by Jo Nesbo
‘Here.’
‘Where’s here ? And what are you doing?’
Meredith smiled. ‘We’re waiting for you. It’s still the birthday.’
‘Did it hurt?’
‘A bit. It was soon over.’
Duff felt his throat thicken. ‘Ewan and Emily, were they frightened?’
‘Shh, darling, we’re not talking about that now . . .’
‘But—’
She laid a hand over his mouth. ‘Shh, they’re asleep. You mustn’t wake them.’
Her hand. He couldn’t breathe. He tried to move it, but she was too strong. Duff opened his eyes.
In the darkness above him he saw a figure, and the figure was pressing a hand against his mouth. Duff tried to scream and grab the hairy wrist, but the other person was too strong. Duff knew who it was when he heard the sniff. It was Hutchinson. Who leaned over him and whispered in his ear.
‘Not a sound, Johnson. Or to be more accurate, Duff.’
His cover was blown. Was there a price on his head, dead or alive? Hutchinson’s moment for revenge had come. Knife? Bradawl? Hammer?
‘Listen to me, Johnson. If we wake the guy in the bunk above, you’re done for. OK?’
Why had the engineer woken him? Why hadn’t he killed him?
‘The police will be waiting for you when we dock in Capitol.’ He removed his hand from Duff’s mouth. ‘Now you know and we’re quits.’
The cabin was lit up for a moment as the door opened. Then it closed, and he was gone.
Duff blinked in the darkness, thinking for a moment that Hutchinson had also been part of his dream. Someone coughed in the bunk above. Duff didn’t know who it was. The steward had explained the lack of bunks was because they had transported ‘some very important boxes of ammo’ on the last trip. They’d had to remove some bunks and use two of the cabins as the regulations only allowed them to store a certain quantity of explosives in one place on a boat. Only crew with stripes on their uniform had cabins of their own. Duff swung his legs onto the floor and hurried into the corridor. Saw the back of a dirty Esso T-shirt on its way down the ladder to the engine room.
‘Wait!’
Hutchinson turned.
Duff trotted up to him.
The engineer’s eyes were shiny now too. But the evil glint was gone.
‘What are you talking about?’ Duff said. ‘Police? Quits?’
Hutchinson crossed his arms. Sniffed. ‘I went in to see Sparks to . . .’ another sniff ‘ . . . to apologise. The captain was talking on the radio. They had their backs to me and didn’t hear me.’
Duff felt his heart stop and crossed his arms. ‘Carry on.’
‘The captain said he had a Johnson who matched the description. You had a scar on your face and had signed up on the relevant date. The voice on the radio said the captain shouldn’t do anything, as Duff was dangerous and the police would be ready when we came ashore. The captain answered he was glad to hear that after seeing you in action in the mess.’ Hutchinson ran two fingers across his forehead.
‘Why are you tipping me off?’
The engineer shrugged. ‘The captain told me to apologise to Sparks. He said the only reason I still had a job was that you’d refused to squeal on me. And I’d like to keep this job . . .’
‘And you will?’
The engineer sniffed. ‘Probably. It’s the only thing I’m any good at, according to the first engineer.’
‘Oh? Did he say that?’
Hutchinson grinned. ‘He came over to me this evening and said I shouldn’t go getting any airs. I was a pimple on the arse of this boat, but I was a good engineer. Then he walked off. Pretty weird fellas on this boat, eh?’ He laughed. Almost looked happy. ‘I’d better go where I’m needed.’
‘Wait,’ Duff said. ‘What good is it if you tell a doomed man he has a noose around his neck? I can’t escape until we’ve docked.’
‘That’s not my problem, Johnson. We’re quits.’
‘Are we? This boat transported the machine guns that killed my wife and children, Hutchinson. No, it’s not your problem, and it wasn’t my problem when the captain asked me to give him a reason to fire you.’
Sniff. ‘Jump in the sea then and swim away. It’s not far. ETA in nine hours, Johnson.’ Sniff.
Duff stood watching the engineer disappear into the belly of the ship.
Then he went to a porthole and looked at the sea. Day was dawning. Eight hours until they were in harbour. The waves were high. How long would he survive in such weather, in such cold water? Twenty minutes? Thirty? And when they were approaching land the captain was sure to have someone keeping an eye on him. Duff leaned his brow against the glass.
There was no way out.
He went back into the cabin. Looked at his watch. A quarter to five. There were still fifteen minutes until he had to turn out, as they said. He lay on his bunk and closed his eyes. He could see Meredith: she was waving from the rock, across the water. Waving to him to join her.
‘We’re waiting for you.’
As if in a dream, Macbeth thought. Or like swimming in a grotto under the water. That must be roughly what it was like sleep-walking. He held the torch in one hand and Lady with the other. Shone the light across the roulette table and the empty chairs. Shadows moved like ghosts across the walls. The false crystal above them gleamed.
‘Why’s no one here?’ Lady asked.
‘Everyone’s gone home,’ Macbeth said, shining the torch on a half-full glass of whisky on a poker table, and instinctively his mind went to dope. The absence of it had begun to make itself felt, but he was holding firm. He was strong, stronger than ever. ‘It’s just you and me, my love.’
‘But we never close, do we?’ She let go of his hand. ‘Have you closed the Inverness down? And you’ve changed everything. I don’t recognise anything! What’s that?’
They had come into another room, where the cone of light caught a line of one-armed bandits. There they were, standing in a row down the room. Like an army of small, sleeping robots, Macbeth thought. Mechanical boxes that would never wake again.
‘Look, children’s coffins,’ Lady said. ‘And so many, so many . . .’ Her voice faded, and soundless sobbing took over.
Macbeth drew her close, away from the machines. ‘We’re not in the Inverness, darling, this is the Obelisk. I wanted to show you what I’ve done for you. Look, it’s closed. They’ve even cut off the electricity. Look, this is our victory. This is the foe’s handsome battlefield, darling.’
‘It’s ugly, it’s hideous! And it stinks. Can you smell it? It stinks of bodies. The stench is coming from the wardrobe!’
‘Darling, darling, it’s from the kitchen. The police threw everyone out at one so that no one could spoil the evidence. Look, there are still steaks on plates.’
Macbeth shone the torch over the tables: white cloths, burned-down candles and half-eaten meals. He stiffened when the light was reflected in two luminous yellow eyes staring at them. Lady screamed. He reached inside his jacket, but only glimpsed a lean, sinewy body before it was gone in the darkness. And discovered that he was holding a silver dagger in his hand.
‘Relax, darling,’ he said. ‘It was only a dog. It must have smelled the food and got in somehow. There, there, it’s gone now.’
‘I want to go! Get me out! I want to go away!’
‘OK, we’ve seen enough. We’ll go back to the Inverness now.’
‘Away, I said!’
‘What do you mean? Away where?’
‘Away!’
‘But . . .’ He didn’t complete the sentence, only the thought. They had nowhere else to go. They never had, but it hadn’t struck him until now. Everyone else had a family, a childhood home, relatives, a summer cottage, friends. They only had each other and the Inverness. But it had never occurred to him that t
his wouldn’t be enough. Not until now, after they had challenged the world and he was about to lose her. She had to come back; she had to wake up; he had to get her out of this dark place where she was trapped – that was why he had brought her here. But even their triumph was unable to jolt her back to reality. And he needed her now, needed her clear brain, her firm hand, not this woman crying silent tears who had no sense of what was happening around her.
‘We’ve found Duff,’ he said leading her quickly through the darkness towards the exit. ‘Seyton’s flown to Capitol, and at two MS Glamis will be docking.’ There was light outside, but at the Obelisk all the windows had blinds, it was eternal night and party time. Gambling tables he didn’t remember from when they had passed through before appeared suddenly in the torchlight and blocked their way. The sound of their footsteps was muffled by the carpet and he thought he heard the snarling and snapping of dogs’ jaws behind them. Shit! Where is it? Where was the exit?
Lennox stood in the green grass. He had parked his car up on the main road and put on his sunglasses.
This was one of the reasons he would never settle in Fife. The light was too bright. He could already feel the sun burning his pale pink skin, as though he were going to be set alight like some damn vampire.
But he wasn’t a vampire, was he. Some things you didn’t see until you got close. Like the white farmhouse in front of him. It wasn’t until you got close that you saw the whiteness was peppered with small black holes.
29
‘WELCOME ABOARD,’ SAID THE CAPTAIN of MS Glamis as the pilot entered the bridge. ‘I’d like us to be on time today. We’ve got someone waiting for us.’
‘No problem,’ the pilot said, shook the captain’s hand and took up a position beside him. ‘If the engines are working.’
‘Why wouldn’t they be?’
‘One of your engineers asked to go back on my boat. He had to get hold of a part the first engineer wants.’
‘Oh?’ the captain said. ‘I hadn’t been told that.’
‘Probably a minor detail.’
‘Who was the engineer?’
‘Hutch-something-or-other. There they are.’ The pilot pointed to the boat rapidly moving away from them.
The captain took his binoculars. On the aft deck he saw a striped cap over the back of an Esso T-shirt.
‘Anything wrong?’ the pilot asked.
‘No one leaves the ship without my permission,’ the captain said. ‘At least not today.’ He pressed the intercom button for the galley. ‘Steward!’
‘Captain,’ came the response from the other end.
‘Send Johnson up with two cups of coffee.’
‘I’m coming, Captain.’
‘Johnson, I said.’
‘He’s got stomach cramps, Captain, so I let him rest until we dock.’
‘Check he’s in his cabin.’
‘Righty-ho.’
The captain took his finger off the button.
‘Three degrees port,’ the pilot said.
‘Aye aye,’ said the first mate.
Inspector Seyton had said the safest option was for the captain and the telegrapher to remain the only ones in the know so that Duff didn’t realise his cover had been blown. Seyton and two of his best men would be ready on the quay when they docked, board the boat and overpower Duff. And Seyton had stressed that when it happened he wanted the crew well clear so that no one would be hurt if shots were fired. Although to the captain it sounded like when shots were fired.
‘Captain!’ It was the steward. ‘Johnson’s sleeping like a baby in his bunk. Shall I wake—’
‘No! let him sleep. Is he alone in his cabin?’
‘Yes, Captain.’
‘Good, good.’ The captain looked at his watch. In an hour everything would be over and he could go home to his wife. Soon have a couple of days off. Just that summons to the shipping line tomorrow concerning the insurance company report about a suspiciously high number of cases of the same type of illness in the crew who had worked in the hold over the last ten years. Something to do with blood.
‘Course is fine,’ the pilot said.
‘Let’s hope so,’ the captain mumbled. ‘Let’s hope so.’
Ten minutes past one. Ten minutes ago a large elk head had come out of an elk clock and mooed. Angus looked around. He regretted the choice of place. Even if it was only unemployed layabouts and drunks at the Bricklayers Arms during the day now, it was the SWAT local, and if someone from police HQ saw him and the reporter talking it would soon get to Macbeth’s ears. On the other hand, it was less suspicious than sitting in some bar hidden in the back streets.
But Angus didn’t like it. Didn’t like the elk. Didn’t like it that the journalist still hadn’t arrived. Angus would have gone long ago if this hadn’t been his last chance.
‘Sorry for being late.’
The rolled ‘r’s. Angus looked up. It was only the voice that reassured him the man standing there in yellow oilskins was Walter Kite. Angus had read that this radio reporter consistently said no to TV and being pictured in newspapers and celeb magazines, as he considered a person’s appearance a distraction from the story. The word was everything.
‘Rain and traffic,’ Walt Kite said, undoing his jacket. Water ran from his thin hair.
‘It’s always rain and traffic,’ Angus said.
‘That’s the excuse we use anyway,’ the radio reporter said and sat down opposite him in the booth. ‘The truth is the chain came off my bike.’
‘I thought Walter Kite didn’t lie,’ Angus said.
‘Kite, the radio reporter, never lies,’ Kite said with a wry smile. ‘Walter, the private person, is a long way behind.’
‘Are you alone?’
‘Always. Tell me what you didn’t say on the phone.’
Angus drew a deep breath and began to speak. He experienced nothing of the nerves he had felt when he had presented his information to Lennox and Caithness. Perhaps because the die was already cast; there was no way back. He used more or less the same words he had at Estex the day before, but also told Kite about the meeting with Lennox and Caithness. He gave Kite everything. The names. The details about the club house and Fife. The order to burn the baby’s body. While they were speaking Kite took a serviette from the box on the table and tried to wipe the black oil off his hands.
‘Why me?’ Kite asked, taking a second serviette.
‘Because you’re considered to be a brave reporter with integrity,’ Angus said.
‘Nice to hear people think so,’ Kite said, studying Angus. ‘Your language is more elevated than other young police officers’.’
‘I studied theology.’
‘So that explains both the language and why you want to expose yourself to this. You believe in salvation for good deeds.’
‘You’re mistaken, Mr Kite. I don’t believe in either salvation or divinity.’
‘Have you spoken to any other journalists—’ he smirked ‘—with or without integrity?’
Angus shook his head.
‘Good. Because if I work on this case I need total exclusivity. So not a word to other journalists, not to anyone. Are we in agreement?’
Angus nodded.
‘Where can I get hold of you, Angus?’
‘My phone number—’
‘No phones. Address.’
Angus wrote it down on Kite’s oil-stained serviette. ‘What happens now?’
Kite heaved a sigh. Like a man who knew there was an immense amount of work in front of him.
‘I have to check a few things first. This is a big case. I wouldn’t like to be caught presenting false information or be suspected of being part of someone’s agenda.’
‘My only agenda is that the truth should come out and that Macbeth is stopped.’
Angus knew he had raised
his voice when Kite looked around the sparse clientele to make sure no one had heard. ‘If it’s true, you’re lying when you say you don’t believe in divinity.’
‘God doesn’t exist.’
‘I’m thinking about divinity in humans, Angus.’
‘You mean the humanity in humans, Kite. Wanting goodness is as human as sinning.’
Kite nodded slowly. ‘You’re the theologian. Although I have to confess I believe you, I’ll have to check out the story – and you as a person. I think that’s what’s called—’ he got to his feet and buttoned up his oilskin jacket ‘—integrity.’
‘When do you think this can appear in print?’ Angus breathed in and then let it out again. ‘I don’t trust Lennox. He’ll go to Macbeth.’
‘I’ll prioritise the story,’ Kite said. ‘It should be mainly finished in two days.’ He took out his wallet.
‘Thank you. I’ll pay for my own coffee.’
‘Right.’ Kite put his wallet back in his jacket. ‘You’re a rare bird in this town, you know.’
‘Definitely in danger of extinction.’ Angus smiled weakly.
He watched the reporter until he was out of the door. Looked around the pub. No one conspicuous. Everyone seemed occupied with their own business. Two days. He had to try and stay alive for two days.
Seyton didn’t like Capitol. Didn’t like the broad avenues, the magnificent old parliamentary buildings and all the other shit – the green parks, the libraries and the opera house, the street artists, the tiny Gothic churches and the ridiculously extravagant cathedral, the smiling people in the pavement restaurants and the expensive national theatre with its pompous plays, incomprehensible dialogue and megalomaniac kings who die in the last act.
That was why he preferred to stand like this, with his back to the town and his eyes across the sea.
They were inside the harbour office and could see MS Glamis now.
‘Sure you don’t want any help?’ asked the policeman with the CAPITOL POLICE patch on his uniform. There had been a discussion about jurisdiction before they arrived, but Capitol’s chief commissioner had been cooperative, partly, he had said, because they felt the murder of a policeman in another town affected them, partly because you can make exceptions on board vessels.