by Jodi Taylor
There was no sympathy. No understanding. Just a blunt, brutal, bleak and, I suspected, very accurate foretelling of my future. Of the destruction I could cause. Of the damage I could do. Of the lives I could ruin.
‘And it’s all down to you,’ Pennyroyal said, stirring the contents of the glass. ‘If you lift your finger, he’ll come running. You know he will. So unless you’re prepared to weather the storm – best you don’t lift that finger, eh? Drink this.’
My hand wasn’t quite steady. I sniffed. It smelled liquoricey.
‘What is it?’
‘A closely guarded secret.’
I sipped.
‘Straight down.’
I tilted the glass. Whatever it was, it tasted thick, dark and not unpleasant.
‘Thank you,’ I said, wondering what I was thanking him for.
He took the glass off me. ‘Back to bed now or you’ll be passed out on the floor in thirty seconds.’
‘Strong stuff,’ I said, getting up.
‘Yeah. One measure’s usually enough. I gave you three. Let’s hope you wake up in the morning, eh?’
‘I’ll make every effort,’ I said. ‘If only to save you the embarrassment of explaining to Lady Amelia that you’ve inadvertently poisoned twenty-five per cent of the team.’
He raised an eyebrow and I thought, for a very swift moment, there might have been a gleam of amusement. ‘You’ll do,’ he said. ‘Off you go, now, because I’m not carrying you.’
I did wake the next morning. Pennyroyal greeted me and Markham as if he had no idea we’d sloped off to a wedding and he and I had never had a midnight chat. The three of us went out and sat under the willows with a pitcher of fruit juice. Markham and I wore our best angelic expressions that wouldn’t have fooled Dr Bairstow for an instant and I suspect not Pennyroyal either.
He handed us both a piece of paper with a list of disbursements down one side and a credit on the other. The difference between the two had been divided into four equal portions. Even divided into quarters, this was still a considerable sum of money. There were rather more noughts than I was accustomed to seeing in my monthly pay cheque. Wow. Take it from me, the wrong side of the law is a lot more profitable than the right side of the law. Considerably less effort and considerably more money. I was impressed.
‘These sums will be paid to you,’ he announced. It would probably have been polite to thank him, but just for a moment, Markham and I were bereft of speech. And that doesn’t happen often.
I asked him if he’d mentioned our names as he’d handed over our prisoners to the Time Police. He shrugged. ‘It never came up.’
Which suited both of us.
We were just beginning to think about lunch when a tiny car raced up the drive, engine roaring, gravel flying and seriously terrifying a couple of blameless fat pigeons who had nothing more on their minds than their own lunch.
‘Ah,’ said Pennyroyal, presumably in case we hadn’t noticed. ‘Lady Amelia has returned.’
Rising, he followed the little car under the arch.
I looked at Markham. ‘What do we do? Go and greet our host politely or give them a moment to discuss whatever it is bounty hunters talk about when they’ve been apart for a couple of weeks?’
‘I think we should give them a few moments, don’t you? If they want us, they know where we are.’
So we sat tight and after a few minutes, Lady Amelia Smallhope appeared through the arch and strode vigorously across the grass.
‘Hello there. Welcome. I hope Pennyroyal has made you comfortable. We rather thought we owed you a spot of hospitality after your invite last Christmas. Everything all right, I hope. Pennyroyal’s bringing margaritas. I know it’s barely lunchtime but I left London before dawn so as far as I’m concerned it’s more than cocktail hour. Although if you plan things right it’s always cocktail hour somewhere. And here he comes.’
And indeed, Pennyroyal, now wearing his formal jacket, was treading across the grass towards us, bearing a well-laden tray.
‘Cheers,’ she said, seizing the frosted glass tenderly placed in front of her. ‘Bottoms up. Or up your bottoms, as dear Papa always said.’
I sipped appreciatively. Margaritas at barely noon was a habit I could really get used to.
Silence fell. Pennyroyal sat down but didn’t drink. There was an air of waiting for something.
‘Well,’ she said, and suddenly her voice had a crisper, more business-like note. ‘Now that we’re all together . . .’
I put down my glass. Something was going on here.
She looked at Pennyroyal. ‘What do they know?’
He shook his head. ‘As far as I know, nothing, my lady. I haven’t said a word. As per your instructions.’
‘Good man. Stick another in there, will you.’ She pushed her glass across the table.
‘Well then, I suppose it falls to me to break the news.’ She looked at us. ‘It took a while but I was finally able to locate Mrs Brown.’
‘Is she still alive?’ I asked, suddenly hopeful. ‘The last I heard she wasn’t expected to survive.’
She fixed me with a glare. ‘There’s nothing wrong with her at all. Well, she’s under house arrest, of course, and I had to go over the roof.’ She looked over at Pennyroyal. ‘Could have done with you that night, Pennyroyal. A chimney is no substitute for a good butler.’
‘As I believe I pointed out when we discussed the arrangements, my lady.’
‘You did indeed, Pennyroyal. Apologies. I shall certainly listen to you next time.’
I exchanged glances with Markham. He shrugged slightly. I was glad I wasn’t the only one without a clue what was going on.
‘However,’ she said. ‘Not the most important news du jour.’
Markham put down his barely touched drink. ‘Which is?’
She turned to us. ‘Mr Markham, Dr Maxwell, I bring good news. Dr Bairstow is not dead.’
My first thought – and I’ll admit the margarita wasn’t helping – was that he had somehow risen from the grave. As I’d always suspected he would do one day. Fortunately, before I could make an arse of myself, more conventional second thoughts shouldered that piece of nonsense aside.
Markham repeated, very carefully, ‘Dr Bairstow is not dead?’
‘Even better,’ she said cheerfully. ‘Not even injured.’
I had a sudden flash of enlightenment. ‘There never was a car crash, was there?’
‘Not even a little one. They drove out of St Mary’s gates and were detained shortly afterwards. They didn’t even get to Rushford.’
‘Where?’ demanded Markham. ‘Where are they?’
‘They’ve been split up. Mrs Brown, as a fairly high-profile member of society, is now under house arrest in London. Dr Bairstow is in a secure establishment which is, I believe, not unknown to you, Dr Maxwell.’
I stared. I didn’t know any secure establishments. I probably should do. There are those who say I should be in one – which is rather unkind, don’t you think? I think my mind was running along the lines of Broadmoor, or Wormwood Scrubs or that big new place just outside Redditch where they put the real dregs of humanity, and then common sense kicked in. They’d want somewhere quiet and discreet for Dr Bairstow. They wouldn’t want him mixing with hordes of unstable troublemakers – as if he didn’t do that on a daily basis at St Mary’s – they’d want him somewhere out of the way. Somewhere no one knew anything about. Not officially, anyway. And then I had it.
‘The Red House.’
She beamed. ‘Well done.’ I felt as if I’d scored the winning goal with the clock ticking down the last seconds. Presumably this was how her ancestors encouraged the peasants to hurl themselves at the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune while they themselves remained quietly on their horse out of harm’s way at the back.
I, on the other h
and, was not beaming at all.
The Red House is a very discreet, very upmarket medical facility to where the great and good can be shunted off after their latest headline-grabbing exploits while their defence lawyers get their act together. Red House clients are mainly politicians although they do have important and relevant people there sometimes. They had once lowered their standards sufficiently to offer me and Leon the use of their facilities. It hadn’t gone well. Which, when you think I was only there for about two hours, said a lot for both it and me. My brief stay there is also the reason Leon’s car doesn’t start well on cold, damp days, but we don’t talk about that. Well, I don’t and Leon also says nothing at all but in a completely different way.
The less well-known aspect of the Red House is that they also offer secure accommodation to people whom the government want out of the public eye. For the public good, of course.
The person in charge – and I’m back to the Red House now – Alexander Knox, had died shortly after I met him. Although executed would be a more accurate description. I saw again that cold tundra. The sprinkling of snow on the iron-hard ground. Heard the moaning wind. Saw the blood on the snow.
When I resurfaced, Markham was asking how long Dr Bairstow had been there.
‘Longer than a month,’ she said, gesturing for another refill. ‘As far as I can ascertain, he was never taken more than a few miles from St Mary’s.’
‘How do you know all this?’
‘We were hired to find out,’ she said shortly.
‘By whom?’ I asked, without any hope she would tell me. Clients were confidential. Apart from the Time Police, of course. As Pennyroyal said, we’d always know when we were working for those buggers because of the number of noughts on the bill and I’d had no problem with any of that. ‘Someone hired you to find them when they disappeared?’
‘Someone hired us to find them before they disappeared,’ she said. ‘Sorry – confusing sentence. To clarify – we were hired before the event in question could occur.’
‘By someone who knew it was going to happen?’
‘By someone who suspected Dr Bairstow and Mrs Brown would be removed from circulation at some point.’
‘Why?’ I asked.
‘Why would they be removed or why were we hired?’
‘Both.’
‘Didn’t ask,’ she said crisply. ‘You do know people just employ us, don’t you? No reasons given, usually. They say, “Ho there, good people. Take this money and do such and such,” and we take the money and do such and such. The whole transaction is usually over in the very short amount of time it takes us to perform the task, grab the money and run.’
Actually, I didn’t believe this. I was pretty sure they didn’t take just any job. And if they didn’t want to do the job then there wouldn’t be enough money in all the world to change their minds. And if you were foolish enough to persist, then there was every possibility you’d wake one night to find Pennyroyal grinning down at you.
I tried to establish a few facts. ‘Dr Bairstow is definitely still alive?’
‘Yes. Well, as of a few days ago, certainly, and I’ve no reason to believe that’s changed.’
‘And he’s being held at the Red House?’
‘He is. Hit me again, Pennyroyal. I’m gagging. That last one had less impact than flinging a chipolata into an aircraft hangar. Thirsty business, this driving.’
‘Well,’ said Markham catching my eye, ‘I wonder if it would be possible for Dr Maxwell and I to request a week’s leave. Things are quiet at the moment. I don’t believe we have much on. This would, I think, be a good time to . . .’
‘Au contraire,’ boomed Lady Amelia, startling the crows in the trees. They rose, flapping and cawing into the sky. ‘We have a very great deal on at the moment. Before you begin to pout, however, I do believe our interests are about to coincide – very profitably, I think – and we need to get busy. Lunch first and then a staff meeting at . . . say . . . two. Don’t be late.’
Seizing her glass, she strode off across the grass. Pennyroyal followed on behind. And he took the pitcher with him.
I looked at Markham. ‘We’re going to rescue Dr Bairstow, aren’t we? All four of us, I mean.’
‘Oh, I think so, otherwise why would they tell us where he is?’
‘Did someone pay them to locate Dr Bairstow and Mrs Brown?’
‘Well, obviously, or they wouldn’t have done it otherwise.’
‘Before the supposed accident?’
‘So it would seem.’
‘Who?’
‘God knows. I’m still struggling to get my head round the fact he’s not dead. Or Mrs Brown.’
‘And who’s funding all this?’
He frowned. ‘All this?’
‘Well, yes. Who arranged for them to employ us? Suddenly you and I are out of St Mary’s and equally suddenly, two bounty hunters who always work alone offer us gainful employment. Exactly the right people for the job are all assembled together in one place and raring to go. For more than adequate remuneration, of course. So who’s providing the adequate remuneration?’
He shrugged. ‘If we work through it logically, we should start with Mrs Brown herself. She will have powerful friends both in a personal and private capacity.’
‘Including a daughter in the Time Police,’ I said. ‘Mrs Brown is probably the best-connected person on the planet. It could be her.’
‘Well, since you’ve brought them up – how about the Time Police themselves?’
I shook my head. ‘I don’t think so. I can’t see the Time Police paying good money to save Dr Bairstow and St Mary’s, can you? Why would they do that? Anyhow, the way Treadwell is going there won’t be any St Mary’s in six months’ time. Their wildest dreams will come true and they won’t have to lift a finger.’
Markham played with his glass on the table. ‘All right. How about someone in the government? Someone who wants St Mary’s to survive. For some reason that escapes us for the moment.’
I looked at him. ‘It’s not you, is it?’
Markham is not who you think he is.
He shook his head and lifted his glass. ‘No. It’s not me.’
‘Only your accent’s disappeared again.’
He smiled but shook his head. ‘No, it’s not me.’ The accent was back.
‘Major Guthrie said you were a Geordie in the army.’
‘Why aye, man.’
‘We are going to get him out, aren’t we?’
‘Your mind jumps about like a frog on a hotplate, but yes. We’ll get him out. And Mrs Brown too, because I suspect her welfare will be the first thing he asks about and if we can’t come up with an acceptable answer, we’ll be subject to the Bairstow Stare.’
‘God forbid,’ I said.
‘Indeed,’ he said.
‘I can’t believe he’s alive,’ I said, my mind still on the implications. What this would mean for St Mary’s. ‘So what’s next? We get him out and then . . . ?’ I stopped because, well, what then?
Markham grinned. ‘As the saying goes, “With Dr Bairstow, anything is possible.”’
I frowned. ‘Shouldn’t that be God?’
‘What?’
‘That saying – I’m sure it should be God.’
‘Sorry. With Dr Bairstow, God is possible.’
We downed the remainder of our drinks and went in to lunch.
Which was unexpectedly grand. Pennyroyal’s famous slow roast pork with rosemary and apple. He’d obviously known Lady Amelia was on her way home even if we hadn’t. I told Pennyroyal it was lucky Treadwell had accustomed me to this new mushroom environment.
He raised his eyebrows.
‘You know,’ I said. ‘Kept in the dark and fed on shit.’ And then realised, too late, he might take that as an adverse comment on his cooking.
No business was discussed during lunch. Pennyroyal and Lady Amelia spoke of mutual friends, Lady Amelia’s visit to the Royal Ballet, shopping, the traffic, the weather and other trivia. Markham and I ate and listened.
Outside, the sky had darkened and rain began to fall.
‘We’ll have our meeting in here, I think,’ announced Lady Amelia. ‘It’s warm and the cocktail shaker is close by.’
‘Right,’ she said, after we’d cleared away the lunch things. ‘Despite its posh appearance and high-class patients, the Red House is no different than any other secure establishment. Authorisation paperwork is required to transfer any prisoner to another location. All documents and movement orders originate from the Home Office, along with details of transportation and approved escort. Everything must be checked and cleared well in advance. We can’t just breeze in and expect them to hand him over.’
‘And from where do we obtain this paperwork?’ said Markham. The accent had disappeared again.
‘Well, obviously the first stage is to submit a request to move the prisoner and the second is to obtain official permission to do so.’ She rummaged in a briefcase and plonked a large white foolscap envelope on the table. ‘Everything we need.’
‘Wow,’ I said. ‘You actually managed to get all that forged at such short notice?’
‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘A really good forgery actually takes considerably longer to manufacture than simply obtaining the real thing. And is much more expensive. No, these documents are genuine. These will pass the strictest scrutiny because they are the real deal.’ She regarded the envelope fondly. ‘They are the dog’s bollocks of genuine documents.’