Part Thirty-Three of the Sensational Shrimpleton Saga: The Ambush.

Last time we met him, the Chief Operating Officer of Shrimpleton Town AFC – James Churchill Proudfoot – was in a bit of a state after he had been robbed and insulted by one of the of the real Big Cheeses on Cumberside Island.

He had been well and truly put in his place by the Honourable Cornelius, no less. The member of the lesser aristocracy in latter-day Britain had not only humiliated and insulted poor old Jim, he had robbed him of most of his money and his mobile phone into the bargain.

 This had happened on the day the Gala Jim had been employed to organise on behalf of the football club fell completely apart at the seams.

True, the less than always diplomatic James Proudfoot had managed to upset several of the natives almost as soon as he stepped-off the ferry from the mainland as well – but not with the devastating results that tangling with Cornelius Cumberlake had produced.

But – had he but known it – Cornelius wasn’t the only person in the Chief Operating Officer of Shrimpleton Town AFC’s life who was less than well disposed towards him.

Not too far from where Jim was sleeping like a baby in one of the dilapidated containers which passed as a General Office at the Black Pool football ground, Lady Lynne Shrimpleton and her crew were being tossed around like a cork aboard her small but luxurious yacht in the lee of the Cumberland coast not too far away.

The storm, lack of sleep, incipient sea-sickness and – above all – Jim Proudfoot’s treachery was surely enough for anyone to cope with in themselves. But things were getting even worse from Lady Lynne’s point of view.

The Embassy had been in touch with news of Baban Singh Chopra’s disappearance in Delhi. She cursed herself when she assumed that Baban had successfully eluded them and – in her opinion – actually outsmarted her.

But the day she would be outsmarted by an obvious toe-rag the likes of Jim Proudfoot was the day she would lose the will to live. She needed to confront this duplicitous son-of-a-you-know-what: and do so as soon as possible. So, with Nine at the helm and Four at the ready, the three Vietnamese eventually left the relative shelter of the coast and headed out to sea once again in the direction of Cumberside Island.

The waters were still rough when Nine unmoored their black dingy once they had dropped anchor just off the coast of the island under cover of darkness and steered them in it towards the rocky shoreline. Lynne and Four leapt out as soon as they hit the stony beach and all three of them half-lifted, half-dragged the rubber craft into the shelter of the few stunted trees which lay beyond.

Lynne was so cold, she was actually shivering. Her men must be too but – as ever – they never complained. They moved a little way inland and crouched together behind a crumbling dry stone wall, which would at least keep some of the bitter chill in the wind off them, however temporarily.

The large flakes of snow which had been steadily falling from the pitch-black sky throughout the journey on the dingy had graduated into a proper blizzard which was being blown into their faces and virtually blinding them, despite the balaclavas all three of them were wearing. In the darkness – without even a moon or any stars to guide them, Lynne had absolutely no idea where they were. Fortunately, Nine did. He led the way through the darkness towards the Shrimpleton Arms.  None of Lady Lynne’s party dared to enter it – someone was bound to recognise one or all of them even if they dumped their military-style gear – so they were reduced to staring in through the steamed-up windows.

The pub looked really enticing – and warm. Out on the choppy north Atlantic, Lynne and her loyal crew members had been frozen all day long. She suddenly realised as well – as she spotted punters tucking into Roast Dinners with all the trimmings and washing them down with beer and wine and spirits of all sorts – that she was ravenous herself. The boys must be too: none of them had eaten since lunchtime and even then it had only been basic rations due to the state of the sea around them. But – strain their eyes as they might into all the pub’s many rooms – there was no sign of James Proudfoot anywhere.

Lynne had a quick confab with Nine and Four as they shivered in the darkness of the shadows to the south of the pub. They decided to search the football ground next. After all, this is where the much trumpeted Summer Gala that Jim was supposed to have organised was meant to have been held earlier on today.

Nine led the way again and it worried him – although Lady Lynne didn’t seem to notice – the way they were leaving clearly visible tracks on the ground behind them as they slipped and slithered through the worsening snow storm towards The Black Pool. Anybody could follow them in conditions like this.

Nine wasn’t clear exactly who he feared might be pursuing them in any case but he needn’t have concerned himself about pursuit. Because nobody was following them.

No – the people he should have been worried about were already lying in wait for his party – and had been for some time.

Cornelius Cumberlake Junior had been in position behind a tree overlooking the football ground since precisely half past eight – just as planned. He had a perfect view over the place. Even though visibility was poor, he could see everything – the crumbling Dressing Rooms; the Shipping Containers – even the bumps and trenches in the pitch itself, all perfectly covered in a thick layer of pristine snow.

To his right, hidden behind a dry-stone wall, Roddy the big farmer could just about be made out as he saw exactly the same scene from a different angle. On the other side of the ground, Roddy’s two men were also hidden away and looking for any kind of movement in the vicinity.

And it was one of them who first spotted three dark figures – two of them clearly carrying assault rifles – approaching from the direction of the pub. The warning call he uttered to alert his companions was that of an Owl: even the locals wouldn’t think about it twice. In fact, it was so convincing that the four men actually heard an answering cry from a real Owl somewhere away in the impenetrable night.

So the delightful Cornelius and his rough farming friends were in a state of heightened alert as they saw the three newcomers get ever closer. Two of these intruders were obviously men: one was tall and powerful-looking; the other small but pretty formidably built too. The other, more petite, figure was equally obviously a woman and Cornelius felt a thrill of distinctly carnal excitement when he thought of what he hoped to do to her later tonight.

Clearly totally oblivious to the fact that they had been spotted, the three figures squatted briefly together and then split up. The tall one headed towards the snow-covered Dressing Rooms, his boots noisily crunching through the thickening snow as he walked away from the others. The smaller man headed for a container close to the one in which Cornelius and his pals had visited Jim Proudfoot earlier – and it was towards this one that the female figure now crept. A pistol had appeared in her gloved right hand. In the left one, she clutched a powerful spot-light which she was shining on the ground just in front of her.

Roddy – who had once been dishonourably discharged from the Royal Marines – noticed this from his hiding place beyond the end of the pitch. He noted that the two men also had flashlights. But they were clearly trained soldiers: they knew that an active light marked you out as a moving target for any enemy sniper – or even infantryman – to have a pop at. They were obviously professionals; the woman equally obviously wasn’t…

She was the first to disappear – and the first to re-appear as well. She made a sound too – an animal he didn’t recognise – and in response, the two men turned in their tracks and started making their way back towards her. They had another brief confab outside the Shipping Container during which the single lit flashlight was extinguished. The men slipped the weapons they had been carrying off their backs and even at the distance Roddy was standing, he could hear them lock and load them. The tall one went to the container’s door and stood to the side of it whilst the other two took up position to its left. Then – at a clearly pre-arranged signal, the door burst open and the three figures were inside in a flash.

Cornelius waved his arm towards Roddy and the big farmer repeated this action towards his own men, who were hidden out of sight of the son of Earl Cumberlake’s eyeline. It was a sign for them all to head towards the container which the island’s Vietnamese visitors had just entered.

The first thing they did when they met was to cock the Twelve-Bore shotguns they had brought with them.

“Locked and loaded!” said Roddy, trying to impress everyone else with military parlance and thus his Royal Marine background with an expression he had actually picked up from an American film about `Jarheads’ .Then they gradually sneaked as near to their target container as they dared. Nine had left the door open and as Cornelius and his men crept ever closer, they were able to see three stooped figures inside, all of them pointing their now lit flashlights at some object in the centre of the room. More signs were exchanged between the men outside before the first one crept noiselessly into the container and headed right. A second man followed him and turned left. Roddy followed next before Cornelius was the last one to enter. He stood near the door, one hand on his shotgun, the other within reach of the light switch which he knew lay to the left of the door he had just entered through: he could just make out its outline against the wall of white which was still falling completely soundlessly from the sky above outside. The three crouched figures were conversing quietly. But because it was all in Vietnamese, the islanders had no idea what they were saying.

In reality, Lynne had been the first to discover James Churchill Proudfoot as he slept on his prefabricated bed in the middle of the room. Well – she hadn’t actually seen him; she had heard him because Jim had been loudly snoring. In fact, she didn’t realise it was him. She had already told her companions that they must have missed Jim Proudfoot in the pub. That was the likeliest place for him to be at this time of night. And even though it was now precisely ten o’clock on the dot, he was probably already so drunk that he had forgotten all about their planned rendezvous. No matter: Ranjit Singh Chopra was the prize they most wanted – even more than the lovely Simran, who would probably be anywhere else but here too – if she had any sense.

All three of the Vietnamese trio had taken one look at the large, prone figure asleep in the middle of the room and thought of just one thing: Baban Singh Chopra. Even under the covering of white sheets (which is how the bath towels looked in the artificial light), the slumbering person was obviously fat. The red turban wrapped around his head was further proof of his identity as were the wisps of unkempt hair and bushy white beard which they could see sticking-out as the big man slept almost on his side with his back to them.

So Jim hadn’t been lying after all. Baban and Ranjit were brothers and the Vietnamese intruders could see with their own eyes that they looked exactly alike. So `Chopper’ really was at the football ground, just as Jim had claimed…

It was an easy mistake to make. But – remembering the last time they had seen a Sikh terrified by having a weapon pointed at him – all three of them feared waking this man suddenly. The shock might be too much for him, too – and a dead Ranjit would be as much use to them as Baban had already proved to be: none whatsoever. So they were quietly planning the best way to rouse him without frightening the life out of him.

They needn’t have bothered. Suddenly, the room was bathed in harsh white light, momentarily dazzling them. A loud voice yelled “Drop your weapons!” followed by a huge explosion as a shotgun was discharged at close quarters.

As super-charged pellets pinged and zipped liked crazed insects as they ricocheted off the walls and ceiling of the metal box they were all standing in and a smell of cordite made them cough, the Vietnamese immediately obeyed. As one, they turned towards the sound of the gun and put their hands in the air. To the side of them, there was a large BUMP! as a startled James Churchill Proudfoot woke with a start – and immediately overbalanced on his rickety couch and fell lengthways onto the floor.

Cornelius, still pointing his smoking shotgun menacingly in their direction, ran his eye over his four prisoners. Part of him wanted to shoot them now – one each for himself and his cronies in turn as the terror of the survivors increased as their turn came ever closer.

That was the bit he loved: the pleading; the begging; the bargaining or whatever his victims indulged in before their final moments arrived. Then the pleasure of shooting them in the guts and leaving them to a slow, painful death. That was even better as they begged for water or called for their mothers. That’s what he and Roddy had done before with thieves stupid enough to steal things from either of them. They always came back if the temptation – an even bigger tractor; a newer Range Rover or whatever it was they were after – was powerful enough.  But they never came back twice; good old Rodders and he made sure that they couldn’t…

He swept his eyes greedily over his prizes and finally spoke.

“Normally, my associates and myself would shoot scum of your sort who trespass on other people’s property and attempt to take liberties without a second thought. I would have no problem disposing of you!”

He pointed his gun straight at Nine, from whom he received no response at all. Four didn’t say or do anything either when it was his turn. But before Cornelius could even start to try and scare Lady Lynne Shrimpleton in the same manner, she beat him to it. She pulled her balaclava off and then shook her magnificent tresses of brunette-coloured hair to allow them to fall naturally on either side of her absolutely stunningly beautiful face. She looked absolutely mesmerising – and she knew it.

“Well, well well – I’m sure we’re all really impressed by what a tough guy you are. But any piece of stuck-up English detritus can act like Rambo – as long as he’s got a weapon and his opponents don’t. That’s how you created an Empire in the Good Old Days, right? But you wouldn’t dare take on either one of my men in unarmed combat, would you? In a fair fight, that is. That’s because you’re a fraud – and a coward. Without that rifle, you are nothing! Call yourself a man? Well – prove it! I’ll give you a fighting chance. Literally! Put down the gun and take me on! Come on, tough guy – if you dare!”

Cornelius’ face had turned a deep shade of crimson as her Ladyship taunted him in this way. It was one thing being feisty – but this attack on his manly powers was a slight he was not prepared to tolerate. He’d give her a personal demonstration of his manhood right here and now if that really was what the insolent bitch wanted!

“Want to see how much of a man what I am?” he screamed at her. “I’ll show you precisely what kind of man I am! Grab her boys – hold her down!”

Oh dear me. Who would have thought it? – a yarn about a football club nobody has ever heard of suddenly developing a plot twist involving violence against women? Remember though – this is supposed to be a Soap Opera and the guidelines I have so carefully considered before setting pen to paper (guidelines we shall be examining very carefully in due course) tell me that the introduction of serious social issues of the moment is never a bad thing.

But is a really bad thing just about to happen to the lovely Lady Lynne Shrimpleton?

Not a million miles away to the west, is another bad thing – admittedly on a far less personal and intimate scale in the measure of these things – about to happen to our second most significant female character?

Find out next time in the following totally irresistible episode of

The Sensational Shrimpleton Saga…