Time and oxygen were running out.
John was still alive, mumbling to himself at the front end of the tunnel. Despite the fact she now considered the man a remorseless monster, she couldn’t ignore his suffering, so she went over to him. “John, you’re still with us?”
He resembled a corpse, grey-skinned and white-lipped. Despite that, his eyes were fully open and he focused on her. “Cheryl… Cheryl, is everyone—”
“No, everyone is not okay, John. We’re in a bad way, and it’s because of you. This is all happening because of what you did to Polly McIntyre.”
He winced, like the mere mention of the name hurt him. He also looked shocked, as if Cheryl had just performed a magic trick. Or shared his deepest secret. “Y-You know?”
“That you then mowed down Happy’s niece and covered up her death? Yeah, I know all about that. I know Maggie was with you too, and that you dragged Alfie into it and made him bury Polly’s body. Whoever tricked us down here knows too. Someone is punishing you, John. Do you have any idea who?”
He closed his eyes for a second, and she thought he might have fallen back unconscious, but it appeared he had only been thinking because he looked at her again. “Polly’s mother? Her brother? Even Happy would want me dead if he knew. It’s impossible though. How could anyone know? It was just an accident.”
“Then who strangled her, John? How is that an accident?”
He frowned, and with his ashen skin it made him appear even more ghoulish. His words were becoming drawn-out as his energy departed. “W-What are you talking about?”
“Polly was strangled to death.”
“No… she wasn’t. I hit her. She came out of nowhere and I hit her.” A tear escaped down his cheek, but Cheryl could only sneer at him. The judgement seemed to upset him even more. “It was an accident, I’m telling you.”
“That you forced Alfie to cover up?”
He turned his head slightly to the side and seemed to be looking at his nephew who was scouring the other end of the tunnel with Leo and Monty. It was a miracle he was able to stand after being so badly burned. “I panicked. I shouldn’t have got him involved. He doesn’t deserve to be in this.”
“Yes, he does. You all deserve this. Monty’s a thief, you’re a murderer, Alfie buries bodies. Jeez, even Leo, who I actually started to think was a decent guy, is guilty of blackmailing himself a promotion.”
John turned his head back to look at her. “What are you talking about?”
“Leo told me about how he blackmailed you with evidence of you cheating on your wife. I know he forced you to give him a promotion.”
“I promoted him because he’s good at his job. He… He never blackmailed me.”
Cheryl hissed. “No more lies John. The truth is out. I know everything. Every little sin.”
“You’re wrong. Leo never blackmailed me. My wife wouldn’t even care. Karen and I… we haven’t…” He blinked and swallowed, almost like he was suddenly confused. “I don’t know why Leo lied to you, Cheryl, but he never threatened me. It wouldn’t have worked even if he had.”
She was about to defend Leo, but somehow she knew what John was saying was the truth. In actual fact, the thought of John allowing Leo to blackmail him seemed absurd. “You’re really telling me the truth, John? Because if—”
“I swear it, Cheryl. I’m telling the truth about everything. I hit Polly with Monty’s car and covered it up. Why would I lie about anything else?”
“You didn’t strangle her?”
“I swear. I deserve this, I know, but it was just an accident that got out of hand. I would never strangle someone to death.”
Cheryl believed him. In all the pain and delirium, she didn’t think John was even capable of lying anymore. It would be an effort he could not summon. He was dying and he knew it. His confession was real, an attempt to unburden himself. Perhaps he thought the truth might set him free.
So who strangled Polly?
Alfie said Polly had been dead when he’d arrived. If it hadn’t been John who’d strangled Polly then it could only have been one other person.
Maggie was still sprawled across John’s legs. Cheryl shook the woman. “Mag? Mag, are you still alive? Mag, I need to talk to you.” She was certain the woman was still alive because she was hot, burning up in fact. A dead body would be cold, right?
Mag moaned and lifted her head. A long line of mottled saliva hung from her mouth. “C-Cheryl, help me, please.”
“I’m trying to, Mag, but I need to know the truth — the truth about Polly McIntyre.”
“She’s…. She’s missing.”
“No, she’s not, Mag. She’s dead, and I know you were involved. You were in the car that hit her.”
“Yes.” It was a surprise when she didn’t try to deny it, but she too was at death’s door. The will to lie obviously slipped away when a person neared death.
“Was Polly dead when you found her in the woods?”
Maggie didn’t answer.
“Mag, please tell me the truth. Was Polly McIntyre dead when you went to her after the accident? Did John kill her, or something else?”
“Still alive. I… I tried to help while John called for help. She was in a bad, in a bad way, bleeding all over, crying. She kept saying she needed to tell the police, that she needed to tell them what had been done to her. She kept saying it over and over again.”
“That she was going to tell the police?”
“Yes! She said he was a monster and that she would tell them everything. John was trying to get a signal on his phone, to get her some help, but all she could do was threaten to ruin his life.” She blinked her eyes slowly, beginning to fade. The talking was tiring her. “It was an accident. John didn’t deserve to go to prison.”
“He’d been drinking and doing drugs, and you were… taking care of him in the passenger seat. He had no business being behind the wheel.”
Maggie didn’t seem to be listening anymore. “I kept telling Polly, it was just an accident, but she wouldn’t listen. She kept asking for the police. Kept saying he was a monster. I couldn’t let John go down for an accident.”
“Or yourself,” said Cheryl, “because you strangled her.”
“The stupid girl left me, left me no choice. Cheryl, please help, please help, please—” She turned her head and bloody vomit escaped her lips. It covered John’s legs, and he reached out to hold her, but he was too weak, almost asleep.
Almost dead.
Maggie, too, looked done for. Her eyes were red, every vessel burst. The liquid coming out of her was foul-smelling and mixed with blood, while the fingers on both hands contorted so badly they threatened to snap. Her neck bulged to twice its size.
“Cheryl, please. Cheryl, please help me, me, me—” She seized again, more blood coming from her mouth, her nose, her eyes.
Her ears.
Maggie slumped forwards over John’s lap. She went still.
Cheryl shook her. “Mag? Mag, can you hear me?”
Leo, Alfie, and Monty came rushing over. “Is everything okay?”
Cheryl examined Maggie’s face, prodded at her neck and tried to feel a pulse. Eventually, she had to turn to the others and break the news. “She’s dead.”
It hit them all equally, and they fell silent. John was still awake, but it was unclear whether or not he understood what had happened. Eventually Leo came and put an arm around Cheryl. She had to force herself not to flinch. If she reacted badly to his touch, he would know something was up. He might sense that she had unanswered questions about him; like why had he lied about blackmailing John?
And what was the real reason he was down there? What was he truly guilty of?
Leo squeezed Cheryl tightly, and she had no choice but to let herself be hugged.
8
Rather than leave her body sprawled on top of John, Leo and Monty slid Maggie away gently, leaving her beside the dissected TVR. Monty remained there for a while, staring at the car that had once been his.
“It really is my old car,” he said when Cheryl approached him. “For two years I thought I’d got drunk and wrapped it around a tree. I woke up in my hotel room the next morning, and the police were already waiting for me when I went for breakfast. My uncle the soliciter had taught me never to say anything so I didn’t, but it never made much sense. I remembered none of it, and I never had a scratch on me, not even a scrap of dirt. The cops couldn’t place me in the car at the time of the accident so they brought no charges, but it didn’t stop me from feeling ashamed. I thought I’d driven drunk and almost killed myself.”
Cheryl put a hand on his back. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Yeah, I did. I drank myself unconscious and shamed myself. I’m Muslim. If I’d followed Allah then I would have been sober and alert that night. John wouldn’t have got away with everything that he did.”
“Look, Monty, I don’t give much thought to God, or Allah, but I don’t think people are supposed to be perfect. Life is tough, and it just goes on and on whether we like it or not. The only thing we can do is make the best of it and try to be good. You’re a good man, Monty. I see it now.”
He looked at her and grunted. “We both know that ain’t true.”
“Perhaps, but you have a choice now. From this very moment, you can be whoever you want to be. If you don’t like who you were then make sure you like who you’ll become. It’s never too late to start making things right.”
Monty looked down at Maggie’s puke-stained corpse. “Sometimes it is.”
The fact he was beating himself up only reinforced Cheryl’s gut feeling that Monty was a good man deep down. He’d bought a little too much into the ruthless world of sales and business, but the truth was that he had screwed people over rather than physically hurt them. And right now he wasn’t proud of it.
Could she trust him? Should she tell him that Leo was keeping secrets? Perhaps he would know something she didn’t. Before she could open her mouth, Leo approached, holding one of the fallen ladder rungs and the bloody meat cleaver that had taken John’s wrist.
“Get that thing away from me,” said Monty, grimacing. “Why do you even have it?”
Leo lowered the cleaver next to his thigh, out of eye-line, but he handed the steel rung over to Monty. “Thought we could do with some tools — or weapons maybe. If we start trying to claw our way out of this hole, we might encounter resistance.”
“You think so?” Cheryl had only been thinking about escaping and had paid no consideration to the fact there were people who planned on keeping them trapped. Arming up was a sensible idea but seeing Leo with a bloody meat cleaver in his hand did not fill her with confidence.
Alfie was with John, chatting quietly. Cheryl decided to go and join them. “How’s he doing, Alfie?”
Alfie’s expression answered for him. “I think he’s about to go.”
Cheryl knelt down and put an arm around him. Beneath his jacket, Alfie’s waist was thinner than hers, and she was surprised to find herself jealous. The petty emotion was somehow comforting after feeling nothing but fear and terror for the last several hours. John appeared to be sleeping, and it even sounded like he was snoring, but the rhythm of his breathing was all wrong.
“Were you close to your uncle, Alfie?” Cheryl asked
Alfie gave a mild smile. “Yeah, I was for a long time; then Polly died and things just got, I dunno, weird. He always looked out for me, and after what happened he kept me even closer, but I think it was just to keep an eye on me, really. He wasn’t a good bloke, Cher, I know that. The things Maggie said about him were probably true. John had a way of twisting people in knots and making them do whatever he wanted. My mum always warned me not to trust him, but I could never understand why at first because he always seemed to care about me. When I was a kid, I was shy.” He held his stunted hand up to her. “Insecure about this. Kids would make fun of me at school, and when I got older I never wanted to go out. John found out and started dragging me down the pub, trying to get me out of my shell. I hated it at first, but whenever he caught someone whispering about my hand, he would go up and give them hell. After a while I started to feel safe in the pub, and I did come out of my shell. Once that happened, girls started to like me, and other lads would drink with me. Turned out, people only cared about my hand if I did. If I was confident enough to ignore it, then it stopped being an issue. John gave that confidence to me, and it changed my life. He wasn’t a good man, Cher, but I loved him.”
She smiled. “I get it. I lost my dad a few years back. He was the centre of my universe, but the truth is he could be moody and selfish, and we always had to do whatever he wanted to do. Sometimes he would go away entire weekends without me and mum. Work, he would call it, but I know it’s because he wanted a break from us. He wasn’t the best dad in the world, but I loved him. I still love him. People aren’t perfect, Alfie, and it’s okay to love them even if they don’t always deserve it.”
“I’m really sorry for what I’ve done, Cher. Facing Happy every day, letting Polly’s mum wonder all this time. If we live through this—”
She gave him a gentle nudge. “I know. You don’t have to say it.”
Monty moved over to join them. “Um, guys? I think, I think he’s gone.”
Alfie leaned forwards and closed his uncle’s eyes. “See you in Hell, unc.”
Cheryl rubbed his back. “You okay?”
“Yeah, I think I’m passed the point where I can feel any worse. Although, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for a pack of fags right now.”
Leo chuckled joylessly. “I’d do the same for a beer. You still want to get out of here?”
Alfie nodded. “Time I took responsibility. Polly’s mum deserves the truth, and not from whatever psychopath she hired to torture us. She needs to hear me say how sorry I am in person.”
“It’s never too late,” said Monty, giving Cheryl a half-smile, “to start making things right.”
“Yeah, okay,” said Leo, and he gave a sarcastic hand clap. “That’s all really lovely and everything, but are we going to go find a way out of here or what? Because, as I see it, we have about forty-five minutes of air left.”
Cheryl got to her feet. “Then we best put our heads together, because I refuse to die down here.”
Leo was peering into the cell. “So what’s the deal with the noose? How will one of us hanging ourselves achieve anything?”
“Someone is controlling things,” said Cheryl. “They know whether we’re obeying the rules or not. If we hang ourselves, they’ll know.”
Monty shrugged. “And then what? Let us go?”
“Maybe.”
“Well, screw that,” said Alfie. “I’m guilty of a lot of things, but I don’t plan on hanging myself.”
Monty stepped towards the cell, but Cheryl stopped him. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to take a look. It’s okay, I’ll be fine.” He moved her back and then passed through the gate. He started looking around, moving cautiously. His hands were trembling, which made it clear how afraid he was.
“You see anything?” asked Leo.
“No. Just the noose.”
Cheryl looked upwards. “What’s it attached to?”
“Hold on, let me see.” The lighting was poor, so Monty stood for a while beneath the noose and tried to trace its source. “It’s attached to some kind of pulley, threaded around, like, a metal wheel. Looks like it belongs on a ship’s rigging or something.”
“Okay,” said Cheryl, looking up at the tunnel’s ceiling and seeing a thick conduit running overhead between the final two cells. “It’s more than just a noose. It’s hooked up to something.”
Alfie stumbled suddenly and Leo grabbed him. “You okay, dude?”
“Yeah, I just got lightheaded for a second.”
“It’s the air,” said Cheryl. “I’m feeling lightheaded too. I don’t think we have very long left.”
Monty cursed under his breath, and then he reached for the noose
.
Leo banged on the bars. “Whoa, dude, what are you doing?”
“We need to find out what this does before we suffocate. Just chill, okay?” To everyone’s relief, Monty didn’t place his head inside the noose. He just yanked on it with both hands.
Clunk clunk clunk.
The noose gave obvious resistance, and Monty had to keep a firm grip on it as he pulled it downward. Out in the tunnel, a metallic grinding sounded overhead, coming from the conduit.
Alfie looked up nervously. “What’s happening?”
Cheryl realised her stomach was calm, the situation no longer able to surprise her. “I’m not sure,” she said. “Nobody panic.”
An ear-piercing whine broke out and caused them all to shudder. It was the wail of a blown speaker, or a megaphone. Eventually the sound softened, giving way to a crackling hiss — and then a voice.
It wasn’t the voice of the no-eyed man. It was the voice of a young girl.
A young girl in terror.
I need you to come get me. I need help. Sobbing sounds. Please come. Where are you? Pause. He, he, he raped me. He raped me! Please, come. Come now. Crackling, like a phone breaking up. Hello! Are you still there? Please come. He left me in the woods. I’m… I’m going to try and find the road. I think I hear a car. Please come get me.
Alfie’s eyes were bulging. “That’s Polly’s voice!”
Monty let go of the noose and it stayed in place. Overhead, the fans clunked to a stop before starting again. Cheryl could tell by the sound that they were once again running the correct way. “The air is coming back. We did it.”
Leo fist-pumped the air, but he didn’t seem to have much enthusiasm. “Nice one, Monty. Come on, get on out of there.”
Monty started towards the gate. The look on his face was one of clear devastation. “That was Polly the night she disappeared. Did you hear how scared she was? She said she’d been ra—”
Monty lurched forward as something struck him in the back. His eyes went wide and he coughed meekly.
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