"Yes, sir," Heaney said. "Of course."
"Do you know what it is that we actually do, Heaney?" Collins said and smiled at the younger man. "Do you know what we do with our never ending bureaucracy and filing?"
"We provide a database, sir," Heaney replied readily enough.
"Yes," Collins sighed. "A very good name for what we do- a database- but, if you look at it differently, what is our database other than a documentation of the darkness of men's souls? The recent history of man's capacity for evil is painstakingly documented in files and databases all over the country and all over the world. We're not just policemen, we're custodians," Collins said and smiled that sickly smile once more. "We're the historians of evil."
Heaney opened his mouth to respond when PC Hendricks rushed into the corridor.
"Sir," he said breathlessly, "a boy has been spotted drifting down the river by the Old Bridge. He appears to have suffered a major psychological trauma-"
Christ almighty, Collins thought, we're even beginning to sound like American TV cops.
"Okay, Hendricks. Get him to hospital. I fail to see-"
"I'm sorry, sir," Hendricks said and turned away from Collins. "We think the boy is Detective Sergeant Heaney's son."
Heaney stared back at the PC.
"We can't get near him, John," Hendricks said. "Every time we approach he starts screaming. We're worried he might harm himself."
Heaney heard Collins as if from a great distance: "Screaming, Hendricks? What is the boy screaming?"
"Nothing sir. It's weird really. That's why we think he's gone- why we think he's unwell, sir. He keeps opening his mouth to scream but nothing comes out-"
The moment broke then. Heaney darted towards the exit already reaching for his car keys. He heard the DCI call his name, telling him to wait, telling him to stay calm but all he could think was we are the historians of evil, we are the historians of evil over and over again.
*
10
"Pat!" Henderson shouted up river. "Gerry's got something."
Gerry yelped, whipped his nose around to the left- uphill, away from the river- and pulled at his leash. Henderson gave the dog some slack and widened his strides to a jog. It was still a source of fresh amazement that such a rush of adrenalin could surge into his veins and lift him- almost renewed- out of the mire of misery such as that of the proceeding day and a half. Pat Marsh had covered the difference between them in no time and sure enough Harvey's ears pricked up too. Henderson had his radio out and was telling control to inform Collins that they had something- possibly Andrew Davies- when Gerry nosedived into a well-hidden pothole in the hillside.
Henderson pulled Gerry out with some difficulty. The instant Gerry’s head and shoulders had gone into the hole, he began barking and yanking on his collar desperate to get at whatever it was down there.
"Fuck me!" Marsh exclaimed. "We never would have noticed that hole." He shone his torch in to the opening and saw that it was indeed big enough for a man to clamber down. Who would want to go down there, though, was an entirely different matter. Signs of torn turf and skid marks on the mud indicated that someone had recently done just that. "Anyone could slip down there and break a leg; I'm surprised that it hasn't been filled in."
Henderson grunted and yanked at the still pulling and growling German Shepherd. "What the fuck's the matter with you? Heel!" That was as aggressive as he had been with Gerry since he had been in training as a pup. The dog obeyed but looked ready to spring at the first opportunity.
"What now?"
"We wait for the team to arrive and then Gerry and I go in," Henderson said. Marsh felt guilty relief that it wasn't Harvey's find. Marsh did not- under any circumstances- want to go into that dark fissure.
11
Brice stepped onto the stair above the lapping water and slipped his loafers off. Then, as an after thought, pulled his socks off and placed them neatly, folded once, next to his shoes. He never rolled his socks into a ball. After turning his trousers up to just above the knee he stepped into the freezing river water that had invaded his hotel. By the time he had reached the foot of the stairs and felt the submerged foyer carpet nap in between his almost numb toes, the water was up to his thighs. He pushed forward, his awkward strides sending rippling waves up against the reception desk. If not for the fact that he felt the chill of the water to his bone marrow, the surreal nature of what he was doing would have been enough to make him stop and sit down, confused and disorientated. As it was, he needed to open the front doors. He felt compelled to get to the floating boy. Something was very wrong with that picture.
At the main doors, he paused. A moment of doubt passed across his mind. Don't open the doors, don't let them in but Brice, the rational manager of the rational world of Measton Hotel, shrugged off the thought and, with no small effort against the flood waters, pulled the doors open.
The vista that greeted him was indeed surreal. The river had spread across Riverside and drowned the shrubbery of the ornate gardens and the quaintly painted water side benches. The road was gone. Only lampposts, jutting defiantly from the water, marked the line of where the pavement began and the road ended; trees reached up to the grey, apocalyptic sky as though waiting to be plucked from the water by divine intervention. To his right, the arches -only the uppermost curvature of the arches- of the old bridge were visible with the exception of the central arch that was still high enough to allow the passage of one young boy in a boat that spiraled of its own accord towards the hotel. To his left as the river curved away towards the abbey ruins and Rennick, the river had claimed every thing. Even from this distance, he could hear the buzz of rescue dinghies as the armed forces, drafted in from various bases around the country, took families from their underwater homes to the safety of higher ground. On the radio he had heard some dignitary or other tell the newscaster that Measton was witnessing the largest mobilization of armed response units than at any time since the Second World War. On the bridge itself, a police car had pulled up and two policemen watched the small vessel drift downstream on the enhanced current. One of the policemen spoke into his radio.
The boat drew near enough for Brice to make out the boy's face. He stared into the distance, unblinking and white faced with shock, his dark hair a vivid contrast to his deathly pallor. Brice stepped out of the doorway onto what he would usually refer to as the courtyard. He vaguely sensed one of the policemen on the bridge pointing towards him. The boat was twenty metres away and drifting closer.
"Are you okay?" He called to the boy, his jaw shuddering against the freezing chill of the water. The boy did not respond. Instead, he continued to stare downstream. Definitely in shock, Brice thought. Lost control in this heavy current, lost his oars, panicked. It was understandable.
"Don't worry-" Brice began when the police megaphone echoed across the water from the bridge.
"PLEASE GO BACK INSIDE. DO NOT APPROACH THE BOAT. WE HAVE REASON TO BELIEVE THAT YOU ARE IN DANGER."
Danger? Brice looked over at the dark uniformed figures in confusion. How could he be in any danger? He glanced back at the boat. Ten metres away.
"GO BACK INSIDE THE HOTEL IMMEDIATELY, SIR."
Brice was about to shout back to the coppers that the current was very weak where he was standing when the boy turned his head and looked at him. Something in the lack of emotion in his eyes and the way he began to open his mouth until it was stretched into an unnatural yawn convinced Brice.
He took a step back into the hotel foyer and felt something rubbery touch his calf.
He jumped away from it instinctively and looked down. He saw something light in colour snake out towards his ankle but he reacted quickly.
"GET BACK IN THE HOTEL!" The urgency in the policeman's voice had an edge of desperation to it now.
Brice lurched through the water, over balancing and sprawling face first into the water. His heart banged in his chest painfully. He felt something snatch at his ankle and cried out, a desperate sob that
echoed hollowly in the exposed beams of the hotel. He heard the sound of wood on wood as the boat bumped into the door frame but didn't care any more. He had to get to the stairs.
There was something in the water.
Glancing down as he drove his thighs through the flood he saw a pale arm circle his thigh. At the same time he heard the water displace to his left and sensed someone- something- stand up and out of the water. He pulled easily away from the underwater hand and glanced- terrified- to his left. A woman- almost blue from the freezing water- looked at him and opened her mouth to scream. Brice threw himself towards the stairs once more.
"PAUL! PAUL! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" A voice bellowed through the megaphone, clearly inflected with a father's emotion.
Brice took a final step towards the stairs. He was there.
The man in the water stood up in front of him, combined water, vegetation and mud falling from his face. He, too, opened his mouth to scream.
A blinding pain slammed into Brice's chest and immediately migrated to his left arm. The foyer around him faded into multi-coloured dots. The pain was of such intensity that he forgot the figures that surrounded him, a man and woman that had drifted in behind him through the open doors. Brice reached passed the man for the safety of the stairs. Dimly he heard a sound like escaping gas coming from the man's gaping mouth and a low whispering voice.
Another pain tore through the small man's rib cage and then he heard nothing. Brice fell forward into the water and rolled on to his side. His lifeless eyes reflected the motionless man at the foot of the stairs but did not see him. The man's mouth snapped shut as did that of the woman. On the boat, the boy stared once again into nothingness.
At the sound of an approaching outboard motor, the two figures placed the hollow reeds back between their lips and sank into the water. On the boat, the boy waited, the prow of the boat wedged in the door frame, pointing into the plush interior of Measton Hotel.
*
12
An odd, echoing voice in the distance caused Henderson to pause and look back towards the river. A police loudhailer. "What did he say?" Henderson asked. Pat shrugged. Gerry strained to get into the hole once more.
"Alright, alright," Henderson said. Marsh noted the tiredness in the older man's voice and felt a pang of conscience at his earlier relief at Henderson being the one to enter the darkness. They had been informed that the back-up unit had been called elsewhere on a matter of extreme urgency.
"Either wait until back-up is available or proceed with extreme caution," Collins had said before signing off to attend to further pressing matters.
Henderson decided to go in; he wanted this to be over. If Davies or any of the others were in there, well God help them. Any funny business and he’d let Gerry off the leash. He was tired, wet and extremely pissed off.
Marsh gripped Henderson's forearm with his right hand as he slid his legs into the hole, while holding Gerry with the other. Henderson's feet reached the bottom and he stood upright, his neck and shoulders above ground. He shone the torch to the right and illuminated nothing but soil and rock. He ran his hand over the soil and brushed away the excess revealing crude brickwork.
"This is manmade," Henderson said. "Very, very old but manmade all the same." He shone the torch in the other direction, up and into the hillside. A tunnel- enough to walk through at a crouch- curved away into the darkness. "I think we're on to some thing," he said when he looked out of the hole again. "Give me the dog; I'll take a look further in."
"Are you sure that's such a good idea," Marsh said. "You heard what they did to the staff at the hospital. We should wait."
Henderson considered this for a moment, looking up at his partner. Perhaps he was right- the desire to have this disgusting day and dreary town in the past was clouding his better judgement; he knew that he should wait. He was about to pull himself out of the hole when he saw the face of young Jennifer once again. Five hours, he thought. The difference between life and death. He had paid the price for patience over and over again in his dreams.
'Give me Gerry," he said. Marsh allowed the straining dog to scramble into his master's arms and Henderson eased him gently into the hole. The canine immediately began pulling at his leash, whining keenly.
"We'll stay in radio communication," Henderson said. "If we lose contact, I'll head back to the surface. If we lose contact and I'm not back within a reasonable time-"
"I'll come in," March said.
"No, you'll call again for back-up and wait until they get here. Clear?"
Marsh looked back at his mentor and nodded briefly. Henderson ducked out of sight, leaving the younger man in the rain.
*
13
Collins watched the launch approach the boy in the boat from the relative safety of the bridge. Next to him, Weaver looked down into the swirling swell of the river, impossibly close to the top of the arches, nervously thinking of the possibility that they could all be swept away among the ancient brickwork at any moment. This town had not been built to contain such weather. As the police boat neared the rowing boat, Heaney reached out to the still passenger. Even from their distance, they could see that Paul showed no sign that he recognized his father's voice. He stared off down the river with the same catatonic gaze that had characterised his behaviour since they had arrived and before. The silent screaming had stopped. For Heaney's sake at least, Collins thought, that was a mercy.
What were they dealing with here? What kind of madness could so transform a quiet- boring- town such as this into something out of a nightmare? The rain intensified and the sky rumbled ominously.
"Fucking hell,” Weaver said to no-one. "It's like the end of the fucking world." Collins looked at him thoughtfully. With the help of a Police Constable, Heaney bundled his boy into a blanket and lifted him to the launch. One of the uniforms on the boat pointed into the water inside the hotel and reached for his radio. Police Sergeant Harry Taylor answered his PC's call.
"Sarge," the radio crackled. "There's a dead bloke in the water here. Over"
"Okay. Await instructions. Over." Taylor looked over Collins.
"Tell him to try to close the hotel's doors so that the body can't float away," Collins said. Taylor nodded and passed on the instruction.
"We recognize the man, sir," the PC told them. "It's the hotel manager. Brice, I think his name is. Over."
The men on the bridge watched the two uniforms struggle to pull the doors closed. One of the PCs had to clamber over the rowing boat and into the water. The doors closed and the launch headed back towards the bridge, DS Heaney holding his oldest son against his chest, stroking the boy's hair.
"Look at the boy's face," Weaver said. "Something is very wrong here."
Collins looked at the younger man and said: "It's this river. The river is the connection."
Weaver blinked at him. Collins turned away and looked downstream.
"Why do you think you're here? Why have you been summoned?" Collins spoke quietly so that only Weaver could hear. "You survived the river. One boy died. Surely it has to mean something."
"But why everyone else? Why the school, the hospital and everything else?"
"Because the river wants to kill the town," Collins muttered. His eyes had taken on a faraway look. Now his gaze cleared and he looked at the other man once more. "It started with Davies. Davies had been diving either the night that Patricia had died or before. What I need to know is where he had been diving and why."
"Why would whether he had been diving or not have any significance?" Weaver wanted to now.
Collins sighed as he watched Heaney carry his boy into the ambulance waiting at the flood water's edge. He raised his hand to the DS from the bridge but Heaney did not look back. "The significance David," he said, "lies in the very real fact that Andrew Davies- paedophile or not- was, on the surface, leading the semblance of a decent life. He was well-respected and popular among his students. Colleagues describe him as a meticulous man bordering on obsessi
ve. Then we have the man that you saw on the video tapes at Rennick. A very different proposition. Something happened to bring about that change and the only thing that we know that he did in the time prior to his-" He considered. "His metamorphosis- is dive the river somewhere near the area where Patricia was murdered."
Weaver gazed at the unnatural swell of the river and saw a girl's doll float out from under the bridge, below their feet; the tiny dummy was still in its mouth.
"Just before we came here, Heaney had been telling me that we should stop dealing with this like police work. That we should treat it like some kind of battle against evil. Perhaps he was right. You saw that boy's face. He was gone. Clearly. Like Davies and Callaghan and- I'm sure- the others too. Gripped by what we've been calling the madness. More and more I think it's a madness brought about by something to do with this river.”
The River Dark Page 33