by mark mctighe
“He’s lost all regard for life.....” Scarlett began.
Leo had slept in some uncomfortable places; hanging in slings off sheer rock faces in significantly sub zero temperatures. And he’d suffered some wood splitting hangovers in his time; but, this was worse than anything he’d ever experienced. Waking up from a chloroform induced sleep in a dark metal locker; twisted, aching, Tasered and thirsty. He righted himself and checked his pockets; nothing, watch missing. A dull orange electric light ventured through the crack on the hinge of the doors. There was no noise; just the sound of his breathing and the thump of his raised heart beat. Thoughts of Rufus came to mind ‘that’s another fine mess you’ve got me in to Dad’. Well this was unquestionably the mess of all messes; so far no one had made it out alive from this position. Leo shook his head, ‘well I’m the exception to the rule’ he thought. ‘Think straight and act fast when the opportunity arises’. Leo gave himself a pep talk. Firstly, there was a chance that the locker hadn’t been put together as well as the others and; secondly, he was considerably stronger than Sasse and Whittaker. All out aggression, ‘the mad dog’ approach and who knows he could be out in a couple of minutes. But was Simon Wass out there? And if so, could he put a stop to it before Leo got out. Leo listened hard. First there was some tapping, then banging.
“I’m Simon Wass”. Leo concluded that Wass was a distance away, perhaps 20 metres. It was difficult to say. He was sure Wass was addressing Horsham and probably through a similar locker. “You’ve seen what I did to the other two bullies.”
Horsham interrupted, “What do you want? I can give it to you if you just let me go.” His voice desperate and verging on the hysterical.
Wass decided to have some fun and played along with the joke for a minute. Let Horsham think that there was room for a negotiation. “OK James Horsham. I want an apology, and I want five million pounds....... Oh, and I want your wife and the children. I want to be their father.” Wass laughed out loud as James Horsham screamed. “You see James Horsham it’s not a negotiation, like I told the others it’s an inevitability. But I’ve saved the best for you, your death will be far more drawn out. You see it was you that pushed the locker down the stairs, it was you that said ‘bon voyage’. It was all your idea.”
Leo decided it was time to join the conversation. “Simon, it’s DI Leopold Dix, it doesn’t have to be this way.”
Wass turned and faced the intruding voice, demonic, possessed, his voice now an octave lower. “If you say another word I will pipe gas into your enclosure and when you’re asleep...... Well you saw what happened to some of the others. And besides I’ve seen how you flirt with Victoria, HANDS OFF, she’s mine now.” Leo fell silent, the cards were seriously stacked against him and he didn’t like Victoria being dragged into it one little bit.
Wass began again, “I’m giving you an oxygen supply, a light even, but it won’t be quite as spacious as it is in there. You see James Horsham; I’ve prepared a grave for you. A grave that by Friday morning will be under 2 feet of reinforced concrete. You’ll still be alive, for a bit...... You left me trapped in that locker and unable to breathe. There was no way out and you walked away. So that is how you will die.” ....... “Oh and the added bonus is you’ve got a couple of days to think about it. You’ve probably lost track of time; it’s only Tuesday night.” A hopeless weeping sound rose and fell.
Leo decided it was time to act and he went ‘mad dog’. The panels bent under the force of his explosion, the locker fell. He screamed and shouted; repeatedly elbowing the panel alongside. He kicked and kicked but to no avail, it was rock solid. Leo could hear a hissing of gas, ‘shit, the fucker’s fitted a valve’. Leo’s legs felt heavy and then silence fell.
“Nothing for you to worry about James Horsham.” Wass was having the time of his life. “It’s just a sleeping policeman. He’s actually a better cop when he’s asleep; gets more stuff right.” Wass found it hilarious. The incinerator site was stone dead; it was a chance to get on with things. ‘Let’s get the sleeping policeman sorted’ Wass thought. He moved over to the yellow hand control and pressed forward. The overhead crane ran smoothly on its tracks until he released his thumb. Wass lowered the pulley until the electro magnet came into contact with the locker with a thump. He raised the locker and moved it forward and onto the back of a flat bed truck. As Wass broke the connection it fell the last foot with a crash. It gave him a sense of power and superiority. He inhaled a large breath of air and held it in his enlarged rib cage. He felt strong. Wass secured the locker with a single ratchet strap. Horsham was enjoying a gas induced nap, he couldn’t possibly get up to any tricks, and that gave Wass the freedom to roam the site and deal with the sleeping policeman once and for all. He drove out of the orange light and into the darkness of midnight. The air was crisp and cool. Wass always felt invigorated in open spaces. ‘I should have taken an outdoor job really but Dad was always dead against it. He always told me that outdoor jobs paid outdoor wages and on the whole, outdoor wages were always lower than indoor ones. It’s rubbish really, some of the best paid jobs are on oil rigs and they are seriously outdoor.’
The incinerating site was dominated by a massive crane; to its left sat a bank of short stubby chimneys; the latest in desulphurising technology. The released gasses scrubbed clean of all toxic traces. To its right sat a tall brick chimney of some 200ft; a remnant of the original plant, decommissioned in the mid 1970s. There had been talk of toppling it but, in truth, it had become a landmark that the local residents surprisingly wanted to keep. Wass stood on the flatbed and pulled a sling under the metal unit. He could hear the stirrings of the sleeping policeman. Wass pulled the control unit over his head and turned it on. He skilfully brought the boom overhead and lowered the release hook. The locker sat level in the sling as he pushed the paddle control up. It shot up rapidly and towards the mouth of the 200ft tower, the voices grew faint as it travelled up and up. ‘Drop’s certain to kill him’ Wass thought, ‘but wouldn’t it be nice if he survived, injured and trapped. Perhaps then he’d understand what it was like to be in a helpless position. Perhaps it will bring him closer to understanding me, understanding why I had to see this through.’ It was dead centre when Wass hit the release button. Wass heard nothing, just as he’d expected, the brick walls way too thick for any sound to permeate. He returned the crane to its original position and replaced the control unit. ‘Job done, going swimmingly’ he thought.
Leo wasn’t even conscious of being raised in the air. He was awake but couldn’t move. His body relaxed and out of his control. He could barely think but knew that he was in some sort of trouble. There was a feeling of lightness; a G force; rollercoaster came to mind. He was falling and could do nothing about it. The metal locker struck the reinforcing rods 30 ft down; two cross rods connected to metal plates and drilled into the engineering bricks of the chimney. A rod broke free and critically for Leo, slowed the rapid decent of the freefalling locker. A further 30 ft down and the locker hit the second set of reinforcing rods. This time it stuck fast. Leo’s relaxed body took the hits well. His face was less fortunate; a tear in the metal of the locker creating a serrated edge which cut deeply to the bone. His reconstructed nose flattened once again. He couldn’t form any words to describe how he felt, a low moaning exhalation of the remaining air in his lungs was the only sound. The creaking locker was damaged. Leo couldn’t see the damage in the absolute darkness. He could feel it. His head felt puffy and he was losing blood, but as the minutes past he slowly came back to life; his fingers strong; legs good. The hinges on one door had started to come away from the casing and this provided an opportunity for escape; ‘escape to what?’ Leo thought. The locker continued to creak and whine but it didn’t rock; it felt sort of balanced, semi stable. He didn’t want to do anything sudden or violent. Leo forced his foot into the small gap and pushed; progressively increasing the pressure in small increments, ‘no jerks’. The door started to bend slowly; still no light but now there was a gap th
at you could push a tennis ball through. He continued like this for what seemed like hours; his face pulsing and bleeding, his head now light and dizzy. After an eternity had past the gap was big enough to attempt an escape. Gingerly Leo slithered out. His hands searching in the dark for a floor, a ledge, a shelf; his fingers wrapped around the metal rod and he pulled himself out. As his weight transferred out of the locker it rocked back, tipped, and continued its flight to the bottom of the tower; 140ft of silence before the crash. ‘Shit’, Leo hung from the cross beam; ‘and that’s another fine mess you’ve got me in to’. He could see Rufus nodding an index finger at him. He moved, hand over hand, until he reached a wall then pulled himself up in to a sitting position on the bar. After about 15 minutes a faint light source appeared above, probably dawn. Leo looked the 60 or 70ft up the inside of the smooth bricked tower. He could now see the size of the problem. ‘What the fuck now?’ He rubbed his hand against the brick. ‘No one is going to hear me down here.......’ He thought..... The options were limited to one; ‘up, I’ve got to find a way to climb this wall.’ The lime pointing between the bricks crumbled in Leo’s fingers as he ran his hand along the brick’s arris. He forced his fingers into the gap to see if any purchase was possible; ‘maybe’ Leo thought. ‘Not extreme walking but extreme free climbing, shit this is all or nothing.’ Leo could feel himself sweating at the prospect of the ascent, but then perhaps it wasn’t sweat at all; perhaps it was blood from the head wound. It was too dark to see.
The bleakness, blackness, absorbed all sense of life, all hope for a positive and bright outcome. Leo forced the fingers of his left hand into a gap between the bricks. He turned and stood, crouched on the metal bar, a tight rope walker. ‘Got to lose the shoes’ he thought; he sat down again and carefully pulled the leather brogues and socks off. They fell and fell. It was the getting started that was proving to be difficult; the leaving of the metal bar. But, Leo kept telling himself ‘move or die’ and when he put it like that well there was really only one thing to do. The arch of the tower was too great to be of any significant benefit, no, it was free climbing and straight up a brick wall. There was no doubt in Leo’s mind; if the mortar hadn’t perished it would have been an impossibility. There was no room for error. Even the smallest slip and it was over, curtains. He distracted himself with positivity. He remembered reading about a climber, branded ‘The Spiderman’, who free climbed a 20 story office block. ‘It’s only possible if the architect has specified a recessed joint’ he’d said. Well Leo wasn’t exactly working with a sunken joint, but with a bit of scratching he could dig out perhaps a centimetre then get his fingers in. A slow routine developed, Leo scratched out the mortar with a brick fragment he’d found; he moved the fragment to his mouth, fixed his new grip, then release the other hand, then he’d take the fragment out of his mouth and scratch the next handhold and so on and so forth, scratching out the next steps in his ladder. His four small toes following below in the handholds he’d created. ‘Move or die, yes Rufus would like that motto’. Victoria Sharpe distracted him for a further 20 minutes before he looked up to measure progress. ‘Reckon I’ve done 30ft, 30 or 40 to go.’ He thought. The feeling in his toes was long gone but thanks to the weight his legs could bear, his arms and fingers remained strong.
Dawn was up; Leo paused on the single metal reinforcing rod he’d reached; the second bar now bent downwards after the impact of the locker. His face oozed and wept from the wound and thirst was becoming a problem. If he remained sitting on the bar for much longer he would never get up. ‘Move or die, move or die’; he thought of Rufus. He didn’t want to let his son down. With the third ‘move or die’ he was on his feet scratching out the next handhold. He kept positive; ‘if I’ve come this far I can go all the way’. The orange circle of light above intensified; a bright yellow lip forming, as the sun rose over the horizon. With the sun, hope and strength were resurrected, a confidence that this was doable. Then the mortar changed and with it Leo’s heart sank and his arms felt heavy. At some point in time the last 10ft had been re-pointed. The joint was almost white and rock hard; Leo’s piece of brick made no headway whatsoever. He started to circumnavigate the tower to see if it was just the section above him that had been doctored; or if the whole circumference had been renewed. His heart rate picked up again when he saw the crack; a fissure perhaps 15mm wide. ‘If I could just get my hand into that........ I’d be sorted’ he thought. The crack started a foot and a half up and continued to the lip of the tower. ‘How in fuck’s name am I going to get into that?’ His thoughts were becoming increasingly desperate and fatigue was now a real issue. He’d been hanging on his fingers and toes for hours and now he need to jump, spring up, a foot and a half and hope he could wedge a hand into the crack. The odds were lengthening. Leo visualised Rufus’s face and drew strength. He dug out two footholds three bricks higher and prepared to leap. The power from the adrenalin rush surprised even Leo; the drive, the height of the upward thrust. Perhaps it was a trick of the light, perhaps the loss of blood; illusion, delusion, but everything happened in slow motion. First the drive from his thighs through his dead feet and toes, then he was suspended in the air chest high to the crack. He thrust both hands, one above the other, into the void; knuckle deep they went. His legs dangled beneath and he was jubilant. THIS he was used to.... Working a fissure was like taking a dog for a walk in the park. Five minutes later and he threw his arm over the lip and thrust his head up in to sunlight........ Unquestionably his greatest ascent. He sat on the lip, a leg either side, a chimney sweep from a previous age; black from head to foot and encrusted with blood. ‘Not a soul, it’s probably’ he looked at his wrist, his watch long gone. ‘It’s probably sixish, so people should start arriving any minute.’ He felt elated, and exhausted. Leo surveyed the incinerator site from his eyrie. ‘Is this where he was keeping us? Are they still here?’ He suspected not but he’d get the site shut down as soon as he got down; conduct a search on a microscopic scale.
A white van belted down the access road. The tyres screeched to a halt. A man in a fluorescent jacket struggled with a padlock. It was great that people were finally arriving but how the hell was Leo going to get noticed? After half an hour the activity was considerable and the noise levels significant. Forklifts moved pallets, a JCB loaded a lorry and a stream of delivery vehicles left the yard. Leo sat and waved his arms, noise was useless, less than useless, it just made him feel dizzy and fainting was not an option; he’d come this far. A group of men gathered and pointed at him, ‘about bloody time’ the relief was enormous. He waved back frantically.
It was probably a well rehearsed procedure for the fire brigade to reach the incinerator. It only took fourteen minutes; although fourteen minutes balanced on the lip of that chimney seemed like twenty four, perhaps forty eight. Leo’s concept of time was sketchy. A further ten minutes and a fireman stood on a platform level with Leo; the rescue complete. Leo was black from head to foot and with no ID was a less than believable policeman; but his force of argument and character persuaded the solitary squad car that had arrived to post men on all the exits; prevent any movement into or out of the site. The less than believing policeman rang Scotland Yard and was put through to Jack Johnson. Leo knew he’d already be at his desk.
“Jack Johnson” his voice abrupt; and the now nervous looking policeman quickly handed the phone to Leo.
“Jack it’s Leo” Jack exhaled noisily; the relief was audible.
15. Hideaway.
Wass was focused on one thing; James Horsham. No one had a clue where Wass was or what he was planning. It was important to him that he now gave it time and made sure the final stages were executed as perfectly as possible. Wass liked a plan and more importantly liked a well executed plan. So just after dumping the sleeping policeman he loaded the ‘gassed up’ Horsham and took him to his secret holding bay. And that was the irony of it all, it was right next to their old school; a disused airfield; one of those large, grassy, open spaces that were use
d as airfields in the Second World War; concrete roads where weeds forced their way through any joint or blemish in the surface. There were a couple of tin sheds which the school had use of; one a store, full of aging equipment and furniture – Wass would have known what to do with that, incinerate the lot; the other shed, a rifle range for the CCF, Combined Cadet Force. It was just an excuse for some of the older boys to play at being Sergeants or Colonels or whatever. It was a badge that gave your bullying legitimacy. Wass hated the CCF. Hated what it stood for, and hated the boys that enjoyed it........ The rest of the airfield was used by a local circus to store their disused or broken equipment. A human cannonball contraption dominated the skyline, stuck somewhere between up and down. There was a dodgem stripped for spare parts, battered old coaches, un-roadworthy; the upholstery home to dozens of mice; fifteen caravans and a dozen metal containers; lockups that the local youths had spent hours trying to unlock. It was in one of these containers that Wass and Horsham had taken up home. It had been easy for Wass to cut through the welding with his oxy acetylene and gain access. The unit was empty apart from a small plastic bag of mildew covered, rainbow coloured, teddy bears. ‘Just the kind you’d have tucked under your arm, a candyfloss in hand, at the local fair.’ Wass considered; ‘bet the plastic bag costs more to produce than the bear.’ Wass visualised the circus owner returning to get his plastic bag; chucking the bears out onto the concrete to fend for themselves. No, Wass wasn’t going to let that happen. When this was all over Wass had decided he would save them. Give them a proper home.
Wass had a couple of days to perfect the burial. He’d already sprayed the coffin with a thin layer of concrete which colour matched the previous castings identically. And over the next two nights, Wednesday and Thursday, he’d cut the reinforcing rods. Then he could carefully place the concrete coloured cabinet between the lattice work of the reinforcing bars and it would appear as if it was a part of the previous ‘footings’. Oh, and it was deep. Wass was certain no one would notice. Wass didn’t have a fall back plan. He’d considered all sorts, explosives even. But, well, nothing had ever gone wrong. No fall back had ever been required and so what if they found Horsham before the pour. He’d be completely mentally deranged by then. Wass could always wait, send him a couple of postcards to let him know he was still out there, then, in a year or two and after Horsham had had a couple of breakdowns he could finish the job. No, it wasn’t a worry, discovery wasn’t a worry, in some respects it was an advantage. But Wass knew how good Wass had become and in reality this was the end for one James Horsham.
