Down Cemetery Road

by Mick Herron

  Thinking about Howard had him checking his watch. Round about now Howard would be getting into the office, sorting through his in-tray, finding Crane’s memo; which would tell him – if he didn’t already know: Crane wasn’t too sure about Howard sometimes; he suspected him of having hidden resources – what had happened in Oxford. What had transpired. Little joke on ‘spire’ there. In his memo, Crane had quite deliberately used the word ‘neutralized’. Howard had a shit-fit when words like ‘neutralized’ were used on paper: there wasn’t a journo born of woman who couldn’t translate ‘neutralized’ as ‘killed’, he said. Crane’s other little joke being, it was the woman who’d been neutralized. As far as the detective was concerned, Crane mentioned that Axel had killed him.

  He could see the Farm now. See its roof, anyway. Another roughstone dwelling, though much bigger than the tumbledown bothy: this one, anyway, largely underground. Like a James Bond hideaway, though severely low-tech; more like, now Crane came to think of it, an ancient church – one of those secret caves where the early ones gathered to celebrate mass, always with one ear open for the coming of the soldiers. Now that was a long time ago. Here, the Farm, was a different kind of throwback. When it was built, the people responsible had had one eye on the skies and the other on the rock. The skies were where the bombs would fall from. The rock was the best chance of surviving them.

  Crane had never known, and did not particularly care, exactly what the original purpose of the Farm had been. That something nasty had been explored here was a given. Images of men in protective clothing nursing volatile liquids came to mind. But the old order, when it faded, had carried many such institutions with it: budgetary restrictions weren’t entirely Howard’s invention. Came the day, the Farm was shut down: he wondered now what had happened to the equipment that must have been used here. Most of it dismantled, trashed; compacted into cubes that might have been anything. But the product wouldn’t have been so disposable. They could have dumped it in the sea, of course, but that would have had something of an impact on the local marine life, no doubt.

  But he didn’t know, exactly. That was speculation. Nowadays, the Farm was a largely empty building with a number of underground rooms carved into the rock, and as far as he was concerned, it was a great place for putting people you didn’t know where else to put. Scream their lungs out, there wasn’t going to be anybody passing. Start a signal fire, no one would ever see. And in the end – because it would always come to this, that was one thing Crane had learned in the business; there was always a bottom line, and everybody reached it – when you didn’t know what else to do with them, you just packed your bags and left. Wave at them from the back of the boat, or the helicopter, whatever. And a year or so later you could come back and clean away their bones, because Christ knows that’s all there’d be left when the salt wind and noisy birds were done.

  Of course, there’d always be fuckers like Singleton and Downey.

  He had reached the inner compound of the Farm now. Like its original purpose, the name was something of a mystery. No guessing games, though, about the figure waiting to meet him: he was six two, face like a brick, and wore a gun in an underarm holster. Muscle. Crane had specified muscle when he’d arranged for a team to be put together, because trainees had been used back when Downey and Singleton were here. And that was a mistake that was never going to be put right, because all the trainees were dead.

  ‘That’s far enough.’

  ‘I’m Crane,’ he said.

  ‘Put the bear down.’

  He put down the bear.

  This time it was just a little girl, and her chances of causing maximum havoc had to be rated at nil. Which was exactly the same rating a number of others had given the chances of Downey turning up here, looking for her. He’d have to be a complete fucking madman, Crane had been told, and he’d laughed. He’d have to be a twisted thinker, somebody else had said. And he’d laughed again. In the end, though, he’d told nobody his true reasoning: that this was where he’d have come looking, if he’d been Downey.

  Simple as that.

  ‘Jacket off.’

  He removed his jacket.

  ‘On the ground.’

  Hence muscle, he thought, as he lay on the ground.

  This particular muscle kicked his legs apart so he’d have a clear shot if Crane tried anything. Then he picked the bear up.

  ‘It’s for the girl,’ Crane said.

  Muscle didn’t say anything. He tore open the transparent bag, and dropped it at his feet.

  ‘Before we go any further,’ Crane said pleasantly, ‘anything you do to that bear, I’m going to do to you.’

  Muscle stopped.

  ‘Just so we know.’

  ‘You’re Crane, huh?’

  ‘I’m Crane.’

  ‘You’re older than I thought you’d be.’

  Crane didn’t say anything.

  After a while, Muscle said, ‘You got any ID?’

  ‘Is that supposed to be funny?’

  ‘Only we weren’t told you were coming.’

  ‘If you were any good, you wouldn’t need to be told. You’d have seen me three miles off.’

  ‘There’s only two of us.’

  ‘The reason I look uncomfortable,’ he said, ‘is because you’re breaking my heart. Can I get up now?’

  ‘I need to check you for weapons.’

  So he lay there while Muscle patted him down; or patted him along, rather, Crane being horizontal. He wasn’t carrying a weapon, so Muscle didn’t find one. Then he was allowed to stand up.

  ‘You haven’t said why you’re here,’ said Muscle.

  ‘I’m trying not to say anything too complicated,’ Crane said. ‘I hate to watch a grown man’s head explode.’

  ‘Fuck you.’

  Crane smiled. ‘Now we’ve done the small talk, can we go inside?’

  ‘You’ve not convinced me you’re Crane yet.’

  ‘Who else would turn up holding a teddy bear?’

  Muscle laughed, a surprisingly high-pitched bark. ‘You really are him, aren’t you? Everyone says you’re a mad piece of shit.’

  ‘I hear good things about you, too.’

  Muscle spat. ‘Well, you’ve been here before, then. Christ knows why you’d want to come back. Place is a fucking hole.’

  ‘I’ll just get my bear.’

  He picked up the toy and its wrapping, then preceded Muscle to the door. As they passed through Crane paused, waved a hand: the big man went ahead. And Crane, behind him, dropped the bear; stretched lightly on his toes and pulled the polythene bag over Muscle’s head, wrapping it round him with one deft twist even as Muscle reached up to claw himself free. Crane kicked his knees from under him, and he dropped to the ground still clawing. And Crane leaned forward, his right hand twisting a tightening knot in the bag, to bend over Muscle’s shoulder, to watch his dying face.

  ‘Are you listening?’ he asked. ‘Can you hear me?’

  Muscle thrashed back and struck him in the face. Crane didn’t even blink.

  ‘You listening?’

  – He thought he was speaking aloud, but couldn’t be sure. Such moments always squeezed him full of joy; he could feel his own vitals, his testicles, tightening with each twist of the knot. And anyway, they never heard, the dying: that man in the bath in the hotel room; he’d been deaf at the finish too. Crane might as well be talking to himself –

  ‘I don’t care how much iron you pump,’ he said. ‘You show disrespect to me, and I’ll cut you in half. We clear on this?’

  Muscle’s face was turning blue. And they were on the same side, Crane reminded himself: that was undoubtedly what Howard would say. But he’d never done one like this before. Like watching someone drowning on dry land.

  From the stairs leading down to the cellar a young blond man appeared, chewing an apple. Crane dropped Muscle, who hit the floor with a thump, then flapped for a bit, reaching for great ragged breaths. Blond dropped his apple too, which hit Muscl
e on the head. He didn’t appear to notice.

  Blond looked down at Muscle, up at Crane. ‘You must be Crane,’ he said.

  Crane nodded.

  ‘I heard you were a mad piece of shit.’

  ‘People exaggerate,’ said Crane.

  Blond was Brian. Muscle was Paul. Or that might have been the other way around. Neither was especially delighted to be here, on a lump of rock in the middle of nowhere; a place that only existed, Brian said, in case God needed somewhere to take a dump. The Farm offered nothing in the way of comfort. The walls were bare, as were the floors; light bulbs swung uncovered from the ceilings. Count themselves lucky there were light bulbs, in fact. There was no Cable, and you couldn’t pick up ITV worth shit; and they only had three videos, one of which was Dumbo. The real Dumbo. The food was all tinned and the microwave was bust so they had to use the frigging stove to cook on. There was a cat they all hated. And, Brian summed up, nobody told them fuck all. Who was the kid supposed to be? And who could they expect to come looking?

  Did they think he’d come all this way to find out if they had any complaints?

  Instead he asked about the nurse, and from the looks that passed between them he knew that yes, the nurse was female, and yes they were doing her. Probably both of them. Probably not at once. So much for the lack of creature comforts, then; he just hoped they weren’t doing it in front of the kid. Crane had a theory about kids: he thought they remembered everything that happened to them even before they could talk about it, and bad stuff came back and fucked them up in later life. He knew this wasn’t an original theory, but that made it more likely to be true.

  He didn’t remember anything particularly bad happening to him and Axel in early life. On the other hand, they were both pretty balanced: not bad, considering the jobs they were in . . .

  They were looking at him as if he’d just flaked out in front of them. ‘So where is she?’ he said.

  ‘Downstairs. With the kid.’

  He left them discussing just how weird he was, which bothered him not at all, and on the way downstairs passed the cat on its way up. It shot past, as if it recognized him. He found the nurse in one of the former cells. The kid was with her. Dinah. For a moment, Crane was left without anything to say: how was he supposed to make conversation with a four-year-old kid? Then he remembered the bear. ‘Here,’ he said. ‘I brought you this.’

  Dinah looked at him with big Disney eyes.

  The nurse was about forty, a battle-scarred blonde. Crane wondered briefly how hard she’d had to angle for the job: just her and two men, with no channels worth watching. But the way she was holding the kid, who clutched tight to her knee, maybe she had other qualifications. Her name was Deedee. Deedee and Dinah. It sounded like a sitcom.

  ‘You’re frightening her,’ Deedee said.

  ‘Me?’

  ‘She’s scared.’

  ‘I’m trying to give her a toy. I’m not going to hurt her.’

  ‘Have you any idea what she’s been through?’

  Amos Crane thought about it and decided the honest answer was yes, he had a bloody good idea. But he also decided, with a rare flash of insight, there wasn’t much point in saying so. Instead he put the bear on the floor, a foot or so in front of the girl, and stepped back, looking around the room. Still very much a cell. There’d been attempts – all around the wall, at Dinah-height, splashes of paint added a four-year old’s version of decoration; the duvet was cartoon lions – but nothing much could be done about the absence of windows, or the way the walls rippled here and there, where the drills hadn’t sheared them smooth. Not what you’d call a nursery feel. Deedee was talking to him. ‘Have you come to take her away?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Because wherever she goes, I’m going with her.’

  He nodded vaguely, as if answering a question. You’ll do what you’re fucking told. ‘I haven’t come to take her anywhere. I’ve just brought her a bear, that’s all.’

  ‘Why is she here?’

  ‘Circumstances.’

  ‘None of us have been told anything.’

  ‘None of you need to know anything. Have you been with us long?’

  ‘Seven years.’

  ‘And how often do you get the background on an op?’

  She bit her lip. On the bridge of her nose, Crane could see the pinchmarks left by spectacles: perhaps she’d just been reading to the child – a scatter of soft books lay all around: pictures of talking crocodiles and huge round babies. He realized the child was staring at him, though she’d not yet relinquished her grip on Deedee’s knee. With his foot, he edged the bear a little closer. For Christ’s sake, anyone would think he was going to eat her.

  Deedee said, ‘And what happens after?’

  ‘After?’

  ‘After whatever it is we’re here for happens. What happens after that?’

  Crane didn’t have the faintest idea, nor did he care to speculate. Once or twice – not in a long time, but you could never rule it out – things went so spectacularly wrong on an op, you didn’t so much mop up afterwards as hose everything down. If that happened here, the chances of Dinah being among those left standing weren’t so high they’d make you dizzy. This was a shame, and would leave Crane in seriously poor odour, but there was little point in getting sentimental.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Arrangements are in place. She’ll be cared for.’

  ‘Why did you come here?’

  ‘I had to see her.’ Startled into honesty, he let the answer roll around his mind another time or two: I had to see her. I had to see her. Back at his desk, he’d gamed the situation just about every which way there was, and there wasn’t really call for anything else. There was a blip on the screen called Nurse; two other blips called Men. It didn’t matter that the Nurse was also called Deedee, or that her colouring came out of a bottle. He didn’t have to wrap a bag round Muscle’s head to mark him out of ten. And nor did he have to see for himself that the blip called Child had Disney eyes, untidy hair like a feathery cap, and limbs like sticks wrapped in pudgy lagging. It was just . . . It was just that he’d felt so out of it, that was all. Axel playing King of the Castle in Oxford; Howard nagging him, Amos, whenever Axel got overexcited. Everybody on the screen, all the players, they were all more involved than he was, even the kid. He’d just wanted to take a look, that was all. So when drastic changes occurred, at least he’d know what the ex-blips had looked like.

  Especially the kid. She was at the heart. It was like when a pawn reached the far side of the board, and got to be queen: one moment she didn’t matter, the next she was at the centre of events.

  Deedee was watching him too now, a look of quiet horror on her face, as if his thoughts had just unravelled in front of her. He wiped a hand across his mouth; tried to fit a smile there instead. She shook her head, though whether in denial at what he had said or what she’d thought he meant, he’d never know. And the child blinked. Was that the first time she’d blinked in all the while he’d been standing there? And how come she was so quiet? Weren’t kids her age talking yet? The vague impression he’d had was they never shut up.

  ‘She’s very quiet,’ he said.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Does she talk at all?’

  ‘I expect she could if she wanted. But she’s four years old and her mother’s disappeared. That’s all she knows about it. Wouldn’t you be traumatized?’

  Crane didn’t answer. And none of it signified anyhow, he thought suddenly: talking, dumb – the kid could be dead, as far as that went, so long as Downey didn’t think she was. An aspect of his gaming he’d be foolish to forget: blips were, in fact, more important than the people.

  He said, ‘The bear’s for her. Do your job. And remember – whatever happens, she’ll be taken away from you. She looks just like a little girl. But it’s no different from guarding a parcel.’

  ‘You bastard!’

  Maybe so. But it was said now, anyway. He turned and walked out o
n them, aware that if the woman had had a weapon, she’d have been a whisker away from using it. But that whisker would always be there. It was the weakness in women, he thought; that they always waited until the last possible moment instead of taking the first possible chance.

  Upstairs he walked straight past Muscle and Blond, who were waiting for a chance to pump more information. The cat, which had got behind him somehow, darted out in front again: Muscle aimed a kick at it, missing by inches. ‘I hate that bastard cat,’ he said. Amos Crane shrugged his shoulders as he stepped into the light. He’d done what he’d intended to do; he’d given the child a bear.

  Amos Crane started to jog.

  Chapter Four

  The Other Sarah Tucker

  I

  A long time ago, things were simpler. The Other Sarah Tucker ate what was put on her plate, never answered back, worked hard at school and passed exams. The real Sarah – this Sarah – grew to hate her. But she was always there, out on the fast track; making friends easily, cooking like a saint. She could sing, dance, rollerskate. It was like sharing headroom with Supergirl.

  Once, she told somebody about the Other Sarah: one of those mistaken moments of confidence that mark the road to adulthood like accidents mark a motorway. It reverberated round the school like a disco beat. Sarah Tucker had an imaginary friend. No: Sarah Tucker had an imaginary enemy. Sarah Tucker was deeply weird. She’d end up in a bin.

  Meanwhile, the Other Sarah Tucker had a boy for each day of the week. She did not get spots; her hair did not hang limp. Her friendships were as painless and uncomplicated as her periods, and the way she modelled school uniform made her a walking definition of Style. This was a girl to make the whole school proud. She didn’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blew.