Matlock's System

by Reginald Hill

  The light moved away.

  “Come,” said the Abbot.

  They slid round out of the passage and into the Chapter House. Unhesitating, the Abbot moved among the marble pillars till he came to the tomb of John de Cancia. Matlock stood and watched, still trying to accustom his eyes to the new darkness.

  “Help me,” hissed the Abbot. He was fiddling at one corner of the marble slab, and now he began to pull.

  Matlock knelt beside him and added his weight, still ignorant of what they were doing. Slowly at first, then smoothly and easily; the marble moved, and Matlock found himself peering into a dark uninviting hole.

  “Ah,” said the Abbot with satisfaction. “There we are. These places were often fitted with tunnels for various purposes. This one is very old and runs to How Hill, a mile to the south. I merely had it extended to open up here. Who wants to enter the tomb, after all?”

  “Ingenious,” said Matlock. “Shall we go?”

  There was a sound behind him. He spun round, gun at the ready, but hesitated when he saw the figure who had so stealthily approached was a monk.

  “Thank God I’ve found you, Abbot,” gasped the man. He moved forward so that his face was visible. It was the Abbot.

  “Ah, Brother Duplex,” murmured the real Abbot. “How clever of you to know about this. You made more use of our rehearsals than I thought. What’s happening out there?”

  “They’re massacring us. We’re out-numbered both in men and firepower. Brother Phillip’s organized what defence he can, but it can’t last long. We must hurry.”

  “Indeed we must,” said the Abbot. “Brother, I see you are well armed. I have nothing, let me have a gun.”

  He reached out his hand. Matlock saw that he was right. Duplex must have paused long enough at some arms cache to grab a couple of hand-guns and a belt of grenades. The monk now thrust one of the guns into the Abbot’s hand and turned to the tomb.

  The Abbot spoke.

  “When doppel-gängers meet, one must die,” he said, and shot Duplex twice in the back.

  “Now Brother Matt,” he said turning, “look not so disapproving. It suits me very well to have my body found by Browning’s soldiers. And two’s company they say. Come.”

  He stooped to pick up the Adjuster. Over his bent back, Matlock saw Duplex half turn on his left elbow, his right hand plucking at his grenade belt. Matlock brought his gun up, but the Abbot rose at that moment blocking his aim. He thrust him aside and fired, but the lost second had been crucial. From Duplex’s nerveless fingers rolled a primed grenade. A whole pack of wild thoughts ran madly through Matlock’s mind. Lizzie, Colin, Ernst, Edna, Carswell, his parents, all rose before him and reached to him and tried to talk to him. But like Ulysses in the underworld, he knew these phantoms needed blood before they could speak. And in his mind he stood and wept silently, futilely before their dreadful pleas.

  But his body moved independently. Two strides forward, the grenade scooped up, arm thrown back and the metal egg hurled into the one place which offered them any escape from its blast.

  The tomb.

  He lay on the ground till the ground stayed still and the stones stopped falling about him. Then he rose.

  “Abbot,” he whispered, his eyes still dazzled by the flash, “are you all right?”

  But the Abbot was up already and peering down into the tunnel.

  “You bloody fool! It’s blocked. We can’t get through. You stupid ...”

  His voice trailed away as he saw Matlock’s face.

  “Yes of course. There was nothing else to do. Of course. Well, lead on. It’s up to you now. Your quick thinking saved our lives. Let’s see if your quick thinking can save us from the results of your quick thinking.”

  “What about the river?”

  “The river? Yes, the river perhaps. Perhaps.”

  Matlock hit the Abbot in the face with the flat of his hand.

  “Wake up, Abbot. Despair is the sin against the Holy Ghost, isn’t it? How do we get to the river without going outside?”

  The Abbot stood in silence for a while. Whether in thought or in shock, Matlock didn’t know. But finally he said, “The Cellarium. That is built over the river. We can get at it through the Cellarium.”

  Outside in the Court they could still hear the sound of the battle raging in the Church. But they crossed without incident and cautiously entered the long, cool vaults of the Cellarium. In there it was absolutely quiet and even the sounds of fighting outside seemed distant and disconnected.

  Matlock was now leading, the Abbot close behind. He had discarded his gun and was clutching the Adjuster with both hands, whether for reassurance or because his strength was failing, Matlock didn’t know. But he knew he was worried about the Abbot whose will seemed to have suddenly bent, if not broken, under the strain. Matlock wondered again how old he was, who he was, or rather, had been to be given this job.

  Perhaps it was these thoughts which distracted him. Certainly he thought later, he should have been aware a couple of steps earlier that they were not alone in the cellar. Even then, he was so keyed up to action that as the two darker patches detached themselves from the wall ahead he was moving sideways.

  The beam of light caught his face, he shot at it and heard a hoarse cry. Then something struck the wall about three inches from his head, a sliver of fine stone raced across his brow and he fell.

  It felt like hours, but his unconsciousness must have lasted only a couple of seconds. When his eyes opened again, it was to see a strange nightmarish tableau. In the middle of the great stone floor, bathed in torch light, knelt the Abbot. Approaching him with gun in one hand and torch in the other was a young soldier, a boy of about twenty. Matlock could see the pallor of his face in the light reflected back from the silvery metal face of the Adjuster which the Abbot still clutched to his chest.

  The Abbot’s face was working as though something lived under the skin. His lips moved, but no words came. Matlock began to feel around carefully for his fallen gun. The boy was standing right over the Abbot now, his face taut with fear — or disgust.

  Suddenly the Abbot thrust the Adjuster up at him.

  “Take it! Take it!” he screamed. “You can live for ever. For ever. Take it!”

  Whether the boy thought the machine was a weapon, or whether he knew what it was and acted in hysterical disgust, Matlock didn’t know. But he jerked back a step, then began to pump bullets through the machine into the Abbot’s body.

  The Abbot remained kneeling for a long time. He hissed through his pale lips. “Life, life,” a couple of times, the Adjuster fell apart in his hands, then he collapsed forward.

  Matlock rolled over and tried to push himself up. His hand touched the still hot barrel of his gun. Clumsily, noisily, he shifted his grip to the butt. He needn’t have worried — the boy stood stock still over the Abbot’s body and heard nothing. He didn’t even move when Matlock, his head still dizzy with pain, missed with his first shot.

  His second tore the boy’s chest open, and the third removed the terrified face.

  Staggering to his feet, Matlock made his way over to the Abbot and turned his body over. Amazingly he was not yet dead. Words bubbled redly from his lips.

  “ . . . too young to bribe with age, Matt . . . too young.”

  Then he was dead.

  Matlock spared a few moments to look at the shattered Adjuster. It was obviously beyond repair. It was five days to his birthday.

  He ran his hand over his forehead in perplexity and found it thick with blood. He must have looked very dead.

  Bending over the soldier he went swiftly through his small pack till he came across the field dressing he was looking for. He had no time for refinement but drew a smear of antiseptic cream across his brow and wrapped a bandage round twice.

  All the while his mind raced on.

  Was it worth it? Even if he escaped it meant only a few days of uncomfortable, frightened, waiting freedom. Wouldn’t it be better to go out now wit
h a gun and die fighting the enemy.

  What would that do? Kill a few boys like this?

  He looked at the faceless youth at his feet.

  Better surely to look for someone worthy of death. Perhaps in four days he could find Browning. Perhaps in five days . . .

  Perhaps I’d just rather die in five days than five minutes, he told himself and the admission made him feel almost light-hearted.

  He turned and headed back up the Cellarium. The river was still his best bet, he felt, but without the Abbot’s guidance, he decided it would be easier to get out of the Abbey buildings altogether and take his chance in the open.

  His first thought was to make his way out of the door through which he had entered the Abbey buildings earlier that night. The thought went through his mind that if he had stopped quietly in bed, Browning’s men could not have been certain he was in the Abbey that night and the attack might not have taken place.

  But he found that a small profitable side-effect of his sense of being a pawn in someone else’s game was a dilution of self-reproach, and the thought was pushed completely from his mind when he reached the outer door and peered through.

  The Strangers’ House was a roaring inferno around which the black outlines of men scuttled like insects on a burning log. The greensward between the House and the Abbey was as bright as day, if daylight could properly be likened to this red and white fury.

  Exit from this door was impossible. Matlock felt the beginnings of despair and suddenly four days seemed a lifetime to lose. He began to make his way back, looking for refuge in the dark shadows of the great building. But now a new and stranger horror began to pursue him. For the darkness around him suddenly brightened, began to redden, to tremble, to dissolve as though it was being burnt away.

  He spun round. The great wall behind him seemed to be full of a terrible flame and his mind began to spiral to some safe insanity of terror as he watched. Brighter and brighter it grew. Then as he turned to run, the truth flashed on him, still stimulus to terror but not to madness.

  A glance back confirmed his guess. The flame was the glow of the raging bonfire which had been the Strangers’ House. He was seeing it through the wall, more clearly each second.

  The wall was made of poro-glass and someone had operated the transparency control. And even as he ran, the implications of what he had seen leapt eagerly into his mind.

  The whole reconstruction of the Abbey must have been done in poro-glass, a type so refined that it was possible to create the exact colour of old stone in it. He was trying to escape like a rat running through a glass maze.

  As he ran, the walls about and behind him misted greyly then cleared to perfect transparency. Searchlights, flames, even the thin sliver of moon which had edged into the crowded sky, all shone through the clearing roof and walls as though aiming their beams at him. He tried desperately to recollect from those childhood memories of the Abbey ruins which walls had been intact, which walls he could hide behind without fearing that they would turn into a sheet of glass.

  For the moment he seemed to have outdistanced the transformation process. He thanked heaven it was based on a slow chain reaction and was therefore gradual not instantaneous. He had lost his bearings in his panic and now he stopped to find out where he was. A little thought told him he was back in the Cloister Passage. Up ahead must be the Infirmary, but that he was certain was part of the reconstruction and must be avoided. He leaned back against the wall and tried to calm his turbulent thoughts.

  Without warning he was bathed in hard white light. Turning he saw that the wall on which he was leaning had become transparent, but the other side must have been in utter darkness and he had no warning. Now there was a little group of soldiers there with two or three high-radiancy torches. They stood and stared at him through the wall for a moment, then one of them came so close that his nose touched the glass and for a second he looked like a small boy with his face pressed against a sweetshop window.

  Matlock saw a look of excitement cross his face, then he turned to the others and his mouth opened and shut in silent agitation. The others all came forward then and peered closely at him.

  Matlock knew he had been recognized. It was eerie to stand there and see these men within a yard of him, silently plotting his death. One of them brought his gun up and pointed it at the wall, but another said something sharply and the gun was lowered.

  Matlock smiled. With hand weapons they were more likely to damage themselves than him by firing pointblank at a three foot-thick poro-glass wall.

  He began to walk slowly, almost casually along the corridor in the direction of the Infirmary. The soldiers kept pace with him, one of them speaking excitedly into a wrist-radio.

  The wall to his right was still a wall. Real or poro-glass he did not know, but at the moment it was beautifully opaque.

  He prayed silently that there would be a door in it. At the end of the passage would be the Infirmary which must by now be as bright as day.

  When the door appeared, he almost believed in God. Then he entered and found himself in a small windowless store-room with no other exit, and his new-formed faith crumbled.

  He glanced around looking hopelessly for something that might help him. The room seemed to be some kind of medical store-room and it was full of crates and bottles. Leaning against the far wall was a row of gas cylinders. There seemed to be two types. Matlock was not expert enough to decipher the markings on them but one of them he was certain must be oxygen. And the other . . .

  Swiftly he moved along the row, turning each tap full on. Then he bent and picked up a bottle he had noticed by the door. Phosphorus. Memories of chemistry lessons in the old smelly laboratory at school more than half a century before came back to him.

  He eased the stopper half out and turned the bottle on its side. The liquid in it began to ebb out. Carefully he propped it up against the wall so that its mouth pointed to the floor at an angle of forty-five degrees.

  Then he stepped back into the corridor and pulled the door shut behind him.

  Looks of relief appeared on the faces of the men opposite. They too must have been praying that there was no other exit.

  “A simple example of the democratic nature of prayer,” said Matlock to the unhearing men, and moved slowly away along the passage. After fifteen paces he stopped. This ought to be safe enough. He sat down and made himself as small as possible. Back in the store-room he imagined the gas hissing out of the cylinders and the insulating liquid dripping out of the phosphorus bottle. And he wondered how long it would be before the other soldiers got round to him. He was surprised that they had taken so long. He could only surmise that Brother Phillip was keeping them occupied with a hard rearguard action.

  Distantly he heard the sound of trotting feet. Booted feet.

  He didn’t bother to get up but glanced back the way he’d come. Within seconds he saw them, four soldiers and an officer moving towards him at the double, guns ready. He wondered dismally whether they had been told to capture him or kill him on sight.

  Then as they passed the store-room door, there was a small bang, followed immediately by a vast explosion. The door was hurled from its hinges squashing two of the soldiers flat against the poroglass. A great tongue of flame licked out into the corridor bearing with it chunks of store-room wall. Protected though they were, the men opposite flung their arms before their faces in horror and fear.

  Matlock rose slowly and without looking at them moved carefully back through the smoke to what had been the storeroom. One of the soldiers was still moving. He shot him as an act of mercy and taking a deep breath, he plunged into the smoke and reek of the room, stepped through a wall of flame, thought for one horrified moment that the wall had not been breached, then felt the cool night air on his face.

  A minute later he was being carried by the river underneath the Infirmary and out into the inviting darkness beyond.

  Looking back later, he realized what risks he took then. But somehow the
river had been identified with safety and escape, and once in it, a trance-like confidence came over him. He made no effort at concealment when he clambered out, but strode openly across the grass, even pausing to look back at the red glow which was all he could see now of the Abbey. He supposed that similar scenes must have taken place at the other centres mentioned by the Abbot.

  Browning’s dissolution of the monasteries, he thought almost jauntily as he struck across country.

  An hour later he was wandering through the outer streets of Ripon. It seemed as if his luck was going to hold.

  Then minutes later he was sucked into the cavernous depths of a Curfew Wagon.

  10

  The first torture wasn’t too bad. Indeed as he swam back to the surface of consciousness, he realized that it was his own refinement of fear, plus the physical debility resulting from the night’s activities, which had caused him to faint rather than any real intensity of pain. The pain had been administered quickly, almost casually. It was obviously routine. You got it no matter what your story was. They hadn’t even asked to see his papers to check the incoherent, jerkily-told tale he had offered them to explain his presence on the streets. A sick daughter — a telephone call — action without thought. It sounded weak enough to start with, and he hadn’t been able to project much sincerity into his voice.

  But the curious thing was that they were ready to believe him. He could feel it as the young sergeant leaned down over him and slipped those terrible metal bands from around his wrists. Their nights, he realized, must be full of people like him, curfew-breakers with good reason, or at least real reason, sad reason, even tragic reason. And they would all stammer and tremble when caught, all sound guilty of every treasonable crime in the law books.