Verdict on a Life

Stephen Baddeley

Description

A Verdict On A Life is volume three of the Darwin Trilogy. It continues and completes, almost, the story of A Witness To A Life and A Judgement On A Life. This is the culmination of a ripping-yarn of good-guys, villains and large breasted women, of love, hate, art-fraud, kidnapping, un-kidnapping, re-kidnapping and lots-of-sex. (Very decorously dealt with, of course.) A tale of violence, torture and sadomasochism. (As sensitively and decorously dealt with as it's possible to deal with violence, torture and sadomasochism.)And then, at the end, because that's where it's meant to happen, the long awaited and hoped for demise, in most unusual ways, of the three baddies, and the goodies, lots of them, going on to live, by and large, mostly, but not completely, as you will see, happily-ever-after.But not happily-ever-after enough to finish the story, not really. No stories have an end, not really. This one doesn't.

Sujets

• Contemporary romance
• Darwin
• Charles Darwin
• Australia

Informations

• Publié par: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 22 avril 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781838596033
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

Copyright © 2020 Stephen Baddeley

The moral right of the author has been asserted.


Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.


Matador
9 Priory Business Park,
Wistow Road, Kibworth Beauchamp,
Leicestershire. LE8 0RX
Tel: [phone]
Email: [e-mail]
Web: www.troubador.co.uk/matador
Twitter: @matadorbooks


ISBN 978 1838596 033

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.


Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

For Hamish.
Contents

Prologue

The Story

Epilogue
Prologue

I once lived in a house. It was on low cliffs. It overlooked the Arafura Sea. There were dogs and chickens and wives and children. The chickens don’t get mentioned again. So, forget them.
My name’s Tom. Annie calls me Tommy. She did the time we met. The time she was wearing a towel. Only wearing a towel, then dropped it. Annie’s my wife. Ambrosia’s my other wife. I’ll tell you about them later.
Not just about them. About all of us. I’ll tell you what’s been happening since last time. Do you know the story so far? Can you remember it? It’s a long story. You may know that already. If you don’t know the story so far, you’ll pick it up as we go along. Hopefully.

I have a problem. It’s in my head. I was born with it. It makes me think in a jerky way. It makes me talk in a jerky way. It makes me write in a jerky way. I can’t help it. Some people don’t like it. I know that. There’s nothing I can do about it. You’ll get used to it. Or perhaps you won’t. Perhaps you’ll stop reading. But, anyway, thanks for trying. Whatever.

The story wasn’t over, remember? That’s why there’s this.

I’m not as stupid as that sounds. I don’t think I am. I hope I’m not. I don’t usually state the fucking obvious. And , I never swore before I met Annie. Some people think I’m smart. Not everyone. I’m not smart in everything. Only some things. I’m stupid in other things. Not as many as I used to be. That’s thanks to Annie. I’m grateful to her for that. It makes up for the swearing.

Everyone wants their say. You’ll get used to it. Or perhaps you won’t. Perhaps you’ll stop reading. But, anyway, thanks for trying. Whatever.
The Story

Enter Chorus:
(A solitary Chorus, a woman, early-thirties, handsome rather than beautiful, dyed red hair, which she would, because she could, change as the whim took her, a line of Chinese characters tattooed on her inner wrist, which she wouldn’t, because she couldn’t. She speaks with a clear and engaging voice. A man in the back row thinks she looks lovely.)

Jeremy Heathfield was surprised to be dying quite so young. He always expected to live longer, and because of that expectation, he may not have done as much with his life, as he would have done, should he have known about this in advance. Awareness of his impending death made him think of all the things he planned to do at some time in the nebulous and unspecified future.
Having been led to believe that he would live to be eighty, or perhaps longer if the actuarial figures were to be believed, he never felt a pressing need to get-on-with-things. He saw a lot of people getting-on-with-things and wondered why they bothered to be in such a rush. He knew there was plenty of time to get-on-with-things later. He felt a little superior to the getter-oners. He looked down on men-of-purpose and wondered why having ‘purpose’ was thought to be such a good thing. Wasn’t it men-of-purpose who thought up the Inquisition, invented sarin gas and marched on Moscow? Those weren’t good things to be getting-on-with. So, what was wrong with just pottering around at home, teasing the neighbour’s dog, doing the crossword, lunching in the village, and leading a happily purposeless life? No harm could ever come of it.

So, when Jeremy thought he was going to die, he had time to think about things. Not the tiny amount of time you got to think about things as your car ploughed into an oncoming truck, and not the extended amount of time you got to think about things when you were being slowly eaten up by cancer. Jeremy got the amount of time you got when your fingernails were being pulled out one-by-one, when your nether regions were being intermittently electrified and when a sweaty man in shirt sleeves and a mask, and with what Jeremy noticed, because at times like those, or so I’m told, you do notice things you otherwise might not, was a birthmark on the side of his neck, was jamming a pistol up your nose.

But Jeremy didn’t know why he was strapped naked to a kitchen chair at two in the morning, or why he was having all those unpleasant things done to him, and because he didn’t know why he was there, and because he didn’t think he should be there, Jeremy felt indignant. That was because Jeremy was the wrong man. He knew he was the wrong man, even though the man with the pistol didn’t tell him who the right man was meant to be. Jeremy knew he had to be the wrong man, because Jeremy had never done anything in his life that could possibly have made him the right man. Jeremy was the wrong man, because the man with the mask, birthmark, sweaty armpits and pistol thought Jeremy was Jeremy’s brother.
Jeremy didn’t know that, not yet.
It’s good to have a family, mostly, not always.
*
Author’s Note: There’s a lady who edits this stuff, and she’s uncertain as to when the above nastiness fits in with the rest of the narrative. You may have the same problem, but it does, sort of, in the end. Trust me.
*
Jeremy wasn’t a diligent or industrious person. He was happy that the second-hand book trade wasn’t what it used to be, and that was why, when his father died, he had an excuse to sell the shop and move away to Wiltshire, to a small village by a stream.
He never liked all the musty old volumes his father doted on and endlessly poured over. He especially disliked the ones in the glass case behind the front counter. They were the ones his father treasured most of all, and it would have needed a very special offer, from a very special person, for him to have sold one of those. So, when Jeremy sold the shop and moved to Wiltshire, to a small village by a stream, with a pub called Cromwells Wart, Jeremy planned never to visit Charring Cross Road again.
*
AN: You may, or may not, have noticed that the English Public House sign writer is not, and for reasons I have not, to date, been made aware of, a fan of the apostrophe. Find me a King’s Head or King’s Arms amongst all the Kings Heads and Kings Arms.
*
Jeremy didn’t feel comfortable living in London. He’d spent his whole life there, but never felt at home there. Jeremy knew he belonged somewhere else, and Wiltshire was somewhere else. That’s what Jeremy thought. Jeremy was a man dislocated in place .
He knew his mother wasn’t happy when he sold the shop and less happy still when, without telling her, he moved to Wiltshire, to a small village by a stream, with a pub called Cromwells Wart . But Jeremy’s mother was a woman who always did what her husband said was the right thing to do, and always accepted the things he did, so, when her husband died, she accepted that what her son Jeremy said was the right thing to do, was indeed the right thing to do.
Jeremy’s mother belonged to that generation of women who didn’t think it was the right thing to do, to question what the men in her life thought was the right thing to do. Jeremy’s father was a man of his times. Jeremy didn’t have that excuse. Jeremy was a man dislocated in time and place.
Jeremy never cared about what his mother thought, or what his mother wanted. Jeremy wasn’t a nice man, or a good man. Jeremy deserved everything he got.

Exit Chorus: (She was happy with her performance and caught the Tube home. He had a beer at the pub and walked home.)
*
Peggy was dead. The Major shot her. Then Prouse shot Annie.
Peggy was dead. That’s what the seaweed said. Annie wasn’t dead, not then. That’s what the seaweed said. The seaweed saw her shot. She was shot in the chest. She wasn’t dead then. He thought she might be now. He wasn’t sure.
We only knew what the seaweed knew. The seaweed didn’t know if Annie was dead. Only that Peggy was. The seaweed was Benny.
Gitmo Benny was a soldier once, a Marine once. Before they kicked him out. Benny was the seaweed. He was shot too. He was shot by the guards. He was shot in the chest, lots of times. Annie and Peggy were shot in the chest, just once. Benny wore one of those bullet proof things. That’s why Benny wasn’t dead. Annie and Peggy didn’t wear one of those bullet-proof things. That’s why Peggy was, and why Annie might be. Annie was shot in the chest. That’s what Benny said. Above her right breast. That’s what Benny said. So, the same place they stabbed her before. The time she was raped, crucified and mutilated. The time Prouse arranged for it to happen.
*
AN: This risks becoming tedious, I know, but I should explain. Prou