by Matthew Dunn
Will frowned. “Patrick’s message. Is it in any way connected to your requirement to capture the Qods Force commander?”
“Yes, it most certainly is related, William.” He pointed at Will. “I need you to identify and hunt down this man. I need you to interrogate him and find out what he plans to do to us. I need you to do what you do best and what no one else is capable of.” Alistair’s face looked somber. “This will be your toughest and most critical mission. You must succeed despite the odds against your doing so.” Alistair nodded once. “Do whatever you have to do. But you must succeed. You must stop him.”
“Stop him from doing what?”
Alistair nodded slowly. “The Qods Force Head of Western Directorate has planned to inflict upon us a huge massacre the likes of which the world has never seen before. You must stop him from committing genocide.”
Six
Will opened the door, returned the keys to his pocket, and looked down at the pile of letters on the floor by his feet. He stepped over them and allowed the door to slam shut behind him.
He had not been to his apartment for more than two years, and despite its being clean and tidy, a musty odor hung heavy in the air. He walked along the corridor and entered the minimalist open-plan dining, lounge, and kitchen area. Light from the Thames-facing windows illuminated floating dust, and Will opened one of them to allow a fresh breeze to course through. He looked out at London. From his position on the building’s top floor, he could see much of the great city and be reminded of all the memories it held for him. He turned, walked to his kitchen, and placed a grocery bag on one of the counters.
Will breathed deeply for a while and wondered why he had come here. He wondered why he so rarely used the place. He wondered why it had never really felt like a true home for him. He shook his head, frowned, looked around the kitchen for a moment before opening a cupboard. He withdrew a small saucepan and a china teapot, rinsed both in the sink, and placed the pan on a burner. From within the grocery bag, he pulled out a bottle of Gleneagles Natural Spring Water, unscrewed the cap, and poured half its contents into the pan. Then he turned on the burner, walked to his bathroom, and stripped off his clothes. The mirror before him showed his muscular but battered physique and the thick bandages that had been expertly applied over his most recent wounds by the London doctor. He stood for a while and wondered how much more abuse his body could take after the years of violence inflicted on it. Considerably more, he decided, and dressed as he heard the water reach the boiling point.
He reentered the kitchen, picked up the pan, and poured a little of the water inside and over the teapot. From the grocery bag, he withdrew a packet of loose-leaf Scottish breakfast tea. He gently opened the packet and smiled as he held it to his nose. The smell instantly reminded him of good times, of times before now, of times he often could not remember in detail. He drizzled some of the tea into the pot, shook the pot a little to spread the tea evenly in its base, and poured boiling water over it. From an adjacent drawer, he withdrew a long spoon and a tea cozy. He stirred the tea three times with the spoon and placed the cozy over the pot.
He moved to his Garrard 501 turntable and crouched beside it to look at his record collection. He knew what he wanted to listen to, and when he found the record, he carefully extracted it from its jacket and set it on the turntable. He switched on the machine and watched its stylus move over the vinyl before setting itself down to play. Speakers beside the Garrard hissed and crackled before emitting the sounds of the Spanish classical guitarist Andres Segovia playing Isaac Albeniz’s “Sevilla.” Will closed his eyes for a moment and recalled the time he had traveled from America to London as a teenager and attended what was to be the old maestro’s last British concert. He remembered Segovia’s final words as Will and others in the audience repeatedly called for more encores.
The old man is tired now and must go.
He remembered hearing shortly afterward that the old man had passed away.
Will opened his eyes and walked back into the kitchen. He searched through cupboards before finding a china cup and saucer, examining both to ensure that they were clean. He carefully poured tea into the cup, walked back into the lounge area, sat at his bare dining table, and looked around. On one wall he saw a framed photograph of a younger Will and three other men standing on a mountain runway wearing high-altitude Foreign Legion parachute equipment and carrying assault rifles. Inscribed at the bottom of the photograph were the words “We gave them hell.” He smiled at the machismo of the sentiment, and his smile faded as he recalled the deaths of two of the men in the picture. Next to the photograph was a family portrait showing a very much younger Will, his sister, and their mother and father. He knew that he could have been only four or five years old when the painting was made. He knew that his father had been taken from him soon afterward.
Will cursed his memories of death and loss and drank a sip of the breakfast tea. The warmth of the drink and the sounds of Segovia calmed him and briefly took his mind to a place of tranquillity. He let himself enjoy the moment before reality intruded as a twinge of pain from one of the bullet holes in his stomach.
He stood and walked into the apartment’s master bedroom. The bed that was usually dressed in crisp, white, fragrant linen was now bare. He vaguely remembered the many women who’d been to this room. They seemed anonymous now. Or maybe it was he who seemed anonymous, not they. He walked out of the bedroom and looked around the apartment one more time. He knew now that he hated the place. It was too cold and bare. He knew that it could have been something very different had there been a lover in his life to share it with him.
Pulling out his phone, he called his bank. He gave instructions to the man at the other end of the line, listened to the banker argue with him and tell Will that he would be mad to do as he was suggesting. Will told the man to shut up and just do what he was told. He checked his watch. Seven hours before he was due to board a plane to Bosnia. Rain was now falling heavily over the city. He decided that he had just enough time to visit two other places in London. Being in the rain was preferable to being here.
Will walked quickly at first, the collar of his overcoat turned up, his head low to shield himself from the weather. When he was satisfied that there were no other people nearby, he slowed and looked around. He was in Highgate Cemetery, North London’s prestigious and eerie old place for the dead, and at first he was unsure where to go. He looked at gravestones, at statues of angels, at Gothic architecture covered with vines and moss, at dark and tangled trees and the narrow twisting footpaths. Everywhere around him seemed designed by nature and the place’s sleeping occupants to keep the grounds secret from outsiders. He rubbed his hands and walked some more until he found a pathway that felt familiar. Rain lashed harder against his face, and he increased his pace, dodging sporadic stones and exposed roots and darting through side alleys, short tunnels, and occasional open ground. He passed tombs and soon knew that he was heading in the right direction. He checked the bunch of flowers in his hand, and even though their paper wrapping was now sodden and falling apart, the blend of golden chrysanthemums and ivory poppies still looked fresh and pretty. He moved around two bends on his trail.
Then he stopped in surprise.
His destination was directly in front of him and approximately thirty meters from where he was now standing. But a man and a woman were standing right where he wanted to be. Umbrellas shielded their heads, and their arms were interlinked. They stood motionless and silent, looking downward, their backs to him. They were well dressed and looked like visiting executives. Will rubbed a hand over his face to wipe away water, took two steps forward, then stopped again. He felt unsure what to do. He knew that the couple could be random tourists, as the cemetery was filled with dead celebrities, academics, politicians, and famous writers and therefore had become a ghoulish attraction of sorts. But he wondered what kind of tourists would come out on a day like today and stand in a part of the cemetery that held dead people of no par
ticular notoriety or interest.
He walked toward them slowly and silently. They did not move, and Will was sure that they were unaware of his presence. He stopped again, breathed in deeply, and sighed. He now knew exactly who they were.
He looked left and right, wondering whether he should turn around and quietly remove himself from this place. He almost did exactly that. But then he silently cursed and looked back at the couple. He felt his stomach tighten and cramp over his wounds, felt a wave of sickness. He breathed deeply again to try to calm himself while rain pelted his exposed face. He shook his head, made a decision, and spoke loudly enough to be sure he could be heard by the people before him.
“Sarah. Sarah. It’s Will.”
He watched the couple turn quickly toward him, saw their umbrellas rise to expose their faces and give them a sight of him, saw the man’s face shift from surprise to anger and the woman’s mouth open slightly before closing. The man took one step away from Will, stumbled, then tried to pull the woman after him. The woman stood still and seemed to resist her companion’s efforts to get her to move.
Will raised his flowers and an open palm. “I didn’t know you would be here. How could I?”
The man pointed at Will and shouted, “Go away! You shouldn’t be here.” He turned quickly to the woman and said in a quieter voice, “Come on, Sarah, let’s go.”
Will stood still. So did the woman.
She glanced at her companion, uttered something inaudible to him, and broke free from his grip. The man replied and strode off, stopping out of earshot of the woman but not out of sight.
The woman glanced at the ground, causing her long blond hair to fall straight downward and hide her face briefly. She smiled and then did not do so, looked back up at something before turning her attention directly to Will. Her expression was sharp, her features stunning.
She beckoned to Will and said, “Come closer so that I can see you properly.”
Will hesitated for a moment. He looked at the man and saw that he was watching them both, that he looked even angrier, that he looked possibly scared. Will turned back to Sarah. He hadn’t seen her for eight years. She was his sister.
“Come closer.” Sarah’s voice was both delicate and strong.
Will glanced again at the man and nodded at him, even though he knew that the action would do nothing to placate him. He gripped the flowers tightly and walked to Sarah. Once he stood before her, he wondered if he should try to kiss her on the cheek. But he just stood there and allowed the rain to stream down his face and neck.
Sarah looked barely older than when he’d last seen her. She was tall for a woman, only a few inches shorter than Will, and slim and beautiful. But her clothes looked very different from the attire Will had last seen her wearing. Back then she had been dressed in jeans and a T-shirt; now she was wearing an expensive suit underneath an open raincoat. He briefly wondered if the nearby man, who Will knew was called James and was her husband and was a senior partner in one of the top London law firms, had bought her the clothes. But he knew that Sarah would never allow anyone to spend money on her. She had always been fiercely independent. She had always believed that she must succeed in life without asking anything of anyone but herself.
Will tried to smile but felt nervous and uneasy, even though he was glad to be with his sister. He coughed and repeated, “I had no idea you would be here.”
Sarah raised her umbrella higher over her head. Her eyes flickered. “As you say, how could you have? I’ve not been here for a while, and when I do come, it’s on a whim.”
Will nodded slowly and asked, “How have you been?”
She smiled slightly. “Is that what you really want to ask me?”
Will shrugged. “It’s a normal question.”
Sarah shook her head quickly. “It’s a question that you should know would take me much too long to answer. Therefore it’s either stupid or thoughtless, or you’re asking it simply because you don’t know what else to say.”
So Will said nothing. Rain hit him harder. Sarah held her umbrella quite still.
She seemed to be examining him and narrowed her eyes before asking, “Why are you here?”
Will glanced down before looking up. “You know why.”
“What I know, my brother, is that this may be the first time you’ve ever come here.” Sarah’s words sounded hard, but her eyes glistened and they didn’t seem as cold as her voice. “At least the first time since it happened.”
Will nodded and looked around. Trees were bare of leaves and shoots, stone headstones and monuments were dimpled with age, and everywhere smelled of winter. But despite their purpose, the grounds around him seemed oddly alive and felt as though they were closing in on him. He looked once more at Sarah. “I’ve been away. Now I’m back, and in a few hours’ time I’ll be away again. I came here because I needed to come.”
Sarah huffed. “That’s just like you.”
Will frowned.
She, too, looked around, then back at Will. “Just like you to avoid spending time with the living in London but instead choose to come and spend it with the dead.”
Will felt anger surge through him. “Sarah, that’s not fair-”
“But not incorrect.”
He breathed slowly and tried to control his anger while simultaneously wondering why he was angry. He knew that he could never really be angry with Sarah. He smiled gently and nodded once. “Without wishing to sound stupid again, may I ask whether you are okay?”
As he saw Sarah’s eyes flicker again, he suspected that her fierce intellect would be tempted to produce another riposte, but instead she spoke softly. “I’m doing very well in my job and will make partner in the law firm next year. I make a good living, have a lovely house, may have children soon, and am married to a man”-she glanced over at James-“who is kind and clumsy and funny and forgetful and boring and loyal.” She looked back at Will. “I am happy with my life, happy with everything, happy that I survived the worst of it all and found the strength to do normal things with normal people.” Her eyes softened and fixed directly on Will’s. “You of all people must see that and understand what I’ve just said.”
“I do.” Will understood exactly what she’d said, plus the hidden meaning within her words. “I also know you’re very lucky to have those things.”
Sarah shook her head. “No. I got them through effort and application, not luck.”
Will smiled. “Don’t make the mistake of thinking you have happiness and I don’t.”
“How could I make that mistake? I don’t know you anymore.” Sarah frowned and took a step closer to him. She lowered her voice. “But I still understand how you think.”
“You always were the clever one.”
“But not as dangerously clever as you.”
Will held her gaze even though he knew that Sarah would not look away. He knew that she had far too much strength to feel intimidated by him. He had always loved her for that.
Sarah moved her umbrella so that it was now covering them both. To Will’s surprise, she placed a hand against his cheek and ran her fingers gently down his face. “You think you’re a loner, Will. Maybe you are. Maybe that’s who you want to be. Maybe”-she paused-“maybe that’s what you have to be.”
Will chuckled. “I can be whatever I want to be.”
“Not in your line of work you can’t.”
He stopped chuckling. “You don’t know what I do for a living.”
Sarah brushed her fingers down across Will’s face before resting her hand on his arm. “Not exactly, no. But I can see enough to tell me that you do unusual things, hard things. And remember, I was there when it all started for you. When you had to make that terrible decision to end your boyhood and become not just a man but a man with the blood of the dead on his hands.”
“Sarah, you know why-”
She raised a finger to Will’s lips and spoke in a near whisper. “Of course I know why. I wouldn’t be alive now if you hadn’t made
that decision. . if you hadn’t rescued me from them.”
The two of them were silent for a moment, and this time both broke the other’s gaze.
Will looked at the ground. “Regardless, we’re both here today for a reason. I couldn’t stop that from happening. We’re here because I failed in the past.”
Sarah cradled her fingers gently under Will’s chin and raised his head so that he was looking at her. “I look at you now and know that whatever it is you do with your life, you wouldn’t allow anything like that to happen again. I see the strength in you, the focus and the determination. And I also still see the things I saw in you when you were a boy. I still see your huge heart, your compassion, your love, your sorrow, your humor and intelligence. But I also see a man who has become not just a loner but very lonely.”
Will smiled, touching his sister’s fingers. The rain banged against their umbrella, but he ignored the sound and focused only on the moment. It was a moment he wanted to hold on to forever. It was a moment that he feared would be stolen from him, just like the few other good memories. He gripped her hand harder. His voice felt thick in his throat as he asked, “You will be okay, won’t you, Sarah?”
Sarah nodded and returned his grip. A tear ran down her cheek. “Of course I’ll be okay. I have finally come to believe that there are more good people in this world than bad. I no longer believe I need protection from imaginary ills. Even though”-she frowned-“even though I still sometimes wonder if that belief is right.” She glanced at James and said quietly, “I’ve told him everything about what happened. He fears you, but he’s not angry with you. He’s angry with himself.” She looked back at Will, and her voice sounded stronger. “He knows he could never do what you did. He knows that in the face of terrible danger, like what you faced and defeated all those years ago, he would cower and watch me die rather than risk his life to save me.” She smiled. “And as odd as this may sound to you, I love him for that, because it means he’s normal. That normality separates you and me now.”