Picture You Dead

86

Tuesday, 5 November

As he turned out of Mackie Crescent, steering the Volvo with shaking hands, and glancing in the mirror at the sinister masked faces of the two men on the rear seat, Harry subtly edged the speed up over the 30 mph limit, to 40 mph then 45 mph, hoping against hope he might get stopped by a police car.

The heavy in the back’s name was Ross or Russ, he had overheard in an unguarded moment from his captor-in-chief. Harry felt like he was in a nightmare, and to add to the feeling, the sky through the windscreen ahead of him was constantly lit up with flaring and exploding fireworks.

Fireworks of anger were exploding inside Harry. And frustration at his helplessness.

‘You’d better mind your speed,’ the American rebuked sharply.

‘Yes – sorry – I... I’m a little nervous.’

‘Yeah? Well your driving’s making me nervous. Stay within the goddamn limit. You don’t mind if I smoke?’ he said, lighting a cigarette.

‘I like the smell, I only quit recently myself,’ Harry said, slowing down, trying to appease the man. His brain was in turmoil, he kept thinking about anything he could do, but fear for Tom’s life and fear for Freya kept him driving obediently to the limit, as he turned onto the A27, then stuck to a regulation 70 mph all the way towards his destination.

Twenty minutes later, as he turned off the dual carriageway and threaded through the urban streets of Worthing, the seaside town to the west of Brighton, he suddenly saw a blaze of flashing blue lights ahead – and felt a flip of hope. Maybe it was a roadblock and they’d be stopped? A drink-driver check? Please God.

But his hope faded as he saw ahead a police car either side of a small, beat-up saloon; on the pavement, two officers, with another two standing by, were searching a scruffy youth held face-on to a brick wall.

Even so, this could be his chance, he thought – his last chance. Jam on the brakes and shout for help? The police would see these two in their balaclavas behind him and then what could his captors do?

‘Don’t even think about it, Harry,’ the American said calmly, as if reading his mind. ‘I’m not exaggerating about the amount of insulin I injected into your son, it’s more than enough to kill him if he doesn’t get enough sugar. I have a message on my WhatsApp that’s ready to go. If I press that send button on my phone, my associate there will simply stop giving your son a regular bite of a doughnut, sufficient to keep his sugar readings at the minimum of two. If you want to keep your son alive, just keep driving.’

Harry kept on driving. Anger and fear roiling inside him. Thinking all the time if there was anything, anything at all he could do to lash back at this bastard. To get his family out of this nightmare. But he felt all out of options.

He negotiated two roundabouts, drove a short distance along another dual carriageway, then braked sharply, turning left past two modern-looking orange and yellow pillars signed WEST TARRING INDUSTRIAL ESTATE. He drove through into a dark labyrinth of single- and two-storey industrial units, each shining grey and yellow in the Volvo’s headlights.

They passed a tyre company, a furniture restorer, a vegan milk depot and several further premises, before Harry made a right and brought the car to a halt in front of a tall steel gate, with equally tall mesh, topped with barbed wire on either side, and a warning sign that it was electrified and monitored by CCTV. Protruding slightly was a numeric keypad. A sign read SOUTHERN CONTROL SAFETY STORAGE.

Lowering his window, Harry reached out his arm and tapped in his code. Moments later the gate slid open, and he drove through into a courtyard, where massive, corrugated-steel hangar-type buildings stood to their right and left. ‘This is it,’ he announced, switching off the engine, unclipping his seat belt and opening the door. The dome light illuminated his two unwelcome passengers.

Turning to look at them, he asked, ‘Either of you coming with me? You’d probably better take your balaclavas off if you do – there are security guards monitoring the CCTV and they might think it a bit odd.’

‘We’re staying in the car, Mr Kipling,’ Kilgore said tersely. ‘You have exactly five minutes.’ He held up his phone and pointed at the blue arrow button on WhatsApp, then held the phone up closer, so Harry could read the chilling message.

Kilgore pressed a button on his watch. ‘The countdown has started, Mr Kipling. And don’t believe for one moment that if you try to call for help that I won’t send this message.’

Harry hesitated for a fleeting second. He hadn’t done this before and had never timed it. ‘I... I don’t know if I can do it in five minutes.’

‘Well, that’s just cost you several valuable seconds,’ the American said in a calm voice of steel.

Harry gave him a quick look, then sprinted towards the right-hand gates. He entered the code with trembling fingers, 428106, hoping to hell he’d memorized it correctly.

An error message displayed on the screen: Two attempts left.

Shit, shit, shit. He pulled out his wallet and checked the code he kept in there. He realized in his panic that he’d reversed two numbers. He entered it again, with his fingers trembling wildly, this time, 428016.

The error message again. One attempt left.

What the fuck?

He checked the code again. Then entered it again, checking each digit in turn. Please God . . .

To his immense relief it clicked open. He pushed it, walked through and it swung closed behind him with a loud clang. Then he ran again, along the row of lock-up units, with roll-up door after roll-up door, until he reached number 257, a small unit, measuring just eight foot by six foot.

There was a combination padlock on the door and, glancing at his watch, he saw he now had under four minutes. His brain seized up and he could not think clearly. What the hell was the combination? For several precious seconds it eluded him. Somewhere close by a flash of light followed by a series of explosions in the air ripped the silence.

He was panic-stricken. He’d deliberately set up this code with a memorable number but his mind was blank. What had he used? Then he remembered, Freya’s birthday. Seconds later, to his immense relief it unlocked.

Leaning down, he tugged the handle of the door and hauled it up. Then he tapped the torch app on his phone and shone it at the interior. There were just a few items in here, large objects they had bought on a whim at car boot sales in recent years but had no room for in their current house – their dream was one day to buy a larger place in the countryside. Among the items was a red and green Victorian clothes mangle, a tailor’s headless mannequin, an oak wine barrel and a vintage grocer’s bicycle with a basket. In the far corner stood a small rectangular package, the Fragonard painting, bound first in protective bubble wrap, with an outer layer of carboard taped around it.

God, so much of their future lay with this painting. Was there anything he could do? Anything at all? He tried to think clearly. The American’s threat re. Tom. Really? Was it a bluff?

It wasn’t a bluff.

No amount of money was worth risking his life, and God knows what these monsters would do if he tried anything. Nothing was worth the risk.

He picked the painting up, and it felt almost lighter than air. Hurrying out of the unit, he pulled the door down, securing it with the code, then ran back. After negotiating the outer gate, he raced to his car. As he opened the boot, the American said, ‘Nice work, Mr Kipling, you still have forty-five seconds to spare.’

‘Good,’ he panted. ‘Phone your mate back at my house and tell him to give Tom the meds.’

‘I’m real sorry, Mr Kipling. That’s not going to happen until we get back to your house and I have the original Fragonard in my hands. I need to check that package properly. So my advice is we should get going. The clock’s ticking.’

Harry laid the picture flat and slammed the boot shut. He flashed back, momentarily, to that late September day when they’d taken this picture to the Antiques Roadshow, and security guards had escorted them back to this vehicle. When he and Freya had been so full of excitement, of hope and of almost disbelief. The kind of feeling, he thought, a lottery winner must experience when checking the numbers and realizing they were a match.

And now these bastards were taking all that from him. And he couldn’t do a damned thing about it.

Or could he?

As he drove back towards Brighton, in silence, he was still trying to think of something he could do. The occasional wild thought snaked into his mind. And every street light they passed lit up the menace of the two masked faces behind him in his mirror.

He glanced at the car clock: 8.42. They’d be home in ten minutes.

Still he kept thinking.

And still he came up with nothing. Nothing but anger at himself for being so helpless.