Department 18 [04] A Plague of Echoes

by Maynard Sims

  “There were all sorts of conspiracy theories about his disappearance. There was talk that the Vatican had had him killed—never proven of course. And the government came in for some very public scrutiny, but nothing ever came of it and gradually the fuss died down. The memo…” he tapped the pocket of his jacket, “…the memo is an instruction to all the teams working here at the time to drop any investigations into Liscombe’s disappearance.”

  They reached McKinley’s office. “So how did it end up in the boiler room?” McKinley said.

  “Good question. And one I’d like an answer to. I’m going to talk to Trudy.”

  “You think it might have something to do with her?”

  “The memo and her charm turn up in the boiler room. I think talking to her is as good a place as any to start.”

  Bailey pulled up outside a small mews house in the Canonbury district of Islington.

  The house was in the centre of a row of terraced properties and stood out, because, unlike its neighbors, it was run down and unkempt. There was a small courtyard garden at the front that had long since given up the fight against nettles and bindweed. They now grew rampantly, choking out all but the hardiest roses, and spreading across the flagstones.

  Flaccid net curtains hung in the grimy windows and the paintwork of the surrounding frames was peeling and streaked with years of road grime. The same story was echoed by the front door. The green gloss paint had peeled away over the years, leaving in its place pock-marked grey undercoat and, in some places, pink wood primer.

  The bell push was hanging by a single screw but worked. Electronic chimes sounded somewhere in the house as Bailey pressed it with his thumb.

  After what seemed an age he heard shuffling footsteps approaching the front door. A moment later the door was pulled back to reveal a very old man dressed in a tartan wool dressing gown and threadbare carpet slippers.

  The years had not been kind to Everett Deayton, Bailey thought. They had diminished him. He had shrunk a good three inches in height and held himself in a permanent stoop that made him seem even shorter. His hair was white and much too long, hanging over the greasy collar of his dressing gown in limp tendrils, and the skin of his liver-spotted face was sagging and jowly.

  The old man stared at Bailey myopically. “What do you want?” he said in a reedy voice. “No hawkers or salesmen. It says so on the door.” He pointed to a square of white card pinned to the door, the ink long since faded to a mere memory of letters.

  “It’s me, Everett,” Bailey said. “Harry.”

  Deayton squinted up at Bailey’s face but no recognition registered in his eyes.

  “Harry who?” he asked querulously.

  “Harry Bailey. We worked together at Department 18.”

  Bailey could almost see the years of memory peeling away in the old man’s eyes.

  “Harry… Harry Bailey…” Deayton squinted at him and turned his head to the side. “Do you still drink? Whiskey wasn’t it? Jameson’s?”

  “I’ve been on the wagon for a few years now.”

  Deayton nodded. “Well, don’t stand out there. Come in.” He turned sharply and Bailey followed him into the house, closing the door behind him.

  The old man led Bailey to the living room.

  Whatever Bailey was expecting it wasn’t this. The room was impeccably tidy, well furnished and spotlessly clean. Against one wall was a plasma screen TV showing the Discovery channel, in the corner on an ultra-modern desk stood a large Apple computer.

  Deayton noted the look of surprise on Bailey’s face and chuckled. Suddenly the old man was standing upright with no trace of a stoop. The eyes were alert and his whole demeanor looked twenty years younger.

  “You old bastard,” Bailey said. “What was the Methuselah impersonation all about?”

  “Can’t be too careful these days,” Deayton said, the voice stronger, more assured. “People tend to look at façades and miss what’s behind them. The house looks like a shithole from the outside, and if you were to see me on the street, you’d think I was gaga. Not a threat to anyone.”

  “Who are you hiding from, Everett?”

  “Take a seat. I’ll make a cup tea and then I’ll tell you.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Oliver Laroche whistled cheerily as he walked from his parked car to the clinic.

  The Melrose Clinic looked more like a stately home with its elegant Regency structure and rolling verdant grounds, landscaped after the fashion of Capability Brown. He was looking forward to seeing his brother again. It had been two months since his last visit. Fitting these visits into his hectic daily schedule always took some planning and the two hours today were eroding the time he could give to his local victim support group. But it was necessary. He was aware that his younger brother, Piers, could become anxious and paranoid if he thought he was being neglected by his family, and that would mean more work for the clinic staff. Laroche wouldn’t want that.

  He was greeted at reception by a pretty young woman in a crisp nurse’s uniform.

  “Mr. Laroche, it’s good to see you.”

  “You too, Maureen. It’s been a while.”

  “You’re a busy man. Your brother understands that.”

  “I hope so.”

  She came out from behind her desk. “I’ll take you up to him,” she said with a smile.

  “Thank you,” Laroche said, returning her smile with one of his own.

  Maureen Brennan flushed slightly. She had always found Oliver Laroche utterly charming. He was incredibly handsome for a man of his age and she had an enormous crush on him. Taking him to see his brother was an unnecessary ritual. The man had been coming here for the last ten years and probably knew his way around the building as well as she did herself. But the ritual prolonged the time she spent with him and, like the true gentleman he was, he always played along with the charade.

  “I saw you on the telly the other night. Question Time. I thought your arguments were very forceful,” she said as they climbed the huge horseshoe-shaped staircase.

  “You’re very kind,” he said. “It’s just a pity they didn’t put me up against people with more intellectual muscle. Two politicians, a militant feminist and a barrow boy made good, not exactly Brain of Britain material.” He laughed softly. “Listen to me. I’m such a snob, Maureen.”

  “No, I agree. The program’s gone downhill lately.”

  He looked at her sharply.

  Realizing the statement was open to misinterpretation she struggled to recover. “Not that I’m suggesting that your performance was in any way substandard. You were brilliant as usual. I just mean…”

  He raised his hand and stopped her. “No explanation needed,” he said gently.

  They stopped outside Piers Laroche’s room. “Well,” he said. “It looks like we’re here. Thank you for escorting me.”

  “You’re very welcome,” Maureen said, still mentally kicking herself. “Will that be all?”

  Laroche smiled at her indulgently. “Oh yes, I think so.”

  Looking slightly crestfallen, Maureen turned and walked back the way she had come.

  Laroche twisted the handle and opened the door.

  Piers sat in a wheelchair, facing the window, staring out at the sprawling grounds. The motor neurone disease that was slowly killing him had twisted his body and ruined his ability to speak. His head was tilted at an impossible angle and a permanent tear trickled from his eye and dripped steadily onto his shoulder. The shoulder of his shirt was protected by a thick wadding of gauze placed there earlier by a nurse.

  Piers looked up at his brother as he entered the room and made a noise of welcome in his throat.

  “It’s good to see you too, little brother. You’re looking well.”

  It was a lie and both men knew it.

  Piers laughed, a peculiar gurgli
ng sound that set Laroche’s teeth on edge.

  “No, I mean it!” Laroche said in mock outrage, and then he laughed too and hugged his brother.

  There were ten years between them, with Piers being the younger at forty-eight. Physically the gulf was much wider. Laroche still had his looks, aided in no small part by a full head of wavy and naturally dark brown hair. There was a fleck of gray at his temples but you had to look for it. Piers, however, appeared a good twenty years older than his brother. His twisted body looked emaciated even though the clinic made sure he was well fed. The emaciation showed in his face with its gaunt, hollow cheeks and the deep, dark sockets around his dull blue eyes. What hair he had left was gunmetal gray and surrounded his head like a dirty halo.

  Every day Laroche counted his blessings. There was nothing now he could do for his brother, except to make sure that his life was as comfortable as possible and to be there for him on his painful journey towards an early death.

  As he couldn’t help his brother, he’d resolved long ago to make his wealth and position in life benefit as many people as he could. Charity work came easily to him and he often showed leniency on the bench. Where many judges took the short-term view of locking offenders up just to get them out of society’s hair for a while, Laroche made every effort to explore the possibilities of probation and rehabilitation, using jail as an absolutely last resort.

  There was a wooden, wheel-back chair, padded with a single cushion, set against the far wall, provided by the clinic for visitors. He dragged it across the room, placed it next to his brother’s wheelchair and sat down. They rarely sat face to face. It made Piers feel he was under scrutiny and that in turn made him deeply self-conscious and uncomfortable. Besides, maintaining eye contact for a prolonged period of time made his head hurt. He seemed content to just sit there, feeling the presence of his brother beside him and listening while Laroche regaled him with stories of the courtroom and Bruford’s, the club in Piccadilly he frequented on his rare, free evenings.

  “Here’s a thing,” Laroche said. “I heard that Dickie Bennington was shot dead in his home this morning. The police think it was either a burglary gone wrong or that he’d upset someone and they were exacting their revenge. I lean towards the latter because he could be an obnoxious prig. I often had the urge to blow his brains out myself.”

  He felt Piers shift in his wheelchair, swiveling his body around to look at him.

  “I thought you might find that interesting seeing as you two were at Charterhouse together. The strange thing is, he was a member of Bruford’s, as you know, and I was having a drink there the other night and he came and sat his fat arse down beside me, insisting I have one for the road with him. He then started talking—he was drunk of course—but there was something about some of the things he was saying that…well, they piqued my curiosity.”

  Piers’ gaze grew more intense, as if he was willing his brother to continue.

  “It was probably something and nothing,” Laroche said. “And I was very tired that evening. But he left me with a poser. How much would I pay for the chance of everlasting life? What an impossible and ridiculous question, and I told him so. But he kept banging away at it. He just went on and on until I told him that everlasting life means nothing unless there is some quality to that life.

  “For some of the poor wretches I come into contact with, everlasting life would be tantamount to a living hell. But even that didn’t deter him and he started dropping heavy hints that he was involved with a group of individuals who had paid a small fortune for the chance of just that. Life everlasting. And that got me. I went home that evening and started searching the Internet. I’m still researching but, from what I’ve read so far, Dickie might not have been so wide of the mark. There are groups out there who believe that life might be prolonged. Cranks for the most part, but there was one piece I read that seemed to have some credibility about it. It was written by a man called Liscombe back in the 1960s.”

  Laroche felt a movement beside him and turned to see his brother pushing himself out of his wheelchair.

  “Piers! What the fu…”

  The word was stifled by his brother’s hands as they clamped around his throat.

  Laroche bucked in the chair, trying to fight back but could do little as he was hauled to his feet. He stared directly into his brother’s eyes but there was nothing there he recognized. The blue eyes were blank, looking straight through him.

  Laroche tried to speak, to plead with Piers, but the constriction in his throat made speech impossible. In desperation he drew back his foot and kicked out as hard as he could, connecting with his brother’s shin and making him grunt with pain.

  The grip slackened for an instant and Laroche tore himself away from his brother, tripping over the chair and landing in a heap on the floor. As he lay there, struggling for breath, unable to cry out for help, he was aware of Piers moving towards him. Piers, paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair for the past four years, was reaching down and grabbing hold of the fallen chair, tossing it out of his path as if it were made of balsa wood.

  “Piers,” Laroche managed to croak. “Piers, stop!” But the words were ineffectual. His brother towered over him, looking down impassively, as if he were dealing with no more than a bug that needed crushing.

  Piers’s hands were reaching down for him when the door opened and Maureen Brennan entered the room. “I heard a crash. I wondered… Piers!”

  “Maureen! Get out of here,” Laroche said weakly.

  Piers spun around, grabbed the fallen chair and pulled it apart in one fluid movement. In less than a second he was moving in on Maureen, a wickedly pointed shaft of broken wood clutched in his hand.

  Maureen stood, seemingly frozen in time, as Piers advanced on her. Her eyes widened in shock as Piers rammed the shaft of wood up under her jaw. She felt it enter her mouth behind her bottom teeth, skewer her tongue and pierce her palate. The wood carried on upwards until it entered her brain and Maureen crumpled to the floor, her dead eyes now filled with an expression of shock and regret.

  Laroche struggled to his feet and launched himself at his brother, grabbing him around the waist and wrestling him to the floor. As he fell Piers reached for the shaft of wood protruding from under Maureen’s chin and yanked it free. He rolled sideways trapping Laroche beneath him and at the same time knocking the wind from his lungs.

  Laroche struggled but he was trapped. His brother was straddling him, pinning his arms at his side. Piers held the pointed piece of wood an inch away from his eye, as if daring him to move again. Laroche stared up beyond the shaft of wood, now streaked with blood and gray brain matter.

  “Why, Piers?” he said.

  An expression close to thoughtfulness crossed Piers’s face. His mouth was working, forming words, discarding them. Finally, in a strained and guttural voice Piers said, “Who else did you tell?”

  “Tell what?” Laroche said, more astonished by his brother’s rediscovered ability to speak than anything else.

  Piers’s lips curled into a look of contempt. “About Bennington,” he said. Part growl, part feral snarl.

  “Nobody, I swear. Just you.”

  Piers seemed to consider this for a moment and then, as if reaching some sort of conclusion, said, “I believe you.”

  Laroches’s sigh of relief turned to a scream as Piers fell forward on top of him.

  To Laroche it was all happening in slow motion. He felt his eye pop like a ripe grape, felt the aqueous humor dribble down his cheek. Felt the screaming agony as the shaft pierced the bone of his eye socket and shredded his optical nerve. Felt nothing as the wood entered his brain and ground to splinters on the inside of his skull.

  When clinic staff entered the room a short while later they found Piers Laroche lying on top of his brother, Oliver, their bodies entwined in a fatal embrace—both brothers dead.

  Chapter Nineteenr />
  Pieter Schroeder snapped open his eyes and winced as a soft pain eddied around his brain, but despite the dull ache he felt exhilarated. It was a long time since he had exercised his powers. Even longer since he’d used them to such a devastating effect. Both Laroche brothers dead and Richard Bennington’s indiscretion perishing along with them. A loose end tied off, no, cauterized. He hated loose ends.

  When his head finally cleared he picked up the telephone and rang Leon Sultan. “I thought you might like to know that I’ve dealt with our little problem,” he wheezed.

  On the other end of the line, Sultan considered this for a moment. Eventually he said, “Very well.”

  “You don’t sound very happy, Leon.”

  “I question the wisdom of you involving yourself in this matter.”

  “Leon, you should have been a diplomat. That was a very tactful way of saying that I should have kept my nose out of it and left you to solve the problem.”

  “It’s what you pay me for,” Sultan said.

  Schroeder nodded his head slowly even though Sultan couldn’t see it. “That’s very true, Leon,” he said. “Very true. And if you want to continue that arrangement, you would do well to avoid questioning my judgment in future.”

  The words had barely left his lips when a savage pain ripped through his chest. The phone fell from his fingertips and clattered to the ground but his gasp of pain was still audible to Leon Sultan who had his cell clamped against his ear on the other end of the line. “Pieter, are you all right?” he shouted into the phone as Schroeder clutched at his chest, folded over and fell to the ground.

  The pain was so severe Schroeder drew his wizened legs up and curled his arms around them, hugging them tightly, trying to alleviate the agony. He could feel his heart pounding double time inside his rib cage and could hear the blood rushing in his ears. Not yet, he thought, starting to panic. I’m not ready yet!

  Time became blurred as he lay curled on the floor. He tried to control his breathing but his lungs were going into spasm and each breath was agony.