A Necessary Hell

by Nigel Price

  “Indeed.” Harry wondered how to broach the next part of his enquiry. “I’ve been wondering where the poor fellow came from,” he began. Schuler adopted a look of puzzled interest but otherwise left him to continue. “Or rather, originated from.”

  When it became obvious that Harry had no more to add, Schuler responded. “Why?”

  “Curiosity, partly,” Harry said. “But mostly because I have been running a crisis management exercise there over the last few days, so it is possibly relevant.”

  “How could it be relevant?”

  “Please humour me.”

  “Okay. Istanbul presumably. Seeing as that is where the flight was from.”

  “Well, that’s the funny thing,” Harry answered. And proceeded to explain about the state of advancement of the frostbite, and his theory that perhaps the man had endured a previous flight from another location prior to boarding the Portland Aviation aircraft bound for Erwitte.

  Christian Schuler sat back in his chair and studied Harry. He attempted to maintain an air of concern for the victim, though it was fast slipping. He adopted the expression of a man whose office was stacked with more immediate operational problems and who consequently didn’t have time for this.

  “That is interesting, Herr Brown, but I’m not sure why any of this matters.” He corrected himself. “I mean, of course it matters. A man has died. But it was a simple case of a misjudged attempt to enter the country. Maybe the police would be interested in where he came from originally, but other than that, it really has nothing more to do with Portland Aviation. We were just the unlucky airline that this person jumped aboard.”

  “Well you see, that’s another odd thing,” Harry said.

  “How is it odd?”

  “Assuming he wanted to travel to a better life in the west, why would he choose to stowaway on your aircraft, rather than one from a more recognisable airline?”

  Schuler frowned. “I’m not following you, Herr Brown.” He looked pointedly at his watch.

  “I mean, if he wanted to travel into Europe, surely he would have chosen an aeroplane with clear markings. Air France, British Airways, KLM, Lufthansa or Air Berlin, any of those, or any of the numerous others that would be more likely to go to a destination in Europe. Instead he climbs into the wheel well of a completely unmarked aircraft which belongs to Portland Aviation. Completely unmarked and which could, therefore, have been going absolutely anywhere.”

  Schuler scratched his head. “I … er …” He shrugged. “No idea. Maybe that was the only one he could get close to and so decided to take a chance.”

  “Big chance,” Harry said. “I imagine Istanbul airport would have any number of major airlines operating out of it. Yet he chose—”

  “Yes, I understand your point,” Schuler answered curtly. “What can I say?”

  “Do you mind me asking what your plane was carrying?”

  Schuler stiffened, his politeness draining faster than water from a bath plughole. “I beg your pardon?”

  “What was it carrying? Or because you trade in aircraft perhaps it was just the crew, bringing in a plane for sale perhaps?”

  Schuler pushed back his chair and stood up. “Herr Brown, I am afraid I am going to have to disappoint you. First of all, I have no idea. As you note, Portland Aviation is engaged in aircraft trading. We assist airlines in selling older aircraft to other airlines. Then we also charter aircraft for a whole variety of purposes. I have no idea about the details of the one you refer to. I heard about the incident yesterday, but beyond that I have no further information. It is a police matter.”

  He moved towards the door and held it open. Harry got the message.

  “In any case, I am afraid that details of cargos and charters and other operational matters are strictly confidential, as I am sure you can understand. And now, if you will excuse me, I have things I have to attend to.”

  Harry got up and left the room. Schuler saw him down to Reception and let him out. The farewell was polite, accompanied by a curt nod of the head and the stiffest of handshakes. As Harry made his way back to his car, he turned and saw that Schuler was watching his departure.

  He got into the Jaguar, but rather than leave immediately, he cruised round the estate, noting the other occupants. He parked beside the exit and got out. Purely historical interest this time. Beside the exit onto the road, a small squat building was set back from the drive, surrounded by tall weeds. It was an old guardroom. Once it would have housed bored sentries. Decades of ghosts looked out at him through cracked, cobwebbed windows.

  A man on a bicycle rolled past. He raised a hand in greeting. Harry nodded and then added a quick “Guten morgen”.

  The man stopped. “British, ja?”

  “Ja,” Harry answered. The man grinned, happy to be right. “Were you based here?” he asked in heavily-accented English.

  “No, before my time,” Harry said.

  “Ah. Sometimes we get old soldiers coming round. I wonder why they bother.”

  Harry had his own theories but his mind was elsewhere. “Where do you work?” he asked out of politeness.

  “Nagels.” He pointed off somewhere towards the centre of the estate. “We make furniture. Were you visiting us?”

  “No. Portland Aviation,” Harry answered.

  The man laughed. “Second-hand car salesmen for aeroplanes,” he chuckled, enjoying his insult.

  Harry was interested. “Good ones?”

  The man’s eyes widened. “Joking, ja? They sell old planes to poor Asian countries and then they crash.”

  “All of them?”

  “No, of course not all of them. But enough to make me never want to be a passenger on an aircraft bought through them.”

  He was about to move on when Harry called after him. “If they are so bad, how do they stay in business?”

  The man was already on his way, wobbling as he regained momentum. He waved a hand in the air. “That is what we all wonder. Auf wiedersehen.”

  Harry stood by the overgrown guardhouse looking after him. A fresh breeze was scudding across the flat-topped ridge. Upon it, a smell he recognised. Spargel. Somewhere someone was cooking more of the bloody stuff.

  After his meeting with Schuler, the cooking spargel wasn’t the only thing that stank.

  Everything had gone like clockwork.

  Of course it had. Someone had leaked the details of Harry’s exercise to the participants. As every incident had been fed to the emergency response team, they had trotted out textbook reactions, ticking all the boxes. But intelligently, with just enough deviation to keep Harry off the scent. So cleverly that he had fallen for it.

  Harry Brown had been played for a fool. He didn’t like being played for a fool.

  However, if Hafner’s throwaway line had set a little bell tinkling, Schuler’s whole performance just now was a hammer banging on an empty oil drum. Until that, Harry might have stuck on his suspicion that it was a case of cheating. That someone needed to rig the result, for whatever reason. Now Harry’s suspicion was of a different order.

  So. Where to go from here?

  The spargel made him think of the severed hand. The de-gloved finger in particular. He would visit the farm. Herr Müller wouldn’t speak to him, but that didn’t matter. It wasn’t Herr Müller he wanted. It was his son, the creature. To get him on his own. And because he knew his limited German wouldn’t be up to the job, he was going to need an interpreter.

  Twelve

  “Why on earth do you want to go back there?”

  Ingrid’s voice sounded tinny through Harry’s mobile. He had driven to a vantage point high over the Möhnesee and stood leaning against the car, surveying the landscape spread out beneath him. Tree-covered hills stretched into the distance beyond the vast reservoir.

  “I can explain when I see you. It’s complicated. And it’ll probably sound a bit strange.”

  He could hear her sigh. “From you it probably won’t.”

  Harry wasn’t sure ho
w to take that.

  “Listen, Harry. I don’t think this is a very good idea. The old farmer was quite angry.”

  “It’s not him I want to speak to. It’s Godzilla.”

  “Don’t call him that. The poor man.”

  “I’m sorry. The Beast then.”

  “Harry.”

  “Okay. I want to check out a theory about the hand.”

  “But the police have it now, and the body. What can you find out by going back to the farm?”

  “I think the finger was de-gloved by the son. Not by falling from the plane.”

  “How on earth can you know that? And why would he do it?”

  “The bone looked fresh. As if it had only just been exposed. As for why, I’m guessing it had a ring on it and the son liked the look of it. So he ripped it off, skin and all. If so, it might help identify the stowaway.”

  Another sigh, loud and clear. “Surely that is for the police? Shouldn’t you be telling them, not me?”

  This was where it got difficult.

  “Listen, Ingrid. Can I explain when I see you?”

  “Harry. I don’t know.”

  “It’s connected with my job at the airport. I’d rather explain later, face to face. Point is, I have to go back to the farm and it would really help if you would come with me to translate. You’ve heard the extent of my German.”

  Silence. The wind blew across the trees and the lake, up over the hillside and into the speaker of Harry’s phone, muffling her answer.

  “What was that?” he said.

  “I said okay. I’ll come.”

  “Thank you. When can I pick you up?”

  “I can get off work early. My last appointment is at two forty-five. So say about three thirty?”

  “Perfect. I’ll see you then. Same place where I dropped you the other day.”

  They left it there. Harry put away his mobile and looked at the scenery. The sky was unbroken grey cloud from horizon to horizon. Reluctantly he got into the car and rolled back down to the shoreline and along the waterside to the hotel. He got a coffee from the bar and took it back to his room. He sat down, fired up his laptop, opened the file for his report, and scrolled through the notes he had typed up to date.

  He felt like a complete idiot. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t seen it earlier. Once, in Afghanistan, he had been caught in an ambush. The thing was, then he had known. Seconds beforehand. Something had felt just wrong. He’d shouted for his men to hit the deck and, sure enough, the chatter of automatic fire and the incoming screech of RPG7 rockets had started a fraction afterwards. His instinct had saved lives. He’d picked up the same vibes here, yesterday morning. A pity it hadn’t been earlier. He could have gone off script. Thrown new incidents at them. He’d had a glimpse of how they reacted blind yesterday morning. The unscripted incident of the stowaway had seen to that.

  But clockwork? Nothing ever worked like clockwork. Not on a single exercise that Harry had ever run. Why would they want to rig the result? What would be the point? The whole thing was supposed to be a learning exercise. Collaborative. No one was going to get sacked. No one’s job was on the line. So why mess it up?

  He had one theory. Delaney’s had been told there was some urgency. To do with their licence to operate. The state authorising body in the transport ministry, and behind that the UN’s International Civil Aviation Organisation – those would be the guys taking a look at the place. It was fairly routine. So a clean bill of health from someone with Harry’s credentials would avoid more rigorous scrutiny from other, higher authorities.

  But why would they want to avoid more rigorous scrutiny? That was the interesting one.

  After a while Harry went out to the terrace for some lunch. Herr Fischer brought the menu. No he didn’t want the spargel suppe, thank you. Nor the spargel with Hollandaise sauce, nor the spargel on toast, nor …

  A beef sandwich duly arrived with another coffee and the day started the long drag into afternoon. Harry slouched back to his room, taking a third coffee with him. Then more scrolling through his notes. The four key principles for civil aviation emergency response. Tick, tick, tick, tick. Then the twelve main focus areas. More ticks.

  He felt like punching something. Or someone. Mostly himself. The exercise had taken him a fucking month to write.

  At long last a glance at his watch showed it was time to move. With relief he chucked aside his papers, put on his jacket and went out.

  The ride into Soest was a well-trodden path by now. The Jaguar rolled up and over the ridge, under the autobahn and along Arnsberger Strasse. Careful past all the speed cameras, accelerating whenever he had the chance.

  In through the city walls, winding through the increasingly narrow streets until he stopped outside the optician’s. He sat with the engine idling. He wasn’t supposed to park there but he didn’t care. He was a man with a mission.

  The mission eventually came out, saw him, waved and came over. He thought it would be a bit over the top to get out and open the passenger door. Instead he let Ingrid take her seat and then gave her his most enchanting smile. On an impulse he leaned across to kiss her cheek. Halfway there he lost his nerve and adjusted the rear-view mirror instead. She gave him a look that told him she knew it.

  “Let’s go then,” he said.

  As he drove back down Arnsberger Strasse and under the autobahn, he gave her the story. All of it. He thought it was the least he could do if she was going to help him out. She deserved it. Damn breaching confidences. Assuming he was right, any lack of professionalism was theirs not his.

  Ingrid stared at him. “For God’s sake, Harry. You can’t be serious?”

  “We’ll find out.”

  “But shouldn’t you be telling someone else about this?”

  “Once I know what there is to tell, I will. You can bet on it.”

  “The local press is going to love this. In fact, it’ll probably be in the national press. There’ll be cameras all over the place.”

  Harry glanced at her to see if she was excited or appalled at the prospect of becoming involved. Hard to tell. A bit of both perhaps.

  The winding approach to the ridge rose before them. The Jaguar purred easily upwards, cruising effortlessly along the country roads. Then down into the bend leading to the Müller’s farm. Judging it unwise to drive into the farmyard, Harry passed it and found a shallow lay-by a little way beyond. He pulled in and turned off the engine.

  “Are you ready for this?” he asked. Ingrid didn’t look happy about it but got out all the same.

  They walked back towards the farm entrance and along the drive. To left and right, no one. Just the same piles of chicken shit, the same puddles and mud. Crossing the farmyard they were tensed for a shout or some form of challenge. None came.

  They reached the edge of the asparagus field. The same parallel rows of plastic-covered mounds lay before them. As far as they could see, there was no one working in the field.

  There was a noise behind them. They turned. Coming out of one of the building, the creature loped in their direction, eyes intent on something in his hand. He looked up, saw them, and hurriedly stuffed it in his pocket. He stopped, observing the two beings who were observing him. Harry raised a hand in greeting. He felt like the human figure etched onto the side of the Pioneer space probe, except with clothes on.

  To his relief, the creature grinned and raised a hand, this time his own. Harry and Ingrid took a couple of steps towards him. “Ask him,” Harry prompted.

  Ingrid cleared her throat and said, very deliberately, “That hand you showed us yesterday. Did it have a ring …?”

  “No,” Harry hissed. “Remember what I said. Otherwise he’ll just shake his head and deny it.”

  She glared at him, then said to the creature, “I mean, that hand, the one that was wearing the ring. Do you still have the ring or did you give it to the police?”

  The creature thought deeply about this, brow furrowed with the effort. Eventually he shook his head
.

  “So that’s a no,” Ingrid said.

  “Perhaps you should have separated the two questions.”

  Another glare was fired his way.

  Ingrid started to speak again, but before she got into it, the creature dug a hand in his pocket and fished something out of it. His fist was clenched. Whatever it held was cushioned in the tight flesh.

  Harry and Ingrid swapped a glance. “Is that the ring?” Ingrid asked.

  The creature processed the question and then nodded.

  “Can I see it?” Harry asked, testing his German again.

  The creature remained motionless, his face a cartoon caricature of suspicion. Harry dug into his own pocket and produced a bag of Gummi Bears. He took one out and popped it in his mouth. The creature perked up and stared.

  Harry held out the packet. The creature took a step forward and moved one hand towards the packet. Harry pulled it back out of reach and popped another in his mouth.

  “What are you doing?” Ingrid said.

  “Preparing to trade.”

  “That’s hardly fair. An open packet of Gummi Bears for a ring.”

  “We haven’t seen the ring yet.”

  “How many have you eaten?”

  “Just the two. I bought the packet to trade. You wouldn’t catch me putting this crap in my stomach unless I had to.”

  The creature grunted crossly. He took another lurching step forward. Harry scowled and pulled the packet further out of range. Then, as if the thought had only just occurred to him, he offered it to the creature. When the creature reached to take it, Harry pulled it away again and pointed to the clenched fist with his free hand. Slowly the creature got the message. The inner struggle between two desires was ferocious. Keep the ring or have the Gummi Bears?

  The Gummi Bears won. The trade was completed, and the two sides drew apart.

  Harry was about to examine what his Gummi Bears had bought him, when Ingrid cried out. A burst of German blasted in Harry’s ear. He spun round, stuffing the ring in his pocket. A tall, thickset man had Ingrid by the collar, spinning her round. It looked as if he was about to slap her across the face.