The Fish's Belly

by Craig R. Kirkby

  The General himself had evaded capture, but had vowed to get revenge on Mac and his family and friends.

  “But you?” asked Harry flabbergasted, “All this time, you were on the General’s side? And you were in cahoots with … that horrid excuse for a human being … Sam Hunter?”

  “Of course,” smirked Dr. Marco, “We played a good-cop, bad-cop routine. Admittedly, Sam over played the bad-cop gig, but it worked a charm, didn’t it?”

  “You played me the whole time?” Harry couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Surely, this was some joke. “But you’re such a great doctor?”

  “All the better to pull the wool over your eyes, my dear,” scoffed Marco. “Oh, don’t get me wrong. I enjoy the surgery, the power in my hands, the blood, the guts … a small pay-back for playing the good-cop role … but I live for moments like we shared yesterday…”

  “Yesterday, I’ve been out for a whole day?”

  “Perhaps … maybe, maybe not,” teased Dr. Marco.

  The effects of chloroform usually last an hour or so. Although it was still only late Wednesday morning, the cruel Dr. Marco was enjoying unnerving the old man. Plus, he wanted to keep him disoriented to date, time and location.

  “But why me? What do you want with me?” pleaded Harry.

  “Revenge … the General wants his revenge.”

  4

  “Revenge?” Harry was dumbfounded.

  “Delicious, isn’t it? The first part of the plan was to destroy one of the children in Japan—”

  “What?” Harry was horrified. “Donald? Dan—?”

  “Rachel,” Marco broke in, “Or Daniel…”

  “No,” gasped Harry, “Please say it isn’t so?”

  “Sadly, it isn’t … Mac thwarted our plans again…”

  “Yes!” Harry couldn’t contain his delight; he punched the air.

  “You still believe he is just a doctor?”

  “The crazy irony here,” replied Harry unable to hide his smirk, “is that he is just a doctor.”

  For a second, a cold shudder ran up and down Marco’s spine as he almost believed him. Shaking the notion that a mere doctor could have caused such untold chaos to the General’s plans, he continued: “The second step involves you, my dear sir…”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, you’re the bait you see.”

  “The bait?”

  Marco’s lips curled into a menacing sneer. “To lure Mac into our hands.”

  “No!”

  “Yes! Mac will receive an email from the General soon. He’ll no doubt try to bust in here to save your skin, and we’ll be celebrating your demise in a week from today.”

  “Where’s the General? Please allow me to plead our case.”

  Marco burst into laughter, “Plead your case? You want to plead your case … to the General?!”

  “Please…”

  “The General doesn’t negotiate, silly old man … this isn’t some church fellowship we’ve got going here. You know the rule, don’t negotiate with terrorists … well; this terrorist doesn’t negotiate either, or show any mercy—”

  “Please, Julius. Please.”

  “You are funny, Harry; so out of your league here my friend. The General isn’t here; he's arriving next Monday … and you will get your audience with him … but plead your case…” And again, Marco cracked up with laughter.

  Julius Marco left the room as a soldier brought in a tin plate with a quarter loaf of dry bread and a gutted tin of beans. The soldier dropped it on a small, rickety side table and grunted: “Eat!”

  “Yes eat, Harry. And try to stay alive, see? I’m going to catch myself a spy-fish … Ciao!”—an Italian greeting used for saying “Hello” and “Goodbye,” pronounced “Chow.” These were the last words Marco yelled as he and three soldiers left the small dishevelled house.

  ***

  Julius Marco didn’t return that night. Harry presumed correctly that he preferred the comfort of the Blue Angus Hotel … and who could blame him?

  His comment about catching a spy-fish disturbed Harry deeply; it could only mean one thing: he was planning to catch Mac, who presumably would be alerted to Harry’s kidnapping.

  But Mac and the children were halfway around the world.

  Did they even know what horror had befallen him?

  And how would they find him? Even he didn’t know where he was.

  Harry’s ‘prison’ was an old, neglected three-roomed dwelling, and the windows were either blacked out with paint or boarded with wooden shutters. It was dark, dingy and layered in dirt and grime. Harry got the feeling that he wasn’t the first person who had been held hostage in these dank quarters.

  Besides his small room, there was one large room occupied by three armed, card-playing soldiers with monster-bad attitudes, and a tiny kitchen-cum-pantry. Between his room and the kitchen was a foul-smelling bathroom with the oldest, most abused toilet he had ever seen … and he had lived in Africa for forty years, witness to some awful-looking lavatories in his time.

  Fifty metres from the old dilapidated house, and out of sight, was a beautiful, huge modern-style home—presently unoccupied. It was one of many hideouts the General used as he forayed up and down Africa. Not nearly as elaborate as his other dwellings, the General had only used it once before—it was certainly not one of his regular haunts. Southern Uganda was not high on his agenda at this point. However, based thirty kilometres northwest of Kampala, the hideout was the perfect place to stage the next chapter in his unfolding revenge plot.

  Between the old house and the General’s mansion, four fierce attack dogs were caged in a large enclosure. Again, out of Harry’s field of vision, he could only hear them—guessing at the number of dogs.

  At any time, Harry had three soldiers watching him—except when the dogs were fed twice a day; then just one watched him while the others fed the dogs. It was obvious they were feeding the dogs “live” prey, what it was Harry wasn’t sure. At times, he thought he heard “squeaks;” at other times, he was sure he heard “clucks.” However, from the snarling, rabid excitement of the dogs, and the squeals of cruel delight from the soldiers, it was clear that feeding the dogs was the highlight of their day.

  Alone in the house with the grumpy soldier left out of the feeding time, attempting to block his ears to the blood-curdling sounds, Harry endured his worst time of the day—though nothing was even remotely pleasant about his confinement.

  The soldiers fed him dry bread, a tin of beans and a mug of water twice that first day, which he ate in his room. In fact, Harry wasn’t allowed to leave his dark and damp room-cell except to use the bathroom, and even then one soldier stood in the bathroom and watched him do his business.

  Harry found it somewhat amusing—what exactly did these soldiers think a frail seventy-two-year old was capable of? They were moody and constantly on edge, and he realised that whoever this General was (Harry had never met him of course); he ruled his renegade army with absolute fear. Their unease emboldened the doctor, and when Julius Marco didn’t return that day—and didn’t appear to be coming back anytime soon—he started plotting his escape.

  Get on the front foot, Harold.

  The thought of Mac walking into a trap set around him as the bait gnawed at Harry, and knowing that the General was arriving the following Monday—from where he had no idea—his smart brain ticked into action, planning his escape.

  Half way through his evening rations of bread and beans he came up with an idea.

  What if I feign being sick?

  Surely, the soldiers wouldn’t sit through an old man vomiting all over the bathroom floor?

  Could I make a getaway having shrugged off their attention?

  Harry mashed the remaining beans into his leftover bread and stuffed the combined mess into his pocket. He would use it later in his simulated retching performance.

  5

  THAT DAY – HARRY’S ESCAPE ATTEMPT

  Thursday 17th March 2011

 


  “This is your captain speaking,” came the aeroplane’s captain over the loud speaker. “Please return to your seats and fasten your seatbelts, we’re in for some turbulent weather ahead.”

  Mac returned to his seat; he had been pacing up and down the narrow aisle of the aeroplane for the first hour of the flight, his mind frantically spinning.

  They had endured a horrific few days in Japan, miraculously escaping the General’s intentions. In league with the Japanese mafia, the General had targeted his children, and although they had foiled his plans, their desire to assist with the relief efforts in the wake of the devastating tsunami that had raked Japan’s north east coast was sabotaged. Although disappointed to have to leave Japan prematurely, he had initially taken comfort in the thought that the General’s threat was over.

  To his great horror, while waiting to catch the flight back to Africa, he had received the General’s email taunting him with the news that he had captured his dear friend Harry, Donald’s adoptive father. He had memorised the email, hoping to extract from it any clue as to Harry’s whereabouts. He replayed the message in his mind:

  Dr. McArthur

  You might have wriggled out of my grasp again, but that only makes me more determined to destroy everyone you know and everything you love.

  I see everything. I know everything. I listen to your phone calls. I read your email correspondence.

  And now I have your friend, Dr. Harry Scott.

  What’s your next move?

  The General

  The first thing he had done, before departing Tokyo, was register for a new email address, as the General had clearly hacked into his current one. Then he contacted his boss Roger Johnson at WCI headquarters on his personal mobile phone, using a public payphone at the Hanedo International airport in Tokyo. He had given Roger his new email address and asked him to change their tickets, rerouting their final destination to Entebbe International airport in Uganda rather than Harare in Zimbabwe. Mac had also begged him to inform the international police agency of Harry’s kidnapping. They had assisted the police involved in the mop-up operation of the General’s activities in Zimbabwe, after Mac and the children had inadvertently foiled the mad warlord’s schemes.

  Mac knew, however, that unless they had a solid lead and proof to match, the chance that the international police would be involved was limited at best.

  Taking his aisle-seat and fastening his seat belt, he looked over at the three seats across the narrow passageway to his left. His daughter Rachel was asleep in the window-seat, Daniel, his son, sat writing in his journal next to her in the middle seat, and nineteen-year-old Donald sat next to him on the adjacent aisle-seat.

  Donald’s eyes were open and intently focused on the back of the seat in front of him. His dead-pan face showed no sign of emotion, and his arms were stiff in front of him; his hands clasped into tight, white-knuckled fists. The joy that usually illuminated his face was gone—understandably so, his father’s life hung in the balance.

  Mac put out a warm, empathetic hand on his arm, breaking the intense trance Donald was in. Immediately, his arms relaxed; his intensity dissipated and a slight smile crept on to his face.

  Mac didn’t say anything, words were cheap and Donald’s faith was strong.

  Donald turned to Mac, “Thank you, Mac.”

  Mac wasn’t sure exactly what Donald meant, but gave him the space to explain by offering him his full attention and a listening ear.

  “Thank you,” Donald continued, “for showing me God’s Fatherhood … every now and again I feel this rage coming over me, this anger I cannot explain, and then you do something so simple yet so powerful like touching my arm…” Donald’s bottom lip began to quiver.

  Again, Mac spoke volumes yet uttered no words; his warm, assuring smile coupled with a gentle squeeze of Donald’s arm, imparted love, understanding and grace into the young man’s troubled soul.

  “Thank you,” whispered Donald as tears streaked down his handsome face.

  ***

  Although he had slept precious little the night before, bathroom floors don’t make comfortable sleeping quarters, Harry’s Oscar-winning role playing the old man with a tummy bug worked.

  Chewing on the pocketed bread and bean pulp, Harry had then spewed it out in self-induced heaving and gagging sessions. It wasn’t pleasant, but it was necessary.

  Watching the old man be sick wasn’t very appealing to the soldiers—they decided to check up on him only every fifteen minutes during the first hour, and then just every hour through the night. This had given Harry time to formulate the last remaining pieces of his escape plan.

  From the limited view afforded him from the bathroom window, he had seen what looked like a line of trees running along a river, some five hundred metres away.

  The bathroom window was small, but he might be able to squeeze through, and if the soldier on duty checked on him only every hour, as was the case last night, he might have a chance.

  “It has to be tonight,” decided Harry to himself. “I can’t fake being sick for too much longer … and I’m not happy dangling like a worm on a hook for Mac to swallow.”

  He was tired; his stomach ached from the pretend retching, and ironically; he felt waves of nausea crashing upon him. The stench of the bathroom seemed trapped in his nostrils, and not allowed to bath or shower; he remained covered in spit, dirt and food.

  He still had many hours to kill before he would have to redo his night routine all over again.

  “Come on Harold. Try to get some sleep,” he muttered to himself.

  6

  Mac kept an eye on Donald, interjecting whenever he felt the young man slipped into an anger-induced trance.

  He hadn’t known Donald long, just nine weeks, and had never known him to be anything but gentle and even-tempered. Then again, he was well aware of the young man’s tragic childhood.

  He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Donald nod off for some much-needed sleep.

  ***

  With just a few hours left before arriving at Heathrow airport in London, both fourteen-year-old Rachel and seventeen-year-old Daniel were awake and fairly chirpy. The best of friends, Daniel had sketched the incredibly challenging events of the past year in his journal, and Rachel asked if they could run through it together.

  Starting with the first heading he had written, Daniel read:

  28th February 2010 - Mum diagnosed with cancer.

  Rachel winced, fighting back the tears that were always so close whenever she thought of her mother: “I’m not sure I can do this.”

  “We don’t have to Rache,” assured Daniel about to close his journal.

  “No, no,” she replied, “Sorry, Danny … I do want to. I need to.”

  “Sure?”

  “Yes, it’s good for me … especially to talk about what we’ve been through with you, Boet”—the Afrikaans word for “brother,” pronounced “boot” as in “foot.”

  Daniel found a warm smile even though his Adam’s apple throbbed. “Okay, sis.” And then he swallowed hard at the next heading read:

  24th October 2010 – Mum died of cancer.

  “Sometimes it feels like it was just yesterday; sometimes it feels like it was another lifetime ago,” whispered Rachel.

  “Yeah, I feel the exact same way.”

  “Do you think we’ll forget Mum?”

  “No, of course not, sis.”

  “I mean, the way her hair smelt, the way she smiled, the way she frowned, the way she laughed…” Huge tears rolled down her cheeks.

  “We’ll never forget, Rache … never.”

  “You two okay?” asked Mac, always alert, always watching out for his children.

  “Fine, Dad … just having a moment,” sniffed Rachel.

  Daniel gave his Dad the thumbs up, something he always did to assure his father that his baby sister was okay.

  Mac smiled lovingly at them both, his warm, caring smile immediately filling any gap in thei
r emotional tanks.

  “Can you carry on, Danny?’ asked Rachel.

  November 2010 – Two months with Gramps and Grams in Tanzania.

  “Now that was an amazing time,” said Rachel, her blue-eyes beaming.

  “Yeah, to enjoy Christmas with them—that was pretty amazing!” Daniel flicked a loose strand of her blonde hair from her eyes.

  “I’d love to go visit them soon again.”

  “January 2011 … Zimbabwe!” continued Daniel, pointing to the next entry:

  10th January 2011 – Arrive in Zimbabwe.

  “Wow, feels like yesterday we met Donald and Harry.”

  “The 10th of January to be exact … gee, we’ve been on a roller-coaster ride since then!”

  “Yeah, a two-day sortie to rescue Dad … against terrorists, facing man-eating lions and hippos on the Zambezi … what were we thinking?!”

  “Not much evidently…” joked Daniel.

  “Then a fantastic eight days at Vic Falls…”

  “And seven event-free weeks serving the beautiful people of Zimbabwe as the hospital base…”

  “Which also gave us time to catch up on our home ed. studies,” smiled Rachel, wagging her finger while frowning as if she was a nagging teacher.

  “Yeah, I’d rather do maths algebra than face man-eating lions in Zimbabwe or the fiery furnace in Japan any day!” chuckled Daniel.

  Smiling, Rachel read the next entry in Daniel’s journal:

  15th March 2011 – Arrive in Japan

  “Hard to believe that between Tuesday and now, I was nearly incinerated!” Daniel shook his head. It was completely surreal.

  “Don’t forget I spent a night with a deadly snake!” reminded Rachel.

  “Father God,” Daniel prayed. “You have carried us in Your amazing grace. Your mercies are new every morning. Great is Your faithfulness, O God!”*

  “Amen!” agreed Rachel as she hugged her brother really tight. “God is so good.”