The Gunsmith

Synopsis—1000 Words A small billet of high quality Chrome Molybdenum steel heated up carefully under the control of an accurate Pyrometer to a safe forging temperature is forged into a rough oversized double barreled gun action. After controlled cooling, the forging is passed on to a master craftsman, a custom gun maker who carefully sculpts a masterpiece with file and chisel either into an elegant double barreled shotgun or a sinisterly beautiful heavy double barreled Express rifle; in either case a “Best Quality” gun that only the few, the very few, can afford to buy, is built. The same applied to David Mac Alpine who could said to be a rough Scottish billet of centuries of genetically alloyed inter Clan violence who was forged and refined into a formidable and dangerous weapon; first by the British Army’s special services and then on the hunting fields of Central Africa where members of the big five that had been insolently provoked by rich hunting clients who believed that their talents for accumulating money blessed them with immortality, completed the work. The refining of the finished Scottish weapon was mainly due to the excellent mentoring he received from wounded and enraged members of the big five especially lions and buffalo. Lord Montdrago, a mysterious international banker and financier who lived on a magnificent estate near London had a passion for hunting big game; his various business interests in Africa, allowed him to indulge his passion several times a year, it also allowed him to induce David, the Scottish gunsmith, into moving onto his estate and becoming the master of the guns with promises of frequent hunting trips accompanying his master to Africa. After his discharge from the British army, David spent an idyllic several years as a professional hunter in Africa guiding hunting clients on Safari; when he inherited the family’s gun making business he returned to Scotland to manage the business. His heart yearned for Africa and Lord Montdrago’s offer was irresistible. The estates well equipped gunroom was situated in the basement of the Banker’s magnificent country house. The house had been built by Lord Montdrago’s grandfather nearly a hundred years before David joined the banker’s staff, All the walls of the house were known to be over six feet thick, “traditional English” the grandfather had maintained. David soon discovered a secret entrance from the gunroom into a labyrinth of secret passageways built into the thick walls which allowed a person to see and hear everything that went on in every room in the huge manor house; the grandfather had taken the secret of his spy holes with him to the grave and no one else had ever known about the secret passageways. David was both shocked and intrigued on his first spying mission in the secret chambers to learn that the main business of the English Lord in sub Sahara Africa was illegally supplying vast quantities of arms to many of the rebel groups in the oil and mineral rich regions of Africa and also stealing large portions of the vast sums of Western aid which his banks were entrusted with to distribute to the impoverished African countries. Montdrago created and destroyed many dictators in Africa and it could accurately be said that the English Lord controlled much of the mineral wealth of that vast turbulent continent. The Banker had a personal assistant, a stunningly beautiful young girl with the most unusual slightly slanted blue eyes which betrayed her Russian blood; she was aloof and withdrawn, not allowing familiarity with the new master of His Lordships guns who quickly fell love with her. David’s spying soon established that the lovely young woman was not the banker’s mistress as some thought but his illegitimate daughter. Every room, passageway and even the estate’s clinic, run by the in–house ex Israeli Army doctor, Bernie Cohen, had surveillance cameras. All telephones were tapped and next to the clinic was the security guards control center with its array of monitors. Strangely the gunroom was the only room other than His Lordship’s apartments and his main conference room which did not have the surveillance cameras. The security guards who patrolled the house and the grounds were numerous and did not fraternize with the other staff. Soon after his initial spying forays and thinking of all he had learnt, David built a perfect silencer for his heavy caliber pistol and always carried it in his combat rig when investigating the secret chambers and soon had cause to use it. Events moved swiftly; surveillance tapes showed that David had been in the gunroom when bodies of Montdrago’s hit men are found in various parts of the mansion. Their mission had been to eliminate both the gunsmith and the doctor whom Montdrago had learned was a Mossad agent. David and Bernie together with the beautiful P.A. are sent on safari in Central Africa where the Professional hunters of the Montdrago owned Safari Company try to kill Bernie and David. David contrives two hunting accidents where wild animals kill the professional hunters causing Bernie to speculate that with two professionals losing their lives to wild animals in two days it would be unlikely that the Company would ever again attract any Jewish clients. Returning to London, David witnesses the banker being killed at his desk by a person from his fathers past David marries the PA and becomes the Master of the Montdrago empire only to learn that a complete Russian plant to manufacture Nuclear weapons had been bought from the Russian mafia who had stolen it from the disintegrating Soviet Union was somewhere on he high seas in a Montdrago owned freighter destined for an Islamic fundamentalist group of terrorists; Mossad, the CIA, MI6 and the Russian mafia all want the plant and only David knows where it is. The superb weapon forged from a billet of Scottish steel prevailed.