Matlock's System

by Reginald Hill

  He opened the door and walked in. Seated at a table opposite the door was a middle-aged woman with a bright smile on her face.

  “Good-day, officer. Can I help you?”

  Then her face changed and he realized Matlock had appeared beside him. Ignoring the woman, Matlock moved rapidly across the room towards the further door. The woman leaned to one side. Francis remembered Matlock’s injunction but hesitated till her left hand came up with a gun in it. Then he fired. He had to shoot her twice.

  Matlock meanwhile had crashed the inner door open and gone through, doubled low. Francis saw the doorway light up with the rapid brilliances of force-gun shots for a couple of seconds. Then all went dark.

  A second later Matlock appeared at the door rubbing his left shoulder.

  “Are you hurt?”

  “Just bruised. I’m not accustomed to the acrobatics of evasion. What about you?”

  Matlock looked quickly round the outer office and noted the two shot-marks on the woman. “Chivalry makes you inaccurate,” he observed.

  But Francis didn’t hear. He was busy looking round the inner room. There had been three men in there. There still were, but all dead. All three had their guns out. Matlock must have moved fast and shot accurately.

  “It would have been easier if you’d stopped the girl from ringing the alarm buzzer. But it’s my fault. I should have realized it might be a girl in there and that would slow you up.”

  “Matlock,” asked Francis in bewilderment, “what is this place?”

  “You mean you want to know who you’ve killed? A delicate piece of machinery is the human conscience. Well, let it rest, Brother Francis. Many years ago when I had some slight authority in this country, I made it my business to get to know as much about our various Security Services as I could. Even if I’d stayed long enough, I doubt if I’d have got to know the lot. But a myriad of little front organizations were known to me and I’ve kept a fatherly eye on them since. Many have disappeared in that time, of course, and I presume others have sprung up in their place. But this name I recognized outside. Either it was now legitimate and the inmates would be only too pleased to help a policeman or too scared to resist a gunman. Or it was working as before. They were a bit quick on the draw for technical education, don’t you think? And this though it looks technical, is probably not very educational. Except perhaps to you.”

  He indicated the banks of machinery which lined the room.

  “But what did they do here?” asked Francis.

  “Faked things mainly, I think. Any well-run state needs all kinds of things if its security is to run smoothly. Passports, visas, paper money. And a well-run police state needs even more. Signatures, thumbprints, affidavits, wills, marriage and birth certificates.”

  He pulled out a drawer and emptied it, then another and another. Francis looked at the piles of legal documents, the letterheads, the blank passports.

  “And the machinery?”

  “Oh, that’s an automatic press. That’s probably some kind of ager. Developer. Enlarger. All mod-cons. And that’s a radio telephone.”

  “Why the hell did we come here, Matlock?”

  “Perhaps you’d rather be outside with the Wagon? Listen, Brother, don’t have a conscience about this lot. I know they don’t go around torturing and terrorizing people. But they know what they’re doing. You’d have to be pretty stupid not to understand that you’re forging the evidence which is going to kill someone. Or cheat someone. Or discredit someone. No one’s that stupid. Anyway, more important to us is that my spotting this place gives us a chance to get out.”

  “How?” asked Francis eagerly.

  Matlock grinned.

  “I see your priorities are surfacing again. Now, during a Curfew only two kinds of vehicle move around the streets, the Wagons and Official Reds. Unfortunately Official Reds are not easy to come by for the common man. But in a place like this, your Official Red is the only form of transport. These chaps wouldn’t be seen dead in anything else. Let’s see if we can find out how to summon one.”

  But before Matlock could start looking, a green light above the ’phone began to flash on and off. Matlock studied the battery of dials and switches in front of him carefully. Finally he picked up the ’phone.

  The noise which came out of it was near-gibberish. Matlock flicked a switch.

  “Harper? Hello Harper.”

  Matlock grunted inarticulately.

  “Harper, you took your time. Listen. Is that Scottish job ready? The security boys are screaming for it.”

  “Just finished.”

  “Good oh. I’ll have a Red round for it in a couple of jiffs. Out.”

  Matlock sat back with a smile.

  “That’s saved us a lot of bother, hasn’t it?”

  Francis peered down at the dials and switches.

  “How did you know which was the descrambler?”

  “I didn’t. I merely flicked the one which looked most used.”

  “What do we do now?”

  “Sit and wait. Perhaps you’d like to tell me now how you came to be in my shower this morning.”

  Francis gingerly edged one of the dead forgers out of a chair and sat down.

  “We heard about four this morning what was going on.”

  “Heard? How?”

  “Well, we rather inferred it. We got word from the Abbey about a sudden flurry of police activity up there — not at the Abbey itself, but in connected organizations.”

  “My organizations, I suppose?”

  “You could put it like that. Anyway, arrests were being made right, left and centre. Not just the mob, but key people. The Abbot saw at once what it must mean.”

  “A clever man.”

  “At any rate, he saw that you must be threatened. There was nothing much we could organize at such notice and as things were so vague. We had made all the agreed arrangements to get you and your friends out of London but we couldn’t bring the timing forward at all. To cut a long story short, I climbed out of my beard and into this uniform.”

  “Which you just happened to have handy.”

  “Which I just happened to have handy. And off I went round to your flat at a rate of knots. There I came across a dozen or so assorted policemen making a very silent entry. I merely tagged on the back and put myself in a dark corner. Later when the bathroom was cleared and the lock had been removed, I transferred in there.”

  Matlock sat with furrowed brows for a while, then slowly nodded.

  “I see. Tell me, Francis, how important am I?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “This sudden activity on Browning’s part. Was this his plan all along, and his approach to me just a bluff? Or was this a snap plan caused by my decision to go to ground. In which case …”

  “In which case, how did he know about it, you mean?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Well, I knew about it. And the Abbot knew. I think I can vouch for us. That leaves you. And yours.”

  “Yes. You’re a real comfort.”

  Somewhere a sharp-edged buzzer cut through the air. They both started to their feet. Then Matlock laughed.

  “It’s the internal ’phone.”

  They went back into the outer office and Matlock picked up the telephone.

  “Yes?” he said.

  “Hall-porter here, sir. There’s a car from the Ministry of Education here. Says he’s come to collect something.”

  “Thank you. Oh I wonder, could you step up here a moment and give us a hand, do you think?”

  “Of course, sir.”

  The ’phone went dead.

  “Why did you say that?”

  “It’s better to deal with him up here than in the vestibule when he realizes we’ve nothing to do with this office. The Ministry of Education! I love that!”

  ” “What do you think this job was, anyway? What did he call it? The Scottish job.”

  “Who knows. We haven’t got time to look for it now,” said
Matlock, tucking more securely into his pocket the small packet he had lifted from Harper’s desk within seconds of shooting the man. “That sounds like our man.”

  A minute later they were on their way downstairs, leaving behind them, securely bound to a chair, the unfortunate porter.

  In the vestibule waiting for them in the scarlet uniform of the Official Messenger Service were two men. They looked with some surprise when Matlock, instead of handing over the file he was carrying, headed for the door.

  “We were told to collect. There was nothing said about you coming with us.”

  Matlock shook his head as if in the presence of incredible stupidity. He held up the file.

  “This is no use without me.”

  “And him?” with a nod at Francis.

  “There could be an attempt to remove this from me. I’ve had him looking after me for a couple of days now.”

  “I might as well see the job through,” said Francis.

  “All right. Come on.”

  They marched outside to where the bright-red bullet-shaped messenger car was waiting. Matlock and Francis clambered in the back, the messengers in the front.

  The driver spoke briefly into his radio link.

  “Twenty-three. Returning to the House.”

  Then they accelerated smoothly away through the deserted streets. Within a couple of blocks, they passed a Curfew Wagon, but this was the only moving thing they saw.

  Neither of the messengers showed any inclination to talk. Matlock sat busy with his own thoughts, while Francis kept a close eye on the route. Suddenly a pressure from his knee told Matlock that this was where they had to get off.

  “Stop the car,” he said in a peremptory tone.

  The driver looked surprised but the car didn’t slow down at all.

  “Official Reds never stop en route,” he explained kindly. “What’s the trouble?”

  With a sigh, Matlock reached into the file he was holding on his knee and took out his gun. (He realized he was actually thinking of it as ‘his’ gun.)

  “This,” he said.

  “The trouble is,” said the driver unperturbed, “that you can’t take over an Official Red. Even if you shoot me, the thing keeps on going till it hits something. Then we all die.”

  “A cool customer,” said Matlock. “Excuse me.”

  He reversed his gun and struck the other messenger sharply behind the ear.He slumped forward without a sound.

  “That’s better,” said Matlock. “Now I can lean forward and get a decent shot. I’m going to count three and then press the trigger. My force-gun is pointing, you will observe, more or less between your legs. The turtle’s nest. Frying tonight, as they used to say. One … two …”

  “All right,” said the driver. He pulled the car into the kerb. “If you want to stop that badly, then here I stop. Now what?”

  Matlock hit him in the same place. Then he and Francis got out and began dragging the two messengers from the front.

  “Think you can drive this thing?” asked Francis.

  “I was relying on you.”

  “One of us better had. Listen!”

  The clang of the Curfew Wagon bell came drifting to them from a nearby street.

  They let the limp bodies of the messengers drop on the road and got quickly into the car, Francis in the driving seat.

  “Right, let’s go.”

  “How?” said Francis searching furiously round. “Tell me how and off I’ll go.”

  The control panel was simplicity itself. A speedometer, a fuel gauge. Two switches.

  Matlock leaned over and pressed one.

  Nothing happened.

  “What’s that do?”

  “Say again, please, and identify yourself,” crackled a loud but somehow distant voice in Francis’ ear.

  He shifted the switch to its former position.

  “Try the other.”

  Matlock twisted urgently round in his seat. They were parked almost opposite an intersection. Suddenly trundling into view along the road running parallel to theirs and about fifty yards away came a Curfew Wagon. Matlock held his breath and prayed. He prayed that in the twenty yards or so in which they were in sight of each other, the Wagon would not notice them. Or that if it did, it would not consider a stationary Red worth investigating.

  Francis pressed the other switch.

  Rhythmic as hysteria, a great pulsating shriek tore the air apart and sent frightening waves of sound in all directions.

  It only lasted a couple of seconds till Francis threw the switch back.

  “Siren,” he said unnecessarily.

  The Curfew Wagon which had almost moved out of sight now came to a halt, then reversed into the centre of the crossroads. The periscopes twinkled round till all four were peering down the street, towards them. They remained in that position, four blank but all seeing eyes, while the great bulk beneath them shifted round and began to move directly towards the little Red.

  “Key,” said Matlock, and plunged out of the car and round to the driver. He was just recovering consciousness and had half risen on his elbow. Matlock pulled his arm away from under him so that he collapsed on the road again. Then he began to prise the man’s clenched fist open. It was locked like a clamp. The dreadful bell sounded nearer and nearer. He lifted the fist to his mouth and dug his teeth into the ball of the thumb.

  There was an anguished screech. The fist became a hand. On the palm lay a small cylinder of metal.

  The Wagon was nearly upon them. As he leapt back into the car, he saw the hatches at the front begin to slide open. He leaned over to the control panel and looked desperately for somewhere to put the key. There wasn’t an aperture to be seen. He ran his fingers along under the dashboard. Suddenly he felt a slight unevenness. A hollow. He took the cylinder and thrust it in.

  Nothing.

  He pressed harder. There was a click.

  At first he thought there was still nothing. Then he noticed the slight trembling of the fuel pressure gauge.

  “We’re running. Let’s go.”

  Francis slammed his foot down on the accelerator.

  The other messenger suddenly rose to his feet and staggered in front of them trying to draw his gun. The Red surged forward with such force that he was flung over the bonnet into the road behind.

  “Christ!” spat Francis between pale lips.

  Matlock peered through the back window. The driver was up as well now, waving his arms. A black tube like the lash of a bull-whip snaked out of the now fully open aperture of the Curfew Wagon, coiled round him and dragged him screaming into the darkness.

  “I think you might have done that fellow a favour,” said Matlock.

  “You think so?”

  They spun round a corner and the Wagon went out of view.

  “Why didn’t they fire at us?”

  “Who knows? They like their quarry alive, they say. And a parked Red might just have been a parked Red after all. But never fear. There’ll be plenty of stuff out to intercept us now.”

  “Let it,” said Francis.

  “What’s the time?”

  “Nearly noon.”

  “Just in time.”

  He swung the wheel hard over and the Red raced crazily up the ramp of a fifteen-storey garage. Round and round the spiral ramp they circled at the same terrifying speed till suddenly they ran out on the level plateau of the top parking lot.

  There was only one other vehicle there,a large out-of-date transporter.

  The Red halted dead and Matlock used the impetus to take him out of the door.

  “That?” he said incredulously to Francis.

  “That.”

  As they ran up to the transporter, the rear board slowly unfolded. Francis had leapt on before it reached the ground. Turning, he pulled Matlock up behind him.

  “Welcome aboard.”

  Inside the transporter, looking absurdly small, was a helicopter. At the controls in long flowing robes was a monk.

  “Greetin
gs, Brothers. Climb up, do. Will there be any others?”

  “No. Get going,” snapped Francis.

  Others. Where are the others? wondered Matlock as he crouched in his seat.

  “Something’s coming up the ramp! Go!” screamed Francis.

  The pilot pressed a button. Above them, the roof of the transporter split open letting in the deep blue of the sky. The helicopter’s vanes began to whirl, her ground jets blasted and slowly, carefully they rose from the chrysallis of the great truck, then climbed more rapidly as a small car pulled off the ramp on to the roof. Out of it jumped a solitary figure who began to run towards the transporter, waving.

  “Wait,” shouted Matlock. “It’s Colin! It’s Colin!”

  “Too late,” said Francis, pointing.

  Two other cars, large and official, had run off the ramp. Half a dozen uniformed figures jumped out of each and ran towards the waving man. They were antlike now, and so indistinguishable when together that to Matlock it looked as if Colin had been swallowed up.

  He strained his eyes to see what was happening down there, but soon he couldn’t even make out the building clearly.

  Then he sat back and closed his eyes.

  And wondered how it was all going to end.

  7

  You “must be tired, Mr. Matlock,” said the Abbot.

  “Not too tired to talk, Abbot,” said Matlock, determined to take an early initiative. But in fact great waves of exhaustion were swelling over his eyes and nothing seemed more attractive than sleep.

  The old wrinkled face looked at him kindly and there were the beginnings of a smile round the mouth.

  “Yes, I think to talk. There is much to talk about, Mr. Matlock, and I would not have you feel that you were at any disadvantage. A few hours’ sleep first. You have had a trying time.”

  “Perhaps you’re right,” yawned Matlock.

  “I hope you will be comfortable. We pay more attention to comfort here in the Strangers’ House than in our own cells, but our store is not great, and the demands on it are many.”

  Matlock looked round the simply furnished room. A narrow bed, a chair, a cupboard.

  “This is fine,” he said, sitting on the bed.