by Mark Morris
Then the moment passed, and it took part of me with it. I felt suddenly hollow, empty, and into that emptiness, like poison into an abscess, came a fresh surge of anguish and sorrow and loss.
Hope looked up at me, her little face etched with concern.
‘What’s the matter, Alex?’
I hadn’t realised I was so transparent. I tried to smile. ‘Nothing.’
‘Then why are you crying?’
‘I’m not crying.’ I swiped at my cheek and realised that I was. ‘They’re happy tears, that’s all. I’m happy that you’re happy. I’m happy that you’re better.’
But she was too bright to be fobbed off so easily.
‘You’re not happy, you’re sad. Are you sad about Kate? Because you don’t know where she is?’
‘A little bit,’ I admitted, trying to stop my voice from cracking.
‘You’ll find her,’ Hope said confidently. ‘I know you will.’ She twitched her right shoulder to draw attention to her missing arm.
‘It’s because you were so brave and clever that I’m going to get better, and I’m going to get a new arm. I know because Clover told me.’ With a curiously adult gesture she reached out with her left hand and wiped my tears from my stubbled cheek. ‘Don’t worry, Alex. You can do anything.’
TWENTY-THREE
DIRTY MONEY
‘Let me speak to him first,’ Clover said. ‘We don’t know how he’ll react.’
Ten to fourteen days’ bed rest, Dr Wheeler had said, but less than a week after his recommendation I discharged myself from Oak Hill Hospital. During the short time I’d been there I’d discovered it was a former stately home in the Hampshire countryside, not far from Farnborough. I’d also discovered that my stay and treatment, and that of Hope’s, was being paid for out of McCallum’s estate.
When the solicitor, Daniel Worth, had first appeared and told me about the bank account that McCallum had arranged for me, and about the monthly allowance that would be paid into it for as long as I lived, I’d been gobsmacked. My overwhelming emotion had been relief at the knowledge that I wouldn’t have to worry about money while I continued my search for Kate.
Once Worth had gone, though, and I’d started to think more deeply about the implications of McCallum’s gesture, my attitude had changed. I’d started to feel uneasy, and then increasingly angry and resentful. And the more I thought about it, the more I realised that the wheels McCallum had set in motion to ease my task as the heart’s new guardian were not for my benefit, but the heart’s. My wishes were irrelevant; my life was irrelevant. I existed simply to be moulded, manipulated, and if my loved ones happened to suffer because of that, then tough luck.
Whether McCallum himself had chosen me as the heart’s guardian or whether it had been determined by the heart, or even by a greater power – Fate maybe – was irrelevant. The point was, I felt belittled, beholden. I felt like calling up Daniel Worth and telling him to stuff the money, to donate the lot to charity.
I didn’t, though. Because of Kate. McCallum’s money might have been dirty money, blood money – or at least that was what it felt like to me – but so what, fuck it. Principles were all very well, but the only thing that really mattered was getting my daughter back, and at the end of the day the more resources I had to do that the better.
Sitting around for a week with nothing to do but think about my daughter damn near drove me mental. However, I didn’t have much choice in the matter. Physically I was fucked, and as desperate as I was to be out there, continuing the search, I was warned that trying to do too much too soon would almost certainly have resulted in a relapse, setting me back even further. Even so, I might still have been pig-headed enough to take the risk if Clover hadn’t been there to stop me. She helped me with my exercises, she encouraged me and monitored my progress, but she also reined me in when I reached my limit. Most importantly she kept me from going completely insane by convincing me that we needed a proper plan of action, and that we should use this period of enforced inactivity to concoct one.
‘I mean, what are you going to do if they let you out right this minute, Alex?’ she said. ‘You’ll run around like a headless chicken and get nowhere.’
She was probably right, but it was tough all the same. Aside from Clover and my eldest daughter Candice, who I chatted with on the phone a few times, the only other person who made that week bearable was Hope. She was a bundle of energy and enthusiasm. In contrast to me, each day was a new adventure to her. On the evening of the day when I’d decided I was going to discharge myself (Clover had tried to persuade me to stay for the full ten days, but I’d been adamant), I’d dreaded telling Hope I wouldn’t be around to play board games or watch cartoons with her any more. But she was fine about it, especially once I promised we’d still be visiting regularly. In fact, as soon as I told her I’d be heading back to London, her eyes lit up and she said, ‘Alex, do you have a mobile phone?’
I smiled. She was steadily breaking out of her Victorian cocoon and adopting the mannerisms and speech patterns of the twenty-first century.
‘I have,’ I said.
‘Jackie’s got one too,’ she said innocently. ‘And so has Ed. He was showing me how to use it. It’s cool.’
Clover’s favourite nurse, Jackie, had brought her son Ed in for a visit, thinking Hope might be bored with no one of her own age to talk to. Hope hadn’t been bored, but she and Ed had hit it off nonetheless.
‘Is that so?’ I said, trying to keep a straight face.
‘Mm,’ she said, ‘and I was thinking, well if I had one too I could ring you up and talk to you on the days when you might be too busy to visit me. And did you also know that you can use a mobile phone to write messages to people? You just press a button and the message flies through the air to the other person’s mobile phone? And then they can read your message and send you one back?’
‘Really?’ I said. ‘Fancy that!’
‘So could I have a mobile phone, Alex?’ she asked. ‘I know you bought me lots of presents for Christmas, but it would be ever so useful, wouldn’t it?’
I thought of those presents, and of how unreachable they were now. I smiled again.
‘We’ll see.’
The next day, after kissing Hope goodbye after breakfast, Clover and I put the first part of our plan into action.
I say ‘plan’, though ‘strategy’ might be a better word for it. The first part had been to get ourselves mobile and hire a car, which Clover had done the previous day from a place in Farnborough. With me strapped into the passenger seat, she’d then driven the fifteen miles or so from Oak Hill to Guildford. Pulling up to the kerb outside Benny Magee’s house, Clover had asked me to let her go ahead, speak to Benny first.
‘No way,’ I said, fumbling with my seatbelt. ‘I’m not letting you put your neck on the chopping block. We’ll go together.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘Lord save me from working-class chivalry.’
I must have looked stung, because her gaze immediately softened.
‘I don’t need protection from Benny, Alex – never have, never will. Whatever’s happened in the past between the two of you, there’s no way he’d ever harm a hair on my head.’
‘Yeah, but what if he’s been got at?’ I said. ‘The last time I saw him he was surrounded by Tallarian and his freaks. What if he’s become one of them? Or what if what looks like him answers the door, but it’s really the shape-shifter?’
‘What if, what if,’ she said. ‘We can’t base everything we do on what ifs. What if I’m the shape-shifter? After all, I was once, wasn’t I? What if I’m leading you into a trap?’
I scowled. ‘I’m just saying we should be careful, that’s all.’
‘But that’s exactly what I am doing by suggesting that I speak to Benny first, before you show your ugly mug. Or do you still think Benny and I might be in cahoots?’
‘Course not,’ I said, thinking back to the last time I’d been here, when I’d been unsure how much I
could trust the woman I’d ended up on the run with. A lot of filthy water had flowed under London Bridge since then. ‘It’s just… oh, all right, go ahead. I suppose you’re right. I don’t suppose it’ll make much difference in the long run. I mean I haven’t even got the heart on me to protect us if we do get attacked.’
‘Exactly,’ she said cheerfully. ‘So we’d be buggered whatever happens.’ She unclipped her seatbelt and opened the car door. ‘I’ll tell Benny to leave the gate open, if that makes you feel better. That way I can make a quick getaway if I need to.’
‘If you get into trouble, just holler and I’ll come hobbling.’
‘No you bloody well won’t. You’ll start the engine and hightail it out of here. No point both of us getting got.’
She jumped out of the car, shutting the door firmly behind her, then strode up to the black iron gates in the high wall fronting Benny’s house. Wearing skinny black jeans, black high-heeled boots and a black fur-trimmed jacket she reminded me of Emma Peel from The Avengers. She was certainly a different proposition from the girl I’d met over three months before, who’d been too nervous to get directly involved in the burglary of McCallum’s house.
She took out her phone, made a call, and a minute later the gates opened. Once she’d gone through, I got out of the car on my side, grunting and wincing with effort. I felt much better than I had when I’d woken up in Oak Hill a week ago, but I was still nowhere near fighting fit. At least I didn’t need a stick any more, though. Those first few days in hospital had given me an insight into what it must be like to be eighty. Where would I be when I reached that age, if I reached that age, I wondered. Hopefully sitting in front of a blazing fire with my slippers on and Kate bringing me cups of tea.
I moved round the front of the car to the driver’s side and leaned against the door with my arms folded. From here, even at hobbling pace, I was close enough to the gates to slip between them if they started to close. The street was quiet and peaceful, the big houses tucked away behind high hedges and tall trees, as if politely but firmly discouraging visitors. I wondered how many of Benny’s neighbours knew about his background. I wondered how many of them had equally dodgy pasts. It was a cold autumn morning, the air so brittle it felt as though you could reach out and snap it with your fingers. The sky was the colour of despondency and the ground was covered in withered brown leaves.
Clover must have gone into the house. I certainly couldn’t hear the sound of voices from beyond the hedge. The big reunion must have come when I was struggling to get out of the car, my own wheezing and grunting having drowned out the ringing of the doorbell and Benny’s surprised exclamation at seeing Clover standing there. As I waited I breathed in air so icily sharp it stung my sinuses, then blew it out in long white plumes. Glimpsing movement high to my left I twisted round so quickly that my aching ribs and stomach muscles sang briefly with pain, but it was only a squirrel, slipping with quicksilver swiftness from branch to branch.
‘It’s okay,’ said a voice, as if assuring me that the squirrel was no threat. ‘You can come in now.’
I turned to face front again, twisting my body more cautiously this time. Clover had reappeared in the gap between the open gates and was looking at me. I couldn’t tell from her face what sort of encounter she’d had with Benny; I got the feeling she was keeping her expression deliberately neutral.
Jerking my head in the direction of the house, I asked, ‘How is he?’
‘Come and see for yourself.’
I followed her up to the house. The door into the front porch stood ajar. I felt annoyed for being nervous, but that didn’t stop the fluttering in my stomach. I couldn’t work out whether it was the prospect of seeing Benny again that unsettled me or the possibility that he might have been got at by the Wolves. How many times could I walk knowingly into danger and escape with my life? Then again, what other choice did I have if I wanted to see Kate again?
Entering the porch, I heard a whirr and a faint rattle behind me, and turned to see the gates in the high wall sliding slowly closed. There was nothing sinister in that, I told myself. Benny simply valued his privacy; besides which, with his background, he couldn’t be too careful when it came to security. I pulled the porch door closed behind me as Clover opened the one that led into the hallway. I followed her through and there was Benny, standing with his arms folded in the centre of his sumptuous domain, slight but somehow solid, indomitable. The hallway was just as I remembered it – the grandfather clock, the artwork on the walls. There was no sign of his wife, Lesley, or their little dog. Benny was staring at me, his expression as unreadable as Clover’s had been at the gate.
‘Alex,’ he said.
I gave a nod of greeting. ‘Hello, Benny.’
Now that I was in his presence I realised how little the wariness I was feeling had to do with Benny himself. The awe he’d previously inspired in me, the dark glamour that had seemed to cling to him, had now largely vanished, and not only because he had betrayed me. Since meeting up with Benny in the Hair of the Dog (months ago for me, only a week or two for him), I’d seen such wonders and terrors, had had my horizons expanded to such an extent, that he and his concerns now seemed petty in comparison. For the first time he seemed to me like a little man who wanted to be a big one. A man with delusions of grandeur who couldn’t see beyond the high walls he’d built around himself.
He narrowed his eyes, as if he knew what I was thinking. In a cagey voice he said, ‘You look different.’
‘I’m older,’ I said with a shrug, but he shook his head.
‘That’s not it. It’s something else.’ For a moment we stood, appraising each other. Then he said, ‘Never mind. Monroe said you wanted to talk, so let’s talk. Come through.’
He turned and stalked away, leading us not left to the conservatory at the back of the house – which I guessed was either too cold to sit in now that the weather had turned chilly or was still in a state of disrepair after being partially crushed by the sinewy darkness that Frank had unleashed upon it – but along a corridor to the right of the staircase. He stopped at the first door, glanced back to ensure we were still following (or perhaps to check I hadn’t pulled a gun on him), then pushed the door open and entered the room.
The decor of the spacious sitting room beyond was cream coloured and made me think of desserts – meringues and white-chocolate parfaits and swirls of white icing on wedding cakes. There were cream rugs on a blonde wood floor, three white leather sofas so pristine they looked as if they’d been carved out of fresh snow and a gleaming white grand piano in the corner. My instinct was to squint against the glare, even though the light filtering through the long, narrow windows that overlooked the front drive was murky.
As he turned towards a sideboard crowded with bottles of spirits on the back wall, Benny swept a hand towards the bulky sofas, which surrounded a glass coffee table like a trio of school bullies closing in on a smaller, weaker victim.
‘Take a seat,’ he said, making it sound like an order. ‘Drink?’
‘Whatever you’re having,’ Clover said, and I nodded.
‘Same here.’
Two minutes later he handed each of us a thick glass tumbler full of Scotch and soda, the latter having come from a siphon that resembled a mini fire extinguisher. Instinctively I’d seated myself on the right-hand sofa so that I could keep him in my sights while he was preparing the drinks.
Benny perched on the sofa directly opposite me (Clover was sitting back, apparently relaxed, on the one between us and at right angles to us both, like the bottom bar of a squared-off ‘U’) and after taking a sip of his Scotch, leaned forward to place his tumbler on the table with a glassy clunk. He stared at me for a moment and I stared back unflinchingly. Although I’d been aware of how much Clover had been changed by her recent experiences, of how much tougher and more resourceful she’d become, I hadn’t been particularly aware of any significant change in my own attitude and capabilities until now. But confronting Benny li
ke this, realising I no longer felt even remotely intimidated by him, was a revealing yardstick, to me at least.
Eventually he spoke.
‘Who the fuck are you, Alex?’
I took a sip of my drink as I considered his question. Who was I? I was the guardian of the obsidian heart. But what did that even mean?
Snorting with quiet humour, I said, ‘I’m not anyone. I’m just a normal bloke who’s been caught up in… extraordinary circumstances. I’m just a dad who wants his daughter back.’
Now it was Benny’s turn to sip his drink and look thoughtful. It struck me that the conversation was like a chess game, each player contemplating the board before making his next move. I was so focused on his pale blue eyes staring into mine that when Clover flapped a hand in front of her face I jerked in surprise, thinking for a moment there was a bird in the room, remembering how the shape-shifter had burst from the chimney in a cloud of soot.
‘Whew,’ she said, ‘I can hardly breathe for the testosterone in here.’
I smiled, but Benny frowned in irritation. Gesturing at me with his glass, he said, ‘Don’t give me that. If you’re no one how come so many people are interested in your welfare? And when I say people, I mean powerful people, people with money.’ I saw him grimace, almost shudder. ‘People who aren’t even people at all.’
‘You know why,’ I said. ‘It’s because of the heart, the one I stole from Barnaby McCallum. It’s not me they want, it’s—’
But Benny was wagging a finger rapidly from side to side, as if erasing my words as they emerged.
‘No, that isn’t it. I don’t buy that. It’s not just the heart. It’s you and the heart. I’ve been giving this plenty of thought since that… since what happened in that fucking crypt. And you and that fucking thing are tied together somehow. I don’t know how, but you are.’
I suddenly realised that what had happened in the crypt (and also, presumably, before that, in this very house, when Frank’s darkness had engulfed us) had shaken Benny to the core. He’d tried to maintain his tough exterior, was trying even now to keep his fear contained, but the more his mouth ran away with him, the more the cracks in his façade widened. His drink clattered against the table when he put it down, a sign of how much his hand was shaking. I almost felt sorry for him. But there was a part of me too that felt a secret satisfaction at the way his hubris had been punctured.