Friday 6 November 2015

The Alleyway Part 2

For the Alleyway Part 1 click here (But I think it works as a stand alone story.)
For audio click here.
I didn't know how long I'd been out for, but it was long enough for them to move me from the alley and into a room. I had a pain in my head and a pain in my arm, but at least I wasn't dead, not yet anyway. I wasn't restrained, but three men stood between me and the door meaning restraints weren't necessary. I recognised one of them, it was Whitefoot of course. I knew he was in on the whole thing. I’d been so busy questioning his actions,  that I'd not seen the obvious, Whitefoot wasn't the target, I was.
The man in the middle had grey hair with a big forehead and unruly stubble. He dressed like a teacher and frowned like one too. He had slits for eyes, and he peered at me suspiciously. The third man was the muscle, his arms were as thick as my chest, and his head looked like it had been forced into his body like a whack-a-mole game. His face gave nothing away, but you could tell he was ready for action, if action was needed.
Hail clattered against the window like a jazz drum solo, the sound echoed around this empty room. I thought of Molly; I hoped she was sleeping and hadn't noticed I hadn't come home. Otherwise, she'd be listening to the rain and worrying herself silly. I stared at my captors, wondering what they wanted.
They were waiting for me to talk first, but I knew their game and I was good at it. They'd break long before I did.
Finally the schoolteacher spoke.
“We want you to work for us Mr Archer.”
“It’s Mr Stanley,” I corrected him, ignoring his other words.
“Sorry,” the teacher said. “Mr Stanley, we’d like you to work for us.”
Again he left it there, it was up to me to ask who they were.
“I already was working for one of you,” I said, staring at Whitefoot, “and look where that got me.” 
Whitest looked embarrassed and so he should.
“We’re sorry,” he said, “we couldn't exactly invite you here, we had to do it this way?”
“Why not?”
“Mr Arch...Mr Stanley,' the teacher said, “we're the secret service, but we have a problem, we have a mole, a bloody big mole, in fact I think we have a company of moles,"
“A labour,” The teacher looked at me blankly. “The collective noun for moles is labour.”.
“I thought it was company,” he said. I shrugged, it wasn't important.
“We'll give you three names, we need you to eliminate them from our enquiries.”
“You think they’re guilty?” I asked.

“We want to eliminate them from our enquiries, you know what that means.”
“Why can't you do it?” I looked at them each in turn, “you're the spies.”
“Only the four people in this room know about this Mr Arch... Stanley, we think someone in our department is passing information on to the spies.”
There was silence again, just the rain on the window and the breath of four nervous people.
“Boy, you are in a pickle,” I said. “What if I say no?”
“We kill you,” the muscle said.
“In that case, count me in.”


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