CHAPTER 8. THE GRAND MASONIC CONSPIRACY.
That evening, Naismith stood in the wood panelled robing room of the Masonic Hall on Watergate. He adjusted his lambskin apron and placed a light blue collar around his neck before pulling on a pair of white gloves. A silver dove depended from his collar. As he did so, he ran through his memorised ritual for the evening's ceremony. A radiographer – nice chap, could go far – was due to be passed to the second degree so Naismith had a lot to do.
A clap on his back knocked his thoughts from his mind. He turned and pulled off his gloves. The two men shook with a knuckly grasp.
"Good evening, Worshipful Master," Naismith said.
Before him stood Jeremy Sandiford. One of the senior partners at Gilbert Greene and Ellison, Solicitors. And one of the other controllers of Saveiro Canadian Inc. Even though he wasn't, the heavy-set man looked Canadian with his balding dome and thick moustache.
"Give me a hand with this," Sandiford said, turning around. As Naismith adjusted the Worshipful Master of Eslaforde Lodge's chain of office, he whispered that Peachornby had found out about their plans to redevelop the land on Mareham Lane.
However, Sandiford didn't seem overly worried. "It was bound to happen. Everyone knows Town Halls are more corrupt than a month old carcass. So I'm not surprised even a fool like Peachornby would come sniffing."
"I suppose so, but we don't want a racist moron like Peachy as a partner, do we?"
"Of course not," Sandiford said with a shudder. "We'll keep him at arm's length. Could you imagine him applying to join our Lodge?"
"He'd never get in – have we got enough black balls to go round?"
"And we've got enough failed politicians in this Lodge." Both men turned and nodded to Charles Langton-Gore as he pulled on his Junior Warden's gauntlets. The man still looked disappointed by the election results even though the reasons for the fix had been explained to him together with a promise that his time would come. Every dog has his day, Sandiford had hinted.
The two men laughed and they walked past the Tyler with his sword drawn to keep out all intruders and cowans to masonry and then into the Lodge room beyond.
Later, during the festive board after the passing, Sandiford and Naismith got together again.
"I've been thinking. We can use Peachornby's greed against him. Keep him even further under our thumb."
"Go on," said Naismith with interest.
And so the Lodge's Worshipful Master explained matters to his Senior Deacon.
***
Patryk sat opposite the Deputy-Mayor and helped himself to another chocolate biscuit. Something important must be going down if choccie bikkies were on offer.
"Are you busy tonight? Don't worry, you'll get overtime."
Patryk nodded, not wanting to speak and spray crumbs over the table.
Naismith took a digital Canon EOS camera from out of his desk drawer and placed it on the leather top. He then placed a 55-200mm long lens next to it. Patryk watched as a recording wire joined the camera. He picked them up and raised his eyebrows.
"You once told me your friend is interested in photography."
Patryk nodded. "Lukasz? Yes, he's good. Some of his photos have been used by the printers for brochures and the like."
"In that case, I want him to take some pics of you handing this envelope over to our esteemed Mayor. Make sure Lukasz gets a full face one of him actually holding it. Even better, one of him looking at the contents."
A large padded envelope joined the other equipment on the desk top. Naismith pulled out a bundle of used twenties.
"There's five hundred of them in there – ten thousand in good old pounds sterling. Take the rest of the afternoon off and make a note of all the serial numbers."
Patryk groaned inside. Another boring afternoon loomed. Maybe he could ask Kassia to help after she finished at kindergarten. He stood and collected all the items and slid them into an empty laptop bag.
"Don't worry – you're on overtime as from now," Naismith said with a smile. "Time and a half. Can't be bad. And think of all the money you'll make once that hotel is completed."
***
Kassia dropped her bag and kicked off her shoes. She loved her job at the kindergarten but it was so exhausting. She wished she had a fraction of the zip those toddlers had. If you could harness the energy of a bunch of toddlers and wire them into the electrical grid then you could solve the world's power supply problems at a stroke.
All Kassia seemed to do was tidy up after them and dry their tears and try and stop a riot from breaking out over whose turn it was to play on the sand table. But that said, she loved her little charges and looked forwards to going into work every day. It was so much better than working in that depressing run-down nursing home back in Warsaw.
The money was much better, too. She was on double what she earned back home – and working with toddlers, there was no night shifts. She hated working nights. However, the cost of living in Britain was far higher than in Poland. Everything was so expensive here – food, rent, electricity, transport. No wonder the locals all had long faces. And the weather. Ugh. The cold and damp, the rain, the lowering grey clouds. So different from the crisp, clear, continental cold she was used to.
Sometimes, Kassia wished she could go home. She missed her family and friends so much. Of course, it was easier to keep in touch these days with Facebook and Skype but it wasn't the same as actually being there. She missed her mother's hugs – and hearty home cooked meals usually starting with the traditional borscht, the deep red beetroot soup followed by kaczka z owocami, duck with fruit stuffing, or kotlet mielony, a mixed meat cutlet, and then to finish off knedle ze sliwkami, plum dumplings or maybe makowiec poppy cake. You couldn't eat that over the internet. Kassia could almost taste the food now.
Kassia missed foraging for mushrooms in the forests near her home – and her father's booming laugh when he found an untouched outcrop. She even yearned for her sister, Dzenetta, who used to get on her nerves so much by constantly 'borrowing' Kassia's clothes and make-up. However, if she could go home now, she would happily lend Dzenetta all her clothes for as long as the girl wanted them.
In her stockinged feet, Kassia walked along their short hallway, and pushed open the door to the open plan living room. She thought she would put the kettle on, make a mug of herbal tea and then curl up on the couch for a while and see who was online on Facebook. Glancing at her watch and mentally adding on one hour to allow for the time difference in Poland, she figured that some of her friends ought to be available for a natter. She should have a bit of time before Patryk got home.
"Hello, Kass," a voice said.
Bang went an hour or so catching up on gossip. "What are you doing home so early?"
"My supermodel girlfriend and her sister kicked me out of bed and so I thought I might as well come here."
"That's not funny, Pat," Kassia said, suppressing a grin.
"Don't you believe me? Don't you think I'm simply irresistible to women?"
"Not really – but you are irresistible to me," she said. Kassia walked over to the dining room table and put her arms around her fella. She kissed the back of his neck while her pony-tail brushed his ear. Only then did Kassia notice the piles of money stacked up on the tabletop. She straightened up in alarm.
"Where did you get all that? Did you rob a bank, Pat?"
Patryk pushed out another chair. "It might have been easier if I had. No, Mr. Naismith wants to keep Peachornby under his thumb."
"If Naismith pays that much he can have me under his fingers and thumbs. Any time he wants. Mmm..."
"Kass!"
"Well, you started it. Going on about being irresistible. Now James Naismith... mmm," Kassia's voice tailed off into a dreamy sigh. Not that she really meant it. She loved her man even with all his faults but that James Naismith, now he was pure sex on legs. He knew how to carry himself and looked like he could treat a woman how she deserved to be treated.
Then she looked again at all that money. There must be thousands and thousands.
"So what is going on then, Pat? And a straight answer this time."
"We're writing down all the serial numbers. Then once the money's in Peachornby's possession, we've got him on corruption charges any time we want."
"Who's 'we'?"
"Well, Naismith of course."
Kassia needed time to think so she walked to the kitchen area and switched on the kettle. As she waited for it to heat up, she thought hard. She poured the boiling water over the teabags and swirled them around with a spoon far harder than she needed so that the fragrant tea slopped out onto the counter. She brought the cups out and placed them on the table next to the piles of twenties.
Patryk pushed a pad and Biro over to her. "Many hands make light work. That's an English proverb."
"I know." Her manageress at the kindergarten often used that phrase. However, that woman rarely tidied up after the little darlings. Kassia picked up the pen and the closest stack of twenties and started writing.
"Are you sure about this?" Kassia asked after a couple of minutes.
Patryk put down his pen and looked at his girlfriend, his partner, his love.
"No. I'm not sure. Not one hundred per cent, I mean. Like you I'm not happy about helping Peachornby win. I don't like him or his politics and I don't trust him but Naismith knows what he's doing..."
"You hope," Kassia interrupted.
"He does, he's very clever. Went to Cambridge – which is a top Uni over here. And listen, Kass, this our chance to make big money. Unless we win the lottery, that is. And we've got more chance of getting struck by lightning than winning the lottery. Well, I'm sick of being poor, of having to make do all the time, of not being able to have the best when the fat-cat bankers and politicians seem to have plenty of everything."
"But I'm happy as we are. I've got you, love, and that's what matters to me most of all."
Patryk raised one eyebrow. "What about those magazines you like? You're always looking at the expensive handbags and dresses and those celebs on holidays in places like Dubai or Barbados. Don't you want a piece of that? Why them and not us?" As he spoke, he carried on writing strings of random letters and numbers.
Kassia fell silent for a while. She knew she wasn't as sharp or quick-witted as Patryk. She knew that she usually needed time to think things through before reaching a conclusion but when she did, she usually got it right. Now she believed that what they were doing was wrong. And not only wrong but dangerous as well.
It felt so immoral letting a man like Peachornby take over. Already he was boasting about having closed down the asylum centre and there seemed to be more skinheads loitering on the streets than before. She couldn't put it in words but there seemed to be a tense atmosphere in town now.
She wondered if Patryk and Mr. Naismith really knew what they were doing and hoped it didn't all go wrong somehow. She doubted if Patryk would listen to her warnings because since he'd fallen in with Mr. Naismith it seemed like he had changed and become greedier and more money-oriented.
Sliding the next batch of twenties out of their band, Kassia said quietly, "yes, it would be nice to have more money. But I don't like the idea of what we're doing. No good will come from helping men like Peachornby."
Patryk snorted with laughter. "We're not helping him, Kass – we're helping ourselves. The guy's a tool. This is our chance and I'm taking it. When we're through here, we'll head back to Poland and buy somewhere nice. What do you think? Put all this behind us and live the good life."
Kassia couldn't mistake the enthusiasm in her fella's voice so she knew she was wasting her time trying to talk Pat out of this scheme. All she could do was watch and wait and see how it all panned out. That was another of her manageress's sayings.
***
That evening, long after the sun had disappeared over Grantham way, Patryk stood by the deserted bulk of the Sleaford Bass Maltings. If the huge brick structure was eerie during daylight hours, it was downright spooky at night. He stood in a patch of moonlight, the better for Lukasz who was crouching behind a pile of rubble, his long lens resting on the broken bricks and concrete.
The wind moaned off the Fenland flats and around the ruined buildings. It sounded like ghosts trapped in the half life between the living and dead. The rusting, decaying metalwork rattled and somewhere, a tin can rolled along a gulley until fetching up against a wall.
From behind a thicket of buddleia bushes, a dog fox barked startling the two men. It padded around a corner, took one look, and then carried on in its unending search for food. Over the railway tracks Lukasz saw a line of houses. Their bedrooms were lit up and Lukasz envied the people there living their ordinary lives. Sprawled out on their couches, watching television or on the internet; putting their children to bed or maybe having a late supper. Ordinary people getting on with their lives. Which didn't involve setting up the Mayor and his skinhead thugs.
Lukasz wore a black jacket and jeans and, in true SAS style, had smeared dirt over his hands and face. In the darkness behind the mound of junk he was almost invisible. The two Poles had arrived early and surveyed the site and between them had decided this was the best spot for the set up. Patryk was in full view from Lukasz's hide and a few test snaps had worked perfectly. You could see everything with fourteen mega-pixel clarity.
Also, Patryk was far enough away from the towering buildings so that no-one could sneak up and take him unawares. Yes, it was as perfect a spot as it could be. Now all they could do was wait for the Mayor of Sleaford to show. Lukasz thought back to the long hours spent in the wetlands along the coast, trying to photograph Red Knots, Oystercatchers, Sanderlings as well as various species of gulls. This was no different. Except that marsh birds don't come with heavies and didn't mind having their photos taken.
Lukasz settled down to wait. A Thermos of soup would be nice but he couldn't risk the smell betraying his hide-out. From what Patryk had told him, Peachornby wouldn't come alone, he'd bring along some of his BNP hard cases. The damp chill seeped through his jacket and Lukasz watched Patryk pace to and fro. Several times Patryk kicked a lump of cement into a gulley.
Then a pair of headlights bounced along the rough track leading to the Bass Maltings. Lukasz stiffened and immediately called Patryk, who felt the phone's vibrations through his pocket. An instant later, Patryk killed the call as he, too, saw the approaching headlights coming down the access road.
Patryk shifted position and waited for a red Rover 75 to barrel down the service road. It bounced over the neglected surface, swerving to avoid the worst potholes. In the darkness, the car looked more black than red, the colour of old, congealed blood. Moonlight reflected from its roof and door panels. Patryk shivered but stepped forward.
Whoever was driving made a show of accelerating until pulling a handbrake turn, sending loose grit and gravel flying towards Patryk. The Rover skidded slightly until the driver regained control and pulled up only yards away from the Pole. The driver didn't bother switching off the engine.
Peachornby eased his bulk from out of the rear seat and stood, keeping the Rover between himself and the Pole. Unsurprisingly, Mason climbed out of the driver's seat. By the illumination of the dome light, Patryk watched Mason run his hand over his freshly shaved head. The skinhead flexed his muscles. As he did so, Patryk stepped to one side to give Lukasz a clear line of sight.
"Why here?" said Peachornby.
"You want to meet in a restaurant, somewhere anyone can see us?"
Peachornby shook his head. "We could've met at my house or at my garden centre."
While writing down all the serial numbers and listening to Kassia's moaning, Patryk had thought through a number of possible conversations. "Is that a good idea? Don't you think MI5 have your places under 24/7 security?"
Peachornby thought for a moment. "Oh yeah, I suppose so. Especially now I'm the Mayor. But it's MI6 that are watching me."
Patryk couldn't resist. "MI6 are the ones who take care of the foreign stuff."
"That's what they want you to think," said Peachornby, tapping the side of his inflamed nose. "And I'm well connected round the world. I know people. Men who know what's really going on – what the World Government don't want people finding out. There's these Serbian guys, on the run now..."
There was no arguing with that so Patryk let it go. "I've brought the money," he interrupted.
"The donation to my campaign funds?"
"No. The bribe," Patryk said loudly for the benefit of the wire.
"Whatever. Pass it over," snapped Mason holding out his hand.
This wasn't what Naismith wanted. He needed Peachornby to be snapped taking hold of the money, not his henchman. Ignoring the skinhead, Patryk walked to one side and held out the envelope over the Rover's bonnet. Peachornby fell for it and grasped the envelope with all the enthusiasm of a baby offered a rattle. A big smile crossed his face.
"Don't you want to count it? Make sure it's all there?"
"Better had, boss. This joker could've nicked a wedge."
On one level, Patryk would be annoyed but tonight he was glad of the young skinhead's distrust. Also, Mason reeked of weed which probably contributed to his paranoia.
"Oh, yeah. You can't trust anyone these days, mate. Check it out," Patryk goaded.
By the Rover's headlights, Peachornby slid out the bundled twenties and riffled through them. There was no way a moron like him could count that quickly but it didn't matter. Lukasz must be getting loads of good shots.
"Satisfied?" Patryk asked as Peachornby slid the last bundle back into the envelope.
"Yes. Tell Naismith thanks and not to leave us out of any of his future plans, okay?"
Patryk nodded. No need to speak any more. That last sentence naming Naismith would have to be deleted later. The two BNP men got back into their Rover; Mason pulled a U-ey and the Rover bounced back along the service road.
Patryk breathed a sigh of relief. That could have gone badly but as he was only there to give them money, he supposed the BNP guys weren't looking for any trouble themselves. They had nothing to gain from beating him up. But if either of them had spotted Lukasz crouched behind the pile of debris then things might have turned nasty. As soon as the Rover was out of sight, Patryk walked over to his friend.
"Got everything?" he asked.
Lukasz stood, brushing dust and grit from his clothes. He grinned and pushed back his hair. "Perfectly. There's no way he can deny receiving the money." Lukasz scrolled through the Canon's memory, showing Patryk the sequence of snaps. A few weren't very good and Lukasz also deleted those that showed Patryk's profile. But there were more than enough for any jury to convict Peachornby on bribery and corruption charges. The two men smiled.
"I'll get these to Naismith tomorrow." Glancing at his watch, "Fancy coming back? I'll call Kassia and ask her to get some snacks ready."
"Sounds good to me. Let's roll."
The two men made their way to Patryk's van which was parked around the other side of the Bass Maltings. A minute later they too were bumping along the access road. At the end, Patryk relocked the gate before making a right and heading back into Sleaford.