Chapter 11: Freight Forwarding

Chapter Introduction.

In which Harry goes east, Larry goes west, Sarah goes south and Rachel goes to Holloway.

The Foreign Office Calls

In the late afternoon, Chief Inspector Grantby’s extension rings.

“Grantby?” he growls into the telephone.

“Chief Inspector? It’s Michael Appleyard here, from the Foreign Office. I got your message earlier — about contacts made to someone here, after Mrs McEwan disappeared, well disappeared for the first time — and I am pleased to say that it was one of the easier things I have had to deal with today.”

Appleyard’s smooth cultured but self-satisfied voice begins to irritate Grantby, just as it had during the case conference at Scotland Yard to review the McEwan case.

“I see, so is there anything else I should know?”

“Yes there is, Chief Inspector!” Appleyard replies brightly. “Some really good news, I think you will agree.”

Grantby’s spirits begin to sink. An “easy” resolution to the question and “‘good news” probably means that Larry Ross had, in fact, been in touch with “contacts at the Foreign Office,” as he put it, and that would mean the information provided by Corinne Aimes had lead nowhere...

Appleyard is speaking again. “ ... we at the Foreign Office keep a very careful diary of events to record all enquires made and all advice given — as well as events in the world, of course. It was an easy matter to search for enquires made by a Mr Larry Ross and by Freddie Clegg Enterprises and, on the other hand, enquires made by us to the Americans and to MI5 about an intelligence operation in the UK.”

Grantby’s heart sinks further...

“But the point is that there were no enquires logged. No one made any enquires about a Jennifer McEwan and we made no contacts with MI5 nor with the Americans. In short, Chief Inspector, Mr Ross was not telling the truth to Dr Aimes. He was trying to pull the wool over her eyes. I think this means that Mr Ross knew exactly where Mrs McEwan was and what was happening to her. I think your Mr Ross has questions to answer. Is that helpful?”

By now, Grantby is chuckling at this unexpected and welcome news. His feelings towards Appleyard are warming by the second.

“Yes, thank you so much, Mr Appleyard. That really is excellent news.”

“Ah, I am so glad,” replies the urbane Appleyard. “We do try to please...”

Freight Forwarding

Freddie Clegg Enterprises is an international freighting company. They have been in business since the 1930’s and Freddie is the second generation of the family to be involved in the business — but the first to be a Slaver.

When Freddie began Slaving, he realized at once that a new and carefully hidden division of the company was needed to handle this very special perishable cargo, and so Canopus ImpEx was born. Canopus, the brightest star in the southern sky, named in honour of the chief navigator to Menelaus, King of Sparta.

Freddie’s close colleagues, like Harry, have all worked in the legitimate business. They know how international freight movements are arranged, how to avoid interference by the authorities, and how to separate the transportation of the “perishable cargo” from any clear connection with FCE.

Once Sarah’s container has been closed, secured and sealed, her Customs Declaration is filled in: Sarah is described as “Fragile. Contemporary Sculpture. Polished Wood. Oak.” Harry moves the container on the Stacker into the dispatch bay. He wraps sticky polythene wrapping around the container and the pallet to unite them as one. Three broad bands running across the width of the container and one running end to end — but taking great care not to compromise the air access to the inside of the container and to its sleeping occupant. He lowers the arms of the stacker so the pallet and Sarah in her container drop gently onto the floor of the loading bay and then moves the stacker back out of the way.

The pallet wrap serves two purposes. First, uniting the container to the pallet makes the whole consignment much easier to handle and freight consignments that are handled easily are easy to forget in the melee of a busy freight warehouse. Second, Harry has left the Customs Declaration easily accessible for inspection but the pallet wrap will make access to the actual contents of the container much more difficult — if removed for direct inspection, it will all have to be replaced and which Official would want to go to all the trouble, just for a “Contemporary Sculpture. Polished Wood. Oak?”

There is also another, more confidential dimension to dealing with the Customs People. It is impossible to examine every freight item leaving the UK — there are just too many — so “Customs” target particular items at random and also conduct random detailed checks in a particular warehouse, or at a particular company. When there is a shipment like Sarah to be dealt with, Canopus must know where the unannounced customs checks will take place and must use a Freight Forwarder who is not on the list for the day in question. This information is available at a price from the right people and Canopus ImpEx knows the right people and is prepared to pay the right price.

Today, the “safest” company to handle Sarah’s transportation is Ace International.

Harry climbs into the cab of a small fork-lift truck. He lowers forks, reverses, and manoeuvres the fork-lift to the rear of the container so he can lift it up and move it forwards into the Ace International vehicle when they come to collect Sarah and take her to the Airport.

As he waits for Ace International, Harry thinks about Larry.

From Harry’s point of view, Larry has three disadvantages before any talents can be considered: he has no military background, and so has no training to do whatever has to be done to complete a mission; he has no experience of Transportation although, to be fair to him, Larry’s expertise in Marketing has helped the business to make much more money than it might have done; and he has no criminal background, so he does not bring any special experience or skills or ruthlessness to the table. Larry could be selfish, as shown when he was happy to abandon his former girlfriend to slavery after Freddie had abducted her in order to lure Larry into the business and to force his cooperation, but treachery and self-centeredness are very much not the same as loyalty and definitely not the same as reliability.

If Larry successfully got himself to North America, would he be an asset to the new company?

He would bring his experience with Inward Bound and Harry has to admit that the Inward Bound business model (as interpreted by himself and Freddie) —which was to give IWB Graduates an opportunity to contract themselves into consensual slavery — carried a much lower business risk and, from time to time, would lead to the occasional talented Graduate suckering themselves into permanent non-consensual slavery. All to the good.

Larry would bring Rachel. She was saleable. Like Sarah, she would need more training (which she would definitely get whether Larry liked it or not) so that was hard cash on the table.

Larry would bring himself. Was he essential to the business? Harry thought ... not. Not essential. Could he be sold? Not in his present state, for sure. His physique lets him down badly. Hair untidy. At least one stone over his fighting weight, probably two. Poor posture. Flabby muscles. No interesting body adornments. Harry did not know this for a fact, but he could not imagine Larry having himself tattooed or pierced — but all that was correctable. No doubt Steve Glennis would charge for the use of facilities, but Harry was sure that something might be made of Larry and, in particular, there might be money to be made out of Larry, in due course.

Harry is enjoying the thought of watching Larry — slave Larry — having a brand placed Smack! on the side of his butt when the bell rings to announce that Ace International has arrived.

Harry jumps down from the loading platform and activates the goods door. The loading bay doors open to show a large capacity VW Transporter van standing outside. As the door rolls open the driver bobs down, acknowledges Harry with a thumbs up when he comes into view, and walks to the rear of the vehicle to raise the rear roller door of the van. He then climbs back into his cab, fires up the engine, and reverses slowly to bring the vehicle into the building and up to the edge of the loading bay platform. By now, Harry is in the cab of the fork-lift. He raises the forks and moves carefully forwards until Sarah in her container is inside the rear of the van. He lowers the forks, deposits Sarah ready for the next phase of her journey and reverses clear.

Harry switches off the fork-lift and jumps down to speak to Ace International.

“Heathrow?” asks the driver.

“Heathrow,” confirms Harry. “It’s booked on the 12:30 Air France to Tampa.”

“It’s quite large?”

“A-ha. Direct shipment, not a consol.” (1)

“Consol? No way. Not that size. What is it, anyway?”

“Some sort of modern statue or something.”

“Modern art statue?” The driver reads the customs declaration and slowly shakes his head. “Huh. Well, less said about that the better.”

“Agreed,” says Harry. “Pleased to have it off my hands!”

“You’re on,” says the driver. “Paperwork: here is your Ace receipt and your tracking number and barcode.” He fixes more adhesive labels onto the crate. “You’ve got our app?”

“Yep, it’s here,” says Harry, showing him the icon on the screen of his smart phone.

“OK,” says the driver, “so to track your consignment in real time, just bring up the App, enter the tracking number, and you will see exactly where it is in the process.” (2)

“Gotcha,” replies Harry. The driver climbs back into his cab and drives away, leaving Harry to finish putting the Canopus ImpEx building to bed.

Harry was brought up in the London Borough of Rotherhithe. Urban myth has it that Rotherhithe is the Borough of Choice for members of the South London Underworld to have as their home address. Whatever the truth of it, Rotherhithe has given Harry many useful contacts which he has used to recruit most of the Canopus Security Staff. The Staff regard themselves as “free-lancers,” rather than paid employees and so the relocation of Canopus from East London leaves them free to explore other business and employment opportunities. Their past and continuing loyalty has been rewarded and encouraged by the generous severance pay they have all received. Today, the team will come to the Canopus building for the last time and work their very last shift as they re-convene to strip the building of any unusual equipment, fixtures and fittings (such as the heavy steel doors on some of the rooms and bars over the windows) which would arouse the curiosity of the commercial estate agents who will handle the sale of the property.

As the process gets underway, Harry checks his smart phone. According to the Ace International app, Sarah has arrived at Heathrow and is through the Secure Perimeter.

The cells are washed down with bleach to denature the DNA traces left by occupants. All the office furniture is removed for resale, computers have their hard discs wiped, the IT equipment is sent for recycling, and the last of the shredded hard copy documents is collected by a confidential document disposal firm. Included in the shredded paper, is a passport issued to man called Harry Keitley, together with his driving license and other documents which could identify him as a particular Harry Keitley who might, in due course, be wanted by the police to “assist them with their enquires.”

At last, Harry stands alone in the street outside the empty building. He hefts his rucksack onto his shoulder, picks up his flight bag, locks the main door for the last time, and puts the key into an envelope addressed to the Commercial Property Estate Agents.

He checks the Ace Tracking App once more. Sarah is in the Cargo Terminal and ready to be loaded onto her aircraft.

He turns, dons a baseball cap with a wide eyeshade and makes his way to Limehouse Station on the Docklands Light Railway, pausing only to drop the envelope with the building key into a convenient post box. He knows the locations of the security cameras at Limehouse and Canning Town stations, on the platforms and inside the trains themselves, and he is careful to face away from them, to join a throng of other passengers when he has to walk towards them and always to look down. That and his cap will make identification of him much more difficult.

Harry takes the train to Canning Town, changes to the Woolwich Arsenal branch, and catches the next train to London City Airport, a small “local” airport built in the former London docklands. (3)

Once at the airport, and once again carefully observing “security camera hygiene rules,” Peter Barker checks in using his Canadian passport for his flight to Amsterdam — there is one almost every hour.

As he waits in Departures, he checks his smart phone once more. Good news! Sarah is safely loaded and her aircraft is cleared for departure. Peter Barker imagines her: sleepy, secure, entertained and, consequently, sweating just a little from the effects of the vibrator thoughtfully inserted into her vagina by Dr Jordan.

Amsterdam is only an hour away from London City and, three hours after Departure, Peter Barker catches a direct train to Frankfurt from the railway station beneath the airport terminal building. The journey is four hours and he has arranged to stay overnight in the Frankfurt Airport Sheraton Hotel. Before he turns in, Peter checks his Ace International App once more. Sarah is airborne and well on her way to Tampa — and an interesting new phase in her life.

The next morning, Peter checks in for the Air Canada flight to Toronto. As he waits in the First Class Lounge for his flight to be called, he checks the Ace app for the last time — and smiles broadly. Sarah has arrived in Tampa. Her container has been collected and she will soon make the crossing to The Colony, her fate nicely sealed. Peter deletes the App and resets the factory defaults on his phone. He removes the SIM card and places the old card in the trash bin in the toilet. Sarah is not the only person who is beginning a new life.

As he settles into his seat aboard the aircraft, Peter wonders about Larry and Rachel. About what Rachel will look like after proper training and after her body has been suitably decorated. He wonders: how much might she sell for?

Departure Gate.

Larry and Rachel are sitting together on the sofa in his flat. The rule is, Rachel stays in the flat when Larry is at work or away. She has a collar which shocks her hard — unbearably hard — if she even approaches the front door. When she leaves the flat, she leaves with Larry, she stays with Larry, and she returns with Larry.

When Rachel reflects on how life might have been, she feels that she has, by and large, fallen on her feet. She is still in the United Kingdom and has not been sold abroad, like other girls who have fallen into the hands of Larry’s company, or, to be more accurate, the company which Larry works for — and Larry himself is quite a good fuck. Not the best she has ever had, but definitely good. He is considerate. He likes it best when she comes, too, and will often hold off until she is well advanced towards orgasm. Not all guys will do that, so Rachel feels that is something in Larry’s favour.

“Rachel?

“Yes, Sir?

Larry loves it when she calls him “Sir.” It makes his mouth water. It confirms in his mind why he is still involved, even enthusiastically involved, with Freddie Clegg and Canopus.

“You and I are going on holiday to the “States!”

“What? I mean, pardon, Sir? The United States?

“New York and then travelling a bit. I’ve got business to do and, for various reasons, you can’t be looked after in The Centre here in London and I thought it would be nice to go together.”

Larry was about to say We have an American colleague who has a private island. That is where we are going. I will be able to keep you naked all day and you will be able to get wonderfully brown, very deep brown, like all those beautiful black girls. Nice?

But he remembers that it is best to be always careful what you say to slaves. He did not want to spook Rachel who might be anxious about being taken to a private island and being kept there naked — so Larry was “economical with the truth.”

“Er ... I mean ... yes, Sir! That sounds wonderful. I am sorry, it’s just so unexpected...”

“Well, just to show you it’s not bullshit, here is your ticket ... and here is mine.”

“But this says Joan Plummer?”

“And mine says Thomas Arthur.

“Here are our passports: I am Thomas Arthur and you are Joan Plummer. It’s better to travel incognito and so, tonight, your task is to absorb your new identity. It must be second nature to you. If someone calls for Joan Plummer, that’s you and you respond. If they ask for Rachael Kernow, you have never head of her. Do you understand me, Joan?”

“Joan?”

“Joan!”

“Oh ... I see ... yes. I am sorry. Yes, Mr Arthur. I understand.”

“You were a script writer in another life. Use your imagination. Think about your parents, the school you went to. Your job. You — Joan Plummer — are a Secretary in a Media Company. By morning, I want you perfect. Go to sleep thinking about Joan Plummer. Am I completely understood?”

“Yes, Mr Arthur. Mr Arthur?”

“Joan?”

“How exactly are we travelling?”

“BA. Heathrow to New York. We are going business class and we have seats together. Good?”

“Together in Business Class? That’s ... that’s very good ... thank you, Sir. But Sir, in novels, the Master would travel First Class and the slave would travel Economy?”

“Yes, but this is real life. In real life, we can either go together in First or I can go in First and you can be created up in the aircraft hold. Have you any preference?”

“I would like to accompany you. Thank you, Sir.”

“I thought you might and do you know, Joan?”

“No, Mr Arthur?”

“Tonight, to say thank you, you can lick my ass and suck me off and swallow. I might even need to pee. I expect you to drink and swallow. Every drop.”

“Yes, Mr Arthur. I should like that very much.”

“Well, what are we waiting for?”

“Er, I am sorry, but what about the Flat and our things? Your things?”

“A flat in London is always useful, but I have arranged for people to come and take care of everything, so you, Joan, are going to start a completely new life.”

Beside her, Larry is gently snoring, basking in a post orgasmic glow but Rachel is awake. She is thinking about her “holiday” with Larry and “starting a completely new life.” Rachel remembers that she is an abductee and now a slave. She is wondering if Larry is telling the whole truth? She is thinking about the consequences of travelling across the Atlantic to a country superficially familiar (from movies and TV) but where different and greater dangers might be waiting for her. Travelling with false documents. Marooned, her opportunity to return to the real world gone forever. And what if Larry decided he preferred someone else to her? What if he met another Sukie? What might happen to her then? But of course, she knows exactly what would happen to her then. She would be disposed of. She would be sold and vanish. Completely. Forever.

And then it occurs to Rachel that the die might already be cast. Perhaps Larry is already tired of her, has already sold her, and the “business trip” has been arranged to deliver her to a new owner? After all, he had actually said “ ... you are going to start a completely new life...”

Rachel turns over in bed. Her handcuff chain, connecting her to a ring set into the concrete wall of the room, rattles. She might share Larry’s flat but she is always under restriction. Restricted in the flat. Restricted in bed. For a moment, Rachel feels the temptation to abandon herself to despair. There seems to be nothing in her hands that could alter the course of events. Then Rachel remembers. Before her enslavement, she was a writer. In her mind, Rachel begins to write a story. A story about a girl like her...