Raucous

by Ben Paul Dunn

  They sat for several minutes without speaking. Michael stood still, not even rolling on the balls of his feet, a statue on guard. Charlotte thought about the reasons for Belfour’s exit, the reason he was taking so long. She was ready to lean over to Roach and tell him something was wrong but she had no time, Belfour swept into the room wearing a white suit like he was a journalist in Thailand in the 1950s. His right hand held a panama hat. He returned to his seat at the table and leaned forward looking at Roach. There was a hint of anger in his yes.

  “In answer to your little conversation in my absence, “Belfour said. “Yes, I am a fruit loop. And yes, the majority of what I produce is sensationalized claptrap I base on nuggets of truth. I ran out of anything even remotely original to write over a decade ago, and many of my educational published works should be considered for the fiction chart. So, yes, Mr. Roach, your time has been wasted. I’m a ridiculous theorist of the highest order.”

  Roach looked at Belfour and nodded. “Bugged room?”

  “Of course, why wouldn’t I? I thought you two would say more but you are hardly conversationalists. And sadly I was unable to contact an important person to find out who you really are, and that’s something I would very much like to know.”

  Michael turned his face to Belfour and asked a question by raising his eyebrows and tilting his head.

  “No, Michael, I don’t think that is necessary,” Belfour said.

  “You seem to be doing well from it,” Charlotte said.

  Belfour stood and swept his arm around the room theatrically.

  “And I am happy about that. I earn on sales, and my works have, in the current climate of famous people being shown to be sexual predators and lying shitebags of the highest order come back into fashion. But as I say, it’s sensationalized fluff I have managed to spin out over a great many years. I have a skill. I write bullshit so well people believe it to be true.”

  Charlotte stood, and Roach followed. Belfour laughed with a guttural bellow.

  “I am not David Icke," he said. "I have not taken copious amounts of acid and watched the entire series of V on Christmas day with the Queen’s speech. I have not invented a lizard people theory involving Royalty and the Bush family. Probably because I don’t have that much imagination. But I can assure you, and I am sure you can confirm to your people, whoever they may be, that what the world believes, or at least those that know of my existence and writing, are on the whole correct. I write bollocks for cash.”

  Charlotte raised an eyebrow and the smile from Belfour’s mouth slipped away.

  “Now, Michael, if you would like to show our guests to their car, we can all go back to how it was this morning. Thank you for your visit, utter waste of everyone’s time. Goodbye.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY SIX

  I’ll be punished too, Raucous thought.

  The only outcome, the final hit to end their game meant he would suffer. But he wouldn’t fight this time; he wouldn’t kill to defend his own life. Next time would be different. He would choose to be the victim, embrace it, and smile at the end because he will have taken them down. And if it meant his life would end, as he knew it would, then he could make peace with that. But the others, he couldn’t find a way to reconcile his promise with what he needed to do, with who would be hurt.

  He thought back to the lesson. Mr. Hutton, a teacher who actually cared but cut no slack. If you didn’t want it, he called you dumb and treated you as if you were. He tricked you every now and again into showing your smarts and he smiled at you and told you, See, something works in that head of yours.

  Hutton was stood at the front of the class trying to elicit debate from 30 kids, only problem was twenty five didn’t want to be involved. Animal rights or animal welfare. No one knew the difference.

  Do you treat each individual animal as our equal and give them rights to live and be protected, or do you consider them as a whole and decide their collective fate with management techniques where some suffer and even die so that the group continues living? The elephant example. Do you kill a few and sell the ivory to finance the well-being of the others, or do you decide that none should be touched or killed and no finance comes at all, because let’s face it, how many of us humans are going to fork out cash to protect and feed some big fat grey thing that lives in another continent?

  Kids arms springing up, those hippy do-gooders from families with enough money to be able to contemplate such things. How much would you give he asked? A small amount by thousands is a big amount. And then he ran through a list of endangered animals, how much for that one, the same? They all said yes. You’ll be giving away your salary if you give to them all.

  Fifty pounds a day. What’s fifty times thirty? 1500. What's the average salary? Probably the same. So don’t buy food or pay rent or spend any money ever again to put someone through university. Most can’t do that.

  “Then they should work harder,” a snob said.

  “And you should know you are a right-wing arsehole,” Hutton replied.

  Raucous remembered Hutton smiling when the kid broke his collarbone during the rugby hour. He patted Raucous on the back and told him it was a fair tackle.

  Raucous packed up his brand new electronic gadget. He knew what he had to do. Protect the whole with sacrifices of the individual. He didn’t have enough to offer to protect each one.

  CHAPTER FIFTY SEVEN

  Roach drove down the driveway and out onto the street. He didn’t indicate or look for oncoming traffic. The wheels screeched as he accelerated as he turned. Charlotte held onto the dashboard with both hands.

  “We need to be honest,” she said. “About us.”

  Roach kept driving, looking straight. The wipers were working on the lowest setting. The car in front was throwing up spray from the road as drizzle fell. The streets were full of commuters going home at a leisurely speed. Lights were on as dusk fell. The windscreen alternated between blurred dazzle and clear screen.

  “I know you are no nurse,” Roach said. “I did my background check, just like Balfour just tried on us. I know what you are. Know what you are capable of. I wouldn’t want to come up against you.”

  “You won’t have to.”

  “Reassuring.”

  They fell back into their silence as traffic slowed and rain fell.

  “So what’s Fairbank?” Charlotte asked.

  Roach had stopped as the cars in front had also. Looking ahead there was the blurred red of a temporary traffic light. Roach inhaled slowly, an attempt by an ex-smoker to enact an old habit.

  “A prolonged investigation that finished with nothing in 2005.”

  “Same year you took early retirement.”

  “Same year I quit. No point starting up something new that would only have the same end as everything from the previous year.”

  Charlotte turned around and looked through the back window. “We are being followed.”

  “We always are,” Roach said. “A minute after we left Belfour. The red Fiesta.”

  “Who it is?”

  “No idea.”

  “So Fairbank?”

  Roach turned his head to Charlotte sharply. He looked surprised but angry. “Where did you get that word from?”

  “You say it sometimes when you mumble to yourself. What is it? Or where is it?”

  “It’s one of those random words police give to investigations. There should be no connection. Probably the place a guy went on honeymoon. But it was an Investigation. A long a deep one, into Pedophile rings, high up. Police, politicians. Important people.”

  Charlotte had read articles in papers, the witch hunts and the evil people that tried to feign innocence. But she had never heard Fairbank.

  “And you found nothing?” she asked.

  Roach pushed his back against his seat with a lot of strength from his legs. He let his head fall back and he took a deep breath through his nose.

  “We found everything. And I mean everything. We had videos, photos, confessions. We
had everything. All of them. All dead and gone. We had them all.”

  “I don’t remember it being news.”

  “The media knows, the information passes to them very quickly. They pay for it, and we’re happy to pass it over. It is not a secret what we had. You just can’t publish it.”

  The traffic started moving again, Roach slipped unsteadily from first to second to third. The engine revving too high for each one. They arrived at the next red light, and Roach put the car in neutral and lifted the handbrake.

  “We only had the evidence for two days.,” Roach said. “Some big hitters came in, Chamberlain and Belfour at the front. People from my old department tried to stand up, and we got hit with the Official Secrets act. And Belfour and Chamberlain walked away with it all. We got shut down. Again. So I quit.”

  Charlotte noticed that the anger had gone from his voice, he was quieter, resigned, like he had thought through a million times and come as close to peace with a failure that he could.

  “You should have stayed on,” Charlotte said. “They are bringing everyone in.”

  Roach snorted and shook his head. He banged the heel of his right hand on the steering wheel and the horn sounded. “Who’s the biggest name they have brought down?”

  “The DJ?” Charlotte said, trying to keep her voice low and soothing.

  “Yeah, a DJ. And some other mildly talentless perverts who worked in the industry. Comedians, entertainers, all nobodies in the scheme of things. I was Westminster, Ranking police, we filmed two of their parties. We had the lot. Not pleasant viewing. I interviewed the big fat one. I interviewed his victims.”

  “They got him eventually. Everyone knows.”

  Roach tried to put the car into first, but he mistimed or forgot to dip the clutch and the gears ground together. Roach forced the gear stick forward and pressed down with his foot, they crunched into place and the car jerked forward.

  “When? When did they get him?” Roach asked. “After he died. They let him live out his entire fat life, and then when he was unable to speak, unable to name names, he suddenly gets outed. Everyone they have brought down so far, and will bring down officially, are a group of low-intelligence perverts who were excluded from the real scene because they were not to be trusted.”

  “The DJ had important friends.”

  The traffic slowed to a stop, Roach eased the car into neutral and let it glide. The car slowed and the breaks whistled.

  “Yes, he did, and another that got to live out his life. All the way to the end, untouched. His legacy is tarnished, but what would he care? And I don’t believe in there being a hell, so there’s no comfort for me in thinking he’s being Heronomous Bosched for eternity.”

  “So why are you helping me?”

  “Because I know about Sir Alex Chamberlain.”

  “You had proof on him?”

  “Nothing. He’s the smartest of the lot. Involved but distant. But the situation has changed. The public has changed. Now I can get to him. I can bring him down before he dies and posthumously his life is ripped apart.”

  “And Rollin?”

  “Rollin isn’t one of them, not in that sense. He has no contact whatsoever. He’s clean. He likes women. Not even young ones. He just likes women. Twenties if he can, thirties, hell forties if they are holding up well.”

  Roach pulled over into a lay-by. He switched off the engine. The windscreen became a blur of speckled water. The rain was heavier and it beat on the roof. He watched a red blur drive slowly by.

  “I’m after Rollin,” Charlotte said.

  “They are not mutually exclusive.”

  “Rollin is the key for me.”

  “Rollin has influence, and as you know that influence takes the shape of Chamberlain. Contracts others should have won, he gained. No bribes, no muscle or threats, nothing of the classic nature. He and Chamberlain have had an exchange of mutually economically beneficial deals for a number of years. And once you start, and have the backing of a man of Chamberlain’s influence, then you have to be very bad at your work to falter. And Rollin is not a bad businessman.”

  “He’s hardly on the rich list.”

  “I don’t believe he wants to be. He is comfortable. He said as much, and he is backed up with the most in-depth financial investigation. He has little liquidity. If he were of the inclination to pack up tomorrow he would need to sell all of his property before being truly rich. He has a few hundred thousand cash. And millions in property. He’s richly comfortable, and that’s how he likes it.”

  “Chamberlain?”

  “Different story. The man thrives on influence. He is one of them, but it isn’t his sole goal in life. He is untouchable. If he spoke and gave names, and presented the evidence I believe he undoubtedly has, then two generations of highly influential people will fall.”

  “He has done that much?”

  “He’s a facilitator. With his own side benefits.”

  Charlotte reached for the glove compartment, opened it and pulled out a revolver. Military issue Beretta, she clicked the magazine from the handle, checked its contents. It had a full load of bullets as she knew it did. She slid clip back into the slot and placed the gun on her lap.

  The window on the passenger’s side was wrapped by knuckles. Charlotte pressed a button on the panel and the window slid down, her hand clenched the gun, her finger on the trigger, the barrel pointed to shoot through the door.

  Michael’s medium length black hair was wet through and stuck to his forehead. His blue grey suit had become several shades darker due to rain.

  “Mr. Balfour would like to ask you to return to his residence. He forgot to add some information. And now he knows who you are, he’d like to speak more openly.”

  Michael noticed the gun.

  “You’ll have to leave that in the car, and if you follow me, I’m in the red ford you know that’s been following you since this morning."

  CHAPTER FIFTY EIGHT

  Raucous moved slowly and quietly.

  Stealth through a natural reaction to a dark building and the insecurity of someone who was sure the place was empty but did not want to be caught. But it was too late in the day for anyone to be around and question him. Entry had been easy. The key procured by the simplest channel. It was traceable back to him if each of the three people in turn were asked. But if someone wanted to know, then it meant his plan had failed.

  Raucous had the protection of position now. The Turk had gone and Raucous had moved in. Raucous was the acting top man. He knew there were those who would chase him down, some who would not accept. And that would come to be, but too late. Raucous protected himself, and for a brief period, a month at most, Raucous would be the man.

  It couldn't last. Raucous had the Turk's office but none of his networks. Raucous was alone, each branch of the Turk's previous business, plotting and devising and hoping for freedom, independence, more money and a name.

  Someone would take over; it was too big a business for it to be held together by one person. Turk had influence, which meant he had help. Raucous would receive none. He knew that, and he was too stuck in his ways to change now. He did not have the skills or ability to sit in an office and hold together a multi-layered business of confusing legality. His plan was something else.

  The set-up would fracture, had already started to splinter, and would fight and reform many times over like kids growing up in high school, a fluid confusing, incomprehensible fluctuation of groups and friendships and alliances. But before it came to the start, Raucous would take what he needed and slip away.

  Tonight was a small piece, important for the whole, but more so for him. A personal project, a benefit to the eventual outcome.

  Raucous smiled as he walked the corridor, looking into rooms, looking for places, the perfect set-up. He had free reign right now. He was finally the man, a boyhood dream come true, but the boy had changed and he was not going to be around to embrace an ambition.

  The secure section of the buildi
ng was covered with cameras, operated from within a glass cabin, and manned at nights by a fat-man disillusioned with life as security. He pined for a career in music, he was the drummer who never made it because he never tried and let time slip by. Raucous knew the type, he had been the same, and held some of the traits still, the position you are in was the conclusion of circumstance, if only other things had fallen right.

  But the fat man was watching empty corridors; Raucous was in the residential house. He had checked the layout, but knew the place from childhood. No extensions had been added, no rebuilds, very little cleaning. It was old and musty, a long way removed from the new and clean establishment it had been when Raucous had broken in with friends as a dare when not yet out of his early teens.

  Raucous placed his rucksack down on the hardwood floor. He made little sound, even though there was no need to be quiet. The residential wing was empty. There had never been permanent occupants, only temporary accommodation when the need arose, a place to entertain and hold social events.

  Raucous removed the hipster's electronic equipment from the bag and he set to work. Forty minutes later he stepped outside. Concealment was key. They had to be unseen.

  CHAPTER FIFTY NINE

  Michael did not lead Charlotte and Roach to the greenhouse conservatory, they were escorted to a smaller room, with two leather armchairs, walls that were bookcases, and a table that held a modern PC. There was a small window, one metre square covered by a cream veil. Belfour was still dressed in white, but he had managed to control his eyes. He was smiling, rather sheepishly Charlotte thought. Probably a nod to his over acting of an hour before. Roach and Charlotte sat in the armchairs and waited.

  “I did a background check. I contacted my man eventually,” Belfour said. He leaned back in his chair and ran his right hand through his thinning grey hair. “I can understand why Charlotte here would want to speak to me to a certain degree, but you, Mr. Roach, are more of an expert on certain subjects than I. And what I told you before is, to a large extent, true.”