“Our man of infinite surprises, finally,” Milly bellowed above the din as Abelard walked in from the kitchen, imposing on the buzzing room a sudden silence. “Abelard here,” he continued, unusually jovial, indicating with outstretched arm the object of his attentions, “is not only a skilled and unflinchingly courageous hunter, but he also insisted on instructing the chef as to the way gamy meat should be best prepared. You must reveal to us how you came by such extraordinary talents or we shall have to question your loyalty,” his laughter now of a more sinister quality.
“I had a look at the background check Bertie did eventually run on you, and it has left me a bit perplexed,” his monologue was taking on a very personal tone. “You are exceptionally good at what you do and, since this afternoon, at what no one would have suspected you can do. I had been intensely curious about where you could possibly have acquired so many eccentric talents. You know what I found?” he asked, rhetorically. “Nothing, absolutely nothing in your background gives me any clue. As I recall, and correct me if I leave something out or, worse, distort the facts,” ratcheting up the intimidation in his tone, but ever so subtly. You would have to be listening very carefully, as most around the table were apt to do when Milly spoke, to notice the small shift. “Born to a farming family in Gascony; only child; alone at five when parents die in automobile accident; raised in orphanage run by the Jesuits; joined military at 19, and availed yourself of educational opportunities to complete university degree; met my niece and breezed through an MBA at a good b-school in France; job and great success at VBI. End of story. Nothing there to even hint at the ambitious drive you’ve shown at VBI, the astounding aptitude for the takeover game and now, the exemplary skill at hunting large dangerous animals with little more at hand than a man may have had 600 years ago. The floor is yours my lad.” He gestured to Abelard who was trying desperately to think in the small moment he bought himself with the single swig from the large beer glass each person had at their place.
“Milly,” you do me great honour. You are the one we should be listening to. Not me. We’re all seated around a table, in a magnificent lodge, owned by an awesome organization built by you. There is really nothing to add to what you have already said about me that would explain my simple accomplishments.”
“That is not good enough,” Milly growled, “you will…..,” was all he could get out when the kitchen staff came shuffling through the doorway with their hands in the air. The other lodge employees, gardener, two maids, two secretaries and two chauffeurs, marched in through the doorway from the entrance hall, also with hands in the air. Behind each group followed a hooded man with a Brugger & Thomet MP9 machine pistol.
There was a third hooded man, holding at his side a semi-automatic 9mm Beretta. He seemed to be the leader. “If you will all please stand and move against that wall the sooner this unpleasant business will be over and the sooner you will be able to return to your fine meal,” he insisted in a deep, but exquisitely polite voice. Obviously a man of culture and good manners. No one moved, all eyes on Milly. At that the polite gunman shot the gardener in the thigh. He was a small, wiry man and was spun right around by the projectile’s force, before falling to the floor. He did not yet feel any immediate pain and only looked, like a dog would, with a questioning tilt of the head, at the small hole in his trousers, the center of a spreading, dark blotch. “Please be good enough to not make me waste any more of this planet’s scarce resources and do as I say.”
Milly was quick to his feet and nodded for everyone else to follow his lead. They lined up along the wall, concern etching the features of most. Abelard was more deliberate than the others. He placed himself below two crossed broadswords, overlaid with a very long bladed dagger, adorning the wall and, like the others, raised his hands.
The leader pulled a photograph from his jacket pocket and after giving it a brief glance he ran his eyes over his captives and stopped at Abelard. Without warning he punched him in the stomach, causing Abelard to double over. He quickly straightened up to again look down at the shorter man. “That was for Jean and Claude, whom you may remember killing.” Only Milly, standing next to Abelard, had heard the gunman’s low snarl. His two accomplices were slightly behind the leader and off to either side, watching the mostly frightened people in the room.
In subsequent statements to the police everyone agreed that after Abelard took the blow everything happened very quickly, so much so that they may have missed some of the action. As soon as he was able to firmly grasp the dagger handle in his raised right hand Abelard swung it with a powerful downward thrust, driving the blade through the leader’s left shoulder, down through the muscles around the clavicle, the point boring down, deeper and deeper until it was stopped at the hilt and lodged firmly in his heart. He did not wait for him to fall, the two broadswords already in his grasp, he was leaping over the table and heading for the doorway to the entrance hall. The machine pistols began spewing bullets at the spot where he had been, cutting down the SVP of special situations, one of the women executives, the cook and the Vice Chairman in charge of retail banking. While the others were howling in pain, Charlotte ‘Jaws” Barker and the Vice Chairman were plainly quite dead. Barker’s notorious crocodile grin contrasted like a Flemish school painting with her dark, unseeing eyes. She had earned the ‘Jaws’ moniker when it was understood that nothing amused her so much as to chew up her enemies, and of those she had more than a few. Not many would miss her.
“I’ll get him,” shouted the gunman nearest the entrance through which Abelard fled, and obviously taking over command, “you watch them.” He rushed through the doorway, towards the exit, supposing that Abelard would dash outside to safety. Fatal miscalculation. As he opened the front door, Abelard emerged from the large cloakroom to the right.
“Leaving so soon?” Abelard asked, with uncharacteristic solicitousness. “Here’s a little something to remember me by,” a swishing sound being the last thing he heard before his head fell with a squishy thud to the stone floor, and rolled almost to the center of the entrance hall.
“Gordy,” the remaining gunman yelled after a couple of minutes, “Gordy, answer me. Ok, Bush,” he yelled to the still empty doorway, “if I don’t hear from you in five seconds I will blow these people away.”
“You must learn to be more patient,” Abelard said, without the least emotion.” He was standing in the kitchen doorway, his crossbow aimed at the gunman. “But your type wouldn’t know the meaning of the word,” he added, before loosing the shaft which entered the thug’s skull between the eyes, the point emerging from the back of his head, where it came finally to a stop. He then joined his dead comrade, sprawled on the beautiful floors the lodge was so proud to show.
“Why did you kill him?” Milly asked with great alarm. “We may never find out why they wanted to take you. Perhaps that’s what you intended. Who were they?” he demanded. He was by now livid and showed not the least empathy for the dead and wounded, their moaning but meaningless background noise. Milly was a man who needed answers and only a species ending event could possibly distract him.
Abelard at first entirely disregarded Milly and stopped to have a closer look at each of the dead gunmen. Then he turned to Milly. “I just don’t know who these people were. But I would sure like to find out,” he said with exaggerated surprise, an innocent rustic, as though preparing a final omigosh.
Milly would very much have liked to strangle Abelard, there and then, but he also desperately needed to master the situation. He shepherded everyone into the entrance, where they all got to see the headless third gunman. There was some retching and groaning before he had them all through the doorway into the large conference room. Only Abelard lagged behind. He again bent over the leader and pulled the folded photograph from his pocket, which he crumpled before tossing it into the crackling fireplace.
Milly did not like to lose control of any situation. This one he particularly wanted to keep close to his senses. There was something very important about Abe
lard and he would need everything at his fingertips if he was to find out just what that might be. He was utterly convinced that the police must be kept well out of the way. With that at the forefront his first tactical order was that he, and only he, would say anything meaningful to the police. Everyone would tell the truth about their personal experience but nothing more. No idle speculation.
“Why did they single out Abelard for special treatment?” the Predator’s voice rose above the low din. Milly had instructed him to ask this question. It was a loose end he did not want dangling before the police.
“They didn’t. It was just chance. The thug imagined Abelard had looked at him the wrong way and needed to teach him a lesson. He obviously made a big mistake. Although it would be easy for someone who does not know Abelard as well as we do to sometimes mistake his expression for disdain. Before he hit him he said, ‘what do you think you’re staring at creep?’”
*