I could think of several things she could have said, like ‘Who the hell are you’ or ‘Get out’, but according to her parents she was more than a bit dim so perhaps attempted bonding was all she knew. ‘I’m Alex,’ I said taking a biscuit. ‘I’m a private detective. Your mother sent me to find you. She was worried.’
‘Oh, she needn’t have been,’ said Sam breathily. She had a little Marilyn Monroe voice which went well with her little Marilyn Monroe body, curvy in tight jeans and tight pink crop-top exposing a pretty belly button pierced by a gold ring. ‘I’m fine. Would you like a cup of tea?’
‘That’d be nice,’ I said, and she moved to a worktop with a sink in it and fiddled around with a kettle while I looked around the room. It had been refurbished, recently: there were several oil-filled electric radiators, and it was warm and smelt of too sweet airfreshener over an underlying musty damp. There were spotlights in the new ceiling, and CCTV cameras, one in each corner.
The room looked fresh and clean and purpose-equipped, with different usage areas, like a converted loft. There was a bedroom section with a large double bed and two doors in the wall behind it, a little kitchen area, a corner with armchairs and bookcases, and a work area with a large table, tools hanging on the wall, and storage boxes neatly arranged on shelves.
I don’t know what I’d expected, but it hadn’t been this. It looked like a display section from IKEA, all the furniture new, or like a show flat. ‘So who lives here, then?’ I asked.
‘Nobody, right now. Rich’s just trying it out, as a conversion, then maybe he’ll do the whole building, but that’d be expensive, so he just did this bit first, do you take milk and sugar?’
‘Just milk, not very much.’ And not very much was also what I thought of Rich’s chances of selling flats in a building tucked away in the armpit of an industrial estate, not to mention that he’d never get planning permission. Sam seemed to believe what she was saying, though. What I didn’t know was whether her reference to Rich by name and without explanation meant that she knew that I knew him, or whether she simply confided, without context, in everyone she met.
‘Have a seat,’ she said. I took the mug she offered and sat beside her on the sofa.
‘So why’d you run away from home?’
‘I didn’t run away from home,’ she said miffily. ‘I’m nineteen. I left home. I wanted to get a job and get a life, and I have. And I didn’t tell Ma and Pa where I was going because they’d have made a fuss. Pa seems to think I belong to him.’
‘So why’d you come to Notting Hill, then?’
‘Because of the carnival. I like carnivals.’
That was the first seriously odd thing she’d said, just as I’d started to believe that her parents were the odd ones in this deal. The carnival was only on for two days a year. She could have moved to Scunthorpe and still come down for the carnival. She didn’t seem exactly retarded, though. Maybe unusually unsuspicious.
She was really very pretty, or she would have been if her huge blue eyes had suggested intelligence or humour or sympathy or warmth or anything whatsoever apart from huge blue eyes. ‘How did you hook up with Jack?’
‘I didn’t. I met Rich and Russell in a pub my very first day, and they said I could stay with them, but Jack insisted I took a room in his place because they have a cleaner and he doesn’t and he thought it wasn’t fair, and I’m good at cleaning, so I said fine. It didn’t matter to me.’
‘D’you like Jack?’
‘He’s OK. Rich and Russell are more fun. They do more exciting things.’
‘Like what?’
‘Oh, you know.’
I didn’t know, but I was beginning to feel creepy again. ‘So has there been vandalism here?’ That was supposed to be what I was investigating, after all, so I’d better investigate. I got up, moved over to the bedroom area and opened one of the doors. It was a bathroom, neatly fitted out with bath, basin, lavatory and power-shower Sam followed me. ‘That bathroom needed a good going-over,’ she said chattily. ‘With bleach.’
When? I thought, my muscles tensing. And why? But I wasn’t going to ask, not now, not with her so close.
I opened the second door. It opened outwards. Behind it was another door, iron bars, like the front of a cage, fastened with a padlock. Through the bars I saw into the room. About eight feet by six, utterly bare. In the middle of it, Nick, slumped on the floor, asleep or unconscious or pretending to be either. She was breathing, anyway, thank God.
Sam was just behind me. I moved away from her, but she wasn’t threatening, she wasn’t surprised, she was the same co-operative blank she’d been since I’d arrived. My heart was beating so fast and so loudly I thought she must hear it, but she just smiled, and I made a huge effort to sound normal when I spoke. ‘What’s the matter with Nick?’
‘She’s been very unhelpful,’ said Sam. ‘She wouldn’t talk to us. She’s pulled all her hair out. So we gave her pills to make her sleep. It’s time she woke up and went to the bathroom and had a drink of water. She doesn’t usually sleep this long. That’s what I’m here for, actually. And that’s why I brought the chocolate digestives. I think she likes them. She eats them, anyway.’
Questions I wanted to ask flitted and collided like bats inside my head, but first I had to get help for Nick, who was still breathing but whose face was gaunt and grey under its normal yellow and whose scalp was raw and utterly bald. She’d always had the habit of tugging out tufts of her own hair when stressed, but never as badly as this. I refused to imagine the fear and anger she’d felt that had made her do it. She’d been missing coming up for seventy-two hours. How long had she been caged like this?
She was wearing clothes I recognized, an old pair of jeans and a thick black hooded sweatshirt with OFFA’S DYKE on the back. They were crumpled, but I couldn’t see any bloodstains. There was no sign of the leather flying jacket she would certainly have been wearing when they caught her, and she was barefoot, but her feet looked undamaged. They’d probably taken away her boots: she’d have kicked.
I wished she’d come round and know that I was here, that she was nearly free. Was she really unconscious, or just pretending to be? If she was pretending, still, now she knew I was in the room with her, was, it because there was more danger about than just Sam? Because she knew someone was watching the CCTV?
I took the phone from my pocket with my left hand, keeping a firm grip on the wire-cutters with my right, and keeping my eyes fixed on Sam. Was she only seriously dim and biddable, or actually crazy?
‘You won’t get a signal down here,’ she said. ‘I’ve tried. You’ll have to go up to the ground floor Who do you want to call?’
‘A friend who’s waiting for me,’ I said. ‘Sam, did you send an e-mail message for Nick?’
She nodded.
‘Why did you do that?’
‘Because she asked me. She said she’d get in trouble with her boss, if she didn’t. Pa taught me about that. It’s very important to do what your boss tells you, always, that way you’ll get promoted.’
‘I thought you said Nick wouldn’t talk? How come she talked to you about the message?’
‘She didn’t talk, she wrote. She wrote to me that she couldn’t talk, she was too frightened.’
‘Didn’t you feel sorry for her, in the cage?’
She shook her head. ‘She needn’t have been in the cage. She didn’t behave. If she’d behaved, she’d have been all right. I behave. I’m all right. Rich and Russell like me a lot. And Jack.’
‘Do you want to come upstairs with me while I make my telephone call?’ I said.
She shook her head. ‘No, thank you,’ she said politely. Her eyes were as empty as ever but there was an element of calculation in her answer, I could feel it. She was beginning to worry me. I wasn’t at all sure who was conning who. If she was bright enough to play stupid – if she had any of her father’s cruel selfishness, or her mother’s obstinacy, come to that – she could be a fully paid-up member of the g
roup, although no girl had been killed since Sam’d left home.
Anyway I wasn’t going to take her word for anything. I checked the phone. She was right, the signal strength was very low. I forced myself to look round the room again. Although it was large, about forty feet long by twenty wide, it obviously occupied no more than a fraction of the factory’s under-floor space. There were four wide shallow wire-screened windows high up on the right, in one of the longer walls. They would look out of the side of the factory and I could just see glimmers of street lamp light through them. It was worth trying for a signal.
I moved past Sam, towards the nearest window, and pointed the phone at it. ‘Polly, Polly, come in,’ I said, watching Sam, who didn’t move.
‘Alex?’
I could only just hear Polly, but just was enough. Just was just wonderful. ‘Call the number we were talking about,’ I said. ‘Call now.’
‘999?’ said Polly.
‘Yes, now.’
‘999, now,’ she said. She spoke again but she was fading. She needed her line free to call out, but she’d hesitate to cut me off, so I did it for her I punched the end-call button, heard the crackly faint intermittent dialling tone, and knew I was alone.
Now was not the time to feel alone. Now was the time to do something. I checked Nick was still breathing, looking for a wink or a twitch or a sign that would show me she knew I was there. Nothing.
I tugged at the padlock on the cage door. ‘Do you have a key for this?’
‘Oh yes,’ said Sam brightly.
‘Where is it?’
‘In my pocket.’
‘Can I have it?’
‘I don’t think so,’ said Sam. ‘We need her locked up. Do have a biscuit.’
The missing key itself didn’t bother me – my wire-cutters or chisel would sort the padlock chain – but Sam’s resistance did. I didn’t want to threaten her openly, but I was very conscious of my lack of command of the situation, which came mostly because I didn’t understand where she stood. Did she realize I’d sent for the police? Did she mind, and if she didn’t, was it because she didn’t realize that locking people up was illegal, or even unusual?
I forced myself to look round the room again, particularly the work area. The table was spotless but the quarry-tiled floor round it was blotched and stained. I pointed. ‘What’s that?’ I said.
She looked. ‘The work table,’ she said. ‘We mustn’t touch.’
‘What’s it used for?’
‘I’m not sure,’ she said, her smooth forehead wrinkling in puzzlement. ‘Cutting things up, I expect. The floor was very messy there and I gave it a good scrub but the stains didn’t all come out. Quarry tiles do stain, and they’re hard on the feet. You wouldn’t put them in a kitchen now, for instance.’
I glanced at Nick again. She was still breathing, and she hadn’t stirred. I wanted to open the cage and check her out properly, but I didn’t trust Sam, and I didn’t know what fed her eerie self-confidence. Her expression was still lively, open, eager All of those things, but something else as well, I realized with sudden jolting clarity. Expectant. She looked expectant.
‘Look,’ said Sam. She pointed above and behind my head. I stepped back and well out of her reach, took a firmer grip on the wire-cutters and glanced up. A red light was glowing beside the trapdoor. ‘Pressure pads,’ she said smugly. ‘There’s pressure pads so we know if someone comes in the door or comes down this end of the factory. Isn’t that clever?’
‘So the light means?’
‘Someone’s coming,’ she said, and smiled.
Chapter Thirty-Three
‘Who’s coming?’ I asked.
She shrugged. ‘Don’t know.’
I didn’t understand Sam’s attitude but one thing I did understand, that I was Nick’s only protection, and that whichever of Sam’s mates was approaching, he’d have a lot more grip on the deep shit kidnapping landed you in than she appeared to, and he’d be a lot stronger besides. I moved back, against the wall, so I was behind the steps.
The trapdoor opened. I pressed myself further against the wall, out of the newcomer’s line of sight, and watched Sam’s face.
It lit up in welcome. ‘Hi!’ she said, to whoever it was coming down the steps. ‘Hi!’
It was Jack Hobbs. Before he readied the floor, I swung the wire-cutters in a wide arc and slugged him as hard as I could on the back of the head.
I could tell from the horrid, heavy sound of the blow that it had been accurate, and from the crumpling of his body that it was effective. I checked him over, pulling his body away from the steps. He wasn’t dead but he did seem deeply unconscious.
‘Why did you do that?’ said Sam. She wasn’t angry, just mildly curious, and my heartbeat, which had steadied at the sense of danger past, quickened again. Had I knocked out, maybe seriously injured, an innocent man, a possible ally? I thrust away the stab of guilt – I couldn’t afford it. When the police came, they could call an ambulance.
‘Can you look after him?’ I said. ‘Have you done any first aid?’
‘Oh yes,’ she said, moving over to check his airway and put him into the recovery position.
I moved back to one of the windows and dialled Polly. She was outside, alone, and I had no idea who else might be out there. I didn’t even know for sure that she’d managed to call the police. I punched the green send button. One ring, then the phone company’s recorded voice suggesting I leave a message. Her phone was switched off.
Savagely, I punched the red button, ready to dial 999 myself, and then saw my own phone’s digital display flashing at me. MESSAGE MESSAGE MESSAGE, it said.
The message must be from Lil. I punched in the message-retrieval number, noticing how sweaty my fingers were, slipping on the keys. Fear Nearly panic.
The message scrolled from right to left.
DOES LALIA MEAN ANYTHING? REPEAT LALIA? GOOD LUCK. LIL.
Lalia. The initials of the list of names in Nick’s message. Meant nothing to me – yes it did! Echolalia. Russell Jacobs with his odd habit of repetition. Russell Jacobs? Why was he the only one Nick had tried to name individually? Was he the leader of the group?
I didn’t have time to speculate. I cleared the phone, ready to dial 999. No signal. Something was blocking the signal, or it had just faded, as they do.
The phone went back in my pocket, the wire-cutters into my right hand, and I darted across to the cage door and started wrestling with the padlock, watching Sam and Jack all the while.
Sam was on her feet in a flash when she saw what I was doing. ‘No! No!’ she shouted, and started pulling at me and beating me around the head with her fists. She was strong for her size but no street fighter: she didn’t pull my hair or go for my eyes or bite or any of the effective things. I stamped hard on her feet with my boot and she screamed in pain and clung to me.
As I pushed her off I felt the chain part and the cage door swung open. Nick didn’t stir She was still breathing, but she looked like death. I hoped she was faking unconsciousness: if so, she’d probably make her move now.
Sam had tumbled backwards onto the floor, where she now squatted, glaring at me. No more Miss Congeniality. I’d have to knock her out, or tie her up. Tie her up what with? Or get Nick out of the cage and lock Sam in it.
I moved towards her and she shrank away, scuttling backwards on her bottom and hands, empty eyes filling with empty tears. Perhaps she thought I couldn’t do violence to a pretty, small, young person oozing vulnerability. She was wrong. I could do any amount of violence to a person who’d colluded in torturing Nick, and who had just tried to stop me releasing her.
‘Get up,’ I said, when she reached the back wall, behind the steps.
She got up, slowly, dusted off her jeans, and smiled at me. Her whole body language had changed. She was confident again: my nerves twitched and my muscles tightened. It was all I could do to keep still.
‘Sam?’ I said.
She pointed over my shoulder, down to the fa
r end of the room. I stepped back several paces in case it was a trick, turned sideways and gave a quick glance in the direction she was looking, towards the armchair/bookcase corner. A red light was flashing, high up on the wall above the bookcases. Someone must be coming in. But where? I couldn’t see a door.
‘Everything’s all right now,’ said Sam, gleeful. ‘You can’t hurt me. My mates are here.’
‘Shut up,’ I snapped, my fingers itching to slam the wire-cutters right into her gloating face, my eyes switching back and forth from her to the light to her to the light to her again – one of the bookcases was moving. It creaked as it moved, opening like a door into the room, but towards me so I couldn’t see who was behind the door.
Then it stopped moving, half-open, and the creaking stopped and in the silence I could just hear the cheers and whoops from the firework party in the Scrubs. Normal people. A crowd of normal people that I couldn’t reach.
‘Rich?’ said Sam.
Fairfax stepped into the room, relaxed, smiling. He looked pleased with his little trick and with himself, but as far as I could see he wasn’t armed. He was wearing the same pseudo-country-gentleman clothes he’d worn when I met him that morning, and looked just as bland and ordinary. My heart jumped and thudded.
‘Surprise, Alex,’ said Fairfax.
‘Not really,’ I said. ‘This is your place and you’re the one who kept Nick in that cage. Are you the Notting Hill Killer, by any chance?’
‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘Clever girl. You worked it out. And I’m afraid I’ll have to punish you. Then kill you, actually.’ He looked pleased at the prospect. He nodded at Hobbs’s unconscious body. ‘Thanks for your help with Jack. I think I’m going to blame it all on him. Bit odd, Jack. All those stuffed animals, not normal, d’you think?’
He was standing in the direct glare of one of the ceiling spots and in the centre of one of the camera sweeps. His blond hair glowed like a halo in the light, and he was aware of it and enjoying it, I was sure.
He could hardly kill me from there. Sam, on the other hand – I flicked my eyes back to her. She’d moved to block me off from the steps and a way out, not that I was going to take it because I had to guard Nick. Sam was only about four feet from me, much too close. She was poised lightly on the balls of her feet, ready to jump.
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