by Mark Gatiss
I walked to the front desk and asked for Kingdom’s room. A sweating concierge in a heavy uniform told me that Mr Kum was on the second floor in Room 209.
I could go up and see him. There had been something there, beneath the boy’s bravado, I was sure of it. And I could do with some affection.
But I didn’t go upstairs. Instead, I left the hotel and walked beneath the palms that lined the driveway. I was Lucifer Box. And I didn’t need anyone.
The blare of a car horn snapped me from my reverie and I watched as a flotilla of limousines glided past on the main road, the flags on their bonnets fluttering. No doubt various dignitaries arriving for the World Government Summit. The cars drew up outside a huge, domed conference centre. They were busy people. In a hurry. Not yesterday’s men.
I cursed my self-pity and tried to pull myself together.
Out on the promenade, the sea was indistinguishable from the night sky but the glowing lights of a ship thrilled with their own romance. I listened to the sound of the surf and then to the shuffle of my shoes on the cracked pavement. I scarcely glanced at the various restaurants and shops that lined the sea-front. Then a harsh, flapping sound made me look up.
I was in front of what looked like some kind of concert hall, cream-painted and monumental. It was flanked on both sides by flagpoles that rattled in the breeze. Long skeins of fabric had been attached to them lengthways and I squinted to make out the design on them: a fleur-de-lys. I stepped closer. Under the emblem, picked out in black on gold was the legend The Great Scout Jamboree.
I stopped dead, baffled. Then it dawned on me. Of course! The Jamboree! I’d only half-listened, back when I’d taken Christmas to that wretched Scout camp. Was it possible? Not Kingston-on-Thames but Kingston, Jamaica? Could my little boy be here? I felt a sudden, very pressing and slightly tipsy need to see the little mite. Now I knew I really had hit a low point. I should see a doctor.
I walked up the wide marble steps to the building’s entrance and glanced at my watch. It was a little after seven. Surely there’d still be someone around who could tell me where the Jamboree was being held or even where Christmas was staying.
I approached the glass doors of the concert hall. Within, a desk lamp was the only illumination. I cupped my hand over my eyes and peered inside. As there was no sign of life, I tried the door. To my surprise, it opened and I entered a high-ceilinged lobby.
The silence was as deep as the carpet.
‘Hello?’
No response. I padded towards the desk. A cigarette was burning in an ashtray, grey smoke idling towards the ceiling. I presumed its owner had stepped out for a moment. I decided to wait.
A muffled flush explained the smoker’s absence and I turned towards the sound. A door opened and a slender silhouette appeared. It stopped sharply at the sight of me.
‘Yes?’ came a woman’s voice.
‘I wonder if you could help me,’ I said. ‘I’m enquiring about the Scout Jamboree…’
The figure stepped into the light. It was Melissa ffawthawte! It felt like months since that game of snooker back at the camp.
‘Why, it’s Mr Box, isn’t it?’ she said, cocking her head to one side.
‘My dear Miss ffawthawte! How very nice to see you again.’
She batted her eyelashes. ‘You’ve come all this way just for a re-match?’
Considering the tone of our last encounter, she now seemed oddly coquettish. What was going on?
‘Ha, ha. Not quite. I’m…passing through. Just wondered how my son—’
‘Oh, you wish to see little Christmas? How sweet.’
‘Well, yes,’ I said. ‘Is he here?’
‘Alas, you can’t visit him tonight. Early to bed, early to rise…’
‘Oh well, not to worry,’ I muttered. ‘Perhaps tomorrow?’
‘That would be fine,’ said Miss ffawthawte, making a note in the desk diary. ‘Shall we say two o’clock?’
‘Smashing. So…do tell. What have the kiddie-winkies been getting up to? Got them well trained, have you?’
‘Oh, yes!’ she enthused, tossing back the coils of her silky brown hair. ‘Very well trained. And soon there’ll be a public demonstration of this. A very public demonstration.’
‘Capital! Well, good night, then. Thank you for all your help. I do hope—’
The words died on my lips. In the dim light from the desk lamp, I’d suddenly noticed something. Miss ffawthawte’s bosom was slightly more exposed than when I’d last seen her. Now I saw almost all of her tattoo, the merest hint of which had so thrilled me in the games room. It was a Black Butterfly.
Melissa ffawthawte narrowed her green eyes and glanced down at her breasts. ‘Dear me. How careless.’
In one smooth movement, she pulled a long-barrelled pistol from her jacket. There was a soft swishing sound, I felt a sharp pain in the neck and knew nothing more.
.14.
‘ARE YOU DYING COMFORTABLY?’
The globular light overhead was like an eyeball dangling from a nerve.
Heavy leather straps bound me to a table at the ankles, across the chest and over the neck. My hands were secured by tight leather cuffs. An insistent itch on my throat reminded where the tranquilliser dart had hit home.
The room around me, glass-walled, green-tinged at its bevelled edges, refused to stay still: juddering, shifting, like a ropey television picture. I winced at the intensity of the surgical lights, screwing shut my wrinkled old orbits. Then, after a few deep breaths, I tentatively looked again.
How long had I been there?
A metal door opened and soft footsteps padded close by. From my restricted vantage point, I could see only a whitish blob and then, suddenly, a face loomed startlingly over mine, the lower half concealed by a surgical mask, the hair tucked away inside a white cap. Green eyes blazed down.
‘Are you quite comfortable, Mr Box?’ asked Melissa ffawthawte.
‘Not at all.’
‘Glad to hear it. I must say, I’m impressed. You are a game old thing.’
I beamed. ‘You’re too kind.’
My exhausted mind was reeling from this new development. What the hell did Melissa ffawthawte have to do with the whole ‘Black Butterfly’ set-up?
All at once, she disappeared from sight. Unable to move, I thought at first she’d left the room but then, with a squeal of wheels, a stool was dragged over towards the table. She sat down and there was a soft sigh from the padded white seat.
‘Now then,’ she breathed. ‘It’s rather important that you tell me what you know–or think you know–about what we’re doing here.’
‘Is it now? How lovely.’
‘And we have ways and means of extracting such information.’
I strained at my bonds and the leather creaked. ‘Ah. I thought we might get around to that.’
‘So why don’t we save ourselves a lot of unpleasantness,’ mused the girl. ‘Just pucker up, Mr Box, and whisper some sweet nothings in my ear.’
‘That’s just what I will whisper.’
‘Hm?’
‘Nothing.’
She crossed her legs–rather sensational in white stockings–and gave a little snigger. ‘We’ll see.’
The wheels of the stool squealed again as she pulled herself closer to the table.
‘I’m a specialist,’ she said quietly into my ear. ‘As I’m sure you were–once.’
I sighed theatrically. ‘Now you’re just being impertinent. A specialist in what, exactly? Needles? Drills? Unnecessary dentalwork?’
‘Such things are for the mere amateur,’ she murmured.
I felt a sudden movement around my ankles. My shoes were unlaced and then, together with my socks, pulled off. Here it came. What the devil did she have planned for me? Bamboo rammed into the flesh under my toenails? The white-orange flame of a blow-torch?
There was a long, dreadful pause and I tensed myself for the inevitable agony.
Still nothing.
Then I t
witched as I felt a sudden bizarre movement on my bare feet. It was a soft, swishing motion, back and forth over the arches and under the toes. It broke off as suddenly as it had started, and Melissa ffawthawte’s face appeared right next to mine. From the tiny wrinkling around her green eyes, I could see she was smiling.
In her hand she held something. It was white and, for a moment, my bleary eyes couldn’t take in its shape against the glass walls of the room.
A feather!
The silly bitch was tickling me.
‘Oh really,’ I chortled–and the leather straps groaned again. ‘You’re not serious?’
The girl sat back a little on the stool. ‘My travels have taken me to some interesting places, Mr Box. I long ago discovered that pain and pleasure are but two sides of the same coin. You have no idea how much a man can give away when the core of his soul has been exposed.’
‘Or his soles, I suppose,’ I chuckled. ‘Shame the Inquisition never thought of this lark. I’m sure it would’ve brightened up the old auto-da-fé no end.’
She shrugged and raised the feather once more.
A tantalising pause and then she resumed her work. I began to titter. Really, what a pleasant way to be tortured! Soon, I was laughing out loud, a delightful tingling running up and down my spine, turning into a warm, fuzzy sensation around the nape of my neck. And then behind my ears.
‘This reminds me, haha…’
Miss ffawthawte’s head cocked to one side.
‘Barber shops…oh, hahaha!’ I snorted. ‘Electrical clippers. Such a pleasant sensation, when the back of one’s neck is…heehee…buzzed over.’
Sweat was beading my face and dripping over my lips. I laughed convulsively, from deep inside my chest, and the aged muscles in my sides started to twinge.
And all at once, I realised that I really, really wanted the pleasant sensation to stop.
The tickling, however, continued unabated.
I giggled on, wheezing and coughing as tears sprang to my eyes and coursed over my face, mingling with the salty sweat and pooling in the hollow at the base of my throat.
My toes wriggled involuntarily as I tried desperately to get them away from the feather’s touch. I began to arch my back, shrinking from Miss ffawthawte’s tender ministrations, but the straps held me tight and my whole body began to shudder.
Then I started screaming. It was too much. Too, too much. Too delightful. I screeched and howled and gasped and laughed and laughed until my lungs heaved. My toes cramped and my legs convulsed, the leather straps cutting horribly into the yielding pink flesh. The sensation had a sort of wonderful horror to it–as though ants were swarming over every inch of my skin, tiny feet caressing each hair. I strained desperately against the leather straps.
‘Stop!’ I croaked. ‘Please. Please. Stop!’
The tickling ceased abruptly. Relief washed over me and I took huge, deep breaths. I could hardly see for the tears.
Miss ffawthawte’s face appeared like a painted image of the sun. ‘Tell me, then. Quickly. Why are you here? What do you know?’
I swallowed, desperate for moisture, then smiled up at her. ‘What do I know? My dear lady, we could be here all night!’ I tried to clear my parched throat. ‘Sir Anthony van Dyck, 1599 to 1641, was court painter to King Charles the First. Born in Antwerp and apprenticed to Hendrick van Balen—’
The girl snarled and began clawing at my shirt. I felt startlingly cold as she ripped it off, exposing my whole naked torso. This time there was no pause and I shrieked as her nails began to scratch and tickle around my armpits. This was worse than the foot torture. Unbidden, memories of long-ago scraps with my brother flashed into my fevered mind. His knees pinning down my arms. The dreadful, unbearable horror of his quick hands tickling at my armpits as I writhed and howled for release.
‘Stop, stop, stop!’ I mewled.
I gasped and sank my teeth into my lip at the terrible loveliness of it all. Blood trickled over my chin but I was scarcely aware of its taste, as waves of ghastly pleasure slammed at my senses. It was unspeakable, sensational, sublime in its horror. I had to stop the tickling or I would go completely mad. Thrashing at my bonds, I yelled and cursed and called ffawthawte every name under the sun.
Now she too was laughing: a crazed, hysterical sound as her talons paddled remorselessly around my armpits. ‘Now you’ll pay for that little game we played, Mr Box. You’ll pay for the humiliation you inflicted on me! Are you dying comfortably?’ she shrieked.
Soon, I knew, I would have to tell her everything. That MI6 were on to her organisation. That, even now, a trap was being laid for her.
I howled.
My pulse throbbed in my temple. I could stand no more. My head felt as though it would burst.
Then, unexpectedly, the door shushed smoothly open. ‘Desist,’ said a quiet voice.
Reluctantly, Melissa ffawthawte sat back on her stool. The relief was glorious, incredible.
‘You won’t get anything out of Mr Box.’ The voice was cold and measured as droplets from an icicle. ‘He’s one of the old school.’
Stunned almost into unconsciousness, I tried to twist my head to see the newcomer but he remained frustratingly beyond my line of sight.
‘What, then?’ snapped ffawthawte. ‘Shall I shoot him?’
‘Oh, no, no, no. Nothing so vulgar. No. We shall be kind to Mr Lucifer Box,’ whispered the voice. ‘It is time for him to be embraced by the wings of the Black Butterfly…’
There was a faint tinkling sound from close by. Then ffawthawte was once more leaning over me. Savagely, she yanked open my mouth, dropped something inside and a bitter taste spread over my tongue.
Almost at once, my head began to swim. But, as I blacked out, one thought began to race around my exhausted brain.
I knew that voice. I knew that voice of old.
It was Dr Fetch!
It was the voice of A.C.R.O.N.I.M.!
.15.
LE PAPILLON NOIR
There’s a sound. Incessant. Pulsing. Like a drum-roll that doesn’t stop.
Eyes open…
A great panorama. A cinemascope of water. Mirror blue, then brown, navy and finally cornflower blue as it meets the sky.
Eyes close…
I’m numb. Novocaine numb. There’s a voice from somewhere. My voice.
Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!
But it’s all I can do to lie there. The pulsing pounding beats on and on.
Then there’s another sound. Soothing. A crashing, rolling roar. And I can move my head a little. There’s sand in my mouth. Rough, salty sand. My eyelids are a closed canopy, pale green, then fiery orange. Sunlight washes over me and it’s wonderful. The hairs on my arms rise up.
Eyes open…
Firm, golden sand, wind-whipped into ridges. Right by my face, a black beetle is toiling. It looks like a coffee bean. I smile at it.
Blink. A curl of orange peel, speckled with quartzy sand. Matchsticks. A lone vodka bottle, glinting. Broken shells, white as china. A tiny crab gently excavating a hole. Grains of sand stick to its pincers and protuberant eyes. I watch it for some time in sleepy fascination, then roll onto my back.
The pulsing pounding hammers on.
A raw sun, dazzling as a torchbeam. Impossibly blue sky. I screw up my eyes and put out a hand to push myself up. Then the pulsing pounding slams inside my head like a clattering train and I gasp and fall back as though struck. I hit the hot, hard sand and there’s no breath in me. I look at my hand. At the hand I reached out with. And it’s not my hand.
But now the numbness is passing and I sit up and I’m dizzy and the world seems too big and I clamp shut my eyes again until the pulsing and the pounding dies down a little. Just a little. And then I look at my hand again.
Both my hands. Hold them out in front of me. Flip them over and back a dozen times. They’re smooth. Pink. Unblemished. They are my hands. But yesterday’s hands.
Now I use them to slowly, carefully, unbutton my shirt
. And they feel strange, as though they’re frost-nipped, like when I threw snowballs as a child. There’s a palm tree nearby and its shadows dapple me. Now my shirt is off and I’m looking down at my chest. It’s a fine chest. Well-muscled. There’s a line of black hair like a trail of iron filings leading over the flat stomach to my groin.
And now the pulsing pounding roars in my head and glee grips me and I tear off the rest of my clothes and I stand up. I run my hands over my naked body and face. Everywhere, my fingers meet firm lines, taut muscles. My cheekbones sharp as blades on ice. It’s impossible! It’s wonderful! And it can’t be true…
Mirror, mirror, mirror–I have to find a mirror!
I look straight ahead towards the sea. Static clouds echo the fluffy white of the breaking rollers. But there’s nothing on the broad beach except me, a few palms and that morning’s footprints, softened, rounded by the wind. I take a huge breath. My skin tingles.
Then I run, forgetting all thoughts of mirrors and reflections. Run towards the surf and hurl myself into it and the water is as warm as blood. As the blood that’s pulsing and pounding in my head. I roll and dive and wriggle like an otter through its soft embrace. Then I shoot to the surface and the spray bursts over me and I spit out great mouthfuls of salt water. I feel alive.
I swim on for what seems like hours and then I’m suddenly exhausted and I slosh up the beach and back onto the sand. The hot, white sand under my high arches. My feet are dusted in fine black hair and they leave impressions in the wet sand that instantly vanish as seawater rises to claim them.
The sun dries me rapidly and then the pulsing pounding returns and I know I have to get on, get on, get on. I hurry back into my crumpled shirt and trousers. What the hell should I do next?
I stumble over the dunes, the breeze flapping at my open shirt. Then I’m suddenly on a long ribbon of pot-holed road and the tarmac is bubbling in the heat. My legs feel strong and lean and long.