Wuthering Dormice (aka Bike) Part 801 by Angharad

I could not believe how simple it was to let them find me. I’d driven the Mini to the back of the hotel, sneaked in the back way and then walked out to my Golf, which was when they attempted to kidnap me. As they were doing so, an old lady was getting into her car and she saw the abduction in progress.

“Just what do you think you are doing, unhand that girl immediately.” She marched over to the car and waving her umbrella, brought it down not on the gunman but on the head of his accomplice who’d got out of the car to assist his colleague. He went down like a sack of spuds.

The gunman then turned to shoot the old lady and I could no longer allow things to go unchallenged. He was still holding me at the nape of my neck, I twisted and brought my elbow up in his face, catching him in the eye. He swore at me and raised the gun to hit me with it and the old lady struck again, this time on his wrist knocking the gun out of his hand.

I dodged out of his grip and brought my other elbow back into his solar plexus. He groaned and I jumped away and kicked him at the same time, a moment later the old lady whacked him on the head and he collapsed, helped by my hand which caught him by the hair and rammed his falling head against the wing of the car.

Two more assailants ran towards us but as they did, the old lady picked up the dropped gun and pointed it at them, they turned and fled. She shot both of them. I’d have still been looking to find the safety catch.

Within minutes of my phone call the place was swarming with police and two ambulances took away the injured. I knew it was going to be a long day by the time we had told our story a dozen times to a multitude of coppers. Finally, Bill arrived and the policewoman who’d been guarding me withdrew.

“What the hell have you been doing? You were supposed...”

“...to blow the bloody doors off.” I completed the famous film quote.

“Eh?” he looked at me as if I was speaking a foreign language.

“Italian Job, the Michael Caine quote.”

“Cathy, you’ve just blown a chance to find where they’re holding Simon.”

“Look Bill, or whatever your real name is, I was busy being abducted when a nice old lady declared war on Russia. She laid out the driver of the car and when my abductor went to shoot her, I had to intervene.”

“Which one is he, two of them have fractured skulls and the other two have bullet wounds?”

“I don’t know, oh he may have a black eye.”

“Cathy, what are we going to do with you? Why did you have to shoot them?”

“I didn’t shoot anyone, that was Myrtle.”

“Myrtle?”

“Yes the old biddy, she’s Myrtle Kingston, retired MI5 agent.”

“You’re joking?”

“Ask her for yourself?”

“But, she’s a legend in the service, I thought she was dead.”

“Dead? She’s alive and shooting.”

“You know, they say she nearly shot Mugabe?”

“No I didn’t, why didn’t she?”

“The gun jammed.”

“Wouldn’t they have got her for it?”

“Doubt it; she was brilliant at escapes from seemingly impossible situations. She once shot her way out of a building full of Chinese soldiers. Hit nine of them.”

“So she’s like Jane Bond?”

“More or less, yes. I must go and meet her a moment.”

“What about Simon?”

“I used my plan, you think of one?”

“Won’t the Russians talk? You know water boarding and stuff? Truth serum?”

“All of them were unconscious thanks to Batman and Robin.”

“Well they won’t be tomorrow will they?”

“What if they decide to take it out on Simon?”

“Why should they do that? It wasn’t his fault they blew it, was it?”

“They’ve lost four men, today. It’s hardly going to improve detente is it?”

“Serves ‘em right, they started this, remember?”

“I’m well aware of that, Cathy. Go back to the house, I’ll contact you later.”

“What about my new friend, Myrtle?”

“I’ll get them to release her on police bail.”

“Will she be a target, now?”

“I doubt it, unless they had someone watching, they won’t know who did what. I hate to say this, but if they get you now, they may well be rather rough with you.”

“How about giving me a gun?”

“I don’t think so, people who carry guns usually get shot more easily than those who aren’t. Just think of our little Russian friends. They were the ones carrying guns.”

I know, but we only found one of them.”

“So you told the police, I don’t suppose they looked in the boot of the mini perchance?”

“No, I wasn’t near the mini.”

“So how come I found this in there?” He held up an automatic pistol in a small plastic bag.

“Search me guv’nor,” I said in a cockney accent nearly as bad as Dick van Dyke’s.

“Don’t push your luck, Cathy. If you’d taken this and used it, you could have had a custodial sentence of up to ten years.”

“What for self-defence?”

“For using a firearm.”

“So I just allow them to shoot me?”

“I would suggest you tell the police you found this under a car or something, if you use it; you’re on your own.”

He put the bag containing the gun next to my handbag and walked away. I quickly scooped it up and zipped my handbag up. Five minutes later, I was told I could go, apparently CCTV footage of the attack was made by the hotel cameras and my story was corroborated by it. I had to sign a statement and promise not to leave the country.

“My fiancé has been kidnapped by the Russian mafia, my children are supposedly in the safe custody of the security services, just where am I going to go?”

“I don’t know, ma’am, but I have to caution you against it.”

“If you bloody lot did your job in the first place, these goons would have been arrested at the airport.”

“That’s British Airport Police and Home Office, not us, ma’am, we don’t get to carry machine pistols.”

“Pity, I could have borrowed one for the weekend.”

“I don’t think so, ma’am, pretty lengthy jail sentence if you were caught in possession of one.”

“So what am I supposed to do if they try to grab me again?”

“Dial 999 and ask for police.”

“Sure, I’ll do that if you can guarantee to be there within five seconds.”

“Be reasonable, ma’am, we aim to be there within eight minutes for firearms.”

“Yeah sure, a fat lot of good that would do. I suspect if they try again it will be to kill me not abduct me.”

“We do our best ma’am.”

I shook my head and carried my rather heavy handbag out to the VW. I left the police HQ as quickly as I could, I wanted to get home and make sure Bill hadn’t unloaded the gun. I was feeling rather more anxious than I’d been before. If they came for me now, I was likely to be rather dead afterwards. My bravado with Bill had now changed into needing to find a loo rather quickly. I drove home as quickly as I could determined to find Simon and rescue him, but I was beginning to think his family were a liability and adding to the everyday risks of raising three girls. Once he was free, I might wave goodbye to my chances of being Lady Cameron in favour of keeping my children safe.