Come, Time

by Richard Jenkins

CHAPTER SIX

  Once again I am hiding, waiting in woodland, in a dense, man-made plantation of coniferous trees. Fussy, near parallel rows, planted for maximum yield, act as a prison keeping light and life out. In the distance, I can see the chapel. It is the perfect watch tower, high in the hills and providing a clear and honest view of the only road that leads to it.

  As darkness beds-in, the chapel remains empty. Leaving the bike behind, I make my move. I scramble out of the woodland, over a puny wire fence and on to a narrow country lane, which provides a steep incline to my destination.

  The chapel is a simple late Victorian building surrounded by its own burial ground. It is brick-built and stands small yet purposeful, with a contented poise. Its proportions are natural and inoffensive until, that is, you notice the single floor, concrete extension that has been flung onto its rear and continues to stick. On each side of the original building are two large, arched windows, which I happen to know have been double-glazed. The congregation who worship at the curch is a group called The Christian Fellowship. A notice board outside proclaims, "As in Heaven on Earth." Oh well, I think, there’s always hell.

  Gaining entry is easy - a single hard kick against the arched, wooden door. Inside it is cold and dark. I feel against the wall for a light switch and quickly find a row of four. I flick one on, give my eyes a second to adjust then rapidly scan the room to form a mental picture of all I see. Once complete, I return the room to darkness.

  The chapel seems more a village hall than a church. No pews, just a dozen or so rows of plastic chairs all aimed at a small stage, which is backed by a single blue curtain and a large wooden cross. The pulpit is basic, a lectern in the shape of a cross. I see nothing else that tells of God or worship.

  From my pocket, I pull my torch, turn it on and head for a door that stands to the left of the stage. Through the door I enter the extension. I see tables and chairs and children’s paintings pinned to the walls. In one corner, I find a small kitchen area consisting of a small fridge, a gas stove, a kettle with jars of tea and coffee, and two Calor gas heaters.

  After coffee and a torch-lit hot dinner of baked beans, sardines and two chocolate bars, I settle for the night. My bed is a row of four chairs positioned next to the window. This gives me a clear view of all that approaches. For warmth, a Calor gas heater works fine.

  Outside all nature is dark, no moon or stars to burst the night. The only constant light is a single, distant street light, little more than a dot, which marks the approach to a small hamlet called Hope.

  A car speeds towards Hope. Its headlights dazzle and snare my gaze. A vehicle-activated road sign spews rich red and amber light, flashing at the driver to slow down. It fixes my stare. Light that cuts through the darkness is always seductive, even more so when you are alone. It’s the promise of something, of people and of life.

  I should sleep but can’t, too much fuel burning in my veins. I turn on the mobile phone and check for missed calls or texts. No one has called or left a message. All is silent, as once I liked it.

  Needing to be occupied, I pull the laptop from my rucksack, boot it up and open the Word document containing the novel. I read the opening line:

  "You can take the man out of the cunt, but you can’t take the cunt out of the man."

  A voice in me wants to argue with this, but another, mutters, ‘why bother?’ All I can muster is this, survival was never easy. I scroll down to the final pages and find what seems to be a story-within-the story, tilted Bunker14382. It reads:

  "In the bunker lived the cream of society, the most successful and the most renowned. There were scientists, artists, wits and intellects, all those that could be found, collected and stored before the missiles came to shatter the earth.

  Of course, military and political personnel also shared space with the country’s finest, as did some from the Civil Service, but even so, the average IQ was still a mighty 165. Men, it will come as no surprise, were dominant. Not in number, but in power, they ruled. Still, there were plenty of women, in fact, more than enough to go around.

  Amongst the inhabitants of the bunker the shock of the destruction dissipated with remarkable ease. A new day, a new dawn seemed the only accepted attitude. Billions of people had been lost, but history had been saved, and our culture stored to rise again.

  One such inhabitant, Karl, who had previously considered himself to beyond blessing, now considered himself to be the luckiest man alive. Granted, there weren’t that many men alive, but still, he concluded, for the first time in his life he was actually going somewhere positive.

  Karl, you see, should never have made it to the bunker. Before the war, he worked as a lowly removal man. He was the man with the van, no job was too small, and most were too large. His route to the bunker was a simple case of mistaken identity. Put simply, the man with the van lived while the most brilliant physicist of his generation was left to cower under a table or doorway until his flesh was smashed into a billion or more atoms.

  ‘Can I breed?’ Karl asked Major Miles Robertson, whose reply was simple.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Not even a little?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Resources are limited.’

  ‘So what am I gonna do?’

  ‘You’ll cook for us.’

  ‘I can’t cook.’

  ‘Can you use a microwave?’

  ‘Yeah, a normal one.’

  ‘Can you read?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then you have all the skills required.’

  ‘To cook.’

  ‘To cook, and clean. You must, of course, keep the kitchen clean.’

  So, it was agreed, Karl became the cook. Nothing fancy of course mainly food that was dried, processed, and microwavable, but nonetheless, Karl was the man who fed the elite, who offered them nourishment and sustenance.

  From the very first day, Karl loved his new job in fact he thought it the best he had ever had. Soon, he began working with flair and passion, especially when working at the only real cooking, the making and baking of bread. This simple process of adding salt and yeast to flour and water, then kneading, proving and baking the dough, quickly began to fascinate him. It sustained him as much as the food he ate, as much as the company he kept.

  As for the other inhabitants, the top flight anyway, they all seemed to stall even though there was plenty to keep them occupied. They could watch all the greatest films and many of the worst. They could lose themselves in the vastness of a digital library that offered a near endless choice of books and music and of course they had each other for company, laughter and song. There was time for leisure and time for work, yet no new art was created, no new stories committed to type. The military had nothing to guard or to fight. The politicians all agreed. The artists soon became depressed, the wits bored and bad tempered, and the scientists, well they all seemed to go mad with anger and fear and a need for God. Karl, however, stayed level and content. Until, that is, Major Miles Robertson invented a plan. He came to believe-"

  No other words appear beyond this.

  I look towards the window where a beat of light catches my eye. From beyond Hope, I see a vehicle slowly emerge. It crawls along the A-road until turning on to the single-track county lane that leads to the chapel. The shape of the headlights looks familiar. They certainly sit higher than those of a standard car. It is definitely a four-by-four. But the Land Rover? The vehicle stops. It is now fifty or sixty metres away. I ready myself. Shut down the laptop and pack it away. Sliding the rucksack on to my back the mobile phone shoots out four sharp raps of high pitched sound. I grab it. I have a text message. Read? Of course.

  ‘Are you in? I want to confess. Answer my call.’

  I return my stare to the headlights. The phone rings; I answer.

  ‘Sam? Say nothing if it’s you,’ speaks a voice which is male, well spoken and smugly amused.

  I see the headlights flicker. Something, or someone,
has crossed the beam.

  ‘So you know my guilt. I cannot deny it; indeed I will not. I made the request, and someone listened. One of many followed my orders. How you know, I have no idea, but then, neither do I care one jot. In fact, it pleases me that you do know. It pleases me that someone innocent knew I was capable of such deed.’

  Again the headlights flicker. I assume the worst. They’ve found me, tracked me down. How? The phone. Their phone. It must have been tracking me. The headlights go dead.

  ‘Anyway, time to say goodbye, Sam. Enjoy the rest of your futile-’

  I discard the phone, think for a beat then act. I block the view from the window by pulling the curtains shut. In need of light, I reach for a switch and turn it on. At the Calour gas heater, I pull my knife, find the gas supply hose and cut it in two. Butane gushes out. I move to the second such heater and do the same. At the gas cooker, I open the oven and grill doors, then turn all knobs to full.

  Pacing away towards a second window, one opposite the first, I grab a roll of kitchen paper and a tin of beans I had left out for my breakfast. Gas now flavours the air. I reach the window, open it and quickly climb out. Outside, I push the window shut then wrap the tin of beans in several layers of kitchen paper. I could run, but can’t, I must stay. If they enter the way I did, into the extension, I have a chance.

  I take out my cigarette lighter and ready myself to act. The not so distant sound of a single dog bark alerts my hearing. In the distance, a helicopter flutters towards me. Another sound but closer, the chapel door thumped open. Surely now, only seconds to see the chapel is clear, to find the extension and enter. I ignite the kitchen paper. The flames cut through the dark and spill into my thoughts. Am I ready to kill? To light the fire that burns to death? Through the window, I see the door kicked open. Phillip and Andrew burst in, handguns aimed and ready. As their lungs take the first hit of gas, their bodies recoil back towards the door. I am primed and ready to throw, but something in me forces inaction. Phillip looks at the window and sees me. I act without hesitation, I drop the fuse, turn and run.

  I know where to go, into the trees, the thick, dense plantation. After jumping a fence into a field, I face a hundred metre scramble up a steep, grassy incline. Through the darkness, I make good progress, feral-like, as my hands and feet propel me forward.

  Behind me a dog barks. The bark is constant, a single, repetitive snap fuelled by adrenalin. The dog has been released, and I am its prey. My only option is to match it as the hunter, so I stop, turn and face the darkness. At least I have the high ground. From the sheaf, I pull my knife. The barking stops. In the sky, the flutter of the helicopter is now a rumble. As bait, I cast my left arm out; the dog duly bites. A furious pain coils deep within. As a release, I stab the knife deep into the dog's back. A sad, even pathetic yelp leaks out. I confirm the kill by slitting its throat.

  Suddenly, I am under a spotlight. The helicopter has trapped me in a beam of dazzling light. I hear a bang and feel a force whiz past my face. Instinct kicks me down, and I cower. I see the dog - a muscle packed Alsatian. I snatch it from the ground and hurl it over my shoulder. With it covering my back, I continue my race to the woodland. Several bullets rip and tear into the dog’s body. Possessed with a will to live, I quickly and frantically reach the trees.

  As I stumble into the woodland, the canopy slices through the beam of light and a thick, smothering darkness renders sight useless. I drop the dog, my shield, and move by touch alone. The only valid direction is upwards, so I continue to follow the incline.

  The helicopter loiters above, but machines are not men, they cannot run on empty. They are what they are and nothing more. Helicopters run out of fuel, guns out of bullets. Nothing can inspire a machine, no fear can fuel it.

  I continue for twenty minutes or more then pause for breath and thought. The helicopter sounds increasingly distant, and nothing on foot seems to pursue me. A pain throbbing in my left forearm starts to nag me for attention. I ignore it. I pull out my torch, turn it on and continue on my way.

  The Woods at night always take your mind to somewhere ancient. Even a cold, hard cynic like me can fool himself into thinking that man is not his own worst enemy. That somewhere, submerged in the shallows of the darkness, lurks something that force alone could never defeat.

  Leaving the Wood behind, I emerge onto a deserted country road. A signpost at a crossroads confirms the familiarity of my surroundings. I am high in the hills and need motion, more than my legs can provide. I think for a beat, and remember a nearby farmyard and the beaten up Land Rover Defender that ferried old man Gittins over field and road. It has been a while since I labored for him and his family, but in the world of Mr. Gittins, nothing retires early and by early I mean living, neither man or machine.

  I reach the farmyard, and all is still. The nearby house is sleeping. The Land Rover is positioned as if left to aide and abet me, no gate to disturb, no dog guarded zone to violate. I open the unlocked door, lean in and release the handbrake. A gentle push rolls the vehicle silently away. With the aide of a gentle downhill gradient, we soon cover eighty plus metres.

  To start the engine, I employ the only useful, practical skill my dad ever taught me, how to hot-wire a car. As an army trained mechanic, he knew all about engines. He used to boast:

  ‘If it’s got wheels and an engine, I can drive it, and I can steal it.’

  Once, I asked him if that included a jumbo jet plane. He didn’t answer but slapped my face for being a cheeky little shit.

  The Land Rover shudders alive. I select first gear and drive away. But to where? I need shelter, a wash and rest. I need to think. I need a plan. I do not concede the fate others wish to impose on me. I know a house, isolated and unoccupied. One that is close, maybe too close to the cottage. An empty house near to the murder scene, am I being a fool? What is the etiquette of a man on the run? Flee far away, or prowl close to the crime? What do the police think of me? Have I been profiled? Do they know the house? Do they know I was due, this week, to work there? Do they have the knowledge to second guess me? No! Because they have got me wrong, very wrong! In all their calculations, I am a murderer, which is something I am not!

  The thirty minute drive to the house is more an ordeal than the hour spent running through the woods. Driving at night on clear roads creates a sort of stillness, and I do not have the mind tonight for stillness. I become agitated and tense. The pain coiled in my forearm springs into life, and a wrap of cold comes to sit beneath my clothes.

  Has the taxi driver taken her bow? The lack of police activity makes me think she has. As I reach the house, I should still be weary, but instead sweep boldly into the driveway.

  The house is a nearly finished new build, a six bedroom pile to retire to. My labour was helping landscape the gardens. The owner, Jon, himself an outsider, has often provided me with work. On holiday with his partner, Pam, I was to come and fill a skip with rubble and waste. A good day’s labour, one fairly rewarded with money and also trust. He left me a key, hidden of course. I was to check all was well with the house; I was to help myself to tea and coffee, and any food left in the fridge.

  To hide the Land Rover from prying eyes, I park it behind the garage. With the house key retrieved from the designated loose paving slab, I rush to the house and enter. Once in, I kick off my pre-planned routine. In the utility room, I strip naked, put all my clothes into the washing machine and activate a quick wash. I then move upstairs to the bathroom. From the medicine cabinet, I find a packet of ibuprofen and swallow three tablets. The wound to my left forearm doesn’t look as bad as it feels. Thirteen puncture wounds, some no more than dots, others centimeter cuts, all joined together with the onset of bruising.

  Next I take a shower. Hot, steaming water, a luxury that only yesterday would have meant nothing to me, but here, tonight, as warmth seeps slowly into flesh and bone, feels absolutely vital. For a few minutes, I forget my situation and think of sweet nothing.

  My planned routine
had not accommodated having a shave, but for some reason I feel I must, so do.

  Drying myself, I feel clean, warm and ready. Once dry, I plaster my left forearm in antiseptic cream then dress the wound in a bandage.

  Downstairs, I pull from my rucksack a change of clothes and put them on. In the kitchen, I hydrate myself with a two large glasses of water. I then make a mug of coffee, which I take, along with the laptop, into the sitting room. Here, I turn the gas fire on to full, sit on the sofa and boot-up the laptop. But for the flames of the fire, and the light emitted from the laptop, the room is dark.

  I know the house has Wi-Fi. It takes a few minutes experimentation but eventually I get a connection. I check the Inbox but see only Spam.

  Oakley, where to start? I Google him, first just his name then his name plus scientist but find nothing of interest. What else do I know about him? He has a cousin, Reese, who studied at Newnham with him, which is what? According to Google, it's a college at Cambridge.

  I go to friendsreunited.com and search for Reese. I don’t know his surname, but I know his aunt's surname. Luckily, it seems they match. Reese Robertson left Newnham in 1993. No description just a listing. I search for Oakley, but he isn’t listed. This gives me an idea, pretend to be Oakley and create him a listing. Give old friends, if he had any, a means to get in touch, to talk about the old times and what they have heard he’s been up to. I could even contact people direct, "remember me, that freak of a scientist? Just murdered my mother. Why don’t we meet for lunch?"

  Reading the terms and conditions, I see that having joined as Oakley my details will be emailed to people listed in all relevant categories, so I add to Oakley’s listing, "wanting to hear from anyone who knew me. Still trying to find myself. So tell me, who was I? What do you remember about me?"

  Maybe I could contact Reese, pretending to be Oakley. Speak of the tragic news concerning mother and aunty. Too out of the blue? For now, yes.

  How did the woman track him down? Maybe all she got was an email. No physical location. He claims to be a successful scientist, but the internet gives him credit for nothing. His work is secret and for the private sector, so maybe the defense industry.

  What was his motive? Why would he kill his mother? Simple, he’s a twisted fucking psychopath.

  I Google his email address. It brings up no results. On Facebook, he has no listing, so I create him one.

  Once finished, I navigate to the website of the local newspaper and see that my story, or part of it anyway, would they ever print the truth, is front page news, "Pensioner found murdered. Local man sought." That’s the first time I’ve been referred to as a local, so that’s what it takes.

  I put the laptop on to charge then stuff my clean, wet clothes into a tumble dryer. With the timer set for one hour, I move back to the sitting room and sit on the sofa, silent and still.

  I could have killed tonight. If I had, then what? They would only have been replaced. At least I know what my pursuers look like now. Let them think I am weak.

  Slowly, I sink into sleep.