Bacchus and Sanderson (Deceased) (51 page)

“We’re fine. William and Tiny are coordinating the police and customs and they will be boarding the ship in a few minutes. Juanita is above with Helena.” He indicated the sky above the ship, and continued,

“Before the customs board she has to be neutralised or they won’t find anything.” Ernest stared at the swirling figures above, Juanita and Helena still locked together, identical in every respect, but one. Him, Ernest. The unknown, forgotten quantity.

“Ben, delay them,” he pointed at the police and customs officers.

“Five minutes should do it. I’ll signal you, keep an eye out above.” He pointed up at the swooping ghosts. Ernest leapt up and began working his way towards Juanita and Helena.

Ben watched him for a moment and then turned and called to William,

“William, can you come here a moment please?” William turned and held up a single finger indicating.

“William, now please.”

William looking exasperated came across to Ben and snapped,

“What? What can’t wait one minute?”

Ben put his arm around Williams shoulder and turned him away from the police and customs officers.

“Stall them, Ernest needs five minutes. Otherwise, they will go on board and find nothing. What can you do?”

William shrugged and then smiled as the answer hit him.

“Prevaricate.”

Helena needed Juanita distracted. The ship had docked and the pointless customs inspection could begin if she could divert her to other more pressing matters. Staring at the throng of bodies below her, she identified Matt and said into his head,

“Kill the man the police are holding in custody. When that is complete, kill Jemima Cortez. Succeed and your sister is safe forever. Fail and the bitch will roast.”

              Matt muttered to John that he needed the toilet and would be back in five. Slipping along the side of the warehouse to the parked police cars, he saw the car holding the prisoner. The police had only left one officer with him, no problem Matt thought. He screwed a silencer onto the end of his Glock 9 mm and walked towards the police car with his hand behind his back. The police officer recognising him as one of the close protection team, opened his window to greet him. Matt fired two rounds into the officer’s head at a range of a foot, killing him instantly. Through the open window he saw the large handcuffed figure he had been told to kill. As he raised his pistol the man said with pride,

“Felicity’s playing to win.” As he spoke the final word the first bullet hit him in the centre of his chest, destroying his heart. The second went through his skull into the seat behind.

              Leaving the silencer attached to the Glock, Matt walked back down the side of the warehouse and began walking towards Jemima in her wheelchair. Passing the main huddled of his colleagues who were still arguing with the police, he adjusted his approach so that he would come at Jemima on John’s blind side. The stone that he kicked was his undoing. His focus had been on Jemima and John and he hadn’t been paying attention to the ground in front of him. He needed to get to within fifteen metres; John wouldn’t give him any second chances if he missed with his first shot.

              John turned, saw it was Matt and started to move back towards Jemima and Ben. He had noticed something. He didn’t know what, but something. Coming around, his pistol drawn he shouted at Matt,

“Stand still and bring you hands where I can see them.” Matt stared at him for a moment. He didn’t have a choice. The consequences were irrelevant. He was twenty-five meters away which was further than he would have liked.

              John’s shout had alerted Tiny and he swung around, taking in the situation, unholstering his pistol, and bringing it on target. As his pistol came up he shouted at Matt.

“Matt drop it now.” Matt looked at Tiny and John a half smile on his face. His silenced Glock came from behind his back and up to chest level in a smooth, fluid movement; Jemima’s head was his target. The safety was off and he squeezed the trigger.

              The bullet clipped the top of the Range Rover behind Jemima and John, missing her by over a foot. As Matt’s gun had come up to chest height, John and Tiny had both fired at him. John’s bullet penetrated his heart shredding tissue and bone. Tiny hit him in the centre of his forehead killing him outright. As soon as he had fired John had dived on top of Jemima shielding her with his body and Tiny had leapt forward placing himself between Matt and Jemima. As Matt hit the ground Tiny charged forward and kicked his gun away and bellowed,

“Clear.” John checked a shocked Jemima for injuries and then shouted,

“Safe and well.” The bodyguards had formed a protective circle around their principals, facing out to repel any further attacks. Tiny looked at John and said,

“Get them back to the cars and out of here, now.” Before John could answer, Jemima shouted,

“No, forget it. That was my sister exacting revenge. She failed, we’re not going to.” Jemima looked at William and hoped he would understand. William hesitated for a moment all eyes on him, he was the boss. He turned to Tiny,

“We stay until this is finished. Do what you need to do to protect us, but we’re staying.”

              Ernest had got to within one hundred feet before anyone noticed he was there. Juanita saw him and gave him a curious look, but didn’t waste time or focus questioning his presence, she just waited to see why he was here and what he would do.

              Helena on her next circuit spotted him and screamed out,

“Charles, why is Sanderson here? Remove him.” There was, of course, no response.

Still furious, she bellowed again.

“Charles, what are you doing?”

              Ernest floated alongside them a look of amusement on his face at Helena’s fury. Unable to contain himself any longer and conscious of the time frame he had given Ben, he asked Juanita.

“Where do you think Helena should have told Charles never to go?”

Juanita still concentrating looked blank. Wagging his finger he said,

“You don’t know? Well, I guess you are quite busy. Same question to Helena. Where should you have told Charles never to go?” Without waiting for an answer, he ignored her and addressed Juanita again.

“She should have said to him, ‘avoid at all cost anything with a religious overtone.’ Specifically, she should have told him to avoid any religious buildings. Temples, mosques
,
synagogues and more than anything; churches.” Helena interrupted him with a scream.

“Of course I did, you moron. Charles would never go anywhere near anything religious. Christianity is to evil, as garlic is to vampires. Charles, here now, idiot.”

Ernest looked at Juanita and gave an imperceptible nod at Helena. Her rage was causing her to lose focus. His next revelation would heighten her to a state of frantic lividity.

“I wonder why then, he is now shrivelled and fading in the church of St Saviours a mile or so that way?” He waved in the general direction of the church.

              Helena’s response was more than he could have hoped for. She broke away from Juanita and flew at him overcome with an uncontrollable rage. He had been expecting a big response, but nothing so undisciplined or foolhardy. Ernest dodged her and shot across the sky towards St Saviours with Helena in close pursuit. Juanita took this opportunity to break Helena’s concealment of the cocaine and then yelled at William and Ben below.

“Go, go, go. Now.” Turning she sped after Ernest and Helena.

***

              William talked as he had never talked before. He waxed lyrical about the importance of ‘our valiant quest,’ the evil of drugs and the love of family. His years as a practising vicar, writing a sermon each week
,
often on the flimsiest of pretexts, meant he was just getting into his stride when he heard Juanita shout to himself and Ben to go. Without a pause he signalled to Tiny and said,

“Gentlemen, let’s go.” He broke into a gentle jog followed by Ben, hoping this display of athleticism would spur the others to follow. Within seconds Tiny, the bodyguards and police overtook him followed by the customs officers in vans with their equipment and dogs.

              The operation went like clockwork. The police stormed up the gangplank demanding to see the captain. The customs officers swarmed onto the ship with search dogs and mobile X-ray and ultrasound equipment. Within five minutes the dogs were walking up and down in front of the logs, unsure whether to sit down next to the stacks of logs showing they had found what they had been searching for or keep pacing. Annabel wheeled Jemima up the gangplank flanked by Eric.

Jemima called to one of the customs officers,

“Remember, don’t waste your time on anything with a diameter less than seventy centimetres.” Ben looked up from the laptop he was typing into with one hand as he walked behind Annabel, pushing Jemima.

“Don’t waste your time looking at the timber.”

Jemima shouted,

“Stop.” and Annabel slowed the wheelchair down and stopped halfway up the gangplank. Jemima twisted around as much as she could and said to Ben,

“Why?”

“It was something that Pablo said that’s been bothering me. He said and I quote ‘Now it is the pure water, no?’ He also agreed when you said the timber had been shelved. The waters on the container ships. I’ve finally managed to identify one container that is carrying mineral water from Rio Pure National Park. Rio Pure means, pure river. The brand of mineral water is called, Agua Pura de la Amazonia; pure water from the Amazon. Three distributors import this water. One in Manchester, one in London and one Belfast. I have checked with each of these distributors, none of the water they import is sold in Great Britain or Europe. In fact I cannot find a single stockist anywhere in the world. The exporting company is wholly owned by Cameron Holdings.” Ben looked at Jemima and could see she wasn’t convinced by his supposition.

“Seems a bit thin. Ben we have fifty customs officers here ready to rip this ship apart to search for cocaine in trees, that is a method we know they have used. We have to go with it.” Ben looked at his laptop focusing on the screen.

“The container containers a thousand, fifteen litre water bottles for water cooler machines. Remember when I took you all through the maths to support my assumption that the cocaine was on the tankers?” Jemima nodded and looked anxiously at the customs officers who were waiting for her instructions to begin.

“Yes, I remember. Cocaine dissolves at a rate of two kilograms per litre of water.” Ben nodded and said

“Do the arithmetic. Each water bottle will contain thirty kilograms of cocaine. There are two hundred bottles. That is six thousand kilograms or six tonnes of cocaine. Buried deep in the depths of the other containers no one will even give it a second glance, It’s water and it’s buried amongst hundreds of other indistinguishable bottles.” Ben could see she wasn’t completely convinced.

“Okay. Can I take a dog handler and a customs officer to play out my hunch and the rest can attack the trees?” Jemima shouted across to the Deep Rummage Team.

“I need a dog handler and a customs officer please. Also Tiny, Ben’s security needs to go with him.” She pointed at the container ship docking further up Fawley Water.

“We need to search that ship as well.” Realising she was taking control she turned to William and said,

“If that’s okay with you William?” William nodded smiling.

              The customs officer motioned to the crane operator on the quayside and the logs were unloaded one by one. As predicted, the largest were at the bottom and when the first log of the correct size was uncovered the customs officer signalled to the crane operator to stop and a sniffer dog was led in. The sniffer dog walked up and down the length of the log and stood at the end indicating he couldn’t smell cocaine. That log was lifted onto the quayside and the dog was sent on to the log below. The spaniel walked up and down the logs sniffing the wood time and time again.

“She can smell something, but she’s not sure. If this wood does contain the cocaine, the wood is a good insulator.” The customs officer said. He had that log removed and place in a second pile on the quayside and led his dog along the next log. Within seconds, the dog sat down and looked expectant wagging her tail and waiting for her pull toy. She’d done her job.

              A chainsaw was used to section the log moving back from the end, cutting thirty centimetre rings. They continued to section the entire log until it lay in pieces on the deck

“Nothing, we’ll try the next one.”

              Ben, his security, the customs office and dog handler had driven the half mile to the cargo ship that was beginning to off load the thousands of containers. The customs officer stopped the crane operator from taking any further containers off and left one of Ben’s security detail to ensure compliance. The dog handler began a discreet walk around the deck, to acclimatise her dog to the smells of the ship, accompanied by Ben and Scotty. The customs officer headed to the bridge to introduce himself to the Captain. Ben chatted to the dog handler as they began a lazy circle of the thousands of containers on deck. They walked up and down the narrow corridors between the rows of containers stacked four or five high.