Prologue
Dan Hayes sat
slumped in his driver’s seat, arms resting on the coach’s big steering wheel, a
pistol held in his right hand. Behind
him he could hear the soft moaning of a woman and sobbing of a child. He raised his head to look in the mirror. Illuminated by the blue flashing lights from
the vehicles surrounding the bus he could see the ashen-faced passengers. Closest to the front was a man with a bloody
wound in his chest, a blonde woman next to him a large bruise on her cheek. Hayes stared into the mirror, looking at each
face in turn: the two Chinese girls, the Japanese mother and daughter, the
elderly Americans, the old ladies. They
all had the same expression: terror.
He sighed and
looked out through the rain-streaked windscreen.
In every direction there were vehicles with blue flashing lights on
top. Behind open doors he could just
make out the black shapes of armed police officers, assault rifles aimed at the bus, their metallic bodies shiny in the harsh lighting of the scene. He stared down at his own gun, suddenly finding
its weight heavy and oppressive. From outside
he could hear a voice calling to him from a loud-speaker, but he ignored
it. The words meant nothing to him. Nothing had meaning any more.
He had made his decision, and
straightening up he rubbed his eyes with his free hand before turning round to
face his passengers.
“It’ll be over soon… Keep down and nobody
try and make a run for it.” To emphasise
his point he waggled the gun.
“Understand at the back?”
The Japanese woman nodded, pulling her
daughter closer.
The door hissed open and he stood up,
stepping down into the well and then out of the bus. The rain lashed his face as he looked around,
screwing his eyes against the stinging needles and the headlights which dazzled
him and the constant flickering of blue lights on roofs.
“Put the weapon down, Hayes, and walk
towards me… slowly!”
The voice from the loud-speaker was harsh
and angry, but Hayes shrugged inwardly.
He didn’t fear the voice any more.
“Hayes… put the gun down. NOW !”
He looked down at the rain-slick weapon in
his hands, and smiled.
The
Ladies Tea Circle
Dottie Prewitt stroked the chest of her
marmalade cat as it sat on her lap, purring noisily and contentedly, eyes
closed and almost smiling. Dottie’s eyes
started to close and her head slowly drooped, a stray lock of blonde hair
falling loose over her forehead. Her
eyes snapped open as the door bell chimed “Rule Britannia” and the cat leapt
from her thighs.
She took a deep breath and stood
up, pausing briefly to adjust her hair in the hall mirror. Opening the front door she was greeted by
three elderly ladies with happy faces and capacious bags in their hands.
“Hello ladies,” Dottie gushed, standing
aside to allow her friends to enter the house.
By the time she has closed the door and returned to the living room she
found the three women all seated and making a fuss of the cat.
“Are you ready to go?” Lizzie Stewart
asked her, looking around the room.
Dottie looked at her, wondering what she
was talking about.
“Go?”
The three ladies looked at her in some
surprise.
“Don’t you remember, Dottie? We’re going on a bus tour to the Lake District today.”
Something stirred at the back of Dottie’s
mind and she suddenly remembered.
“Oh!
I’m so sorry ladies, I had forgotten all about that. When are we to be at the bus?” She pulled her sleeve back to stare at her
watch in something akin to mild horror.
She had been forgetting things lately…
important things like appointments with her doctor, to family matters. It was disconcerting and not a little
worrying for her.
“There’s no rush, Dottie. The bus picks us up at twelve. All we need to do is get to the railway
station by eleven and everything will be fine.”
A wave of relief swept over Dottie and she
asked her friends to wait for a few minutes while she packed a bag and made
some sandwiches.
Lizzie leaned closer to the other two and
lowered her voice.
“Do you think Dottie’s all right? I mean, at her age she could, you know…”
“Oh, Lizzie!” hissed Maggie
Barnstaple. “How could you say such a
thing? She's younger than you are.”
Lizzie tutted and straightened her back
with an audible crunch. She was in her
sixties and, like Dottie, had dyed her grey hair blonde but wore it in a tight
perm like the other two. Dottie tended
to wear her hair in a shoulder-length bob, which actually had the effect of
making her appear a good deal younger than her sixty-three years.
The ladies were all part of a tea-drinking
club in their town, meeting every Saturday and Wednesday for morning tea, walks
and day trips, making the most of their free time and the fact that, for
various reasons, they all lived alone and enjoyed the company. There were other ladies in the circle but
this quartet – Dottie Prewitt, Lizzie Stewart, May Guthrie and Maggie Barnstaple
- were the original founders and most dedicated members.
The Lake District
trip had been organised in the spring, some four months previously. Now, as the summer wore on, it was time to
take the tour. They would arrive in
Penrith and board the bus there. The
tour was scheduled to last for around six hours and would take in the majestic
scenery. Weather reports were favourable
so they were all looking forward to a lovely day.
Dottie returned some ten minutes
later with a tartan bag over her arm, a light hiking jacket and an umbrella.
“Ready?” Lizzie asked. Everyone burst out laughing and they headed
for the door. Dottie looked around the
living room and then down at the cat, sitting upright on the sofa. She rubbed its furry head between the ears,
eliciting a soft purr.
“There’s food and water in the kitchen,
Matty. Help yourself but don’t eat it
all. Bye bye.”
With a wave she was gone.
Matty jumped from the sofa and ran to the
window, nosing the net-curtain aside and peering out. He watched as the four women walked away down
the road towards the local railway station.
His eyes closed and he fell asleep in the sun.
* * * * *
The taxi squeaked to a halt outside the
station as Lizzie paid the driver and told him to keep the change. In response he got out and opened the
kerbside passenger door for them.
Chattering excitedly the ladies made their way to the ticket office,
brandishing their rail concession passes as they passed through the ticket
barriers.
Despite the summer sun the platform was
chilly, with a cool north wind blowing down the tracks towards them. Dottie closed her jacket closed and thrust
her hands in her pockets, bag at her feet.
“Are
you feeling alright, Dottie?” Maggie
asked, her hand on the other woman’s shoulder.
“Just
a bit chilly. Be okay when we get on the
train.” Dottie gave her friend a smile
and took a deep breath. “Hard to believe
it’s summer.”
“Ooh! Here it comes!” someone chirped and all eyes
looked to the south, where the lights were green and they could see the train
coming through the morning haze.
The
train ground to a halt with a clank and squeal of brakes, and with a final
hydraulic hiss it remained still. Being
an electric train there was the usual ticking sound as the motors idled, ready
to lurch into motion once again. The
ladies clambered aboard and headed for the nearest free set of seats with a
table between them. Jackets were thrown
onto the rack over their heads and they all settled down ready for the off.
“Oh
this is nice,” Lizzie cooed. “Nice comfy
seats and a lovely big window.”
“Much
better than those old trains.”
They
all agreed and discussed the merits of the bearded entrepreneur who founded the
company, and then reminiscing about the days of steam engines and other 1950s
memories.
“I
can still remember the first car my Harold bought,” Dottie said dreamily. “A maroon Ford Popular. He loved that little car, polishing it every
Sunday so he could see his face in the bonnet.”
She looked out of the window sadly, the memories of her husband’s last
few days still painful: watching him in his hospital bed, growing weaker and
weaker as his heart finally gave up the fight.
Sensing that the mood could be turning from happy to one of sadness
Maggie produced a pack of playing cards.
“Who’s
for Old Maid?”
By
noon all but Dottie were
asleep. She put her magazine down and
closed it carefully, resting her hands on it.
She opened her bottle of Lucozade and took a mouthful of the sweet fizzy
drink. She turned to the window and
gazed out at the scenery as it zipped past; trees and buildings were a blur as
Dottie let her mind wander back to the first time she and Harold had been
together on a train.
It
had been a summer day like this, but then it was a steam train and they were in
a compartment rather than an open carriage.
Harold had drawn the curtains, shutting off the view from the corridor,
giving them an illusion of privacy. As
they kissed his hand had rested on her thigh, slowly moving up her body.
She
smiled as she recalled his warm hand sliding inside her blouse and touching her
breast. When they heard the door click
they parted and did their best to look innocent while the conductor had asked
to see their tickets. When the man had
closed the door behind them they burst out laughing, the tension broken. That night they made love for the first time
in a small inn and vowed ever-lasting love.
Harold
and Dottie married a year later in a registry office in Aberdeen while on holiday. They had wanted children but due to a
childhood illness Harold was sterile, so they had pets to make their new house
seem less empty. Harold joined the
police while Dottie took a part time job as a receptionist for a local doctor.
After
twenty years Harold was invalided out of the force after being shot in the
chest by an armed robber. Although he
left hospital feeling well he was informed that the damage caused by the 9mm
bullets meant that he was no longer fit for front line service in the
police. He was offered the rank of Desk
Sergeant but turned it down, feeling that spending all day, every day behind a
desk would drive him mad.
So
with a healthy police pension (and his premium bond numbers coming up a few
months later) Harold and Dottie settled into a quiet life. However, neither of them knew that the damage
caused by the bullet was getting worse as the years passed, and it was this
which, in the end, killed him.
Dottie
wiped away a tear and looked down at the wedding and engagement rings on her
finger. A smile formed on her lips and
she sighed.
“Thinking
of Harold?” It was Lizzie, awake now and
stretching, her back cracking. She let
out a gasp and winced.
“We’re
getting old,” she giggled and took a mouthful of water from her bottle.
“I
was just thinking back to when Harold and I took the train together for the
first time. He was so randy.”
They
laughed softly together and caught the attention of a middle-aged man typing on
his laptop computer. He tutted
dramatically and returned to what he was doing, eliciting more laughter from
the ladies.
* * * * *
The train
pulled into Penrith station and the four elderly ladies staggered out, wincing
and rubbing their painful arms and legs.
It was cooler here than at their home station. Maggie pulled out a crinkled sheet of A4
paper and unfolded it, peering at the printed text and then at her watch.
“Well, we
have an hour to get to the bus, which should be parked… there!”
She pointed
through an opening at a large white coach.
The others followed her finger and saw the bus. Like a gaggle of excited schoolgirls they
made their way towards the exit.
The bus was a
large white vehicle with tinted windows and mirrors at the front which made it
resemble some giant caterpillar. On the
side was the tour company logo: Monarch Tours.
“Ooh, looks
very swish,” May Guthrie giggled. “We’ll
be like princesses.”
“Step seems
awfully high,” Maggie muttered. “Not
sure I can get my leg that high.”
“Just imagine
it’s Cliff Richard waiting for you inside,” Dottie laughed.
There was no
sign of the driver or other passengers so they decided to waste half an hour or
so with a wander around the area.
Clutching their bags tightly the ladies tea circle went off in search of
their favourite beverage.
When they
returned they found that the bus door was open and a few passengers were in
their seats. The ladies produced their
tickets and showed them to the driver as they clambered aboard the coach. There were only four people on the bus so
far: an elderly couple in matching sweaters and baseball caps, and an Asian
woman with a teenage girl closer to the back of the bus.
The elderly
couple smiled at the ladies as they passed while the Asian woman bobbed her
head slightly. Maggie and May sat on one
side of the aisle, four seats up, while Lizzie and Dottie took the other side,
Dottie claiming the window seat.
“Well this is
all very posh, I must say,” Lizzie cooed, flipping the small table down from
the seat in front of her. “Just like an
airliner.”
“Much more
legroom, though,” Dottie added.
It was at
that moment that the couple in front of them turned and introduced themselves.
“Hi, George
and Alice Creek
“Are you all
together?” Alice asked. She was a small, fragile looking
woman with a tight perm, her grey hair like a crash helmet. Her husband was a rotund, heavily built man
with a few wisps of white hair around his head.
“Yes, we’re a
sort of coven,” Lizzie said in all seriousness.
“Oh my!” Alice gasped, her hand
covering her mouth.
Maggie burst
out laughing and told the American couple that they were just a group of
friends who meet up for chats, tea, and daytrips. While they were talking the Asian woman
appeared and bowed.
“Hello. My name is Sayako and this is my daughter
Ami. We are in your beautiful country on
vacation.”
George
grunted and sat down again. Sayako
smiled, but Dottie could sense there was sadness behind the smile. She looked at the Asian woman, estimating her
to be in her thirties while she looked to be in her early twenties, while the
girl looked to be around twelve or so.
Both wore their hair long and were dressed in what looked to be very
expensive casual clothing. Dottie
introduced herself and asked where the woman was from.
“Chiba in Japan . This is our first time in England .”
“Your English
is very good,” Maggie added, smiling at the woman’s daughter.
“Thank
you. I learn it in Australia when I was young. I am sorry, but my daughter does not speak
too well English.”
Dottie flushed when she heard the
American in front of her mutter under his breath: “Neither does the mother.”
She smiled to
Sayako and said in breezy voice:
“Well I’m
sure we’ll all get on fine, and please don’t worry about it. Maggie over there used to be an English
teacher before she retired.”
Sayako turned
and Maggie waved at her, beaming brightly.
“Thank you…
you are kind.” She looked down at Ami
and whispered to her, then bent her arms and clenched her fists in front of her,
a broad smile on her face.
“Yosh!”
Ami bobbed
her head enthusiastically, smiled and turned to the ladies.
“Sank you,”
then trotted off back to her seat.
Sayako bobbed her head and returned to her seat. When she had gone Maggie turned to Dottie and
spoke in a soft voice.
“The daughter
is such a beautiful girl… they both are.”
Dottie
lowered her voice to a whisper.
“I don’t
think our American friends approve.”
Just at that
point they heard the man groan again and looked up. Two more passengers had stepped aboard the
bus. Two more Asian girls were handing
their tickets to the driver while a young man stood behind them. All three wore small packs.
“More zips!”
“Do you mind
not using that kind of language?” Dottie hissed, her face reddening. “I heard what you said when that Japanese
girl was talking. You’re a guest in our
country, so please show some respect.”
George
grunted and dragged his wife off to another pair of seats closer to the front. Dottie smiled to herself and, while Lizzie
was chatting with the others, she pulled out her small digital camera and
checked the power. The small screen on
the rear showed the last image on the card: the four ladies armed with
candy-floss at the Pleasure Beach in Blackpool
during the Easter period.
George
and Alice
Three days before
Today
was another excuse for George to grumble.
He
and his wife Alice had boarded the Virgin Atlantic Boeing 747 after a ten
minute delay (and much arguing with the staff at the boarding gate), only for
them to be seated behind a young black couple and their baby, and as babies are
prone to do it was crying. The mother
was rocking the baby in her arms and trying to calm the little boy down. George grumbled that babies shouldn’t be
permitted aboard airliners as a courtesy to regular fare-paying passengers.
The
woman turned round in her seat and looked over the headrest at George, her eyes
boring into his.
“My
child has as much right to be on this airplane as you do!” she hissed in a
strong mid west accent.
“Then
keep it quiet,” George retorted.
“My
son is teething, so it’s natural for
him to cry. He’s a baby for God’s
sake!” With that she turned back round
and continued to comfort her son.
“What?”
“That
wasn’t very nice, honey.”
“Nice? I don’t care about ‘nice’. This is a long flight and I just want to
sleep, not listen to some kid bawling its eyes out.” He fastened his own seatbelt and yanked it
tight with a grunt. He turned to the
window next to him and stared out at the ground crew clambering into their
motorised carts and small tractors.
“Good
morning ladies and gentlemen, this is your pilot, Captain Peter Gaskill. On behalf of Virgin Atlantic I’d like to
welcome you all aboard today’s flight to Heathrow…”
George
slumped in his seat and looked up at the speaker grille.
“God
I hate that accent.”
* * * * * *
George
was from a military family, a Marine Corps family. His father and one uncle had fought the
Japanese in the Far East, and his father had
fought the North Koreans and Chinese in another war... the Korean War. He listened to their lurid stories full of
adventure and horror, leaving a deep and abiding hatred for Asian people
in general, but particularly the Japanese. He would never buy a
Japanese car or television, Korean curries were anathema, while he regarded the
Chinese as rice-eating peasants with no minds of their own.
This
anti-Asian bias came to a head when he enlisted in the US Marines and went off
to Vietnam
in the sixties. Unlike a majority of the
young men in that conflict he enjoyed it.
By that time he had met and fallen for Alice Meeker, a student and
part-time shop-girl. While the other
members of his squad tracked down Vietnamese girls for drinks and sex he was
cleaning his rifle or writing letters home to his father and Alice.
He
couldn’t understand why his friends would sleep with the Vietnamese girls, as
to him they were no more than chattering peasants. He was here to kill Vietnamese, not have sex
with them.
The
war ended in American defeat and he returned home to insults and abuse, but he
didn’t care. He was a Marine, and he
could take it. Six months later, now
married to Alice ,
he was discharged from the Corps for starting a fight with a former friend who
had invited him to attend his wedding… to a Vietnamese girl. George, being George, had let everyone within
ear-shot know his feelings about the marriage, and a fight had ensued. It ended with George being thrown into the
street and the police being called.
After
the Corps he took up a job offer to work in an electronics factory assembling
televisions, but he left in protest when a Japanese company bought the
plant. He hated the new work practices,
the hours, but most of all the Japanese staff and management who were also
based there.
A
cousin offered him a steady job driving trucks, which he happily accepted. It was a job he enjoyed and continued with it
until his retirement.
Now,
with their two daughters married and living in other states the Creeks decided
to take a trip to England ,
home to Alice ’s
parents. Alice ’s
parents left Surrey when she was less than a year old and settled in New Jersey . Not long after meeting George she became
aware of his overt xenophobia and racist outlook on life. Initially she had tried to change him, but
after a few years she gave up. Some
people were beyond redemption, she had said to herself.
“Cabin
crew take your seats for take off,” came the pilot’s voice, while the seatbelt
signs flashed and a chime sounded. The
televisions in the rear of the seats showed the view of the runway from the
nose-mounted camera: at the moment the view was of the tarmac moving slowly and
a white line almost dead centre.
As
she watched Alice
noticed the tarmac was moving a bit faster, the sight making her slightly
dizzy, so she looked past her husband and out of the window. Presently the plane reached the runway and,
for a moment or two stopped, as if gathering strength for the next stage.
The
engines roared and the plane started to move forward again. As she watched the tarmac became a grey blur
and she felt herself being pressed into the seat, even more so when the giant
aircraft angled upwards and soared into the air. On the screen the runway vanished to be
replaced by the city, getting smaller and smaller. After a few minutes the Boeing banked and
climbed higher.
They
were on their way.
“Damn
airplane’ll tear itself apart before we get to England !” George grumbled, taking
out his glasses and opening his newspaper.
Alice
smiled and started to read her own magazine.
* * * * * *
The
flight had been uneventful and George had slept thanks to a few glasses of
wine. He was woken by Alice when the pilot announced that the plane
would be landing at London Heathrow in half an hour and the seatbelts sign was
illuminated. The mad rush for the toilets was at its peak and George
found something new to complain about.
The
747 landed without incident and the passengers disembarked, heading for the
immigration section or for their connecting flights. It took George and Alice just under an hour
to complete their journey through the various checks and pick up their bags at
the carousel.
They
reached their hotel a little after lunchtime and were taken up to their rooms
by a helpful member of staff. The eighth
floor room was spacious and had a view over the Thames ,
the London Eye clearly visible in the distance.
While Alice
unpacked George examined the bathroom, whipping back the shower curtain
violently and knocking the tiles.
“What
on earth are you doing, George?”
“Just
checking the tiles. You know what these
English builders are like… ah! Hear
that?”
“Hear
what, honey? Come on, give me a hand to
unpack.”
Feeling
vindicated George closed the bathroom door behind him and unzipped their bigger
case. Everything inside was folded
neatly with sharp creases, with the shirts protected by polythene bags.
No comments:
Post a Comment