I drove in. The security guards would see me, and stop me, but they wouldn't be expecting a gun. At worst they'd have their eyes peeled for a notebook and I would tell them the pen was mightier than the sword even as they set about throwing me out. Then I would pull the gun and say I'd lost faith in the written word and get those hands up. Except I drove up to the front of the house unchallenged. I parked and climbed out. I stood on the gravel for several moments, listening, but there was nothing to hear. I rang the front door bell, but there was no response. I skirted round the house, peering through the windows, but there was nothing to see. The back door was locked, but there was a window to the left which was open just a couple of inches, wide enough to give me a grip. I gave it a good pull and it came open. I climbed in. I didn't set off any alarms. I called, 'Anybody home?' as I stood in the kitchen. 'I've come to read the meter.'
Nothing.
Sean was the boss. Perhaps in the dementia of cold turkey he had sent everybody away. Perhaps he didn't want anyone to see or hear him in the degradation that came with weaning yourself off drugs. Perhaps it was just him and me. I drew the gun and mounted the stairs.
If he was being torn apart by vicious spasms, he was enduring them quietly. There was no sound, not even the ticking of a clock. I walked along the hall. His bedroom was at the end, door closed. I knocked on it. There was no response. I tried the handle. It wasn't locked. I pushed the door open and entered, gun stretched out in front of me. I would shoot him and shoot him again if it meant keeping my wife and baby alive.
But the room was empty. And the bed was made.
I didn't know much about going cold turkey besides what Gene Hackman had taught me, but I suspected graduates of the school of dead fowl didn't make the bed when they were finished. There was no blood on the walls, no sick on the carpet, it didn't smell of disinfectant.
There was no cold turkey.
More likely, somewhere else, a strutting peacock.
I cursed. I felt strange: an odd mixture of disappointment and relief.
I checked the wardrobes. His clothes were hanging there. I left the room and tried his study door. It was open as well. There was no sign of any drugs. Alice had said they'd been flushed down the toilet. I tried the drawer in his desk. All of the prescriptions were gone as well.
I sat in Sean's chair and tried to work out what to do. Clearly there had not been time for him to go through cold turkey. Alice had left him alone, so he'd gone straight out to score some more drugs, taking his security team with him. Possible, but it didn't feel right. The house felt too empty. Even though his clothes were here, there was a finality about it. The gates had been left open. That was more than carelessness. Any fool could have detected that he'd left in a hurry. But of his own accord?
I stared out of the window, trying to work it out. He hadn't taken his clothes, but he was rich enough to have wardrobes full of clothes in properties all over the world. Then again: he had paused long enough to take the stacked cans of film from The Brigadier. Or had somebody stolen them? Or had Alice returned full of guilt from our little fling and found Sean in such a desperate state that her resolve had broken and she'd spirited him away to some better place? And how would O'Ryan react to my failure? He had left me his number. All I could do was call and tell him what had happened. Would he say tough and kill my family, because that was what psychos did, or you did your best so I'll let them go?
There was a strong, cold breeze blowing outside and it was causing the parasols surrounding the swimming pool to rattle like the masts at a yacht club. As I looked down towards them my eye caught the tail end of something floating across the pool. It was visible for just a moment, then hidden by the bank of parasols. I looked away, then back as it drifted momentarily into sight again. And a shudder ran down me.
Legs.
Bare.
I ran out of the study and down the hall. I took the stairs six at a time, half-sliding on the banister, then through the kitchen and out the way I'd come in.
I slowed as I approached the pool. It did not seem the weather for swimming, but there was no accounting for when a junkie might go paddling. So approach with a certain nonchalance then shoot him as he lolled on his lilo.
But I knew he was not swimming. The clatter of the parasols seemed to increase, like they were giving a round of applause for my entrance. All the world's a stage, and my life's a fucking comedy.
The body was at the far end of the pool now, face down and blue.
I hurried along. I picked up a long pole with a net at the end which they evidently used to extract leaves from the water. I reached in with it and pulled the body to the edge.
I didn't drag it out.
I had touched dead people before, I had no wish to repeat the experience.
I pushed down on one side, submerging it briefly but also turning it round so that when it floated back to the top it was face up.
I looked down and sighed.
Dr Fruitcake had written his last prescription.
25
I stood by a cool pool with a cooler floater and pleaded with Colonel Michael O'Ryan for my family's life. He was having none of it.
I was using Sean's mobile phone. He had left it behind in his hurry to depart. It was easy to check the last number he'd called. Not the emergency services. Not even Alice, but KLM, the Dutch national airline. I called them and gave them some crap about being Sean's agent and there being a mix-up and wanting to confirm what flight he was on, but they denied any knowledge of him. I persisted and they said don't you think we'd notice if we had a movie star flying with us? and then I had a very small brainwave – bleedin' friggin' obvious, Sherlock might have said – and told them he might be travelling under an assumed name. Did they by any chance have a Dr Fruitke listed, and bingo. His flight for Amsterdam had taken off an hour before. I asked if he was flying alone. She said no, there were two hundred and sixteen other people on the flight. I thanked her for her time. I had no way of contacting Alice. I could only assume that for now she remained blissfully innocent.
'He's in Europe,' I told the Colonel. 'I have no idea where to start. I've never been to Europe. I don't speak European.'
'I don't give a flying fuck, find him.'
I said, 'I've no idea where to start. It could take me the rest of my life.'
'You were a reporter, you find out.'
'I was never that sort of a reporter.'
'What were you then?'
'A satirist.'
'Ah. That's the kind takes the piss out of other people's troubles.'
'That's it,' I said, not wishing to pick a fight, though he wasn't a million miles away.
'Then fly to fucking Amsterdam and start looking, and see how fucking funny that is.'
'What about my wife and child?'
'The sooner you kill Sean, the sooner you see them again.'
'But it could take months.'
'Well, you don't have months.'
'How long do I have?'
'How long does it take to starve to death?'
'I don't know.'
'How long did it take Bobby Sands?'
'I don't know. I think they sneaked him ham sandwiches once in a while.'
'I wouldn't take the piss, satirist. I'll tell you this. I have them in an underground bunker. You will never find it. Tonight I will give them their last meal. Then out go the lights. I will supply them with water. You ever see a hamster drink water from a bottle? That's how they'll get it. They don't get any more food until I have proof Sean is dead. And bear in mind, satirist, little kiddies die quicker than grownups, you hear?'
He cut the line.
I slumped down beside the pool.
Dr Fruitcake stared up.
Physician, heal thyself.
Satirist, dying is easy, comedy is hard.
No, comedy is easy, dying is hard.
I took out the gun. I weighed it in my hand. I wondered how many people it had killed before. Or if you could really say it had
killed anyone. Guns don't kill, only men kill. I'd heard that in a film some time, and it sounded like the truth. I threw the gun into the pool. I wouldn't be able to take it where I was going.
It took an hour to negotiate the city centre traffic and get to the airport. On the way I phoned Sam Cameron and told him I was pursuing Sean O'Toole to Amsterdam.
He was surprised. I was sitting here thinking you'd probably turn in a crappy cut'n'paste job just to get back at me. But I'd overlooked the fact that though you get on like a wanker, you .do actually care about what you put your name to. Then again, Amsterdam? I admire your enthusiasm, but is it strictly necessary?'
I didn't tell him why it was so urgent that I fly to Amsterdam, I just assured him that it would add a million copies to his sales of the Sean O'Toole book.
He said, 'You wouldn't just be trying to fleece me out of more money, Dan? I got them to fax me the hotel bill. You hit room service pretty hard.'
'I want the ticket waiting for me at the desk, I want hotel accommodation laid on in Amsterdam.'
'Did you hear what I said? I'm not made of money, Dan.'
'Yes, you are, Sam. Now please do this for me. It's important.'
And maybe he heard something in my voice. 'Is something wrong, Dan?'
'Yes.'
'What can I do?'
'What I ask.'
'Do you need me to contact Trish?'
'No,' I said.
I cut the line. Sam was okay. He had a heart of fool's gold.
I reached the airport and turned into the short-stay car park, which was optimistic of me, and probably misplaced. I hurried to the desk and asked about my ticket. It was waiting for me, business class, and so was a voucher for the Hotel Ambassade, which according to the small map on the back was right in the centre of Amsterdam. I asked the girl on the KLM desk if she'd managed to get Sean O'Toole's autograph earlier and she kind of smiled before saying, 'Sorry, was he here?'
She asked if I'd anything to check in, but there was just my small travelling bag and I could take that on as hand luggage. I had two hours to kill until my flight. There was the bar, and then there were all the other places: the shops, the restaurant, the amusement arcade, but they all reminded me of the family I didn't have; only the bar seemed to suggest the abject loneliness I was feeling. So I headed there. I would have one to steady my nerves, and another couple just for the hell of it. That would be it. I needed to remain clear headed. I had to find Sean O'Toole somewhere in mainland Europe, then kill him. I was an assassin. The least well-prepared assassin in the history of assassins. But I would stick with it. I would not be disheartened. I would keep after him like a dog after a bone. And if ever I did write a book about it, it would be called The Day of the Jack Russell.
I sat over a pint trying to figure out why Sean was flying to Amsterdam. Was it purely in panic over the death of Fruitcake, the first flight out of town? Had he been involved in Fruitke's death? Or had he merely gone all wobbly over the potential bad press of having a junkie dead in your pool? If Fruitke had been thrown out by Alice, how had he ended up in the pool? And how much of it had to do with the fact that Amsterdam was the centre of the European drugs trade? Had Fruitcake been involved in Sean's three-million-pound drugs deal? Had they argued over that? Had Sean drowned him? There'd been no blood in the pool, so it wasn't immediately apparent how the bad doctor had died. His apparent addiction to heroin could not have helped him swim – it wasn't one of the stimulants or steroids Olympic athletes were routinely tested for – but it probably wouldn't have robbed him of his ability to swim. Perhaps it had been bad gear. Perhaps . . . There were too many questions and not enough answers.
Something came to my ears, vaguely, far away. My name, and then last call for flight . . .
And I looked at my watch and it was time for takeoff and I'd barely touched my drink. I snatched up my bag and ran.
My bag was going through the X-ray machine when I remembered the talc. I broke out in a cold sweat. The guy said, 'Can I just take a quick look inside your bag, sir?'
I nodded. I thought about Midnight Express and prison rape. I wondered if he could detect a racing pulse. I swallowed with difficulty. I told myself that people did not smuggle drugs out of Ireland and into Amsterdam, it was the other way round. He wasn't looking for drugs, he was just doing his job. He lifted out my nicely folded shirts and pressed underwear and set them on the table and checked through them one by one. He opened my wash bag and squeezed the toothpaste. He shook the bottle of talc. He looked up and said, 'Did you pack this bag yourself, sir?'
It was time to run. But he would catch me, and my wife and child would die. I smiled. I kept my head tilted slightly back so that the sweat would run down my back and not my face. 'Are you joking?' I said. 'It's far too neat. My wife did. But I watched her.'
He sighed. He shook his head. 'I'm afraid I won't be able to pack it all back in quite so neatly. They give us a course in it, but it's never really been my strong point. Here goes.'
He lifted the shirts and began to stuff them back in.
In truth he wasn't doing a great job, but at that moment I didn't give a damn whether he got a couple of creases in them or tore them into shreds and stuck them in his ears.
He zipped the bag shut, smiled apologetically and said, 'Have a nice trip.' The pun wasn't intentional, or appropriate, but I mumbled my thanks and picked up the bag. A moment later I was racing down towards the gate and Amsterdam.
26
'Mr Starkey?'
Uhhhhhhhhhhh . . .
'Could you put your tray table up and your seat forward and fasten your seat belt? We're experiencing a little turbulence.'
'Uuuuuh thanks . . . enjoyed the movie . . . uuuh . . .'
'We haven't shown a movie.'
'Uuuuuh . . . sorry . . . somebody did.'
Daymare.
A horror movie with a happy ending.
Trish was in it and Stevie and it was horrible and traumatic but we'd been reunited on a beach at the end; I felt warm and loved and optimistic; my personal in-skull movie house.
See, I know about movies. They don't make movies with unhappy endings any more. They don't do well at the previews. People want to feel good coming out of the cinema. Uplifted. Ready to kick the world in the shins and romance that girl into bed. They don't want to be depressed. They don't want the hero's wife and child to die. They want sunsets and beaches and reunions.
We all do.
Life isn't a movie, Dan.
Oh, but it is.
You just pay more for the popcorn.
Philosophical, I.
I, philosophical.
I, on the verge of breaking down because once again I had been thrust into a situation over which I had no control, a situation not of my creation. This year's Nobel prize for Being in the Wrong Place at the Wrong Fucking Time goes to . . . Get a job, Dan, earn an honest living. Nine to five. Go wild and try nine to half five. Do some overtime! But get a job. Oh, what I would give!
I was being served a little meal in a little plastic tray on a little fucking table and my wife and child were . . .
I sighed, loudly, and began to peel the foil top off the hot meal, but it wouldn't give. I tried it this way and that. I opened the plastic bag containing the plastic utensils and tried to cut my way through the foil with the flimsy knife, but it still wouldn't give. I sighed again. The nun beside me looked over.
I shrugged. I have a thing about nuns. It's a long story. I'd checked the outline of her habit for gun shapes as I sat down. She was gone sixty, but you're never too old to start. I was brought up never to trust nuns and only learned later that the same applies to hippies.
'Are you all right, son?' she asked. 'First time?'
The obvious answer was, Fuck off and die, anti-Christ bitch, but I nodded helplessly.
She reached across and peeled the foil off.
She said, 'You poor dear, your hands are shaking.'
I examined my hands.
; I gave a little laugh. 'I'm not even hungry,' I said. She nodded sympathetically. I tried to be nice. 'So what's a nun doing flying business class?'
'I'm going to a convention.'
'A convention of nuns? Is that the correct term?'
'I mean . . .'
'Like a coven of witches, although, of course, you're not. What is it, like a record convention? You know, you trade rare habits and those difficult-to-find rosary beads?' I giggled nervously. I tried to apologise. 'Sorry. I'm not anti-Catholic, it's just such an entirely alien culture to me. Like Aborigines. They go walkabout, you go to conventions. I'm sorry, I'm babbling. I've a lot on my mind. It's not the flying. You're not a priest, but you're probably governed by the rules of the confessional, aren't you? You know, you can't tell the police if I tell you something?'
'Well. . .'
'What I mean is, can you say a prayer for me? Not for me, in fact, but for someone else. Prayer by proxy. Can you do that? And then keep it a secret – not that you said a prayer, but what I'm going to tell you, because it's a life-or-death situation.'
'I . . .'
'My wife and baby are being held hostage and I'm going to Amsterdam to try and save them.'
She looked at me for several moments. Her hand jerked suddenly, but stayed in place, gripping the armrest. She was fighting with herself about pressing the assistance button. I shut my eyes. I forced myself to be quiet. If I was carried off the plane in a straitjacket I would not be able to kill Sean O'Toole and my family would die.
When I opened my eyes again the plane was coming in to land at Schiphol Airport, jerking about over the final few hundred feet before bumping down to a round of applause from a loud Italian family near the back. As I lifted my bag down from the overhead locker the nun nodded at me. I wanted to apologise, but my upbringing prevented me. She said, 'I don't know if you were serious, but I said that prayer, and one for you.' I said thanks.
Shooting Sean Page 13