The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1602 by Angharad Copyright © 2011 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

Chas and Dave weren’t their real names as James had inferred earlier, apparently the name belongs to a couple of Cockney singers who had a huge hit with ‘Rabbit Rabbit’ or some such name. Can’t say it was one that I remembered. However, they introduced one of themselves as Chas and the other as Dave. They gave me a letter of introduction from James. It contained the code word that he’d agreed with me so these two were the real thing.

I called James and told him about the incident which had already occurred. “You took a prisoner? Good for you.”

“I don’t know he looked pretty dazed.”

“What did you do to him?”

“He–um–bumped his head on my meat tenderiser.”

“What one of those mallet things?”

“Um–yes.”

“You hit him with one of those?”

“Only twice.”

“Twice? Geez, Cathy, you’ll have rendered his brain to mincemeat.”

“He was threatening Simon.”

“Oh that’s different,” I thought I could hear him banging his head on his desk.

“Sorry, but they sort of surprised us and it was to hand, so I used it.”

“They had guns and you had a meat tenderiser–I’m surprised they didn’t all surrender.” He chuckled. “You never fail to surprise me, Cathy.

“Sorry, he was conscious when they took him off in the ambulance.”

“Don’t apologise, it was meant as a compliment. If ever they come to get me, I hope I have you as my back-up, girl.”

“I might need a bit more notice than you gave Chas and Co.”

“They’re supposed to be ready at a moment’s notice, silly buggers crashed their car.”

“Anyway, they’re here now, can I go to bed in relative security?”

“I should think so; can I talk to one of them?” I passed the phone to Chas and he and James spoke for several minutes.

Chas spoke to me just before I went up to my bed. “We’ll patrol the place all night so you’ll be okay.”

“They had some nasty weapons,” I showed him the back door.” He examined the bullet holes and muttered something.

He looked at the door frame and pulled out with a pen knife a few bits of shot. “You were fighting against a Kalashnikov with a shotgun?”

“I only had a meat tenderiser, Tom had the shotgun.”

“Which of you downed the captive?”

“Um–I suppose I did,” I explained about the inspection cover and he laughed.

“You mean to tell me you took out a hit man with a meat tenderiser and he had a machine gun?”

“Um–did I do something wrong?”

“No, Missus, you did extremely well, you used your major advantage, you know your territory, he didn’t.”

“I was always telling Tom that one day someone was going to have an accident with that inspection cover. Now I’m rather glad he didn’t do anything.”

“I’ll bet. Go on off to bed, if there’s a problem I’ll call your mobile.”

There weren’t any and we stayed in bed although I don’t think even the kids slept very much, I know I didn’t and I felt exhausted but couldn’t seem to switch off the adrenalin.

Simon and I talked on and off for a couple of hours and I think then that sleep overwhelmed me for an hour or two. I awoke feeling like death warmed up. I decided that the children would stay home today and almost felt like trying to hide somewhere, but I suspect they’d know all my usual hidie-holes and be watching them. Might as well stay here and defend ourselves.

I went upstairs and checked my compound bow. It was working fine and I had a few arrows left–actually a whole box of them, and these weren’t target arrows, they were aluminium killing instruments with a stainless steel barbed head, shafts painted matt black with black feathers except one silver one which was the guide feather. In the dark, these things would be almost invisible and would certainly inflict major wounds. If the police saw them, I’d be in trouble for possession of dangerous weapons, and I had ten of them plus a bow with telescopic sights. If you can draw it and hold it still, you are guaranteed to hit something. If you do, the wound might well be fatal.

Simon had puzzled why they had captured him coming home but hadn’t killed him. I didn’t know either unless someone else was the target–usually his dad. It wasn’t me or the children, of that I was quite sure and it certainly wasn’t Tom.

The troubles with the Russians had more or less stopped although the woman who’d cased the joint, could well have been Russian, but then she could have been lots of other things too. Neither of us were convinced the bad guys were necessarily Russian–so who else?

We didn’t know, though what if the intent was hostage taking for ransoms? Not the wild garlic, but the payment of blood money for safe release of loved ones. They didn’t look or sound like Somalis and even with lightweight boats, we’re a bit away from the sea so they’d have had a long walk and even longer ride back to Somalia.

The children were delighted to have the day off and Henry did suggest sending his car to take them away to Hampstead where he thought they might be even safer. I disagreed and insisted they stay with us.

James arrived at lunch time, by which time my frayed nerves and tiredness and the irritability with the children was in danger of killing one of them. So his visit was a nice diversion for a short while.

I made him a cuppa and he and Simon, Tom and I sat at the kitchen table. “Do you know who are doing this?”

“I’m about ninety five per cent sure.”

“Who is it?”

“The hit squad come from Argentina...”

“The bank takeover, they ran off to Argentina or somewhere down that way.” I said excitedly.

“They did indeed. It appears they have resurfaced and still have a lot of dollars they’d like to use.”

“They’d have even more if we hadn’t been able to freeze their assets.” Simon sounded very tired.

“Quite, which is why they’ve come back to get you and hopefully regain control of their assets.”

“About a hundred million, worth having, well for petty cash,” he smirked, “We’ve applied for an order to seize these in compensation for their criminality.”

“I thought they had been seized?” asked James.

“They have by the government, but I want some of our losses back and this seemed a good way to reclaim some.”

“So you want the government to release them to your bailiffs?” James and Simon were discussing the cause far more knowledgeably than I could have.

“More or less, could save some jobs.”

“So, now they’ve failed, will they toddle off back to South America?” I asked this question.

“I very much doubt it, these are hardened hit men...”

“Well one had a soft skull,” I interrupted.

“They won’t think twice in killing you all.”

“James that has really made me feel safe and secure.”