The Mercy Seat

by Martyn Waites

  ‘Apparently CCTV footage has him getting on a King’s Cross-bound train in Newcastle on the Tuesday,’ Maria told Jamal. ‘And a similar one in London shows him getting off. So that would appear to back up your story.’

  ‘Can I have my money?’

  ‘Let’s just get this straight.’

  There had been no contact between Colin Huntley and his daughter. Other friends and family had been questioned and eliminated. Publicly, the investigation was ongoing, but unless there was a break soon, Maria’s sources had told her, it would start to be wound down.

  ‘You’ll have to talk to the police, you know,’ Maria said. ‘You’re a witness.’

  The colour drained from his face. He began to shake. ‘No way. Joe said that. I gave you this so I wouldn’t have to. I just want my money.’

  Maria sighed. She couldn’t just let him go. He was, at present, the only source for a potentially huge story. She had to have his credibility verified, have him protected from her competitors. Even get a sympathetic plod to talk to him when the time was right.

  She looked at her watch. Sharkey would be here soon. He could throw some kind of legal blanket over the whole thing, buy her some time. Until then, she had to hang on to Jamal, not let him out of her sight.

  She smiled at him, putting pen and notebook back in her bag. He didn’t return the smile. Looked only anxious.

  ‘Listen. Mr Sharkey, the man with the money, won’t be here until later on tonight. I’ve got to do some work before then. Why don’t you come with me?’

  ‘Doin’ what?’ He sounded suspicious.

  ‘Colin Huntley has a daughter. And she lives just up the road. Now, I need to talk to her about all this, so why don’t you come along? You don’t have to say anything. I’ll tell her you’re a trainee or my assistant or something.’

  Jamal shrugged, although there was a hint of pride somewhere in his features. ‘’K.’

  Maria smiled with what she hoped was encouragement. ‘What harm can it do, eh?’

  They left the restaurant, the crowd flowing against them, eager for the latest slice of Hollywood comic-book escapism, and headed for the cab rank outside.

  17

  Donovan stared hard at Father Jack. Tried not to let the lethal goons on either side intimidate him.

  Failed.

  Donovan tried to keep his voice calm and even. ‘What’s the deal, then?’

  Father Jack looked at the disc.

  ‘This,’ he said, clearly enjoying the moment despite his all-too-obvious pain, ‘in return for – let’s not be greedy – fifty thousand pounds. And that half-caste boy.’

  The last few words spat out, Jack’s brows twisting with fury.

  ‘Good try, Jack,’ said Donovan, ‘but the price is too high. And last time I saw Jamal, he was with you.’ He smiled despite the situation. ‘How’s your injury, by the way? Is that a nappy you’re wearing? Didn’t know they made them so big.’

  A fresh wave of sweat broke over Father Jack. His breathing became heavier, his gaze darker.

  ‘Mock all you want,’ he said, ‘but what’s about to happen is going to hurt you more than you hurt me. I take consolation from that.’

  ‘Take your pleasure where you can,’ said Peta, angry and unafraid, ‘because your nasty little operation is finished.’

  Father Jack attempted another smile. ‘Don’t be … so melodramatic. Your cameras … are destroyed …’

  ‘Think we didn’t back things up?’ said Amar.

  ‘Think we didn’t expect something like this?’ Peta said, hands on hips.

  Donovan was impressed by how cool she was being. He was still terrified.

  Jack waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. ‘I have friends …’

  Peta continued: ‘It’s all been passed on to a national paper. There’s enough hard evidence to convict you. And you won’t be able to rely on your tame councillors or police. They’re part of our package. Get ready, Jack. You’re going to be famous.’

  Father Jack was wheezing hard now, red-faced, as if he was sitting in a pressure cooker. He looked about to explode. When he spoke, his voice had a forced quality to it.

  ‘This disc …’ he said, ‘… you still need this disc. Trade. Pass over what you’ve got. And you walk out of … here … unharmed.’

  ‘Bollocks,’ said Donovan, with a fearlessness he wished he felt. ‘Like we believe you.’

  ‘And it’s too late,’ said Amar, seemingly as unperturbed as Peta. ‘We’ve passed it on. Finito.’

  Father Jack looked like he had reached the foothills of a major heart attack.

  ‘Mark …’

  One of his soldiers stepped forward, helped him to his feet. Once there, Jack seemed unsteady, swaying as if about to faint. He passed the disc to Mark, nodded.

  Mark placed the disc on the table, brought his baseball bat down on it. Again. And again. Until there was nothing lift but silvered shards.

  Jack locked eyes with Donovan, his face a mask of pain and hatred.

  ‘Nobody wins now.’ His voice was a fetid whisper.

  He gestured. Mark helped him to the door. He turned, spoke to him.

  ‘Wait till I’m gone, then … have some fun with them.’

  Father Jack closed the door behind him. In the silence that followed, he could be heard making his laboured way down the stairs.

  Silence returned to the room.

  ‘Sorry, folks,’ said Mark, smiling. ‘Nothing personal.’

  The men laughed.

  Peta didn’t.

  She kicked out sharply, hitting the nearest one with a blow to the groin. He doubled over, air leaving his body in a painful huff of surprise. His grip on the bat loosened. Bringing both hands up, she disarmed him, dislocating his thumb and several of his fingers in the process.

  ‘Joe!’

  She threw the bat to Donovan. He clumsily caught it, put the right end in the palm of his hand.

  The thug dropped to his knees.

  Her actions had bought them precious seconds, the thug crew too surprised to respond. Now they did.

  They attacked, one on one, anger driving their movements. They didn’t like being bested, especially not by a woman.

  Adrenalin kicked in to Donovan; he felt no tiredness, no ache, just the desire to survive.

  ‘Bastard!’

  A bat was bearing down on him held by Mark. He turned, dodged just in time. The blow landed against the wall. Trusting to his survival instinct, he quickly brought his own bat down on Mark’s side. The man cried out, crumpled. Donovan was sure he heard ribs crack.

  He swung again, catching Mark on the shoulder. Nothing broke this time, but Donovan felt the reverberation of the blow the length of his arm.

  The thug grunted in pain. He turned, swung his bat wildly, pain pushing up his anger, losing his grip on it.

  It hit Donovan in the stomach. He bent over as the air was knocked out of him.

  Mark leaped at Donovan. He connected, hard, knocking him back into the table, pulling him painfully to the floor, Donovan dropping his bat in the process. Mark kneeled on him, one hand round Donovan’s throat.

  Donovan saw the anger and hatred the man held for him, a man he had never met before. The thought momentarily confused him. He was brought back in to focus when he saw Mark pull back his other arm, make his hand a fist.

  It was the arm that Donovan had hit, but he was sure it could still do some damage. There was no way Donovan could fight back on his attacker’s terms, meet like with like. He needed to use his own strengths.

  Donovan brought his hands up, pushed back into Mark’s twisted face. He forced the heel of his left hand on to his top lip, pushing lip and nose back as far and as hard as he could. Mark dropped his arm, let it join the other, pushing hard round Donovan’s neck.

  With his other hand Donovan scratched round the man’s face, trying to get a grip of something he could use. He tried Mark’s neck, but it was too fat and gym-pumped to get a grip. He tried his cheeks. No
good.

  He found Mark’s eyes, tried to claw at them.

  Mark guessed what he was doing, tried to rotate his head away, kept the pressure on Donovan’s neck.

  Donovan brought his other hand up, found the other eye. Clawed, raked, tried to get a grip.

  Mark kept squeezing Donovan’s neck.

  Donovan felt the air being choked from his body, a final constricting gurgle. He felt his strength ebbing away. Black holes, like openings to a universe beyond, began to appear in his vision. He knew he had enough left in him for only one last, desperate chance.

  Donovan put his thumbs over Mark’s eyes.

  Pushed.

  Hard as he could.

  Mark screamed. He tried to pull his head back while still maintaining pressure on Donovan’s neck.

  Donovan held on, hands like rigored claws.

  Mark gave up, pulled away. He rolled off Donovan, lay curled on his side, left arm trailing limply, right covering his face.

  ‘You’ve blinded me … You’ve fuckin’ blinded me …’ Whimpering.

  Gasping and coughing for air, Donovan struggled to his feet, reached for the baseball bat. He swung it into Mark’s kidneys. Once. Twice.

  He pulled his arm back for a third swing, found his strength had deserted him. He slumped, back against the upended table, bat cradled in his hands, looked around the rest of the room.

  The other three crew members had been similarly disarmed. Amar was kneeling over one of them, arm locked round the man’s throat. The man clawed ineffectually at the hold. Amar’s muscles no longer looked like those of a gym-narcissist. They, and the look on his face, meant business.

  The other two lay groaning on the floor.

  Peta kneeled down before the captured man. She looked lit up by the violence, truly alive.

  ‘Listen,’ she said to her captive, ‘I know you’re just the hired help. Get up and leave now and that’s the end of it. But keep going and so will we.’

  She looked around. Smiled.

  ‘And we’ll finish it.’

  The man, seeing he had no option, nodded.

  Amar tentatively loosened his grip. The man rose warily to his feet.

  The others joined him. Donovan’s assailant held his hands over his face, was helped out by one of the others.

  ‘You nearly fuckin’ blinded him!’ said the man Amar had just released.

  ‘And I’ll do the same to you,’ said Peta. ‘Get out.’

  The man stared at her. She returned his gaze, unblinking.

  Eventually he broke the look, left.

  ‘And tell everyone you were beaten by a blonde girl and a Paki poof,’ shouted Amar.

  She and Amar looked at each other, exchanged high fives.

  They noticed Donovan. Crossed to him. Peta kneeled down.

  ‘You OK?’

  Donovan managed a weak smile. ‘Should have seen the other feller.’

  ‘I did.’ She laughed. ‘And you made a right mess of him. Well done.’

  Donovan looked at her and Amar. They were buzzing. The violence had energized them. It had just tired him out.

  ‘Room’s a mess …’ said Donovan.

  ‘Think we’ll get our deposit back?’ asked Amar.

  They laughed, cleansing the flat of tension.

  Donovan sighed. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘suppose we should go give Father Jack the good news.’

  Hammer was bored.

  He sat behind the wheel of his car, his anonymous Vauxhall Vectra, watching the girl’s flat. It felt like he had been there for weeks. It felt like he had been there for ever.

  Since leaving Keenyside at the station house he had come back to the same spot. Now it was dark and there had been no movement.

  Usually on jobs like this he would fall into a near-fugue state while waiting. Pass the time by playing back all the injustices ever done to him throughout his life. He would imagine them as short stories. With the holdall on the seat next to him, unzipped, its contents face up, as an audience. The stories had new endings. Ones where his tormentors were terrified by his strength, where he tortured and humiliated them before forcing fearful repentance from their shattered bodies, ultimately finding peace by killing them, even eating their bodies, symbolically taking their souls.

  Failing that, there was his iPod, death metal on heavy rotation.

  But nothing worked for him today. He knew why. The last few days had fired him up. Regent’s Canal, the Pennines … that was his true calling. His real work. Not this. This bored him.

  And when he became bored, he became angry.

  And when he got angry, someone had to pay.

  ‘Let something happen!’ he shouted, pounding the steering wheel.

  Soon after that, something did.

  He blinked, thought he was seeing things.

  He wasn’t.

  It was the rent boy. Jamal. Walking up to the block of flats with a woman beside him. He didn’t recognize her, but she wasn’t important. The boy was the important one.

  His first thought: phone Keenyside.

  The boy and the woman walked up to the block of flats. Rang a bell.

  Her bell.

  Keenyside’s mobile rang and rang. No answer. Must still be at his house in the countryside. No reception there. Hammer hung up before voicemail kicked in, not risking leaving a message.

  He looked around, wondered what to do.

  The woman was talking into the entryphone, talking quite a bit. Eventually the door buzzed open and the two of them were admitted inside.

  Hammer rubbed his face. Needed to think.

  Make a decision. Use his initiative.

  He looked at his mobile one last time, as if the very act of doing that would will a call through from Keenyside.

  Nothing.

  Hammer gave an angry sigh, zipped up the holdall, opened the car door, swung his body out. He locked the door behind him, pulled his woollen hat down over his ears, scoped the street to see if he was being watched.

  He wasn’t.

  Turning his collar up to hide his face, he crossed the street to the flats, approached the front door.

  Ready to ring the bell.

  18

  Donovan saw that the door of the house was unlocked, turned to both Peta and Amar, who shrugged. Exhausted and badly shaken, but not giving up yet, he pushed it open.

  The children were gone. A cursory look around downstairs confirmed that. And quickly, too: like looters had ransacked the place, taken CDs, DVDs, anything saleable.

  A noise from upstairs: a creak of the floorboards.

  Donovan motioned to the other two, pointed at the stairs, began silently to ascend. Peta and Amar nodded, did likewise.

  On the landing Donovan paused, looked around. All the rooms were empty, evacuated in the same haste as downstairs. Single items of clothing lay scattered, discarded; hands not quick enough to stuff them into holdalls before running. But a thoroughness amid the mess; these children were used to running.

  Donovan stopped before Father Jack’s room. The only door closed. Noises coming from behind it. He touched the handle, pushed it open, stepped into the room.

  All round was carnage. Drawers and cupboards pulled out, contents spilled and strewn over every surface. Father Jack’s inner life exposed; like dangerous, guilty secrets confessed aloud.

  Blood everywhere. The white furnishings accentuating it. Jackson Pollock gone postal.

  On the bed, half lying, half sitting, was Father Jack. The eye of a sickening storm. Cradled in his arms the broken, unmoving body of Si.

  Father Jack was sobbing.

  The three watched, not knowing how to proceed. Father Jack, eventually registering their presences, looked up. He realized who it was and panic spread across his features. He made a move to run, but something inside him signalled the futility of that. He sighed, nodded.

  Donovan almost found pity in the man’s plight.

  Almost.

  ‘We’re calling the police, Jack,’ said D
onovan.

  ‘Well, make sure they get the half-caste,’ said Father Jack, his voice watery and blubbery. ‘Make sure that little cunt pays for what he did to my boy.’

  The paedophile looked at Si’s face. Spreading purple bruises and whitening of skin. Began tenderly to wipe the blood away from the boy’s eyes, sobs sending flubbery oscillations through his body.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Donovan, ‘blame Jamal. Blame us. Blame your childhood. Blame fucking Coronation Street, if you must. Blame anyone but yourself.’

  A howl ripped itself free of Father Jack’s throat.

  ‘He did it, you cunt! With this! With this!’ He held up the heavy-metal separator and restraint. ‘He hit him with this! He hit …’

  His voice trailed away, obscured by sobs.

  Donovan was unmoved. ‘Maybe so. But your prints are on it now. Your DNA. A violent child abuser or a phantom boy. Who’s a court more likely to believe? You’re fucked, Jack.’ He gave a mirthless laugh. ‘And not in a good way.’

  The sobs continued unabated.

  Donovan turned to Peta and Amar. ‘You got enough?’

  Peta nodded. ‘I think so.’

  ‘Let’s call the police,’ he said. ‘Then Maria. Get it sorted out.’

  He reached inside his jacket pocket for his mobile. His hand stopped halfway. He looked at Peta.

  ‘Could you do it?’ he said. ‘I’m just too tired to deal with anything.’

  Donovan walked out of the room, down the stairs and out of the house. He sat on the pavement outside, sighed. He closed his eyes.

  Tried to feel nothing.

  ‘Caroline Huntley?’ Maria spoke through the metal grille of the entryphone.

  ‘Yes?’ A weary voice, but expectant with a tiny dash of desperate hope.

  ‘My name’s Maria Bennett. I’m the editor of the Herald. Could I come in and talk to you, please?’

  The voice on the other side of the grille sighed, as if suddenly tired beyond hope. ‘I’m not talking to journalists. Please go away.’

  ‘I understand that, Ms Huntley,’ Maria said quickly before the woman could hang up, walk away. ‘I don’t want anything from you. I might have some information for you. About your father.’