Talent
by Mr. House and Her Son, the Amazing Dog Trumpet
© 1999 FacistsInHeaven
Chapter the Third: House!
“I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips, Straining upon the start. The game’s afoot:.”
The police had contacted my neighbour and the house had at least been watched over during the two weeks I had been in the hospital. There were no furry surprises in the fridge and my mail was piled on the kitchen table neatly in order of obvious importance. There was canned food in the cupboard and I set about making myself at home. I sat idly in the kitchen with a bowl of soup and began dealing with the piles of mail. Mostly junk and flyers that were out of date by now, a letter from Cathy and the kids telling me they were staying over in France for a while longer and would be back at the end of the month unless she managed to get booked on another seminar. There were a couple of bills, one for the visa and one for the electricity and a couple of issues of the local newspaper. The first of which was remarkable in that it had a headline that told of my crash.
I began to read through the column and turned the page to reveal a picture of the crash site. The photographer must have been on the scene quite quickly after the accident. There was the truck slewed across the lanes of the highway, the two women from the Ford were standing at the side of their car and the paramedics were dealing with my wreck seen through the broken rails of the safety barrier. Another team was treating the driver of the Range Rover for what appeared to be minor head cuts. His car was jammed against the concrete of the central meridian wall. While he and his family stood at the edge of the road nearby.
I had a sudden feeling that this picture was very important I couldn’t tear my attention away from it. The newsprint dots, the writing, the position of the people in the photograph. It was suddenly essential that I see something in this photograph. Something that had to do with my new-found gift. I knew this had to do with the ‘obligation’ that I’d been told about during my dream.
I closed my eyes and laid my hand across the paper. With a deep breath, I cleared my mind and allowed the photograph to take shape in my head. The sharpness of the image made the scene fresh and brilliant. The characters were frozen in time, the vapour from the truck’s hydraulics hung in the air as a solid curtain. The cars on the other side of the barrier were caught in their rush. I began to track through the scene, able to move around in three dimensions and see the scene from different angles. What was it that was wrong here? I couldn’t tell, but there was an urgency in my search that made me sure I should find something.
I began to check on the positions of all the people in the site. The Truck, the Range Rover, the Ford, the Fiat spread along the concrete wall by the truck’s wheel, my car crashed through the fence. Something screamed out for my attention.
Then I was on to it. I could see through the rear side of the Fiat. The metal of the roof torn up and away like a can of beans. What at first appeared to be a pile of blankets revealed itself to be a body, squashed into the space left between the front seat and the parcel shelf. It seemed to be laying over something and as I centred my view on it, I found something that surprised me. The smashed cadavers now dripping across the dashboard of the Fiat, had been carrying a high-powered rifle that looked as if it could take out an elephant. Its barrel was just poking past where the body used to have a lap and from the tiny wisp of vapour that still clung to the muzzle, had been recently fired. When I checked out the truck in minute detail, there was a flash mark at the rim of the truck’s wheel where the tire had blown out. The skid marks showed the result of that. It was certain that the mark was a result of a bullet
For some reason, the Fiat’s passengers had been taking pot-shots at the truck as we were driving that road, but why?
The truck was carrying a collection of different cars but they didn’t seem the sort of things that anyone would want to blow off the road. This was having the look of some sort of organised hit I had a look at the family in the Rover. Two kids, the young boy was tearful with all the fuss. The older girl was in her early teens and looked on at the scene with a concerned excitement. Mother was a handsome woman who seemed to be more concerned with calming her son and discovering that their vehicle had been dented than anything else. Dad, a tall strong man, hair slightly greying at the temples, he looked as if he was used to dealing with surprises. He seemed unruffled by the commotion and was watching the crash site with a look of detached interest. I noted the licence numbers of the vehicles and came out of my scan.
I sat for a long time, letting the soup bowl cool. The facts were churning around in my head. Notwithstanding the fact that I was involved in something other than an accident, I felt at a loss to identify how I should proceed from here. The police were out of the question, how was I going to explain my knowledge. How was it possible that the police had not said anything about the gun? I would have to go after this lot on my own.
I drew a deep bath and let myself lay in there for a long time while I sorted through my options. It was certain that I would need to trace those licence plates. They were the only leads I had to the mystery. So I had to get access to the vehicle licencing centre’s computer system. I would have to do some scouting to achieve that. In the meantime I had to take the attitude that it was me that was the target for the hit. I’d have to be careful.
I dried off from my bath, and went to the bedroom. The TV Sprang to life and I lay on the bed, idly flicking through channels at random. fifty-seven channels and nothing on as they say. I watched a couple of music videos that almost pretended to be musical, but did have some rather attractive young things wiggling in time to the beat. Some rap, with a capital ‘C’ was next on, so I flicked over the channels again and came to a stop on CNN. The news reader was spouting about some economic downturn news. She had a rather attractive face and I lay there just looking at her.
The next story sure had my interest though. On a screen behind her head another face flashed up. It was familiar, the father from the Range Rover.
“.. Earlier today. Authorities are saying that this marks the start of a new, aggressive campaign by the Shaw group to dominate the market.. Chairman Peter Shaw told reporters that he would soon be the owner of the airline and also its associated shipping business...”
So that was the guy, Peter Shaw. I recalled the details I knew about him; financier, leader of the Shaw Group of companies. He was one of the country’ s ‘movers and shakers’ and had lead the take-overs of some competitors who were probably richer than some small countries. Peter Shaw was serious money.
At least one thing was cleared up. It probably was not me who was the target I’d never been anywhere near his circle of influence as far as I could tell. The question was, what would I find about Mr. Shaw that I was apparently destined to uncover?
I phoned the office and let them know what I was doing. They had been told what had happened and my projects were progressing fine without me (damn!), I gave them the details of my prognosis and left them with the assurance that I would be in at the start of the next week.