Brilliant Short Stories

by Stan Mason

  Bellamy was stunned. ‘I can’t believe he’d do a thing like that!’

  Charlie shook his head slowly. ‘Do you think I’ve come here to tell you lies?’

  ‘You could have mentioned all this a long time ago. Why now, when he’s dead?’

  ‘A lot of people were scared of his power. He had connections at the top. Anyone challenging him took serious risks. He was very devious... dangerous... capable of distorting the truth in a credible way to suit his purpose. I’m sure if he said night was day many people would believe him.’

  ‘Well you don’t need to fear him any more. He’s dead!’

  ‘He may be dead but he leaves behind legacies for all of us in one way or another. Even for you.’

  ‘Me? How can that be?’

  Charlie paused for a moment wondering whether he had said too much. ‘Just after you married Denise, your first wife, I sent you on assignment to Alaska. It took over four weeks for you to cover the story about the oil, the cold north, and the people who worked there.’

  ‘History, Charlie. It’s all history. I couldn’t wait to get back from those frozen wastes.’

  ‘What you didn’t know was that Denise and Tim had a relationship long before you met her. When you went to Alaska, he visited her a number of times at your home.’

  ‘Go on, Charlie! Get it off your chest!’

  The other man drew deeply on his cigarette. ‘Tim boasted in a sly way. He used to tell people his story and then swear them to silence. Before you returned, he dropped hints about sleeping with Denise in your absence, at your house, in your bed. When your son, Roger, was born four weeks premature, everyone formed their own ideas. And when you broke with her a year later, we thought the truth had come out.’

  Bellamy’s face turned to thunder. ‘That’s enough, Charlie! You’d better get out of here before I lose my temper.’

  ‘Don’t get mad at me! You’re a good newspaperman, Bellamy. Now that Tim’s gone, your career will move up a few notches... deservedly.’

  ‘That’s all you people think about! Promotion! Career! Assignments! What the hell do you know about anything? Just leave, Charlie, before I do something I’ll regret.’

  Charlie held up his hands in surrender. ‘O.K. I’ll leave, but he was a real bastard and you could never see it.’

  Bellamy went to the door and opened it. ‘Out!’

  ‘Don’t forget the obit. Fletch wants it as of yesterday.’

  His host squared up to him menacingly. ‘Out!’

  After Charlie had gone, Bellamy poured himself another drink watching his hand shake as he held the glass. Frank returned briefly to collect his trilby and stared at him with concern.

  ‘Pull yourself together!’ he told him. ‘You’re shaking!’

  Bellamy stared out of the window unhappily. ‘How could Charlie come here as bold as brass and suggest my son is Tim’s child. Where does he get the nerve?’ He paused to think for a moment. ‘Tim and Denise? No... someone would have told me... especially John Mac! That Irishman couldn’t keep a still tongue to save his life. Two drinks and he was a chatterbox. Old Bill would have told me if there was any truth in it. Salt of the earth Old Bill.’

  ‘Take it easy, old chum!’ calmed the reporter. ‘Don’t let it get to you!’

  ‘What did Charlie have to gain by telling me all this now? He hated Tim. He sent Tim to Banovatu. Sent him to his death. Now it weighs heavily on his conscience.’ He paused for thought again. ‘But what if Charlie was right? Did Tim claim the credit for all those stories? Did he deceive me about my annual reports to keep me down? Charlie isn’t the kind of man to spread rumours... or tell lies. Surely Tim didn’t think I was a serious competitor to him at the paper! Well... it’s all in the past now. As Tim used to say: “Yesterday’s news is great for wrapping up fish and chips.”

  ‘No one can argue with that,’ added Frank.

  ‘But Charlie had to be wrong about Roger. Denise wouldn’t... I mean, Tim may have visited her while I was in Alaska and Roger was born prematurely. But that proves nothing in itself. As far as the annual reports, it’s hard to believe he wrote one for me and one for Fletch. And even if he got the best assignments, no one else could have written such excellent reports.’

  ‘Before I leave,’ continued Frank, ‘I want to tell you about Northern Ireland. During a campaign of terror by the IRA, Tim influenced them to use the newspaper for their cause, promising them extensive coverage. To show their power over life and death, they planted a bomb in a car outside a major retail store in Belfast. To add realism to the story, Tim asked for the dubious honour of contacting the store thirty minutes before the blast occurred. As it happened, fourteen people were killed when the bomb went off.’

  Bellamy seemed confused. ‘But if he issued a thirty- minute warning, how could he be blamed?

  ‘Because he never made the ‘phone call. He said he was stopped by the border police and interrogated for nearly an hour. By the time he was released the bomb had gone off. I didn’t doubt his story at the time until I discovered that all newspaper reporters were cleared in advance of their arrival in Northern Ireland. They were never held or detained for interrogation at the border. He did it solely to get a scoop. Sadly, fourteen people paid for it with their lives! He wasn’t anyone’s friend. Nor was he great... as you thought. Good reporters don’t need to do things like that to get ahead.’ He picked up his hat. ‘I’ll call back later for the obit.’

  After he had gone, Bellamy finished his drink and turned to his computer, talking aloud as he typed. “It is with regret we report the death of Tim Collier, a war correspondent of the Daily Globe, killed yesterday in Banovatu. He leaves a wife and two children.” He helped himself to another drink and stared at the text. ‘That’s it for Dennis Rose! His widow and children! That’s it for Elsa, your first wife! For Jenny, your second! For Kim Li and her ten-year old daughter! for my Denise! For fourteen people in Northern Ireland. And last but not least... for me! The only one who couldn’t see you in your true colours. You cheated me on my stories, swindled me out of the best assignments, lost me my promotion... and you may be even be the father of my son. Damn you, Tim Collier! Damn you in Hell! But I’ll have the last laugh yet. The obituary you would have died for me to write... is dead... D-E-A-D! You are nothing!’

  In his sub-conscious mind he could hear the sound of a distant bugle playing “The Last Post”. Tim Collier would get nothing more!

  Key Area

  One of the conditions which seriously affects a marriage is the factor of imbalance between the two people involved in the marriage. The initial chemistry is sufficient to attract the male to the female, or vice-versa, but it is rarely enough in itself to sustain a lifetime of love and devotion. By sheer dint of random success, some couples are completely happy with each other enabling them to lead a satisfactory life together. In such cases, the partners seem to be extremely tolerant of each other, or they appear to be immune from the problems which seriously affect other people in their marriages. Invariably, however, rarely are the man and woman married to each other evenly tempered, evenly-matched or equal in terms of the many features of married life... including the damaging area of dominance. Almost certainly, one half of the couple will display features quite differently to the other in terms of being an introvert or an extrovert, relating to control of activities, dealing with family finances, purchasing materials for the home, whether they are cutlery, crockery or furniture, and also in relation to intimacy. Consequently, although one assumes that courting and marriage would identify deficiencies, traits, characteristics, and dominating instincts of one kind or another, they rarely do. In almost every case, the man and woman who woo become paragons of virtue because they go to extraordinary lengths at that time to please the person they are courting. The truth emerges later... perhaps many years later... when it becomes difficult to untie the
marriage knot easily, mainly because children have been born to the family. For those who become impatient at the divisions between husband and wife, which seem to get wider and wider as time goes on, only divorce will suffice. But there are countless individuals too timid to proceed that far. They prefer to remain dominated and suffer being henpecked for the rest of their lives... resisting only in the silent tomb of their minds!

  Randolph Rawlins was a modest clerk in an insurance company. He was forty-seven years old, a short chubby man, partly bald, wearing horn-rimmed glasses. In his married life, he was completely dominated by his wife. And she had every reason to dominate him... at least that’s what she told everyone. From her point of view, her husband was fuddy-duddy... a clumsy man... a fumbler... a dodderer. He was incapable of making swift decisions, needing a good woman to hold his hand to lead him through life. She never allowed him an opinion; from her point of view he wasn’t entitled to one. However, although he didn’t agree with many of her ideals, he failed to challenge her on any occasion. Such dangerous reactions would lead to a sudden argument which would drone on and on and on until he felt he was going out of his mind. As a quiet domestic man, who could sit working through a crossword puzzle for hours, or watch television programmes at length, a fierce argument was the last thing he wanted in life. He was moving steadily towards middle-age in relative comfort. He was married, with two grown-up children who had left home. He enjoyed the status of a pleasant office job and he went on holiday twice each year. Who could complain about that? For comfort, he smoked a pipe and liked to sit at home wearing carpet slippers. All he wanted was an easy life and a couple of caravan holidays in Cornwall or Scotland during the Spring and Autumn. But the world was about to turn on its head. Instead of following the usual routine, Mrs. Rawlins had decided she wanted to go abroad this year... and whatever decision she made was set in stone. Worse still, she had set her mind on Spain for the summer vacation. Rawlins was very unhappy about the situation. When he was fifteen years old, he had been taken to Spain with his parents. The holiday turned out to be a total disaster. He had been mocked by the local lads in Loret de Mar, forced to eat potato soup at the pension where they stayed, and had witnessed horrid scenes at a bull-fight. It was cruel and barbaric to see the bull savaged in the ring and killed. From that moment onwards, he was determined to avoid Spain. However, Mrs. Rawlins was interested in buying a property abroad and she had been sent a brochure of a villa at Calpe, a beautiful seaside resort not very far from Valencia. The property was a pretty place with two bedrooms, a kitchen, a bathroom, a balcony and a garage. There was a tremendous price advantage because Calpe was little known... in fact it was only a tiny fishing port... and the pound sterling was very strong against the peseta making the price an even greater bargain.

  ‘If we manage to get this place in Calpe,’ she told him, ‘we can go there for one of our holidays each year. The weather is practically guaranteed to be fine out there. The only charge, other than the cost of our food, will be the airline fare... that’s all. Apart from that, we could get a local agent to let it out when we’re not there. In time, we shall make our money back from the savings and the rent and still own the villa. What could be better than that?’

  ‘Isn’t there somewhere else that you fancy? Like the Algarve in Portugal,’ suggested Rawlins, trying to divert her from her plan. ‘I mean it’s certain to get boring if we go to the same place every year?’

  Mrs. Rawlins gave him a wilting look, the effect of which set him back in his armchair. As usual, he was wasting his breath. When his wife made up her mind, nothing on earth would change it... certainly not someone as mundane and ordinary as Randolph Rawlins.

  In due course, they left for Spain at the end of April for the Hotel Magnifico on the Costa Blanca. It was the stepping-stone to Calpe... the last hotel at which they were likely to stay before buying their own residence in Spain. Mrs. Rawlins dispensed with the awesome expression on her face as she became quite excited at the prospects. She was looking forward to seeing the villa identified in the brochure. At the price mentioned, it was a snip and she feared that someone might get there first to steal it from under her nose. A taxi had been booked to call for them at the hotel at ten o’clock that morning to take them to their destination. As the adrenalin ran through her body, she left the hotel room anxious to get to the taxi. Emerging from the lift at five minutes to ten, she stared at the clock in Reception as she went towards the front door. Her husband would follow her within a few minutes. He was in the bathroom and she had left him with strict instructions to bring the camera. There was no point returning home to Britain trying to remember what the villa looked like, the shape of the rooms, and all the facilities. Everything needed to be photographed. However, Randolph was such a dodderer, he was still in the bathroom when she left and, most probably, he was still in there now! She waited impatiently, tapping her foot in annoyance, and huffed and puffed before sitting in a chair outside the hotel under a parasol. The taxi had not yet arrived. The Spanish were not very reliable when it came to time. They were the very limit when it came to making arrangements! But regardless of how she felt, there was no option but to wait.

  Shortly after, Rawlins emerged from the hotel lift and glanced at the clock. His face became flushed and he started to panic. ‘Oh my God,’ he thought to himself. ‘She said ten o’clock and it’s a few seconds after. She’ll have my hide again. I’ll have to make some excuse. Any excuse.’ He tried to think of something but nothing useful came to mind. It was a hot summer morning and the sun was already beating down from a clear blue sky. Why did they want to go to Calpe to see some stupid villa. The Hotel Magnifico was the place! This was the life! Sun, beach, swimming lots of entertainment and nothing to do except to enjoy oneself! There was only one small cloud on the horizon... Mrs. Rawlins! Why did she insist they had to go to see the villa on such a wonderful day? the visit ought to be left for one of the dull cloudy days. In any case, why did they need to buy a place abroad anyway? It was a waste of money! Caravanning in Cornwall, Wales or Scotland was much more fun. When on holiday in Britain, one always had the feeling one could get home if there was any problem. But not out here in Spain. There were all kinds of transport required to get home... airports, planes, trains... it wasn’t a comforting thought at all! However, although Rawlins valiantly refused to accept he was a henpecked husband, he had no intention of expressing his disapproval because he knew he would end up in the dog-house. This meant that Mrs. Rawlins wouldn’t talk to him for a minimum of three days and life would be terribly uncomfortable in the silence which prevailed. However, he recognised that the trip to Calpe was her choice and he was practically on time. On this occasion, he would take advantage of the situation, pause for a short while as a token of defiance, and make her wait. Yes, that’s what he would do! He would make her wait for a change. Without haste, he sauntered to the Reception Desk, reading the headlines on some of the English newspapers which lay on the counter and then realised he still held the key to the hotel room in his hand. Casually, with a broad smile on his face, he dropped it in the slot of the box marked “LLAVES”. In that instant, he recalled his wife had told him in no uncertain terms not to forget to bring the camera with him when he left the room but, as usual, he had forgotten. When she discovered his misdemeanour, she would flail him with her sharp tongue telling him how this was yet one more occasion when he never listened to anything she said. Consequently, at the moment he dropped the key in the slot, he reacted with a swift reflex action, thrusting his arm very deeply into the vent with substantial force in a vain attempt to recover the key which had just slipped from his fingers. The sudden erratic movement proved to be absolute folly for his arm became well and truly trapped deep down in the box. He turned his head awkwardly towards the hotel receptionist who stood only a short distance away. The man had clearly witnessed the incident but he pretended he hadn’t seen it, hoping the outcome would not be part of his problem on this particular
day.

  ‘Per favor!’ Rawlins called out weakly, trying to get over the shock of having his arm trapped. The man’s eyes flickered in his direction for a moment and then shifted elsewhere quickly. The movement was indicative in that he had no intention of becoming involved in the problem. It was something the tourist would have to resolve by himself. ‘Per favor!’ repeated Rawlins a little louder this time. The man was not to be moved however. He pretended to be busy by shuffling a sheaf of dog-eared documents which had been resting in a pigeon-hole below the counter since the day the hotel had been built. All the year round the hotel was plagued by visitors who seemed to have a great deal of money but very little sense. Now this stupid tourist had managed to get his arm trapped in the hotel key-box! What a stupid thing to do? There was always a first time for everything but this incident was beyond belief!

  ‘Senor,’ bleated Rawlins. ‘I need assistance. Assistenzia. Arm... stuck... in... slot!’ He glanced at the clock. The hands showed that the time was four minutes past ten. Mrs. Rawlins would be getting very impatient by now and the taxi was probably waiting with its engine throbbing. The omens for this day did not look particularly good! But how could he extricate his arm to meet her outside?

  At that moment, two hotel guests approached the desk for specific information on the buses and the receptionist dealt with them slowly and deliberately in his own time. Eventually, after they had gone, and when it suited his purpose, he moved slowly in the direction of the trapped Briton. ‘Senor,’ he uttered gruffly, with an air of complete indifference. ‘I am here to help you. What do you want?’

  ‘I dropped my key in here. In the llaves! I dropped it in here.’

  ‘Si!’ retorted the receptionist patronisingly. ‘That eez what the llaves eez for... keys! Everyone staying at the hotel leave thee keys in the llaves. You object to that maybe. That is why you put your ‘and in the llaves.’