State Sponsored Terror

by David Carter

  ‘Where can I find Elizabeth Mariner?’

  ‘She’s in the dealing room,’ answered the girl in a squeaky voice, pointing to the right.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Hewitt, smiling at the pretty girl, before hurrying after his boss.

  ‘You can’t go through there, sir!’

  ‘Watch me!’ shouted Smeggan over his shoulder, as he pushed his way through the double doors.

  Inside, things were quiet. Some staff were away at lunch, others were eating at their desks, reading the latest edition of The Messenger. Many of the desks were unmanned and empty, a result of the recent bout of redundancies. Of the twenty-four work stations, only a quarter were occupied.

  ‘Which one of you is Elizabeth Mariner?’ Smeggan barked.

  Elizabeth looked up from her newspaper.

  The others betrayed her by staring at her. Smeggan didn’t wait for an answer. He was already beside her, gloating down.

  ‘Elizabeth Mariner, I am arresting you under the Prevention of Terror Act. You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention now, something you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’

  Liz glanced disdainfully up at him. ‘I do not recognise the significance of those words,’ she said, ‘and I would like to exercise my legal right to refer to PACE, the Police and Criminal Evidence Act.’

  Smeggan scoffed.

  ‘Is everything all right, Liz,’ said one of the young dealers, getting to his feet, and making toward his colleague.

  ‘I’d take a seat if I were you, sir,’ said Hewitt, grabbing the guy from behind by the shoulders, and forcing him back into his chair.

  ‘A clever arse, eh?’ snapped Smeggan at Liz. ‘Don’t you so hate clever arses, Hewitt?’

  ‘I do that, sir,’ he answered, right on cue.

  Smeggan snapped the handcuffs to Elizabeth’s narrow wrists.

  ‘Is that really necessary?’

  ‘Rules are rules! All terrorist suspects are to be handcuffed at all times, immediately, without exception,’ parroted Smeggan.

  ‘I’ll need to get my things together and finish one or two jobs,’ she said, struggling to open her desk drawer.

  ‘You will collect nothing. You will finish nothing. You will come with us, now. Trevor, take her!’

  ‘Good God,’ she said, but by then she was being led away from her bemused colleagues who sat watching the lunchtime drama in silence.

  AT WATERLOO STATION, they boarded the Bournemouth train. It was due out in five minutes. It was already crammed, as Smeggan led the way toward the second coach, pausing to peep behind, to see Hewitt almost dragging the suspect after him.

  ‘Come on Hewitt!’ he shouted, turning to the front, grinning. ‘We mustn’t miss the train!’

  In the coach, every seat was taken. Smeggan approached the first set of four seats and flashed his card.

  ‘I am commandeering this area,’ he barked. ‘Away!’

  On the left side sat two aging city type gents, matching Messengers spread out at the business pages on the table. They glanced once respectfully at the ID card, stood up, collected their bags from the rack above, and disappeared further up the train without a word. On the other side of the table sat a mother with a boy who might have been her son. The kid looked about thirteen.

  ‘Where are we supposed to go?’ the woman moaned.

  ‘Not my problem!’ shouted Smeggan. ‘Shift yourselves!’

  ‘Really! This simply is not good enough. I am going to make an official complaint.’

  Smeggan leant down and removed a handful of the straight brown hair that covered her ear. ‘We are apprehending dangerous terrorist suspects here,’ he said coldly. ‘They are being taken to Hampshire for urgent interrogation, now unless you want to come along and join the party, I suggest you shift yourself.... and be quick about it.’

  The woman glanced at Liz, and half smiled.

  ‘Come on mum,’ said the boy, ‘I think we better do as the man says.’

  ‘That’s the spirit,’ said Trevor, playing good cop, as he pushed Liz down into one of the seats vacated by the gents. Security regs demanded he handcuff her to the arm of the frame of the seat, which he did, before reaching up and removing the woman and boy’s bags from the rack. ‘I am sure you will find fresh seats,’ he said sympathetically, ‘further on up the train.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said the woman, without a smile, and a moment later they too were gone.

  The train began rolling, creeping westwards, through busy sections of track, weaving between gangs of bored maintenance workers, high above the dingy suburbs of Clapham. Liz stared out through the dirty glass, though not for long, for she closed her eyes and dozed. She knew well enough why they wanted to talk to her, but she also knew she hadn’t committed any serious offence, beyond perhaps sheltering a frightened, if wanted teenager, and surely they wouldn’t throw the book at her for that. Would they? Could they? She thought back to the morning, checking and rechecking in her mind her movements and actions.

  Martin had volunteered to drive her to London. He said it would be safer that way, and he was probably right. Martin was annoyed that before they had left she had nipped out to buy a newspaper and chocolate for the lad. He was always nibbling on chocolate; it seemed to be the only thing that kept him going. In her head, Liz remembered Adam’s exact words.

  ‘The good stuff!’ he’d demanded. ‘The dark Swiss stuff, none of that English milk rubbish, and a Messenger too if you don’t mind. I want to read about the Saints, now they are back in the Premier League.’

  The good stuff, as he called it, was becoming harder to obtain, and more expensive too, though she didn’t mind the cost. The more she grew to know Adam Goodchild the more she liked the kid. There was something indefinable about him. He was young and carefree and optimistic, despite the recent violent death of his mother. But far beyond that, he possessed what used to be called balls, there was no denying that. It was becoming a rare thing in a man, balls, or so it seemed to her. She wanted to find out more about his interests and friends, and as she sat there with her eyes closed, pretending to sleep, she wondered where he was, and what he was doing at that precise moment.

  She reasoned that if these SPATs guys knew where she worked, then they probably knew where she lived, and in that case she guessed their officers would have visited 20 Blue Reef Point. They were probably ransacking her apartment at that very moment, and what terrible images that conjured up.

  Did that mean that Adam was also in custody? Perhaps Martin too? And if so, what had they confessed to? She wasn’t worried, not overly; she wasn’t the worrying kind, and she still didn’t believe that what she had done was so terribly dreadful.

  She closed her eyes tight and began snoring softly, though she didn’t approach sleep. She wanted time to think things through, for she knew she would be rigorously questioned soon enough, and in that, she was right. Two and a half hours later to be precise.

  It was just after three o’clock when Smeggan closed the door to the interview room with a bang, and sat down, Hewitt by his side, Liz opposite. The recording CD already on, though the final disk would not be made available to defence counsel. All that namby pamby human rights drivel had been put to bed several years before, courtesy of the Leader, and thank the Lord for that, thought Smeggan, for wasn’t policing so much more efficient and result driven now, than it had ever been during that stagnant period before, those years that now seemed so far away. Dead years, he called them. No solicitor was present either, snapping around their ankles, though she would be granted one, eventually, once she had been charged, if it came to that.

  ‘Put the lie detector on her arm,’ ordered Smeggan.

  ‘Sir!’ said Hewitt, as he stood and made his way toward Liz, where he rolled the right arm of her jacket and blouse to her elbow and connected the wires of the latest model to her fair skin.

  In the Service it was known as LIDA, the Lie Detection Assessor, a
nd LIDA was a girl’s name that meant beloved of the people and how apt was that, thought Smeggan. LIDA was indeed beloved in the Service and throughout the security services too, because it worked so well. It produced reliability results almost on a par with the advent of DNA testing, and most powerfully of all, it was compulsory, and just like DNA, discovered in Britain.

  There was a mandatory ten-year hard labour jail sentence for anyone refusing to accept LIDA, straight off to Dartmoor – your feet wouldn’t touch - and refusing wasn’t such a bright idea anyway, for it meant the suspect was strapped to the chair and LIDA was forcibly introduced. The prisoner would receive a mandatory ten-year sentence, with hard labour, for nothing. No one refused LIDA anymore, no one other than the criminally insane, or those who had simply given up.

  Hewitt fixed the wires as gently as he could, though there was still an initial sharp jab of pain for the interviewee, as the first hint of electricity was introduced into the device, into Liz’s arm.

  Liz jumped.

  ‘What do you know about the Tinbergen Papers?’ asked Smeggan.

  The liquid crystal display on LIDA flared upward, as did Hewitt’s nostrils and eyebrows, as he exchanged glances with his boss.

  ‘Well, well, well!’ said Smeggan triumphantly. ‘What have we here? You have successfully been caught lying, before you have even opened what some men might consider to be, your pretty little gob, and that has to be a first, eh Hewitt?’

  ‘It does sir, so far as I know, sir, yes it does.’

  ‘So I repeat, Miss Mariner, what do you know about the Tinbergen Papers? And before you answer, I advise you to think very carefully before replying.’

  Elizabeth gathered herself.

  ‘I don’t know what you are talking about.’

  Hewitt squinted down at the display. ‘Not much, sir,’ he said in a surprised tone, ‘just a flicker.’

  ‘I am not having that,’ snapped Smeggan, ‘I am not a fool, and we will stay here for as long as it takes, until we get to the root of the matter. There will be no tea breaks, no coffee breaks, no comfort breaks, no toilet breaks, if you get my drift, at least not for you, my dear, not until we are satisfied that you have told us everything you know. So let us begin again. This is how it works. We ask you questions. You tell us all about the Tinbergen Papers, or you will stay here, in this room, in that filthy chair, until you do. I would remind you that we can legitimately hold you for 180 days under the recent Terror Laws. If we have to detain you here at this desk for the next 180 days, then I am quite prepared to do precisely that. Are you prepared to sit there for that long.... in soiled underwear, with your tongue hanging out? Come on, dear lady; let us avoid the need for things getting messy, the Tinbergen Papers, if you please. Start talking!’

  Thirteen

  Earlier that day, shortly after Liz and Martin had left for London; Adam had been sitting before the picture window, staring down at the surfers. He ate half the chocolate Liz had bought, as he scanned through The Messenger, and the news of the Saint’s latest Premier League thrashing at the hands of Brighton & Hove Albion.

  There was nothing in the newspaper about his mother, not a word; indeed no terrorist related stories at all, other than the ubiquitous warnings about who one spoke to, and what you spoke about, and after that, paragraphs on the official line about the importance of cooperating with the police, and particularly the SPATs, at all times. For some reason he became fidgety. He felt an urge to get out of the apartment; almost as if someone was telling him to clear out, and at ten past nine, he did just that.

  He went for a walk down toward the splendid new Boscombe pier. He didn’t notice the grubby Ford saloon, and the two desperate-looking ill shaven guys inside, travelling quickly in the opposite direction, toward Liz’s flat.

  There weren’t many people on the promenade, a few day-trippers down from Swindon, or some other horrific sprawling conurbation in the hinterland. There were a splash of diehard surfers who now rode the artificial reef all year round, but Adam had no desire to join them. He came to a bus stop where three old bats, as he saw them, were waiting, greyhairs, senior citizens, call them what you will.

  They all appeared like his great aunties from years ago, as they eyed him suspiciously, as he had noticed older people now often did. Perhaps they thought he would grab their bags and do a runner. It wasn’t unusual, even down there on the prom. Whatever they were thinking, their amateur detection programme was soon interrupted when the 121 bus rolled up, flaunting itself with LYMINGTON & BROCKENHURST boldly lit up in orange on the destination sign above the driver’s head. The old bats struggled onto the bus, and Adam duly followed.

  It was as well that Liz had slipped him a ten pound note, just in case, she had said, you never know when you might need it, and she was right at that, and though the grumpy bus driver bleated some nonsense about passengers who couldn’t be bothered to present the correct fare, Adam skipped up the stairs and sat down on the empty upper deck.

  He gazed out through the window at a young kid surfing the growing waves. He looked younger than himself, and he wondered why the kid wasn’t in school. The Education Welfare Officers would get a bollocking if they were caught.... not catching the kid. Adam laughed aloud. He was good, the surfer, expert even, far better than Adam could ever manage, and then the bus turned the corner and struggled up the hill, and the sea veered violently out of view. Adam was heading toward Brockenhurst. He was going home, and he wondered what he might find when he got there, and who he might meet.

  BROCK WAS MISERABLE and depressed. The sky was grey and teary as Adam hunched into his borrowed jacket and tried to become invisible as he sauntered past the house, his house, their house, Lilac cottage, the house where his mother had been killed, murdered in the back garden in a scene that belonged in the worst nightmare. It was still difficult to believe it had really happened.

  There was no one about, and no legal notice fixed on the front door, as he half expected. The curtains were open, just as they always were; the small front lawn appeared as if someone had attacked it in his absence. That was his job, Adam’s, the lawn mowing, so who had usurped him? Not that he cared who had cut their damned lawn. He didn’t break his stride or stare unnecessarily at the cottage; instead he fixed his eyesight toward the end of the lane, and walked steadily by. He only saw one person in the street, an old man he vaguely knew, but they didn’t speak, they never had. At the end of the lane Adam turned about and headed back toward the cottage, toward his home. But would he go in, and could he get in? He still hadn’t made up his mind as to whether he should try.

  When he reached the cottage path he found it impossible to walk by. He felt like an iron filing, irretrievably drawn to the magnetic blue front door. He turned right and scampered up the path. One quick look round. No one about. Key out, in the lock, turn to the right, door open, jump inside, door shut. Breathe out. Phew! Silence, but for his heavy breathing and thumping heart.

  The house appeared empty, as he hoped it would. There was broken glass in the hearth, and the remains of his photo frame strewn about the rug. It wasn’t difficult to guess who had stolen his picture. He went through to the kitchen and filled the kettle, as he always did, took the coffee from the cupboard and grabbed a clean mug.

  His arrival hadn’t gone unnoticed.

  Upstairs, on his mother’s bed, a woman stirred. Alerted by the noise downstairs. She rose and quickly dressed, for she imagined it was that bastard Smeggan. The night before she had let herself be persuaded, through a full bottle of good red wine, to come to the cottage with him. She had drunk every drop; he didn’t touch the stuff, though she now possessed a headache the like of which she had rarely experienced before.

  In the cold light of day she could not believe she had been so easily persuaded, and by a weasel like him. She put it down to the fact that SPATs officers could obtain better quality booze than anyone else, stronger, more potent, and she wasn’t used to it, though in that assumption, she was only partially r
ight.

  She felt dirty and defiled. There was no way on God’s earth she would ever agree to a second round of that, with him, though in truth, what that had consisted of, she wasn’t entirely sure, for she couldn’t remember much, not of what had occurred later on, though her body offered enough clues. She told herself that no matter what threat or deal lay on the table, or in their case, the bed, no matter what her son had done wrong, or how serious the charges against him might be, she would never agree to anything again with that vile man.

  She dressed in silence and tiptoed to the dressing table and carefully removed the things from the chunky glass plate that sat there; make-up and cheap costume jewellery, a half empty plastic bottle of nail varnish remover, and two old keys. She set them silently on the bed and grasped the dish, and hid behind the door. When Smeggan entered the bedroom she would crash it across his thinning hair. If it smashed his skull, so much the better, she was past caring.

  Adam drank his cheap supermarket coffee hot. It was dire, though the heat made it bearable, and he seriously doubted it had ever been truly acquainted with a coffee bean. He shivered, and that reminded him that he must collect his coat from his bedroom. He went to the stairs and began ascending.

  The woman heard him coming, the creak of the boards, the noise that a man’s body makes when it moves about a silent house. She tried not to breathe as her muscles involuntarily tensed. She clutched the heavy pressed glass and raised her arm high above her head. She heard the person on the landing outside. He went into the other bedroom and was doing something with the wardrobe doors. Then he was back; outside, inches away from where she stood, poised like a statue. She stopped breathing.

  Adam stood still, and peered in through the open door. He could see his mother’s things, scattered over the end of the bed, things that normally sat neatly on her dressing table. Why had the SPATs done that? What spiteful thinking was behind it? He would take them, those things, his mother’s possessions, as mementos, keepsakes, worthless items to anyone else, useless things, yet possessions that had once been treasured and polished and touched and loved by his dear mother. He would have them; he would gather them all, and take them back to Liz in Boscombe. He would keep them forever. He stepped inside the bedroom.