Chapter 20 A New Day
Chan Utah’s fingers drummed the top of his desk in agitation. He looked up at the burly figure of his newly appointed bodyguard.
‘I hope you will be able to live up to my expectations. My last bodyguard didn’t.’
‘I’ll do my best, sir!’
‘That will not be good enough! You must be better than best.’
‘Can I ask what happened to your last bodyguard?’
‘Yes! You may ask, somebody used him like a piece of cheese, he was garroted with a cheese cutter.’
‘Nasty!’
‘I asked him to follow someone at a discreet distance, but he got too close and paid the penalty with his life. He decided to take a baseball bat with him and I think that gave him away, especially when the park was in the other direction.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘All I asked was for him to follow this man to see where he went, I didn’t ask him to beat the living daylights out of him. I trust you will obey my orders.’
‘Yes sir!’
‘Stand down for now, I will let you know when your services will be needed, possibly tomorrow.’
The man left Chan’s office and Chan began to drum his fingers on his desk. He settled back in his chair and wrote the name Roland James in his notebook. He placed a question mark against the name. Had he been the culprit that had slain his man or was he a victim himself? Perhaps he was hasty in trying to kill him by getting his men to take him out to sea and tie him to a buoy and shoot him, but even that had backfired and he didn’t harm his man, so perhaps that was a good sign. He wondered whether he could make him an ally instead.
Chan’s life had been hard. He had been brought up by a English family, a refugee sent from China just before the out break of civil war. His position in the East End of London had to be fought and won and the respect from those who lived there had to be earned, which he had achieved through kindness.
Chan’s foster parents were the old fashioned type and obviously they had been brought up to respect other people’s dignity, whatever their race, creed or colour and Chan had a wonderful life in their care. Perhaps the only thing that would bring a smile to his face would be his second name “Utah” I suppose it added some excitement to the rest of his name – Chan Utah Smith and Chan decided to place a hyphen between Utah and Smith which sounded important, although his upbringing had not included how important he was as it was drummed into him by his foster parents that everybody on earth was important.
Chan decided that Roland James was a victim of circumstances not in his control and therefore he would try and acquaint himself with him.
Chan owned several nightclubs in and around the town. They were not the sleazy type of establishment, a few gambling tables allotted in a separate room and a licensed bar and restaurant. They were the type of place you could bring your grandmother to and not feel ashamed. Chan was still a young man and his foster parents were still hale and hearty and they had moved from their humble property to take up residence in a suite of rooms that had come with Chan’s first buy. He was able to purchase this as his parents had the money put by as part of his inheritance when they had departed this earth, but things being what they are, they saw the wisdom and some small profit of their money being put to good use and his foster dad offering to do the books and order the groceries which was one way of keeping that part of the business in the family.
Chan wanted to be one of the good guys, not wishing to sully his future with actions that might cause ructions within his family circle and he winced as he remembered how some of his men had chucked Roland out of his flat window and of course the boat trip. Luckily both of these actions failed. He had issued orders to rough up Roland James, but someone got over zealous and there followed a gun battle with the police and Chan lost some of his men, one was killed and three went to prison. Chan thought Roland was the enemy, at least he thought so after information received from his field operatives who told him that he had dated Chan’s girlfriend, Joanna Stefan.
Chan had dealings with the Mafia, with Luigi Stefan, the Godfather of this district and not by choice, because unknown to his parents he had been caught on the hop when he and some of his gang members tried to muscle in on one of the Mafia’s going concerns and Chan had to pay the penalty, a heavy one if he wanted to keep his nightclubs intact.
Chan had walked a tightrope for three months and his last dealing with the Mafia had just been finalized. He was told to keep away from Joanna as Luigi had other ideas for her welfare. Chan had noted Roland’s connection with Luigi Stefan and had thought this man was going to be Joanna’s new man. Judging by what happened shortly afterwards, this didn’t seem to be the case. He had heard that Joanna was in intensive care at the local hospital with a police guard and he dared not visit in the normal way. He had dressed himself in a white coat and borrowed a stethoscope which he draped round his neck and strode past the policeman on duty, only to find Jo in a coma. He pretended to go to another patient, but changed his mind. He made a few notes on a chart at the bottom of the bed and hurried out. The policeman stopped him and asked to see his identity. It was unfortunate as Chan’s reaction could not have been taken in any other way but hostile as he gave the policeman a downward chop on the back of the neck and he fell like a heap of logs. Chan ran out through the doors of the ward, a siren went off and lights along the corridor were flashing. He stopped running and walked very quickly to the stairwell door and disappeared from view. A lift shuddered to a stop and policemen ran from the lift along the corridor to the ward. A policeman lay on the ground and a nurse was tending to him. One of the other policemen found a bunch of flowers on Joanna’s bed and placed them in a plastic bag and took them away. Everything else seemed okay, apart from the policeman on the floor.
The police checked all the wards and corridors on that wing, but the elusive bogus doctor was not found, only the stethoscope which was hung over the back of a wheelchair which were taken away for a fingerprints check. They were returned a few days later – there were no fingerprints on them except those of the real doctor who reported them missing the same day.
Chapter 21 Chan Finds Out
Chan was struggling to become half decent and failing miserably. He hadn’t realized how powerful his Chinese chop had been and learnt that day when switching on the radio – a statement read out in a news flash – “The police are looking out for a bogus doctor who visited St. Jorgans Hospital yesterday. They are unable to identify the assailant. A policeman who tried to stop this man is now in the Intensive Care Unit fighting for his life – if anyone can give any information regarding this attack. Please contact 0…. “ Chan switched off the radio, he was done for.
When he got up this morning he was cheerful and yesterday was something he had regretted doing in the first place and now this catastrophe with the policeman. He even thought about giving himself up to the police, but then remembered his parents and how they trusted him.
He remembered how it was drummed into him when he was a little boy how important it was to trust the police, that they might save his life one day. ‘If you keep your nose clean you are home and dry.’ His father was full of clichés, and not many of them made sense. Chan knew he had cooked his goose this time. He prayed that the policeman would survive.
He summoned his new bodyguard.
‘I want you to go to St. Jorgans Hospital and make discreet enquiries about the welfare of the policeman in the ICU. I don’t care how you do it, but don’t get caught!’
‘That will be a lot easier than you think, sir! I have a friend in the same ward as Joanna Stefan and I will go in visiting hours and see what I can find out, that way it won’t look suspicious’.
Martin wondered why Chan was enquiring after the policeman, unless…. of course he was the mysterious bogus doctor. Martin was no fool and now he knew how dangerous this man Chan was and if he knew who he really was, he wouldn’t stand a dog’s chance of survival. Martin waited for the hour of visiting time approached. He was in the car park at the hospital and wiled away the time by doing a crossword. He knew he was being watched from a distance. Had Chan already found out who he really was? Panic welled up in Martin’s chest, but only for a moment. He knew he could handle the situation, he had been extensively trained, but it would blow his cover and that was the last thing he wanted to do.
Martin Church locked his car and walked very slowly towards the hospital entrance. He expected any moment to hear the noise of a car coming towards him, but all was quiet and at last he went through the automatic sliding doors of the hospital entrance.
The nurse recognized Martin and signified to him with a nod, but Martin went up to the desk as would someone who genuinely was visiting a sick friend. He whispered, ‘Someone might be watching!’ The nurse nodded and pointed towards some corridors and said in a normal voice, ‘Just follow the green arrow, sir!’ Martin trudged off in the direction of the green arrow in a slow measured walk, not hurrying and if anyone had been following, it was going to make it difficult for them to hide anywhere. So he turned round suddenly. There were a few people in the corridor, the usual doctors and nurses and other members of the public and also someone washing the floor who had his back turned away from Martin. Martin slipped round the corner and into the first door he came to. It was a linen cupboard. While he was waiting, he placed a plastic crystal hearing aid in his ear and with the small bottle of water swallowed a small tablet and waited a further quarter of an hour and then peeped out through a crack in the door. There was no-one around. He left the linen room and proceeded to the ward.
Martin reached the ward and went to his friend who was tucked away in the corner. ‘I’ve brought you some grapes!’ ‘Thank you, very kind of you!’
‘How goes it, are you feeling any better?’
‘Yes the doctor has told me I should be okay to be operated on next week. They’ve put another policeman on guard outside the ICU unit where Joanna Stefan is, the trouble is Martin – I don’t recognize him as one of our lot.’
‘I’ll investigate and see which police station he comes from.’
Any onlooker witnessing the scene would see a man with bandages round the head and the left arm.
Martin stayed the full time and the bell went and he got up and shook the man’s right hand and left the ward.
Martin reached his car, unlocked it and got in. ‘Well!’ said a voice from the back seat. It was Chan. ‘How did you get into my car?’
‘We have ways,’ said Chan and held up a bunch of curious objects.
Martin explained that the policeman was going to pull through and also Joanna had come out of her coma and had been moved to a more secure wing of the hospital.
Chan patted Martin on the shoulder and said, ‘Well done! Perhaps you had better drive me back to the office.’
Martin was thinking hard as he drove Chan back and he was wondering about the cleaner in the hospital, could he have been the one following him, but dismissed the idea as there wouldn’t have been time to set up the situation or was he already a plant and that is why Chan asked him to find out how everything was. Martin knew that Chan had many people working for him, but he had never met any others, apart from the nightclub personnel, but then people always look different during the day. Martin had that surprise item that Chan knew nothing about and he had set up the system while he was in the linen cupboard. He had placed a tiny crystal in his ear and swallowed a small antenna. After a couple hours the antenna would turn to dust and become natural wastage.
While he was speaking to his friend who had been the policeman who had been viciously attacked by the bogus doctor placed to protect Joanna Stefan just in case there were another attack on her, they had an innocent chat about different subjects like a visiting friend would have chatted about and the information was being broadcast to him via the crystal in his ear. Martin had got rid of the crystal when he scratched his ear just before he said his goodbyes.
Martin knew about Roland James who had visited Joanna that morning, seeing her all wired up and shared a cup of tea with the policeman. It was a narrow avenue of time that had separated Roland from meeting Chan as the bogus doctor, who appeared on the scene. Had they met there might have been another casualty, not that Roland had met Chan, but Chan knew Roland.