Blood Line: What if your family was the last left alive? (The Blood Line Trilogy Book 1)

by Michael Green

  ‘They’ve only got three horses between them. I’d say it’s going to take them the best part of twenty-four hours.’

  ‘Which way do you think they’ll go?’

  ‘Probably through Borough Green, along the M20, then up the A228. It’s the most direct.’

  ‘What’s wrong with the farm bikes?’

  ‘They obviously put something in the fuel tanks.’

  ‘Can they be fixed?’

  ‘I can fix them,’ boasted Damian.

  ‘Right,’ Nigel snapped, the resolve flowing back into his body as the numbness caused by his son’s death began to ebb. ‘Get two of the bikes back here, repaired and refuelled. You two,’ he went on, pointing at Jasper and Damian, ‘take the bikes and go after them. Take the road up through Eynesford and then go down the A2. You should get to Gillingham before them. When you get there, set up an ambush and, when they turn up, make a better fist of things than you did at the White Horse Inn.’

  ‘It’ll be tricky bringing ten prisoners back here with just the two of us,’ Jasper reasoned.

  ‘I don’t want you to capture them,’ Nigel said bitterly. ‘I want you to mow them down. Kill everyone except Allison. I’ve got special plans for her.’

  Jasper nodded.

  ‘Greg’, Nigel continued, ‘can stand guard on the top of the tower. Shoot anyone who steps out of line. I’m going to teach these bastards a lesson they’ll never forget — one way or the other.’ The brothers had suffered from Nigel’s temper all their lives, but they had never witnessed this depth of anger. ‘Get to it,’ he ordered.

  Mark led the escapees towards Gillingham. He took some comfort from the fact they hadn’t heard any farm-bike engines, but he also knew there were other routes to Gillingham.

  He cursed himself for having let slip where they’d landed all those months ago, but consoled himself that Steven had told Jasper their yacht was called Osprey rather than Archangel. But they’d left Archangel’s wind-generator operating and her dinghy would be conspicuous on the promenade in the leisure park between the mound of the paddling pool and the empty swimming pool. The dinghy had Archangel painted on the stern, together with the New Zealand flag. If the Chatfield family couldn’t find a yacht called Osprey it wouldn’t take them long to identify Archangel as the vessel they were after.

  It was dark when the party arrived at the outskirts of Gillingham. Still they’d heard nothing. The clatter of the horses’ hooves rang out on the tarmac roads, announcing their progress. Mark ordered the horses set free; they would continue on foot.

  ‘This way,’ Steven said, picking up Lee and heading off towards the leisure park.

  ‘No,’ Mark said quickly. ‘I don’t like the feel of it. We’ll head upriver, find a dinghy and row downstream.’

  ‘But that could take ages,’ Steven protested.

  ‘My leg’s killing me,’ Adam complained.

  Everyone was weary.

  ‘Trust me,’ Mark said. ‘It’s worth an extra couple of miles to be sure. Now let’s get going.’

  The exhausted band stumbled after him as he led the way through the burned-out streets of Gillingham. Two hours later they arrived at the Historic Dockyard in Chatham. They found two small dinghies aboard the old ship HMS Gannet, dragged them to the river and loaded the passengers aboard. Mark rowed one dinghy and Steven the other. Slowly, in the darkness, they made their way downriver on the ebbing tide.

  When they rounded a bend, the moon peeped momentarily from behind the clouds and Mark, glancing over his shoulder, spotted Archangel ahead. Steven saw her moments later and they both stopped rowing. They strained their eyes and ears for anyone aboard, but there were no signs of life. Mark manoeuvred his dinghy alongside Steven’s and whispered, ‘Hang off while I go alongside and check her out.’

  He drifted alongside Archangel and peered over the gunwale. All was quiet. He motioned to Fergus to hold the dinghy in position and ensure it didn’t bang against Archangel’s hull. Then he cautiously removed his shoes and, rifle in hand, climbed aboard.

  Suddenly he froze; the main hatch cover was partly open. He knew they’d left the hatch firmly closed. He backed off before edging forward again, making his way stealthily to the fore-hatch, which had been left ajar to allow air to circulate through the boat. Silently, he lifted the hatch cover, taking care to ensure he wasn’t silhouetted. He waited and listened for what seemed like an eternity, and then lowered himself through the hatch into Archangel’s forward cabin.

  Again he waited, sifting through the sounds of the boat he knew so well, but there was only the lapping of the water, the familiar creaking and the low drone of wind in the rigging.

  He reached around the bulkhead, turned on the light switch and peered cautiously into the main cabin. No one was there. Rifle in hand, he searched the remaining two cabins. At last he could relax; he lifted the washboards out of the main hatchway and climbed up the companionway.

  When he stepped into the cockpit a stream of machine-gun bullets and tracers spat at him from the shore. One of the bullets hit him in the shoulder with such force he was spun around and knocked off his feet. As the bullets continued to ricochet off the steel hull and cabintop he dragged himself to the gunwale. Both dinghies were safely in the lee of Archangel, their passengers cowering beneath the gunwales as ricocheting bullets skimmed across the water. But there was no way they could safely get aboard.

  From the direction of the tracer bullets Mark concluded that Jasper and Greg had discovered Archangel’s dinghy. They must have set up their machine guns on either side of it, one hidden in the paddling pool on the mound and the other in the empty swimming pool. Had the escapees made straight for the dinghy, they could all have been dead by now.

  Steven peered cautiously into Archangel’s cockpit. ‘Have you been hit?’ he asked. He’d seen his father fall and wasn’t sure whether he’d dived to the deck or been shot.

  ‘Yes, in the shoulder, but I think I’m okay.’ Mark wasn’t so sure. He was beginning to feel light-headed and the wetness on his arm told him he was losing a lot of blood.

  ‘Do you think you can get back inside?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘I’m not going to be able to get up on the foredeck and lift the anchor. But if you can start the engine and pass me the bolt cutters I can cut the anchor chain. Then we should be able to motor down the river keeping the dinghies on the lee side.’

  Mark crawled back across the cockpit floor. As he stumbled through the hatch another burst of bullets came for him. He guessed the brothers must have night-vision goggles. He found the bolt cutters, made his way back to the hatch and slid them across the cockpit floor towards the lee gunwale. When Steven’s hand reached to retrieve them another round of fire streamed in their direction.

  ‘When I’ve started the engine, cut the anchor chain,’ Mark shouted. ‘Bang on the hull once she’s free.’

  There was a scraping sound as Steven pulled his dinghy along the hull. Mark retrieved the engine key from the chart-table drawer and carefully inserted it in the ignition alongside the hatchway. When he guessed his son was in position he turned the key. Archangel’s diesel spluttered to life on the second attempt. Seconds later, as more machine-gun bullets ricocheted off Archangel’s bow, three loud bangs on the steel hull confirmed that Steven had cut the anchor chain.

  As Archangel drifted downstream with the current, Mark climbed back up the companionway and wriggled along the cockpit floor on his back. Bullets streamed across the cockpit, centimetres above his chest. He put the engine control into gear and reached up for the ship’s wheel above his head.

  ‘Bring her ten degrees to starboard,’ Adam called. He’d peeped over the gunwale between machine-gun bursts and had seen Mark lying on his back, unable to see where Archangel was heading. ‘That’s enough … Take her back five degrees to port …’

  As they motored slowly downstream, Adam continued to con Archangel from the safety of his dinghy on the lee side.

  �
��Hard to port,’ he called as the mast of a sunken yacht loomed ahead. When there was no response, Adam peered into the cockpit and found Mark no longer had hold of the wheel.

  Hoping they were out of range of the machine guns, Adam pulled himself over the gunwale, took the helm and swung Archangel away from the sunken yacht. He felt her keel touch an obstruction but he’d reacted just in time. As she turned, Archangel heeled over and broke free.

  ‘Everybody down below,’ Steven ordered as he jumped into the cockpit and rushed to the aid of his father. The others scrambled over the gunwale and stumbled down the hatchway as Adam continued steering Archangel downriver.

  Eventually the river opened out and Adam headed for the port bank. All the windows on the starboard side of the boat were smashed and there was a smell of diesel where the plastic containers on deck had been punctured. They could still hear the farm-bike engines, but they were a long way away, on the opposite shore. They had made it.

  55

  It was two days before Mark was well enough to venture back on deck. He’d lost a lot of blood and he’d had to grin and bear it while Allison extracted the bullet that had hit him.

  On the third morning of the voyage everyone sat in the cockpit enjoying breakfast. Archangel strained forward, the foaming wake tumbling astern marking her progress.

  ‘Uncle Mark, how long before we get to New Zealand?’ Luke asked from the helm.

  ‘Well, it’s nearly three months’ sailing lad, but I want to stop off at Brisbane for a few days as well.’

  Steven challenged his father, ‘But we agreed to sail back non-stop.’

  Mark sensed his son was still troubled by his nightmare about Jane and was anxious to return to Gulf Harbour. He continued anyway.

  ‘I thought we might stop off and visit our relations.’

  ‘What relations?’

  ‘Great Uncle William’s descendants, of course.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  Mark took Aunt Margaret’s chart of the family tree from his pocket and spread it on the cockpit table, putting a winch handle on the document to ensure it didn’t blow away. He told them the story of their secret uncle. They were dumbfounded.

  ‘To think that all this time we’ve had another uncle our parents never talked about,’ Adam said.

  ‘It was a big scandal at the time,’ Mark went on. ‘Aunt Margaret was mortified when she told me the story.’

  ‘She would have been even more mortified if she’d known the rest of the story,’ Allison said softly.

  Everyone looked at Allison. She turned away.

  ‘What is it?’ Mark asked softly.

  ‘Our grandfather and grandmother were …’ Her voice petered out.

  ‘They were what?’ Mark prompted gently.

  ‘They were brother and sister.’

  ‘Brother and sister!’

  ‘Yes. And not only that, they were twins. But they didn’t know,’ she added quickly, as if she felt they needed defending. ‘They were orphaned at birth and split up a week after they were born. Neither knew they had a twin. They met by chance when they were adults, fell in love and got married.’

  ‘When did they find out?’ Adam asked.

  ‘They never found out. I’m the only one who has ever known. I discovered the truth when I was researching the family tree for my mother. I didn’t even tell her … she would have been devastated.’

  ‘I can’t see why,’ Steven said. ‘It’s an amazing story. Surely she’d want to know?’

  ‘My mother’s very religious, as you know. In her eyes, her mother and father would have committed a terrible sin, and she would have been a product of that sin. That’s why I could never tell her.’

  Steven shrugged. ‘I don’t see how they could have committed a sin if they didn’t know they were brother and sister.’

  ‘How did you find out?’ Adam pressed.

  ‘Well, I always knew that grandfather Chatfield was an orphan and came from Kingston-upon-Thames. I traced his family back as far as 1872 before I came to a dead end.

  ‘I also knew our grandmother’s maiden name was Wrightson and that she came from West Malling. When I traced the Wrightson side of the family, I hit another dead end. Then after months of trolling through church records I got my big break.’

  ‘Your big break?’

  ‘Yes. I discovered our grandmother was an orphan too. A couple called Wrightson who lived in West Malling adopted her when she was a week old. They never told her she was adopted, and when they were killed in a train crash they took their secret to the grave. It was the sort of thing people kept quiet about in those days.’

  Mark nodded.

  ‘When I followed the trail further back,’ Allison continued, ‘I discovered our grandmother’s name prior to her adoption was also Chatfield. Everyone always assumed that the fact Grandfather and Grandmother were born on the same day was pure coincidence, but it wasn’t. When I checked out the records against the adoption papers, I got a match. They were twin brother and sister.’

  ‘A lucky coincidence for us,’ Mark said. His mind had raced ahead, assimilating the new information and analysing its implications.

  ‘Lucky?’

  ‘I’m guessing that the union between twin brother and twin sister created a unique gene, one that protected us from the pandemic. That’s why the Chatfield blood line has survived.’

  Adam shrugged his shoulders. ‘You could well be right. There’s got to be some explanation. It’s as good a reason as any.’

  Mark saw that Allison was crying. He pulled her closer. ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s Mum,’ she sobbed. ‘I should never have left her.’

  ‘Your Mum will be fine,’ Mark assured her.

  ‘Yes,’ the others chorused. ‘Your Mum will be fine. Aunt Margaret can take care of herself. Hasn’t she always?’

  56

  But Aunt Margaret was far from fine. She, together with everyone else, had been ordered to assemble in Flag Court. Greg sat up on the parapet with the machine gun trained on them.

  It was three days since the escape. Jasper and Damian had returned to Haver, but the community still didn’t know whether their other relatives had escaped or been captured or killed.

  The treadmill was unmanned; Nigel had decreed that everyone should be present. With the machine gun trained on them, they couldn’t avoid a sense of impending doom: a sense accentuated by the fact that the cart which had served as a platform for Mathew’s execution had been wheeled back into the courtyard. Worse still, the block and the medieval axe they’d used to behead him were on the cart as well.

  Nigel, Damian and Jasper walked into the courtyard and climbed up onto the platform.

  ‘Somebody,’ Nigel said, resting his hands on the cart and leaning forward, ‘helped the prisoners escape. Somebody made their way up the tower steps and unlocked the door.’

  Panic coursed through Duncan’s veins; his hand went involuntarily to the pocket of his tunic. The key Fergus had given him was still there.

  ‘Now I want that person to step forward,’ Nigel continued. No one moved. ‘Someone’s going to pay,’ Nigel continued menacingly. ‘Now are you going to step forward, or are we going to have to come down there and find you?’ Still no one moved. He nodded to Jasper, who drew his pistol and jumped down from the cart. Damian also drew his pistol. The machine gun tripod on the parapet squeaked menacingly as Greg’s eyes followed Jasper’s progress.

  Jasper stared each person in the eye in turn. Only Paul flinched, his head twitching nervously from side to side, but Jasper dismissed the twitching as Paul’s normal affliction.

  He began to crouch down and look into the frightened eyes of the children. With a sudden movement, he whisked Mary-Claire off her feet and threw her up onto the cart. Paul, Cheryl and Bridget surged forward. Damian’s gun, held in his free hand, pointed down into their faces.

  ‘Just keep coming,’ he threatened as Mary-Claire struggled to break fre
e from his grip. The three stepped back a pace.

  ‘Well, who was it?’ Nigel asked again.

  Still no one answered.

  ‘Very well, we’ll start with Mary-Claire, and we’ll keep going until we find the culprit.’

  Jasper jumped back on the cart, and took hold of the axe. Damian forced Mary-Claire’s head onto the block. Cheryl, screaming hysterically, tried to climb up onto the cart but Nigel stamped on her hands and kicked her back down.

  ‘It was me,’ called a voice from the back of the courtyard.

  Damian released Mary-Claire, who scampered across the cart and jumped into the arms of her waiting mother.

  ‘It was me,’ said the voice again.

  ‘Don’t waste my time, you old fool.’ Nigel bellowed. ‘You can’t even walk, let alone climb the tower.’

  ‘I can walk,’ Aunt Margaret said defiantly. She pulled back the rug from her lap and dragged herself out of the wheelchair. Both her feet were strapped in her leather boots with the iron rods running down the sides. She took her old walking stick and, slowly and painfully, tottered across the flagstones, the tap of her stick ringing around the silent courtyard. Almost within reach of the cart, she tripped on an uneven flagstone and sprawled on the ground. Warren raced forward to help her.

  ‘Stay where you are!’ Damian yelled, pointing his pistol at Warren.

  Nigel gestured to Jasper, who jumped off the cart and lifted Aunt Margaret onto the platform, where she gripped the side of the cart. She tried to hold her head high, but her arthritis prevented it.

  ‘How did you get past Sir Greg?’ Nigel demanded.

  ‘There’s a secret servants’ corridor that leads from the Morgan quarters to the first floor of the tower.’

  ‘And how did you get into the cell?’

  ‘Steven made two keys to the cell door.’

  ‘And where’s the key now?’

  ‘I dropped it down the manhole into the reservoir, just as he told me to.’