‘I’m thinking about it, mystery boy.’ George spun the chair. ‘But hey, since we’re here, why don’t I try my trick again? It won’t take a minute. Let’s see if I can get into my dad’s old video favourites. They’re a scream.’
‘No thanks,’ said Heidi.
But George was staring at the space above the desk with a new expression; hard and concentrated. A sliver of screen took shape, a scene welled up. It was outdoors, at night: a small crowd had gathered around a spot-lit circle. A girl in a dirty teeshirt was roped to a stake, her head hanging down, arms tied back over the cross bar, her feet dangling off the ground. A man in a white robe approached her. It was George’s dad but younger, his hair in shining chestnut waves. He held a knife. The crowd was silent; the girl struggled, crying feebly. Mr Carron didn’t say a word as he sliced at the flesh of her arms and body, moving like a dancer. Then he set the point of the knife in the notch of her collar bone.
‘He’s my dad,’ whispered George. ‘He did that and he’s in me. He’s my dad.’
‘If that’s real, original footage,’ breathed Clancy, over Heidi’s shoulder. ‘Carron’s crazy.’
‘It’s real,’ said Heidi. ‘He’s a Sacrificer. That’s what it’s all about.’
‘I knew that.’
The girl’s hair was draggled blonde, but if she raised her head, Heidi knew the she would see her own face. She couldn’t look away. Don’t look up. Please, don’t look up, she prayed . . . Mr Carron drove it in. He opened the girl’s body, Heidi’s body, in one powerful straight down stroke. A mass of red flesh and glistening organs appeared and tumbled—
There was a sound like ice breaking. Heidi and Clancy spun round. The sliding panel they’d come in by was now a solid barrier, with a bank-vault lock.
‘Ouch!’ said George, happily. ‘He’s onto us. Sorry pals, I can’t hack that one.’
The Steel Door flew open. George Carron senior strode in, Roger close behind. Mr Carron wore a dinner jacket. Roger wore pyjamas, a woolly hat and a scruffy plaid dressing gown.
‘What the hell’s going on, George?’ shouted Mr Carron.
‘Hey, Dad! There you are. I’ve been showing my friends around. Hope you don’t mind.’
The Bogeyman glanced at Heidi; his eyes flicked over Clancy. Like a majestic evil king, whose will is law, swiftly deciding how to deal with a minor annoyance—
‘George, you’re coming with me. Upstairs.’
‘What about Heidi, and the truant boy?’ murmured Roger.
‘They can stay down here.’
‘Do you know who I am?’ said Clancy, hands casually behind his back.
The evil king’s attention was caught. He frowned: he seemed mildly interested in the question, or maybe in the pistol that had appeared in Clancy’s steady grip.
‘Tell me. It’s loaded. Come on, Mr Carron. Tell me who I am.’
Stubbly Chin had left the Steel Door open. Heidi could see out into in the dank well at the foot of the basement stairs. A wild-haired figure stood there, clutching something heavy. Tallis put a finger of her free hand to her lips and crept forward, bare feet soundless.
‘Enough nonsense. Give me that!’ snapped George’s dad.
Tallis swung the iron duck. It hit Carron’s shoulder: not the back of his head, as the Old Wreck had probably planned. Carron staggered forward. Clancy recoiled, caught off balance, but stayed on his feet. Tallis stared at them all, still clutching her weapon.
‘Deal with her, Roger,’ snapped Mr Carron. ‘For God’s sake!’
‘No problem, no problem!’
Roger shoved George aside. His fingers flew above the desktop, in sharp little gestures. George started laughing hysterically, as the little girl from the Bedroom Floor appeared, a piteous, transparent, 3D ghost—
‘Oooh, Tallis,’ crooned Roger, ‘Loo-oo-ook! Molly’s here! She’s come to get you, because you let me do it. Everyone knows you’re a senile old drunk. They’ll put you away if you try to make trouble. They’ll turn the Gardens into food plant.’
‘I just walked through your “Molly” outside my bedroom door,’ snapped Tallis.
‘But she’s a ghost, she can be everywhere. Come on sweetie, back to bye-byes. I’ll protect you, I won’t let them take the Gardens. No take sweetie, you remember what I promised—’
‘IDIOT! ’ screamed Tallis. ‘ SICKENING FOOL! MY MOLLY IS IN MY HEART! I DON’T BELIEVE THE DEAD WALK! I BELIEVE THAT I MUST SUFFER! I PROTECTED YOU, DEVIL, AND WE MUST LIVE IN HELL TOGETHER! ’
‘Calm down, old girl,’ said Mr Carron. ‘Everything’s fine. It’s not easy, but I’ll keep the government out of here. That’s what you want, you know it is, and worth any price—’
Old Wreck bared her teeth: suddenly calm. ‘Not anymore. You can push someone too far.’
A creeping shadow had followed Tallis to the basement; the same shadow that had followed Heidi to her room, the night she fetched her phone. Heidi watched it, while things moved fast and slow, as if in strobe light. Tallis swung her doorstop again. It smashed into a scanner casing and flew across the room. Roger and Carron grabbed her. Roger had his dressing-gown belt round her throat, Carron held Tallis’s arms: it was messy, no more cool decisions. The murderers and their victim scuffled, grunting. The shadow got under Roger’s feet. . . Then George’s dad was lying still, blood all over, and Heidi was looking at the doorstop, which had somehow got into her hand. Her ears were ringing. Roger Maylock huddled on the floor, clutching himself and moaning. Tallis clasped the Bad Dream Cat in her arms. He struggled, mildly, to escape.
‘Stimmung! Oh Stimmung! Oh, can it be? Is it really you?’
Clancy held the pistol low, and disarmed it.
‘Did I kill him?’
Heidi crouched to check. ‘No, he’s breathing. You sliced his scalp open, that’s all.’
‘I’m glad. What are we going to do about the Sacrificer videos?’
‘Nothing must be found,’ cried Tallis. ‘Or the Emperor will kill us all! Quickly! We must burn the place to the ground!’
George stood looking down at his dad, the great Mr Carron, and nobody moved. They heard the police sirens, racing through the Gardens.
Sorrel had done something useful, for once in her life.
27: The Second Fountain
After the Solstice Storm clear-up the Inspector called a meeting. The police had returned to Mehilhoc, in strength (which had been useful in the clear-up). The Inspector was staying at the Blue Anchor with his Sergeant, DS Marilyn Earley; plus a Special Clerical Assistant called Dan Royal. More police, nobody knew how many, were at Knowells farm: interviewing staff, and taking the place apart.
The meeting was held in the same Learning Centre study room as the interviews after the shipwreck. The Inspector and his team, with Dr Gunn and Barbara Holland, sat at a table; Evie the champagne Labrador sat under it. Heidi, with Challon, Challon’s mum, Jo and Joe Florence and their mum, and Brook with Tim Healey, faced them, on the comfy chairs. Clancy was supposed to be here, but as usual he hadn’t turned up.
The cop-in-the-woods sat quietly behind the inquisitors, his greasy cap pulled down over his eyes; long legs stretched out. He looked just the same as he’d looked before: eerily the same.
Everyone who’d been staying in the storm shelter had gone home. The Learning Centre nursery and pre-teen kids could be heard, busily chatting; and occasionally Tanya’s voice. The real Inspector still looked like his avatar; except older. Heidi remembered how she’d promised herself that she would meet him in the real world, when it was over and Mum was safe. With a strange lurch in her stomach, she realised this was never going to happen. She would never walk in triumph into the real world version of that blue-walled interview room. Never hear the Inspector say, Well done Heidi, you were right, your mum is innocent.
It felt like losing an imaginary friend.
Dr Gunn was talking, explaining how the situation in the Garden House had come about.
‘After their father’s death, R
oger Maylock lived alone down here. His sister Tallis had a career in arts administration in London. During the Crisis Roger engaged a couple, a man and a woman, who cannot be named, as his housekeeper and driver. When no schools or Learning Centres were open the housekeeper, a qualified teacher, gave lessons at the Garden House for pre-teen children; with Roger’s approval. Molly Healey attended these lessons with her best friend, a boy whose family also had a smallholding on Sea Lane; close to Heaven Farm. They have since left the area. The boy, who can’t be named, was seven. Molly was six. The children would be delivered to the Garden House by the boy’s older sister; or by one of the parents. They’d take a packed lunch and make their own way home through the Gardens. Some three months after this pattern was established, the boy told his parents that he didn’t like “things that happened” when he and Molly were “posing for Mr Roger”. Neither set of parents knew anything about this “posing”. They made inquiries. They were told, by Roger’s housekeeper, that the photographic sessions were perfectly innocent, and that she was always present (this latter point she later retracted). The parents were not satisfied: the children were questioned closely. The boy’s story was disturbing. Molly’s response was worse. She passionately denied all knowledge of the “posing”; appeared terrified, and insisted that her best friend was lying. Her parents became convinced that their little girl had been raped.’
Tim Healey shuddered, and nodded.
‘Roger was indignant and defiant. Nevertheless, and despite a lack of direct physical evidence, the Child Protection Unit and the CPS found grounds for an investigation. Then Tallis stepped in. Believing her brother was the victim of a witch-hunt, she secured the best lawyers and fought for his cause: stridently and ruthlessly. However, having viewed forensic evidence collected from digital artworks and other materials found in Roger’s studio, Roger’s defence team at length advised him to plead guilty to a slightly lesser charge, before he came to trial. Tallis was horrified. She thought she’d destroyed his case. In fact she may have saved his life. The Occupation had run its course during this lengthy, contested inquiry. The Army of Liberation was looking for war criminals. Roger Maylock, given his connections, and the special nature of his crime, might well have been claimed by the Chinese and executed, if he had been awaiting jury trial. As things were, he returned to the Garden House to serve a whole life sentence under the strictest form of domiciliary surveillance. All records of his confinement, including the required domiciliary physical visits, show a model prisoner.’
Dan Royal, the Special Clerical Assistant, was taking everything down on paper, using an actual typewriter. The keys rattled at an amazing speed. Nothing to do with Roger Maylock, thought Heidi, was going to be trusted to a computer network, ever again.
‘Tallis kept him away from me,’ she said. ‘I worked out why, but I thought it couldn’t be too bad. He’d have had a surveillance drone on him, not just a tag, and I never saw one.’
‘Thank you Heidi.’ Dr Gunn made a data-gesture, gathering invisible notes. ‘I prepared my account for Heidi’s benefit. I thought she had a right. Does anyone have anything to add?’
‘Rose and I think he told Tallis the truth, in the end,’ said Tim Healey. ‘He told her what he’d done to Molly. That’s what destroyed her, poor woman. It was common decency to inform the Social Services. Of course Portia got onto a private firm, under her control. But we never thought they’d send a fifteen year old girl!’
Brook took her dad’s hand, and squeezed it.
‘Angel Care will have questions to answer,’ said Dr Gunn. ‘We can’t speculate as to their relationship with Portia Knowells today. Tim, the inquiry will need permission to access Molly’s medical records. I believe physical evidence of rape was never confirmed by the police?’
‘No, it never was. She was so young, and so distressed. I know it’s hard to understand why we stayed,’ pleaded Tim. ‘But everything was in chaos, and we couldn’t take her away from Heaven. It was her home, why should Molly be punished? And when she was gone, there was Brook. You carry on from day to day, and you think: you just shut your eyes. We should never have let Heidi be alone there, I can’t excuse it—’
It wasn’t common decency, thought Heidi. It was Rose feebly trying to blow the whistle, without getting into bother. But what could you do? They weren’t just paying for your research, Tim. They were telling you they’d save Brook’s life.
‘I was okay,’ she said. ‘Honestly, I was fine.’
‘We all of us owe Heidi,’ said Challon fiercely. ‘All of us.’
‘Hear, hear!’ roared Joe Florence, and blushed like a tomato.
‘Thank you Joe,’ said the Inspector. ‘To return to the present: I have news of the foundered ship. At least one lifeboat reached the coast of Belgium. A crewman apprehended by the Belgian Coastguard has made a statement, which has been relayed to us. Apparently, this was his first such voyage. He had been led to believe that the young farmworkers were of age, and voluntarily recruited—’
‘They all say that,’ muttered DS Earley.
‘Indeed they do. The ship’s officers, who had worked with Mr Carron before and were dissatisfied with their pay, insisted on coming inshore: to threaten the boss’s reputation and secure a better deal. When they saw local teenagers on the beach these officers immediately recognised bargaining potential. The whole thing was a spur of the moment decision, and the disaster itself was due to faulty old charts, provided by Mr Carron himself.’
He made the same invisible notes gesture as Dr Gunn. ‘No doubt we’ll see further developments there. Meanwhile, and to sum up. The case against Roger Maylock will be re-opened, along with a catalogue of new offences. George Carron is in custody. Be assured, any strings he tries to pull will be a matter of interest to us, not an advantage to Mr Carron—’
‘Portia Knowells,’ said DS Earley, ‘was dancing sky-clad at the time of the raid, at a respectable Solstice Celebration in the all-weather Pagan Grove outside Crawley. She has not been arrested and has no comment to make.’
‘We’ll get to Portia,’ said the Inspector. ‘Knowells Farm employees have been asked not to leave the estate. A few have been more formally detained. We’ll be talking to all residents of Mehilhoc over the next few days, including the younger Exempt Teens. Later there will be individual interviews. Meanwhile, each of you here today has special knowledge of recent events; which I ask you to regard as strictly confidential. Does anybody have anything else to bring to our attention now?’
Silence.
‘Then that concludes our business. Be warned, when it gets going the investigation will be intensive, relentless and there’ll be no amnesties. If there’s anything you feel you ought to tell us, make it sooner rather than later.’
Missy Pulak bowed her head.
‘Thanks for coming along, everyone. Heidi, would you stay for a moment?’
Everyone left, including DS Earley and the SCA with his typewriter. Heidi faced the Inspector, Barbara Holland and Dr Gunn, all alone. She tried to stop herself from trembling.
The Chinese Empire didn’t mess about, with Sacrificers. You got that drummed into you, along with the Encouraging Anthems. If a suspected nest was found, Human Rights went out the window. Anyone associated got killed, and associated meant whatever the Chinese wanted it to mean. Nothing had been said, since the night of the raid. No mention of the cult, but the police must know. Mehilhoc must be doomed. The entire village would probably be wiped out in a freak epidemic or something, because mass executions are bad for morale.
But something was going on that she didn’t understand, and either it was good, or it was unbelievably bad. Either she was facing three high-up Sacrificer sympathisers, and George Carron’s worst crimes were going to get a disgusting cover-up. Or the fearless Ninja who had said trust me was in charge: protecting the innocent . . . The cop in the woods had stayed behind too. He looked up, with a flash of blue eyes, and smiled at Heidi.
The Inspector clasped his hands,
one over the other. ‘Heidi, I’m going to ask you some questions. Answer carefully, but don’t volunteer anything. We want only the facts.’
She answered everything she was asked: about Roger, the quad ride by moonlight and the secret passages. They were very interested in the scanning fields that sometimes mistook George for his dad. They didn’t ask her anything else and they took no notes. But that didn’t mean much. They probably all had futuristic brain implants, even Dr Gunn.
She kept thinking rotten meat. She couldn’t help it.
When Dr Gunn finally asked if she had any questions of her own she shook her head: slightly dazed to find that she was still alive.
‘Heidi,’ said the Inspector, gravely. ‘You understand that you must never talk about what you saw at Knowells, or in those passages; or in the Garden House basement, not to anyone at all?’
‘Yes. Inspector, where were those kids really going? The ones on the black ship?’
There was an awful silence. Heidi’s heart shook, her mouth dried. Dad! I blew it! They wore me down, I gobbed out totally the wrong thing!
‘Given the state of that ship,’ said Barbara Holland dryly, at last, ‘You could say they weren’t going anywhere. Except the bottom of the sea.’
Heidi swallowed, gripping her hands together. ‘It was murder.’
‘The police will argue for that view,’ said Dr Gunn. ‘But justice must take its course.’
‘Yeah, I know. Yeah, I know. I don’t want to upset or distress the Emperor in any way.’
Barbara Holland made a choking sound, quickly cut short.
‘No need to bring the Emperor into it, Heidi,’ said the Inspector. ‘Our English Justice System is independent, and we’re proud of that trust. George Carron was sending vulnerable teenagers into slavery, on an old hulk of a ship that shouldn’t have been at sea. He’s facing several counts of that nature, and several very serious charges of aggravated trafficking in forbidden technology. That’s more than enough to put him away for “life means life”.’
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