The Guardian

by Christopher Kenworthy

  Luther was still deeply unconscious in the back seat, his pupils inert when Carver peeled back the eyelids to make sure.

  They decided to leave him prostrate. Amy on her own and in character, she pointed out, would not have bothered to get him into a sitting position.

  Climbing in, Carver pulled the boot lid down on himself, and lay for a long time in the hot, smelly darkness while the car bucked its way squashily back onto the road. His head banged painfully once against the seat support in the dark, and then the engine settled down to a steady hum, punctuated from time to time by the violent braking he was beginning to recognise as a characteristic of Amy’s driving.

  Riding in the boot was not a simple matter. He had learned that the hard way in Beirut. Unable to see the road conditions, he had no chance to brace himself for bends and surface inequalities. He was constantly being banged about the interior of the cavity, losing hair, skin and temper on projecting ridges and seams.

  From bitter experience, he rode braced in a kind of spread-eagled foetal position, hands behind his head and feet hard against the side of the car.

  He was so concerned with making himself proof against the bumps and bangs that he missed the moment when the engine note changed slightly and the car began to thump alarmingly. The remarkable Citroën suspension, he realised, was saving him from the worst of the potholes, but it was still a very uncomfortable ride.

  It suddenly came to one of Amy’s tyre-screeching halts, and he heard feet scraping as someone approached the car.

  The boot was too well insulated to hear much of what was going on, though he could hear that two different male voices were involved. He took his hand off the parcel shelf, cocked the Desert Eagle and held it ready, eyes slitted against expected glare if the boot lid suddenly jerked open; but after a moment, the suspension rose again and the car bumped over an obstacle he hoped was a threshold, and swung to a stop and reversed. The engine note became suddenly loud as though echoing inside a building. Then it stopped, and the car settled on its suspension as the ignition was turned off. Carver was now six inches closer to the floor.

  The vehicle shifted slightly as Amy got out and the doors slammed. Just over his head, someone said: “Get his feet.”

  He felt rather than heard the whisper of cloth against cloth as they pulled the back seat passenger upright.

  The car was now resting on its suspension, so when they lifted Luther out, it did not bounce again. But he heard the doors close, and the voices recede. Silence fell, punctuated by the click of cooling metal.

  He eased the hammer of the pistol down in case he accidentally let it off in the dark. In this garage – if a garage it was – the sound of the shot would be like a howitzer, and bound to sound the alert.

  Fumbling, he explored the inside of the boot lock and probed with his screwdriver. The lock was much more difficult to manoeuvre from the inside and in darkness than it had been in sunshine, and after five sweaty minutes, he was prepared to kick out the seat backs to escape when the mechanism suddenly clicked and the lid swung upwards before he could catch it.

  There was a smell of dust and diesel oil, and he lay for a moment, letting his eyes get used to the sudden light and listening intently for any sound which might indicate alarm. The place was silent, though somewhere a long way away music was playing and he could hear somebody whistling at a distance.

  He cocked the Desert Eagle once again. The weight of the mighty handgun was reassuring now instead of being a nuisance.

  The kind of thing which would give you comfort in a cold night in the Sinai.

  Carver eased himself over the rim of the boot and swung his legs to the floor, staying crouched to clear the boot lid. It was an awkward position, and prevented him from seeing round the side of the car, or even through the windows. He must clear the car, but as discreetly as possible. He took one long step to the side and then another, and started to turn.

  As he turned he caught a whiff of stale sweat and tobacco, and threw himself to one side without looking up.

  Something smashed into the rock floor just where his head had been and he hit the dust with one shoulder, rolling and trying hard to get the big pistol into action.

  As he did so, a voice said: “Don’t kill him!”

  And then! “Carver! Look! Look!”

  Between him and the door was a line of men, thin and skeletal against the light. Carver recognised the twisted off-centre pose of men carrying sub machine guns, and froze even before he saw, outside in the courtyard beyond the firing squad, Amy looking like Joan of Arc at the stake.

  Holding her by the hair in the stiff, unnatural pose was a man who could have doubled for Gerald Durrell, white-bearded and white-headed. Her body shielded his, but his head easily overtopped hers.

  “Welcome to Château Bram,” said Sigmund Dark. “Won’t you drop the Eagle, or shall I cut this young lady’s throat?”

  Amy was totally immobile, and Carver could see, balanced across the apricot pillar of her throat, a knife which would have taken her head off completely with one good slash.

  He leaned forward and laid the pistol on the ground in front of him.

  “Now step back,” said Dark.

  Carver stepped back one pace and then two.

  “Lie down on your face and put your hands behind your back,” said Dark, without moving from his place in the sun.

  Carver did so, and instantly, there was a scuttle of feet and a man dropped on his back, his knees driving into Carver’s kidneys. The pain was excruciating, but it did not let up until Carver was handcuffed, his face grinding in the dust.

  “Bring him,” shouted Dark from the courtyard and two men picked Carver up by the arms and stood him on his feet.

  Head swimming with the pain from his kidneys, Carver tried to match his pace with theirs as they crossed the court. His legs were still stiff from the cramped space in the boot, and from time to time he lost the rhythm. His captors made no attempt to let him regain it. They dragged him helpless, with feet trailing painfully until he could manoeuvre them under him again.

  He regained his feet as they dragged him across the courtyard and up the steps to the first floor entrance of the massive tower-keep opposite. On the stairs he was careful to maintain his balance. Badly bruised ankles, he knew, could be a worse hamper to sudden movement than fetters.

  When they got to the tower chamber, Sigmund Dark was already sitting on his medieval throne behind his massive desk.

  He was wearing a tailored safari jacket and slacks in a light tan material, and looked like a benevolent District Commissioner about to hold court. On the desk in front of him, a glass of mineral water sent sparkling motes of light to liberty.

  Amy, her arms free, was sitting in one of the long settees down by the windows. She avoided looking at Carver when he came in, keeping her eyes firmly fixed on the floor, but there was no mark of violence on her, and the cropped, black helmet of hair was neatly combed. One of the guards was standing behind her with his arms folded. He had no visible weapon.

  Luther sat shakily on the opposite side of the room, a small glass in his hand. He looked sick and confused and there was another guard standing behind him, this time with a sawn-off shotgun in his fist, leaning against his shoulder like a dueling pistol. Carver regarded the weapon with more respect than the squat Uzis the other men carried. At close quarters it was devastating and less likely to fill a confined space with ricocheting bullets.

  The two guards stood Carver in front of the desk and stepped back out of his sight, though he could still smell them just behind him and to either side.

  In the journey across the courtyard he had learned they were professional and capable jailers. There was an economy of effort and a rapport between the two which made them act like two components of a well-oiled machine.

  Carver knew a lot about jailers. Very few jailers knew much about Carver.

  He was at the moment more interested, though, in th
e man behind the big desk.

  The man who cut the heads off inquisitive telephone callers and sold little children into slavery was sprawled in his big chair, one hand supporting his cheek and the other braced against the arm.

  His demeanour was of a man who has just been relieved of a nagging worry. A man relaxed in well-earned rest after a dreary chore. His expression was sleepy, almost friendly.

  But there was nothing sleepy about his eyes. Like little golden shiny creatures they explored Carver from head to toe and from side to side, as though looking for some special marking.

  “You disappoint me, Carver,” Sigmund Dark said suddenly. “I was expecting more of you. Much more.”

  Carver shrugged.

  “You win a few, you lose a few,” he said laconically.

  “You would appear to have lost them all,” said Dark. “It is time for us to be frank with one another.”

  “Okay, shoot,” said Carver. He was standing with his weight on one leg, as relaxed as a man could be, with his hands padlocked behind his back. They were using the kind of adjustable handcuffs favoured by the Italian police, and as usual, they had drawn them too tight. They were cutting off the circulation from his hands, and he needed to get them off as soon as possible, certainly within the hour. He wanted to keep this interview as short as possible.

  “Who told you about me?”

  “You did, “said Carver. “Next question?”

  Dark smiled.

  “We can keep this at a conversational level, my friend, or we can progress to the higher decibels. Personally I would rather listen to you talking than screaming, but either can be arranged.”

  Carver shrugged.

  “Suit yourself. I’m answering your question. I phoned the number in the book and you answered. When you cut the head off the wrong guy, just for making a phone call, I knew I was on the right lines. After that it was just a case of following my nose.”

  Dark’s eyes flickered towards the figure of Luther, sitting woozily at the far end of the room.

  “Yes,” he said. There was a wealth of meaning in the word, and none of it missed Luther.

  “Just a moment,” he said. “You told me...”

  “Be silent. So you followed me down the line to here just because of suspicion?”

  “A headless body,” said Carver “is pretty strong grounds for it. Anyway, I am looking for my daughter. You could say I’ve come for my girl.”

  Dark frowned. “So I hear. But so far as I know we have never had a girl called Carver on our books. It has been in all sense of the word a wild goose chase for you.”

  “She isn’t called Carver,” Carver told him. “She’s called Grossman, Irene Grossman.”

  Dark stared at him, puzzled. “Irene Grossman? Kiti?”

  The girl rose from her cushion beside the throne, startling Carver who had not seen her there.

  She brought a file from the cabinet drawer and laid it in front of Dark. The man gestured with his hand and she opened the file and read “Grossman, Irene. Five feet four inches, blonde, blue eyes, English, French, Italian, and Spanish, three cuisines, chess, backgammon, whist and bezique. Fifty thousand dollars.”

  She hesitated a moment, then laid the file down on the desk and pointed out a notation at the bottom of the page. Dark glanced down at it and nodded.

  “Fifty thousand?” He wagged his head. “A knock down price for so talented a girl. Make it sixty.”

  The girl paused again and then made a note in the file. Dark nodded at Carver.

  “For once,” he said, “you seem to have something right. She is here. Do you wish to purchase her?”

  Carver shook his head. “I’ll just take her with me when I go.”

  To his surprise, Dark threw back his head and gave a hearty bellow of laughter.

  “Oh, you will,” he said. “You truly will. But in the meantime, we have much to discuss, you and me. Bring him down to the exercise room and find Lefeu for me. I need his special talents.”

  There was a ripple of unease among the guards.

  “Lefeu,” he said. “Where is Lefeu?”

  “Perhaps he’s gone to start a fire,” said Carver.

  Sigmund Dark jerked his head, and pain splashed across Carver’s shoulder like molten lead. He blinked, twice, and glanced back at the man who had hit him.

  “See ya later, fella,” he said smoothly, and clicked his tongue with a wink. The German, Ducher, grinned back at him and made to spit on the floor before he remembered where he was.

  “I asked a question,” said Sigmund Dark, dangerously.

  “He went down to the town with Gehn to Search for M. Luther,” one of the guards ventured. “I could find him...”

  “Do. Quickly. Bring him back here,” said Dark. The man was fleeing the room even as he spoke, leaving only one guard standing behind Carver.

  “Now then, Carver, we shall have some answers out of you,” Dark said, bringing his attention back to his prisoner. “You have cost me a few good men...”

  “And at least one good woman,” said Carver.

  “...And at least one good woman, as you rightly remark. I don’t like losing highly trained personnel, Carver. I don’t like it at all.”

  “Then employ a better class of help,” Carver told him.

  He had changed his own posture restlessly while the conversation was going on, and now he could just see the man on his right out of the corner of his eye without moving his head.

  With Lefeu and Gehn and the man who had been sent to find them out of the way, the garrison of the castle had been substantially reduced. Luther appeared to be in disgrace, and one man would have been told to watch him. There was another standing by Amy, and there must be at least one or two more. Dark would never leave the gate unguarded, and there must be one watching the slaves.

  Nobody’s purse was bottomless, and seven or eight men would complete the garrison of the place. Any more muscle hanging around would be too noticeable and subject to local speculation.

  There were three men in the room with him now, not counting Dark himself and the disgraced Luther. He wondered exactly what Luther had done to be in quite so much disgrace.

  Almost immediately, his question was answered.

  From an inner room came a girl whose face appeared to have been assembled in two halves. One half was smooth and Very beautiful. The other was horribly puffed and marked with a long, broken scar down one side. So fresh was the scar that the blood around it was still black. She walked awkwardly, like someone who has fallen asleep in the sun and been badly sunburned.

  “Yasmin,” said Dark. “I am glad to see you. I have a little job for you, if you feel well enough.”

  From the way her black eyes fastened on Luther, Carver guessed why the man was in disgrace.

  “Carver, you have shown such ingenuity in finding me that I feel you have earned a demonstration of just what we have been doing here. It may help to make your remaining hours easier to bear,” said Sigmund Dark.

  He stood up and clicked his fingers like a man calling the waiter.

  “Bring him along. Luther, walk with me as we go. We will show Carver our business premises. I so rarely get a chance to show off my operation to a man who would appreciate it,” he explained to Carver, like a good host inviting his guest to admire the ingenious way he has installed the new swimming pool.

  With one of the guards walking in front, his sub machine gun cradled in his elbow, and two bringing up the rear, they walked out into the courtyard and turned to where the big white gas tank stood guard over the little door to the dungeons.

  “I am planning to have this tank screened from the yard with a wall,” said Dark as they entered the stairway down. “It has to be in this corner where it will benefit from the shadow. Temperatures here regularly reach the low hundreds in midsummer. Though our altitude keeps it feeling fresh.”

  Carver was boxed by the guards, one before and one behind. The
y were vigilant and practised as before. They fell into their routine in a way that showed much practice, and he noted that any two of them keyed together just as smoothly as any other two. They were conforming to a well-drilled plan of action.

  The asset with well-drilled routines is that you can perform them without thinking about it. That is also the drawback with them.

  They had reached the first landing, now, where Sigmund Dark opened the first door. Inside, two girls looked up from a game of backgammon. Each was a remarkable beauty in her own individual way. A platinum blonde with the rare honey coloured skin and intense blue eyes of a true Aryan and a dark, exquisite beauty with a jewel in her nose.

  “Gudrun and Satya,” said Dark with a benevolent smile. “Excited, my darlings?”

  Flashing smiles and chorused enthusiasm made Carver blink and Dark smiled at his surprise as he closed the door.

  “You expected, perhaps, chains and branding irons?” he said. “These girls – and boys – are bound by stouter stuff. Their own will. If you tried to free them, they would fight you to the death. And with great ferocity and skill, as you shall shortly see.”

  There was a baffling air of suppressed glee about him as he led the way down to the next level and opened a door to show three young men in their own dormitory. Two of them were performing a series of rhythmic exercises, while the third lay on his bed, reading.

  “Don’t stop in the middle of a set,” Dark told the exercising pair, and they continued to exercise, each movement flowing naturally into the next. Fists were clenched on the hip; bare feet flew high in a curiously stilted series of movements.

  “Kung Fu?” asked Carver, surprised.

  “Aikido. Similar,” said Dark.

  “But more defensive?”

  “You do know your stuff, good for you. But we do teach them – certain selected ones – a more aggressive form of martial art. It is quite remarkable. Wait and see.”

  In the exercise room, mats were laid out in preparation for a martial arts exercise. Dark smiled at them, and waved a hand.