Who Dares Wins

by Vince Vogel

  Her eyes widened sharply and she turned to Dorring.

  “It’s okay, Mo,” he said. “It’d be nice to catch up.”

  With a look of confusion now nestled on her face, Mo stood up and glanced over at the bar.

  “Well, I had to clean the glasses anyway,” she said. “S’pose I better be gettin’ on with that.”

  She got up from her chair and went over to the bar, going in through the gap in the counter top left by Conner. Dorring’s old comrade took her former place and joined him in gazing out the window at the bay.

  “Looks like a pretty bad storm is coming,” Conner said.

  The water was very choppy in the harbor, tossing the boats about. Most of them were now in, their masts bobbing from side to side like the pendulum of a metronome. The storm was right at the mouth of the bay, a vortex of black cloud swirling angrily with the sea foaming and raging underneath. Even the gulls were flying off for cover, heading towards cliffs on one side of the bay’s mouth.

  Dorring felt unable to turn to the other man. There was so much he wanted to say, to ask, but he didn’t know exactly what was going on. Could Conner be trusted with the truth? Could he mention Kevin? Or was this man to be suspected and feared? Everything had been turned upside down and Dorring needed time to think of a strategy.

  Eventually, Conner turned to him from the view and Dorring did likewise. Their eyes met across the table and Dorring spotted a glint of sadness in the other man.

  “How are you, Conner?” he said.

  “I’m good, partner.”

  He offered his hand and Dorring took it. Their hands squeezed each other and Dorring noted that his old comrade had lost some of his muscle tone in the preceding years. Had replaced it with fat. On his lap sat a well fed stomach. It looked like a curled up cat sleeping under his shirt.

  Their hands parted and they went back to staring for a few seconds more. Dorring gathered that Conner was weighing him up. There was a look on his face full of suspicion and intrigue.

  “What are you doing here, Dorring?” he asked.

  “What is it with everyone in this place?” Dorring said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, first the ferryman. Then the barmaid. Now you. Why’s everyone so eager to know why I’m here?”

  “We don’t get many visitors this time of year.”

  “Probably because you scare them all off.”

  “Probably.” They were silent a little longer and then Conner added, “So what are you doing here?”

  “I’m on holiday,” Dorring stated blankly while looking square into Conner’s eyes.

  “And you came here to McGuffin?”

  “Yes. I read about it in an article.”

  “What article?”

  “National Geographic. An article on the fauna and flora of the Outer Hebrides. You have a type of seal that comes to the beaches at this time of year. Only five hundred in existence. Then there’s a heather that grows only on this island. Extremely rare. I believe your boss grows it for his pharmaceutical company.”

  “He does. Gordon’s Heather.”

  “That’s the one,” Dorring said, looking him straight in the eyes.

  “So what, you’re retired now?” Conner asked next.

  “Yes. Have been for some time.”

  “I would have thought you’d have stayed in the unit your whole life. I could never imagine you being very good in the real world.”

  “I’m not. That’s why I travel.”

  “Got a good pension then?”

  “Enough. Plus, my mum died and I inherited a little.”

  “I’m sorry to hear about that.”

  “You’ve nothing to feel sorry for,” Dorring said blankly, his eyes trained on the man opposite.

  Conner grinned and pointed a thick finger straight at Dorring.

  “You always were a dry bastard, Dorring,” he said with a grin.

  Alex turned back to the storm. It was in the bay now. He spotted three boats out to sea that were obviously late in. They were riding the great waves, climbing steadily up their steep banks and then toppling over the other side, their bows smashing down into the water as the boat came over the peak, disappearing partway under so that for a few seconds you were afraid that the rest of the boat would follow, until it’d emerge back out of the water and the boat would ride up the slope of the next wave.

  “You still see the boys?” Dorring said without turning from the view.

  “The boys? Huh! Not really. Christmas cards. But not much else. You?”

  “No. I haven’t seen anyone since the day I left.”

  “I heard that. Some of us tried to find you, but it was impossible.”

  “I hid myself away,” Dorring said in a hollow voice.

  “Someone said they heard you’d moved upstairs. Joined special branch.”

  Dorring turned to Conner and gazed into him. He realized that his former comrade knew nothing for sure and—like he’d said—had only heard a rumor. A very close to the truth rumor. But a rumor all the same.

  “Nothing so illustrious,” Dorring said with a blank look. “I was discharged and for the last ten years I’ve been traveling around.”

  “Traveling around? Like a bloody nomad?”

  “Like a bloody nomad,” Dorring repeated. “So go on then: who sends you Christmas cards?”

  Conner had to think a moment. Then he answered.

  “Packham—you remember Chris?”

  “Yeah. I remember Chris Packham.”

  “Him. Durant. Harding. Johnson. Mckay. You know—the rest of the boys. All except you.”

  It was his turn to stare into Dorring.

  “I’m not the Christmas card kind of guy,” Alex said.

  “More the show up out of nowhere kind of guy,” Conner suggested.

  “Yeah. But like I said, I’m on holiday. Read an article and was interested about the place. Thought I’d come out here.”

  “And you happen to end up in this pub on the day I walk into it?”

  “Yes.”

  “How’d you end up here in this pub?”

  “This pub?”

  “Yes.”

  “The taxi driver brought me here,” Dorring explained coolly. “I got off the ferry, got in his car and asked for a bar, thinking it the best place to find somewhere to stay. He dropped me right outside that door.”

  “So this is serendipitous?”

  “Yeah. I guess.”

  The two turned their heads and went back to staring at the boats. Three of them were still caught in the storm, but had entered the mouth of the bay and were now safe. Fishermen lined the railings at the front of the harbor. It appeared they were waiting for the last of the men and were relieved that the boats had made it. Once they were mooring themselves on the jetties, the mass of fishermen began to break up and started to make their way up the stone steps to the pub. Soon, the place would be filled with their wet, worn bodies.

  “You seen any of the others from that time?” Dorring said.

  “What is this?” Conner retorted peevishly.

  Dorring turned to him. “I asked a simple question. Out of interest. It’s up to you if you want to answer.”

  Conner pierced his eyes at Dorring and his lip curled slightly.

  “So?” Dorring pressed him.

  “From time to time,” Conner replied blankly.

  “Any of them come visit you here?”

  “No. I go to see them on the mainland.”

  “So no one from back then has come to see you here on McGuffin?”

  Dorring’s gray eyes penetrated the other man.

  “No one has come here,” Conner said, and Dorring could see no evidence of a lie, though Conner always did have a good poker face.

  The first of the fishermen entered the pub, the bell above the door going wild.

  “Ten pints o’ ale, missy,” a large man with a ruddy face said. “An’ ten whiskeys to go with it. We need our barnacles warmed here. Hell
of a day.”

  The men spotted Conner and nodded to him reverently. He nodded back without taking his eyes off Dorring.

  “You know,” he said, his voice low and drowned out by the general din that had come in with the men, “a lot of us thought maybe you’d left the unit because of what happened in Helmand.”

  He stared at Dorring with a solemn expression. The look intimated exactly what part of their five years in Helmand he meant, and it made Dorring mad. The latter clenched his fists and gritted his teeth, his whole body going rigid.

  “And what would you know about Helmand, Conner?” he said.

  “Why’re you here, Alex?” Conner said back, ignoring the question.

  “A holiday. Why’re you here?”

  “I work on this island. I protect this island. I worry when I see a man like you roaming around it. It makes me uneasy for its citizens.”

  The two men stared at each other and it appeared you’d need a knife to cut through the tension building between them, their eyes burning into each other. Dorring began to assess the situation. Assess where everyone was in relation to himself. Who would be a danger and who wouldn’t. In what order he’d have to fight. Conner first. He was by far the most dangerous. The fishermen were big men, but he was sure they knew little of fighting. Of real fighting. Mac the landlord looked like he could handle himself, but only if the thing he had to handle was a drunk in need of being shoved out after one too many. No, he’d be no hassle either.

  But there was no need to fight.

  A face came to the door. A neat and tidy face. The type used to moisturizer and a distinct lack of cold, salty air lashing against it. It was such a contrast from the red, wind-burned faces of the fishermen. And his gold-rimmed glasses looked expensive. Not the sort of thing a fishermen can afford, no matter how many fish he catches.

  “Conner?” he called through the door in a well-to-do voice.

  The fishermen turned and all of them removed their hoods and held them to their chests.

  “Good day to ya, Lord Appleby,” they said in unison like a men's choir.

  “Good day, chaps,” the man at the door said, brushing a manicured hand through his manicured hair. “Bit of a storm out there. I hope none of you were caught too badly in it.”

  “Nay. Only a wee bit o’ bother for some o’ tha boys who were picking up the crabbing pots further oot. But we’re all back now.”

  “Good to hear,” Appleby said before turning his eyes back on Conner.

  “I’ll be going,” Conner said to Dorring, standing up. “Stay out of trouble.”

  He walked out with Lord Appleby and Dorring watched through the window of the door as they got into a white Rolls Royce and drove away.

  “What were that about?”

  Dorring turned to his left and found Mo standing beside him.

  “Nothing,” Dorring replied. “Just catching up.”

  “You both looked real intense.”

  “We served in the SAS together. Our relationship was born in intensity.”

  “I guess,” she said, looking a little bewildered by what he’d just said. “Anyway, I’ll have to finish serving this lot before I can go. Probably be aboot an hour. Is that okay?”

  “Sure. I’ll go for a little walk.”

  5

  Dorring didn’t leave his bag in the pub. He took it with him. He walked north from the Mermaid and Anchor, away from the bay and towards the hill with the church. The one he’d seen from the ferry. He walked up narrow cobbled streets where people ran into buildings out of the rain. It was hitting fast and Dorring brought the hood of his coat over his head.

  At the main town center, he passed shop windows where people stared out at the big man passing by under the weight of the rain and his rucksack. He wondered whether they’d already heard of the stranger in town. He turned east onto a residential road and from the windows, children ogled him until their mothers pulled them away.

  Passing along a narrow alleyway that split the tight town like a crack, he decided to take a break from the rain and hunkered under the shelter of a doorway. Hidden from the rest of the alley, he stood wondering where he would go when a figure walked past the mouth of the doorway.

  It was the woman from the ferry. She was under a hood, but he spotted the face poking out and observed the mole on her cheek. She hadn’t noticed him when she went past and he leaned out of the doorway and watched her as she walked to the end of the alley. With nothing else to do, he decided to follow her. Not in any malevolent way, but because he was simply curious. Though he couldn’t tell if it was his attraction to her that made him that way, or the fact that she struck him as mysterious, what with the photograph and the sad look he’d seen in her eyes during the journey from the mainland.

  Dorring left the doorway and followed behind through the veil of thumping rain. At the end of the alley, he turned left and traveled uphill along another narrow passage, the woman some twenty or so yards in front. He followed her up a steep hill and she never once turned over her shoulder. Observing her as she went through a tall iron gate that led up stone steps into a cemetery, Dorring waited at the bottom for her to reach the top before he too went under the arch of the gate. At the summit, he passed the statue of a tearful angel that stood guard, being sure to pat its head as he did.

  Dorring stopped and gazed through the rain at a field of gravestones and monuments, the white, gleaming church standing to the side and looking as if it was made from bone. The hill appeared to be the highest point of McGuffin and overlooked the whole island. Dorring wondered if it was so the dead had a clear view of the bay in order to look over their ancestors. Perhaps that was the thinking behind it.

  The woman was walking amongst the graves. Dorring stood watching her as she stopped in front of one. Getting closer, he took cover behind a large monument that honored all the fishermen who’d lost their lives to their age old enemy, the sea. It was a wall of marble covered in the names and dates of the departed men. At its top was a marble carving of snarling fishermen dragging in a large net. Working hard above the names of the dead.

  The woman stood before the grave for some time and though it was hard to tell through the thick, beaded curtain of rain, Dorring was sure that she was crying over it. Eventually, she kneeled before the headstone and kissed it. Then she left. Dorring watched her disappear back down the stone steps. Then he came out of his hiding spot, leaving the hardworking fishermen to their eternal struggle with the net, and walked to the grave.

  The stone had been desecrated, the top half of it smashed off. Around it grew weeds and the grave was unkempt and grown over. Glancing up the rows of nearby graves, Dorring noted that the others were all well looked after. It made him wonder why this one had been left to nature, as well as being desecrated.

  Coming to the headstone, he moved the weeds back with his hand and found a partial inscription, the rest of which had been on the smashed off piece of stone. There was the end of a name and a date.

  hlin 1960 to 1995.

  That was all.

  Standing up from the grave, Dorring glanced around. The cemetery was the size of a football pitch, lined with neat rows of graves that bent with the hill. A few wide oak grew in places and an iron fence surrounded it all.

  Dorring saw something through the thick rain.

  A figure was standing beside an oak tree at the edge. At first, Dorring mistook it for a stone statue—some gargoyle keeping watch over the dead—but he soon realized it was a live person. The man—his size dictated this assumption—was tall and dressed in jeans and a large, bulky, green coat, the hood of which hung over his face so only his white chin stuck out at the bottom.

  Though Dorring couldn’t see the eyes or face within the darkness of the hood, he was sure that whoever it was was looking right at him. So he decided to approach him.

  However, no sooner had Dorring started to walk towards him than the figure turned and moved away. Dorring began jogging and so too did the man, until he was
jumping over the iron fence and disappearing down the edge of the hill.

  By the time Dorring reached the fence, whoever it was had climbed to the bottom of a steep bank of grass and rocks that led to a road. The other side of that was lined with houses. An alleyway split them and the figure dived into it once he’d crossed the road.

  Dorring hopped over the fence, carefully came down the bank, slipping on the wet earth near the bottom but catching himself, and ran across the road into the alley. About ten yards in, it met another alley that went both left and right. Dorring glanced both ways. It traveled between the backs of houses and was lined with gates and fencing. Glancing left, he spotted the back of a green coat disappearing around a corner some twenty yards away. He tore after it, but when he turned the corner, he found nothing except an empty alley leading out into the street ten yards ahead.

  Dorring ran towards the mouth of the alleyway. But as he passed a back gate, it swung sharply open and he was suddenly grabbed from the side and thrown forcefully into a fence that he almost went though.

  It was the man in the hood.

  With his face still partially hidden, he stood before Dorring with a wry grin written across his mouth. Nevertheless, Dorring didn’t really notice the smile. What he did notice was the large hunting knife held tight in his hand.

  He came at Dorring and the latter maneuvered himself away to avoid the blade. Missing, the man came at him again in a frenzied attack, slashing backhanded through the rain as it splashed off the knife. Dorring grabbed the arm as he dodged it. He tried to pull it around, maneuver the limb so he could break it in a grip and have the fingers release the knife. But his opponent was far too strong and skilled for this. The heavyset arm almost lifted Dorring from his feet as it swung him into a fence.

  He was forced to let go. Another frenzied attack. The figure came at Dorring as he got away from the fence and Dorring had to guard the blows and swing his body out of the way. A plunging knife attack came down at him and he expertly twisted his body around just in time to take the blow into his rucksack. Twisting sharply back, he tried to use the bag to pull the knife from the hand. But the grip was too firm and the attacker merely retrieved it as Dorring swooped around. He jumped back from more blows, the blade slashing through the air, and the figure stopped as the two stood a few yards apart, the man breathing heavily from the effort, the rain splashing off of him and steam rising from both of them. Dorring quickly removed his rucksack and threw it to the side. Then he stood glaring at the man.