by KJ Charles
“Impossible situation. Never mind. Come on, you son of a bitch, open.”
“The worst thing is the dark.” Will wasn’t sure he wanted to blurt this out, but he couldn’t stop talking, not after six full days of solitude. “They didn’t give me a lamp. Hours and hours sitting here in the dark.”
Kim just grunted. Will went on. “And the not washing. I’d had enough of being filthy by Armistice, and of being hungry, come to that. I’m sick of being hungry, and I’m sick of these fucking people.”
“I’m dreadfully sorry to hear it,” Kim said in a tone of pure, rising triumph, and there was a little snick. He sat back on his heels, and pulled the cuff open. “There.”
“You little beauty!” Will kicked off the metal. He’d have kissed Kim if he wasn’t aware of his own stink. “You bloody genius. Let’s get out of here. No, let’s burn the place down.”
“Let’s not,” Kim said firmly. “I’ll telephone the police, you eat something while we wait. You might even wash your—” His head came up, like a startled hare. “Do you hear a motor?”
Will’s heart plummeted at the familiar note, getting louder as it approached. “Oh Christ. It’s them. They’re coming back.”
“Can you run? Where are your shoes?”
“They took them. Let’s go.”
They sprinted together down two flights of stairs. Will had no idea of the layout of the house so he followed Kim into a kitchen. The window was indeed broken. Kim went to unbolt the back door while Will had a few urgent swallows of water from the tap and grabbed a hunk of bread from the table, and they ran outside.
The sky was grey but still painfully bright, and remarkably large after six days in a room. Will shaded his eyes, assessing the terrain. They were at the back of the house and it didn’t seem like the motor was usually parked behind here. There was a good-sized kitchen garden, its few plants yellow and straggling in this dismal season, surrounded by a red brick wall.
“Can you climb that?” they asked each other in chorus. Kim rolled his eyes. Will grinned harshly and led the way, the ground cold and wet and sharply stony under his feet. He didn’t feel hungry now, just lean and keen, as the will to survive took over his body and lent a quivering electric strength to his muscles. He’d missed that sensation. His foot was absurdly light without the chain.
Kim gave him a leg up. Will straddled the top and leaned down to give him a hand, and they jumped down the other side in a scramble.
“Copse,” Will said.
“Where? Oh, trees. How disappointing.”
Cops would indeed have been better. They ran for the stand of trees anyway, stumbling over thick tuffets of rank grass. The ground was wet, with claylike mud that stuck to Will’s stockinged feet in heavy, cold, wet clumps and made running an experience from a nightmare. He’d often cursed his army boots, but socks were not an improvement.
“Bloody hate mud,” he muttered.
They made it to the trees without incident except several sharp things under Will’s feet, sticks and stones there to break his bones. He growled a curse as they ducked out of view from the house.
“Now what?” he asked. “Keep going? The hue and cry will be up any minute.”
“My motor is on the other side, in the lane.” Kim pointed in the direction of the house.
“Parked nearby?”
“Round a bend.”
“Any idea of the terrain?”
“I passed a tiny village a couple of miles south of here. I don’t know about the other way, nor do I know what happens if we continue over the fields from here. We’re in the North Wessex Downs, if that helps, about ten miles north of Andover.”
They might as well be in Belgium for all Will knew of the area. He shrugged indifference. “They’ll find I’m gone any minute, and they’ll see your motor. Either they decide the game’s up and run for it or they try to get me back, in which case they’ll be coming this way because they know we didn’t go out the front and the trees are the obvious place to go. So we make a stand here, or we skirt round the hedges and get back to your motor-car, or we head off in search of civilisation on foot.”
“But lacking shoes.” Kim grimaced. “Go for the motor?”
“Works for me. Uh-oh.” He pulled back behind a tree. Kim glanced over at the house and moved back as he saw the same thing: a man coming up the outside of the wall, moving purposefully in their direction.
Just one, the bald one. Kim jerked a thumb, suggesting they start moving. Will shook his head, pointed at Kim’s chest, and mouthed, “Handkerchief.”
Kim’s brows twitched but he handed it over. It was decent, strong linen, in a delicate shade of lilac. “Ponce,” Will murmured, bent to pick up a good-sized stone, and knotted it into the cloth. There was a clear track between the trees, not a path exactly but the way people walked when they walked here. Will positioned himself behind a tree on one side, indicated where Kim should stand on the other, and set himself to wait.
He’d done this before. It was all very familiar: the mud and the cold and the smell of wet wood. The hunger, the heartbeat, and the light-headed feeling of the world coming to a single, simple point. Sky above, earth underfoot, enemy at hand. Move, eat, kill.
The enemy’s footsteps approached, changing from a distant squelch to a wet crunch as he came into the stand of trees. Will kept his breath shallow. In through the nose, out through the mouth. He glanced at Kim, who was frozen in place, far too tense, for all the world as if he’d never waited in ambush before. His face was set, but his hand was trembling.
Leaves rustled and sticks broke under the enemy’s feet. He wasn’t trying to be quiet, so he didn’t need the element of surprise. He had a weapon, then. Will adjusted his intentions accordingly
The enemy was right on them now. He came forward along the path, gun in hand, turning his head from side to side. It was his bad luck that he turned it to the right as he came abreast of them, so that he saw Kim first.
They both recoiled, Kim and the enemy, just a fraction of a second’s shock sending each of them back. That was the enemy’s second piece of bad luck, because Will was moving forward. He brought the makeshift cosh down, using the extra swing from the knotted handkerchief to give it the greatest possible force, and the enemy went to his knees with a grunt that sounded oddly wrong. Because he was English, not German, of course. Will brought the rock down again, and this time something gave in the skull he hit. The enemy pitched forward onto his face and didn’t move again.
Kim’s eyes were very wide. Will said, “Take the gun. Keep a look-out.”
The enemy was unconscious, still breathing but not likely to move any time soon. Will checked his feet, decided they were large enough, and started unlacing his shoes.
“Is he dead?” Kim’s voice was a whisper.
“Not so far. Is it loaded?”
Kim checked with a few clicks. “Full.”
Will stripped off his claggy socks, shoved them in a pocket, and put on the enemy’s—they were wool, pleasantly warm from his body—and shoes. These were a couple of sizes too big, but still a vast improvement.
Kim was keeping watch with a reasonably competent air, gun in hand. “Can you shoot?” Will asked.
“Pretty well.”
“Will you? If necessary?”
“Probably not as easily as you,” Kim said. “Which might be for the best, as we should try not to kill anyone, or at least anyone else. Let’s get to the motor, shall we?”
They went along the outside of the hedge that ran along the field, stooping low. Will went first, oversized shoes loose on his feet; Kim followed, moving quietly.
November-grey skies above, wet grass and clods of earth beneath. Smells of mud and wet sticks, the slow rot of autumn, Kim’s light cologne, Will’s own fusty unwashed odour, the trace of blood on the stained handkerchief. Sounds: mostly their feet, Kim’s shallow breaths suggesting tension or exertion, a few late buzzing things, sparrows in the trees. Will kept an ear out for sudden caw
ing. He’d known crows give away a location before now, and prayed they wouldn’t send a pheasant rocketing. You could hear the bloody things a mile off.
It was slow going. Will became very conscious of the hunk of bread in his pocket, and of the thirst that a few swallows of water hadn’t quenched, but those had to be put to one side. There was only the long, slow, crawling progression through the mud for now, checking round the corners of the hedge, horribly aware of how exposed they were. The strain in cramping thighs, the cold ponderous weight of mud-clogged shoes, the wet chill pinching his fingers.
And then, finally, there was a line of trees and a ditch, and the road on its other side. They were perhaps a couple of hundred yards to the side of the house where he’d been imprisoned. There was no sound anywhere except birds.
Will went low to recce, going into the ditch and using cover. The road seemed empty. Kim crawled to join him in the ditch at Will’s signal, mimicking his stance and movements. A bright chap, that. He’d have been useful in Flanders.
Kim brought his mouth to Will’s ear, the breath warm and tickly. “My motor is just round that corner.” He indicated the bend in the road.
If he was Libra, he’d have someone watching it. Maybe two. “Hand crank?” Will asked softly. If the car took several minutes to start, this might be tricky.
“Electric starter. Reliable.”
Will nodded. “All right. Here’s the plan...”
He made his way round the corner with painstaking slowness. You could be quick or you could be quiet, but not both. It took perhaps five minutes to traverse a handful of yards, but at least nobody was shooting at him.
A Daimler, sides splattered with dried mud, sat by the edge of the road. Libra stood in front of it. He had a revolver in one hand, hanging by his side. Will could have shot him from here, and would have, if he’d had the bloody gun.
He made his way through the undergrowth, taking it slow, mud seeping coldly through his trouser legs, and found a good position, then hunkered down to wait there. He took his borrowed shoes off while he was at it: they’d flap too noisily on the road if he had to move fast. His feet immediately felt chilled. He passed the time unknotting the handkerchief, discarding the rock, finding a couple of pebbles, and retying the cloth to put knots at two opposing corners.
A few minutes later, there was a crunch of feet on stone and Kim’s voice barked, “Don’t move! Hands up!”
Libra looked round sharply. Will whisked himself silently from the trees onto the road, ducking behind the Daimler.
“Hello, old man.” Kim’s voice was very cool. “Always a pleasure. Congratulations on your promotion.”
“Secretan,” Libra snarled. “You treacherous shit.”
“You can’t take a joke, that’s your trouble. If your hands go down I will shoot you where you stand.”
“You don’t have the nerve. You’re a gentleman.” Libra spat the words. Will edged forward around the side of the car, stockinged feet wet and cold but silent.
“Wrong on both counts. Hand over the information.”
Libra paused. “Why don’t you ask Darling for it?”
“Don’t play silly buggers with me. I assume he’s in a shallow grave somewhere. I’ll send flowers. Now hand it over.”
“He’s gone. You let him out,” Libra said, with just a thread of question in his voice.
“Gone?” Kim repeated, incredulous. “You mean you lost him? You useless arse!”
Libra began to reply. He didn’t get far, because that was when Will rose up behind him, flicked the weighted handkerchief round his neck, and pulled.
Libra flailed, one hand grabbing for the cloth. Kim was there almost at once, grappling the revolver from him. Will gripped his makeshift garotte hard, wedging one knee into Libra’s back for extra leverage. Twenty seconds should do it.
“Will!” Kim snapped. “Don’t kill him!”
Libra thrashed helplessly as the cloth bit into his throat. The bones would be starting to bend, the windpipe giving way. Will liked that thought a lot, and he kept pulling until the muzzle of a gun pressed hard against his temple, which got his attention.
“Will,” Kim said again. “Stop.”
The revolver was cold and hard against his cheek. Will turned to meet Kim’s eyes, and didn’t see treachery there, or betrayal. Kim was, in fact, giving him what Will’s mother would call a Meaningful Look. “Why?”
“Bad tactics. Put him down.”
Will released his grip. Libra collapsed over the bonnet of the Daimler, purple-faced and choking. Kim said, “I will give you a gun if you promise not to shoot him. I mean it, no killing. All right?”
Will grunted, but took the revolver Kim handed him, and held it to Libra’s skull as Kim quickly checked his pockets. “Oh, good, handcuffs. Convenient. Let’s get him out of the way, shall we?”
They hauled the gasping man into the trees on the other side of the road and cuffed him with his arms round a tangle of nice sturdy hawthorn trunks. Will fished one of his six-day worn, mud-sodden socks out of his pocket. “Gag,” he said at Kim’s quizzical look.
“You’re annoyed with him, aren’t you?”
“Should have let me kill him.” Will shoved the filthy sock deep into Libra’s mouth, and used the handkerchief to secure the gag. “As I expect he’d agree right now. Let’s go.”
“The road’s too narrow to turn,” Kim said as they got in the car. “We’ll have to drive past the house.”
Will checked Libra’s revolver. “I’m ready. Step on it.”
The Daimler’s engine caught at once, as promised. Kim accelerated away in a squeal of tires and a shower of stones. Will thought he saw someone come running as they sped past the house, and twisted round in his seat, but the next second they were round another bend in the lane.
“Settle down,” Kim said grimly. “I’m going to get this bus moving.”
The motor leapt forward, pushing Will back in his seat, far too fast for a country lane. Kim watched the road with steely concentration, mouth set, double de-clutching like a racing driver, the engine purring like a big cat in response. Will fished the bread out of his pocket. It was squashed, and he had to brush a bit of mud off, but he ate it anyway.
Kim took a turning at the next crossroads. “Where are we going?” Will asked.
“No idea. I just want to put a few options between us and pursuit.”
“Shouldn’t we head to London?”
“That’s the last thing we should do,” Kim said. “You, my friend, need to be somewhere entirely elsewhere for a few days while we sort this tangle out. Somewhere Zodiac can’t reach you. I happen to know a very nice old lady with a spare room perhaps three hours’ drive from here. We’ll park you there.”
“And then what?”
“I shall work out the next move with you off the board. I’ve just spent six days searching for you and it was pure chance I succeeded, so I would really prefer not to have to do that again. And I doubt Libra will play a waiting game next time he gets his hands on you, so all in all, your recapture would be best avoided.”
“Then why didn’t you let me kill him?”
Kim didn’t answer for a moment, manoeuvring the motor round a series of tight bends. “Because you’re better than that,” he said at last.
“Are you serious? Do you think he’d be the first man I’ve killed?”
“I’m positive he’d be the first you’ve murdered. And that would have been murder. It’s one thing to knock a man on the head while trying to escape, and another to do a professional garrotting job. Moreover, the latter would just hand Zodiac a weapon against you, because if you think they wouldn’t make a complaint to police of a dangerous tramp making an unprovoked attack, you’re optimistic. Don’t kill anyone.”
“Easy for you to say,” Will muttered. It was meant to be a joke, but Kim slowed slightly, enough to put his hand on Will’s leg, a brief, comforting touch.
“You’ve had the devil’s own time, Will. I know th
at. I’m not asking you to forgive or forget, just to hold off so we can do this properly. Please, let me take the lead until you’ve had a bath, some food, and a lot of sleep.” He paused. “Maybe two baths.”
“Sod you.”
“Try to see it from my point of view. I had the upholstery cleaned only last month.”
Will shook his head, making himself smile. It was funny, in its way, but the battle-excitement was ebbing from his veins and his many physical and mental discomforts were rushing back.
“I’m thirsty,” he said abruptly.
“There’s a village coming up. Hold on.”
Kim drove through it and parked the motor a little way beyond, around a bend to avoid being seen. Will sat in it and waited for what seemed an unconscionably long time while Kim went to get supplies. He returned after an age with two pewter tankards and a brown paper parcel.
“I paid for the tankards,” he said. “Drink off the tops so they don’t spill, and we’ll keep going.”
Will did that, draining about a pint between the two mugs, then attacking the parcel, which contained thick-sliced ham and pickle sandwiches. Not cheese, thank God. He devoured the lot in a couple of minutes, sluicing it down with ale. Picnicking in a Daimler while chauffeured by a lord and dressed like a tramp.
Thirst quenched and hunger staved off for now, he dozed off, despite the roar of the engine and the cold. It was an uneasy slumber, not a real sleep, one that felt feverish, and he kept twitching awake at the sound of Libra’s voice or the sensation of a weight round his ankle. Kim spoke to him reassuringly, with words Will forgot as soon as he heard them, but a tone that said, You’re safe. In his half-dream Will believed him, and the miles rolled away.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
It was dark when they arrived at a little cottage on the outskirts of a village. They could have been anywhere in Britain for all Will knew. He stared through the windscreen, dizzy with exhaustion and hunger, as Kim went to the front door, returned, and tugged at his arm. “Come on, old man. Out of the car now and say hello to Nanny. Nanny, this is my pal Will. Will, this is Mrs. Mungo.”