A Plague Of Crows th-2

by Douglas Lindsay

  'Kill the old guy,' he said. 'If you don't, the other women will die. If you kill the old guy, I'll let them go. You think you can do that much for me, Tommy?'

  I had a gun in my hand. That's the moment I think most about when I think about that night. The moment he gave me a gun, knowing I would do nothing with it other than what he was telling me to do.

  I should have shot him. John. I should have shot John when I had the chance. Then I would have died. Or I should have turned the gun on myself.

  Except, I believed him. The whole idea was to mock me further, to complete my humiliation. He fully intended to let those women live if I killed the grandfather, so that I would know that he would have let the first woman live if only I'd been able to penetrate her.

  I looked at the grandfather. His dead eyes looked back. His dead eyes. I stood there, my trousers still at my knees, my pathetic, impotent penis resting woefully on my balls, and I shot him. Twice. In the chest.

  John didn't kill the other women. A man of his word.

  *

  Right from that night, that first night, I woke up gasping, my voice straining, silently screaming into the dark. In the forest, in the dead of night. Woke up, sweating, the guilt of a million years crawling over my skin like cockroaches. I'd wet myself.

  They were sleeping. One of them was supposed to be the guard, but he was keeled over as well. The Bosnian women were gone. They weren't a threat.

  They were gone. The bodies of the dead were gone.

  I stood up. The dead of night in a forest in the middle of a war. Picked up my bag, picked up my camera, and stinking of piss and cheap booze and shame I walked out of there. Didn't look back. Some part of me wondered whether I should pick up a gun and kill the four of them while they slept. Then I could have turned the gun on myself.

  I didn't pick up the gun. I kept on walking. I wondered if they'd come after me, or whether they'd search through the forest for the women. Didn't even look over my shoulder. Didn't care. They could have come after me if they'd wanted. They could have caught me, tortured me. They could have come invisibly from behind, a sniper in a tree, and taken me out.

  I walked on. Every now and again I came across evidence of the war. I realised I wanted to see the women. I wanted to see them, wanted to apologise, as if that would make everything all right. As if that would bring back the old man, as if that would mean I'd stood up for them, or at the very least, that I'd been able to save her. The woman who'd been desperate for me to penetrate her. I'd apologise, they'd forgive me and I would receive absolution. Instant. There and then. Or else I could give them a knife and offer myself to them for vengeance.

  I wake up. There is no sound. I can open my eyes, but there is total darkness. Darkness so complete that it appears solid. As if I'm inside a solid block. Wonder if I've been buried alive. Maybe I'm not alive.

  But then there's the pain.

  39

  Taylor looks at his watch. Just after two in the afternoon. His heart sinks, although he immediately questions himself. The day is already dragging and there's a long way to go. But what is it he's looking forward to that evening?

  Gostkowski beside him, they walk back upstairs from the interrogation room. An ugly day questioning people, most of whom were lying; or, at the very least, skewering their stories as far as possible from the truth.

  What is Gostkowski doing that night? He's never wondered before. He knows she's not married, but that's all he knows. He would probably have heard from Hutton, but they haven't seen much of each other. Even when they were working together, he didn't talk about her. Which was peculiar, for Hutton.

  Taylor glances at her and understands. Of course. He smiles ruefully to himself. Fucking Hutton.

  He envies him. A carefree life, happily drinking and shagging. Slight glitch every time the possibility of getting back together with his wife comes along, and a moderate amount of remorse about the fact that he rarely sees his children, but that aside, a guilt-free life devoted to indulging himself in his pleasures of women and alcohol, both of which he finds in endless supply.

  'You talk to Sgt Hutton much since the Plague of Crows thing?' he asks.

  Hasn't seen Hutton and Gostkowski talk at all, but knows that his sergeant is capable, on occasion, of a degree of discretion.

  Gostkowski glances briefly at Taylor, then looks away as she surprises herself with a rare moment of candour.

  'We got a bit too involved during the Crows investigation, Sir,' she says. 'It was unprofessional. I haven't really spoken to him since.'

  'Hmm,' says Taylor.

  That they'd had sex in the first place was entirely in keeping with Hutton's character, that the DI had ended it because it was unprofessional in keeping with hers.

  They come to the front desk, Ramsay holding dominion over his territory, never seeming to be off duty.

  'Sergeant,' says Taylor. 'We'll release Masters later, but I'm not in a rush. Leave him for another hour or two, make him think the worst.'

  Ramsay nods.

  'Hutton around?' asks Taylor.

  'Haven't seen him today,' says Ramsay.

  Taylor has talked as he walked, but now he takes a couple more paces and then stops.

  'What's he been working on the last couple of days?'

  'Principally the school beating.'

  'He passed that onto Dorritt,' says Taylor.

  'He was writing up a report on it for him. I presumed he was continuing to work for the DCI…'

  'What else have you given him?' asks Taylor sharply, aware that Dorritt would no more have wanted Hutton working for him on the school beating than the other way round.

  'He had several ongoing cases, and I know it was logged in yesterday evening that he was given first sight of an insurance fraud case involving a small building firm in Westburn,' said Ramsay firmly. Undaunted by his superior officer's sharpness of tone, having been many years in the job.

  'You didn't think to check his whereabouts this morning when he didn't come in?' said Taylor.

  'If he was late,' said Ramsay firmly, 'it would hardly be the first time. He has prior. If he was out on a case, then I can't be expected to keep minute-by-minute checks on all our detectives.'

  'These are hardly normal times,' says Taylor.

  'It's been two months,' replies Ramsay.

  'Jesus,' says Taylor, 'it was two months between the last two. There isn't a set length of time after which it's all right.'

  'And there isn't enough manpower in the station for us to keep any kind of regular check on the precise whereabouts of everyone who works here. There has to be a certain amount of personal responsibility. Sir.'

  Taylor stares for a little while longer then turns away, takes out his mobile. Gostkowski stands slightly awkwardly. She thinks Taylor is overreacting. Thinks that the men are having some kind of ridiculous, testosterone-laden alpha male power struggle. Also believes that Hutton is liable to have been too hungover to come in, or is off on some absurd tangent of an investigation.

  An unreliable officer, that's how she sees him. Does not feel very good about getting carried away in January and allowing herself to be added to Hutton's absurdly long list. The sex was good, once or twice. The third had been too much.

  Taylor turns back. Softened a little. Holds his hand up to the sergeant.

  'Not answering his mobile or home number. I know on some level I'm probably being melodramatic, but the Plague of Crows is coming back, and some police officer somewhere is going to end up under the knife. Would you mind calling the folk running the bracelet scheme and finding out where he is?'

  'Not at all, Sir,' says Ramsay.

  'Thank you,' replies Taylor, and then he leaves him, heading back to his office.

  Gostkowski and Ramsay share a glance as she follows.

  *

  There are in Taylor's office three minutes later when the phone rings. Taylor lifts it abruptly, barks, 'Yes?'

  'The Sergeant is at his house, Chief Inspector,' say
s Ramsay.

  'You have confirmation of that?' says Taylor.

  Slight pause.

  'The bracelet is at his house, Sir. There's no alarm gone off to suggest it's been broken or tampered with, so we can assume that the Sergeant is there with it.'

  Taylor hangs up without saying anything else. He looks across the desk at Gostkowski.

  'The bracelet says he's at his flat.'

  'So that's where he'll be,' she says.

  Taylor looks at her while he lifts the phone. Dials Hutton's home number, lets it ring. No answer. Uses his mobile to dial Hutton's mobile. Waits for a few rings, then hangs up. Has looked at Gostkowski throughout.

  'I'm sure it's nothing, Sir,' she says. 'He's not the most reliable.'

  'It's two in the afternoon,' says Taylor, 'he usually isn't that shit.'

  Another glance at his watch, a quick look around the station.

  'I'm going round there. Only take a few minutes. You stay on the domestic. You know where we're going with it anyway. I'll call in, let you know when I find him.'

  Some glib comment comes to Gostkowski's mind, about not killing Hutton when he finds him, but it's not her way to utter any of the occasional glib comments that enter her head.

  Taylor leaves.

  *

  He stands at Hutton's door. No answer. Waits impatiently. Has a bad feeling. Was aware of having had a bad feeling even before he came out here, even before he began to enquire after Hutton's whereabouts. Pointlessly checks his watch. Looks along the short corridor. Tries the door handle. Locked. Another glance along the corridor, and then he puts his shoulder to the door.

  Nothing. This is what he needs the Sergeant for. Does it again, and again. Kicks it with the sole of his shoe, hard next to the lock. Nearly falls over. Someone along the landing sticks their head out the door, looks suspiciously along the corridor.

  'Fuck off,' mutters Taylor, words vaguely aimed in their direction. The door closes again.

  He's not counting. Eventually the lock starts to give and the door opens, screws pinging away into dark corners.

  He enters the flat. Smells of cigarettes. Taylor shakes his head. Genuinely thinks at this point that he will find Hutton dead. For all the worry, he's not thinking about the Plague of Crows. He's assuming something much more prosaic about Hutton. Alcohol poisoning, perhaps. A binge too many. Fallen asleep in his bath and drowned.

  Would he have killed himself? There was a darkness in him. A depth of some description that he did not talk of. A past. The war in Bosnia. Never talked about it. Never talked about it to the point that it was significant him not talking about it.

  'Sergeant?' he calls. Despite the ill-feeling, still wary of walking in on the sergeant, drunk and naked in bed with someone or naked in front of the TV.

  Glances into the bathroom. Nothing. Slight feeling of relief, yet the wariness and anxiety grow. Into the bedroom. Clothes dumped everywhere, the bed unmade. A full ashtray. An empty bottle of vodka on the floor beside the bed. Taylor's heart sinks at the sight of it all. And then, there it is, and his heart sinks even more.

  The bracelet. The bracelet which was supposed to be impossible to remove without setting off a string of alarms, sitting humbly and quietly on the bedside table.

  He stares at it, then carefully takes out a handkerchief, lifts the bracelet and puts it in the pocket of his coat.

  40

  You might call it sensory deprivation. Can't hear, can't see. There's no smell. Hands and legs bound, can't touch anything. Trouble is, that leaves pain.

  A lot of pain. The after-effects of the taser still linger, particularly in my groin, but the worst is my hand. She crushed my hand, while I lay, impotently, consumed by pain. And the pain in my hand has not lessened.

  I don't know what the body does to try to combat pain. I presume it does something, releases some chemical or other. Whatever it is, it ain't up to the task of dealing with a crushed hand. The most God-awful screaming pain I could ever imagine.

  She crushed my hand to get the bracelet off.

  You know? You know what? I deserve it.

  I wake up, blinded by darkness, and all I can think is that I've had this coming. I don't know who she is. At least, I'm not sure. I'm not sure, but there was something trying to click in the middle of my brain. I'd been thinking about it, something about her. She seemed familiar. I walked into this. Something about her face.

  I saw her in my dream. The dream that's not really a dream, the dream that's a flashback. She was there. She was one of the women, sitting on the sidelines, watching their men being butchered, She was there, getting raped, several men taking her in turn. She lay on the forest floor as her sister or cousin was shot in the head because this pathetic, complicit coward could not get an erection. And then she watched as the coward put two bullets in her grandfather's chest. She was there throughout.

  I lie, bound and gagged in the dark, no idea where I am, no sounds, no smell, and that's all I can think. Really, she doesn't look like any of those women, but she could easily have been one of the younger ones. Maybe that's what this is. Revenge. She was a sixteen-year-old girl being violated, physically forced out of her youth.

  My hand throbs. My penis aches. Feel a bloody, useless miserable wreck. But lying here, lying in this abject state of despair, I don't feel fear at the horror that's to come, I don't feel regret, I don't feel any kind of self-pity.

  Relief.

  Is that what I'd say? I feel relief. At last, it's come. Revenge has come. Revenge will be brutal and unpleasant and agonising, but at the end of it I'll be dead, and when I'm dead I'm going to be free. I won't have to live with that night in the forest in Bosnia anymore.

  Any day now, I shall be released.

  Bob comes into my head. Fuck, I almost laugh, except I can't laugh. My mouth is gagged and anyway, I'm not for laughing. Not like this, and not with those images in my head.

  I've been wanting release for so long. Suicide always seemed a chicken's way. Running from it. Not facing up to my past. I knew it was coming eventually. The time when I would have to stand up and face the consequences of what I'd done.

  Every time I saw the war crimes tribunal in the Hague, I wondered if they were going to mention me. Mention the Scottish journalist who stuck his nose in, got involved, went too far, couldn't get himself out, sat and watched and even then, when all he had to do was have sex in order to save a life, couldn't even do that.

  There seems to be a blanket over me. Why is there a blanket? That seems like a consideration, when none has been previously given.

  I'm lying here, tortured, aching. Everything hurts. My past has caught up with me. And I feel relief. And I can't help thinking that I shouldn't be feeling relief. Relief is something else to be feeling guilty about. I couldn't save that woman. I killed the old guy. I don't deserve relief. I don't deserve to feel relief at this torture.

  I just deserve to suffer, and to go on suffering.

  41

  Taylor is in Connor's office. Montgomery sits to the side, nominally more an observer than a participant, but he is about to get involved.

  Taylor is incredulous. Connor uncomfortable. Montgomery contemptuous.

  'You're fucking kidding me?' barks Taylor.

  Connor has been getting gradually weaker as the months have gone by, as the Plague of Crows has turned his great opportunity into the dead weight that will sink him. He will call it his bane, Connor's Bane, when he writes his memoirs. The memoir that no one will want to read or, indeed, publish.

  'Chief Inspector,' he says, although as words of admonition they are bound to receive no respect.

  'What's the point in these stupid bracelets,' says Taylor, dismissively holding up his wrist, 'if we don't follow up when there's an identifiable issue? He's missing. The sergeant is missing. Why are we here? Why did the department spend God knows how much money if we're just going to ignore it when it happens?'

  Connor glances at Montgomery. Montgomery looks dismissive of Ta
ylor, although he has little more respect for Connor as he can see he wants him to argue his case for him.

  'It's not the fact that there's a rogue bracelet, or there's potential for something to have happened to a police officer,' says Montgomery. 'It's the officer in question that's the issue.'

  'Aw, come on to…'

  'Chief Inspector, by all account your sergeant has been going off the rails the last couple of months. Regularly late for work. Two weeks ago he missed an entire day after a night when he was seen pouring into a taxi, completely out of his face on vodka. He's sleeping around the station like he's on some demented bender of sexual destruction. And this despite being suspended last year for inappropriate sexual behaviour.'

  'During none of which,' says Taylor, 'did he remove his bracelet or actually go missing.'

  'It's not too great a logical progression to imagine him taking it a step further and wanting some peace and quiet. He's probably sleeping with someone else he shouldn't be, and doesn't want to be traced to their house.'

  Taylor rages. Closes his eyes. Could take two steps over there and land a punch on the fucker. And not some pointless, painful blow to the jaw. A punch to the neck, just under the chin. Let's see the bastard get up from that.

  Part of Taylor's annoyance, of course, comes from the fact that he knows Montgomery might be right. It is odd that Hutton has just vanished, and he really cannot explain how he would have removed the bracelet without damaging it. Nevertheless, it would be in keeping with how it's been going with him. They hadn't been talking about it, but clearly the Plague of Crows business, something about it, something intrinsic at the heart of the case, had got under Hutton's skin.

  'Have you checked what your wife's doing today?' says Montgomery.

  He looks coldly at Taylor, knowing full well that Taylor had been divorced in the past year, his wife leaving for a younger model.

  Taylor looks at Connor, ignores Montgomery. It's the only way to deal with him, punching in the throat being off the agenda.