One Damn Thing After Another

by Dan Latus

  ‘Get away from me!’ she snapped, pushing out with both hands. ‘Don’t you come anywhere near me.’

  For a moment, I thought she was contemplating jumping. Then I knew she wasn’t. She was too self-aware, and too robust for that. I sat down on a ventilator cap and tried to appear relaxed. She stared at me, suspicious.

  ‘OK, Martha. What’s going on?’

  ‘Go away, Frank. It’s nothing to do with you.’

  I waited a moment or two, and then said gently, ‘What have you got yourself into?’

  She said nothing.

  The seconds passed. Half a minute. Longer. Still she said nothing. Nor did I. Waiting is something I can do.

  Then, visibly, she seemed to deflate. I watched as she collapsed inwardly. All that anger that was fuelling her attitude dissipated.

  ‘They have my daughter, Frank,’ she said quietly. ‘Bobrik has her.’

  I winced. I should have known something had happened.

  ‘You have a daughter?’

  She nodded. ‘Alysha. She’s seven.’

  ‘You left her with her father?’

  ‘No. Her father and I are no longer together. I left her with her grandmother.’

  ‘In London?’

  ‘Yes.’

  All this reminded me again just how little I knew of Martha. Time had been compressed in our brief acquaintance, and the illusion had been created in our togetherness that we knew each other well.

  ‘I’m not going to apologize, Frank,’ she suddenly blurted out. ‘I did what I had to do.’

  I nodded. I believed her.

  ‘You’d better tell me what happened,’ I suggested.

  There wasn’t a lot she could tell me. The story was simple, and straightforward. She had received a couple of phone calls. They had been the start of it. One had said they had her daughter, and if she wanted to see her again she should keep quiet. The other, from her mother, had said Alysha was missing. It had all escalated from there.

  Bobrik wanted information from her at first, and then he had required her support in his corporate war with the Podolsky family. Otherwise, Alysha’s body would be returned to her.

  I shook my head and felt sick at heart. As Martha had said, she’d had no choice. No-one in her position would have felt they did have a choice. What I didn’t know, and didn’t ask, was when all this had started. There seemed no point.

  ‘And now I’ve blown it,’ she said bitterly. ‘All that I’ve done. And now it’s unravelled. Everything is lost.’

  I wondered if she had come up here to jump off, to end it all. Somehow, though, I didn’t really believe that. She had come to get away from us all, to salvage her peace of mind. Martha was strong. I took comfort from that. It gave me hope, something to work with.

  ‘First,’ I said, ‘we have to level with Leon.’

  ‘Oh, no!’ She gave a scornful laugh. ‘Lenka has always wanted to shoot me. Now she has the perfect excuse to do it.’

  I shook my head. ‘No. You’re wrong. There are things we can do, but we need Leon on side.’

  ‘We?’ she said then, incredulous.

  ‘Yes. We. We’re in it together, you and me, Martha. Don’t forget that. We’ll go forward together.’

  Or not at all, I was thinking. I didn’t promise we’d get Alysha back. It would have been an empty promise. I had no idea how or if we could bring that about. All I meant was that Martha should understand that she was no longer alone with this problem. I was with her, and I wanted Leon to be with her, too.

  She took some time before she said anything more. I gave her the time. It seemed the least I could do.

  ‘You will help me, Frank?’ she asked eventually, still suspicious.

  I nodded.

  ‘Why? Why would you help me?’

  After all that has happened, she presumably meant.

  ‘Because of all that has happened,’ I told her with a wry smile.

  We left the Presidium together. I half-expected to be stopped, at least challenged, but nothing happened. Why should it? To Blatko and Vorodin, if they or their people were watching on closed circuit TV, we were minor players of little or no interest to them.

  Even so, we left the building carefully and discreetly, using the emergency staircase at first and then the lift to take us to the bottom of the atrium. There, we mingled with guests wandering towards the exit, and left as part of a small crowd. Once outside, we made our way over to the promenade that runs alongside the river.

  From there I called Leon. I had Martha with me, I told him. We needed someone to collect us, so that we could join up with him for discussions. He said he would send a car for us.

  It was a grim-faced Leon we found back at the villa. Each in our own way, we had let him down, and he wanted us to know that. Perhaps he felt I should have pushed Martha off the roof, instead of bringing her back here.

  He glared at her but said nothing. She stared back defiantly. I decided to get in first and nip it in the bud, if I could.

  ‘Leon, Martha has been under unbearable pressure. None of us knew that, but I do now. It explains things.’

  Leon’s gaze turned towards me. ‘Frank?’

  ‘Bobrik has Martha’s daughter. He abducted her, and required Martha to do certain things for him if she wanted the child to live. She did the best she could, but back there in the meeting it all became too much for her. She snapped. Frankly, I’m not surprised.’

  Leon turned back to Martha. ‘Is this true? He has your child?’

  She nodded, and was suddenly close to tears.

  ‘Yet you said nothing? To me, you said nothing?’

  ‘I couldn’t. Alysha is seven years old, Leon. I want her alive – I want her back!’

  Leon shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe what the world had come to. I wasn’t sure if he was more mad at Martha or at Bobrik.

  ‘Leon—’ I started.

  He cut me short with a chop of his hand in front of my face. ‘Frank, I understand everything. She is a mother. Martha is a mother. Mothers will do anything for their children. It is a great weakness. In one sense, it is a great weakness.’

  I still wasn’t sure what he would do or say, but I had the sense to keep quiet. He walked over to Martha and wrapped his arms around her for a moment. Then he let her go and turned back to me.

  ‘Suggestions, Frank? Proposals. What are we to do?’

  ‘I’ve been thinking about that. It’s a terrible situation, admittedly, but not without hope. Let me tell you how I see things. You ready to listen?’

  ‘Of course.’

  The door opened to admit Olga, who I hadn’t seen since she took off for Switzerland. Boy, was I glad to see her.

  ‘Olga!’ I said. ‘You’ve arrived at exactly the right time.’

  Chapter Forty-Four

  ‘FRANK! AND MARTHA. HOW are you both?’

  Olga was looking radiant. I have to say it. And she brought a calming beauty with her into the room. Martha just gave a wan smile, but at least it was a smile. Leon seemed surprised to see her.

  ‘Where’s Lenka?’ Olga asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Leon said. ‘I expected her to be here by now.’

  Never mind that, I was thinking impatiently. It’s not Lenka we need right now.

  ‘We’re in a bit of a state, Olga,’ I said without preamble, ‘and you might be able to help us.’

  Leon looked questioningly at me. I ignored him. I ignored Martha, too. For the moment, at least, Olga was the only one who mattered. She was the one who might be able to get us out of the hole we were in.

  ‘How can I help, Frank?’

  I took a deep breath and plied her with the question distracting me. Either she could, or she couldn’t. If she couldn’t, then I didn’t know what to suggest. I would have to think of something else.

  ‘Olga, can you use your IT expertise to track a mobile phone? I know police and security services can do it, but can you do it, without all their special equipment?’
<
br />   ‘The phone is moving? Perhaps because someone is carrying it?’

  ‘Exactly! Can you do it?’

  ‘Yes. I can. But I can do better than that.’

  I beamed at her, and then at Leon and Martha in turn. ‘Then we’re in business,’ I told them.

  I phoned Bobrik and told him we wished to reconvene the meeting at the Presidium, Leon having previously established that Blatko and Vorodin were amenable to the arrangement. First, though, we needed to be satisfied that Martha’s daughter was alive and well. Yes, he said with chuckle. He could understand that. To that end, I suggested Martha should be allowed to see her daughter. If she was satisfied, she could phone and let us know. After that, we would return to the Presidium.

  Bobrik was cautious, but he thought it through and agreed. Martha would be collected from a downtown location and taken to see her daughter. Then, if the meeting progressed satisfactorily, and the deal he wanted could be clinched, both mother and daughter would be released. Maybe, I couldn’t help thinking. Maybe they would. We would have to take precautions to be sure of that.

  But one step at a time. Making Martha a hostage was a means to an end for us. She was more than willing to take the risk, and none of us had anything better to suggest anyway.

  Olga gave Martha a phone with the numbers she might need. We also fitted her up with a tracker device no bigger than a small coin, assuming they would take the phone from her and switch it off as a matter of course.

  ‘Remember, Martha,’ Olga cautioned. ‘You must switch the tracker off if they are going to scan you. Then switch it on again afterwards.’

  Martha nodded.

  ‘You sure you’re OK with this?’ I asked her, worried.

  ‘It’s my daughter, Frank. Of course I’m OK with it.’

  So that was it. We were ready. I gave her a hug.

  Then we pressed the start button.

  Leon came with us to the rendezvous downtown along the riverside, where Martha would be collected. Just before he had the driver stop to let us out, he said, ‘And you, Frank? Are you happy with the arrangement?’

  I nodded. I was as happy as could be expected. ‘The other car’s in position?’

  ‘It is. Good luck to you both!’

  He shook our hands and we got out. The big car moved away, heading to the small hotel he was once again using as an antechamber to the Presidium.

  I shepherded Martha across the pavement and we stood half facing the river and the road. The Vltava seemed quiet today. There were plenty of tourists on the Charles Bridge, despite it being bitterly cold in the gusting wind, but none at all on the barges and pleasure boats tied up at the quayside, waiting for summer. The road was busy, though, with a constant stream of traffic. Cars, buses and trams, all with their headlights on, carrying people home in the gathering gloom, as the working day drew to a close.

  ‘How long is it since you last saw Alysha?’ I asked.

  Martha took a deep breath and shuddered. ‘Three months,’ she said reluctantly.

  Tears were threatening to come. I winced and gave her a hug. ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘It’s nearly over now.’

  She pressed her face against my chest for a moment. Then she straightened up. ‘Don’t worry about me,’ she said. ‘I will do what needs doing.’

  ‘I’m not worried at all,’ I said, smiling to encourage her.

  It wasn’t true. I was worried as hell – about everything. The big worry was what happened if our tracking failed? They would almost certainly take Martha’s phone away. Perhaps they would scan her and remove the tracker, too. Maybe the safeguards wouldn’t work, either. An even bigger worry was that Bobrik would have no intention of letting Martha and her daughter go anyway, whatever happened. So there was plenty to worry about.

  With just a few minutes to go, I took out my phone and made a quick call.

  ‘Ready?’ I asked.

  There was a grunt on the phone. Ready.

  Martha looked at me questioningly. I just shook my head. Nothing to worry about.

  A big Mercedes pulled off the main road and onto an access slipway leading down to the quayside. It stopped. A man got out and stood waiting.

  ‘OK,’ I said, squeezing Martha’s hand. ‘Let’s go.’

  She walked over to the car. The man opened the rear door. Martha got in. The man gave me a stare and a nod. I nodded back. The man got in the front passenger seat. The car did a three-point turn and headed back onto the main road.

  I watched the Merc disappear into the traffic and stood still for a couple more minutes. Then I walked to the kerb and waited for the car parked in an alley on the other side of the road to collect me. We were off and running.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  OLGA SAID ON THE phone, ‘They are heading out of the city, north towards Neratovice.’

  I studied the laptop and could see she was probably right. The red dot she had conjured up on my screen was doing just that, heading fast out of town.

  The course was set. We didn’t need to be close behind. I spoke to the driver, who slowed down a little.

  Olga spoke in my ear again. ‘They have taken the phone from her, I think. It has gone dead.’

  We had expected that.

  ‘The tracker has also gone dead,’ Olga added, sounding calm. ‘Perhaps Martha has switched it off.’

  I gritted my teeth. Now we were dead, as well, dead in the water.

  ‘Ah!’ Olga said. ‘It is OK.’

  I blew out gently with relief as the red dot reappeared on my screen.

  The journey took thirty-five minutes. Then the red dot turned off the main road and into Lipno, a small village a few more minutes away. My Google map indicated that it stopped on the edge of the village, at an isolated property. We continued down the highway, looking for another way into Lipno.

  Via unlit country roads and farm tracks that had not seen a snow plough, and in deep darkness, we made our way around and back to Lipno. It was a rough night. A while ago it had begun to rain. That had turned to sleet now, and there was a rising wind. The driver swore as we hit a huge pothole, and I wondered if it had been a mistake to make this detour into uncharted territory.

  My other phone rumbled and vibrated.

  ‘Hello…. Martha?’

  ‘I am with Alysha. They will not allow me to say more.’

  ‘Understood. Is she all right?’

  After a brief hesitation, Martha said, ‘I think so.’

  ‘Good. I will phone Leon now, and let him know.’

  ‘Frank, I don’t believe they intend taking us back to the city. I overheard them talking, and—’

  The phone went dead.

  I grimaced. I feared she was right. It was why I was here. Bobrik was not a man to be trusted. We had known that. Once he had what he wanted from Leon, Martha and Alysha would have served their purpose. They would be redundant, a nuisance as well as a potential hazard. Best to get rid of them.

  I phoned Leon to tell him Martha was with her daughter.

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘I will return to the Presidium, and do the business with Bobrik.’

  ‘You might want to wait a little while,’ I advised. ‘Martha said she doesn’t believe they will let her and Alysha go.’

  ‘No, of course they won’t. But we go ahead anyway. Do what you can, Frank.’

  The phone went dead. I winced. Leon had sounded very calm and accepting. It was hard to believe. This was a critical juncture. He was placing an awful lot of trust in my capabilities. Or perhaps he just wasn’t all that interested in what happened to Martha and her daughter. They were not family, after all.

  It wasn’t good – any of it – but there was no point holding back now. I had to carry on, and hope for the best.

  I studied the screen. We were close to the target now. It was just a couple of hundred yards away. I told the driver to stop. I would go on alone from this point. What I would do when I got there I didn’t know. Something. I would do something. That was the plan, all
of it.

  I took out the Glock Leon had given me and checked it once more. Satisfied with that, I made sure the driver understood his instructions. Then I left the warm, dry interior of the car and waded off into the night, steeling myself against the howling wind and pelting sleet, ready to do what I could.

  The road from the village was snow-ploughed only as far as the boundary of the property we had identified. So for all practical purposes, the property was at the end of the road, in winter at least. From a snow-covered thicket of bushes near the entrance, I studied the layout. The main building was a large timber structure, probably an old farmhouse. I noted the distribution of lights indicating occupied rooms and tried to get a feel for how the house was organized.

  My guess was that Martha and her daughter would be in the basement, the cellar. All these old houses had them, and that was the safest place in them. It was also the hardest to escape from, of course, and the most difficult to get into. So the basement was where I would start.

  Men started loading a truck at the front of the house with boxes and suitcases. I watched for a minute or two. Four men. It looked like they were preparing to depart, to evacuate the house. That spurred me on. Martha and her daughter might not have much time left, if I was right about that. I had to move fast.

  I skirted the fringe of shrubs and bushes enclosing an open space that was probably a grassed area in summer and moved closer to an outhouse at the rear of the building. If I could reach that unseen, I should be able to get inside the house and down to the basement.

  I froze when four figures came back out of the house carrying stuff for the truck. There wasn’t much chance of them seeing me but I didn’t want to improve their odds by moving. Somebody said something. Somebody replied. There was laughter. Then another voice joined in.

  That was when all my planning and theorizing fell apart. For a moment, I couldn’t believe my ears. As Mike Tyson once said, everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  THERE WAS NO DENYING it. The voice was real. Even as I stood there, stunned, my brain was processing what I had just heard, working out what it meant. The last of the voices I had heard was a woman’s, and it was one that was very familiar to me. I spent a minute or two going through the how could she?, I can’t believe it! routine. Then, sick at heart, I pulled myself together.