Dogfighters: Under the Hill

by Alex Beecroft

  Carter sipped his tea, his little finger held out in a genteel curve. Placing it carefully back in the saucer, he pulled a large brown file towards himself, flipped it open. Chris recognised his own picture, upside down, still in uniform, looking young and dazed and gormless.

  “Says here,” the inspector began, with another of his hair-thin smiles, “you run an outfit called Matlock Paranormal. Hunting down ghosties. You going to tell us Mr. Chaudhry was taken away in a UFO? Sucked down into the underworld by giant illuminati lizards?”

  “I’m not going to tell you that. No, Inspector.”

  Carter turned back a few pages, put his forefinger gently down in the centre of a report on headed hospital notepaper. “Says here you were invalided out of the RAF on grounds of insanity. Now we’ve got a missing man. You were seen breaking into his house, his bloody phone is in your pocket, you give us a cock-and-bull story about classified information. I’ve got to say, Mr. Gatrell, things are not looking good for you. You’d better hope Mr. Chaudhry turns up soon, safe and well, or what we may be charging you with…” he paused, winched his smile tighter for dramatic effect, wiped his moustache and finished, “…is murder.”

  Murder? Murder meant no bail. Murder meant he’d be stuck in here for days while they gathered information, longer if they somehow managed to build a case. “Can you have murder without a body?”

  Carter beamed and even his eyes flickered with colour for a moment. “Oh, interesting question. Again, not exactly what an innocent man would ask. So what have you done with it, then?”

  And all that time, Ben could be in danger. A day in this world could be a hundred over there. He could be believing himself abandoned—as Geoff surely did—he could already be changed beyond all recognition. Lost.

  “I have to get out of here. I can’t be sidetracked by this. I don’t have time…”

  “You want to take your phone call now? I’m thinking you’ll be needing a lawyer.”

  Outside the high windows, a platoon of fit young men were square-bashing, marching up and down, all with serious expressions and shiny shoes. Phyllis put her handbag down on the desk and sank into the chair offered. The man opposite looked young to her, but everyone did, these days. He certainly had enough gold braid on his sleeves to open a factory.

  “Air Vice-Marshal Henderson?”

  “Miss…?”

  Huh. As if he didn’t know. Phyllis primmed up her mouth, disappointed in him already. What was the point of looking so clean cut if you were only going to dirty it by playing silly buggers? “Mrs. Phyllis Mountjoy.” She tapped on the desk, indicating the precise line of his report with her picture, name and address. “As you well know.”

  “What can I do for you, Mrs. Mountjoy?”

  He was worried, she thought. Not a flicker of an emotion on that parade-ground face, but his collar was limp and there was a suggestion of damp around his temples. His buzz-cut hair looked dark with moisture. Sweating.

  “I’m here to ask you to see to it that the police release Wing Commander Gatrell at once.”

  He crinkled his forehead at her, too artificially for it to really be called a frown. “I don’t recall the name.”

  “Stop talking nonsense, young man.” She pulled the manila folder out from under his hand, let him read the name on the label. “You know of him because I mentioned him. And if he had not been important, you would not have invited me here for this little chat. No point in being coy now.”

  The vice-marshal smiled. This expression she judged to be at least half-genuine, so she returned it with a slight upturn of her own lips. Nothing, she hoped, at all like triumph.

  Out on the parade ground, the sound of shouting gave way to the rhythmic thud of marching and a lone voice calling, “Left, right. Left right left.”

  Henderson realigned his files and leaned forwards. “I will admit I was curious to see what Gatrell was up to these days. The Service feels a certain amount of paternal concern for those of its members who might be said to have been injured in the course of duty. Gatrell’s breakdown… Very sad, of course. Not sure what you expect me to do about it.”

  “He is in jail.”

  “I’m aware—”

  “Awaiting trial for a murder that he certainly didn’t commit. That probably hasn’t even happened yet.”

  “Yes. And again, I say to you, what business of mine is this? Unfortunate that his insanity has led to this, but really not my problem.”

  “I bet it isn’t.” Phyllis fished the photographs out of her bag, unfolded them and passed them over.

  Phil, he’d said, over the phone from the police station, calling her in place of a lawyer. In a suitcase under my bed. My insurance policy. Copy everything. One copy to Grace, one to yourself, and take another to Air Vice-Marshal Henderson. Tell him, prepare for an invasion. Tell him, I could help, if I was free. He could put pressure on, make them give me bail at least. I only need a couple of days to try to get Ben and Geoff back. And once Ben’s back, this all collapses, you see?

  “These, however, are your problem,” she said, placing them down in front of him one by one. Shocking things—a photograph of a wrecked plane, Chris and something else blackened, vaguely humanoid, in the burning debris. The body in the mortuary, the forensic reports, copies of letters, some with Henderson’s signature attached. Shocking things—things she scarcely believed herself.

  His face went rigid as rigour mortis again while he leafed through the stack. Pearls of sweat broke out on his forehead and rolled down his temples. “These are classified documents. Where did you get these?”

  She felt a little sick, brought her handkerchief out of her bag and wiped her upper lip, the dab of lavender scent on the linen was calming. There were pink roses embroidered in one corner of the square—her mother’s work. That too bolstered her courage, for her mother would have made short shrift of Henderson and his ilk. Soldiers, scarcely a step up from servants.

  “The originals are in a safe place. Copies are with several members of our group, all of whom have been instructed to send them to the national press in the event of anything untoward happening to me today.”

  She’d thought that was paranoia, for the British government was not like these foreign despots who disappeared people all over the place, but she caught the movement of his left hand as he brought it out from under the desk, placed it flat on the surface. Had he been going for a button? A gun? Surely not.

  “Definitive proof of time travel, flying saucers, hostile extraterrestrial life, and the fact that the RAF, in collusion with the government, hushed it all up. I’m sure you don’t want the public to know about this.”

  He mopped his stubbly head with his own much larger hanky. Then he sighed. “We gave the man a new life. New identity papers, even a pension. What more does he want? It’s not carte blanche to murder and get away with it. This is nothing more than blackmail.”

  “Don’t be absurd.” Phyllis was really getting rather cross with the man. What happened to taking responsibility? You expected this weaselly behaviour from politicians these days, but she’d hoped for better from the boys in blue. “I thought I’d explained it wasn’t murder. These creatures that took him, all those years ago, have now taken another young man, and Chris is getting blamed for it. As a matter of fact he was trying to stop it.”

  “Nevertheless.” The vice-marshal leaned back, looked out at the now-empty parade ground and the barbed-wire fence beyond. The base sat in acres of pine trees, screened from the world. Far away from criticism, Phyllis thought, and pulled the papers back towards herself.

  “It would be quite convenient should Gatrell be put away for murder. Less chance of anyone believing anything he said. The whole thing could be dismissed as an imaginative attempt to cover up a sordid little murder. Good-looking young man, was he? The victim? Our boy Gatrell had a caution on record for being too ready to notice such things. One more mad, dead gay, eh? Who’s going to argue with that?”

  Phyllis grasped he
r handbag tight and pulled it against herself like Kevlar armour. For a moment she was completely lost for words. “You know, you have no idea why I’m here, and I have a mind to let it stay that way. I should like to see you caught on the hop and humiliated. If it wasn’t that the nation, perhaps the world, was at risk, I’d leave now and let you take the flak.”

  Henderson rose, leaned forward, his spread hands braced on his desk and his face close to hers. She stiffened her upper lip, raised her chin and glared at him.

  “What on earth are you talking about?”

  “I was sent to give you a warning.” Of its own accord, her right hand betrayed her state of mind by opening and closing her bag with a tap, tap of clasp like the sound of a stopwatch, counting down. “Chris believes that the abduction of Mr. Chaudhry is only the start. He’s received warnings that there is to be an invasion. You should put your troops on…red alert or whatever it is.”

  “On the word of a madman?”

  “You know he isn’t mad. You’re the one who gave the order to cover up all the evidence last time. You know what these things can do—at least, you know they can break time, shoot down a plane in the forties and have it land in the nineties. Aren’t you at all concerned about the safety of your country?”

  Henderson stalked stiffly to the door and opened it, stood in the arch, looking out. Somewhere along the white corridor came the sound of a whistle, booted feet and surprising, generous laughter. At the sound of it, the air vice-marshal relaxed. He passed his hanky over his hair. “Perhaps I am concerned. But you must admit, Gatrell’s behaviour has been…eccentric since he left the service. He may not have been insane when he was discharged, but I don’t know the state of his mind now.”

  He gave his wintery smile. “I don’t know what hold he has over you. This must have been something of an ordeal for you. Why would you come here, put yourself through this, for him?”

  “Because I’m a patriotic Englishwoman who believes it’s her duty to do her bit for her country?”

  “Hm. That may even be true. But why believe him in the first place? All of these things could be faked.”

  Phyllis looked again at the upside-down photograph with her name beneath it. Beneath that, her life story. “I lost my children—you’ve seen. After the accident I felt very useless for a long time. No one should outlive the purpose of their life. But he needed me. They all do. The MPA. But Chris especially. I thought at first it was just one of those things. Now I know it was because he lost his world too. We have all been trying to build something new and good to replace what was stolen from us. We have all been in the same boat.”

  “Sentiment.” Henderson closed the door and leaned on it, but his face had softened.

  Phyllis raised her eyebrows at him. “Or instinct. Besides, do you have no sentiment of your own? The man was a pathfinder in World War Two. Distinguished Flying Cross. A genuine war hero. One of the very few, and the only one who could still be under your command. That doesn’t mean anything to you? You don’t think he’s owed a little trust?”

  Henderson gave a soundless snort of amusement. “Well, since you put it that way. The man’s not really loopy, I take it?”

  “I would say not. You’ve seen some things, I’m sure. I’ve seen more. And Chris”—this was probably an unwise thing to say, but she was going to say it anyway—“he’s been our squadron leader. We’ve trusted him and come out alive from situations I would not like to face alone. I think if there is some sort of alien invasion planned, the country would be better off with him out of jail and able to deal with it. And of course, you can always re-arrest him later. He’s not the kind of man to do a runner, as they say on TV.”

  Henderson drifted back to his desk, sat down, mopped his brow and reached for the telephone. “Very well,” he said, punching in a string of nine numbers and hesitating over the last. “I’ll have a word with the chief of police. But we’ll be watching carefully, you understand? I want that man of his to turn up alive within the month or I pull the plug on the whole thing and send him back.”

  “I’m sure,” Phyllis pinched herself beneath the desk, just to choke back the exclamations and effusive thanks, “that you won’t have any cause to regret this, sir. Thank you.”

  “Well, if all my visitors were as charming as you…”

  When she was out of the door, she had to stop and check her reflection in her hand mirror. She hadn’t suddenly lost ten years. Feather-cut silver hair and bright blue eyes, rose-petal pink lipstick aside, she still looked like the grandmother she would have been, had a cruel fate not intervened. She gazed a little longer and then laughed, going out through the gates with a spring in her step. Brylcreem boys! Some things clearly never changed.

  Chris stood at parade rest in the DI’s office, eyes forward, fixed on the Manchester United calendar. One glance at Carter’s face had been enough. “Friends in high places, eh?” said the inspector. “Well, that doesn’t carry any weight with us. We’ll be watching you. You try to leave the country and we’ll have you. And one more hint of anything illegal and we’ll do you so hard you won’t know your own name. Understand? Plenty of time to get the evidence to convict you, so don’t think you’re out of the woods yet.”

  “I can go?” The frantic thoughts of escape that had plagued him overnight—somehow cutting his way out of a police van en route to the magistrate’s court, perhaps, or knocking out a prison guard, swapping clothes, blagging his way out at the guard’s end of shift—fell away in a moment of profound relief. They wouldn’t have worked anyway. They would just have made things worse. But he would have felt honour bound to try it regardless. Now, thank God, he didn’t have to. He only had to somehow force entry into the world of Faerie, confront its queen and her invasion force, and snatch back two of her hostages. That seemed easy by comparison.

  “Sergeant Devlin will take you to pick up your effects. You can go for now.”

  Thank you, God. Thank you, Phyllis—I knew you could do it. And thank you, Air Vice-Marshal Henderson. It looked like the brass hats did still care after all. Not like Butcher Harris of course—this soft and flabby modern world couldn’t support a man like him any more. But they still knew how to throw a gamble, make the big gesture now and again.

  The thought made him square his shoulders and want to salute. One more person not to let down. Yes, sir!

  Chapter Five

  Ben floated downwards towards reality like a seed on the wind. His mind was full of chariots and forests where he rode behind a charioteer in a turbaned helmet glorious with feathers, a parasol above him, its fringes aglitter with gold. He felt the pull of a great bow as the wind tugged at his long hair and the dhoti that he wore, blue and silver as the sky glimpsed amid the fluttering leaves.

  Beside him, in a lighter, faster, one-man chariot, Arran sped, blood like a caste mark on his forehead and dripping down his snow-white arms, bespattering the golden torc around his neck. Other than jewellery and a twist of leather to hold back that floating silver hair, he wore nothing at all, and Ben’s dream-self did not appear to think this unusual. He’d long ago got over being shocked by what the barbarian got up to.

  Waking came so subtly that it was several long, relaxed heartbeats before he realised he had passed out of the dream and into reality. When he did, it was with a sensation like double vision. He remembered this place—remembered Arran’s chambers with old familiarity. And he also remembered never having been here before last night, when he was kidnapped and drugged.

  Some pretty powerful stuff. He wondered if the memory of disturbing, changeable sex was dream or reality. It had a dreamlike texture, but so did everything here. Despite his boast to Chris that he was entirely without hang-ups where sex was concerned, the thought that it could have been real made him feel queasy and unclean. He drew the line at interspecies date rape.

  Crawling out of the bed with some difficulty (this morning it was blue, like a little pond of silk) he rolled out onto the marble floor, stood up and went
looking for a bathroom. It lay behind the door he’d expected—a great cistern of cool water with steps down into it and a floor that threw back the light like black diamond. He remembered this too. Remembered that the flowers that floated there, when crushed, released a slippery, jasmine-scented sap that cleaned the body and left the hair glossy as polished jet.

  Somehow the bath was not as calming as he would have liked. The double vision only compounded his queasiness. He was afraid to look too closely at the mirrored floor in case the wrong reflection looked back.

  Climbing out, he found a wardrobe exactly where he expected it to be. Inside hung a number of outfits, long tunics and baggy trousers of exquisite cloth, that he felt he had a right to. He chose a suit of silk, the blue-green of a peacock’s throat—interwoven with scenes of battle in gold thread. The buttons that held the neckline closed were carved out of huge single sapphires, and a chain of emeralds had been folded up atop it, swung to his waist when he put it over his head.

  When he looked at himself in the still surface of the bathing pool, it was again with that feeling of vertigo. Ben thought, I look like something from bloody Bollywood, and someone else thought, It is a little plain, but it will do.

  He sat down on the diamond floor. The water, flowing constantly into and out of the pool, made a sound like rain. The flowers in the pool turned, one by one, from the white stars of jasmine to the ragged pink and gold of honeysuckle, and their new scent made the room cloying sweet. Who the fuck are you? Ben said to himself and felt a dim, far-off jolt of outrage that a Dalit had dared talk to him like that.

  They were messing with his head, and—as Chris would say—they were doing a damn fine job of it. Going out once more into the main room, he tried the door, both expecting and not expecting it to be locked. It melted at his touch, like thawing snow, and let him out into the opalescent quiet of the nobles’ quarter.