The Magpie Trap: A Novel

by AJ Kirby

  The Magpie Trap

  By

  A. J Kirby

  A White House Stories Publication

  Published by White House Publications in 2013

  Copyright © A.J Kirby, 2013

  Kindle Edition

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publishers, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed by a newspaper, magazine or journal.

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  www.andykirbythewriter.20m.com

  http://paintthistownred.wordpress.com/

  Published in paperback in 2008 by YouWriteOn.com

  The author asserts the moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

  All Rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the author, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  ALSO BY THIS AUTHOR

  Novels:

  Sharkways

  Paint this town Red

  Perfect World

  Bully

  Novellas/ Novelettes:

  The Haunting of Annie Nicol

  The Black Book

  The Call of the Sea

  Short Story Collections:

  The Art of Ventriloquism

  Mix Tape

  Non-Fiction:

  Alex Ferguson’s Greatest Manchester United x11

  The Message

  For Heidi, who loves me despite my flaws,

  And who inspires me to be a better person.

  For Mum and Dad; my constant readers.

  For Jenny and Leigh, who have already escaped the Magpie Trap, it seems.

  And for Grandad in Kitt Red.

  Finally, to all of my friends, and especially Davoc;

  (Thanks for the cover, cocker)

  You’re the ones that I persevere for…

  “What is the need to tell about it more? (…)

  Thus ended these two homicides in woe;

  Died thus the treacherous poisoner also.”

  Geoffrey Chaucer, ‘The Pardoner’s Tale’ (The Canterbury Tales)

  Prologue: The Hunter

  Walking on dry sand could turn a romantic walk into an all-out endurance test. It is a patience-testing chore which requires different muscles in the masochist’s legs than walking on virtually any other surface; you walk in a different way.

  Walking in high-heels must feel like that after a while.

  At first, you are devastatingly aware of your own ungainly nature. You do not glide, you do not saunter; you stagger, you lurch forward; you gloop forward like a lump of shit on the edge of a shovel which just won’t shake off. You know, when you are walking on sand, that you are, basically, shit. You cannot do anything; you are helpless.

  Exhausted, Mark Birch tottered towards the Hotel Vasco Da Gama. Five hours of lifting his legs out of the surprisingly robust embrace of the fine sand had tautened his calf muscles to breaking point. But Mark wasn’t decked out in high-heels, nor was he in recommended sensible beach footwear, instead he wore flip-flops. Flip-flops which sulkily threw themselves to the sand in oh so many ‘I can’t go on’ moments; flip-flops which took out their own revenge on his relentless feet by biting between his toes like angry crabs. But Mark’s broiling brain barely registered the cuts from a thousand tiny stones upon his bare feet; he hardly felt the ache in the back of his legs. Instead, his murderous rage pushed him onwards, and the sight of gradually nearing beach hut, signalling that he was closing on his destination, spurred him on to one final push.

  One thought had unrelentingly pumped through his mind like an electric current, generating the required power to keep him walking. One thought; or rather one voice. Crackly telephone lines have a way of disguising voices, however, that morning’s phone call came from an unmistakeable source.

  Ringing phones at times like those set the pulse racing; the imagination trailing only just behind; what has gone wrong?

  Crackling… ‘Sparky; is that you?’ The voice burned Mark to the core; as though it was coming directly from a telephone exchange within the bowels of hell.

  ‘We need to meet, chief,’ the voice continued. ‘There’s a couple of things we need to clear up.’

  Ease in the voice; obliviousness even. As though what had happened between them was simply a misunderstanding.

  ‘Please listen to me, cocker. I just want everything to be back to the way it was…’

  The way it was? Incredible! Things can never be the same again.

  But the voice continued, ploughing on; barging through closed doors of thoughts and feelings, intruding upon private pain.

  ‘It’s not for me; it’s for you!’

  A salesman’s voice to the end; a syrupy, persuasive voice, like that of the devil himself, pouring poison into his ear. But with a hint of fiery chilli pepper added now:

  ‘Sparky; you’d better come. After all; I know where you live now.’

  Breathlessly, Mark’s only response: ‘Where? Where do you want me to meet you?’

  ‘The Hotel Vasco Da Gama… north coast. Meet me at the beach hut. I’ll have your cut of the money. And Mark? Don’t come armed. I have to trust you on this.’

  His friend, who had betrayed him in the worst possible way, was now bringing up the thorny question of trust. Trust which could never be regained; battle-lines had been drawn in the sand. Mark knew that far from offering an olive branch, his friend was outlining the new, violent parameters of their relationship.

  Mark could not accept that he would forever be stalked by his past; he knew that it would continue to twist and distort his present, never allowing him to have a future. It was revenge which drove him towards his destiny, but it was not for the loss of the money. It was in bereavement for the loss of his peace of mind, his clarity, and his fulfillment.

  To this end, he gripped the small, sharp knife in his pocket tightly. It had already drawn some of his blood, but he never felt the cutting of its blade. Besides, too much blood had already been spilt for him to care any more anyway.

  His monomaniac intensity made Mark blinkered; the wondrous, picture-postcard white beaches, the palm trees, the wrinkled background panorama of mountains were all shut out. All he saw was the abandoned beach hut, with its dilapidated wooden walls and the sad slumped flag only just erect on its straw roof exposing its failure.

  Within the hut sat his friend, looking as unflustered as if he were simply enjoying a relaxing holiday. The fucking Man from Del Monte sat there magisterially; the fucking playboy of playboys playing at being a player. The clean, white shirt reflected the suns rays and dazzled. His hair was immaculately coiffured, and his sunglasses, even from a distance, looked expensive. Slick-back, cock-sure; slick-sure, cock-back; unbelievably, he was smiling.

  Mark approached. Every muscle twitched its antagonism toward the still seated figure in the hut. The moment had played in his head many times; how it was supposed to happen; Mark’s desire had commandeered the remote control. It had fast-forwarded through his friend’s futile attempts to charm him, like he used to in the old days, and then had paused longingly on the moment when his friend had caught sight of the knife. It had chugged forward on slow-mo as his friend started begging and pleading…

  Since that fateful betrayal, every piece of meat Mark had sliced h
ad been his friend’s flesh; at first tough, but eventually, gelatinously pliant to the jagged edge of the blade. Mark could almost smell the hot, bestial stench of urine on his friend’s leg, as he finally, desperately concluded, that no matter how much of the money he was to bribe Mark with, there was no escaping the real pay-off.

  It was finally going to happen…

  But there were more than two pairs of eyes on the scene on the beach that day. Through the palm trees flanking the beach, the hunter waited. Mark, his prey, was edging ever closer to springing his trap.

  I spy with my little eye…

  In a sense, Mark Birch had been walking into the jaws of a trap for his whole life, and no matter what charms and superstitions he adopted in order to ward off his evil fate, he was simply drawn in deeper and deeper.

  The trap’s teeth had made their mark upon him; he was chosen. Rewind the tape; confront him at any point of his life, and you’ll see that look in his eyes; that look which says: I’m falling. From here the only way is down.

  An image: a shaven-headed, squat man is standing directly on top of a fresh batch of newly printed bank notes; on a funereal pyre of money which stretches up towards the sky. Well, maybe not that high; but the corrugated ceiling maybe. The king’s ransom acts unknowingly in its Icarus-like grasping for these heights; it is an object, a thing, but the man, in climbing onto this stack, opens himself up to torment by the twin gods of ambition and temptation. The thing is instantly more than a simple thing - it is becoming. Cash, money, dollar, spondooliks, wonga; it will become all of these things and more, once it passes into the grubby hands of the world.

  Once there, some alarming percentage of it will become coated with the powdery grime of drugs, or perhaps it will buy guns, junk food, or a woman, or a boy…

  Yet more of it will find its way, sneakily, craftily, into the hands of loan sharks, or into murky casinos. But maybe, just maybe, that note which is underneath the clunky work-boots of this man will drop accidentally into the till of an ice cream man, whose wares will make one small girl’s day seem to shine with joyous newness, or maybe it will float on some chance breeze down some grid somewhere, and reach somebody that really needs it, for survival.

  For the moment, most of the money remains mockingly pristine and clean, in both senses of the word. It awaits the great signifier; human desire. But perhaps it has already been tainted; the man’s boots have spread possessive footprints across the top layer of notes. He has introduced the virgin money to a quick taster of the contortions it will have to perform later on in life; its bending and creasing to the vice-like will of people; vice-like in both senses of the word.

  This compact man is the King of the Castle, but he surveys his realm with apparent calm, apparent ease. He turns to camera and we start to define his features a little more clearly. His face is dark; brooding even. A prominent nose overshadows the rest of his features; it awkwardly props up a pair of glasses which fold across his face with all the grace of a stubborn deck chair refusing to be erected. The glasses shield small piggy eyes, boxer’s ears.

  He has a pock-marked chin and a well-lined brow which resembles the ripples the tide leaves in new sand. Taking his full body into account as he creakily moves across the reams of money, you acquire the immediate impression that he wallows through life; as though a lorry-load of cement has been haphazardly poured over the man; slowing his moving parts. The setting cement though, has captured the careworn quality of his face; it shows that something does lie beneath… The throb of quickening blood pulses through the veins which stand out on his temple.

  Observe though; the statue moves once more. He steps forward and bows, lowering himself off the top of the pile of money as though cracking through cement with each bend of his limbs. He descends from his tower of wealth and back into reality. The soft cushion of the bank notes has now been replaced by the cold, hard concrete of the room’s sterile floor. As he lands, there is an audible slap of his boots on the floor, but it might as well have been a slap across his face.

  Watch; watch those small ‘tells’ which betray this man’s discomfort.

  He fiddles with the crucifix on the chain around his neck. He rubs it between his fingers as though trying to summon up a genie to provide him with guidance. But with a wistful smile he tucks it under the collar of his overalls and once more steps awkwardly up onto the pile of new bills, this time carrying a tool.

  He hoists himself up using his free hand, gaining leverage by getting a foothold on a crate is at the foot of the pile - a crate; there is so much money here that it will have to be transported by fork-lift truck.

  When he reaches the summit, the man pauses to wipe his brow, to gain his breath. He has stocky shoulders and a thick neck, which would suggest that he is tough, but there is a tell-tale shake in his leg, betraying giddiness maybe? The stack of money is, after all, fairly tall, and there is always a more tangible possibility of being hurt when falling from such a height. Falling from a skyscraper, you’d be wearing the crash helmet of unconsciousness; from this height, you’d feel every mortal part of you hitting the cold, hard ground.

  But maybe it is the presence of the money itself which has inspired such wobbles in his legs. There is probably a ton of money in that room. Not the hackneyed ‘ton of money’ which you’d lose in the bookies on a crazy bet, but a real, ton of money. Maybe you’d be able to bend down, pick up handfuls of the stuff and throw it about like confetti, but you’d never be able to pick up the whole lot.

  And the money isn’t the most seductively valuable thing in the room. No, the money is almost a diversion, there to distract from the real prize. Look around the vast space of the room, what do you see? Of course, you see the money, but you see something else, once your eye is finally diverted, don’t you? For the money is strangely pushed to one side, off in the shadows.

  Look at the CCTV cameras for a moment; they have almost rudely turned their back on the cash, and instead are thrusting their criss-crossing spotlights over one thing in particular. It is a technological instrument of some description. It hardly seems worthy of a mention, but so effortlessly does it transcend the vulgar allure of the money, in those supposedly non-judgemental eyes of the CCTV cameras, that we must give it a second look.

  The item itself is hardly bigger than a briefcase. It is made of some kind of hard, metallic substance which looks as though you could drop it a thousand times, and all you’d dent would be the floor. It could either be immensely heavy, or Gossamer-light. But something about the low thrum it gutturally emits suggests immense harnessed energy. It throbs with the fiery intent of a sleeping dragon. And the more closely you look, the more the object does actually resemble something organic; the metallic casing could almost be thick scales.

  Listen to the tiny dragon’s snore. It exhales a low vibrating moan which says: I can give you exactly what you want. But there may be a price. But be quiet now. The dragon seems to be waking; two red lights click on - eyes? Something is happening. And then, from the dragon’s mouth spouts a fountain of vomit. A torrent of bile is channelled onto the conveyor belt in front of the dragon. And what is being projected from the dragon’s gaping mouth is in fact money; clean, pristine, spend-able money. The dragon is, in fact, a printer; and judging by the rate at which the spondooliks are spontaneously erupting, there’d be a pretty steady market in dragon-sick.

  And our tiny instrument has a name; it is the world famous Precisioner printer. Ah, the Precisioner printer; safe behind her gilded steel cage; watched-over relentlessly by cameras which perch like a flock of sentinel birds amongst the roof beams. Their mechanical eyes watch proprietarily over their domain, imbued with a robotic menace and whirring cruelty.

  But hang on, you say, this stocky man has been allowed into their nest unawares, like some devious Oviraptor. And now you see the lone protagonist of our drama again, and realise that, of course, he is in disguise. That’s why he’s been allowed to get this far. He is in disguise as an electronic security eng
ineer; see his crisp blue overalls? On the back is written the words EyeSpy Security. And it appears to be a more than adequate disguise - he’s got this far hasn’t he?

  Using the money as a prop, he reaches toward the cameras on the roof beams, tool in hand. Is he trying to destroy the security systems? He certainly moves toward this particular camera with purpose…

  And then you lose sight of the man. He has slipped from the periphery of the camera’s vision. Suddenly your picture jolts alarmingly. Horizontal lines rapidly descend the screen as though it is a fast-forwarded game of Tetris. And then static; before finally, a black screen. We are left, literally, in the dark.

  Suddenly the screen starts to flicker into life once more.

  Focus… adjust… you can just about discern the outline of shapes in the background, but the image is like a negative from a damaged film. Wait: gradually, the brightness is tempered, contrast is added. Fine tunings are being made. And then we see the full moon-face of the security engineer loom into the picture once more, in extreme close-up. His face is set in a mask of steely determination.

  He bites his lip in concentration as we see the blurred outline of his hand - too-close to the camera to be seen properly - twisting the lens at the very front of the instrument. Then he moves back, edgily across the money, and he picks up a battered-looking laptop which he has connected to the camera itself. He checks the clarity of the image, and then moves on to the next camera.