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Nothing what-so-ever
discarded through the car window, nothing left in the gutter, not
even a fag end dropped. Adam scratched the back of his head; his
eyes panned across the familiar street. The light was fading, soon
that would be that, he might as well go inside, watch TV, open a
can and eat something. What a bloody good idea, he thought, when did I last eat? But then he noticed an overflowing litter
bin attached to a nearby lamp post.
    Perhaps the
kitchen worktop was not the best place to sift through the entire
contents of a public litter bin but the bright fluorescent pelmet
lighting was in his favour. As he suspected, almost the entire
contents were associated with a long stay in a car - mostly take
away leftovers and packaging, several empty fag packets and fag
ends, empty cans of pop and one soggy, stained, foreign newspaper.
Jenny walked in.
    ‘Adam! What the
hell!’
    She was not
best pleased at the unhygienic waste scattered across the expanse
where she buttered her toast, rolled out pastry and chopped her
veg. Adam had migrated across to a clear bit of worktop with the
foreign newspaper.
    ‘I’ll clear it
up in a min.’
    ‘You’d
better... What’ you looking at? You’ll find that’s Polish.’
    ‘You know
Polish?’
    ‘No but I know
‘Nowosci’ is a Polish paper, seen it at work, some of the Polish
contractors read it.
    ‘Poland!
They’ve taken her to Poland!’ exclaimed Adam.
    ‘Who’s taken
who?’ asked Jenny.
    ‘Those men...
they’ve taken Madeline to Poland.’
    ‘Madeline?
Poland? Why would they do that?’ asked Jenny, incredulously.
    ‘Yes, yes,
Poland... Need my passport!’
    Adam bounded up
the stairs, leaving Jenny somewhat puzzled with his rash conclusion
and annoyed that in the short time Adam had been home he had
managed to decimate her lovely rented kitchen.
    ‘I’ll tidy up
later.’ Adam shouted down from his seriously underused bedroom.
    ‘Yes, yes, of
course you will!’ said Jenny, she knew that later could mean weeks,
if not months and she wanted her kitchen back well before tea time.
There was no point in making a scene, pointless complaining, he was
afterall, a single, undomesticated man and this was one of the many
penalties of sharing a house with one. Besides, on reflection it
would be better to clear the mess up herself. If Adam did
eventually take on the job, he certainly wouldn’t disinfect the
surfaces or recycle the rubbish in the correct coloured bins.
Moments later Adam launched himself down the stairs skirting over
most of the steps.
    ‘See you later,
if anyone wants me, I’ll be in Poland.’
    Adam appeared
to be absorbing the moment in the most hyperactive way possible,
failing completely to abate his momentum from the decent of the
stairs. Fortunately the front door was open or else there would
have been a nasty collision, a smashed front door and another spell
in hospital.
    ‘Adam, when I
said an accent, I didn’t mean foreign.’
    Adam was well
out of earshot before Jenny had finished her sentence. Adam was on
a mission, blinkered and impetuous. Only common sense would have
stopped him in his tracks but he hadn’t any time for that.

Chapter 5: A
Polish interrogation
     
    Adam soon found
himself standing on Polish soil, Warsaw’s to be precise.
     
    In actual fact,
Madeline had been taken to a place somewhere in Cheshire which, as
most people know, is in England not Poland. The place happened to
be Capesdown Hall – a huge Jacobean mansion in several acres of
grounds containing wild dear, sheep and many security guards. It
wasn’t widely known but rumours had it that Capesdown hall was used
exclusively by the government - MI 5 or 6 or 7 or something. The
number didn’t particularly matter – what did matter was what went
on inside, behind the bland red brick walls and obscured glass
windows.
     
    It would have
been sensible to find a nice hotel and sit tight until he had a
call from Barnton but Adam was impetuous, Adam was Adam. No harm