by Mark Dawson
“I’ll take care of them.”
He knew what that euphemism must mean. “We could talk about that.”
“You need to know something else, too. I don’t want to get our relationship off on the wrong foot, but I have the evidence to prove what Control did. Milton gave it to me. I sent it to the government. They have it just as they want it at the moment: Control is gone and you’ve taken his place with no fuss and no noise. Smooth and seamless. But it wouldn’t take very much to rake over those coals again. I could easily send it all to a newspaper.”
“That sounds like a threat.”
“Depends how you take it,” she said. “That’s not what I want it to sound like.”
“What do you want it to sound like?”
“I want you to have all the information you need when you make your decision to work with me.”
She was confident and she had reason to be; she had a strong hand. “What exactly would you want?”
“Oliver Spenser is dead. I want the four agents who were responsible for the murder of my husband and the abduction of my little girl. Their names are Lydia Chisholm, Connor English, Joshua Joyce and Bryan Duffy. Chisolm might be dead. If she is, I want solid proof of it. The other three are out there somewhere. I want GCHQ to make finding them a top priority, and then I want you to pass me the information. I’ll take care of what happens after that.”
“But we wouldn’t have to worry about them?”
“They’ll go quiet. You wouldn’t have to worry about them.”
A car went by, sweeping its headlights into the cabin and, for a moment, he saw her hard, implacable face. “No,” he said. “I don’t think we would.”
“And most of all I want Control.”
“That’s five,” Pope said. “How are you going to get all of them?”
“One at a time.” He heard the door open. “I’m going to get out of the car now. I’m not unreasonable. I know you’ll have to give this some thought.”
“I’ll need a couple of days.”
“You can have a week. I’m not going anywhere.”
“How will I find you?”
“You won’t,” she said. “I’ll find you.”
Beatrix Rose stepped out of the car. Pope found he had been holding his breath. He looked in the wing mirror and watched as she stepped between the two cars parked behind him, turned to the left, and then disappeared. He stayed where he was for a long minute, staring into the dark and watching the lights of the stacked planes as they patiently waited for their chance to land. She was a dangerous woman, he knew that much for sure. Dangerous didn’t even cover it. Ten years of enforced exile would have filled her to the brim with spite and bitterness and there was no telling what consequences that might have.
How reliable was she? How much could he trust her?
She did have a point, though: he had no idea about any of the men and women that had been bequeathed to him. Were there any bad apples? Which ones? Were they all bad apples? And she had the evidence of Control’s corruption. It was difficult to imagine how deep down the rabbit hole that would go if it ever saw the light of day.
He heard the sound of a high performance motorcycle engine somewhere behind the car. A single high beam headlight cut through the dusk and a red, white and green Ducati 1098 roared by the outside of the car. The engine growled and the rear light cluster glowed red as the rider braked at the exit and then, as the gate lifted, the engine howled again as the rider fed revs and accelerated onto the road and away.
Pope shook his head. The way he saw it, he really didn’t have any choice. If he didn’t take up Rose’s offer, she would probably find them all herself. It would just take a little longer. In the meantime, she could bring down British intelligence. Didn’t it make better sense to take advantage of the very particular set of skills that she could bring to the table?
Pope started his car and pulled away.
The motorcycle was already long gone.
Chapter Fifty
MILTON SMILED at the steward and handed him his boarding card. The man checked it and smiled in return, welcoming him on board and directing him down to the right, into economy. He had a window seat just in front of the wing. He nodded at the woman sitting in the aisle and she unclipped her belt and stood so that he could sit. He sat down and stuffed the copy of Great Expectations that he had bought in the airport shop into the mesh pouch on the back of the seat in front of him. Space was a little tight and his knees bumped up against the seat. He looked out of the window at the runway and the terminal buildings beyond. The headlights of the service vehicles that buzzed around the big jet raked across the runway.
The woman next to him bumped her elbow against his as she gripped his armrest by mistake.
“I’m sorry,” the woman next to him said. “My nerves are awful. I’m a terrible flyer.”
“Quite alright,” Milton said.
She was quiet as the plane rolled down the taxi-way, following the queue of jets waiting for their take-off slots. As they swung around at the end of the approach, perpendicular to the start of the runway, the angle allowed them to watch the BA flight ahead of them as its engines boomed and it climbed slowly into the air.
“I hate take off the worst of all,” the woman said.
Her face was a little pale. Milton gave her his most reassuring smile. “You probably know the statistics. You were more likely to get into a situation on the way to the airport than you are now.”
“Thanks,” she said. “I’m Sadie.”
Milton didn’t really want to get into a conversation; he would have preferred to read his book for an hour or two and then try and catch some sleep. “I’m John.”
“Is this business or pleasure?”
He thought about that; it was an excellent question.
“A bit of both.”
“What do you do?”
“I’m between jobs.”
She carried on talking, vague sentences tumbling out with nervous energy. Milton kept an open, friendly expression to his face and made the appropriate responses when they were required, but he quickly zoned her out. This was business, not pleasure. He had been unable to decide upon his destination after Pope left and so he had bought a newspaper and a sandwich and found an empty seat. He had opened the newspaper and started to read, trusting that something would present itself. The story that finally caught his eye was on the tenth page, buried in the international news. It had snagged his attention and, no matter how much he tried to think about something else, he could not. He made up his mind. He finished the sandwich and went to buy a one-way ticket from the desk.
The pilot jockeyed the jumbo around until it was on the runway, nose pointing straight down the centreline. The engines cycled up and the jet lurched forwards. The woman stopped speaking, gripping her armrests so hard that her knuckles showed white through the skin on the back of her hands. Milton looked out of the window as they sped through the buildings, the lights merging into a multi-coloured blur. They roared through the terminal and out the other side and the cabin tilted gently as the jet took to the air. Front wheels, back wheels, and up. Milton kept watching as the airport opened up beneath them, and then the lights of the towns and villages that surrounded it, the cars on the motorway, the late night train that snaked its way east towards London. He looked down on England wondered when he would see it again. Perhaps he never would.
John Milton closed his eyes and thought about what he was going to do next.
THE SWORD OF GOD
A John Milton Novel
Mark Dawson
PART ONE
Chapter 1
SHERIFF LESTER GROGAN saw the man on the shoulder of the road, hauling a heavy pack in the direction of Truth. He was a hundred yards away when he noticed him for the first time, so he slowed the cruiser in order to take a better look. From behind, he looked just like any other hiker who passed through the hills in this part of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. He was a little over average height
, and he looked lithe. He looked strong, too, judging by the amount that he was carrying without appearing to struggle. There was a large backpack over his back with several smaller bags lashed to it and, carried on a strap so that it crossed diagonally across his bag, there was a rifle.
Grogan drew up alongside and slowed the car to his pace. He reached for the button to slide down the electric window.
“Hold up there, partner?”
The man stopped. He looked across to him. “Yes?”
“How you doing?”
“I’m fine.”
Grogan quickly assessed him. He was dirty and dishevelled, with long dark hair that reached down to his shoulders, matted and twisted at the ends, and a thick, shaggy beard. His clothes were dirty, too. His jeans were frayed at the cuffs and patched in several places, and his hiking boots were caked with mud. He had the bluest, coldest eyes that Grogan had ever seen. They burned out from beneath heavy brows with an icy fire, and as the man turned to look at him in return, he felt momentarily disconcerted.
“Lester Grogan,” he said by way of introduction. “You’re just coming up to Truth. Couple of miles up the road.”
“I know.”
“And I’m the sheriff.”
The man just nodded.
“And what’s your name, friend?”
“John.”
“John?” he said, pressing for something that he could run through the computer.
“That’s right.”
“You got a second name?”
“Sure.”
Lester started to feel irritated. “You want to stop giving me attitude and tell me what it is?”
“Have I done something wrong?”
“Not that I know of. I just like to know who’s coming into my town.”
“Milton.”
“All right then, Mr. Milton. Good to make your acquaintance. What you out here for?”
“Just walking.”
“Just walking?”
“That’s right.”
“From where?”
“Trout Creek.”
“And where are you headed?”
The man shrugged, the backpack riding up his shoulders a little as he did so. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Wherever I end up, I guess.”
Lester Grogan had been a policeman for twenty years, and he hadn’t lasted as long as that without having learned to trust his instincts. And, right here, this guy was pressing all kinds of the wrong buttons: he was evasive, he had an attitude on him, he looked like a bum. None of those characteristics made him feel a whole lot better about him, or the prospect of him coming into his little town.
“You planning on staying in Truth?”
“Thought I might.”
“You want a ride?”
The man shook his head. “No, thanks. I’m good.”
Lester reached across and opened the passenger door. “Seriously,” he said. “Let me give you a ride. Take the weight off.”
“I’m fine, Sheriff.”
“Get in the car, John.”
The man fixed him with those cold blue eyes again and, for a moment, Grogan thought he was going to call his bluff. That might have meant it would get interesting. But just as he was sliding his right hand down to his holster and his pistol, Milton shrugged the pack off one shoulder and then the other, opened the rear door, and slung it inside. He unslung the rifle and placed it carefully next to the pack, shut the door and got into the front next to him.
“All right,” Lester said. “Let’s go.”
LESTER DROVE west, following the long straight line of Highway 28, crossed the bridge over the Presque Isle River, and continued to Truth. They passed the mailboxes of the big houses on the edge of town and kept going, passing the sign for the KOA Indoor Playground and the strip mall with the gas station, the ATV rental shop, and the Pizza Hut that had only recently been opened. He had lived here ever since he had come back from the Gulf, and every little detail about it was familiar to him, from the wide-open spaces between the businesses to the ever-present green of the forest on the fringes of town. There was the four-way junction where old man McDonald had crashed his pickup into the UPS van last week. Johnny’s Bar where, last night, he had been forced to stop a fist fight between Thor Bergstrom’s boy and a couple of hikers who had been a little too enthusiastic with their drinking. He knew it all.
It was a peaceful, pleasant town. Small, just over a thousand residents, never too busy and it rarely presented any kind of challenge when it came to policing. Lester liked to think of himself as a modest man, but he was quite sure that the firm way that he went about his job was one of the main reasons for that. He kept on top of things, never allowing problems to develop, stamping them out quickly and decisively. That was what he was paid to do and he took pride in his job.
The man sitting in the car next to him could become a problem. Lester was able to read the signs. He was going to make sure it didn’t happen that way.
They reached the junction with Falls Road, the main drag that led into the centre of town. There was a blue sign for the state police and another for Big Trout Falls. The lights changed to red and Lester drew up to a stop.
“So,” he said as he waited for the lights to change, “where are you from?”
“Here and there,” the man, Milton, said.
“You don’t say much, do you?”
“I don’t have much to say.”
“What about that accent? What is that, English?”
“That’s right.”
“That’s not an accent we hear all that much up around here.”
Milton said nothing. The longer Lester was in his company, the more uncomfortable he became. His initial impression, as he had watched him on the side of the road, had been that he was a vagabond, a drifter. The kind of man who, in his experience, only brought aggravation to a place. He wasn’t so sure about that now, but, after talking to him, the initial reason for his reluctance to allow him into town had been superseded by something else. It wasn’t fear, because it took a lot to frighten Lester, it was more of an apprehensiveness that this John Milton was trouble. He was closed off, opaque to the point of being unhelpful, and it made Lester nervous. He acted like he had something to hide. The reasons for his unease might have changed, but his initial conclusion was the same: this was not the sort of man that Lester wanted in his town.
The lights changed to green. Instead of taking the right that led into Truth, he drove on. Milton turned his head to watch through the window as the glow of the town disappeared behind them, and then, when he turned back, he almost started to speak. Lester stiffened in anticipation. But Milton changed his mind, and, with a thin smile breaking across his face, he stayed quiet yet again.
Lester kept on driving west. They passed the sign that said YOU ARE NOW LEAVING TRUTH – COME BACK SOON and then, at that point, there could be no further doubt. Still Milton said nothing. Lester drove on another mile until the blue expanse of East Lake was visible on the left, and there he slowed the cruiser and pulled into the lot that served the campsite beyond. He turned off the road and crunched across the stones and gravel until he came to a stop. Dusk had fallen fully now, and beyond the wooden guard rail and the gentle slope of the terrain lay the wide tract of the water.
He switched off the engine. “I hope that was helpful.”
Milton opened the door and got out of the car. He opened the rear door and took out his gear.
“There’s a campsite over yonder.” Lester pointed down to the shore. “It’s ten bucks or something to stay the night. But if that’s a problem, you let them know that Lester Grogan sent you. They’ll look the other way.”
Still Milton did not reply.
“Goodnight, then,” Lester said, reaching across for the door handle. He pulled it shut and lowered the window. “Look after yourself.”
Milton put his right arm through the straps of his big pack, hoisted it off the ground, and settled it across his shoulders. He picked up his rifl
e and turned back to the cruiser. “I’ll be seeing you around.”
Lester’s hand hovered over the start button. He looked back at him with a smile on his face, but he made sure there was steel in his voice when he replied, “No. You won’t.”
He stared out at the man, saw him looking down at him, felt that same jolt of disquiet and, hoping that he had just misinterpreted his meaning, pressed the button and put the cruiser into reverse. The night was drawing in quickly now, and the lights flicked on automatically, the beams sweeping out over the still water, catching the insects in the bright shafts. The gravel crunched beneath the tyres as Lester put the car into drive, rumbled away to the road, and turned right to head back into town.
Chapter 2
MILTON WATCHED the lights of the cruiser as it headed down the half mile of straight before the road bent to the left and was swallowed up in the dark embrace of the tree line. That, he thought, had been almost comical in its unexpectedness. He looked down at himself. He supposed he did look a little rough and ready, a little ragged around the edges, but he had been living off the land for the past few weeks, and modern amenities had been few and far between. What did they expect around here? A haircut and a manicure? A lounge suit?
He had started out in Ohio. That had been where the trouble had started and where he had decided that the best way to insulate himself from temptation was just to put as much distance between himself and it as possible. He had bought the things that he needed in Akron and then set out into the wilderness, skirting the southern shore of Lake Erie, turning north at Toledo and then following the water north into Michigan. He had walked most of the way, occasionally breaking up the journey by hitching or, on one occasion, smuggling himself into the empty boxcar of a freight train that rumbled north out of Flint. He stayed away from towns, skirting them when he could, and had found quiet spots to sleep in his tent. It had been peaceful and calming, exactly what he had needed to quieten the clamour in his head.