Nice To Meet You Cally (Calliaster Doyle Book 2)

by S G Read

  ‘If I let you escape, I'm as good as dead!’ He replied. ‘If I leave you where you are, then you aint going nowhere, so that's where you'll stay.’

  Cally cried again, this time at the prospect of wetting herself. She struggled with the ropes that held her but it was no good. Even if she did get loose the man would simply tie her back up! Her despair grew, then the inevitable happened. She felt the trickle of water down her leg and saw the water escape through a gap in the floorboards. She had never felt as low as this and worse was bound to follow. If she told them about the security box they would want the key and if she told them about Drummond, they would either kill him for the key, or the money if he had it, or bring him there to help persuade one or the other to talk. Either way she reckoned she was dead, as soon as they had the money. The room grew dark but she did not sleep much, the chair dipped in the middle and she was sitting in a pool of her own urine. She tried to tip the chair to let the urine run off the chair but overbalanced and she and the chair fell sideways with a crash that woke her gaoler.

  ‘What was that?’ He asked sleepily but Cally did not reply. He turned the light on and stood her up again. ‘Do that again and you'll suffer!’ He warned.

  ‘Oh like I won't suffer anyway. Stop, I'm really terrified!’ She replied sarcastically.

  The man slapped her face.

  ‘I'll get you for that!’ Cally hissed. She was not going to be blown out like a candle if she could help it.

  The man drew his gun and put it to her forehead.

  ‘You little brat!’ He cursed.

  ‘Go on blow me away! I'm sure your boss will be pleased!’ Cally taunted.

  He tapped her head with the barrel: Not hard but hard enough to hurt. Cally bit her lower lip to stop from crying out and to make sure she said no more.

  ‘That seemed to stop you from yapping. Now keep quiet while I get some shuteye.’ The gaoler ordered and turned the light off before settling into his bed.

  At least the puddle was gone, not that she was comfortable but at least it felt a little better. When morning came she needed to try to find a way of escaping. The she remembered her father. How could she go and leave him and there was no way she could take him along! She cried herself to sleep.

  The car took Archie to a meeting with Zicci and they sat with only a table between them, the leader of a crime syndicate and a broken down ex patrolman.

  ‘What happened to Charlie?’ Zicci asked.

  ‘It goes deeper than that. It's the why I want you to understand and how I can help get revenge.’

  ‘Antonio bring us coffee and keep it coming. Now you have my undivided attention, I loved my half-brother and someone is going to pay for his death.’

  ‘And so they should!’

  ‘What! This from and old lawman? Where are you coming from?’

  ‘Look what being a patrolman got me, and Charlie for that matter. My son-in-law took a substantial amount of money from Clo's account.’ Zicci held up a hand. ‘Doyle, Dermot Doyle, am I right?’

  ‘Spot on.’

  ‘I bet Clo was fit to be tied.’

  ‘When they tried to get him to tell them where the money was he ran in front of a greyhound, the bus not the dog. As he was a vegetable, still is for that matter, they went after Cally my granddaughter which ended in a shootout at the home.’

  ‘Charlie told me Clo was killed there with his men.’ Zicci added.

  ‘Well Clo’s replacement has kidnapped Cally and for some reason unknown to me, he came to get Dermot as well. Charlie tried to stop them and they shot him dead.’

  Zicci leant back and took another mouthful of coffee.

  ‘You obviously want you granddaughter back in return for something, so what is the something?’ He asked.

  ‘We are trying to trade the money for my granddaughter and her father but I am pretty sure they'll not hold to their end of the bargain. If I told you where the exchange was going to take place you could make sure they play it through and get your revenge. After we've gone of course.’

  ‘I'll think about it. I'll also send someone round to look after the funeral. We may not have seen eye to eye when he was a policeman but we had a few laughs after he retired and I'll see he gets a good send off.’

  Zicci was gone before Archie reached the car to be driven home. With two patrolmen posted there Archie said nothing to the others about his conversation.

  Drummond could not sleep and Barbara found him staring out of the window in Cally’s room.

  ‘Not sleepy?’ She asked.

  ‘Where is she?’ Drummond replied. ‘I just want her to come back, I don't care about the money!’

  ‘Nor do I. If we could find the money we could let it be known that we have it and arrange a trade.’ Barbara insisted.

  Drummond digested that for as long as it took to excite him.

  ‘Yes! We must find the money! I'll wake Dan!’ He said with new found enthusiasm.

  ‘It's two in the morning!’ Barbara said, holding him to stop him leaving. ‘Dan is no spring chicken he needs his sleep.’

  ‘If he could sleep.’ Dan said from the doorway.

  ‘It seems so hopeless.’ Drummond wailed and cried.

  Barbara drew him to her and held him tightly.

  ‘Let it out it doesn't help to bottle it up,’ Dan sighed, ‘or try to wash it out of your mind with whiskey, as I found out. I still think about Jenny every day.’

  Tears welled in his eyes and he left the room to be alone. He always cried on his own. Barbara freed herself from Drummond and followed Dan.

  ‘Come here you big galoot, you're part of the family now!’ She took him in her arms as well, trying to comfort him and being comforted herself. After a few minutes they separated.

  ‘So where are we going to find this money?’ Dan asked.

  The other two sat there with blank looks on their face.

  ‘It would be near to where they were leaving from!’ Barbara said after a while.

  ‘How were they going to leave?’ Drummond asked.

  Dan looked at Barbara and she looked back at him.

  ‘Did you bring his things back when you brought him home?’ Dan asked.

  ‘Yes, why?’ Barbara replied.

  ‘Let's see if there's anything there that might shed some light on it.’ Dan suggested.

  They walked to Dermot's room and looked through the things he'd had with him when he had been injured.

  Lieutenant Cooper had not been sitting idly. He had notified all the precincts about it and was calling a double kidnap and cold blooded murder. He had also made sure that all the mobsters he knew about, knew just how much this was going to hurt them. The police were raiding known gaming and drinking establishments all over Chicago in an effort to make the other mobs put pressure on whoever had her to let her and her father go. It was all he could do and some of it was outside the law and he knew it. He had not told Barbara yet but they had a witness who saw Cally dragged into a car.

  Dermot lay on a mattress on the floor. At first all he could see was the ceiling but as he lay there, he wanted to see more and tried as hard as he could to move his head. Many times he tried and failed but this time when he tried, his head rolled to one side and he could see the door. He felt elated, it was the first time he had been able to move anything except his eyelids since the accident. Now he tried to move it back and after an hour he moved it to look the other side but found only a wall. Over the next hour he managed to move his head as he wanted to and started on the right arm. He worked his way along it, first trying to move the shoulder joint, then the elbow, then the wrist and lastly each finger in turn. Nothing happened until he came to his little finger, after several attempts, it moved and when it was half way forward it took the next finger with it. He lay there exercising the finger, feeling as though he had accomplished something important.

  Dan picked up three slips of paper out of the sheet they were in with Dermot’s other things and saw what they were.

&
nbsp; ‘Train tickets!’ He said excitedly. ‘What if the money is in a locker at the train station?’

  Barbara looked at her nurse’s watch.

  ‘Well the station is open all night and it's going to take an hour to get there. That will make it six o'clock before we get there.’ She replied.

  ‘What are we waiting for?’ Drummond yelled. ‘Let's go!’

  ‘Do we tell the police?’ Dan asked.

  ‘No we don't!’ Barbara replied quickly. ‘But we will have to find a go between to get in touch with whoever's got them!’

  ‘I know just the man.’ Dan said with a wink and I hope I have to persuade the little worm to help us!!’

  Chapter 5

  They drove to the station and tried the keys in the doors which had the corresponding number, each door opened to reveal a well stuffed carpet bag. Normally the three would have jumped for joy at the find but they just took the carpet bags back to the truck and drove back to the retirement home.

  Dill could not sleep, something was worrying him so he walked to the room that served as a kitchen for a drink. He heard someone talking and stopped outside. Not really to eavesdrop more to find out who it was. Inside he heard Jacob's voice.

  ‘What's going to happen to them?’ He asked.

  ‘From what I hear, when we get the money they're fish bait. Not that Doyle will notice, he's like a fish anyway just lying there and sucking air.’ The answering voice was Peter, he was the man who would do the deed if anyone did.

  Dill turned and walked back toward his room.

  Cally woke feeling very stiff and a little sick, no one had fed her or given her anything to drink. She felt the need to go but crossed her legs to ease the feeling.

  ‘When do I get something to drink?’ She shouted, her voice slightly croaky. ‘If I die I will not be much use to you!

  The man on the bed jumped up and banged his head on the sloping roof above him.

  ‘Damn! You little witch I'm going to teach you some manners!’ He shouted and walked over angrily.

  His first slap with his open right hand sent her and the chair across the room. He stood her up and did the same with his left hand but this time before he could pick her up she bit his hand as hard as she could. When he recoiled in pain he kicked her. It was while Cally lay there she saw the metal patch which had been used to repair a broken floorboard. A wire had been looped up by it with the top layer worn off showing a bare wire below and she thought of a possible way of escape. Not a brilliant idea but the best she might manage considering her position. The door opened and Bertram Dill stood there.

  ‘What the hell are you doing? Do you know what the time is?’ He saw Cally laying on the floor bleeding. ‘How are you going to explain her death to Michael? Have you fed her? Given her a drink?’

  The other man stood there holding his bleeding hand and Cally squirmed so that she could see what he was wearing on his feet. They were bare.

  She smiled a slightly crooked smile, as a normal smile hurt, then Dill picked her up.

  ‘Are you thirsty?’ He asked.

  ‘Yes.’ Cally answered but it came out as slurred as her father used to talk when he was drunk. The thought of her father made her cry.

  ‘You leave her alone, I'll get her a drink and something to eat. You touch her again and I'll forget I'm a book keeper.’ To back up his bravado, he pulled out Harry Drew's pistol and held it against the man’s nose.

  ‘Just make sure she don't keep yapping.’ The gaoler grunted.

  ‘I wouldn't have to yap if you gave me a drink and not make me sit here and wet myself!’ Cally shouted.

  Her reply was answered by her gaoler giving her a swift backhander with his good hand. Dill retaliated by rendering the man unconscious with the barrel of Harry's gun. He picked her and the chair up again but did not untie her.

  ‘I'll get you some food and a drink but I can't untie you, that's up to Michael. If I let you escape I'd end up in your place in the lake!’ He knew the last sentence would stop her from talking for as long as she could but it was better than telling all and still dying.

  Cally's eyes opened when she heard what he said.

  ‘Is that it then?’ She asked. ‘I tell him what he wants to know to save me and my pa and we still get drownded?’

  ‘It's drowned; and yes I think so.’

  Cally thought she perceived a regret in Dill's voice.

  ‘Why did you kidnap me if you don't like what they are going to do to us?’ She asked.

  ‘Promises were made but obviously made to be broken!’ He replied and walked away.

  He passed Jacob on the stairs.

  ‘What's going on?’ Jacob asked.

  ‘Sean was kicking the shit out of the girl.’ Dill replied.

  ‘The boss won't like that. I'll tell Sean about it.’ Jacob offered.

  ‘I already did!’ Dill said and walked on.

  When he returned to the room with food and drink for Cally Jacob was still there.

  ‘He won't cotton to you much when he wakes up.’ Jacob said with the hint of a smile.

  ‘The feeling is mutual. I don't cotton to anyone who sees fit to kick the shit out of a little girl who happens to be tied to a chair at the time!’ Dill replied.

  ‘Me neither.’ Jacob said and slapped Dill on the back before leaving the room.

  Dill helped Cally to eat the food and drink the drink before he returned to his bed. He shut his ears to Cally's pleas to be taken to a toilet. When the gaoler awoke he turned the light off and slumped on his bed moaning. Cally's plan would have to wait until daylight to be perfected.

  Dermot lay in his bed, by now he was weak with hunger but he could wiggle three fingers on his right hand. A tray of food lay nearby and it was his ambition to eat it before the rats did. He exercised his neck muscles until it hurt and was sorry he had but the pain spurred him on, he so wanted to massage his aching neck and there was no queue of people to do it for him. He opened his mouth and closed it to make sure he could eat, if he could pick the food up. This made his jaw ache but he did not stop. He had heard Cally's voice which meant they had her and he wanted to rescue her, a hard task for a man who could only move three fingers and his head.

  ‘Now what?’ Drummond asked when they were safely back in the home with the money.

  ‘Now that morning is here I'll go and see a man about acting as a go between in the exchange.’

  Dan drove off in the truck as a patrol car drove up. He nodded to the driver and drove on.

  The lieutenant walked up to the home.

  ‘Has there been any contact from the kidnappers?’ He asked.

  ‘Not a dicky-bird.’ Archie replied from where he stood blocking the doorway with his walking frame. ‘Come in for coffee.’ Slowly he turned and walked inside giving those inside time to hide Drummond and the money.

  They sat and the lieutenant outlined his plans and his hopes but Barbara was not really listening, they had their own plan. Her ears picked up when he mentioned the hotel hideout and the fact that it had burnt to the ground during the night. Its usefulness at an end, they had torched soon after the raid, to remove any possible remaining evidence and for the insurance money. Cally had told Barbara about the hotel and now it seemed they had to find out where the new hideout was. The lieutenant left after two long mugs of coffee, leaving Barbara distraught. Her father and Drummond tried to console her but neither knew where the mob’s new hideout was.

  Dan drove past the burnt out hotel then stopped. Now he had to find their new hideout, first he had to see a man who might be persuaded to help. He drove to the store not far from where his boat had been moored but it was boarded up. He drove to the next store, the store he had gone for help after he had been beaten senseless. He stepped inside and found the same store owner, the same seedy goods on sale, he suddenly realized just how low he had sunk.

  ‘Can I help you?’ The store owner asked before he recognised Dan. ‘Dan Craigrose as I live and breathe.’ He walked from be
hind the counter and shook his hand.

  Dan gave him a ten dollar note.

  ‘A debt paid in full I believe?’ Dan said. ‘What happened to Stocker up the street?’

  ‘The law was round here like flies round a pile of cow dung and found his redeye store. They also sweated out of him that he was one of Clo's ears. He's in the lock up now for a few years.’

  Dan was disappointed.

  ‘You don't happen to know where that lot hold court now?’

  ‘Not at the moment. I don't do no more than sell the stuff they say I got to, at the price they say but that's all they get.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Dan walked out.

  ‘Nice to see you again.’ The store owner called after him.

  Now Dan needed to find the new headquarters and quickly! A name jumped into his head, Fromes. He stopped at a phone box, looked up Fromes' office address and drove to it. He climbed the stairs and knocked the door.

  ‘Looking for me?’ Fromes said from behind him.

  ‘I am. I have a job for you.’ Dan replied.

  ‘I already have one as you well know.’

  ‘What's the pay.’

  ‘Two dollars a day.’

  ‘We’ll give you three and expenses.’

  Fromes face lit up.

  ‘And what's the job?’

  ‘Just find Luigi Clo's replacement's new hideout.’

  ‘I'll stick with the two dollars from the state and no expenses thank you!’ He walked past Dan and slammed the door.

  Dan walked back outside despairing, a boy sat in the truck.

  ‘Take me for a ride.’ He begged.

  Dan was in no way ready to be nice to children, but as he was about to tell the boy to skedaddle, Lucy's face appeared in front of him. For a moment he staggered like a drunk and had to hold on to the door handle to stop from falling.