Murphy's Heist Read online

  “Pompous prat,” muttered Murphy.

  Bell looked again at his telephone index, dialled an international number. “Bobby Bell here. The delivery we talked about is fixed up. We collect by boat tomorrow night, and then sail to the rendezvous. I reckon we won’t be there until maybe midday, that’s the day after tomorrow. We can anchor in the bay, wait there until nightfall. You could collect in the dark, or during daylight in the evening. Make sure the money is deposited in the joint account.” He listened to the other man.

  “Four point five million, yes. Sterling. When we hand over the goods, you give us an envelope with your password in it, and a case with one point two million in cash, sterling.”

  After listening to the phone for a while, he finished the call.

  The money for Bobby Bell would be deposited in an offshore account that they had set up. The account needed two passwords before the money could be transferred. Bobby had his own password, and when he got the envelope, he would have the second password, and be the only person that could transfer the cash. Watertight system.

  He only had to phone his young brother back, and the arrangements would be complete. Except, maybe, for booking a flight. He could do that on the net.

  “Hi Gerry, Bobby again. It’s all arranged. We’ve got to be anchored off Hoylake tomorrow night, eleven pm. Then across to just south of Dublin. Stay there until dark. Then back to Douglas again. Is that okay with you?”

  “Yes, it’s what I reckoned. There’s about 1200 litres in the tanks now, so we’d need about another 6,000 to be safe. I can fuel tomorrow morning. I’ve spoken to Darren, and he’s free. He expects to be paid the usual. What time do we see you tomorrow?”

  “I haven’t booked the flight yet, that’s my next job. What time’s the first flight in, do you know?”

  “Yes, there’s a flight at 08:55, it gets in about 09:50. Aer Lingus. I’ll buy you lunch. Do you want me to pick you up from the airport?”

  “No Gerry. I’ll get a cab. I’ll see you at the chandlery, okay?”

  “Yes sure. Now I’ll get Darren fixed up. See you in the morning.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  McBride woke with a splitting headache. They had consumed several bottles of wine. That always happened when he had dinner with Ian Smith. Still, it had been quite a jolly evening, and he had slept well afterwards. He got down to the restaurant before service stopped at eleven, but it was a close call. He spotted Dusty Miller, drinking a cup of coffee. He looked as if he had finished breakfast, unless he hadn’t had any, of course.

  “I’ve got a hell of a hangover,” McBride announced.

  “Well, you were really knocking it back by midnight,” Miller observed. “I’ve got some news. Been looking at my laptop this morning, and the bug on Murphy’s van was activated yesterday about teatime. Very briefly. The programme’s got a fix. I think it’s been in a garage, or other building, which is why we didn’t get a signal.”

  “You mean Murphy took the vehicle out, and then put it back again.”

  “That’s one explanation,” said Miller. “Or he removed the bug.” “You’ve got the location. Shall we go and look?”

  “ If Murphy got the van out and put it back, then he’s going to use it soon. But I wouldn’t think it would be during daylight, there’s quite a lot of police activity. But he might wait until tonight.”

  “So we go along when it’s dark?”

  “That’s what I’m saying.”

  “Suits me,” said McBride. “I have to do four paintings for Ian Smith before I leave. And I haven’t started, so if you’ve no objection, I’ll get started today.” He looked at his watch, “Quarter past eleven. I’ll make a start. Two of the scenes are very close by, so I’ll get my gear out of the car, and get going.”

  “I’ll walk down with you to your first location, then I’ll do some serious walking for the rest of the day.”

  “If we’re going down to find the van, and even Murphy, shall we meet in the bar tonight at around seven? Could have a few sandwiches, and then strike off.”

  McBride got his gear from the car, and the two men walked out of the hotel grounds.

  McBride made for the hill overlooking Murphy’s house, up by the style, from where he’d seen the bald headed man chasing the woman in a nightgown. She was Murphy’s wife with Alzheimer’s, he now realised since talking to Ian Smith.

  He set up his easel, and Miller said he would watch for a while, if McBride had no objection.

  “None at all. People watch me all the time, and I give painting demonstrations as well. I’d find it strange if everyone ignored me,” he grinned.

  He erected the easel, which unfolded so that the case was on the tripod arrangement with the drawer opening out to McBride’s side, and the lid tilting up to give him an angled support. McBride set the angle at a good thirty degrees, giving Miller a running commentary, as he had done so many times before for spectators. “I like to paint at a bigger angle than some do. That makes the paint run better. The faster you paint watercolours, the more fluid, if I can make a pun, the painting looks. There’s nothing as bad as a tight, over-fussy picture.” Whilst he was talking, he was placing his board on the easel. His watercolour paper was bulldog clipped along the top of the board.

  “There is no need to wet or stretch the paper before I begin, because I choose to paint on a thickness that won’t warp, not at the size of this painting, which is only 16” x 12.”

  Before I paint, I draw the scene with a soft grade pencil. But before I do that, I just wet the paints on my palette, to make them soft and easy to apply.” He took the palette and opened a jar of water, which he placed in the open drawer in front of him. With a large round brush, he dabbed each paint pan liberally with water. “Now, I will spend about twenty or thirty minutes getting the drawing right. By that time the paints will be just right to apply.”

  He was quiet for a few minutes, while he checked the scene, even moving his easel to the right, to get the view as he wanted.

  “The trick is to get the scene lined up, so that you can copy size for size the view on to the paper.”

  Now McBride had the pencil in his hand, lightly drawing a horizontal line, maybe sixty percent from the bottom of the paper. “That represents my eye level. All the perspective lines meet on the line. That’s what makes the view realistic, so that the scene that’s below us, down the hill, looks as it should.” Quickly now, he was marking salient features, and expanding the drawing in several areas at once. “What I do is not only draw the solids, houses for instance, but draw the shapes between the features. It’s the only way to get the proportions right. But don’t forget that I’ve had an awful lot of practise.” As Miller watched

  him, he was amazed to see the view unfold on paper in a way that was undoubtedly better than a photograph. It was a view by an artist, reflecting the artist’s take on the view.

  “Wow,” said Miller, wish I could do that.”

  “So you can, it just takes years and years of practise, but not everyone wants to invest the time. I happen to know that you play golf a hundred times better than me, but you’ve invested more into it.”

  He was getting his palette out from behind the easel, and picking a round brush, dipping it in the water. Mixed a colour, cobalt blue, with just a touch of cadmium red. “The red is just to take the brightness off the blue,” he explained. He now had a liquid runny paint in the palette depression. He filled his brush with colour, and applied it to the paper with confidence; it went on smoothly, a bead of colour collecting on the lower edge. “The effect of gravity working for me,” he explained. Quickly he dipped his brush in the paint, and painted further down the picture, the brush sucking up the bead, leaving no marks between the previous brush stroke. Diluting his paint with water, he continued, making the paint paler. He turned the board, added more red to the paint mix, started at the horizon, and worked the paint up to join the previous brush strokes. He turned the board back the right way. “That’s the sky d
one,” he said.

  “You certainly make it look easy, and so fast.”

  “Yes” said McBride, “One and a half hours and twenty years of learning how.”

  Miller watched until McBride was putting the finishing touches to his painting. “Looks as if you’ve got that one right,” said Miller, “now I’ll go for my walk. See you tonight.”

  McBride spent a further twenty minutes, mostly just looking at the scene, working out whether he could improve the painting, but very much aware that he could go too far, and spoil it completely. The old adage: stop before you think it’s finished, was always at the front of his mind. He packed his things, and carrying the easel in one hand and his board in the other, he set off through the village, stopping at the pub, and finding it was not too late for his lunch.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Bobby Bell had to leave his apartment at six in the morning to catch the plane to Douglas.

  He didn’t bother with breakfast, he’d have time for that when he got to the airport. He’d managed to make the reservation on line the previous evening, and had produced the electronic boarding pass on his printer. He carried hand luggage only, mainly underwear and shaving gear. He had an extra sweater in his bag. He knew how cold it could be once out at sea. He dressed in jeans, and shirt, roll neck jumper, and carried a thick anorak. He was quite excited to be going on the yacht. He really didn’t get time, or the cash recently, to do a lot of sailing. At 250 litres an hour, it was like burning money.

  At Dublin airport, he fed his boarding card through the machine, passed through security, bought a newspaper, and went for coffee and a croissant. He opened the paper, and searched the news columns. There was nothing more about the bullion theft, apart from the fracas in Belfast yesterday. There was a photograph of John McBride, together with one of his paintings. The headline said: Artist rescues ferry passenger, with a further picture taken from the deck, showing two heads in the sea, making for the lifebelt.

  The aircraft was in the air for barely half an hour, before touching down at Ronaldsway Airport. A little more than ten minutes later, with no baggage to collect, he was in a taxi for the five mile run to the Marina.

  He asked the driver to drop him on the South Quay, and walked along until he got a good view of his yacht, standing at the railing, admiring the boat. It was built in 1957, a 70 ton motor yacht, teak hull and mahogany superstructure. He loved the classic lines, and knew that this was the only boat he would ever want. It was 82 feet long plus the diving platform at the stern, with a beam of 20 feet. On the main deck, from the bows aft, were dining room, galley, wheelhouse, which was raised, and stateroom. There was a large deck, partly roofed over, with open sides. From this deck there was access to the lower deck down the companionway, which was just inside the stateroom, and at the stern, steps down to the diving platform. The lower deck contained crew quarters forward, with bunks for three.

  There were two double cabins, a bathroom, and aft was the master cabin, with king size bed, and en suite bathroom. All the fittings were of superb quality. The boat had twin Gardner diesel engines, and auxiliary generator. The wheelhouse was equipped with ship to shore phone, GPS navigation, depth sounder, chart table, and chart cabinet. The whole boat had undergone a full overhaul only two years ago

  As he watched, he saw his brother Gerry come along the pontoon, and go aboard. A few minutes later, Darren joined him, casting off before he boarded. Gerry slowly reversed out from the pontoon, turned, once he was clear, as if on a sixpence using the bow thruster. He motored across the marina to the fuel pontoon, barely moving. Bobby could hear, up here, the burble of the engines.

  By the time Bobby had walked round to the Bell Chandlery, he saw the boat returning to its berth. Gerry bounced into the chandlery barely seconds behind Bobby. They both clasped each other’s arms, grinning. Gerry, two years younger than Bobby, was tanned and slim, looking the picture of health. “Come through, Bobby.” Gerry led the way along the chandlery frontage, and through the door to his private apartment. His wife was in the kitchen, stacking dishes into the washer. She seemed pleased to see him. “Come and have a cup of coffee in the garden, we’re going to.”

  At five to four, Bobby and Gerry, collected their luggage, and said goodbye to Gerry’s wife. “Have a good voyage,” she called to them, and stood on the terrace, watching them walk down to the yacht.

  Darren was already on the boat, sitting in a chair on the aft deck, reading a copy of the Daily Mirror. He jumped up when the men came aboard. Gerry said: “Come on, be ready cast off, lift the fenders, and coil the ropes”

  “Aye aye, sir,” said Darren with a smile. Gerry started the engines, checked that coolant water was circulating, examined the instruments for a moment, and then shouted out of the window “Cast off now” and watched whilst Darren ran along the pontoon, casting off the forward line, and Bobby did the same with the aft line. Then, with both of them aboard, Gerry eased the boat out of its berth. Darren and Bobby lifted the starboard fenders, and Darren then coiled the mooring ropes on the deck. They both entered the big wheelhouse, and watched as the Contessa moved slowly through the marina, and then through the outer harbour.

  Once she was out to sea, they felt a slight swell, which gently rolled the boat. “It was a good forecast,” said Gerry. “Through until the day after next”

  “By which time we should be back, if it all goes according to plan. I need to talk to you, Gerry, when we get a minute.”

  When Douglas was a grey smudge on the horizon, Gerry said, “Okay, Darren, you take the helm. If any ship comes within quarter of a mile of us, call me, even if it’s going away. Keep the same heading. We’ll just be in the stateroom.”

  The two men stepped down to the stateroom, leaving the connecting door open, and Gerry sat down in a chair near a coffee table. Bobby went over to the bar, and got two cans of beer from the fridge, then sat down opposite Gerry.

  “Gerry, this needs saying. What we are going to do is criminal, if we get caught. Or it is for me, but you don’t have to do it, if you are worried. We can drop you off, say at Liverpool, and pick you up again, when the criminal bit is done.”

  “Tell me what the criminal bit is. You don’t take risks, you’ve got away with it before now, and look at you, sixty last year!”

  “What I’m going to do is pick up Murphy, you remember him, and I should think you’ve read about his heist in the papers. I’ve arrange to pick him up off Hoylake, on the Wirral. He’ll have the bullion with him. We’re going to take both off with the tender. This is dodgy, if we’re seen while we’re doing this, or if Murphy is followed, and he’s not that bright, you’ll remember.”

  “And then?”

  “We sail over to the republic, and anchor just south of Dublin, in a small bay there. Someone will come out in a dinghy and collect the loot, bringing a bag of cash for Murphy.”

  “What about you? Surely you’re not just doing this out of a love for Murphy?” “Definitely not, I get a lot bigger percentage, but direct into an offshore bank account that we’ve arranged jointly. Once the money is in the account, only somebody who has both passwords can move it. When they are on board, I check that the cash is in the account, and the men bring me the other password.”

  “Bobby, it sounds dodgy. The guys coming aboard know the loot is here, what’s to stop them taking it by force, probably sink the boat for good measure?”

  “I’ve dealt with these guys before, they’re Russian businessmen. I was buying guns and selling them to the IRA provos, and they were always business-like, and on the ball. If you look in that cupboard over there,” Bobby pointed, “you’ll see AK47s, so we’ll just be nonchalantly holding one apiece. But for God’s sake be careful, because they’re loaded. Be no purpose, otherwise.”

  “So, assuming everything goes okay, you drop Murphy off when we unload the bullion?”

  “If he wants to. Otherwise we bring him to the island. But not to Douglas, we’ll maybe drop him at Castletown, might do
the same with Darren. Give him some taxi money.

  We don’t know if the police will meet us back in Douglas. They might search the boat, if they have had a whiff of it.”

  “So they will find the guns, and maybe some trace of Murphy?”

  “No, I’m ditching the guns, as soon as the transfer is over. And we go over the boat with a fine toothcomb. I’ll even puncture the tender, and sink that. If somebody has seen it when we collect Murphy, we can tell the police it was stolen a couple of weeks ago.”

  “Now I can see why you’ve got away with it for years,” Gerry smiled, “count me in.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  The Belfast to Liverpool ferry crossed ahead of them, maybe two miles distant. Bobby leaned over the rail watching it. The swell was larger now, as they were distant from the land. But the Contessa was a good sea boat, with easy lines, and rode the swell with ease. Bobby was at the helm now, Darren in the crew accommodation forward, getting a shower. Shortly he would prepare a meal for them. He was a competent cook, but no chef. Gerry had set the speed at 12 knots, economical with the fuel, and yet timing to get to the anchorage at Hoylake at about ten that night.

  They could have set the autopilot, but Gerry preferred a man on watch, because of the multiplicity of ferries crisscrossing the Irish Sea. So Darren prepared a meal, and then took over the helm whilst the other two ate, in the stateroom rather than the dining room, for communication’s sake. And after Gerry had eaten, he took the helm, and Darren came down to the statement to eat. Bobby sat and talked to him, asking whether he was looking for a career at sea?

  “No,” said Darren, “I like it, but I look after my mum at home, and I’m happy working in the local pub, got lots of friends and that”.

  The journey seemed to last too long, but Bobby pulled a paperback out of his overnight bag, and settled down to read.

  ***

  Miller was eating a sandwich in the hotel bar, when McBride got back to the hotel with two paintings complete and ready for framing. He left them in his room, and returned to the bar. “What do you recommend in the sandwich line?” McBride asked Miller.