The Predators

by Brian Freemantle

  ‘She is.’

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘Learning.’

  Claudine was chilled by the word. A challenge? Or a taunt? She couldn’t avoid it. ‘Learning what?’

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Not a clever negotiating lady like you!’

  ‘What’s Mary learning?’

  The line abruptly became clear enough for a brief sound of background noise. ‘How to be a good girl.’

  ‘Let’s talk about getting Mary back.’

  ‘I’m not sure I want to give her back yet. I’ve become attached to her.’

  This was wrong: dangerous! ‘I said we wanted to negotiate.’

  ‘There is nothing to negotiate really, is mere?’

  ‘Tell me what you want.’

  ‘I want to speak to the ambassador.’

  ‘He wants me to talk to you on his behalf.’

  ‘You’re not understanding, silly woman. You all do what I tell you, otherwise Mary isn’t going to be a happy little girl. When I call tomorrow I want to speak to McBride, not you. And by tomorrow you’ll know what will happen if you don’t do precisely what I tell you.’

  ‘There’s something I want to say,’ blurted Claudine, trying to hold the woman.

  ‘I don’t want to hear anything you’ve got to say. I want the ambassador waiting this time tomorrow. And I know he will be.’

  ‘I want—’ started Claudine but stopped as the line went dead. The receiver was suddenly heavy in her hand. She became aware she was shaking again and dropped rather man replaced the telephone on its rest. She looked up to see everyone staring at her.

  Something was wrong. Didn’t fit. Or jarred, maybe. There was something in the recording mat they’d just sat through that was out of context, but she couldn’t isolate it. There’d been too much in too short a time, she told herself. Objectively, she shouldn’t have even taken the call, although she was glad she had. Claudine believed, despite the discrepancy, whatever it was, that it had been useful and that there was a lot to learn from it. But later. Not now. Now she was stretched to breaking point, about to snap. Overwhelmed. The shaking came in spasms, starting, stopping, starting again.

  ‘Are we going to get Mary back?’

  Claudine only just avoided wincing at the desperation in McBride’s voice. And at the wide-eyed strain on the face of Hillary, who Claudine had not realized was present until she’d replaced the telephone. Claudine felt crushed, as if the room – no, not the room: a force she couldn’t see – was closing in to compress her into something very small, too small for them to hear or take notice of. Fumbling the Librium from her track suit pocket she said: ‘Can I have some water, please?’

  Blake poured it for her, once more using the closeness to say: ‘You want the doctor again?’

  Claudine shook her head. ‘I need some time. To listen to the recording again, compare it to the written transcript …’

  ‘You must have some impressions!’ insisted Smet. ‘It was the woman in the car, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Of course it was,’ said Claudine irritably.

  ‘On a mobile telephone,’ said Rampling. ‘That’s why the sound level kept rising and falling: interference from bridges and highly built-up areas. That’s why we couldn’t get any sort of fix: tomorrow we’ll use scanners.’

  ‘Are we going to get Mary back?’ Hillary McBride repeated her husband’s question, even-voiced, rigidly in command of herself. She added: ‘Back alive?’ and Claudine wished she hadn’t.

  ‘I think so,’ said Claudine reluctantly.

  ‘That’s not good enough,’ protested McBride.

  ‘It’s the best I can offer,’ said Claudine.

  ‘You’re supposed to know!’

  ‘I don’t know,’ admitted Claudine. ‘Not yet. I will but not yet.’

  ‘I don’t think we should press Dr Carter any more,’ said Sanglier.

  ‘The inquiry … inquest …?’ groped Claudine.

  ‘It’s a formality: we won’t need you,’ said Harrison.

  ‘I’d like to go back to the hotel,’ Claudine admitted.

  ‘What if she calls again?’ demanded Hillary McBride.

  People seemed to be advancing towards her, retreating and advancing again and Claudine regretted taking the tranquillizer. With a monumental effort she said: ‘She won’t call again: not until the same time tomorrow. Maybe not even then.’

  ‘So you have worked something out?’ demanded Smet.

  ‘I want to go home,’ said Claudine.

  She was unaware of the drive back to the Metropole or of Blake’s being with her until focusing jerkily upon him helping her through the foyer. She began to wonder how he’d got the key to her room but couldn’t hold the thought and then found hreself in it. He was there too, but moving around: momentarily she didn’t know where he was. He emerged from the bathroom, tossing something up and down in his hand, and as he crossed to the bureau telephone Claudine remember the bugs.

  ‘All clear,’ he announced, holding out the tiny pin-heads in the palm of his hand.

  ‘I don’t want to be by myself,’ said Claudine.

  ‘No,’ agreed Blake.

  It hadn’t gone at all as she’d intended and Félicité was angry: frustrated. Claudine fucking Carter wasn’t frightened enough. None of them were, if they were prepared to let the woman take the call which they should all have been pleading to receive. They had to be taught a lesson.

  She coasted the Mercedes into the limited parking zone outside the railway station and on her way to the public telephones thrust deeply into a refuse bin the mobile August Dehane had programmed with the number of one that had been stolen a week earlier in Bruges.

  Lascelles came on the line as soon as Félicité had identified herself to his receptionist. ‘A scalpel?’

  ‘I’ll explain when we meet.’

  ‘I’m looking forward to seeing her,’ said the doctor.

  ‘She’s beautiful,’ promised Félicité.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Where’s the lady?’ Mary had been waiting eagerly, on her feet just inside the door when she heard the key grate. Now there was a plunge of disappointment.

  ‘She couldn’t come,’ said Charles Mehre.

  ‘She promised!’ She’d become her friend. Been kind to her. It wasn’t fair.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Is she coming later?’

  ‘No. Just me.’

  ‘She promised!’ Mary repeated.

  Charles Mehre shrugged.

  ‘I want to come outside,’ insisted Mary.

  The man hesitated, blocking the entrance to the cell. ‘All right.’

  He hardly moved. To pass she would have to brush against him. Mary stayed where she was. ‘I can’t get by.’

  He giggled, still not moving. ‘You can if you squeeze.’

  ‘I don’t want to squeeze.’ He was very much like Victor, the garden boy back home. She became aware of something, surprised, but decided against referring to it yet. She was very uncertain about what was happening.

  He finally shifted, although still not very much. But she was able to pass without touching him. He smelled stale. Mary went to the bench seat in front of the table at which she’d eaten on previous evenings with the woman.

  ‘We’re going to play games,’ he announced.

  ‘I don’t want to play games.’ The woman hadn’t told her about this: about anyone coming but her. It was the two of them, she’d said: special friends. Better friends than she was with dad and mom. She’d started to believe her.

  ‘You must!’

  His voice was suddenly loud, harsh, and Mary didn’t like it. Why hadn’t the woman come, like she’d promised? ‘Where’s my food?’

  ‘No food.’

  ‘Why not? I always have food now.’

  ‘Not tonight.’

  ‘Why not?’ Mary said again. That wasn’t fair either. S
he did always have food now. Why was this man being mean?

  ‘Because.’

  ‘I’m hungry.’

  ‘No food.’

  ‘You’re bad!’ said Mary, talking to him as she talked to Victor at home.

  ‘Not bad!’ The voice was loud again but this time in protest.

  ‘She’ll be mad at you.’

  ‘No!’ The tone changed again, sulkily.

  ‘You don’t like her being angry at you, do you?’

  ‘Won’t be. Gaston said.’

  Gaston, thought Mary. ‘She will be, if you don’t give me something to eat.’

  ‘Dance for me.’

  ‘No.’ She didn’t like this.

  ‘I want you to dance for me.’ The harshness was back.

  ‘I’m too hungry.’

  ‘Will you dance for me if I get you something to eat?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Properly, like I want you to dance?’

  ‘I want to eat something.’

  He remained uncertainly between her cell and where she sat, shifting from foot to foot. ‘All right.’ He started across the room, towards the stairwell door, but stopped halfway, frowning back suspiciously as if there was something he didn’t understand. His lips moved but Mary didn’t hear what he said. She made herself sit back against the cushions, as if she were settled. He continued on and Mary tensed with his every step, moving the moment the door closed behind him.

  The carpet deadened the faintest noise of her running across the room. She listened, against the door. All she could hear was her own heartbeat, bump-bumping in her ears. She pushed the door towards its frame before pressing the handle down, actually holding her breath. The door moved, swinging soundlessly inwards. She stood at the opening, staring upwards, able to see an oval of light at the top. A black and white checkered floor, she remembered. A heavy door, heavier than the one she’d just opened so easily, leading outside. She wouldn’t be able to run, if it was blowing as hard as it had been when they’d brought her here. Didn’t matter. She could hide, once she got outside. That’s all she had to do, get outside. She went up the first two steps, then stopped. She was frightened. She knew downstairs: her room with the sliding peephole in the door and the bathroom and the strange room with a big screen and the round dance floor in the middle. Felt safe there: safe with the woman although not with this man. The man who wanted her to dance. That was silly, a man wanting her to dance. It wasn’t like dad wanting her to dance. That would have been different. All right. She’d never danced for dad, though. It looked a long way up, to the oval of light. She had to get there. Get away. Get outside. She went up two more steps. Stopped again. She wished the woman was there. Someone she felt all right with. Mom or dad. Why hadn’t they paid? The woman said they didn’t care. Didn’t want her. She hadn’t believed it at first but they hadn’t done anything to get her back. And she seemed to be the reason they had a lot of their fights. But she’d seen dad cry, on television. Heard him say he loved her and did want her. It was the woman who was kind to her now: showered and dried her. Last night they’d gone through her backpack and looked at her schoolwork and the woman had even given her a lesson, but as a game, not the proper geography for which she’d got the B. The questions had been easy but she’d really tried and the woman had been pleased with her: called her a clever girl. She’d been proud to be called clever. Now she was confused: confused and frightened, although she didn’t know what she was frightened about. Just not knowing. Being alone. She didn’t want to go outside: didn’t know what was out there. Perhaps they were all up there, all the men in stupid masks who’d looked at her through the hatch. She wished there were more of them, not just this man who smelled bad and laughed in a silly way, as if he knew a joke that nobody else did.

  There was the noise of a door, opening, closing. Footsteps across the hall. Mary scurried back, closing the downstairs door behind her and running to where she had been sitting. She was there, against the cushions, when he entered, a tray balanced across one arm.

  There was bread and cheese from the previous day. The milk only half filled the glass and had lumps in it and was sour when she tasted it. The bread was stale but she made herself eat it, as slowly as she could. She pared off the cheese in small slivers.

  ‘You’ve got to shower. Take your clothes off.’

  ‘I don’t want to.’

  ‘You must.’

  ‘Why?’

  He frowned. ‘She says.’

  ‘She changed her mind. She told me yesterday she doesn’t want me to do that, not any more.’

  ‘Not true.’

  ‘Why aren’t you wearing your mask?’ she asked finally.

  When he smiled Mary saw his teeth were very uneven, as if there were too many crowded into his mouth: she hadn’t worn her brace for days now.

  He said: ‘Don’t have to, not any more.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Doesn’t matter any more.’

  ‘Why not?’ she repeated.

  ‘Secret,’ he snickered. He reached out, to touch her hair, but Mary pulled back. He sniggered again.

  She’d eaten too much cheese, practically all of it, to prolong the meal and now she felt sick. She wished she’d gone up the stairs. She didn’t feel safe down here any more.

  ‘You’re pretty.’

  Mary couldn’t think of anything to say.

  ‘I like you. Like your hair.’

  ‘I don’t like you touching it,’ said Mary, pulling away again.

  ‘Nice hair.’

  ‘Leave me alone!’

  ‘Haven’t got to.’

  Mary didn’t think the sickness she felt had anything to do with what she’d eaten: it wasn’t like a tummy upset pain. ‘Did she say that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘She told me you did. Told me herself that you didn’t have to touch me.’

  ‘She didn’t.’ He’d been sitting next to her on the bench, close enough to reach out towards her. Now he got up and crossed to the tape deck and CD equipment against the wall beside the large screen. He stood there, staring at it in total bewilderment, awkwardly touching switches and knobs. ‘No music,’ he complained.

  ‘We don’t want any music,’ Mary said nervously.

  ‘To dance,’ said the man. ‘We need music to dance.’

  ‘I don’t want to dance.’

  ‘Yes!’ The harsh loudness was back. He wasn’t sniggering or laughing any more. ‘Have a shower and then dance: play like you did with her, for the towel. Play with me.’

  ‘I didn’t like that,’ said the child. ‘I don’t want to do it again.’

  ‘I’ll slap you. I want to slap you.’

  Victor! She had to treat him like Victor. ‘That would be bad.’

  He shook his head. ‘No one knows.’

  ‘It’s not right, to hit people.’

  ‘Nice. Good.’

  ‘No! No, it’s not good. It’s wrong.’

  ‘He said I could.’

  ‘Who?’ She didn’t know what to do! Dad! Please, dad! There was no one to tell her what to do. I won’t be naughty again, God. I promise. Help me and I’ll be very good. Please, God.

  ‘Gaston.’

  ‘Gaston doesn’t want you to hurt me.’

  ‘He does. Said I could.’

  Mary started to tremble. There was a lock on the inside of the bathroom door. Could she pretend to do what he wanted: get inside before he could follow her and lock him out! She might be able to, if she was quick: quicker than she’d been when she tried to run away from the woman the other time. She could pretend to dance a little first, make him sit down to watch to give herself the chance. What if he got to her before she locked it, like the woman had done? She’d be even more trapped then. Have to do what he wanted. Or he’d hit her. He’d said he would hit her: wanted to. ‘I want to go back into my room now.’

  He shook his head. ‘Not any more.’

  ‘You mustn’t hurt me. Do anything bad to me.’


  ‘I can.’

  ‘If you do you’ll go where bad people go.’

  He frowned at her, head to one side. ‘What?’

  It had been the ultimate threat against Victor, when she’d wanted to make him cry. How much longer could she go on talking, keeping him away? She still felt sick and now her throat was beginning to get sore. I won’t make Victor cry ever again, God. I promise. ‘You know where bad people go?’

  ‘Jail.’

  ‘That’s it, you’ll go to jail.’ Mary seized on the word. ‘Go to jail for a very long time. For ever.’

  ‘No one knows.’

  ‘They’ll find out.’

  ‘Can’t.’

  ‘My father can. He’s a very important man. Lots of special people work for him.’

  ‘Doesn’t matter.’

  ‘If you go away – leave me alone – I’ll tell my father you were kind to me,’ promised Mary. ‘Then they won’t send you where the bad people go.’ She wanted to make pee pee: already felt wet. Do the other thing: very much wanted to do the other thing. Her stomach was rumbling, making rude noises. She tried to keep her bottom tight together.

  ‘ME NOW!’

  The words roared from him, furiously. He’d shown no sign of losing his temper and Mary screamed out in shocked surprise at the unexpected noise. He was coming towards her, arms outstretched, hands cupped, and she cringed back against the seat, trying to slide sideways round the tiny table so that she could run. Run where? She didn’t know. Just run. Around the room. Anywhere. Run to the bathroom. He snatched out, grabbing her arm as she darted to her right, pulling her towards him and Mary brought her other hand up, trying to push him off. His smell was much worse, not just his body but the breath from his ugly mouth. He was grunting, squeezing her.

  ‘STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT!’

  Mary was scarcely aware of the words at first, not until the woman reached them, beating at the man with open-handed slaps. The woman got between them, slapping the man again and again. He roared, not a word, just a sound, and slapped the woman back and she screeched, clawing at him so that Mary saw blood burst out on his face. Mary fell back against the table, hearing it split as it tilted, spilling her back on to the bench.