The Shadow Walker in-1

by Michael Walters

  Drew looked up as they approached the looming shadow of the hotel. The building itself was another example of undistinguished Soviet-style architecture, through the hotel had obviously been extensively renovated in recent years to cater to an international market. Nergui led him into the alley at the rear where the body had been found.

  “You said he was killed at night?” Drew said. “So how did he get into the hotel?”

  Nergui shrugged. “We’re still trying to find out. There are various possibilities. It’s possible that the killers actually took a room there, and somehow brought him in during the day. We’ve been following up with all the guests who were booked in that day, which is taking a long time-a lot of them are international visitors. But I’m not optimistic. More likely they just bribed someone to let them in. We’ve interviewed the staff, but nobody’s saying anything. Hotel staff are used to being discreet.”

  “Even in a murder case?”

  “Especially in a murder case, I think. They don’t want to get involved. They may even have been threatened.”

  “It just seems incredible that someone could be drugged and then taken up to the roof and, well, thrown off, and nobody saw anything.”

  “Not that incredible, really,” Doripalam said. “It was a Saturday night. There are few places to drink in the city, especially if you are an expatriate. There would have been a lot of drunken people in the hotel. Who notices one more person being half carried along the corridor?”

  Drew nodded. “And the third body? You said that was found in one of the ger camps?”

  “I’ll get a car to take us out there,” Nergui said. “It is a little way from here, at the edge of the city.”

  The car arrived in minutes in response to Nergui’s call, and they were driven a mile or so from the city center to the ger encampment in the suburbs. For the first time, Drew found himself in an environment that seemed genuinely alien. The center of the city had been distinctive, but the pervading atmosphere and architecture were reminiscent of those in much of the former Soviet Union. For Drew, who had traveled only a little in Eastern Europe, the city had recalled nothing more than the anonymous settings of 1960s spy films.

  This, though, was very different. The car pulled up at the point where the paved road gave way to a rougher track, and the three men climbed out. Ahead of them were rows of the traditional gers, forming what appeared to be an exceptionally neat and well-cared-for shanty town. A few men, women and children were visible between the constructions, chatting together like neighbors in any suburb, all dressed in the herdsmen’s costumes, the thick felt pulled tight against the chill of the morning. There were tethered horses, dogs, even a goat. Further along, there was a chicken run, the scraggy birds scratching at the dusty ground. As they emerged from the car, Drew was struck by the richness of the atmosphere, the mix of smells-the scent of wood smoke, the musky aroma of goats and horses, somewhere the acrid stench of burning oil or gasoline, all interlaced with the enticing smells of cooking.

  The camp was an extraordinary sight. To Drew, it appeared different in kind from the type of encampment which one might find in a Third World country or amongst displaced or refugee peoples. These people were living in this way apparently through choice, maintaining a lifestyle balanced between their nomadic roots and the increasingly urban demands of the twenty-first century. There was a sense that, for all the concrete and glass monoliths of the city center, this community could, if it wished, simply pack up and move on.

  “It is very different from Manchester, no?” Nergui smiled.

  “It’s different from-well, anywhere I’ve ever been,” Drew said.

  “For most people here, this is simply the natural way to live. They may be compelled to work in the city for economic reasons, but they retain their links to the steppes, to the traditional ways of living. They prefer to live here rather than in a bleak tower block in the city.”

  “Probably a sane decision,” Drew said.

  “Definitely. But, having lived in the West, I’m not sure I quite understand this lifestyle anymore.” Nergui laughed. “I like having my creature comforts too much.”

  “Where was the body found?”

  “There.” Nergui pointed to the ravine that lay beyond the rows of gers. “Come.” He led them along the track until they were standing on the edge of the ravine. A line of gers stood immediately behind them.

  “There was no attempt to hide the body?” Drew asked, recalling with a shudder the graphic photographs he had viewed of the exposed and mutilated corpse.

  “It seems not,” Doripalam said. “We think they drove a truck or van over to that point,” Doripalam gestured to the paved road that ran along the far side of the ravine. “And then they just tipped the body over. It would probably have simply rolled till it hit those bushes.”

  “But why leave it here?”

  “I think it is the same as the first body. They probably wanted to take it somewhere where it could be disposed of quickly and easily, but where it would be found. The road over there does not run close to the gers, so no one would take any notice of a truck passing in the night. They probably barely stopped. As it happened, the body was not visible from this side, as the bushes shielded it. Otherwise, it would have been spotted an hour or two earlier.”

  Nergui began to lead them back past the gers to the waiting car. Although the summer was over now, the sky was clear and the day was growing warmer. Nergui had told him that the autumn weather could be changeable. There had been a few flurries of snow earlier in the week, the first signs of the approaching winter. They passed an old woman, wrapped in the now-familiar dark robes and sash, carrying a bucket of water. She smiled and nodded a greeting.

  Drew had opened his mouth to make some comment about the gers, but at the same moment Nergui uttered an incomprehensible cry and flung himself backward toward Drew. Drew stumbled, taken aback, and lost his footing, finding himself rolling on to the hard earth. Nergui flung himself across Drew, and then Drew felt the other man pulling hard on his jacket.

  “What are you-?”

  “This way!” Nergui said sharply, tugging harder. Drew rolled over, and ended up lying beside Nergui, who was rapidly shuffling back behind one of the gers. “Come!” he snapped, gesturing urgently at Drew. Drew crawled after him until they were both shaded by the tent. Doripalam had dropped to his knees at Nergui’s shouted warning, and was now scrambling around beside them. Behind them, chickens clucked loudly, alarmed by the disturbance.

  “What is it?” he said.

  Nergui was breathing heavily. “There,” he said, gesturing up at the front of the ger. “But keep your head down.”

  Drew peered tentatively around at the front of the ger. There, embedded neatly in the thick felt, was a crossbow bolt still vibrating from the force of impact.

  It seemed ridiculous. More a scene from an old Hollywood Western than any kind of real threat. At the same time, Drew recognized rationally that the arrow was a lethal weapon. If there was someone out there shooting at them, their lives were in danger, as surely as if they were facing a sniper with a rifle.

  “Where did it come from?” he whispered.

  Nergui pointed to an apparently disused factory building that lay across a patch of empty ground. “Up there, I think. Somewhere on the first floor.”

  “Do you think they’re still there?”

  “I don’t know. My guess is not. Too risky, even if they’d hit one of us. I think they’d have taken one shot then made a run for it.” “What if you’re wrong?”

  “I’m not planning to bet my life on it.” Nergui carefully pulled his cell phone out of his pocket, and dialed the number of the police officer driving the car. “He can get the car along this dirt track,” Nergui said. He spoke briefly to the officer in Mongolian, and a moment later the car came bumping along the track toward them. As it stopped, Nergui pulled open the rear door, and he and Drew bundled inside. Doripalam clambered into the front passenger seat. The driver rapidly
reversed toward the main road, and then pulled out in the direction of the factory.

  Drew realized he was shaking. “Thanks,” he said. “I thought you’d gone mad. How did you manage to see the bolt?”

  “I don’t know. Instinct, I think. I saw a movement in the air out of the corner of my eye, and somehow registered that it was something more dangerous than a bird. I wasn’t sure where it was headed, but I threw myself back without really thinking.” He laughed, humorlessly. “Mind you, if my instinct had been wrong, I might have thrown you into its path, so you shouldn’t be too profuse with your thanks.”

  “Or worse still, you’d have messed up my suit for nothing,” Drew smiled. Both of them were playing this down, but he suspected that Nergui’s instincts were more finely honed than he was letting on.

  “There is nothing worse that one could do to an Englishman,” Nergui agreed.

  The car pulled to a halt in front of the factory building. The ground floor windows were boarded up, and there was no sign of life. Above, the windows had been left uncovered and most of the glass had been smashed. Presumably it was from one of those that the arrow had been fired. They pulled the car up close to the doors to minimize the risk of being shot at from above.

  “What are you planning to do?” Drew asked, peering through the car window at the concrete building. “We can’t risk going in there on our own.”

  Nergui shook his head. “Certainly not. It’s bad enough that your life has been placed in danger once. The ambassador would never forgive me if I allowed it to happen a second time.” Nergui remained blank faced, and it took Drew a moment to realize that the Mongolian was joking. “I’ve sent for backup,” he said. “They will be here in a few minutes. We’re risking allowing whoever it is to escape-I don’t know if there’s a rear entrance to this place, but I’ve asked for a car to go to the back. But we don’t know what we might be facing here. If this is just some joker taking a pot shot at the police, then he’ll be long gone anyway. But if it’s our killer, and he’s still in there, then we don’t know what he might want.”

  The moments ticked by. This wasn’t the first time that Drew had faced the prospect of entering a building with a potentially dangerous suspect inside, but here he felt absurdly vulnerable, because he had no idea what to expect, what the norms were. He had never, even in his most paranoiac policing moments, expected to have an arrow shot at him. And he had never faced a killer capable of mutilating his victims’ bodies.

  “What’s your guess?” he asked to break the silence. “Do you think it’s our killer?”

  Nergui looked back from the window. “My guess is not. My guess is some joker.”

  “But why shoot at us?”

  “You will be surprised to learn,” Doripalam interjected, “that the police are not always popular here. I know that this is difficult for a British policeman to understand.”

  Drew regarded the young man’s blank expression. “And you share our sense of irony, too,” he said. “But how would he know you were from the police?”

  “Probably recognized the car,” Doripalam said. “Cars like this usually mean either police or politicians. A good target in either case. If it is just some idiot, he probably didn’t mean to kill us anyway. Perhaps just to give us a fright.”

  “He achieved that objective, anyway. Speaking for myself, you understand.”

  “It was a good shot. He knew what he was doing. But we have many skilled archers in this country.”

  “You need to get yourselves some cowboys.”

  “Some would say,” Doripalam said, “that the police are precisely that.”

  Behind them, two more official cars drew up. Nergui signaled for their occupants to remain in their cars for the moment, then he and Doripalam carefully opened their own doors. Nergui pressed himself against the concrete wall, edging back toward the other cars, protected by the building from any attempted assault from above, Doripalam following closely behind. Drew started to follow, but Nergui gestured him back. “As I say, the ambassador would not forgive me.”

  Nergui motioned to the other police officers to join them. The other cars had also been parked by the walls, and four officers climbed from each, pressing themselves against the walls by Nergui and Doripalam. Drew heard the sound of other cars, presumably lining up against the rear of the building.

  There was an external entrance to the building a few yards further along the wall, fastened with a chain and a large rusty padlock. Gradually, the group of officers edged toward it. Nergui peered for a moment at the door fastening, and then spoke quietly to Doripalam behind him, who inched slowly back to one of the cars and returned, moments later, with a crowbar.

  It looked as if the wood was rotten. Doripalam inserted the crowbar between the door and the frame, and pressed his weight against it. The door burst open with a splintering of wood, and the chain and padlock fell uselessly to the ground. He peered cautiously around the frame, pulling a flashlight from his pocket. He shouted something loudly in Mongolian, and then shone the flashlight inside, flashing it around the empty factory space beyond, clearly ready to pull back immediately if there was any response.

  Drew realized he had been holding his breath, and let it out steadily. Everything seemed to be quiet. Nergui signaled to the men behind him, and he slowly followed Doripalam into the darkness.

  Drew shook his head. It wasn’t possible for him to sit here quietly in this car while Nergui and his team were potentially risking their lives. He opened the door of the car, and slipped out to join the police officers still waiting to enter the building. The officer at the rear turned and looked at him in surprise, but then gave a grin of welcome. Drew pulled out the pocket flashlight he always carried and held it as if it were a weapon.

  Nergui called out something from inside. Drew had no idea what had been shouted, but it didn’t sound troubled. It was presumably an instruction to the rest of the team, because they all began to move slowly into the dark building.

  Drew followed last. Stepping to one side so that he wouldn’t stand out as a target in the doorway, he paused for his eyes to grow accustomed to the gloom.

  Inside, the building was largely a hollow shell, an enormous space which had at one stage housed manufacturing machinery, but which now echoed emptily. He could see the shadows of the other officers positioning themselves around the walls. Above them, there was some form of walkway running around the walls at the upper floor level-perhaps once intended for machine maintenance. Some pale light came in through the broken upper windows, but there was little to be seen.

  Nergui and Doripalam stood poised at the far end, standing in front of a large double door, which presumably led into a storage room. There was a thin line of light coming from around the doors, indicating that there was illumination in the room beyond. It was difficult to be sure from where Drew was standing, but it looked brighter than daylight alone.

  Doripalam signaled to two of the men to explore the walkways, reached by stairs in the corner of the factory space, although it seemed that the upper area was unoccupied. As far as Drew could see, there was nowhere else for anyone to hide, other than in whatever space lay behind the double doors.

  The remaining men gathered at each side of the doors. Drew followed the officers across the oil-stained concrete floor, and stood beside them. Nergui reached out and tried the handle of the left hand door. It opened easily and a pale strip of light shone out across the concrete. Nergui raised his hand to Doripalam and another officer, who brought forward two handguns, handing one to Doripalam. Drew had not realized that the police were armed, but it was scarcely a surprise. He was slightly more surprised to see that Nergui himself was also holding a firearm.

  Nergui motioned to the two armed officers to stand facing the door, so that between them they would be covering the whole area behind the door. Then shouting some kind of warning-probably the Mongolian equivalent of “Armed police,” Drew thought-he kicked back the door. A bright light flooded out into the facto
ry space, momentarily blinding Drew.

  There was silence. Then Nergui said something and walked cautiously into the room. Doripalam slowly lowered his weapon, staring into the brightly lit space, a blank expression on his face. At first neither he nor the other armed officer made any move forward. Then they slowly turned to look at each other, and followed Nergui.

  Another officer started to follow them, but a shouted instruction from Nergui caused him to stop. The rest of the team looked at each other in bafflement, but no one moved.

  Ignoring the command-after all, he told himself, he was not part of Nergui’s team-Drew stepped out from behind the police officers, and moved around until he was directly facing the doorway. Then he walked forward cautiously.

  Nergui was standing in the middle of the room, staring fixedly at the object spread out before him. Doripalam and the other armed officer stood to one side, both gazing at the ground. There was a bright spotlight shining across the whole area, illuminating the ghastly scene. Drew wondered irrelevantly what the power source of the light was.

  The object of Nergui’s gaze was a decapitated body, propped against the wall in the full glare of the spotlight, like a grotesque museum exhibit. Fixed between its two hands, as if mimicking some parody of a ghost, was the victim’s own head.

  Drew stood for a moment, transfixed. To his side, some of the other officers had begun to cluster around the door, their curiosity finally getting the better of them. One of them, one of the younger ones, moved forward to look at the scene, and then backed away, a look of shock on his face, his hand over his mouth. He turned and moved rapidly toward the entrance, retching as he ran. Others began to move back similarly, as if the bright room were somehow contaminated.

  Nergui looked up, and saw Drew. He nodded and beckoned Drew forward. Drew approached the room, uneasily but with less disgust than was evident amongst the police team. Although he had never seen anything quite like this, he had seen enough in his time to be able to cope.