Sixteen Horses

by Greg Buchanan

  She never did anything like this again. She’d tried never to think about that strange hour. She hadn’t even been unhappy. She hadn’t had a right to feel like that, to become untethered from her walk home, from her plan for her life, from life and normal living.

  What bad things had ever happened to her, to justify a stupid, selfish act like that? She rewrote it in her mind when she could – that she knew the railway line had been decommissioned, that she’d just been going for a pleasant, sunny walk in her sunny new career.

  She’d left the railway track before it was dark. She overslept that night.

  When at Christmas Cooper’s sister talked about a suicide at her secondary school – a boy who’d gone into the sea, who’d never come back, who they thought might just have been dragged out into the great nothing after biting off more than he could chew – Cooper left the room and went to have another nap.

  That was all she could do with most of the problems in her life, other than shouting, or breaking up, or seeking a solution – any solution – no matter it be good or bad, no matter the cost to her or those she cared about. Certainty mattered more than goodness.

  It was all she could do in the end: crave the certainty of sleep.

  The morning after she and Alec had discovered the crates in the woods, it was cold, or maybe it was just the hotel room.

  The stranger who had knocked, who came to speak with Cooper, was just a man, no mask, no protective gear. He had serious eyes and slow, shifting movements. He wore a white shirt and red tie. It took him a few moments to smile, a practised smile, and it rarely left him after that. He held a small folder of A4 pages in his hand.

  ‘You’re awake,’ he said. ‘That’s good.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  That whole morning, Cooper did not ask for their names.

  They did not offer them.

  They’d passed police officers on the way down and across the hall, she and the man in the red tie with the fake smile. He’d asked if she’d wanted water. She’d said yes.

  ‘I can’t live without it,’ she added, and then, after a pause: ‘Because it’s water, and—’

  ‘What?’

  She had immediate regrets. ‘Nothing.’

  She was nervous, tired.

  The man opened a door for her. He left to fetch her drink.

  It was quieter in here, at least.

  An old man and a middle-aged woman waited for her within.

  This new room was like the one she had woken up in, in its colours at least. The same yellow curtains. The same dark polished wooden shelves. This had been a lounge, once.

  The old man sat across the chamber with a cup of tea. His face was pitted by acne scars, his suit pinstripe black on grey. His hands were upturned, his fingers criss-crossed as if they were about to initiate prayer. His eyes were vacant. He rarely looked at Cooper. He said nothing the whole time they were there.

  The woman, however – she stared right at her. The stranger’s cheek was caught on the edge of a twitch, a slight tremor in her hand as she scratched her ear. She was in her forties, fifties, maybe, though it was hard to tell. She also said nothing, for a while, at least.

  Documents and folders lay around the tables, some bearing the insignia of Public Health, some marked with other acronyms, other government departments and committees.

  The door opened and Cooper stiffened at the surprise of the noise. She knew she needed to calm down. She—

  The man in the red tie came back with Cooper’s water and set it down on a table next to an empty chair.

  Cooper did not sit there.

  ‘You worked on a case for us, once,’ the woman said. ‘Years ago, now . . . We wouldn’t have spoken.’

  There was something careful about her words. As if she was processing something in her mind, some hidden disgust that wasn’t about Cooper, wasn’t about any of them. Something that couldn’t let her go.

  ‘What case?’ Cooper asked, but even as she spoke, the doors opened once more. People came in with croissants, pastries, a covered plate of bacon.

  ‘Feel free to help yourself,’ said the man. ‘And please. Sit down.’

  Cooper did so.

  The waiting staff left.

  The woman went on, buttering a croissant. It was a long time before she was finished, before she finally spoke.

  ‘Tell me about these horses,’ she said, a knife still in her hand.

  ‘What about them?’

  ‘How you came here. What the locals told you. Tell me about it.’

  ‘I mainly worked with the police,’ Cooper said. ‘I didn’t conduct many interviews.’

  The woman kept staring at her, finally eating the croissant. Cooper went on.

  ‘The inspector – Harry Morgan – he phoned my office the afternoon the horses were found.’

  ‘What pieces were found?’ the man asked.

  ‘Decapitated heads. Tails, also.’

  ‘Was that all that was found?’

  One of the documents on the table had a photograph of Alec on it.

  ‘Dr Allen?’ the man went on. ‘I asked if all you found were the heads and tails.’

  ‘Tyre tracks,’ Cooper said, turning back to him. ‘Nothing else from the body itself.’ She paused. ‘Someone had made a campfire nearby – a vagrant interviewed by the police the next day. He claimed to have witnessed the animals’ burial.’ Still they said nothing, they just waited for her to say more. ‘And there was . . . well, there was a bird outside the tents.’ She scratched her arm. ‘It was dying.’

  The man looked over at the woman.

  ‘What happened to the bird?’ he asked, turning back. ‘What was wrong with it?’

  ‘It was infested with parasites. It was having difficulty breathing. I helped it.’

  ‘How?’ the woman asked.

  ‘I snapped its neck.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  The other vet – the quiet one on the phone, who’d spoken of a man and horse screams – she was dead. An overdose of ketamine, most likely stolen and written off as spillage from her surgery. The full catalogue of all those things she had taken, all those things she had ordered on her practice’s behalf, would not be uncovered for weeks. Wires, certainly. Sedatives. Tools.

  Personal protective equipment was missing, large size coveralls too tall for her use, masks, disinfectant.

  No one had noticed.

  The authorities had gone to Kate’s home.

  They had found evidence of blackmail there, a burner phone used around Ilmarsh for the past two months. She had been forced to do so many things. She thought she’d be helping steal the animals at first – that this was all.

  Kate didn’t exist any more.

  Cooper thought of Kate’s mug. I’m not sheepish about doing a good job.

  She didn’t know what to say.

  Kate hadn’t existed for a few hours now.

  She didn’t know what to—

  The man looked through his notes, then he asked Cooper a question. ‘What is your relationship with DS Alec Nichols?’

  ‘Is he OK?’

  ‘Answer the question first.’

  Cooper hesitated. She drank some of her water. ‘He’s a professional. Can be a little . . .’

  ‘A little what?’

  ‘Nervous. Easily riled. He certainly doesn’t have a good appetite for, you know . . .’

  ‘No, I don’t know.’

  ‘He didn’t cope well with the bodies.’

  The man straightened his back, looking over briefly at his superior.

  ‘Did Officer Nichols, or any other person in this place, ever discuss sickness, illness, disease, infection, or contagion?’

  Cooper scratched at her nose. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘What did he discuss with you?’

  The sun was rising now. The noise of people began to thicken on the floors below, like a chorus.

  ‘I’ve answered every question.’ Cooper turned to the woman. ‘Now answer mine.
You haven’t even told me what—’

  ‘It was Bacillus anthracis,’ the woman said. ‘A strain of it, anyway. Fast acting. Killed the older police officer, George Hillard. Two others critical, Alec Nichols included. The evidence suggests anthrax spores were deliberately placed around the horse heads.’

  No one said a thing.

  ‘Show her the letter.’ The woman turned to her colleagues.

  The man in the red tie produced a photocopy from his pile of documents.

  He passed it to Cooper.

  The letter was typed. Before being photocopied by the authorities, it had been stained by some anonymous liquid.

  There was anger in me once. I dreamt at times of being better. We killed to help and in helping I tasted something in me.

  I have burned fires. I am awake and no one saw me and no one will. These things I did I did and no one knew until I let them. I have held the dancing plague. I blossom, now.

  The smile is yours.

  You could have saved him.

  ‘A number of dead birds were discovered in the night. We found copies of this letter in their beaks. Folded down their throats, wrapped in plastic. Their necks broken, just like your broken crow.’

  ‘Where?’ Cooper asked.

  The woman didn’t answer the question.

  The man spoke instead. ‘DS Alec Nichols’s fingerprints were found on the wrapping of several.’

  He took the piece of paper back.

  ‘You were vaccinated years ago, weren’t you?’ The woman paused. ‘The full course. I read it in your file.’ She smiled. ‘It was like you were meant to come here. Like a hero from another hall, come to slay the monster.’ Her smile had no warmth, no feeling. She sat up straight. ‘I’ve read about you.’

  Plants bloomed out in the gardens beyond.

  ‘You were hired for four days, if I understand correctly. We’d like to extend your employment, Dr Allen.’ The woman looked away at last. ‘You’ll be leaving within the hour.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  Their car did not stop at Well Farm. But still, Cooper heard the evidence of their work, saw it, smelt it, even through the partially opened window. The hum of the flies, the birds, the blazing fire.

  How things had changed.

  Men and women sifted through the grass, the reeds, the abandoned soil of the Coles’ farm. They were like shadow puppets in their hazard gear, their dark silhouettes moving against the red horizon. There were thirty of them, maybe more. They had come to catalogue lives.

  Cooper’s new colleague, the woman who had questioned her, she looked out of the window, too. Still, no formal introduction had been made. Her coat had a nametag on it. ADA SOLARIN was printed in bold capital letters above the logo NATIONAL CRIME AGENCY. She could be anyone. She could do anything.

  On the other side of the road the last great fire of November burned.

  It smelt of food at first.

  The black smoke rose.

  During Cooper’s education, they’d sometimes gone to abattoirs. Her first visit had been by herself, back before her interview to get into vet school. It was considered impressive if you organized such a trip – a brave willingness to confront the routine and purposeful slaughter of animals whilst working in a profession dedicated to caring for them.

  So, after reading this online, Cooper had gone. Being a vet had been her dream. Seventeen years old, she’d found the people working in that place to be nice – nicer than many others she would encounter in her rotations – and they’d make light jokes with her, they’d include her in their tea breaks, they’d ask about her hopes.

  Chains jangled as cows were herded through one by one, pigs to follow in the afternoon. The cows did not know of those murdered before them. They were even calm in the run-up, though this turned, as the time came closer, to a slight unease. Before the end, they would understand only that this place was not a good place.

  The pigs, they were different. They knew where they were, they always knew. And they screamed in their knowing, next to all those nice men.

  Cooper thought of those days and other days, as they drove past the smoke of Well Farm.

  She thought of it as she watched the bodies of one hundred and eighty-two sheep systematically tossed onto a pyre. Ada would tell her the number when she asked. The woman had a head for statistics.

  Stack upon stack of wooden pallets stood, sourced from the same supplier who had built the town’s bonfire those days past. Fallen between them, spilling from edges fused by fire and dust and wool and wind, there was a shambling mass of the young and the ewes, burned to cinder, feeding those who came after them, collapsing under the weight of all the dead and dying.

  Cooper said nothing, but her face must have given her away.

  ‘Multiple sheep were infected,’ Ada explained. ‘It’s a precaution. It’s necessary.’

  Ada watched her. Cooper said nothing.

  ‘We found a body in the fields. Too late to do anything.’

  ‘Who?’ Cooper tried to hide her feelings.

  ‘An old man. Collapsed in the marshes. He had soil from the horses’ burial site caked around his fingers. He’d brought his daughter to the hospital . . .’

  Ada paused.

  ‘Then he went back to where he had shown DS Nichols the horses, just a few days before. He sifted through their burial site. Picked at it in his final moments. Collapsed . . .’

  ‘Suicide?’

  Ada shrugged. ‘He spent his final hours alone.’

  He had not survived to see the sun rise.

  They drove on, stopping only for a roadblock.

  When Ada showed her badge, strange officers waved her through.

  No one would ever live here again.

  The streets were empty. Even the market was deserted. Flowers trembled in the growing breeze, red and yellow bending as they passed.

  ‘Will Alec get better?’ Cooper did not turn as she spoke. She just kept watching out of the window.

  After a few moments, Ada answered.

  ‘No one can find his son.’

  The car came to a stop, up near the docks. A boat waited.

  Cooper hesitated. ‘What do you mean, no one can find him?’

  ‘What I said.’ Ada undid her belt. The driver turned off the ignition. ‘Simon Nichols was not at home. Not at any friend’s home. There’s evidence someone was in the car with Alec when he crashed. Mud on one of the back seats . . . A small quantity of blood. Others are looking at that now.’

  She opened her door.

  ‘Come on. That’s our boat.’

  Cooper got out. They’d given her new clothes, a thick jacket. But she’d have to change soon again, anyway.

  The people ahead, they wore hazard protection gear.

  She thought of the letter as they walked.

  She thought of crates, of heads in fields.

  She thought of an abattoir, of cows, of pigs, of the nice people who had killed them.

  The smile is yours.

  You could have saved him.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  The boat cut through fog. It was everywhere, the thickening of the world and air, the collision of warmth and emptiness. The clarity of deserted Ilmarsh was lost to them.

  Cooper retched within the toilet cubicle, shaken from the motion of the boat. She regretted the croissants.

  She went back to the main deck.

  Rust lined the edges of the blue-green metal. White bars stood at regular intervals, metal chains blocking off sections from their access. Ada stood at the end – the stern? The bow? Cooper didn’t know what any of it was called. Ada had her back to all these things.

  She was smoking, a slight grey mingling into the white cloud all around.

  ‘Those things will kill you,’ Cooper said.

  The woman turned.

  ‘We won’t see it till it’s right in front of us,’ Ada said, her voice higher and gentler. ‘The place we’re going to . . . it had a family, once. They lived out here for ye
ars. Raised sheep and pigs. Sold their produce on the mainland.’

  Ada threw her cigarette into the sea.

  Cooper watched it catch in the waves. She’d had a long and complicated history with cigarettes and other toxins. She resolved to give them up, there and then. And it felt strange, the thought occurring. How unimportant, how small it seemed. But even in times like these, no one stopped being themselves. They just had to hide it better.

  The cigarette disappeared in the grey water. Ada continued her story.

  ‘Forty-five years ago, the son left his parents behind. Got a degree. Made something of himself. Did everything he was supposed to do. Got married. Had children. Served his country. I knew him.’

  Still the boat hummed.

  ‘He came back, eventually, he took them all back to meet his parents. And he never went out to the world again.’

  She stared at the fog ahead.

  ‘Fifteen months ago, fishing boats caught sight of a fire out here. By the time a response could be made, most of the family were dead or dying, the animals too. Only the youngest daughter survived.’

  They must be near, now.

  ‘What did the girl tell you?’ Cooper asked.

  Ada ignored the question at first, only speaking after a long hesitation, a sudden straightening that suggested she’d seen something out there. She soon relaxed. ‘The marshes on the island were sewn with a novel strain of anthrax and quantities of amoeba known to assist with germination and replication. No animal vectors required. There was evidence of cultivation. Of an unsound character.’ She hesitated. ‘The daughter told us nothing.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘She had become mute.’ They were nearing the shore now. Cooper could see boats out there. There were people, moving back and forth. Shapes manifested through the thick air. ‘We removed as much as we could. We committed to a clean-up operation months ago, as soon as we had the budget, a plan, at least . . . Signs were erected, warning travellers not to dock. And before you say anything . . . No one came out here, anyway. There was no risk of anything spreading, of person-to-person transmission. Other, similar sites had been left contaminated for far longer with no major incidents. They’re only spores.’