I cruised round the aisles and filled my trolley with a few other bits and pieces I thought I’d be needing. I didn’t think I’d need a weapon, but seeing them all made me feel strange about being on a job without one. It would take too long to apply for a gun legally. The US laws aren’t as crazy as people in Europe imagine, and I didn’t want to take the risk of stealing or buying one illegally. Normally, if I knew I was going to need one, I would plan to obtain it in-country, because that meant I wouldn’t have to worry when travelling on commercial flights. If that wasn’t possible, I’d put one in the diplomatic bag, along with any other special kit I needed, and then pick it up at the embassy. This wasn’t happening on this job, however; the timings hadn’t allowed it. Besides, I was carrying out a PV review; what would I need a weapon for?
The hunting-bow section at the rear of the store caught my eye. Three customers in their early fifties, baseball caps on their heads and beer bellies hanging over their belts, were trying to outdo each other with their war stories. I overheard, ‘When I was in Da Nang there was a whole week I thought the good Lord was going to take me away…’
I saw some crossbows that took my fancy. They were small, but I knew they were powerful. Since the UK government had banned handguns, the pistol clubs had had to find another sport, and many now used their ranges to fire crossbow bolts instead of pistol rounds. The club where I’d been shown how to use one was in Vauxhall, just across from the Firm’s HQ.
I picked up one model and examined the optic sight and the attachment to keep spare bolts. The price tag said $340, which was all right, but the other side was disappointing: a label told me it needed a North Carolina weapons licence.
The only option left to me was an ordinary bow, and I wasn’t short on choice. There were racks of them to choose from, with names like Beast 4x4, Black Max and Conquest Pro. Made of carbon fibre, aluminium or composite resin, with cams that worked like gears at the end of the bow to give the bow cable more power, these modern versions of the longbow would have had Robin Hood creaming his Lincoln green.
I found one I liked the look of, the Spyder Synergy 4, proudly boasting thirty-two inches of throbbing manhood end to end, cammed and cabled up, ready to go – as long as I had some arrows. I wanted the smallest ones I could find, just like the bow. Looking along the racks I worked out it was the two-footers I was after, and picked up a box of six. But that wasn’t the end of it. I then had to choose the arrowhead. I went for the Rocky Mountain Assassin; it looked like Thunderbird Three with its tail fins, which were in fact razors. It also seemed to be the only one that came with ready-assembled fins.
I was quite enjoying myself at the bow mix ’n’ match counter, and the next item I needed was a quiver. These, too, were cammed up and fixed onto the bow, so that everything was secure and close to hand.
I carried on and got the rest of the stuff on my mental shopping list, and with enough kit to bow-hunt until Christmas I went to the checkout. The woman with the baby was examining a necklace in the jewellery department. She obviously hadn’t liked the holster, because the stainless steel .45 CQB still gleamed from her open bag on the counter.
Behind the checkout a woman in her early twenties sat bored out of her skull, apparently not that interested in the latest style of handgun or waterproofs. Her hair was gelled to her forehead, and she didn’t even look at me as she said, ‘Card or cash?’ I couldn’t keep my eyes off her fingernails. They were two inches long and nearly curling, like Fu Manchu’s, and were painted with an intricate, black and white chequer-board pattern. I couldn’t wait to describe them to Kelly.
I replied, ‘Cash,’ did the transaction, lifted my bags, put my twenty cents change into the ‘Candy for Kids’ box and left. While I was loading the boot of my car, the woman with the baby came out and got into a people carrier. I couldn’t help but smile as I saw the stickers plastered across the back:
‘This vehicle insured by Smith and Wesson.’
‘A proud parent of a terrific kid, sponsored by Burger King.’
And, best of all: ‘The driver carries only $50… OF AMMO!’
In amongst all of these was a large silver Born-Again Christian fish sign with the word Jesus in the middle. It was just like old times, part of the crazy kaleidoscope of contradictions that made me love America so much. It was a good job I hadn’t made a mistake the last time I was looking for a wagon with a fish sign on it, and climbed into this woman’s vehicle. No doubt the vehicle’s insurers would have given me a greeting to remember.
There were still a few other odds and ends I needed, so I drove away from Yadkin and towards the city centre – or what I thought was the centre. After ten minutes I had to stop, open the boot and get the maps out, hoping that on one of them there might be a town plan. I worked out where I was and where I was going to: a shopping mall, the nearest one I could see. It was about a mile away.
It turned out not to be the single, contained area I’d been expecting. The main mall building looked more like the Pentagon, but clad in something like York stone, and the remaining outside shopping areas and carparks must have straddled an area of more than eight square kilometres, with traffic jams to match. The big blue sign for WalMart was exactly what I wanted, and the store was part of the outer shopping area. I waited at the lights, peeled off right, and went into the carpark. There was the usual line-up of stores – Hallmark Cards, post office, shoe superstores, a Lone Star steak house, then my mate, WalMart.
As I got a trolley I was greeted by an elderly male welcomer with his happy face on. ‘Hi, how are you today?’
I smiled back at him. He had a WalMart baseball cap on which was a size too big for his head, and a T-shirt over his long-sleeved shirt which told me how happy WalMart were to see me. There was an ATM machine just past the turnstile. I took the opportunity to get some more cash out on my card and off I went. The place was full of Airborne soldiers, screaming kids and stressed-out mothers.
I selected food that was both ready, and quiet, to eat. No crisps or cans of fizzy drink; instead, I picked up four big tins of Spam, four large bottles of still mineral water and a bumper pack of Mars bars. Then a couple of laps around the gardening section, and I was done.
There was a little self-service café which I’d missed as I entered, maybe in the excitement of my welcome to WalMart. After paying, I left my trolley with my new friend – it was also his job to keep an eye on them when people went to the café. I picked up a tray and got myself two large slices of pizza and a Coke.
As I ate I ran through my mental checklist, because I didn’t have that much time left to mince around. Deciding I had everything I’d need, I finished the pizza and Coke and headed for the exit. I felt a stirring in my bowels; I couldn’t find the toilet, but no matter, I’d go to a coffee shop. However, the pangs made me think about something I’d forgotten: I went back to the pharmacy section and picked up a couple of party-size packs of Imodium.
Thinking about it, the pizza hadn’t been too bad, so I went back in and bought two full-sized Four Seasons.
As always, I’d chosen the trolley with one dodgy wheel, so as soon as I was outside on the concrete I was all over the place, pushing it at a crazy angle in order to go forwards. When it came to supermarket trolleys, my lucky number was zero.
I threw everything into the boot; I’d sort it all out later. As I got behind the wheel, I got the phone out, turned it on and checked the battery level. It was fine. All the same, I fished out the spare battery, swapped it for the one I’d just checked and then plugged it into the recharger. I was going to need both batteries full up and ready to go.
One last check of the map and I nosed out into the solid traffic.
9
I drove out of town and back towards the lake. It had started to rain a little and I had to put the wipers on intermittent, turning them off again just before Raleigh when they started to rub on the dry windscreen. Soon afterwards I spotted a rest area, pulled in and got sorting.
Bending into the boot I started to pull off the sticky-back price tags from the Gore-Tex and my other purchases, stuck two on my hand, then packed all the stuff into the hunting bergen. I made a point of putting the secateurs in one of the little pouches on the outside, together with the string and gardening gloves, as I’d be needing them first. The gloves were a bit embarrassing as they were like Marigold washing-up gloves with lots of little lumps on the fingers for grip, and worst of all they were yellow. I should have opened them up and checked the colour. It was too late now to do anything about it; I needed to get back to the lake. All the other items, including the plastic petrol container, went in the main compartment of the bergen.
All I had to do now was prepare the food. I folded the big sections of pizza in on each other and wrapped them in clingfilm. I ripped the Mars bars out of their wrappers and clingfilmed them together in pairs. Then I opened the tins of Spam and also clingfilmed the contents, and the whole lot went into the bergen. Peeling the labels from my hand, I stuck one on top of the other and then both over the small battery light on my phone. Then I went into the menu and turned off all the sound facilities.
It was then down to a good smearing of insect repellent. I didn’t know if I’d need it or not, but better safe than scratching. I got back into the car and headed for the lake. The rain had died down, at least for the moment.
Flicking through the radio channels, I found myself listening to a woman who was talking about Southern females spending more time and money on their hair than those from any other area of the USA. ‘That’s why we should buy this magical mousse that—’ I hit the seek button. There was someone else explaining the reason why the weather was all screwed up: El Niño. ‘We’re lucky here in North Carolina, unlike the main areas hit, like Alabama; they had twisters.’ I hit the switch and landed on a Christian station. This one was telling me that it was God, not El Niño, who was responsible for climate changes. Apparently the good Lord was not best pleased with all our sinning and was sending us a warning. However, the first step towards salvation might be to buy one of the channel’s leather-bound Holy Bibles, available for only $98.99. All major credit cards accepted.
I was back in the woods. It was just past seven o’clock and nearing last light, especially under the canopy of high trees. That was absolutely fine by me; I wanted the maximum amount of dark to get on target and sort myself out before first light, then find out whether or not she was in the house. I hoped she was, otherwise it was back to DC and a great big empty drawing board.
I hadn’t had time to think about a good drop-off point for the car, but maybe the lake attracted families in the evenings, and the carpark had looked a very likely lovers’ lane. Either way it meant other vehicles and my car would blend in.
I was about half a K short of the carpark when I finally had to turn my lights on. I had a quick spin round; there were a few lights in the tent area, but only one other car, which presumably belonged to the young couple I could see having a romantic interlude under the canopy. Well, they were until my headlights hit them and they had to hold their hands up to shield their eyes.
I parked as near as possible to the barbecue area, but not so close to the young couple that I was going to have to go ‘Hi’ when I got out. Not that they would have noticed me; from what I could see he seemed totally engrossed in trying to get his hand up her skirt, though unfortunately for him she appeared to be more interested in the food they were cooking.
Looking across the lake, I could see lights on in both houses. I was still gagging for a shit, so I decided to walk over to the toilets with my new boots and ring-lace them while I relieved myself. The weather was still warmish, and the crickets were really going for it, drowning the noise of my footsteps on the mud and wet gravel. The stars were trying to break though the clouds, and the surface of the lake was as flat as a mirror. I hoped it stayed that way and didn’t rain.
The toilets were moulded, all-in-one, stainless steel units, with just a handle sticking out of the wall, so nothing could be vandalized. It was hot, dark and muggy in the cubicle, the only light coming from outside the main door. Swarms of buzzing things had been waiting on the ceiling for some poor unsuspecting arse to show up on the radar. As the first two or three dived in I heard a laugh from the girl by the barbecue. Maybe he’d found his target as well.
I pulled out a few sheets of toilet paper from the container and its hard texture gave me a flashback to twenty-odd years ago, and the juvenile detention centre: ‘Three squares only,’ the staff had barked. ‘One up, one down, one shine.’
That reminded me, I needed to bung myself up; I’d better take some Imodium. With my Timberlands in my hand and my shiny new boots on my feet, I trogged back to the car. The lovers were nowhere to be seen, but their car was still there and the barbecue was glowing. He must have scored and they’d moved somewhere more secluded; it’s amazing what you can get away with if you make a woman laugh.
I opened the boot and got out the bergen and bow, checking that I hadn’t left anything I’d be needing for the job or which would compromise what was going on if the car got nicked. In went the Timberlands; I wasn’t going to fuck them up, I’d only just broken them in. I opened a foil pack of Imodium and swallowed four capsules. The instructions said two, but that was a problem I’d had all my life: I never listened to advice.