by Alex Palmer
He listened. In the night silence, he heard soft footsteps approaching the door.
‘Are you in there?’
Harrigan drew in a breath. The last thing he’d expected to hear was a woman’s voice.
‘You must be awake by now,’ she went on. ‘You just wait. There are other people coming. Grace is one of them. We’re going to have fun tonight. Grace is going to watch you burn. Then she’s going to burn herself. You just sit there and think about that.’ She laughed.
Is that right? Harrigan thought. Well, fuck you, whoever you are. He had never hit a woman in his life. His father had sometimes hit his mother when he was drunk, until Harrigan had been big enough to stop him. Watching his father do this, and then, maudlin, beg for forgiveness in the morning, had left Harrigan with a contempt for anyone who did the same. But this wasn’t a woman. This was a murderer who happened to be female.
‘Are you going to talk to me? You can talk. I know you can.’
There was an odd hint of hysteria in the woman’s voice. She was building up her excitement. There was some other edge too. Tears. Why tears?
‘I thought someone was following me tonight. But I got rid of them. No one’s coming to save you. You might as well talk to me. You’re not dying alone. Grace will be with you. And if we can, we’ll get your daughter too. We’ve got something that’ll turn her head to pulp.’
Keep talking, whoever you are. I’m waiting for you. Everything you say makes it easier.
‘Are you going to answer me? Open your fucking mouth. You can still talk.’ Hysteria again, this time wound up to a greater intensity. Strange anger, resentment. ‘Go on. Cry. That’s what you’ll do in the end. Everybody does. They cry and they shit themselves. They all say please when it’s too fucking late. When we open the door, you’ll come crawling out saying please. When you do, she’ll be watching you and it’ll be too fucking late. Then she’ll crawl in the dirt too. Everyone does.’
There was silence again. Still Harrigan waited.
‘You’re going to burn in your own car. We’ve done that before. The first time we ever did anything. I can’t wait to see what it looks like again, what you sound like. What do you think?’
Come in and ask me if you want to know so badly.
‘Joel will be here soon. Maybe fifteen, twenty minutes. That’s all the time you’ve got left. I’m going to piss on your face. You can lie there and drink it. I’ll turn on the lights, I’ll take your blindfold off. You can look up at me before you die.’
You are sick. You are so sick.
Suddenly the bright lights of a car glared through the cracks around the door. Harrigan heard her unlocking the padlock, then removing the chain. Maybe when you’d done this so often before you got arrogant. You didn’t see your victims as anything other than creatures waiting for slaughter, crying for mercy you didn’t have to give.
A key turned in a lock, then the door swung open. The glaring headlights lit up the interior of the hut, revealing only the empty mattress. The woman stopped in the doorway, startled. ‘Where are you?’ she shrieked even as Harrigan came out of the dark and hit her on the side of her head as hard as he could bring himself to hit a woman.
She went down, not quite unconscious. She didn’t seem to be armed. He got hold of the rope they’d used to tie his legs and began to tie her up. She tried to fight and bite him but she was too groggy and had no strength to match his. A stream of obscenities came out of her mouth, barely comprehensible. He still had his handkerchief. He took it out of his pocket and pushed it into her mouth. Then he picked her up and put her on the mattress. She was still making noise and began to wriggle, trying for the door. He looked around. There was nothing to tie her to to keep her in one place. Then she collapsed back, breathing hard. Her eyes rolled up and closed. He pressed her eye, a common test for pain, to see if she was awake. She didn’t respond.
He took the time to look at her. An attractive redhead probably just over forty. Sara McLeod? Nadine Patterson? What name would she answer to? He searched her, found her car keys in her jeans pocket and took them. She had no weapon of any kind and no mobile. He stood up. In the car lights, he saw the book near her head and picked it up. It was Justice Under the Law. He flicked it open to the title page and saw his signature. Bought last night at his launch by Joel Griffin, who was supposedly on his way here right now. It was his MO: everything planned to the last detail.
Carrying the book, Harrigan went outside into the free air, shutting the door behind him. It locked on closure. The key was still in the lock. He took it, then re-chained and re-padlocked the door. The lights of the car were glaring in his eyes and he walked around to the side of the vehicle, cursing whenever his bare feet trod on something sharp. The car was a blue Mazda he hadn’t seen before.
He looked around to see where he was. As he’d guessed, the national park. He’d been locked in a small, squat building situated on a low slope. Probably it had been put here during World War II, some home-defence facility close to the coast where equipment might have been stored or the home guard were expected to fight invaders. Darkened forest surrounded the open area it stood in, at that moment illuminated by the lights of the Mazda. At this time of night, it was a good place for a murder.
He searched the car. There was no gun and no mobile telephone. He opened the boot. A digital video camera and jerry cans of petrol. He closed it and looked up the way it must have come in. A fire trail cut through the bush up a steep slope, presumably towards the nearest ridge. Parked to the side of this trail a short distance up the slope, gleaming palely and pointing downwards to the open space, was Harrigan’s car.
Painfully, he limped up to it. The keys had to be somewhere here. How else was anyone going to turn it into a murder weapon? Then he saw rocks wedged against the front wheels. He tried the door. It opened. This was simple. Turn the whole thing into a missile. Who needs to start the engine? Just set it up so it rolls forward over whatever escarpment is below.
Harrigan was a careful man. He had a spare key concealed on the outside of his car for emergencies. He tossed his book on the front seat and set about checking for it; it was still there. Once he’d retrieved it, he began searching the car. They had taken his mobile, his gun, his backpack with its handy collection of tools. He had no weapon and he couldn’t call for help. How much time did he have? Time to drive out of here and get help? Griffin was coming, Grace with him. Griffin was supposed to be her target not the other way around. They’d be here very soon, if the woman in the hut knew what she was talking about.
Someone had been following her, she said, but she’d got rid of them. Did that mean Grace’s people were out there, tracking her? They had the means to do that. If so, why hadn’t they acted? Or had they already stopped Griffin’s car? He couldn’t know. He did know he didn’t trust Clive. If he drove out now, would he meet Griffin coming in? Where would that leave Grace if she was with him? No, he would wait. He couldn’t leave her alone in this place. There would only be Griffin, one man. She had to be armed as well. That was a point in their favour. And if no one came, then he would leave.
What he most wanted were shoes, but there were none, not even the pair of old thongs he usually tossed in the boot when he was going fishing. There were some rags. He tied them around his feet but they were almost useless. They had left his car tool kit behind. He searched through it and selected the heaviest spanner he could find. There was also the torch he always carried in his car, which was powerful. He took that as well. He made sure the handbrake was on, locked the car and took the keys. Then he went back to the Mazda, turned off the lights and locked that as well.
After this he followed in the direction his car was pointed. A breeze coming up from distant water ruffled his hair. Again wishing he had shoes, he reached the edge of an escarpment and looked down. A short, steepish fall onto rocks, young trees and ferns growing below. Soak the car in petrol and send it down here. Both of them burned to ashes, still alive when the fire was started
. These were the people he was dealing with. No point in being sentimental about them.
A small arc of trees extended out from the forest towards the hut, coming closest to it on the far side near the back. He walked into the trees as quickly as he could, crouching down where he could stay hidden. It was a clear starlit night; extinguishing the headlights had brought a sense of peace to the scene. The silence around him deepened; he turned off his torch. In the quiet, he heard the calls of the night birds and rustling in the bush around him. Just the wildlife going about its usual business.
He had been there only a few moments when he became aware of a car making its way down the trail. No engine, no headlights. It was time for something to happen. In the darkness, Harrigan waited. He was supposed to be marked as a dead man, but this time the dead would bite back.
24
Grace could see the rounded shape of a hut at the end of the fire trail, a pale gleam of cement in the starlight. They passed Harrigan’s car on their right and came to a halt beside the blue Mazda. There was no sign of anyone.
‘Where is she?’ Griffin said. ‘She should be waiting in the car.’
‘She didn’t do what you wanted.’
He leaned forward to look into her face. ‘You keep quiet. Save your voice till later.’
He turned the lights on low beam. The hut’s door lit up dully as a dirty green. The clear ground about the hut itself became a lighter grey. The colours of the end of the world. Grace checked both sides of the hut as best she could. There was no one in sight. Why didn’t you come, Clive? Three times I called you. Why didn’t you come?
Carrying her gun, Griffin got out of the car and walked up to the Mazda, tried the doors. It was locked. He stood there looking around. Grace tried to move but she was pinned in her seat.
‘Where are you?’ he called out. ‘Why did you lock the car? I told you, we have no time. We can’t play any games.’ He turned on the spot. ‘Sara? If you’re here, come out. Stop playing these fucking games! There’s no time!’
There was no answer, only the silence of the night.
‘Are you there?’ Griffin called, anger in his voice. ‘Come out! Don’t do this to me!’
Again, nothing. He walked to Grace’s side of the car and opened the door. He reached across to unfasten her seatbelt and it struck her, the terror he’d said she would feel. I am here, this is real, there’s no way out. It took complete possession of her.
He stood back. ‘Get out.’
She couldn’t move. He laughed.
‘I knew it would happen,’ he said. ‘It always does.’
The laughter gave her something to hang on to, some residual stubbornness. She got out. I have nothing to lose now. Her body seemed to be flashing hot and cold; she felt she would lose control of it. Hold on. Don’t let them turn you into a thing they want you to be.
Griffin had her by the hair. ‘This way.’ Pulled her to just in front of the hut. The stars seemed to wheel overhead.
I want to see my daughter. I want to see Paul. I may not see them again.
‘Kneel.’
She knelt. He had put his gun away somewhere, a pocket perhaps, and produced a knife instead. He put it to her neck. She felt the bite of steel on her skin. He had nicked her.
‘Move and this knife will find the vein. I’m not like Chris. I know what I’m doing.’
She began to shake uncontrollably. She did not know how to stop it. There were tears in her eyes. He wasn’t looking at her.
‘Sara? Where are you?’ Again the only reply was silence. ‘There can’t be anyone else here. She must be here.’
‘What about the people who left our car?’ Grace was surprised to hear herself speak. Her voice was shaking.
‘They’re gone. You see, I told you. You’re starting to come apart now. I knew it when I saw how you reacted to Chris’s name that day in Westfield. This is the way to you. A knife and a can of petrol.’
‘You aren’t him,’ she said, some strange calmness coming out of nowhere.
‘What did you say?’
She stayed silent.
‘You’re not as frightened of me, is that what you mean? Feel that? You will be.’ He cut her again, a little deeper. ‘Stand up.’
She stood. In the car headlights, he looked at her neck.
‘You see-you’re bleeding a little. Everyone starts somewhere.’
He called out again. ‘Sara. I don’t want to wait. Where are you?’
A thumping came from inside the hut, a rattling of the chain on the door.
‘Oh, no, she didn’t,’ Griffin said. ‘I told her not to.’
The thumping continued.
‘I told you not to!’
Another bang, then more thumping, frantic. Holding Grace in a grip that twisted her down to the ground, Griffin looked around at the trees.
‘If you’re out there, Harrigan, you can watch me cut your partner’s throat. Sara! Stop that racket!’
The noise got worse, a constant drumming. Suddenly, Grace felt her bonds cut through, the rope fall away and the blood run stinging into her hands. He pulled her upright. She turned swiftly. He was there with her gun.
‘Do anything and I’ll shoot you. I won’t kill you but I’ll make you hurt. Anyone out there listening-hear what I just said. You take these.’ He threw a set of keys in the dust.
She picked them up, dropped them, picked them up again and dropped them from her still stinging hands. Finally she grasped them.
‘What am I supposed to do with them?’
‘Open the hut. I want to see what’s inside and I don’t want to open it myself. No one’s going to come up behind me.’
Grace put the key in, fumbled, dropped it, picked it up, dropped it again. This time she was stalling. If Harrigan was out there, she had to give him time. With his spare hand, Griffin hit her hard across the side of her face. She fell forward, stunned.
‘Stop wasting time. Open it.’
Shaking, she got to her feet. The padlock and the chain came into focus. You could use that chain for something. It was thick and heavy. Griffin was edgy, constantly looking around behind his back, waiting for whoever might try to come up behind him out of the dark. She put the key in the padlock, unlocked it, let the chain slide to the ground with a thud. She unlocked the door. It swung inwards. Griffin grabbed her by the collar and pulled her back and then sideways. Sara came rolling out, staggered to her feet, making noises behind the handkerchief in her mouth. Griffin looked at her and laughed. He pushed Grace forward.
‘Get that handkerchief out.’
She reached and pulled it out quickly, jerking her hand back. Sara spat. There was dirt on her face and in her hair.
‘He hit me!’ she shouted.
‘Why did you open the hut?’ Griffin shouted back simultaneously.
‘Just get these ropes off me.’
Griffin pushed Grace to the ground till she lay face down in the dirt, pointing the gun at her. Sara suddenly kicked her in the stomach. She gasped but kept her eyes open. From where she lay, she could see the chain on the ground. Keep your eyes on it. Don’t let it slip away.
‘Turn around,’ Griffin said to Sara. With the knife in one hand and the gun in the other, he cut the ropes.
Sara turned and directed a few more kicks into Grace where she lay on the ground. She gasped but didn’t call out and kept her eyes open. Have a baby; be in labour for twelve hours before you’re rushed into an emergency Caesarean-it teaches you about pain.
Griffin had put the knife back in his pocket. ‘Go check his car,’ he said.
Sara sprinted up the slope to the car.
‘It’s locked,’ she called back, almost shrieking. ‘He’s out there. Just shoot her. Let’s go.’
Griffin turned towards her, away from Grace in the dirt. Grace pulled herself up on all fours, pretending to retch, edging a little away.
‘I didn’t want to just shoot her. Fuck you, why did you have to open the hut? I told you not to!’ he shouted.
Grace snatched at the chain and was on her feet. He turned and, with both hands, she smashed it across his face with all the strength she had coupled with her desperation. He fell back and she hit his hand, cracking the bone. The gun fell to the ground. Before she could reach for it, Sara was coming for her, screaming. Griffin stumbled back, shouting in pain, one hand on his face. Blood began streaming from his nose. Grace met Sara full on and knocked her back. In this grip, they twisted like mad dancers. In the melee, the gun got kicked away into the dark past the two cars. Grace thought she heard it hit something. Sara struggled like someone possessed but Grace got her on her pressure points, holding her between herself and Griffin.
‘Make her let me go. She’s hurting me,’ Sara wailed.
Griffin had his knife. He was holding it in his left hand, not his right. His mouth was open. Blood was pouring down his face and shirt.
‘Are you going to come at me with that knife?’ Grace shouted at him. ‘Or will you put it in Sara first? I think you would if you wanted to. You make her do everything else. Why not make her die for you?’
‘He’s behind you,’ Sara shrieked as Harrigan came out of the dark, spanner raised to bring it down on Griffin’s head.
Griffin leaped sideways, feinted with the knife, then stumbled backward off balance, falling and twisting one leg. The spanner missed.
Sara tore herself out of Grace’s grip with enough strength to knock her backward. She leaped onto Harrigan’s back and began to claw at his eyes. Griffin got to his feet, scrabbling for his knife. Harrigan dragged at Sara with one hand, pulling her hair, swinging around. She clung on. Then he swung away, falling back heavily against the car, knocking the breath out of her. She lay in the dirt, gasping.