‘Who owns the firm?’ I asked.
‘It’s not on the web site but my friend says it’s some Brit called Ryder.’
Ker-ching. A step forward. Mr Ryder had branched out into security. Now there was a surprise. I wondered just what kind of ‘protection’ he offered to his clients. I thanked Charlie and threatened him with bodily violence if he breathed a word of this to anyone.
‘One last question. How would you know which branch the numbers and the password belong to?’
‘I don’t know but I could ask my friend.’
‘Can you also find out which branches have security deposit boxes?’
As I left him I looked at the address for the branch in Inca — Av Alcudia 5.
Bingo.
Chapter 42
Thursday March 6 th 2008
The best laid plans and all that. My post HMV revival and my reinvigorated mission to bring down Dupree hit a roadblock of immense proportions.
I had decided that I needed to go to Spain. Charlie had come back to me and said that only two of the branches of Mallorca Security carried safety deposit boxes and one of those was in Inca.
I priced up flights and accommodation along with a car and came up someway short of the required readies. I tried to tap up Martin but this proved tricky. I told him about the meet with Charlie and he was none to happy. No reason. He just went south on me and clammed up. Conversation became a tough gig and he wouldn’t let me in on his reason for the cold shoulder. I didn’t have time to fart around so I went my own way.
Back to the tools as they say. Time for a little breaking and entering.
My small tool kit for the hostel was lightweight and I needed some decent stuff so I rolled up to the Barras, a match to the markets of Marrakech only with more diversity. I hadn’t expected to pick everything up in one go and, in that, I was wrong.
It was Sunday afternoon and the place was just calming down from heaving. I had spotted a few likely stores and stalls with the sort of products I needed and was just about to put my hand in my pocket when I stumbled over a hardware stall with an owner who couldn’t have looked dodgier had he been wearing a trilby, a trench coat and spoken like George Cole.
As soon as I enquired after the price of a couple of items he nodded to a boy playing a Nintendo DS to take over and he beckoned me behind the stall. He reached into a box, rooted around and pulled out a leather wrap.
‘You wouldn’t be looking for one of these would you, sir?’
‘Sir’ sounded so dismissive I almost smacked him one. Instead I took the wrap and laid it on the ground. Checking that no one could see, I undid the cord holding the leather together and rolled out the dog’s bollocks of a tool kit. It made the one that I had half-inched at the hostel look like a kid’s toy. A bit old school but there was only one use for the combination of tools that nestled in the wrap and the owner knew it. I fingered the tools, each held in place by its own piece of hand sewn leather.
I rolled it back up and stood up.
‘Bit old fashioned,’ I said.
‘Premium kit though sir.’
‘Price?’
‘One hundred’
I laughed.
‘Twenty five.’
He laughed and I laughed and we both laughed all the way to sixty quid.
Next on the list was a target. In the old days this was easy. We had informers falling over themselves to tell tales of the riches locked away in homes. With no one to help, I went back to the shoe leather and picked an affluent end of town and spent a couple of days walking the streets and a couple of nights walking the back gardens.
I had narrowed my thoughts down to one of three houses and was sitting in the back garden of my first choice, trying to figure out the security. It had been a long time since I had broken into a house and not only was I rusty, but technology had moved on apace.
All three houses sported burglar alarms and no doubt an array of passive infra red boxes, tremblers, contacts — even CCTV. But that was the price of a good haul and I needed it to be good. I had no intention of doing this twice.
The house I was looking at was a semi-detached sandstone affair. A huge garden sat out back — one that had clearly been designed to allow the local second fifteen to play bounce games in it. The back was dominated by a crystal palace that the owners probably called the conservatory. It had no curtains and, as I squatted behind a compost bin, I watched the comings and goings of the owners.
As far as I could make out there were three occupants — mum, dad and teenager. Mum and dad were sitting in the glass house watching the telly and teenager had just left with his face tripping him — dad had probably told him he could only have two hundred quid pocket money this week.
I looked up and saw the light on the attic flick on. There was a dormer to front and back and I reckoned this was the teenager’s room. I also had it figured that it was the way in. My guess was that neither of the dormer windows were wired up.
I decided to sit tight, wait until everyone had gone beddy byes and then make my move.
The route to the attic was easy. Or would have been had it not been for the cast on my wrist.
There was a water butt catching the rain from the conservatory (so green these people) — this would let me climb onto the edge of the conservatory, up onto the window ledge above (probably the bathroom), over to the next window and from there, to the roof and in. I had no worries that the teenager would catch me. I’d be in and out of his bedroom before he could fart.
As they say — the best laid plans.
The lights went out around the house and I waited a full hour, cold and cramp my only companions.
The night was flickering as clouds sped by — covering the moon more often than not. The next time it dropped dark I made my move.
I balanced on the water butt and hauled myself onto the top of the conservatory. Keeping my feet on the lead flashing, and away from the glass panels, I grabbed the window ledge and pulled myself up. The moon re-appeared and I froze, moving my head slowly to see if I could be spotted from any of the other houses but, even this deep in winter, the evergreen foliage was thick enough to hide the house from all around.
I prepared to move to the next ledge when a light flicked on. Framed in the window I heard the shout as the woman of the house saw my shape through the frosted glass. I tried to jump to the next ledge but my feet were poorly positioned and I felt myself slip. There was nothing to grab onto and I spun out and away from the building before crashing through the conservatory roof below.
I landed on the tiled floor in a spray of glass and the wind was kicked from my guts. I heard the start of chaos coming down stairs and tried to get up but the lack of air and the pain from my back slowed me down. Lights appeared in the hallway and I rolled onto my front. Voices shouted and I heard a man’s voice tell his wife to dial the police.
I pushed up onto all fours and, as the main room behind me flooded with light, I looked for a way out.
I may have come through the roof with relative ease but the conservatory was double glazed and there was going to be no James Bond style launching myself at the glass and out into the garden beyond.
The man of the house crashed into the room and I turned to face him. He held a sawn off baseball bat in his left hand and that meant he was prepared to use force — you don’t chop a baseball bat into a weapon for fun. His eyes were still watery from sleep and I had maybe thirty seconds before he was fully back on planet Earth.
I forced my lungs to grab some much needed oxygen, put my head down and tried my best Usain Bolt impression and headed for the front door. The man saw me coming and raised the bat to swing. At the last moment, I ducked and felt the rush of air as the bat parted my hair. I grabbed the door handle of the hallway door and used it to swing myself into the hall.