Rant (6 page)

I wasn't actually crying, it's just the stench coming off the guy was making my eyes water, but I didn't have time to go into it. Another police car had just streaked past the park, siren still going but he was definitely slowing down, looking for something. I eventually managed to pull out the gun, squeaking as I pulled out a fair clump of pubes that had got caught on the barrel.

‘Shut. Up.' I said through gritted teeth. Surprisingly, he did. For all of five seconds. We both stared, fascinated, at the twist of curly hair wrapped around the barrel of the gun I was pointing toward him. Then he started up again.

‘Oh, I get it. You're one of these bastards that makes old tramps fight each other to the death and then you and your missus shag the winner together. Terrible business that. Read all about it in me chip papers the other day. You ought to be ashamed. Still, I know people can't help their sexuality.'

I really did think I was going to throw up.

‘Ah well, let's get on with it,' he said resignedly.

‘Just take off your coat,' I said, quietly. ‘Please.'

‘Can't we go somewhere private?'

‘Just do it.'

He did, muttering all the while about the permissive society and privacy issues, then looked around before he asked,

‘Is this some kind of reality TV thing? Like, is me mother going to jump out from behind a bush in a minute? Is that Davina woman going to come in and give us a hug?'

I took a deep breath and shrugged myself into his coat. I could feel the hairs in my nose curling. I handed him my jacket and he looked at it disgustedly.

‘George at Asda? You've got to be kidding. That's an Armani I gave you.'

I felt grease scrape under my fingernails as I slipped the gun into my new pocket and the carrier bags under the front of the coat. I reached out two fifty-pound notes.

‘Get yourself a new one,' I said. ‘And a cup of tea.'

‘Don't bleedin' patronise me,' he shouted.

I bent down and took a handful of mud from next to the bench and smeared it over my face and hands. Too late I smelt the dog turd and spotted the used condom half buried in it. I sighed.

‘You want to be careful, doing that,' he told me, ‘there's used needles and all sorts round here.'

I walked away from him, back into the park, back towards home, pulling a greasy old hat from the pocket of the coat as I went. I slipped it onto my head, trying not to think about it as it sat there like a cold cowpat. My scalp started to itch menacingly.

The last of the red-hot Eurovision lovers was still shouting something at me as I stepped back out onto the pavement but I couldn't hear for the traffic, the sirens, the fatty hat pulled down over my ears.

And, believe it or not, gentle reader, this was when things
really
started to turn bad.

I stumbled and twitched the three miles home, recoiling every time a siren went off near me. (Which seemed surprisingly often. How come there are suddenly so many police available when you don't want to see one? You're always reading in the papers about people phoning up and no police appearing when someone's been murdered or mugged or fiddled out of their royalties for a TV appearance, but you rob one little bank and— ranting again, sorry.)

I hunched myself over what was now quite a weighty haul of money and headed for home. It took a couple of hours to weave my way through the back lanes and cycle paths but I got there eventually and as I crept into the street I looked around furtively. No, I don't know what I expected to see – a group of Mexicans in sombreros carrying guitars, stuffed donkeys and Uzis, maybe…

I was a complete wreck, my adrenaline level having at last dipped to a sustainable level, and wanted nothing more than a cup of tea and my bed. And a wash. A long, long wash in very hot water. The thought of hot water and my position in it set me shaking again so I jogged across the road to the house. As I went I reached into my pocket for my—

Bugger.

No, my bugger wasn't in my pocket.

Nor were my house keys.

Or my wallet.

Because this wasn't my pocket and it only contained some greasy cellophane (you don't want to know what was on it – or if you do, then you're out of luck, because I
certainly
didn't want to know what was on it) a battered old equity card in the name of Al Cooper (maybe he was telling the truth about Eurovision – and you don't think it could have been Alice Cooper, do you?) and a booklet from the hospital, cheerily entitled
101 Things You Didn't Know About Impetigo.
My skin began to crawl out from under my shirt and slink off down the street in search of happier times. So that was what my friend in the park had been shouting at me as I left. The fake passport was in the old jacket too.

I sighed. So if the park guy went to the police…

But I was beyond thought for the moment; I really needed a cup of tea. I wandered up to the front door, wondering if I could break in, when I noticed that the door was standing open. My stomach flipped over for the final time and as I deposited the feeble remains of last night's Indian meal onto my own doorstep, I realised that it was Anna's half day. And that I was a dead man.

I thought about just running away and joining a cult. Seriously. Some kind of group for nihilistic failed actors who resent the world and want to bring Armageddon down on the West End as soon as possible. I even started walking back down the path until it occurred to me that there's probably quite a waiting list to join so I decided I might as well face Anna, and the music.

I walked back up the house. It was odd that Anna would leave the door open; something definitely wasn't right. Maybe she was lurking behind the door with a carving knife or a frying pan. Maybe she'd had enough and had left. I have to confess, somewhat guiltily, that the last thought cheered me up for a second, until I realised that however angry she might be – and she was definitely going to be more than a little cross – I needed her by my side right now.

Nevertheless, I was very wary as I entered the hall with a cheery ‘Hello! You're not going to believe the day I've had. Now before you start getting upset I have to tell you that none of it was really my fault as…there …was…goodness. You really are in a mood with me, aren't you?'

The house was trashed. There was paper everywhere, furniture overturned, broken glass. I took out the gun from the carrier bag. Not that I would shoot Anna, you understand. I just had the vain hope that maybe I could shoot myself before she got to me.

‘Oh Anna! Darling?' I called in as jolly a voice as I could muster. ‘Where are you? Promise you won't castrate me before you've heard me out. Come on Anna, you're scaring me. I promise I'll pay you back for the Indian last night and I'll take all of the money to the polieeeeee
eeeEEEEEK!
'

The back door was shattered. There was blood all over the kitchen, and a note on the table. It seemed to be written in crayon.

There was a severed finger lying on top of the note, pointing accusingly in my direction.

Reader, I wept.

Wednesday 5
th
. Morning rush hour.

I am still the designated driver.

I sit on a pair of testicles swollen like grapefruits (my own testicles, incidentally, in case you're wondering) and wince every time I have to press a pedal. As we're now driving through Bristol, this is quite often. The traffic is appalling, as usual, and I can feel a creeping road rage wafting in through the windows and infecting me. I feel like putting my foot down and smashing everything else off the road. I could do it too, as the off-road tank that we've stolen probably wouldn't suffer any more damage than a high-speed train hitting an ASBO kid. It would probably be about as morally questionable, too. I don't mention any of this to my passengers though, as I don't want to give them any more ammunition for hating me. Especially now that one of them has a gun pointed at my head.

We're driving through a rather upmarket area of the city and I begin to relax a little. Hopefully this “friend” of my “friend” is a fairly civilized chap, whatever his murky background.

Then, surprise, surprise, everything begins to change. The shops become seedier, the houses more run down, and every corner seems to harbour a young man in a hoodie, twitching and shuffling and generally being furtive.

Once civilisation has completely disappeared over the murky green horizon, I'm instructed to turn off the main road and up a side street that looks like something out of Oliver Twist. A group of white Rastafarians with a combined hairdo resembling a dried-out cornfield glare at us lazily as we park.

‘Go and knock on the door,' says Uncle Sam from the back seat.

I start to protest but he jabs the gun into the back of my head and rasps, ‘Just do it.'

I get out of the car.

As I cross to the pavement one of the scarecrows wanders over. He is short and fat and has bare feet. He looks like Frodo Baggins might have looked if the forces of good hadn't prevailed.

‘Black, E's, H, acid?' he asks, in a bored Somersetshire voice.

‘What?' I ask.

‘Coke?' he says, ‘Whizz?'

‘What do you take me for?' I ask

He looks me up and down.

‘How about some nail polish remover?' he asks. ‘You can take it home an' have a good sniff, innit like. Loser.'

I lean into his face. ‘Take a good look in the car behind me, Drug Lord of the Rings. The fat guy with the pissed-off face and the bandage around his head is an undercover government agent with a very big gun. Now, if you don't disappear in the next five seconds he may well shoot you. If he doesn't, he'll definitely shoot me, and I'm not making any promises that you won't get caught in the crossfire. Now, piss off.'

He stares at me for a second. ‘You need some valium,' he says quietly. ‘I can do you a good price.'

I have to admit I'm sorely tempted, but there is a sharp clacking noise and we both look around to see Sam tapping the car window with the barrel of the gun and smiling cheerfully. When I look around Worzel Gummidge and his scarefriends are hoofing it up the road.

I walk up to the front door of the flat like John Wayne with nappy rash. I don't know what to expect. Some old guys like Sam, maybe. Some geriatric spy who might be able to help us track down who these madmen are, before they kill us/kill my wife/have us kill someone/kill my chances of ever appearing on
Coronation Street
.

So imagine my surprise when the door opens to reveal a stunningly beautiful blonde Bond-girl type and the biggest, muscliest, most Nazi-esque human being I have ever laid eyes on. He looks like a fridge-freezer with arms. Both of them are holding very large automatic weapons, pointed at me. And neither one of them is smiling.

‘Hello,' I squeak.

I think about pretending to be a Jehovah's Witness, but on balance I figure it would only increase my chances of being shot.

‘I'm with Sam,' I say. No response. I jerk my head backwards and their guns flick up a couple of inches. Needless to say, this does little to calm me down. ‘Sam Smith. Sam's in the car,' I croak. ‘He's fine. He just wanted me to—'

‘Can you speak up a bit?' says Bond-girl in a lovely refined English accent.

I clear my throat.
Project, man,
I think. Always give your audience your best, even the ones in the cheap seats. And especially the ones with big guns.

‘Sam,' I say, as loudly and clearly as I can, ‘Sam Smith, he's in the car. He wanted me to check things out and then he's coming in—'

‘Stop shouting, for Christ's sake,' says Bond-girl, ‘and get inside. And did you just fart?'

I go in and she waves across to the car. Or I think she's waving at the car. Maybe she's just wafting away an unpleasant aroma. But like I said, I can't help it when I get stressed.

As I go in I see Sam opening the car and staggering out, bringing our new best friend with him.

Mr Nazi prods me in the back with his gun and I sashay through to the living room, bow-legged and shaking. The men waiting for us are everything that the gun-toting Nazi is not. Small, shrivelled, short-sighted judging by the great thick glasses they wear, unarmed and in a wheelchair. Or one of them is in a wheelchair, anyway. Maybe he's unlegged, ha ha. The other only looks a very short step away from one. And I imagine short steps are all he can manage at his age. Wheelchair Man looks about a hundred years old and the other chap looks old enough to be his grandfather. The walking dead man grins a toothless smile at me and belches halfheartedly.

‘ell-lo,'
says Wheelchair Man, sounding like a cross between Stephen Hawking and Sparky the Magic Piano.
‘you-musst-be-Mayu-kel.'

Tuesday May 4
th
. Afternoon.

Admit it, Michael, you're finished,
I thought.

All I could do now was phone the police and hand myself in. Maybe join the Wormwood Scrubs Amateur Operatic Society and learn to sing soprano – bound to be a big hit with the boys.

I was actually reaching for the phone when it occurred to me that if I did call the police, then my chances of ever seeing Anna again would be reduced to nil. Even assuming that whoever had taken her didn't kill her, I couldn't imagine her ever coming to see me. Unless they brought back hanging. Then she'd probably have booked a front seat.

Think, Mike
.
What would George Clooney do?

Hire in a new scriptwriter, I imagined. Or have his name taken off the credits. Or start suing people. That's the American way.

Oh. Hello!

The American. I had forgotten about him.
He
must know what's going on. Hoorah! So, I decided I
would
go to the police if the American couldn't think of a way out of our little predicament – because it
was
ours now. A trouble shared and all that. I felt better already.

I picked up the carrier bags and the gun and a few extra bits and pieces I thought I might need and peeked out through the front door. Apart from the fact that lots of other people were peeking out through their front doors, and disappeared rather quickly when they saw me, everything appeared normal.

I left the front door ajar and walked to the corner with as innocent an air as I could. Pure nonchalance. Gene Kelly couldn't have done it better.

I hesitated at the foot of the path. Looking around in that obviously furtive sort of,
Hey, I'm being furtive, so you pretend you can't see me, and I'll pretend it's working and I can't see you seeing me,
kind of way that all the best amateur spies go in for. Then I see the Big Fat American looking straight at me from his doorstep and it's so obvious that he can see me that I stop being quite so furtive.

‘Well if it isn't Mr Stinky,' he said, somewhat smugly. ‘Come for another peek at my pants, boy?'

Yes. He did. He really said “boy”, just like Rod Steiger in
In the Heat of the Night
. Now I'm no Sidney Poitier, but I did a good impression of righteous indignation.

‘And who might you be, boy?' he asked in that sheriffy sort of drawl.

‘They call me Mr Rant,' I said, advancing on him until we stood nose to nose in his doorway. Then I thought that sounded a bit silly so I pointed my gun at him. Pointed his gun at him. Well, it was someone's gun, and it was pointed in his general direction, if you discount the wobbling. And he certainly wasn't taking any chances.

He looked a little taken aback, but not quite as much as I would have liked.

‘You be careful with that gun, son.'

‘Okay,
Dad
.'

‘What? What is this, I — Oh. I get it. You're here about some kind of weird paternity shit? Well, let me tell you, boy, taking precautions were as much her responsibility as mine and you ain't gettin' a penny out of me.'

‘Just shut up and get inside,' I said, menacingly. Or it would have been menacing if I hadn't sounded like my voice was breaking.

And if I hadn't farted.

‘Oh, man, will you stop doing that,' he said, but at least he headed back into the house. I followed, closing the door behind me.

‘I'm just nervous,' I said, ‘Sorry.'

‘Jeeezus,' he said, wafting his hand in front of his nose theatrically. ‘Go see a doctor. Do you think maybe you have Irritable Bowel Syndrome? ‘Cause it's certainly irritating the hell out of me. Maybe you should try colonic irrigation. Worked for me.'

‘If you don't shut up right now, Buffalo Bill, I'll irrigate your colon with a bullet,' I hissed, somewhat testily.
God,
I thought,
I'm something of a natural at this.
Surely I was moving to the dizzy heights of Villain, Second-in-command. I'd have to remember to update my details when I sent my CV in for work next time.

I took the length of washing line out of my pocket.

‘Now what in the hell are you going to do with that,' he asked sarcastically.

‘Look, it's nothing personal,' I said, ‘It's just that I've been having a really bad day so far and I would feel much better if you couldn't jump up and throttle me at any point.'

‘I'd feel a helluva lot better if you'd stop waving that damn gun around, but we can't have everything, now can we.'

‘Look, just humour me.'

‘I am humouring you, boy. I am humouring like you've never been humoured before. You don't want to find out what happens when I stop being humorous because you for one will not be laughing.'

‘Okay, look, ha, ha, I'm humoured. Now, let me tie you up and I'll put the gun down. Or don't let me tie you up, and I'll shoot you in the leg.'

‘Sounds fair.'

So after a few minutes fumbling and a lot of ‘the rabbit goes around the tree and through the hole and then…no, the rabbit comes out through the hole and round the tree and back down the hole' (I never was very good at knots), I eventually got his hands tied together, him tied to the chair, and the chair tied to the table. I debated tying the table to the door but that seemed a bit excessive.

‘Okay,' I said, a little breathless from the exertion of pulling on knots and shifting furniture, ‘My name is Michael Rant. Call me Mike. Nice to meet you.'

‘Likewise,' he said dryly, ‘My name is Samuel Smith. You can call me Mr Smith. Or Sir.'

‘Okay, s
ir
,' I said. ‘Now, I have a problem—'

‘I wasn't going to remark on that, but as you brought it up, do you make a habit of storming into people's houses and gardens, stinking and waving guns around?'

‘No. I'm quite new to this game.'

‘You don't say. So what exactly was it that you wanted to talk with me about, young fella?'

‘“Talk with me”? “Young fellow”? You Americans don't half talk funny.' The look he gave me threatened to melt the gun, so I hurried on, ‘Well, if you'd just let me explain. The thing is, I received a package in the post. It should have been delivered here, but the number fell off our door so the courier got it wrong. And it was a gun and some money. And now they've kidnapped my wife. And I've got lots of money that isn't mine. But not all of it is yours.'

I looked at him. He looked back at me like a dog that's been shown a card trick.

‘So here I am,' I said, to clarify matters.

‘I think you may have missed out one or two salient points, but you have got my interest,' he said. ‘So start again. Slowly. And tell me more about the bit with the package.'

So I did. He seemed to be much more interested this time and just as I was getting to the bit about the bank he stopped me.

‘I'm sorry you've been dragged into this,' he said.

‘Into what?' I asked. ‘What the hell is going on?'

He looked at me, seeming to weigh something up in his mind. Looking back, I imagine he came to the (not unreasonable) conclusion that he could be open and frank with me, as no one in his or her right mind was ever likely to believe a single word I said. Ever.

‘Look, it's like this,' he said, somewhat shamefacedly, I thought. ‘I work for the American government. For the CIA, to be precise. But don't ever try to confirm it or shop me in because it will all be denied and neither you nor I will ever be heard of again.'

‘The CIA?' I sputtered, ‘As in the Central Intelligence Agency? My God, how old are you? Are you sure you don't mean the Geriatric Intelligence Agency?'

He didn't even crack a smile.

‘I'm seventy-one,' he said, proudly, ‘and I'm probably in rather better shape than you. But I'm what is known as a sleeper.'

‘I bet – you probably need about twenty hours a day.'

‘I'm a sleeper – an undercover agent – and I've been here off and on since the early sixties. We don't work on normal ops, we just collect information and take on duties as required – though there haven't been too many of those recently.'