The Truth

by Peter James

  And just supposing that Sarotzini was prepared to kill people and get involved in illegal cover-ups, then how safe was Susan? Or himself?

  What did Sarotzini really want from them?

  Susan had told him that Sarotzini had lied about his wife and wasn’t married. And she told him that he’d talked about his religion and had said that Jesus Christ was an impostor, but she was unclear what his religion was, and urged John to read the books on the occult that she’d left in the bottom of a suitcase at her parents’ house.

  He had read them. Some of the chapters that enabled him to understand the significance of the occult symbols in their house and of new-born babies disturbed him deeply. And the daily visitors, with their occult gifts, disturbed him as deeply, as if by the sheer weight of their numbers they lent credibility to his consternation.

  OK, Susan’s fears that the baby would be taken and sacrificed the moment it was born had been groundless, but only so far. Perhaps it didn’t need to be a new-born baby. Perhaps Sarotzini was keeping Verity for one of the specific dates listed in his book. Walpurgis Night was coming up: 30 April. Or the Summer Solstice on 21 June. Or Lammas, the great Sabbat festival, on 31 July. Or the Autumn Equinox. Or Samhain. There were any number of festivals ahead.

  How deeply were they into something they did not understand?

  And what was their exit? Handing over Verity? That was no longer an option for him; not without tremendous reassurances, backed by hard evidence, that her future safety would be assured. And, even with that, he doubted Susan would ever consent, not now.

  He said nothing of his fears to her or to her parents. Dick and Gayle Corrigan were having a tough time coping with their grief over Casey, and he knew the room was bugged, probably being watched, and maybe their house and their cars and God only knew what else.

  That feeling of helplessness he’d experienced a year ago in Mr Clake’s office had returned with a vengeance. But then he’d had at least some idea of what to do and where to turn.

  Now he had none.

  Chapter Sixty-seven

  As the private jet accelerated Susan felt the joins in the runway bumping beneath them. Verity’s mouth opened in alarm, and Susan cuddled her, making soothing noises. The roar of the engines deepened, the plane shook, and then it was riding a cushion of air and Los Angeles was tumbling steeply away beneath them.

  Her ears popped. She held her nose and blew, then Verity started to cry. Susan wondered if her little ears were hurting too – they must be, she decided, and she didn’t know how to deal with this.

  She turned to John. ‘Hon, does it say anything in your CD about how we get Verity to pop her ears?’

  He hauled his briefcase on to his lap and opened it. All the papers in it slid forward from the angle of the climb. Rummaging inside, he pulled out his laptop, powered it up and inserted one of DigiTrak’s recent CD releases, which he’d had sent over, titled Dr Harvey Addison’s 1001 Useful Things to Know About Your Baby. He searched through it. Ears popping on an aeroplane was not among them.

  Verity’s crying worsened. Mr Sarotzini, sitting opposite in one of the rearward-facing seats, said, ‘If you feed Verity, the sucking and swallowing will ease the pressure in her ears, Susan.’

  She looked back at him resentfully. With every day that passed she found it harder to accept that Mr Sarotzini was Verity’s father, and regarded even this piece of advice as an intrusion. So what did he expect now? That she was going to expose a breast right here, in front of him, and start suckling Verity?

  And then, she wondered, suspiciously, How did he know what to do? Had he had other babies, like Verity? From other brood-mare mothers, like herself?

  ‘She’ll be OK,’ she replied. ‘She’ll settle down. It’s just the noise of the take-off that unsettled her.’

  Verity bawled even more loudly, her tiny mouth contorting, her face puce. As soon as the jet began to level out, Susan unclipped her seat belt and, a little unsteadily, carried Verity down to one of a cluster of chairs around a small boardroom table at the rear of the cabin.

  There, in privacy, she slipped out her left breast and held Verity’s face to it. Within seconds, the baby’s screaming faltered, and she began to nuzzle the nipple. Susan watched her contented expression, and felt a glow of warmth, which almost immediately gave way to a feeling of anger that Mr Sarotzini had been right. ‘We’re going to England,’ she whispered. ‘You’re coming home with me. Are you looking forward to it?’

  John peered round to check if Susan was OK, but couldn’t see her, then looked back at his laptop and clicked on the Introduction icon, which was a small avatar of Harvey Addison.

  A second later, Harvey filled the screen, oily smooth and silky-voiced, welcoming every new mother in the world to his essential guide. John’s emotions churned at the sight of his friend. He’d been in the studio to oversee the filming of this intro, less than a year ago, and could remember it clearly.

  He looked up and saw Mr Sarotzini watching him. The banker had returned to accompany them personally to England. John had been wary of accepting his invitation to fly them home in his private jet. If Sarotzini wanted to get rid of him and Susan, a thousand miles out over the Atlantic would have been as good a place as any. But then so would the clinic have been, he reasoned. If Sarotzini’s people could cover up Casey’s death, then his own and Susan’s would not have posed a problem either.

  Mr Sarotzini had told him that commercial airliners were breeding grounds for bugs; it was in the best interests of Verity’s health that they accepted. And, John had to admit, he was enjoying the novelty: this plane was the size of a commercial airliner, and had proper beds. And he’d got a certain thrill of power going through a separate section at Los Angeles airport; being, however fleetingly, in the realm of the super-rich was seductive. But not seductive enough to dull his wits.

  Mr Sarotzini said, quietly, ‘So, Mr Carter, the two of you have had three weeks in which to consider my terms. You have arrived at an answer?’

  ‘I haven’t had any terms from you,’ John said fractiously.

  The banker looked at him reproachfully. ‘I conveyed them to Susan. I would have thought, perhaps, during the past three weeks you would have discussed them?’

  ‘Susan’s in a state of shock. She needs counselling, therapy, probably a long haul with a psychiatrist. She doesn’t trust you or me or anyone right now. She believes you and I are in cahoots and that we have a hidden agenda. How can you expect her to think rationally? She’s a strong girl, she’s doing her best, she’s coping, but that’s all she’s doing. She’s coping, she’s trying to be a good mother, OK? If you have terms you want to discuss, you discuss them with me.’

  ‘I am permitting Susan to keep the baby. She has told you this?’

  ‘She’s under that impression. Presumably my feelings don’t count.’

  ‘You are her husband, Mr Carter. You are at perfect liberty to say no. I would understand.’

  John stared at the banker, at his coldly arrogant face, his immaculate suit, his shiny loafers, his expensive tie, reclining but alert, like a basking reptile, in his wide seat. ‘Would you?’ John said, cynically. ‘Would you really?’ He looked back at his computer screen, at Harvey Addison’s face frozen now, still, motionless.

  Dead.

  ‘Exactly how long does Susan get to keep her for?’

  Mr Sarotzini raised his hands. ‘Susan is Verity’s mother. How long does a mother keep any child?’ He leant forward and, unhurriedly, pressed his fingertips together forming the familiar bridge. ‘Of course, Mr Carter, I understand. It is not easy for you.’

  ‘That’s something I will have to discuss with Susan when she’s fit and ready. I also have a number of conditions for you.’

  The banker looked at him quizzically, as if amused by his presumption. ‘Yes? Please tell me.’

  ‘The first is that I want Susan under doctors of our own choosing from now on.’

  There was no reaction. ‘And the second?
’

  ‘I don’t want any more surveillance. No more bugging of my house, no more cameras.’

  ‘Give me no cause for alarm, Mr Carter, and further surveillance will not be necessary.’

  ‘Susan ran because she was scared you were going to take the baby away.’

  ‘That is no longer an issue.’

  ‘So there will be no more surveillance?’

  ‘No more, Mr Carter.’

  Their eyes met and John tried to gauge the sincerity of this statement. But he couldn’t. ‘Third thing, I don’t want anyone else coming to harm.’ John watched the man’s face carefully, but there was no visible reaction.

  ‘You require a bodyguard? Someone to protect Susan and Verity – and yourself?’

  ‘That’s not what I meant,’ John said. This time he saw a definite tightening around the man’s mouth and eyes. ‘And I want phone numbers where I can get hold of you. I want to know how often you expect to see Verity, what she will be told about who her father is, and who will pay for her upkeep.’ He hesitated. ‘And I want to understand what’s going on. Why did you want to have this baby so much? Why are you willing to give her up? This is not making any sense to me.’

  ‘In your Bible, Mr Carter, there is an eloquent line in, I believe, St Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. ‘ “Now we see through a glass darkly. Then, we shall see clearly.” ’ You are familiar with this line?’

  ‘I’m familiar with the quotation, but it’s not my Bible, I’m not religious.’

  ‘I don’t require you to be religious, Mr Carter. I am simply explaining that although at present you do not understand my decision to leave Verity with her mother, one day you will. It is not necessary to understand everything. Man has lived on this planet for four hundred thousand years without understanding the universe around him. That is a far more vexing problem than why a baby girl should be allowed to remain with her natural mother, is it not?’

  ‘You might have a reason that’s rather less cosmic,’ John replied. ‘Perhaps you were hoping for a boy, and a girl doesn’t suit your purposes. Or does she have some rare genetic disorder that’s going to kill or cripple her and you don’t want to be landed with an invalid?’

  Mr Sarotzini gave John a look of profound sadness, as if John had wounded him deeply. ‘And there is no place in your heart, Mr Carter, for simple compassion? You would not entertain in your harsh judgement of me the possibility that I, too, am a human being, and am capable of simple human emotions? Perhaps because you perceive me as wealthy, this puts me on a pedestal where I cannot be touched by the kinds of feelings and responses common to other people?’

  The distress in the banker’s voice took John by surprise. The man sounded genuinely close to tears. John was not sure what to say. Then the banker continued. ‘I have done everything in my power for you and Susan. I saved your business and your home, and I have risked disgrace and prison to save Susan from a possible murder charge. Can you not understand how fond I have grown of dear Susan? How much it would hurt me to see her unhappy? If I take Verity away, it will unhinge her further. And what purpose would it serve? Just to satisfy the whim of an old man.’

  ‘What about your wife?’ John said, softening a little, moved by the man but not sure he was telling the whole truth. ‘You told Susan that you have no wife.’

  Mr Sarotzini lowered his eyes. ‘Would Susan ever have agreed if she’d known that? I don’t think so. I’m just an old man, Mr Carter, old and lonely, who wanted to leave something of himself behind on this planet when he died.’ He nodded a few times, still looking down. ‘And, thanks to you and Susan, I have done that. Susan will make a better mother than any nurse or nanny I could hire. You – you and Susan will make better parents, give Verity a happier upbringing than I could ever hope to do. That’s all, that is my only agenda, that is the truth, Mr Carter.’ He looked up at John abjectly.

  John’s emotions were in disarray. Had he misjudged this man? Had he been swept along by Fergus’s wild stories of satanism? Jumping to conclusions about the occult drawings in the loft? Maybe Mr Sarotzini did practise the occult in some form – the religion he’d told Susan about, which she hadn’t understood – but the occult wasn’t necessarily bad, was it? There were plenty of good occultists, white witches, weren’t they called?

  Was that how Sarotzini had amassed his wealth? Through the occult? Through casting spells?

  The thought was absurd. Yet it was absurd also to be sitting in this private jet, absurd that his gentle wife had killed her sister and maimed her obstetrician, absurd that they were taking home a baby that he hadn’t even fathered, and that they would have to live a lie that he was the father for –?

  For how long?

  Until Mr Sarotzini came to claim her?

  ‘I presume,’ John said, ‘that you are going to release the shares in my business and the deeds to our house?’

  The question seemed to take Mr Sarotzini by surprise. ‘Our arrangement, Mr Carter, was that you would hand over the baby to me on the day it was born, and I would then return the deeds and shares to you. This has not happened. You and Susan have not yet earned my trust. How do I know that you will not decide, when you return to England, to put Verity out – for instance – for adoption by strangers?’

  John exploded, ‘That’s ludicrous!’

  ‘Yes,’ he said quietly. ‘I would like to hope so. But Susan, as you have admitted, is unbalanced. Who knows what is going through her mind?’

  ‘Susan intends to keep Verity. She loves her more than anything in the world – far more than she loves me.’

  Mr Sarotzini smiled. ‘All is well, then. You need not fear for the shares or deeds.’

  ‘So when do I get them back?’

  ‘When I am convinced.’ He smiled again and settled back in his seat. Then he pointed to John’s laptop. ‘Please, you have work to do. Don’t let me interrupt you any longer.’

  John stared back at him, seething with rage, all feelings that he might have misjudged the man swept aside. It was all he could do to restrain himself from getting out of his seat and grabbing the banker by the throat. There was nothing to be gained by an outburst.

  He stared back at his computer screen, at the motionless face of Harvey Addison, and tapped a few keys, clearing the screen, trying to clear his mind, his rage turning slowly to despondency. He was tired of being Mr Sarotzini’s puppet, tired of having his life controlled by this man. When they had gone into this, he had been able to see a clear exit at the far end. And just a month ago he had thought that when the baby was born, it would all be over.

  Now, it seemed, that had been only the beginning.

  They would be landing soon. Susan was dreaming, and Verity, curled in her arms, her tummy full of milk, was sleeping soundly. In the dream she was in a room she did not recognise: it was a large room and she was alone with Mr Sarotzini and another man who was in the shadows at the back; a very old man in a wheelchair.

  Mr Sarotzini said, ‘Susan, dear Susan, it is time now for you to understand what I am.’

  ‘What are you?’ she asked.

  ‘I am an instrument, that is all. I am merely an instrument for a Higher Power, Susan, just a humble servant of this Power, that is all, a messenger, a link in a chain, given a duty to carry a baton and to pass it on. This baton is a genetic code that contains knowledge from far back in history, a knowledge of all the Truths. It is a knowledge, Susan, whose time has come.’

  Then with a trace of bitterness, he said, ‘Regrettably I am not physically capable of passing it on. The Power has made me search for two others who carry this gene, and there are few on earth who have it, a mere handful of people. It has not been easy. The first success was twenty-five years ago, when the grave of an old man in Bavaria led me to the male, a small boy who was living in Africa.’

  Susan asked him, ‘Is this boy, the carrier of this gene, is he Verity’s father? Is he the man from Telecom?’ She felt lost, like a small child, like Alice in Wonderland. Her vo
ice echoed around this chamber as if she was in a cave. ‘Is he the man who was in the room – when – when I was being fertilised? Are you Verity’s father, or is this man? This boy you found?’

  ‘It’s not important.’

  ‘It is. It is important. It’s everything. I want to know the truth. Tell me the truth.’

  ‘You, dear Susan, are Verity’s mother, that is what counts.’

  ‘And the father? Who is the father? Is it the man from Telecom? The man who was in the room in the WestOne Clinic?’

  ‘There are some things it is better never to know.’

  ‘I want the truth.’

  ‘There are many Truths.’

  ‘Please, Mr Sarotzini, don’t play games with me.’

  ‘The Twenty-eighth Truth states that sometimes it is better to believe than to know. The Thirty-fourth Truth states that reality is what you believe, not what you want to believe.’ He smiled. ‘So similar and yet so different. It is beholden on all of us to find those Truths with which we are comfortable, and live by those. And it is more beholden on you, than on anyone else. Because one day, Susan, your baby will change the world.’

  ‘Why me? Why my baby?’

  ‘Because you also carry this gene. You must never be afraid, you must only be proud.’

  ‘What is this gene? How do you know I carry it?’

  ‘We searched for twenty-five years for a female who carried it, Susan. Last year, finally, we were successful. We found the grave in Los Angeles of a lady called Hannah Rosewell.’

  ‘Hannah Rosewell? My grandmother?’ Susan replied in astonishment.

  ‘We performed DNA tests on her remains.’

  ‘My grandmother?’

  ‘There are a mere handful of people in the entire world who carry this gene, Susan, and forces beyond nature have kept them far apart. The Apo-E-AA. This is the gene of my tribe.’

  ‘Your coven?’

  Mr Sarotzini ignored the remark. ‘If you have this gene you will live for at least a century, and probably longer. It is the strongest, most resistant gene in our species. We identified it in your family through a search through longevity records. Your grandmother, Hannah Rosewell, lived to a hundred and one. It a privilege to carry this gene, Susan, and when two people who carry this gene meet and produce a child, they are producing a human of a strength that has not been seen in thousands of years.’