by Peter Cotton
‘Can I have a go?’ said Jean.
I handed her my new toy. She swung it back and forth, tentatively at first and then with more vigour.
‘You could do some real damage with this,’ she said, handing it back to me.
‘Let’s hope I get the chance,’ I said, stowing the club under the top mattress. ‘Now let’s see if Joe’s up for a chat. And just so I can engage him, I’m going to tell him that you’ve done your back in, Rolfe. I know it’s partly true, but I’m going to say that you’re in absolute agony and that you need painkillers. Can you turn it on if you have to?’
‘Exaggerate, you mean?’ said Rolfe, looking from me to Jean. ‘Well, according to some people, that’s what I do best.’
I went to the door, thumped on it a few times, and waited. There was no response, so I thumped it again. Then the slide opened, but by barely a centimetre.
‘Step back,’ said Joe, in a muffled voice.
‘We need some painkillers,’ I said, stepping away and pointing to Rolfe, who was groaning on the mattresses. ‘It’s his back. Aspalgin would be good. Or Nurofen, if you’ve got it.’
‘I got nothing,’ said Joe, slamming the slide shut.
‘Wait!’ I said, my voice full of emotion. ‘Please wait.’
The slide opened again, just a few centimetres. Joe checked my position, and then he opened it a bit more.
‘What?’ he said.
When I’d thought about what I’d say to Joe, if and when I got the chance, most of what I’d come up with was straight from the textbooks. According to the experts, as a kidnap victim, you should try to build a rapport with your captors. Get to know them and let them get to know you. Show sympathy where possible. Don’t complain. Appear reasonable. Remain low-key.
While ours wasn’t a normal kidnap situation, I had these sentiments in mind as I considered how to approach Joe. In the end, I decided to try to push his greenie buttons, hoping that a concern for the planet was his motivation for murder.
‘I guess you’ve got your reasons for locking us up,’ I said, looking at the eye in the slot. ‘But the other two people in here, Jean and Simon? Their stories have nailed dozens of environmental vandals over the years. The illegal loggers. The cockies who bulldoze the bush. If you kill them, the environment will lose two of its best advocates, so you must find a way to let them live.’
I surprised myself with the passion I injected into this little speech. And while Joe didn’t respond, he didn’t leave, either. After an extended silence, I dangled a second-string argument.
‘I’m a policeman,’ I said. ‘I know the risks, and I choose to put my life on the line. But Jean and Simon here didn’t bargain for this …’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ said Joe. ‘Everyone deserve special. And you say you don’t want it, but you do. So we see what happen. Okay?’
Joe’s voice had a smile in it, like he was enjoying our chat.
‘Okay, but just remember,’ I said. ‘These two didn’t sign up for this. And whatever else you believe in, you’ve gotta believe that their deaths would be nothing but bad.’
The eye seemed to soften. But without its partner, and a face to give it context, I couldn’t really assess the impact I was having. There was another prolonged silence. Then Joe spoke.
‘When prawn trawler go to sea,’ he said, ‘it drag in lots they no want. Like small fish and useless sea creature. Even seal and bird. But only prawn is good. The rest, it by-catch, and it stay on deck and die. Then they push it back in water. It victim of stupid system and big waste. You here by accident, like by-catch. I no want you, but you here. For now. Later I push you back.’
‘When we’re dead,’ I said grimly.
‘We see,’ he said. ‘Please understand, human is same like kangaroo. Or tree. Or maybe cockroach. All is okay. Place for everything. But cockroach on food, or in bed, is no good. So must die. People who no good for me, or mine, they’s same like cockroach. Only harder to kill. But really same.’
‘Is that what Susan Wright did? Threaten you in some way?’
‘No,’ he said, turning his head away from the slide, distracted for a moment. ‘She have something we want. Something hard to get.’
‘And Alan Proctor?’
‘Proctor? He was cockroach. And easy to kill.’
Someone out in the corridor said something to Joe. The voice echoed like an angry hiss. He turned away and said, ‘Okay.’ Then he shut the slot and locked it. End of conversation. I went back to the mattresses and sat next to Jean.
‘I was hoping to give him something to think about,’ I said. ‘I don’t think it worked. Anyway, he’s not the one we need to influence.’
‘The woman?’ said Jean.
‘That’s right,’ I said.
‘So what now?’ said Rolfe. ‘You’ve got your club. We’ve blocked the vent that delivers the gas. Shouldn’t we be doing something about the other vent up there?’
‘No,’ I said, looking at the cleaner of the two vents. ‘There’s an exhaust fan inside that one. It’s there to suck the fumes out of this place — when they’ve done their job.’
Rolfe was unsettled by this explanation, but said nothing. Jean was quiet, too. And so we sat there, silently pondering our fate, hungry and tired. I began to wonder why the team hadn’t heard from any of the residents that Rolfe had interviewed in Red Hill on Monday night. Our fears for his safety had received blanket media coverage throughout Tuesday. Maybe his interviewees weren’t big media-consumers. Or maybe they hadn’t made a connection between the missing journo and the one who’d knocked on their door to ask about missing cats from years ago.
Jean was different. It was still the middle of the night, so it would be hours before it was generally known that she was missing. But once people heard, someone from Red Hill was sure to call the cops to say that she’d knocked on their door just before she disappeared. Then they’d learn that Rolfe had been knocking on the same doors, and McHenry would link their disappearance to my own — especially as I’d been keen to tail Jean. If I were him, I’d assume that the three of us were all in the same place, and in mortal danger. The problem was, this room was miles from Red Hill, and we hadn’t found it when we’d been searching for Wright and Proctor. It meant we three were beyond help, and there was no one who could save us but ourselves.
According to the experts, kidnap victims should accept their situation, await resolution, and not attempt any heroics. It was reasonable advice, as only a small number of kidnapped people ever escape their captors. However, the advice didn’t apply to us. If we accepted our situation and waited patiently on these mattresses, I was 100 per cent certain that we’d soon be dead. What still wasn’t clear was why Joe and his mate had taken so long to dispatch Wright and Proctor. What had they been waiting for? And how much longer did we have?
As if to answer this question, the lights flashed off and on, twice. I knudged Jean and Rolfe, and we trudged to the back of the room and faced the wall. The door opened with a squeak of hinges, and closed in what sounded like the same movement. The bolt slammed back into place and the lights flashed again. Then the ginger cat let out a throaty growl, and the three of us swung around to see a small black-and-white cat in front of the door. It was up on its tippy toes, hissing death at ginger.
‘That didn’t take long,’ I said, stunned by how quickly things were moving.
Rolfe shooed the cats to opposite ends of the room. They soon settled on their haunches, their eyes locked on each other.
‘So here we are,’ he said, sitting back down. ‘Three little cockroaches waiting to die. Well, surely there’s something more we can do! There must be!’
There was more, but I’d been keeping it to myself for fear that too much detail might cause these two to drop their bundles. Now the time had come to reveal all.
‘Here
’s the thing,’ I said, kneeling on the edge of the mattresses, facing them. ‘Joe kept Wright and Proctor dehydrated and food-deprived while they were in here, but both of them had full stomachs when they died. And there was a date-rape drug called ketamine in their systems. In essence, he starved them, then gave them a feast of drugged food, and once they were unconscious, he turned on the gas. You’d expect him to use the same method on all his victims, but maybe he won’t with us — he’ll know that I know about the ketamine, and he’ll expect me to tell you about it so that you don’t eat any of the food he gives us. So he might forget about sedating us, and just turn on the engine out there and be done with it.’
‘And if he offers us food and we reject it?’ said Jean. ‘I guess he’ll turn on the engine pretty soon after that anyway, right?’
‘If he brings food in here,’ I said, ‘Rolfe should make a big show of eating it.’
‘What?’ said Rolfe, mystified by this suggestion. ‘Why would I do that?’
‘Joe will know that I warned you about the food, so when I abuse you for eating it and you keep eating despite the abuse, he’ll think we’re totally demoralised — that we’re in disarray, and that we’re even more vulnerable than we appear. And that’s how we want him to see us, because that way he’ll be much easier to catch off-guard when he comes in here to check on us. After we’re supposed to be dead.’
‘How dangerous is this ketamine?’ said Rolfe.
‘Essentially, a moderate dose will put you to sleep in a hurry. You’ll have strange dreams and you’ll be wonky when you wake up. But it won’t do any damage. I can assure you of that.’
‘And you really think it’ll help if I do a little performance and eat some of it?’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘Okay then, I will.’
With that resolved, I suggested we take turns in getting some shut-eye, and I nominated Rolfe to go first. He agreed, and rolled onto his side and closed his eyes. Within minutes, he was fast asleep. Jean edged closer to me so that our shoulders and knees were touching. Despite our situation, I felt strangely at ease sitting there with her.
‘What’s the first thing you’re going to do when we get out of here?’ she said.
‘I don’t really know,’ I said. ‘Shower, I guess. Change my clothes. And then nail these bastards. What about you?’
‘Yeah. The same. Clean myself up. Then tell the world about this place.’
The serious set on her face turned into a smile as something else occurred to her.
‘And I’d thank Detective Darren Glass for saving me,’ she said. ‘And I’d demand that he be rewarded for his bravery. And his nous.’
‘And the reward? What would that be?’
‘Oh, something appropriate.’
She looked into my eyes, and then she moved her head towards mine, and our lips met. Just brushed together, really. She pulled her head away to where we could focus on each other. We smiled, and then we kissed again. This time, the kiss lingered. And when our lips finally parted, I put my arm around her and she turned towards me.
‘You know what they say about kissing and cuddling at times like these?’ I said, as she snuggled into me.
‘They have something to say about everything else, so what do they say about this?’
‘That people in situations like ours tend to get physically close. But what they’re really doing is comforting each other. And themselves. And when their ordeal’s over, things usually don’t go much further between them. They resume a polite distance. And sometimes they never see each other again.’
‘And is that what you want, Darren?’
‘No. I want to see you in that hat again. The black one with the feather.’
‘You liked that feather, didn’t you? In fact, you couldn’t take your eyes off it.’
‘You were waving that thing at me, weren’t you?’ I said, totally surprised by this revelation.
‘It was shameless, wasn’t it?’
The lights flashed off, on, off and on, breaking the spell. We separated, Jean knudged Rolfe, and the three of us lumbered over to the back wall. The slot opened and slammed shut, and then the door squeaked open and quickly closed again. The lights were still flashing as I swung around to see a big black tomcat crouching by the door. He was puffed out, and his ears were pinned back as he eyed the other cats. Then he flicked his bristling tail and retreated to the vacant corner next to the door, gurgling all the while, ready for a fight.
26
WHEN WE SETTLED back on the mattresses, the ginger cat surprised us all by coming over and rubbing itself against Rolfe. Rolfe patted the animal, tentatively at first, and then in long strokes from its head to its tail. The cat was soon curled up on his lap, purring with its eyes closed.
A buzzing noise came on in my head, the type you get on a long-haul flight ten hours from nowhere. I stood up and walked to the other side of the room, and steadied myself against the wall. Then I walked back to the mattresses and lowered myself down next to Jean. She rested her head on my shoulder and dozed for a few hours. She stirred occasionally, and once when she did, she snuggled into me again and I put my arm around her. I feared our sudden closeness might make Rolfe feel a bit excluded, till I caught him smiling as though he found our intimacy somehow reassuring.
At one point, Jean asked if we’d be alright. I tried to sound convincing when I replied that we’d be fine, but I was fighting the growing realisation that our chances of surviving this place hovered somewhere between slim and non-existent.
Later, while Jean slept, Rolfe asked me how I felt about dying. I told him I hadn’t thought about it, which was a lie. Then he asked if I was prepared for death. As well as I could be, I said. And it dawned on me that he was readying himself for the end.
He said he would have liked to have left a last note for his sister. I fished around in my jacket for the ink cartridge from my pen and a faded supermarket receipt I’d found flattened in the back pocket of my trousers. I handed them to him, and he thanked me, then leaned the receipt on the bottom of one of his shoes and wrote down his final thoughts. After he handed me back the cartridge, he asked where he should leave the note. I told him I’d put it under the carpet where the skirting had come away.
‘Why would you hide it where it’ll never be found?’ he said.
‘Look, even if we don’t make it out of here,’ I said, ‘my people will find this place, and when they do, your note will turn up. And, eventually, they’ll pass it on to your sister. I promise.’
He accepted this reassurance and handed the note over. I lifted the carpet and pushed the note under as far as it would go. Just as I was settling back onto the mattresses, the lights went out, plunging the room into darkness for what seemed like several seconds. Then they went on again. And off. And on. As we made our way to the back wall, I reminded myself that if I was going to have an impact here, I had to compensate for what hunger and dehydration were doing to my reaction time, my balance, and my strength. It could be the difference between living and dying. The door opened and quickly closed. The slot in it squeaked, and the lights flickered a couple of times.
When we turned around, a plate full of sliced-up pizza was sitting in front of the door. Without prompting, Rolfe let out a cry of joy and rushed to the food. He shoved a couple of slices into his mouth, then hovered over the plate with his cheeks bulging. The slide in the door remained open a pinch so that Joe could assess how his offering was being received. Jean followed me back to the mattresses, and we slumped down together and scowled at Rolfe.
‘No one can be that bloody hungry, Rolfe,’ I said, eyeing him with contempt. ‘What a complete idiot!’
Rolfe tweaked his eyes into a smile. Jean shook her head and growled. Then Rolfe stepped over the plate of pizza so that he blocked the line of vision between the mattresses and the door.
> ‘You!’ said Joe, opening the slide a bit more. ‘Go back your friends!’
‘Whatever you say, darling,’ said Rolfe. ‘But you know, you sound rather tense. Maybe you should have some of this pizza. Better be quick, though! Ohhh, no! Too late!’
Rolfe picked up the last four slices, took a bite out of two of them, and hurled the other two at the cats that were spread out along the back wall. The animals cringed, but held their positions as the missiles hit the floor in front of them. Rolfe shot Joe a crazy smile before skipping over and joining us on the mattresses.
The smell of the pizza was almost unbearable, as was the noise Rolfe made while eating it. I concentrated on the growls the ginger and the little black-and-white cat were making as they hoed into the slices Rolfe had tossed at them. Big tom was the only cat with no interest in the food. He’d given one of the slices a suspicious sniff, and had then returned to the door to keep watch on everyone.
Rolfe turned and saluted Joe with a half-eaten slice. Joe muttered something inaudible. Rolfe saluted the door again, prompting Joe to growl at him. Then the slide slammed shut, and Joe was gone. Rolfe immediately lifted the edge of the mattresses and spat partly masticated pizza onto the floor. He added the uneaten bits of pizza to the pile, and dropped the mattresses on top of the lot.
‘So, three-and-a-half slices,’ he said. ‘If it’s drugged, I guess that’ll be more than enough to put me under.’
‘Let’s see how you go,’ I said. ‘I’m sure you’ll be alright.’
‘I certainly hope so,’ he said. ‘And when you get us out of this, remember, I’ve got first call on the medics when they arrive. Okay?’
‘That’s only fair, Rolfey,’ said Jean, patting his shoulder. ‘And we will get out of here, won’t we, Darren?’
I nodded, though I now doubted we’d survive this place. I was dehydrated and very tired. I was also very dizzy, and every movement was an effort. Even so, I knew I could muster the strength if ever Joe’s head came within range of my club.
