Mitchell, D. M.

by crime The King of Terrors (a psychological thriller combining mystery

  A sharp jab in the side of his neck, a needle going in deep. Liquid fire being pumped into him. And then he was released.

  He made for the door, smelling the damp scent of night as he tried to run down the short path to the gate. But his legs felt as though they’d had weights strapped to them and he could hardly lift his feet. His world descended into a waking nightmare, the kind where he wanted to run, to escape the beast at his back, but his body was fighting against the pressing weight of gravity, or was pushing without effect against a soundless gale. The stars in the sky began to multiply. Then they became smudged into streaks of incandescent blue. He found he could no longer support the weight of his body, no longer control its direction.

  The Land Rover’s distinct shape melted into the night, and that same night spread like a cloud of ink in water, till his entire being was swamped in a swirling, smothering blackness that seeped into his brain and turned it off.

  * * * *

  29

  One-Way Ticket to Hell

  The last in a long line of deeply unsettling dreams tramped towards the place from which they can never be retrieved. Only their bruising on the emotions lingered. Wakefulness crashed in like a chilled wave hitting the beach, and with it came the horrifying remembrance of being attacked.

  As if an electric current had been passed through him his eyes snapped open and his body lurched forward. But he could not see a thing, not a single speck of light. Then he experienced a frightening choking sensation, his mouth blocked, stuffed with something that threatened to enter his throat. He panicked at the lack of sight and tried to move but found he could not, his arms were bound. He fought against his bindings, thrashing wildly; tried to shout out but his screams came out as a muffled whimper. He squeezed his eyes closed, opened them again, repeated the process. Nothing. He was totally blind, and that made him panic all over again.

  His hands were fastened tightly at head-height and no amount of struggling loosened them, which only inflamed his desire to be free. He tried till he was too exhausted to go on anymore and stopped, his body limp, breathing laboured.

  Gareth Davies let the first wave of panic subside, forcing himself to breathe calmly through the nose, attempting to overcome the intense fear brought on by the total dark, his inability to move. He forced rational thought on a raving mind.

  Had they blinded him? The thought terrified him and he began to hyperventilate all over again. No, he thought, he wasn’t blind. It was cold, damp; he’d experienced something similar before, a long time ago as a kid. He’d been taken down into some caverns or other on a school trip. The guide shone a light on a rock and it cast the distinct shadow of a witch’s head. But the thing which really unnerved him was when he demonstrated what it was like when the lights were turned off. It must have only been twenty seconds or so, but it was horrible. Like a solid black wall. He wanted to scream back then; scream for the stupid man to stop messing around and turn on the lights. He remembered feeling intense gratitude when the lights flicked on, but the short experience stayed with him.

  He was cold and he was sat on hard earth and stone with his back against what felt like a stone wall. He was in a cave, he thought, in the dark. He was reliving the fear all over again.

  Was he dead?

  He dismissed the thought immediately and closed his eyes. He found this strangely comforting; better to close his eyes and see nothing than to open them and see the same.

  Why? Why was he here? Who were those men who attacked him? And where the hell was here? This can’t be happening, he thought. He must be in the grip of a nightmare from which he would surely awake.

  But he didn’t and the nightmare hung on.

  His logical self barged its way to the surface. He drew in a deep, slow lungful of breath to tamp down his escalating panic, then began to examine the bonds that held him. Sharp tugs told him they were made of leather or something similar, wrapped tight around his wrist, that in turn were fastened to clinking metal which must be fixed to the wall. He tried to bring his wrist round to his mouth so he could test the binding but the tether was too short for this. His legs, however, were free. He listened to the sounds his shoes made as he scuffed them on the floor. Loose stones and dirt. It wasn’t bare rock like you’d find in a cave, and it felt flat, man-made. That suggested some kind of mine, not a cave. Next he tested the air with his nose. Dry and dusty from where he’d kicked up the dirt, but not too damp. But it was cold.

  ‘Bet you like detective novels too,’ Fitzroy had once told him. ‘Sometimes you are too logical for your own good. You analyze things so much you miss out on the fundamental things in life.’

  Gareth almost smiled at the memory; or he might have done hadn’t his lips been pasted together with heavy-duty tape.

  ‘Actually, no, I don’t like detective novels as it happens. Too formulaic. I suppose you’re telling me you rely on intuition, on instinct, eh?’

  ‘I’ve learned to trust it, yes.’

  ‘Feel the Force, Luke!’ he said with a grin.

  ‘There will come a time, Mr Spock, when logic is no longer enough. You will have to go beyond logic.’

  That time was now, he thought. What had happened to him recently, what was happening right now, defied rational thought. The pieces simply would not fit neatly together.

  He rubbed the side of his mouth against his shoulder, felt the tape begin to peel away at the edge. Elated with the tiny victory he set about stripping it back further, the tape sticking to his clothing and allowing him to peel enough away for him to spit out a wad of cloth that had been stuffed into his mouth. He took a deep breath and then yelled out as loud as he could. His voice did not produce an echo, he noticed; rather it felt like he was in a small, low-ceilinged room.

  ‘Help me!’ he screamed. ‘Can anyone hear me?’

  The cry fell away fast and silence crashed down on him again. He was left listening to the sound of his blood rushing in his ears. He yelled again; yelled until his throat burned with the effort. Once more the silence fell like a thick and oppressive blanket. He was about to shout again when he thought he heard a noise, far off, the scrape of footsteps, perhaps? His imagination creating the equivalent of a thirsty man’s oasis mirage?

  ‘Hello?’ he shouted. ‘Can you hear me?’ Then, miraculously, he saw a glimmer of light and he felt a rush of unadulterated relief at this wonderful, flickering vision. ‘Help me! Help me!’ he cried. ‘I’m being kept a prisoner!’

  The light clearly came from some kind of lamp and he was surprised to see that it illuminated a long, low tunnel. He made out the shadowy forms of three men loping slowly and silently towards him. As they approached their lamp lit up his prison cell. He was in a large, oblong chamber, the stone walls relatively flat, the ceiling very low, also carved flat. He noticed the men were bent low to avoid cracking their heads.

  ‘Thank God you heard me!’ he said, gratitude flooding his voice. ‘Please untie me. I was attacked and now I’m being held against my will.’

  The three men stopped before him, the lamp held out towards him, the light blinding after his long immersion in total blackness. Their forms disappeared in a hazy fizz of white light.

  ‘Be quiet,’ one of the men said.

  That’s when he knew he wasn’t out of trouble. He yanked hard at his bindings and screamed out in panic again.

  ‘It’s no use wasting your energy like that; we’re a good fifty feet underground and tucked nicely away at the end of about six miles of corridors and chambers. It’s an old quarry, you see. Abandoned, forgotten; not unlike you,’ he said. The man came round into the light, crouched down onto his haunches, his leering face a foot or two away from Gareth’s.

  Gareth squinted in the light at the man before him. His hair was long, black and straight; it shimmered healthily, like the plumage of a raven, in the lamplight. His skin was a ghastly pale colour, and, strangest of all, his eyes were hidden behind heavily tinted glasses. Fifty feet below ground and he was wearing shades.
He lifted a thin hand, his forefinger and thumb grasping the edge of the tape on Gareth’s mouth. ‘Who’s a clever boy then?’ he said, his voice quiet, calm, assured. He gently peeled away the tape and tossed it to the ground.

  ‘Who the hell are you?’ Gareth snarled. ‘Untie me you bastard!’

  ‘Don’t do that, Gareth; it’s so demeaning and I rather expected better of you.’

  ‘How do you know my name? Who are you people?’

  ‘I know all about you, Gareth. In fact I know more about you than you do.’

  ‘Untie me!’ he said.

  ‘I’m afraid I cannot do that. And anyhow, even if I did, where would you go? You wouldn’t get far. There is an absolute maze of old tunnels down here, dead-ends galore, and of course there’s also the total darkness. So escape is not only futile but impossible. No one ever comes here now – it was abandoned by the miners a century ago.’ He reached out and tested the binding at Gareth’s right wrist. ‘They used to mine something called firestone, so called because of its resistance to heat. It was used in furnaces and the like, places where temperatures reached as hot as Hell. Ironic, isn’t it, that here you are but a single step away from the real thing.’

  ‘You’re crazy. Let me go. The police will be looking for me.’

  He laughed. ‘Really? You do live in a fantasy world. ‘Down to business, Gareth. Where is she?’

  ‘Where is who?’

  He sighed. ‘Where is the woman?’

  ‘What, the crazy red-head? No idea and quite frankly I don’t care.’

  The man looked back at one of his companions. ‘She must have been the one talking to him at the railway station.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I thought she’d simply taken a fancy to him, or was just making conversation. Never paid her much heed. Sorry, Camael.’

  ‘Listen, Camael, or whatever they call you,’ said Gareth, ‘there’s been some kind of big mistake here. I’m not who you think I am. I take photos, in heaven’s name! Whatever it is that you’re all mixed up in then you can bet I’m not involved in any of it.’

  ‘Yes you are,’ he said, head snapping back. ‘You’re right at the heart of it and so is she. So, please tell me where she is.’

  ‘I’ve told you, I’ve no idea what it is you’re going on about.’

  ‘Where is the woman you went to see at the hospital?’

  ‘My sister?’ he said, his eyes widening. ‘She’s involved with you?’

  ‘Your sister?’ Camael said. His brow crumpled into a frown. ‘Yes, tell me about your sister. Where will we find her?’

  ‘I don’t know anything, other than I’d never clapped eyes on her till the day I nearly killed her. And even if I did know where she was, do you think I’d tell a bunch of weirdo thugs?’

  ‘I ask you to reconsider, Gareth. Try to remember, for your own sake. It would be easier on yourself if you played along.’

  ‘Go to hell!’

  Camael’s breath hissed out through his noise like gas from a leaking pipe. ‘It is not I, fortunately, that will be making that particular trip, Gareth. I’m afraid that will be you. Yes, they call me Camael. Some call me the Dark Angel of Doradus. I am your one-way ticket to Hell.’

  * * * *

  30

  The Third Man

  The musky scent of lilies was overpowering. If there were one flower that Stafford disliked it was the lily. Death, that’s what they always reminded him of. The sweet smell of death and loss. Every funeral he’d ever been to as far back as he could remember he’d seen lilies. There was something about their bloated flower heads he found quietly disturbing. They were in abundance here, along with more condolence cards than they had on the racks at Clinton’s. Wood must have been a popular man in life, Stafford thought. It caused him to ponder on how many cards and lilies he’d receive after he’d died. As many as this? More? Fewer? Did it really matter?

  That it mattered to Mrs Wood was plain to see; the flowers and cards were given prominence and one tiny area near the TV in the corner of the room, on which stood a photograph of the late Mr Wood, had become something of a shrine. She was running out of room to put them all.

  She was a small woman, very quiet, everything about her being round; round eyes, round face, round body like a ball dressed in tweed. She was putting on one of those forced welcoming smiles, behind which he could tell there was a frenzy of dark, conflicting emotions. She offered Styles and him a cup of tea, and appeared glad of the task which helped occupy another few seconds of her mind’s time. Styles never drank tea; he was a strong black coffee man, but he made appreciative noises when she brought in a tray bearing china cups and saucers that must have been in their possession since they got married, brought out, he imagined, only for special occasions. Everything in the house pointed to a life made for two suddenly halved.

  Mrs Wood sat down, hands clasped in her lap, scrutinising the arranged crockery to satisfy herself that everything was as it should be. Only everything wasn’t as it should be. It was an acted-out normality, Stafford thought. He glanced at Styles, whom he thought looked faintly uneasy in the face of the woman’s automaton intensity. Or maybe he was transplanting his own mood there. Stafford pictured his own wife sat in Mrs Wood’s place. Would she behave the same way if he had died?

  ‘You were there when he passed away,’ she said to the two officers.

  ‘We arrived afterwards,’ Stafford explained. ‘There was nothing we could do, I’m afraid,’ he added.

  ‘There was nothing anyone could do,’ she said. ‘I never expected a heart attack. He was such a healthy man, for his age, or so we thought. You know, golf at the weekends, liked to walk the dog every day. But Carl was getting on,’ she noted with wooden forbearance. ‘One must be grateful for what one’s had, I suppose.’

  She didn’t look in the least grateful, Stafford thought. She didn’t look like anything. He marvelled at how a face can be bleached entirely of emotional colour. ‘Did you husband, especially of late, say that he was troubled in any way? Did he show any signs that something gave him cause for concern?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ she said without hesitation. ‘He was not an easy man to live with. He fretted over most things, like work, or paying the bills, or leaves on the lawn. His teacup always had a storm in it. I did say that he’d worry himself into an early grave.’ She lifted the cup of tea to her lips, her eyes unblinking.

  ‘Was he worrying about anything out of the ordinary, aside from the leaves and the bills?’ asked Styles.

  She fixed him with an unexpectedly stern stare from over the delicate rim of her china cup. ‘Leaves and bills were very real to him,’ she said crisply, then remembered herself. ‘They might seem silly little things to others.’ She glanced upwards to a spot on the ceiling. ‘The death of his one-time friend and colleague troubled him greatly,’ she said. ‘He passed away only three weeks ago and Carl took the news terribly. Well you would, wouldn’t you? A friend passing away like that.’

  ‘What was the friend’s name?’ asked Stafford.

  ‘Howard Baxter,’ she said. ‘He was an archivist, I believe. They went back a long time, to when they were just starting out in the 1970s but they’d not seen each other in a long while. It’s still upsetting, though, when a friend dies, even a friendship that has lapsed. It sets you to thinking – about life, getting on, the impermanence of things. Drives you into melancholy if you let it. That was the effect on Carl at any rate. What made it worse was the fact Howard had taken his own life. Hung himself, I think. Carl didn’t want to talk about it. Even refused to go to his funeral, which was out of character. It was a shame, too, by the sounds of it; Howard was about to publish something quite extraordinary by all accounts, and in truth the man was in desperate need of the income as it transpired he was a bit of a gambling man with huge debts. It’s strange, don’t you think, how a person like Howard, who’d always held down good jobs, can end up still being in so much debt. He even worked for Lambert-Something or other as an archivis
t – you know, the pharmaceutical firm.’

  ‘Lambert-Chide?’ said Styles.

  ‘That’s the one. Surely such jobs must have been pretty lucrative, and he’s always had them. Well, that hardly matters to him now, does it? Debt or riches we are all equal bedfellows in the grave, are we not? It sounds as if his debts drove him to his final decision. Very sad.’ She nodded. ‘Is the tea to your satisfaction, Inspector?’ she asked of Styles.

  ‘Perfectly fine,’ he replied, taking a sip to prove it. He noticed the woman’s hand trembled, like a leaf shivered by a breeze.

  She let her cup rest in the saucer, the two rattling tellingly together. She set them down on the coffee table in front of her. ‘A Return to Eden,’ she said absently.

  ‘Sorry, Mrs Wood?’ said Stafford.

  ‘That, I believe, was the title of Howard’s work. I haven’t the faintest idea what it was all about, but I did hear Carl talking about it over the phone to him – why, it must have only been a fortnight before Howard died, the last conversation they would ever have, as it happens. And, ironically, the first they’d had in over ten years. Carl wasn’t best pleased about it, whatever it was. I heard him telling Howard not to be so damned foolish, which was uncharacteristically harsh for Carl. I remember he came off the line looking rather worried. But as I say, being rather worried was not unusual for Carl, and it’s a fact that historians can be scathingly critical of each other’s works, you know. That’s what was at the heart of it, I shouldn’t wonder; professional ardour that was probably regretted afterwards.’

  ‘Did Mr Howard Baxter have a wife, children we might talk to about this Return to Eden?’ asked Stafford.

  She shook her head. ‘He was…’ She hid her lips behind her cup. ‘…you know, batted for the other side, so to speak.’