The rest of the day was spent in planning mode; Colin made a list of all the items he would require when he travelled further west to have a few final words with Sir Godfrey Penrose. He asked the surveillance section to find out if the Dartmoor cottage was a regular weekend retreat for the happy couple, which he doubted; or whether Sir Godfrey had a male or female companion that shared his rural bolt hole. Or was it that he had bought the cottage so that could escape the mad, mad world in London alone to recapture his younger days camping out on the moorlands?
Colin was right about one thing; there was no evidence that Penelope Penrose had ever visited the property. Her married name reminded Colin of a programme that Sharron had liked when she was little, but he couldn’t bring the title to mind. It was possible that Godfrey had some company in his London pad, but again, there was no evidence to suggest that the cottage was being used as a love nest. As far as the surveillance section could ascertain Sir Godfrey let the train take the strain on Thursday or Friday afternoon and travelled back late on Monday. “The joys of a non-executive post” thought Colin “grafting three days a week maximum for a small fortune plus share options! Nice work if you can get it.”
The problem was the frequency of Sir Godfrey’s visits; it appeared to be random. Colin checked the local press for events that might attract the former politician; he was sure a car boot sale in Yelverton was not for him, and he couldn’t imagine him having signed on for the local darts team. No, it had to be something more refined surely!
Just when he was thinking he might have to change his plan and stake out the pad in London, with all the problems of trying to get rid of a body in Knightsbridge, he stumbled across the answer. There were all sorts of courses and expeditions taking place across Dartmoor throughout the year, where young people faced all sorts of adversities trying to complete elements of an Outward Bound scheme or a Duke of Edinburgh award. Sir Godfrey at seventy years of age was probably past the rough and tumble of his earlier TA days, but he was still a voyeur at the very least. He got his kicks watching the youngsters scrambling around the moors in all winds and weathers; was there more to uncover though, time would tell.
Colin couldn’t see what persuaded these kids to do outdoor stuff like that if he was honest; every Easter the media covered the plight of some poor lads or lasses that were missing on the Ten Tors challenge; thankfully they usually turned up suffering from nothing worse than hypothermia and everyone got on with eating their Easter eggs. Why was it that nobody thought about why anyone other than a bloody idiot would willingly go out in a wilderness to walk fifty five miles and have the cheek to expect the emergency services to risk their necks getting them out of the shit when things inevitably went wrong?
These days you’ve got a job to get the emergency services to come out for sane people, let alone nutters! Colin had a view about that sort of thing; he could remember telling his first wife Karen that people who went down potholes and got stuck were idiots too. She would ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ at the TV when they eventually surfaced safe and sound, or sit wiping the tears from her chubby cheeks when a body bag was winched up, but she never grasped Colin’s logic that the money wasted on these adrenalin junkies would have provided more support for her when she had had their beautiful Sharron. Perhaps Karen wouldn’t have suffered her post partum haemorrhage if there had been an older doctor around; maybe she would have been able to have more kids.
Colin told himself he had to stop thinking about the past. His family days, however dysfunctional they might have been, were behind him. He had to concentrate on the here and now. He checked the activities on the moors scheduled over the next few weeks. The surveillance reports indicated that Sir Godfrey was a creature of habit. There was nothing on the books for this weekend, so he anticipated that the old buffer would drive up to Stowmarket to endure a frosty reception from Penelope.
Sir Godfrey would have some warm thoughts to keep him going to help get him safely through to Monday morning, when he escaped back to Egerton Gardens; the following weekend would see several hundred youngsters on the moors and Colin would put good money on him being on that train west!
CHAPTER 16
Colin had worked on through the evening, putting the finishing touches to the itinerary of his proposed assignment. Once he had completed it, he had saved it on his laptop and crashed out on his bunk, without even bothering to undress.
He had slept fitfully through the night that followed; he dreamt of Karen and Sharron for the first time in a long time. He had suppressed those memories so well and yet just reading about how Sir Godfrey Penrose had taken advantage of those innocent children for so many years, had caused all those emotional times in his life to come tumbling back.
He had dragged himself out of bed at six o’clock and gone straight to the pool. He had stripped off, showered and put on a pair of trunks; he dived into the water and swam until he couldn’t raise his arms or kick his legs any longer. He had clambered out of the pool and sat on the edge with his feet dangling in the water. Tears were close, but not that close. Gradually, he fought against the feelings that sought to overwhelm him and regained control. Colin Bailey, the stone cold killer was back.
He had looked up when he heard someone else enter the building; it was Athena.
“Good morning Phoenix” she said.
Colin had watched her as she slowly stepped out of her tracksuit bottoms and peeled her sweatshirt top over her head to reveal her one piece grey swimsuit. She looked incredible.
“Do you come here often?” he managed to ask, eventually. His tongue seemed to have stuck to the roof of his mouth.
“Is that the best you can do?” she had mocked and slipped into the pool. She set off with long smooth rhythmical strokes and tumble turned at the end of the lane; she looked so graceful that Colin had sat and watched her for a few minutes mesmerised. He knew he had to get up and get dry before he got cold; but he wanted to stay just a little while and get his breath back properly. Well, that was his excuse!
Eventually he had managed to tear himself away from the sight of her long powerful back and the grey costume that made her look more like a fish than a human; although when she had removed her outer clothes Colin was under no illusions, Athena was all woman. He dried himself and dressed quickly; he needed to get back to his quarters and get some clean, warm clothes on. Then he had to get to work; to take his mind off Athena.
Colin had visited the canteen and eaten breakfast, wondering if Athena would come in to get something too; of course, she wouldn’t eat with the hired help, what was he thinking! It didn’t stop him from looking up every time the door opened. He took his time over his second cup of coffee to no avail. He strolled back to his quarters; he needed to contact Erebus and set up a meeting in the orangery to go through his proposed plan for direct action against Penrose. He walked through the door and saw that he had another ‘post-it’ note on his laptop.
“I’m going to have to teach Erebus how to use a mobile phone or email” he thought and picked up the note. Surprise, surprise it wasn’t from Erebus!
‘I dropped by but you weren’t here? A.’ it read. There was a ‘sad face’ emoticon under the A.
Colin smiled to himself; the ice maiden has a softer side after all. It was a shame he had to put all his energies into his new assignment. He was summoned to the orangery to meet Erebus at two o’clock. The message was delivered by one of the transport guys. Colin had asked what was going on this morning. Erebus and the others had been in some heavy duty meeting all morning; all the guy knew for sure was that Athena was going to London shortly and the government had just escalated the terrorist threat on the streets of the UK from ‘moderate’ to ‘severe’.