by Paul Starkey
He heard footfalls padding across the room. He stared at the ceiling for a while longer. When the footsteps returned he closed his eyes and his smile widened. Already he was planning the next time. It wouldn’t be in as luxurious a setting as this one, a hotel maybe, or the back of his Beemer— If he was lucky, maybe her flat.
He didn’t think beyond the next time. He never did. All he knew for sure was that he’d tasted virginal flesh and wanted more.
He sensed her clamber back onto the bed. Was about to turn and look at her when something prodded his stomach and…
Chapter twenty four
He was back in that horrible darkness, that terrible void filled only by dry, unbearable heat, and the sounds and smells of suffering. The dream was identical, up to a point. The same, angry guttural voice demanding answers in a language neither Tyrell, nor the young man from Liverpool could understand. Then the punches— so many punches— then the sobbing, the pleas; pitiful sounds of a broken man. Then the other Arab; the one who spoke English; the one who sounded so caring. “Tell me what to know and I can make the pain go away.” Then the water again; the sound of a man drowning.
“It is your turn now I think, John,” said the Arab once more.
This time however, John Tyrell did not awake immediately. This time there was more. He felt himself moving, stepping, or perhaps being pushed, forwards. Suddenly he started to see. Not clearly, just a haze, dominated by the searing light of the sun, swinging in the sky like a pendulum.
No, not the sun, and not the sky. It was a naked light bulb, high wattage, hanging from a dark stone ceiling. Swinging this way and that like a hangman’s noose.
His vision was slowly clearing, slowly coming into focus, as if he’d been in shadow and his eyes were adjusting to the light. He realised he’d been blindfolded, and the cloth had been removed from his eyes.
Still he couldn’t see clearly. It was shapes, nothing but ill-defined shapes. One of them might have been a man in a chair, another blur of a man standing behind him, hands on his shoulders. A third hazy ghost seemed to hang over the hypothetical man in the chair. When he spoke Tyrell realised it was a man, the second interrogator, the pleasant one.
“This is a terrible process, but we must do these things, you understand that, don’t you?” There was no answer. “We must have the truth. I would prefer that it came without pain…but we must have the truth.”
Good cop/Bad cop. One of the oldest and simplest interrogation techniques, and one that could break even experienced and well trained operatives. The trick was to present yourself as both fiend and angel, as death or deliverance, until the person being tortured came to believe that it wasn’t you inflicting suffering on them, they were doing it themselves.
His vision was still clearing, but slowly, agonizingly slowly. The Arab had stood now, turned to face Tyrell. He saw the vague outline of his face. Narrow pointed nose, pinched, pock marked cheeks, a dark beard.
He was smiling. “Definitely your turn now, John.”
The gunshot woke him. He moved from bright heat to cold darkness in an instant. Night surrounded him like a funeral shroud and for a few confused seconds he clawed at thin air, as if he could pull himself free of the darkness that enveloped him.
Realisation groggily swam back to him, and he calmed himself, deep breaths in, long, slow exhales out. He remembered where he was, he was safe in a teenager’s bedroom, safe in England from Arab torturers. Still he couldn’t slow his racing heart, still he was unaccountably afraid; because the darkness was still all around him, and he had the terrible fear that he wasn’t alone, the oppressive feeling that myriad eyes were staring at him from the blackness.
He remembered there was lamp on the bedside table. He reached for it now, rolling across the bed as he did so. His hands touched the base of the lamp, but he’d miscalculated the size of the mattress, and even as his fingers closed on the switch he tumbled from the bed like a toddler still missing the safe confines of a cot.
He swore as his knees hit the floor with a thump, but he somehow kept his right hand on the bedside cabinet, fingers brushing the light switch, while his left palm touched the floor.
Not the floor. A foot.
With a panicked squeal he pulled back, flicking the switch whilst simultaneously gripping the base of the lamp, ready to use it as a weapon the moment he saw a target.
The light was dim, and swung like that god-awful bulb as he hefted the lamp, but it was enough to illuminate the room and show him he was alone. He was sat with his back to the bed, still gripping the lamp while he stared at the foot he’d touched. A single, grubby trainer that he’d tossed to the floor with no pretence of care because he was so desperate for rest.
His pulse was finally slowing. He chuckled to himself, a rough, dry sound. Then he heard movement, a commotion, and his pulse quickened once more. Shouting, footsteps…
He reached for his trainer, then stopped himself when he couldn’t see its mate. Time might be more important than comfort and so he hobbled barefoot towards the door.
The corridor immediately outside of his room was cast in shadow, but several lights burned further along the ceiling in both directions so he could see where he was going. He just wasn’t sure where he should be going. The noises had abated now.
For a moment he just stood there. To his left the corridor ended in the staircase down to the kitchen, to his right was the landing. In the end, not knowing which way to go, he shuffled forwards to gaze out of the tiny window that faced the door to his room.
Nothing moved outside except for the naked branches of the oak tree swaying in the breeze. At first he thought the rain had stopped, but peering closer he realised that it had merely metamorphosed into a fine drizzle.
When a shape sprang out from beneath the shadow of the tree his breath caught in his throat, until he realised it was merely a dog. He watched as it padded slowly towards the house; head lolling, tail wagging. It was a big dog, an Alsatian judging by the shape, and pale grey in colour. Chalice said the Carmichaels didn’t own a dog, but maybe one of their neighbours did, and maybe Fido was used to wandering over to White Wolf House for the odd snack.
White Wolf House…
He narrowed his eyes to focus further. That’s a ridiculous notion, John. It can’t be a wolf; it’s a dog, a big pale haired dog, not a white wolf. There haven’t been wolves in England for centuries.
This house is getting to me, he thought.
He watched until the dog disappeared into the darkness below. Then something else caught his attention, another shape appearing from out beyond the tree. Is that a…
The sound of a door creaking open made his head snap rightwards. There, at the end of the corridor, a man was stepping out of another room. He moved with deliberate slowness, and Tyrell couldn’t shake the feeling that he was watching a mannequin, an automaton. The man closed the door and then turned to face Tyrell, and as it did so his face was illuminated by the light overhead.
Tyrell had almost expected the metal face of a robot. Instead he saw Quintus Armstrong. He was wearing his glasses again, and his face showed so little emotion that Tyrell realised in many ways a robot had left the room. For a few seconds he merely stared at him, but then Ibex pointed towards the door opposite him. A moment after that he exited the corridor through it.
Tyrell followed. Glad that there was carpet beneath his feet rather than bare boards. All thought of the shadow he’d seen step out from beneath the tree was gone now, all thought of the wolf like dog as well. He padded along the corridor; feeling like a patient who’d got out of bed late at night and was wandering the corridors of a hospital, the only man awake.
He followed onto the landing just in time to see Quintus step through the door on the other side of the spiral staircase. But that was Lucy’s room. Suddenly fear gripped him, but he still couldn’t bring himself to run. He walked quickly across the floor. He kept his eyes on the door ahead, too afraid even to look down the stairs to the mid-landing b
elow, the one he’d felt someone staring at him from earlier.
The house was starting to scare him, but once he walked through the door into the bedroom beyond, ephemeral fears were replaced by cruder horrors.
The room was luxurious yet quaint at the same time, a happy, innocent room. But what had happened here was far from innocent. There were six people in the room. Four of them were stood, not moving, whilst another would never move again. Only Lucy Parrish was in motion, slowly tugging up her skirt. Her blouse hung open, and he could see her breasts, feebly concealed by a lacy white bra. In other circumstances he would have found this arousing; A beautiful young woman, barely clothed.
Not now. There was a dead look in her eyes. Her skirt hitched up she was buttoning her blouse, looking momentarily confused when she came to one that wasn’t there, after a second she would move on until she reached another empty space. That’s what her eyes reminded Tyrell of. Once there’d been bright buttons there, now only raw fabric remained.
Brendan Fox looked almost comical on the bed. Naked from the waist down except for his socks, lying back with his legs splayed like a fallen skater. His shirt was half undone and askew, and there was a damp patch on one side. Because the shirt was black it was impossible to detect what had caused the dampness. Luckily—what an odd word for this situation—the duvet cover was pale enough that the blood soaked into it was visible in all its vermilion glory, an irregular stain spreading out from beneath Fox’s body. Resting close to the edge of the stain lay a Beretta, looking like a dead scorpion.
Brendan Fox’s eyes were wide open, staring at who knew what. There was a perplexed look on his face, but no fear, no understanding of what was about to happen. He hadn’t seen it coming. Given what had obviously happened here, Tyrell couldn’t help but feel Fox had gotten off lightly.
Lucy seemed content with her ministrations, despite the fact that at some point in the process of buttoning her blouse she’d slipped one button through the hole above where it had meant to go. She looked like a child who still hadn’t learned how to dress herself, and Tyrell felt a vague sense of fatherly concern that went beyond mere empathy.
She was picking up her watch from the bedside table; she fastened it to her wrist, never once looking at the bed itself. She ran her fingers through her hair. Only after this last ritual did she acknowledge the presence of others in the room.
Chalice was stood closest, intentionally Tyrell surmised. Cheung was stood apart, and he actually took a step back as Lucy walked around the four-poster bed to stand before Chalice. At first Tyrell thought the younger man might be afraid of her, but his hand never strayed close to the pistol strapped under his armpit, and in profile it was easy to see horror etched into his face. He wasn’t afraid; he was guilty.
Ibex didn’t even seem interested in the tableau of rape and death before them, he was gazing around the room like a tourist in the Sistine Chapel.
John Tyrell just stood by the door, feeling ill at ease and not knowing what to say, what to do, wondering why the hell he’d taken Mellanby up on his offer, why he hadn’t stayed at home to slowly wither and die like the frightened old man he now was.
Chalice and Lucy stood facing one another for half a minute before Chalice finally spoke, breaking the unearthly hush that seemed to fill the room like a tangible, mocking force. “Lucy,” was all she whispered, as if she didn’t know what else to say.
For her part Lucy Parrish fared little better. She forced a sad, guilt stricken little smile. “I’m sorry.” The words were almost sobbed, and again Tyrell was touched by how childlike she seemed, how innocent.
No, not innocent. Whatever else happened to this young woman during the rest of her life, what had occurred in this room would ensure that innocence was something she would never recover.
Chalice had composed herself now, shaken away her paralysis. “Thomas,” she said. “Tom,” she snapped, louder when Cheung didn’t initially respond.
“Yes?” he croaked. He coughed. “Yes?” he repeated, clearer this time. He’d turned to look at her and his face was ashen. His eyes were locked on Chalice, unable or unwilling to look at Lucy.
“I want you to take Quintus and John downstairs, to the drawing room. I…we’ll be along shortly.”
He nodded dumbly in reply and then turned towards the door. “Gentleman, please,” he said looking at Ibex and Tyrell in turn before gesturing towards the door. He didn’t wait for them, merely walked towards it like a ghost. Ever the cold calculating machine, Quintus Armstrong turned and followed.
John Tyrell stayed where he was. After a few seconds Chalice sensed he was still there and turned around to look at him. “John, I need you to go downstairs.” She smiled grimly “Please.”
“Can I…Can I help?”
She shook her head. “No. Thank you, but no. Just go downstairs and we’ll be down shortly.”
He nodded, then followed the others out of the room. As impotent as he’d felt since he woke up in that hospital bed with so much of himself missing, he hadn’t felt as useless as he did right now.
* * *
Chalice waited until the men had gone, until the door was closed, before she moved. Slowly she walked over to the bed and picked up the Beretta, the murder weapon. Had it been murder though, she wondered. She removed the magazine, slipping it into her jacket pocket, then ejected the round from the chamber, this went into her other jacket pocket. She felt it tap against the phone nestled there.
The phone she should be using to call for backup. The entire operation was compromised now. What was it one of her instructors used to call it? A clusterfuck. Yeah that just about summed it up.
If she used the phone though what was currently messy might become disastrous. She knew Mellanby, he’d take over, want boots on the ground ASAP cleaning this up. Ibex would be spooked; he might even make a run for it. Even if he didn’t, the mobilisation of so many operatives at short notice might well show up on somebody’s radar. The Chinese could put two and two together and come up with four, and then any hope of manipulating the supply of information passing back to Beijing would be lost.
The alternative was to maintain radio silence. To carry on as planned and sort this situation out once Quintus Armstrong was well on his way to a wealthy new life. Sir George would be angry, but he’d understand.
Chalice slipped the Beretta into the waistband of her jeans, but made no move for her phone. Lucy remained silent as Chalice turned her attention to the body. She hadn’t checked for a pulse, there was no need. She knew what death looked like, had seen it close up in a scraggy little desert village years before. That didn’t mean she had to keep looking at Brendan Fox though, the look in his eyes reminding her so much of…
She grabbed the edge of the duvet and dragged half of it over the corpse.
“I’m sorry.”
She turned to look at Lucy. “You don’t have to be sorry,” she said, but inside she was torn. Part of her wanted to bring Fox back to life so she could shoot him herself, but another part of her wished Lucy had been more professional, gone down official channels. Brendan Fox wouldn’t have seen a courtroom for what he’d done, likely wouldn’t even be drummed out of the service, but he’d have been punished, relegated to the shittiest jobs imaginable. For an egotist like Fox that would have been worse than any prison sentence.
She wasn’t even sure Lucy knew what she was apologising for. She looked confused, and even after Chalice had covered the body still she never once looked at the bed.
“Am I going to get into trouble?”
Chalice almost laughed at the earnestness of those words. “No,” she said simply. “You’re not going to get into trouble.”
Just as Fox wouldn’t have stood trial, neither would Lucy. It would be hushed up, that was what the Security Services did best. She would get counselling, probably a sideways move to a department where nobody knew her. The script of Fox’s death would be rewritten. Killed on active duty by a mythical Islamic terrorist; or else an a
ccident during training, although god knew how many times the service had pulled that one.
Fox would be buried a hero, his wife and kids would get his pension, and Lucy wouldn’t be punished, except perhaps by herself. It wasn’t a perfect solution, but it wasn’t a perfect world.
Despite not looking at the bed, Lucy still stood uncomfortably close to it. Chalice gently took her arm and steered her towards the door. “Lucy,” she said.
“We’re going to have to go downstairs in a minute, do you understand?”
Lucy nodded, though she still looked dazed.
Chalice smiled, tried to appear friendly, even though it was something she’d never been good at. “Good girl. We need to finish what we started. Now you don’t have to carry on with the note taking…”
“I want to,” the younger woman blurted out. “I mean, I need to,” she added slightly calmer.
“That’s good.” Keep her busy, keep her mind of this. Chalice put her hands on Lucy’s shoulders. “I promise you that tomorrow morning, as soon as this is done, I’ll get you to a doctor. Make sure you’re ok. Before we go downstairs though, I need to know if you’re injured. Are you bleeding or…”
“He didn’t hurt me.”
Oh he hurt you alright, just maybe not physically. She wanted to ask; why didn’t you scream, why didn’t you fight him off? For all his bravado Fox was a typical bully, not so much a coward as a realist. He’d have backed off, if only you’d fought him.
Jesus Christ I’m almost taking his side in this, next thing you know I’ll be blaming her for leading him on.
“I shouldn’t have done that, to him.”
Chalice was surprised to see clarity in Lucy’s eyes now. “It’s ok.”
“No it isn’t,” said Lucy sadly. “I don’t think anything will ever be ok again. I just…I just need to explain.”
Chalice smiled warmly at her. “You don’t need to…”
Lucy had gripped Chalice’s arms now, her nails digging in ever so slightly, her eyes blazed in a way Chalice had never seen before. “I do,” she said with cold certainty. “My dad…daddy…oh…oh…fuck.”’ She began to sob. A moment later she flung her arms around Chalice and buried her head against her chest.