Marcher: The Author's Preferred Text

by Chris Beckett

  Cyril laughed loudly at this but PC Leonard was rather stung. He and his wife had adopted a small Pliocene opossum called Gringo that lived nowhere else on Earth but Bristol Zoo, and they were very proud of their name on the sign outside the possum’s cage and of the framed certificate on the wall of their lounge.

  ‘Oh I don’t know, sir. I think it’s very valuable work. And of course it’s wonderful for the country. Britain is on the cutting edge of…’

  ‘Those poor mammoths,’ said Cyril. ‘They’re like chained titans, aren’t they? Once they ruled the world and now…’

  His voice broke. PC Leonard glanced uneasily across at him.

  The old deskie was shaking with sobs.

  Chapter 10

  That afternoon and all the next day the switchboard at the DSI police station in Thurston Meadows was jammed by dozens of agitated callers waiting to be put through. It seemed that everyone who had a grudge or an obsession or a paranoid delusion suddenly needed urgently to be heard. Some wanted their own personal hunches to be prioritised over all others and acted upon at once, threatening the police with ‘the media’ if they failed to act. Others wanted to issue lurid new death threats of their own against the deskies in general, against Burkitt personally or against sundry other named DSI employees. Another group again wanted to name names, accusing neighbours, ex-boyfriends, the boyfriends of ex-girlfriends of being responsible for the crime. And then there were those who had more elaborate charges to lay, and could prove beyond all doubt that Burkitt’s attackers, or the DSI, or Burkitt himself were in league with the Americans, Satan, foreigners or aliens from outer space.

  And they didn’t just use the phone. In the waiting area by the duty desk still more accusers gathered, hissing and crackling and smouldering away like lit fireworks. They muttered and clutched dog-eared notebooks. They leapt up and sat down again. They craned their necks to see what was going on behind the toughened glass and peered with jealous and suspicious eyes at each new arrival coming in. News had happened. News had arrived in Thurston Meadows and they were all desperate to be a part of it.

  Then Slug came in. His eyes red, his skin glistening with sweat, he burst into the office and straight away began thumping and banging on the glass.

  ‘Take a ticket please sir,’ said the duty officer, putting her hand over the mouthpiece of her phone. ‘You’ll be called when your number comes up. We’re very busy as you can see, so I’m afraid there’ll be a bit of a wait.’

  ‘I’m no’ waiting for nobody, alright? I need tae talk to the Immigration people and I need tae talk to them now.’

  ‘There’s other people before you, sir. If you just take a ticket, we’ll be along…’

  But the desk sergeant looked over and saw straight away that this wasn’t going to work.

  ‘Can I just take your ID, sir?’ he asked, coming across to the window.

  ‘Never mind that. I need tae see the immigration people now.’

  The sergeant tried the extension number for the office where Charles and his colleagues were temporarily based.

  ‘I’m very sorry, sir,’ he said, ‘but none of the Immigration people is available at the moment. Can you give me your name?’

  ‘Never mind my fucking name, pal. They’re going tae want to hear what I’ve got tae say to them. They’re going tae want to hear it very badly. Do you understand me? I want you tae call one ay them and tell him tae come back now.’

  Eventually he was persuaded that he needed to talk to a policeman first so that they would know what to tell the Immigration people. An officer came out – it was PC Leonard, the proud adoptive parent of that Pliocene opossum in Bristol Zoo – and took him to an interview room.

  ‘Have a seat, sir,’ said PC Leonard.

  But Slug was too agitated to sit down. Pacing about in the tiny room, he took out a cigarette and lit it with yellow, shaking fingers.

  ‘Okay pal,’ he said, when he’d finally managed to get the thing to light. ‘Now you listen tae me. You write this down. I know who’s behind the attack on that deskie yesterday. It’s shifters. They’re trying tae get young men tae join up wi’ them and they’re setting them tae kill people as a test. That Burkitt was lucky. Those boys meant tae kill him. But there’s lots more deskies on the list I can tell you.’

  He sucked in smoke so hungrily that the filter came apart in his mouth and he had to break it off.

  ‘Sorry sir, I’m not quite clear. Are you saying that…?’

  ‘Are you going to fucking shut up and listen, sunshine, or am I going tae lose my rag? Write this down, okay? I can tell them who’s putting these boys up tae this. I can give them names. I can tell them where they’re hiding. But I need slip first. Nae slip, nae information. Simple as that. Write it down. I’ll come in this time tomorrow – all right? – the same time tomorrow. Write it down. And if you don’t have one ay they Immigration people there with a bag ay slip all ready – twenty seeds minimum, mind, I know they’ve got plenty – then forget it, I willnae even open my mouth. Do you get my drift, sunshine? Have you written all that down? Loads ay people are going tae die unless someone listens to me, and I won’t talk without seeds. Write it down. That’s my message. That’s all I’ve got tae…’

  Slug’s phone bleeped. He took it out of his pocket with trembling fingers.

  ‘Shit,’ he muttered as he saw the name on the screen. ‘I’m out ay here.’

  ‘Wait a minute, sir!’ said PC Leonard. ‘Could I just…’

  But Slug was gone, out of the interview room, out of the building. Footage from the CCTV cameras outside the DSI compound was subsequently to show him beginning to run in one direction, then changing his mind and running in the other.

  Later on, when the Royal Commission looked into the whole Clifton tragedy, much would be made of PC Leonard’s failure to realise the importance of what Slug had said to him, and his failure to recognise that Slug was not only a shifter himself but the specific shifter wanted for questioning in connection with the Tammy Pendant disappearance. But PC Leonard would always stick stubbornly to the same defence.

  ‘I just thought he was a nutter,’ he would maintain, exactly as he did when Charles questioned him about it that same day. ‘The place was full of nutters that morning. I just thought he was off his head.’

  ~*~

  Late that afternoon Carl got a call on his mobile as he was heading down to the Old England.

  ‘All right, Carl? How’s it going? Got a little job on for you, my old mate. Tell me where you are and I’ll swing by for you.’

  There was no pressure, no hint of menace, and yet somehow also no choice.

  Gunnar picked Carl up in the white van that Laf had used before. He was dressed in overalls like a plumber.

  ‘So what’s this job then?’ Carl asked.

  ‘A nasty little job, I’m afraid mate,’ Gunnar said. ‘A nasty job. One of those little things you’d rather you didn’t have to do but you know you’ve got to, if you know what I mean.’

  He drove out of the Zone, out of the city and six or seven miles down the A37 into Somerset before he eventually turned down a small side road, and then up a track into some dank and overgrown woods, where he pulled up behind another car which had arrived earlier. The sky was dark by now and it was lightly but steadily raining.

  ‘Sling that lot on, mate,’ said Gunnar, indicating a heap of work clothes and some boots in the back of the van. ‘We don’t want you to go home looking all muddy and that do we? Your mum would moan at you.’

  While Carl changed, Gunnar rolled up a spliff. He passed it across when Carl had finally got the boots on and Carl drew in the rich and oily smoke as Gunnar led the way into the wood. The black trees, choked with creepers and ivy, seemed somehow intense and limitless to Carl, like the black worms he’d seen in his mind dividing and dividing as he lay on the floor in the shifters’ hideaway. More sinister still, there was a deep silence which was completely new to him. Apart from that one night when Laf first took
him to Erik’s hideaway, he had never in his life been anywhere where the sound of traffic couldn’t be heard. Here there was only the rain.

  And then a strange cry came suddenly from straight above him.

  ‘Fuck!’ Carl cried out. ‘What the bloody hell’s that?’

  ‘An owl, me old mate. Just a harmless little old owl.’

  Gunnar snapped on a powerful torch.

  ‘So what is this job exactly?’ Carl asked.

  It was the third time he’d asked the question.

  ‘Like I say, a nasty little job,’ Gunnar told him. ‘A sort of disciplinary matter, I suppose you’d call it.’

  The torch made a tunnel of pale tree trunks, surrounded on every side by darkness.

  ‘Disciplinary?’ Carl was alarmed. ‘You’re not saying I done something wrong or nothing are you, only I…’

  ‘Oh no, mate. Not you, bless you! No it’s Slug. You remember Slug? The little Scotch geezer? He’s done a silly thing, I’m afraid. Poor fella, he wishes he hadn’t done it now. And I wish he hadn’t either because then we wouldn’t be in this position he’s put us in. But you’ve got to have some discipline, eh Carl, or where would we be?’

  There was more torchlight through the trees ahead of them.

  ‘Here we are then, mate. Soon get it over with and then we’ll get you home in time for cocoa and telly with your mum.’

  A small group was waiting for them. It proved to consist of skull-faced Laf, Erik, two young men who Carl hadn’t met before called Jod and Micky, and Slug himself. Slug was naked from the waist up, gagged, and tied hand and foot with rope. He was shivering violently.

  ‘Ah Carl!’ purred Erik. ‘Carl, Carl, Carl! Carl of the pithy phrases. Good to see you again, my friend. Glad you could make it.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ muttered Carl, glancing furtively at the terrified eyes of Slug and then looking quickly away again.

  ‘There’s a little stream running by just over there, Carl,’ Erik warned, ‘so careful you don’t fall into it in the dark. It’s a bit late in the year for swimming.’

  ‘Yeah, cheers mate.’

  ‘Now then, let’s get down to business. Jod, can you put up the noose, please? Micky, can you light up the branch so Jod can see what he’s doing?’

  By torchlight, Jod threw a rope over a thick branch that thrust out over the stream. Slug made desperate noises through his gag.

  ‘Oh come on, Slug,’ Erik said. ‘You don’t deny you were trying to sell us out to the authorities do you? You don’t pretend you didn’t know the price of treachery?’

  He turned to Carl.

  ‘I even told you that, Carl, didn’t I? I told you at our very first meeting what I’d do if you betrayed us.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Carl muttered.

  ‘And we’ve only met once, haven’t we? Whereas Slug, well, we go back for some time, don’t we Slug? We’re old companions. So, after all this time, you really can’t claim you didn’t know. It just doesn’t wash.’

  ‘MMMMMM!’ went Slug.

  Erik laughed and turned back to Carl.

  ‘So remind me, Carl, my friend. Remind Slug here. What did I tell you about the penalty for treachery?’

  Carl ran his tongue round his dry lips.

  ‘Hang… hanging. And… a spear…’

  ‘That’s it. Well done, Carl. I knew you were on the ball. Hanging and spearing. The traditional form of sacrifice to Wod. Wod once even sacrificed himself to himself in that way, would you believe, sacrificed himself to himself and so found a new and deeper knowledge. Or so the story goes. Who knows, maybe you’ll find it too, Slug? Maybe you’ll find the wisdom that has so spectacularly eluded you thus far.’

  He lifted his torch to illuminate Slug’s face, glanced back at Carl.

  ‘Slug’s big mistake was to underestimate me,’ Erik said. ‘I’m something of a “techie”, as Laf likes to call me. I’m rather good with electronics and the like. I had Slug here wired and he didn’t know it. I had a little bug sewn into that greasy jacket of his. I’m afraid it’s embarrassingly easy to bug someone who never changes his clothes. I had him wired and I heard everything he said to the police. Everything. Childish I know, but the first thing I did was send him a little text message to let him know I was listening.’

  He turned to Jod.

  ‘Next job, I think, is to tie the bag of stones to him, if you don’t mind.’

  Jod fastened a bulging knapsack round Slug’s waist. Erik nodded.

  ‘Right. I think we’re all set now. Laf and Gunnar, will you do the honours please.’

  With a muffled wailing sound, Slug sank to the ground and curled up into a foetal position, but Laf and Gunnar simply dragged him along the ground. Spotlit by the torches of Micky and Jod, Laf fastened the noose around Slug’s neck and Gunnar pulled on the rope until he was firstly lifted back up onto his feet and then forced to stand on tiptoe right at the edge of the stream. Gunnar tied the other end of the rope securely round the tree trunk. There was a moment of stillness, and then Carl became aware that Erik had produced a long spear from somewhere and was creeping slowly forward, like a leopard, if rather a stiff and ungainly one, creeping towards its prey. The spear had a large metal head, maybe two or three inches across at its widest part, and almost a foot long.

  ‘Right?’ asked Laf.

  ‘Right,’ said Erik.

  Laf pushed Slug so that he swung out over the water, threshing and gagging horribly. And at once Erik came rushing forward to thrust the heavy spear into Slug’s belly, twisting it and then pulling it back out. A great gout of blood and intestines slewed from Slug’s body and slopped down into the stream. Carl vomited profusely.

  ‘Cut him loose,’ ordered Erik.

  Gunnar took out a knife and cut the rope so that Slug fell into the water. Weighed down by the bag of stones, he sank immediately to the bottom. They all went forward to look down at him, clearly visible by torchlight through the limpid water. He was still kicking and threshing away down there, his pale guts waving in the current like some grotesque kind of waterweed, the dark blood pouring up from him and off down the stream like a trail of oily smoke.

  When Carl vomited again, Erik turned on him.

  ‘Are you shocked by what you’ve seen, Carl? Do you disapprove?’

  ‘No mate, no,’ Carl hastily wiped his chin, very very anxious indeed to dispel any impression of disapproval. ‘It’s just, you know, I’ve never seen a bloke killed before. I’m not used to it. I know he deserved it, if he grassed you up and that. I know he had it coming to him.’

  Erik didn’t seem to hear his answer.

  ‘It is brutal I agree,’ he mused. ‘It is in fact a crime, not only in the legal sense but in the moral one. But at least it is a crime of heat and violence, not of timidity and coldness. Those Inclusion Zones are a crime too. Those cold DSI offices with their pine furniture and their priggish mission statements are a crime, of which the beneficiaries and perpetrators are the prosperous and comfortable folk who live outside, far, far away. That’s a crime too. But here’s the thing, Carl: you can’t avoid committing crimes. Like animals we humans have no choice but to transgress against others if we are to live at all. Look at a hawk, Carl, hovering in readiness for the kill! Look at a lion about to pounce! We have no choice but to commit crimes. The only choice we have is the kinds of crime we commit: the crimes of coldness and bloodlessness or the crimes of blood and heat.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Carl, who had turned away from Slug’s corpse and the obscene white ribbons trailing from its belly. He didn’t understand what Erik was saying, but he knew that Erik was one of the coldest and most bloodless people he had ever met, including even his icy aunt Liz Wheeler, Tammy Pendant’s mother.

  The others too seemed to have grown tired of looking down at Slug. They stopped shining their torch beams into the water and swept them this way and that while they waited to be told what would happen next, conjuring out of non-existence the ivy-choked shapes of individual trees and then sur
rendering them back again to the darkness. Each tree was different, each one a unique and separate hieroglyph, alien and utterly opaque.

  ‘Turn off the lights,’ commanded Erik. ‘I would like to say a few words about the late departed Slug. Or Steven Kenneth Patrick McIntosh, to give him his real name.’

  It had stopped raining. Ragged openings had appeared here and there in the cloud above them, and bright stars were shining through.

  ‘There is a story,’ said Erik into the darkness, and he sounded just like a vicar at a funeral. ‘There is a story that when Wod’s son Baldur died, everyone and everything wept in each and every one of the many worlds of the Tree. Not only the people and the gods, not only the giants and the demons and the trolls, but even the animals, even the fishes in the rivers and the seas, even the plants and stones. Some versions of the story even suggest that the world still weeps for him with each new day, and that what we call dew-drops are really the earth’s never-ending tears. A rather charming notion, I’ve always thought.

  ‘But something tells me that no one will weep for Steven Kenneth Patrick McIntosh. There will be some squeamishness, some distaste at the manner of his passing. There will be some sense of shock and fear among the brutish and degraded creatures that it pleased Steven to call his friends. But I feel rather confident that no one will feel the slightest pang of grief for Steven himself, for the world made no room for poor Slug. All his life he beat on the cold stone wall that excluded him – and he tried everything, including, finally, treachery – but it never yielded to him, never let him in. He was always utterly alone.’

  The starlight reflected in the smooth surface of the stream created the illusion that this small dark tangled place was surrounded on all sides by a glittering sphere, and Carl tried to persuade himself that what was happening here wasn’t real, that real life was still going on somewhere else, far away outside.