Hunt Hunted Murder Murdered

Hunt, Hunted.

Murder, Murdered.

by

Michael McBride

Published in 2008 by YouWriteOn.com

Copyright © Text Michael McBride

First Edition

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.

This publication is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or events is entirely coincidental.

Published by YouWriteOn.com

January 2007

Dev Coulding wiped the final beads of rain from his furrowed brow and threw the hankie down on the passenger seat. One riddle leading to another, but he had to get to the final solution before the others did or he’d be the butt of their jokes again. The car in motion he sped off through Townhill onto the back roads of West Fife towards Saline. Full beams tracking the road ahead, hedgerows and fencing snaked along the horizon. A treasure hunt, for fun, but tonight he had a mission. Alone, lonely but desperate to keep in with his mates, the only thing he had left.

With every turn he is faced a new piece of sodden road, in a state of disrepair, damaged with hard standing loosened by a tractor’s unapologetic movement during the agricultural close season. More hedgerows, not really stock fencing as holes gaped through, and it would be likely a lamb or 2 had been lost in previous times. But the sheep would be wallowing in the hollows away from the wind and rain tonight, not looking for the greener grass across the track.

Lights up ahead, police vehicles force a quick dropping down of gears and Dev sits pushing the car along in third, while the rain covered country coppers wave him down.

He hoped they hadn’t been watching his erratic headlights dipping and flowing through the bends before, as the officer approached.

‘Good evening sir, can I ask where you are heading off to?’

‘Just out for a drive’

‘On a night like this?’

Dev realized he would be better off telling the embarrassing truth.

‘I’m on a treasure hunt – it’s a game which me and the mates have set up’

‘A Treasure hunt?’

‘You know, you get clues and go looking for the next one’

The policeman wiped some rain from the front of his cagoule and bent over towards the window.

‘OK, whatever. Listen, a wee lass went missing a few nights ago. Do you recognise her?’

The photograph was fairly small, no bigger than a passport image, and in the patchy torchlight it could have been anyone.

‘No, I don’t think so’

Dev looked again at the girl. She could only have been in her early teens, but it was so hard to tell. Blond hair. Green or blue eyes. A school uniform gave it away. Must have been Queen Anne's High, he recognised it from the maroon and black tie.

‘OK, but if you do, let us know. Her parents are distraught’

Window wound back up in his early 90’s Escort. He really needed to get a new vehicle, but it was difficult. Money didn’t always come easily, and truth be known, if the motor packed in he probably wouldn’t be in a position to replace it.

Back on track the police lights faded away behind the trees and knolls as the road turned towards Steelend. Still another 6 or 7 miles to get the next clue.

‘
The shepherd won’t go out without his stick;

Ask what’s missing

Another clue should

Lead you to the correct wood’

Dev knew the answer. The Shepherds Crook leads him to the Crook of Devon, and if the Shepherd won’t go out – he’ll stay in.

The Crook Inn.

The car was doing 60 again across the central lines of the unmarked roads leading up past Knockhill, where the racing of vehicles is allowed. Can’t and won’t fail this time. Dev needed and would get to the end of tonight’s enigma and return to the others.

His mate, Bob, and his wife Marie would be scooting around North Queensferry and Rosyth; Spiv and his latest flame would be checking out clues along by Crossgates; and Tom and Emma would have various clues leading them west to Cairneyhill and Oakley.

Aidrian and Monica would be walking the streets of Dunfermline as their part of the challenge – and they would all meet up in the Seven Kings to enjoy the craic and to share the adventure they had just endured.

The Powmill Milk Bar lay in darkness, as the digital clock showed 7.57pm. The road was wide and empty as Dev hit 70mph past the Rumbling Bridge turn off, and only seconds now before the Crook would be in sight. Nearly 8pm. Get the last part of the clue, out of the pub by 8pm, and off to find the last piece of the puzzle. Back to the pub for 8.30 at the latest and see if he’s managed to get back first… or anywhere but last. Always more fun to hear about the others trials and tribulations when you weren’t in last place.

Down to 50 in the 30 zone, and quickly reducing speed as the pub appeared on the left. Car parking to the rear, but Dev parked at the door, and got out, car still in gear.

The Crook Inn lay fairly empty and deathly quiet. A grey faced woman sat on a bar stool behind the bar, a dark, but graying man at her side, chatting to a couple at the bar. All heads turned when the door opened.

‘I’m looking to find out what’s missing’, Dev burst out, desperate to get out of here as quickly as possible. All faces turned to him, scrutinizing his manner.

‘What did you say?’ the broad Scots tone was harsher than expected from the barman.

‘I believe that you have something missing here. Can you tell me what it is?’

The barman's face turned a shade of scarlet, and the woman wept. The rest of the clientele murmured angrily to each other as the barman started at pace to work his way from the bar towards Dev.

‘What do you mean by that, you sick bastard? Do you know about my daughter? Have you done something to her? Do you know where she is?’

Dev realized his error, or had he been set up?

‘Listen I’m sorry I was told to come in and ask.’

‘By who?’ The man was closing in on him and Dev backed towards the swing doors of the bar, remembering the car outside.

‘Listen, I’m sorry, OK’, and with that Dev turned, bolted out the door and, scraping his back end off the car bonnet, found himself in his car again. Looking out to the left the barman tried the passenger door, but luckily this car was devoid of central locking and unlocking.

‘You bastard, you tell me what you know.’ The voice boomed as the bar owner made his way round the front of the car towards Dev's door. The others were coming out of the bar now, too. Dev forced the car into reverse, praying that tonight it would continue to perform. Praying he would get of this mess intact and praying he would not become the scapegoat of their misery.

‘I’m sorry OK. I don’t know anything’, and with a glance back, the Cro_k _nn disappeared, and Dev spun the car on the empty street to make his escape.

In the rear view mirror he saw the bar personnel pointing and racing towards their own vehicles, so Dev pushed on, down Naemoor road and hopefully to the safety of the darkness. He’d stop down the farm lane off Muckhart Golf course, and see if there was anymore activity. But then he’d progress slowly back to Dunfermline – and tell the story. Bloody hell, what a story.

Dev pulled up. The lack of activity on the roads was eerie, but understandable as the rain was still falling and the winds still gusted around the trees. Take a breath. These were the little girl’s parents, and he had just caused them no end of upset. Shit. Why would the guys send him there tonight. Maybe they hadn’t realized. Likely the clues had been written days before. Just a mistake, and all would end peacefully, happily ever after. What was the clue again.

‘
The shepherd won’t go out without his stick;

Ask what’s missing

Another clue should

Lead you to the correct wood’

Ask what’s missing? That’s what started this mess. But maybe that isn’t what they meant. The Crook Inn had been missing the O and the I. O___ I____. That’s what was missing. So Olive Island, the woods that they had used for courting in their younger days, and not far from here, that was the next venue. Dev considered staying, but the road that he was on led away from the Crook and it would not be likely that anyone would follow him to Olive Island, deep in the Ochil hills, off the main track.

There were some cars on the Dollar road, but going east. Dev crossed over the track and found the obscure entrance, and the memories flooded back. Nights with various girls in this car. Good memories. A small farmhouse just off the track was in darkness, although a light flicked on to the rear, probably because the wind blew a branch across the motion sensor from the trees that surrounded the premises. A car in the drive, but no-one home. The track ended with the rusty old gate and the parking place that he’d spent past evenings with Monica, with others. Steamy windows being wiped down with white cotton knickers on the journey home to Dunfermline.

Dev opened the car door and walked up to the gate. So where was the clue? It was dark where there were no street lights, although to the south the cars still streamed past and the rain kept falling. Dev pulled his V- neck up and over his head, and started to climb the fence. Olive Island was a patch of trees, like a wee oasis in a field which was used as a grazing meadow. They always called it Olive Island – an island of trees often surrounded by flooded marshland, but in the summer it was lush green. Tonight it was sodden. Bastards making him trample across this muck. He felt like phoning in and telling them he wasn’t going through with the clue – again. But tonight he had to. He was not going to give up and take the flak again.

The mud seeped into his Nike trainers and over the bottoms of his designer jeans. Bastard. But there was no other way to Olive Island. So, squelching and leaving a trail of muddy tracks, Dev made his way over the meadow. The rain felt so cold. He’d left his jacket in the car. Stupid. The trees from Olives Island rose and fell like shadowy flames across the backdrop of the Ochil Hills and he hoped beyond hope that the clue would be here and he could get back. A very small light shone from the ground in the undergrowth. A torch. That must be the clue to return with. Dev scrambled through the twigs and branches and reached the torch. Lifting it up it felt sticky to the touch, and shining the torch onto his own hand he discovered the sticky substance was red. Blood red. This was sick.

He shone the torch shining down towards the ground at his feet where a small trail of blood led to the bottom of an old oak. A girl. Gagged and tied. Eyes staring. Deathly stare. Dev's heart raced in panic and thoughts of the girl’s parents and this situation began to haunt him. An envelope sat on the body. Dev started to weep. Who would do this? How could he explain? Maybe he could find out from the envelope. He wiped his hand and picked up the envelope using his jumper to prevent any fingerprints, but the blood was on his jumper already. He felt it harder to breathe. The letter was out of the envelope and he forced it open.

It was a clue.

‘
Devalue life I am the start

Could it begins, and ending’

Someone had set him up. Dev at the start, Could – it begins, and end – ing. Dev Coulding. But now he had the clue, and he could discover who did this.

A crack of a branch and Dev's torch fell to the ground.

Dev Coulding was dead. A figure disappeared into the shadows, as a dad came looking for his daughter in Olive Island.

1

Jan 2008

It’s 1955 and the 8 bodies sit around the recently furnished room. Wallace Squaregut, a policeman with an attitude puffs, on a pretend cigarette blowing fake smoke out of its plastic sheath. His blond walrus moustache is poised like a dead rat, ready to fall off his top lip if he is asked to speak. Pretence is the name of the game. His closest companion is Lady Ratzenberger, a harlot dressed in scarlet, cigarillo in its holder, pointed to the ceiling. She is now owner of Heighley Manor since her husband’s tragic death hours earlier in this fictitious place. Everyone an actor, but in this false reality the characters in this room indulge in good humoured discussion to find out who the murderer is, why they did it and with what. A reality Cluedo game.

‘Any of you cocks for anymore beverages?’ Bob laughed as his character slipped down from high class toff to housing scheme scum.

‘Bob!’ A shrill young maid shouted across the room,

‘Stay in character or you’ll spoil it’. The maid was Bob’s fiancée of 5 years, Marie, sounding as though the wait for a wedding date played constantly on her mind.

‘I can’t when Emm keeps asking for Bacardi Breezers – its hardly the drink of the 50’s’

Slight mirth and merriment erupted, but cautiously from the visitors to this apartment.

‘Lager?’ Bob stood holding his arms aloft, each hand containing a can.

Two hands rise towards the sky as if two late night partygoers thought they saw a taxi light in the distance.

‘Mind yer cigarettes, this is a new carpet’ Bob quips.

‘Stay in character!’ Marie continued in the same vain.

‘I am, I’m pretending those fags are real’, Bob hands a cold tin of Tennents to his mate on the sofa.

‘Cheers bud’ said Cllr Frank Bresner, aka Spiv aka Simon Deuchar, of Camdean, Rosyth, as the newspaper had stated when he was done for GBH in his late teens. His girlfriend was sitting at his lap, kneeling comfortably on the floor, chest heaving through fifties negligee.

‘Pam, you wantin owt?’

‘No thanks Bob, I’ve an essay to write up tomorrow’, Dorothea Pandrop aka Pamela Watters looked out of place – an 18 yr old in the midst of some late twenty-early thirty something’s.

Marie rolled her eyes. ‘In… character….Bob.’

‘I’m no fuckin Bob then, am I.’ He pushed his face towards the pretty maid. Its Gerald Ratzen frigger to you!’ The deep red lining of his jacket flashed as he turned quickly and guffawed in a deliberate, insulting tone. All part of the game. Marie threw him daggers that he could feel in his spine but he didn’t care. He was the host, the life of the party and feeling mighty fine and plenty drunk.

Bob staggered through towards the kitchen for more beers passing an army general at the door. The General touched his arm whispering, ‘Tell ye what, your wife’s patter is murder…’ He smirked and swigged his beer. Cigar rounding the near empty can.

Elias Godfrey, the general, played by Tom McAndrew kept his eye on Spiv's new tart, ogling her fine breasts before catching the glare of his wife. Her disapproving look was not unusual. She knew what he was like. A ladies’ man if ever there was one.

‘I say, forthwith and wherewithal, I think I’ve got it!’

Wallace Squaregut, under normal circumstances known as Aidrian Burgess, rose from his seat. He was a rotund fellow, his policeman outfit being a little on the small side.

‘I think
I
might have done it!’