True to Your Service

by Sandra Antonelli

  “Redistributed, shuffled into a new position as an instructor, a consultant, as a reservist asset, or administrator,” Kitt angled his head slightly, “no one ever really gets away from or out of this line of work, do they, sir? To be honest, I can’t really picture myself as an administrator. That’s more for women like SOD Deputy Director Cubby, and men like the Assistant Commissioner and you, sir.”

  Llewelyn’s soft smile was made of spines, the barely visible fine sort one found on Indian figs. “Yes, yes. Off you go to Amsterdam with Eaton and Charteris, Major, as an outside associate investigator for Hedison’s. Morland, inform AIVD we’re in their garden.”

  “Everything’s in place, sir,” raspy-voiced Morland’s fingers flew over a tablet screen.

  “Splendid.” Llewelyn turned to Saltzman. “Many thanks to you and the Fraud Squad for your assistance in bringing this to our attention, Assistant Commis—” Three sharp peals of the crisis buzzer drowned out his words. “There’s been an incident,” Llewelyn stated the obvious as Morland pushed back his rolling chair and switched on the wall screen. Another tone, one with a higher pitch, sounded, indicating the building was now on immediate lockdown, all operations cancelled.

  Morland adjusted the TV’s volume, and they watched the BBC’s coverage of the carnage on the Broad Walk for nine minutes before Tech Services finally sorted out routing the live feed from the CCTV cameras on Chester Road, footage from the camera closest to the collision nothing but a grey screen.

  After twelve seconds of closed-circuit footage, Bryce said, “Is that your car, Kitty?”

  “Yes, it is. Will you excuse me, sir?” Kitt rose, eyes on the wall screen zooming in on smashed motor vehicles, paramedics tending to the injured, sheet-covered bodies, a lone hot pink shoe. His fingers closed around the ring in his pocket, a thread of acid burned in his throat. He wanted to blame the sensation on the wretched pretext for a cup of coffee he’d drunk instead of a filament of fear based on a single shoe.

  “How fortunate University Hospital is just up the road.” Llewelyn reached across the table, snagged the edge of the paper napkin, and slid it along with the half-eaten Chelsea bun. “Morland,” he lifted the bun to his mouth, “tell Rattray at the Security Desk to allow Major Kitt and the Assistant Commissioner to pass.”

  Two hours later, the caustic thread was still in his throat when he bypassed the double doors that led to the morgue at University College London Hospital. Kitt walked along the hallway, behind the Forensic Pathologist.

  Years of proficient experience nullifying emotion, his brain partitioned action from reaction as if the two things were far removed from ever being whole. There were essential peculiarities that came with his chosen profession. The virtue of patience was necessary to cultivate for intelligence work. Waiting, observing, forbearance were crucial elements for any operation. Being hasty, jumping to conclusions, trying to force a matter were all counter-productive. There were instances where he had to remind himself of all this, to remind himself to be patient, particularly when the passage of time was such an odd thing. The distance between particular moments could seem like minutes or years. The hours since he’d left the Consortium had passed like seconds, but the walk down the corridor behind Dr Marc Phancey lasted seven-hundred years and Kitt tumbled the chunky gold wedding band in his pocket through his fingers.

  Dr Phancey pushed a hinged door and ducked into an interior suite. The TV Kitt passed in the family room down the hall broadcast the media’s speculation whether the major incident was an unfortunate accident or an act of terrorism. Bystanders and witnesses at the scene who had taken matters into their own hands before police had arrived made the matter even murkier. Confusion reigned. Whatever the case, the wounded—and dead—had been brought to this hospital. Kitt followed Dr Phancey into a pale-green room. While he’d expected something clinical, something smelling of antiseptic and hospital, the room was modern, comfortable—and as windowless as the Gray conference room, the space softly lit up by light boxes showing a lake, green grass, flowers and trees. It was a lifeless view for a lifeless room meant to be soothing about lifelessness. “Why are we in here?” he said.

  “We’ll have more privacy in the Bereavement Suite than the morgue, where my colleagues are working. We can do this in here with photos on the tablet, exactly the way we would with anyone else.” Dr Phancey managed a dry smile. “Are you with SO15 now?”

  Another strand of acid laced along his oesophagus. “I’m a bit pressed for time, Marc.”

  “Of course,” he said, folding back the cover on the tablet. “When was the last time we saw each other?”

  “Suzuki’s wedding.”

  “That’s right. I don’t suppose I’ll get lunch out of you for this, will I?”

  “Not this time.” Kitt gave the man a small smile.

  He smiled back, head shaking. “You know, I’ve never been able to find that Lebanese place the four of us went to all those years ago. That was a fun night.”

  “Simon and Hugo broke up a long time ago, Marc.”

  “I didn’t ask you about your brother. What was the name of that girl you were with all those years ago, after Op Granby, Holly? Honey?”

  “Honor.” Kitt looked out a pretend window.

  “Right, how could I forget that stupid ‘Honor and off her’ joke Simon made? I saw her in Paris last summer. At least, I thought it was her.”

  Kitt turned about. “Show me what you have, Doc.” The burning in his throat intensified and spread into his chest. “Please.”

  Dr Phancey tucked the tablet against his hip, clearly unsettled by the favour he’d been asked to do. “The bodies haven’t been prepared. We don’t even know names yet.”

  “I’m aware of that.”

  Phancey’s mouth flattened. “For fuck’s sake, Kitt.” He switched on the tablet and handed it over. “If you get queasy, the loo’s across the hall,” he said, and left.

  Regardless of the proficient experience nullifying emotion he’d had, however his brain partitioned action from reaction and kept the two things far removed from ever being whole, a corrosive film scorched his chest and throat. Kitt swiped through the pictures of the dead, who numbered four in total. Broken-bodied, bones exposed, features obliterated by blood, by open wounds and open, sightless gazes, he took it all in until he reached blonde hair muddied and darkened by blood. For a long moment, he stared down and the world, his world, stopped turning. “Jesus Christ,” he whispered, every iota of long-practised calm disintegrated as he crumpled, knees hitting carpet, tablet bouncing on the sofa.

  Chapter Three

  “Excuse me. We’re conducting an interview here,” bespectacled Inspector Ponsonby said.

  “Not anymore. She’s being moved to a ward.” The Charge Nurse, Gibson, a lean Indian man with curly black hair and muscular arms, slid the cubicle curtain across wider and stepped aside for a young freckled man wearing an orange zip-up vest, Porter printed on the back.

  “Hold on now, this is important,” Police Sergeant Chung put up a hand.

  “Then follow us.” Gibson turned and the porter began pushing Mae’s wheelchair through Accident and Emergency, down a small maze of hallways to a lift, Felix a ginger crescent on her lap, two policemen from Counter Terrorism Command followed along, while Gibson walked alongside the porter and chattered away about the history of the University College Hospital.

  Mae looked at the four men accompanying her. It was vests for all in men’s fashion choice today; the dog’s yellow wraparound, Gibson’s smock-like, the porter’s high-visibility orange, Ponsonby and Chung’s black—and bulletproof.

  Was bulletproof really necessary?

  Gibson pushed open a wide door. Impatient, Inspector Ponsonby went into the room, Sergeant Chung two steps behind. The injured witnesses who had been mobile had been moved from A&E and brought up several levels to a wing in one of the old red brick buildings, to a less hectic, quiet ward a world away from the sterile, drab notion conjured by the word hos
pital. With the exception of the standard adjustable hospital bed with side rails, the room was something straight from a country estate, with opulent Victorian furnishings, knick-knacks, and gilt-edged oil paintings of women with bustles and parasols. The sun filtered through filthy, paned glass sash windows that were stuck with pigeon poo, bits of downy feathers, dappling shadows on pink and green floral-patterned wallpaper.

  A hospital room with Victorian furniture was not what Mae expected.

  “It’s where we usually house visiting dignitaries needing medical care.” Gibson said, as the porter rolled her into the suite and locked the wheels.

  Mae rose from the wheelchair and set Felix on his feet.

  Ponsonby smiled pallidly. Well-dressed, his vest hid a slight paunch. Large, white rectangular glasses sat on a hairless face with a solid square jaw sporting a tiny shaving nick on the left side. “Make yourself comfortable.”

  “I’d be comfortable if we did this after I bathed.” The knotted side tie of the pale-blue gown had twisted into her hip while in the wheelchair and Mae rubbed the irritation. Somewhere downstairs, in a different wing, police constables with the Met had collected her bloodied jacket, leggings, and the hot pink joggers she’d worn—or one of them anyway, she’d lost the left shoe. A nurse or doctor had washed her face and hands, but not her hair, and she stank of vomit and sweat and blood that wasn’t hers.

  The dog’s makeshift lead slackened in her grip. She stared out the feather-dotted dirty window. A fat, grey pigeon flapped about on the window ledge. Felix darted to the glass, letting out a small bark. “I had to leave the woman there,” she said softly. “I couldn’t do anything for her.”

  “You’ve been through a lot.” Ponsonby looked over his shoulder at the charge nurse. “Gibson, was it?” Ponsonby said.

  “Yes.”

  “Thanks, Gibson,” Chung cut his brown eyes to the door and the porter leaving.

  Gibson stayed where he was. “She’s my patient, she’s being observed for concussion, but I’ll do my best to stay out of your way, Inspector.” Gibson lay a hand on Mae’s shoulder. “Your watch and things are in a packet on the bed. We’ve contacted your brother, Mae.”

  “Thank you.” Mae looked at the nurse’s thick knuckles and then up at his moon-shaped face. “I think she choked on her own teeth.”

  Gibson gave her a pat. “I’ll get you some tea and sandwiches. Towels are on the bed and the bed’s made up with some rather lovely cotton sheets.”

  “I don’t have to get in bed, do I?”

  “No. You just need to relax. I’ll get you the tea.”

  “I don’t like tea, but thank you,” Mae said.

  “You’ll have it and a sandwich anyway. I was a Captain and matron in the AMS, with the Queen Alexandra’s Nursing Corps, so you’ll follow my orders.” He turned to Ponsonby, busy on his mobile. “Best you get to it now, Inspector, rather than later.” Gibson glanced at Mae. “She’d be better off resting, but I do what I’m told.” Frowning deeply, Gibson departed.

  Sergeant Chung had busied himself arranging things. Tall, dark-eyed, he swept back a hook of black hair from his forehead and moved a small, square cherry wood table made for playing cards into the sunlight, placing three chairs around it. He gestured to Mae. “Come have a seat.”

  Mae sat on a straight-backed padded chair. The cushion under her bum was lumpy and needed to be re-stuffed. Felix trotted away from the window, sniffed at Chung’s shoes. His paw touched the Sergeant’s knee for a moment, as if to latch on and revert to the humping behaviour obedience training had broken, but the dog pranced off and plopped down on a red Persian rug in front of a fireplace. He yawned, mouth wide, tongue curling out and up. How the dog hadn’t been hurt was a miracle. She watched Felix settle into a crescent and close his eyes.

  Elbow on the table, Mae set her chin in her hand and felt something sticky there. She pulled her palm away, finding flakes of dried blood. This blood was hers; it had flowed from a slice across her ear, from a cut in her scalp, from a blow to her nose to stain her cheeks and sting the burns streaking her neck. The burns, the emergency doctor had explained, were caused by the chemicals that inflated the airbag, and the grimy smears and little cuts on her knees came from kneeling in gravel beside a woman gasping for air, her laboured breathing like pebbles in a Hoover.

  Ponsonby pulled out a chair on the opposite side of the table and sat. He lay his mobile on the table and sighed. “Sergeant Chung and I will record this,” he said.

  “I’m sorry, Mrs Valentine. I know this is unpleasant, but it’s necessary” Chung took a seat clearing his throat. “Walk us through it. Where were when you saw the driver being beaten with the cricket bat?”

  “I already told you.”

  The two policemen glanced at each other. “We need you to tell us again, for the recorded statement.”

  “On the ground beside my employer’s car. I’d been inside the car when it was smashed by the tipper lorry.”

  “Please speak up.” Ponsonby pushed the phone closer, sat back, and crossed his arms, yawning.

  “I was on the ground beside my employer’s Bentley,” she said, and glanced down at her wrist to check the time, forgetting her watch, glasses, necklace, and the diamond ring Kitt had given her were in a packet on the bed. She had no idea how much time has passed since the accident—or terror attack—and guessed by now Kitt would have heard the news, despite being shut away training his neophyte little spies or doing the paperwork associated with training neophyte little spies. She laughed, a pfsst of air.

  Chung slung an arm over the back of his chair and looked over at the sleeping dog. “What do you remember about the tipper driver?”

  Early last July, she’d been taken to a police station and questioned about the man she’d killed—in self-defence—in Kitt’s kitchen. She’d been on a hit list. Valentine, the name she’d shared with her deceased husband, had been on a list—along with the names Bianco, Man, Torrisi, and Russo. Bianco had actually been the Sicilian town Misterbianco. Man was Li Man, a ‘cleaner’ for the Gallia Mafia family responsible for the hit list—although hit or miss list was more accurate. Torrisi was an immigration lawyer and refugee advocate, who was still alive, Russo had been a baker who lost his hand and his life, while she had been lucky and killed her assassin with a toilet brush. Mae wondered if these two policemen knew about her actions or if some details of the Gallia Mafia family’s international money-laundering ring had been covered up or classified by Kitt’s employers and the British government. The July interrogation had taken place in a dull grey room, the only window a small square in the door. Those two detectives had been no-nonsense and rude. These two policemen were no-nonsense and guarded.

  “What do you remember about the tipper driver?” Chung said again.

  “What do I remember?” she said, the top of her head throbbing. “Here’s what I remember: the woman pinned between both vehicles, the woman on the ground, the man with the bicycle.”

  Chung ignored her question. “Go on.”

  “There was shouting, lots of shouting, and a cricket bat thumping a man on the ground near the tipper. I think it was the driver, but I never saw the person behind the wheel.”

  “What were you doing in the park?”

  Mae laughed. “I dropped off my employer for a meeting and took his dog for a run.”

  “Can you tell us how many people were beating the driver?”

  “No. I remember the cricket bat, not the people carrying out the beating.” She looked at Ponsonby again. His spectacles were a throwback to early 70s Elton John, only without diamantes. She snorted, picturing the Inspector wearing a coat made of ostrich plumes and gold sequins. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to laugh. This is rather surreal and I feel as if I’m sleepwalking wide awake.”

  “Yes. That’s totally understandable.” Ponsonby inhaled and exhaled. “You’re a butler, is that correct?”

  “Yes. Inspector, has anyone ever said you remind them of Elton John?”
she said.

  Chung had a small cough to cover a chuckle before he made a clicking noise with his teeth. “A woman butler. Not something you see every day. Okay, this may be difficult and I’m sorry, but can you walk us through the morning? You dropped off your employer and then… Start with whatever you recall.”

  “I took the dog for a run. After the run, we went back to the car. I passed a man in lycra whizzing about on his bike and another man in a pork-pie hat. He was built like a rugby player, you know, all muscle and no neck, and the pork-pie hat was too big for his head. He spoke Spanish. The dog and I got in the car to go. Except we didn’t go anywhere because the tipper hit the car. I don’t remember it actually happening. The next thing I know, I was looking at a woman crushed between the tipper and the car I was in. She was still alive, but choking on something. We were looking at each other. I think I got out of the car—well, I fell out of the car, and there was another woman on the ground, a man too. I’d seen him riding a bicycle. They were both dead.”

  Ponsonby adjusted his glasses and tapped soundless fingers on the table. “Did you see anyone get out of the tipper?”

  “No. I was trying to…” Mae heard a sudden, rattling choking sound of the crushed woman’s last breaths, “…I was attempting to give first aid to the woman trapped on the bonnet of my employer’s car. She died right in front of me. I held her hand. All I could do was hold her hand. I couldn’t help her or the other woman or the man. I guess I heard the cricket bat before I saw it.

  “Did you see anyone inside the tipper then, or was the driver on the ground then?”

  “No, but the door was open. Somebody had already pulled him out.”

  Ponsonby leaned forward. “How long did you witness the tipper driver being beaten before you tried to stop it?”

  Mae squeezed her eyes shut and pinched the bridge of her nose, then wished she hadn’t. The flesh was tender. She’d been struck by something that had made her nose bleed. Her head ached, the shell of her ear twinged in time with her heartbeat, the burns on her neck pulsed too, but nothing was broken. The woman crushed between the Bentley and tipper had been broken. The other woman and the man with the bicycle had been broken. The tipper driver, beaten with a cricket bat, had been broken. “A minute, three minutes, an hour, I don’t know, he was broken. They were all broken. I couldn’t help any of them.” She opened her eyes. “Do you have enough? I’d like to bathe.”