Tales Of The Gurrier

Max leaned heavily against the full length glass of the hotel window. The suite overlooked central London taking in the sweeping grandeur of Mayfair, Hyde park and Marble Arch. In the distance the giant oval of the London Eye spun slowly in the gathering dusk.

Stifling a grunt of pain he reached into his tailored evening jacket for his cellphone attempting to avoid getting blood on his cufflinks.

He flipped open the slim black device and spoke.

‘Control’

‘Control here, report.’

‘Afraid its gone tits up old boy. The Russians had a man on the inside. Karzamov is dead and I’ve taken one in the belly.’

‘Confirm status agent 6. How long since losing the target?’

‘Karzamov is down two minutes, bodyguards sixty seconds’

‘Very well, scrub team dispatched. ETA five minutes’

‘Wait. You’re sending in the cleaners?’

‘You’ve got five minutes. Control out.’

Maxwell Blunt slumped over into a chair and surveyed the chaos. There were four bodies in the room. Ivaly Karzamov diplomatic attache to the Kyrgyzstani government and Russian mole lay on the king size bed his brains splattered over the night stand. His two bodyguards lay slumped against the wardrobe leaking blood onto the axminster. The fourth body, the woman, was in the bathroom. Her carotid artery had been severed with a broken vodka bottle.

‘Waste of a damn fine bottle of Moscow’s best,’ he said before she gut shot him. Stupid, he knew his smart mouth would do for him one day.

Control would not forgive him for the balls up he had made of this one. He winced at the pain in his abdomen. Damn that bitch had caught him a nasty prang. It looked serious. Taken the wind right out of him. He’d sit here and rest for a bit. Wait for the scrub team to arrive. They would know what to do.

He was curious. Not many people met the cleaners in his line of work. As a rule he didn’t stick around after the wetwork. Usually there was a car chase or a woman or some such excitement to be getting along with. He hoped they brought medical supplies and something to drink. He could do with one judging by how much of the old claret was flowing briskly from this blasted hole in his guts.

There was the sound of a car pulling up outside. Max crawled to the window to see a battered Volvo screech to a halt outside the hotel foyer. Two elderly ladies emerged clutching large carpet bags. One of the ladies waved the hotel porter away and began rummaging in the boot of the car. The other looked up, spotted Max and gave him a cheery wave.

‘Damn shame the people they let in here nowadays,’ thought Max as he limped back to his chair. Next time he would insist on the Savoy. ‘Now where was that bloody scrub team. The Russians would be missing their star diplomatic liaison soon.’

There was a knock at the door.

‘Who is it?’ said Max fumbling with the silencer for his beretta.

‘It’s the cleaners dear’ said a voice.

‘Who sent you’

‘That nice young gentleman in Control’

‘And the code. What’s the codeword?’

‘Ooh I had it here, hold on a tick’

‘Oh for Gods sake just come in,’ said Max limping to the door and pulling it open to reveal the two elderly ladies from the Volvo.

‘What the bloody hell!’ said Max.

‘Hullo dear you must be Max, I’m Doris and this is Vera. Now don’t mind us. You just sit yourself down over there and we’ll get started.’

‘What? You’re the clean up team?’

‘We’re the cleaning ladies yes. Ooh that’s a nasty looking cut you have there. Why don’t you sit yourself down and we’ll make you a nice cup of tea?’

‘But the bodies’

‘Don’t you worry your head about it, Vera will take care of those. That’s her department’

Doris led Max back to the chair by the window while Vera produced a kettle and teapot from the carpet bag and proceeded to make the tea.

‘You made a right mess in here didn’t you dear,’ said Doris.

‘I, well yes I suppose I did,’ said Max.

‘What did this poor gal do. You stuck a bottle right in her neck.’

‘Er she shot me,’ said Max feeling a little defensive.

‘Oh well there you go. That’s young people these days, you can’t trust ‘em. That’s what my Stanley says. It’s all that violence and the internet he says.’

‘She was a double agent for the Russian secret service actually.’

‘A double agent, well I never! The young people don’t have no loyalty towards anything today. Sugar?’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘Sugar, in your tea dear. One lump or two?’

‘Oh two please.’

‘There you go. Now if you’ll excuse me dear, I’ll just go help Vera run the acid bath.’

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This story is part of Flickr Fiction Friday and inspired by this photo from Flickr user CinDLin.

Chris, Elimare, Teaandcakes, Littlegoat and Aquafortis are also taking part in this little bit of fun. Click on the links to read their versions.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 16th, 2006 at 9:41 am and is filed under Flickr Fiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.