The chopper embedded itself into the wall as Straw fell to the floor clutching his side.
Blake kicked him over and pointed the knife. He pulled out his mobile phone and held it out screen first, Sara’s face bright.
He saw a flicker of recognition pass across the man’s milky pink eyes.
‘Where is she?’
Straw raised a shaking hand and tapped his ear, shaking his head. He opened his mouth, emitting more vile fumes and a cat-like yowl. Blake saw that at some point his tongue had been cut out.
Straw gestured towards the kitchen cabinets. He staggered up. Blake stepped back giving himself some distance knowing how fast he could move.
Straw continued gesturing towards the cabinets. Blake let him move towards them.
Straw lurched forward past the flickering light of the gas ring past the rattling, steaming pot and grabbed a meat mallet swinging it backwards, slamming it with a crack on the back of Blake’s head. Blake swung the knife blindly catching Straw across the eye. Straw’s hand went into the pot tipping it and its contents onto the floor setting light to the kitchen top.
Blake slumped to the floor. Emitting a horrible low yowl and clutching his eye in his one good hand he kicked Blake in the head slamming him unconscious and stumbled out of the kitchen.
Then the lights went out, followed by two dull thuds and Straw collapsed to the floor. As the flames began to build in the kitchen a figure moved out of the shadows of the hallway and bent down to remove two darts from Straw’s cheek. The figure turned to look at the unconscious form of Blake, then rose, moved back the way he came as the smoke began to roil up towards the ceiling. Light from the flames began to build. Outside, the dogs started howling.
Blake had no idea how long he was unconscious but the first thing he heard as he came round was the desperate screams of children and the howling dogs.
As he pulled himself up, he realised the air above him was full of thick smoke and a fire was building all around him. Taking a deep breath of air from floor level he pulled himself up just as the glass in the windows started to explode around the house. The children’s screams were becoming more intense. The smoke was stinging his eyes but he was able to make out a low door under the stairs that he hadn’t seen before. It was buckling under the heat.
‘Sara!’ he screamed, the smoke and heat shredding the inside of his throat, starting to blister his skin, ‘Sara!’
The screams increased as the under-stairs door burst into flames with a terrible roar, forcing Blake backwards and out through the back door into the sudden cool of the night air outside, leaving the screams inside the inferno on the other side of the wall of flames. More dogs had gathered to howl and bark on the perimeter of the fire as he sprinted round to the front of the house, his head still bleeding from the blow, desperately searching for a cellar window or a coal chute or anything that might provide another way in to the children trapped under the house.
‘Sara!’
Through the heat and light he could see the entrance to the basement through the door under the stairs.
Blake moved toward the basement door.
‘Sara!’ He screamed.
Blake pulled his coat over his head and across his face. He plunged in.
But the heat was too fierce. It burnt through his coat and licked strips of skin from his hands trying to reach his face. Its incandescence scorched his lungs beating him back.
Blake fell, tears streaming, lungs screaming for air.
‘No, no, no,’ he gasped.
‘Up! Get up!’
A massive groan came from above the stairs and before he could move the ceiling caved in obscuring the basement door with fiery debris. The floor above him creaked and buckled. It was only instinct that saved him from the falling mass. Even then his conscious self screamed defiance, unwilling to move anywhere but forward toward the basement to his daughter.
A cross beam smashed across his back. He fell into the debris. Consciousness slipping, he pushed out with all his remaining strength, around him new fires caught and burned the air.
‘Sara,’ he coughed.
With a massive heave Blake pushed himself free. He lifted himself on his hands and knees. An inferno raged metres from him. Blake crawled forward but the heat was too great.
Blake’s head fell. His shoulders shuddered and he emitted a low bestial howl. His fingers gripped the jagged debris ripping into his already burnt hands.
He screamed and screamed and screamed until his throat gave out.
The fire grew and pushed him back further and further until he stood, blackened and bloodied in the yard, with the dogs licking at his hands, like some demon that had freshly arisen from the pit of hell.
He could hear sirens over the roar of the flames and flashing blue lights lit up the sky. Four policemen ran towards him, all carrying taser guns.
Blake lowered his head and readied to launch himself at the flames again.
‘Halt!’ the one closest ordered. Another voice screamed out from the basement. Blake launched himself, sprinting toward the blaze. Before he could reach the flames the tasers punched him off his feet and all he saw was the black sky above before losing consciousness once more.
CHAPTER 8
the interrogation...warped eternity pendant...the mortuary...
When he came round his mind was eerily quiet but it felt like his eyes were still burning. The harsh strip-lights of the police cell made his head throb as he pulled himself into a sitting position, coughing painfully, his chest scoured by the smoke he had inhaled, his throat blistered and his tongue blackened. Someone had bandaged his hands. He started coughing and it seemed to go on forever. He didn’t hear the slit in the cell door rattle open, or see the pair of eyes staring in at him doubled up, struggling for breath. A foam cup of water lay on the floor. He picked it up when the coughing finally subsided and sipped from it slowly. His head felt like it was underwater. His ears rang and he couldn’t smell anything but the acrid stench of his own body. His back felt like it had been kicked in by a mule.
The slit slammed shut and the door unbolted noisily. A young man in a cheap grey suit and frayed shirt collar came in carrying a file. The door slammed shut after him. He didn’t look like a policeman. He consulted his file before speaking.
‘Blake Mandel?’
Blake didn’t bother to look up. He was too busy trying to breathe without coughing. The man sat down on the narrow bench beside him.
‘My name’s Stuart Corrigan and I’ve been assigned to you as counsel.’
‘My daughter, Sara?’ Blake wheezed, starting off another coughing fit, which sent a blinding pain through his head.
‘I don’t know, they’re still searching.’ Corrigan said. ‘You want to tell me what happened?’
Blake merely stared at the floor. He had no intention of wasting any more valuable breath. He didn’t care who this man was. If he didn’t have any news about Sara then he was of no interest. After a few minutes Corrigan gave up trying to get any answers from his client. He stood up.
‘I’ll be with you during your interrogation.’
He put a hand on Blake’s shoulder for a second before going to the door and knocking to be let out. Blake didn’t look up. A stranger’s well-meant kindness was of no use to him.
After what seemed like an eternity, two policemen arrived in the cell, cuffed him roughly and escorted him to the interrogation room. He was met by a scarred table, three hard chairs and some recording equipment. Slit-like windows set high in the walls let in shards of low, early morning sunlight, cutting through the gloom like cinema projectors. A camera winked down at him from the corner. Corrigan was already waiting in the room but Blake didn’t make eye contact as he sat down beside him.
A detective took the third chair. He was stocky, his bald head shaved close to the shiny scalp. There was something of the bull terrier about him, the gimlet stare of his small eyes all the more threatening for the silence that surrounded him. It was hard
to judge his age but he was probably in his early forties. He looked inquiringly at Corrigan who simply shook his head. The detective sighed and pressed the red button on the recording equipment.
‘Detective Fallon, Number 6566,’ he intoned, ‘conducting first interview with Blake Mandel. Time is 06.22.’ Blake was surprised by how early it was. Corrigan must have had a sleepless night.
‘Blake Mandel?’ Fallon was addressing him directly.
‘Where is my daughter? Where’s Sara?’ Blake asked, not looking up.
Fallon leaned back in his chair and folded his arms, the bulge of his biceps straining the seams of his shirt sleeves. Corrigan tried putting a restraining hand on Blake’s arm but he shook it off. Bringing his cuffed wrists up high, he slammed them down on the table, cutting more scars into the surface of the table and into the flesh of his wrists. He ignored the pain.
‘Where is she!’ he shouted.
Fallon leant forward and very deliberately jabbed the recording equipment off with a thick finger.
‘Let me tell you how this is going to play out.’ he said, sounding more tired than angry. ‘I’m going to ask you the questions and you’re going to answer them. The alternative is that I put you back in that cell and you can spend the next twenty-four hours climbing the fucking walls.’
Corrigan opened his mouth to protest but Fallon simply stared at him and he thought better of it. Blake said nothing, staring at the blood that was seeping up through the bandages from where the cuffs had cut the skin on his wrist bone.
‘Good.’ Fallon pressed the red button again. ‘I’ve read your statement. Your assistant - Stephanie? She confirmed your whereabouts at the time your daughter was taken.’
Blake’s eyes did not move but both the other men thought they saw a tremor run through his whole body. Blake felt that with those few words he had been stripped bare and exposed for exactly what he was, an unfaithful husband, a bad father and a vile creature, who deserved and expected no mercy from anyone. The night’s images filled his head. Alien images, as if they belonged to someone else. Images his mind was not built to hold. They flitted in and out of focus in his mind’s eye. He saw clearly his own weakness and his failure to save his daughter. The failure grew in his stomach, threatening to spill what was left of his worthless guts. Only denial served to quell the rising tide of self-loathing. No, his daughter was still alive. The basement was empty. Yes, Yes. That was it. Yes. It all fitted. Sara was still alive and he would find her. He just had to get out of here as quickly as possible.
‘After that,’ Fallon continued, ‘rather than let us handle it, you hacked the city CCTV system, saw someone you thought was following your daughter. Accessed the DOJ’s database - got a match and went down there looking for her and when you couldn’t find her you killed William Straw and torched the place. Nice touch.’
Blake finally looked up. ‘He attacked me.’ he said. The words scraped across his sore throat, making them sound tearful. ‘And he did take my daughter. I saw it in his eyes.’
‘What else did you pull aside from Straw’s record?’ Fallon asked, as if he hadn’t heard Blake’s croaked words.
‘Irrelevant,’ Corrigan intervened.
‘What?’ Blake couldn’t understand why this would be the priority. Why wasn’t this man asking him more about Straw, about the children and the clothes in the house? Why was he worrying about computer files?
‘You don’t have to answer that,’ said Corrigan, turning to Blake.
‘Who set the fire?’
‘I don’t know …’
‘Come on. You set it didn’t you. Hey? You panicked. You didn’t mean to kill Straw. Shit just happened.’
‘No.’
An officer stepped into the room and handed Fallon a file.
Fallon stared at him for a moment before opening it on the table in front of him and reading. ‘William Straw’s remains have been confirmed. They found some others, though they’re difficult to identify.’ He pulled a page out of the file and slid it across the table. Blake pinned it down under his cuffed wrists and looked at it.
‘These were in an outhouse that survived the fire,’ Fallon said. ‘Recognise anything?’
The sheet was covered with small photographs of jewelry, bracelets and watches, all of them child-like and poignant in their shabbiness. They had been discarded in the same way as their former proud owners. Blake stared at the montage, taking in each item as he came to it. He reached one at the centre of the page and his vision contracted involuntarily. He fought to keep breathing as every muscle in his body tightened and convulsed. It sat there, small and dented. An eternity pendant, warped by the fire. Sara’s. In the distance he heard a question, but he was too far away. He could not make out the words or the sense of it. The things that connected him to the real world withered and fell away. His fingers clawed at the paper, scraping it up from the table, crumpling it up into a tiny ball.
‘You let her burn in there.’ whispered Blake his voice quivering with rage.
Blake launched himself at Fallon, reaching for his throat with his cuffed and bloody bandaged hands. Corrigan grabbed at Blake’s shoulders trying to pull him off. Fallon sat stock still as Blake’s hands flailed at his thick muscular neck. Then as if bored he slapped his hand across Blake’s arms and spun him around like a toy and took him in a choke hold.
Blake’s hands flailed hopelessly against a forearm like oak locked across his throat. Corrigan and the two policemen behind him watched impassively as slowly Blake lost consciousness.
Sometime later Blake woke again in the small white cell that had become his world.
The first thing he saw was Corrigan sitting on a chair on the other side of the cell, beside an open door. He was leaning forward with his head in his hands. It looked as if he might have been there for some time. His hair was standing up as if he had been running his fingers through it and no longer cared what he looked like.
Blake let out a grunt as he tried to sit up and Corrigan straightened up. His face showed no trace of a smile.
‘You’re free to go.’
Blake realised that someone had taken off the cuffs while he was unconscious.
‘Really?’ he said, his voice barely audible as he rubbed at his throat. ‘Didn’t I kill Straw and burn him in his house?’
‘You want to go to jail? Keep talking. A first-year law student knows they can’t prove you didn’t arrive at the house at the same time as the police. You telling me different?’ asked Corrigan.
Blake slowly stood up, every part of him aching.
‘I assaulted one of your detectives. I get a pass for that as well?’
‘So long as you don’t press charges for the illegal choke hold.’
Corrigan shook his head. Held out a hand of appeasement.
‘Look Fallon’s a bastard. But even he sees what this is.’
Blake gave him a look of pure hatred.
‘Get the fuck out of my way.’
Corrigan lowered his gaze and stepped aside.
‘There’s something else.’
Blake stopped beside him.
‘What?’
‘Your wife, Julia.’
‘Is she here?’
Corrigan looked up at Blake.
‘Come with me.’
The mortuary was cold and smelled faintly of soap. The concrete floor glistened as if just washed and the wall tiles gave off a green tinge under the artificial lights.
Corrigan and the two police officers stood back respectfully as the mortuary assistant peeled the plastic cover away to allow Blake to see Julia. No-one said anything as Blake took in her white face and the vivid slit in her pale arm. The tiredness that had marred her face for so long had left her. She looked ten years younger, like the carefree girl he had married. Had he done this to her? If so, she was finally free of him. He stepped closer and lifted a lock of greasy hair from her forehead, tucking it behind her ear and placed his hand on her cold, smooth cheek. It was as soft as a baby
’s.
At some point they had visited Julia and told her. When the counsellor who had accompanied the policewoman left, Julia had gone into the bathroom, locked the door and slit her wrists.
He had not been able to reach her in time either.
A stranger had held her amongst the kicked-in remains of the door as the life bled out of her.
Blake’s cracked heart shattered again as he whispered for her forgiveness.
CHAPTER 9
winter’s calisthenics...retirement options...michael...josie...
Blake jolted awake. The coach had pulled into a station. The bright lit concourse was empty. Blake stood up and stepped out of the coach. He buttoned his coat, pulled up his collar against the chill and walked across the concourse and into the dark beyond.
Raised scars glistened in the streaming sunlight scissored by the iron bars set in the high window. Winter slammed the flat edge of his hand into an imagined opponent followed by a snap kick with back breaking speed and ferocity. A sole guard in a high watchtower observed as Winter worked his way from one end of the cell to the other, each movement measured and each punch and kick coming to a powered stop millimetres from the marked walls.
Suddenly he stopped, the patchwork of scars in sharp relief against the rest of his torso. He closed his eyes and brought his breathing under control. The drops that fell from them could have been mistaken for sweat but the quivering lip gave away the truth.
Winter opened his eyes. Pain turned to controlled rage as he brought himself under control and started again but this time the blows were real.
The guard winced as Winter slammed fist and heel into the walls of his cell. His hand hovered over the emergency call button that would summon the padded and shielded quick response team. But he did not press. The first time Winter had raged, soon after he had been brought in, they had gone in fully armoured. Two of his fellow guards had been hospitalised. Later they had dragged him from his cell and beaten him and he had not uttered a sound. When they finally stopped, exhausted, he had looked up at them with bloodshot eyes and a cold calmness that was more frightening than any rage or anger that had ever been directed at them. Later they learned of the full extent of the crimes that had been levelled against this man and they had whispered amongst themselves that perhaps an overture should be made - an admission of ignorance. It was so and was received in silence. So now when Winter took to the walls of his cell with his fists, they just looked away. The walls would win out and they would after a time take the bloodied Winter from his cell and to the prison infirmary where they would tend to his wounds. Then he would be placed back in his cell, hands and feet bandaged and the guards would whisper amongst themselves asking if what they had done for him was enough recompense for what they had done to him in ignorance and nod to themselves hoping that they had.
The Winter Man Page 8