Outstripped

by Avery, T. C.

  Charlie returned her consciousness to the proceedings in front of her. Safe and relieved in the knowledge she had never purchased or ordered one of those specialized offerings. So she had nothing to fear.

  She feigned her embarrassment accordingly.

  Brian unfortunately didn't follow 'the girls' pattern of customary procedure. He picked up the exceptionally well-endowed article in question and asked, "Is this item yours madam?"

  "It is," she replied.

  "Mind if I.......?"

  By this time Charlie was standing with her weight on one leg whilst the toes on her opposite foot pivoted and waved on her half height heel. Her arms were crossed and she tore apart her tight-lips to respond with increased agitation.

  "If you must."

  As her hands moved defiantly to her uniformed wisp of a waist, Brian lowered the Vibrator to nose level and the dog earned his next morsel in suitably excited fashion.

  "Are you carrying any illegal substances today madam?" asked Brian.

  "No, I am not," she replied indignantly.

  "We'll, have you been using any whilst you have been out of the country?"

  "I tried some pot a few years ago," she said, offering up far too much unnecessary information to someone who could easily exploit such comments. She realized the error of her 'foot-putting' and added, "So, the answer's no, I haven't."

  The customs officer then did what all good customs officers would do under the circumstances. He said, "Oh. Well we'll just take a closer look anyway," and he handed Charlie's vibrator to a stern looking female colleague who had been called to assist by the dog handler moments before.

  Charlie was starting to get concerned. She knew she'd done nothing wrong, but why was Brian being such a Twat? And why did her private possessions need waving around in front of half the airport? (Okay maybe just the few people who'd been selected to have their privates inspected). She wasn't ashamed, she was more like someone somewhere stuck between uncomfortable, indignation and "fuck this for a game soldiers," but unfortunately you can't say that to a customs officer. So she folded her arms again and waited.

  "We're just having your, er, item X Rayed madam. Shouldn't take a moment."

  There were whispers all around. Charlie could hear people calling her name over the barriers. The words guilty, drugs, air stewardess and vibrator were clearly audible. Over and over they went. Actually it was all in her head. She was flushing, however, getting hotter, then colder, then hotter again. Nervously chewing the insides of her cheek, gritting her teeth, raising her face to the ceiling tiles. Huffing and puffing. But why? There was nothing to discover.

  The iron lady came back. She handed the vibrator over to Brian and whispered something to him.

  The phrase "Bet you're jealous of that baby, aren't you, bitch?" was venomously running through Charlie's mind when Brian interrupted.

  "The X Ray showed that there's something other than batteries and machinery inside madam. We need to take it apart."

  "What?" Charlie's worst nightmare had just broken. "I don't understand. There's nothing inside it. At least nothing I know about."

  "We need to dismantle the vibrator madam." There, he said it this time. "There is something inside. I need to ask you again. Is this yours madam?"

  Charlie was almost at panic stations. Had someone planted drugs on her? In her vibrator, of all places? Just like that lady said at the party. Was this her vibrator? It had to be. She never let it out of her sight. Well not literally. But.....

  "Um........ I think so, but there can't be anything in it. I'd know, surely? I've changed the batteries a few times." And with that she realized she'd just confessed, not only to merely owning such a mechanism, but also to some serious, avid usage thereof. She could now add embarrassment to the long list of uncomfortable feelings currently under experience.

  By this time Brian had already unscrewed the bottom and was busy extracting the battery. It was one of those nine-volt square variety ones. He measured it up against the length of the toy and it was comparatively tiny, even to Charlie, now she came to think of it.

  Taking tools from his female colleague (who by now was giving Charlie the evil eye. You could almost see her snapping the surgical gloves ready for an assault of the very personal kind), he dove deep into the bottom of the toy and un-clicked some ‘clicky’ things. Out fell a very small but false interior bulkhead, and to follow, fell a small, clear plastic bag with what looked like a very tight roll of U.S. Dollar Bills.

  Charlie nearly fell over. She went bright red, furrowed her brow and gave off all kind of mixed messages. Not surprisingly.

  "What the hell....? I mean where did....? How....? I've never seen that, errrrr...... ever." She was quite convincing with her innocent bystander routine, but the evidence was there. And she had only just, moments before, categorically confirmed it was hers.

  Brian laid all the parts and inserts down on the podium top. Charlie went to pick up the money roll, but was stopped and advised otherwise.

  He slowly unfastened the plastic zip lock bag and took out the contents. As it turned out there were three thousand, two hundred and fifty eight dollars, mostly in fifties and hundreds, and at the centre of the roll was a small hand written note. The little missive was written in capital letters and detailed bank account numbers, international swift codes and the letters W.A.I.F.A. Obviously it was an aide-memoire. Had the money been withdrawn or was it to be deposited? No one knew, least of all Charlie. But there it was in her possession.

  Dogs don't normally sniff out money, and the vibrator was clean, so the catalyst for getting the little tail wagging was also a mystery for Charlie. As it turned out the plastic bag had definitely carried some form of pot, hashish, dope or other marijuana derivative on a previous occasion, but this wouldn't come out until further testing had been done whilst Charlie answered some stern questions in a very un-salubrious little room without windows.

  Now, on the face of it, the money was private. It couldn't be assumed to be illegal, underhanded, stolen or anything other than personal funds for that matter, except for a few observations and suspicions, determined and dreamt up by our diligent crew from Her Majesty's Customs and Excise.

  No one would ever know they'd been tipped off. It would always remain on record as a chance discovery, unearthed during routine and random checking procedures.

  The significance of the miniature haul was unknown. Our customs guys just knew there was something 'not quite right'. Charlie's denials seemed believable but the subsequent testing of the vibrator, the money and the note confirmed that she had used it recently, the bag had been carrying marijuana and the note detailed a bank account held in London by a certain individual known as Luke Banner. The questions 'why' and 'why' were posed for the second two but they all knew the answer as to why she'd used the vibrator.

  The Iron Lady did get her chance to try out her new rubber gloves on Charlie after all. There was nothing to be discovered of course. Then a further twelve hours was endured in a holding room whilst the world waited for a bowel movement. She was eventually released pending further investigations into the money and the bank account. At this point the matter was handed over to the police.

  Charlie was dumbfounded.

  "Of course I know the name Luke Banner," she told Suzanne on the phone. "I've not seen him in ages, but what's he got to do with all of this, and how did that stuff get into my vibrator?"

  "I've no idea."

  "It was rhetorical," she almost shouted.

  "Okay, Okay, I'm only trying to help," added Suzanne. "What, have they said happens next?"

  "They didn't, really, except that they'd be investigating things. And then they said I wasn't allowed to leave the country, or town for that matter. What the hell do I do? I'm supposed to be going to L.A. on Wednesday. What do I tell the office?

  "I'm not sure. Would you like to come over and stay for a few nights?"

  "Is that OK? Only I really don't feel good about this. I haven't don
e anything but how am I supposed to prove it? It would be good to have some company."

  Charlie did go to stay with Suzanne and her little boy, and as it turned out, within a matter of days, she too needed the support and the company.

  The unexpected knock on the half open stable door turned out to be some plain clothed detective double act.

  "May we come in?" One of them asked, after first determining he was speaking with Suzanne.

  "Yes of course. What's this about? There's not been an accident has there? She was, naturally, oblivious to the predicament about to unfold.

  "No. We're not uniform madam." He said as she ushered him in to the kitchen.

  Charlie shoulder propped herself on the adjoining door frame from the lounge with her warming cup of coffee held securely in both hands, and looked in on the developing scenario.

  "So, you're here too madam?" The other detective spoke up as mutual recognition became apparent between himself and Charlie.

  "Just visiting." She responded before blowing on her drink and taking a sip. "What's this all about?"

  "Yes, what's this all about?" Suzanne added taking back control of her own impromptu kitchen confab with the fuzz.

  "This," he paused, "is all about your association with Luke Banner, and the rest of your little crowd in that photo, there." He was pointing to the large frame on the opposite wall. It was the picture of Suzanne, Charlie, Maddy and Carmel on their prom style school disco night about eight years earlier with their larger than life partner in all things anti-establishment, namely Luke.

  "What do you mean association? I haven't seen him in years." And she turned to Charlie to corroborate and gain a similar response.

  "What's he done? In fact what are we supposed to have done?" Started Charlie who was now feeling highly concerned for herself. This was the second time she'd been confronted in only a few days. Things were getting weird and worrying.

  "So where d'ya get the picture from then?" The detective asked bluntly. He knew it was only two years old since the cops already had three other versions of the same item in their possession.

  "He sent it in the post some time ago. I tried to get in touch but he never answered his phone and I couldn't be bothered anymore after leaving loads of messages. He never did ring back. It is a good picture though."

  Then Charlie chipped in with, "He sent me one too, but I only left one message. Couldn't be arsed."

  "We know madam."

  "How do you know?"

  "We have it." He replied, with a hint of sadistic one-up-man-ship style of pleasure in his voice. "And before you get all high and mighty, I need to inform you that we have tried for several days to get in touch with you, but you're not too good at responding to messages yourself."

  "Yeah well," she said, casually and quite dismissive.

  "We've got a lot of questions to ask you, and we needed to search your apartment. So we did."

  "Don't you need a warrant for that?" Suzanne interjected again.

  "You mean like this one?" He said pulling some carefully creased high gram paper from his inside pocket. "This one’s for your house. Here and now."

  "Hang on a minute.......... Just what the hell is this all about? You still haven't said why you're here or what we're supposed to have done."

  "Money laundering." The other one said.

  "Money laundering, internationally. With a whole heap of sordid goings on to boot." added copper number one. "And what we're here for is that picture. Funny you all have one just the same. The others are full of little secrets."

  "Eh?"

  "They've all got something inside. Something that connects you all and something that's likely to get you put away."

  "It'll get your dirty laundry and your sordid shenanigans aired in public."

  Charlie came over to join and console with Suzanne, since she was stopped in her tracks when she went to take the photo off the wall for a closer inspection.

  After informing Suzanne of their full intentions, one of the detectives went outside to advise his evidence team it was now appropriate to conduct their search. And in they came. They might as well have had surgical gloves snapped and ready, plastic bags over their shoes and cameras flashing for Africa. But actually there were only two of them, and it was pretty low key. Not some C.S.I. 'solve everything with D.N.A. test results in an afternoon and home for tea' kind of operation with highly unrealistic yellow and blue lighting everywhere.

  There wasn't a great deal to be found, or removed, other than the photo frame and its incredible contents of old soiled knickers, flight schedules and notes allegedly from Luke.

  Suzanne was genuinely astounded when the backing was removed from the picture, and according to the police she gave a very convincing display of feigned innocence. As did Suzanne, when they explained what was discovered in her version of the photo. Way out of date Dutch Guilders that is.

  The little boy was farmed out to Suzanne's mum and dad whilst she and Charlie humoured the police down at the station with their explanations, alibis and ignorance. Their problem, however, was that none of it meant one iota of difference in the face of such comprehensive condemnation by the catalogue of evidence set before them.

  During their separate interrogations they were advised that Luke, Carmel and Maddy, had also undergone the same trip down memory lane in pursuit of the truth. The truth as the police knew it anyway, since, according to a certain well-used phrase, 'The evidence simply does not lie'.

  They too were asked about their relationship since school and their collective involvement in a fairly sizeable money laundering operation, seemingly masterminded by Luke. He had set up the bank account, the phones and the lockup. He somehow obtained the ill-gotten gains. And it was he who conducted all but the initial stage of the complex and multi faceted currency cleansing operation.

  "Quite a clever little plan really." The police had commented of the long drawn out, small numbers game they'd all been a part of. "Large enough figures to make the exchanges and the efforts worth while. But not too large so as to draw attention."

  The nail in the coffin for them all wasn't the pictures themselves, or the contents, or even the bank account. It was the key in Maddy's picture. It matched the one on Luke's car key ring.

  Just between you, me and the door post, some time ago, many moons earlier, Lucy had secured a few more temping positions at Banner Products. And on one of those fortuitous opportunities she had indeed managed to complete the very difficult and dangerous task of switching the 'Yale' padlock key for an almost identical alternative. A key which would fit perfectly in the, soon to be exchanged, padlock, securing the large wooden gates to Luke's lockup under the clichéd railway arches.

  There were three versions of that key:

  • Luke's, which he used on a regular basis

  • Maddy's, which she knew nothing about, and

  • Jody's, which was used from time to time to deposit incriminating evidence in the deepest darkest corners and hiding places of said clichéd lockup.

  Phone bills, pictures, bank statements and eventually a huge haul of custom made vibrators.

  Good ones.

  Ones with secret hiding spaces, behind the battery compartment.

  Ones that were identical to the beast that Charlie was caught with.

  One that came from the same haul of serial numbered personal products, of which there were a few missing.

  This special haul of vibrators wasn't ordered in the usual manner, as it turned out, for the day-to-day wholesaling of sex toys supplied by Placeres Privados.

  It was a custom design, specifically requested, and signed for, by Luke himself on company letterhead and ordered discreetly on behalf of W.A.I.F.A. outside normal operations.

  It was paid for, in advance, using the special W.A.I.F.A fund and it was delivered to, and stored in, Luke's private lockup.

  "Now if that isn't a slam dunk for your little operation and an indication that you were about to go big time into traffick
ing and money laundering, then I don't know what is." The detective completed his summary and stood down from his pulpit to await, and tape, the first of many admissions of guilt.

  It didn't arrive of course. Charlie, who was to go first in the police confessional, having kicked off the case with 'Vibrator-gate' at the airport, was lost for words. She collected her thoughts, and let loose with a barrage of short, sharp, shouted statements of her own.

  "What a story."

  "A four year story."

  "Four incredulously false years."

  "Four fucking impossible years."

  "Four years that just didn't happen."

  But just how does one defend one's self against insurmountable evidence?

  She was in Jamaica, Panama, Hong Kong, and God knows how many other places when all these deposits were made. International destinations that somehow coincided, on many occasions, with Carmel's ship time in port.

  But it wasn't her. She continued. She didn't do it. And as far as she knew, neither did Carmel. At least they weren't acting together.

  Okay, she did have the vibrator and she had to concede it looked like hers. But where did the money come from? She didn't know anything about the bank account and she's never even heard of W.A.I.F.A.

  "None of it's true." She demanded, over and over again.

  It didn't help her cause or the court case when it finally came round. She'd simply be attempting to defend the impossible with all four of the others. But at least she didn't have to deal with some sort of Immaculate Conception.