The rain had intensified now and was falling in a continuous sheet. Dark hedgerows flew past, road spray hissing from the wheels and past the open window. He passed the first farmhouse, a distant light across the fen, and joined the B road for Launceston. Soon he was trundling along with the evening traffic, a light rain falling, the lights of the cars swimming across the wet pavement. He stopped at a newsagent and picked up a fifty-pound phone card, paying cash.
A few miles down the road he pulled into the carpark of a Tesco supermarket on the edge of town. The place was busy with afterwork shoppers, the lot almost full. Outside the main entrance was a bank of public telephones. He searched the eaves of the building. A single CCTV camera watched the automatic doors. Another was perched atop a lamppost at the far end of the lot. Clay pulled up his hood, wandered to the opposite end of the carpark and circled back towards the phones, avoiding the cameras’ eyes.
Closing the phonebox door, Clay brushed the rain from his jacket then cradled the receiver between his shoulder and ear and dialled the number. The line clicked, fuzzed and finally rang. Clay imagined the telephone on the little pinewood table next to the kitchen window, her walking from the lounge, looking out across the valley, the Dents du Midi towering in the distance, perhaps in cloud now, early snow falling at altitude. She was safe there, he told himself, veiled by a new name, a new identity, a place to live free from questions and intrusions. The ring tone pulsed for the fourth time, a fifth. Clay looked down at his boots, the rain falling across the pavement, the shoppers scurrying past with fists clenched over straining plastic.
‘Allo?’ A woman’s voice. Not Rania.
‘Is Rania there?’
‘Who is calling, please?’ A strong French accent, an older voice.
He decided to take a chance. ‘It’s Clay, Madame.’ He doubted that they would be monitoring her calls, that the police had made any sort of connection between them, yet.
‘Monsieur Clay?’ the woman gasped.
Clay knew the voice now. It was the old lady who’d led him to Rania after the violence in Yemen. The violence that had brought him here. Madame Debret.
‘She is not here, I am afraid.’
‘Where is she?’
Silence. Caution. Good.
‘Do you remember the Café Grand Quai in Geneva?’ he said. Where he and Madame Debret had met for the first and only time.
‘Oui.’
‘You held my hand. Told me about Rania’s father.’
A deep breath. ‘I am worried, Monsieur Clay. I told her that she should not leave, but she insisted.’
‘Where has she gone?’
‘Chypre.’
‘Cyprus?’
‘Nicosia, yes. Her editor has given her this assignment. He contacted her two weeks ago. At first she did not want to go. But he was insisting very much, calling her many times.’
‘LeClerc?’
‘She did not say his name.’
It had to be LeClerc, the man Clay had met in London, the one who’d finally published Rania’s story, the one who, in doing so, had helped to blow the casketlid off Medved’s corrupt and deadly oil production activities in Yemen, helped expose the murderous cover-up entrusted to the Bulgarian mercenary, Zdravko Todorov.
Soon after publication, the Medveds had lost all financing for their Petro-Tex venture in Yemen and were forced to sell the company at a loss.
‘When did she leave?’ Clay asked.
‘More than two weeks ago. You might see one of the stories she has written in the journaux.’
‘Did she say when she’d be back?’
‘No.’
‘Have you heard from her since?’
‘Non.’
‘Forwarding address?’
‘None.’
‘Telephone number? Mobile?’
‘I am sorry.’
‘Thank you, Madame.’ He was about to hang up when he heard her call out.
‘Monsieur Clay, please. Wait. She left a message for you, if you called.’ Noise down the line, scraping, a drawer being opened and closed. ‘I have it here. She wrote it for me.’
Clay waited, said nothing.
‘It says only: ‘Ecoutons la confession d’un compagnon d’enfer.’
Clay understood only one word: enfer. Hell.
‘It is Rimbaud, I believe,’ she said. ‘Listen to the confession of hell’s companion.’
A tumour of ice materialised in Clay’s chest. He knew this, from the boy-poet’s A Season in Hell, the chapter entitled ‘The Infernal Husband’. He curled his lip, hung up the phone and stared out into the half-light of day. She’d chosen carefully, knowing he’d read this prose-poem over and over while he was in Geneva searching for her, this lament, taken by its power: I am lost. I am impure, a slave of the infernal husband. A widow.
Why this? Something was wrong. Clay pulled in a half breath, let it flow back out as vapour, then looked long both ways along the storefront pavement, out into the carpark, through the big front windows into the fluorescent glow of the supermarket, the patchwork of vivid primary colours, his insides roiling in a Southern Ocean gale.
Shoppers raced for their cars, newspapers and umbrellas over their heads. Raindrops drummed on the stretched skins of car roofs and pelted the tarmac like bullets. Clay stared at the rain guttering down from the roof.
He picked up the phone and dialled his Cayman Islands banker. It was the first time he’d made contact since the killing. Clay gave the password and his account number.
There was an urgent message for him, the banker said. It had arrived only three days ago. Clay jotted down the name and telephone number. The prefix was for South Africa, the area code Johannesburg. He put down the phone, checked his watch, took a breath and dialled.
A receptionist put him straight through to the clinic’s director.
‘This is Declan Greene,’ he said. His new identity, a recent and unintentional gift of the Yemeni secret police, complete with offshore bank accounts, an Australian passport and an apartment in Perth, Western Australia. ‘I had a message to call.’
The director paused, as if searching his memory. ‘Yes, thank you for calling, Mister Greene. We were expecting to hear from you sooner.’
‘I’ve been busy, Doctor.’ Doing nothing. Waiting.
‘I am very sorry to disturb you like this, but you see…’ The director stopped, cleared his throat. ‘There is no easy way to say this, I am afraid, Mister Greene.’
The line crackled, empty.
‘Then you’d better just tell me.’
‘Yes, of course. We traced you through the payment you made to the clinic earlier this year, Mister Greene, and since there are no direct living relatives, not any more, you were the only person we could contact.’
Clay’s throat tightened.
‘I’m very sorry to inform you that Eben Barstow died four days ago.’
Clay’s legs quivered. Eben, the best friend he’d ever had, wounded in action in Angola all those years ago, a bullet to the head. Clay had carried him to the helicopter and he had survived, if you could call it that, physically functioning but otherwise dead. How many times had he tried to convince Eben’s parents to let him die? Now it was done. Relief surged through him, a decade of regret. It took him a moment to catch his breath, to fully process this information. ‘Did you say no living relatives?’
‘That’s right.’
‘What about his parents?’
‘They died the same day.’
Jesus. ‘The same day?’
‘Yes. Tragic. But there is something you should know, Mister Greene. The circumstances of Mister Barstow’s death, were – how can I put this – unusual.’
Just say it, for Christ’s sake. So many times he had anticipated this moment, such had always seemed the inevitability of it, but now that it was here he couldn’t quite believe that Eben was gone, that the tiny shard of hope he had carried with him all those years – wrapped up in a teardrop, a pearl, hidden away somewhere
so secure he’d almost forgotten it was ever there – had turned out to be the folly he always knew it was.
‘Mister Greene, are you there?’
‘Tell me.’
‘He was shot, Mister Greene.’
Clay thought he had misheard. He was hot. Died of fever.
‘Someone broke into the hospital at night, went to his room, and shot him three times. Twice in the chest, and once in the head.’
Clay’s blood stopped pumping. Jesus Christ.
‘And whoever it was, they also broke into our records department. It seems they were after information about Eben, about our accounts.’
‘What did they get?’
‘Everything, I’m afraid, Mister Greene. The police said it was a very professional job. The perpetrators were in and out without being seen by any of our staff, or waking any of the other patients.’
Jesus. ‘And Eben’s parents?’
‘They died in a car accident. As I said, a tragedy.’
Clay’s mind blanked, raced. All three of them, on the same day?
‘Mister Greene, are you there?’
‘Yes.’ No, not really.
Outside, the rain was coming down again, hammering against the thin steel of the supermarket’s cantilevered roof. He pushed the receiver onto his ear.
‘There is a sizeable credit on Mister Barstow’s account,’ came the voice, faint against the din, ‘which you paid in advance, if you recall. What would you have us do with it, Mister Greene?’
Clay stood staring out at the cars and the rain coming in trembling panes. ‘Are there any others?’
‘Pardon me, Mister Greene? Others?’
‘Any others like Eben.’
‘Sorry, I don’t follow.’
‘Vets.’ Fucked up unfortunates. The half-digested shit of a forgotten war, a failed system. Him.
‘Yes, of course. There are three others.’
‘Give it to whoever needs it most.’
Silence there, so far away, in a place he used to call home. And then: ‘That is very generous, Mister Greene.’
Clay said nothing, waited a moment, was about to hang up, when the director’s voice came again, urgent: ‘Mister Greene, before you go. There is something else.’
‘I’m listening.’
‘You must understand. We are all very shocked here.’
Clay waited for the director to continue.
‘When we found him…’ The director paused, cleared his throat. ‘You can imagine. It was a horrible sight.’
Yes, he could imagine. All too well. Did so on a nightly basis.
‘The killer, or killers, left a message. We have no idea who it was intended for, or what it means.’
‘Tell me.’
The director paused, then continued, his voice wavering. ‘It was written on the wall, in Mister Barstow’s blood. It said: “She’s next”.’
Clay stared down at the wet concrete, the implications of this moving through him now like a slow dose of poison. ‘Are you sure, Doctor? Absolutely sure that’s what it said?’
‘No question at all, Mister Greene. The words were very clear, well spelled out, as if they had taken their time. They used a brush.’
‘Did you say brush?’
‘A paint brush, yes. They left it in the room.’
6
Three-Day Head Start
It was an hour short of dawn when he reached the outskirts of Falmouth on Cornwall’s south coast. The first morning commuters painted the roads with sleepy headlights. Clay knew that with each minute his chances of being detected grew. He needed to get rid of the car, quit this cold, damp place. He left the motorway, turned towards the sea and worked his way along the coast road, scanning the warehouses and shops that cluttered both sides of the road, grey brick walls, fenced yards choked with machinery, chandleries, glimpses of the broad estuary opening up on his left as the sky lightened. After a few miles, the first boatyard, full of gleaming white fibreglass craft bobbing in ordered ranks within a dockwork lattice, the freshly paved parking area dotted with expensive German cars, and then, a few minutes later, another marina, well-tended and prosperous.
Clay drove on.
After a while, the buildings began to age noticeably, brickwork faded and crumbled, the first bruised Fords and rusty Hillmans appeared. Twenty minutes later he slowed and followed a narrow laneway down towards the water. At the end of the cul-de-sac was a stretch of clapboard fence about fifty metres long. The boards sagged between listing posts. Grass and weeds choked the verge. A few corroded aluminium masts poked above the fence. To the right, beyond a tangle of bare trees draped with bramble and ivy, a chainlinked equipment yard, rusty machinery, stacks of wooden shipping pallets. To the left, an old brick warehouse building, windowless, empty-looking. Clay slowed the car and approached what looked to be the entranceway to the place. The sign, hanging from a bar over the gate, looked decades old, grey, peeling lettering on a once-blue background. It read simply: Pearson & Son. Vessels bought and sold. It was worth a try.
Clay turned the car around and tucked it tight beside the brambles at the far end of the fence. The dashboard clock showed five fifty-eight. He turned off the engine, opened the door, stood and stretched. The air was heavy with that dead smell of the sea, of things recently expired, washed ashore. He closed the door and walked along the verge to the gate, scanning the laneway back to the coast road. There was no one about. The gate was wire link with tarpaulin stretched behind, ragged and torn. A rusty, padlocked chain held the gate closed. Clay peered through the gap between the gate and the fence post. A gravelled lot, brambles thick on all sides, an asbestos-roofed shack, a few dilapidated sail boats up on blocks, the grey fibreglass hulls of land-ridden power boats, stacks of weathered lumber, a few drums, the flat, grey estuary in the background. The whole place had that marginal, break-even look. Clay looked back down the still-deserted laneway, wedged the toe of his boot into the fence, grabbed the wire, pulled himself up and over, and landed with a smooth flex of both knees.
He looked at his watch. 06:07. The boat ramp was quiet, the haul half out of the water as if someone had forgotten to pull it out after a launch. There was no wind. Half a dozen craft dozed on buoys under a close, grey sky. Gulls cried low across the glassy estuary, wingtip perfect. Clay stood for a moment and looked out across the muddy water towards the sea.
‘Buying or selling?’
Clay turned towards the voice, startled.
A man stood on the boat ramp. He was short, not much over five feet, clad in a grey wool jumper, faded, loose-fitting jeans and black lace-up boots. He was clean-shaven, the skin lined, weathered. His hair was spiked, straight-up punk, platinum. He looked Clay up and down, fixed for a fraction of a second on his stump.
‘Both,’ said Clay.
Punk shuffled down to where Clay was standing and stood, hands on hips, looking up into his eyes. ‘Bit early for boat buying, innit?’
‘Couldn’t sleep.’
Punk glanced at Clay’s shoulder, narrowed his eyes. ‘I can see that.’
Clay raised his hand to his arm. The sleeve was wet with blood. ‘Clumsy.’
Punk’s mouth curled into a thin approximation of a smile. ‘I’m not buying.’
‘What about a trade?’
‘You thinking perhaps that nice new BMW out front?’
Clay smiled. ‘Could be. Depends.’
‘Shame about the window.’
Clay said nothing, insides tumbling.
‘What’re you after?’
‘Something sea-going. Sturdy.’
Punk sniffed the air, looked out across the estuary. ‘If you’re in a hurry to go out there,’ he jutted his chin towards the sea, ‘you should think again. Storm coming. You an experienced yachtsman?’
Clay pointed to a powerboat moored about fifty metres out. It looked sleek and powerful, with twin inboard-outboard engines. ‘What about that one?’ He had about thirty thousand pounds cash left. That was it.
&
nbsp; ‘Not for sale.’
There were a couple of old-style boxwork cabin cruisers that looked as if they hadn’t moved in decades, an open whaler and a compact sloop with an aluminium mast – too slow, too light and small to make the crossing. Nothing else back in the yard had looked even remotely seaworthy. Clay turned and started walking back to the car. He would have to try somewhere else.
‘Where you going?’ said Punk.
Clay kept walking.
‘Ey there, guv, what you want for the car?’ Punk called after him.
Clay stopped, looked down at his boots, at the oiled gravel of the boat ramp.
‘Don’t worry,’ Punk continued. ‘I can clean it. I have friends.’
‘I’m happy for you.’ All mine are dead or in deep shit. Clay stood, not looking back. He had a decision to make. And he had to make it now. Trust the guy, or leave. Problem was, he was running out of time. Time and options.
Evolution of Fear Page 4
