by Janet Wakley
For a few moments no-one spoke as they each came to terms with the latest frustration of their situation. Every painful step, as they had fled for safety with growing optimism as the distance increased, had merely led them towards this insurmountable barrier. The darkness, which had so far concealed their escape, would soon inevitably give way to a cold grey dawn. It could only be a matter of time before their captors, realising that they had not headed for the road, would turn their attention to the acres of flat marsh land which surrounded the great house.
“What the hell are we going to do now?” hissed Clive bitterly. “We’ll never get across that river, it’s too deep.”
“They’re dykes, Clive,” said Mel. “If we’re in the area of the Broads, they’re like a grid, bordering most of the fields. That’s why the farms are so big and don’t need fences. The animals can’t stray anyway.”
Looking back towards the silhouetted contours of the big house, the distant flickering of torches could just be seen, dancing erratically in an ever widening circle.
“But even farmers have got to get from one field to another. We must go on.” Clive tried to rally his colleagues. “There might be a bridge or a narrowing that we can cross. Come on, we can’t give up now and wait here to be found.” Clive set off slowly to his right, following the edge of the dyke. Cautiously he tapped his foot on the ground, every two or three strides, to establish its solidity. Clouds scudding across the sky repeatedly obscured the thin pale light of the moon. There was no discernable path. Tall grasses merged with the reeds, making the formation of the bank ill-defined with ridges and slopes ready to entrap a misplaced foot.
Tugging at Silas’s soaked sleeve, Mel helped him to his feet and maintaining a grip on his arm, pulled him along behind her. Yard by yard they worked their way along the bank following in the footsteps of Clive, whose crouched dark shadow against the skyline resembled a slow-moving sloth. The wind bit into their flimsy clothing. Like an obedient child, Silas allowed himself to be led, the wet and cold racking his body with a ferocity that reduced him to numbed submission. Progress was slow; too slow. But it was impossible to walk faster in the darkness. After what seemed an interminable time, but was probably only about ten minutes, Clive stopped, halting the little convoy in a neat row behind him.
“We can’t go any further,” he called over his shoulder. “There’s another dyke crossing this one. We seem to be at the corner of the field and there’s still no sign of a bridge.”
“What’s that black shape on the other side?” Mel looked beyond him. “Is it a barn or something?”
Clive studied the distant outline. “I think it’s that church down the track from the house.”
“So we’ve almost gone round in a bloody circle!” Silas castigated through clenched teeth. Dropping to his knees as he let out a despairing grunt. “I can’t go on like this, I’m freezing and wet through.”
“Clive, we’ve got to get him somewhere to dry out. He’ll die out here. It’s just beginning to get light and we need somewhere out of the wind where we can rest. We can’t stay here,” she pleaded.
“Just keep going,” Silas growled from behind her. He struggled once more to his feet.
Obediently they pressed on, slowly and carefully, fearfully aware that they were no longer increasing the distance from the house, but manoeuvring parallel to it and its ruthless occupants. Twenty yards on, a rotted wooden post signalled the breakthrough they needed. A plank, set low into the muddy bank, crossed the dyke just inches above the carpet of algae that concealed its watery depths. Mel held Clive’s hand for support while he tentatively prodded at the insubstantial bridge with his foot. It held fast. Testing it with his whole weight, he released Mel’s hand and edged sideways across the void to the far bank.
“Go on, you go next,” Mel instructed Silas.
“Well I can’t get any wetter if I fall in,” he grumbled as he stepped past her and reached down to the edge of the plank. She watched him balance across the narrow beam and without a backward glance, followed him across as soon as he had climbed the far bank.
A hundred yards separated them from the derelict round towered church. An equally neglected and overgrown churchyard surrounded the medieval monument. Names and dates of forgotten generations were no longer decipherable on its few remaining headstones, which leaned at obscure and precarious angles. The lack of any pathway made progress through the long grass and tangled gorse slow and difficult. Absorbed as they were in high-stepping the tangled undergrowth, Mel and Silas almost collided with Clive’s back when he stopped abruptly before the fragmented remains of the perimeter stone wall of the churchyard. The eerie ‘churring’ of nightjars, hunting for moths low over the heather had become silent.
“Get down,” he breathed, and threw himself prone beside a small section of knee-high stones. Without hesitation the others followed suit. Voices. The lights of two torches emerged round the end of the church and scanned the churchyard in erratic sweeps as the men explored the shadows and fissures likely to hide their absconders. Barely daring to breathe, the three lay flattened beneath the broken wall. Oblivious now to the cold and wet clothing, they strained to listen for approaching footsteps, fearing the sudden glare of a torch beam exposing their fragile shield. They had almost stumbled straight into the clutches of their captors.
Minutes passed. Mel, unable to contain her curiosity, tentatively raised her head. Slowly she peered above the wall, prepared to recoil in an instant. A tall athletic figure was following the outer walls of the church, examining each of the buttresses of the flint church. His companion, a thick-set figure whom she suspected was Hood, remained by the far corner of the rectangular nave, waving his torch randomly into the darkness, but its beam fell far short of the escapees.
“Come on, they didn’t come this way. They’ll have made for the road across the fields. Let’s get back,” Hood called impatiently to the younger man. “If they’re not inside the church, they’re hardly likely to be out here,” he rationalised.
“Alright.”
There was something in the way the second man had answered that alarmed Mel. He had only said the one word, but inexplicably she felt uneasy. In the darkness, it was not possible to get a good look at him and she did not wish to expose their whereabouts by risking being caught in the flashlight of their torches, but there was definitely something familiar about him. It sounded very much like the German accent of Kurt. But surely he is dead!
25
From behind the church stone wall, the trio watched patiently as torches carried by the two gang members swung like pendulums, their glow gradually diminishing as the distance and darkness enveloped them. Beckoned onwards, Clive led them round the circular flint tower towards the north side of the church and crept nervously towards the porch.
The entrance was open to the elements; a door no longer protected the sanctuary within. Inside the porch was an empty niche, bordered by two stone carved figures which had paid the price of neglect. The facial features and arms having been broken away gave their shapes a grotesque and inhuman appearance. Patronage of the church had departed decades earlier, the pre-Norman building standing now as a relic of forgotten times. Inside, the nave was stripped of its wooden pews and furnishings. Glassless windows now provided access for pigeons that used the pillars and beams as a welcome habitat. Stepping over the flagstone flooring, it was a relief to the three to be out of the biting wind, but the church offered little comfort. The cold gloom smelt musty and of acrid bird excrement.
“We can’t hide in here,” pronounced Mel. “What if they come back?”
“We’ve got to,” retorted Clive, pushing Mel ahead of him. “It will soon be light and they’ll spot us a mile away out on those marshes. We’ll at least be out of the weather in here. They won’t come back, because they’ve already checked it,” he affirmed.
“You can’t know that.”
Mel shuddered at the thought of spending several hours in another dark and smelly place. “I think we should get as far away as possible before it gets too light. Silas will be warmer anyway if we keep walking.” She tried to persuade Clive, who appeared to have suddenly acquired a streak of obstinacy.
“No, we’ll stay here.” He was adamant.
“But there’s nowhere to hide in here. If they do come back, we’re sitting ducks,” protested Silas. “Come on, let’s get out.”
The argument that ensued was heated and forceful. Clive, pleading his inability to continue running, persisted with his claim that the church had already been checked and they needed cover during the daylight hours as well as rest. Mel and Silas had one thing only on their minds, to get back outside and away from the foul-smelling gloom. They were still less than a quarter of a mile from the big old house.
“Well, I’m out of here,” said Mel finally. “I’d rather take my chances outside and hide in the undergrowth if necessary. You two can make up your own minds.”
As she headed back towards the door, Clive side-stepped into her path, obstructing the exit. In the half light, Mel saw his face change. The soft brown eyes took on a cold hard stare as he took up a stance with his legs apart and his right arm rose away from his body with his fist tightly clenched.
“Don’t be stupid, Clive,” snapped Silas. “It’s not safe to stay here. We can be miles away in a couple of hours. We must stick together and try to get to the safety of some houses.
They both saw it at the same time. A tiny glint of light, reflected close to Clive’s fist, and their eyes were transfixed upon the blade of the scalpel used earlier to cut away the lock of Charlie’s room. With a gasp of fright, Mel recoiled backwards. “Clive, what are you doing?” she breathed in disbelief and remembered how, when they had released the door lock of Charlie’s room, Clive had taken possession of the instrument.
“You brought us here on purpose, didn’t you. I knew we couldn’t trust you!” growled Silas. “I suspected you all along. I told Mel. The way you were already here before we arrived, waiting, as cool as a cucumber. It had to be you who was taken out to steal the equipment from a hospital because they knew they couldn’t trust me not to try and escape. What have they got over you, man? You surely don’t think they will let you go, do you? They’ll blame you just as much as us for Charlie’s death. Put that thing down and let’s get out of here.”
Silas too had a weapon and took up a stance facing Clive, the screwdriver held firmly at his side. Whether poised for self defence or attack, Mel couldn’t tell. She backed further away, aghast at the scene unfolding in front of her. Clive had been her rock. It was his stability that had given her the courage and strength to get through this ordeal and now even he appeared to be part of this conspiracy. She wanted to cry. She wanted to run. Instead she stood away from both men, fearing the outcome of the confrontation.
“We know about you,” Clive spoke with menace in his voice. “Charlie told us before he died that you were married to Maddie before him. I suppose you thought we’d never find out. It’s you we can’t trust. We should have left you down in that cellar. It was only Mel who persuaded me to go back down for you. I can see that there was clearly more planning that went into this hostage taking than first appeared. Of course you’d help them. I’m just surprised you put up with the awful conditions, or was that also part of the plan, so that we didn’t suspect anything?”
“Alright, so I could have told you both about Maddie, but how would that have helped?”
“But you,” Clive continued, turning his attention to Mel, who stood rooted to the spot in stupefied bewilderment. “What’s your part in all this? It was you who insisted we get Silas out and.. and.. I trusted you.” His voice petered out, lost in a confusion of fear, dismay and anger.
Maintaining a safe distance from Clive, it was Mel’s turn to throw in a challenge. “When you were upstairs in the surgery, Clive, what did you say to that big man, Hood? I heard him say to you to ‘forget it, they’ll never know.’ What was that all about?”
Clive’s attitude hardened, the tension in his knuckles shone white against the lightening sky from the doorway behind him. “I can’t tell you. But you’re trying to implicate me with these thugs and all I want is to get out of here. He said he didn’t care if Charlie didn’t survive; he wanted him out of the gang. Said if I did escape, to head for this old church and he’d see that I wasn’t harmed.” He wiped the sweaty palm of his left hand across his jumper. “I’ve got more to lose than you; my wife, my children. They’ll get to my family,” he moaned.
“Clive, how could you believe such a thing? They didn’t go to all that trouble for nothing. Now they know Charlie’s dead, they won’t let any of us walk away. We must get to the police and get help. Come on, please, put that thing down and let’s get out of here,” cried Mel.
Clive remained steadfast, poised like an animal about to attack, but bewildered and caught in a dilemma he couldn’t resolve.
“You fool!” expounded Silas, “You bloody fool! You killed him and now you want to get us killed too.” Lunging at Clive, he thrust the screwdriver at his chest. Surprised by the attack, Clive tried to side-step the tool, but only succeeded in diverting its aim towards his shoulder. He screamed out as searing pain surged through his upper arm and the scalpel dropped to the floor with a clatter as he clutched at the wound, stumbling backwards. Crashing to the ground, he writhed in agony, drawing up his knees to protect against further onslaught.
“Come on, out of here! Let them come back and find him!” yelled Silas to the shocked Mel and grabbing her arm, dragged her roughly from the dark, foul smelling building and pushed her ahead of him out into the fresh air.
Mel felt sick. Did Clive really betray them? Had she really exposed him as a traitor who had killed to secure his own safety? She was confused and scared and still could not believe that he had either deliberately killed Charlie with drugs or was capable of betraying her.
“We can’t leave him there. He doesn’t deserve to die in that place,” she protested.
“Just get going. They’ll be back soon, you see.” Gripping her upper arm he forced her to run. They headed north, away from the dirt track which led back towards the big house and ran north towards the marshes which stretched out in front of them, shaped only by rows of alder trees and reed beds. As she struggled to keep her balance on the uneven ground, she sobbed uncontrollably. Rivulets of salt water trickled down her cheeks, moistening her opened lips as she gasped for oxygen to feed the straining muscles of her leaden legs. She didn’t know where they were going. Dragging her with him, his feet squelching in his saturated shoes, they stumbled along, trying to put as much distance between them and the church as possible. Frequently he cast a backward glance to check for followers as they fled.
Eventually the next inevitable dyke obstructed their route. As they neared a mound of tall grasses, Silas pulled Mel down onto the cold, wet bracken. At last he let go of her arm and they lay there for a few moments, their lungs heaving as they tried to recover from the exertion.
“Silas, I want to go back for Clive. What you did was unforgivable. How could you stab him like that? I must go back, I can’t leave him there in that awful place.” Unrestrained she vented her anger in short sharp bursts. “I don’t believe he would have hurt us; he was just scared. He just doesn’t know who to trust,” she pleaded between gasps. “I truly don’t believe he killed Charlie. He was dying anyway. He didn’t stand a chance. All we did was buy some time.” Leaning up onto her elbow, her breathing now more under control, she looked towards Silas, waiting for his acquiescence and response.
“Shut up, girl. You don’t know the half of it. I know he didn’t kill Charlie.” Silas was calmer now and knelt up, brushing the wet shreds of bracken from his chest in an almost casual manner. “I killed him. If you had been a half-decent skilled scrub nurse
, you would have noticed that I didn’t properly tie off one of the bleeding points properly. It was only a matter of time before he bled to death.” A contemptuous sneer crept across his face. The resistant frown lines on his forehead eased as he studied the changing shocked face of his accomplice. “You could say it was my parting gift to my ex-wife.” He appeared almost euphoric as he recalled the success of his vengeful act. It was really helpful that you came to get me out of that cellar. I thought I was going to have to break out myself with this’ he held up the screwdriver so that it caught the light.
“Then why did you hurt Clive? You might have killed him. It wasn’t his fault. We agreed we would all get out of this mess together!” Seething with anger now, her voice rose to a shout.
“I have my career, my reputation. Yes, they took me by force, but I did at least agree to what they wanted and I don’t think they’ll blame me for Charlie’s death. I wasn’t there. So long as I tidy up for them and leave you both behind, I’m sure Maddie will see to it that they will leave me alone.”
“So why didn’t you kill us both at the church?” Mel’s anger was rapidly changing to dread.
“It was unfortunate that Clive decided to be difficult.” Silas appeared to have completely regained his composure. “Hopefully the gang will return and finish him off. It was my intention to dispose of you both out here in the marshes where it will take so long to find you that I will be long-gone. I’ve no intention of leaving evidence for a murder charge. I will get away and report to the police how I was abducted and escaped. I’ll make headline news in the media and Maddie and her cohorts will stay out of my life or suffer the consequences of three murder charges,” he gloated.