(aka Bike) Part 1190 by Angharad Copyright © 2010 Angharad
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“Just what is this place?” We walked into a plush modern building all glass and marble but with no sign to indicate what it actually was.
“Keep your eyes open and your mouth closed and act as if you own the place.”
Jim led me to the counter which I presume was reception. “We’d like to examine a deposit box.”
“Do you have your key?”
“Yes, well my wife does, Kate if you could...”
I reached into my bag and fiddled for a moment before bringing out the bunch of keys. The woman behind the desk picked out the small key and examined it. Then she tapped in a number on the computer keyboard. Is that why they call them keyboards? I wondered–it was safer than thinking why and what we were doing.
“Follow me,” said the woman her bum swaying in her tight skirt and skyscraper heels and despite his claims to be gay, Jim’s eyes seemed glued to her gluteal muscles and sub-cutaneous fat.
We entered a private room with a desk or table in the middle of it upon which a large locked box was standing. The receptionist handed me back the keys and told us to press the bell on the table when we’d finished.
I picked up the keys and selected the deposit box one, I looked at Jim and he nodded. I inserted the key and turned the lock. Opening the box I wasn’t sure what I expected to find inside.
It was a series of manila envelopes, inside which we found treasury bonds–at a quick calculation there was over five million pounds. Beside that there was a hundred thousand pounds in fifty pound notes and some diamonds. The box was completely full.
Jim pulled a folded up cloth bag from his pocket and stuffed the bonds, money and diamonds into it.
“What are you doing?” I gasped, shocked by his action.
“This is mob money, I’d like to see it do something for charity, like build a hospital or school in Africa, feed the homeless at Christmas or pay for hostels for those on the streets.”
“What will they do?”
“Who, the homeless or the mob?”
“The mob.”
“Take out a fatwa on us, but so far they haven’t caught up with me.”
“I’m a bit more vulnerable than you with six children.”
“True, but think of all the good this evil money can do.”
“I am, I’m sure it could do loads, but I’m still worried about the risk.”
“There’s a High Street Bank just round the corner, let’s open a deposit box there and at least make it safe.”
“Um–I don’t kno–um, okay.”
“Oh and you get to keep the key.”
“Why me?”
“Because you’re far more responsible than I am. I’d be tempted to spend it.”
We left the bank, after locking the keys in the box except the box key. Jim handed that back to the receptionist. “Should someone come asking for that box number, please give them the key.” We strolled out before she could answer.
“Was that wise, now they’ll know we stole their cash?”
“I don’t think it would have taken very long for them to look inside the box, there are safeguards for people who lose keys, you know, mother’s maiden name, that sort of thing.”
“MacDonald,” I answered.
“Yes I know.”
“Is there anything you don’t know about me?”
“Oh lots, like how the hell you’re breast feeding and how you have saved so many lives.”
“So many lives?”
“Yes, the children at the QA and various other people.”
“Who?” I bluffed.
“Look, Cathy, I know about the miracles you perform–a perfect little angel, you are, which is why you’re going to have the keys for this little lot, oh after I remove my fees. Ten K should do for the action the other night and continuing protection.”
“Am I still at risk?”
“Only as long as the Don Corleone of Sarf Lunnun is alive.”
“Perhaps we should take the money back, it’s worth nothing compared to my family.”
“Very well said, but I have a little plan to minimise the aggro.”
“I’m not sure I’m going to like this.”
“You probably won’t, but it’s very simple–we kill the bad guys.”
“We?” I gasped.
“Okay, I do the actual vermin control, you just act as the tethered goat.”
“I don’t like this, have we got a plan B?”
“Only reversing positions and I suspect I might be a bit better at the despatching bit.”
“Definitely.”
We entered the High Street Bank and after talking with the manager for a few moments–all right, I name dropped–my pa-in-law’s to be precise–and they provided a new deposit box which we locked after James removed ten thousand and I kept the key–actually, I asked them to send it to my local branch and for them to place it in a new deposit box and hold the key for me and only me, unless I was deceased and in which case to be given to Simon or Trish if he predeceased her.
Jim waited for me while I set this up unknown to him. I scribbled instructions on a note for Simon and had it sent through their internal mail system to his office.
“Happier now?” he asked.
“Yes, even if your plan fails, they can’t get their money back.”
“My plans never fail.”
“They could just shoot us down in the street,” I complained and shivered in the unseasonable cold.
“If they did they’d have to get past the two snipers who’ve been covering us ever since we got out of the car.”
“I can’t see them.”
“If you can, their training has been wasted.”
“How do they know where we’re going?”
“Duh,” he said, then I realised he knew exactly where we were going before he picked me up. I blushed.
“Watch out for the big black BMW, the one in need of a paint job–that will have pissed him off almost as much as emptying his piggy bank.”
“Doesn’t he have another car?”
“Undoubtedly, probably another similar one or a suitably large Mercedes in which to carry his ego.”
“And driving round in a Porsche isn’t?”
“You were rather glad of its acceleration a little while ago if I recall.”
“My little Mercedes is quite nippy.”
“Enough to outrun six litres of V12 BMW?”
“There are speed limits, you know?” It was a dumb thing to say seeing as I’d ignored them to escape our pursuers.
“I’ll let you think about that for a moment,” he said, then smirked when I blushed.
“Is his car bullet proof?”
“I have no idea, we’ll find out in a minute.”
“How do you know that?” I looked at him being able to predict so many of these things. He nodded up the road and double parked at the roadside maybe two hundred yards away was a large black BMW with its engine running, the exhaust was clearly visible in the cold and relatively still air.
“Don’cha just wish you were sat in the Porsche right now?” he said quietly.
“We could run for it.” I suggested, ever the optimist.
He felt inside his jacket and adjusted something.
“What’s that?” I asked knowing what it was.
“This here is a Smith and Wesson 500 magnum, even more powerful than Dirty Harry’s most powerful handgun. It’ll stop an elk, so a rat shouldn’t be too much trouble, should it?”
“What’s that he’s holding out of the window?” I asked noticing it wasn’t a shotgun or a handgun.
“It looks like a Mac 10 with silencer.”
“Whatever that is?”
“Just let’s say it can put a thousand holes in you in a minute.”
“A trifle excessive if you ask me.”
“I’ll remember to later–when I say run, get the fuck out of here.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll tell you later.”
I looked up the street and the car started to move slowly towards us.
“Go–GO,” he shouted and pushed me away as he walked towards the centre of the road. I froze for a second then did as I was told–ran like fuck.
Comments
Bike pt 1190.
Cathy needs a refund for all the aggro he is causing.
May Your Light Forever Shine
May Your Light Forever Shine
Action girl strikes again
Maybe I was wrong about Jim...... maybe.
This is still way better than 'The Archers' (British Radio Soap).
Ang, do you work and plot 'Daily Dormouse' as well? This is true multi-tasking.... and feed the cats (or do they have to open their own food containers?)
S.
Very sensible.
In fact running like fuck is possibly the most sensible thing Cathy has ever done. I'd have done it very much earlier :)
Robi
hmmm
ever since this Jim bloke popped up I've been flashing on this movie I watched the other night. 'Taken' with Liam Neeson as the cool brute avenger seeking his kidnapped daughter. Dark and nastily vicious, sort of fits the mood of this little mini saga in a tale. I'm wincing already.
Kris
'Laqnguage Timothy.'
That's one hell of a hand-gun.
A 500 magnum will stop a car. The bullet could go longitudinally through an aluminium engine block and still erupt with fatal force out of the back of the bell housing. All in all, a very nasty weapon and it's got one almighty bang. The sound alone will nearly concuss you if you are in the cone of primary acoustics. It's like a stun grenade.
Before the ban on Handguns after Dunblane, one of my staff owned a 500 magnum. He was a keen target shooter and belonged to Port Talbot gun club. At that time, his gun was legal and fully registered through the gun club then he had to surrender it after the Dunblane massacres.
He demonstrated the force one afternoon (Legally)on the rubble mound breakwater in Port Talbot. I stood behind him as he fired the bullet at an angle to the slab of rock so that it would ricochette out to sea. After a f-----g deafening bang (and I was behind the cone of primary acoustics,)I stared stupidly at the slab of rock 3 metre diameter and about 40 centimeteres thick. It had cracked in half and that was only a glancing hit.
I realised it was a very nasty weapon and I asked him why he kept such a powerful gun.
He said that while he used it mainly for recreational target shooting, the most interesting use for the gun was to settle arguments about firearms. The holywood shit like cowboys hiding inside a log cabin while the baddies fired round after round was ridiculous. One 500 magnum round would blast a hole in a board door big enough to crawl through.
He used to invite friends up to the gun club to demonstrate it's power. Being a very mild mannered and likeable guy he avoided arguments but it gave him satisfaction to see people's ideas of 'The A team' and shit like that change dramatically after a demonstration of it's power.
I was certainly impressed and it gave me much room for thought.
Jim's got a pretty useful weapon there.
I don't own any guns. Never have and never want to. Though if our civil liberties continue to be whittled away it might be prudent to bear arms agains forces of oppression in our own country. I'm beginning to understand why Americans reserve their right to bear arms, trouble is there's a perpetual 'arms race' between the criminal and the law enforcer.
Loving the story, don't ever stop,
Love and hugs,
OXOXOX.
Beverly.
Growing old disgracefully.
I firmly believe
that old stuff about hiding in the cabin. Those old guns were using black powder loads and cap and ball type loads. While impressive sounding, those round balls and low pressure loads did not have a lot of penetration and were very inaccurate. Even once they got into improvments of loading shells, they were still black powder until more modern high pressure smokeless loads came about. And a log cabin would still be good protection back then. Not so with todays improvments though. My toys will shoot right through into a house the way they are built since the 1900s, or even earlier. Heck, you can put your hand through a typical wall and reach through to unlock and open a door.
Diamonds, eh?
So nothing whatsoever to do with a previous plot then...? :)
So, doing a spot of Wiki research, the MAC-10 can fire 1,000 rounds per minute, at an effective range of 50m (~55 yds). The car's 200yds (~180m) away, so Cathy's got a bit of time to dart around a corner or into the nearest shop. Besides which, assuming there's only one gunman in the car, he'll probably be more concerned with Jim's Model 500 (according to Wiki, the Magnum 500 is the ammo rather than the gun), which very conveniently has an effective range equivalent to the distance between the car and him, but has a very strong recoil - which probably only gives him the chance to fire off a couple of shots before he's mincemeat. Then again, his pet snipers are probably also watching the car, so may also have a chance to fire off a shot or two before the MAC-10 is in range of Jim.
Not to mention that he'd then need to disappear asap, as the police would no doubt be very interested in a chap standing in the middle of the road firing a gun at the occupants of a car... and Cathy will no doubt face yet another police interrogation when she gets back home as a witness (of course, even though she'll be a few hundred yards away facing the opposite direction at the time the shots are fired, the Met will no doubt be convinced she saw something).
There are 10 kinds of people in the world - those who understand binary and those who don't...
As the right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, then only left-handers are in their right mind!
Guns
The reason I chose a MAC 10 for my story 'Playtime' was precisely that: to put a lot of rounds down in a very short time. The comments above remind me of a story by the late lamented Bob Shaw, in which a 'cowboy' is given a .457 Magnum by a time traveller. He pracrises by firing at a pot on the edge of a well, and once he has wiped the blood from his eyes after being hit in the face by the recoiling weapon, he realises there is a large chunk of the wellhead wall missing. Later in the story, there is indeed a scene where one of his assailants hides behind a wooden wall.
Yup. As predicted above.
One of the problems/advantages of the old SLR over the SA80 was that it could happily put rounds through brick walls.
Coincidences
I was getting the oil changed in my car this afternoon. Unlike many places of this type, they actually had a decent collection of current magazines. I picked up a sports magazine, and one of the first adds was for the Smith and Wesson 500 pistol. My goodness what a cannon! If I understood the ad, there will be 1000 numbered pistols produced. I don't think I would have the nerve to even fire the thing. I probably couldn't afford the ammunition. I describe a 50 caliber sniper's rifle in two of my stories. It, the rifle, probably has a higher velocity bullet, but that is one heck of a weapon regardless. how did it get to the UK so quickly?
Portia
Portia
.44 Mag
I'm gonna get spanked for this, sorry. I fired a .44 a few times and to me, it is a two handed gun, and you really do need to "grip" the weapon.
Khadijah
The action just doesn't stop!
Thanks A+B: I don't know how much you enjoy writing the action stuff, but it reads as if you love it.
I had to smile at the lines:
From what I know about Jim's gun, whether the car is bulletproof or not is going to make little difference.
For those who are au fait with the good book, Matthew 26:52 seems fairly apposite at this point.
Powerful Shooter
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With a gun that powerful,
With a gun that powerful, Jim would have had to take lots of practice to fire it competently at any target. The recoil has to be tremendous in and of itself. The last largest magnum load I remember was .257 caliber (rifle sized round) and it was used in a single action revolver with a solid block type chamber (due to the explosive forces it exhibited). I read an article on it, where the inventor sat with his back against a tree and fired it and knocked himself out from the recoil by his head hitting the tree. He stated he had designed the gun for hand gun deer hunting. I think I'll stick to the .45 caliber Model 1911A1, for all around use. Jan
.45 auto
I know that Erin does not like much gun talk so I will restrict my comments save to say that the .45 was my primary weapon in the MPs. The Ruger p-90 of the same calibre is superior, except I expect it would not be as resistant to jaming as the old one. The old one was a real hand beater, ungh! Still, the recoil was light enough to get off more than one shot in a short time; maybe 2-3 seconds. I'll bet the cycle rate on that 500 is 5 sec, and on a little person like me. I may only fire once, lol.
Of course, that is what Big, Powerful Men are for; pant pant. LOL
Khadijah
500 mag 50cal pistol
one had better be ready for this puppy. a few yrs back b4 transition, I had a chance to - I was gonna say "play" with this & the S&W 44 magnum. Both of these are very serious pistols. I was most interested in the 44 as that's the ole dirty harry gun. I had several friends with said gun, but never seemed to find time to get out on range with it. now mind ya this was still in my fairly in good shape male days B4 hormones & I'd been around lots of weapons, I shot the 44 1st. I thought it was gonna rip my arms outta socket, but I never really believed I wasnt in total control thru the 25 shot round we did.
Next up 500mag. I'd never shot any 50 cal that wasnt bolted down to something & wasnt too sure , but excitement to try this was too much. so I marched up to the line & sighted in, & fired a round off.
two things occurred, 1st thing i noticed was me sitting back on my ass, by time the shock of that occurred was wearing off, i noticed the ringing in my ears, even tho i was wearing 1st rate ear protection. well to shorten this a bit, I looked up & rick, down @ the gun, unloaded the gun, handed it to him, and Exclaimed never again !
I've only shot two weapons that put me on my ass, tho several that put bruises on me
1 was some make or another 410 shotgun -- I was 10 yrs old, and the other time was the was the M107 50 cal Barret, I ended up with a disloated shoulder, but what a weapon.
Me I'll stick to my 308 winchester rifle & M&K 9mm anymore
Key
Just a thought but if the gangsters could get in to the bank deposit box with a password why go to the trouble of try to kill Cathy and her family, also why didn't they look in Julie handbag whilst they had her, why oh why didn't they just kill her in stead of trying to burn her alive, just a thought
Dave
Key
Just a thought but if the gangsters could get in to the bank deposit box with a password why go to the trouble of try to kill Cathy and her family, also why didn't they look in Julie handbag whilst they had her, why oh why didn't they just kill her in stead of trying to burn her alive, just a thought
Dave