Sunday 30 April 2017

Sowerbutt's Letter

“We’ve have gone to much trouble to get here to Rhodos,” the colonnello from the Italian 2nd Blackshirt Division said. “This letter is of the highest importance. His Majesty trusts you to deliver it in Ankara as soon as possible. Guard it with your life, my friend.”
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Repository


Polly smiled. “Your clever repository idea?” Jo-Jo said. “I’ve had a long chat with my mate, the porter from the National Gallery. He says you need to store paintings in a room with a steady temperature and you need what he calls a certain moisture content in the air. We are building an airtight room inside the barn – the lads worked over Christmas. I’m tracking down machinery in the Smoke for the heating, ventillation and keeping the place dry. Part of the repository can be for cash and documents. Ordinary safe deposit boxes for jewellery – got a load of them from a bombed-out bank. Mr Sorbay says he has some customers lined up."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Opportunity


"Let’s get down to business,” Polly said. “Sorbay is earning his keep for a change, we have a guest arriving at the cottage in the next day or two. Professor Harold Whistler from London University, we call him Mr Whistler. Sorbay went on about him,  he’s some sort of expert on the Jerries, working for the Gingernut on some special projects. The Gingernut wanted him somewhere quiet and safe away from the bombing. The good news is that the stoppers, the local WarAg and all the other nosey-parkers have been told we are off limits – national security. Which means, gentlemen, that as long as we are discreet, we can do what we like. We can get on with planting whatever we want and stocking up. We’ll be able to keep animals here for the other farms we buy in the area. The gem-cutting business will be fine without anyone interfering."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Slap


Spaghetti kept his Webley trained on the hawk-faced man in handcuffs beside him in the van. He began muttering when the men pulled off their balaclavas. “We’ll get your handcuffs off and have a chat back at the brothel.” Sowerbutt frowned: “He’s muttering. Spaghetti, shut him up, will you. We need to concentrate in case anyone is following us.” With a grin, Spaghetti slapped McGaskie’s face hard. Silence.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks


Sowerbutt's Success

Spaghetti heaved and heaved again, the clasp on the prison van door finally coming away; its brass padlock dangling uselessly. “Now,” snapped Sowerbutt and the door was jerked open. The tip seats were empty. “Taking a chance, short of screws,” smiled Sowerbutt as he pulled down the folding steps.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Knife


Madame Komarovski stood well; she had once danced with the Imperial Russian Ballet. “Given the choice, I would use a knife, Mr Sorbay, a sharp knife. But we will do as you ask to the letter, we’re professionals.” Several of the men in the room took her meaning and slipped their hands between their legs.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Plan


Sowerbutt told the briefing in the East India Dock Road brothel: “According to our informant, we’ve got at least 10 minutes. The prison van is expected at the Brixton nick at 11.20. They’ll sound the alarm when it doesn’t arrive. Then the local stoppers – reservists, no doubt – will take a few minutes to get there.  Probably be on bikes with petrol very short. I want us all to be long gone before they turn up."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Break-In


As the fireworks, which had been laid across the roadway and along the pavement, banged, fizzed and whooshed, two muscular-looking men ran to the side-door of the two-ton prison van. One carried a crowbar, the other a Webley pistol.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Fireworks

“Blimey, Bonfire Night. What’s going on?” The grey-haired man stared through the windscreen of the Leyland prison van. It was his second day back in uniform after retiring a couple of years earlier. With the call-up stepped up after Dunkirk, retirees from the Prison Service were being encouraged back to work. Bursts of red, gold, silver and orange shot over the street, a stone’s throw from Clapham Common.  Sprays of glittering stars, splashes of colour. Bunches of crackers, tied together with rafia, snapped and fizzed as they jumped along the pavement. Fountains whooshed gold, silver and green stars towards the overcast sky. Bangers, stuck in drainpipes and odd holes, added to the cacophony. 
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Fight

Sowerbutt walked across the reception room and kissed Franco’s hand. “We fought together in the war, Paco. We fight together now. My Family in the Smoke always came first. Your Highness and General Moscardó, the beloved father of my late wife, are my family."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Business

“We read with interest of your progress in encouraging the tourists to Benidorm, Jimmy. You have my full support, the support of El Caudillo. We are a poor country, ruined by the Bolsheviks. We need foreign currency. The rest of Europe, including West Germany and Italy, basks in the generosity of American aid; yet neutral Spain receives nothing, not a cent for our poor people."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Warning


Over bowls of steaming bean stew at Benavente, a picturesque medieval town, the Guardia Civil commandant whispered about the terrorists in the Galician mountains. “The region is loyal; officially the El Piloto brigands don’t exist, Senor Sorbay. But we must be careful, you are armed. My men are on full alert.”
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Journey

The journey across Spain from Alicante in the government Fiat Ardita had been slow and uncomfortable. Despite the fighting ending more than 10 years earlier, the roads were still potholed and rutted, houses ruined and much of the countryside devastated. Fields pitted with shell craters, trenches hacked across prime land, rural tracks mined.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Family


Generalissimo Franco walked heavily across the ornate reception room, put his hands on Sowerbutt’s shoulders and kissed both his cheeks. “Jimmy,” the man, dressed in the immaculate uniform of a Captain-General, said, “it is very good to see you again. You must always call me Paco, you are family. Many terrible things happened during the years of fighting, but I will carry the loss of my beloved goddaughter, Kasandra, in my heart forever. You were too generous to the scum who murdered our poor girl. I would have crucified him and left him as carrion."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Thursday 27 April 2017

Sowerbutt's Soldiers

Four experienced members of the SAS, on special detachment, were infiltrated into the prison several years after it opened; their orders to break out - using non-lethal force as necessary. After several weeks, they were forced to admit defeat and were returned to their unit.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's File

The files former occupants, including the vital index page, were separately stamped with the classification Never To Be Released, repeatedly checked, placed in an acid-free archival storage box and driven under close escort some miles from Kew to a tightly-guarded anonymous storage facility, designated under the Official Secrets Act of 1989.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Archivists

The weeders, as a small section of high security-clearance Home Office archivists are known, worked overtime to replace the contents of the unassuming file with some typed foolscap sheets about wartime public morale and political attitudes, compiled by Coopers Snoopers.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Finger

A chubby finger in a Horse Guards office trembled on its way down the list followed by a spectacular explosion. The well-furnished suite was more familiar with erudite conversations about matters of state and the acquisition of KCBs than shrieks of anger over ancient East End road accidents.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Monday 3 April 2017

Sowerbutt's Friends

Turning to Sowerbutt, Franco said: “The Brigadier and I are old friends. What is it, 15 years or so? He organised the aeroplane that brought me back from exile to Tetuán in Morocco for the start of our crusade. You know each other, it pleases me that my friends have worked together."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Citizenship


Franco said. “You are an honoured citizen of our Spanish State. Driven out of your victorious England by the godless Reds; a fake burial, indeed. In Spain, we line the scum up against the wall."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sowerbutt's Family

“Jimmy,” Franco said, “it is very good to see you again. You must always call me Paco, you are family."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks

Sunday 2 April 2017

Sowerbutt's Friend


Generalissimo Franco rose from his chair, walked heavily across the ornate reception room in the Pazo de Meiras at Sada, put his hands on Sowerbutt’s shoulders and kissed both his cheeks.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks 

Sowerbutt's File

The files former occupants were separately stamped with the classification Never To Be Released, repeatedly checked, placed in an acid-free archival storage box and driven under close escort some miles from Kew to a tightly-guarded storage facility, designated under the Official Secrets Act of 1989.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks 

Sowerbutt's Explosion

A chubby pink finger in a Horse Guards office trembled on its way down the archives list followed by a spectacular explosion. The well-furnished suite was more familiar with erudite conversations about high matters of state and the acquisition of KCBs than shrieks of anger over ancient East End road accidents.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks 

Sowerbutt's Tribute

Hawk-Face changed direction at the last minute when he spotted the blond man and his menacing dog. He swept the bowler off his mop of bottle-yellow hair, held it out in silent salute and bowed low as the gravediggers began shovelling the heavy clay into the grave.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks 

Sowerbutt's Burial

The low growl at the back of the Dalmatian’s throat was enough to send shivers up a brave man’s spine. Hackles rising and teeth bared, the dog watched as the latecomers made their way across the cemetery.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG geoffreyhowe.wix.com/howebooks