(2005) Rat Run

by Gerald Seymour

  Half an hour later, Malachy closed the outer door behind him and padded down the walkway. It was near to midnight. Over the railing, he could see the little clusters of figures, where they would have been when Mildred Johnson came back from the bingo. On the last flight of the stairs he had to scrape himself against the graffiti to get past two vagrants hunched down: one had the sleeve of his coat rolled up and a syringe poised above the skin; the other was probing with his fingers for a vein in the back of his leg, contorting himself and cursing at the effort. He could smell them. They seemed not to notice him. He thought the first would use the syringe and then, if the other had found a vein, it would be used again. When he was past them he stumbled down the last flights of the steps, then leaned against the street wall and panted. To go on or turn back? If he turned back he would have to retrace the route past the vagrants with the needle.

  It had been the intention of the architect responsible for the Amersham's design that residents should park their cars and vans under the blocks, but for the last fifteen years, no man or woman had dared to leave a vehicle in the garage spaces: smashed windows, stolen radios and tyres, vandalized paintwork had cleared the cavern areas. Interior lights, set in the support pillars, were broken and only the street-lights reached under the low concrete ceilings. The residents who had cars left them out on the street now, under the high lights: they could come out from their barricaded front doors, peer down from the walkways above and check them.

  Between distant pillars, a small fire guttered.

  Shadows flitted round it and he heard low voices.

  Above him was a sign, paint flaking, detailing the numbers of the parking bays. He looked for the number he had been given, then breathed hard and stepped into the interior. He had on the rubber-soled trainers from the charity shop, but however lightly he attempted to walk, his tread seemed to shout his advance. Sometimes his feet crunched on broken glass, and once he stepped and slid in fresh faeces. He could just see some of the numbers on the pillars, enough to guide him towards the far wall. The outline of a car loomed in front of him. He felt the weakness in his gut and at his knees, then the hiss of a window being electrically lowered. He tried to see inside and could make out a head in a balaclava.

  The voice was muffled through the wool. 'Is that you?'

  'It is me.'

  'Wanted to hear your voice, know it was you.'

  He knew the voice. 'What's a piece of shit like you doing here?' and 'You look after that lady. .. Watch out for her.' He said curtly, 'I know your voice and we do not need, for whatever your purpose, this crap in the middle of the night.'

  'Fighting talk from a big brave boy. Understand me, I am not here, I was never here. Ever get the idea that I was here and shout about it, and it'll be your word against mine - and your medical history against the busload of people who will stand up and swear on the Bible, good and firm, that I was elsewhere. Forget it. Those are the rules. I am not here and you never met me here. You got hold of the rules?'

  'If you say so.'

  'I say it. I said that I'd find out about you—'

  'You did.'

  'Don't interrupt me, doesn't make me happy.' A pencil torch flashed on in the car, and the beam shone down on a file of papers. 'You are Malachy Walter Kitchen?'

  'I am.'

  'Son of Walter and Araminta Kitchen, born 1973?'

  'Yes.'

  'On leaving school, a year's teaching in Krakow, Poland?'

  'I cannot see that that is relevant to anything.'

  'Everything of you, to me, is relevant.' The papers on the lap were turned. 'You joined the army. Your father was a senior officer, now retired. You were recruited into the ranks. Basic Training, then Germany, Logistics Corps. I suppose it was a gesture

  - a poor one, and it did not last. Right?'

  'I'd have thought you had better things to do with your time than pry into my past.'

  'Easy, Malachy, easy, there's a good fellow.' There was a stifled chuckle. 'You were pulled out. There's a letter in the files from your father. A request was made to friends to give you a hand up.'

  He ground his teeth. 'I didn't know. If I had I wouldn't have accepted the offer.'

  'That's convenient - always good to keep the pride.

  So, you went to Sandhurst, to the Royal Military Academy, to be made into an officer. Not much of one, only "fair" ratings for team work. Described as a

  "loner" - but they're down on numbers, these days, and they pass through what they've got.'

  'My academic work was graded "above average". I was good enough for what I wanted to do.'

  'Absolutely right. You were accepted into the Intelligence Corps in '96. Dad couldn't complain about that - it was respectable. You were at the corps'

  base at Chicksands for three years. Your assessments give no indication of what will happen. It is said of you that you show aptitude for working under pressure on your own. You were one of those solitary people who makes a virtue of not needing company.

  Where I am we have a few. They've slipped through the net, and they're arrogant, opinionated, not good work colleagues. Once we've spotted them they're out. Do you recognize yourself?'

  'I recognize nothing. It's your game.'

  'You married Roz in '98. Wasn't clever but you did.

  Daughter of a warrant-officer instructor at Sandhurst.

  You set up home in married quarters at Chicksands.

  But that's not my business.'

  'That is not your bloody business.'

  'Not my business except when I can see I'm pouring salt on to a raw wound. Trekking on, you're then posted to Rome to be on the military attache's staff.

  That must have been nice, bit of a doddle, I'd have thought. Cocktail parties, NATO exercises and updating the Italian army. Heavy stuff.'

  'I did what was asked of me.'

  'Back to Chicksands. Working to Major Brian

  Arnold. Rarefied long-range guessing on the agenda.

  What do we know about the Iraqi order of battle?

  How mobile is a Republican Guard armoured

  division? Who are the personalities in command of Iraqi units? Where have they been trained? What is the quality of Iraqi logistics and support arms? War is getting closer, work hours longer - earlier away from the little woman and later back. Immersed in work, head never above the parapet... Am I getting it right?'

  'If you want to believe it, you can believe it.'

  'Don't get shirty with me, Malachy. I'm the one with a home and family to go back to. You've neither. The war starts. All those clever papers you've written, they're all proven crap. The Yanks slice through the defences, which was not in your predictions. No, you hadn't got that right. Hardly time to blink and the fighting war's over, and it's peace. You are one of many, suddenly sitting on your hands and looking at the sun shining down on Chicksands. Your trouble, though - and it's the same trouble for all the work-obsessed geeks - is that you don't do hobbies.

  Nothing to fill your days, and nights. Not going well with the lovely Roz, eh? Then Major Arnold drops his bombshell. You're off to Iraq.'

  He understood. It was as if a rope had tightened round his throat. He said hoarsely, 'There was work, worthwhile work, to be done there.'

  'That's better. Now we're singing from the same hymn sheet - excellent. And the excreta's in the fan.

  Supposed to be mission accomplished, but it's not.

  The time for rose petals chucked under the tracks of tanks is a memory. It's about terrorism and about improvised explosive devices and law-and-order breakdown and the assassination of collaborators, and a dream that's as sour as old milk. First you get to Brigade in Basra. I expect they get the message -

  another junkie from Intelligence, boasting brain power over brawn and telling the brigadier where he's doing it wrong - short-cut to getting popular, eh?'

  'I was coming with a different viewpoint.'

  'Soon as they could get rid of you, Brigade did the business and packed
you off to a battalion of Jocks, somewhere out in the sand. That must have been a thrill. They're real soldiers, getting their arses shot at, and now on their territory is a guy from outside their ranks. I expect you didn't hesitate - with the full weight of your Intelligence Corps expertise - to point out to the commanding officer where they were going wrong. I read a little note from someone at the HQ: a gathering in the officers' mess and everyone's yapping about what should be done, but the I Corps officer reckons they're talking shit and can't keep his mouth shut, says, "My opinion, anyone who thinks he knows the short-fix answer to southern Iraq's problems is ill informed." I'll bet that went down as well as if you'd pulled the pin and dropped a hand grenade. So, they sent you—'

  'All I did was tell them what I thought.'

  'Back to the old self-opinionated stubbornness -

  couldn't let it go then and can't now. They sent you up to a company base, codename Bravo. I'd hazard that there were a fair few at Brigade, Battalion and Company who'd have raised a cheer if they'd known you were going to fall on your face. You went out on patrol—'

  'That's enough.'

  'Not good listening, eh? Getting sensitive, is it?'

  'It wasn't like anyone said.'

  'What did they call you, Malachy, after the patrol?'

  'I don't have to listen.' He was shouting.

  'What was their description of you, Malachy?'

  'Go fuck yourself.'

  'A bit of spirit, Malachy - that's what I want to hear.

  I think we're progressing. You don't want me to say what they called you, all right, how they described you, all right, you haven't forgotten. It's hung round your neck. I said you were a failure - a man can live with that. But a man can't live with what they called you. Am I right, Malachy?'

  'Cannot.'

  'Anyone stand your corner, speak for you? I don't think so. Think of topping yourself, Malachy, ending it?' 'Thought of it.'

  'And you fell - no work, no wife, no family, no friend. Collapse, booze, mind broken . . . You were lucky you ended here.'

  The fire beyond the pillars flared and there was a shriek of laughter that echoed through the car park, across the empty bays.

  'What did you lose, Malachy?' The voice had

  softened. 'What replaced personal pride, self-esteem, respect? Shall I answer? Would it be shame?'

  Malachy whispered it: 'Disgust.'

  'What's it like? I don't know.'

  'It's demons. It's always with you. It's a torture chamber. There's no time in the day or the night that it's not with you.'

  'Let me tell you a story, Malachy, and listen well.

  I'm a young copper. I'm with a mate and it's the middle of a balls-freezing night and we get this call in Hackney. Intruder on the roof of a warehouse. My mate goes up on the roof, and I'm tracking along on the ground. My mate goes through the roof. I saw him in Stoke Mandeville when he hadn't been there - the spinal injuries unit - more than two days. He was weeping his eyes out, couldn't have been consoled because he was diagnosed as near quadriplegic. I made a big effort, because it had cut me right up, saw him again in a month, and when I went into the ward I could hear his laughter. It was food time and he was learning to eat and it was all over his front and his face, just like everyone else had it. He said to me, quiet, "What you learn in here, there's always someone worse off than yourself." A good sob story, yes?

  Last I heard of him he was doing a job, from a wheelchair, in police communications. Being called a cripple

  - that's not as bad as what they called you, but it's down that road. He was thought of as useless. Are you useless, Malachy?'

  'I don't know,' he said simply.

  'Do you want to find out?'

  A ripple of panic caught him. He sensed that everything was choreographed. 'What if there's no road back?' he blurted.

  'Always is, you have to believe that - otherwise stop fucking about and living like a goddamn recluse.

  Walk on to the bridge and bloody well jump. But you have to believe it. Malachy, get something in your mind.'

  'Tell me.'

  'You saw her. Bruises, broken arm, violated like they'd raped her.'

  'I saw her.'

  'There's a road back, Malachy.'

  Through the open window a slip of paper was

  passed to him by a hand gloved in black leather. He saw the glint of the eyes through the balaclava's slit as the man reached across. There was no light to read what was written on the paper and he pocketed it.

  'What do I have to do?'

  'Don't have to do anything, Malachy. The vagrants steal to buy the wraps. With the money they steal, from an old lady's purse, they buy. The dealers sell to them. You do what you want to do, Malachy. You do what you think is right, and maybe that'll make a ladder for you. Goodnight, keep safe.'

  The window was raised, and the engine was

  gunned to life. Without headlights, the car reversed sharply and swung, squealed tyres, between the pillars and out into the lit street. Malachy stood rooted, his mind pounding confusion.

  Chapter Three

  He woke. It was already past eleven o'clock.

  The banging on his door drummed into his head. If it had not been for the sound Malachy would have slept on. He dragged himself off the bed.

  It had been a sleep he had not known for months, for a year. No dreams and no nightmares. No images squirming in his mind.

  The banging persisted. He shouted out that he was coming, but his voice was faint from a dried-out throat and the banging did not stop. He pulled on his trousers that he had dumped last night on the carpet when he had fallen, collapsed, on to the bed.

  'Yes, I'm coming. For God's sake, I'm coming!'

  Out of the bedroom, he walked past the table. There was the mat on which he put his plate, the little plastic containers for salt and pepper, a mug he'd left there from which he'd drunk instant coffee - and the sheet of paper. He snatched it up and buried it in his pocket.

  He went towards the door.

  Last night, back from the parking bays under the block, he had read, again and again, what had been passed to him through the car's window. He had sipped the coffee and told himself he would sleep on it, not decide anything till the morning. He would not commit himself till the morning; he did not have to . . .

  his decision. It had been the best night's sleep he could remember. But nobody owned him.

  'I'm coming.'

  He unlocked the door and dragged down the bolt.

  He paused, seemed to suck air down into his body. He could not remember when last his door had been banged on but, then, he could barely remember when he had last slept a whole long night and been free of the demons.

  Dawn was there.

  'I went to see her,' she said.

  'Yes.'

  'Are you not concerned for her?'

  'Of course I'm concerned for her.'

  'You want to know how she is?'

  'I'd like to.'

  'I thought you would be there. I thought you would have visited her. She had Tony early before he went to work, then me when I have finished. I thought you would be there . . . but I look at you, and I see you were asleep.'

  'I thought I'd go later on,' he said weakly.

  'She does not sleep. She has the pain in her head and the pain in her arm, both are severe. Worst is the pain in her soul. Do you understand me?'

  His voice was limp. 'Please, explain to me.'

  'A policeman came yesterday afternoon and gave her a victim number. He asked her if she could describe her attackers. It was dark so she could not.

  The policeman said there was a camera covering the stairwell, but it did not have film in it. There are many cameras for show, but few with film in them. It hurts her that no one will be punished. I am sorry that you did not travel to see her.'

  'I slept in late, didn't mean to.'

  He thought his excuses demeaned him to the tall African woman, elderly, but still cleaning ministry offices and stairca
ses, and thought she regarded him with contempt. Probably working through her mind were the snippets of his history that she knew. Had once been a gentleman, like the men with individual offices that she rose early to clean. Had been disgraced and had collapsed. Had been a vagrant living rough, like the vagrants who had stolen from her Millie.

  'Don't you go tiring yourself, Mr Malachy. You go back to bed. Not good for a young man to exhaust himself. In three days she will be coming out, when they have done the pin in her arm. I apologize, Mr Malachy, for disturbing you.'

  She was gone, away with her dignity.

  He closed the door.

  He pulled the piece of paper out of his pocket.

  Three names. Not the names of vagrants but of members of the High Fly Boys who strutted the Amersham. He studied them, then took a pencil stub and began to write down, hesitantly at first, then feverishly, what he would need to buy.

  13 January 2004

  Baz was the section's star. Had to be one, and it was him.

  The way he was going he was close to being the platoon's star. The company commander always noticed him and he'd heard he was listed for his first stripe, and he'd get it within the next fortnight. Baz was the best shot in the platoon, and when other Jocks in the section couldn't reassemble an SM80 or a GPMG after cleaning, it was to Baz they turned.

  Back at the depot, east of Inverness, Baz played right central stopper in the battalion soccer team. As a member of HQ

  platoon of the company, Iraq suited Baz as well as a good glove fitted a hand.

  He listened to the briefing. Baz didn't rate the corporal.

  He himself could have done the job better, blindfolded and with an arm behind his back. Because he didn't rate him, he hardly listened as the corporal, reading off notes, told them what route they would take, on foot, out of Bravo. Two and a half hours of showing the presence. Baz, like every other Jock at the police station, knew a lift was coming the following morning, and that the patrol was going out that afternoon to give the impression that everything was normal, quiet, routine; a break in the patrolling pattern might sound a warning to those in the identified buildings who were to be lifted.