After a long moment, I began. Told him how I’d moved in with her. About Sunday morning. ‘I woke up and found her gone.’ A monotone. ‘Then she ’phoned, said she was at John’s flat, that she’d found the password.’
‘Did she say what it was?’
‘No. I worked it out later. In prison.’
‘So how d’you think she found it?’
I shook my head. ‘I’ve no idea.’
‘All right, what happened after she ’phoned you?’
‘I drove round. Parked outside. The front door wasn’t locked so I — ’
‘Did you see anyone?’
‘I — I don’t think so.’ I swallowed. ‘I pushed it open…she was lying there on the bed, I thought she was larking around…’
‘Come on,’ said Jones urgently. ‘You’re doing fine. What happened next?’
‘Oh yes. There were sheets of Parc-Reed notepaper on the floor, Parc-Reed in big red letters — ’ My head jerked up — ‘That’s how she found the password!’
‘You see?’ said Jones, ‘you’d never have worked that out without thinking it through. What did you do then?’
‘I — I made some comment about Sleeping Beauty, went to kiss her, that’s when I realized… Oh God!’
‘Was she fully dressed?’
‘Yes.’
‘Now think, think about that room. Was there anything that might suggest someone else was there?’
I thought. ‘No.’
‘All right. Then what?’
‘Her face — her eyes were open, staring, her neck was bruised — ’
‘Did you touch her?’
‘I turned her over. Then I just stared at her.’
‘For how long?’
‘I don’t know. I just remember coming to on the floor. I thought — I hoped, it was a dream.’
‘Did you hear anything, any noises?’
‘No.’
‘Did you see anything?’
‘No. There were just the bed legs, the carpet, the dust, and — ’ I jumped.
‘What? What is it? You saw something, didn’t you?’
‘No,’ I lied, ‘just the carpet — ’
He pulled me round. ‘You saw something.’
‘No.’
‘What was it? Look at me.’
He gripped my shoulders and against my will, I looked up. His eyes were light brown, hazel…
‘What was it?’
‘A pair of shoes.’
‘A pair… What shoes?’
I replied tonelessly. ‘The same shoes I saw in the disused floor above the lab when I was hiding from you. Wednesday. When I stayed behind to have a go at the computer.’
‘Whose — ?’
‘They were John’s shoes,’ I said in a dead voice.
He made me go over everything again, then he looked away, absently tapping the table-top with a fingernail.
‘Suspect X,’ he said at last, as I’d known he would. ‘I felt sure he was still around, now I know why.’
‘It doesn’t mean that — ’
‘Yes, it does.’ He thought some more. ‘No wonder the bastard’s been out of sight and yet a jump ahead of us all the time. He’s been camping out just over our bloody heads. No, listen! He knew I was about to pull the switch on him, but he needed more time — you said yourself that his work seemed unfinished, that’s what he’s been — ’
‘But he wouldn’t have killed Sally!’ I burst out.
‘Why not? She was a threat to him. When she found him there, she knew everything…and she hated him, you told me yourself — ’
‘Not hated — ’
‘Hell hath no fury…? She’d have told everyone and I’d have been able to stop him, at least that’s what he thought, so he killed her. Then set you up to take the rap.’
‘But why was he in the flat?’
He closed his eyes a moment. ‘The other letters, the ones from North American Pharmaceuticals. He didn’t want anyone finding them, didn’t realize I’d already seen them — ’ He turned back to me. ‘Were they there when you found Sally?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Did the police mention them?’
‘No.’
‘Then he’d got them, and was dreaming about catching his plane to the States, but then you escaped, and the next thing he knows, we’ve set a trap for him. So he tries to kill us. No wonder he used a voice synthesizer, you’d have recognized him straight away.’ He paused. ‘I’m sorry about this. You liked him, didn’t you?’
‘Yes, I liked him.’ Snatches of his last letter came back to me. ‘I’m nearly there…if they leave me in peace…holding out for the best offer…’
Jones said, ‘I think we’ve got enough now to hand it over to the police, it’s — ’
‘I want to talk to him first.’
‘For God’s sake! He murdered your girl and then set you up for it. You think he’s going to listen to you?’
‘You listen, there’s something you haven’t thought of, or maybe you have. The police’ll be far more interested in recapturing me than listening to a wild theory from you. And even if you did persuade them to do anything, if he’s not there, or you miss him, then I’m back in the — ’
‘I shan’t need to say anything about you.’
‘No? So how will you explain your theory? I dreamed it, Officer? They’ll realize soon enough that I’m involved — ’
‘I’m not convinced you’re right — but what do you suggest?’
‘We get him ourselves.’
‘Too risky.’
‘I’ve nothing to lose. And quite a lot to gain.’
He considered me thoughtfully. ‘I don’t think you want to talk to him at all. More like beat the truth out of him.’
‘Something like that.’
He smiled faintly. ‘All right. But if we do get him, we’re handing him over. I’ll see that you’re cleared. Agreed?’
I nodded.
He asked me to describe the disused floor and as I did, he emptied, dried and refilled his gun with fresh cartridges.
Then we drove the short distance to the hospital. We didn’t speak.
I felt…nothing. No anger, no sorrow, not even a desire to get it over. Perhaps there was nothing left to feel with.
We parked out of sight of the laboratory. Jones said, ‘You must do everything I indicate in absolute silence. Keep behind me, and when we get to the room, I go in first, you wait till I call you.’
We walked as close to the walls as we could, so as not to be seen from above. Jones extracted the key and we slipped inside. Waited two minutes. No sound.
He flashed his torch for an instant, then we crept upstairs. Ducked beneath the tapes. When we reached the landing above, we waited again. Another flash. The padlock and hasp hung uselessly, but the door was closed.
Very gently, he turned the handle. I could hardly hear it, but felt it swing open.
Not a sound in the darkness.
He crouched, flashed a beam down the passage. Nothing. Silence.
He stepped through and I followed, my hand touching the wall. A floorboard creaked and we stopped. Moved on.
Complete silence. Faint light from an open door. Jones’s shadow. My fingers on the wall. A piece of plaster crunched and we stopped again.
Silence. Almost there. I touched his shoulder. He turned, touched my arm. I saw his hand find the knob. The door opened, silhouetting him. He went inside.
We’ve missed him, I thought dully, we’ll never catch him now.
Light sprang from the torch —
‘Christ!’
Footsteps crossed the room.
After a moment he said, ‘You’d better come in, Chris.’
I stepped inside. Jones stood beside the bed and in the light from his torch, John’s face stared back at me.
I don’t know how I knew it was John. His face was black, cheeks puffed out like a balloon. Eyes like screwed-up paper. Thickened lips drawn back over still perfect teeth. And
the smell.
But it was John.
CHAPTER 18
Jones pocketed his gun. ‘Hold this for me, will you?’ He handed me the torch and began methodically to search John’s pockets. The smell surrounded us.
‘Ah.’ Jones pulled something from the breast pocket. ‘Let’s have some light…a library ticket… Mr John Devlin.’ He looked up. ‘We need more than that, really.’
I swallowed. ‘He used to wear a pendant round his neck, a thistle…’
Jones said resignedly, ‘Shine the torch.’ He compressed his lips and undid the shirt buttons. Picked something up with two fingers. ‘That it?’
I nodded, unable to speak.
His head jerked up. ‘Put it out, quick!’ As he moved over to the window, I heard a car approach. Its lights momentarily lit the room.
‘Range-Rover,’ said Jones softly, peering from the side. ‘What’s the betting it was the one by the river?’
A faint squeal of brakes, then the engine died. A door opened and clicked shut.
‘Who is it?’
‘I can’t see from here, but they’re coming in. Come on.’
I followed him back into the corridor and the next room. He pulled me behind the door.
‘We left everything as we found it, didn’t we?’ he muttered. ‘Lab keys, tapes, the door up here…’ He took out his gun. ‘Don’t do anything, we must catch him with the body — ’
The door at the end of the corridor opened and Jones gripped my arm. Footsteps on the wooden boards, the bobbing light of a torch through the crack…the shadow as he moved past. Jones still held my arm. The smell seemed to cling to him.
Silence. More footsteps, then a gurgling noise that I couldn’t place. Nor could Jones at first. Then, as it stopped —
‘Oh bloody hell!’ He ran out into the corridor. ‘Hold it! Don’t — ’
I followed. There was a whoosh as the petrol ignited and a tall figure jumped out in front of us.
‘Hold it!’ shouted Jones again, levelling the gun at him.
The figure turned, faced us for an instant. I snapped on the torch, not that it was necessary — I had already recognized his profile against the flames.
Charles Hampton.
He gave a strangled cry, dropped the can he was holding and ran down the corridor.
‘Stop, or I’ll shoot!’
He took no notice and Jones fired a shot over his head. It made no difference.
Jones turned to me. ‘Can he get out that way?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Right.’ He started running.
I followed, but something made me pause and look into John’s room. The bed was a funeral pyre, the flames curling round the dark shape of his body.
‘Bring that bloody torch!’ shouted Jones, and I ran after him.
At the far end of the corridor Charles was struggling with a door. He turned, flung his own torch at Jones and darted into the last of the rooms. The door slammed.
Jones reached it and tried the handle.
‘He’s locked it!’ he said as I reached him. He turned back to the door. ‘Hampton!’ he shouted. ‘You’d better come out or you’ll be trapped.’
No answer.
‘We’re not going to hurt you. Better give yourself up than be burned.’
Still nothing.
Jones looked back down the corridor. Already, the flames were licking the ceiling.
‘We’d better get out and raise the alarm,’ he said. ‘He’s not worth risking patients’ lives for.’
‘You go, I’m staying — ’
‘Don’t be a fool.’
‘I need him — alive.’
‘You’ve already got all the evidence you need to — ’
‘I’m handing him over, alive. Give me the gun, then go and raise the alarm. Get some people to hold a blanket under the window — ’
‘You’re coming with me.’
I smiled and shook my head.
He looked at me and realized I meant it, then looked past me to where the fire had taken hold of the corridor.
He pressed the gun into my hand, said, ‘Good luck,’ then started running back. He paused in front of the flames and tore off his jacket, covered his head with it and leapt…
For an instant he was etched, black against yellow, then as he disappeared, part of the ceiling fell in a shower of sparks.
I ran up the corridor. ‘Tom! Are you all right?’
No answer. A vortex of flame licked me, singed my hair, and I fell back.
Back at the door, I yelled, ‘Charles, it’s me, Chris Randall. I’m coming in.’
Thinking: Well, it works on television, I aimed the gun at the lock. The recoil surprised me. I fired three more times, then kicked at the door. It flew open the second time.
He was standing by the window, motionless, looking out.
‘Charles.’
He didn’t move. I approached him.
‘Charles!’
Still no movement.
‘Jones has gone for help. He won’t be long.’
‘Jones, I suppose, is Dave.’ He didn’t look round.
‘Yes.’
Now he turned. Saw the gun in my hand.
‘Why don’t you shoot me? You can say it was self-defence.’
‘I need you alive.’
‘I don’t.’
He lunged at me, at the gun, his strength overwhelming me. I fired into the floor, kept firing until there were just clicks, then let him take it. He stared at it in his hands.
I went to the door and looked up the corridor. The fire had spread to another room.
I closed the door and wedged it with a piece of wood. Charles was still staring at the gun. He slowly raised his head.
‘Why did you do that?’
‘I told you, I need you alive.’
‘And I told you, I don’t want to live.’
Something in his voice brought the rage boiling to my head and I strode over to him.
‘It isn’t going to be that easy for you, Charles,’ I said between my teeth. ‘You’re going to live, you’re going to tell the police what you did and after that you’re going to prison.’ My chest heaved. ‘You’re not going to like prison, Charles. I know. I’ve been there.’
He stared back at me.
‘Why did you do it, Charles?’
Still he stared.
‘I said, why? Why?’ I screamed, kicking his legs. ‘Why, why, why?’ I drove my fists into his belly, his face. He stood there, not moving, just silently accepting everything I did to him.
‘Why, Charles?’ I said, pleading with him now.
‘I don’t know.’
‘Please tell me.’
His lips moved. He turned to the window again, then started speaking in a low voice, barely audible at first.
‘I don’t know. I’m not a snob, you know, I can’t help the way I speak any more than…than he could. I didn’t hate him either, not to begin with. We were working together at Parc-Reed. Except that John — Mr John Stuart Devlin — he wouldn’t work with anyone.
‘We were supposed to be investigating the molecular structure of HIV. I tried, I really tried, but he just…wouldn’t…stop. He had to make me look small at every opportunity. I tried to build bridges. I invited him to my home, and d’you know what he did?’ He turned a ravaged face to me. ‘He seduced my wife.’
He looked away. ‘Our marriage was already shaky, but that finished it. When I found out, I hated him more than anything, more than the Devil. I went into work…we had a fight. We were carpeted. When it all came out, he was sacked, and I was put on the road. As a “Products Specialist”.’ He infused the words with a bottomless contempt.
‘Sarah left me. I tried to pick up my life. I’m a scientist. I thought: If I work, do as I’m told for a while, they’ll let me back into the laboratory.
‘I worked. Hard. Then I was sent to Oxford National Microbiology Lab to help them instal the new Parc-Reed anti-HIV test. John was t
here. I don’t know why I stayed any longer than I had to, morbid curiosity, I suppose. Then Peter Carey, with whom I got on, suggested I stay for a while and look at ways of improving their other techniques.
‘Of course, Parc-Reed leapt at it, told me to stay as long as Peter wanted me. So I did, and before long I guessed what John was doing. Then, I had to stay.’ His eyes twisted round to me. ‘You see, it was my idea in the first place, looking at the regulatory proteins of HIV. I remember mentioning it to him in the early days. My idea.’
I didn’t believe him. I could see in his face it was something he’d convinced himself of.
‘And he was going to sell it to America for a fortune. My idea. Or Parc-Reed’s, or Great Britain’s, whichever you like, he was going to sell it, sell us all, and not even for greed. It was to spite us, because of the chip on his shoulder.
‘Anyway, at the Christmas Party, Peter got the scent of it, which is why he didn’t sack John. Peter needed to get his name on some original work, which is why he wanted people like John and me around him. He spoke to me afterwards, asked whether I knew what John was doing. I told him what I guessed. Then he suggested, obliquely, that I find out more, so that he could get rid of John and he and I work on it.’
He smiled wryly. ‘I gave him an equally oblique reply, then went straight to my old Head of Department at Parc-Reed, who thanked me and said leave it with him.
‘I asked a month later what was happening.’
Before my eyes, Charles’s face grew old and hunted. ‘I was told to mind my own business and get on with the job I was paid for. I realized then that nothing was happening.’ He raised his eyes to me. ‘But I was wrong, wasn’t I?’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘Tom Jones was sent to look into it.’
‘If only I’d known.’ He stared out of the window again. I could smell smoke, but didn’t dare to stop him talking.
‘That night,’ he said, ‘that Friday before you came back, I decided to have it out with him. Everyone else had gone. I went to his lab and told him what I knew. He laughed at me. He was even more bloody than usual. I don’t know why.’
I did, of course; it would have been just after his row with Tom Jones.
Charles’s voice started trembling.
‘I kept my temper somehow and told him that he and I should hand the work back to Parc-Reed. I even offered to try and get his job back. D’you know what he did? He told me I couldn’t even handle a woman, let alone a scientific concept.
Bad Medicine- A Life for a Life; Bed of Nails; Going Viral Page 35