FEARLESS FINN'S MURDEROUS ADVENTURE

by Mike Coony

  ———

  Earl and I grabbed our luggage and passports and took off for the airport; we hopped the next China Airlines flight to Hong Kong. With Earl still looking as sick as a wet dog, we got a taxi from Kai Tak Airport to the heliport in Sheung Wan.

  May-Li sent a car to meet us at the Macau heliport. Within five minutes of landing I was dropped off at the Mandarin Oriental, and Earl was taken to the Pousada de São Tiago.

  I’m sipping tea in the hotel lobby, waiting for Uncle Sui. He walked in surrounded by eight bodyguards…walking a whole lot closer to him than I’m used to seeing.

  “Vincenzo…why wasn’t I told that a private jet is coming to collect the packages?”

  “It was arranged at short notice….My Uncle Angelo has a habit of doing things on the spur of the moment…and expecting everyone to fit in with his plans,” I tried to explain. “But with everything going on…the investigation into Susie’s murder…I thought you’d be happy to get the girls out of your hair.” I can see by the look on his face that my last remark pissed him off.

  “With everything going on? Vincenzo, have you not heard about the massacre here last night? A truckload of very dead Russians was left outside the Lisbon Hotel. Yes…I’d say that there’s plenty going on!”

  “Does that mean what I think it means?” I asked, as I leaned across the table to pour lapsang souchong into Uncle Sui’s willow pattern bone china teacup.

  He didn’t answer me outright, but the shadow of a grin that flitted across his face says it all.

  “My granddaughter took it upon herself to make certain arrangements. Your woman and her child will be here soon. May-Li has come to an understanding with our friends at the Macau airport…you and the two females will board the aircraft without being bothered by any of the usual formalities. What happens when you get to wherever you’re going we can not help you with. Come back to see me Vincenzo…and bring that presumptuous uncle of yours with you. Now it’s goodbye, good luck, and bon voyage my friend…bon voyage.”

  With that, Uncle Sui left just as he’d entered – closely surrounded by eight bodyguards. Who is he expecting to avenge the dead Russians?

  ———

  A jeep with blackened windows arrived at the house. Nakita Sylvina and I got in and the guards loaded our luggage into the back. We drove to a pier where a speedboat is waiting for us…with its jet engines churning the water. People are gathered around, admiring the boat shaped like a cigar case.

  May-Li is on board the boat. The guards handed our luggage down to a boat boy who’s wearing a white shirt, black shorts, white deck shoes and black wraparound sunglasses. We tore away from the Cheung Chau pier in a plume of water.

  “Are we going to see Finn?” asked Nakita Sylvina, tugging at my sleeve.

  “Not this time sweetie…but I am sure that he will come to see you when you are settled in your new home. Maybe he will even collect you from school with Anna. That would be nice, yes?” She hugged her doll and nodded yes at the idea.

  We were met at the pier in Macau by a Lincoln Town Car, also with blackened windows. It dropped us at the Mandarin Oriental in less than five minutes.

  Vincenzo’s waiting for us! I ran over and threw my arms around his neck. He walked us to a table and ordered sandwiches and coffee, and Nakita Sylvina asked for ‘Finn’s drink’ – fresh orange juice.

  “Vincenzo, now tell me, what is going on?”

  “All I know is what Earl told me, and what May-Li told you….My Uncle Angelo is a very powerful New York businessman and he’s sending his private jet. They’ll fly us to Canada where we’ll live in a mansion he owns until we’re married and can go to the US. Will you be happy when you and Nakita Sylvina become American citizens?”

  As if I need any convincing to say yes, he reminded me that Nakita Sylvina and I will soon travel on US passports. And he said after the wedding we can all return to Russia to visit my mother…and even bring her to America…if she wants to come.

  “Vincenzo, if we have to live in Iceland to be together, Nakita Sylvina and I will be there with you. It is a nice thought about my mother, and we will see in time if she wants to visit America…but you do not need to convince me. We will go anywhere you say….OK!”

  ———

  Uncle Angelo’s Gulfstream landed on schedule, and the Lincoln Town Car with blackened windows drove us right on to the tarmac. Nataliya Yelena carried a sleeping Nakita Sylvina up the stairs and I lugged the bags.

  We boarded the jet without anyone at Macau airport to see us off or wave goodbye. We’re someone else’s problem now. The Far East is kind of like that – people come, people go, everything moves on…there’s not much sentimentality, no looking back, and no regrets.

  It’s a long flight to Canada. We’ll be flying over the North Pole, and I asked the co-pilot to give me a shout ten minutes before we’re there.

  “Sure, I’ll let you know. We’ll be re-fuelling in Moscow first…if you want to stretch your legs there, grab a sandwich, or whatever,” he said.

  “Not this time….We’ll make do with what you have on board.”

  Nataliya Yelena was sort of jumpy during the stop in Moscow; I told the guys to hurry it up, and we were flying again in no time….

  “Ten minutes to the Pole,” the co-pilot announced over the intercom.

  I moved to a window seat in the back of the jet and peered out the small window. It’s a clear night; there’s no cloud cover and I can see the icebergs and ice floes as we cross the magnetic pole. It might be wishful thinking, or my eyes are deceiving me, but I could swear I see a pair of polar bears. At twenty thousand feet, probably not. I suppose it must’ve been an illusion.

  50

  EN ROUTE TO LONDON and BUCKINGHAMSHIRE, UK

  Four days after our little party in Macau, a large brown envelope arrived for me at the Island Shangri-La. I forgot that I’d asked Vinnie and Earl to look after arrangements to get me and Mac out of Hong Kong – in case anything went wrong after we dealt with the Russians.

  Thanks to the Yanks, Mac and myself now have perfectly forged New Zealand passports in the names of Rory Mac Kyle and Finbar Furlong. So we’re taking a British Airways flight from Hong Kong to London, via Bombay, to attend Susie’s funeral.

  As we passed the newsagent in Kai Tak Airport I noticed the headline – ‘THAI BODYGUARDS TURN ON RUSSIAN BOSSES IN MACAU PROSTITUTE RING’. The Thai minders employed by the Russians are getting the blame for the murders. No harm there, they’re horrible creatures anyway. And I know Uncle Sui is sure to be delighted with the news.

  We’ve gone through Immigration Control, and I’d like to ring Anna at her mother’s house in Helsingborg before we leave. But I’ve just heard the boarding call for our plane, and there are long queues at the two international phone kiosks in the departure lounge.

  ———

  For the first half of our flight to Bombay, Mac gave me a blow-by-blow account of the five days he spent with his Macanese translator in China’s Hainan Island. He doesn’t seem to have learnt much Chinese….

  “Come on Finbar, stir yerself. We’re in India…they want us off the plane so they can clean it.”

  “Mac, what the feck’s going on? I was fast asleep you numbskull!”

  “Didn’t ya say ya wanted ta make a telephone call before we get ta England?”

  “Sorry Mac, you’re right….Let’s get going.”

  Mac handed me one of his hooky credit cards as we walked down the jet way to the concourse. I slipped it into a telephone with international operator service and gave the operator Anna’s mother’s phone number. Mac squashed into the box beside me; we listened as the phone rang in a traditional wooden house in a beautiful small town on Sweden’s western coast, across the water from Denmark.

  “Hej.”

  “May I speak to Anna?”

  “Hej….Vem ringer vänligen?”

  “It’s Finn, Anna’s friend. May I speak to Anna please? I’ve only got a few minutes. I’m
at an airport in India, on my way to London….Yes, I know her friend Ingrid. Why do you ask?…Dead? But she can’t be dead!”

  Mac grabbed the phone from me and I pushed my way out of the small phone box to get some air. After he spoke to Anna’s mother he stared at the handset before carefully replacing it on its cradle. There are tears in his eyes. I’ve never seen tears in his eyes before…not even when they slaughtered his family back in Warrenpoint.

  “Finn, for Jaysus’s sake, she died of a heroin overdose….Do ya hear me Finn? A feckin’ heroin overdose! Anna’s too upset ta speak….Her mother said they found Ingrid dead in a bungalow in Fuerteventura last night. Ingrid…dead…heroin….Ya can’t go through with that other business now Finn, so you can’t! You’re already risking twenty years in jail by going back ta the UK for the funeral. The Yanks haven’t informed the gards yet on the Clonmel kidnapping fuck-up, so they still want ta lock ya up at home for that. And the Stockholm police want ta interview ya about the fellah whose face ya smashed. Never mind about the money Ingrid stole, which is sure ta come up now she’s been found dead…a foreign national in the Canaries! The last thing ya need is more trouble…especially the kind of trouble that killed Ingrid.”

  We walked back up the jet way and re-boarded the aircraft for our onward flight to London. I threw whiskey into Mac until he fell asleep; I have a lot of thinking to do…and not just about Ingrid.

  Mac and I haven’t discussed the slaughter of the Russians. But according to Chopper Conway, Susie was certainly killed in retaliation for the massive losses on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange brought about by her husband’s newspaper articles. I don’t know if Chopper’s detectives found out that Susie was providing insider information for the articles; Chopper didn’t mention anything about that. Anyway, we’ve killed a bunch of innocent pimps – well at least they were innocent of butchering Susie Cooke.

  The night we dispatched the Russians, I knew in my heart that they hadn’t kill Susie. I’d already worked out that they couldn’t have made the connection between Nakita Sylvina, me and Susie. I only showed my face around Galina Maksimovna’s apartment the first night in Moscow, when we went looking for Theatre Apartments. The thugs weren’t trying to kidnap Nakita Sylvina yet, and they can’t have spotted me. If they’d figured it out it would’ve been Anna they went after. So when I stabbed that first Russian it wasn’t for Susie. It was because of what they were about to do to the girls they’d just collected from the airport…and for all the other girls they’d forced into selling their bodies to strangers – to protect their loved ones at home in Russia. I've always hated pimps. Years ago I beat one to death in Dublin for slapping one of his girls. So I suppose there’s no point in losing any sleep over the innocent Russian pimps.

  ———

  We landed at London’s Heathrow Airport, and Rory Mac Kyle and I made it through Customs and Immigration in no time. We’re getting a train to Buckinghamshire for the funeral, but Mac wants to take a taxi to Marylebone Station instead of getting the train into the city.

  As I sat into the taxi it dawned on me that I don’t have a black tie to wear for the funeral. I asked the driver if he has any suggestions.

  “No problem guv. There’s a Tie Rack shop at the station…cheap as chips they are too. Going to a funeral are we gents? Someone close, eh? Family is it?”

  “Close, but not family,” I replied.

  “Right guv….You might want to think about a wreath, eh? We’ll be passing a flower shop where I cut down to Marylebone. Do you want me to pull up there? Course, not so long ago I’d have recommended getting a bunch of white lilies off Buster Edwards, the Great Train Robber. But he’s none too well….And he’s gone an’ given up his pitch at Waterloo Station, ain’t he? Else I’d have run you over there, no charge. A gent is Buster…a real gent. Mark my words.”

  “Please do stop driver, and thanks for the tip. You know Buster Edwards well then, I presume?”

  “Not personal like, nah.”

  “I see,” I replied, and switched off. He’s just another horse’s hoofer…a fantasist. I nudged Mac as we listened to the driver prattling on about how exciting it must be to rob a train, or better still…a bank.

  We stopped at the flower shop and I bought a wreath of simple white flowers to take to the funeral. Mac said he wants to send flowers for Ingrid, but her body is still in the Canary Islands and Anna’s mother didn’t know when it will be back in Sweden.

  I picked up a black tie at Marylebone Station before we boarded the train to Gerrards Cross. Susie’s funeral is in Chalfont Saint Peter Church of England in Chalfont Saint Peter, Buckinghamshire.

  It’s perfect weather for a funeral – overcast skies and dark clouds threatening a downpour. Mac isn’t coming with me to the service and burial, but he’ll hire a car and drop me at the church. He’s going to drive to Jordans, a Quaker village about thirty kilometres from Chalfont Saint Peter. He says it’s very peaceful there, and with this news about Ingrid he can sure use some peace. Anyway, I don’t think Mac likes any church ceremonies – baptisms, communions, weddings or funerals. He claims that he doesn’t mind dispatching folks, but he isn’t keen on seeing them buried. The thing is that a funeral is the only church ceremony where Mac doesn’t look out of place. He’s far too big and fearsome-looking not to upset babies, communicants and brides.

  ———

  A tall, round spire rises into the dreary sky above the castellated walls of Chalfont Saint Peter Church. As I approached the formidable granite entrance, a lone bell began to toll.

  When the service was over I walked from the ivy-covered nave through an archway of ancient yew, wreath in hand. There’s a freshly dug burial plot in the church grounds, where they will soon lay my love to rest.

  The name Butler is on the lichen-encrusted monument standing guard over the scarred black earth. I’ve just learnt the family name of a girl I’d loved…and thought I knew so well. I can’t believe it. God help me, I didn’t even know her maiden name; I never bothered to ask. Damn me! Susie died a Cooke, but she’ll spend eternity as a Butler. I wonder if she saw the humour of a Butler marrying a Cooke. Yes, I suppose she would’ve.

  Three people partly responsible for Susie’s brutal death are standing around the grave: Fran Cooke, the erstwhile husband; Paul Wills, the traitor; and Finn Flynn, the deceiver. Paul Wills won’t look me in the eye, and when I try to catch his attention he finds something compellingly interesting in the empty hole in the ground. A gaunt Fran Cooke is staring dejectedly across the grave at me, but he seems puzzled. I suppose that’s no surprise, with all the electroconvulsive treatment he’s no doubt been given – to wipe the Clarrion Group information from his memory.

  I re-introduced myself to Fran. He pretended to remember me from Hong Kong, but I’m not sure if he recognises me or if I’m just a faint blur in his memory. Evidently, he’s either forgotten, or never knew, that I was living with his wife…and that she was murdered in my home.

  A French woman joined us by the grave and introduced herself as Marie-Thérèse Gullet, an ‘old friend of the late Susanne Butler.’ I corrected her, explaining that Fran Cooke was Susanne’s husband, and that for some years she’d been Mrs. Susanne Cooke.

  “Merde…shit! I am so sorry. Of course…you are Fran. I was Susie’s art teacher when you met. I hadn’t realised that you’d married. So sorry for your loss….Susie was such an incredible girl, such a brilliant human being. I’m sure you must miss her terribly.”

  Trying to avoid any further embarrassment for the breathtaking Mademoiselle Marie-Thérèse Gullet, and the dumbstruck Fran Cooke, I jumped in with my two left feet.

  “Mademoiselle Gullet, I recall Susie telling me all about you.”

  “Call me Marie-Thérèse, please.”

  “Susie told me about her school experiences…over late night glasses of wine in Hong Kong.” I hope I placed sufficient emphasis on the word ‘experiences’; I want to let her know that I know all about her lesbian love affair with th
e schoolgirl Susanne Butler. Why? I’ve no idea. Jealous of a former lover perhaps? Could be, I suppose.

  A man with an air of authority and a distinguished shock of white hair approached the grave, accompanied by an older version of Susie. They were followed by four professional pallbearers carrying an oak coffin with brass handles to the bier.

  As I laid my white wreath on the coffin I noticed the mound of earth taken from the ground to open the grave is covered in emerald green AstroTurf…fake grass…for feck’s sake. Susie would detest the whole thing.

  Marie-Thérèse is squeezing my arm just below the elbow. “Veuillez m’excuser, à des funèraliiles me font peur…excuse me, funerals scare me,” she whispered.

  “The only funeral that would make me nervous would be my own,” I whispered back, in an attempt to make light of her comment.

  My remark’s had the desired effect. Marie-Thérèse relaxed her grip and her hand is resting where it had been squeezing. But when the ruddy-faced vicar mumbled ‘earth to earth, ashes to ashes’ the grip returned. I looked down at Mademoiselle Marie-Thérèse; the tears are rolling down her face and she’s making no attempt to wipe them away.

  When I looked up I saw that my wreath has slipped off the coffin and fallen on to the earthen mound. The white flowers contrast starkly against the unnatural green of the imitation grass.

  I shared a taxi with Mademoiselle Marie-Thérèse Gullet from Chalfont Saint Peter to Gerrards Cross. As we pulled in, I noticed Susie’s parents are temporarily re-united in grief. They’re standing at the front door of the Jolly Farmer Pub, greeting people arriving for the post-funeral refreshments.

  “Rupert dear, this is Finn…Finn Flynn. He was so kind to our Susie after the incident with her silly husband. He offered her shelter in his home…which is where she met her untimely death,” said Susie’s mother.

  Rupert offered me a limp hand, which I took gently in my rather larger paw. Then I assumed it’s my turn to be ever so English.