Evolution of Fear

by Paul E. Hardisty

  ‘As I was saying, this piece is old, and quite valuable. But I’m afraid, gentlemen, that this is not the Patmos Illumination.’

  Crowbar leaned across the desk. ‘What did you say?’

  ‘I said: this is not the Patmos Illumination.’

  Crowbar slammed his palm down on the desk. ‘Kak.’

  ‘How can you tell?’ said Clay, the implications of this spinning through his head.

  The curator reached out and touched the edge of the icon. ‘This piece is similar in size and composition to the original, but about two hundred years younger. You can tell by the pigmentation.’

  ‘So it’s a copy,’ said Crowbar.

  ‘No. Rather, a later original based on the same theme, influenced by the earlier work.’ The curator looked up at them and frowned. ‘It’s called art.’

  ‘Art is the guy who ran the grain elevator,’ said Crowbar.

  The curator looked up at him as if he was crazy.

  Crowbar waved his hand, looked over at Clay. ‘Arthur Brooks. Ran the grain elevator in Viljoenskroon, near where I grew up.’

  The curator shook his head. ‘I can understand how you mistook it.’

  Crowbar nodded, took the illumination from Clay and started wrapping it in the towel.

  But the curator put his hand on Crowbar’s arm. ‘Wait,’ he said. ‘Please.’

  ‘You heard him,’ said Crowbar. ‘We have to go.’

  ‘This artefact should be in a museum. It belongs to the people of Cyprus.’

  Crowbar pushed the curator’s hand away and continued folding.

  Clay reached into the bag, pulled out the second piece, put it on the desk and flipped open the towel.

  For a moment, it looked as if the curator was trying to work out just how that particular sleight of hand had been executed. His gaze flicked from the illumination on the desk before him to the towel that Crowbar still held in his hands and back again. He stared a moment, then snatched up the icon, turned it in his hands, examining every part of it. ‘My God,’ he gasped.

  ‘Another original based on the same theme?’ said Clay.

  ‘What the fok did you do that for?’ hissed Crowbar in Afrikaans.

  Clay ignored him. ‘Well?’

  ‘Incredible. They are subtly different, but every detail is authentic. The work of the same artist, clearly, the same period. I will need to do tests, refer to the archives, to be sure.’ He wiped his hand across his brow. ‘Panamaiou.’

  ‘That stupid fok Todorov took the wrong pieces,’ said Crowbar in Afrikaans, taking the second piece from the curator. ‘Let’s go.’

  And before the academic could object, they were gone, down the corridor and back to the car.

  46

  A Hell of a Thing

  ‘It’s a set-up,’ said Crowbar as he pulled the Pajero up onto the pavement to bypass a queue of traffic waiting to turn right onto Makarios Avenue. The vehicle lurched back onto the tarmac and sped through the intersection. ‘Either they’ve told her to call you and tell you the boy’s at Xilares, or they’ve made sure she overheard them. They will be waiting for you.’

  ‘Katia’s scared, Koevoet.’

  ‘Of course she’s scared. Who isn’t?’

  ‘You.’ He meant it.

  Crowbar laughed. ‘Ja, besides me. Fok jou, broer. Changes nothing. They own her.’

  But it hadn’t just been fear Clay had heard in the young woman’s voice. There had been defiance there, too, lithium flaring on uncertain waters. ‘They think they own her.’

  ‘Be careful, seun. Don’t invent. Always see it for what it is.’

  Clay turned his face into the stream of cool night air, let it wash over him. ‘We have to get Hope’s son back.’

  Crowbar gunned the engine, sending the Pajero flashing down Elefteria Street towards the old city. ‘We’re running out of time.’

  Clay checked his watch again. Crowbar was right. He needed to see Katia first, hear it from her straight, look her in the eyes. If it was a set-up, and they were waiting for him at Xilares, he’d know as soon as he saw her. ‘Turn here.’

  Crowbar skidded the 4WD into a high-speed turn, accelerated down a side street.

  ‘Three blocks, on the right, the apartment building.’

  Crowbar pulled up a hundred metres short. The street was quiet, quaint limestone homes nestled within lush gardens, the yellow lights of evening flickering between dark, swaying branches, the sounds and smells of evening meals drifting in the air, a mother’s call, a child’s shriek, the clinking of pots and crockery. They sat in the darkness a moment, let silence cover them.

  ‘What do we do about Rania?’ said Crowbar. ‘Without the Patmos Illumination, Medved won’t deal.’

  ‘You heard the curator. They’re pretty close. All we need is a few minutes. Less. By the time Medved figures out it’s not the real thing, we’ll have Rania out.’

  ‘We may not get that chance.’

  ‘It’s all we’ve got. We’re just going to have to play it out, broer.’

  ‘That’s if we can get to her. The RV is out of town, west of the old airport, on the border. There will be roadblocks up at all the main roads out of the city.’

  ‘We go the back roads, then.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Crowbar. ‘Risky. We get caught up in a roadblock and you can say a long goodbye to Rania.’

  Clay looked over at the dark silhouette of his friend. ‘Time for you to go, oom,’ he said. ‘You’re not implicated in any of this yet. I’ll take it from here.’

  Crowbar smiled. ‘Fok jou, Straker. You can’t do it without me. Now get going. If Katia’s telling the truth, we’ll go to Xilares, get the boy. They won’t be expecting us.’

  ‘And if she’s not?’

  ‘We go anyway. Fight our way in if we have to.’

  Clay nodded, stepped out onto the pavement, every sense tingling, endorphins flooding his system, the biggest high. ‘If I’m not down in ten, come and get me.’

  Crowbar nodded, looked at him a moment then drove off, disappearing down a side street.

  Clay started towards the building, careful to keep his stump in his jacket pocket. At the adjacent corner he crossed the road and stopped in the shadow of a large pine tree outside the throw of the streetlights. Katia’s flat was on the southeastern corner, overlooking the road. Lights blazed. Curtains fluttered through an open patio door. From where he stood Clay could see someone moving inside, a woman. Clay stood for a while in the darkness then saw her stride out onto the balcony, light a cigarette, exhaling long with her head back, blowing the smoke up into the night. It was Katia. She’d taken three puffs when she jerked her head around, looked back into the flat. Then she flicked the cigarette over the balcony and hurried back inside. Clay watched the orange end spin like a flare to the ground and land on the pavement in a puff of embers.

  Less than two hours now until the rendezvous with Medved, until Rania. Jesus, he breathed to himself, if … But he didn’t allow himself to continue the thought. He buried it. Destroyed it. Focused back on what he had to do right now. That’s how you stayed alive. This was what Hope had been trying to explain to him that night off the Syrian coast. It wasn’t that you were forced to do things for which you were not designed. It was the exact opposite. It was a hell of a thing.

  A car pulled up outside the building. Clay sank back into the shadows. A couple got out. He heard voices, laughter, farewells in English. At the doorway, the man reached into his pocket, pulled out a set of keys, fumbled with the lock and opened the glass door. Clay started moving across the street. The woman giggled as the man ushered her inside with his hand in the small of her back, drifting downward. They were inside the well-lit lobby, heading for the stairs. Clay sprinted along the pathway and grabbed the door handle just before it clicked closed.

  Clay stood at the bottom of the stairwell. He could hear the couple making their way up. Whispers, a slap on bare skin, more feminine giggles, then a door closing. Silence. Clay moved quickly
up the stairs, emerged onto the fourth floor landing, found Katia’s door. He stood a moment in the corridor, listening. The muffled sounds of Greek pop music from the flat next door, the drone of a TV further down. Nothing from Katia’s flat that he could make out. He knocked twice.

  Nothing. He waited a moment, knocked again, harder this time.

  The sound of footsteps.

  ‘Who is it?’ came Katia’s voice through the door.

  ‘Declan.’ Low.

  A pause, longer than he would have expected, and then the sound of a bolt sliding back, a chain. The door opened. Katia stood before him dressed as if ready for a night on the town. A wild night.

  Clay stepped inside. ‘You seem surprised to see me.’

  ‘I didn’t think you’d come,’ she whispered, clearly flustered. ‘You said that you were going to…’ She stopped. Her cheeks burned red under her thick makeup.

  Clay kept his gaze fixed on her eyes. ‘You asked me to come over, Katia.’

  She looked down at the ground, back over her shoulder. ‘I … I thought you were going to Xilares.’ She was hiding something.

  ‘Are you sure the boy’s there, Katia?’

  She flicked her big fake eyelashes, looked back over her shoulder, down at the floor, then started pushing him back towards the door. With the change in light he could see that her lower lip was bruised, swollen. The lipstick had been an attempt at camouflage.

  ‘I’m going out, please leave now,’ she whispered, glancing back into the apartment again.

  ‘Is someone else here, Katia?’

  She blinked, inclined her head. She looked terrified.

  Clay reached out and took her hand. ‘I can help you, Katia. But you have to tell me the truth.’

  There were tears in her eyes. ‘I’m…’ she began, sobbing now. ‘Clay, I’m sorry … Please, you must go.’ She pushed him towards the door again.

  All of a sudden it was clear. Crowbar had been right. It was a set-up. And if the boy wasn’t at Xilares, if that was just a lure to draw him in, then there was only one other logical place he could be.

  Clay clamped down on her hand, pulled her close, whispered into her ear. ‘The boy’s here, isn’t he?’

  47

  Hurt

  Katia closed her eyes, swallowed a sob.

  Clay reached into the pocket of his jacket, pulled out the Beretta. At the sight of the weapon her eyes widened, froze there big and terrified. With his stump he guided her back towards the door, putting himself between her and the main room.

  ‘It’s okay, Katia,’ he whispered. ‘Don’t worry. I understand. I’m not going to hurt you.’

  She opened her mouth as if to speak, eyes swimming in whirlpools of tears.

  ‘Where is he?’ Clay said.

  She buried her hands in her face and crumpled to the floor, pointing to the bedroom door. It was closed.

  ‘Is he alone?’

  She shook her head without looking up.

  Clay knelt by her side and spoke into her ear. ‘How many?’

  ‘One,’ she mouthed.

  ‘Just call out that it’s okay. Make something up. Anything. A friend came by. Can you do that for me?’

  Hope dawned across her face for a moment, a realisation perhaps that things could be different for her. But in an instant her expression changed. It was fear there now. Terror. She shook her head from side to side.

  ‘No,’ she said through the tears. ‘No. I can’t. He’ll send me back to Russia. I don’t want to go back. I’d rather die.’ She hid her face in her hands again.

  A muffled voice from the other room: ‘Katia?’ A man.

  Clay put his hand on Katia’s back. ‘Look at me.’

  She shook her head, kept it buried in her arms.

  ‘It’s not him you have to worry about, Katia. You’ll go to prison for this. The Cypriots take a very bad view of kidnapping.’

  The man’s voice again, in Greek: ‘Who is it, Katia?’

  ‘Help me,’ said Clay. ‘Please. We can make this right.’

  ‘Dimitriou will kill me. He’s said it lots of times.’

  ‘No, Katia. He’s finished. I’m going to finish him.’

  Her eyes flashed through the tears. ‘You don’t know him. He knows everyone here. He is very powerful. They are all together.’

  ‘Help me. If you do, you’ll be free of him. I promise.’

  She stirred, hope fighting with fear in her eyes. ‘Promise?’

  Clay nodded.

  She sniffed, took a deep breath. He helped her to her feet. Then he closed the door, loud enough so it could be heard in the other room and signalled to her with a nod.

  ‘Endaxi,’ she called out in Greek. It’s okay.

  The man’s voice from somewhere inside the apartment, in English: ‘Who was it?’

  She snatched a deep breath, looked at Clay. ‘My neighbour,’ she called out, voice unsteady. ‘He is going to London on a business trip. He…’ She stood. Her eyes darted right and left. A second dragged out, another. Then just as Clay thought she would freeze up altogether, she blurted out in choppy Greek, ‘He wants me to water his plants while he is away. I always do it for him.’

  The man laughed. ‘I’m sure you do.’

  Katia crisped her lips. ‘Pig,’ she hissed. ‘One of D’s men. He … he does things to me. D lets him. As payment.’

  Clay put his arm around her shoulders. ‘Okay, Katia, here’s what we’re going to do. I want you to call the boy. Tell him you’re going to make him something in the kitchen. A treat. We’re going to try to get out of here without anyone getting hurt.’

  She nodded, smoothed her skirt, wiped her eyes.

  ‘Alexi,’ she called out. ‘Would you like some ice cream?’

  ‘What?’ came the man’s voice.

  ‘Can he have ice cream with me?’

  ‘Bring me some too,’ called the man again.

  ‘Go to the kitchen,’ murmured Clay. ‘Start getting out the stuff. Then call the kid.’

  ‘What if he comes out?’ Her voice was shaking.

  Clay could see the bruises under her makeup now, felt the anger rising in him, the burning shame, too, coming hard and bloodstained and stomach-emptying. He doubled over, put his head to his knees. His heart was loping. He gulped for air, fought it back. When he looked up again, Katia was staring at him, terror in her eyes.

  ‘Go,’ he said.

  Katia pushed herself forward, tottering on her heels. Clay moved to the corner of the hall. From there he could see all of the apartment’s main room, the open kitchen to his right, the door to the bedroom. Katia reached the kitchen, opened the freezer, banged the ice cream container down onto the counter.

  ‘Alexi,’ she called out. ‘Ice cream.’

  The bedroom door clicked. The sound of Greek TV. Clay took a step back, flattened himself against the wall, the Beretta’s Braille grip familiar as a recurring nightmare. He watched Katia. She smiled towards the bedroom door. Then the tacky peel of bare feet on tile. Little steps. The feet moving in an irregular shuffle, a limp. The boy.

  Katia stood there with the spoon in one hand and a bowl in the other, her eyes flicking from the boy to Clay and back again, and he saw, in the harsh kitchen light, her hand and the spoon and the ice cream dripping white onto the black granite counter top.

  ‘Where’s my fucking ice cream?’ yelled the man, voice louder now that the door was open.

  ‘Coming,’ said Katia, staring right at Clay, eyes wide like a terrified animal.

  The boy was in the middle of the main room now, about three metres away. Clay could see the back of his head, the dark curly hair, the way he swung his left leg slowly forward without bending the knee, overbalancing on the right. Clay glanced around the corner towards the bedroom. Just the television light strobing on the far wall. He pocketed the gun and stepped towards the boy.

  The boy heard him coming and twisted at the waist just as Clay reached him. His face was bruised, eyes mere slits cut in th
e swollen purple flesh. His lower lip was three times its normal size, split and oozing blood. Clay clamped his hand over the boy’s mouth just as it opened, muffling a scream, scooped him up under the knees with his stump arm. The boy was struggling, wriggling and flapping like a landed fish, strong. Clay squeezed him hard, looked at Katia. ‘Let’s go,’ he mouthed.

  Katia dropped the spoon into the bowl, started walking.

  ‘What’s going on out there?’ the man’s voice again.

  ‘Sorry, just dropped something,’ said Katia.

  Clay was at the door now. The boy had stopped struggling, lay panting through his nose in Clay’s arms.

  Clay put his mouth close to the boy’s ear. ‘Your mother sent me to get you, Alexi,’ he whispered in English. ‘You’re safe. We’re going now.’

  The boy went limp in his arms as the fear fled.

  Katia was beside them now. She opened the door, trying to be quiet, but she rushed and the bolt slid back with a loud click.

  ‘What’s going on, Katia?’ the man shouted from the bedroom.

  Clay pushed Katia out into the corridor, started guiding her towards the fire escape at the end of the corridor. More shouting from inside the apartment. They were about halfway to the stairs when the fire door swung open. A man burst into the corridor, back turned.

  Clay swung the kid under his left arm, started reaching for his gun. The man pivoted, faced them. It was Crowbar.

  ‘Jesus,’ breathed Clay.

  ‘We’ve got to hurry,’ said Crowbar. ‘Medved won’t wait around.’

  Clay looked at the boy. ‘Okay, Alexi?’

  The boy nodded.

  Time looped back on itself and he was carrying another injured boy, back in Yemen, the kid’s body wracked with radiation poisoning, and Clay, through his ignorance and selfishness, somehow responsible. And that other time, many years before, when he had pulled the trigger and the boy had bled to death in his arms, Clay cradling him just like this and the dust from the helicopter covering over everything and the gunfire so loud in his head every night since.

  ‘This man can carry you better than me,’ he said, his voice far away, over mountains.