by Mark Morris
It wasn’t as though I’d be abandoning Alex; his trail, such as it was, had turned stone cold, and I was certainly going to get no help in finding him from the local authorities. I’d probably serve him better by getting back home and trying to put my head in order. In fact, extricating myself from Greenwell’s sticky web was surely the only way that I could help him. At least in London there would be people who would listen to my story, who would take me seriously. As soon as it was discovered how appallingly I had been treated here, the authorities there would surely feel compelled to act. I could even get the papers involved, whip up a public outcry. I allowed myself to relish the prospect that this time next week Greenwell wouldn’t know what had hit it. The corrupt mechanisms operating at the heart of this rotten little town would be laid open like the innards of a laboratory rat, exposed for all to see.
Back at the pub I packed quickly, feeling efficient and purposeful now that I had decided to go. It was almost midday, and the sun, which had all at once sprung through the haze which capped the town as though in approval of my decision to leave, was angling through the skylight above my head, draping a band of light across the duvet and the floor beyond. I zipped up my bag, then crossed to the small, lacy-curtained window that looked down on to Wedge Square below. I had glanced perfunctorily out of this window only once before, and wasn’t sure why I was doing it now, except perhaps to gain one final overview of the town before I put it behind me, hopefully for good. I lifted the net curtain and leaned forward, and immediately my gaze was drawn to a group of men standing in the centre of the square below, as if waiting for something. It took me a moment to focus on them, to register who they were – and then I suddenly went cold.
There were four of them in all: Rudding, the two policemen who had ordered me to strip, and another with his back to me. It was this one, whose face I couldn’t see, who frightened me the most.
As if sensing my fear, drawn to it, the fourth figure slowly turned, then tilted his head and looked straight up at me. I saw the glint of his teeth when he smiled, the sharply angled bone structure of his face. It was his eyes, though, that drew me in. They seemed to burn through the distance between us, as if their very gaze could slice through flesh, cause pain.
‘Matt!’ I gasped, lurching back as though shoved. I was still gripping the net curtain, and before I let it drop I saw Matt turn to the others, gesture up at my window. All three of them swivelled their heads in my direction. Though their features were no more than vague blots at this distance, I sensed zealous rage emanating from Rudding, grim satisfaction from the two policemen. Matt himself was a void, merely a shape that disguised a terrible and consuming darkness. Rudding let out a cry, almost a shriek of triumph, and then the four of them were swarming (if four people can swarm) towards the Solomon Wedge.
I let go of the net curtain and looked wildly around the room. What could I do? They were coming for me and I had nowhere to run. I’d hear their feet pounding on the stairs in a moment. The skylight? No, the Solomon Wedge stood alone – there was no Batman-like escape to be had over the rooftops. The window, too, offered nothing more than a sheer drop on to concrete forty feet below.
I dithered for a moment, then rushed into the bathroom and pulled the shower curtain across. Then I ran back out of the bathroom, tugging the door closed behind me. As I climbed into the big pine wardrobe against the wall, I was shaking with fear, all too aware how flimsy and desperate my plan was. What I was hoping was that all four of my pursuers, thinking I was in the bathroom, would pile in there, whereupon I would emerge from the wardrobe and leg it down the stairs. It was the sort of thing that would probably have worked in some kids’ crime caper, but if it worked here it would be a miracle. My heart was pounding and my insides felt like water. I was shaking so much I wondered whether I’d be able to run even if I did get a chance.
I pulled the wardrobe door closed behind me, shutting myself in darkness. If I’d had my mobile I could have rung Keith, but it was packed away in my bag and in my panic I’d forgotten it. As I heard them coming up the stairs, I pressed myself against the back of the wardrobe, wishing desperately that I could merge with the wood behind me and disappear. There was a crash and suddenly they were in the room; I heard their thumping feet, the savage bark of their voices.
‘Check under the bed.’ Each syllable Rudding uttered was like the snap of a steel trap.
I braced myself, awaiting the inevitable, not sure how I’d react when the door was yanked open, whether I would fight like a maniac or crumple with terror.
There was a bit of moving about in the bedroom, a few bumps and thuds, and then someone said, ‘In here.’
I sensed movement receding from me, and I thought incredulously, They’ve gone into the bathroom. Surely my silly little plan wasn’t going to work?
I knew I had no choice but to go for it. I pushed open the wardrobe door, feeling as though my legs were going to give way, as though I was going to pass out with fear. I fully expected someone – Matt – to be waiting by the bed, arms folded, a grin on his face, but astonishingly the room was empty. What was more, the door on the far side was standing invitingly ajar. Moving as softly as I could, holding my breath, I crossed towards it.
I almost made it out undetected. Less than a second later and I’d have done so. However, just as I was about to step on to the little landing, the bathroom door was pulled open and Rudding emerged. Our heads twisted, our eyes locked on to one another; for an instant we both froze. Then his face contorted into an expression of pure rage, an incoherent screech leaped up from his throat, and he lunged across the room towards me.
I ran, my feet pounding the stairs, and almost immediately heard the wordless shouts of my pursuers bouncing off the walls. As I descended, the many centuries of human progress, of civilization, seemed to peel away from me in layers, so that by the time I reached the door at the bottom of the stairs that led into the pub, I was nothing but the same animal that has existed since life began on this planet, the one whose entire being is centred on simply running in terror, trying to keep ahead of whatever shape death may have taken behind it.
I ran into the pub, panic clouding my vision, only peripherally aware of heads turning to look at me. I bolted for the exit door and someone stepped into my path. I swerved to avoid them, and saw the red shimmer of jovial Jim’s silk shirt, his chubby, ringed hands coming into focus as he tried to grab me. I lashed out, was aware of my hand connecting with something, heard a grunt of pain and felt a brief lightning streak of glee across the dark, crushing sky of my fear, even as I was turning away.
There were bodies in front of me and behind me. I was struggling for air, for space, as if in a nightmare. I caught a fleeting glimpse of jovial Jim’s wife, her face both uglied with hatred and gimlet-eyed with fanaticism. Then something connected hard with my ankle, made me cry out in pain, something else tangled with my feet, and I was down.
A jagged burst of pain shot inward from my right hip, which took the brunt of the impact with the floor. I heard a roar of triumph, or thought I did, through the pounding in my ears. I was surrounded by jostling bodies, which towered over me, by legs, by feet – I expected them to start kicking, stamping, and curled myself into a ball.
Then I sensed the crowd quieten and move away from me. I looked up and saw the bodies around me parting, people shuffling backwards on either side to form a corridor. Down the corridor strode Rudding and the two policemen, Matt a dark presence at the rear. Without a word Rudding leaned over me – then his hands shot forward and grabbed my arms. I struggled, but his strength was deceptive for such a little man. I tried to twist my body to kick him in the side, but the older of the two policemen grasped my right ankle, held it in a grip that felt strong enough to bruise bone. The younger policeman took hold of my left ankle, and between the three of them they bore down on my limbs until I was lying on my back, spreadeagled.
I felt humiliated, vulnerable, sick with panic. They had forced me into a position wh
ere they could do whatever they liked to me, where I wouldn’t be able to do a thing about it.
Matt stepped forward, stood astride me. He was grinning, obviously enjoying himself, revelling in the power he held.
‘Matt,’ I said, ‘please stop this. What do you hope to gain by it?’
He didn’t answer. Instead he bent his knees, lowered his body down towards me, and then very deliberately knelt on my chest.
I gasped at the weight of him. His knees ground painfully against my breastbone. I thought I heard my ribs creak, was afraid they might snap, cave in.
‘Matt, you’re hurting me,’ I said, each syllable a painful effort.
For the first time Matt spoke. ‘I know,’ he said.
‘Please,’ I begged him. ‘Please, Matt … I can’t … breathe.’
His only response was to reach out and place his hands around my throat. He squeezed, and I felt what little air I was managing to draw in cut off.
The panic I had experienced up to now was nothing compared to this. It came roaring and flailing out of me like a mad thing, making me want to thrash and convulse and kick and scream. However, I could do none of these things; I couldn’t move. All I could do was lie there and have the life throttled out of me.
The tightness in my head and chest expanded, became unbearable, then unendurable; I felt sure that the overwhelming need for air would drive me mad, that my heart and brain were swelling like overinflated balloons and that eventually they would explode.
My vision started to break up, my thoughts to sizzle out, become engulfed by the airless dark.
Oh God, I thought, I’m going to die, oh God, I’m going to die, oh God, I’m going to—
twenty-three
I was in a dark place, a small place, a quiet place. Its confines comforted me. I wanted to stay there for ever, alone and drifting, devoid of pain, memory, thought. But even as the notion lulled me, I felt my mind struggling for full consciousness, striving to restore my senses. It was as if there were two of me, one wanting to give up, let it all go, and the other determined to fight on until my last ounce of strength was exhausted.
Inevitably the fighter inside me won, made me open my eyes. Instantly my senses felt bombarded, invaded. Memory came flooding back, and with it fear. I remembered Matt’s hands around my throat, my terrible panic, my inability to move. I remembered thinking I was going to die, remembered the terror of that – and yet, despite that terror, I almost wished that I had died, because at least then there would be no more pain to come.
After the initial burst of stimuli, my senses were now beginning to settle down, enabling me to take in my surroundings. I was in what appeared to be a narrow, walk-in pantry. The light was dim, but I could make out rows of shelves on both sides of me, stacked with tins and jars, bottles and Tupperware boxes and foodstuffs in cellophane packaging. There were cardboard boxes of bottled French lager stacked on the floor beneath a thick stone shelf. The instant I saw them I thought, He bought those on a day trip to Calais.
A shiver passed through me. Who? Who had bought them? My mind didn’t seem to want me to know. Moments before it had flung itself open, allowing consciousness to stream in, but now I could almost hear metal shutters clanging down, vaults of information being sealed.
I climbed gingerly to my feet, my limbs stiff. Oddly, however, my throat and neck felt fine, despite Matt’s attentions. Ahead of me was a door, and I moved across to it, tried the handle, expecting it to be locked. To my amazement it opened immediately.
My eyes were so unprepared for the light that flooded into them after the dimness of the pantry that for a second it seemed as though the room in front of me was whiting out, like a photograph too rapidly exposed. I squeezed my eyes tight shut and stood for a moment, breathing in air that I suddenly realized smelled of tomatoes and garlic, onions and herbs, and watching the red tracery of my own veins inside my eyelids. My senses seemed to reawaken one by one, so that what filtered through next was sound, a faint murmur of speech that I knew instinctively was not the natural discourse of two human beings, but the more measured, rehearsed cadences of scripted speech.
Used to the red glare behind my eyelids now, I opened my eyes once again. I was standing in the corner of a large, cluttered kitchen. There were pine wall cabinets; a large pot sink with old-fashioned brass taps beneath a window which looked out on to a small, enclosed paved area bordered by flower beds; a big wooden table scattered with letters and leaflets and menus for takeaway food places; a heavy old sideboard against the far wall beside a door that led into a tiled hallway.
The room was almost unbearably familiar. I had been in this house so many times, had so many happy memories of it. And yet the place distressed me, frightened me, and the reason it frightened me was …
Was because something bad had happened here.
No, not just bad. Cataclysmic. The worst thing that I could possibly ever imagine had happened in this place. I looked round, my eyes devouring details in the hope of enlightenment. I was terrified of the answers I might find, but I needed to know. It was time to know.
Details:
A large scorpion model on the sideboard.
A purple and pink striped climbing rope hanging on one of a row of hooks by the back door.
Pictures on the walls – a framed poster of The Goalkeeper’s Fear of the Penalty directed by Wim Wenders; a portrait of Kenneth Williams in the style of Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe; a photographic collage of exotic insects.
‘No,’ I said and put my hand over my mouth. Then I was running, out of the kitchen, into the tiled hallway. I was aware of the staircase to my left, the wood-framed mirror inset with candle holders affixed to the wall on my right, the front door twelve feet in front of me.
Time seemed to slow as my senses suddenly sharpened. For a moment everything seemed crisp and perfectly aligned, details and textures almost quivering with their own unique vitality. The light pouring through the door’s stained-glass panel made it look as though colour were bleeding towards me, intending to entwine me in its cathedral-like radiance.
I went through the door to my right and entered two familiar rooms which blended together and became one. In truth it had been one room all along, but until now my mind had not allowed me to recognize the fact. I had walked this house in my dreams or my thoughts many times, and had always found it deserted and had always been fearful of it. But in person I had been here many times too. In my life before.
This was Alex’s house. Alex’s house in London before he came to Greenwell. Before the grey man took him away.
And here was Alex, sitting on his sofa, feet up on the edge of his low coffee table, watching TV and eating a plate of pasta which was balanced on his thighs.
As I walked in he glanced up at me and smiled. ‘Hiya, Gemmo, how’s it going?’ he said.
I gaped at him. He gave me an amused frown.
‘What’s the matter with you? You look like you’ve just—’
‘Don’t say it,’ I said quickly.
‘Say what?’
‘What you were going to say.’
‘OK,’ he said slowly, but he was still smiling, still treating my behaviour as a joke.
‘What’s happening, Alex?’ I asked him.
He looked at me cautiously, as if this might be a trick question and he was wondering how best to answer. At last, like a doctor trying to placate a dangerous patient, he said, ‘Well, I’m eating linguine and watching The O-Zone. Then later—’
He got no further. The door crashed open and Matt lunged into the room.
He was holding a kitchen knife in his hand, and though he was blank-faced he looked utterly, utterly crazy. Both Alex and I were so shocked that at first neither of us moved or said anything.
Matt jumped forward, and holding the knife high above his head in his right hand, made a grab at my arm with his left. I reacted for the first time, snatching my arm away and stepping sharply back from him, banging the side of my knee against the side of th
e low coffee table and losing my balance, sprawling half across the table, then ending up on the floor.
Matt lunged forward again, at which point Alex jumped up, the plate of pasta sliding from his lap, linguine and sauce spilling like guts on to the green carpet. Alex shouted something, I don’t know what, then Matt rounded on him, sweeping his knife arm down with savage intent. The next thing I knew, Alex’s arm had been slashed open and there was blood going everywhere, on the carpets and furniture, across the coffee table and on me.
It didn’t slow Alex down. I don’t think he even felt it at first. He went for Matt again, reaching for his knife arm, but Matt was like a frenzied animal, twisting and fighting and leaping. I cried out – a combined warning and yelp of horror – as Matt spun and slashed downwards at Alex, like a tennis player dealing with a tricky backhand. I didn’t see the knife go in, but I saw blood suddenly start to pour out of Alex’s side, just above his hip. It came out like water running from a punctured bag. Alex staggered a little and Matt moved forward again, and all of a sudden Alex was turning to face me, and there was a knife, or at least the handle of one, sticking out of his chest. Alex had a strange expression on his face, the mild irritation of a man who discovers a smudge of dirt on his fresh white shirt. He reached for the knife handle with a hand that appeared to be encased in a shiny red glove, but before he could clasp it his hand started to shake.
Then he bent forward and was sick on the carpet.