by David Carter
The fat one thought that an odd thing to say, enough for him to make a mental note to check that exact point when they arrived back at the office. It was just him they wanted, wasn’t it? Good question.
‘Oh yes, just you,’ confirmed the thin one, winking again at the schoolgirl jailbait, before dragging Colin down the path toward the car. ‘Just you mate, just you.’
IN EAST ANGLIA, JOSS was called to the officers’ quarters. A messenger had arrived especially, a skinny spotty ginger haired youth who had appeared breathless at the doorway to their hut.
‘Right now!’ he’d said. ‘They said you must come Right away. Most pacific they were.’
‘Not pacific, specific you idiot,’ corrected Joss.
‘I don’t freaking know, do I,’ screamed the youth. ‘You from the grammar police, or what?’ he whinged, close to losing his temper. He was miffed enough about missing his afternoon mug of tea and sticky bun, and he could do without some snotty stuck up tart correcting his dubious English language.
Joss made her way across the camp toward the officers’ hut, a structure that could only be differentiated from the rest of them by the red and white signs outside, and the hastily repaired walls. She went inside, full of hope, for she imagined that Frank had finally swung her release. Perhaps that strange Mister Granger had come through for her at last. Her information contribution had finally been properly recognised, and not before time.
The atmosphere inside the hut was not conducive to optimism.
There were perhaps ten officers there, some standing and talking, some gabbling on mobile phones, some sitting at desks writing, and one or two asleep. They were all women. Those that were awake glanced at one another at the arrival of Joss, or so it seemed to her, as if respectfully waiting for the senior shit to start speaking. Rank was everything. Rank was authority. Rank was king.
Joss stood self-consciously in the middle of the room, until finally she said: ‘I’ve been summoned!’
‘Shut your gob until you are spoken to!’ said the fattest one, as she lay on a bed, murdering a bar of chocolate.
Joss pulled a face.
One of the officers, who had been standing with her back to Joss, slowly turned about.
‘Name?’ she barked, through a whiny, nasally voice.
‘Cornelius, J.’
‘Yes.... Cornelius, J.... we have been waiting for you, haven’t we. There has been some news. Bad news.... for you.... sweetie-pie. Your father has been arrested.... on terrorism charges. Obviously it is impossible for the daughter of a terrorist to remain in the Party. Your provisional membership has been expunged,’ and she stepped forward and seized and ripped the badge from Joss’s shirt, tearing a rough hole in the collar in the process.
Joss flushed. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘It’s simple, Cornelius, J. Your father has been busted, and now, so have you.’ Several of the others tittered. ‘Now beat it, shit-head! Dismissed!’
It was all Joss could do not to burst into tears, as she scurried outside and hurried back to the hut. She was no longer a John Hop, no badge, no authority, no perks, no respect. Her former colleagues would shun her, she knew that, and the other non-party members would shun her too. No one ever wanted to know a busted officer, no matter how lowly the rank, just in case she wasn’t truly busted at all.
Joss was alone with her thoughts, and it wouldn’t be long before those thoughts centred on one thing. Escape.
EARLIER THAT DAY, A young woman wearing a school uniform had arrived outside the maroon boathouse on the Dorset Stour River. She stopped and scooped up several pieces of gravel. Her aim was true. The first stone struck the window where Adam was stretched out on the sofa reading an old Viz comic. Viz was a banned publication for it was deemed not to show sufficient respect to public servants.
Banned or not, it had more readers than ever before, readers who enthusiastically passed round back copies, for they were amongst the most sought after of banned publications. There was a thriving collectors’ market too, and ridiculous prices had been paid for some of the more controversial issues. Adam was engrossed; reading about their most celebrated character, and he had to rein in his laughter. It was then he heard the rattle of stone on glass.
He was slightly puzzled as to why Eve had returned, but pleased too, for she was good company, and he was becoming lonely, holed up in that damp, timber hut. Her visits were the highlights of his day. Perhaps she had returned with extra rations, for he was still hungry. He jumped from the sofa and skipped down the stairs.
‘Hello, you,’ he said, as he began opening up. ‘Hope you’ve brought more food. I’m still starving.’ He yanked open the door and saw a young woman standing there.
She was pointing a Berretta pistol at his face.
‘I am a SPATs officer,’ she spat out. ‘Get inside, and no sudden movements.’
‘I hope you have brought some food with you,’ joked Adam, as he trotted up the stairs. ‘I’m bloody starving.’
‘Shut the fuck up!’ she said, a comment Adam thought most unladylike.
Standing in the centre of the room he stared across at her in the school uniform she had clearly grown out of. She was older than Eve, but not by so much, and she was quite good looking, in a millennial kind of way, all big blonde hair and eye makeup and a little too much perfume, and Adam couldn’t help but wonder why such a young woman would ever want to join the SPATs.
He wondered what she had done to be given so much responsibility, and a firearm, at her age too. He was still thinking of that when she clipped his wrists together. Shiny new cuffs, hot off the press. There was a great demand in the kingdom these days for stainless steel cuffs. He was about to ask her how and why she had become a SPAT, when two guys entered the room in a hurry.
‘Everything all right, Di?’ said the taller one.
‘Everything is fine,’ she said cockily. ‘The guy’s a pussy. Trussed up and ready to go.’
One of the blokes grabbed Adam’s arm and led him toward the door.
‘Can I take my chocolate?’ he pleaded, glancing back at the coffee table.
They all stared down at the small piece of dark chocolate remaining there, wrapped in twisted silver paper. The girlish thing bent down and picked it up, snapped it in half, and slipped a piece into her mouth.
‘No,’ she said grinning. ‘You can’t.’
Thirty-One
Martin was woken just before six in the morning. His head throbbed; his face had bulged hideously, as if someone had roughly stuck the inside of a golf ball above his eye. He was hungry and thirsty and his throat felt as if shards of glass had been secretly introduced.
The night before his comrades had quizzed him relentlessly on the whereabouts of Weston and Owens. Where had he been taken exactly? Where were the others? What had gone on? Initially, Martin had fobbed them off by saying that they had been separated and he had no idea where the others might be, though he knew they didn’t believe that. They were to discover the truth soon enough, when Devlin returned from the pub with a stupid grin on his blotchy face.
He painted pictures in graphic detail, dwelling on the red stains on the promenade tarmac, and the sight of Owens’ crushed head lying on the mortuary slab afterwards, and all because their friend and comrade, Martin Reamse, couldn’t be bothered to release a tiny harmless piece of information. In time, they should all learn a lesson from that.
Eventually, Devlin left them alone, departing to the sound of chicken noises directed at Martin, and stupid laughter, and thoughts in Devlin’s mind that the others would gang up and give Martin a full-on shellacking. Kill him, even; that wouldn’t be the first time, and no one would be surprised at that, or too disappointed.
It was well into the small hours before Martin finally fell asleep. Some time later he was being roughly woken by a screw, poking his ribs with the end of a truncheon.
‘Up, Reamse!’ he yelled. ‘I won’t tell you again!’
‘What is it?’ mumbled
Martin, as he staggered into the rough clothing he had hastily piled in his locker not so long before.
The others were all awake too, taking turns to glare at him.
One said cheerily, ‘It’s your turn for the Blackpool jump, chicken! Cluck cluck cluck!’
The thought of another visit to Blackpool Tower made Martin feel physically sick. The only reason he didn’t vomit was because his stomach was empty.
‘Get your things together!’ screamed the screw.
That was a laugh, thought Martin; his things consisted of a comb, which was a pretty useless article seeing as he was hairless, and a toothbrush. It wouldn’t take a lot of packing.
A few moments later, Martin was led outside and thrown into the back of the same white transit van; the only thing different being the driver was a stranger. Through Martin’s good eye he managed to make out that instead of heading north toward the city centre, and the Tower, they had turned south. There was no doubt about it; they were heading toward Preston, and the motorway network beyond. But where were they going? And why?
DURING THE DAY, THEY stopped just the once, somewhere in the English Midlands for a pissbreak, as the guard referred to it, and a polythene plate of poorly cooked chips soaked in substitute vinegar that Martin ate without a pause.
After that, the van sped onward, southward, cruising the A419, a four-lane highway, sweeping down the Swindon by-pass, heading for the M4. They didn’t get that far. After passing the recently nationalised Honda car factory on the left, the van turned hard right at the next roundabout. Then right again into a small and newly constructed approach road. Martin guessed they had almost arrived. It had taken nine hours of hard bucking driving to reach Swindon, and the van was on its last legs.
The driver yawned loudly, and sang a song by the same singer that Devlin had been so keen to learn his bedroom habits. Then the van came to an abrupt halt, Martin hearing the handbrake spitefully jerked on. In the next moment the back door was flung open.
‘Out, prick!’
He peered past the guard at the modern grey concrete building beyond. They had pulled up close to the main entrance, an inviting first appearance of floor-to-ceiling plate glass windows. Above the glass, a blue neon sign shimmered, advertising itself to the world as: The Bletchington Clinic.
His keeper beckoned him toward the glass, but they were not windows at all, but doors. Martin pushed the left one open and they went inside beneath the blue humming sign. He found himself standing at a white hospital-like reception desk. The driver exchanged words with two guys sitting on high stools behind the counter. They were dressed in pristine nursing jackets and were young, clean-shaven, and fit. The driver passed them his clipboard and they signed for the consignment known as Martin Reamse. Delivery complete, responsibility shifted, time to get away for a bit of R & R, and a nice meal and a fag and a shag.
One of the guys came around the counter and grabbed Martin’s right wrist. The nurse or whatever he was, didn’t say a word, just tugged him away, along a white sterile corridor, pausing only to take a curious look at the bump on Martin’s face, though he still said nothing.
At the end of the corridor they turned left and walked some more until the nurse opened a door on the left side, and pushed Martin inside. The door closed behind him, and Martin heard it being locked.
The room was a cross between a cell and a hotel bedroom.
Against the right wall was a wonderful single bed, beautiful in Martin’s eyes, or in his good eye, freshly made and inviting in appearance. On the left side of the room was a pink padded chair, and at the far end behind a partition, a sink, shower, and lavatory. Beyond the bathroom area was a lancet window, more of a medieval slit in the thick walls, no more than four inches wide. He squinted through the double glazed glass. Darkness was coming down fast but he could just make out rough lawns with a circular bed of small trees in the centre, and more similar buildings beyond. He thought of taking a shower, yet as soon as he sat on the bed and kicked up his feet and lay back; he was lost on the cool linen pillow and sleep followed fast.
The next thing he knew, it was morning.
His door was open and someone was shouting at him to get up. He peered through sore eyes and remembered his damaged eye, and stroked it. It was tender to the touch and his vision was still blurred. He focused on the young guy in black trousers and white nurse’s jacket. There was some kind of fancy epaulettes on his shoulders that said Princess Alexandra’s something or others. Who the hell was Princess Alexandra anyway?
‘If you want any breakfast,’ the guy said coldly, ‘you have to get washed and shaved first.’
‘I don’t have any things,’ mumbled Martin.
‘On the sink,’ he said. ‘Open your goddamn eyes!’
He was right. There was a single throwaway razor there, and a tiny bar of pink soap, the kind you see in cheap motels the world over, plus a small can of unbranded shaving foam. Martin couldn’t remember those things being there before, though he couldn’t be sure.
The shower came on as if it was reading Martin’s mind, and he shrugged off his rough clothes and stepped under the tepid water. Goose bumps bubbled up everywhere, as the water cascaded over his shaved head, and down his back, and over his twitching backside. He went to work with the soap and by the time he had finished the soap had vanished.
The water cut off, and he leant out and reached across for the single hand towel. When he was dry, he shaved himself with the same tepid water from the sink, inevitably cutting himself several times under the chin. While he was doing that he was conscious of the nurse, guard, or whatever he was, back in the room, setting up a small folding table. He was laying out what looked like breakfast, and Martin was ready for that. He hadn’t eaten a thing since those cardboard chips.
He rubbed the top of his head with the palm of his hand. The hair was beginning to grow back, his scalp was itchy, and a hint of colour had returned.
‘You look gorgeous,’ said the guard, watching Martin, as the guard stood with both hands on his hips. ‘Come and sit down.’
Martin went to the table.
From somewhere, a bowl of stodgy looking porridge appeared. It was steaming and smelt OK.
‘Eat it or lose it,’ said the guy.
Martin sat down and began eating, as he watched his keeper reach out to the corridor and return with a mug of stewed tea from a stainless steel trolley. A white plastic plate appeared bearing a single slice of dry toast. The porridge tasted better than it looked. Martin swigged the tea, wondering what noxious chemicals might be hiding in there. He picked up the toast and showed it to the guard, hoping for butter, or margarine.
‘Most people save a little porridge and spread it on the toast,’ the guard explained, ‘moistens it, apparently,’ as if he were a top TV chef dispensing vital culinary information.
‘Thanks for the advice,’ said Martin, handing his empty porridge dish to the guard. ‘Even if it was a bit late.’
‘You didn’t ask.’
He bit off the corner of the toast with a loud crunch.
‘What is this place?’
‘After brekky,’ said the guy. ‘We’ll catch up together. Tell you what’s what, that kind of thing. All will be revealed.’
‘OK,’ said Martin, bobbing his head, and moistening his mouth to deal with the dried baked bread. He’d remember that tomorrow, the little trick with the porridge, if it were a regular thing.
It was clear that breakfast was over.
The door to the room was still open, yet no one had traversed the corridor, nor had anyone outside shouted a thing. It was eerily silent as if they were the only people in the building, and that didn’t sit right. The guard was busying himself folding up the table, and placing it behind the door against the wall. The dishes were gone, the room spotlessly clean, and the heating on. It couldn’t have been more different to the shithole in Blackpool, and when the guy came back into the room, he was carrying a large blue file. He turned the pink armchair towa
rd the bed and sat down and beckoned Martin to sit on the mattress.
‘Right,’ he said, balancing the upended file on his knees, and looking at the first sheet of paper. ‘You are Martin Reamse, and you are twenty-nine.’
‘Well done,’ said Martin, sarcastically.
The nurse looked up and sighed.
‘Look fella, take my advice, I can make your life here bearable, or difficult. You cooperate with me, and you’ll find things more comfortable. Get my drift?’
Martin nodded. ‘Yeah, sorry.’
‘My name is Jason Wellworthy, and I will be your case officer while you are here.’
‘Sounds grand,’ said Martin, just about keeping the sarcasm from his voice.
‘Not really,’ said the guy, almost smiling.
This bloke was in his early thirties, Martin guessed, and he looked pretty fit too. Perhaps he worked out. Perhaps in his line of employment they were encouraged to work out. Martin instinctively knew the guy could handle himself well enough, and he wouldn’t fancy his chances against him, if it ever came to that.
‘You are here for observation and assessment.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘Precisely what it says. You will be thoroughly interrogated again. It says here, the authorities are certain that you know far more than you have yet revealed.’
‘They always think that.’
‘That’s as maybe, but take my advice, Martin, tell them everything you know, and as soon as you can. It will be far better for you in the longer term. Believe me; I know what I am talking about. Everyone here always talks in the end. It’s only a matter of time. It’s your only chance, my friend. You could save yourself a lot of grief, and I mean a lot.’
