Sowerbutt's Adventure

“Russian crown jewels inside, I suppose, guv,” Spaghetti whispered. “Never seen such security - barbed wire, trip wires, electrified wire, broken glass, traps, strips of nails, armed guards. I even spotted a couple of sound detectors, don’t see many of those about. Wonder which of the 20 bedrooms His Gloriousness the Ambassador, Maisky isn’t it, kips in?”

Sowerbutt smiled and shook his head. The two men watched like hawks as Tipper, ghost-like, slipped through the shadows on the manicured lawns of the Italianate mansion in South Kensington. He froze, waiting for a couple of armed guards to pass, then picked his way towards the marble steps up to the imposing front entrance.
The three men had brought sacking with them to cover the broken glass as they climbed over the high brick wall surrounding the Soviet Embassy. All three were experienced burglars, but it took them much longer than usual to get in, past the endless obstacles.
Tipper, a black balaclava pulled over his blond crew-cut, sidled up to the edge of the steps. Pulling a cloth bag from his jacket pocket, he emptied the contents on one of the steps and pushed the items one-by-one across to the middle. Two plain gold rings, two wallets with papers but minus several pound notes which were safe in Tipper’s pocket, a miniature Orthodox icon and two bloody thumbs that he had bought from the elderly undertaker at the end of High Bob for two pounds.
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