They dragged her inside, panting like a pack of hounds. The first thing she saw was the corroding block of a Ford V8 engine that had been sitting in the same spot for twenty years. The second thing she saw, against the far wall, was Richard tied to the folding army cot. She shook them off and went over to him. “You ok?” He nodded. She looked back at the boys and said, “Untie him. Then we’ll talk.”
The NSSMIBC started jumping up and down, practically screaming, “We ain’t gonna be talking, bitch, we ain’t gonna be talking. We gonna be playing, yeah, playing games, all day long.” And he kept jumping around like a kid at a piñata party.
The BMIBC regained his sense of leadership, if not propriety, and smacked him in the back of the head. “Stand down, fer christ sake. We got her, now we gotta think things through, right? Figure out how to get what we really want.”
“What we really want? I KNOW what I really want, and it’s right there. Right up that hot little dress of hers. I don’t need do any thinkin about nothing.”
The boss man looked at the MSMIBC and said, “Sit on him if you have to.” He walked over to the cot, took out his buck knife, and cut the ropes that held Richard down. Then he went to the refrigerator and got out three beers. He hoped a beer might cool down his bro who was ready to go off in his pants. By the time the beers were gone, a semblance of equilibrium had established itself. Richard was stretching and standing up. The NSSMIBC had stopped hopping up and down. The other three sat in plastic chairs around the plastic table. There was no way for Gale to cover up those legs that would make Sharon Stone cry, so she didn’t try. She was totally calm, realizing what could happen, but setting her mind to work on ways to handle these guys to avoid the worst. She took the initiative, saying, “You goons didn’t grab me just for fun and games. You grabbed me for the same reason you grabbed him,” nodding at Richard. “What is it? What do you want? You mess with me, you may not get it.”
“Goons. She call us goons,” the BMIBC said. “I like that. She hardly have any clothes on to start with, and she calls us names.” Looking at his boys he said, “She wants to know what we want. Should we tell her? Or just start eating?”
Richard said, “Leave her alone. Jinny and the Junes know you did anything to her, they’re going to do more than start a little building fire. Start your asses on fire maybe, after they shoot you.”
The NNs looked from Richard to Gale, not quite knowing how to proceed. Both of the Junies were talking big, and they had seen Jinny’s handiwork, with Richard now evoking his name. On the other hand, there were those thighs, right there, for the taking. Not in their wildest dreams had any of them expected the reality of this temptation. Richard tried the same tact Gale had tried. He repeated her statements, “You didn’t grab either of us for fun and games. You had a reason. What is it? Is it important enough to risk throwing it away. Jinny will track you to your holes in Idaho if you mess with her.”
The boss man wasn’t scared by what Gale and Richard had said, but it did give him pause. Just how much trouble did he want to take back to Idaho with him. He was committed to exacting revenge on Stirg, the man who had ordered the assassination of his grandfather. And if that meant doing Anna along with her grandfather, then so be it. But Stirg had the Israeli commando bodyguard, who might be a problem, and this Jinny guy had demonstrated a penchant for violence, and then there were these June people. Did he need all that hassle? He went and got three more beers, and passed them around. Looking first at Gale and then at his boys, he said, “Sure is tempting, ain’t it? And it’s been awhile for all of us, too.” He paused, during which time the NSSMIBC and the MSMIBC both got the vibe they really didn’t want to feel, which was no fun and games with this slick looking bitch. In unison they drained their second beers and crushed the cans. The boss man continued, “But sometimes you got to sacrifice for the mission.” He thought, but didn’t say in front of the boys, not wanting to do anything that could be interpreted as weakness, "And sometimes you got to be smart and not stir up any more hornets nests than necessary.” He said, “We got our mission here, and we got to stick with it, and not get sidetracked by no nooky. We snatched both these foo foos, and we now we trade ‘em for the Stirg bitch. That was the plan. That’s what we got to stick with. Sorry boys. When we get back to the ‘Ho, we get ourselves some real ‘hoes, all we want. I promise.” He stood up to reinforce his decision. “Who’s got the geek’s phone. We need to call that Jewls guy, tell him what we want.”
Chapter 50 – The CD Flies to Renee
Back in the bunker after lunch Paul took over the piano. He said, “Give me an hour or so alone, and I can do this. I’m going to use the Hey Renn tune as the second song, the really important one that spells out the main concept of the opera. Sometimes I write the music first, and sometimes the lyrics. For this it’s going to be music first. When I have the melody down, you two can come back in, and we’ll record it. Then we’ll add a track or two to the piano track, maybe a bass line, maybe a strings section in the background. The primary instrument on the song is going to be piano, not guitar, and not synthe. Then maybe you can work through another piano part, while I do the lyrics,” he said, looking at Anna. “After I get the words, we put it all together. It may be rough, but it will get the message across to Renee. It will tell her I love her and want her to sing all the songs, and it will tell her what the concept of the opera is. I hope she likes that. Ok?”
“You love her, Dad?”
“I do. I really think I do. Anyone who sings like her, and looks like her, what’s not to love. Music, woman, song, singing, long hair, beauty, soul. Aren’t those things to love?”
“I’m pretty sure she’s married.”
“I’ll face that challenge when it presents itself. Right now we got to get to work.”
Anna and Stella left the studio and went into the living room, where Stella picked up a Vogue and Anna stared into space, wondering how she was going to help Paul McCartney play his greatest song since Hey Jude. Stella closed the magazine to look at the cover, which showed a date of six months earlier. She said, “That little rat, Jools. This is the best he comes up with, a six month old copy. When he comes in again, will you beat him up for me?” She looked at Anna, who was sitting rigid, except for her fingers, which were twitching. Stella sensed an increased heart rate, and said, “Hey, what’s the matter?”
“What’s the matter? Your father wants me to play a piano part on Hey Renn, which is the most important song in the opera, and I’ve never even heard the song, and he says it’s going to be a great song, and he’s Paul McCartney, and….”
“Easy girl. He not a manipulator. If he says you can do it, it’s because he knows you can do it, and that’s what he said. He has confidence in you, and so do I. You can play. And don’t worry, it’s his song, he’ll do the heavy lifting. What you have to do is to stop thinking and start feeling. That’s what it’s all about, and that’s what he wants from you in your playing. Let it rip from the start, because it’s ok to make mistakes. That’s the way recording goes. You make a mistake, you do it again. Ok?”
“Ok. Do we have any wine open?”
“No wine now, girl. Wine tonight, when we’re listening to the finished demo of Hey Renn. We might even invite Scotilly and Jools.”
“Just one glass?”
Stella shook her head, and in part to distract Anna, took up bashing Jools again for providing old fashion magazines. She said, “Doesn’t he know that the stuff in here is out of fashion by now?”
In the studio Paul played riffs and short snatches of melodies on the piano, then swiveled on the bench and picked up the Rickenbacher and riffed some rhythm lines, then picked up drumsticks and dinged around on a high hat for ten minutes, and then returned to the piano. He began to sing, not words, just sounds, either doubling down on the melody or created a harmony with it. The meaning of the song began to take shape in
his mind at the same time that the melody and rhythm took shape. The ideas out of which the lyrics would form were simple but profound: “Renn, my love, we’ve been together so long, such caring and devotion, and it comes from us having so many common interests outside ourselves, such a rich palette from which to make our lives together. We just enjoy being together and doing these things, some intellectual, some that generate good feelings, some just fun and light. Almost every day we do active things together, and we’ve been doing the same things together for years and years. That’s the key to our long love and relationship, we’re compatible on the outside. We do stuff together, all the time, and it never gets old for us.”
These were the ideas that roamed Paul’s head for the next hour, stimulating the music and stimulating the words that fit with the music. Him and Renee, together for so many years, subject to slings and arrows like everyone, but maintaining a pattern of shared events and activities that allowed them to sit above most pain and discouragement. And as he said it would, the music and the words came together after a while, and the song was written.
When they heard noise in the kitchen, Anna and Stella went in, where they found Paul making another cup of crappy coffee. He said, “Anna, next time Jools comes in, will you beat him up for me so he gets us some decent coffee? Please?”
Stella said, “She has to beat him up for me first so he gets some new magazines. Then she can beat him up for you. How’s the song?”
“Done.”
“Is it as good as you wanted? Does it say what you wanted it to say?”
“I think it’s very nice, the melody. And yes, when I get all the lyrics right, it will tell the basic story of the opera, of the rest of the songs.”
Anna hesitated, but remembering Stella telling her to let it rip, she asked, “Is it better than Hey Jude?”
He took the first sip of the bad coffee, thought for a few seconds, and said, “Oh yes. Quite.”
Chapter 51 – The News About Gale
The next morning Jools had no idea Anna was going to beat him up on two accounts the minute he entered the bunker, so he was feeling chipper as he hand-washed Scotilly’s lingerie in the washroom sink. He’d just finished hanging the last pair of silk panties on the line when Anna’s cell phone rang. “Jools here, how may I help you?” It was Anna’s cell phone, but by now he had appropriated it as his own, and answered it as he did their household phone.
“That you, Jew…els? You know who this is, don’t you?”
This racism was a first for Jools, and he had to gather himself. “This is Jools, yes, and I believe I’ve had the pleas….I believe we’ve exchanged words. How is Richard?” Jools recognized the voice, and cell phone caller ID showed Richard’s number.
“Before we get down to business, Jewls, I got to know if you’s a Jew boy, cause that’s what your name sounds like. What kind a name is Jewls?”
“I told you before, sir, my surname is Smythe-Woolmington, III, and I am Church of England. I am not of Semitic ancestry. Jools is a favored Christian name of the Smythe-Woolmingtons going back to Charlemagne. Would you care for me to spell my name for you, sir, to avoid further digressions from the important business at hand?”
This genealogical foray was enough to kill the BMIBC’s interest, so he said, “Drop it, Jewls, ok? We got news for you, and you can pass it on to all your crowd. We have another visitor here at our camp; someone to keep the Richard guy company. Not that kind of company; we’re doing that, aren’t we boys?” He motioned to the others to whoop it up, which they did, but only half-heartedly, them wishing they actually were keeping that kind of carnal company with Gale. “Her name is Gale, and they twos is together, like brother and sister. Anyway, here’s our demands. We want the Stirg bitch. The one we met on King Street the night you snatched the Beatle guy. We get her, you get these two back. We don’t get her, we start having all kinds a fun with the girl we got here. All three of us. Ok? Got it?”
Jools said, “Hold the line, please, I must get my master.” He ran into the kitchen where Scotilly was finishing her scone with marmalade. “It’s the kidnappers. The other ones. They’ve kidnapped someone named Gale, and have her with Richard. They say they want Anna in exchange for them.”
Scotilly looked pained, and said, “Can’t even have a decent breakfast anymore. We don’t have enough trouble, with those ones down in the bunker, and the Junes calling and threatening us. Now we have out of town kidnappers calling us at this ungodly hour, ten in the morning. Can’t you handle it? I’m in no mood to play a violent Taliban person. Seems unreasonable, this early.”
Jools knew it was his duty to respond to Scotilly’s needs, but didn’t this constitute an executive decision? He had very limited experience in dealing with kidnappers; none in fact, this being his first foray into this occupational line. He pushed the speaker button on the phone and said, “Would you be so kind as to repeat your demand again, sir?”
“You heard me. The Stirg bitch for these two. And it’s gotta happen soon. We kinda getting tired of using her already, if you know what I mean. She got nice legs, but a little skinny for our taste. We like them lumberjack girls where we from. We grow ‘em big and thick up in the ‘Ho.”
“Very well, sir. We understand the demand. We will discuss it and call you back as soon as possible. Good day to you.” And he hung up.
“Jesus Christ,” said Scotilly. “Who knew all this would happen from our little plan. All we wanted was one kidnapping victim, Paul McCartney, and now there are five. How things snowball. I guess we need to consult with the June people. Maybe they know how to handle this. Last time we talked they exhibited a certain savoir faire. Call them, please.”
Jools was thankful he was off the line for dealing with the demand, and dialed Gwen’s number. Under the circumstances, he wasn’t going to play games by calling her Gwenny. When she answered he said, “Good morning, Ms. June. Jools here, with Scotilly. How are you this fine morning?”
Gwen’s intuition was of the highest order, and she sensed trouble in Jools voice. She hit the speaker button so Roger could hear. “We’re good. What’s the problem?”
“Problem? Who said there’s a problem?” He looked at the phone like he was looking at Gwen’s face. How did she know?
“Cut the crap, Jools. What’s up?”
“Well, there is a new development in our project, though it comes from outside our core group, and therefore cannot in any way be directly attributable to Scotilly or myself.”
“Jools.”
“The gentlemen who kidnapped Richard have acquired another person of your acquaintance using the same method of procurement and association.”
“Where’d you learn to talk like that, Jools?”
“My father, Gwenny, Ms. June, and himself from his father before him, ad infinitum, going back to Charlemagne, as I understand it.”
“You got any kids you’re going to burden with all that elocution, Jools?”
“Ms. June, if we may return to the plight of your associate, Gale, by name and perhaps by personality.”
Roger understood. Gale had been snatched, and here was his wife trying to ding the butler just for doing his job. He said, “How do you know about this? Do you know what they want? Did they make a demand?”
“They did, sir. They have Richard’s phone, if you’ll remember, and they used it to call Anna’s phone, and they told us they have her with Richard, and they implied a certain kind of activity in progress with her, and they told us they want to swap her and Richard for the person they referred to as the Stirg bitch, meaning Anna, I presume.”
Gwen said, “What did they mean by a certain kind of activity in progress?”
“Uh, at one point they implied that such activity was in progress now, but at another point they said such activity would commence if their demand was not met soon. I cannot say for certain which is accurate.”
“What do you think
they meant by that?”
“I think they meant, Ms. June, and not to put too fine a point on it, that they were, or soon would start, participating in intimate relations with Ms. Gale, and you will pardon both my forwardness of description and my usage of the lady’s Christian name, but that is the only moniker by which I know her.”
Gwen looked at Roger and mouthed the word moniker, then said, “Ok, we get the point, and you’re excused for your forwardness, given the circumstances. Anything else you can tell us?”
“Not about the kidnappers, I’m afraid. They know we have Anna, and they want a response to their demand very soon. I told them we had to consult on the matter, and we would get back to them. What should we do?”
“First, Jools, you and your master should feel guilty as sin for starting all this shit by snatching Paul and Anna and Stella. Now you have two more on your conscience, and we hope that weighs heavily on you. If those goons mess with Gale or Richard any more than they have, we hold you responsible. Get it?”
“But, but, all we wanted was the Beatle, Mr. McCartney, and it was in the interest of art and culture that we wanted him. Oh, and a little cash, of course. But, but….”
“Can it. Your ass is on the line now, more than ever. Don’t do anything until you hear back from us. How’s the music coming?”
“I was about to go down to the bunker and check when the phone call came. I will do that now, and get back to you when I can. Ta, Gwenny.”
Gwen hung up, looked at Roger, and said, “Ta, my ass. Now what? A bunch of neo-nazi morons have Gale, and you know what they’re going to want. They’ve probably never seen anything like her in their smarmy little lives. When and how do you think they snatched her?”
Roger looked thoughtful, and said, “She left here last night just after 5pm when we told her we weren’t serving cocktails. It’s now going on 11am. So they got her last night or early this morning. I’d bet last night, maybe after she left here. Remember, one of them was here a few days ago, hanging around down the street, and his friends were hanging around over at Stirg’s. They saw Stirg leave here, so they know we’re associated. Maybe they thought if they kidnapped someone we knew, they could get to Stirg through us.”