by Mark Tilbury
Duggan paced back and forth in front of the fire. Although confident locking Clancy in the basement was the right thing to do, he couldn’t help wondering if it might cause additional problems in the future. After all, you didn’t pacify a wasp by putting it in a jam jar, did you?
Bella, dressed in a clean red tracksuit, crossed her legs and smiled. ‘You okay, Master?’
Duggan tried to return the grin but only managed a sneer. ‘As well as can be expected, considering the pressure I’m under.’
‘Would you like me to relieve some of that pressure once Sir Bernard has been dealt with?’
A tempting prospect, but indulgence would have to wait until the Good Ship Thorndike was sailing in calmer waters. ‘Not tonight. I’m going to hit the hay after Clancy’s been put to sleep.’
Bella nodded. ‘Maybe it’d be best all round if we simply eliminated him.’
‘I wish we could.’
‘But no one will know he’s here, will they? He’s hardly gonna tell anyone what he gets up to in his spare time.’
Duggan shrugged. ‘Parliament’s infested with his type. I can’t afford to assume he’s not confided in someone.’
‘I doubt it. They’re all pretentious bastards.’
‘That’s as maybe, Bella, but it’ll be enough for him to wake up and learn both the boys have gone to their graves. I mean, he can hardly reconstruct them and demand answers, can he?’
‘What are you gonna tell him when he wakes up?’
‘That he was interrogating the boys and he collapsed.’
The doorbell chimed and interrupted the conversation.
‘You get it, Bella. The least I see of his ugly mug, the better.’
‘Yes, Master.’
She came back a few moments later with a wet and breathless politician. ‘Sir Bernard Clancy to see you.’
Duggan held out a hand. ‘Hello, Bernard. Weather bad?’
Clancy didn’t shake the proffered hand. ‘That’s a daft question to ask in England. Weather’s always bloody bad.’
‘True.’ He turned to Bella. ‘Make Sir Bernard a coffee, dear. Oh, and put a nip of brandy in it to take the chill out of his bones.’
Clancy got straight down to business. ‘Where’s the boy?’
Duggan’s confidence slipped a notch. What if Clancy didn’t drink his coffee? Demanded to go straight to the basement? ‘All in good time, Sir Bernard. First of all, I want to give you an update. There’s been a slight development.’
Clancy sat on the sofa. ‘What development?’
‘Number Nine’s remembered something.’
‘What?’
‘I’ll let Bella tell you. She’s the one who’s been interrogating him.’
Clancy ran a hand through his sodden hair. He took a cotton handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed his wet face. ‘This had better be good, Karl. I’m on budget time, and I can’t afford to waste it listening to piffle and hearsay. I need to find out what that boy knows.’
‘I understand. But it would be far better to hear what Bella’s learned before you go blundering in.’
Clancy shivered. ‘I don’t blunder, Karl. I look at stone-cold facts, and it doesn’t look good from where I’m sitting.’
Ruining my best leather couch with your fat, wet backside, more like. ‘What do you mean?’
‘None of us know what he’s said in private to his parents or sister, do we? They could be imparting information to the police as we speak.’
Duggan took a deep breath. ‘I’ve already told you, Sir Bernard. Thanks to Dean, we’re fully aware of what Number Nine remembers because he had to spend a considerable amount of time with that dreadful sister of his. She confided everything to him.’
‘From my experience, everyone on the planet holds something back.’
Duggan’s patience was wearing as thin as Clancy’s hair. ‘What do you suggest? I send Dean to kill the rest of the family?’
Clancy seemed to consider this suggestion briefly. ‘No. Of course not. But you’re not the one who had his name bandied about.’
‘The therapist’s dead, Bernard. The dead can’t tell tales.’
‘What if he told someone prior to his demise.’
Duggan sighed. ‘No offence, but all your years of mixing with politicians has made you paranoid.’
Bella returned with a steaming mug of coffee and placed it on the table. ‘Two sugars and a dash of cream, Sir Bernard. Exactly as you like it.’
Clancy grunted and studied the drink as if it might be laced with truth serum. ‘Karl tells me you’ve got an update on Number Nine, Bella?’
Bella sat next to Duggan. Crossed her legs. ‘Yes.’
‘And?’
Duggan prayed Bella would manage to stall him as planned.
Bella uncrossed her legs, stroked her wig, and said, ‘He seems to think he’s been abducted by aliens.’
Clancy blew steam from the rim of his mug and took a sip. ‘What the bloody hell’s that supposed to mean?’
‘He’s no longer, shall we say, in the room. His mind’s shutting down.’
‘Why? What have you done to him?’
Bella shrugged. ‘Nothing. But he seems to be deranged. Suffering hallucinations and delusions of grandeur.’
Clancy sipped his drink, brow furrowed, eyes darting left and right. ‘Perhaps he’s yanking your chain.’
‘He’s not in any fit state to do anything,’ Duggan said. ‘From what I hear, it’s common for the mind to shut down when under duress.’
Clancy finished his coffee in silence. Banged the mug down on the table. ‘I’ll shut the little bugger down when I get my hands on him.’
Bella leaned forward. ‘But, don’t you see, it doesn’t matter what you do to him. He’s in a non-negotiable state. I’ve tried everything possible to get information out of him. He was claiming to be Winston Churchill just half an hour before you arrived.’
Clancy’s head drooped. ‘Churchill be damned. I… I…’
Duggan stood. ‘Sir Bernard?’
The politician rubbed his eyes. Yawned. Sank back in his seat. Yawned again.
‘Are you all right, Bernard?’
‘He looks extremely tired, Master,’ Bella said. ‘Must be all those late nights in Westminster catching up with him.’
Duggan laughed. ‘You could well be right, Bella. You could well be right.’
Clancy’s head slumped forward. He snored several times and mumbled something incomprehensible about bananas.
Bella joined The Master. ‘Let’s put the poor little lamb to bed.’
Getting Clancy into the basement was easy. They simply shoved the roly-poly politician down the steps. Well, halfway to be precise; he got wedged between the wall and a railing support. But getting him to the basement steps had taken nearly all the fuel left in Duggan’s tank.
With the basement door finally locked, and the politician dead to the world, Duggan leaned against the kitchen wall, panting. ‘He must weigh at least fifty stone in his birthday suit.’
Bella laughed. ‘At least he’ll keep the worms well-fed when he finally pops his clogs.’
They walked back to the lounge. Duggan went to the drinks cabinet. This was no time for fine wine; he wanted something that was guaranteed to carry him off to slumber land. He took the top off the whisky decanter and poured a generous measure of the amber liquid into a glass. Turned to Bella. ‘Would you like one?’
She nodded. ‘Bugger meditation, my back needs pain relief.’
Relaxing together on the couch with their drinks, Bella asked, ‘So, what do we do now, Master?’
Duggan took a slug of whisky. Flashed up an oven in his belly. ‘We’ll finish punishing Seven and Nine tomorrow. Then chop them up and put them in the freezer.’
‘Sounds like a plan.’
‘Ideally, I’d stretch their suffering out for another week, but under the circumstances, it’d be best to get rid before Clancy wakes up.’
‘Agreed.’
&nb
sp; Duggan took another large gulp of his drink. Coughed. Rubbed his watering eyes. ‘It might be in order to drown Number Seven in the fish tank. Let them have a little nibble on his nose before he departs.’
Bella smiled. ‘That’ll teach him to stick it into other people’s business.’
‘Indeed. As for Number Nine, I want to skin that little upstart alive and feed his heart to the piranhas for all the trouble he’s caused me.’
Bella finished her drink. Stood. ‘I can’t wait to get started, Master.’
‘Me, neither. Good night, dear. And thanks for being my anchor in such stormy seas.’
She smiled sweetly. ‘It will always be so, Master. It will always be so.’
Chapter Forty-Seven
Tommy had now been missing for three days. To Danielle, it seemed like three months. Every passing hour stripped away another layer of hope. She walked downstairs and into the living room where her mother was staring absently at the TV. Two middle-aged women were arguing on the Coronation Street cobbles. Danielle had enjoyed watching the soaps before real-life drama had invited itself to Feelham. Now, it just seemed like a load of trivial nonsense.
‘Where’s Dad?’
‘No idea.’ Rachel didn’t look at her. She sniffed loudly. ‘Probably out searching for Tommy. Or down the shed hiding himself away like he always does.’
Danielle thought her mother was being unfair. Her father was doing the best he could given the appalling circumstances. ‘Any news?’
‘Do you think I’d be sitting here if there was?’
‘Sorry.’
‘I can’t bear this. It’s mental torture.’
‘Tell me about it.’
‘I wish the police would do what they’re paid for and find him. I keep imagining all sorts of terrible things.’
Danielle searched for something positive to say. Found nothing. Tommy was dead. She knew it in her heart. Dean, too. Whether he was involved in her brother’s disappearance was no longer important; they were both missing, and until the police found them, everything else was simply speculation.
Rachel finally glanced at her daughter, eyes brimming with tears. ‘What have we done wrong? It’s as if God’s punishing us.’
Danielle almost told her God wasn’t punishing anyone, because He wasn’t real. But this was no time to get into a debate about the legitimacy of God. ‘Bad things happen all the time, Mum. It doesn’t mean everyone’s being punished.’
Rachel plucked at a cushion. ‘I’ve always done my best to lead a decent life. Gone to church. Prayed for the less fortunate. Volunteered for charity. And what do I get in return?’
‘It’s not—’
‘Condemned to a living hell.’
Danielle had no argument with that. ‘But we can’t lose hope, Mum. Remember when he disappeared before? We all thought he’d never come back. Imagined all sorts of horrible stuff. But he did, didn’t he? Just when we’d completely given up hope of seeing him again, he turned up at the hospital.’
‘With a fractured skull and half a dozen other injuries.’
‘But he was alive.’
‘Just.’
Danielle knew her half-hearted attempt to be optimistic was stupid. It was obvious Tommy wasn’t coming back, injured or otherwise. The best she could hope for was whoever had taken him would get their just desserts one day. She certainly didn’t believe Dean was the only one involved. There had to be someone else. Someone who’d put Dean up to it. Got him to do their dirty work for them.
Rachel abandoned her chair and went to the window. Peered outside. ‘I wish the police would say something. It’s as if we’ve been left in a vacuum. I swear to God my head’s going to explode.’
Danielle knew exactly how her mother felt. Times ten.
The doorbell rang and they both jumped.
‘Who the hell’s that?’ Rachel said, leaning closer to the window.
Danielle’s heart picked up speed. ‘Maybe it’s the police.’
‘There’s no car outside.’
The bell rang again.
Danielle walked into the hall. ‘I’ll get it.’
She opened the front door. Jordan. What was he doing here?
Jordan jigged from one foot to the other. ‘Hi, Danielle. Dad said he saw on the news Tommy’s gone missing again. Is that right?’
She nodded, tears stinging the backs of her eyes.
‘Only I think I know where he is.’
Danielle’s heart thudded. ‘How?’
‘I gave him Aiden’s old smart watch so he could stay in touch and stuff. I put a load of photos and music on it for him. But there was also a tracking app Aiden downloaded when he was at army cadets.’
Danielle invited him in. Closed the door.
Jordan reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his phone. He tapped the menu and brought up a page showing a map of Oxford.
Danielle squinted at the screen. There was a small red cross marked on the map.
Jordan tapped the screen again and read out, ‘OX19 BPD. That’s the postcode for where he is.’
‘Are you sure?’
Jordan bobbed his head. ‘Yeah. At least, it means he’s somewhere pretty close.’
Danielle gawped at the screen as if it had performed witchcraft. ‘Jesus. I’ve gotta call the police.’
Rachel walked into the hall. ‘What is it? What’s happened?’
‘Jordan says he knows where Tommy is,’ Danielle said. ‘He gave Tommy a watch, and it’s got a tracing app on it.’
Rachel appeared as if the news had sucked all the strength from her legs. She held on to the wall for support, mouth hanging open.
Danielle hurried back to the lounge, grabbed her phone from the table, and called DS Baker on his personal number.
He answered after what seemed like an eternity. ‘Baker?’
‘It’s Danielle Scarlett.’
‘I was about to call you. How can I help?’
‘We’ve located Tommy.’
‘Really? Where?’
‘He’s somewhere in Oxford. His mate gave him a smart watch with a tracking app on it, and he’s managed to locate him.’
‘Okay. Give me the phone number and the postcode for the location and I’ll get the boys from Oxford get on to it. Tell them we’ll need as Armed Response Unit in attendance. I’ll be straight over.’
Danielle disconnected the call.
Rachel ran a trembling hand through her hair. ‘Well?’
‘DS Baker’s coming over.’
Rachel called up the stairs. ‘Charlie? You up there?’
No answer.
She hurried towards the kitchen. ‘I’m gonna check down the shed. If he’s not there, I’ll ring his mobile.’
‘Do you want me to leave?’ Jordan asked.
Danielle looked at him as if she’d seen him for the first time. ‘Huh?’
‘Do you want me to get outta the way?’
‘No. You wait here for the police. They’ll need to see your phone. Come on through to the lounge.’
Danielle offered him a seat at the dining table. Her thoughts were racing in a dozen different directions all at once, underpinned by a certainty it was already too late to help her brother. He was either already dead or had been moved to a different location.
‘Please, God,’ she whispered. ‘Just for once, please let things turn out all right.’
***
It took Baker fifteen minutes to arrive. He was accompanied by Constable Finlay, a tall, gaunt man with a constant look of surprise on his face. The two policemen declined the offer of a seat and stood inside the lounge doorway.
‘My husband’s on his way,’ Rachel said. ‘He’s been out searching for him along the Bunky Line.’
Baker looked at Jordan. ‘I understand you’ve got some information, son?’
Jordan nodded. Handed his phone to the detective.
Baker studied the screen. ‘Have you called the number?’
‘Yeah. Three times, but Tommy di
dn’t answer.’
Baker smiled at Jordan. ‘So, this tracker’s on Tommy’s smart watch?’
‘Yeah. I gave it to him after he got outta hospital. It used to be my brother’s.’
Baker handed the phone to Finlay. ‘Get on to Oxford and tell them to get an available unit out there straight away. Make sure they’ve got a ram, but tell them not to do anything until we get there.’
He nodded and went into the hall, ducking instinctively under the doorway.
Finlay returned to the lounge a few minutes later. ‘The location has come back as Thorndike House. It’s not far off the Botley Road. They’re sending a unit to meet us at The Prince of Wales Pub and take it from there.’
‘Okay. Good. Let’s go.’
Rachel grabbed Baker’s arm as he was about to leave. ‘Bring him back safe. Please, Detective, bring my son home safe.’
Baker nodded. ‘We’ll do our best Mrs Scarlett. I promise you.’
Danielle sat on the sofa. She didn’t doubt Baker would do his best, but sometimes that simply wasn’t good enough, was it? Especially when you were dealing with the purest form of evil.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Tommy’s body temperature was hovering on the edge of hypothermic. His teeth rattled constantly, and his lips were a dangerous shade of purplish-blue. At least the cold had gone some way to lessen the pain in the rest of his body, but that was of little consolation.
Olly was no longer moving or responding to Tommy. He lay facing the wall, curled into the foetal position. Tommy hoped the other boy was dead. At least he’d be out of this hellhole. No longer at the mercy of Bella and her hideous slave owner.
He looked at the man lying halfway down the steps. It was anyone’s guess who he was or what he was doing there. Tommy didn’t have the energy or the inclination to think about it. The man’s size brought the driver to mind, but he was already dead, wasn’t he?
The door swung open. Protested on its hinges. Tommy lifted his head and saw Bella and The Master walking down the steps.
‘Shall we drag him to the bottom?’ Bella asked. ‘Or leave the Grand Old Duke of Pork neither up nor down?’
The Master kicked the man in the side. ‘I should’ve installed an engine hoist down here. Made life a lot easier. My back feels as if it’s been stomped on by an elephant.’