Rob Johnson - Lifting the Lid

by Rob Johnson

  ‘We don’t do small. We only do regular, large, or—’

  ‘Super. Yes. – Make it super then,’ Trevor called out over his shoulder as he strode towards the exit.

  Outside in the car park, he broke into a run and pulled the spare set of van keys from his pocket.

  * * *

  Sandra got to the exit, via the empty table, just in time to see the van turn left onto the main road.

  ‘Shit, shit, shit,’ she said and stared at the keys in her hand for a few moments until the penny dropped. She chided herself for her stupidity – and her bladder for its limited capacity – until her eyes focused on the yellow cardboard tag that was attached to the keyring. It was printed with the name and logo of a car dealer, but what particularly caught her attention were the letters and numbers written on the back of the card in red ink – the vehicle’s registration number.

  She walked over to the table which Trevor had so recently vacated and sat down. She took out her mobile phone and was scrolling through her contacts list when a skinny waitress with dyed black hair came over and asked her if she was ready to order.

  ‘Cheeseburger, chips and a large coffee,’ said Sandra without taking her eyes from her phone.

  The waitress tutted and started writing on her notepad. ‘Cheeseburger, fries and a large coffee,’ she said, but with heavy emphasis on “fries”. ‘So will that be regular, large or super fries?’

  ‘Regular,’ said Sandra but then suddenly looked up at her. ‘No, hang on. Make that super. I think I’m in need of a serious carbohydrate fix.’

  ‘Whatever,’ muttered the girl and wrote on her pad once more before slouching off towards the counter.

  Sandra found the number she was searching for on her mobile and pressed the Call button. A familiar voice answered almost immediately.

  ‘Martin, it’s Sandra. I need a favour.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  The glare from the early evening sun was starting to make him squint, so he reached up and pulled down the sun visor. He vaguely registered that he must therefore be heading west, but other than that, Trevor neither knew nor cared where he was making for. All he did know was that he wanted to put as much distance as possible between himself and Sandra and the various other people who seemed intent on either arresting him or doing him serious physical harm.

  He’d estimated that an hour’s driving would put him beyond the reach of any pursuers for the time being at least, and the straightness and smooth surface of the road had encouraged him to push the van almost to its limits. He’d covered about fifty miles now, and the appalling smells that were emanating from the back seat reminded him that Milly must be getting desperate for a squat-break, so he began to look out for campsite signs.

  Eventually, he spotted one which claimed that there was a site two miles from the main road. He took the turning and, about five miles later, drove in through the main gate of the Riverside Farm Campsite.

  He checked in at the small wooden office inside the entrance and found a spot near to a slow flowing river, from which he assumed the campsite derived its name. He jerked on the handbrake, switched off the engine and sat back in his seat, surveying his surroundings. The campsite was large but sparsely populated, with gravel tracks criss-crossing the neatly trimmed grass, which sloped gently down to the river.

  This will do nicely, he thought, as Milly leapt onto the passenger seat beside him and began to lick his face with eager enthusiasm.

  ‘Okay, girl,’ he said, patting her on the head. ‘I get the message.’

  He opened the driver’s door, and Milly bounced off his lap and out onto the grass.

  ‘Don’t go far. And don’t go annoying anybody,’ Trevor shouted after her, increasing his volume so she could hear him as she sped away, zig-zagging this way and that with her nose to the ground like some manically out-of-control mine detector.

  He went to the back of the camper and lifted the tailgate. He pulled out a small folding picnic table and chair and set them up next to the side door of the van. Sliding the door open, he climbed inside and randomly grabbed a packet of Simmer ‘n’ Serve from the cupboard behind the driver’s seat. There were half a dozen varieties of dried ready-meals to choose from, but he was in no mood to be picky. He’d already begun to feel light-headed with hunger, and his stomach was threatening to implode. He needed to get something solid inside him, and fast.

  Half filling a saucepan with water, he placed it on the three-ring hob and turned on the gas, but when he clicked on the ignition button, the expected flame failed to materialise. Click-click-click-click-click. – Nothing.

  ‘Oh bloody hell. Don’t tell me…’

  He jumped out of the van and hurried round to the far side. Wrenching open the other sliding door, he snatched up the small blue gas bottle and shook it. – It was empty.

  He rammed it back into its compartment and slammed the door shut.

  This was the first time he’d tried to use the cooker, and it had never occurred to him to check there was at least some gas on board when he’d bought the van. They probably sold refills in the campsite shop, but it was already closed. What an idiot.

  Still, no need to panic. He could always make a sandwich and—

  Then it struck him. He’d intended to pick up bread and milk and a few other bits and pieces once he’d left his mother’s place and was on the road, but what with the breakdown and all the other comings and goings, it had completely slipped his mind.

  Back inside the van, he rummaged through the cupboards in search of anything edible that didn’t require some form of heating, but his quest was in vain. Not even a tin of baked beans, which he would have gladly eaten cold on this occasion. He dropped to his knees and examined the contents of the tiny fridge. A couple of boil-in-the-bag cod in parsley sauce and a six-pack of beer. Now there’s an idea. Quite a lot of protein in beer.

  He peeled off a can and went to the locker above the sink to fetch a glass. When he opened it, the box of dog biscuits caught his eye. – Oh, come on. He was ravenous, yes, but not quite that desperate… yet. Reaching in for the glass, the back of his hand brushed against the Jiffy bag. He’d been trying to put it out of his mind, curious to know what it contained but afraid that opening it might land him in even more trouble than he was already. – But maybe… just maybe, and talking purely hypothetically of course… he could probably… if he really wanted to… and he wasn’t convinced he did… be really really careful unsealing it, have a quick peek inside and close it again so nobody’d be any the wiser.

  Taking hold of a corner between forefinger and thumb, he eased it from the cupboard as if it were contaminated with some deadly virus.

  He stepped out of the van and placed the can of beer, the glass and the Jiffy bag on the table and sat down. Fastidiously positioning the padded envelope so that one of its long sides was exactly parallel to the edge of the table, he poured the beer, never taking his eyes off the package for a moment. He took a long drink and continued to stare at it. What the hell was he doing with the bloody thing? More importantly, what the hell was inside it that had so suddenly turned his quiet and ordinary life into a nightmare of guns and mayhem?

  For several more minutes, he looked and pondered, taking frequent sips from his beer until the temptation became far too strong. He put down his glass and slowly reached out both hands towards the Jiffy bag. Again, he used only his forefingers and thumbs to take a tentative hold of the two nearest corners.

  Just then, Milly came bounding over and almost knocked the table flying. Trevor let go of the package to save the table and swore at her. He glared at the dog and noticed she had something in her mouth – something that looked a lot like a string of half a dozen sausages. The words ‘Oh shit’ had barely left his mouth when he heard a man shouting, and the shouting was getting rapidly nearer.

  ‘Oh shit,’ he said again but with greater emphasis when he looked round to see a very large bearded man in a grubby grey T-shirt and faded denim cutof
fs bearing down on him at speed.

  ‘That your dog?’ The man stabbed a nicotine-stained finger in Milly’s direction as she disappeared inside the van with her prize.

  By the colour of his face, Trevor thought the guy either had a serious blood pressure problem or he was very very angry. However, circumstantial evidence tended to suggest the latter might prove to be the better but far less welcome bet.

  ‘Well is it?’ The man was now standing directly in front of him on the opposite side of the table, his hands on his hips and his considerable bulk almost entirely eclipsing the setting sun behind him.

  Besides being so hungry he could almost have eaten a string of raw sausages himself, Trevor was physically and mentally shattered and not at all in the best of moods. He was also getting rather irritated by the number of times he could be asked the “Is that your dog?” question during the course of a single day. It wasn’t bravery but some form of exhaustion-induced hysteria which prompted him to respond in a way he wouldn’t normally have dared. He looked up at the man’s crimson, bushy features.

  ‘Er, no,’ he said and drained his glass of beer.

  The man’s enormous tattooed hands left his hips and clenched at his sides. ‘Don’t mess with me, shithead, or I’ll bloody clatter you. If that’s not your dog, then what the fuck’s it doing in your van?’

  Trevor shrugged and poured the rest of the can of beer into his glass. ‘Visiting?’

  The man’s face turned an even deeper shade of scarlet, and his knuckles grew white with the increased force of the clenching. ‘Listen, you. That mangy mutt of yours has just nicked a buncha sausages from my barbecue, and I wanna know what you’re gonna do about it.’

  Trevor was aware of chomping sounds coming from inside the van as he said, ‘What? You want them back?’

  ‘Course I don’t want ‘em back. Not after your bloody mutt’s been slobbering all over ‘em.’

  ‘Well I’m sorry, but I really don’t know what you want me to do about it. In any case, I didn’t see her with any sausages.’

  ‘Okay, so how about we ‘ave a little look then, eh?’

  With that, he marched round the table and gawped in through the sliding door of the van. Trevor, who could no longer hear any chomping noises, got to his feet at the same time and also looked inside. Milly was lying on the back seat and licking her lips, but there wasn’t a single sausage in sight.

  ‘See? No sausages,’ said Trevor with a wry grin.

  ‘You calling me a liar?’ The man squared up to him, clenching and unclenching his fists.

  ‘No, but if there aren’t any sausages, I can’t give them back to you, and if there were any sausages, you wouldn’t want them anyway. So what exactly do you want?’

  ‘You can bloody well pay for ‘em for starters.’

  Trevor sighed and pulled out some change from his pocket. ‘Okay, okay. How much?’

  It was obviously a much trickier question than he’d realised because there was a pause while the man seemed to be wrestling with an especially complex calculation.

  ‘Fiver.’

  ‘What? Five quid for half a dozen sausages?’

  The man’s face brightened as if he’d scored some major victory. ‘Ah, so you did see ‘em then.’

  Trevor sighed once again but decided it was worth every penny just to get rid of the knuckle scraping headcase. ‘All right, Poirot, you’ve got me bang to rights,’ he said, counting out five one-pound coins and dropping them into the man’s dinner plate of a palm.

  The knuckle scraper studied the coins for a moment as if to satisfy himself that they were genuine and then thrust them into his pocket. ‘You wanna keep that mutt on a lead.’

  ‘Good idea,’ said Trevor with heavy sarcasm.

  ‘You wanna watch out I don’t bloody report you.’ He wagged a finger in Trevor’s face, then turned on his heel and stomped off across the grass.

  ‘Dickhead,’ muttered Trevor, making sure he spoke quietly enough so the man wouldn’t hear. ‘Sod off back to your hog roast and your fat ugly wife and your eighteen fat ugly kids.’

  He climbed into the van and saw that Milly was in the same position on the back seat and still licking her lips. She seemed more than a little pleased with herself and was apparently oblivious to the fact that her master had come within an inch of having the living shit kicked out of him by a Neanderthal with fists the size of bowling balls.

  Trevor gave her the most withering look he could muster. ‘Right, young lady, you obviously can’t be trusted, so you’ll have to stay tied up from now on.’

  He took a length of rope from one of the cupboards and tied one end to Milly’s collar and the other to the handle of the sliding door. She now looked considerably less pleased with herself, and she watched Trevor with doleful eyes as he grabbed another beer from the fridge and stepped back outside.

  Sitting down at the picnic table and filling his glass, he took a drink and gazed at the Jiffy bag. After a few moments, he picked it up as tentatively as before and turned it over in his hands. There were no markings of any kind on either side. He eased his finger under one end of the flap and took some time in sliding it along until the flap was completely free. He paused and took three large gulps of his drink, looking up and all around him to check that no-one was watching. Setting his glass down on the table, he opened the neck of the envelope by little more than half an inch. He peered inside, aware that his heartbeat was setting the rhythm for some unseen marching band.

  ‘Eh?’ he said aloud and immediately opened the Jiffy bag to its fullest extent. ‘That’s ridiculous.’

  He tipped the contents out onto the table. Six packets of Silk Cut cigarettes. All this cloak and dagger stuff for half a dozen packets of fags? It didn’t make sense. Picking one up, he examined every side for some indication that they might not be what they seemed. Although he’d never smoked in his life, he’d been around enough people who did to recognise a fag packet when he saw one, and that was exactly what this was. A perfectly ordinary packet of cigarettes.

  He scanned the other packs on the table. All were exactly the same, and all of them were cellophane sealed, so they couldn’t have been tampered with. Each bore the same health warning: “Smoking seriously harms you and others around you”.

  Yeah right, thought Trevor, and apparently it can get you chased by the police and mad people with guns too. What could be worse for your health than that?

  He stuffed the cigarette packets back into the Jiffy bag and resealed it as best he could. Clutching it to his chest, he took a long drink and wondered why anyone would want to make so much fuss over a few fags. He’d no idea how much a packet cost these days, but it couldn’t have been much more than six or seven quid, and thirty-odd quid’s worth hardly amounted to tobacco smuggling.

  Milly’s whimpering from inside the van interrupted his ponderings. Despite her substantial sausage snack, she was making it clear to Trevor that it was way past time for her evening meal. He returned the Jiffy bag to the locker above the sink and opened a tin of dog food. Spooning the chunks of meat into her bowl, his rumbling belly tried to persuade him to save some for himself and only narrowly failed.

  He spent the next hour sitting outside, drinking beer and trying to figure out a rational explanation for the contents of the Jiffy bag and what his next course of action should be. Eventually, however, he realised his brain was far too tired and addled to come up with anything even remotely coherent and decided that his best option now was some much-needed sleep.

  Promising himself he’d get up early and head straight for the nearest café and a slap-up breakfast, he left the picnic table and chair where they were and set up the bed in the van. He grabbed a pillow and a duvet from a shallow cupboard above the cab, and although his mind and grumbling stomach seemed intent on preventing it, he was asleep within seconds with Milly curled up beside him, snoring softly.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Trevor had no idea how long he had been asleep when he
was awoken by a tapping noise. It took him a few moments to reconfigure his brain cells into consciousness, and then he heard the sound again. Someone seemed to be knocking on the side of the van. The events of the previous day came flooding back to him, and his immediate instinct was to panic. He glanced at his watch. It was just after eight o’clock.

  ‘Mr Hawkins?’

  He didn’t recognise the man’s voice, but that didn’t mean a thing. He knew of at least three people who were after him, and quite likely there were others.

  ‘Mr Hawkins?’ The voice was louder this time.

  ‘Er… yes?’ Pulling the duvet around him, he sat upright and wriggled himself towards the foot of the bed.

  ‘I wonder if we could have a word.’

  Oh God, thought Trevor. That sounds like police talk. Surely the fat slob with the sausages hadn’t really reported him. But even if he’d gone to the campsite manager, there’s no way they’d call in the—

  ‘Mr Hawkins.’ It was more of a statement than a question now, and whoever was speaking was getting impatient.

  He pulled back the curtain on the side door and slid back the window. The broad chinned face of a man with slicked back dark hair was smiling in at him and holding up some kind of identity card. ‘Sorry to disturb you, sir. I’m Detective Sergeant Logan from the Metropolitan Police and this is Detective Constable Swann.’

  Trevor peered over Logan’s shoulder at the face of the woman who was standing behind him. She too was smiling.

  ‘I’d like to ask you a few questions,’ said Logan.

  ‘What about?’

  ‘I’ll explain at the station.’

  ‘Station?’

  ‘The local police station, sir. Now if you wouldn’t mind getting dressed…’

  Milly’s face appeared next to Trevor’s at the open window, and she surveyed their early morning visitors as if trying to decide whether they presented a sufficient threat to merit the effort of barking. She apparently concluded that they didn’t and contented herself with panting and dribbling.