Cult Following: No Faith To Lose (The Capgras Conspiracy Book 0)

by Simon J. Townley

  “And an ex-jailbird, don’t forget…”

  “But you were a martyr for press freedom.”

  “So you want me to convert? Help you spread the word?”

  “Is the idea so strange? Many people here were cynical at first, until they learnt the truth. Do not be so fast to pass judgment. Wait until you’ve met his holiness. You will come to understand that he is divine, sent to us from God.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “In many ways,” Daniel said. “There is a light which shines from his eyes. It is extraordinary to behold, and no photograph captures it. You’ll see. You’ll be entranced, I promise you.”

  “I can’t wait.”

  “This flippant attitude does you no justice. Still, there is time for you yet.”

  “Yes, about that. When can I leave?”

  Daniel rose from the chair. “Not yet, I’m afraid. It may be a while.”

  “It will give me time to finish the book. Sleep well,” he said as Daniel was leaving.

  “And you, good night,” he replied cheerily, unaware he had confirmed Tom’s calculations as to the time of day.

  Capgras listened to his footsteps retreating across the stone floor, wondering if now would be the right moment to play his trump card.

  Chapter 19

  A Lift Home

  The metal pot under his bed was unhygienic, difficult to clean and unpleasant to use. Iron was, in almost all respects, the wrong choice for a potty. The rusting snags would, however, be the ideal raw material for crafting a homemade lock-pick.

  Daniel had locked the door behind him and removed the key. Capgras twisted off a length of metal from the pot’s handle, twisting and turning until the iron weakened and sheared. He poked it into the lock to explore the inside of the mechanism but when he jabbed too hard, the end of his makeshift tool snapped off. He swore, in fluent Anglo Saxon, prodded at the hole and managed to push the broken piece out the other side. He ripped more iron off the handle and made a new probe: the lights would go out soon and this would be all the harder in the pitch darkness. The new tool proved stronger, but the lock still wouldn’t turn. His cast his mind back to Tumbler Joe’s lessons in clink. The trick was to apply enough force, in this case with his shoulder, to get a pin scissored between top and bottom plate. Then it should be a simple matter to lift it with his homemade picking tool. When the top of the pin reaches the shear line, the bottom plate will slide, and with a little luck, that will cause a new pin to bind.

  He lent his weight into the door and twisted the metal until he almost had it. Any moment now, and the first pin would be done.

  The light bulb flickered and died, leaving him in utter blackness. He took a deep breath. Take things slowly. If this one snapped, there would be no making a new tool. Not tonight.

  In a strange way, though, the darkness helped. He listened more intently, trusted his instincts, and felt the inner workings of the lock. At last it opened with a metallic clunk. He froze, listening for sounds of movement. No sound came, so he pushed the door open an stepped softly across the stone floor. Luck was on his side for once: the door was open, unlocked. No guards sat outside waiting to pounce. No alarms went off, screaming their warning.

  The night was clear and still, with enough moonlight to see where he was going without lighting the place up like a prison camp in a war movie. He breathed in the fresh scents of the moors, so sweet after the rank and fetid air in the cell. He stretched his arms and back, revelling in the simple freedom of movement. No time for hanging around. He needed to escape the cult headquarters, get off the moor and return to his beloved London as fast as possible.

  If he tried walking out of here, it might take hours in the dark. Something faster, and easier on the legs was called for. As luck would have it, a van stood parked outside the main house, with no one around. He hesitated. Was this a trap? It looked like it. But they couldn’t know he was free. Could they? He kept close to the stone walls of the building. Lights swung in the darkness, approaching from the farmhouse: a group walked towards him with torches in their hands. They stopped beside the van and loaded bags into the rear. He identified four voices: two male, two female, and one of them was Gina, he was sure of it.

  “You know the plan, call us with any problems, but not unless necessary. Get rid of your phones before….” Gina’s words tailed off into an ominous silence. “Share the driving. Four hours to London, at this hour.”

  “We’ll get the rest of the stuff and be on our way,” one of the men said.

  “I’ll leave you to it,” Gina said. “I envy you.”

  The door to the house opened and she disappeared inside. The other three set off back along the path to the farmhouse. Why not drive there? Why carry bags back and forth? It made little sense, but they were mad, the lot of them. No time to worry about it. This was his way out.

  The back doors of the Transit van stood open and inside Capgras found boxes, bags of equipment, and a pile of rags.

  Three of them would fit in the front. They would not want to travel back here, among the junk, sitting on the cold metal floor, thrown around by every jolt in the road. This was a risk, but it was also a free ride back to London, provided he could stay hidden.

  And he had his secret weapon too. He put one hand to the collar of his Belstaff jacket. Was it time to activate Ruby’s tracker? Only a few hours of power, she had said. Better to wait. Once he was off Dartmoor, when he was close to London, then he would call the cavalry.

  He climbed in, found a spot near the middle of the van, pulled the dust sheets and over his body and lay still, barely breathing, listening intently for their return.

  Chapter 20

  Eavesdropping

  The van bumped and bounced along the unmade road that led from the manor house. Capgras lay under the sheets, jolted from side to side, forcing himself to remain quiet. If he could endure a few minutes of this, without crying out, and without being discovered, then the worst of it would be over. The roads would improve. Soon they would be on a proper highway. It would twist and turn, they all did out here on the moors, but he didn’t get car sick, and it couldn’t be any worse than the cell they’d been keeping him in. And once they reached the main roads, and the motorway, he’d be fine. Home in time for breakfast, with any luck. Provided he got away unseen. group had piled bags and boxes into the back of the van. Then as he had expected, all three sat in the front cabin. He was separated from them by a thin metal wall with a small window which they were unlikely to look through unless he made any obvious noise.

  He huddled under the blankets, thankful for the warmth. He longed to stretch out, to move freely at last after so many days in the cell, but he was close to freedom now. Lie low. Get home. And then… a shower, coffee, bacon and eggs. Maybe go to bed for the rest of the day.

  The van turned sharply to the left and accelerated. It reached the proper road, and the drive became smoother. Capgras lay his head down. It would be good to sleep the journey away. He’d wake if they stopped.

  He was wrong. He did wake, but they had already parked, and the van door stood open. A cold blast of air hit him. A torch flashed across the inside. Good thing he’d huddled up, covered by the blankets.

  “All here,” said one man.

  “Let’s get going,” the woman said. They climbed back in the front and the engine rumbled into life. Where were they? A motorway service station, perhaps. The Transit lurched around two sharp bends. The familiar roar of motorway traffic told him his hunch had been right. They must be halfway there by now. Stupid to sleep through that, but he’d got away with it. Maybe his luck had turned.

  He lay still, listening to the road, the traffic, the steady drumming of the diesel engine.

  The woman’s voice, muffled and indistinct, filtered through from the cabin in front. One man responded, his words little more than a deep grumble. Curious, Capgras shifted his position to press an ear against the metal partition.

  “We should go over the plan,”
the woman said, “make sure we have the details set down.”

  “We’ve gone over it five times,” said one man, the driver judging by the direction of the voice.

  “Can’t hurt to do it again,” she said. “We won’t get another chance, once we’re in the city. We’ll ditch the van, take the stuff and split up. After that, no contact remember. So, we’ll go through it…”

  Her words were drowned out by the roar of a truck’s engine. Capgras pressed his head hard against the cold metal.

  “… Once I’m in position with the sarin, you place the explosives and retreat. Sam, where?”

  “In the second waste bin after…”

  A truck’s horn blared. Damn. But explosives? Sarin gas? Where was it, n the back of this van, right here, in these boxes? He kept his ear against the metal.

  “John?”

  “In the doorway of the church, the one…” Another truck engine rumbled by.

  They were planning an attack. It sounded like now, today, this morning. As soon as they reached London. It would be rush hour by then, with people pouring into work. Sarin gas was about as toxic as it comes. Delivered properly, in the right location, indoors, in a crowd, thousands might be at risk.

  But why carry out random acts of mass murder? It made no sense. Then again, nothing they said or did made sense.

  The voices from the front had fallen quiet. The plan was in place but he didn’t know where. Or when, not for sure. He had to raise a warning, but he had no phone, no way to communicate with the outside world until he reached London.

  For one wild moment, he considered checking the boxes. He could set off a controlled detonation to take out the van. But who was he kidding? He didn’t know the first thing about explosives. And what about the sarin? What would happen to that? And how many would die in the motorway pile up? There had to be a better way.

  He could try the back door: get it open, leap into the road and be mown down by a truck. No one would hear his story that way. Or climb on the roof of the van, signal for help. They’d take him for a madman, but they’d call the police. How long would he last up there, without being blown off? He’d never do it quietly. These maniacs up front would pull over to the hard shoulder, and deal with him there. The traffic would flash past. No one would give it a second thought.

  So, wait. Fine. But when he reached London, what then? Run, find a phone, alert the police. But where to send them? He’d have to tail the gang, stay within sight of one of them at least, or he’d never know the target, until too late. Follow them, or make an early call? Bad options, bad choices. But he didn’t have long. The van turned off the motorway, slowing as they drove down a slope. It stopped. They were in the city, judging by the smell of the air, the volume of traffic and the jingles of the local radio station, blasting from a nearby car.

  He hid himself under the blankets , mind racing but ready to act. He reached for his collar and activated the tracker.

  Chapter 21

  The Hero Saves The Day

  His luck was in. The would-be suicide bombers opened the back of the Transit and took out their bags, failed to check under the blankets where he hid, then moved off across the car park, without locking him in. He peeked through the doors. They were on the top floor of a multi-storey. The three of them stood in a huddle near the edge, looking down on the city below, with their backs to him. He slipped out of the van and scurried for cover, hardly able to believe his good fortune. But he still needed a phone. And he had to follow them without being seen.

  They moved off towards the stairs. Capgras tailed them, keeping out of sight on the concrete spiral staircase, which smelt, as always, of stale piss and cigarettes. He loitered until the door swung shut. Then he leapt down the final two flights and peered through the narrow window. They were moving out. He took a chance and followed them down a path leading to an alley. If they looked around now, they would see him for sure. But they walked on for fifty yards, then paused as they reached the road. He waited, pressed against a brick wall. They split up. One man crossed the road, the other went right. The woman turned left. Capgras sprinted to the end of the alley and tailed her as her head bobbed in and out of the crowd.

  The streets were already busy. It was seven thirty, and commuters poured into the centre of the city from all directions. The trains, the stations, would be rammed. The pavements seethed with bodies weaving around each other as they rushed towards work, or breakfast, or transport. Where was she? He’d lost her. Then he saw her, a few feet in front of him. She’d stopped by a lamppost to consult her phone. He loitered, but that’s a dangerous activity on London’s pavements. He was jostled from side to side. People could cope with movement, but give them a stationary object that should be in motion, and the elegant dance collapsed into chaos.

  She set off again. Where would they strike? When? He had to get help, but not lose sight of the woman. She stopped again, sitting on a bench away from the bustle of people, her phone to her ear. Who was she calling? In the van, they agreed no communications. Was she getting fresh orders? Capgras slipped into a store, grabbed the first disposable handset he saw and slapped cash down on the desk, thankful the cult, in its wisdom, had left him in possession of his own wallet. Leaving without waiting for his change, he ripped the box open while walking. She was still on the bench, hadn’t moved. She glanced in his direction. Damn. Had she seen him? No. No way she’d pick him out in this crowd, not unless she was expecting him to be there. She got up and began to walk, doubling back on herself, then turned left to head down to the river. She turned right when she reached the Embankment, heading for Westminster bridge. When she picked up pace, he scurried along to keep her in view.

  Capgras dialled the police emergency number, asked for the control room, and told them his tale. Either they believed him, or they didn’t. But his luck held, one more time. They alerted the top brass.

  “Chief superintendent Fitzroy, gold commander for the day. You’re aware how serious this sounds? Are you sure? You have evidence?”

  “They’re part of a cult. They kept me prisoner, for days, and I overheard them planning an attack with explosives and sarin gas. Two men and a woman. But I don’t know the target. It might be Westminster Tube station but I could be wrong.”

  “You can identify them?”

  “I think so. I’ve still got eyes on the woman, but they’ve split up.”

  “Follow her, but don’t get close. And keep this line open.”

  In the distance, sirens howled. He ducked and dived through the crowd, keeping her in view as she approached the bridge. She paused, went right, heading for the tube. He hung back, her head bobbing through the melee of commuters. She stopped for a moment on the pavement outside the station. She almost made it to the doors, but the armed response unit, looking more like stormtroopers than British bobbies, surrounded her, guns at the ready, screaming at the public to get back. A surge of panic flowed through the throng, Capgras held his ground as all around him people turned and fled.

  He glanced up at the nearby surveillance camera and nodded. They must have eyes on him. That was fast work. And finding him, they had stopped her. It was done. The worst of it at least. They got her on the floor, arms strapped behind her back. The other two were out there somewhere. But they wouldn’t strike, not now, not if they had any sense.

  This was his day. His luck was definitely in. He should buy a lottery ticket and ask the most beautiful woman in London for a date. He could not put a foot wrong. Who would have thought it? Tom Capgras, jailbird, eccentric, outsider, ne’er-do-well, thorn in the side of the establishment, voice of defiance to authority, part-time drunkard, layabout and misfit had come good in the end and saved the day.

  Chapter 22

  Wasting Time

  Tom Capgras loathed police stations. He had always found them cold, harsh and brutal in their design, layout and décor. Now, on top of the in-built hostility he felt towards all authority figures, he also had to contend with the feelings of intense st
ress verging on panic when he thought back to his arrest, the questioning, the implied threats. The time in prison.

  This would be a hindrance, to say the least, if he continued in his career as a crime reporter.

  The door to the waiting room opened. DCI Liam Cassells, who had interviewed Capgras on the day of the supposed gas attack, waved him inside. “Won’t take long,” he said. “Got a few bigwigs want to see you.”

  “Can you tell me what you’ve found?”

  “I’ll leave it to them. This way.”

  Cassells led him to an interview room. They were joined almost immediately by a deputy chief constable in uniform, and a detective, in his fifties, with white hair. The chief constable introduced himself as Ashton Franklin. The detective sat at the back without giving his name, acting as if he wasn’t there.

  “We found nothing,” Franklin said. “No sarin, no explosives on any of them, or in the van. Not a trace. They deny any knowledge, claim they don’t know each other and have alibis for their movements in the previous twenty-four hours. So either we picked up the wrong people, or you imagined the whole thing. And considering there has been no attack, it’s beginning to look strongly like the latter. Any comments, Mr Capgras?”

  “You’ve seen my statement, I assume. I was on Dartmoor, traveled in the back of that van.”

  “That’s at least partly true,” said Cassells. “The van was driven from the South West and into the city at around the time you say. But we’ve been to the farm, and there’s nothing there. No cult, no hippies, no sarin gas, no explosives, no signs of terrorist activity. It was deserted.”

  “Not possible. You sure you went to the right place?”

  “It fitted your description.”

  “What can I tell you? Everything in my statement is the truth. Why would I make it up?”