“Just since the ATV arrived.”
“Do they have a radio set?”
“I don’t know. Does it matter?”
“I hope not.”
He mulled that over. The ATV had arrived, and been destroyed, a day after he’d told Cavalie about the convoy. And that had been the word he’d used. She and her people been based somewhere during the last year. Could it be Calais? He hoped he was wrong. If not, then their situation was a lot worse than he’d first realised.
Chapter 26 - Theft and Murder
Calais
Chester’s hand slipped as he pried the skylight loose, sending the tyre-iron skittering across the flat roof. Swearing quietly under his breath, he stalked through the already deep snow, retrieved the tool, and took the opportunity to examine the road below. Even with the glasses, now taped tight to his head and close to his eyes, visibility was appalling and dropping fast. He quickly crossed to the skylight, stabbed the chisel point around the rubber seam, and peeled the frame up and off. The glass came away in one piece, slipping from his hands at the last minute, but it had only a few inches to fall to the roof where the snow-topped frozen peaks of mud muffled the thud.
“Like riding a bike,” he murmured as he lowered himself through the skylight, dropping the last three feet, landing in an office with a closed door. When he was certain there were no corpses, moving or dead, he gave the room a second, longer glance. Desk, chair, laptop that had come off the Ark, a row of filing cabinets with an overflow stack of manila folders against the wall. Despite the unfamiliar language on the paperwork inside the folders, he’d place a comfortable bet on it being a lawyer’s office. Not the sort of place someone with local knowledge would loot, but only because it wasn’t likely to contain any useful supplies. As he made his way to the door, his boot knocked against the towering stack of folders, causing a cascading avalanche of paper. He stopped. Listened. Other than the wind outside, all was silent.
Cautiously, he opened the door. The second-hand light from the open skylight gleamed off narrow glass windows and pitted steel door-handles, silhouetting a darker expanse he was sure was a stairwell. He opened the door opposite. It was a meeting room with windows facing the street. The room next to that was another office, smaller, but filled with just as much paperwork. With each door he opened, a little more light seeped into the corridor, a little more sound echoed around the building, a little more time was given for any nearby undead to make themselves known. But there were none, and no useful salvage for their little band.
The topmost stair creaked as he set his foot on it. The step below cracked, though it didn’t break. To dispel the rising fear, he stomped down to the windowless door at the bottom of the stairwell, and flung it open.
The door led to a reception area with battered plastic chairs, an equally battered desk, and a glass door that was cracked but closed. He walked over to a chair, almost sat down, but stopped himself at the last moment, crossing to the glass door instead. He peered out at the snow.
It was the cold, focusing his mind on a primal need for survival. That was the brutal explanation for what had happened in the last hour. They’d rushed in blindly. It had been Locke who’d done the shooting, but only because she’d been holding the weapon with a suppressor. Yes, they’d found the executed corpses before the first shot had been fired, and yes, the prisoner they’d rescued had confirmed that it was an execution of prisoners. But they hadn’t known. Not at first.
“It’s the cold,” he said. “Just the cold. And you did the right thing.”
It was the cold. He could feel it leaching into his bones. Even standing, feeling the chill breeze seeping around the door’s frame, he was tempted to close his eyes, if only for a second.
He forced himself to take a step back. He took another, then moved slowly through the rest of the ground floor. He gave it only the most cursory of searches, not really seeing half the objects his eyes fell on, but that was enough to confirm his first assumption, that there was nothing to be found.
In a room with a sink, he found a fridge. From the stench inside, he regretted opening it. The cupboards above smelled less, but were empty of anything edible. There was nothing here they didn’t have in the bank, but they had so little and needed so much. Above all, they needed options because any way he looked at it, they had none. He returned to the reception area, hacked the hatchet at the padded chair behind the reception desk until he had half a dozen ragged strips of cloth. At the rear of the building was a fire escape. A gentle pressure on the lock-bar, and the door opened.
Behind the office was a paved courtyard with high railings covered in sheet metal, six feet in height. All attempts at gardening had been abandoned long before the outbreak; cigarette ends were the only things planted in the otherwise empty pots ringing the paving slabs. Chester upended two of the largest, and stood on them. There was a narrow alley behind the office, with more commercial premises on the other side. To the right, the alley widened into a loading bay for something that might have been a warehouse, or possibly a supermarket. With so many refugees having come through the port, not to mention Rhoskovski’s gang, all of the obvious places would have long ago been looted. What he wanted was a house. He tied a strip of seat-fabric to the railings above the wall, and climbed over, ignoring the cold biting deep into his hands.
He added gloves to list of essential supplies. He’d give himself an hour to search three or four houses, and then turn back. He’d had a pair of gloves when they’d arrived in Creil, but he couldn’t remember when he’d lost them. During the crash? Or was it when Cavalie had taken their bags? Wait, hadn’t Bill given him some gloves yesterday after they arrived in Calais?
His foot crunched on glass buried beneath the snow. The sound brought him back to the present. He’d already walked two dozen yards from the lawyer’s. Hypothermia, hunger, and exhaustion were making his mind wander. He stood a moment more, looking at the loading dock just ahead of him. From the posters, the warehouse was either a parcel-delivery centre, or a stationery supply company. Perhaps it was something else entirely, but it certainly didn’t contain food. Opposite the main entrance, on the other side of a wide road, was a row of houses. What lay beyond the houses was a mystery hidden by the falling snow.
He tied a strip of cloth to a lamppost, and crossed the road. Avoiding the front doors, he angled to a small gate between two of the narrow terraced houses. The rusting padlock was easily broken. He pocketed it, and moved into the rear garden, pushing the gate closed behind him. Another minute, and he was inside the house.
Ten minutes later, he’d stuffed a bag with as many coats and jumpers as he could, adding a few mugs and bowls from the kitchen around which he wrapped scarves and hats. There was little else in the kitchen, but he took the opportunity to change. Drier clothes, and the security of being indoors helped clear his mind.
“Shoes.”
He found them stacked in a blocky shelving unit by the back door. Hers at the top, his in the middle, and a child’s below that. He’d no idea what size would fit Flora Fielding, so added a pair each of his and hers, and now the bag was utterly packed.
“Right, that’s sorted. Next, food and light.”
There was nothing in the kitchen. No batteries, no matches. And now he was looking for them, he saw the traces of someone who’d emptied the house of the immediately practical. The owners, he assumed. It was a small house, with cupboard-space for only a week of food, and that had been taken, too. A small house, with few possessions, it wouldn’t have taken the owners long to pack it all. He doubted it had taken them much longer to decide to leave.
His eyes fell on the kitchen chair.
“Light and food,” he murmured.
Light was a two-edged sword. Yes, a fire would bring heat, but the light would mark their position. He was still unclear precisely whom they were up against, or how many were left, but surely they’d come looking for those captors who were now dead. No, light was dangerous. Food, though, was utter
ly essential. With it, they could stay in the bank where it was unlikely they’d be found. Without it, they’d have to flee, and do so before the storm ceased, leaving their footprints as a trail anyone could follow. He’d lost all track of time, and visibility was terrible, but he guessed it was still morning. But with the blizzard raging, they wouldn’t travel fast, and so wouldn’t be able to stop when true darkness fell. He’d fought his way through Birmingham at night, but that was only a distance of a couple of miles to a known refuge.
“Food, then,” he said. “And find it fast.”
He tied another strip of cloth to the gate leading to the main road, before heading to the house’s rear garden. He pushed and climbed his way through one garden after the next. He knew what he was looking for, a large house in which multiple children had once lived. There, the parents might have stocked up on more dried and canned staples than they were able to take with them when they fled. Hopefully.
Instead, he found bodies.
They lay in a corner plot where a roofless house was under construction. Most likely, the corpses had first been thrown into a trench dug before the outbreak. That trench had been filled, and so had the rest of the building site. Corpses lay two or three deep. As far as he could tell, beneath the shroud of snow, they’d all been undead. Most had been shot, though a few had been stabbed or bludgeoned. He stepped around the bodies, already having given up on finding food, now curious what lay on the road outside.
He expected to find a barricade as the explanation for why so many corpses had been gathered in one place. Again, he was surprised. Opposite, in another row of small houses, light flickered behind a window. Outside was a handcart similar to that they’d seen in the school, though this one was adorned with a grotesque caricature of a cartoon mouse.
It had to be some of Rhoskovski’s gang. Why they’d risked a light could be explained by assuming they didn’t know what had happened at the school. Sent out with a cart full of corpses, when the blizzard began, they’d opted to take a breather in the house. One person, or two. Perhaps three, but no more, not with only one cart. Hadn’t Flora said something about the guards getting the prisoners to clear bodies? In which case, were there prisoners inside, or were these guards now taking a break from the indignity of having to work? No sounds came from inside, so possibly only one person. Possibly, but not certainly.
He was stalling, and he was slowly freezing. By his guess, he was only a few hundred yards from the bank in a straight line, perhaps five hundred yards up the road then down the other. It was too close. If the weather cleared, sounds might carry. Smoke certainly would. Inside that house, almost certainly, was food. The cart suggested the people were connected with the school, but they might not be. They might be former prisoners, just trying to stay alive. They might be anyone, and he’d never know, because the moment he crossed the road, he’d have no choice but to kill them. He couldn’t wait where he was until they’d left, not outside in the snow. Not for much longer. Either he advanced, or he retreated, back to the bank, and told them they all had to leave. That wasn’t an option, not without food, not in a snowstorm. Go back for help, for advice, for the others’ opinions?
Cold was seeping into his bones. Time had run out. He had to act, and there was only one course open to him. He had to be ruthless. It would be murder, plain and simple. But so was what had happened at the school. He left the rifle slung on his back, gripped the hatchet, bowed his head, and marched purposefully across to the house. Whoever was inside, someone else had given them this job. Right now, their worst fear was their boss discovering them. He’d play to that.
He hammered the back of the hatchet against the door. A rhythmic rat-a-tat-a-tat that no one could mistake for the undead. The light inside was suddenly extinguished. He heard a chair fall. Footsteps unevenly staggered across the room. Glass broke. Muttering in French that verged on angry. The footsteps drew nearer. Chester stepped back, and to the side. The door opened. He saw the grubby clothing, the unshaven face where angry fear was turning to confusion, the hand reaching to the AK-74M. Chester swung. The hand axe slammed into the man’s temple. The eyes beneath didn’t have time to switch from confusion back to fear, let alone pain. The corpse crumpled, taking the hatchet with it. Chester stepped over the body, dragging the tyre-iron from his belt, moving into the previously lit room. Even in the gloom, he saw no moving shadows. He paused, listening, but heard nothing. It appeared as if the man was alone. He walked back to the corpse, dragging it a few feet further inside so he could close the door, then returned to the front room.
He searched around in the dark. His hands knocked into bottles, a glass, an overflowing ashtray, but then he found the lighter. By its thin flame, he located the candle.
A wooden wine crate was on the floor, but only one bottle was still unopened. More empty bottles were stacked on the carpet around the broken TV. In front was an armchair. A few dozen phones and tablets lay abandoned on the floor by its side. He checked one, then another. Both were out of power. Lined up on a bookshelf were rows of prescription bottles. Without much hope, he scanned the labels, hoping for vitamins, but he was disappointed. They were all painkillers. He revised downward his odds of finding anything useful. The kitchen confirmed it.
The sink was full of broken bottles. Knives had been hammered into the wooden counter top. The other downstairs room was full of wine and spirit crates, empty food-cans, discarded plastic wrappers. Upstairs were beds, slept in since the outbreak, but not in recent months. The bathroom was similar, utterly unusable. He went back to the living room where the corpse had clearly spent his time. The man had brought his haul here months ago. Once here, once the house had become a slum, he’d not had the motivation to move it to a better location. Or was it that the man hadn’t wanted to share it? Either way, it had remained here, and he had returned here, to his squalid refuge. The pill bottles had to have come from a clinic or pharmacy nearby. Perhaps a nursing home or hospital. He picked up a bottle, trying to discern the issuing-address, then put it down. Wherever they’d come from, it didn’t matter.
He was putting off the most unpleasant chore, but took another look around the room, delaying the inevitable for a moment longer. In the corner was a green-plastic and canvas rucksack. Not waterproof, but the sort for a traveller who’d spend their journey inside a train or plane. And inside, he found food, of a sort. More of the pink marshmallow biscuits, similar to the pack Bill had found in the canvas bag around the neck of the jailer in the school.
“Now, that’s interesting.” He checked the room again, but there was no other food. It was dangerous to jump to conclusions, but the obvious explanation for what was otherwise an unlikely coincidence was that Rhoskovski and his people were running low on food. It was interesting, though not immediately helpful.
He threw the bag over his shoulder, pocketed the lighter, picked up the candle, and finally returned to the corpse. Placing the candle on a dusty shelf, he quickly searched the dead man’s pockets. The man had a pistol at his belt. A semi-automatic nine-millimetre. No spare ammunition. He un-looped the AK-74M, and counted the rounds in the magazine. Twenty-two, and no spare magazine. That was also interesting. Finally, he turned to his hatchet. It was stuck.
He grabbed the man’s arm for leverage, gripped the hatchet, placed a foot on the corpse’s neck, and stopped. The man’s sleeve had rolled down. There was something there. He held the arm closer to the candle, and pushed the sleeve down further. It was a tattoo. Crude, and recent, no more than seven months old, but unmistakably three leaves wrapped around a branch.
“That’s more than just interesting. Damn.”
Wasting no more time, he retrieved the hatchet, blew out the candle, and pocketed it. He hauled the body outside and onto the cart. Barely checking to see if there was anyone else nearby, he pushed cart and corpse over to the building plot and dumped the body in with those of the undead. The snow should cover the corpse, but it hardly mattered if it didn’t. He made his way back to the ba
nk.
Chapter 27 - Summit Conference
Calais
“There’s trouble?” Locke asked without turning around. She sat on a chair balanced on a table she’d placed in the corner. From there, through two corner windows, she had a view of both the street outside and the alleyway.
“Not immediately,” Bill said, as he, Chester, and Flora entered the bank’s lobby from the stairwell. “We thought it best to come down and tell you, so we can all discuss what to do next.”
Locke relaxed fractionally. “I take it there’s no chance of hot water?”
“Just snowmelt,” Bill said.
“I can offer you a biscuit or three,” Chester said, opening the bag. “And some clean clothes. A tad mildewed, but they’re dry.”
“What’s happened?” Locke asked.
“I went out on a bit of a scavenging mission,” Chester said. “I came across one of the thugs. Guy had a tattoo on his arm. Three leaves on a branch.”
“Rosewood?” Locke asked. “Have you explained about Cavalie to Ms Fielding?”
“They have,” Flora said. “I think the man he killed was Paulo. There was always friction between him and Rhoskovski. And we believed, or we were led to believe, that there was someone in command above the pair of them.”
“That person has to be Cavalie,” Bill said. “Anything else is too great a coincidence.”
“Where did this happen?” Locke asked. “Was there a radio set?”
“Inside a small house,” Chester said. “And no, I didn’t see a radio. Building was too small, too low to the ground. Even if there was a transmitter on the second floor, a signal wouldn’t reach the countryside. No, that house was somewhere for him to wash down a few pills with some vinegary wine, and embrace oblivion for an hour or three.”
“We know Cavalie was getting fuel from somewhere,” Bill said. “And we know that not all her people were in Creil. Either they’ve been hiding out here, or, possibly, somewhere halfway between.”
Surviving The Evacuation (Book 15): Where There's Hope Page 24