by Sam Nash
“He who? How can a kidnapper kill thousands?” His frown extended.
“Lars Visser. He is a terrorist, trying to bankrupt whole countries with natural disasters.” Mary heard herself and grimaced. “Look I know it sounds ludicrous, but trust me, this man means business. He faked my death just so that no one would come looking for me.” She felt his attitude shift from concern to pity.
“You want me to drop you off at the General Hospital, little lady? It’s not far from here. They will have people who can help you there.”
“Thank you, no. I’ve had my fill of hospitals for a while.” Mary manoeuvred herself onto the passenger seat and fastened the safety belt. “You think I am insane. I can understand that. After the things that have happened to me in the last few days, I’m beginning to think I am too.”
“Can I take you home then? Do you have a husband, boyfriend sorry… significant other, family?” The driver said, trying to recall current phrases.
“I have, but I don’t know if I can trust him anymore.” Her voice broke. The cabbie reached into the dashboard for a pack of travel tissues, offering them to Mary on an outstretched hand. She thanked him inaudibly, trying to regain control.
“Well I have to take you somewhere. Can’t drive around aimlessly all night. Do you want me to take you to the constabulary in the centre of town? That’ll be open.”
Mary thought for a moment. If she blurted out the same story to the Police, they would detain her for a Psychological Evaluation and have her sectioned before midnight. “Do you know of a bookshop just off West Walk? It’s Dan something’s place. Has a blue canopy over the shop front.”
“Wildman’s? Sells freaky books about weird stuff and the occult?”
“Yes, that’s it. Please can you take me there?” I’ll borrow some money from Dan and get my story straight first. The driver looked at the blood spatter on her clothes, the blackened nails and the finger marks around her neck and stayed quiet, nodding his assent. Mary sensed what conclusions the cabbie had drawn. An occultist’s crazy ritual gone hopelessly wrong and she is covering up with a mad story.
Casting an eye at the buildings they passed in the street, Mary knew they were almost at Dan’s place. She didn’t have time to explain. “Thank you so much, for everything. You have been so kind to me. If you wouldn’t mind waiting a little longer, I will get the fare from my friend.”
Mary stood on the pavement, looking for signs of life. The shop front was in total darkness, but the curtains percolated blue light in the flat windows above. Dan was at home. She located a doorbell and pressed down, listening for a response. The taxi engine thrummed behind her and she glanced around to smile at the driver. As she did, a small flash of light caught her eye from the opposite side of the street.
Peering into the gloom, she thought she saw a shape of a man in a parked car, but when her vision adjusted, all she could see were the headrests against the whitewash of the building beyond. Mary rang the bell again. This time, the curtains moved in the flat windows. Dan slid the sash window open and leaned out.
“Dan, it’s me, Mary. Please can I come in?” She shielded her eyes from the glare of the street lamp.
“But, you are…Mary, is that really you? You are supposed to be dead. It was on the news. I ordered flowers and everything.” Dan froze, leaning on the windowsill, as if he needed the time to manually edit his assumptions.
“Dan?”
“Oh right, yes. Sorry. Be down in a tick.” Tumbling down the stairs and tripping over book stacks piled in every available space on the floor, Dan hurried to unlock the shop door. “God almighty, you look positively resurrected. What happened?”
“I’ll tell you everything in time, but for now, I really need your help. Can I borrow some money to pay the taxi, please?” Mary felt on edge again, a creeping coldness activating the receptors along her spine and neck, making her shiver. Were they just headrests in that car?
“Yes, of course.” Dan walked towards the taxi, removing his wallet from his back pocket. He looked at the meter and handed the driver two twenty pound notes. “Keep the change.”
“Cheers mate. Hey, look after her. I think she might have had a bump on the head or something. She was babbling a lot of crap about terrorists and being kidnapped earlier.” The driver reset the meter, pocketed the money and saluted Dan with two jaunty fingers tipped to his forehead as he drove away.
Dan turned to Mary. “I can’t believe it. I want to hug you but you look like you might break. Come inside. Let’s get you cleaned up.” He piloted her into the shop with the gentlest of touches to the small of her back. The fusty smell of vintage dust and old ink soothed her frayed nerves. A cocoon of aged tomes enveloped her senses, blotting out the harsh invasion of today’s Wi-Fi world. Mary picked her way through counters and shelves, tables and displays to the stairs at the back of the shop.
“Turn left at the top. Can I get you something to eat or drink? A nip of Brandy perhaps?” Dan followed her up to his lounge, tidying away laundry and empty mugs as he walked. “Is that blood?”
“Yes, but not mine. I know I look a frightful mess and I’m sorry to burden you with it, but I didn’t have anywhere else to go.” Books filled every space. An acoustic guitar stood as the room’s focal point, guarding stacks of vinyl records beneath a steel faced turntable. A bachelor pad with the tiniest hint of feminine insinuation – two floral cushions lay on the sofa and a red silk dress in drycleaner’s wrap, hung from the back of the door. Dan caught Mary staring at it.
“Connie’s. I picked it up from the cleaners for her.” His expression dropped.
“Oh, I’m intruding. I’m so sorry. Is she here?” Mary shuffled with reluctance towards the door.
“No, it’s ok. Please stay. She has vanished again. I expect that she is sniffing out another exposé, and she’ll turn up in six weeks like nothing has happened.” They circled the seating, choosing their distance carefully - Mary the settee, Dan in his favourite winged armchair. Mary rubbed at the bruises on her neck. They were tender to touch. “What happened to you, Mary?”
“A lot of things, terrible, unbelievable things. May I use your bathroom, then I will tell you everything.” She stood up, waiting for directions.
“Where are my manners? Sorry, Mary. Plenty of hot water, towels are in the bathroom cupboard. I’ll dig out some of Connie’s clothes that might fit you. Shall I make you some tea? I know you are partial to it.” Dan dashed about his flat, filling the kettle and checking through the laundry for stray items of women’s clothing.
Mary sat on the toilet. Relieved trembling took hold of her limbs. Dan’s shock in finding her alive was some comfort. She felt reasonably sure that he had no involvement in the events that had brought her to his door.
The roll neck tub looked so inviting. She wanted so much to fill it to the brim and sink under the surface for hours, scrubbing away the grime of the past few days. The bathroom clock clicked past the eleventh hour. Mary decided on a quick shower, a pair of Connie’s cotton trousers and a T shirt. Dan found her a grey cashmere cardigan, but Mary declined to wear it. She remembered how Constance had put Parth in his place at the ball. Mary imagined herself receiving a savage, Parisian reprimand should she spill anything on it.
Finding a lonely teacup and saucer at the back of a cupboard, Dan used it to serve Mary a cuppa with some crumpets. With a tangle of damp, clean hair clipped high on her head, Mary relaxed into the sofa cushions to begin her story. They jumped at the sound of a heavy thud on the shop door, accompanied by the doorbell screaming continuously.
“They’ve found me…”
Chapter Eighteen
“Don’t let them in. They will hurt us both.” The bell was shrill and relentless. Fists hammering on the shop front reverberated the toughened glass in the frame.
“I’ll call the Police.” Dan tugged at his mobile phone stuck in a tight jeans pocket.
“No time for that. These people are ruthless. We have to get out of here.” Ma
ry gripped Dan’s arm and then looked to him to take charge. “Is there another exit?”
“Wait…” He took large strides across the room to a side unit, opened a drawer and pulled out a set of keys. Grabbing a coat and the sofa blanket, he rushed Mary through to the kitchen. The key was in the kitchen door lock. Dan turned it and ushered her through and out onto the steel frame of the fire escape. Locking the door behind him, they scurried down the steps. The clanking noises echoing from the walls of the surrounding structures. They heard the glass of the shop window splinter as they scrambled through to a set of interconnecting alleyways.
“Oh Dan. They’ve smashed your windows in.” She touched his arm, an automatic gesture.
“I’m insured. It’s just glass.”
Mary broke into a jog to keep up with Dan’s gait down the service road leading to a row of battered grey garages. Counting out loud as they passed each faded metal door, he stopped at the eighth one in the row. “It’s this one.” He felt each key on the ring in turn, trying to ascertain the one that would fit the lock in the pale light of the rising moon. The clanging echoes of boots on the fire escape sounded once again. They had searched the flat and were in rapid pursuit.
“Please, hurry.” There was a tone of fright in her voice. Dan handed her the blanket, and swiftly raised the garage door. Squeezing himself along the slim space between breezeblock and car, he fed his slender legs into the driver’s seat.
The burgundy Gordon Keeble sports GT started first time, much to their relief. He depressed the clutch and cautiously pushed the gearstick into first. Edging forwards, Mary closed the garage door and jumped into the passenger side. As Dan switched on the headlights, Mary twisted in her seat, peering at the two figures sprinting towards them. In the crimson blaze from the glare of the tail lights, she recognised one of the men. “That’s Flynn, the man with one missing finger - Yelena’s lover.”
“Him again. I swear that bugger has been following me around.” Dan swerved to avoid a cavernous pothole in the track.
“Put your foot down, Dan.”
“I’m trying but this service road is not very serviceable.” He steered the vehicle along the broken concrete trails bordered either side and in the middle with lush tufts of grass.
“They are gaining on us. Can’t you go any faster?” Mary knelt on the seat, monitoring their progress through the back window.
“Not if I want to get out of here with the sump and rear axle intact.” A break between garages revealed smooth asphalt ahead. With some caution, Dan pressed the accelerator pedal.
Flynn and his colleague ran faster. Mary watched him reach into his breast pocket. “Oh my God.”
“What?” Dan turned the wheel and aimed for the void between the buildings.
“He has a gun.” As she said it, a shot rang out, glancing off the far side of the car. One glowing red lamp extinguished, with a faint tinkling of fractured glass. Dan bumped down the kerb and floored the accelerator, navigating by instinct through the maze of tiny lanes. Mary watched as Flynn lowered his weapon, stopped running and concede to failure.
The car sailed along the traffic free roads and out onto the floodlit motorway. Mary wrapped the blanket around her shoulders and sighed.
“Okay Mary, start talking.”
***
It was just past three o’clock when they pulled into the unkempt drive of a villa on the Norfolk coast. Dan yanked the handbrake up and left the car in gear as an added precaution from the steep slope leading off the cliff and into the sea. He nudged her shoulder to wake her from her fitful doze.
“We’re here.” He waited for her to shake off the exhaustion and orientate herself.
“Where’s here?” Mary stretched, then pulled the blanket closer to her, quivering with the night hours and frigid temperature.
“It belongs to Connie. She brought me here once. Said she wanted to get away from it all.” Dan got out of the car and stepped up the wooden veranda stairs, pausing to let Mary find her way to him in the darkness. The ocean swelled and receded close by, dragging the shingle with a hypnotic swish to its ebb and flow. “Wait here a sec.” He reached up to two tiles of slate bearing the house numbers and slid them apart. The key was hanging in a tiny recessed chamber. Mary smiled at the ingenuity and wondered if Dan’s Parisian girlfriend had any other household surprises in stall for them inside.
The French chic styling continued from the elegant fretwork over the front door to the open plan living space inside. Simple duck egg blue walls and white painted furniture adorned each beautifully coordinated area. Mary expected nothing less.
“No one would think to look for us here.” Dan said, throwing his coat down on one of the two sofas and wandering into the kitchen to switch on the mains utilities.
“You don’t have any other mobile devices, do you? Other than your phone? It’s just they can…”
“No, Mary. And you watched me chuck the SIM card out of the car window before we left town. There isn’t even an internet connection here. Just a landline, which I will use in the morning to get cover for my shop. You can stop worrying and relax.”
And Mary did just that. She curled her feet up on the couch and lay her head on an embroidered silk cushion. Dan closed all the curtains and blinds, locked the door and returned to the lounge area to find her gentle breaths had carried her into a safe slumber. A loose tendril of hair swayed close to her lips, brushing against them with each inhalation. Smiling, Dan swept his long fingers across her forehead with a tender touch, drawing the tress behind her ear.
For the first time since he had met her, Mary looked at peace. The haggard shadow of a woman that had appeared on his doorstep seemed to visibly regenerate under his gaze. The pinched cleft above her nose smoothed out, the blue grey channels surrounding her eyes, plumped and filled with each blessed moment of sleep.
Dan pulled the blanket over her shoulders and turned towards the stairs. Something made him look back. Her small frame occupied less than three quarters of the settee. She looked so vulnerable. The bundle of folded legs and woollen fabric pulled him back to her side. Eschewing a comfortable bed upstairs, Dan trod on the heel ledges of his shoes, prizing them from his feet and lowered himself down onto the opposite couch.
Flicking the edges of his coat outwards, he draped it over his chest and closed his eyes. Seconds later, he pushed himself up again, trying to mitigate the creaks and squeaks from the sofa springs and retrieved a number four iron from Connie’s golf bag under the stairs. Propping it up against the arm of the settee, he resumed his reclined position and tried to still his unquiet mind.
***
“Morning, sleepy-head.” Dan kicked the front door closed, struggling through to the kitchen with straining carrier bags of groceries.
“What time is it?” Mary said, through one open eye.
“Around ten-thirty. It is a glorious day out there. What say I cook you some brekkie while you wash and dress? There will be tonnes of Connie’s clothes upstairs. The woman has more shoes than sense. Then I thought we could walk down the cliff path and figure out what to do.”
“Sounds like a plan.” She yawned and sauntered up the stairs, taking the blanket with her for comfort more than warmth. Nipping to the toilet first, she turned on the bath taps, leaving the tub to fill while she looked through the wardrobes for something suitable to wear.
Everything in Connie’s bedroom was neat, tidy and coordinated. The hint of blushed pink on the walls, carried through onto the vintage eiderdown, the pillowslips of brilliant white Egyptian cotton contrasting against the distressed lacquered metal bedframe. French free standing wardrobes stood either side of the dormer window overlooking the sea.
It felt intrusive delving into Constance’s clothes, a woman who she had barely had an introduction to at a party. Mary touched the garments with respect. Silk blouses, cashmere sweaters and coats, fine wool trousers and nestling in the base of the cupboard, handbags and shoes of all the famous names. I can’t wear thes
e. Some of these items cost more than I earn in a month, possibly several months.
Mary opened the second wardrobe, inside three sets of running leggings and matching crop tops, a casual linen trouser suit and a black document case resting between the running shoes on the floor. Don’t be nosy. The papers of a journalist are of no concern to you. They are private. Borrowing clothes is one thing, prying into secret files is quite another. She scolded herself, while reaching for the case. You have no will power at all. Grampy would be disgusted with you. She depressed the tapered button beneath the catch and paused, listening for Dan’s activities. She could hear him in the kitchen cursing to himself having dropped an egg on the floor.
Sliding the clasp through the catch, she tentatively lifted the lid, as though her cautious movements would prevent detection. The tab from the first drop file read ‘Lars Visser’. Without compunction, she slid out the folio of notes and pages from the suspension file. The noise from the filling bath changed pitch. Shoving the case back into the wardrobe, Mary hurried into the bathroom with the folio and locked the door behind her.
Switching off the taps, she closed the lid of the toilet seat and perched on top, flicking through the newspaper clippings and hard copies of Connie’s notes. This must be a backup file. Why else would she tuck it away here? Surely electronic copies were what most people used in journalism.
The first few wafer-thin sheets were of clipped newsprint, articles showing Lars Visser, Dutch philanthropist, his benefactors shaking hands with the billionaire from humble roots. She looked at a photograph of Visser wearing a lab coat and watching a scientist operate expensive new donated equipment. Mary felt the side of her mouth curl in revulsion. The second article listed all the orphanages he had sponsored in Holland and Germany.
The third sheet was a Companies House printout, showing parent companies of global conglomerates that had associations with Visser and a stock portfolio of shares in his name. Blimey, Connie must have some lofty contacts to get hold of his shares portfolio. This woman certainly digs deep. A stapled bundle of sheets lay at the back of the folder. Connie had typed up conversations with various interviewed sources and written her conclusions in terminal paragraphs underneath.