Pink Wellies and Flat Caps (33 page)

She shakes her head again.

‘Shall we force it open?’ I say, surprising myself.

‘This is better than a P. D. James novel,’ giggles Georgie, pointing to my Blackberry
. ‘Hadn’t you better tell him you’ve found it?’

Damn.

‘I have it Charlie and …’

‘I’m in a cab and on my way now. I’ll be fifteen minutes. Can you be there with it? I’ll miss my train otherwise.’

Fifteen minutes?

‘Okay,’ I say in a small voice.

‘Think,’ says Georgie anxiously. ‘Does he do the lottery?’

I shake my head.

‘When is his mother’s birthday?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘I’ve got it. It has to be the day you met.’

I shake my head doubtfully and smile knowingly when nothing happens.

‘We have to force it,’ I say.

She pulls a face.

‘That’s a bad idea. Won’t he know you did it?’

‘I’ll say that’s how I found
it. He’ll never know.’

She looks uncertainly at the briefcase and pulls her hair into a knot at the nape of her neck, rubs her hands together and says,

‘Last try. What’s the date of your wedding?’

I sigh.

‘He won’t use that.’

‘He might be more romantic than you think.’

‘Twenty-third of December.’

She blows on her hands and deftly changes the numbers. I hold my breath.

‘Holy shit,’ she yells as there is a click.

‘I don’t believe it.
’

Georgie picks the case up so cautiously that you’d
think it was a bomb. She sits it carefully on the couch and we both stand back looking at it.

‘They won’t fly out by themselves,’ she
says after a moment of silence.

I jump at her words. I feel so guilty and I haven’t actually done anything yet. That’s not strictly true. I have opened the case, well that is I got Georgie to open it.

‘I don’t think I can look inside,’ I say while my hands itch to do so. ‘It feels like an invasion of privacy.’

‘It’s not the best way to start a marriage,’
agrees Georgie.

Hell, what a dilemma. It is somehow worse now that the case is open. Georgie lowers her head to the opened top.

‘What are you doing?’ I shout.

She jumps back her hand on her heart.

‘Christ Ali. You scared me to death.’

I twist my hands together nervously and glance out of the window.

‘You take them out,’ I whisper, ‘carefully mind you,’

She shakes her head.

‘Oh no, no way am I implicating myself,’ she says stubbornly, moving further away from the case.

‘He won’t know
…’

‘Want to bet? In one of P. D. James
’s novels …’

I snort impatiently.

‘It’s not a novel though is it?’

‘You wanted to open it so you should take the things out.’

Georgie is quite right of course.

‘Okay, keep watch at the door and if you see Charlie coming down the street whistle or something.’

‘I can’t whistle,’ she says bluntly.

I gape at her.

‘How can you not whistle?’

She shrugs and lifts her hands irritably.

‘I don’t know. I just can’t.’

‘You never told me.’

‘You never asked me,’ she snaps.

Cagney and Lac
ey we are not.

‘I’ll shout
Hi Charlie
as soon as I see him. I’ll give the impression I have just arrived. Okay? Christ, I’m beginning to wish I had gone to Starbucks for coffee,’ she moans, scooping up her coat. ‘It would have been a hell of a lot less hassle.’

I wait until she has pulled the door to and then look longingly at the contents of the case. The question is can I live with myself if I do this? More importantly, can I continue living with Charlie? What is wrong with me, it’s not like I’m stealing state secrets and selling them to the Russians is it? I straighten my blue woollen dress over my buttocks and push my breasts out and glance quickly at my reflection in the mirror. I look seductive enough to distract Charlie just in case, not that I seem to be distracting him very much lately. I had done everything under the sun to get information out of him regarding the rescue plan. I had cooked him exotic meals, offered my body left right and centre until he was worn out, and finally had resorted to pleading with him to tell me. Nothing had worked. He wouldn’t tell me where, or when, he had just assured me that everything would be fine and that I wasn’t to worry. I know he means well. He loves animals and there is nothing wrong with that is there? In fact, if I hadn’t gone to Trenowyth I would be supporting Charlie a hundred per cent. But I did go to Trenowyth and made a lot of friends there. I can’t just sit back knowing there could be a raid on their farms. The clock is ticking. I need to make a decision. I hear Georgie’s heels clip-clopping on the pavement as she paces back and forth. I take a deep breath and plunge my hand into the case and touch something soft. The next thing I know I am looking at a peanut butter sandwich. A little bead of perspiration has formed on my forehead and I strain my ears for Georgie’s heels before pushing my hand in again. This time I fumble around expertly while one ear is cocked for Georgie’s warning. I pull out several folders and hastily flick through them. After finding nothing I carefully replace them in the bag and take another wad, praying that there is something there. I somehow feel there won’t be time to go back again. I feel myself beginning to shake and tears well up. Why oh why couldn’t Charlie have just told me who he planned to target? If he had I wouldn’t be doing this. I scan through the folders and am shocked to find between them a copy of
Big Bums
magazine. Heavens, I know Charlie is a bum man, but really, a magazine of bums in his case? It has been well thumbed too. It opens to what is obviously a favourite page and I gasp at the huge bum that is pointing up at me. Talk about in your face. When does he find the time to look at this? Surely he doesn’t you know what to these bums. I drop the magazine as the thought enters my head and quickly retrieve it to study the pages for stains. This is terrible. Who thought I would study the photograph of another woman’s bum to see if my boyfriend has been wanking over it. My boyfriend is a dirty old man. I’ll find condoms next or God forbid, a whip and chain. He said we needed to spice up our sex life. That will teach me to poke around in someone else’s things. Hang on. Charlie isn’t just someone else, he’s my soon-to-be husband and I’m damned if I’ll feel guilty because
he
looks at dirty magazines. Anyway it’s not hard porn is it? A few bums are nothing to get paranoid about. All the same, I can’t help thinking there is nothing wrong with my bum, so why does he need to look at someone else’s? Damn it, I can’t even confront him without admitting I went through his briefcase. A Crunchie falls out from between the papers and lands at my feet. I am overcome with longing for the smooth creamy milk chocolate coating but I fight off the urge to leap on it and instead remind myself of the Maltesers hidden in my undies drawer. I will most certainly need them later. Finally, I have found what I have been searching for and a folder titled Operation Turkey is in my hands.
Operation Turkey,
I ask you, couldn’t he come up with a more original name? There are several copies of the plan, along with diagrams and at the top of the list is Orchard Farm in the village of Stantonford. Oh no, these are people that I know, I can’t possibly let them do this to Mona, not after she has worked so hard.

‘Why Charlie, hello,’ yells Georgie in such a high
-pitched anxious voice that he would be bound to guess that something is going on. In my panic I drop the folders, and the bum magazine, and step straight onto the Crunchie.

‘Bollocks.’

‘Isn’t it a beautiful day for December? Do you think that is snow in the sky?’ I hear Georgie say.

Charlie grunts.

‘Aren’t you working today Charlie?’

There seems to be some sort of commotion on the stairs and I take the opportunity to shove a copy of
Operation Turkey
into my handbag. I push the bum magazine and broken Crunchie back into the case before clicking it shut and turning around to greet Charlie. I’m panting as if I’ve run a marathon. Georgie pushes past him at the front door and runs to hug me.

‘Hello darling,’ she says loudly, looking at the case. ‘Did you change the numbers?’ she whispers.

Shit. I shake my head dumbly.

‘Great, thanks Ali,’ sighs Charlie. ‘I thought I’d lost it. Are you okay?’ he asks looking at me curiously.

‘Yes, shouldn’t I be?’

‘You seem breathless.’

‘I’ve been doing sit ups,’ I say stretching.

‘I never knew you did those.’

Georgie studies the briefcase.

‘I started today,’ I lie and shake my head at Georgie.

‘God what a fab case,’ she says wide-eyed. ‘Is it yours Charlie?’

‘My mother bought it for me last Christmas.’

Oh, really? I wonder what she would think of you storing filthy books inside. I bite my lip to stop myself from confronting him.

‘I’d better be off. You girls have a good time, and take good care of my car while I’m away Alice.’

As soon as the door closes I flop onto the couch and exhale loudly.

‘I can’t believe you forgot to change the numbers,’ scolds Georgie
. ‘Did you find it?’

‘I found a lot of things,’ I say crossly.

‘Uh oh.’

‘A magazine full of bums,’ I say, storming into the kitchen and banging two mugs onto the worktop.

‘It could have been worse,’ she says, rummaging through a cupboard and pulling out a packet of fig rolls.

‘How much worse exactly?’ I say, stuffing a fig roll into my mouth.

‘Moira Higgs came home early one day after a phone call saying little Thomas was sick. She walked into the house with little Tommy and there was Geoff in her underwear and wearing her make-up.’

‘I think that’s worse.’

She giggles and carries the tea into the living room.

‘The question is, did you find the addresses and was Edward on the list?’

I fish the list from my bag and study it. What disturbs me most is that none of the farms that I know on the list are turkey farms. There is something seriously not right about this whole business. There must be fifty farms targeted for this horrible deed of Charlie’s. I feel my legs go to jelly when I read the plan and the name
Operation Turkey
that sounded funny at first doesn’t seem so funny any more.

Georgie did her best to talk me out of it. There wasn’t a single argument she didn’t use. But what the hell was I supposed to do? I couldn’t sit back and forget what I had seen could I? I sat nursing a mug of cold coffee for an hour after Georgie left. Eventually I had scooped off the skin and re-heated it in the microwave.

‘Shouldn’t you at least give Charlie an opportunity to tell you just what is happening?’ Georgie had said.

‘I gave him that opportunity,’ I argued, ‘but
Operation Turkey
could be happening right at this very moment.’

‘And then again it may not be. There was no date on the plan. Don’t you think you’re getting things out of proportion? It may never get past the planning stage for all you know.’

I just feel I can’t take any chances. I owe it to Mona. I know Edward is in New Zealand with Lucy short for Lucinda, but everyone calls me Luce by now, but I can’t leave little Pepper to cope alone. I don’t want him going to a little piggy safe house, or wherever they put them. I just hope the farmer who has taken over Trenowyth will understand my feelings and let me take him. I have no idea where I will put Pepper when I rescue him. I think Charlie may spot him if I put him in the bedroom. We don’t have a garden, and I can’t very well hide him in a car I don’t have. As it is, I’ll have to bring him back in Charlie’s car. I really must look into getting a new car. Best if I make a list of all the things I’ll need to take with me. I grab some paper and begin my list …

1)
        
Overnight bag. It surely won’t take longer than one night. Hopefully Charlie will never know I was involved in the rescue operation to foil his rescue operation. I should call it the
Pig Operation in Opposition to Turkey Operation.
God, I sound demented.

2)
        
Fresh air spray. Mostly for when Pepper has boarded the car. I wonder how often pigs shit? I must ask Jed. Maybe when I stop at the service station she can go then. Obviously not in the service station loo, I’m not that silly.

3)
        
Some kind of defence weapon just in case things get nasty. I’m sure they won’t but perhaps I should take a bread knife or something. What am I thinking? I can’t possibly take a bread knife. I might well stab Charlie. Obviously I wouldn’t stab him deliberately but if it’s dark I won’t know it’s him will I? That would be terrible. I can almost see the headlines
Woman stabs fiancé by mistake
. That would be pretty horrific wouldn’t it? No, delete that, better not take the bread knife.