by Tony Butler
“I’ll arrange for another dozen huts to be put near Ben and Eve’s,” he said. “We’ll need a bent doctor to take care of them and I know just the man.”
“I already have a girl in mind to be our first breeding mother,” Janine said. “She’s fifteen, coming sixteen and desperate, or so she told me on the phone. She’ll be ringing me back later today and I’ll set up a meeting. Can you get the old hut ready for her within the next day or two?”
“No problem. I’ve got six weeks before I have to fly home again. I’ll sort out the hut and the doctor. You just concentrate on the girl.”
* * * *
The small cafe was crowded and Janine was surprised by the cleanliness of the place. After ordering a large mug of tea and a buttered, toasted tea cake she found a vacant table in a corner and sat down. Karen had told her that this was where she usually ate because the food was cheap here. Janine had finished eating and was beginning to think that either Karen had already been and gone, or she’d changed her mind and wasn’t coming.
Then the door of the cafe opened and Karen came in. At least Janine thought she must be Karen. She was wearing the kind of anorak that she’d described on the phone, and Janine didn’t think that there could be that many young, attractive, blonde, pregnant schoolgirls coming into a place like this. Janine quickly drained her mug of tea and carried it to the counter for a refill. There was someone else standing between her and Karen. Karen hadn’t seen Janine and she stood with a mug of tea in one hand and a plate in the other, on which was a bacon sandwich. She was looking for a seat.
“Karen!” Janine called, and the girl looked at her. “I’m Janine from the Foundation. That’s our table in the corner over there.”
The girl relaxed, then smiled and nodded and made her way to the table. Janine breathed a sigh of relief and waited to be served.
“What do you think, Miss?” Karen asked when Janine returned to her seat. She spoke in the kind of voice pupils used to address their teachers. “Will the Foundation take me in?”
“That’s why I arranged to meet you. How’s your hostel?”
“It’s alright I suppose, but you have to be out by ten unless it’s raining. They let you stay in the lounge then.”
“Have you thought any more about putting the baby up for adoption, Karen?” Janine asked as she lifted the steaming mug of tea to her lips. She’d arranged to meet Karen in the cafe because it was always crowded, and no one would remember them.
“Not really, I mean half of me wants to keep it, but I don’t know if I could cope with bringing up a baby on my own.”
“It won’t be easy, but it has to be your decision. Anyway, there’s no need to worry about that now. Let’s go and speak to this friend of mine. She runs a special unit especially for young girls like you who’re pregnant, and some of the girls there are your age. You could have a chat with those who’ve decided that they’re going to keep their babies. Perhaps we could get you booked in to a room there.”
“Yes, alright!” Karen said, animated with excitement. “When can we go?”
“Why not now? I’ve got the day off, and I fancy a drive in the country.”
Karen chatted for a while during the drive to Catherstone, but eventually the drug that Janine had slipped into the girl’s coke started to work and slowly her eyes closed and she fell asleep. Russell was waiting at the rear of the house as she parked the car and he walked over. Opening the passenger door, he took a long look at the sleeping girl.
“Not bad,” he said. “Now, let’s get her into the basement room before she wakes up. Are you sure no one knows she’s with you?”
“Yes, we met in a transport cafe – no one there will remember us – and she doesn’t know anyone at the hostel.”
She helped Russell get the girl out of the car. Between them, they half carried her into the house and down the stone steps that led to the basement. The room installed by Matheson’s Chemicals was almost a self-contained suite and, where you would have expected to find windows, framed scenic pictures hung on the walls.
The door was steel and the lock was on the outside. Janine often wondered what the previous tenants had used it for.
They lay Karen on the bed and left the room, locking the door behind them. Janine suspected that the girl would sleep for at least another two hours.
Karen was awake and sitting on the bed when they returned and she looked frightened as they shut the door behind them.
“What’s happening?” she asked. “Where am I?”
Janine let Russell deal with her. After all, this was his house.
“You’ve been brought here to have your baby, Karen, and you’ll be staying in a hut in the land behind this house. You’ll have the run of the land—all one hundred and twenty-five square miles of it. There’s a half a mile strip of marshes in front of the fences, so be careful not to fall in or you could be killed. If you behave yourself, you’ll be treated well and have some little luxuries like a CD player and maybe even a television. On the other hand, if you don’t behave yourself, I will hurt you so much that you’ll scream yourself hoarse. No one can hear you and there’s no one to help you. No one at all.”
“Please, let me go! I won’t tell anybody, honest! Just let me go!” She started to cry hysterically. Janine slapped the girl hard across the face, once, twice, three times. “Shut up!” she hissed and hit her again.
Karen stopped her wailing and sniffed as she tried to stifle the sobs that burst from her throat.
“That’s better,” Russell said. “Now, listen up. If you behave yourself and do exactly as you’re told, you’ll be well treated, but if you do anything that harms your baby, you’ll spend the next five months strapped to the bed and if anything happens to your baby, I’ll kill you. Believe it. Now, you have everything you need in here and there’s a radio on the table. I suggest you settle yourself in. We’ll be taking you out to your new home later.”
“Don’t look so worried, Karen,” Janine said. “We’re going to breed you, not put you down.”
In the beginning was the scream, thought Russell six months later when Karen’s baby announced its arrival into the world. Janine held it up for him to see. It was a boy – a boy they’d already sold for twenty thousand pounds. This would be the first baby of many that would make him and Janine rich and it was difficult to believe that this idea was actually working. Janine had already picked up a fifteen-year-old runaway boy who was now living in a small hut on the land and after Karen had recovered from giving birth, she would be given the boy to mate with. The birth of Karen’s son was just the beginning and already other couples who moved within the same social circle and desperate for a child had made approaches to him. Russell didn’t intend to disappoint them and, to make sure of that, they would need a permanent doctor. They had been lucky this time. Both he and Janine knew that. If there had been complications, they could have lost Karen and the child. It was time to pay Marcus a visit.
Marcus was at home in his luxury flat. When he opened the door, his eyes were bloodshot and he held an open bottle of red wine in his hand.
“Russell, old chap! Come in and join me in getting well and truly pissed. I suppose that you’ve heard the news?”
“Yes, it was in all the papers, on the television and has probably been put out over the internet,”
Russell said, following Marcus into the lounge.
“Struck off! Bloody well struck off just for touching up that bloody girl! I tell you, Russell, there’s no justice. I mean it’s not as though I raped her or anything.”
“No, but you did grope her when you thought she was still under the anaesthetic. You were Goddamned lucky she started screaming before you did anything worse to her. You could have ended up behind bars. Anyway, that’s why I’m here. How do you fancy a job?
“Doing what? I’m a doctor—sorry, was a doctor, for Christ’s sake. I don’t know anything else.”
He swayed slightly and sat down too quickly. Some wine slopped out
of the bottle onto his white shirt, but he didn’t seem to notice.
“That’s just it, Marcus. I need a doctor and I don’t care whether you’re struck off or not, because I have a scheme going where your patients are girls in their mid-teens – fifteen, sixteen and seventeen year olds. And as long as you don’t get them pregnant, I don’t give a shit if you want to have a little fun with them, because they’ll never be able to complain.”
Marcus looked at him owlishly. “You give me the job and my professional services will be all yours. Will I get paid anything?”
“Marcus, old buddy, you’re going to be rich. Very rich indeed.” Russell laughed and, taking the bottle out of Marcus’s hand, fetched two glasses to pour them both a drink.
Chapter Nine
Wales 2012
Ben and Cassie booked them all into a motel near the A55 a few miles from Colwyn Bay. Cassie, Jay and Ben had single rooms on the first floor and Tom and Anna had a double room on the second. Jay unpacked the nightclothes and toiletries that they’d bought in a twenty-four hour hypermarket, then went down to the restaurant to join the others. She was feeling confused and afraid. Only the fear of upsetting her grandparents stopped her from running away and hiding out. Ben and Cassie were already sitting at a small table near the bar and when they saw her, Cassie smiled. Leaving Ben at the table, she came over to her.
“Jay, I know how difficult this must be for you, but just for tonight try and put it out of your mind. No one knows where you are, so just try to relax and enjoy your meal. Okay?”
“I feel like some kind of freak,” Jay said. “I’m scared.”
“Of course you’re scared. If it were me, though, I wouldn’t be scared,” Cassie said. “Terrified, yes, but scared, no.”
Despite everything, Jay smiled. “I’m just trying not to think about what’s happened.”
“Good, and remember, you’re not on your own. Ben and I will try to protect you as best we can. Oh look, here come you grandparents. Why don’t you take them over to our table? What would you like to drink?”
“I’ll have a diet soda, please.”
“Right, I’ll bring it over.” Cassie made her way towards the bar, and Jay, seeing that her grandparents were about to sit down by Ben, went over to join them. They had been shown to their table in the dining area. Theirs would be the last meal order taken that evening as it was now ten-forty-five, and Jay suddenly discovered that she was ravenous. She chose the steak and after the others had given the waiter their order they chatted together like old friends. There were several television sets mounted around the restaurant and all of them turned towards the set nearest their table when the eleven-o-clock news came on. Jay had made the headlines and, when the scene changed from the studio to a reporter who was standing outside of her grandparents’ house, Jay groaned. Reuters and TV crews stood outside the gate, but worse than that was the queue of people that lined the pavement. The queue started outside the house, stretching the length of the street and around the corner. People stood behind wheelchairbound children and adults. Sick looking men and women, some leaning on canes or supported by their Zimmer-frames, stood silently, staring longingly at the empty house.
“Over sixty people are standing here hoping that seventeen-year-old Jay Williams will come and heal them,” the reporter said. “And the queue is getting longer all the time. The question is, though, where is Jay Williams now?” A photograph of Jay that had obviously been taken at the talent contest appeared on the screen and Jay looked around to see if any of the other diners was staring in her direction, but nobody was. The next item of news replaced her photograph and she breathed a sigh of relief. She was safe at the moment but what on earth she was going to do?
Their meals arrived and Jay had an uneasy feeling that whenever she looked up at the waiter that he avoided meeting her eyes.
“These spare ribs are good,” Tom said. “How’s your salad, Anna?”
Before she could reply the restaurant door burst open and cameras started to flash. Jay, who’d been temporarily blinded by the glare of the flashes, saw a woman holding a microphone, followed by a man with a video camera, come hurrying towards her.
Jay leapt from her chair, grabbed her coat and ran. She pushed through the swinging doors that led into the kitchen, and the door slammed into a waiter carrying a tray full of food. He gave a startled yell as the tray upended itself and plates full of hot food tipped over him. He slipped and fell backwards but Jay darted past him, out of the backdoor and emerged in the car park. Without pausing, she ran towards the darkest corner, leapt over a fence and found herself standing on the nearside lane of the A56. A pair of headlights was almost on top of her and she threw herself backwards, buffeted by the displaced air as a vehicle sped past.
* * * *
The three men sitting in comfortable leather armchairs were the sole occupants of the opulently furnished room of an exclusive ‘Gentleman’s Club’, located in St James’s Square, and only a few minutes walk from Westminster. Each of the men had arrived separately in ten-minute intervals by chauffeur driven Bentley limousines.
Once the waiter placed their respective drinks on the table and left the room, Jeremy Marchant, the British prime-minister, shifted in his seat. “I apologise for having to delay the meeting, gentlemen. Another damned riot. Nottingham this time.” He looked drained and his illness was betrayed by the slightly yellow tinge in his eyes.
Henry Matheson, the American Vice-President, sighed. “Why the hell don’t you just do what they want, and pull out of Europe until it comes to its senses like you promised before you got yourself elected?”
“There’s too much pressure from the banks, the city and our legal profession – they’re making billions from all the new legislation. People can’t even send their kids to school without the proper legal documentation nowadays.”
Russell Downey, the youngest of the three men and Matheson’s head of security, laughed. “You Brits have taken the personal claim business to new heights, Jeremy. Is it right that parents have to list every single physical activity, including play surfaces, weather conditions and items of equipment they’re allowed to use, before their kids can take part in games or sport?”
“We’ve also included edible stuffs from the beginning of next term,” Jeremy said, smiling for the first time. “If ever I get booted out of office, I’ll make a bloody fortune,” he joked. Their secret twenty-year-old partnership had made them all multimillionaires. Their fortunes were safely stowed away in the Cayman Isles.
Henry took a sip of his Southern Comfort and savoured the sweet liquid before swallowing.
“Okay, Jeremy,” he said. “Let’s cut the crap and get down to business. Why the emergency summons? I know that I’m treated as a big joke by the president, but I still have a busy schedule. You’re lucky that Russell and I were only in Belgium.”
“Yes, I know, Henry, and for what it’s worth I sympathise with you. President Slojhenski may be your first female president, but she seems to be an American version of Margaret Thatcher. Younger and prettier perhaps, but she’s strong. It’s a pity she’s such a complete and utter bitch!”
Jeremy spat out the last few words with such venom that Henry looked at him in surprise.
“I take it then, that the reports you two didn’t get on at your mini-summit last month, were correct?” Henry was intrigued. Jeremy was considered by others, besides the man himself, to be quite a ladies man.
“She told me I was a bigger threat to the democracy of the West than any terrorist group, and that Europe was becoming a communist style police state!” Jeremy scowled at the memory and then passed a tabloid newspaper over to Henry and then another copy for Russell. Henry looked at the headlines. TEENAGE GIRL - Healer Sensation. Henry read the article about the Welsh girl who’d apparently healed a couple of people by somehow covering them in some kind of blue light and wondered what the hell it had to do with him and Russell. Russell asked the question. “Is this supposed to mean anyth
ing to us?”
Jeremy nodded. “Possibly. The girl lives in Conway, that’s Wales, with her grandparents, but according to a report that I received this morning the family only moved there fifteen years ago. Before Jay Williams—that’s the girl’s name—healed the other girl, somehow she lifted a bus off her.”
Henry almost spilt some of his drink. He knew now and he could tell by Russell’s expression that he did too. So, that’s why they were there.
Jeremy nodded in confirmation. “That’s right, the family moved from Catherstone Village. Is there the remotest possibility that the female infant could somehow have survived?”
“No way!” Russell was adamant. “We all saw Adam pitch her into the marsh. She went under alright, we all saw it. There’s no way she could have escaped from there or survived.”
“We have to make sure, though,” Henry said. “If it is the girl, she could jeopardise everything, including our ongoing project. Russell, get yourself over to the village and see if you can find out anything, and then—”
Jeremy interrupted him. “What worries me, Henry, is—if the girl did manage to survive somehow—how do we know that the male didn’t too?”
“I don’t even want to think about that,” Russell said.
“You’d better check it out while you’re there,” Henry said. “Call in at the Foundation and take a look at that mine shaft and make sure he’s still there.”
“Okay. If it is the same girl, do you want me to head for Wales and take her out, or what?”
“Yes, get rid of her,” Henry answered. “Make it look like a robbery or something.”
“Try not to draw attention to The Devil’s Footprint,” Jeremy said. “We don’t want to put our current project at risk.”
Henry, who knew that one of the runaway girls Russell and Janine were holding on The Devil’s Footprint was the same rare blood type as the British Prime Minister, wondered if the rumours about Jeremy’s failing health were possibly true. That would explain his sudden concern that the project remained on-going. It would have made more sense, otherwise, to close the place down and dispose of any possible witnesses. Henry kept his suspicions to himself, however. It would be stupid to antagonise Jeremy by exposing his health to scrutiny.