A Dark and Twisted Tide

by Sharon Bolton

  ‘She told us nothing about that.’

  The sound of a diesel engine reached them. A police van was approaching. Anderson went over to talk to the sergeant in charge as several uniformed officers jumped out.

  ‘Her story came out over the course of several weeks,’ said Christakos. ‘She became quite friendly with Kathryn Markova. Frankly, it didn’t surprise me. Given how prized sons are in Afghan families, how relatively unimportant girls are, it’s quite common in some areas for girls to be brought up as boys from a very young age. Some of them don’t even know they are girls until puberty hits and the bodily changes become evident. Quite what psychological damage has been imparted by that stage, I really couldn’t say.’

  95

  Lacey and Dana

  ‘NADIA?’ NO, SHE wasn’t seeing things. That was Nadia, crouched on the ledge by the boat. Nadia, not dead after all, not a rapidly bloating corpse tied by the neck to a mooring ring, but very much alive. Those big, silver-grey eyes hardly seemed to blink in the half-light.

  A scuffling noise at her side told her that Pari was moving deeper into the tunnel. With Nadia blocking the way out, it was the only sensible thing to do.

  Where was Thessa? Were the two of them in this together?

  Lacey set off in Pari’s wake, her back pressed against the damp bricks, forced to stoop by the low, curved ceiling, constantly afraid of missing her footing. She sidestepped as fast as she dared, occasionally glancing ahead, more often looking back, watching the woman who was coming after them.

  Nadia came steadily, but slowly, as though not wanting to risk falling back into the water or to get close to the oar Lacey was still holding. Or maybe she just knew they couldn’t get out. Lacey risked another look forward. If Nadia and Thessa were working together, Thessa could be waiting further up the tunnel.

  ‘Think about what you’re doing, Nadia,’ she called. ‘If you kill us, you’ll never see your children again.’

  Nadia paused and spat some angry words in her own language.

  ‘She says she has no children, you idiot,’ translated Pari. ‘She never did. She never had chance.’

  ‘Go, Pari,’ said Lacey. ‘Find that ladder. There’ll be one. There always are in these tunnels.’

  Pari hesitated. ‘What about Thessa?’

  Bloody good question. Where was Thessa? What was Thessa? Had she been in the water just now? Had she pulled Nadia away from Lacey?

  Pari started moving again and Lacey followed. Nadia matched their pace, stalking them through the tunnel. She was like a cat, waiting for a wounded bird to scrabble out from beneath the bushes.

  The tunnel curved, taking away the pale light of Thessa’s lantern. They would have been in complete darkness were it not for the occasional ventilation grids in the roof. So far, it seemed exactly the same as the tunnel she’d searched with Fred and Finn.

  At last, Lacey felt something hard and cold jar against her right shoulder. Yes! A ladder up to street level. Pari, driven by panic, was already several rungs up.

  Unsure how to follow her – as soon as she took away the threat of the oar Nadia would be upon her – Lacey stayed where she was. Then a sudden flurry of movement behind Nadia caught the attention of them both.

  Thessa was moving quickly towards them through the water, swimming butterfly, a stroke particularly suited to her anatomy. Without thinking, Lacey raised the oar and shoved Nadia hard in the back. As she fell into the water, Thessa was on top of her instantly. The two swimmers disappeared in a fountain of black, foam-topped water.

  ‘Lacey, I can’t move it.’

  Pari was at the top of the ladder, had reached the manhole that blocked their escape route. Lacey took another step up the ladder and stopped. She couldn’t leave Thessa. She jumped back down on to the ledge, her feet splashing noisily in the water that had by now completely covered it.

  Directly in front of her, a head and shoulders broke the surface of the water. Nadia was back.

  ‘Women like Nadia have no real place in the world,’ Christakos was saying as the uniformed team unloaded the tubular steel reinforcer that would break open the door of the pumping station. ‘Their position is worse than that of servants, of slaves even. They are like the ghosts of slaves.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Dana.

  ‘They are not men. They might be taught to fight, to handle guns and defend their families, but they’ll never be accepted among the men. At family gatherings and weddings, they have to stay with the women. But they’re not proper women either. They’re not allowed to marry, have children, wear feminine clothes. Other women treat them as freaks. They’re called narkhazak. It means eunuch. Children throw stones at them in the street. They don’t fit in anywhere and if they come to the attention of the Taliban, they’re likely to be executed.’

  For once, Dana really didn’t know what to say. There was an explosion of sound as the steel ram banged into the warehouse doors. The doors held.

  ‘There was an incident shortly before Nadia left Afghanistan. It was the catalyst for her leaving in the first place.’

  ‘What happened?’ Dana asked. The team at the door were about to try again.

  ‘The Taliban saw her out in the street unveiled and arrested her. They chained her in a storm drain and left her there. It was dry, but they knew, and she knew, that once the rain started the empty drain would become a torrent and she’d drown. She was left there for two days, chained by the neck, waiting to drown. None of her friends or family helped her. In the end, it was men working for me who helped her escape and come here.’

  The doors fell inwards and the officers disappeared inside, Mark in the lead. Stenning, Anderson and Mizon followed. Dana could see beams of light as torches were switched on and shone around. She and Christakos stepped forward until they were at the entrance of the building.

  She was looking down, that was her first surprise, although she’d been told the pumping station was half underground. The pale bricks and tiled interior reminded her of Victorian public baths. There were lots of hiding places: stone columns, arched recesses, huge iron plinths. The team were moving cautiously, even Mark was keeping his head, but Stenning was still, his torch-beam fixed on something on the ground. He looked up at Dana and she saw his lips form a single word: blood.

  With a growing sense of dread, she unlocked the cuffs and released Christakos. ‘Go first.’ She indicated the stairway down. ‘Slowly. Stay close to me.’

  ‘It’s clear, Ma’am.’ The uniformed sergeant came to meet them before they were halfway down. He looked up, his face all angular shadows in the dim light. ‘No sign of anyone, but there’s water on the floor, and one of your colleagues has found what could be—’

  ‘I know.’ Dana had reached the bottom step. Mark was at the far side of the room, peering into the first of three large outlet pipes. She hadn’t noticed before, but he’d brought one of the life-jackets from Fred’s Targa with him. Shit.

  ‘Ma’am, there are weights here.’ Mizon was at one of the arched recesses, looking up at a shelf. ‘Just like the ones we found in the marina. And I’m pretty certain these are linen shrouds I’m looking at. This is where the bodies are wrapped and weighted.’

  ‘But not drowned.’ Mark was wearing the life-jacket now. ‘That’s happening somewhere else. Lend us your torch, Pete.’

  ‘No!’ Dana strode over to the outlet pipe as the torch was passed from one man to the other. ‘No one is going into the sewer. It’s too bloody dangerous.’

  He shook his head. ‘I’m not one of your officers, Dana.’ He pointed back over her shoulder. ‘You need to keep talking to him. Ask him if that sister of his really is a cripple. Because if she is, there’s no way she can get into this place. Have a look around.’

  For a second, he fooled her. She took her eyes off him, to look round at the doors high in the wall, at the steep iron staircase leading down, at the precarious ladders, at the three outlet pipes that were the only access to the sewer. In the second
s it took her to realize he was right, he’d gone.

  ‘No!’ She held up her hand to stop Stenning, who’d been on the verge of following him. ‘I am not responsible for what DI Joesbury does. You, on the other hand, are staying here. Gayle, get hold of Chief Inspector Cook. If the sewer has to be searched, his officers will have to do it.’

  She walked back over to Christakos. ‘We finished searching the South Dock Marina,’ she told him. ‘In addition to two more bodies, we found the weights that we believe were attached to Anya Fahid and Rabia Khan. Nothing else.’

  He stared back, not really taking in what she was saying.

  ‘You mentioned nine women,’ she said. ‘It is just possible that four of these women are still alive. That your sister really did help them escape. Alex, in your opinion, was Nadia Safi capable of violence?’

  Christakos thought for several long seconds before speaking. ‘I’m no psychologist, but what struck me about Nadia was that, although her lot in life had been dictated by men, it was women she hated. Other women – particularly young, attractive women, those who were desirable – they engendered feelings of absolute rage in Nadia. When we realized quite how disturbed she was, we decided to release her without further treatment. Then she vanished. We were worried, of course, but not entirely sorry to see the last of her.’

  Christakos took a deep breath. ‘Detective Inspector, I think I’ve been a complete fool. My sister isn’t a killer. She just set one free.’

  96

  Lacey

  ‘KEEP GOING,’ LACEY hissed to Pari as she scrambled up the ladder towards her.

  More loud breathing, little gasps of distress. Pari wasn’t strong enough.

  ‘Give me some room.’ Lacey started climbing again, moving upwards until she and Pari were side by side on the ladder. She reached up and the two women pushed at the grille together. Finn had had trouble with a couple of these covers. Mud, dirt and debris got caught and stuck. You just had to push hard and not give up. She felt it move. She could do it. She could get them out. And then a sound below turned her heart cold.

  Nadia was climbing after them. In a few more rungs, a couple more seconds, she’d be able to reach Lacey. All she’d have to do would be to grab hold of Lacey’s foot and take her own weight off the ladder. They’d both plummet to the water, and Lacey really wasn’t sure she could fight the woman off a second time.

  Lacey pushed again on the iron grille above her. She climbed up another rung, partly to get her legs further from Nadia’s reach, partly to give herself more purchase to push against. The grille moved. The ladder was shaking with the weight of the woman climbing it and Lacey could hear laboured breathing below her. Any second now, she’d be within reach.

  The cover came loose at the exact moment that Pari gave a furious shriek. Lacey glanced down to see her kicking at Nadia, trying desperately to keep her at bay. Lacey pushed again and the grate slid free.

  ‘Pari, now!’

  Pari shot up the last couple of rungs and into the street above them. Lacey was about to follow when a strong, wet hand clamped around her ankle. She looked down to see the snarling face getting closer. Then Nadia herself was the one screeching in pain. Below her, Lacey could see Thessa, who’d raised herself from the water somehow, clinging to Nadia. The three of them were dangling like a human rope, and only the grip Lacey had on the ladder preventing them from tumbling down.

  ‘Lacey!’

  Pari’s face was above her, her arms lowering the grille again. For a second, Lacey didn’t get it. Then she took one hand off the ladder, felt the other almost wrenched apart by the weight it was holding up, grabbed the grille and helped Pari guide it through the hole. She let it fall.

  ‘Thessa! Get out of the way!’ she yelled.

  Nadia’s grip broke. She gave the heavy grunt a body makes when all its air is expelled at once and fell backwards. But she twisted as she fell, and the grille continued falling. It hit Thessa too, and took her down. When Lacey jumped back down on to the ledge of the sewer tunnel, neither Nadia nor Thessa were anywhere to be seen.

  THURSDAY, 3 JULY

  97

  Lacey and Dana

  INDUSTRIAL UNITS FILLED the skyline in front of them. There was a chain-link fence several metres high almost at the water’s edge, a fleet of white vans visible beyond it. They were heading for a spot on the south bank, a mile or so downstream of Greenwich. Some time overnight the weather had broken. Cloud upon cloud had banked up overhead and the wind humming down the Thames felt like winter. Or a normal English summer.

  On the narrow, rock-strewn shore, six people were waiting. The pathologist Mike Kaytes, three members of the Marine Unit’s tactical team and two SOCOs. Something lay on the stones behind them. Lacey could barely make it out, and that was probably deliberate on their part.

  Behind her in the dinghy, Finn Turner was talking on the radio. ‘Did you catch that?’ he said, when he ended the conversation.

  Without turning round, Lacey nodded. The body of a young woman, found in the Thames by Cleopatra’s Needle early that morning, was now at Wapping police station and had been identified as that of twenty-eight-year-old Nadia Safi. After her fall from the ladder, the tide had swept her up-stream and she’d become trapped between two boats.

  ‘What you probably didn’t hear is that she had a connection with South Dock Marina,’ Turner said. ‘Her employers kept a boat there. Nadia went down there to clean it, stock it for weekend trips. The small motor boat they also kept there is missing.’

  Almost there. Turner cut back on the throttle, relying upon momentum to carry them the last few yards. One of the tactical team stepped into the water and caught the rope. The dinghy stopped and Lacey climbed out. The first pair of eyes she met belonged to the pathologist.

  ‘Good to see you, River Police.’ There was something about his scowl that wasn’t quite as rigid as normal. That made her think he might actually mean it.

  ‘Thank you for waiting.’ She let her eyes travel past him to the small, pale form on the bank. ‘Is that – her?’

  Tight-lipped, he nodded.

  ‘We were identical twins,’ said Christakos, once he’d taken his seat in the interview room. ‘Which of course means we were the same sex. My brother was named Mujeeb, but because of his condition he never felt comfortable being male. He didn’t have a penis, you see.’

  Christakos turned to Anderson. ‘And it’s impossible to consider yourself male without a penis, wouldn’t you say, Sergeant?’

  ‘I can’t say I’ve ever given it much thought,’ said Anderson. ‘But I don’t imagine it would be easy for a boy.’

  ‘When we were in our early teens I first saw the signs of his veering towards the feminine,’ Christakos said. ‘He grew his hair longer, started wearing looser clothes, in brighter colours. Just before we left Afghanistan, he started calling himself Thessaloniki, Thessa for short. It was a joke on me, you see. Alexander the Great’s sister was reputedly a mermaid of that name. Not that he thought I was great – it was more of a comment on my arrogance.’

  Arrogance, thought Dana, looking at the broken man across the table, which had vanished completely. It was as though his sense of self had died along with his twin.

  ‘What exactly was his condition?’ she asked.

  ‘Sirenomelia,’ said Kaytes. ‘A birth defect characterized by an apparent fusion of the legs into one single lower limb. It’s also known as Mermaid Syndrome.’

  Lacey kept her eyes on Kaytes. She wasn’t ready, yet, to see what the river had left behind on the south shore.

  ‘I’ve never heard of it,’ said Turner. From the blank faces around them, it seemed nobody else had either.

  ‘It’s very rare,’ admitted Kaytes. ‘And it’s usually lethal. Most babies with the condition are stillborn. Few of them live more than a couple of days. There’s nothing in the literature to suggest someone could live to this age. Or indeed be quite so strong.’

  She was going to have to look some time. It
was why she’d begged to be allowed to come here. There was a demon to be faced and it lay, cold and dead, just a few yards away.

  ‘What causes it?’ asked one of the SOCOs.

  ‘No one really knows,’ said Kaytes. ‘For a while it was thought to be linked to maternal diabetes, but that’s more or less been ruled out. From what I could gather, and I didn’t have a lot of time to read up, there’s an abnormality in the umbilical cord that prevents proper devel opment of the lower limbs and a number of abdominal organs. Typically, the kidneys don’t develop and so the baby dies of renal failure.’

  ‘Nobody expected Mujeeb to live,’ said Christakos. ‘Babies with that condition almost never do. But it wasn’t quite so severe as some of the cases you hear about. He had one kidney that performed perfectly well and another that was weaker but still functional. And, significantly, he had a perforate anus. He could process food and dispel waste products. He lived.’

  ‘It can’t have been easy for him,’ said Dana.

  Christakos gave her a look that suggested she had no idea. ‘Afghanistan in the 1950s,’ he said. ‘And our parents didn’t take the care of him they probably should have done. There were a number of incidents when we were small. Other children from the neighbour hood. It didn’t always start and finish with name-calling. A favourite game was to throw him into the lake and watch him swim. Of course he could, instinctively, but the games got rougher. One time, I really thought they were going to drown him.’

  ‘Sirenomelia,’ said Lacey. ‘Sirens sang, didn’t they? They sat on the rocks and sang to sailors. The women in the clinic could hear Thessa singing to them.’

  ‘Mythology’s not really my thing, River Police,’ said Kaytes. ‘I’ll do my best to tell you how he died, but beyond tha—’

  ‘I killed her,’ said Lacey. ‘She was trying to save me and I killed her. I dropped an iron grate on her head. She fell back into the water and if she wasn’t dead by then, she drowned.’