like Barney – I assumed – was connected in a geezer like way to the entire London underworld and could arrange to have deviously painful things done to us with previously benign looking objects (because of the lack of openly available firearms I assume that London gangsters have to get creative with household items). All this could be done, of course, from the lavish expanse of his jail cell and one simple chess move in the exercise yard could signify a kneecap here or an eyeball there.
So the idea that I had settled upon was hiring a hitman, but my big stumbling block on this idea was that they’re not exactly listed in the yellow pages. In order to get around this obstacle we would need to find one by other means, which meant asking around. But where? I figured that Rich might know some dodgy characters and we could start there but this raised the issue that if Rich knew them then Barney would know them as well.
So, I got lateral on the problem. The Pakistani and Indian communities in London are pretty alien, I imagine, to Barney and his world. They are also another community that use hit men, but to undertake honor killings. All we needed to do was find an Indian or Pakistani hit man and we would be sorted.
I explained my thought process to Rich.
‘That is quite possibly the most deranged idea I have ever heard you come up with,’ he just looked at me, ‘Indian hit men? Where the fuck do you get this shit come from?’
‘Have you got a better idea?’ I asked. He just shook his head and poured us another couple of slugs of whiskey.
‘We could do it ourselves,’ said Rich, without looking at me.
‘I have honestly considered it, but I just don’t think I could pull the trigger, even on a wanker like Barney Gibbons.’
‘You looked like you could have done him earlier.’
‘Rush of blood to the head,’ I said waving Rich away, ‘I was angry.’
‘You could do it in hot blood, you mean?’ asked Rich.
‘I don’t know…but I can’t exactly start asking Barney to start dissing our mum hoping to get me riled enough to shoot him.’
We sat in silence, the booze starting to take an edge off the events this evening. My neck had stopped hurting completely and I was - strangely – looking forward to seeing what kind of scar I was going to get. I loved the scene from Jaws where Richard Dreyfuss and Robert Shaw are comparing shark bites and one day I’ll be able to turn this evening into a great fisherman’s tale…if I was still alive of course.
‘What do you reckon about Barney’s henchman?’ I asked.
‘I dunno, I guess it would be good to have some professional help on hand,’ said Rich, ‘we should arrange to meet him - when we have a bloody clue what we’re doing.’
‘Do you reckon that this bloke is a way of somehow fucking us over?’
‘How’d you mean?’
‘I’m not sure, shooting us, dropping us in it at the end?’ I said, Rich looked off and shrugged.
‘I don’t know, be more likely to be Andy,’ he said, ‘he’s more pivotal to this going right, isn’t he?’
‘Actually, we don’t really need him at all,’ I said after a pause.
‘Eh? I’m lost, isn’t all this computer shit the most important part of this whole sorry mess?’
‘Yes and no. We needed Andy to get us past some of the defenses on Pat’s PC, I definitely couldn’t have done it.’ I said, ‘but when we get to the bank and tap in the passwords I imagine that the interface or the way this computer works is going to be about as alien to Andy as it will be to you and me.’
‘We’re right fucked then, aren’t we?’ said Rich. He poured another splash of whiskey into my glass and topped his up as well, ‘why’d you tell Barney that we needed Andy?’
‘A bit of insurance,’ I looked at Rich’s face, ‘I was thinking on my feet, he’s Barney’s nephew, I figured he might be useful to have around if Barney gets Lock Stock on us.’
‘Hmmm, I suppose it’s an idea…’ said Rich, ‘what about this computer? We’re going to be fucked when we get into the bank…’
‘Ah, shit I nearly forgot!’ I said, searching my inside pockets, ‘here we go.’ I chucked a folded sheet of paper onto the desk, Rich unfolded it. He looked at it for a long time.
‘So, who are these two blokes? Klaus Thom and James Hendry? Are they computer experts or something?’
‘No, no, they work at the bank.’ I was spinning this out, I was quite proud of myself on this one.
‘What?’ frowned Rich, ‘I’m confused, are we going to nobble them or something’?’
‘No, not at all. I spent today trying to solve some problems,’ I said, ‘I hunted through the files that we got from Pat’s computer and found out who writes the software for this computer.’
‘These two?’
‘No, a company in Zurich writes the software,’ I said, pausing, ‘we’re going to a demo in a couple of days time – it’s on the top of the sheet.’
‘What? Why…oh, to learn the software!’ Rich clapped his hands like a toddler, it was almost sweet, ‘that’s inspired,’ he said nodding. He picked up the paper again, ‘I still don’t get the connection with these two though, are they going to be there?’
‘No I got their resumes from Pat’s computer as well,’ I took in a breath, ‘we’re going to impersonate them.’ Rich looked at me and laughed, he shook his head. ‘I know it’s a mad idea and –‘
‘No, mate, it’s not,’ said Rich, ‘it’s Genius.’
‘I just figured that if we manage to pull this off, we need to leave a trail…’
‘I know, I know,’ said Rich smiling, ‘but why these two? One is, what? – German?’
‘He’s Dutch, actually. I picked these two, because they are around the same height as you and me and they look vaguely like us…’
‘Bollocks, they look nothing like us!’
‘You should have seen the selection,’ I said, ‘but these two both have facial hair and one wears glasses – I figured they’d be the easiest to impersonate.’
‘Unless they say something to you in Dutch, of course,’ I shrugged.
‘I thought you’d be the Dutch one.’
‘Because I speak Dutch?’ said Rich.
‘You speak Dutch?’ I asked, shocked.
‘Of course I fucking don’t,’ laughed Rich, ‘who does?’
‘Well, Dutch people,’ I said, ‘you can do accents better than me.’
‘I think we should tell Barney we’re going to Zurich,’ said Rich after a pause.
‘What? That’ll just mess the whole thing up!’ I protested. Rich put his hands up to quieten me down.
‘Wait a second,’ he said, ‘and think about it.’ He tapped the side of his head and leaned back in his chair. I looked off into space and thought what it would look like to Barney if his two patsies hopped on a plane and skipped town. It would look bad and he would probably contact gangsterpol and get a couple of Swiss heavies to have a go at us with swiss-army knives – if they could find the right attachment, of course.
So we’d have to tell Barney that we were going to Zurich for something �
�� it’s not exactly Amsterdam so we couldn’t feign that we were going for a last hurrah. So we needed to concoct something.
‘Okay, thought about it and I agree,’ I said, ‘we should tell Barney that we’re going to Switzerland, but what for?’
Rich sighed, ‘I dunno, open a bank account?’
‘Why not? We need one for all the dosh we’re going to nick – aren’t they super private or something like that?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Rich.
‘Do you reckon Barney will have us followed?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe,’ Rich rubbed his face, ‘I think he might just get someone to make sure we get on the plane back to Heathrow.’
I touched the bandage on my neck and winced a bit when the pain flared up at my touch. ’Let’s just assume that Barney is going to have us followed and open an account, that might be enough to get rid of his worries. He won’t see us going to the software company – ‘
‘- because we’ll be in disguise,’ Rich clinked his glass off of mine. As a famous leader once said: I love it when a plan comes together.
CHAPTER 10
‘I feel like a total cock,’ said Rich, pushing his glasses up, ‘and this beard looks totally fake.’ Rich sat on the edge of the bed in the utterly grim hotel that we were staying in in Zurich. If I could use one word to describe the hotel I would probably use suicide or carehome. Everything seemed to be past it’s prime or had an unidentifiable stain on it.
Rich seemed to match the tired environment and looked a little bit like a furniture salesmen from the 1960s. He brought the only suit he deemed ‘business like’ which turned out to be a brown, single breasted classic cut which when paired with a cream shirt and a striped tie gave him a faint whiff of Abigail’s Party.
Steve supplied the beard and the glasses through some of his contacts. I thought the beard looked amazing, it looked totally home-grown. The glasses had proper lenses in them and Rich had already complained of headaches he had yet to acquire.
I was also wearing some glasses and some facial hair. I’d also had to dye my hair a dark brown, which I thought was quite becoming, and wear a suit. Thankfully I had something a little less retro.
We didn’t know what the script of our meeting today would be, but we already planned to make a few generic enquiries about the upgrades that the manufacturer had developed and also to act dumb in the two hour training / demo session we had. We wanted to come across as a couple of underlings who had to learn, unenthusiastically, about a piece of software they were unlikely if ever to use. That way, we surmised, we’d be able to ask how to do cool, fun and ultimately illegal things.
We hadn’t noticed a tail, but I wouldn’t know how to spot one. I had tried stuff that I had seen in the movies, like looking in shop windows and suddenly changing direction patting my pockets, but so far I hadn’t seen anything. Maybe that was the point.
‘You look like another person, honest it’s great,’ I said.
‘Okay, well, let’s go then – we’re early, but I can’t be arsed hanging about.’
We waited for the lift and when it arrived there were already four people in it and we had to squeeze in a bit. When the lift finished it’s juddering progress to the ground floor we left the hotel through the reception area, which completely belied the standard of the rooms.
There were cabs outside and we got into the back of a waiting Passat and handed the driver a piece of paper, he looked at it a moment and punched the address into the sat-nav and we were under way.
‘Did you see the two blokes in reception?’
‘No,’ I said trying to remember anyone in reception.
‘They were sitting in the armchairs near the front desk, reading magazines. They scanned everyone who came off that lift. I saw them at the airport when we were cuing for a cab. I just did a bit of a double take.’
‘So, I guess the…’ I looked into the rearview mirror of the cab. The driver - bored I suppose – was following the conversation. ‘I guess that they were just looking for other English people at the conference.’ We stayed quiet for the rest of the journey.
The headquarters for SecProm SBB (they’re not exactly challenging Xbox with that name) were situated on a quiet industrial estate about half an hour north of Zurich. If it weren’t for the jaw-dropping mountain backdrop we could have been outside Swindon. The units were all the same and I shuddered at what it must be like to work there, but I guess we would find out.
The cab left us outside the unit and after checking our watches we realised that we were early by about half an hour. But it was cold and we decided to go in and at least get a warm drink. The entrance was up a flight of steps that led to an intercom with a camera, we pressed the buzzer and after seconds we were buzzed in without having to utter a word.
We waiting in a small room with carpet tiles almost the same color as Rich’s suit, he was practically camouflaged. The only sound was a low hum from a snack machine, which was completely devoid of snacks.
A door opened and a young man entered, he looked a bit too young and funky to be selling computers in the banking industry. He wore a slick suit and no tie and extended his hand with a warm smile. ‘Klaus and James from Leberman’s?’ we nodded, ‘I’m Henrik, I do the sales for SecProm,’ he shook our hands firmly, looking us in the eyes. I’d experienced guys in sales doing this and it was practically habitual. They interacted exclusively in deal making mode and it got a little un-nerving after a while. ‘Why don’t you come through?’ He spoke with a slight German accent.
‘Your reception area is a little…’ I said, letting it hang out there.
‘I know, I keep telling the bosses that we need to make a better impression but we normally demo off site. This is a little unusual, and very last minute.’ He didn’t seem to be probing us as he negotiated a series of fire doors.
‘I know, we were only told a couple of days ago to get up to speed on the system…we were going to Zurich anyway, so…’ I said.
‘You, killed two birds with one stone – is that the expression?’
‘Exactly,’ I said, ‘thank you for seeing us.’
‘No problem,’ we were standing in a room with a television on a stand and a conference table with some chairs, ‘if you could sit, I’ll bring you some literature. Would you like some coffees – actually, you would prefer tea?’
‘Yes, tea would be lovely,’ I said.
‘Ya, tea would be great,’ said Rich.
‘Oh yes, you’re dutch? Waar kom je vandaan?’ asked Henrik.
‘For James benefit, We should probably use only English, I think.’ Said Rich, in quite the worst Dutch accent I’d ever heard. It wavered between German and West Indian, I can’t believe Henrik is falling for it.
‘Are you Dutch as well?’ I asked. Henrik smiled.
‘My girlfriend is Dutch and I know a few phrases, I just wanted to try one out.’ He said as way of explanation, ‘I am Swiss, German Swiss.’
‘Okay,’ I said nodding.
‘So?’ he said looking at Rich.
‘Oh, your Dutch is very good, for sure,’ said Rich smiling.
‘No, no – I mean, where are you from in Holland?’
‘Amsterdam.’
‘Great, that’s great,’ Henrik stood up, finally, ‘I’ll get the teas.’ He left through another door. When it wheezed shut I turned to Rich.
‘Fucking hell Rich, you sound like Jim Davidson, what kind of accent is that?’
‘I thought I did well, I thought he rumbled us,’ he looked around. ‘You sure this is the right place, it’s grim.’
‘Yeah, I guess they don’t get out much.’ Henrik returned with a tray and some glossy pamphlets describing, in bullet point form, the wonders of the system we were about to experience. The tea, in usual European style, had the beverage allure of the bottom of a fish tank.
I have never had it clearly explained to me how Europeans don’t know how to make tea. It’s bloody easy, you get a tea bag leave it in a mug o
r a pot for a few minutes, pour and then drink it. They get coffee, they understand the universal technique required to make a half decent latte – so why is it they cannot figure out how to make something that is inherently simpler?
Henrik switched on the TV and DVD player and pressed a combination of buttons to get to the right input. Eventually, the screen flicked onto the right channel and he pressed play. ‘I will leave you to it,’ he said, getting up.
I was shocked. I don’t mean that they were using chimps or semi-naked people in the video. It was so badly made that it almost took my breath away. The sound was awful and you could barely make out what they were saying and it had a voiceover that wouldn’t be out of place on a furniture commercial. This company obviously had money – they were selling IT to the financial services sector, after all – so why did this commercial have to look like a porn video? I tried to put my industrial disease to one side and concentrate on the television.
I needn’t have bothered. It was the usual fluffed up sales video, telling you how their product would revolutionize your business and a few vox pops of (inwardly) happy customers extolling the virtues of their system in matter of fact tones that implied that you’d be mad not to buy it, immediately. I really couldn’t get any sense of the system or how it worked, so I flicked through the brochure and waited for Henrik.
‘God, we’ll never figure this out,’ said Rich, ‘it’s just a blur of numbers.’
‘But that’s the sales video, when we actually get to use it it’ll be easy, just you wait.’
Henrik came back and sat down. ‘Impressed?’
‘Yeah, it looks great,’ I said with as much enthusiasm as we could muster.
‘I’ll take you down stairs where we can borrow a machine and show you how it works now,’ he smiled conspiratorially, ‘though obviously it will control virtual money from virtual accounts.’
We laughed as if this were a gag told over cigars at a gentleman’s club. ‘Shall we?’ asked Henrik.
We went through a door and I was expecting the thrum of computers and smart technicians – like in Silicon Valley – jotting down binary numbers as they ironed gremlins out of aluminum clad workstations. I thought we’d see up lighters casting bluish beams over punched out sheets of steel and smoked glass; like a cross between 24 and Apple.
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